“Wait,” Wallis called out as loud as she dared. Helmut never slowed down. Wallis suddenly felt the cold March night on the back of her neck. Her clothes were damp from sweat.
Wallis watched him fade into the darkness before she walked up the front steps and cautiously opened the door, trying not to let Ralph escape into the night. She nudged him back with her foot as she eased inside. As Ralph aged and his hair turned greyer, he had begun to resemble a moving mop head, zipping from room to room, up and down the stairs. Sharp barks emanated from one end of the mop as the other end twitched from side to side.
Hector, Angie’s husband answered the door.
“Hey, Wallis, come on in,” said Hector, in his usual booming delivery. He scooped up Ralph and tucked him under one arm as he held the screen door open for Wallis.
Hector’s nature was shy, particularly around women and he always kept his sentences short and to the point before disappearing to another room in the house or wrestling with some of his young sons.
“You okay?” asked Hector, taking a closer look at Wallis. Wallis opened her mouth to say something but couldn’t come up with anything reasonable to explain away the fear that must show on her face. She shrugged and started to take off her coat.
“Let me take that,” said Hector. Wallis mumbled a thank you, as she let go of a deep shudder and eased past him and a frantically yipping Ralph.
A little army of children anchored on the ends by teenagers were lined up at the long narrow kitchen table, eating away and talking loudly over each other about school or the high school football team or video games. Wallis recognized most of them. The older ones were the small cluster of babysitters used by everyone in the neighborhood.
“Hector, are you going to play Tetris with us tonight?” asked a small boy on the far side of the table. Wallis felt herself relax a little as she watched Hector blend back in with the kids, bragging about how he was planning to win every game.
I’m safe here, she thought, knowing it was irrational and shaking slightly from the new idea that there could be familiar places where she could be in danger.
She gave a small wave to the women at the two card tables set up in the family room, the necessities for Bunko night laid out before them. Four women to a table with three dice at each table and two small bowls of treats to munch on as each woman waited her turn to roll the dice or a new game to start. One bowl was always devoted to chocolate, the other to something salty.
Around the corner in the dining room were two more tables set up the same way with a small hand bell resting on the table closest to the kitchen door. A seat was still vacant at that table.
“Come on, Wallis,” said Julia, an over-sized blonde in matching orange knit pants and top, “we saved you a seat at the head table. Have a sit-down so we can get going. My lucky hand is feeling itchy tonight.” She let out a seasoned cackle that ended in a wet cough.
“Those patches aren’t working for you, are they Julia,” said Bridget, a tall, lanky brunette with an outdated shag wearing the same kind of outfit, but blue, as she patted Julia hard on the back. Wallis recognized the Wal-Mart fashions from her grocery shopping last week. The ensembles were part of a large display of matching coordinates set up underneath an aging celebrity’s likeness.
“Not wearing one right now. Forgot last night and lit up while I had one on. Nearly passed out from the rush.” Everyone let out a laugh.
Most of the women were close to Wallis’ age and a few, like Bridget were older. All of them were talkers. Wallis liked coming to Bunko and listening to the women make bawdy jokes about their husbands or playfully moan about their weight or their bad habits. None of them ever gave Wallis a hard time about contributing so little and no one used the time to get too serious about anything. It was a nice little slice of middle-class suburbia without the accompanying angst Wallis usually swam through every day.
Wallis took her seat and quickly wrote her name on the index card at her place.
“Thanks,” she said, handing the stubby yellow pencil back to Angie. “What’s traveling tonight?”
“Threes. I’ll keep score this round,” said Angie, pulling the small yellow pad closer to her. Similar negotiations were quickly decided at the other tables.
Angie raised the bell and said, “Ready?” giving the bell an easy shake. “You go first, Wallis. You look like you had the longest day.”
Wallis let a smile creep up her face and picked up the dice. Her first roll resulted in two ones and a five.
“Snake eyes,” said Maureen sitting opposite her. “Good job, partner. Roll a few more like that.” Each player took their turn rolling the dice three times, the desired ‘ones’ getting marked down as notches on the yellow pad at each table.
“Bunko!” yelled out an excited Silvia at the next table over, raising her arms over her head. All three dice had turned up ones, giving her and her temporary partner five extra points.