Dark City

17.

The noise from the TV in Carl's room woke her up.

The local news channel was covering Alex's disappearance. "Shark River Hills has instituted a strict curfew. No persons shall be permitted to loiter, idle or congregate in the public streets or parks of Shark River Hills between the hours of eleven p.m. and six a.m. The neighborhood watch seeks volunteers to help enforce the curfew."

A patch of sunlight baked Lacey's pillow. She rolled over and grabbed her cell phone. There was a text from Nathan.

I need you. Come to the Stop and Shop at 2 if you're free.

Weird text. She crinkled her nose, not wanting to get up. It was already almost two and maybe Tom had seen the text and gone to see what Nathan wanted. He should have been job hunting.

She wanted pancakes. With yogurt maybe. So Lacey threw a skirt on and zipped herself up. With bright pumps and some lipstick, she felt ready to begin her quest for both pancake ingredients and the answer to what Nathan could possibly want from her.

The supermarket had a sign with a yellowish tinge and an outdated illustration from the 1960s, as was often the case for businesses on the West side of the tracks.

The masses crowded the entrances and exits of the Stop & Shop, parking their carts askew and leaning into them like they had no spines to keep them upright. Lacey pushed through them. Each time somebody got in her way she would clear her throat, and say, "Beep beep."

As she skimmed the aisles for Nathan, she noticed a couple staring and whispering. She checked that she had remembered to wear a bra. People were supposedly friendly in the suburbs as long as you wore the uniform. In her beige dress shirt and vintage plaid skirt, she felt she'd made quite an effort. The couple stared anyways. If it wasn't the tattoo on her neck, it was her clothes. If it wasn't the clothes, it was her hair.

The woman kept staring long after the man had moved on to potato chips. She had short hair with the tips perfectly curled out. She held her eyebrows a millimeter higher than normal people. Her man had artfully messy hair. He was thin for his height, but androgynously attractive, and in his stylish shirt-vest combination, he most likely had not dressed himself.

Lacey wanted to march up and confront the woman, but she remembered her sincere effort to fit in, to lay low, to look like everybody else. Just walk away, she told herself.

In the privacy of the skin care aisle, she slipped a bottle of eye cream up her sleeve and covertly dropped it in her purse. Nathan was nowhere to be seen and she was bored, so she popped out her cell phone and pretended to be chatting on it as she picked up a few items.

"Oh honey, we can't possibly make it to the Kensington's for dinner." Nail polish, in the purse. "I can't stand Felicity Kensington! I won't have the energy to put up with her." Fake eyelashes, very nice; in the purse they went. Lacey came back around the dairy section and she heard a familiar sounding voice nearby. It was deep and devoid of inflection.

"There you go," said Nathan. He handed a cell phone back to one of two young ladies who tittered and nodded.

"Thanks," said the girl as she played with her hot pink bra strap. "I'll call you if I see her... and maybe even if I don't."

Nathan nodded. "If you see her."

They passed Lacey as they disappeared around the corner. The other girl couldn't contain her giggles. "You're such a slut!"

"What? I want to support my troops."

Lacey clacked over to Nathan on her plastic heels.

"Were you just hitting on those teenagers?" she asked.