Free The Ghosts of Lovely Women by Julia Buckley Page A

for many seconds I had absolutely no plan, no idea what to do next. Finally I began to think. I didn’t have my cell phone with me — it was inside the apartment, plugged in and charging for a new day. In order to call the police I’d have to go to a pay phone; the same was true if I wanted to call my parents, my brother or sister. In any case Lucky was leaving for vacation and my parents were too far away. My near neighbors were either elderly or not likely to be home — one worked nights and another was a perpetual socializer. I wasn’t going to risk old Mrs. Bettenger’s safety.
    Before I knew it I was back on the elevator, then running down the dark sidewalk. P.G. was at my side. We winged our way down one block and over two until we reached the building Derek Jonas lived in. “Be home, be home,” I murmured to myself. I went into the little lobby and found the nameplates near the mailboxes. Most of them were typewritten, but the one which said JONAS was handwritten; perhaps he was too new a tenant to have had the new plate made.
    I rang his buzzer; something was twirling around in my stomach, causing a ticklish pain. “Come on, come on,” I said. P.G. growled out his frustration.
    “Yes?” said Derek’s voice.
    “Derek, it’s Teddy. Can I come up? Or can you come down? I have a problem.”
    He buzzed me up immediately. “Second floor,” he said.
    P.G. and I ran up the stairs. Derek was standing in his doorway, holding a child. I stopped, shocked. He was
holding a child
: a boy with curly blonde hair and a sweet face like an angel on a Christmas card. He looked to be about two or three. His chubby legs were wrapped around Derek, and his little bottom sat on Derek’s crooked arm.
    “Oh,” I said. “Oh.”
    Derek smiled. “This is my nephew, Charlie. Charlie, this is Teddy.”
    The boy held up a little hand, and I realized that he was tired, almost half asleep. “Hi, Charlie,” I said. Then I looked at Derek. “Someone’s in my apartment. I couldn’t call the police because my cell is in there. P.G. and I went out for dinner and when we came back I saw my door was open, and—”
    Derek leaned forward and grabbed my arm with his free hand. “Come in here and call the police. They’ll tell you when it’s safe to go over there.”
    “Right,” I said. Derek pointed to his phone, which sat on a built-in sideboard against one tangerine-colored wall. I walked there stiffly and made the call; the dispatcher began to ask me questions, but I was distracted because the baby — Charlie — was reaching for me, making fussing sounds.
    Derek apologized, saying something about Charlie preferring women, and then somehow I had the boy and Derek had the phone. I accepted the child automatically, half fearing a screaming scene, but to my surprise he nestled his little head against my shoulder without a fuss.
    I looked around, rocking slightly to soothe the little boy. Derek had a nice place, although the décor was rather simple. Elegant, though, I saw as I admired the furniture. Charlie put chubby arms around my neck. He was kind of sweaty.
    “Seesaw?” he said.
    “What?”
    “See song?”
    “You want me to sing you a song?”
    “Yeah.”
    He closed his eyes in anticipation. It might be the cutest thing I’ve ever seen; it helped that I could see his pudgy face up close. The kid was all sweet lashes, plump lips and perfect skin. He was a cartoon of a cute baby.
    Derek was still on the phone; he seemed to be giving the operator his address and phone number. “Uh— okay, Charlie. Let me think.” I made my way to a different room — a bedroom that had a little crib in one corner — so that Derek wouldn’t hear me singing. I had a pretty good singing voice, but I wasn’t in the habit of serenading anyone except myself. I found a chair near the crib and sat in it, leaning back so that Charlie wouldn’t slump forward.
    I tried to think of something I’d heard on the radio. Willie Nelson’s craggy