Free The Funhouse by Dean Koontz Page B

she could say all of that. She didn’t dare.
    “Did he touch you?” her mother asked.
    “I told you—no.”
    “He touched you.”
    “No.”
    “Don’t lie to me.”
    “We went to the prom,” Amy said shakily, “and he got sick, and he brought me home. That’s all, Mama.”
    “Did he touch your breasts?”
    “No,” Amy said, unsettled, embarrassed.
    “Did you let him put his hands on your legs?”
    Amy shook her head.
    Ellen’s hand tightened on the girl’s shoulder, the talonlike fingers digging painfully deep. “You touched him,” she said, her words slurring just a bit.
    “No,” Amy said. “I didn’t.”
    “You touched him between the legs.”
    “Mama, I came home
early
!”
    Ellen stared at her for several seconds, searching for the truth, but at last the fire went out of her dark eyes; the debilitating effects of the booze became evident again, and her eyelids drooped, and the flesh of her face sagged on her bones. When she was sober she was a pretty woman, but when she was drunk she looked haggard, much older than she looked otherwise. She let go of Amy, turned away, tottered back to the table. She picked up her empty glass, carried it to the refrigerator, dropped a couple of ice cubes into it. She added a little orange juice and a lot of vodka.
    “Mama, can I go to bed now?”
    “Don’t forget to say your prayers.”
    “I won’t forget.”
    “Say the rosary, too. It wouldn’t hurt you.”
    “Yes, Mama.”
    Her long dress rustling noisily, Amy hurried upstairs. In her bedroom she switched on a lamp and stood by the bed, shuddering.
    If she failed to raise the abortion money, if she had to tell her mother, she couldn’t expect her father to intercede. Not this time. He would be angry and would agree to any punishment her mother proposed.
    Paul Harper was a moderately successful attorney, a man who was in control in the legal arena, but at home he relinquished nearly all authority to his wife. Ellen made the domestic decisions, large and small, and for the most part, Paul was happy to be relieved of the responsibility. If Ellen insisted Amy carry the baby to term, Paul Harper would support that decision.
    And Mama
will
insist on it, Amy thought miserably.
    She looked at the Catholic icons her mother had placed around the room. A crucifix hung at the head of the bed, and a smaller one hung above the door. A statuette of the Virgin Mary was on the nightstand. Two more painted religious statuettes stood on the dresser. There was also a painting of Jesus; He was pointing to his Sacred Heart, which was exposed and bleeding.
    In her mind Amy heard her mother’s voice:
Don’t forget to say your prayers
.
    “Fuck it,” Amy said aloud, defiantly.
    What could she ask God to do for her? Give her money for an abortion? There wasn’t much chance of
that
prayer being answered.
    She stripped off her clothes. For a couple of minutes she stood in front of a full-length mirror, studying her nude body. She couldn’t see any sure signs of pregnancy. Her belly was flat.
    Gradually the medical nature of her self-inspection changed to a more intimate, stimulating appraisal. She drew her hands slowly up her body, cupped her full breasts, teased her nipples.
    She glanced at the religious statuettes on the dresser.
    Her nipples were erect.
    She slid her hands down her sides, reached behind, squeezed her firm buttocks.
    She looked at the painting of Jesus.
    Somehow, by flaunting her body at the image of Christ, she felt she was hurting her mother, deeply wounding her. Amy didn’t understand why she felt that way. It didn’t make sense. The painting was only a painting; Jesus wasn’t really here, in the room, watching her. Yet she continued to pose lasciviously in front of the mirror, caressing herself, touching herself obscenely.
    After a minute or two she caught sight of her own eyes in the mirror, and that brief glimpse into her own soul startled and disconcerted her. She quickly put on her flannel