All Shots

that.”
    “You and your positive methods! I half wish you were still using choke collars.”
    “You do not!”
    “I do. At least you didn’t use them on me.”
    So, I had a good time, in fact, such a good time that it wasn’t until I was driving up Concord Avenue past Saint Peter’s that I again began to worry and to wonder about Mellie, and to hope that Kevin had finally freed himself from the impossible task of rescuing Jennifer from her social-skills-training fiasco. As I turned left onto Huron Avenue, I found myself missing Steve and wishing that he, Leah, and Rita hadn’t all departed at the same time. I should explain that although my house faces Concord Avenue, the driveway is on Appleton Street, which is one-way. From the Square, I take Concord to Huron, turn left, and then go right on Appleton, as I did that night. When I pulled the van into the driveway, I saw nothing out of the ordinary. The exterior of our house is exceptionally well illuminated. There are so many lights that we’d be guilty of polluting the environment if we routinely used all of them. Fortunately, they have separate switches, so we limit ourselves to turning on the lights we need when we need them. Because I knew I’d be coming home after dark, I’d turned on some lights on the back of the house, enough for me to see that there was no one around. Next door, Kevin’s car wasn’t in his usual spot in the driveway, but the windows in the Dennehys’ living room showed the glow of the television. Mrs. Dennehy was waiting up for her son. When I opened the door of the van, I heard the muffled ring of the phone in my kitchen. The machine was set to pick up after the phone had rung eight times. Had it just started to ring? Was Kevin trying to call me? Or Steve? Maybe Steve had reached a place where his cell phone worked. Maybe he’d tried to call me on mine. It was in my purse, but I’d turned it off. Damn! I should’ve remembered to turn it on and check for messages before starting back home.
    With my key ring still in my hand, I quickly locked the van, ran the few feet to the back steps, and sprinted up to the door. The dogs would be fine in the locked van; a back window was open. My purse, too, was in the van, as were empty spring-water bottles, a little cooler that I’d used for fresh dog treats, and other odds and ends that I’d carry into the house after I took the phone call. I put the key in the lock and opened the outer back door, which leads to a small hallway, little more than a landing, with a door to the cellar and with stairs that run up to the second floor and to Rita’s third-floor apartment. Straight ahead is the door to our kitchen. I’d unlocked my outer back door thousands of times, of course. The phone was still ringing, and I was in such a hurry to answer it that I can’t even remember the automatic act of unlocking the outer door and pushing it inward. When I opened the door, it never occurred to me that in my rush to leave the house, I’d failed to make sure that the outer door was locked. I can recall no sense whatever of the presence of another person in that small space.
    The first thing I remember is what the man said: “You have some things that belong to me. I want them back.”
    He was standing behind me. For a moment, it seemed as if he had materialized out of nowhere; caught off guard, I was too startled and frightened to realize that he’d already been in the hallway when I’d entered. It seemed to me that I was caught in a recurring nightmare: I enter my own house to find a strange man there who says that I have something of his and who wants me to hand it over. Since I have no idea what he means, I can’t just get rid of him by giving him what he wants. This second version of the scene was, however, different from the first. Adam’s Harley had been parked in my driveway. Leah had let him in. “You have something for me,” he’d said. Adam hadn’t implied that the something belonged to him; he’d seemed to expect me to pass the unknown something along to him rather than to give it back. But the big difference, the terrifying difference, was that Adam hadn’t tried to scare me. “Hope I didn’t startle you,” he’d said. Furthermore, there’d been nothing threatening about his manner; he’d been perfectly pleasant. In comparison with the man in the hallway, Adam now seemed like the ideal guest. Why the hell had I dashed for the phone? Cell phones work both ways. If Steve