Sandman

by Tammy Bird

  He reached down toward his foot. He felt the thin strip securely fastened around his left ankle. He rubbed it between his index finger and thumb. Safe here. Katia. Safe with the periwinkle. Safe with the monitor. Safe and sound. Still here. The sounds. The smells. Get out! Get out, you fucking retard. Get out. Why did he say that? He rocked and felt and tried to make the words work together to tell Katia what he had seen. He wished he could remember the words for the blood, for the sweat and fear, for the other pictures in his head.

  He didn’t like blood. He rocked. And rocked. Trying to control the sensory input, to re-center his own body.

  “6:30 is time for Dr. Callum Abney.” Marco almost hummed as he said the words “6:30 is time for Dr. Callum Abney.” The sounds followed him today. “6:12 PM.” The smells now in his safe place. “6:14 PM.” Have to tell Katia, tell Dr. Callum Abney. “One-six-six-M-P-H. One-six-six-M-P-H. Katia. One-six-six-M-P-H.”

  ****

  Katia waited. Marco rocked.

  “Which will win? The need to self-regulate or the time showing on the clock in your safe room?” Katia waited in the hallway for Marco. She glanced at the door. The waiting was always the hardest part. No matter how many times she sat against the wall outside Marco’s safe room, it never got easier to feel the helplessness that came with an episode. Her head hurt and her eyes burned. “Come on, little brother.” The numbers on her phone moved to 6:15 PM. And then 6:16. Marco’s rocking slowed. His chant softened. Katia waited.

  At exactly 6:20, Marco’s lanky, teenage frame emerged. The clock won.

  “It is 6:20 PM, Katia. We see Dr. Callum Abney at 6:30 PM. Katia and Marco leave the house at 6:20 PM.”

  “Yes, Marco. We do.” Her voice was quiet. She took her baby brother’s hand, and together they headed toward the door.

  Katia took her brother’s hand again when they exited her car and walked past several reporters outside Dr. Abney’s office. They hurled questions at Katia:

  “Have they identified everyone in the dunes?”

  “Are you still in contact with the dead woman’s daughter?”

  “Can you give us background on Gina Dahl?”

  “Why did you run from the scene?”

  She gripped Marco’s hand more tightly as she felt him tense. She swallowed and took several deep breaths. Her brother would feed off of her reaction. Another meltdown might just take her down with him. “I’m sorry.” She made eye contact with the one reporter she recognized. “I’m taking my brother to a doctor’s appointment. You know what I know. Please ask an officer or the coroner about the beach.”

  Marco’s palm was sweaty. She felt it slipping out of hers. She held even tighter. She guided him through the front door and down the hallway.

  Dr. Abney told her years ago to let Marco’s hand go when he relaxed his grip. Don’t overprotect, Katia. Let him grow and learn, Katia. She tried. She really did. But Marco was all she had, the only person who needed her. She wanted to hold his hand, wanted him to stay a child. Tonight she needed to hold his hand, possibly more than he needed to hold hers. She suspected the reporters would be their new normal, at least for a while.

  She looked over at Marco after they were greeted by the receptionist and led into Dr. Abney’s office. She let go of his hand. While Katia and Dr. Abney spoke, Marco sat silently on his end of the black-leather couch. At some point in the conversation, she realized there was stubble on his face. She made a mental note to buy shaving cream and a razor.

  When the conversation turned to Marco’s well-being after school that day, Marco picked up the melon-colored pillow from his end of the couch and hugged it tightly against his chest. Katia reached for his hand, stopped herself, looked at Dr. Abney and then at the gray-and-black cat-shaped clock on the wall. The inside of the cat’s ears was the same melon color as the pillows. 7:30 PM. Katia and the doctor talked for thirty minutes while Marco gently rocked and hugged the melon-colored pillow.

  “Marco, do you want another one of my special cameras?” Dr. Abney asked.

  Marco bobbed his head, but he didn’t speak.

  The idea for the disposable cameras came up a few years ago. “We’ll always look for ways to play to his passion, Katia,” Dr. Abney told her then.

  “He has a camera, though, and a drawer full of memory sticks, and a computer for larger display,” she said.

  “Let’s think about that,” the doctor said and smiled.

  Katia hated when he said things like that, hated that it made her feel like she was being analyzed as much as her brother, hated that it made her feel dumb for not already knowing what it was they should be thinking about. She expressed as much to her father once. What is dumb, he chastised, is that you let someone make you feel dumb. We’re paying for the doctor to help Marco. You’re Marco’s sister. You know him. Ask whatever question you want to ask, and ask until you have the answer you need. End of story.

  Her father wasn’t much on what he called psychoanalyzing B.S. In fact, when he brought Marco on the rare weeks Katia couldn’t, both he and Marco typically left agitated and it took Katia the entire next day to get her brother calm.

  The doctor didn’t have to say, “Let’s think about that,” anymore. Now Katia knew. A disposable camera allows for those with sensory issues to photograph what his or her mind’s eye is perceiving as a threat. It will do so without the photographer having to look at it again on the camera or on the large screen. Processing the difficult information happens as the picture is taken. Anxiety of repeated visuals is lessened, and the person analyzing the pictures gets a clue about the cause of the meltdowns.

  Dr. Abney pushed back from his black, lacquered desk, stood, and looked again at Marco. “One or two, Marco?”

  Marco raised two fingers. “Please.” Marco spoke for the first time since leaving the house.

  “Two it is.” Dr. Abney smiled.

  Marco smiled in return.

  Katia’s heart felt lighter. Since the day of her mother’s death, others accused her of being dark and uncaring. Dark she was. But not uncaring. For Marco, she would lie down and die. She looked at her brother. His eyes were following the doctor who made his way to the far end of a stark-white bookshelf that ran the entire long wall behind his desk. Katia liked how everything in the room popped from the black-and-white background, the way his purple tie and lavender shirt popped from his white coat, the way the melon pillows popped from the black couch, the way the colorful bookbindings popped from the white shelves. It felt like they were in one of Marco’s old, pop-up, nursery rhyme books now stored in the closet under the stairs.

  Dr. Abney rummaged around in the drawer for a moment and came up with a yellow-and-black disposable camera in hand.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The day was emotionally exhausting. All Katia wanted to do was strip off the day in a hot shower and crawl between her cool sheets. She picked up a burger for Marco in Avon before they headed home. It was one of Marco’s weekly rituals. Whoever drove to the therapy session stopped at the same place and ordered the same thing. The owner never wrapped it in a crunchy wrapper. Instead, it was handed out the drive-through window wrapped in a napkin. No fries. Only a burger. Marco ate it on the way home.

  “Teeth and bed,” she said as the two walked in the front door.

  Marco headed straight for the stairs. Nights like this, she was thankful for routine and for a brother who didn’t argue. Scratches. Rocks. Spits. Spins. But doesn’t argue. She laughed at herself. It’s the little things.

  Katia went into the kitchen and took her own burger out of its napkin wrapper. She didn’t even sit down while she watched the second hand move around on the clock. Tick. Tick. Tick. 8:05. Her father was already in his room. Just as well; she was too tired to fight with him tonight. She planned to catch him early in the morning to tell him about Frankie. She wasn’t sure yet what they were going to do with him. She hoped their father would let him stay. He would be good company for Marco.


  Katia thought about her plans for the next day. She wanted to see Elliot and Brent. They would be at the station. She pulled her phone from her back pocket and texted Elliot.

  Meet tomorrow? Fill me in?

  Pretty uneventful 24, he texted. And then, You aren’t missing anything.

  Nothing?

  Everyone is gawking at the beach. Absolute madhouse there. FBI now swarming.

  They agreed on a time, and she slid the phone back into her pocket.

  Tick. Tick. 8:11. She started for the stairs. At the top, she glanced out the large picture window. A light-blue Volkswagen van was parked on the edge of the side road.

  Andrew.

  She kept her cool while she gently laid the covers up close to Marco’s chin. Not touching. Never touching. Just ever so close. “Sweet dreams, Monkey Head.” She looked at the clock on her brother’s nightstand. 8:15. Marco smiled. Crossed his arms under the covers in the symbol for hugs.

  Katia reached down and pulled the tiny chain on the lamp with the cloud-covered shade of periwinkle blue next to Marco’s bed. The same lamp that had always been and would always be.

  In the darkness of the room, Katia walked over to the window direct center of the periwinkle wall. She reached for the string and pulled it inward and over.

  Before she eased the blinds closed, she looked to where the van was still parked. Old school. She shook her head slightly. Weird and old school. The movement briefly brought something else into her line of sight. Then it was gone. What the fuck? A gun? Is that motherfucker going to try to kill me? She tried to remember their conversation earlier, the words he said before he left. “I thought you might want to know what I heard today.” Was that it? Why are you here, you weird shit? I’ll slice you to bits before I allow you to hurt us.

  She let the blinds fall softly into place. She considered waking Papi. After their spat earlier, she wasn’t ready to do that unless it was absolutely necessary. She loved him, and he loved her, but Katia suspected the older she got the more she reminded him of their mom, and those memories were still too painful to overcome, even for the sake of his children.

  Katia paused outside Papi’s closed door. No light shown in the small crack between the solid wood door and the hardwood floor. A moment later, she took her cell phone out of her pocket and moved quietly down the stairs. She briefly considered another text to Elliot but decided she didn’t want to involve him and potentially bring harm to his family. Brent still kept the early morning hours he established in high school when he worked with her father. That meant 4:00 A.M. She certainly didn’t want to send him a whiny “Andrew is creepy and he is sitting outside my house and I want him to leave” text.

  Zahra or Paige would come. She didn’t know Paige well enough yet to assume how she would react. Zahra wanted to hang out. She wanted to hang out with Zahra. Elizabeth was heavy in her head, though, and it felt like cheating to admit it.

  Her mind whirled with the events of the last few days. She felt bruised and vulnerable and pissed and perplexed. What do I have to do with Gina’s death and Elizabeth’s empty apartment? The other bodies? Why in the fuck is this happening? Haven’t we been dealt enough? She wished her mom was alive. She would know what to do.

  If she got to the front door and Andrew was still there, she would text Zahra. She leaned sideways against the door and tried to get an angle on the van. She tapped her screen and immediately swiped down from the top and moved the sliding bar to the left to dim the brightness.

  Andrew is outside. Parked. Watching the house.

  Zahra’s response was immediate: I’m coming over.

  Katia checked Andrew’s position before she answered: He is just sitting there. My dad’s here. Just sleeping.

  Katia’s phone buzzed in her hand, and Zahra’s face lit up the screen. She put the phone to her ear.

  “You text me that, and then you want me to just sit here texting back and forth like you’re telling me about a kite gliding contest or some shit?” There was obvious concern in Zahra’s voice.

  Katia adjusted her body against the inside of the front door, trying to get a better look at the van from the adjoining window. “I have no idea how long he’s been there or why he’s there. He said something today about what he heard at the beach.”

  “Before he took the kids to the school?”

  “I don’t know. He freaked me out. I made him leave. I feel like a fucking idiot. I should have kept him talking. Maybe he knows something. Or maybe he was going to confess something.”

  “I don’t get that vibe,” Zahra said.

  Katia felt her face flush. She swallowed hard. She wanted to go out to the van and yank Andrew out by his shoulders. If Marco wasn’t asleep upstairs, she might. She knew herself well enough to know that.

  Zahra interrupted her thoughts. “I told the state detectives about his visit to your house today. They may have already questioned him.”

  “Fuck.” Katia peeked out the window again.

  “Yeah. I’m almost there.”

  “I told you—”

  “I know what you told me. I’ll be there in a few.”

  Katia stood guard. It was comforting to know she would have someone to hang out with in a few minutes. And Zahra had a gun.

  ****

  Marco kept his eyes squeezed shut. One. Two. Three… He counted his sister’s footsteps as she headed down the stairs. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen. He knew she was at the bottom. He counted every night. It’s what he did. I am Marco. I have autism. Go to sleep, Marco. Mom isn’t coming home, Marco. Clouds. She is in them. He started to hum. In his head, he heard her sound. He missed her. Sweet dreams, Marco. Hummmmmm…

  He wanted to get up. No, Marco. Bedtime means bedtime.

  He listened. He heard her talking. I hear scared. He put his feet over the edge of the bed and went to his door. He stopped just inside the doorframe and looked down at his bare feet against the hardwood. He heard Katia’s voice better from here.

  “Fuck.”

  Katia stop saying that. My head remembers it and says it inside. Fuck. He didn’t like when Katia said that word. Papi says it’s bad. Katia isn’t bad. He didn’t want to hear any more of that. He left the doorway and padded over to the window.

  Two fingers to peek. Why are there cars outside? A white Aveo. A blue VW van. Nighttime is for sleeping. Not for driving. He stood and watched a man in the van. He looked at the front door of their house. The man’s eyes shifted toward the window, toward Marco. Marco waved behind the tiny crack in the blinds. The man waved back. He slowly opened the car door. The man is coming to the door. Don’t tell Katia. Nighttime is for sleeping.

  Marco went back to his bed and slid under the covers.

  ****

  Zahra was unsure as to how she wanted to handle the newest situation. As soon as she hung up from Katia, she checked in with Xavier. He was on duty tonight at the Hatteras Island Sheriff’s Office. Zahra was an officer out of Southern Shores. The two worked together multiple times over the last few years.

  “No,” Xavier said. “Andrew hasn’t been questioned. We didn’t have anything to make us think he’s connected. No prior convictions. He’s a fellow town employee, at the beach to do his job.”

  Zahra suspected Andrew was more than he claimed. She could feel it. She just didn’t know how or why. She was hoping Xavier’s soft spot for her would get him to speculate with her based on what they did know. It didn’t take long for him to begin.

  “Profilers are working hard to put together a statement for the press, so I heard.”

  She waited for him to volunteer more information.

  “Probable psychological orientation,” Xavier said. “Includes chronic sexual deviance and peculiar sexual experiences throughout his life. He is likely an avid reader and watcher of pornography and may have been involved in experiments including forced sexual acts on children as either the perpetrator or perpetrated.”

  “Seri
ously?” she said, her tone dripping with sarcasm. “That couldn’t have been too hard to figure out.” She pictured Xavier’s signature shrug and the straight line of his lips.

  “He’s most probably a white male, late forties,” Xavier said. “The burial site is visible from the row of rentals above. This specific location means something to him. He has likely navigated it many times, telling us he’s not a stranger or a transient.”

  Zahra thought about Andrew. Thirty-five at best, probably less. He visited the OBX many times, but it wasn’t his home until last year. “If his family stayed in a rental, would that be enough to learn how the town moves through tourist season and into hibernation?” She didn’t think so. She was interested in what he thought.

  “Maybe. This is a predominately white area, so men of other nationalities would have likely been noticed spending excessive amounts of time on the beach.”

  “So, probably white.”

  “The crime indicates some level of intelligence and preplanning, too. He would have a place to complete the killings and a way to get the victim and tools to the burial site.”

  “Right. He’s strong and has a vehicle and a license to drive on the sand.”

  “Definitely. Brief mentions serial killers are typically creatures of habit. They have a reason for what they do. We may or may not understand it, but it’s a valid reason in their mind.”

  Zahra mentally ticked off recent events. Andrew lives in the upper half of a converted beach house—an unlikely place to kill. It didn’t fit. And yet, he was outside Katia’s home three nights after she found the most recent victim of a lengthy killing spree.