by Alex Garland
Sean relaxed his right hand around the grip on his automatic, then tightened it. The light caresses on his neck were starting to burn a little, and more itches were springing out elsewhere. On the small of his back, on the back of his thighs, his scalp, his wrists, his stomach. Each one kicking off another.
Sean wondered: Is this what happens if you miss a scratch? Let an itch go, and suddenly you’re dealing with an avalanche. Your whole life, fending off avalanches with a rub of the fingernails here and there, unaware you’re doing it.
An avalanche was far more in touch with his senses than he had planned, but it was too late to do anything about it now. Eliminate one and he’d have to eliminate the lot, and he couldn’t afford to get so distracted, to lose what focus he had.
“Focus?” Sean whispered thickly. The tickling had infected his tongue. It had even, somehow, infected his vision and his hearing. Having covered his skin’s surface it was working inward, clouding him up in a needling crescendo, becoming abstract and ambitious.
“Can’t manage much…”
Mouthed it, didn’t say it. Or if he said it, he didn’t hear it.
“…more of this.”
In the fish-eye, standing in the elastic corridor, Don Pepe seemed to agree. Spitting out a splinter from his toothpick, he motioned at the closed door. Joe reached out and knocked for the second time.
The second time. The third time would be with the heel of a boot.
Time, then, to take the initiative.
And with that decision the itching either had consumed Sean entirely or it had gone.
The suck of air from the opened door pulled another door shut, farther down the corridor. Caught in the passing vacuum, the lightbulb above the Filipinos began a single outward swing. Their heads turned to trace the source of the unexpected slam. Sean, his gun already leveled, was unseen by any of them. Standing in the doorframe, as good as alone, a free agent in a split second.
The mestizo was photographed by the first muzzle flash with his eyes half closed—the reactions of his blink halfway slower than a bullet. The second muzzle flash pictured him falling backward, still looking in the direction of the slam, with his toothpick hovering in space, an inch away from his lips. Teroy’s head was turning.
Sean pointed the gun at the next-nearest figure. Third muzzle flash: The mestizo was collapsing, and the flop of Bubot’s bangs had jumped upward like an exclamation mark. Teroy, incredibly, had his pistol almost fully drawn. Joe hadn’t moved out of profile.
Sean took a quick step back into his room, shooting twice more, these rounds aimless. In the same movement, he spun around and shoved the door closed with his shoulder. Then he leapt forward, landing heavily, facedown on the floor.
There was no immediate hail of return fire, and no moans or screams from the shot men outside. When Sean lifted his head a few moments later, all he noticed was that the bedroom was full of blue smoke and the smell of sparks. Was it possible that he’d hit all four Filipinos? He couldn’t recall the last ten seconds clearly enough to be sure.
4.
Although the Karaboujan was high in the water with a light cargo of dried noodles and Levi’s jeans, the salt spray still reached right up to the guardrail. Beneath Sean’s feet, the ship’s engine vibrated dully through the metal decks.
“Did I hit one?”
Alan shrugged.
“How do I know if I’ve hit one?”
“You don’t have to know. You’re only supposed to be getting used to the feel. So fire off a few more.”
Sean put easy pressure on the trigger, didn’t jerk or yank, and nothing happened.
“Hammer,” said Alan impatiently. “Remember. The hammer isn’t back. First shot on this automatic won’t do anything unless the hammer’s back. First shot you have to cock it by sliding back the casing. After that, the recoil does it all for you.”
“Right.”
Sean tried again. This time his gun bucked and burst and ejected cartridges, and when it was over, he counted: four or five. Of the four or five white-tipped dorsal fins that had been following in the slop trail, four or five remained.
“I’m probably missing them.”
“I said it doesn’t matter. You’re only supposed to be getting used to the feel.”
“Well, I think I’m getting there.”
“Unh-uh. Not yet. You’re still bunching up when you pull the trigger.”
“Oh.” Disappointed, Sean glanced down at the pistol in his palm. It felt as snug as a fat wallet, which, perhaps, was why it looked so unnatural there.
“Reload,” said Alan, and frowned when Sean hesitated.
“Something the matter?”
“No.”
“You sure? If there is, fine. Plenty of crew could use the extra cash.”
“I was just wondering if I’d ever really need to use this.”
“One day it’s going to be me captain of this tub, and it’s going to be you dealing with Don Pepe alone. I wouldn’t want to be doing that if I couldn’t use a gun, so it’s only fair that I make you ready. Not looking for anything on my conscience.” Alan pushed his peaked cap back on his head, then jabbed a stubby finger at the sharks. “Now I want to see you blowing holes in those things. And no bunching up.”
“No bunching up. Okay.”
“So let’s see it.”
Sean never did hit a white-tip, as far as he knew, and eventually he got bored with trying. Instead, he shot seagulls. Soaring, catching updrafts, keeping pace with the Karaboujan, they made for almost stationary targets. And you could never kill enough to empty the skies around the crow’s nest. There always seemed to be a similar number floating around, no matter how many had thudded onto the top deck or spiraled into the ocean.
5.
When the return fire finally came, Sean had already crawled across the carpet and was behind the teak bed. An exploratory bullet was the opening shot, punching through the door, drilling into the brickwork between the windows. Then every inanimate object in the room burst into life. The burned telephone leapt off the bedside table, pillows shuddered and spat feathers, cupboards swung open, glass shattered, fist-sized chunks of ceiling vaporized.
But nothing was finding Sean, curled on the floor with his arms over his head. There was no bullet with his name on it. And better yet, he had a plan of action. The very instant the shooting stopped or there was the faintest click of an empty chamber, he was going to be on his feet and covering the short sprint to the opposite wall. Aiming straight for the hole he’d clawed around the steel plate.
Seconds later, the click came. No nightmare, no treacle-syrup movement, nothing considered except objective and intention, leaving Sean with the mentality of a freight train. Unstoppable; anything in the way of a freight train would have to be insane.
This was in his way: crumbling plasterboard, peeling wallpaper facade, and a token structure of desiccated wooden slats. Asking to be obliterated, it gave way willingly.
Sean stumbled out of his room and into the next one just as the shooting restarted. Plaster grit was in his eyes and nose, in his hair and between his teeth. He spat, panted, and blinked
Then he saw that he hadn’t stumbled into the next room after all—he was in a corridor. A second corridor on this level of Patay, lined with windows on one side and doors on the other, apparently running parallel to the first. By the light cast through the hole behind him and moonshine from the street outside, he could see down most of its length. There were chairs lying on their sides, folded mattresses, scattered refuse, newspaper pages. And at regular intervals, the corridor seemed to be segmented by jagged ridges and short spikes. It looked like the inside of a vast backbone, a newly discovered fossil.
The guns stopped again. Their magazines were empty, or possibly the door had been blown open by the last fusillade, and the Filipinos were already moving cautiously inside.
Sean took a step forward, then broke into a run. No sense in going forward slowly, and certainly none in going back
ward. Jumping over the segments and chairs, he registered other details. Under his feet, menthol-cigarette butts. Thousands of them, a year’s worth of emptied ashtrays, white filters heaped and spread like cauterized maggots. Above his head, missing patches of ceiling through which a higher level of Patay could be glimpsed, darker and dustier.
As the end of the segmented corridor grew nearer, Sean found a moment to think. He had to get out of this corridor and into the other. It was the other that led to the stairwell, and the only way out of the building. And, seeing as the two corridors ran parallel, all he needed to do was duck into one of the doorways he was passing.
He ducked into the next doorway he passed. Ten or so feet to his right, the stairwell. Sixty feet to his left, under the still-swinging lightbulb, Don Pepe and Bubot lay outside the entrance to his room.
Two dead, thought Sean. Two alive.
He flew down the stairs. Flew, in midair most of the way, his shoes making the barest touch on each step, just enough to control his descent.
Halfway between Patay’s first and ground floors, he heard the sound of Joe and Teroy coming down after him.
Son-Less
1.
“Teroy, you are lucky that you are not a Japanese.”
Teroy looked puzzled. “Lucky, sir?”
“Very lucky. If you were a Japanese, you would be dead now.”
“Dead, sir?”
“Hara-kiri, Teroy. Suicide. Stabbed by your own sword, for shame that you made Mr. Sean spend even five minutes in this cockroach-infested carcass of a hotel.”
“Sir, I can only apologize again.”
“My point is that you can do more than apologize. But I suppose it is a good thing that the Filipinos are not like the Japanese. If they committed suicide every time they made a mistake, there wouldn’t be any of them left.”
“Very true, sir,” said Bubot.
“Eeh.” The mestizo sniffed reflectively. “Jojo. Knock.”
Jojo knocked.
It was unusual that there was no movement to be heard from inside the room. After a knock, you might expect to hear a chair scrape backward, or the sound of someone walking to open the door. Jojo glanced over his shoulder at Teroy to see if he had noticed, and he had. There was a slight frown on his forehead, and he was holding his gun hand away from his body, a few inches from where it would naturally hang.
Seconds passed and still the door remained closed, with no sign of its opening.
Don Pepe gestured for Jojo to knock again. Behind him, Jojo heard Teroy exhale slowly.
Jojo heard the latch turn on the door in front of him, and as the door was yanked open, he felt the rush of air on his nose and lips. But the door slam—it came from the side, down the corridor. And it had been the kind of noise he had been waiting for, or expecting. So when it came, that was the direction in which he moved his head. To the side.
There was a hammer blow on his ears and a tight cone of sparks, etched into his peripheral vision even after his eyes had clamped shut. And an airless constriction in his chest, as if he had dived into the icy water of Don Pepe’s indoor swimming pool, air-con chilled.
Eeeh!
“You see, Jojo, in this tropical Asian climate, it is all but impossible to immerse yourself in cold water. But in Europe, daily immersion in cold water is not only possible but a long-accepted aid to a healthy constitution.”
Eh.
“There are no churches in the Philippines. In Spain there are churches. Here, you have only…”
Ah.
“God in heaven, what have I done to…”
Suck.
“I said hands. Not hand.”
Old as any church that Jojo had ever seen.
“Jojo. Knock.”
The mestizo’s last words. That was the way it was.
2.
Words filtered through the ringing in Jojo’s ears.
“Paré! Are you hit?”
Jojo’s head still pointed toward the slammed door.
“Are you shot?”
Too dazed to know if he’d been shot or not, he didn’t reply. He might have been shot. He didn’t have the vaguest idea what had happened over the past few seconds, so anything was possible. And there was a strangely acute heat on the lower parts of his legs, around his shins and calves.
Jojo looked down and saw Bubot. The last time he had seen Bubot, he had been standing up. Now the sip-sip king had dropped to the floor and was lying like a Chinese beggar, knees folded neatly under the torso, face hidden, arms flopped out to catch spare change.
Bubot’s head was pouring blood onto Jojo’s trousers.
“Move away from the fucking door!” shouted Teroy.
But the only thing that moved was Jojo’s eyes, flicking sideways to Don Pepe.
“The door, paré!”
Don Pepe was slumped with his legs splayed out in front of him and his body half twisted, one shoulder leaning against the wall, keeping him from keeling over. His chin and neck and shirt collar were bright red. The splashes around his nose were even redder. Pale skin, never in the sunlight, never out of cover except after nightfall. The whisper had it: A touch of sun would turn him black in a day.
“The door!”
Teroy grabbed Jojo by the arm and yanked him backward.
“He can shoot through!”
“He?”
“The—” Teroy broke off. Maybe it was to catch a breath. He was breathing heavily, almost panting, and glittering sweat beads were forming over his face even as Jojo watched.
Mysteriously, Teroy started feeling around the belt line of Jojo’s trousers.
“Gun?”
“It’s…it’s in the car.” An odd panic slid into Jojo’s gut. Familiar, after a second or two. This was his nightmare coming true: The moment he actually needed to use his gun, he was letting Teroy down. “Kumpadre, I left it…the glove compartment. I…didn’t…”
“In the car,” repeated Teroy, anger flashing across his face. Then he nodded, wiped the sweat off his upper lip, and reached somewhere inside his jacket. Pulled out a small revolver. “Okay,” he said, flipping the safety catch as he handed it over. “It’s okay.”
Jojo took the revolver silently.
“Now listen, paré. On three, we’re going to shoot at the door. We’re going to shoot at the door before he does. You use all the bullets. You keep shooting until all the bullets are gone.”
“Shoot into the room.”
“Into his room. On three.”
“Yes.”
“You’re ready?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
Teroy crossed himself with the barrel of his automatic. “One.”
One, two, three. Noise, blood, Bubot begging for small change, Don Pepe sitting with his sunless skin and slick red jaw—these things were beyond understanding. But numbers emptied the mind, leaving room for other thoughts.
A single thought, as his thumb turned the wedding ring on his left hand.
Just past eight o’clock, Miranda would be working on her jigsaw. A big one, perhaps two feet square when complete. He’d gotten home early the previous Saturday and found all the little pieces, scattered on the floor at the foot of their bed. Jojo had been surprised, and wondered why she’d bought it. Seeing her crouched over the box, studying the picture for clues, he’d had to ask himself: What would drive her to buy a jigsaw?
“Miranda,” he’d said anxiously. “Am I neglecting you?”
She didn’t look up. “No.”
“Then why did you buy a jigsaw?”
“I didn’t buy it. Nana Conché bought it for her grandson, but he didn’t like it so she was disappointed. She threatened to throw it away. I thought that was a shame.”
“Oh.”
“I thought it might be fun to make.”
Yes, Jojo had reflected, I can see that—remembering the quiet and methodical way she’d worked out how to reload his magazine.
“I was
afraid you’d think I was neglecting you. Since I’ve become the mestizo’s driver…working so many nights.”
Miranda still didn’t look up. She’d found two pieces that matched. “Well, that’s why I thought the jigsaw might be fun. To pass time, waiting for you to get home.”
“Ah.”
“Why don’t you help me make it?”
“Okay.”
“Good. You’ll see, there are so many pieces that it is really quite difficult. Probably too hard for Nana Conché’s grandson. He would only have gotten frustrated.”
Jojo knelt beside her and started hunting for a piece with two straight edges. “We should start with the corners. That’s the way.”
Miranda tutted. “I know. I’ve found them already. I have them here.”
“Ah yes.”
“There’s dinner for you under the plate over there.”
“Have you eaten?”
“An hour ago.”
“Well…” Jojo shrugged. “Let’s just work on this.”
“One.”
His thumb turned the wedding ring.
“Two,” said Teroy.
Jojo left the ring alone and gripped his gun with both hands.
“Three.”
3.
Shoulder to shoulder with Teroy, eyes screwed against the sparks and spinning chips of wood, Jojo had a bad feeling about his arms. They felt untrustworthy and oddly disconnected from the rest of his body. For the moment they were doing everything he asked—keeping upright and as steady as the recoil would allow—but for the next moment, there were no guarantees. They seemed on the verge of rebellion, threatening to seize up and become useless.
It was as though they were aware of something that he wasn’t. If it wasn’t for the convulsion of shock each time the pistol kicked, and the blankness that followed, he felt sure he’d know what the thing was.
No recoil. The chambers were empty. Teroy pulled him to the side of the doorway. Then he grabbed the gun out of Jojo’s hand, reloading it before he reloaded his own, sliding in the new bullets with the same unthinking confidence as a street conjuror rolling a coin between his knuckles.