Oliver Crum and the Grim Menagerie

by Chris Cooper

  He asked her to join him out on the back porch. “I should have said this the other night after our roaring success of a welcome dinner.” He leaned in close to her.

  His mom chuckled. “Can’t say it was the warmest welcome, but you apologized, and that’s all that matters.”

  Oliver looked down at the table. “That’s what I wanted to talk about. I am sorry for keeping the move from you, but I don’t regret my decision to move here, and I’m not ashamed of it. I’m happier now than I’ve ever been. I have friends and family here, and I’ve learned a tremendous amount in the past year, helping Izzy with the bakery and the hives. I know how to take care of bees now. Bees! Remember how afraid of them I used to be?”

  His mom paused for a moment. “You know I’ll always love you, but I can’t pretend that I approve of what you’re doing. I just don’t understand it.”

  “You don’t have to understand. That’s the best part about it. You don’t have to accept it either. You just have to accept me.”

  She sat back in her chair and scowled. “For you to sit here and insinuate that I don’t accept you—I can’t believe it.”

  Oliver rubbed his temples hard. “If that’s what you want to take away from this conversation, then there’s not much I can do about it.”

  His mother pursed her lips.

  “You judge,” he blurted out.

  “Excuse me?”

  “It’s what you do. I tell you the truth, and I feel like you judge me for it. Everything is a massive guilt trip with you. I feel like I’m a constant disappointment—always have.” He’d said too much too quickly, and the truth spewed from his mouth as if it were a leaky faucet.

  “Well, I guess I’m just a terrible mother,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone.

  “See! You’re doing it right now! I can’t have a conversation with you that isn’t passive-aggressive and guilt ridden.”

  “I am not being passive-aggressive,” she said through gritted teeth.

  “You treated Dad the same way.”

  The line seemed to catch her off guard.

  “I know it’s no excuse to lie to you, but I’m hard enough on myself without you piling on, and so I distanced myself, especially after what happened to Dad.”

  Her expression softened somewhat. “His death was hard on both of us, but that’s hardly an excuse,” she replied.

  “Do you know how painful it was to find out Dad had been gone for a week and you hadn’t bothered to tell me? I apologized to you for keeping Christchurch a secret, but you never apologized for keeping Dad’s death from me. And my secret pales in comparison.”

  Oliver saw a little crack in his mom’s tough exterior, and she wiped the corner of her eye.

  “You know I thought I was doing what was best for you,” she said. “You had to focus on school.”

  “Being home with my family would have been best, and it should have been my decision to make,” he said, voice shaking.

  His mom was quiet.

  “Don’t you have anything to say?” he asked.

  “No,” she replied. “You’ve made it clear how you feel. I need a little time to process.” Her voice was low and reserved.

  “Okay.” He took a deep breath. “For what it’s worth, I’m not trying to be harsh, but I realized I’d been holding on to so much anger. I thought I had let it go, but you being here is bringing everything rushing back.”

  She didn’t come back with a passive-aggressive remark, which told him she’d listened, but he worried he had pushed the woman too hard.

  After the conversation, his mom spent the next few days reading alone in her bedroom. He gave her space but wondered if she was truly mulling over their conversation or was simply angry with him.

  On top of the strained relationship with Bev, Oliver worried about how he’d left things with Asher. The day of the next menagerie show arrived, and Izzy and Oliver climbed into the station wagon to go see the Amberley show and Asher’s new exhibit. He assumed they were still invited but worried about the reception they would receive when they arrived.

  Will Asher even want me to come? He imagined Ruby would be furious, although she didn’t seem to have much of a penchant for anger.

  Izzy’s fingers wrapped around the steering wheel in an arthritic death grip. Oliver had planned to drive, but she insisted. She pulled the station wagon through the center of town.

  “Nothing from your mom yet?” she asked.

  “Not a word,” he replied.

  “I’m sure she needs time to think. The woman wouldn’t have stayed this long if she wasn’t giving serious consideration to the things you said. Do you feel better about it?”

  “I feel much better now it’s out in the open. I didn’t realize I’d been carrying all of that resentment.” He looked off into the distance as they passed the Christchurch sign.

  “So what’s in store for the Halloween menu this year?” he asked, trying to shift the conversation to a lighter topic.

  The holiday was still several weeks away, but they started celebrating as soon as the first leaves changed colors in late September.

  “The usual. We’re also going to try bear claws with chocolate fur and fondant fingernails and Cthulhu cupcakes.” Izzy perked up in her seat as she answered.

  “Cthulhu?”

  “Think giant octopus god,” she replied.

  “Sounds promising.”

  “He’s my favorite deity,” she added.

  Oliver had seen Izzy do little driving outside of the town square, and now he understood why. She’d driven the Christchurch streets a thousand times before, so her driving was automatic. As the road wound around the countryside to Amberley, she struggled to keep the station wagon on course. She’d veer the wheel every time she turned her head to talk to Oliver, and he had to warn her several times of upcoming bends when she became distracted by conversation.

  As Izzy pulled the station wagon onto the main drag of Amberley, colorful decorations lining the streets greeted them. Orange and yellow streamers hung across the street lanterns, the lights of which were made to look like jack-o’-lanterns. Store owners had lined their windows with cobwebs and monsters of various shapes and sizes.

  “These decorations blow Christchurch out of the water, don’t they?” Oliver asked.

  “I’ve never been here with Halloween decorations up. This is incredible!”

  Izzy made the turn past the church and parked across the street from The Parlor. A line extended out the door and wrapped around the sidewalk.

  “Wow, word must be getting around,” Oliver said.

  “And this is all because of the guy from last year?” Izzy asked.

  “Asher? Not entirely. You’ll see once you meet Ruby. She has a few talents of her own.”

  Jen noticed the pair standing at the base of the steps and waved them toward the doorway.

  Oliver and Izzy squeezed their way past the line and to the front door.

  “Ruby’s got chairs reserved for you. Go on in,” she said.

  “Crazy crowd tonight, huh?” Oliver asked.

  Jen gave him a sarcastic eye roll. “You don’t say.”

  “I feel like royalty,” Izzy said, looking back at the line.

  “Let’s have a look around. You have to see the chandelier,” Oliver replied.

  As Izzy entered the lounge, her eyes shot upward toward the bone chandelier, and her mouth hung wide open.

  “Crazy, isn’t it?”

  “This must have taken ages,” she replied.

  The bar distracted her as she turned toward Oliver. Caleb was, once again, pouring shots of the pear-colored liquid into funny-looking shot glasses.

  “Absinthe!” Izzy pushed her way through the crowd and toward Caleb, who set a tray of the fancy glasses on the bar. Oliver tried to keep up, but the undulating crowd blocked his path.

  The place must have been at least two or three times busier than the last weekend. After a few side steps, a twist, and a turn, he caught up with I
zzy, who was already leaning against a small exposed area of the bar, clutching a small glass.

  “Absinthe?” Oliver asked from behind.

  “‘After the first glass of absinthe, you see things as you wish they were. After the second, you see them as they are not. Finally, you see things as they really are, and that is the most horrible thing in the world.’ At least, that’s what Oscar Wilde said. Sounds fantastic, doesn’t it?” After Izzy’s monologue, the surrounding crowd seemed to second-guess whether to try the mystery drink.

  “Don’t worry, folks. It’s pure bunk, I promise you. Hallucinations have always been a rumored side effect of the wormwood in absinthe, but it’s only the alcohol that’s responsible for any pink elephants you may encounter,” Caleb said. “This small sample won’t do any damage, but you can take an entire bottle home with you this evening for a mere $45. Be sure to smell first, then sip to clean the palate. Let the absinthe wash over your tongue.”

  Caleb noticed Oliver standing behind Izzy at the bar and reached across to pat him on the shoulder. “Oliver! Glad you could make it. Should be a great show tonight.”

  “This is Izzy, my gre—my aunt.” He caught himself but still received a subtle jab from Izzy, who had already emptied her absinthe glass.

  “A pleasure,” Izzy added. “But it appears someone has forgotten to fill my cup.” She winked at Caleb and held out her empty glass.

  “I’m going to have to keep my eye on you,” Caleb said, “but I think I have something you might enjoy even more.”

  He knelt down behind the bar and returned with a bottle and three fresh glasses. He leaned between Oliver and Izzy so that the other guests couldn’t hear. “We save this for special occasions. This puts the stuff we serve to everyone else to shame. Three hundred bucks a bottle, so savor every sip.” He poured a small amount of milky-white absinthe into each glass.

  “Hold on a minute,” he said as Izzy lifted her glass. “Always dilute it first, or else you’ll be sorry in the morning.” He pulled three odd-looking spoons and set them across each glass, then placed a sugar cube on each. As he poured water over each spoon, it gradually melted the cube and trickled through the slits underneath.

  Once Caleb had finished preparing each glass, he raised his for a toast.

  “To Asher and the two who saved him,” Caleb said, tipping his glass toward Oliver.

  “Hear, hear!” Izzy added.

  Oliver laughed and took a sip. Based on the odd color, he expected an acrid taste, but the initial bitterness faded into pleasing herbal notes.

  “Not too bad, right?” Caleb asked.

  “Not what I expected,” Oliver replied.

  Someone across the hall distracted Caleb. Ruby stood halfway out her office door, frantically waving for him. He looked at his watch then slid the bottle back behind the bar. “Missed my cue. Head on in and take your seats. Time to get things started.”

  Oliver was relieved that Caleb had greeted him warmly, easing his fear that the man would show them the door.

  As Izzy and Oliver passed Ruby’s office, she tapped Izzy on the shoulder. “You must be Oliver’s aunt. So glad to meet you. Saved two seats for you up front. Think you will like the new display. Asher’s been working on it all week.”

  Caleb’s voice boomed from the other room, encouraging the audience to take their seats in front of the stage. Izzy and Oliver sat in the seats Ruby had roped off at the front of the room.

  The crowd shuffled through the rows of chairs. Once they had settled, Jen placed the needle on the record player, and the lights went dark. As they waited for the show to begin, Oliver heard the clinking of glass overheard.

  When Ruby pulled the cover off the first aquarium, Izzy whispered, “Skeletons? What a cool trick. What are they swimming in?”

  “You don’t want to know,” he whispered back. In telling the story about Briarwood to Izzy, Oliver had told her about Asher’s blood, but she had never seen it for herself.

  Izzy stared intently as Ruby traced the glass with her finger and several of the fish followed. When she tapped her knuckle on the glass, she sent the fish into a frenzy, and a few launched toward the source of the sound, collapsing like tiny accordions against the wall of the aquarium.

  Midway through the show, Caleb brought the house lights up, and Oliver looked up at the ceiling.

  He swore he heard something above them, but the can lights overhead seemed to be brighter than last time, and he found it hard to look at them for any length of time. There seemed to be some sort of rack underneath the light mounts, but he couldn’t make out what it held.

  Oliver watched Izzy’s reaction closely when Ruby pulled the cover off the mirror. Although he’d seen his emaciated reflection before, it still made him shudder, and one day, it wouldn’t be an illusion. Izzy cupped her hand over her mouth in amazement at the image in front of her.

  “Before you depart for the evening, I have something special to share with you—an addition to our collection of cadaverous creatures,” Ruby said after snapping the reflection of the audience back to normal. “The person responsible for some undead wonders you see here tonight has been hiding behind the scenes, and since our new addition to the Grim Menagerie is so fantastic, we felt it only fair that the creator should be the one to unveil it. Asher, if you please.”

  Asher appeared through the side door to the stage and nervously paced toward the center while refusing to make eye contact with the crowd. He cleared his throat, and his voice wavered at first. “Thank you, Ruby. Fortunately, our new display needs no unveiling, since it’s been hanging right above your heads this entire time.” He gestured toward the ceiling.

  Asher walked toward the back of the stage and unwound a rope from a stage hook. Metal squealed against metal as the mystery rack lowered from above the crowd.

  A dozen or so specimen jars were suspended sideways from a makeshift frame made of plumbing pipes. As they passed through the wall of light and into view, the can lights backlit the jars, casting a shifting red glow onto the crowd and revealing the creatures inside. Somehow, Asher had assembled a fleet of skeletal monkeys, which stared down at the crowd, pantomiming their way around the large jars.

  “I hope you enjoy our undead troop,” Ruby added, but the new display preoccupied the crowd.

  Several stood to get a closer look, and Oliver laughed when Izzy let out an audible gasp next to him.

  “What kind of voodoo is this?” Izzy asked.

  Oliver looked back at the mirror and scanned the crowd to see their reactions through the reflection. As he looked at the back of the room, he noticed a man standing against the wall. Oliver recognized the dingy sweater and hunch of the man who had danced his way through the alley on Oliver’s second visit to The Parlor. He seemed unaffected by the visual above him and instead slid out from the back row of chairs and started down the aisle toward the stage. Oliver thought perhaps the man was planning another impromptu dance session, but as he came closer to the mirror, Oliver noticed a flash of something metal in his hand.

  When the man made it to the base of the stage, just a few steps from a nervous Asher, Oliver stood and shouted a warning over the commotion of the crowd. When Ruby made eye contact with him, Oliver pointed at the man in the aisle. She locked eyes with him and said nothing but pointed up at the ceiling. The man stopped and looked up at the display overhead. He let out a terrified scream as one of the heavy glass jars broke loose from the frame and crashed down upon him, sending blood, bones, and broken glass everywhere as it hit its target. The man fell out of Oliver’s sight, behind a row of people.

  Ruby stood in front of the man, glaring down at him. She whispered something to Asher, who quickly disappeared through the doorway on the side of the platform.

  A few of the audience members moved in to help, but not before Caleb rushed to the aisle and picked up the knife, sliding it into his sleeve and concealing it from the crowd. He pulled the man to his feet and escorted him down the aisle and out of sight. The d
ebris that had fallen on him had vanished, and the jar was now safely back in place in the metal frame.

  “Isn’t the first time we’ve had someone screaming on the floor, but I assure you, this time, it’s all part of the show,” Ruby said, scrambling for words.

  The crowd laughed, and the cover-up seemed to work, although some still seemed confused by the vanishing glass.

  “Thank you all for visiting the menagerie this evening. Please stay and have a look around. Our creatures don’t bite as long as you keep your distance.”

  The crowd erupted into applause once again, and Ruby seemed to regain composure as she bowed.

  “Did you see that?” Oliver asked.

  “Yeah!” Izzy replied. “It looked like the jar broke off the display, didn’t it?”

  “No, the man had a knife, and it looked like he was coming after Asher.”

  “Knife? What are you talking about? She said it was all part of the show.” Izzy marveled at the structure suspended above their heads. “What a great illusion.”

  “It’s not an illusion,” Oliver replied.

  As soon as the audience dispersed, trickling around the room and back to the entryway to take in the obscure gallery of oddities, Oliver sidestepped the crowd and headed toward Ruby’s office.

  “Where are you going?” Izzy asked.

  “Come with me,” he replied. “I have to make sure they’re okay.”

  “Who’s okay?”

  He ignored her question but pulled her toward the hallway. Light was creeping out under the office door, and Caleb greeted him when he knocked.

  “What happened?” Oliver asked, eyeing Ruby, who was sprawled across a violet chaise in the corner of the room. Asher sat in a leather wingback chair behind Ruby’s desk and shifted his eyes away when Oliver’s met his.

  “I told you this was a mistake.” Caleb shot a glance at Ruby.

  “Asher can’t live in hiding forever. He’s already spent the first quarter of his life in a cage,” she replied from under a cold compress.

  “But to put him on display like that?”

  “His dad’s dead. He’s no longer in danger. Nice job letting me tell him, by the way.” She shifted her sights to Oliver.