She cupped her hand and tipped the bottle. At once her palm filled with a thin caramel broth. She didn’t have time to examine the gruel thoroughly—Janet grabbed the sink and an arrow of burning puke shot from her mouth.
She stared down in complete shock. A splash of bile had slapped the porcelain basin with flecks of the bottle’s brown fluid, and there, leaning against the sink’s plug, was a dark bronze coin with a human skull imprinted on its face.
Sometimes you meet a person and immediately don’t like them. Sometimes you go to a place and immediately feel uneasy. Sometimes you catch an old fragrance and it brings back a hated memory. Sometimes somebody touches you in a way an enemy has touched you in the past.
The coin did all of these things.
It was ugly. For all her disdain, Janet didn’t care to know what it was or how it came from her own throat; she just didn’t want the coin in her house. Not for a second longer. There was a deep sense of ownership with it, despite just laying eyes on it. This was her coin and it would always be her coin. She thought about throwing it in the waste basket or into the field outside, but what if it somehow showed up again? She didn’t want to fucking see it. Not ever! Seeing it again would be unbearable. A poison-tipped sword through each eye. Keeping the coin for even another moment was too much of a burden to bear.
A light knocking came at the door. Janet took the coin with a disgusted swipe that made of arch of putrescence in the sink. She hit the water to rinse off her hand and then hurried out to the front room.
Another knock.
Faye.
She never got the hint, did she? If you have a house key, it means you can come in whenever you like. Otherwise, they would have never given her one.
But the person through the peephole, Janet found, was not Faye.
She opened the door and blinked through the obnoxious sunlight. “Hi, Sam. How are you?”
The old widower stood on the porch with a sad, fatherly shine in his eyes. He handed over a bouquet of wildflowers.
“I… heard, this morning from your friend Evan. It’s good to see you up and at ‘em. That whole hospital thing was pretty scary sounding.”
Janet looked uncomfortably down at the flowers. “It was.”
“There’s all sorts of blossoms in there. I don’t know their names but I think every color of the rainbow has a representative.”
“Did you pick them?”
Sam snorted through his untamed gray mustache. “Hell no, bought them!”
She smiled. “You’re so sweet…”
“I would have come down to the hospital if I’d known sooner.”
“No, no that’s okay. Things have been tough. Tough year.”
“God you’re right, it’s been about a year now,” he said. He awkwardly turned his eyes out to the empty street. “It still makes me sick to my stomach, thinking about that day.”
“Yes.” Janet leaned into the door jamb.
“Saw someone come plowing down the street just the other day. The dumb jerk. Yelled my ass off at him.”
“Oh Sam.”
“Well it isn’t right. People just have no clue about safe driving. Really, they have no clue. Especially teenagers, which being a high school teacher, you know already.”
“I was just an aide.”
“You were close enough to smell their crap,” he said pointedly.
“That I was.”
“So you’re doing better now?”
“I’m fine now, just had one too many was all.”
“I don’t know how you even had one. You and me used to be the only dry people on this block!” Sam laughed a little too much and went silent.
“Yeah, my tastes changed.”
“It happens, I reckon.” He took a step off the porch with a lurch. “I hope your tastes go back, and you keep safe.”
“I’m trying.”
“I do understand.” Sam’s eyes glinted and he nodded then. “Well, say hi to Herman for me.”
“I will.”
He turned away—Janet swallowed something as dry as dead leaves, her voice scratched her throat— “Sam, um, do you still collect coins?”
The wind picked up at that moment, blowing Sam’s shoulder length gray hair and his retro Boston Red Sox t-shirt. He grinned faintly.
“Sure do,” he said.
FURY
Need to get to the store today to get some hand soap, can’t keep using dish soap, the stuff’s eating up my hands—too many stupid trips to the store for one item—how did Gabriele manage getting everything in one trip every Saturday—? Unbelievable—gets a little easier to bear each day but sure miss that gal—later, get the photo album out, if I’m up for it—
Glance out my window to the Erikson’s house—that poor woman needs help, both of them probably—none of my business—what the hell do I know—? Never had kids, never knew my parents, not much of an authority—I’m a sixty-seven year old retired self defense instructor who went from having a wife and a life, to watching bad science fiction movies every night, perched over processed TV dinner food— don’t know what life-lessons I could to offer to anybody, except several great chokeholds and “don’t eat the two Hungry Man dinners in the same day”—seeing Janet like that, damn, I need to get out there and start challenging myself—life ain’t over—life is still good—love my life—loved it better with Gabby, but there’s no changing that now—
Guess I have to get into some better clothes if I go out—damn it, shoulda got the soap when I was out buying the flowers—goofball, that’s what Gabby woulda called me—yes, I’m gonna have to get that album later—need to see her face and remember her— can’t understand how some other men just go right out and get another woman—well, keep it real—certainly wouldn’t turn down one to come by and keep me company again—not being unfaithful, or even feeling like I would be—but how do these other widowers start from scratch—? Seems like a really difficult place to begin a relationship from—ah well, she’d have to be special—nobody could be Gabby, but special they’d have to be—
Stomach feels wrong—go to the kitchen for some Pepto—well double shit, that’s gonna have to go on the list with the hand soap—where are my damn keys—? best get going before the stores get crammed with impatient cross-town traffic—they really ought to refrigerate Pepto in the store—hate it at room temperature, and by how warm this winter’s been, by the time I get home, gonna have to drink it lukewarm—guess I could drink it in the parking lot—can’t imagine how that would look—some old fart self medicating out in the open because he’s not too proud, oh no—but it really might have to be done just like that because my gut is feeling nasty right about now—
Fact is, everything feels nasty, it’s all of a sudden, and thinking of lying down a bit—things are blurry here in the kitchen, so I go to the bedroom, get on top of the unmade bed, dig out the comforter from under my back, just the movement makes me want to puke—outta nowhere, emotions are running high now, I’m thinking of Gabby not being here, feeling sorry for myself, tears in my eyes—feel so bloated, yet want to keep drinking until I black out—holy Christ is my gut bubbling—did I have any lemon lime soda left—? I should have checked—
Vomiting over the side of the bed, more liquid than I remember drinking, ever, and it tastes strange, like an astringent chemical—I’ve been poisoned—somehow, at some time, I’ve been poisoned—ate at the diner this morning and had pancakes and turkey bacon—nothing tasted weird—oh god, just thinking about that food and I’m puking more of the vile stuff—
Need to call for help—waves of dizziness overcome me, just when there’s another sickly tug at my stomach—fall off the bed and bang the back of my head—doesn’t hurt, my body’s numb—is this what dying feels like—?
Can’t remember where I put the cell phone—don’t look for it, just go you idiot, go outside, go to the neighbor’s house, the woman, Janet, you got her flowers, go and ask for help, she will help—
Crawling through the b
edroom, feel something staring at me from the darkness in my bathroom—it’s a bad thing, a monster, the eyes, the eyes are cold and wicked and black and unreal and I have to be imagining its gray flesh and shark teeth—the smell from it, the putrefaction of a corpse washed up on the shore of a contaminated river, my stomach jumps up into my mouth again, and all the dizziness returns, images marry together and my soul rips in half and those pieces in half and then those in half—and then I’m remembering—
The coin Janet gave me—it’s still in my hand and all the pain in the world feels to be coming from its center—took it to be nice, don’t collect coins anymore at all, but this coin has brought that monster, which is leaning over me, Christ, a shark’s face that blends into the body of a dragon—can’t drop the coin—stuck to my hand—!
“You’ve taken payment for a death that doesn’t belong to you—”
Gagging on puke, feel it run down my face, feel it burning my eyes—crawling away again, palms stinging with pins and needles, blood pounding in my embattled heart and head—my house tilts sideways and whips around, the universe on a spin cycle—catch sight of my cell phone on the couch—so far away, and the monster’s behind me, but it hasn’t eaten me—don’t think it wants to eat me—maybe not yet—
Reach up and take my phone—stare at the many number keys—they collide together in a vertigo mess that makes me blink frantically for focus—none comes—a reptile hand picks the phone out of my hand and gently tosses it back on the couch—
A human mouth speaks from beyond the shark’s rows of pink stained teeth—“What were three, are now one, and I am Fury—”
Retch on something rancid and my vision darkens—it’s about to go out entirely—
“You have a chance to stay my vengeance,” says the Fury with calm reassurance—“Do you know the song—? The song my heart so dearly needs to hear—?”
Want to sing him Gabby’s song, the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life”—Can’t remember which part—can’t talk, will never talk again—
Another surge comes from the depths of my stomach, but it halts in my throat—
“Who keeps the bottle now—?”
“The bottle—?” My thoughts are lost—
“How did you come by this coin—?”
Can’t answer—everything disintegrates and slides down, fluid pushes me over rough moving water—drowning, salt water forces into my lungs, balloons them, bursts them—keep moving on, nature’s plaything, rolling through the current, dragging across bone fragments that line the endless deep, only to fall past them, across underwater cliffs, and there is no real bottom to this, and can’t see the top, where the surface should be, or the sky, where’s the sky—? Nothing above, nothing below, everything inside, everything deep, deeper than the deepest, and cold, so freezing and unbearably icy frigid, alone, ultimate loneliness, worse than losing Gabby, how could that possibly be—? No, hell no, there is no such thing, until now, there is no sound, no love, no memories, not until I reach the other side, but what other side—? It’s long gone, forever gone, somebody sings—
The God doesn’t want any memories here—
They’ve died and will never come back.
8
Having a very large piece of yourself, a desperate desire, removed in total isn’t as cathartic as one would expect; sobriety is a dreary sensation that spreads from the toes, all the way into the brain, where it resides like a cold lump of lead; to be sure, it’s an experience that falls well short of bliss.
Janet had to sit down once it happened. At first she accepted this was the prolonged response of her body shutting down, that the bottle and the coin and maybe even Sam’s visit had been byproducts of a dying mind. Maybe she was still in the hospital right now, with Herman leaning over her, his big warm hands clasping her cold bloodless ones, telling her to hold on, to not leave him.
The strangeness occurred right after she’d given her coin away. She knew that something had been let go and she’d never have it back. More bizarre, letting go the coin had been this emotional journey that Sam inflicted upon her. His footsteps crossed from one side of her mind to the other and he went out an exit that always existed but until now hadn’t been discovered. It was a passing, a crossing, a final voyage that had been paid for in full.
And in the end of all of this, Janet didn’t want to make that trip to the liquor store. Not now, not ever. Her plans for another rendezvous with alcohol-induced death would never come to be. The thought of even one light beer repulsed her. The beloved acquired taste had returned to being vile, as it had before Melody went away.
Faye knocked on the front door, but unlocked it before Janet had the chance to rise from the couch. Her friend’s elfish face was sullen and defeated, and Janet knew the gym hadn’t turned up anything.
“You want me to call?” she asked, putting her purse down on the end table.
Janet felt dizzy. She should have felt relieved she could now do this without needing to be drunk (god that was strange), but it had been a long time since she faced reality in a sober vehicle. Fear was all around her.
“Yes please.”
Faye didn’t lose a moment and picked up her cell phone to dial the police department. While she waited she studied Janet closely. “Evan’s checking all the bars they used to go to.”
Janet nodded, but said nothing.
“Oh yes, I’d like to report a missing person. Will you send somebody to—” Faye’s expression changed to sudden confusion. “Oh.”
She held the phone away from her and said to Janet, “We can either go down there and file the report or do it over the phone. They don’t send anyone to your house.”
“Let’s just get it over with now,” said Janet, relieved no cops would be coming over.
“Wait, which way is more effective?” Faye questioned the dispatcher. She knitted her brow as an answer came. “Either way? You’re sure? We’ll just do it over the phone then. Yes. Okay, I’ll wait.” Faye looked over at Janet again and gave a weak smile.
Janet considered reasons why police didn’t come over to houses. Were there so many missing people now that the cops couldn’t keep up? That was a rather disturbing thought. People were vanishing at such a rate the police had to streamline the entire process, which meant their attention would not be only on her husband.
“Okay,” said Faye to the phone. “His name is Herman Erikson—hello? Are you there?” Faye rolled her eyes and shook her head. She leaned forward and whispered in Janet’s ear, “Scatterbrained.”
Janet nodded numbly.
“Yes, so as I was saying his name is Herman Erikson and he’s 6 foot 2, about—how much does he weigh?”
The question was for Janet. “Oh about two hundred and thirty pounds, I think.”
“Two-thirty, yeah, and brown hair and his eyes— pardon? What? Oh really?”
Janet sat up straight and grabbed her knees. What were they saying? Had they found him already? Tell me he’s alive. Please, tell me he’s alive. I won’t believe it, but I need to hear it.
“In twenty minutes?” Faye asked, her face long with surprise. “Sure, sure, same house. We’ll be here.” She pressed off her phone with a smirk. “Wow.”
Janet almost jumped to her feet. “What?”
“This cop knows you and Herman. Her shift’s almost done and she’s going to come over to take your report in person.”
“I don’t know any cop.”
“Well, she knows you. That’s good, right? Maybe they’ll put Herman on their priority list or something—well, I guess they can’t have those, but you know what I mean.”
Janet let her body slump back into the sofa. So the police would be here after all. Great.
After a moment, she got up and went to the bathroom. The bottle seemed to be in a different place on the sink than she remembered. Janet touched its glass, petted its cold surface. This morning she could only think about finishing what she started, drinking herself to sleep like her paternal grandfather had do
ne, but she could finally see past that foolishness. Her heart wasn’t healed, but her body was, for now.
There was only one bottle she needed now.
1) Describe the last thing you saw the person wearing: white t-shirt, blue jeans, black cross trainers.
2) Any known medical conditions and any medications that the missing person relies upon: Herman had high blood pressure. He wasn’t good about taking his pills, though. It was for maintenance, so not having them with him wouldn’t be life-threatening.
3) Photographs of the missing: (a) a shot of Herman and Janet at their anniversary dinner in San Francisco, a month before Melody was born (b) a cell phone picture of Herman on his birthday from this year, sitting on the couch, holding up a new flannel shirt Faye and Evan had bought him (c) Herman and Lester playing catch together in the backyard with a tennis ball.
4) Account—in as much detail as possible—where the person was and what he was doing before he went missing: Herman had arrived with Janet at the hospital. Hospital staff indicated he had been in the waiting room for several hours before leaving. Then, at approximately six in the morning, Evan Ledbetter spoke on the phone with him. Herman indicated he was driving and some of the things he said were nonsensical.
“What kind of nonsensical things?” asked Officer Davis.
Faye shrugged and looked at Janet. “I guess we need Evan for that. He hasn’t really wanted to talk about it that much.”
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