Lambs
Page 24
He hated playing Mother Hen, but the shaky kid could barely get along with the people he lived with—how was he going to survive on his own without getting in to some sort of trouble?
If the cops picked him up he was done. Burning Cottonwood. Killing Leon. They’d put the kid away for a long time.
Enough. Arthur explained the best he could. If Connor got it, he got it, but the ghost was getting closer and who knew how much longer the Satanic goons were willing to sit patiently in their car waiting for them to make a move. It was time to get this show on the road. He stressed and re-stressed the important points. Connor smiled and nodded and clutched his grenade tightly, but his crazy shakes and even crazier stare spelled trouble.
Arthur had the uneasy feeling that the kid was going to screw something up before this was all over. But as it stood Connor was on board and he was smiling and that’s really the best that could be hoped for. All things considered it was remarkable how the kid was holding it together what with those nasty, deep cuts all over his chest and back, but then Arthur remembered his ruined foot and noticed that he was smiling despite the continual throbbing and the approaching ghost and the compounding sense of doom that slowed his thoughts and then just like that Connor’s crazy joy was a little easier to understand. They were alive. They had a plan. There was hope.
Arthur felt like he should give Connor a hug or something. Instead he mussed the little guy’s hair with brotherly affection. “Hollywood is ours my man.”
They beamed at one another. It had been a rocky two years. They had their fair share of good times and bad. Three days after Arthur moved in to Cottonwood he was already defending Connor, holding him down, preventing him from lunging at Santos and getting his hyper ass kicked. They were lots of times when Arthur had to hold the jittery, sweaty spaz back until the blinding fire that drove his four foot frame to attack housemates nearly twice his size died away. There was an intimacy that bound them, born of intense moments—the rage leaving Connor broken and shivering, as helpless as an infant, while Arthur held him and whispered words of consolation—and it made them almost brothers, almost family, the closest thing to a true friendship that was possible in a cold place like Cottonwood.
The shaky kid was fucked up all right. A mess, like the well-drawn villains Arthur loved to read about in comic books. But he considered him a brother and wanted him to obtain the normal life he craved. Like in Arthur’s family picture. A mom and a dad and a cocoon of love.
Perhaps one day…
Arthur wanted to go over the plan again. Once more just in case. As he began, “Tues—”, his words tangled in his throat. Giuseppe was hovering directly behind Connor.
Panic drove him. He screamed things like “Move!” and “Run!” but Connor just stood there, his excited smile giving way to a perplexed stare. The world spun and Arthur lunged in a daze. He got Connor off guard and sent the poor kid tumbling down the embankment.
Giuseppe disappeared. Arthur’s head swam and bile crested at the top of his throat. Connor was lying on his back and his eyes were open, blinking. Arthur had to get away from him. He turned toward the Satanists. The driver had gotten out of the car but was holding his ground. The passenger remained in the passenger’s seat. Arthur wondered if he ran to them would Giuseppe follow?
As if to answer his question the bulky ghost reappeared hovering over Connor’s prone form. Arthur shouted “Run!” yet again, but it was too late. The behemoth descended, most of its body disappearing into the ground until only its head and shoulders were visible. Giuseppe raised his right hand and pressed the ghost gun against Connor’s left temple.
The gun went off and there was an explosion inside Arthur’s heart. He sensed the blast at his core and tremors wracked his nerves so that he felt as if he were vibrating apart. Giuseppe rose up and hovered a few feet above Connor’s lifeless body. The meaty gristle about his temples disappeared and his face was as smooth as machined porcelain. He looked whole, almost alive, almost there. His dark eyes filled in the empty sockets and darted shadily from the left to the right. The gun was gone and his hands were squeezed into harmless fists. He floated for a second, maybe two, and Arthur thought he saw the beginnings of a smile paint his lips before he flashed away in a blur of anti-light.
* * *
Arthur stumbled down the overpass. He fell halfway and slammed against the pavement at a few awkward, painful angles. When he settled at the bottom he lay still for a few seconds. He didn’t want to see his best friend dead. He didn’t want to see the mess Giuseppe made of Connor’s head. But he had to. So groaning through the new bruises, he pulled himself from the ground and crawled over.
Connor’s eyes were still open, his mouth slightly parted, and he looked as if he was going to say something. Arthur tried to ignore the red, black, pink mess that gunked up the little guy’s temples. He wanted to pretend that Connor was okay, that he was just in mid-thought, trying to wrap his aggravating stutter around something important.
Pebbles and debris bit into Arthur’s elbows as he crawled closer and put his head on Connor’s chest. Something hard and knobby dug into his side. Arthur adjusted, rolled, and noticed that Connor’s little hand was still clutching the grenade. He took it, sealing its heft in his right hand and then resumed his position, placing his swimmy head on Connor’s still chest.
“Hey?” One of the Satanists called from their car. “You boys okay?”
Arthur ignored it and listened to Connor’s silent heart for signs or secrets. He pressed his face harder and focused his hearing. “Please,” he whispered.
“Is he okay?” The second Satanist. His voice was a little higher and tinged with genuine concern.
What Arthur hoped to glean from Connor’s cooling biology was a mystery, but still, there should be something, some thing, some kind of relief or closure. But while listening to the hum of blood slowing he was met with nothing save for the noise between his ears. He supposed he was hoping for a justification of sorts, for a hard, shiny thing deep inside him to awaken and sing his praises for putting poor, poor, shaky, insane Connor out of his misery. Or for internal commiseration—it’s not your fault Arthur—you couldn’t help it Arthur—it’s beyond your control Arthur. But no. There was no consolation here. What Giuseppe did (and Adele and Fred every three years) wasn’t just. There were no upsides or benefits. And Arthur, being the conduit, the center, the cause, was equally to blame. Prevention had always been an option. It was as easy as opening up his wrists (for real) or jumping into traffic. Hell, all he had to do was let Connor’s fire consume him back at Cottonwood. But no. He had to press on. He had to survive.
What was he afraid of?
Why didn’t he end it all back at ten, eleven, twelve years old when he grew the brains to ponder, to really consider his odd affliction? He knew he was hurting people. He knew he was responsible. He knew then the only way to stop it was to kill himself. Instead, he spent year after year convincing himself that he was crazy, or while wrapped up in the aftermath, dead bodies and psychological evaluations and new placements, he tried to pretend like he had nothing to do with anything. Pretending, lying, denying. He was as guilty as his ghosts if not more so.
What was he afraid of?
Could dying really be that bad? There was either nothing (his suspicion) or reincarnation or some sort of afterlife. All three were better than living cursed and murderous and afflicted right?
Arthur sat up. And if he continued on, if he marched over to the Satanists and went with them and confessed his involuntary crimes, what then? Could they help him? Would they make things worse (they worshipped the flipping Devil)? And should he feign ambivalence and embrace life, how long before his heart stopped beating? How long before the murders ceased and the tortured souls that clung to his essence found their bloody deliverance and faded away never to return? Arthur closed his eyes and clenched his lids. Would there ever come a time when he didn’t think about dying or regret or worry? Was it normal to worry about shit as mu
ch as he did? He didn’t think so.
A wave of emotion hit him and unhitched his heart. The pulsing organ floated free in his chest and throbbed with pain, each beat a wincing sting. Connor was dead. His fucked up best friend was really dead. Fifteen years. Fifteen awkward years. He deserved better. Tears roared from his sockets in violent, twin hurricanes and a long, ropy string of snot dangled from his nose. Arthur didn’t bother to wipe his face, instead he let sorrow reign and cried until his ducts stung with exhaustion.
Both thugs had exited their car and were walking toward him. Arthur stood up and took in a great gust of air. He held the grenade aloft. The thugs stopped in their tracks.
“Easy son,” the taller of the two men said.
“Yeah easy,” his counterpart echoed.
Arthur ignored them. He gripped the rough metal. In one fast, decisive moment he pulled the pin and let the safety bar flip through the air. Its dark, metallic arcs sent the thugs running. Arthur pressed salvation to his chest. His brain kicked into hyperspeed, seconds to go, years upon years of shit to sift through.
A short sixteen years.
Not a boy, not a man.
And Fuck you he thought to no one and everyone.
Fuck you and your unfair curse!
Tears continued to fall fast and heavy.
I just wanted to live and love and…
He didn’t want to go out like this, crying and complaining, so he screwed up his strength and smiled on the impending end.
He wiped at his face with his free hand and bid adieu to Adele, Giuseppe and Fred and wished them peace.
He bid adieu to the world, to social services, to his long dead parents, to Connor’s spasms, to Melanie’s crushingly beautiful, exquisitely expressive eyes.
He bid adieu to thought and worry and fear and became the ever-widening smile that spread across his face. By the time the burn flared with destruction there was nothing left to incinerate but uncontainable joy and freedom.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Louis Calvillo writes lovely dark fiction. If you love to read, and you’re a little bit freaky, you will most likely enjoy his stuff.
Check out his library of literary chaos @ the website: michaellouiscalvillo.com.
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Table of Contents
LAMBS
1. Growing Pains
2. The Flame
3. A Girl Thing
4. The Fine Art of Self-Sabotage
5. House Warming
6. Impulse Control
7. Regression
8. Ever Burning
9. The Substitute
10. The Pin
11. Pretending the Future
12. Bright Young Thing
13. The Pin (Reprise)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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