They

by J. F. Gonzalez

  “What is it? Is it my mother?” Vince’s heart was racing.

  “I’m afraid your mother has been murdered, son.”

  Vince sat on the bed, the news of his mother’s death settling over him. It should be affecting him more than it was, but it wasn’t. It felt as if the news Chief Hoffman had delivered was more along the lines of, I regret to inform you that your appointment with your accountant has to be changed—is Saturday morning okay? Or, the kids down the street from your house stole your garbage cans; would you like to press charges?

  “Vince? Are you there?”

  “Yes, I’m here. What did you say?”

  “I said, your mother has been murdered.” There was a sense of awkwardness on the other end of the line, as if Chief Hoffman wasn’t used to delivering this kind of news. Vince supposed he wasn’t. He’d lived in Lititz for a little over a year, and the most local law enforcement had to put up with was catching speeders on Route 501 and breaking up the occasional bar fight at the local tavern.

  “How?” Vince asked. “What happened?”

  That seemed to break the tension. “Well, we’re investigating it now as a homicide because that’s certainly what it looks like. It appears to have been a breakin gone bad. Her neighbor, Jacob Harris, found her when she failed to show up to church that day. The door was busted open and the place was ransacked. They found Maggie in her bedroom.” Chief Hoffman’s voice was deadpan. “She was slashed up pretty bad. The coroner thinks she probably bled to death.”

  “My God,” Vince said. He was shocked.

  “Nothing appears taken,” Tom Hoffman continued. “At least not yet. The place was a mess; drawers pulled out and rummaged through, cabinets opened and stuff spilled out, sofa cushions slashed open. Crap everywhere. They even tore apart the attic. Nothing valuable appears to have been taken, but then your mother didn’t appear to have anything of value anyway.”

  “No, I don’t think she did,” Vince said. As far as he knew, his mother had disavowed all worldly things years ago.

  “Anyway, Lillian Withers suggested I call you,” Sheriff Hoffman said. “She said that you’d been estranged from your mother for quite some time, but she felt you should know.”

  The mention of Lillian Withers cut through the din of shock that Vince felt over hearing the news of his mother’s death. He managed a slight smile. He’d always liked Lillian, even though she was cut of the same fundamentalist Christian mold of his mother. He didn’t know why he liked her; perhaps it was the gentle way she listened to him when he was growing up, the times she baby-sat him when he was ten years old and mother had that awful job at the factory. This would have been when they were living in Toronto, Canada. Man how time flies, he thought. But there were other reasons why he felt a special fondness for Lillian above all the other people Mom had chosen to surround them with when he was growing up. She’d provided a human touch and voice when all that was shoved down his throat was hellfire and damnation. And in a world devoid of love—especially from his mother—that went a long way.

  “I’m glad you did,” Vince said. He ran a hand through his hair. “How did you find me?”

  “We may be small town cops, but we can still track people down if we have to.” Chief Hoffman gave his first genuine laugh since he called, and Vince found that to be a welcoming relief as well. “Although I gotta admit, it was tough. With no criminal record to go by, it took me about four hours longer than usual.” This time they both laughed, and Vince found himself in a better frame of mind than he’d felt in…why since Laura’s death. “I finally got your address through tracing your social security number. We kept running names until we found a match.”

  “When did this all happen?” Vince said. He had a million questions and they all beckoned to be answered now.

  “Last night, we think. She was found early this morning. I’ve been putting off calling you because…well, I don’t convey bad news very well. Never have. Especially when it comes to something this grim.”

  “I understand.”

  “Lillian wanted me to give you a message,” Tom Hoffman said. “She wanted to know if you could come out and sort of…help out with making the funeral arrangements and maybe tending to your mother’s property.”

  “Of course,” Vince said. Isn’t that what you were supposed to do when your mother passed away? “I’ll try to get out there tomorrow if I can.”

  “Thank you, Vince. And please accept my condolences.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Goodnight, Vince.”

  “Night.”

  He hung up the phone feeling numb, detached. Despite the severity of the news, he didn’t feel anything. He supposed he should feel some sense of outrage or grief. After all, it was his mother who’d been murdered. But he didn’t feel any of those things. A part of him felt guilty over his lack of immediate sorrow and grief, but he quickly quashed them. He’d been a mess when he heard about Laura’s death. He’d cried, gone into a rage. The depth of his mourning for Laura was so deep that he didn’t think he would be able to pull himself out of it. But he was starting to do just that. And now there was the news of his mother’s sudden death.

  But he didn’t feel sad over what had happened to his mother. Not in the least bit.

  Because let’s face it, he thought as he exited the bedroom and headed downstairs in his Bart Simpson boxer shorts, she was a sad excuse for a mother the last fourteen years. She didn’t even want to see me, much less hear from me. The way she treated me when I left for college, when I graduated, when I got married. She told me I was the spawn of hell. What kind of mother tells her child that?

  One like Maggie Walters, obviously. A woman who immerses herself so deep in crazed Christian Fundamentalism that even snake-handling Pentecostals think she’s off her rocker. A woman who plucks her son away from his father at the age of eight and moves him all the way across the country, then enters him in no less than a dozen schools between then and when he’s sixteen, trying everything she can to suppress his life, ruling over him with an iron fist and the King James Bible…telling him that even if he lived in accordance to the word of God he was probably going to Hell anyway…that was a woman who lost all respect from her son.

  But I’m all she’s got she can call family, he thought as he pulled out the Yellow Pages from the counter near the phone and began flipping through it to find the travel agencies. What else can I do?

  With that question in his mind, he began making arrangements to fly to Pennsylvania the following morning.

  Chapter Two

  FOURTEEN YEARS.

  It was hard to believe it had been that long since he’d set foot in Lancaster County, much less the state of Pennsylvania itself, but that’s how long it had been. Fourteen long years that seemed to have gone by with the speed of a few months.

  Vince Walters thought about the time gone by as Delta Flight 189 taxied down the runway of Philadelphia International Airport. It was already late afternoon, and he had another two-hour drive to Lititz. He unfastened his seat belt, pulled his carry-on baggage out from beneath the seat in front of him and put it on his lap. An elderly woman beside him was watching the scene from the window with a sense of longing; she was coming to visit her brother who she hadn’t seen in fifteen years. They’d talked briefly during the nearly five-hour flight, and Vince hadn’t lent himself too well to the conversation. She was a sweet woman, but he had too much on his mind. Last night’s conversation with Tom Hoffman for starters.

  And then the dreams.

  The dreams had actually been recurring figments for the past year now. The first one had started off innocently enough; he is alone in the dark, seated on something (a raised dais perhaps?) There is the faint flickering illumination of lights far off in the distance. He thinks it might be candles but he can’t be sure. And then he senses others with him, grouped around him. He is elevated above them somehow, as if the dais is a throne. And then the low hum starts. That’s when he wakes up.

  O
r at least when he used to wake up. The dream had intensified a little bit as the months passed, and they seemed to explode after Laura died. This time the low hum turned into a chant, and the darkness in the room lifted just ever so slightly so that he could make out the figures gathered around him. Only they seemed to be cloaked in darkness.

  He’d sought therapy when the second dream came. This dream was more disturbing and violent.

  In this dream he is around three years old. He is in a house somewhere. There are other adults in the house with him. It feels very much like the adults are here to visit his parents, although he doesn’t see them anywhere. He doesn’t really recognize anybody in the dream, although he feels that he should. They all have a sense of familiarity to them that is nagging. In the dream he is happy and playing. One of the adults, a young woman, acts as a babysitter. She sits by him, smiling at him as he plays with a Mr. Potato Head on the floor. A few other adults are gathered around talking to her, pausing every now and then to look at him. They are keeping an eye on him, making sure he doesn’t hurt himself or get into any trouble.

  After awhile he senses they’ve left their positions and are now in other areas of the house. He turns to see where they’ve gone and finds that the woman is now talking to somebody on the couch on the other side of the room. Her back is to him. All the people in the room are young; the women lithe, wearing blue jeans and halter-tops or long flowing dresses. Their hair is parted down the middle. Some are wearing headbands. The men, likewise, are long-haired for the most part. Some are sporting beards. Others have short hair, but appear to resemble the other men by their choice of dress: blue jeans, sandals, T-shirts or denim vests. There is a scent in the air that he has later come to associate with marijuana. It hangs in the air like a cloud.

  He doesn’t notice the wild man until it is almost too late. He sees him hanging in the background of the hustle and bustle of the party, watching over everything with avid interest. Every time Vince turns to see what is going on among the adults, the wild man averts his eyes, as if he doesn’t want Vince to know he is watching him. The man has long scraggly hair and a beard, ratty looking T-shirt and jeans, barefoot, beaded necklaces hanging down his hairy chest. His eyes are gray and piercing in the dim light. He hangs back in the shadows, leaning against the doorjamb between the living room and the kitchen. Not talking or mingling with anybody.

  Vince continues playing quietly with himself. He is happy and content. And then a forearm snakes around his throat and hoists him off the ground roughly.

  He is jarred out of his play as he’s lifted off the ground. He begins screaming and crying, mostly from the shock of being so roughly picked up, but also from the pain and pressure of the arm around his throat. He screams, but he can’t hear himself over the shouts of the others in the room. He feels a mad rush, and then all at once everything is a sense of jarred images: shaken perceptions of the room he is in, as if he’s being jostled about; excited and angry voices; the rush of running people, the crush and mad violence as he is pushed and pulled and shoved; the constriction of his throat, and then the sharp pain as something is held against his temple, the point digging into his flesh, and over it the mad voice of the man who has picked him up. The man is shouting something above the din of the others and he sounds angry and insane. And then there is nothing else but the screaming and the total helplessness of being unable to escape.

  The first time he had the dream he came awake gasping for breath, the beginning of a scream lodged in his throat. He’d thrown the covers off his body, his skin tinged with sweat as the nightmare washed over him. Laura had only been gone a month and he hadn’t had what he referred to as his “darkness” dream in months, and then all of a sudden he’s hit with this. That first night he’d climbed out of bed and went to the bathroom where he’d splashed cold water on his face, then leaned over the wash-basin, head bowed, trying to gather his composure. His adrenaline had been pumping and he felt nervous, tingly. He felt like he’d just escaped the clutches of a deranged madman, or the jaws of a slobbering monster. He looked into the mirror at his reflection, ignoring the dark circles under his eyes. “God, that was bad,” he’d said. “That was a bad one.”

  He’d tried to get back to sleep that night, but remained awake.

  The dream returned a few nights later, more intense and terrifying then the original. The second time he had it he woke up screaming.

  The third time the dream came there was an added bonus. As he struggled to free himself from the wild man’s grip, as the madness erupted around him, he felt warm wetness cascading over him, soaking him completely. And then the smell of blood.

  He’d screamed himself awake that time.

  Vince gazed out the window as the 757 angled into the terminal. Passengers next to him began to rise and gather their baggage. Vince rose to his feet and hung back, waiting until the plane was stopped and people began moving. The elderly woman who’d been seated next to him had already gathered her purse and was standing up, waiting patiently for the aisle to clear. She cast him a warm smile. “I hope you enjoy your stay in Philadelphia,” she said.

  “Thank you,” Vince said. He almost said, I hope so too. He didn’t think anything about this trip was going to be enjoyable.

  “Are you visiting family?”

  “Family.” He confirmed.

  “Oh, that’s nice! Cousins? Aunts or uncles?”

  “A little of both, actually,” Vince lied. He looked down the aisle to see if it was moving. The plane had finally parked and those that were in first class seemed to be getting up and moving. Vince was halfway back in coach, near the wing. It would be a while before those in the front of the plane cleared the way enough to allow him to leave his aisle.

  “Well that’s so nice,” the elderly woman said. She was wearing cranberry colored slacks and a lavender blouse. Her hair was a mix-match of blond and gray, short and curly. She looked to be somewhere between sixty-five and one hundred. “It gives me such joy to see young people like yourself take time out to visit with their families. I think family is a very important thing to have.”

  “I agree,” Vince said. The truth was, he didn’t. As far as he was concerned, she could take her concept of the American Family as defined by wherever she’d gotten the myth from—Newt Gingrich, Ralph Reed, whoever—and shove it up her elderly ass. The only thing the concept of the American Family had ever done for him was hurt and scar him.

  He turned to glance out the window, making as if to check the weather. What he was really doing was avoiding more conversation. The woman was nice and he was sure she meant well, but if he had to engage in conversation with her for another ten seconds he was going to snap at her and he didn’t want to do that.

  She seemed to take his turning away as a hint and settled her sights on the aisle again. Already those that were toward the front of coach were moving into the aisle and down, heading out of the plane. Vince sighed, hoping the crowd would hurry up. He still had to get his baggage, secure a rental car, and drive out to Lititz. And then he wanted to find a hotel and try to catch some winks. He hadn’t slept well at all last night.

  The dreams…

  Both of them hit him last night, the “darkness dream” followed by the dream in which it felt like he was going to be murdered by the long-haired man. He hadn’t had either dream in months and had come awake with a sudden gasp, the scream on his lips, his body dotted with sweat. The bedroom windows had been open, allowing an offshore breeze to blow through the curtains to help cool down the house. He usually slept better on warm nights with the windows open a crack.

  Not so last night. He hadn’t been able to get to sleep at all, and he finally rose around four a.m. and went downstairs to watch TV. When seven-thirty came, he’d called Brian Saunders’ office. Brian had picked up on the second ring. “Brian.”

  “Brian, its Vince.”

  “Vince! How’re you doin’ this fine morning?” Vince could picture Brian at his desk, immaculately dressed, spo
rt coat hung up on the coat rack in the corner of his office, his chair overlooking the sprawling suburbs of Irvine and north Mission Viejo. Brian Saunders had the best office in the building. “You caught me just in time. I was just about to go down to the cafeteria to indulge.”

  “Those breakfast burritos will kill you, bro,” Vince had said, grinning.

  “I know, but ya gotta have a vice, right?” Brian chuckled.

  “I guess so.” Vince then plunged into the news of his mother’s death with Brian pretty easy. There was no holding back with Brian on anything. Next to Laura, Brian was his best friend. “Listen Brian, I got some bad news last night. My mother passed away and I’ve got a ten-thirty flight to Pennsylvania this morning.”

  “My God, that’s horrible!” Brian had exclaimed. He’d become serious almost immediately. “What happened?”

  Vince had given him a quick run-down, which really wasn’t much. Brian listened calmly and quietly. When Vince finished, Brian’s voice was low, sincere. “I’m very sorry to hear what happened, Vince. I know…well, I know you two weren’t very close, but still, it’s a horrible thing. It’s a horrible way for her to die.”

  “I know,” Vince had said. He’d been sitting on the couch, still dressed in his Bart Simpson boxer shorts. He’d turned down the volume of the TV, which was tuned to VH1. Lenny Kravitz had been singing about an American Woman. “I keep thinking that I should feel differently about all this. I should feel…sad, or…I don’t know…”

  “You should be mourning,” Brian had said. “The way you mourned for Laura.”

  Vince had nodded to himself. “Exactly. But I don’t. Is that shitty, or what? Here my mother has died—been murdered—and I react as if it was nothing more than a goldfish I had for two weeks that kicked the bucket.”

  “But you weren’t close to your mother,” Brian had quickly interjected. “You told me yourself how she treated you. How she neglected you. I mean, look how she reacted when you told her you were getting married.”