The Unseen

by Bryan, JL

  Later, a massage therapist would visit Peyton’s room. He was hoping for someone Swedish and blond, but he’d been hoping for that with his aquatic physical therapist and been sorely disappointed.

  Now, Peyton sat in his bed, raised to a sitting position so he could eat his lunch—brie and ham croissant, melon balls, and arugula salad, all of it fresh and delicious. Milton Hospital did not fuck around with their catering.

  He flipped past an old vampire movie on his room’s large flat-screen TV and stopped on the History Channel, where he watched a documentary about mysterious ancient megaliths while he ate. The show skipped over the obvious sites like Stonehenge and dug into more obscure corners of the world, like the stone statues and gates of Tiwanaku in Bolivia, a city more than a thousand years old and long abandoned. The show panned over hundreds of ‘dolmens’ on a South Korean island called Ganghwa, each dolmen consisting of a capstone weighing hundreds of tons supported by two very thin, relatively feeble-looking stones. Some of them had been standing for nearly three thousand years.

  “Who built these mysterious cities, these haunting ruins?” the narrator kept asking, but never answering. “What ancient people gave rise to such wonders?”

  “Look it up on fucking Wikipedia, man!” Peyton finally shouted at the screen.

  “Oh, excuse me!” somebody said. “Are you upset?”

  Two young women stood in his open doorway. They weren’t wearing scrubs, but blouses and long skirts. He didn’t recognize them, but they were around his age, and they were pretty.

  “Oh, hey, sorry. It’s the TV’s fault.” Peyton paused the DVR. “So, are you my massage therapists?” Please say yes.

  They looked at each other and laughed.

  “Sorry, no,” said one, a pretty blond girl with a black eyepatch like a pirate concealing her right eye.

  “We’re the Cheer-up Crew!” said the other girl, taller and olive-skinned.

  “Yeah, what?” Peyton asked.

  “We volunteer through our church,” the first girl said, and Peyton tried not to roll his eyes. He was rapidly losing interest in them, and he wanted to learn about Göbekli Tepe, an eleven-thousand-year-old stone temple in southern Turkey.

  The second girl stepped back into the hall and pulled a cart next to the door. It held a dozen vases of bright flowers, each with a different species of plush animal attached with a ribbon.

  “We go out to hospitals and old folks’ homes once a month to cheer up the patients,” the first girl continued. “I’m Reese. That’s Marnie.”

  “Hi-ey!” the olive-skinned girl waved.

  “And they let you do that?” Peyton asked.

  “If we ask the doctors nicely!” Reese said, and Marnie laughed.

  “Would you like a puppy?” Marnie asked.

  “No, not this guy.” Reese drifted closer to the bed, her single blue eye taking in Peyton’s face as though mesmerized. “He looks more like a tiger to me.”

  “Tiger!” Marnie cheered. She brought a vase of flowers with a little stuffed tiger attached and set them on a shelf in his room. “It already looks nicer in here.”

  “What are you watching? Ancient stuff?” Reese looked at the screen.

  “Stone Age monoliths. Listen, thanks for the flowers, but I’m not interested in attending your church or whatever you’re going to try and sell me. You can just leave the brochure.”

  “What brochures?” Reese held up her empty hands. “Marnie, do you have any brochures?”

  Marnie pretended to check among the flowers and stuffed animals on her cart. “Fresh out!”

  “We’re just supposed to cheer people up,” Reese said. “If talking about religion doesn’t, then we won’t! Hey, is Machu Picchu on this show? I’ve always wanted to go there.”

  “They might. They’re talking about Göbekli Tepe. In Turkey.”

  “Oh, this is hardcore.” Reese sank into one of the two guest chairs, uninvited. “Don’t you always wonder what went on at old places like that? I mean, if a temple’s ten thousand years old, right, then what did they worship there? Who did they worship?”

  “I’m guessing your church has a theory,” Peyton said.

  Reese laughed and held up her hands, shaking her head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to go there. So what happened to you? Can I ask?”

  “Car crash.”

  “Ow!” Marnie eased into the chair beside Reese. “Was it bad?”

  “Broke some ribs.”

  “Ohh!” both girls gasped as though in pain. Peyton tried not to laugh at them.

  “How did it happen?” Reese asked.

  “It’s kind of a wild story. You’re too innocent for some of the details.”

  “Who says I’m innocent?” Reese leaned forward until her cheek rested on the armrail of his bed, her one blue eye gazing up at him. “Come on. We like wild stories.”

  Marnie nodded vigorously and leaned forward in her chair. Both girls watched him as though they couldn’t wait to hear, bathing him in the warmth of their complete attention.

  Peyton began, hesitantly, to tell them a version of the events, leaving out the drugs. They acted as though entirely fascinated by his DJ work, peppering him with enthusiastic questions, and he warmed up to them. They leaned closer, as though enraptured, as he told them of the behemoth truck lined with smokestacks, charging toward him along both lanes, and how his car had spun.

  The more the girls listened, the more Peyton wanted to talk.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Maybe you should come around more,” Kieran said. “Fucking Class D license. I can only drive with family members. So, you know, just mom.”

  Kieran was driving their mother’s Hyundai a bit unsteadily down the crowded interstate toward the center of the city, caught in three p.m. traffic. Cassidy was on her way to the first of three physical therapy appointments she was receiving from the public health system.

  Their mother had told Kieran to take Cassidy to her appointments, knowing he would never turn down a chance to drive under his restrictive provisional license. Cassidy understood it was supposed to be her time to talk with her brother and attempt to be some kind of good influence.

  “So what have you been up to these days?” Cassidy asked. “You and your friends?”

  “Just hanging out.” He shrugged.

  “Sounds kind of lame.”

  “Whatever. Everything costs money.”

  “You could get a job.”

  “I tried that,” Kieran said. “I got a job at the Burger Taco place for like a week. But they stick you with all these hours you have to work, and they’re total dicks if you like aren’t there on time, or if you have to leave early or whatever. I mean, I have stuff to do.”

  “What stuff? You said you need money to do stuff.”

  “Right, but only until the band takes off,” Kieran said.

  “The band?”

  “I’m in a band now!”

  “You have to tell me about it.”

  “You wouldn’t like it.”

  “I know a lot of DJ’s at a lot of clubs,” Cassidy told him.

  “Okay, check it out. We do like a costume thing—”

  “Like KISS?”

  “More like Gwar, with the big monster suits,” Kieran said. “Only not as elaborate, because that would be hard. And then we do like a Swedish deathcore sound but then we rap the lyrics.”

  “So it’s like a novelty act? It’s a joke?” Cassidy asked.

  “No, no! It’s for real. Like we really want to freak people out, with fake blood and stuff. And make people scared and scream.”

  “Have you played anywhere?”

  “We’re still in rehearsal, you know. In Devin’s garage. But we did record the rehearsal. Want to hear it?”

  “Yep, I really do.” Cassidy braced herself. “What do you play in the band?”

  “I’m the second rapper,” he said. “Bruce is the main rapper, because he owns the soundboard and microphones and stuff. And Devin plays drum
s. We need a guitarist and some other stuff.”

  “Wait, so it’s just you rapping with drums—” Cassidy began, but then the speakers buzzed and whined as they blasted a deafening, crashing, rhythm-free drum solo by Devin the Blue-Haired Ass Grabber. If she focused, she could barely discern human voices attempting to rhyme somewhere in the background.

  She turned the volume down.

  “You like it?” he asked.

  “I think it needs work.”

  “Yeah, we need more musicians and stuff, but we’ve got the rappers and the drummer. Anyway, it’s the idea that’s going to make it sell, the monster costumes and things like that.”

  “Okay. Then what?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, what are your plans? After high school?” Cassidy asked.

  “Oh. Man, don’t bother me about that right now. I was in summer school all day already. Stupid English. When am I ever going to use that in real life?” Kieran shook his head.

  “You don’t have any other ideas about your future, though? Like what kind of job you want?”

  “I told you. The band.”

  “I’m not sure how realistic that is, Kieran...”

  “You’re just like Mom!” he snapped. “Mom didn’t want you to be an artist, but you did it anyway. And now you’re telling me I can’t make music.”

  “You can, but don’t expect to make a living from it.”

  “You make a living doing your thing.”

  “Just barely. And people can’t download their tattoos free from the Internet, like they can with music. I know a lot of musicians, and they all have crappy day jobs.”

  Kieran rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything.

  “That thing I found in your room,” Cassidy said. “The little brochure from the cult. Did you really fill out the questions—”

  “I already told you, that was just a joke! How hard is that to understand?”

  “I just want to know you’re not taking it seriously.”

  “When did you get so lame?” Kieran shook his head.

  The physical therapist’s office was in a low cinderblock building near the hospital. The interior was sparse, with old carpet and a couple of exercise machines. Her assigned therapist wasn’t Ibis, unfortunately, but a fiftyish lady named Shirley with a croaking voice that sounded like decades of cigarettes. She stretched Cassidy’s muscles with her hands, showing little mercy.

  The exercises involved pulling weight via a pulley and cable. She raised the weight to work her quads, and pulled it down to work her hamstrings. It was slow, painful work.

  Shirley showed her the same exercises Ibis had and told her to do them three times a day. So far, Cassidy had been doing them zero times a day.

  “Does Ibis ever work over here?” Cassidy asked.

  “Who’s that?”

  “He’s the therapist who visited me in the hospital.”

  “I don’t recognize the name. Must be one of the new people. I’m better with faces than names.”

  “Me, too,” Cassidy said. “He’s the tall black guy? Kind of cute?”

  “I don’t know everybody in the hospital,” Shirley said. “Let’s do one more set.”

  Cassidy groaned as she pulled weight with her throbbing leg.

  On the drive home, Kieran was in a much less chatty mood, and instead blasted the hard electronic sounds of Skrillex over the Hyundai’s shivering, whining sound system. Cassidy’s leg thudded with pain, and she saw transparent creatures everywhere. Grey moth-like bugs with wings like condors glided above the interstate, along with the vulture-things.

  At the apartment, Kieran reluctantly helped her up the stairs while her right leg shivered with ache and exhaustion. Cassidy tried to ignore the little worms and bugs crawling on his skin, feeding freely on him.

  Inside, Cassidy strained to keep her balance on her crutches. Kieran moved a stack of unopened mail from one of the wooden dining chairs, then carried the chair away down the hall.

  “What are you doing?” Cassidy followed him to the bathroom, where he pulled aside the shower curtain and placed the chair into the tub. Under Kieran’s watch, the bathroom had grown far dirtier than it had been when Cassidy lived there. The white shower tiles had grown yellow, and a strange dark crust lined the rim of the toilet bowl.

  “You kinda reek, so I figured you need a shower,” Kieran said. “This is how Devin showered when he broke his leg at the roller skating rink in sixth grade.”

  “How did he do that?”

  “Trying to impress some girl who wasn’t even looking at him,” Kieran snickered.

  “Thanks for the chair. That’s a big help.”

  “I know.” Kieran stepped past her and out of the bathroom.

  “Can you bring me a towel?” Cassidy asked. The only towel in the bathroom was balled up on the floor next to the toilet.

  “Fine!” Kieran sounded exasperated, but he made the huge sacrifice of bringing her a clean towel from the linen closet. “Anything else, Your Highness?”

  “Guess not. So you’re going to do your homework now?”

  “Shut up, Mom.” Kieran slammed the bathroom door in her face, closing her inside, then stomped back to his room and blasted what might have been Swedish death metal over his speakers.

  Undressing herself was a tricky, slow process, but she eventually managed it. Cassidy eased her way into the wooden chair and sighed in relief when she sat down. She’d been sponge-bathing herself with a wet towel over the sink, and hadn’t really enjoyed a shower since Friday.

  The hot water splashed over her, and she took her time shampooing, soaping, and rinsing, though the water turned cold after five minutes. She didn’t care. It was good to feel clean and refreshed, even if brownish transparent bugs with nine legs and long stalks for eyes trundled along the dirty wall tiles.

  Afterward, she knotted her towel around herself and hopped to the small bedroom. She paused in the doorway, trying to figure out why the room looked different.

  After a moment, she figured it out. There were no bugs in the room at all, not a single segmented worm or fat mutant fly. Though her brain ached and itched with sobriety, the hallucinations were suddenly gone.

  She turned her head. The ugly little creatures were still half-visible as usual in the hallway and in the bathroom. Only her room was cleared of them.

  Let me clear your room, Barb had said. Just a clearing spell to get rid of any little evil things that might be hanging around.

  Cassidy’s heart thumped a little faster, and she felt momentarily disoriented. If Barb’s silly spell had worked, that implied that the bugs were real, and that magic was real, and the supernatural was real...

  Or maybe it was a placebo effect. Barb’s little ritual had convinced Cassidy’s mind to stop hallucinating the ugly little beasties in her room. Cassidy told herself that was the answer—it was all psychological.

  Still, when she entered the room, the atmosphere felt changed, as if it were lighter and clearer somehow. It’s all in your head, Cassidy reminded herself.

  She underwent the extremely difficult process of pulling on her underwear, shorts, and tank top, then she slung her purse around her neck and hobbled through the living room and out onto the balcony for a smoke.

  Cassidy texted Peyton: PT kicked my ass. Leg feels broken again. How are you?

  He didn’t respond for a few hours, and his message was only four words: Sleepy. Good drugs goodnite.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Tuesday afternoon, Peyton was surprised to see Reese return to his room, bearing a tall glass Starbucks bottle and an enormous blueberry muffin.

  “Hi again,” Reese said.

  “Hey,” Peyton said. “I thought you guys only did the hospital thing once a month.”

  “We do. I just kept thinking about you, poor boy with the broken ribs.”

  “It’s not that serious. I’m getting discharged today.”

  “Oh, good!” She chewed her lower lip as if nervous. Her
mouth was just a little pouty, her single blue eye beautiful, her other eye concealed by the black patch. “I just thought I’d come by on my lunch break. I brought you a muffin.”

  “That thing’s huge,” Peyton said. “I just had lunch.”

  “I know, and it’s full of carbs and sugar...” Reese licked her lips. “Want to share it?”

  “Okay.”

  Reese sat on the edge of his bed, her shapely ass temptingly close to his hand. She wore a black skirt today, longer but tighter than yesterday’s, and a sleeveless pink blouse. He watched her pink fingernails tear off a chunk of blueberry muffin and place it between her lips.

  “It’s so good,” she whispered, as though letting him in on a dangerous secret. She tore off another chunk and fed it into his open mouth.

  Peyton chewed the snack—it was okay, not as great as she pretended. Kind of dry. He wondered what she wanted. He imagined Cassidy walking in and finding the pretty blond girl on his bed. He doubted that scenario would end well.

  “You must think I’m crazy, showing up like this,” Reese said. She began to rise from the bed, but very slowly, as though reluctant to leave. “I should go.”

  “No, it’s okay. I’m not doing anything but waiting to get the hell out of here.” The private rehab center’s charms were starting to wear off—even with sweet pharmaceutical-grade opioids slowly feeding into his body, Peyton just wanted to get back to his loft and snort a line of coke the size of his arm.

  “Okay.” She relaxed, gave him a wide smile, and settled back onto his bed. “So...tell me about Peyton. Who are you besides a guy who drives into guard rails?”

  “I’m a DJ. Local clubs, mostly. No big deal. What about you?”

  “I’m an ‘executive administrative assistant.’ It’s very different from a regular administrative assistant,” Reese said.

  “How’s that?”

  “It means I get salary instead of hourly, so they can work my butt off day and night and I never get overtime.”

  “Sounds great.”

  “Oh, yeah. Tell me about these.” Reese touched her fingertip to his neck, tracing the vine of thorny black roses Cassidy had inked there.