Kill All Angels

by Robert Brockway

  “We’re out of alcohol.”

  His eyes went wide.

  “No, you had all those bottles above the fridge before,” he pleaded.

  “Yeah, but you drained them all before we left, remember? Except for the flavored vodka. You poured that down the sink.”

  “That’s right. Did you ever thank me for that?”

  I rolled my eyes at him.

  “Look, I’ll front you some cash for beer if you do something for me.”

  “Okay, but we’ll have to stick to oral unless you have a condom,” he said, with total sincerity.

  “Not even if you looked like Christian Bale and smelled like freshly baked cookies,” I said. “I’ll throw down for the beer if you stay gone for a few hours. I need some alone time.”

  “Ah, I gotcha,” he said, and winked. “You want me to pick up replacement batteries too, for the ones you run down?”

  “Jesus, shut up. The offer is going once, going twice…”

  “Hey! I didn’t say no! I’ll go,” he said, stumbling to his feet. He held his hand out in front of me like an expectant toddler.

  I went to the cabinet by the back door and pulled down my lucky cat bank. I forget what he’s called. I think it’s a Japanese thing—little cartoon kitty smiling with one paw in the air. I unscrewed his head and brought the body over to Carey. I showed him the inside, filled with quarters.

  “Seriously? Change?” he asked.

  “Seriously? Like you’re too proud?” I countered. “It’s my laundry money. More than enough.”

  “All right, all right,” he said, and took the cat bank from me.

  He headed for the door, then paused with his hand on the knob. He turned back toward me.

  “You gonna leave this unlocked for me to ‘accidentally’ walk in on something?”

  I flipped him off. He laughed, and stepped out. He left the door open. I sighed and closed it behind him, then set every lock I had. Just to be safe, I double-checked the back door and all the windows, too. I stood in the middle of my quiet living room, all alone and with nothing to do for the first time in as long as I could remember.

  So… what now?

  I thought about watching TV, playing internet, reading a book—it all seemed so trivial.

  Shower first, I guess, then I’ll figure it out from there …

  I headed to the bathroom, paused at the door, and glanced down at the storage containers that supported my bed. The middle one held socks, underwear, a clothes steamer, various odds and ends, and my vibrator. Since Carey had put the idea in my head already, it had been—Jesus, months.

  * * *

  I showered until the hot water ran out, toweled myself off, and crawled into my nest naked. I came twice, and only stopped there because I figured I should eat something. I slipped into my ratty pajamas—pilled fleece sweats and a baggy, hole-riddled Guns N’ Roses T-shirt left over from an ex-boyfriend—and plundered my kitchen. Nothing in the fridge would be good, for sure, and I didn’t even wanna trust the freezer in case there had been a power outage or something while I was gone. But the pantry held two cans of SpaghettiOs, and that sounded strangely appealing. My go-to comfort food. I should have been starving, but faced with the reality of eating, I just … wasn’t. The front door rattled hard, and I heard a thump.

  “Aw, damn it,” Carey yelled, from outside.

  There was never a good time for Carey, but I’d enjoyed the hell out of my recuperation period and was okay with the idea of company. I padded over to the door and flicked the locks open. Carey took one look at my ensemble and dropped all pretense at lusting after me. He pushed past and made straight for the kitchen. I could hear him shoving things aside to make room for the beer, then the sound of cardboard tearing, and the pop-hiss of a can being opened. He came out holding two beers—one open, one not. He sat down at my tiny dining room table and drained one of the cans completely, his knobby Adam’s apple bobbing up and down with every chug. When it was empty he set it down on the table, cracked the next one, and took a sip.

  Only when he finished that one did he get up, grab two more, and set one in front of me. I raised my eyebrows at him. He waggled his at me. I shrugged and pulled the tab. We sat like that for another few minutes without saying anything.

  “You enjoy your alone time?” he finally said, with feigned interest.

  I shrugged.

  “So … universe cubes and space whales, huh?” Carey said. I could hear the laugh in it.

  “Damn it, it wasn’t an actual cube, or an actual whale. I said it was more like a metaphor for … uh…”

  I gave up. I knew I’d lost Carey at “metaphor.”

  He sat quietly, sipping his beer and staring out the back door. There was nothing interesting out there: two mismatched thrift store folding chairs, an IKEA table, and an old Persian rug growing mold spots. The little patio was completely fenced in against the access path that ran behind the building.

  “Okay, you don’t believe me,” I tried again. “That’s fine, but—”

  “I didn’t say that.” He looked me straight in the eye. “I believe you. I’ve seen what you can do since taking that first angel. You’re connected to something bigger, that’s obvious. I wasn’t thinking about whether or not to believe your story. I was thinking about how to find another angel.”

  “R-really?” After my conversation with Jackie, I just figured it was going to be Kaitlyn against the rest of the rational world. “Any ideas?”

  “Just one, and I’ll be honest: It’s fucking terrible.”

  I laughed. He didn’t.

  “No, really,” Carey elaborated, no mirth to his tone. “It’s bad. It’s dangerous, morally bankrupt, and something I find personally fucking detestable. If I had any other leads whatsoever, no matter how bad they were, I would jump on them like a hobo on a pint of Mad Dog before pursuing this one.”

  “Wow, uh … what is it?”

  “I can’t say yet.” Carey saw me start to protest and held his hand up. “That’s how bad it is. If I told you about it, you’d stop me, and then we’d be nowhere. I just need you to say it. Say you’re absolutely sure that the only way forward is to find another angel as soon as possible.”

  I chewed on my lip.

  Was I sure about the visions? Really sure? Jackie could be right. It could be heatstroke or sleep deprivation or something. I didn’t think I was feeling the effects of several weeks of restless nights, but maybe it was taking some hidden toll.…

  No.

  I can feel it in my chest: a sort of fullness, puffing me up when I should be deflating. I’ve never felt that before, but I know what it is: purpose. This is right. The vision is real.

  “I’m absolutely sure,” I said.

  “Fuck,” Carey said.

  He pushed back from the table and went to the kitchen. He banged around in the fridge, and emerged with two beers in each hand and one tucked in his waistband.

  “I’ll be back later tonight,” he said. “But if I’m not, assume I died horribly and never stop running.”

  “You’re being dramatic,” I said.

  “I’m really not,” he said, and stomped out the door.

  I got up and got myself another beer, too.

  SEVEN

  }}}Carey. 1981. Valencia, California.}}}}}}}}}

  I woke up feeling like I’d smoked two packs of cigarettes and tried to run a marathon. Spiderwebs of pain were tangled all through my back and chest. I tried to sit up, gasped, sucked in breath, caught a bunch of spit, and started coughing. I passed out.

  I woke up again, feeling like I’d smoked six packs of cigarettes and tried to swim the English Channel. I took it slow this time. I eased myself into a sitting position, and took in my surroundings. I guess I’d broken into a construction site and crawled into a big cross section of pipe to sleep it off.

  Jesus. How much did I drink last night? And of what, jet fuel?

  I looked around for Randall, thinking at least I could slap him awake and ma
ke myself feel better by making him feel worse.

  Then it came back to me.

  I didn’t sob, or scream, or punch the concrete and bust up my knuckles. I just went flat and cold, like somebody had popped my top and left me open in the fridge all night.

  Stop. Don’t do that. Not yet. You lost him once before, remember? The Unnoticeables took him in New York, and you got him back. This is just grounds for another awesome rescue mission, full of punches and shenanigans. Another chapter in the Carey and Randall story. Four years of fucking up monsters and still going strong.…

  I tried to crawl out of the pipe. It took way longer than it should have. I thought I’d just knocked the wind out of myself last night, but it was plain that my ribs were fucking shattered. I hobbled instead of walked. It felt like stitches covering every inch of my lungs. I was winded after three steps, but I pushed on. I had to get back to Six Flags, see if they left a trail I could follow to wherever they’d taken Randall.

  It took me hours to hike up the small bluff that I must’ve sprinted down last night. I couldn’t even muster the strength to push aside the scrub, so I kept getting caught up in small bushes and skinny little trees that I should’ve been able to plow right through. Halfway up, I looked to my left and saw a neat paved path snaking up the hill straight to the gates. It wasn’t the first time I’ve called myself an asshole, but it was certainly the hardest.

  The sun was almost directly overhead by the time I reached the perimeter fence of the amusement park. I was shivering and sweating at the same time. It felt like I was trying to breathe through lungs filled with gravel. The inside of my leather jacket was soaking wet; it pooled in the elbows where I had my arms crossed against my chest, trying to hold my ribs in place. But I made it. I made it to the top of the bluff. I made it to the fence. I made it to the spot where Randall fell, and now I could track him down.

  I didn’t need to go far.

  He was still lying right there where he fell, limbs shattered, face a bloody Halloween mask. I didn’t need to check if he had a pulse or any of that shit. His head was twisted nearly backward. I looped my fingers through the chain-link. It started as a dramatic gesture, reaching toward my fallen friend, but then I was just trying to hold myself upright. I wanted to climb the fence and drag him out of there, bury him somewhere he’d like—like beneath the floorboards of the girl’s restroom at the Whiskey a Go Go. I wanted to at least grab something to remember him by like his …

  Huh. I guess Randall wasn’t much for material things. I couldn’t think of a single thing he owned that would mean shit to either of us.

  But he deserved better than this. He deserved better than to be left mangled beneath a roller coaster at fucking Six Flags. He deserved at least Disneyland.

  I couldn’t even give him that. I turned and looked back down the way I’d come. A steep, dusty hillside littered with roots and other pitfalls. I couldn’t do it again, not on the way down. I hobbled over to the side entrance, where the path intersected the fence. A sallow-chested teenager was sitting on a little wooden stool just outside the gate. He saw me walking the fence line and frantically whispered something into his walkie-talkie. It didn’t look like he got a response, so he just sat there, quietly panicking while I approached him, surely looking like some desperate murderous junkie who’d do anything to pay for his next fix. I got within speaking distance and he cleared his throat like six times.

  “S-sir the park is closed this week for renovations,” he began, but I just waved him off.

  His mouth snapped shut like a ventriloquist dummy. He watched, mute, as I staggered onto the paved path, and began slowly, achingly limping down it. After a few dozen steps, I stopped, turned back to the kid, and raised both middle fingers. I held them there for a full minute while he stared at me, unwilling or unable to speak. Then I turned and walked away.

  That’s how I left my best friend. Sprawled out under a roller coaster, corpse baking in the California sun, his eulogy just two shaky middle fingers extended as far as they could go.

  * * *

  It took me ten minutes, two bribes, and six threats in four different languages to convince the cab driver to pick me up. I didn’t have any money for the bribes, and I don’t speak four languages. I can swear in sixteen.

  He was Czechoslovakian or something. I got drunk on Long Island once with some Russian motherfuckers that I’m pretty sure were close enough to Czechs. They taught me, and I’m remembering phonetically here, “lee-zat moj pika!”

  I screamed that at the cabbie a few times, and he opened the door.

  I think it means “lick my pussy.”

  He didn’t say a word during the rest of the very long trip from Valencia to the west hills of Los Angeles. But he watched me through the mirror more than he watched the road. He pulled to a stop outside of Matt and Safety Pins’ place.

  We called her Safety Pins because, when we met her, she’d had safety pins stabbed through her ears in place of earrings. She’d always been more about the grand gesture than the authenticity. We called him Matt because he was a black punk, and you didn’t need help to remember a black punk. There were, like … four of them. In the world.

  The two had made good since me and Randall last saw them in New York. She’d come out here to be an actress, or a model, or a singer, or whatever it is professionally beautiful people do. Matt, the awkward goon, did the only thing he could do: He dropped everything and followed her. What were his other options? A little shit like that doesn’t get a girl that looks like Safety Pins every day. He dug in like a lamprey and rode her all the way to Hollywood. For her part, she didn’t seem to mind. She genuinely seemed to love the chump, even though his ambitious L.A. plan was apparently to get work at a record store and smoke weed literally every second he wasn’t working.

  Safety Pins, not surprisingly, had an equally beautiful, and therefore rich, family. She and Matt were staying in her uncle’s second home. It was all boxy, with floor-to-ceiling glass looking down on L.A. like a judgmental god. It had a kidney-shaped pool with plastic blue water. A little one-bedroom poolhouse/guest quarters that Randall and I crashed at when we arrived in town. Took them two days to notice us in there, but they gave us permission to stay after a few beers and gentle reminders about who kept them from being melted by tar men back in NYC.

  The cabbie didn’t like me stepping out of the taxi without paying him. He leapt out the driver’s side and crab-walked around the front of the car—trying to cover every direction I might run at once. The dickhead couldn’t see I wasn’t in any shape to run anywhere. I was barely on my feet. I hadn’t caught more than a glimpse of myself while he was staring me down through the rearview mirror, but I knew I looked like death’s pale, sickly cousin. We argued for a few minutes across a language gulf so vast it was practically a sea. The only thing either of us understood was how much each wanted the other to go fuck themselves.

  Matt finally came out the door with a short-short fuzzy girl’s bathrobe cinched around his waist. He ran toward us waving his arms, trying to keep the peace. A few more minutes of swearing, threatening, and bartering and my fare was established. Matt went back inside to get the cash to pay for it, while the cabbie and I exchanged evil eyes and taught each other rude gestures. When Matt settled up the tab, the driver got back in his fish-reeking taxi and peeled out, holding two fingers in a wide open “V” out the window.

  “Lick my pussy!” I yelled at the quickly disappearing cab, and turned back to a clearly pissed-off Matt, who was waiting for an explanation.

  “All of my ribs are broken. Randall’s dead. Get me a beer,” I said.

  I pushed past him, into the main house where Randall and I hadn’t been allowed until now, and curled up on a gargantuan white leather sectional that probably cost more than my freedom.

  Matt ran in after me, spouting a million questions.

  “All of my ribs are broken. Randall’s dead. Get me a beer,” was all I would say to him. Finally he gave in, jogged to t
he kitchen, and returned with two dark-colored bottles.

  “What the fuck is this?” I said, craning my head to get a better look at the abomination he’d just handed me.

  “It’s … beer?” Matt settled in on the couch next to me. “Carey, can you please explain what the hell is going on now?”

  “This isn’t beer,” I said. “Beer comes in cans. What the hell is a ‘stout’?”

  “There are other kinds of beer,” Matt said.

  I took a sip. It tasted like truck-stop coffee and the way a freshly paved highway smells. I handed it back to Matt and glared at him. He sighed, got to his feet, and returned to the kitchen. He came back holding his own bottle and one dented can of Schlitz. He passed the latter to me, and I popped the tab. I tried to chug it, but my ribs weren’t cooperating. Felt like a snake crushing me from the inside. I had to settle for sipping it. This was not a sipping occasion.

  “Now explain,” Matt said.

  I did. I told him the whole thing. Every little bit, including the part where I cut and ran on Randall, leaving him to die. That stupid little ball of pride in my throat tried to keep me from confessing that, but my self-hatred won out. I didn’t just admit it; I hammered the point home. I omitted the fact that Randall told me to leave him. I added in a few bits about how girlishly I ran, wrists flailing, crying all the way, while Randall begged me to stay and help. If it wasn’t the truth, it’s how the truth deserved to be. When I was finished, I waited for Matt to hate me. The bastard couldn’t even give me that.

  “What the hell else were you supposed to do, man?” he said. “You were hurt. You couldn’t have saved him. What’s the point in both of you dying? At least this way you can get the fuckers back, right?”

  “No!” I heaved back to throw my beer across the room, but it wasn’t empty yet. Sipping was messing with my momentum. I reconsidered the dramatic gesture and took another sip instead. “I mean, yeah, they are absolutely going to pay for this. But I should have stayed. He would have stayed for me.”

  “Randall?” Matt raised an eyebrow. “You sure about that?”