by E A Comiskey
“Did you travel a lot for your work?” Maddie asked.
“Yes. A fair amount.”
“My own family, on the rare occasion they manage time to call, doesn’t share many details.” She clicked her fingernails against the little wooden strip on the end of the chair’s arm.
Burke, curled like a cat in a corner of the sofa, rubbed her forehead with her fingertips.
“Exactly what kind of work did you do before you retired?” Maddie asked.
Stanley rubbed his chin with the knuckles of his right hand. “I was a private investigator of sorts.”
“How exciting.” She caught her long strand of pearls between two fingers and twisted it.
“The silver screen has given that impression, but I assure you, I spent more hours with my nose in a book than chasing bad guys in exotic locations.”
“Did you ever catch anyone I’d have heard of?”
“I once staked an offspring of Vlad the Impaler in a pub in Romania,” Stanley replied.
Burke’s hand dropped lower, pressed against her closed eyelids.
“Oh, a stake out,” Maddie exclaimed.
“More of a stake in,” Stanley said.
She giggled.
Richard rolled his eyes. “I gotta use the sandbox.” He traipsed through the kitchen and down the hall to the half bath. More birds. Birds on the wallpaper border. Birds embroidered on the towels. Little soaps shaped like birds, so old they’d taken on a cracked, dusty appearance. An enormous cardinal in an ornate golden frame stared at him while he peed. “Don’t judge the stream, old boy. The water pressure ain’t what it used to be, but at least the hose ain’t leakin’.”
He used the soap that smelled like oranges, dispensed from the beak of a glass robin, and headed toward the kitchen to snoop. Passing through the dining room, he noticed the table had already been set for dinner. The sight pulled at his heart. Lacy blue scrolling decorated the edges of the dishes. They’d been hand-painted, all matching, yet no two exactly the same.
Barbara’s dishes.
After so many years, how could it be possible for her to jump out and surprise him like that? After all this time, her death remained a scar on his heart, healed but still prone to occasional, painful flare-ups. Finding and killing the creature who’d killed her didn’t make her loss hurt any less. If anything, revenge left a hollowness in his chest, a feeling that he hadn’t done enough. He wanted to kill the skinwalker again and again. Then again, people in hell wanted ice water, and look how that worked out for them.
“Dad?”
He turned to find Maddie watching him from the doorway. A little line marred the space between her brows. “You okay?”
He gestured to the table. “I saw your mom’s dishes.” The words sounded stupid uttered aloud. What was a dish? No more than a piece of glass from some factory in Mexico.
Maddie drew near and ran one finger over the blue lines. “I hope you don’t mind that I used them. They’re my favorite. Much prettier than the plain modern things they sell now.”
He shrugged. “Just dishes.”
She smiled up at him. “Not really just a dish.”
“No. I suppose not,” he agreed.
She took a deep breath. “So, your friend Stanley seems an interesting fellow.”
“Don’t he, though?”
“I’m glad you’re here. I’ve missed you, Dad.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Really?”
She rolled her eyes, just like Burke. “Of course. You’re my father and you disappeared in the middle of the night and haven’t come home for six months. I’ve missed you, and I’ve worried about you, and I’ve wondered what I did to make you want to stay away from me.”
“I didn’t go to be far away from you.” That was the God’s honest truth. Maybe he didn’t want to be preached at day and night, but going off with Stanley had nothing to do with getting away from Madeline.
“Someday, maybe you’ll take the time to explain to me exactly why you did go. Everest was a good place, Dad. I didn’t dump you in some nasty nursing home or something. I spent a lot of effort to find something nice for you.”
“I know, kid.” It had been a lovely facility. Not a single thing in the world wrong with it other than the staff members who literally feasted on the souls of the elderly. No one had thought to mention that part in the brochure.
She tapped a nail against the back of a chair. Click. Click. Click. Like a deathwatch beetle. The shiver from earlier escaped and scuttled up his spine.
“Well,” she said with a sigh, “I just need to check the turkey. Burke and Stanley went to wash up. Dinner should be ready on time. I don’t want you to eat too late. It can’t be good for your digestion and you need to get your rest. I worry about you gallivanting around the countryside. You should be somewhere safe and pleasant.”
“Safe and pleasant aren’t all they’re cracked up to be,” Richard said. “A man needs a little adventure to stay alive.”
“Rosalie Adey and Edith Porter had an adventure when they took a senior’s bus tour to see the leaves on the coast of Lake Michigan last month. It was all booked through the place where they’re living. I got a brochure from them. I’ll show you later, after dinner. You’re going to love it.”
He wanted to inform her, in no uncertain terms, that he would not be moving into the old folks home with the widows, but she’d already given his arm a little squeeze and drifted off into the kitchen. Right before she disappeared around the corner, she called over her shoulder, “They even have a big heated pool, Dad.”
Lord, but she made him feel old.
Chapter Five
Albert
Albert rode his bike to work whenever he could. November had brought below-freezing temperatures, but he could still bundle up and make it work. In another month or so, snow and ice would hold the world captive and he’d be forced to drive his car like all the other sheeple.
Where would he be in another month? By then, the launch would be old news and the world would wait for news of the first settlers setting foot on Mars.
The settlers would be big news. History makers. The folks children would read about in history books a thousand years into the future.
But what would Albert be?
Just the guy who was left behind.
He pedaled harder and gritted his teeth against the cold that bit into the skin of his face.
They need people like me. They don’t understand how much I can do for them. I need to tell them. This is the time. Carpe diem, Albert. Now or never. Go big or go home.
A plan formed. When he arrived at the office, he’d lock up his bike, stop in the lobby restroom to tidy himself up, march into Jones’s office, and announce that he deserved a spot on that ship.
Resolve warmed his frozen bones and carried him along with the effortlessness of a bird in flight. He reached the office parking lot, wrapped the lock around the front wheel of his bike and rammed his way through the big glass doors like an invading marauder. Adrenaline fogged his mind and, before he knew it, he was in front of Jones’s receptionist.
“I need to see him,” Albert managed.
Her red-painted lips formed a perfect, joyless smile. “I’d be happy to take a note and see if he is able to schedule an appointment.”
Albert’s limbs buzzed and tingled. Maybe he’d pass out. Please, God, don’t let me vomit. “No. Now. It’s important.”
“I’m sure it is. Mr. Jones’s schedule is full of meetings regarding important matters. It’s necessary for us to sort the important from the crucial.”
“I’m Albert Peters,” he shouted, slamming his palms down on her desk. Why was he shouting? He didn’t know and he couldn’t stop. “It’s important. I’m important. He needs me!”
Behind him, a door opened with a click and a gentle voice asked if everything was okay.
Albert spun and met the gaze of John Jones. Tears sprang to his eyes and he blinked fast to make them go away, certain he’d die of sha
me if he cried in front of this man. Words deserted him. He scrambled and clawed for any semblance of an intelligent sentence.
“I’m Albert Peters. You need me.”
A fly passed between Jones and the overhead light fixture, sending a little black shadow across the space between the two men.
Jones held out a hand and Albert took it.
The remaining shreds of control left him and a tear spilled over his eyelid.
“Everyone has their place in the food chain, Albert. Pond scum is no less important than a lion roaming the savannah. You are valued.”
Albert nodded and, without another word, left the office on legs that carried him along as if they operated separately from his will. He rode the elevator to the second floor and sat down in his cubicle.
John Jones values me. I am special. I knew it!
He tugged a tissue from the box on his desk and blew his nose. He’d been thinking about the upcoming changes at work all wrong. The launch wasn’t the end. It was the beginning.
His eye fell on the calendar.
He had a date coming up. His first real date in…well… It didn’t do to dwell on how much time had passed. It was a blind date, but a date, nonetheless.
This was the one. No doubt about it. He felt it in his gut. He was a man of great value and this woman would recognize his worth and nothing would be the same for him ever again. John Jones said so.
Or…well…he said something like that.
Chapter Six
Richard
Maddie insisted they stay at the house. Said she had plenty of room. Pleaded the case that they were only giving her a few short days before they set off again to who-knows-where, only to return for another visit who-knows-when. They’d conceded to her demands in order to shut up Stanley, who lectured them about the wisdom of choosing your battles.
She did not have enough space.
Apparently, she operated under the sorely mistaken assumption that Richard and Stanley would be comfortable sharing a single room containing a queen-sized bed. When they first saw the arrangement, Stanley slapped Richard on the back and said, “No worries, old boy. I promise not to steal the covers or peek under your skirt.”
Richard dropped his duffle in a fussy, spindly-legged chair and declared, “You’re two pickles short of a barrel if you think I’m sharing a bed with you. I’d sooner sleep in the car.”
Maddie padded into the room with a pile of towels. “You try sleeping in the car in this weather, I swear I will call the cops and have them drag you back in here and cuff you to the bed.”
Stanley unzipped his garment bag and hung the contents in the closet, giving each a little shake to avoid any potential wrinkles. “What do you say, Dick? Will you share the bed with me if handcuffs are involved?” The corners of his eyes crinkled in amusement.
“Mr. Kapcheck, I would think a proper British gentleman such as yourself would be above such bawdy humor.” Maddie deposited the towels on top of a vanity in the corner.
“Madam, don’t believe the old myth about the French being the world’s greatest lovers. We Brits may be laced up tight on the outside, but behind closed doors we remain the race that descended from men and women who worshipped the gods of pleasure under the silver light of the full moon as it glimmered upon their beds of leaves within the primeval forest.”
A deep crimson blush bloomed upward from Maddie’s prim, high collar all the way to the grayish roots of her dyed-auburn hair. She pressed one hand against her ample bosom, opened her mouth to reply, blinked three times in slow succession, closed her mouth, and scurried from the room.
Richard had to give credit where credit was due. He’d never seen anyone silence his daughter more effectively.
Stanley chuckled at the observation when Richard told him and clicked the television on to hear the news while they dressed for dinner.
Now, Stanley stood before the full-length mirror adjusting the absurd, elaborate knot on his orange silk tie, while the newsman talked about some famous billionaire getting ready to launch a passenger ship to Mars. “Coleum Corporation spokesperson John Jones once again used today’s press conference to reiterate their mission’s focus on peace, prosperity, and a future where there’s space for all.”
“World moves too danged fast.” Richard tucked his wrinkled blue Polo shirt into his Chinos. “I remember when folks got excited about being able to cross the Atlantic in one jump.”
Stanley retrieved his waistcoat from a hanger and buttoned it up over his flat stomach. “You’re not telling me anything I don’t know. I remember when Mr. Peabody in the next village purchased a Model T. My mother went to mass and lit a candle for him, convinced anyone with a desire to travel faster than a horse could run must surely be possessed by the devil. We’re old men, Dick, doomed to succumb to the vigorous forward momentum of the young.”
Richard scowled at his reflection. With his shirt tucked in, there could be no mistake. The one thing he’d succumbed to was the furniture disease—his chest had fallen into his drawers. He tugged the shirt out of his waistband. “Speak for yourself, ya old goat. Least I came out of the baby chute this side of the twentieth century.”
Stanly met his eyes in the mirror and raised his brows. “Yet now we’re a fifth of the way through the twenty-first, and we may just live long enough to see a human colony on another planet. Who’d ever have imagined?”
Richard remembered being a boy, hiding under his covers with a flashlight after being told to go straight to sleep, the slick pages of a new comic book from the Tombstone Pharmacy beneath his fingers. The bright colors and wild, improbable images crawled into his imagination and painted an image of adventure more real than anything he’d ever experienced with his five senses. In those pages, good was good and evil was evil and the guy who did the right thing got the girl every time. “All them science fiction writers in the 1950’s went mad imagining about it. It never did end in peace and prosperity and a future with space for all.”
A knock sounded at the door. Richard crossed the room to open it. There was a time when he’d have just shouted for the person to come in, but that particular habit had nearly resulted in disaster one night in a seedy hotel on Ventura Boulevard, and he was a man smart enough to learn from his mistakes. He opened the door a crack.
“Just me,” Burke said. She wore a floor-length patchwork dress that swirled around her legs like water when she entered the bedroom, and draped from her straight shoulders in a way that brought to mind ancient monarchs on gilded thrones who ruled with god-like authority. Peeking over her grandfather’s shoulder, she smiled at Stanley. “You look absolutely dashing.”
Stanley bowed his head in her direction. “A pale moon to your dazzling sun.”
Richard rolled his eyes. “I’m gonna barf.”
“Oh, Grandpa, stop. Aren’t you going to dress for dinner?”
He gestured to his body. “Am I naked?”
She ignored his question. “Has she pressed for info yet?”
“Nothing outside of what you heard,” Richard said. “She told me about a great facility with a heated pool, though.”
Burke faked a gagging noise that made him smile.
Stanley turned off the television, silencing a darkly handsome man with a scar over his left eye speaking from behind a podium about a new day dawning in which no member of the human race is unvalued or without purpose. “I suspect the two of you have worked this whole visit up to something sinister in your minds. Madeline has been nothing but gracious thus far.”
The two of them stared at him.
Stanley raised his hands in surrender.
The doorbell rang and Burke sank onto the bed as though hearing a death knell. “There it is.”
“What’s the matter with you?” Richard asked.
“I’ll bet you the next turn in the shotgun seat, that’s some horrid date she set up for me.”
Stanley left the room, his argyle-stockinged feet silent against the thick padding of the carpet.
A moment later he returned, hands stuffed in the pockets of his pleated trousers. He shrugged. “He might have a fantastic personality.”
Burke groaned and dropped her head into her hands. “It’s not too late to go back and find those carnies. A good hunt would be—”
“Oh no!” Stanley exclaimed. “You mustn’t ever hunt them. They’re—”
“Don’t,” Burke said, holding up a bejeweled hand that sparkled in the orange sunlight streaming through the window. “Did I tell you I don’t want to know? I wasn’t kidding. I really don’t. I love carnivals. You will not ruin carnivals for me.”
Stanley shrugged again.
Richard caught sight in the mirror of the wiry white wisps floating around his head. He patted them. They sprang back up, heedless of his wishes. “Come on then,” he said, giving up on his appearance entirely. That ship, if it had ever sailed, left the harbor a long, long time ago. From an early age, it had been clear he would never cruise through life on his good looks. “Let’s get this over with.”
Three months earlier, he’d decapitated a rugaru with a chainsaw. How bad could Thanksgiving dinner with family be?
Chapter Seven
Burke
Maddie sat in the living room sipping tea with not one, but two men. The younger, a thin, beak-nosed man with wire-rim eyeglasses, had a face that appeared to be three quarters forehead. The other, who was maybe sixty-something, brought to mind Mr. Rogers, right down to his reddish-orange cardigan. They both rose to their feet when Richard, Stanley, and Burke entered. The skinny guy rubbed his palms against the legs of his baggy brown slacks.
“This is my father, Richard, my daughter, Burke, and their friend, Stanley Kapcheck,” Maddie said, gesturing to each of them in turn. “Everyone, this is Albert Peters and Luke Castleberry.”