Before I Wake

by Robert J. Wiersema

“Thank you,” I said, leaning in and kissing him quickly on the mouth before I realized what I was doing.

  “You’ve given up so much, lost so much. I was so happy when you told me that you had started writing again. I don’t want you to lose that.” His eyes held mine until I nodded.

  “Good,” he said. “Merry Christmas, Karen.”

  He stood up.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I thought I’d clean up this mess,” he said, plucking handfuls of paper from the floor. I turned the notebook over in my hands, feeling the leather warm to my touch.

  “This is beautiful,” I repeated as he crumpled the paper into the garbage next to Sherry’s bed.

  “I’m glad you like it,” he said, arranging the teddy bear my brother Steve’s family had sent into the crook of Sherry’s arm, touching her cheek with the back of his hand.

  “I’d like you to stay,” I whispered. I wasn’t sure if I had spoken loud enough for him to hear.

  He straightened slightly.

  I had wanted to say it for a while; the wine made the words a little easier.

  He turned away from Sherry to face me.

  “Tonight. I’d like you to stay tonight. With me. We can talk about tomorrow in the morning. But—”

  He took two steps toward me.

  “—I was alone last night. I don’t want to be alone tonight.”

  For a moment he looked like he was about to launch into a speech. Then our eyes met, and he nodded.

  “Fortune favors the bold,” he said, picking up his glass.

  LEO

  I waited inside Mr. Perkins’s van around the corner from the Barretts’ house. It smelled like gas, but I liked it. It reminded me of what I was here to do.

  I had Sherry’s picture from the newspaper in my lap, and I held on to my rosary. I said the Hail Mary over and over again as I stared at the picture.

  Hail Mary, full of grace.

  I felt sorry for the people they had fooled. Thank God for Father Peter, who saw the truth that the sheep couldn’t see. Someone brave enough to do something important. Something to save those too stupid to save themselves.

  Blessed art thou among women.

  I was so lucky I met him when I did, before I could have my head muddled and confused by meeting the Barretts. Before I had actually knelt by that child of the devil. I would have knelt.

  And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

  All my life I tried to do what is right. I go to Mass whenever I can. I go to confession. I say a blessing before every meal, and a prayer before I go to sleep. I take care of Mother now that she can’t take care of herself.

  But this. Tonight. Tonight I will be a lion of God, a warrior, bringing the battle home to those evil enough to try to destroy His children. Tricksters and crooks. Evil. Tonight I will be a lion for God.

  Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.

  SIMON

  In the past few weeks with my family, I had learned to savor the little things; to hold on to the moments of grace as they came. Like walking through the still house with Karen, turning off all the lights except for the Christmas tree in the living room, making sure all the doors and windows were locked.

  Like the weight of my daughter in my arms as I carried her up the stairs, as I laid her down in her old bed, close to our room.

  Like the warmth of my daughter’s skin as I kissed her forehead and whispered, “Good night.”

  Like following my wife down the hallway, my body tingling.

  Like the momentary pause as we both looked around the bedroom as if seeing it for the first time.

  “Do you want to…?” she gestured toward the bathroom.

  I shook my head. “You go ahead.”

  “I won’t take long.” A moment later I heard the water in the sink, the rattling of the hook on the back of the door as she took down her robe. The sounds of our life together.

  I let myself sink into the bedside chair and rubbed the heels of my hands into my eyes. It was late, but I didn’t feel tired. In fact, I felt electric.

  The toilet flushed and the door opened and Karen stepped out, her housecoat loosely belted. “I opened a new toothbrush for you. It’s on the counter. It’s blue.”

  I brushed my teeth and washed my face. When I opened the hamper to drop in my dirty shirt, I saw her panties at the top of the pile. They were warm, and soft to the touch.

  LEO

  No moon. No stars.

  No sound.

  The lights were off inside the house except for the blinking Christmas tree. The other faithful had been told to leave. All was still.

  Oh holy night.

  The witching hour. That’s what Mother called it: the witching hour. No good Christian had any business being out at this time of night.

  What did she know? This was the holiest time of the night on the holiest night of the year, a time for all good Christians to stand up and be counted, if they were good enough, and true.

  I leaned against the van for just a minute, feeling the lion of God inside me trying to get out. I had to remember to slow down, to do everything right, just the way Father Peter told me.

  I opened the back door of the van as quietly as I could. I could barely breathe with the stink, but I knew what I had to do.

  I zipped my coat up high around my mouth. That’s better.

  I picked up the gas can.

  I didn’t shut the van door. I didn’t hide or skulk. I walked like a man through the gate, right up to the front door. The gas can was heavy, but not for me. Not for the lion.

  The porch light wasn’t on. There was no security light, nothing. It was just like Father Peter had said it would be. I felt a little scared as I walked up the ramp, but mostly I felt strong. I felt like I could do anything.

  I splashed the door with gas from the can. I tried my best to stay dry, but some of it splashed on my coveralls and the stink filled my nose and made me feel like I might throw up. But I didn’t stop. I splashed the walls with gas, up and down, all the way along the flowerbeds and around the corner down the side to the back of the house.

  When the can was empty I threw it into the hedge. It didn’t matter. It would all be over before anybody found it.

  When I got back to the van I was shaking—I felt so good to be doing God’s work! Just one more step.

  He had tried to warn them. They knew that they were sinning, and that they would be punished. Father Peter had told them.

  One more step.

  First a prayer, then the fire.

  SIMON

  She was already in bed when I came out, the comforter pulled up around her neck, her housecoat draped over the chair. It took me several seconds to realize that she was lying on the wrong side. I had always slept on the side of the bed closest to the bathroom. I walked around to the far side of the bed and lifted the covers, sliding in alongside her.

  The sheets were smooth, cool and familiar.

  “This is kind of weird,” she said, her voice low.

  “Yeah.” It was as if there was a bubble around us, a delicate, shimmering globe that the wrong word, the wrong action, the wrong thought, could destroy.

  “It feels…”

  “New,” I finished, unsure of where the word had come from.

  She nodded. “Yeah. New.”

  “Like those nights in the dorm: covers up to our necks, Donna in bed just across the room—”

  “Trying to be so quiet,” she added.

  “Not getting any sleep.”

  “I always wonder how we survived that year. Falling asleep in class—”

  “When we went to class at all.”

  Her hand found my hip. Her fingertips were hot.

  It was strange to cross the distance between us. As I reached out, Karen’s eyes closed a little and her breathing sharpened.

  We both kept our hands the same safe space, the nonpresumptive area of hip and abdomen, careful not to trespass where we were not yet certain we bel
onged. We hovered in a soft, trancelike state, neither of us quite prepared to take it further.

  Then cautiously, I slid my hand until the base of my palm brushed gently against the cool side of her breast, bare and surprising.

  Her eyes met mine.

  I raised my eyebrows playfully.

  And immediately regretted it.

  Karen pulled away without physically moving, her jaw tensing.

  “What is it?” I asked, lowering my hand again to the safer area near her hip.

  “I’m not…” She shook her head against the pillow. “I’m too tired to make any sense. I’m sorry.”

  I didn’t move, just waited for her to continue.

  “I, I don’t want…I don’t know what I want. I just…Could you please just hold me? I’d like, I just want to feel you against me. Is that okay?”

  I lifted my hand to her hair, smoothing it. “Of course it’s okay,” I said. “Of course it is.”

  She came into my embrace, the space between us disappearing, my arms around her, hers around me. We fit together perfectly, as we always had: she curving where I was rigid, soft where I was coarse. Our foreheads touched, the remaining space between us bridged by our breath.

  “When you touch me like this,” she said. I felt her words more than heard them. Smelled them in sweet mint.

  “What?” I asked after she had been silent for a long time.

  “It’s the same way you touch Sherry. Smoothing her hair back.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, afraid that I had hurt her in some way.

  “No, no, no. I like it. I like the way it makes me feel.” She pulled herself even closer against me.

  “How does it make you feel?” I asked.

  “Safe,” she said, and on that word, on that single syllable, her voice broke like the edge of a wave. Her back shuddered with sobs. I didn’t try to stop her, to comfort her with whispered words. Instead, I stroked her back, the buttons of her spine. I cupped the round base of her skull in my hand, gently stroking her soft hair as she cried against me, her tears hot on my cheeks, salty in my mouth.

  As she cried, I could feel growing there, as had once before, a presence between us: the tiny perfect form of Sherry nestled between her parents’ bodies. Our bodies were shaped by her absence, by the almost unbearable weight of her loss.

  LEO

  Father Peter had filled the glass bottle at the church. When he pushed in the rag his lips were moving. I thought he was praying, but I couldn’t hear the words.

  When he handed me the bottle, he had asked, “Are you sure that you can bear this burden?”

  I hefted the bottle in my hand. I remembered how it felt when God had guided my hand when I threw the bottle at Mr. Barrett. I imagined the flames, and the lion inside me roared. “Yes, I’m sure.”

  “I knew you would be,” he said. “This is for you. Use it well.”

  I felt for the lighter in my pocket as I stepped onto the Barretts’ front lawn.

  My breath made a fog and my fingers hurt from the cold. It didn’t matter. In a minute I would be warmed and cleansed by God’s fire.

  I struck the lighter and touched it to the rag. It burst into blue flame with a loud pop that scared me a little.

  It was hot on my face as I closed my eyes, as I prayed for God to guide my hand.

  I drew back my arm. “Hail Mary,” I whispered, letting the bottle fly.

  The flames were blue in the night sky.

  Something moved in the corner of my eye.

  The bottle tumbled once in the air.

  The man came out of the shadows and threw himself in the direction of the bottle, reaching out, like he thought he might catch it. But the glass smacked against his shoulder, spraying burning gas all over him.

  His arm and chest burst into flames, and around his feet the grass burned where the gas had spilled. He kicked the bottle away and he screamed and fell on the ground.

  He rolled and rolled, trying to put out the fire, but the flames didn’t go out, and he screamed again and again.

  I knew why the flames weren’t going out. I knew who he was, how much he loved the flames.

  I threw myself at the devil, swinging my fists. The heat of his flames tried to drive me away, but I didn’t give up. I kept hitting and hitting.

  “Stop it,” the devil screamed, rolling away from me, pulling at his burning coat. “Stop it!”

  Flames were eating at part of his face, but I knew him. His long hair, his beard, his eyes. He was the one from the meeting, the devil who wouldn’t bow his head to pray.

  “Devil,” I shouted, throwing myself at him again.

  KAREN

  “Simon? Do you hear that?”

  He was already rolling out from under the covers and crossing to the window. There was a hint of light as he drew back the curtain. I pulled the sheet with me to cover myself as I leaned toward the glass.

  At first, I didn’t know what I was seeing. There was a fire—no, someone was on fire! And someone—was that Father Peter’s bodyguard?—was punching him, kicking him, as he tried to roll away, as he writhed in the flames—

  The scene vanished as the room filled with light. Simon was by the door, pulling on his pants.

  I dropped the sheet and pulled open a drawer for something to wear. “Was that Father Peter’s—?”

  “I think so.” He tugged a T-shirt over his head, and he started through the door. “It looks like he’s trying to kill someone.”

  “What should we—?”

  “Call the police.”

  I grabbed the cordless phone and followed him, looking into Sherry’s room before racing down the stairs.

  HENRY

  So much pain, all at once. I couldn’t—

  I kept rolling on the ground, trying to smother the flames. I could smell burning meat, and I knew it was me. My face, my arm. If I could just get Tim’s coat off.

  Then there was a blow and a cracking in my chest and I couldn’t breathe. Another burst of pain. Another kick.

  “Stop it!” I cried out. Every word pulled at the burned skin on my face.

  I opened one eye, and closed it again as I rolled away. If I could just—

  My right hand didn’t work anymore. When I tried to move my fingers, the pain was crippling.

  Fumbling with the zipper with my left, I shrugged the coat off that shoulder. I shrugged again, but it was stuck.

  I opened my eye again.

  The fabric of the coat had melted and clung to my skin like glue. If I pulled it off, it would take the skin right off my arm with it.

  I couldn’t leave it.

  Bracing myself, I started to pull.

  “Go back to hell, you devil!” More blows rained down on me. I heard a crunch and saw a bright light and I was suddenly choking on blood. My nose…

  He was still coming at me, arms flailing.

  I stumbled away and pulled off the coat, peeling the burnt skin from my arm. My scream stopped the big man in his path.

  I couldn’t breathe, and my eye clouded over with the pain. My entire arm was an open wound, so tender that the movement of air across it felt like fresh flames.

  Then he punched me again, and again, wherever he could reach. I reeled and stumbled and fell.

  “Go back to hell!” he shouted, drawing back to kick me again.

  The pain was too much to bear.

  And then there was a sudden brilliance. He looked behind him at the house. The porch light! The porch light was on.

  He ran toward his van. It took me a moment to get my bearings. Grass. Concrete. I was at the edge of the driveway. And right there—

  As the van door opened and closed, I pulled myself across the driveway and into the shadow of the hedge.

  Then I surrendered to the dark.

  KAREN

  Simon’s adrenaline carried him out the front door and partway down the ramp before he stopped, clutching the flashlight like a club. I was only a few steps behind.

  “There’s n
o one here,” I said. I hung up before the phone connected.

  “Look.” Down the street, taillights shone in the dark, and a cloud of steam rose from the exhaust as the van pulled away.

  For a moment I thought Simon might run after the moving vehicle. Instead, he walked to the base of the ramp and looked around the yard.

  “What the hell?” he muttered.

  I was closer to the house and smelled it first. “Do you smell that?”

  He lifted his head. “What?”

  The reek burned my nose. “Oh, God,” he muttered. Crouching, he touched the door just under the knob.

  The lower half of the door was wet. Simon touched a finger to the wetness and brought it to his nose. “It’s gas.”

  “On our door?”

  “Check on Sherry,” he said, turning on the flashlight and starting down the ramp again. “Lock the door.”

  My head was swimming as I checked our girl again. I couldn’t tell if it was the fumes or the danger we were in. They had soaked our door with gasoline. What were they trying to do?

  Simon looked flushed and scared when he came in. “There’s gasoline all over the house. And I found these on the lawn where they were fighting.” He had an empty soda bottle in one hand, and a winter coat, partially burnt, in the other.

  “Is that—?”

  He nodded, a sheen of sweat breaking out on his face. “Yeah. A bottle bomb.” He hefted the bottle in his hand.

  “Father Peter.”

  He nodded slowly. “It looks like they planned to burn down the house, but—”

  “But somebody stopped them. Whoever he was fighting with.”

  Simon nodded. “It looks like he’s pretty badly hurt,” he said, turning the coat over in his hands. Half of it had melted into a gnarled clump of plastic.

  “Is he still out there?”

  Simon shook his head. “I couldn’t find him.”

  The thought was numbing. Someone had tried to burn down our house. Someone had tried to kill us all. This wasn’t a warning.

  “Should I call the police?” I asked. I still had the phone in my hand.

  “I don’t—” He bit his lip and shook his head, trying to figure out what to do.

  “No,” I said, setting the phone down. “Probably not. So what are we going to do?”

  “The gas—we could hose it off,” he ventured.