The Mentor

by Lee Matthew Goldberg

  She heard the jingle of the padlock being tampered with and thought for a moment it could be a savior. But from the way it jingled she knew. Him. And not just him—the violent side of his personality that resembled the villains in horror novels she used to love. She could never imagine reading them again.

  The door swung open and moonlight flooded inside, revealing every deplorable nook of the prison she’d lived in for the last few weeks. She was embarrassed by the fetid stench. It seemed as if thousands of days had passed since he’d cleaned the shack. She hated the bugs crawling on her legs and the way they’d wormed into her skin, or even worse, that she’d gone insane and was imagining those bugs. And there he stood, panting and sopping with sweat, rubbing the elbow patch on his blazer that had caught on a branch and torn a gaping hole.

  She screamed as loud as she could through the muzzle, but it was tied too tight. He hated when she screamed and would punish her for this, but the punishments would happen regardless, and it made her feel good to piss him off. He balled up the chain that attached her to the floor and whipped her across the face. An old welt opened and the blood poured over her eyes until everything was bathed in red.

  She felt herself being turned around as he groped her, a daily tradition. His thumb traced the small tattoo on her butt. She could feel his thumbnail digging into her flesh and heard the sound of him sucking. His hand grabbed at her left breast, but she knew he cared less about that part of her flesh. It was her heart he hungered for. With his fingers, he kept in time to her heartbeats as he entered her from behind. The worst thing was his delicate nature once he was inside her. She’d rather be impaled, not made love to, which she knew was how he’d describe it. Her heartbeat sped up along with his thrusts, and he let out a cry of release that shook the foundations. She had the ominous sensation of the two of them being the only people left in the world. No savior would ever find this camouflaged shack and her hidden existence. She’d do her nightly dance with him until one of them perished.

  The weight of him on her back got lighter as he finished. Tonight he decided to sob, his weeping becoming softer as he backed up toward the door. She turned around to see his face, to torture herself even more so she could visualize all the ways she’d kill him. The two locked eyes. His were tired and ringed with circles. Hers were reddened and a poor reflection of her former self. Did he say he was sorry, or did her demented mind just imagine that? Each night, it got harder and harder to tell.

  “You know I do this because I love you,” he said, gripping the doorknob.

  She gave a solemn nod.

  “Ours will be a story for the ages,” he said again, and then shut the door.

  She heard the jingle of the padlock. In the darkness, she conjured him up again. In this vision, she’d become unchained and given a sharp knife by the gods, which she plunged into his chest and twisted around until she scooped out his heart and held it beating in her hand.

  “Fuck you,” she said, as his dripping heart slid from her fingers and the shack’s broken slat revealed her moonlit smile.

  * * *

  KYLE SHOT OUT of bed, drenched in night sweats. He instinctively reached for Jamie and then realized she wasn’t there, her pillow a cruel replacement. Devil’s Hopyard sat on the nightstand, responsible for his heart slamming into his chest. He gulped to catch his breath and shut his eyes only to see the girl in the shack, reaching out toward him as if he could stop the madness.

  Save me, she said in his mind. He opened his eyes to make her go away.

  He gulped another breath and chased it with a swallow of water. Finally, his heartbeat slowed to a normal thump. He unstuck the drenched shirt from his body and swung himself out of bed, planting his legs on solid ground. He eyed the Devil’s Hopyard manuscript with disdain.

  His phone rang and the caller ID said William. Kyle chewed on a nail, wondering if this was still a part of his dream. The pages he’d read during the night were even more depraved than the earlier ones. He tried to rationalize why William would choose to enter the mind of such a sick and twisted character, especially for ten long years. The writing was god-awful, nonsensical in parts and obsessively repetitive. He kept reading, hoping to see a purpose, a shift in the narrative that might reveal its brilliance. He didn’t remember falling asleep, the manuscript’s words bleeding into a nightmare.

  The phone stopped ringing and he heard the beep of a voice mail. He had no desire to hear it now. He spied the clock, 8:00—way past his usual wake-up hour. He rushed into the shower and turned on the water to full blast, no time to process the horrific night he had experienced.

  In his office at Burke & Burke, after a double espresso shot and a round of e-mails, he finally got around to listening to William’s message.

  Mornin’ Kyle! It’s William. Just thought I’d see how far you got with Devil’s Hopyard. My stomach’s been doing flips all night in anticipation. Let me know if my baby has potential. Ciao.

  The most disturbing part of the message was the fact that William called it his baby, as if the manuscript were a real living thing. Kyle had tried to block it out all morning, purposefully leaving Devil’s Hopyard at home, but it had crept into his consciousness. To distract himself, he read the first twenty-five pages of a just submitted thriller called The Dead Can’t Hunt You Down, about an ex–hit man who tries to leave his former organization only to become hunted by them. Its opening in Marrakesh was taut and suspenseful enough to keep him invested, and he found himself wishing William had written this book instead.

  His phone buzzed with a text. Instinctively, he knew who it was.

  Hey Kyle! Just wanted to see if you made any more headway with Devil’s Hopyard? If I don’t hear back, I might have to give my exclusive to someone else. Ha!!!

  Normally Kyle would’ve grinned at that joke, but he was in no mood. Breakfast wasn’t sitting well. He also had no idea how to respond, not wanting to hurt his professor’s feelings, but William needed to know that Devil’s Hopyard was one of the vilest things he ever set eyes on. He couldn’t stop thinking about the poor girl in the shack because it seemed like William was writing out some dark fantasy.

  Kyle texted back: Slammed from work, but will get to Devil’s Hop soon.

  His phone immediately buzzed with William’s reply: Don’t keep me hanging!!!!!

  Kyle typed a response, cracking his neck in annoyance. I promise I’ll call you when I can.

  His phone buzzed again, but he shoved it in a drawer without even looking at what William wrote. He resolved to spend the rest of the day reading about the ex–hit man gone rogue so the gruesome images from Devil’s Hopyard might slowly fade away. Hours later, he found himself plunged into a gripping cat-and-mouse tale until he had finished half of The Dead Can’t Hunt You Down and it was time to meet Jamie for dinner.

  * * *

  KYLE HAD MADE reservations at ABC Kitchen, a trendy restaurant in the Flatiron District with a chic laid-back California vibe. When he entered, Jamie was already seated and nursing a margarita. She wore a dress with a plunging neckline and had a thin teal sweater hanging from her shoulders. She stood and kissed him on the lips, tasting of pomegranate.

  “I ordered some calamari to start,” she said.

  A waitress came over, and Kyle immediately asked for a glass of Four Roses Single Barrel. Jamie scooped up his hand in her own.

  “I have some news,” she said, clearly excited. “I’ve got a lot of interest from that investor in Sweden, Elka. She’ll be here next week to see some of my work.”

  “That’s fantastic.”

  “It’s a start. She’s looking for foreign businesses as a way to expand her brand. She’s loaded, though. I think Ingvar Kamprad is a close relative.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “The founder of IKEA.”

  Jamie followed Kyle’s eyes, which were drifting away from her.

  “Kyle?”

  “What? I’m sorry. I’m distracted.”

  Jamie cinched her th
in sweater at her neck, as if she’d gotten cold.

  “I could tell,” she said, twirling the straw in her drink.

  The waitress brought Kyle’s bourbon.

  “This is fabulous news,” he said, raising his glass. “I know you’ve worked hard.”

  “I have,” she said softly.

  “My day was just crazy,” he said, after taking a stiff sip.

  She crossed her arms. “I know. I’m getting used to that.”

  “It’s just…” he stammered. “Well, what did you think of William?”

  “Your professor? He was lovely. I could tell how close the two of you were—”

  “I read more of his manuscript.”

  “And?”

  Kyle traced a finger around the edge of the glass.

  “Jamie, it was so fucked-up. Like, really dark and disturbing.”

  “Isn’t that good? Aren’t you in the market for thrills and chills?”

  “Yes, but … this had no point. Its just page after page of a madman babbling.”

  “It has to have some plot.”

  “I mean, the narrator is a professor, just like William, and he fixates on this student in his class. He dreams of cutting out her heart—”

  Jamie laughed and then covered her mouth. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t expecting you to say that.”

  “And then he has this fantasy where he chains her up in a shack and abuses her. It’s brutal. I had nightmares all night.”

  “Doesn’t that mean it affected you? You always complained about the queries you used to get. That the writing wasn’t real enough.”

  “William’s writing is terrible,” he said, lowering his voice. He didn’t know why he felt the need to be quiet, as if someone could be listening.

  “Are you more upset about the subpar writing or the fact that it’s disturbing?”

  Jamie often liked to play devil’s advocate, a trait Kyle found frustrating. She’d been a prelaw major before making the switch to design.

  “Who spends five hundred pages writing about eating a girl’s heart?” he said, throwing up his hands.

  “So you finished the pages?”

  “Well … no.”

  Jamie gave a self-satisfied grin as their calamari arrived, pretzel-dusted and with marinara and mustard aioli. She popped one in her mouth.

  “These are soooo good, Kyle, you have to try.”

  She held out a dripping piece of squid, but he was more interested in making his point.

  “If a book is going to be seriously depraved, it has to be well written.”

  Jamie ate his piece of calamari, a dot of mustard lingering on the corner of her mouth.

  “So that means if William’s book had amazing prose, you’d be fine with it?”

  Kyle ate some calamari to avoid an answer he didn’t want to give.

  “Listen,” he said, after he swallowed, “today I read this thriller about an ex–hit man hunted down by his former organization. Exceedingly violent, half the characters die in a vicious way, but—”

  “It was well written?”

  “Yeah, the author has actual talent and the violence felt organic. I was at a literary panel once where a crime writer spoke about how every time you kill a character, you have to take into account the weight of that death, their families—”

  “But it’s just fiction,” Jamie said, exasperated. She could discuss books for only so long before her eyes began to glaze over.

  “But fiction is a mirror for reality,” he said. “That’s what’s so fucked-up about William’s book. It felt real.”

  Jamie finished the last bite of calamari and pursed her lips. “Again, you could make an argument for that being a good thing.”

  “Like with Sierra Raven,” he began, not noticing Jamie’s eyes roll slightly to the left. “Her writing is haunting but beautiful. It’s clear she lived through a tragic childhood being bounced around foster homes, and she was able to infuse that into her work.”

  “Well, not everyone is as brilliant as Sierra Raven,” Jamie said, knocking back a big gulp of her margarita.

  “Where’s that tone coming from?”

  Jamie blew the bangs away from her eyes. “It’s the way you talk about her.”

  “Sierra’s amazing. She netted a million-dollar deal in one day. Jamie, she changed my life.”

  “Have you ever spoken about me that way to someone?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Jamie spoke slowly. “Have. You. Ever. Spoken. About. Me. That. Way?”

  “Of course!”

  “Sometimes, Kyle,” she began, and stared at a twinkling chandelier to get her thoughts right, “I don’t know, you light up when you mention Sierra, and I get it—I know how much your career means, we’ve always connected because of that, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look at me that same way.”

  The waitress came over to take away the plate of calamari. She asked if they were ready to order an entrée, but neither responded. The waitress backed away, clearly wanting no part of their tension.

  “Why would you want to start something tonight, Jamie?”

  “Why would you?”

  “I just mentioned what a shitty day I had after getting no sleep.”

  “And I just mentioned what a wonderful day I had after getting a possible investor, but that doesn’t warrant more than a minute of interest from you before your problems become front and center.”

  “Now you’re just being silly.”

  Jamie raised her hand in the air to signal for the waitress.

  “I’m not ready to order yet,” Kyle said.

  “I’m getting the check.”

  The waitress came over and Jamie asked for the bill.

  “Come on, let’s talk this out,” he said. “Don’t be like that.”

  “I’m not hungry anymore.”

  He tried to grab her hand, but she slid it under the table.

  “I’m just gonna go home,” she said.

  She rose and he knew it was best to let her go. When Jamie made up her mind, there was no changing it. She pushed her chair into the table.

  I’m sorry, he mouthed to her, pressing his hands together in the form of prayer. “Please don’t be mad.”

  “I’m just tired,” she said. “I have to get things ready for Elka this week.”

  “Okay.”

  He stood to embrace her and was glad that she accepted it, meaning she was mad but it would pass. She even allowed him to kiss her on the cheek. He hated his impulsive mouth, wishing he could take back calling her silly.

  “Let me know you got home okay,” he said, and sat back down as she left. A moment later, his phone vibrated, and he anticipated it being a text from her. He frowned when he saw William’s number.

  So what’s the news, Kyle? Should I be making room for a Pulitzer on my mantel???!!!

  Kyle texted right back, his fingers typing at an angry pace.

  Got through some pages. Yes, we definitely need to talk tomorrow. Will call. Night.

  He thrust the phone in his jacket pocket but could still hear it incessantly buzzing as reply after reply came through.

  Each one caused a minor twitch in his eye before he silenced the cell for good.

  6

  WILLIAM BARELY SLEPT during the night. Sometimes his mind ran at such an accelerated rate that nothing could quiet it down. Instead of counting sheep, he took himself on a tour of Devil’s Hopyard, running through sentences in his head and making sure they were shaped with utmost accuracy. He envisioned Kyle reading the manuscript and cringed at the thought that it might not be perfect. Kyle’s last texts had been abrupt, which was surprising after the great dinner they’d had. He reasoned that Kyle was a busy man now, no longer that kid in the back of the class he knew from Bentley. It irked him a little to think how the power had shifted.

  In the hour before sunrise, he watched Laura sleep. She was positioned like she was dead, hands folded across her chest. She never made a sound while s
leeping, her flaring nostrils the only sign of life. He curled a strand of her hair around his finger, tying it tighter and tighter till it cut off his circulation. This occupied him until the sun finally came up and he slid out of bed.

  He had an early-morning meeting with his student Nathaniel, whose essay on The Stranger was a sorry affair. With a red pen, William had drawn a giant F on the cover page and didn’t leave any comments. He had plugged some of it into Google and a few identical papers came up. The protocol would be to inform the administration, but he wanted to deal with Nathaniel first. Since he’d been at Bentley for so long, he justified that he had the right to do what he wanted.

  In his office, he reread Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Cask of Amontillado,” since his independent study class would be covering it this week. He reached the end.

  I forced the last stone into its position; I plastered it up. Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones. For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them. In pace requiescat!

  There was a knock on the door as Nathaniel peered inside. The kid hadn’t combed his nest of red hair and was wearing sweatpants. William became instantly annoyed. He placed Poe down.

  “Shut the door and take a seat.”

  Nathaniel slunk into a chair, chewing on his lip.

  “You know how serious plagiarism is, don’t you?”

  Nathaniel started to cry, his face turning pink.

  “College is just so hard, Professor,” he said, using his arm to mop up the tears. “Like, sometimes I sit in class and everyone has these great ideas and I have nothing.”

  “Stop crying, Nathaniel.”

  “And my parents, my dad, he’s this businessman and he wants me to be one too and they tell me how much money they’ve spent on my education, and, like, if I got kicked out…!”

  “You’re not getting kicked out.”

  Nathaniel gave a hard sniff. “No?”

  “I want to know why you tried to plagiarize in such an obvious way.” William held up Nathaniel’s essay with the big red F. “This whole paper was literally cut and pasted.”