The Calling

by Robert Swartwood

  I paused, cleared my throat, and said, “You know, I think I could go for a bottle of water after all.”

  Pastor James Young swiveled in his chair and opened a mini-fridge underneath the table behind his desk. He pulled out a bottle of Deer Park and handed it to me.

  I uncapped it and took a few sips of the water, then wiped my mouth and set the bottle aside.

  “Okay,” Pastor James Young said after a moment, when it was clear I wasn’t going to speak. “So you think ... it was a demon that tried attacking you?”

  “I didn’t. I thought it was just one of those dreams that was really real. Like when you dream you’re playing baseball and the ball comes right at your head and you jerk up out of sleep the moment it almost hits you. But I told my parents about it the next day, and my mom”—glancing once again at the corkboard—“she put the idea in my head. She said that I was being oppressed.”

  “Do you think you were being oppressed?”

  “I don’t know. But after last week, after ... after finding my parents like I did, I’ve been thinking a lot about that dream. Because you know how you asked me earlier how I’m feeling? I’m exhausted, yeah, but ever since last week, I’ve felt just like I did that morning a year ago. Just lying in bed and watching for one of the shadows in the corner to move. Because I know what this guy is waiting for, the bastard who killed my parents.”

  The pastor looked even more uncomfortable than before. He glanced down at his desk, started to move that stack of papers but then thought better of it, took a deep breath. “What do you think he’s waiting for?”

  “He’s waiting for me to close my eyes. He’s waiting for me to go back to sleep so he can come and finish what he started.”

  Chapter 2

  Here is how the police reconstructed the last couple hours of my parents’ lives:

  After the Lanton High School graduation Friday night, after hearing their only son’s name announced and then watching him receive his diploma, after tracking him down through the sea of students and parents afterward so they could give him a hug, so they could get a few pictures of him in his maroon gown and mortarboard, they told him they were very proud of him and then got ignored when their son spotted some friends and said he had to leave, that he’d see them later.

  Somewhere then in the gymnasium lobby they met up with Jack and Celia Murphy, whose older daughter, Melanie, I had dated for nearly two years. We had since broken up, but over those two years the Murphys had become close friends with my parents. So my parents met them there and engaged in some small talk, before deciding to meet at the Friendly’s along the highway. There they ordered ice cream sundaes and the men talked about hunting while the women talked about books. According to their waitress, whom the police only identified as Bethany, they spent nearly two hours at their table, taking their time with their desserts, getting their water glasses refilled every half hour. Then, around ten o’clock, my father and Jack Murphy argued over who was going to pay the check. Neither of them agreed to split it. They actually ended up playing a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, and then got into a heated debated on whether it was one two three go, or one two and then go on three.

  “It was kind of cute,” Bethany told police. “They sort of acted like brothers.”

  In the end, my father came out victorious, his Rock beating Jack Murphy’s Scissors.

  At ten-fifteen, in the Friendly’s parking lot, my parents said their goodbyes. My mother and Celia Murphy hugged, my father and Jack Murphy shook hands, Jack promising that he was going to beat my father next time, and then my parents left. They stopped at a gas station on the way home, my father filling up the tank of his Volvo, then going inside to purchase a quart of milk and a fresh loaf of bread. This the police confirmed from credit card receipts and the gas station surveillance video and the night clerk. My parents drove directly home, where they arrived at somewhere between ten-forty and ten-fifty. This was confirmed by Bud Donnelly, a forty-two-year-old investment banker who lived next door with his wife. He had just gotten back from taking his cocker spaniel for a walk when my parents pulled into the driveway.

  He said to them, “So Chris finally graduated, huh? Congratulations.”

  “Don’t congratulate us yet,” my mother said.

  Bud said, “What do you mean?”

  My father said, “She means once Christopher finally graduates college, then it’s time for congratulations.”

  The three of them apparently got quite a chuckle out of that.

  Once inside the house, it becomes only speculation. As their only child, who’d lived in that house for eighteen years, I can pretty much assume my dad took off his tie, unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt, and sank into his recliner to watch the news. My mother probably took off her heels, her earrings and necklace, before sitting at the dining room table and grading papers until eleven-thirty rolled around and my father called her in to watch the opening monologue of The Tonight Show. Depending on who the first guest was, they turned off the TV and headed upstairs, where they undressed, brushed their teeth, and got into bed.

  I arrived home at about five-thirty in the morning. It was still dark outside. I came in the backdoor, took off my shoes, and went upstairs where I literally passed out on the bed and did not wake back up until six hours later, when the repetitive blaring of my parents’ alarm clock yanked me from my sleep.

  I thought about this when I returned home that Friday afternoon. It was the first time I’d seen the place since last week. I’d been staying in a Motel 6, under constant police protection. The house was still a crime scene, but since I was going away for a while, Steve said he’d allow me back in the house for a few hours to pack. Driving through my neighborhood, I tried spotting changes in the houses, in the trees, in the cars parked in driveways or along the street, but everything looked the same. Then I pulled up in front of the house I’d grown up in and looked at the two-story as if for the first time. It looked the same, yet it didn’t. The grass needed mowed, sure, and the conspicuous yellow and black crime scene tape strung up around the property would have to go, but besides that ... it still didn’t look right.

  There were two cars already parked in the driveway. One was a black Ford Explorer, the other a township police cruiser. Standing between them, their arms crossed, Steve Carpenter and Dean Myers seemed to be deep in conversation.

  I got out of my car and started up the drive toward them. Both men had noticed me pull up, had glanced my way, then went back to their conversation. It was as I neared that my uncle uncrossed his arms and extended his hand toward the police chief. He said, “Steve, thank you for all your help. I really appreciate it.” Then he was walking toward me, saying, “Chris, how did everything go?”

  “Good.”

  He nodded and said, “Great, I’m glad to hear it.” He glanced past me at where my tailing cruiser had parked across the street. “I think Mom’s resting right now, so we should hopefully be back around two o’clock. Okay?”

  I told him it was. Then we just stood there for a moment, neither one of us saying anything. I stared at my uncle, who stared back at me. He stood just under six-feet, his black hair shaved into a crew cut, a trimmed mustache hovering just above his upper lip. I didn’t know much about him except that he was thirty-seven, unmarried, and had spent some time in the military. Now he worked as a deputy in New York. He and my grandmother had come down Monday, for the funeral on Wednesday. I hadn’t seen or heard from either of them since I was six years old, the last time I visited New York with my parents. Something happened the next year, something that involved my father’s father, and that was why all communication had been cut. To be honest, until Sunday night when my uncle had been contacted and then called me, I didn’t even remember they existed.

  “All right, Chris,” he said, “we’ll see you then.”

  I watched him get into his Explorer, then watched him as he backed out of the driveway. I waited until he’d turned the corner, until he’d disappear
ed behind houses and trees, before turning back toward Steve.

  “Well?” he said as I approached. “How did everything go?”

  I told him the same thing I’d told my uncle, not wanting to impart the real reason I went to see Pastor James Young.

  “Good,” Steve said, but his voice somehow betrayed him, making it clear he didn’t believe things were very good at all.

  He wore his gray uniform today, his silver badge catching some of the sun. An older man, large but not overweight, he was widely known for his gentle nature, for his fairness and patience. But I remembered the rage in his eyes for the first two days, when he had been convinced I’d murdered my parents. It remained constant until I’d gone through all the lines of questioning, until I’d passed the polygraph test, until the forensic lab came back and confirmed that my DNA was nowhere to be found in my parents’ room. Until two of my friends hesitantly stepped forward to admit that I’d been drinking and smoking pot with them at a party until about five a.m. Friday night.

  “Is everything cleaned up in there?” I asked finally. Meaning, was the mark in blood taken off my door?

  Steve shook his head. “Not everything. Some things we still had to keep there in case we need to come back to it.” Meaning, yes it was.

  A light breeze picked up, rustling the leaves in the massive oak in the front yard.

  “Believe me, Chris,” Steve said, “this is the best route right now. We just ... I can’t afford to keep twenty-four hour protection on you anymore. I’m sorry.”

  “No, you have nothing to apologize for.” I glanced at the cruiser parked across the street, the police officer inside who’d somehow gotten stuck babysitting me. “I understand how things are.”

  “Trust me. You’ll be safe up there in Bridgton. Your uncle will be able to keep an eye on you. Nothing’s going to happen to you. I promise.”

  I didn’t say anything to this. I didn’t tell him that he shouldn’t make promises he wasn’t certain he could keep, not when a week had gone by and the police had no leads at all on who had murdered my parents. No evidence found inside the house. No apparent motive for the crime. No apparent entry point. It was like the killer had been hiding in the shadows of their bedroom the entire time, waiting for them to close their eyes, before stepping out and cutting their throats.

  Steve said, “I know there’s some tension between you and your grandmother and uncle. I sensed it at the funeral. Hell, I sensed it a few minutes ago when Dean went over to talk to you. But whatever happened in the past, things change. People change. You’ll all get over whatever happened too, I know you will. It just takes time.”

  A car drove down the street. For a moment I thought it was somebody with the news, somebody doing a drive by to see if anything had changed here, and now wouldn’t they get a nice surprise to find that the victims’ son was standing right in his own front yard with the chief of police? But it was Darren Bannister in his blue Buick Rivera, the old man only glancing at us as he drove toward his home three houses down.

  I said, “Do you even know what happened eleven years ago? When I was seven, why my dad cut off all ties with his family?”

  Steve shook his head.

  “My grandfather tried to kill me. When I was seven years old, he came down here and kidnapped me and tried to kill me.”

  Steve opened his mouth, started to say something, then must have thought better of it. He waited a moment, letting that sink in, before saying, “Like I told you, Chris, it just takes time. Everything will work out. We’re going to catch this guy. I mean, hey, look at what happened to Kevin Parker and his wife. That worked out for the best, right?”

  Kevin Parker, a local bestselling author, had lost his wife nearly eight months ago. Some thought she had just run off, but as it turned out she had been kidnapped. A few days ago she had been found again, somewhere in the Adirondacks, but from what I could tell the Lanton Police Department had had no hand in the rescue.

  I said, “So you’re certain it wasn’t Grant?”

  Steve sighed. “Again, yes, we are certain Grant Evans had nothing to do with your parents’ murder.”

  “You talked with him?”

  “Chris—”

  “He has an alibi and everything?”

  “Chris, believe it or not, we know what we’re doing. And for the final time, Grant is not a suspect. I know you two had your disagreements in the past, but trust me, he’s clean.”

  Our “disagreements” was me beating the shit out of him a month ago in the cafeteria, for seemingly no reason at all.

  “Anyway,” Steve said, stepping forward and patting me on the shoulder, “you take care of yourself. I’ll be in contact with your uncle daily. Hopefully in another week or two you’ll be back here and everything will have cooled down.”

  He shook my hand, smiled once more, then got into his car. Just like with my uncle, I watched him as he backed out of the driveway and pulled away. Then, in the sudden silence, which somehow overpowered the typical summer sounds of birds chirping and busy traffic out on Rockwell Road, I heard the distant growl of a lawnmower. Also there were kids playing somewhere close, probably in someone’s backyard. I tried imagining what they were doing; playing tag, maybe, or swimming in a pool. It didn’t really matter. All that mattered was that life went on just as it always did. People live, people die, and still the world turns. It all seems so obvious, so standard, until someone close to you actually dies, and you notice the world hasn’t stopped. Then the realization hits you that when you die, the world won’t even hesitate, because it doesn’t care at all.

  Chapter 3

  I was a half hour into packing—going slowly, taking my time in a room that had become alien to me—when the doorbell rang. I paused, thoughts of who it might be racing through my mind: Steve, my uncle, a reporter ... or my parents, waiting dead at the door like the son in W. W. Jacobs’s “The Monkey’s Paw.” I shook the image from my mind—

  my parents standing side by side, staring ahead with no eyes

  —and hurried downstairs. When I opened the door, the officer who’d been waiting in his cruiser across the street stood staring at me.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Myers, but there’s a gentleman here who says he’s your neighbor down the street. A Darren Bannister?”

  Before I could even open my mouth to ask who he meant—from all I could see it was just the two of us here on the porch—he stepped aside. Behind him, cowering like a lost kitten, was one of the oldest men in the world.

  “Hello there, Christopher.”

  I nodded to him, then told the officer he was fine. Once the man had left, walking across the lawn toward his car, I forced a smile.

  “So, Mr. Bannister. How are you?”

  Short, hair whiter than snow, he was dressed in baggy jeans and a yellow short-sleeved shirt. He wore thin glasses that looked as if they’d been made during the Depression. He’d lived three houses down from me all my life. His wife had died years ago, and ever since then he’d been living alone. When I was younger, I made twenty dollars mowing his lawn or shoveling his driveway, depending on the season and how much I needed the extra cash. In his hands now was a brown paper-wrapped package.

  “Oh, I’m just fine.” He had a thick Irish accent and a rustiness in his voice from smoking all his life. He smiled, showing the yellow teeth he had left. Then, just as quickly, his expression became somber. “I was at me daughter’s house all last week. Just got back Wednesday. Heard about your parents. I’m sorry, Christopher, really. They both were fine people.”

  I thanked him. “What can I do for you, Mr. Bannister?”

  “Here you are.” He held the package out to me. “Yours.”

  “Mine?”

  He nodded. “Had it for ... oh, five years, I’d say. Your granddaddy mailed it to me. Said I was to give you it when ... when something bad happened. And I’d say what happened was quite bad indeed.”

  “My grandfather?”

  Darren Bannister simply nodded, not
taken aback by my sudden incredulity.

  I stared at the package in his hands. It was a mail parcel, which looked just as old as Bannister himself. I said, “What’s in there?”

  “Don’t know exactly. Your granddaddy wouldn’t tell me. Just said that I was to—”

  I grabbed the package, held it up to my ear as if to listen for the ticking of a bomb. There was nothing, so I weighed it in my hands. It felt like a book.

  “How did you know my grandfather?”

  Now that his hands were free, the old man didn’t seem to know what to do with them. Finally he put them in his pockets, shrugged and said, “I met him the couple of times he came down here to visit you and your folks. Then ... you know, after he went away, he wrote me every once in a while. Asking how you and your family were doing.”

  “And you never thought that was odd?”

  “Course I did, Christopher,” he said, actually sounding cross. “But his letters seemed so sincere, I just couldn’t ignore them. So I wrote him back, told him I’d try to keep him updated, but I never did after that one time. Then I received that in the post and didn’t know what to think. Your granddaddy said I was to give it to you if anything happened. Said if I knew I was going to die or get real sick, I should find someone else to give it to you. Figured I’d ask me daughter, if that was the case. Sounds queer, I know, but that’s all I can tell you.”