by Jack Heath
‘No,’ Cedric says. ‘I don’t know why, exactly.’
I can guess. It’s easy to convince yourself something is okay. You can come up with all sorts of rationalisations, reshaping the world so you’re a hero, or at least not an asshole. But it’s much harder to convince yourself that other people will think it’s okay.
You can take a bite out of a corpse and tell yourself he felt no pain, and that he was a bad guy anyway. But you’re not going to tell anyone else you did it, ever. You know they won’t see your point of view. Because, deep down, you know your point of view is bullshit.
‘They wouldn’t understand,’ I prompt.
‘Or maybe they would understand too well.’ Cedric starts scraping another poppy. ‘They care about me. They might try to help me.’
I wonder if any of the Guards actually care about Cedric. I haven’t seen any sign of that. Killers can have emotional connections to other human beings. A group of soldiers might massacre a village and still love their own wives and children. But while the Guards have common enemies—the police, the inmates—that doesn’t make them friends.
‘And you don’t want to be helped,’ I say.
Cedric and I make eye contact. For a moment, I feel like he sees me, the real me. It’s like he’s looking through a powerful telescope that can see the dark, distant edges of my universe, where other people have seen only a scatter of stars.
I can see by the look on his face that he feels the same way. That I understand him more deeply than he wishes to be understood.
‘You loved Samson, didn’t you?’ I say.
It’s a shot in the dark. Two-thirds of me expects to be wrong. But Cedric flinches, as though I’ve hit him.
It was the way he reacted to the body. Just sat next to it, and said, ‘Oh.’ At the time, the word seemed uncaring, or even flippant. In retrospect, I can hear the sadness in it. Oh.
Sadness, but perhaps not enough surprise.
‘And he didn’t love you back,’ I continue. I’ve heard worse motives for murder.
‘He loved me.’ Cedric’s voice wavers, and he tries to cover it with a cough. ‘I know it.’
His knife slips, plunging right through the heart of a poppy he only meant to wound.
‘What happened?’ I ask. Knowing if Cedric’s the killer isn’t enough. I need to know if he’s my ally or my enemy.
‘We’d both been drinking,’ he says. ‘The others had gone to bed. I was telling him about something that happened at a literary festival in New York—a librarian hitting on me, her daughter getting embarrassed, a publicist trying to get rid of them both. Samson was laughing so hard. And I thought, See? I can make you happy. Why won’t you let me?’
‘When was this?’ I ask.
‘November nineteen.’ It’s telling that he knows the date. ‘We kept talking. After a while he rested his head on my shoulder. And then …’ Cedric looks away. Wraps his coat a little tighter around his shoulders. ‘Anyway, we stayed on that sofa till sunrise. It was the best night of my life.’
I feel an unexpected trickle of sympathy for Cedric. My situation is different—Thistle fled from me after finding a human head in my freezer—but it’s similar, too. She was mine for one night, and now she’s gone for good. There are some things no amount of couples therapy will fix.
‘But when everyone else got up,’ Cedric continues, ‘Samson acted like nothing had happened. I spent all day waiting for him to talk about it, but he hardly looked at me. When I confronted him, he said he’d been drinking. Like that explained everything.’
I’m surprised Cedric is telling me this all this. Most men wouldn’t talk about it. They’d keep their jaws clenched until they found something to hit. Anger is the only emotion a man is allowed—some would say taught—to feel.
‘That must have made you mad,’ I say. Mad enough to kill somebody.
‘Yes. But not at Samson. At the others, for shaming him.’ He looks up at the greenhouse roof, blinking away tears. ‘He killed himself over it.’
He sounds like he believes he’s telling the truth. I wonder if knowing Samson was murdered would give him any peace.
‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘He must have really loved you.’
Cedric kisses me.
It comes out of nowhere. I guess it’s been a long time since anyone showed him any kindness, or even listened to him.
His lips, full and soft, are only on mine for a second before I bite him.
‘Argh! Fuck!’ He pulls free and staggers back.
I lick the blood off my lips. It’s electrifying. Like the first salty potato chip out of the packet. Like the first hit of opium after a year sober.
Cedric touches his lips, looks at the blood on his fingers. ‘What the hell, man?’
I still don’t say anything. I’m frozen, playing tug-of-war with myself. I want more, but I can’t have it. That dark voice in my head, saying, You could eat until you’re full and then chop up the rest and bury it in this garden and tell everyone he—
‘Jesus,’ Cedric says.
The word, the shock in it, shames me into a moment of decency. ‘I’m sorry,’ I stammer. And then I run out of the greenhouse without looking back.
CHAPTER 20
Red next to black, safe from attack. Red next to yellow, you’re a dead fellow. What am I?
The urges are worse when I’m stressed or tired. Today I’m both.
I’m digging like a maniac, trying to avoid the hunger burning up my guts. The taste of Cedric’s blood has awakened something in me. I want more. It’s like my stomach is eating the rest of me in desperation.
Samson’s body is nearby, still wrapped in a sheet. He’s going under the vegetable patch. It’s fallow at the moment. No seeds. Plants can turn sunlight into energy, but only if there’s enough nitrogen in the soil. Samson’s body is made partly of nitrogen, so Fred said to bury him here.
Samson would love the thought that parts of him would live on, Donnie told me. I was astonished—and kind of outraged—to see the tears in his eyes when he said this. They’re going to turn Samson’s body into vegetables. What a fucking waste.
But I can’t do anything about it. The vegetable patch is right near the greenhouse. If Cedric walked out and saw me eating his crush, I don’t think I could talk my way out of that.
My plan is to spread the sheet out and lay it on top of Samson, then pile the dirt onto that. Later I can unearth one corner of the sheet, then peel the whole thing back to expose the body.
But there probably won’t be a later. Tonight we pick up the new prisoner—one of Lux’s enemies. He or she will reveal to everyone that I’m not Lux.
The shovel splits the ground. The dirt has been recently turned, and a square of sackcloth has protected it from snow and frost, but the digging is still hard.
It’s not just my life on the line. If I die, or get chained up in that slaughterhouse, those prisoners lose their only hope of salvation. They might be monsters, but the thought still weighs on me. I had the chance to save them, when that sheriff’s deputy showed up. Now we’re all doomed.
Fear of getting caught is a noose, one that’s been around my neck my whole life. Now I can feel it getting tighter and tighter.
The hole is deep enough, but I keep digging. Putting off the moment when all that meat has to go to waste.
There must be a way out of this, a solution to the puzzle—something clever that gets me and all the prisoners out of this alive. But I can’t think of it when I’m this hungry.
Samson’s foot is sticking out of the sheet. I try not to look at it.
Some days the voice in my head is the sensible one, and I’m the bad guy. Other times, I’m the responsible one.
If you weren’t so hungry, you might be able to think of a way out.
‘No,’ I grunt, still digging.
He’s dead. He won’t mind.
‘No.’
Plus, he was a killer. Who cares what happens to his body?
‘No.’
‘No.’
You’re a dead man anyway. Why not have a last meal?
The dirt at the bottom of the hole is too compacted to dig through. I throw down the shovel and drag the bundle over. I put the sole of my shoe against the shapeless mass inside and push. The corpse tumbles in, landing with a wet thud and a snap of broken bones.
The foot is still sticking out. I look at it, breathing heavily. I’m so hungry.
The voice is silent. It knows it’s won.
I reach down and grab his ankle. Glance back towards the greenhouse. No sign of Cedric.
I put Samson’s dirty toe in my mouth. It’s bigger than it looked and covered with fine hairs. I’m about to bite down, when—
‘What are you doing?’ Zara is standing on the other side of me, holding a bag of flour.
Panic. I drop Samson’s foot and hastily turn my face away. ‘Nothing. Just, uh, saying goodbye.’
I wipe my mouth and glance back at Zara to see if she buys this. A delighted grin is spreading across her face. ‘Do you have a foot fetish, Lux?’
‘Um … yes?’
‘Well.’ Zara smooths down her skirt and sits on a flat rock next to the vegetable patch. ‘Your secret is safe with me.’
‘Thanks.’ I’m cursing her for showing up at the wrong moment. I really, really wanted that toe.
‘Actually, you don’t need to keep it a secret,’ Zara says. ‘We’re all very open here. We don’t kink-shame anyone.’
She’s hasn’t mentioned the fact that Samson is dead. That’s a bit more than a kink. ‘It’s … kinda hard to be honest about what I’m into.’
‘Don’t worry. It gets a little easier each time.’ Zara kicks off her shoes and starts stretching out her stockinged toes. ‘Can I tell you a story?’
‘Sure.’
‘When I was a kid, I loved drawing. I’d make pictures of dragons and ruined castles and knights on horses. Some were in black and white, some in colour. I got some free illustration software and drew something new every day. I was obsessed.’
‘That doesn’t sound too kinky.’
Zara gives the comment a more generous laugh than it deserves. ‘Well, one day I broke my stepmom’s laptop. It was an accident—I tripped over the power cable, and it fell off her desk and cracked. But she wanted to punish me. So she took my laptop and she threw it out the window. It was only a ground-floor apartment, but the fall still killed it. All my illustrations were on there. Years of work. This was before cloud backups.’ She snorts. ‘A wicked stepmother. What a cliché, right?’
She doesn’t know how much information she’s giving me. If she had her own laptop but used free software, and a ground-floor apartment but a desk for her stepmom, I can pinpoint her household income within a couple of thousand dollars.
‘She apologised, of course,’ Zara continues. ‘She said I’d just made her so angry, and that her work was keeping a roof over our heads. I should be more careful in future, she told me—it was the kind of apology that was really just a list of the things I’d done wrong. So after she and Dad went to sleep, I snuck into their bedroom.’
So far every encounter with Zara has felt like a performance. She’s always glancing at the others as she talks, measuring their reactions. Not now, though. Her eyes are trained on the forest, but I don’t think she’s really seeing it. She’s back there, in that bedroom.
‘I might have made some noise, but they didn’t wake up, or maybe each of them thought it was the other one. I hid under their bed, right under my stepmom’s side. I had a needle for sewing badges onto my Girl Scouts uniform. It felt like I sat there for hours with it trembling in my hand, trying to work up the courage. Then I reached up around the side of the bed and pricked her.’
I stare at her. She doesn’t appear to be kidding.
‘I don’t know which body part I got. Her thigh, maybe. I expected her to scream, but she just stopped snoring suddenly, and then there was a little gasp, and she muttered, “What in God’s name?” She grabbed around in the bedclothes like this—’ Zara mimes rummaging ‘—looking for whatever had bitten her. Then she gave up. I waited for her to go to sleep … then I stabbed her again.’
Zara’s cheeks glow as she describes this. She has one hand resting between her thighs.
I’m distracted by something panting nearby. When I turn to look at the dog run, both dogs are asleep, their heads on their paws. Must be an animal somewhere in the forest—but it sounds close.
‘This time she yelped,’ Zara continues. ‘Ever step on a cat’s tail? It sounded like that. She scrambled out of bed and turned on the light. I could see her veiny old feet, right next to my face. I just lay there, my heart pounding. She pulled back the blankets so she could look under the bed. But just as she was bending down, Dad told her to knock it off. “You’re imagining things, honey. Go back to sleep.” They argued for a while, but eventually she got back into bed.’
I’m strangely uncomfortable hearing this story. Not because of the act—stabbing someone with a needle is nothing compared to the things I’ve done—but because of the way she describes it. The other Guards see the torture as righteous punishment, a solemn duty. Clearly Zara doesn’t.
‘It’s hard to describe how exciting it was,’ she says. ‘Having that power to hurt and not get punished for it. Way more fun than drawing. Even after I got my new laptop, I never went back to it.’
‘Do the others know this story?’
‘Of course. Like I said, no shaming here.’ She pats my knee and stands up. ‘The sooner you open up to us, the better. You have no idea how good it will feel.’
She’s right. I have no idea. I’ve never told anyone what I am. A couple of people—dead now—found out, but I never told them. And even after they knew, my compulsions were only ever discussed obliquely. Take the body and … do what you do, the old FBI director once said to me. Charlie Warner, the crime lord I used to work for, called it body disposal. I didn’t want to say the actual words, and they didn’t want to hear them.
But I get the feeling that Zara is different. I could tell her: I eat people. She wouldn’t be disgusted. She might even be excited.
This little group of monsters could be the perfect place for me to settle down. If only I was who they think I am.
‘Anyway, I just came back to get some more food for the traps.’ Zara holds up a bag of flour. ‘Take a walk with me?’
‘Sounds good.’
She offers me her hand to help me up. I wipe my dirty palm on my pants before taking it. Then she leads me into the forest, like the fairy-tale creature she is.
The yeast traps are just jelly jars with cheesecloth stretched over the top of them, held on with an elastic band. Through the glass I can see a spongy white mass.
‘Here’s one I prepared earlier,’ says Zara, like a celebrity chef. ‘Usually I pour in a cup of milk and wait for it to go sour before I mix in the flour, but this one is a bit of an experiment. I used water instead, because I don’t especially like the smell of spoiled milk.’
She shoots me an enigmatic smile, like this is a joke—who likes the smell of spoiled milk?—or a character flaw she’s embarrassed to reveal.
‘Looks like it’s working,’ I say, although I really have no idea. I’ve been hungry my whole life, but I’ve never had to resort to baking my own bread.
‘Hmm,’ Zara says, tapping the glass. ‘Maybe.’
She lifts off the cheesecloth and adds a little more flour from the bag, along with some water from a steel bottle. She stirs the mixture with a stick from the ground.
Her clothes are loose, leaving her arms and neck exposed. She doesn’t seem to feel the cold.
It’s like she wants you to taste her, says the voice.
I’m reminded of an old joke about a hungry soldier walking through a jungle. He spots a bacon tree in the distance. As he approaches it, licking his lips, he’s shot by an u
nseen adversary. It wasn’t a bacon tree—it was a hambush.
The other kids at the group home thought that was hilarious, but the punchline only made me hungry.
I want to know why Zara was snooping around upstairs, but I don’t want to ask directly. ‘I was talking to Cedric earlier,’ I say instead. ‘It sounded like he and Samson were close.’
‘Oh?’ Zara looks politely interested.
She’s not biting. I put some more bait on the hook. ‘But it seems they had a falling out.’
If Zara killed Samson, she’ll confirm this. Make Cedric look guilty. Divert suspicion. It’s what I would do.
But Zara just says, ‘Poor Cedric. He has a gentle heart.’ She picks up another yeast trap and examines it.
I take a risk. ‘Remind me what you did for a living? Before you came here?’
‘I never told you,’ she says.
Lucky. ‘That explains why I can’t remember. Were you a baker? A pastry chef?’
‘I wish. Just a humble public servant.’ She bows. ‘I travelled the world, working for the Department of Agriculture.’
I was thinking she might have been a therapist. She has that aura—attentive and non-judgemental.
As we get deeper into the woods, the canopy blocks out more and more of the feeble winter sun. There’s barely enough light to see by and every tree looks the same. Zara must have an amazing memory or she’d lose half the yeast traps she hid.
‘Is that where you learned this stuff?’ I ask.
‘God, no. I was working on the language for trade bills. I never met an actual farmer.’
‘Why did you leave?’
She shrugs. ‘Guess I just got sick of being behind a desk. What about you? You never told me what you did before this.’
She says before this as though I’m one of the team. Like now I torture people for a living.
‘I was a teaching assistant,’ I say, because Lux was. I hope she doesn’t ask me any math questions.
‘Which school?’
‘Braithwaite.’
She holds up a fist. ‘Go Panthers?’
‘Go Panthers,’ I confirm. ‘You know your college football.’