Companions in Ruin

by Mark Allan Gunnells

  two days prior to the shootings

  The school bus pulled up in front of Ned’s house. It was a dilapidated one-story clapboard hovel with peeling paint and a dirt yard. His father’s rusty pickup was parked in the driveway, which meant he’d probably lost another job. As the doors opened, Ned stood and started making his way to the front of the bus. Three seats from the front, Greg Travors snatched Ned’s backpack from his shoulder.

  “Hey, give it back,” Ned said, his voice coming out as a whine.

  “You want it, Twerp,” Greg said, holding out the pack. “Take it.”

  Ned reached for the backpack, but then Greg snatched it back and tossed it across the aisle to Phil Westmore. As Ned turned toward him, Phil tossed the pack over to Vinnie Cedars.

  “Kid, I ain’t got all day,” the bus driver growled, ignoring the boys playing keep-away with Ned’s backpack. “I got a lot of other stops, so haul your skinny ass off my bus.”

  “Guys, come on,” Ned said, hating the pleading sound of his own voice. “Give me my pack.”

  At the back of the bus, Freddie Kline unzipped Ned’s pack and held it out the window, dumping the contents into the gutter below, before dropping the pack as well. Ned hurried out of the bus, the doors closing immediately behind him as the bus rumbled on its way, the back tire running over Ned’s History book. Ned gathered up his books and papers, stuffed them back in the backpack, then headed into the house.

  His father was standing just inside the living room, by the window. He was staring at Ned like he would a pile of bird shit that had just plopped on his shoulder.

  “Hi Dad,” Ned said, just wanting to get to his room.

  “I saw what went down on the bus,” his father said, nodding his head toward the window. “Those punks made a fool of you.”

  Well, why didn’t you come out and help me? Ned thought but said nothing.

  “You’re fucking pitiful,” his father said, his voice low and seething. “I have a hard time believing you even came from my gene pool. Sometimes I think your mother must’ve fucked a rooster and a turd to end up with a chickenshit like you.”

  “But Dad—”

  “Shut up!” his father shouted, lashing out and smacking Ned in the side of the head. “Why didn’t you stand up for yourself, boy? I didn’t raise you to be no pussy. Why didn’t you snatch your bag back and tell those boys to suck your motherfucking cock?”

  “There were too many of them.”

  “So what? Maybe they would have kicked your ass, but at least then you could have held you head high knowing you stood up for yourself instead of just bending over and taking it. At least then you could have proven you were a man.”

  “Dad, I didn’t—”

  “Get out of my sight,” his father said, turning away and taking a swig of his beer. “I can’t even look at you right now. You disgust me.”

  Ned retreated to his room, closing the door behind him. He curled up on his bed, thinking of everything his father had said, thinking of everything he had to endure at school. Ned’s father may have been a useless drunk, but he was right about a few things. Ned did need to stand up for himself; Ned needed to prove he was a man.

  Interview transcript. Subject: Henry Irving Samuels, English teacher at Corinth High School. Age: 29.

  I’m still in shock. When I heard the news, I just couldn’t wrap my brain around it. Ned Terp is—sorry, was—one of my best students. He wrote the most expressive and skilled poetry. I just can’t imagine him as a cold-blooded killer. No, I wasn’t at school that day. I was running late that morning, and when I finally left the house, I discovered that someone had flattened all four of my tires. I called Principal Synder to tell him what had happened, and he said he could find someone to cover my morning classes. I was supposed to come in for my afternoon classes after lunch, but by then it was all over the news. I guess I’m lucky. I just can’t reconcile what I know of Ned with what they’re saying about him. The Ned I knew was sensitive, intelligent, and had a bright future ahead of him. It pains me to know that to the rest of the world he will be remembered only as a monster.

  the morning of the shootings

  Ned parked the pickup half a block from Mr. Samuels’ house and walked the rest of the way. It was before six, the sun just starting to peek its head over the horizon, but he didn’t want to risk being seen by Mr. Samuels. He didn’t have time to answer a lot of questions. He had a busy day ahead of him, a lot of work that needed to be accomplished.

  Mr. Samuels’ BMW was parked in the driveway. The house was dark; it didn’t seem that anyone was yet up. Ned scanned the surrounding neighborhood. No one was outside. Someone could be watching from a window, but he’d have to risk it. He crouched down and scuttled into the driveway, removing the pocketknife and flicking it open. He started on the far side of the car away from the house, stabbing into the thick rubber of the tires until he heard the sound of escaping air. He did the two on that side of the car then hurried around and did the two on the other side. Wasting no time, he closed and pocketed the knife and hurried back down the block.

  He wasn’t sure if his plan would work, if flattening the tires would be sufficient. Mr. Samuels was a dedicated teacher, he may just catch a ride to school when he found his car incapacitated. Still, it was the best that Ned could do. If Mr. Samuels didn’t stay home today…well, Ned couldn’t let anyone stop him from doing what needed to be done.

  Climbing into the pickup, Ned paused to place a hand on the rifle that lay across the passenger’s seat. It was cold to the touch, just the way Ned felt inside. Turning away from the gun, Ned started the truck and drove off, headed for school.

  WORK IN PROGRESS

  “So how’s the book coming along?” Jen asked.

  Jeremy was walking back into the den with two cups of coffee and a plate of sugar cookies on a small silver tray, and he stopped abruptly, causing the coffee to slosh over the rims of the cups. “Um, great, still banging away at it.”

  “What’s the page count now?”

  “1500.”

  Jen frowned. “I thought last time we spoke, you said it was 1800.”

  “Ah, yes, but I realized the last few hundred pages were going off in an unfortunate direction, so I scraped them.”

  “So how close are you to finishing it?”

  Jeremy sat on the sofa across from Jen, dabbing at the split coffee with a few Kleenex. After handing his friend her cup, he took a sip from his own and said, “Still quite a ways. Not even sure I’ve reached the halfway point yet.”

  Jen whistled. “Damn, by the time you’re done, you’ll need a crane just to pick the thing up.”

  “It is a true epic, that’s for sure.”

  “Should be. You’ve been ‘banging away at it’ for…what? Three years now?”

  “Well, I haven’t spent the entire time writing. I’ve also been doing extensive research. With the story being set in Italy during the Renaissance, I want it to be as historically accurate as possible.”

  Jen leaned forward. “When are you going to stop putting me off and let me read what you’ve got?”

  “I told you, I don’t like to let people read my uncompleted works.”

  “I respect that, but at the rate you’re writing, we’ll be 105 by the time you get this thing completed. At least let me read some of it, give me a little taste.”

  Jeremy sighed and rubbed at his eyes. “You’re just not going to let this drop, are you?”

  “Not until you give in,” Jen said with a smile. “I’ve been hearing about this book for years. I’m dying to get a peek at it.”

  “You are a tenacious little minx, aren’t you?”

  Jen sat back in the chair. “I always get what I want.”

  “Fine, you’ve worn me down.”

  “Really? Are you just messing with me?”

  “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

  Jeremy left Jen nibbling on a cookie and went down the hall to the extra bedroom he used as his office. It was
a disaster area of books and papers strewn about, creating a knee-high labyrinth of piles and stacks along the floor. His monster of a computer, ten years old now, sat on a desk in the corner, covered with a thick layer of dust. Jeremy spent fifteen minutes rummaging through various piles of papers until finally putting hands on a manila folder containing a small stack of slightly yellowed pages.

  He returned to the den and held the folder out to Jen, who had devoured half the cookies in his absence. “Here you go, the first two chapters of my magnum opus.”

  Jen rubbed her hands together and took the folder. She opened it up and flipped quickly through the papers inside. “There’re only about twenty pages here.”

  “Yes.”

  “Twenty pages out of fifteen hundred…that’s all I get?”

  “You know what a perfectionist I am,” Jeremy said, taking a sip of his now-lukewarm coffee and lighting up a cigarette. “Those are the only two chapters that are polished enough to meet the high standards I set for myself.”

  “Do you want me to read them here?”

  “Oh, no, that’s just a copy. Take them home with you, take your time.”

  “I can’t wait,” Jen said, holding the folder to her chest. “And when I’m done with these chapters, I know I’m going to want more.”

  ***

  What Jen didn’t know was that there weren’t any more. Those two chapters of Jeremy’s book were all that existed. He’d started the book three years ago with much passion and enthusiasm, so much so that he told everybody about the project, bragging about his plans. He received much encouragement from his friends, and many requests to read the book when he was done. He’d sat down to write with as much optimism as a blushing bride on her wedding day.

  But two chapters were all he’d managed. Writing turned out to be much harder than he’d been anticipating. It took him nearly four months to get twenty pages, and the research involved was monumentally boring. He realized he just didn’t have it in him and abandoned the book.

  And yet his friends still asked him about it, and he just couldn’t bring himself to admit that he’d failed. Instead he chose to lie, inventing this epic novel that he was constantly tinkering with, that kept growing like some kind of cancerous tumor. He milked it for all it was worth, figuring he could play this out for the rest of his life if he had to without ever actually having to write another word.

  Jen was the only one who still asked to read the book, and he hoped these two chapters would appease her enough that she would let it drop for a while.

  ***

  “Hello,” Jeremy said into the phone. He was lying on the sofa in only a pair of boxers, an old episode of Who’s the Boss? playing on the television, now on mute.

  “Jeremy, are you sitting down?”

  “Jen, is that you?”

  “Of course it’s me, and I’ve got some big news.”

  “What’s that?” he asked, cramming a handful of chips into his mouth, crumbs raining down on his bare chest.

  “I read those two chapters you gave me, and they were fucking brilliant.”

  This got Jeremy’s full attention, and he sat up as if yanked on a tether. “So you liked, huh?”

  “Liked? I loved it. So rich and complex and intriguing.”

  Jeremy found himself preening under the compliments. He’d been living with those two chapters for so long he’d lost all objectivity toward them. “Well, it pleases me to hear you enjoyed what you read.”

  “Oh yes. So much so that I did something bad, but I think you’ll forgive me when you hear the results.”

  He froze with another handful of chips halfway to his mouth. “Um, what did you do?”

  “Well, I have this friend who runs his own small press publishing company, name is Chris.”

  “Oh, Jen, no, please tell me you didn’t…”

  “I sent him your chapters to look at.”

  Jeremy reflexively balled his hand into a fist, crushing the chips into potato dust. “You had no right to do that without asking my permission first.”

  “I know, I know, I said it was bad, but just listen. I got an email from him about ten minutes ago, and he was raving about the chapters. Said it was some of the most compelling writing he’d read in ages.”

  Jeremy found himself knocked totally speechless. It was one thing for his friend to tell him his chapters were good, but an actual publisher…? “Jen, are you just pulling my leg?”

  “I’m serious. Chris asked me to give you his email address and phone number. He wants you to get in touch ASAP.”

  “Why?”

  “Why do you think, silly? He wants to read the rest of what you’ve got, and he said of course he couldn’t make any promises, but if the rest of what you’ve done is as good as the first two chapters, he might be willing to offer you a contract for the book when it’s complete.”

  “But there’s no telling when that’ll be, I still have so much to go.”

  “Maybe this is just the push you need. If you know you have a deal waiting for you, might speed the process along. And even if he ends up not publishing your book—he realizes that you might want to go with a larger press—it might be nice to get a critique from someone in the book business.”

  “Oh, um, I just don’t know about this. I mean, maybe in the future, but not now. The writing is at a very delicate stage and—”

  “You can’t fool me, Jeremy,” Jen said. “I know why you’ve really not wanted anyone to read any of the book all these years.”

  “You…you do?”

  “Sure, you’re afraid. But you have nothing to be afraid of. You’re an amazing writer, and I just know my friend is going to want to publish your book.”

  “Jen, really, I—”

  “Enough discussion. I’m going to give you his email and phone number, and the rest is up to you.”

  Jen rattled off the information, and Jeremy jotted it down on the back of a pizza box lying on the coffee table. After Jen hung up, he sat there stunned for several moments, the television continuing to play soundlessly across the room. His mind was completely empty of thought.

  Except that wasn’t true. The fact was there were too many conflicting thoughts zinging around in there for him to pick any one thought out of the chaos.

  An actual honest-to-God publisher loved his stuff, was interested in possibly publishing him, interested enough to want to read more.

  Only there was no more to read.

  But there could be.

  Maybe Jeremy could put an end to the charade and get back to the book, take up where he left off. He could get the book published, and maybe it wouldn’t make him rich or famous, but he could always look at the finished product on his shelf and know he’d accomplished something.

  But could he do it? That was the real question. It had taken him four excruciating months to do just two chapters, how much longer would it take him to finish a whole book? And there was all the time and energy expended on research, edits, revisions. What if he poured years of his life into this thing only to have it ultimately rejected and ridiculed?

  No, he preferred things the way they were, but could things stay that way now that Jen had introduced this new wrinkle into the fabric of his pretense? He knew her well enough to know she’d never let it go, would keep hounding him about the matter.

  But what could he possibly do about it?

  With a weary sigh, he stood and walked over to the mantel to retrieve his cigarette pack. He could use a smoke.

  ***

  Jen parked at the curb two blocks from Jeremy’s house. That was as close as she could get, part of the street cordoned off with sawhorses and a crowd of people in nightgowns and pajamas gathered at the barriers, watching the fire.

  Even from here, she could tell it was Jeremy’s house that was ablaze. Fire engines with flashing lights were parked on the lawn, and hoses sent sprays high up in the air to try to douse the flames. It seemed a losing battle.

  She’d received the call at just bef
ore midnight, waking her from a deep sleep. Jeremy calling from his cell, tears in his voice as he asked her to come. She’d thrown on some sweats and dashed for the car.

  She scanned the crowd, looking for her friend, finally spotting him standing by himself under an oak in a neighbor’s yard. He wore only his underwear. She hurried to him, throwing her arms around him and hugging him tight.

  “Oh Jeremy, what happened?”

  “I don’t know, I think maybe I left a cigarette burning downstairs when I went up to bed. The smoke detector woke me, I was lucky to get out.”

  “You poor baby.”

  Jeremy leaned against the tree, as if his legs were unable to support him. His eyes were red and his skin coated with a thin layer of soot. “Everything’s going up in smoke,” he said. “All my artwork, my great-grandmother’s china, my baseball card collection I’ve had since I was a boy…and of course the book.”

  “What book? You mean your book?”

  Jeremy nodded, seemed unable to speak for a moment. “The computer, all my back-up files, the paper copies…they were all in the house. All those years of work, all the blood, sweat, and tears I put into it, all gone.”

  “Oh Jeremy.”

  “Guess I won’t be talking to your publisher friend after all.”

  Jeremy broke into fresh tears, and she took him into her arms again. She held him that way for some time as his house burned behind them, lighting up the night sky.

  DEPRAVATION

  HOUR ONE

  Julie sat on her bed, arms folded across her chest and her mouth turned down in an angry pout. She simply couldn’t believe her mother would do this to her. And over nothing. Nothing major, anyway.

  Okay, so maybe Julie had forgotten to pick up her kid brother from Little League practice, but she’d been chatting online with her bff Suzie about what they were going to wear to the dance tomorrow night and Julie had simply lost track of time. Besides, her brother Kip’s coach had given him a lift home, so no harm no foul. Her mother was just overreacting, that was all there was to it.