Ribbons

by Evans, J R

  He used a fishing tackle box to store his paints and brushes, but he used it for something else, too. It was the kind that unfolded when it opened so that you could see all the different compartments. It was handy because it seemed like you needed a couple dozen shades of paint to get a space marine to look like it was ready to kick serious ass. The box also had a tray that you could pull out of the bottom. Underneath the tray was an old aspirin bottle. Adam opened the bottle and dropped the pill in with the others that he had spit out over the past few weeks. The bottle was half-full now.

  He didn’t like taking the pills. They made his stomach hurt, and his head got all fuzzy. When he took them, he just felt like sleeping or watching TV all the time. The tremors still came when he took the pills; his body just didn’t react as much. He tried explaining that to the doctors, but they didn’t listen. They had him try all kinds of different pills, some worse than others. When Adam tried to tell them the tremors still came back, they would always make him take more pills for a while and then switch him to something else. Now Adam found it easier to just tell them the pills were working.

  He had to be careful, though. When the tremors did come he had to find a way to stay calm. That was hard when his parents were yelling at each other. It was easier when he was by himself. Drawing also helped. He wouldn’t draw anything in particular. Just lines. Lines that swirled, and curved, and sometimes exploded into little patterns, almost like writing. At first he had drawn on paper, but lately he had started drawing on the walls of his clubhouse. Just looking at the lines would calm him down. Then the tremors would turn into daydreams. And that wasn’t so bad. He knew he said things during the tremors. He could never remember what he had said, but he wondered if it might be related to the things he saw in the tremor dreams.

  He felt them coming now. It was like hearing two people talking as they walked down a long hallway toward him. Muffled rumbling at first. Slowly getting louder and clearer. Then he started to pick out patterns and phrases. When the sound seemed like it was right next to him, he started to shake. He reached into his tackle box and pulled out a Sharpie. He heard a click as he took the cap off the pen, and then the world shook apart.

  The Christmas lights started to vibrate and shift out of focus. One second Azrael was sniffing his nose, the next he was running away. Space marines jumped across the table, and the gaps between the boards that made up the floor seemed to be getting bigger.

  Adam felt his pen touch the wall. The rough scratching as the tip dragged across the wood. A line spiraled, crossed over itself, and then split off in a different direction. It was like drawing lines between the stars that formed a constellation. Only, instead of stars he was connecting ideas. Then his hand pushed through the wall.

  He was standing in a forest. It was still, and at first it was completely silent. Then he heard a bird screech off in the distance. The forest was dark and dense. It would take forever to walk through it, but he wouldn’t know where to go anyway, so he didn’t move. He looked down at his feet and saw that he was standing on a path. It disappeared into the darkness in both directions. He knew this was a tremor dream so he wasn’t afraid. Soon the tremors would stop and he would see a new drawing on the wall in front of him.

  He heard footsteps coming down the path. And then music. The tune seemed familiar, but if it was from a song he knew, he couldn’t remember the words. Somebody was humming along with it. As he looked down the path, a man stepped around a tree and out of the shadows. His eyes were watching the trail as though he was concentrating hard on where he was going. He held a music box in one hand and almost dropped it when he finally noticed Adam.

  “Jesus!” said the man. “You scared the hell out of me.”

  Adam didn’t quite know what to say. Usually people couldn’t see him in his tremor dreams, and nobody had ever tried to talk to him.

  “What are you doing here?” asked the man. “Are you looking for the garden?”

  Adam opened his mouth to ask, What garden? but what came out was, “Take-unto-you-the-whole-armor-of-God-that-ye-may-be-able-to-withstand-in-the-evil-day-and-having-done-all-to-stand.”

  The man closed the lid of his box, and the music stopped. “I don’t know what that means. Who are you? Did she send you? Are you supposed to take me to her?” He sounded very hopeful.

  Adam couldn’t answer any of those questions. “The-Lord-is-my-light-and-my-stronghold-Of-whom-shall-I-be-afraid?”

  The man slowly shook his head, the hope draining out of his eyes. “No. She didn’t send you. She wouldn’t. She chose me. I send people to her. You’re just another whisper left over in my head. You want me to step off the path.”

  Adam was afraid to open his mouth. This guy sounded seriously disturbed, and Adam didn’t want to make him mad.

  His mouth opened anyway. “Who-hath-cut-a-channel-for-the-torrents-of-rain-and-a-path-for-the-thunderstorm.”

  And it did make the man mad. “I know what you’re trying to do!” He pulled something from a pocket, and suddenly there was a knife hovering a few inches from Adam’s nose. “It’s not gonna work. I’m almost there.”

  The man must have cut himself when he pulled out the knife because Adam saw blood starting to seep through his shirt down by his ribs. Adam clenched his jaw tight and then slowly lifted a finger to point to the man’s chest.

  As the man looked down, more blood spread across his shirt. At first it just looked like a shapeless splotch, but then a red line crept up his body in a curving pattern. The line spiraled, crossed over itself, and split off in a different direction. The man’s eyes widened, and he dropped his music box to grab at his chest. He started to scream, but it was cut off.

  And then Adam was staring at the wall of his clubhouse. The tremors were leaving his hand, and the world snapped back into place. The line he had started drawing now filled the wall, but the ink from the pen must have run dry because the last pattern was barely visible. The scream still echoed in his ears, and Adam wondered if maybe it had come from his own mouth.

  29

  The first bottle of wine had been almost empty when Christy arrived. Now Erica was finishing off the second. Christy had only refilled her glass once, and it was still half-full. It was late in the afternoon, which meant Erica was up pretty early. It also meant that she was having wine for breakfast. Christy wasn’t sure why. It didn’t seem to be cheering her up at all. And she certainly wasn’t drinking to forget.

  “I miss her,” said Erica.

  It wasn’t the first time she had said that since Christy had sat down with her. They were in Erica’s living room. Christy had only been there once before, but that was for a party, and it had been so crowded that she’d barely noticed the furniture. Now, with just the two of them, it looked like Erica had flipped through a furniture catalog until she found a living room she liked and just ordered everything on the page. It was nice and elegant, but it didn’t really feel like a home.

  “It’s only been a couple days,” said Christy. At first she had tried to distract Erica with gossip, hoping to get her mind off the breakup. It had worked for a while, but now it seemed like they were back at square one. Erica obviously had something she needed to work through.

  “It feels longer,” said Erica. “Especially with all that’s been going on.”

  Christy took a sip from her glass. Time to dig into it, she supposed. “Did she say why?”

  “I’m sure it’s partially the stress of trying to track down that psycho,” said Erica. “But mainly it’s me. I’m not what she wants anymore. Not what she needs.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true.”

  “She pretty much said it to my face. And I was too high to do anything about it.”

  Aha. So, this was depression mixed with guilt. Christy knew about the drugs—all the girls knew. It had been pretty obvious. But it hadn’t been a problem for months.

  She remembered when Erica had first started at the Golden Delicious. It hadn’t seemed like she was going to b
e there long, which was what most of the girls told themselves when they started. That wasn’t a bad thing. But Erica hadn’t been looking for some quick money. She had been looking for the next step up, whatever that was. She had tried out porn for a while and even released a couple of videos, but she didn’t get along with the people she was working with. From what Christy had heard, Erica tended to go “off script” a lot and made people bleed when they weren’t supposed to. So that didn’t last too long.

  Erica went out with people who had a lot of money, but she never stayed with anyone for long. Either she got bored or they got hurt. She had never considered any of those relationships serious, and it didn’t seem like she wanted to find somebody to take care of her. Not even Dani apparently.

  Erica wasn’t actually that great at seduction. She was excellent at branding, and she had quickly made a name for herself. If you wanted to be tied up and whipped in Las Vegas, you went to Erica. Which was great for business at the Golden Delicious. Some guys saw her as a celebrity, and she seemed to enjoy the attention. She put a lot of effort into her costumes and routines. You always got a different flavor of Erica each time you visited.

  The drugs were a problem, of course. They got her into a lot of parties, and she met some powerful people, but they also dragged her down. She never seemed to focus on any one project for very long. She wasn’t able to build anything, and she didn’t have anybody to keep her on track. Except for Uncle Quent.

  “Oh,” said Christy. “I thought you quit.”

  Erica couldn’t meet her eyes. “Quent was helping me.”

  “Maybe I could help? Or Matt?”

  “Matt? Didn’t we just spend the last hour making fun of him?”

  “He’s not so bad,” said Christy. “You heard about the clubhouse out back?”

  “Yeah,” said Erica. “I’m sure it’s strictly ‘no girls allowed.’”

  “Well, we do have cooties,” said Christy.

  Erica smiled a little at that. “True.” The smile didn’t last long and vanished altogether after her next sip of wine.

  Christy leaned over and put her hand on Erica’s. “You should call her.”

  “She told me not to.”

  Christy gave her a knowing look. “Which means?”

  “Okay. Maybe I’ll try tomorrow.”

  “You should try tonight.”

  Erica stared into her wine for a few seconds.

  “Fine,” she said. “Tell Matt I may not be in. Either I’ll be having make-up sex or I’ll be too depressed to work.”

  “Okay,” said Christy. “But if things don’t work out, it might be good to be around other people. Plus, you could take out some frustration in the VIP room. And get paid for it.”

  “Sure,” said Erica. She drained what was left in her glass.

  Christy wasn’t convinced that Erica would follow through, but there wasn’t much else she could say without calling her an addict. Maybe a better friend would have done just that. The truth was, they weren’t that close.

  Christy set down her glass and stood up. “I should head out. My shift is starting soon, and I promised Adam I’d pick up dinner.”

  Erica stood up with her. “Well, thanks for stopping by.”

  Christy started to say something but stopped when Erica reached out and hugged her. It felt strange, coming from her, but it also felt sincere.

  “I should be a better friend,” said Erica. “I can be.”

  “I know,” said Christy.

  It was almost dark as she started driving back home. She could see the lights of the Strip in her rearview mirror. People had high expectations when they saw those lights. This was supposed to be the place where you could cut loose and be the person who you usually hid away from the rest of the world. It made it hard to live here, though. You got used to seeing those hidden people everywhere. Fantasy made flesh. It was like living in an amusement park. If you weren’t having a good time, people didn’t want to be around you.

  Christy had lost herself in that fantasy for a while. She’d become an adult too soon. Instead of finishing high school, she’d learned about diapers and breast pumps. Her mom had helped out, but she also needed to work to support all three of them. Her anger and frustration with Christy had vanished the moment she held Adam in her arms. It had returned, however, when Christy started acting like a teenager again.

  Christy hadn’t gone to her high school prom. Nobody had asked her, of course. She didn’t regret it. At the time, she hadn’t wanted to run the risk of seeing Dwayne. Dwayne, whose life hadn’t changed at all because he’d chosen not to let it change. She had tried to stay in touch with her high school friends, though. They invited her out after graduation even though she hadn’t been part of the ceremony. A girls’ night out. One of them knew the DJ at a club, and they got in without ID. It was awkward. Her friends didn’t know how to talk to her anymore. Christy wanted it to be like it was before she had gotten pregnant, but it wasn’t. They kept asking her about being a mother.

  What’s it like to have a kid?

  How much did it hurt to give birth?

  Should you really be drinking that cosmo?

  Luckily, it had been hard to talk much at the club anyway. Christy lost herself in the music and the bodies dancing up against each other. It felt good not to think. So, she didn’t think when the guy she was dancing with took her hand and led her out the door. There was a limo waiting outside, and it sounded like a good idea to go for a ride in it. Even sex had sounded like a good idea, until it was over.

  It felt fine. It had been her first time since she had given birth, but that had been six months before. Instead of feeling utterly relaxed afterward, she felt anxious. She got dressed immediately, and the guy lying in the bed didn’t seem surprised at all. He leaned over the edge of the mattress to pick up his pants. Instead of putting them on, he fished his wallet out of a pocket. He thanked her, and handed her something. She thought it was money for a cab ride home. When she walked into the hotel lobby she saw it was a lot more. Five one-hundred-dollar bills.

  He must’ve made a mistake. She started to head back to the elevator. He had been a nice enough guy. Quite a bit older than she was. Maybe he had just wanted sex, but that’s all she’d wanted, too. She stopped walking as the doors slid open. It wasn’t a mistake somebody would make. She let the doors slide close again. He had paid her. Her first reaction was to laugh. She ended up crying all the way home in the back of the cab.

  Two years later, her mother had passed away. Acute heart failure. She was taken to the hospital on Wednesday. By Friday, Christy was living alone with Adam. Her mother left her everything she had, but they were renting, and the money had only lasted through the end of the year. And she still hadn’t called Dwayne. They had to move into a smaller place, and Christy found a job as a cocktail waitress at a casino. With tips, it was enough to live on.

  When Adam had his first seizure, Christy had to take off so much time that she lost her job. She had put the hospital bill on a credit card. When he had his second seizure, her credit card had been declined. That’s when she had finally called Dwayne. Who was a complete ass. She tried to explain what was going on, but he had refused to listen. He went on about how he was with somebody else now and how he had debt of his own to worry about. She hung up on him when he accused her of taking Adam away from him.

  Adam had been three and a half at the time, but he could tell that something was wrong. He brought her a Band-Aid after she’d hung up the phone because she was crying. It made her cry harder, which made him start crying. They held each other until the tears stopped. Adam was laughing again in half an hour.

  Christy had hired a babysitter that same night. She’d gone out and come home with five one-hundred-dollar bills. That was six years ago.

  Now, she wondered if she should be looking at other options. Dwayne was back in their lives. She didn’t know what had changed for him, but he seemed genuinely interested in how they were doing. He had offered to
help out with the hospital bills several times, and last time she had let him. With Quent gone, now might be the right time to make a change. Matt seemed to be doing the best he could, but he was mixed up in something way over his head. He couldn’t control things the way Quent had been able to, and she didn’t want to put Adam in the middle of any fallout. Too bad. Matt seemed to get along naturally with Adam, where Dwayne had to work at it.

  Her stomach growled. She might actually get a burger for herself tonight. Normally that wasn’t a good idea on a work night, but then again, neither was a growling stomach. She needed something to start soaking up the wine. She figured she should get an extra burger for Matt while she was at it. He was pretty bad about feeding himself. And she wanted him to be in a good mood if Erica did decide to come in.

  30

  Erica rolled the brass cylinder between her fingers. It felt heavier than it looked. The oil from her thumb left a faint fingerprint on the casing. She tipped it over and let the powder pour out. It was so fine that wisps of it lingered in the air as the rest tumbled down into the water. That was the last one. The box was empty. She pushed the lever and flushed away a thousand dollars’ worth of bliss and suffering.

  She knew she had to do it before calling Dani. If not, she would probably end up getting high all night. Odds were that Dani wouldn’t even pick up the phone, but she might answer just long enough to tell Erica to go fuck herself. If that happened, she would end up emptying the box anyway. On the off chance that Dani stayed on the line long enough to have a conversation, Erica didn’t really know what she was going to say. She would start with I’m sorry, and then see where things went.

  Talking with Christy had helped. Erica had always admired her. She never hid who she was, even when she was with a customer. Erica could never put that much of herself out there. She was still trying to figure out who she wanted to be. It was hard to settle on just one life. Erica was happy trying on a different face every day. The problem with not knowing who you were was that nobody else did, either.