Darkness Follows

by Mike Dellosso

  “But Daddy’s not wearing any shoes.”

  Molly gave Sam that be-a-good-example look. “Daddy should get some shoes on too.”

  Sam ignored the look and opened the door.

  A state trooper stood on the porch, notepad in hand. “Mr. Travis?”

  “Yes. Sam. And, uh …” Molly was there by his side. “My wife, Molly.”

  “I’m Officer Coleman.” He looked at Molly, then past her into the house. He was already sizing up the situation. “You made the call, ma’am?”

  “Yes,” she said, nodding. “Sam said he heard a gunshot and then the window shattered.”

  Sam didn’t miss her choice of words. Sam said he heard. Not Sam heard a gunshot. She doubted him already. Since the accident she hadn’t taken him seriously. She would deny it, of course she would, and Sam knew it wasn’t intentional, but he could tell. To him it was as obvious as blue fur on a cow.

  “May I come in, folks?”

  “Oh, yes. Of course,” Molly said.

  She and Sam moved out of the way, and Coleman stepped through the doorway. No more than thirty, he was a short man but built like a bulldozer. Thick neck, broad chest, and bulky arms. What every cop should look like. When he removed his hat, his close-cropped hair made his head look like it had a five o’clock shadow.

  “Is anybody hurt?”

  “No,” Sam said. “Molly and Eva”—he motioned to his daughter standing on the bottom step—”were asleep when it happened. Upstairs. I was standing by the door here.”

  Coleman made some notes in his pad. He stopped and looked around. “Is anybody else in the house?”

  The cop’s left eyelid drooped ever so slightly, like a shade half-closed, and it reminded Sam of Marty Miller in the fifth grade. He had the same lazy eyelid, same side too. Sam remembered looking into that eye right before Marty’s fist met Sam’s mouth. What he’d found there was hate and hurt and hellfire. Vengeance came at the hands of Tommy, though. After that, Marty Miller and his droopy eyelid never messed with Sam again.

  “No. Just the three of us.”

  “And you said you were standing here at the door.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Was it open or closed?”

  “Open,” Sam said. “I was getting some fresh air.”

  Coleman examined the entryway, then leaned forward so he could see the window in the living room. He was measuring the distance. “What time did this happen?”

  Sam shrugged. “Just after sunrise, so what, about six thirty, I guess?”

  “And you called us at six fifty. Did any time elapse between the gunshot and the window breaking? Was there a delay?”

  “It was instantaneous.” Sam snapped his fingers. “The shot, then the glass broke.”

  “Has this ever happened before?”

  “No.”

  “Did you hear any other shots last night or this morning?”

  He had. Of course he had. He’d heard a whole battle taking place. Gunshots. Cannon blasts. Screams and hollers. “No. Just the one.”

  Coleman glanced into the living room again. “Mind if I look around?”

  “Not at all,” Molly said. “If it was a bullet, shouldn’t there be a hole in the wall opposite the window?”

  Coleman walked to the far wall and studied it. “Most likely, yes.” He glanced several times between the window and the wall, drawing a line with his eyes. But the wall was clean. There were no holes. Nothing was disturbed. “You didn’t find any rocks or anything?” Coleman asked, circling the couch, his eyes running trails along the floor.

  “I looked all around the room,” Molly said. “Didn’t find anything.”

  Coleman stopped and looked at Sam. “Did you hear anything else besides the gunshot? Any yelling or talking? A car engine?”

  Again Sam thought of the sounds of battle. Did the wails of the wounded and snorts of frightened horses count? “No. Just the gunshot.”

  “You didn’t hear a car drive away?”

  Sam shook his head.

  “You sure it was a gunshot?”

  Sam forced a little laugh. “Pretty recognizable sound, isn’t it?”

  “A lot of things can be mistaken for a gunshot.”

  “I’m certain it was a gunshot.” A musket shot, to be exact, but Sam didn’t think that detail would buy him any credibility points.

  Coleman scanned the floor and far wall once more. “You have any enemies, Mr. Travis? Anybody you owe money, anybody you may have ticked off?”

  Sam didn’t like where the questions were going. He just wanted the cop to do his thing and get out. “Not that I know of.”

  “What do you do for a living?”

  “He was a self-employed carpenter,” Molly said.

  Again Sam didn’t miss her choice of words. Was a self-employed carpenter.

  Coleman caught it too. “‘Was?’”

  Sam’s hand reflexively went to his head, to the scar. “I fell a few months back and injured myself. Been on disability for a little while.”

  “You ever have any clients complain, file any lawsuits, stuff like that?”

  Sam shook his head. “Never. There’ve been a few jobs where the client wasn’t completely satisfied, but I went back and made it right. I always do that.”

  Coleman glanced between Sam and Molly. He kept his voice low. “You two OK? I mean, marriage problems or anything?”

  Molly took Sam’s arm in her hands. “No, of course not. We’re fine.”

  Looking at Sam, Coleman kept his expression flat, emotionless. “You seeing anybody’s wife?”

  Anger rose in Sam’s chest. Flashes of Marty Miller taunted him. The lazy eyelid. The fist. The fat lip for a week. “Of course not!”

  “What kind of question is that?” Molly snapped.

  Coleman shifted his eyes and tightened his jaw. “Sorry, folks. Routine questions. We have to cover every angle.”

  “What do you think happened?” Molly asked.

  Coleman took one last look at the living room. “If there was an entry point anywhere in the room, I’d say it was probably some poachers or groundhoggers with bad aim. But … I’m not sure. I’ll file a criminal mischief report and check if there were any similar reports filed in this area recently. I’ll check with the neighbors too, see if they heard anything. In the meantime, if you see or hear anything suspicious, call the barracks immediately.” He retrieved a business card from his pocket. “That’s my name and the number for the barracks. I’m sorry this happened, folks. Not exactly the kind of thing you want to wake up to. Call your insurance company about the window. I’ll check the area and make extra checks in the next few days. If anything comes up, don’t hesitate to call, OK?”

  They both nodded, and with that, Coleman shook their hands. Sam watched him get into the cruiser, back out of the driveway, and pull away.

  From the steps Eva said, “Mommy, there’s something I didn’t tell you.”

  Five

  SAM LEANED AGAINST THE DOORFRAME OF THE DINING ROOM. Molly sat next to Eva on the step. A strange heaviness permeated the house, as if Eva’s simple declaration was the precursor to a coming storm of immense proportion. A storm that would devastate, maybe even annihilate, their family.

  “What is it, darling?” Molly said, stroking Eva’s hair. She apparently could not sense the tempest.

  Eva, on the other hand, could. She had an odd look in her eyes, a mixture of fear and concern. She glanced at Sam, squeezed Max tighter, then said to Molly, “It’s about Daddy. Can I just tell you? Alone?”

  Molly and Sam locked eyes. Since his accident Eva had asked a ton of questions, and Sam and Molly had done their best to answer honestly without adding worry and stress to their seven-year-old. But this seemed different.

  Molly said to Eva, “It’s OK, baby. You can tell both of us. Daddy can hear what you have to say.”

  “It’s fine, honey,” Sam reassured her. “Go ahead.”

  Eva swallowed hard and leaned her head agains
t her mother’s arm.

  Molly wrapped her in a hug and set Eva on her lap. “Now, what’s this all about?”

  “Is Daddy OK?” Eva spoke to no one in particular. She made no eye contact.

  Molly looked at Sam, then ran her fingers over Eva’s straight blonde hair. “Yes, darling. Daddy’s fine. He’s gonna be fine.”

  Sam squatted and put his hand on Eva’s back. He could feel her heartbeat tapping rapidly against her ribs. “I told you I’m fine, buddy. Nothing to worry about.”

  “I had a dream last night,” Eva said. Her voice was low and serious.

  And again that sense of an impending storm. Sam could almost hear the thunder in the distance, smell the ozone in the air.

  “There was someone in my dream. He was real shiny all over. His name’s Jacob. He said he’s here to help us.” Eva’s eyes darted to Sam, then away. There was uncertainty in them, like she was sharing something she’d be mocked or punished for saying. She nuzzled her face against Molly’s shoulder. “He told me to tell Daddy I love him every day and make sure he knows it. And he said Daddy’s real scared and needs my prayers.” She spoke as if Sam were nowhere near, a million miles away.

  A jolt of electricity ran up Sam’s back, and the hair on his neck prickled. He looked at Molly.

  She said, “That sounds like an important dream, baby. You should tell Daddy you love him every day. And give him hugs and kisses too.”

  Eva turned her face toward Sam. In less than an instant that million miles closed to twelve inches. “Are you scared, Daddy? Was Jacob right?”

  Sam knew his hesitation said it all, even to a seven-year-old. “Sometimes. All grown-ups get scared sometimes.”

  “But what about right now?”

  “No, buddy.” Another lie. He remembered Tommy’s voice last night, the reverberation of the cannon blasts, the echoes of agony from across the field. He hadn’t been scared of the sounds; he’d been scared of himself. “I’m fine right now.”

  “I’ll pray for you,” Eva said. “Like Jacob said.”

  Pangs of guilt hit Sam like multiple bullet punches. His daughter’s faith put his to shame. Since the accident he’d not prayed much at all. Had no interest in it. He swallowed past the baseball in his throat and said, “Thank you, Eva. I think I need your prayers.”

  Eva sat up straight in Molly’s lap and threw herself at him, wrapping her little arms around his neck. “I love you, Daddy. I love you so much.”

  Behind his eyes Sam’s sinuses felt as if they’d been injected with concrete. He held his daughter close and took in the familiar scent of her skin. “I love you too, little buddy. Daddy’s girl.”

  Six

  NED COLEMAN ARRIVED BACK AT THE BARRACKS AS THE first-shift staties were heading out to comb the highways and byways of Adams County. On his way into the building he ran into John Becker, a five-year war veteran who thought he was the good Lord’s gift to law enforcement. According to Becker, he had spent those years training in the army as a Green Beret, seen some covert action in Central America, drug cartel stuff, then came home to hillbilly land to serve and protect. At least that was the story he told.

  Becker slapped Ned on the back as they passed. “Hey, man, good ride?”

  He called a shift a “ride” for no reason at all, except that this was John Becker, supercop, and he said it like he owned the word. It irritated Ned.

  “Wonderful. Just wonderful.”

  Becker kept walking but spun around and backpedaled. He was wearing mirrored aviator sunglasses, the kind that looked cool in the 1980s on Tom Cruise in Top Gun but looked ridiculous on Becker. “I heard Santos puked all over your vehicle,” he said with a grin. “Bet that was nice.”

  Ned kept walking and didn’t say a word. He pushed through the glass doors, waved a weak hello to a couple other staties preparing for their “ride,” and found his desk. He needed to fill out an Initial Crime Report on the shooting, then he could call it a day. That was another thing Ned didn’t like: paperwork.

  As he waited for the computer to boot up, Corporal Jim Kerr stopped by his desk. “You wrappin’ up, Coleman?” Kerr was OK as far as corporals went, but he was a real pain in the butt when it came to procedure. Everything was by the book, no exceptions.

  “Yes, sir. Just doing this initial, then heading home. That shooting on Pumping Station held me over.”

  “Everything go book there?” Kerr’s annoying phrase was “go book,” meaning “by the book.” Everyone knew he was trying to get it to catch on so he could claim he’d coined it. Ned refused to play along.

  “Sure. Smooth as glass.”

  Except it hadn’t been as smooth as glass, had it? And it hadn’t gone by the book either. There was no entry point on the far wall or anywhere in the room. He’d checked it out good. No slug on the floor either. A shooting with no bullet. And the neighbors had heard nothing. Not that that disproved anything in itself. Out there on Pumping Station the houses were separated by a few hundred yards of farmland on either side. If it was a low-caliber rifle, a sound sleeper could miss the discharge easily.

  Something about that Travis guy just didn’t seem right, though. Like he was withholding information. Ned hadn’t been a cop long, but he’d quickly developed that police instinct and could tell when someone wasn’t spilling his guts. In fact, if Travis’s wife hadn’t played it so cool, he’d have thought Travis was making the whole thing up. ’Course, maybe he was making it up. Maybe Travis had a short fuse and busted the window in a fit of rage, or maybe he was just a klutz and too embarrassed to admit it. Concocting some story about a shooter would keep the cops and his wife off his back and get the damages covered by his homeowners’.

  Hey, it wasn’t Ned’s job to read minds, just the evidence, and while this was weird, it certainly wasn’t the weirdest thing he’d seen in Adams County. But that was the problem: the evidence. It didn’t support Travis’s testimony.

  Kerr tapped the desk with his index finger and looked straight ahead. “Make it quick, trooper. You’re already pullin’ OT.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Fifteen minutes later his report was finished and he was officially off the clock. Ned Coleman wanted nothing more than to head home, jump in the shower, throw back a couple beers and some food—he had leftover Chinese in the fridge—and hit the sack.

  Seven

  SAM SAT AT HIS DESK IN A STUPOR. THE STUDY’S FOUR WALLS seemed closer than the last time he was in here. How had he never noticed how small this room was? The feel of his desk chair, the curve of the seat, the lumbar support … it all irritated him.

  Minutes ago Molly had ordered him to his room like a child so she could clean the mess in the living room. He wasn’t sure if she believed him about the gunshot or not. Wasn’t sure if Coleman had believed him either. Fact was, he wasn’t sure if he believed himself. He could no longer trust his own mind. It was sending false signals to his ears, counterfeit sounds that existed only in the shortcircuited sphere of his broken brain.

  Anger and frustration bloomed in him like poison flowers. Six months ago he would have been the one cleaning up downstairs, putting plastic over the window, calling the glass guys. Now Molly had taken over that role, usurped it to “protect him.” He knew her intentions were good (she was only trying to protect him) and that her uncertainty about his mental capacity was justified (since the accident he’d proven himself to be cognitively challenged in more than a few areas), but she needed to give him a chance, let him learn how to function on his own again.

  Sam ran his finger along the edge of the desk, leaving a trail in the light dust. He could hear her down there, sweeping glass across the hardwood, brushing it into the metal dustpan, dumping it in the plastic wastebasket. Eva was down there too, mouth going like a high-rpm engine. He couldn’t make out what she was saying, but he imagined her telling Molly every last element of her dream. He’d never known someone to remember dreams in such vivid detail. Eva could recount hers as though she’d just finished watch
ing them in high definition on the big screen.

  His desk was a mess. That was something he’d lost since the accident—his organizational ability. Bills were piling up, some no doubt overdue. He didn’t even know anymore. Molly had tried to commandeer this from him too, but he’d insisted he could handle it, and to her credit she allowed him to try. Finances and bookkeeping had never been his specialty, but he’d managed them adequately. Now, of course, the disability checks were birdseed compared to what he used to bring home.

  Atop the envelopes and bills and receipts and other assorted junk Eva’s notebook sat like a lump of smoldering coals. That was another thing, the strange writing.

  Samuel Whiting. Who was he? What was he?

  And why was Sam Travis suddenly in Samuel Whiting’s head? He’d have to deal with that another time. Soon.

  He leaned back in his chair, the wheeled office job Molly got him for his birthday three years back, the birthday after he decided to venture out and experience the life of a self-employed carpenter. He’d loved his work too, until the fall. He still had no memory of it, which drove him batty. He was a fixer, and if he’d made a mistake—a wrong step, a faulty joint, a careless move—he wanted to know about it so he could make a memo to self to never do that again.

  But by all reports he’d done nothing to cause such a fall. He tried to imagine it, his foot slipping on a loose shingle (though none of the shingles were loose), his legs disappearing from under him, hands groping frantically to find purchase on something, anything. His body being airborne (the roof from which he fell was twenty feet high), feeling weightless for a mere moment, then striking the ground. His head taking the brunt of the fall, neck snapping but not breaking, brain rattling like an egg yolk in his skull. Then lying motionless, unconscious, while sirens blared and passersby whispered and murmured. But it was only his battered brain that conjured those images; there was no truth to any of them. It may have happened just like that, or it may have been nothing like that.