Darkness Follows

by Mike Dellosso

  He perused the paper, the handwriting, the words.

  My mind grows dark at the thought of continuing in this madness.

  It was as if this Samuel Whiting had once again braved the threshold of time and read Samuel Travis’s mind. Sam didn’t know how much longer he could keep going like this. His madness was growing, and no matter how hard he resisted, how hard he fought, its pull was relentless. But the other words had struck him hardest.

  There is no light in my life now, only darkness. At times I feel I am not my own.

  These were Sam’s words, written by his own hand. Since two nights ago, when he’d heard Tommy’s voice and followed it downstairs, when he heard the sounds of battle as if they were in his own front yard, when he fell asleep on the couch and awoke to find the first of the Samuel Whiting entries, when the window shattered, he had not felt like himself. Uninvited guests had taken up residence within him, and their names were darkness and despair.

  At times I feel I am not my own.

  He ran his finger over the words. He studied the letters, the way the double e’s looped together, the way the m’s looked like n’s. There was no mistaking—and he wished with all his heart he was mistaken—that the entry had been penned by his hand. His eyes could not be fooled.

  It was as if this Samuel Whiting were communicating with him, whispering over a great gulf, centuries wide. Like they were becoming one … maybe already were one.

  But who was Samuel Whiting? And what was the Pennsylvania Independent Artillery? Should he know this stuff?

  Turning in his chair, Sam grabbed the computer mouse, and the monitor’s screen sprang to life. His fingers danced across the keyboard. He googled “Pennsylvania Independent Artillery Battery E” and got a few results that looked interesting. The first listed battles in which the battery was engaged. There was Manassas, Antietam, and Harper’s Ferry, in 1862. In 1863, they were at Chancellorsville, then …

  There it was. July 1 through 3, the Battle of Gettysburg.

  He went back to the search screen and added “Battle of Gettysburg” to his inquiry. More sites popped up. Clicking on one, he found a concise history of the battery during the Gettysburg campaign. Two memorials commemorated the battery, one at the summit of Culp’s Hill and one on Power’s Hill. The article also said the battery had been commanded by a Lieutenant Charles A. Atwell. No mention of Samuel Whiting at all.

  He ran a search of “Samuel Whiting.” There was a doctor in San Antonio, a Massachusetts clergyman who died in 1679, a Texas newspaper publisher who died in 1862, and a photographer who lived during the Civil War era but resided in England. None were his Samuel Whiting.

  Downstairs, dishes clattered and the microwave beeped four times. Seconds later Molly hollered up at him. “Lunch is ready, Sam. You hungry?”

  He wasn’t, but if he didn’t go down, she’d be suspicious and prod him with more questions. He scolded himself for thinking so negatively of her. She was a good woman. For the past six months she’d taken on the brunt of the housework and cooking, of helping Eva with her homework and keeping up with the yard, and rarely if ever complained.

  “Yeah. I’ll be right down.”

  He shut off the computer and headed to the kitchen for lunch.

  Twenty-One

  MOLLY HEARD THE CLOMPING OF SAM’S FEET ON THE STEPS before she saw him. She’d made grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup, one of his all-time favorite lunches, and set their plates on the counter that had the barstools. She was still shaken by finding the groundhog. She knew it killed Sam not being able to work and that he danced with depression daily. Maybe his way of dealing with the emotions was to dig that rifle out of the closet and gain back control in one part of his life. Shooting was something he could do, and apparently do well. Besides, those groundhogs were pesky. She was glad to be rid of one.

  Sam entered the kitchen, hands in his pockets, a guilty look of pleasure or satisfaction on his face. Like he wanted her to understand he didn’t care if she knew about the groundhog.

  “Hey,” Molly said. “What do you want to drink?”

  “Diet Coke,” Sam said. “Where’s the paper?”

  She pointed to it on the table.

  After retrieving the paper, Sam sat on a barstool and picked up his sandwich.

  “We don’t pray before eating anymore?” Molly knew she’d let her irritation show and immediately regretted it.

  Sam bowed his head, closed his eyes for thirty or so seconds, then opened them and took a bite.

  Trying to change the subject and the mood, Molly said, “What are you up to, up there?”

  Sam chewed, swallowed, shrugged. “Nothing much.”

  “Working on your writing?” She noticed the shift in his eyes. He was uncomfortable with this subject.

  “A little.”

  “Mind sharing what you’re working on?”

  More chewing. He swallowed, then rested his elbows on the counter and laced his fingers in front of his face. “Thought I’d try a Civil War piece.”

  “That’s great, babe. Mind if I read it when you get some done?”

  Except it wasn’t great. It was odd. Despite living in Gettysburg, the largest national military park in the country and arguably the best-known location of all the Civil War battles, Sam had never shown an interest in it. History wasn’t his thing and, the way he told it, never had been. So why this sudden fascination with the War Between the States?

  Sam shrugged again. “Sure.”

  The silence between them grew for a good five minutes while they ate. It was a wall built higher and thicker with each second that passed, and Molly felt the tension mounting as each new brick was laid. She dipped her sandwich in her soup, something she enjoyed but Sam found revolting. He hated soggy bread and crumbs in his soup. Eva took after Molly in this, and the two of them teased him about being picky. But Molly could tell he was in no mood to be teased today.

  Finally she broached the subject that had niggled at her since seeing the vultures circle above the dead animal. “Sam, I found the groundhog.”

  “I know.”

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “What’s there to talk about?”

  His avoidance tactics annoyed her. It was the same thing her dad used to do when he stumbled in after midnight, glassy-eyed and thick-tongued, and her mom questioned him about his whereabouts. Molly would stay up, making sure he got home safely, then listen as her parents argued about his nocturnal activities.

  “How about the fact that as long as I’ve known you, Sam, you’ve never fired a gun, let alone shot at anything living? I’ve heard stories of what a great shot you were when you were a kid, but you’ve never even liked talking about it. I feel like there are whole pieces of your past, your life, that I don’t even know about.”

  “You don’t want to know. You don’t need to.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  He looked at her with something in his eyes she hadn’t ever seen before, something dark, something frightening. “You don’t.”

  She’d had enough. “Fine. So what? All of a sudden, you dig your rifle out and start taking shots at groundhogs from your window. Where did this come from?”

  Sam dropped the remainder of his sandwich and pushed the plate away. It clanked against the bowl, which spilled some tomato soup onto the counter. “Why’s it matter where it came from? Maybe I just got bored and felt like doing it.” He stood quickly, knocking the barstool over. “Do you know what it’s like to sit home all day and do nothing?” He grabbed the newspaper, then the car keys from the hook over the counter.

  Molly watched him with a certain level of disbelief. “What are you doing?” He hadn’t driven since the accident, the fall, the brain injury.

  “I’m going for a drive. What? Are you gonna take my car keys away too?” He turned to leave.

  “But you’re not supposed—”

  “You don’t know that.” Sam spun around, and Molly saw the aggravation, maybe even anger, in his f
ace. The tightness of his brow. The tension in his jaw. “The doctor cleared me to drive two weeks ago. I haven’t because I knew you didn’t want me to. But now I want to go for a drive. I need some freedom, Moll. Can you understand that? I need to be able to do something I want to do, to pick up and go when I want, without you worrying or firing a million questions at me. Isn’t that OK?”

  She knew she wouldn’t be able to stop him. He was doing it to spite her now. To prove he could and that he no longer needed her to mother him. Maybe he needed to get out. Hopefully the freedom would start him on the road back to work. She forced a smile and knew it looked weak. “I’m sorry, babe. Go for a drive. Go clear your mind.”

  Without another word Sam left the house, closing the door behind him a little harder than necessary. Molly listened as the car started, the wheels turned on the driveway, the engine revved, and her husband drove off to who-knew-where.

  God, keep him safe.

  Twenty-Two

  SAM PRESSED THE EXPLORER DOWN PUMPING STATION ROAD faster than the posted forty-five mile per hour speed limit. The faded asphalt uncurled before him like the gray tongue of a dragon that had held him prisoner within massive jaws behind dagger-like teeth.

  He was free.

  Driving came back so naturally, even after six months. The feel of the steering wheel, the touch of the brakes, the acceleration, the handling—it was as if he’d driven just yesterday. And the vehicle took the gradual turns and rises and falls of the road without complaining. It was a good purchase. They’d saved almost three years for it.

  But Sam’s mind wasn’t on the quality of the Explorer or on the road or on how right it felt to be behind the wheel again. His thoughts were on Molly. He understood, of course, her concern. Part of that was just her personality. She liked to dote on people, to care for them. She would have made a wonderful nurse. But growing up with parents who never encouraged her to do anything worthwhile had dampened any initiative. She could have gone to college with the right kind of support, could have made something great of herself. Instead she finished high school, took a job as a clerk at a Gettysburg gift shop, and soon after met and married Sam.

  Her mistake.

  Sam slowed the Explorer at a stop sign, crossed Steinwehr Avenue, and entered the battlefield. Monuments and cannons lined the roadway, reminding him of the sounds from the other night. The blasts of cannon fire. The successive pops of rifles. The screams and hollers of men in the throes of warfare. It was so real, so vivid, so close.

  He passed an elderly couple driving the other way. The man waved politely, but Sam did not return it. He parked the Explorer in a gravel lot, shifted it into park, lowered the windows, and cut the engine.

  The world around him, the killing fields of Gettysburg, were silent. No cannons, no rifles, no hollers or sounds of boots marching or wagon wheels turning. Only the occasional singing of a bird or creaking of old branches in the breeze. There were witness trees around him, over a hundred and fifty years old, that had watched as the battle raged and as bloodshed bathed their roots. To his left, large, pocked rocks jutted from a field like cavity-laden teeth. The grass had been freshly mown and lay in clumps here and there. The field sloped gradually then took a steep turn for the sky, where it was topped by a fortress of granite rocks: Little Round Top. And to his right, Devil’s Den, a striking setting of rocky outcroppings and rounded boulders. He suddenly wished he knew more about the area.

  Sam picked up the Gettysburg Times from the passenger seat and unfolded it. The front-page headline read “Senator Lincoln to Address Nation From Famous Gettysburg Location.” He scanned the article. He wasn’t one to keep a close eye on current political affairs, but he knew enough to recognize the name of Stephen Lincoln, the senator from Pennsylvania who’d recently taken a stand against abortion and switched party allegiances. Apparently this Lincoln was part of a movement to amend the Constitution to outlaw abortion once and for all. And from the way the article read, his bill was gaining momentum. His change in political convictions, though initially unpopular, was now rallying and strengthening the conservative movement throughout the country. Senator Lincoln was coming next week to deliver a speech from the very spot where Abraham Lincoln gave his Gettysburg Address.

  Big deal. Sam wasn’t impressed. Politicians came and went all the time, offering this and promising that and delivering on none of it. This guy was no doubt just another slick, snake-oil salesman, getting everyone tied up in knots over some amendment that would never see the dawn of day. He was a liar like the rest of them.

  From his left Sam heard the muffled crack of a dry branch and the rustle of grass. He lowered the newspaper and snapped his head toward the sound.

  Tommy was standing there, not twenty yards from the Explorer.

  It wasn’t the seventeen-year-old Tommy that Sam had so often imagined, but a younger version, thinner, smaller, maybe fourteen or fifteen. Head and face still intact. He stared at Sam, arms hanging at his sides, right hand grasping the end of a broom handle, left hand wrapped in something. Hair tousled by the breeze, he wore that black AC/DC shirt he had liked so much and faded, torn jeans.

  Sam broke out in goose bumps. The scar on his head took to aching again, that dull ache as from a stiff joint.

  Could this really be? Of course it couldn’t; he knew that. But Tommy looked so real, so now. He was betrayed, though, by the dark haze that surrounded him, a glow but not a glow … an anti-glow. The haze seemed to suck the light from the atmosphere around Tommy, and it shimmered when he moved.

  Tommy shifted his weight from one leg to the other and lifted the stick high over head. He grinned like a mangy old hyena.

  Sam knew this part. No, please no. Not this.

  His older brother—his dead older brother—opened his mouth to speak …

  “Hey, Sammy.” He was standing in the field behind their house, on the other side of the small rise that blocked their view of the first-floor windows. In his right hand he held a broken broom handle; a long leather leash was wrapped tightly around the knuckles on his left. At the end of the leash was Gomer, the family dog. Good old Gomer.

  Gomer was crouched low to the ground, ears laid back against his head, watching Tommy from the tops of his eyes.

  “Hey, Sammy, wanna have some fun?”

  Sam knew what Tommy had in mind, no question about it. He’d grown tired of cats and moved on to dogs. To Gomer. Feelings of both fear and pity overcame Sam, and he almost started to cry. “Tommy, don’t. Just let him go. It’s Gomer.”

  “Oh, don’t be a sissy. He deserves it anyway.”

  “What’d he do?”

  Tommy motioned to the field behind with the stick. “I found him out there, rolling against some carcass, told him to knock it off, and he tried to bite me.” He looked at Gomer, made a threatening move. The dog flinched, then growled deep in his throat. “I’m gonna show him who’s boss.”

  Sam’s mind churned and locked, churned and locked. He knew Tommy was lying. They’d had Gomer since he was a pup, and he’d never tried to bite anyone. If he had tried to bite, Tommy had it coming. “He was probably just scared. You probably scared him.”

  Tommy turned and glared, the stick held waist high. “What? You siding with Gomer, little brother? The dog? You think he had a right to bite me?”

  “No, I …”

  “I should beat you with this stick after I’m done with your buddy Gomer here. How would you like that?” He paused to see Sam’s reaction, then broke into a wide smile. “I’m just kidding, sissy.”

  He started wrapping the leash tighter around his hand, drawing Gomer closer, like a deep-sea fisherman reeling in the big catch. Gomer tried to resist, digging his feet into the soil and letting out a deep guttural growl, but it was useless. He was no match for Tommy’s strength.

  “Just let him go, Tommy, please.” Sam hoped his plea would flip a switch in his brother’s brain. Hoped it would wake him from the madness he was about to do.

  Without tak
ing his eyes off Gomer, Tommy strained against the dog’s resistance and said to Sam, “Shut up, sissy. I thought you’d want to help, but if you’re scared, you can just leave.”

  Anger boiled in Sam’s chest. He clenched his fists and pressed his molars together. Gomer was now within Tommy’s striking distance. He was hunched on his hindquarters, pressing his forelegs into the ground and trying to backpedal, twisting his head side to side so violently that Sam was afraid he’d break his neck before Tommy could take a crack at him. Half of Sam wished Gomer would break his neck and bring the end quickly, thereby escaping Tommy’s maliciousness.

  At last Tommy struck. He raised the stick above his head and brought it down on Gomer. Gomer flinched and ducked, but the stick landed against his shoulder, drawing out a sharp yelp. Gomer cowered and bared his teeth, snarled and growled. Again Tommy brought the stick down. And again.

  Sam could take no more. He rushed his brother and reached him in five steps. He had no idea what he would do. Tommy was two years older and at least thirty pounds heavier. Tommy saw him coming. He whipped the stick around and caught Sam in the chest, knocking him off his feet so that he landed on his butt in the dirt. The blow momentarily stunned Sam and knocked the breath from his chest. He sputtered and gasped and coughed until he found air again. His chest burned, and his eyes blurred with tears.

  “Get lost, Sammy,” Tommy yelled. There was hatred in his eyes, a malevolent look more intense than Sam had ever seen from him.

  Gomer seized this moment to lunge and take his captor’s ankle in his teeth. Tommy cursed and crashed the stick down on Gomer’s head. Gomer released his grip immediately and stumbled back, dazed.