“Giving up,” Herbert said. He raised a hand towards Jake’s chest and Jake flinched, the last of his anger seeping away. Is this what he had to look forward to? “It just seems fitting this way.”
“They’re gone now! You know that!”
“I’ve called them before,” he said and cleared his throat. “Ftgan-mhor-rich.”
Jake ducked past Herbert, his nerve-endings tingling. His entire body grew warm. “STOP THAT!”
Herbert might not’ve heard. His eyes were completely empty as he followed, hand raised. “Ghrnich-mrone entow. Ftgan-rich.”
The tingle grew into a duller version of the crickle-crackle feeling. Pain began to blossom in Jake’s chest and he staggered. “STOP, GODDAMMIT!”
“No,” the former Doorway Man said. His lips twisted. “Ftgan-mirsch-soth.”
The pain exploded through Jake’s body and the muttering in his head burst into existence. He couldn’t feel his legs and arms and the Doorway Man bore down as he went to his knees.
“You’ll be fine,” the Doorway Man whispered and shoved his hand into Jake’s chest.
Immediately it was different and both felt it. Instead of the pain fading into the pins-and-needles, both sensations roared through him. The world before his eyes jumped into hyper-quality—the colors, the sounds, the smells.
The Doorway Man’s eyes bulged, his mouth drawing down into a rictus of exertion.
And then Jake felt the pain and pins-and-needles expand. The only thing his tortured mind could think was of an overflowing glass of liquid spilling into another.
The Doorway Man screamed. Jake screamed with him.
This has never happened before, he thought. These things have never taken a former holder.
At the edges of his vision, black encroached; it was as if the world before him had been made two-dimensional and someone was taking a sopping brush of black paint to it.
He looked down at Herbert’s arm and saw it was gone, replaced by an arm-shaped hole of darkness. He sensed no dimension save from the blackness’s depthlessness. It grew, consuming Herbert’s shoulder, his chest, pulling him apart.
God, Jake thought. He might’ve screamed it.
(we’re susceptible but we’re not enough)
We’re enough now, he thought.
The blackness filled the world, the roaring crackle consumed it and, in the center of his mind, the muttering had become the rough inhuman bark of anticipation. Jake felt himself dimming, losing himself, coming apart.
Jake Reznic and Dewey Herbert—The Doorway Men—opened the way for the black void and whatever lied within it.
Love Song
for the Rejected
Evelyn’s mother died before she could tell her daughter why Evie had a chunk of stained glass embedded in her chest.
Evie had no idea there was anything strange about the glass until her soon-to-be adoptive parents accompanied her to a physical. Both the parents and the pediatrician fainted dead away, startling the five-year-old girl into terrified tears that lasted way after the adults came to.
The stained glass was shaped like a cartoon heart between where her breasts would grow. Subsequent x-rays showed that the toothpick-thin lead cames grew from Evie’s ribcage; metal and bone fused as one, with no connection to her real heart. The fingernail-sized panes of glass were red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, arranged randomly and much harder than regular glass. Her mother referred to it as Evie’s rainbow heart before she died.
There was no mention of it in any medical records. No mention of it from her father, of course. Whoever he was. =And, of course, no mention of it from her mother, dead of a skull fracture after slipping on black ice as she left yet another disastrous date.
Evie didn’t turn as Brett walked out. Couldn’t turn. Wouldn’t allow herself to turn.
Still, the rough slam of the apartment door made her jump.
Evie slumped onto the couch and cried. She was no longer the terrified little girl on the examination table. Her corn-colored hair had darkened to a polished-wood tan, her face heart-shaped, her blue eyes open and expressive.
Evelyn Starling, twenty-six, with a body and personality that drew a lot of attention. Copy-editor at Sigel Publishing, living in one of Hathaway’s nicer neighborhoods.
Heartbroken. Again.
She grabbed a Kleenex from the box on the coffee table and blew her nose. It disgusted her—not the loud, Foghorn Leghorn honk, but how routine all this felt.
How is it not routine? she thought, standing up. This is not the first rodeo bull that’s trampled you flat.
Too true.
Brett. Another link in a long chain of men who offered vague reasons like, “It’s not you, it’s me,” while trying to avoid her eyes as much as humanly possible. She swore, if she heard that damn reason again, she’d scream until she passed out.
Her hand went to her chest. She might as well see the damage now.
She moved into her bathroom and, flicking on the light, faced the mirror. Thank God she’d worn waterproof mascara; her eyes were moist and puffy.
The face that lures men in and drives them away, she thought bitterly, shrugging off the burgundy boyfriend-jacket and dropped it onto the toilet seat. She wore a silk white-white tank top underneath. Up close, she could see the upper rim of the latex prosthetic appliance that covered her heart.
She pulled the tank top off slowly, then her bra. She paused a moment, studying the latex appliance.
It bothered her that she had to work herself up for this.
She gripped the upper edge of the appliance and pulled, feeling the brief tug as the glue came away. Putting the cover down on the edge of the sink, she forced herself to look at her rainbow heart.
Each piece of glass was now black.
Evie gripped the edges of the sink. What little color had been there this morning—the barest hint of blue in the left curve, the cherry core—was now gone. Blackened.
She’d feared this day since she was sixteen when the darkening began, but, now, she wasn’t sure how she was supposed to feel. She didn’t feel meaner, or colder, or indifferent. Her rainbow heart had gone black. Stop the presses.
The end of the rainbow, she thought. The stained glass formerly known as my rainbow heart.
She was starting to smile when the pain struck. What felt like a wooden stake skewered her through the glass like a bug. She gasped and shuddered, squeezing her eyes closed. Instead of seeing darkness, she saw the palest blue pulsing like starbursts behind her eyelids, near-blinding in their brilliance.
Her revenge, a rough, guttural voice in her head whispered, barely audible. It’s coming.
The pain faded, faded, disappeared, leaving behind a tingle in her flesh. Panting, she opened her tear-swollen eyes.
Behind her in the mirror, a black amorphous shadow, humanoid in the vaguest sense of the word, towered over her.
She spun.
Nothing but her shadow, thrown by the lights above the mirror.
She let out a shaky breath, her hand going to the stained glass.
It was warm.
For all her laudable attributes—physically stunning, emotionally open, mentally capable—Evie was tragic when it came to love.
She had ten years of bad luck, starting when she was sixteen and slept with Michael Rettger. Oh yes, she knew all the names, all the events, and she ran through them in her head on lonely nights when sleep wouldn’t come.
She’d dated previously—even fooled around a bit—but Michael was the first. Palms clammy, legs weak, a million thoughts racing through her head, she went to him.
She forgot about her rainbow heart.
Until, afterwards, lying in Michael’s room, Michael had spotted the loose edge of the upper portion of the latex appliance.
“Hey, what’s this?” he’d asked.
It was the feel of his fingers on her appliance rather than his voice that jolted her awake. She recoiled, trying to block him, and the movement aided ra
ther than slowed Michael from pulling the cover off.
The moment hung, waiting. Sunlight from the window glistened off the stained glass. Michael, frozen with what looked like a hunk of pale flesh in his hand. Evie, mortified, covering her chest.
His eyes bounced back and forth from her chest to her horrified expression. “What?” He looked at the appliance in his hand. “What? What?” Realization dawned in his eyes. “What the hell?”
Still covering her chest, she yanked the appliance away and stumbled from the bed, grabbing her clothes. Michael didn’t move, staring where she’d lain, hand half-raised, as if still holding the appliance. He blinked rapidly. “What?”
She dressed quickly, shoving the latex appliance in her pocket, fighting tears and the throat-choking mortification. She thought of her adoptive parents fainting dead away and the tears broke through her small mental barrier.
She turned briefly when she reached the door. Michael looked at her the way she imagined an astronaut would view a mind-bending new creature; his mouth hanging opening, his eyes flashing how hard his brain was trying to wrap around this.
They broke up a week later, via text message, and Michael avoided her eyes whenever they crossed paths.
That was when the rainbow heart began fading. She switched to stronger glue and never let that happen again.
Daniel McLaughlin, senior year. He never saw the rainbow heart, but he was gone after three months.
Russell McDermott, her freshman year of college.
Greg Andrews, while she did her internship at Putnam in New York City.
Kyle Marston, her first year after college.
The list went on and on.
None harmed her, none controlled her, the relationships had been easy, but they all drifted away.
Evie’s rainbow heart faded with each one, then slowly began to darken at the edges.
She knew the dangers of this and feared the day when the heart would become entirely black, but, still, she was driven into new relationships, new situations of giving and receiving. It was as if her heart knew the same as her brain but refused to listen to reason. And she paid for it.
She was dressed and sitting on the examination table when Dr. Roberts came back in, chart in hand. He was a burly older man whose trimmed blond beard was flecked with grey. He leaned against the counter and scanned the chart, flipping up the top sheet to read something beneath. He looked up and smiled. “You’re fine, Evie. Relax.”
She let out a long breath. “Really?”
He set the chart down on the counter and adjusted his rimless spectacles. “I checked the x-rays today with past ones. The heart hasn’t shifted, or changed in any way. There doesn’t seem to be pressure on any organs. You haven’t had the same pain since last week, correct?”
“Minor aches.”
He crossed his arms and sighed. “Sometimes it feels like you’re one of my daughters, Evie. I worry about you.” He adjusted his glasses again. “Anyway, I can’t explain why the glass went black or the pain.” He straightened. “You have pain like you did before, you see me immediately. Otherwise, let’s circle back here in a month. Jeanie at the front will make the appointment.”
“So nothing weird at all?”
He cleared his throat and checked the chart. “One of the x-rays showed a dark spot behind the glass, about the size of a tennis ball, but it was gone in the next shot. That’s it. I saved it, just in case, but probably nothing.” He smiled warmly towards her. “Nothing serious.”
Her breathing was the only sound in the dark apartment. In Evie’s bedroom, the glow of streetlamps outside and her digital alarm clock provided minimal light.
Evie lay on her back, topless and asleep in the center of her double.
The latex appliance between her breasts flickered, then began to glow. It grew in intensity. Lines of sky-blue light edged around the seams.
Evie, still asleep, grimaced and moaned. It came from her mouth, but sounded like the grunt of a great animal.
After a while, it dimmed, then went out.
She felt a twinge in her chest when the new mailroom clerk with the easy, self-conscious smile passed her glass-wall office. She looked away, clenching her fists to either side of her computer keyboard.
Three weeks since Brett walked out and the first burst of pain, and already … she shook her head. She’d seen the mail-clerk twice so far this week; delivering packages throughout the department, his hair the same color as hers and indifferently tousled. And that easy, self-conscious smile.
She wondered idly if she had any packages today.
She lightly hit the edge of her desk with her fists. No, dammit. Besides, what happens with my glass now? she thought. It’s already black and causing me pain.
She turned back to the manuscript on her computer and sighed. The legal pad on her desk was already filled with jotted notes, complaints, and questions—and she was only 100 pages in.
Her eyes drifted to the glass wall. The clerk was talking to Pam, from payroll, and Pam was obviously laying it on thick. She felt a twinge in her chest that had nothing to do with her glass heart.
She looked away and forced herself to focus on the manuscript, her hand absently going to where the stained glass beneath her blouse and rubbing.
It was luck that put her and the clerk in the same elevator alone together a week later.
“New here?” she’d asked. Light, easy. A good conversation-starter.
The clerk jumped the slightest bit, surprised. “Uh … yeah! Yeah, I am. Mail room. Me low-man on Totem pole.”
Evie laughed. “Everyone’s low man at one point or another.”
The clerk’s smile was less self-conscious now, but just as cute as before. “Don’t you have an office? I can’t see you being low man of anything.”
I’ve got a live one, here, she thought.
Evie smiled and offered her hand. “Evelyn Starling. In spite of the office, I’m just a copy-editor.”
The clerk shook with her. “Peter McDonald. In spite of my package cart, I really wanna get outta the mail room and be a copy-editor.”
Evie laughed.
“Listen,” Peter said. “You wanna get some coffee?”
Evie’s smile widened. “Sure.”
Peter stopped at a corner florist on his way to Evie’s apartment and bought a bouquet. It was cliché and done a thousand times, but the urge overcame him and Peter often followed his urges.
Walking down the well-lit avenue, he checked the address Evie had given him on the back of her card. Not far. It was ten-after-six and they’d have plenty of time to make their reservations. Dinner, of course. Another cliché and done-a-thousand-times thing.
The street was lined with bright shops and boutiques. Couples young and old walked, enjoying the cool October evening as the sun sank, staining the sky purple. This was his first time really walking through Hathaway since moving here and he found he liked it—almost as much as he liked Evie.
She was easy to talk to. He found himself revealing things that he never would’ve revealed to someone he’d just met, such as the fear that’d crawled up his throat his first night here.
Evie was empathetic and relatable, telling her own horror stories. It was the perfect give-and-take in a situation that demanded awkward conversation.
But for all her empathy, all her easy-going nature, he sensed something darker within her. Not necessarily bad, but Peter hadn’t had to awaken all his brain cells to figure out that this woman hadn’t been very lucky with men. It was in her gaze, her quickness to fill the silences.
Peter knew a thing or two about that. Past girlfriends who’d been kind called him a hopeless romantic. The not-so-kind called him a loser.
I have no intention of hurting this woman, he thought. Only a fool would.
With a spring in his step, Peter went to the stoop and pressed the buzzer for Evie’s apartment.
Three dates later, Peter slid out from under the blankets and padded naked into the dark livin
g room. He felt for his cigarettes in his jacket on the couch and sat down. The flame was bright enough for him to blink, the click of the spinner-wheel obscenely loud in the early-morning silence.
Oh, man, Peter, he thought, exhaling. Oh shit.
He hadn’t planned on this—when it came to sex, he was hopelessly passive—but he’d be lying to say he hadn’t dearly wanted it. It took more than a little willpower not to grin like a fool. A fire burned across his nerves, roared vibrantly through his gut.
It had all been so smooth. Like their dating, nothing felt forced or awkward. Natural. Give-and-take.
His assessment that Evie knew the dark side of relationships had been borne out, of course. On their second date, she’d apologized ahead of time if she acted distant; she’d just gotten out of a relationship that had not ended well.
The conversation recurred to him, and, for the first time, he thought of how odd that was. Who said things like that on a second date?
For the moment, he felt as if he were not alone in the room. The specters of old boyfriends crowded in on him, pressing him down, staring. He wished he could meet the Ghosts of Boyfriends Past, if only to say, You morons.
As Peter smoked, Evie slept contentedly on her side. The top sheet lay puddled around her bare waist, the bedsheet wrinkled into sand dune waves. The stained glass behind the latex appliance glowed pale blue. Its illumination transformed the tousled bedsheet into a barren, alien landscape.
Evie stirred, the light rippling across the bed. Low, barely audible, she moaned that vaguely inhuman sound.
The light was gone before Peter came to bed.
Time passed; six-weeks’ worth.
They stayed in, went out, saw plays, stand-up comedians, readings, movies, bands, hung around each other’s apartment. They took a weekend and went to the Poconos, going Dutch because Peter couldn’t afford to pay for both but refused to have her pay all. They ate Thai, Chinese, Indian, fast food, Italian, German, Korean, and Japanese. They were not clingy, they were not distant. They, in their fifth week, opened a Netflix account together. As Christmas approached, they made plans on visiting both sets of parents.
Bones are Made to be Broken Page 12