by Jason Beech
Morbid thoughts washed away with work. She organized charity events to help fund research into her condition. Concentration on the process pushed fear from her mind. She had a bicycle event in the coming weekend, a big dinner function with a minor celebrity the next, and a calendar booked for the foreseeable future.
The repressed secret in that corner of his mind jolted her.
4.
“Hi, Anna. How’s it going?”
“I’m fine, Erik, how are you?”
“I’m on it, as always.”
“Good to know.”
Erik liked her smile. It brightened his day. He gave her the prescription order and she asked him to wait. He sat down and divided his attention between her and the kid insistent on having the little plastic pharmacy toy which dangled in front of him. It would probably choke him, he mused. It would stop his whining at least. He compared him to his daughter. Carly would never behave like this. As good as gold. Didn’t mean she was boring. The girl had character, but she knew when to pick her battles, even at two years old, and a stupid little toy like this would not have her in battle-gear. Stupid boy. Dumb as a plant pot.
He gulped as if maneuvered a pool ball, as dry as Arizona, down his throat. He gulped down a sob. Damn. His tears had run dry a long time ago. Where had that one come from? Carrying Ally on his back through the surf of the Mediterranean … the image dappled his thoughts like sunshine … her mouth open with laughter. An old, naked man had walked by them. His bits and pieces dangled like weathered rope. He stunned Erik, his puritan upbringing came to the fore, outraged. Ally thought it the funniest thing she had ever seen. “Europeans,” she had laughed, “I love them.”
How would Carly take life without her mother? How would I cope? The boy looked at him as if Erik had directed an insult his way. He must have sensed the disdain as he now gripped his mother and hid his head behind her legs. He must sense the shame of his behavior – he had taken a step toward manhood if he had. Now face life, kid.
“Your prescription, Erik.”
“Thank you.” He approached the counter with a scratch of his ear. “You look well.” Erik bit his lip. Anna and the boy’s mother examined him.
“I do? Thank you.” Anna nodded her head at an angle as if she dodged the compliment.
“Okay, see yer.”
He left and hoped his summer tan had hidden his blushes.
5.
He needed to do it now. Tomorrow would look creepy. It took five minutes to spot the deep red Acura. Red cars crammed the parking lot. The grays and blacks stood out today. The dent in the driver’s side of her car alarmed him. Not careful, then. He wrote on the scrap of paper, ripped from a flyer for a Chinese takeaway, and placed it under the windscreen wiper. He walked away, conscious of the neighboring supermarket's elderly greeter’s observation of him.
6.
Ally wriggled and writhed. Death's fingers played with her insides. Images slide-showed through her head.
“Where’s Erik?” She clenched her teeth.
Brianne stroked her hair. “I don’t know. I can’t get hold of him.”
Ally dipped in and out of consciousness, not sure which she liked best. Her husband felt not far away, she could sense him, saw his thoughts in images as well as words. The images had started colorful, full of sunshine. She saw Carly and herself in there all the time. Gifted her an optimism which she fought to grasp. Lately, the colors had washed out, an expansive outdoors now replaced by a white sheen indoors, which squeezed in on her. What was he thinking? What lay on that top shelf? They no longer talked about the future. Her fault, she knew. She no longer asked as she now read his thoughts. She had forgotten he did not know about her perceptions.
She let out a primal grunt. Brianne rubbed at her hand.
“Ally, where do you keep your painkillers? Maybe you need more?” Brianne never scared easy, but Ally could sense her fear, though she didn’t hear a word.
Why have I got this power? It made no sense. If I have the power to read his mind, why not the power to stop this pain? Better still, why do I not have the power to live? To make myself better?
“Brianne, I’m so scared.” Her words filtered almost inaudible through clenched teeth.
Brianne managed to caress her dearest friend into a calmer slumber. Wiped tears from her own face as well as the ones which splashed Ally.
Ally saw lab coats and clinical rooms. White walls, white surfaces, strip lights. The whiteness pulsed. Erik sat on a stool, bent over a counter where he examined some substance. “This will make everything better.” White walls sent her mind blank and took her to a deep sleep, like her soul stood ready for departure.
7.
Brianne turned the kitchen upside down in search of medication. She rummaged through the medical drawer once she found it. The box lay buried beneath a pharmacy of other pills, probably new; at least unopened. The prescription label dated them eight weeks previous. Funny. The other bottles, many of them empty, had shards of a label left on them, all scratched beyond identification. She held them up to the light as if that would help. She clasped two of the tablets and shoved the rest back in the drawer.
8.
Erik sat at the bottom of their bed with Carly asleep in his arms. Stared at his wife. If awake she would have seen a haunted man attempting to paint a future. He had thanked Brianne, held her hands tight for more time than she felt comfortable. He realized it after her departure, but didn’t care. She'd been a good friend. She gave him an odd, hesitant look. He couldn’t fathom it. He didn’t ask if she had a problem. His thoughts lied elsewhere.
The air-conditioner made him shiver. He tucked Ally in to keep her warm, put Carly to bed, and stood outside on the porch with the lights off. He let the heat soak him. The humidity read ninety-five percent and it made everything sheen. His grip on the railing tightened, as if the porch barred him from the outer world. Two cars passed by. Envy held his eyes on them until they drove out of sight.
His phone bleeped. “Hello?”
He remembered little of the conversation over the phone. Anna’s tone stabbed cold. Words and phrases he remembered: how could you? Coward. She may have called him a bastard. Maybe he called himself that. The heat prickled his skin. He went back indoors, relieved at the cold blast.
Anna had turned him down. He had spent months building a rapport with her. They had smiled at each other every time he went to the pharmacy. She'd been friendly – he thought receptive. She was a little younger than him; fit, athletic, and gorgeous. He had examined every curve he could see through her white coat and imagined the rest he couldn’t. A woman he could grow to love, a woman Carly could definitely warm toward as a substitute mother. Carly always gurgled with joy when Anna spoke to her, and had once reached out as they entered. Damn it, Anna had encouraged him. She knew Ally was dying and had offered assistance if he ever needed it. Just call me, she had said. What’s that if not an invitation?
He drank whiskey into oblivion.
9.
Ally woke up screaming. Fended off the knife which stabbed her. Red lines opened up on her arms and neck, her heart pierced. She waved her arms and punched. Kicked her legs. Thrashed her body.
Nobody stood above her. She laid still. Her eyelids motored at the intense pain of her illness. As her breath normalized, she sat up and trembled at the dream’s vivid reality. Death felt so close, but it would not take her yet. She reached out for Erik. Her hands found her daughter. She craned her neck. Carly sat in the dim dawn light, her eyes wide with terror. Not a single sound of it escaped her.
10.
Erik’s eyes flashed open. “What? Eh?”
He found himself in the basement, splayed out on the sofa. He focused on his daughter’s toys and the house they had built together from a bucket of Lego. He didn’t recognize it at first.
“Ally?” He had heard her. Had she screamed? He got up, stumbled over a toy horse, regained his balance, and climbed the stairs slow. He couldn’t form a single though
t, except a vague annoyance with his knees as they creaked at every step. Yes … Ally. She had called out. In pain. How long could it last? Why did she have to go through it all?
He must have dreamt it because he heard no more calls. He filled a glass of water for her and went to the drawer. Slanted light entered through the kitchen blinds, enough to make his retinas recoil. He shut them tight for a moment and went back to the drawer. He squinted inside. The lack of light must have played with his senses as all the tablets lied in disorder. His forehead creased. Ally knew her medication's whereabouts. Why had she come to this drawer?
He ran upstairs. Ignored every hammer blow to his head at every step, and entered their bedroom. His wife rocked Carly on the edge of the bed.
“What happened?”
“I scared her.”
“Did you take your medication?”
“No. I haven’t had anything since yesterday morning.”
He ran back downstairs and examined the bottles. The one he opened had two tablets missing. His breathed like he'd just struggled through a marathon. He heard voices as if submerged underwater. He heard Ally ask him to talk to her, to tell her his problems. “You are my problem.”
“Why? What have I done?”
He turned, sharp, the form of his wife Brianne-shaped.
“I have a friend in pharmaceuticals.” Brianne had her back to the door she left ajar.
Erik could only frown and each line on his head told her the story. Every droplet of blood his heart pumped drummed in his ears, his body on a war-footing. Brianne had taken the pills.
“Brianne?”
He heard her swallow. He shut the drawer, a bottle of pills still in his tight grasp.
“Erik.”.
He turned towards her, an automaton, and reached blind for a way out. His blood told him to act. He didn’t know what, but he headed for her, in search of spots to aim for.
The gun she pointed at his stomach stopped him.
“I can’t believe it, Erik.” Each word staggered off a dry tongue. “I wasn’t sure if you were trying to kill yourself or Ally. Now I know”. A tear precipitated a stream. “The police are on their way.”
Erik slumped into a chair by the table and massaged his forehead, his eyes red and wet. “Brianne, why do such a thing?”
“Because Ally’s my friend.”
Why did this woman have to interfere? His heart heaved. “I’m her greatest friend. You’re nothing compared to me.”
“Then why feed her this poison?” She tightened her grip on the revolver.
Ally, forgive me, he thought. The pain you suffer every day makes my heart burst. The doctors can’t do anything for you. Why suffer? Why put Carly through it too? She knows something is wrong. She's aging fast, older than her years. She suffers, as I do, to see you in such agony. I wish you could live. I wish you could live longer than me, because I love you… I love you I love you I love you. I wasn’t killing you, I did it to relieve you. Maybe to relieve myself too, I don’t know. I’m too scared to analyze that … I’m terrified of it. I do know I want to remember you as you were, not as someone suffering, and part of me will die when you do. I’m dying now…
The outline of his wife, their daughter in her arms, blocked Brianne. He wiped the blur from his eyes. He searched for words, but emotion held them down.
You’re an idiot, Erik.
“What?” He noticed her eyes widen at his question.
What do you mean, what?
He told himself he had gone nuts.
I don’t have long left. If your pills have shortened that time I don’t know if I can forgive you. But I’ll try, because I want to make the most of every moment. I want to live, Erik. I want to live so much that every second matters, and I want to spend it with you and Carly. God, I wish you could hear me, because my heart is breaking and …
Erik stood, his hands cold. His skin quivered from a thousand pin-pricks. He melted at her horror and love, mingled - mangled.
I never wanted to hurt you. I wanted to stop the hurt.
Then you throw those pills and help me make the next months the best time of my life … I need to throw up.
He took Carly and led her by the arm to the bathroom. She vomited while he waited outside, wiped her mouth clean, and stepped back out. He hugged her tight and ignored the slight stink from her mouth.
I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Every moment, I’ll be there.
I’ll hold you to every word. Don’t let me down.
She released herself from his bear hug, scared it might reduce her time further. Tears made rivulets down her cheeks as she approached her friend. Told her to put the gun away and inform the just-arrived police that everything was okay.
Brianne looked over her shoulder as she left and wondered what she had done.
Where’s My Money?
“Hey, Jack,” I say, screwing my nose.
“Hey, Harry, how are yer?” he says, as if he doesn’t know what I want, like we’re long-time friends. Well, I suppose we are, but this is business, and he knows it.
I bar him from an exit at the bottom of the steps which leads to street-level. He’s not athletic enough to jump the railings, and those two scraggy mutts couldn’t protect him – they'd run from a hamster, never mind a well-aimed kick. For some reason, they have romance in their eyes. Maybe not. Maybe lust. I see lust everywhere. I see lust in old Mrs Bretton up the road, but maybe that look she gives me is just distrust. It’s possible. I am a shady bastard.
My wife is long dead.
“I’ve been meaning to get back to you, Harry, ever since our last meeting,” he says. Avoids my eyes and examines the ketchup stain on my vest. Hey, I saw him from across the street while I ate. I had to rush before he got away - the street is a mess. Obstacles everywhere slow an old man down.
“I bet you have. We have this meeting every other day and somehow I come away without my money.”
“I know, I know. Every time. How does that happen?”
“You tell me, you wily old tart. Do you have it?”
He pats his shirt and trouser pockets. He pats them again, harder, to emphasize he doesn’t have my damn money. Again. “I’m sorry, Harry, I don’t have it on me.”
“You never do.”
“What about tomorrow?”
“Will I see you tomorrow?”
“Sure.” He feels his pockets again. I wonder if he’s feeling himself up. Looks like it to me. I hear noise behind me. Like fur caresses fur. Doesn’t sound right. Gives me a sense of déjà vu.
“You look tired today, Harry.”.
“What?” I’m distracted by the sound of tongues which loll and mouths that pant. I refuse to turn around and look. I adjust my sunglasses instead, but keep my body in Jack’s way. Mrs Bretton is on her doorstep. She isn’t looking at me; she’s got her eye on what’s behind my back.
“You look tired,” he repeats. “You know what helps with that?”
“I don’t… sleep probably… what?”
“You need a good woman.”
I fight that probe for my weak spot. Fireworks explode in my head. I worry about an aneurysm. Now I can’t look him in the eye, though I know he gazes at me directly.
“Are those your dogs?” I ask.
He leans over to see past me. “No,” he says.
“Do you have dogs?”
“No.”
“Then why look?”
“Wanted to see what you were talking about.”
I hear a whimper. I see Mrs Bretton smirk and lean on her walking stick as if settling in to survey the street theatre. What did I stop Jack for? Last week we had something on. Something to do with cards. Man, this never-ending déjà vu, like I had done all this before, many times over.
“I’ll see you later, Harry.” Jack shakes my hand. That’s a strong handshake. I bet he takes no prisoners in a confrontation.
I avoid the mutts as I climb over the temporary plastic work-site fence, and then skip over the road-rubb
le on the way back to my flat. I retake my seat at the window. The fried bread is cold, and the egg’s sun has set. I look out to Mrs Bretton who still watches the dogs. She shouldn’t seem this attractive … she’s ollllllddd. So am I, I suppose. Things slip. Daily.
I shake the ketchup bottle and stare at my bills as if that could send them up in flames. I could do with money. The amount my son sends isn’t enough. It hasn't been for a long time. A yelp forces my head up. Two dogs circle each other and sniff each other’s arses. I sense a battle for territory. Those damn things keep me up every night with their howls, as if a full moon commanded them.
A man feeds them a bunch of crackers from the palm of his hand, oblivious to where their tongues have just explored. He ought to take care – might catch a disease. He looks familiar. I saw that side-parting above a hand of bad cards once. He looks like Jack. It is Jack.
“That bastard owes me money,” I mutter.
I get to my feet fast, unconcerned at spilling ketchup on my vest, and run before that mug escapes me. Again.
The Real Man
1.
It had been a long time since he almost lost his life. Months of work had built confidence back up to where he felt sociable again, just like before. Now he could smile at the woman who approached him by his front door.