by Will Carver
Her head was hurting because she was eating too fast, but the app said her fried chicken was only three minutes away.
One more spoonful.
The pain of her freezing brain passed down into her shoulders and back. It felt like another attack. She had to keep herself calm. She knew how to fight the symptoms, at least.
Then the doorbell rang and her heart rate increased. I made her more excited.
See: the Western diet.
She wheezed down the hallway, dragging her bare feet because lifting them was too much effort.
‘Good evening. One family bucket, beans, corn, fries, two litres of Pepsi aaaaand…’ the man on her doorstep fished around inside his bag, ‘one tub of cookie-dough ice cream.’ He smiled.
Dairy free. Because she’s on a diet.
‘Thank you.’
‘Have a good night.’ He acted as coolly as he could. He could see the state she was in. He knew everything in that bag was for her. There was no family.
I could have made her feel guilty and it would have resulted in her eating everything.
I could have left her that night. She would have eaten everything.
I stayed and watched her. I saw as she ate the skin of three chicken legs before dunking the meat into the carton of beans meant for four people. I hung around as she gulped a pint of that fizzy drink straight from the bottle. I did nothing as she took the lid off the ice cream and placed it on the coffee table to defrost.
Then I pushed her too hard.
She wasn’t even hungry for the food, but the pleasure centre of her brain had been deadened by gluttony. The grease was around her mouth but I made her want more. And quicker.
A handful of fries was dipped into the ice cream. Another swig of Pepsi. Her teeth typewritered up and down the cob of corn before it was thrown into the bucket.
Another chicken skin.
Another flicker of pleasure.
I stroked at her some more and that rapture tingled between her legs for a moment. It was fleeting. Voracity had deadened her libido long ago.
One more bite. One more spoonful. One more lick.
Stuff it in.
I saw the panic in her eyes. That this was dangerous. The fear of death, but more than that, the realisation that she was alone and there was nobody to help her. To slap her on the back. To attempt to wrap their arms around her waist from behind and pull inward and upward in a sharp, single movement.
She was choking to death and I could not tear myself away from the sadness of it all.
Dorothy was trying to gain momentum by rocking her body back and forth, just so that she could stand up. She beat a fist against her chest, attempting to dislodge whatever was stuck in her throat. She managed to reach for the Pepsi, hoping to wash it downward.
There was nothing I could do. I left her to it.
Dorothy died-with-a-chicken-bone-in-her-throat Reilly managed to get to her feet, she was grasping at her neck. Then she moved around behind her seat and launched herself towards the back of the sofa, hoping the upright section would hit her in the gut hard enough to act like a solo Heimlich manoeuvre.
But the undersized sofa, built for two, was light and flimsy and the legs buckled at the back and the front flipped up hitting her – comically – in the face. She fell onto the gentle cushioning and dislodged nothing.
She kicked her legs. She rolled. I left.
Dorothy Reilly would not be found until after I was gone and had taken Detective Sergeant Pace with me.
CURRENTLY UNAVAILABLE
It would require more than a single incident. That much evil could not cut through the malevolence of this world. No. I had to infect the town. It had to be a plague if there was going to be any impact, if I was going to make a lasting difference.
I have been there through wars, through famine, through plague. Those are the larger stories. Hinton Hollow was small. Perhaps I needed more of these stories.
Think global, act local.
I cast my net wide that day, capturing all who held a grudge or felt anxious. Anyone with a wandering thought for mischief or depravity was caught within my grasp. Anyone with a passing notion of infidelity. Anyone who cursed their boss or sister or another driver, even in their minds, was touched.
LIV DUNHAM WAS PASSIVE
She loved her job. She was getting married.
She thought life was happening to her.
Life was passing her by.
She had tried Oz’s mother first. Before she pestered the police again.
Where the hell was she?
‘Come on, May,’ she whispered out loud to herself as the phone rang once. Twice. Five times before the old-fashioned answering machine kicked in again.
‘You are through to the Tambor residence,’ a formal but jovial male voice uttered. ‘We are currently unavailable to take your call. Leave a short message and one of us will get back to you as soon as we can.’
May Tambor had not changed the message from her husband’s voice even though he had died just over four years ago. Sometimes, when she was out, she called her own house just to hear him talk to her again. Oz had told Liv that he hated getting that message when he called his mother; it just brought it all back. But he’d never say anything to her because he didn’t know what it felt like to have someone in your life that you loved in that way suddenly disappear forever.
‘Hi, May. It’s Liv again. I’m starting to get really worried about Oz. Just wondering if you’ve heard from him in the last day. Please give me a call when you pick this message up. Thanks.’
She placed the phone down gently and exhaled as though she had just delivered bad news to someone close. Liv tried to keep her tone as light as that of the dead man who had asked her to leave a message. She didn’t want May to worry. Oz was all she had now.
Oh, Oz. Where are you? Talk to me. She looked upward at nothing and the words vibrated inside her skull.
Liv Dunham ambled into the kitchen, turned on the cold tap and left it running while she fetched herself a glass from the cupboard.
I’ll wait here. He’s coming back. She was finding it more difficult to lie to herself.
She took three large gulps of the water then fought hard to keep it down. Her throat was hurting from all the crying and felt as though she was swallowing straight vodka.
Back in the lounge, Liv sat on the edge of her sofa. Alert. The television stayed off. She couldn’t hear about that poor Brady kid any more, it was horrid, she’d got enough on her mind. She knew his older brother, Michael. Well-mannered. Average but likeable. His parents seemed happy, too. Young. Still in love. Interested in their child’s education from an early age.
She couldn’t fight her instincts as a teacher and a member of the community. She contemplated what the Bradys must be going through, then she worried about May Tambor. And she thought about the wedding preparations and whether Oz had simply driven to Wales to sort out his fucking passport. Maybe her friends were right and he would surprise her. Maybe the whole town was in on it.
Maybe they weren’t.
Her legs started to jump up and down, agitated and impatient.
She’d wait.
That’s what she was supposed to do. Wait. They’d told her yesterday.
But she couldn’t. She was starting to feel ineffectual. She was allowing Oz not to be with her. What was she actually doing to help? Staying at home and calling people. She was the opposite of a receptionist.
After a few mad moments, Liv Dunham found another number to call. She knew something was wrong. Oz wouldn’t just leave without saying anything. He just wouldn’t.
There were four rings before somebody answered. One less than it took for Oz’s dead father to request you leave a message for the Tambors.
‘Hinton Hollow Police,’ it stated. ‘Constable Reynolds.’
VOICES
Oz Tambor was alive. For now.
All was dark. Starless. But he knew that he was in a car. And it was cold. He could’ve se
en his breath if there had been any light. And the wind outside bounced around the canopy and pushed its way through branches and leaves to sound like whispers.
My whispers.
Voices all around him.
My voices.
And he didn’t feel able to move, though his body was in no physical pain. And his eyes wanted to close but his mind refused to let that happen. He was staying alert. It’s just as black when they’re open, anyway.
And he should not have left the house like that yesterday morning.
Then he wouldn’t have been there, in an unlit car, in the biting forest surrounded by breathy murmurs he couldn’t understand but were slowly driving him mad.
He had been taken, but he was alive.
And he had to somehow stay that way for three more days.
A LONG PAUSE
The news had said that nineteen people had jumped from the top of Tower Bridge. There were videos emerging that onlookers had taken on their phones, and Maeve knew that’s where Pace would have been. Then buried in paperwork and identifying bodies, probably. But she couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad had happened to him.
It was irrational. It was silly. She knew. But she called him again. And he’d better pick up this time because she was going out of her fucking mind.
‘Where the fuck are you? What are you doing? Even the fucking President of the United States has time to tweet a hundred times a day so I don’t know why you’re so busy that you can’t shoot me a quick text to say that you’re okay.’
She’d been drinking. The things inside were leaking out.
‘I’ve had a shit day, in case you care. There’s no point in going into it, I don’t want to do that over voicemail. I just want to talk to you, babe. I need to hear your voice. It will calm me down. I’m sure you’d be the same the other way around.’
H o p e.
Maeve had ordered Thai food to go with her two bottles of wine. She was distracted and could not be bothered to cook for herself.
There was a long pause. Her breathing slowed.
‘I wish you were here. Please come back to me when there’s some let-up in this case.’
She hung up, then, to nobody, said, ‘I need you.’
THEY WERE KIDS
Michael Brady had fallen asleep within minutes of his father leaving the room.
SOMETHING ABOUT JACOB’S HAIR
He hated having it washed.
He hated having it brushed.
He loved having it ruffled at the back by his older brother.
The pillow still pressed against his chest. It smelled like Jacob’s wet hair. The clean scent of his freshly bathed little brother.
Michael hadn’t had a nightmare about that day in the park; he may have dreamt, but he didn’t remember anything when he woke up startled by the sound of yet more shouting.
He had drifted into slumber over an hour ago, feeling dismay for his father but that he was protected and cared for and safe. The weight of his own sorrow finally pressuring him into fatigue. He didn’t dwell on his mother’s words. The transformation of Hinton Hollow was not affecting the children. They couldn’t be touched by the encroaching twilight.
But they could still feel fear.
They were kids.
And Michael was awoken from a dreamless sleep by a sound that instantly filled him with terror.
He had heard that howl once before.
NUMB
‘You stupid fucking bitch.’
That’s what he shouted as he burst in on his wife in the bath.
‘You cunt. You idiot.’ She was lying there just as he’d imagined.
A NOTE ON SORROW
Grief presents itself in different ways.
For Owen Brady it started with tears and the misery of loss.
There was alcohol. And self-doubt.
And a touch from Evil.
All that was left was his anger, blame and a distaste for his wife.
He grabbed hold of any part of her that he could and yanked her from the tub. His son was awake, lying in his dead brother’s sheets, scared at what was happening in the room next to his. Worried that his father had been struck by the latest wave of Hinton Hollow madness.
Then Michael went numb. Just as he had in the park.
He held his pillow tight, unable to move.
Owen Brady had no idea what he was doing.
BOTTOM OF THE BATH
Faith Brady wanted to be left alone that night. She wanted a little time. She didn’t want to scare her son or upset him. She didn’t want her husband bursting into the bathroom and screaming at her.
But she got it all.
Faith Brady could never tell them what she had done.
That she should feel guilty.
That it was her fault that Jacob was dead, no matter how her friends and family protested or attempted to pacify what they saw as natural, maternal remorse.
Faith Brady was jolted from another heavy bout of self-absorption when she heard the creak of the sixth and seventh stairs.
Her husband was on his way up to her.
To try again.
Why can’t you just leave me alone, Owen. You’re going to ruin everything.
She replaced the bottle of vodka she had been swigging from, covered it with the underwear in her top drawer, and perched herself on the edge of the bed, her head drooping so she didn’t have to make eye contact. It was too painful.
He could never know.
Owen Brady had been trying to get his wife downstairs since she had returned home with their other son, Michael. Owen had been referring to the shooting as the accident. The police were calling it the incident. The police description was more accurate.
‘I’m no good to be around.’ She had slurred her words slightly. But Owen Brady only heard upset and tears rather than booze and culpability. She hadn’t lifted her head because she knew the look on his face would break her.
She was removing herself.
Faith Brady had acted on autopilot for a few moments. Speaking words she expected every mother would utter in that situation.
Everybody blames me. You blame me. You shouldn’t be near me. I’m bad luck.
Her mind was occupied with the sight of her own soft, manicured hands. She saw them covered in blood. She looked at the forefinger on her right hand. The one that never physically pulled the trigger, but certainly helped to aim the gun. She could see the teeth marks where she had been biting it in hostility since yesterday.
Faith finally lifted her head when her husband resorted to pleading.
He is weak.
‘Just … please.’
The disgust shown on her face had only been for herself. She wished she could have taken the bullet to her chest. She was bigger, she thought; perhaps she’d have lived. Or maybe she too would have ceased to exist before her head hit the stony floor beneath her feet, and then she wouldn’t have to feel any of this. She wouldn’t have to live with this.
She saw Owen withdraw at the sight of her.
Then he had mentioned Michael.
‘I don’t want to see Michael,’ she had shouted. She hadn’t wanted the words to come out that loud but the statement must have been true for her to react in that way.
I did nothing. I did not want to touch her.
IF I HAD THREE WISHES
1. That Faith Brady would have taken the bullet that day
2. That people were better and would choose more good.
3. You’ll have to come back to me on this one.
Michael made her feel worse by being alive. He had been there. He must have known something but he was not saying it. She couldn’t have him look at her. And know. He was her first-born and, in a small way, had always been favoured slightly. But not now. Not now that his brother was dead.
‘Just leave,’ she had screamed, hoping to push her husband away. Hoping to push everyone away.
Stop caring about me. Just give me time. I only need a little time.
> Owen forced a glimmer of reality back into his wife’s eyes when he propelled himself in her direction. She saw that he was angered. He was sick of her. He should be. She put a hand out to his chest and begged him for the one thing she believed she needed.
Time. Only a little time.
Then she lied. And he had bought it.
L i e s.
Faith Brady took the bottle of vodka from her drawer, walked into the en-suite bathroom, lit three candles and plugged the bath. She swigged at the vodka and grimaced. The only way she could feel better was to feel worse. She turned the hot and cold water on and adjusted until the correct temperature liquid flowed from the ornate mixer tap – slightly too hot – and poured in a muscle-relaxing bubble bath.
Then she swigged again. This time watching herself in the mirrored surface of the medicine cabinet on the wall. Her face was paler. Bonier. Witchier. She thought she looked evil. See also: self-loathing, anxiety, airbrushed magazine images. She felt unholy, though she had no religious convictions of her own.
What are you doing? she asked the woman looking back at her.
What have you done? one of them whispered.
Her fragile mind galloped.
She thought that Michael knew something. That he was protecting her for some reason. She couldn’t bear the thought that this could be hanging over him. She’d already killed one of her children the day before.
Faith Brady rested the bottle on the side of the bath and fumbled the layers of clothing off her body and onto the cold tiles. The mirrored cabinet was starting to steam up so she could no longer look at the face she had come to despise.
She told herself that it would all be okay.