by Mark Teppo
“You will not believe the day I’ve had,” Hurley started. When Colby, the designee to be vocally incredulous by virtue of being on Hurley’s right, said nothing, he spread his hands wide like he was reaching to hug the entire table. “It was pretty incredible.”
Jack dismissed Colby’s vacant stare. “Some report he turned in. Got him in a funk.”
Hurley’s grin stretched as wide as his hands. “Okay, so there’s this Executive Assistant who works for the Vice-President of Sales. I hear she’s, like, forty-eight years old or something. You’d never believe it. Toned, tight—must spend four hours a day at the gym. Just an amazing piece of ass.
“Anyway, we’re in the elevator today—coming back from some meeting on Four—just her and I, and she catches me sneaking a peek at her tits. Know what she says? She says—”
“‘Take me back to your office and fuck me’?” Colby surfaced from his reverie, revenant rising from an ancient tomb, drawn back to the table by Hurley’s story.
Hurley’s smile faltered, real-time erosion stripping away the edge of a cliff. “Hey, Colby, come on.”
“You always tell the same story.” Colby looked at the others, inspecting their faces for a sign that they, too, were aware of the persistent core of Hurley’s tales. “Aren’t you tired of it?”
“It’s not the same,” Hurley countered.
“Oh, what was last week’s?” Colby asked. “An intern in the copy center who wanted to get copies of your dick. Was that it? And the week before—something about a car wash?”
“Come on, Colby, we’re at the Alibi.” David put a hand on his arm. “Does it matter?”
Colby shoved his hand away, drunkenly missing his wrist and having to use his whole arm to push the other man away. “Yeah, maybe. Maybe if we’re going to lie to each other—to ourselves—we ought to be a little better at it.”
“Who pissed in his drink?” Hurley groused.
“No, damnit. I’m serious. Aren’t we getting too old for this? How long are we going to keep coming here and telling the same banal lies?”
“I thought that was the point.” Jack raised an eyebrow.
“What are we hiding from?” Colby countered.
Jack reached for his drink. “Well Colby, since you’re the one pissing in the stories, why don’t you tell us. What are we—what are you—hiding from?”
The room lurched beneath Colby as if Jack’s words were punctuated by a quake—tremors rumbling through the manmade bluff of the city’s edge, threatening to calve off the Alibi Room and throw it down into the bay. A muscle in Colby’s cheek twitched as if he had just been stung by a wasp. Does it matter?
Does any of it matter? An existential black hole lurked in wait for him. The velvet womb of the Alibi tried to hide him from this pit, tried to keep him from spilling into the limitlessness of . . .
“Nothing,” he muttered.
“Then quit spoiling it for everyone else.”
*
“So, are you a virgin?” Hurley asked Colby as they walked along the path beneath the frozen branches.
“Excuse me?” Colby said.
Hurley stopped and put his hand on Colby’s arm to slow him down. “You know the stories. The unicorn can only be snared by those who are innocent of sin. You know, virginal maids sitting out under trees, waiting for the unicorn to come lay its head in their lap. Maybe that’s why they were bait; they could see the animal.” He shrugged. “Ergo: since you can see it, does that mean you’re a virgin?”
Colby looked at the ice-fused branches of the poplars and birch overhead. As a child, he had chased squirrels in the park, laughingly pursuing them into the thickets of trees until they darted up the knotted trunks. It had been a long time, but he remembered always seeing the sky: blue through the partially interlocked puzzles of the leaves. Now, winter linked the trees in the awkward embraces of estranged cousins at familial funerals. It was like being inside a cathedral, a sacred place where confessions were heard and one’s holy worth was considered. Are you a virgin? Are you worthy of God’s embrace?
Suddenly colder, his spine reacting to an impression—a latent memory that was more instinct than personal recollection—Colby shivered and looked away from the dome of ice.
Ahead of them, David and Jack tracked the unicorn’s trail, eyes watching for the chaotic pattern of each successive spatter.
“Listen,” Hurley said, “It’s not a big deal if you are, but—”
“What about Jack?” Colby interrupted, indicating the two men ahead of them. “Is he a virgin too?”
Hurley opened and closed his mouth several times. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“By your argument, non-virgins can’t see the unicorn, which would explain why long-time studs like you and David can’t see it. You’re blind because you shook your dicks at too many girls over the years. Is that how it works?”
“It’s just an idea—”
Colby cut Hurley off with an abrasive laugh. “Maybe I’ve not had the ‘office romances’ that you’ve had, but I lost my virginity when I was fifteen, Hurley. And I’ve slept with a few women since then.”
“Fine,” Hurley snapped. “You got a better explanation?”
“We should be asking Jack. He seems to be the resident expert.”
“Right,” Hurley snorted. “David would know better. He’s been hunting—”
“What?”
“Maybe that’s what it is.” Hurley grabbed Colby’s arm. “Listen, maybe it’s like that theory that every story is augmented and changed with every telling. You know, like that game we did in school as kids where we’d all line up and the teacher would whisper something to the first kid. He’d pass it along to the next and the next to the next, you know, on down the line. The last kid then says aloud what he is told, and it is always different. Maybe the myth of the unicorn is the same thing. After all these generations of telling the story, the details have gotten muddled. Maybe it’s not about being a ‘virgin’ but about being innocent.”
“Innocent. How?”
“You ever been hunting, Colby? Have you ever killed anything?”
“No. Jesus, Hurley.” Colby grimaced. “I’ve never even held a crossbow before tonight.”
“Right. And David and I have. He’s taken me bow hunting with him a couple of times now. This isn’t my first time.”
“But that would mean that Jack is innocent too.” Colby glanced at the receding pair. Until he found his quarry again. Until they caught up with the wounded animal. His chest tightened as if a python was squeezing his ribs. “What happens to the unicorn if we kill it?”
Hurley hefted his crossbow, getting a better grip on the stock. His eyes were bright and clear, unstained by alcohol. “Maybe that’s when it becomes visible again. Maybe that’s the only way the rest of us will ever see it.”
*
The waitress replenished their drinks, removing the ice-filled glasses as if she was clearing the detritus of an expired ceremony. The four men made no eye contact with one another for a moment, their faces turned in random directions like a quartet of demagnetized compasses. The foursome, cast adrift from their collective mood by Colby’s outburst, sought other distractions. Hurley stared after the waitress; David grew fascinated with the play of light on the half-moon of his fingernails; Colby’s eyes roved around the room as he tried to pretend he didn’t feel the feral burn of Jack’s gaze.
“Are you tired of listening to us, Colby?” Jack asked. “Is it too much of an effort to have a beer and play along for a few hours? Have we bored you that badly?”
Colby stared at his glass, unwilling to raise his head. “I’m just tired,” he said. “Long week. It’s got nothing to do with anything.”
“Yeah, ‘nothing.’ Is that the whole problem? You woke up this morning and realized just how empty your life is. When was the last time you got a decent raise? Or had a date? What friends do you have outside the four of us? Are you still living in that shithole in Parkway, or did you ever man
age to save enough for a deposit on a place across the bridge?”
Each question was a psychic blow that collapsed more of his body: his lungs grew tighter, his stomach knotted, his throat constricted to a tiny hole. Each question externalized an interior complaint Colby had been fighting, had been dismissing this last quarter as he had focused on his report. As if everything would be resolved with the release of his findings; as if his document was a life-affirming manifesto instead of a study in paper consumption. Jack’s questions were delivered as if he was trying to push Colby into the existential blankness that filled the void behind the inconsequential truth of his report.
Colby tried to brush them off, tried to dismiss them with a wave of his hand. “Forget it,” he said. He struggled to get out of the plush comfort of the chair. “I’m done. I’m heading home.”
“You need to do something,” Jack said. “Something real. Jump out of an airplane, race a motorcycle. Something like that.”
Colby paused, one arm partially snared in his coat. Against his better judgment, he turned and looked down at Jack. “Now?”
“Why not?”
Colby had a show of looking around the room. “Because it’s the middle of the night. Because I—”
“Because you’re scared? Because it’s easier to talk about doing something than actually doing it? Because you’d rather bitch about us telling the same old stories than actually go out and make a new one?”
“No—”
“It’s just an excuse, Colby. Whatever you’re going to say. It’s just a lame excuse to do nothing again.”
Colby flushed. He shoved his remaining arm in his coat. “What the fuck do you care?”
“Because I think you’re right. Because Hurley does tell the same damn story every time, and I’m sick of it too. But is that his fault? Is anything we fail to do here any fault but our own?”
“Jesus, Jack,” Hurley snorted, stung by his words.
Colby’s tongue was dry, and he licked his lips as if to find moisture on them. “What did you have in mind?”
Jack smiled. “There’s a unicorn in Windward Park.”
Hurley laughed. “Ah, shit, that’s a good one, Jack.” When the others looked at him. “What? It’s a good setup for a story. Giving us all grief for being boring and then hitting us with . . .” He faltered. “What? You believe him?”
David nodded. “I heard it too. From someone else.”
“Oh, and that makes it true?” Hurley shook his head and reached for his drink. “Everyone could be telling the same lie here. That doesn’t make it true.”
Jack was still staring at Colby. “So let’s go find out. If you’re so eager for something true and hard and honest, then let’s go. Let’s go out there right now and find it.”
“Why?” Colby asked, the only word he could manage.
“Why not?”
“That’s not a reason.”
“Isn’t it?” Jack raised his chin towards the wall behind Colby. “David and Hurley have enough hunting gear to outfit all of us. Let’s go bag ourselves a unicorn and get the head stuffed. Mount it right there on the wall behind you so no one forgets.” He laughed and looked at the others, spearing them with the fervent gleam in his eyes. “Fuck the stories. Let’s go make our own.”
*
The ground was slick and icy near the lion statue, and Colby nearly fell. His hip caught on the angry mouth of the statue where he regained his balance, leaning against the cold stone for support. Behind him, Jack was shouting incoherently, giving voice to the bloom of pain from the shattered bones in his shoulder.
The unicorn thundered up Glory’s slope, its hooves cracking against the frosted hillock. Colby pressed himself against the stone lion, stealing a glance upslope as the animal passed. Silver twinkled in its mane, its horn a glittering spike. Blood streamed down its white flank from Jack’s earlier crossbow bolt.
“Where is it?” Hurley was in a panic. “Where the fuck is it?”
“Look for Jack’s bolt,” David shouted. Standing in the open meadow at the base of Glory, he sighted carefully through the sights of his crossbow. The experienced hunter, Colby thought, transfixed by David’s patience, waiting for his prey to come into range.
The unicorn charged down the slope past Colby, head lowered.
But he can’t see it.
David squinted and fired. The unicorn flipped its head up, horn rising. The metal bolt struck sparks—a cascade of falling stars—as it ricocheted off the hard horn. Galloping past the stunned hunter, the unicorn dipped its horn down. David spun, trailing a thin arc of crimson, and then he was facedown on the ground.
Hurley hesitated, caught between trying to do something for Jack’s shattered shoulder and his fallen friend. Colby found himself wondering how surreal the scene must be for the florid salesman. First, Jack had been knocked down and trampled and now David, throat cut, was a crumpled shape on the white ground. All the while, Hurley hadn’t seen the animal that had dropped two of his companions. Like fighting a ghost.
The unicorn wheeled near the tree line and pounded back across the field. Colby braced his back against the cold statue as the animal charged towards him. His crossbow lay on the ground not far from him, but he didn’t dare move from the statue, as if he could meld himself into the stone and disappear.
The unicorn pulled up short of Colby, rearing back on its hind legs. Up close, its hooves were huge and flashed like the blade of a headsman’s axe. The blood streaking its flank made its ribs appear like dusty shadows under its pale skin. Its eyes were stark and white with panic, and its chest heaved like massive bellows.
Colby was sucked into the winter whiteness of the unicorn’s eyes, suddenly pulled into a pure void bereft of shadow and darkness. As the animal towered over him, the panic and fear flowed out of Colby as if a plug had been pulled out of him and all the emotional tension was draining out of his body. He was floating in the opaque purity of the unicorn’s gaze and, instead of being lost against this background, he was a single dot upon the white sea. A nut. A seed. A catalyst.
The unicorn blinked, a shuttering of souls, and Colby was snapped back into his own body. The animal lowered its horn. Not as an antagonist, but as a gesture of recognition and kindness. Of understanding. Colby raised his hand, his fingers reaching for the tip of the unicorn’s horn.
The unicorn bleated and took a drunken step to Colby’s left, and he saw the fresh crossbow bolt jutting from its side just behind its shoulder.
Jack, leaning against Hurley, lowered his crossbow, a triumphant grin working through the pain wracking his face.
The animal staggered on the uneven slope of Glory. It shook its head, twisting its neck in an effort to see what was biting its flesh. Colby took a step towards the wounded creature, hand still outstretched. He reached for the bolts jutting out of its sides instead of the horn. If he could just touch the bolt, he could draw it out before the unicorn expired. He could stop the flow of the blood.
The unicorn’s front legs buckled and it fell heavily against the slope. Its head lolled on a weak neck, and Colby laid a hand on the heaving animal’s flank. The skin was hot and slicked with sweat.
“Get out of the way, Colby!” Jack shouted. He had Hurley’s crossbow and was pointing it at Colby and the unicorn. The tip of the bolt shivered as Jack’s adrenaline-charged muscles twitched and jumped.
With a clarity like the white field he had seen in the unicorn’s eye, Colby knew Jack would fire. If he tried to block Jack’s shot, his sacrifice would be a fruitless one. Jack—or Hurley—would just reload and fire again, unobstructed.
The unicorn snorted behind him, a sighing exhalation like a furnace expiring. Colby started to turn his head to look at the animal and his gaze fell on his discarded crossbow. The bolt was still in place, ready to fire.
“Colby—” Jack started, a grim finality in his voice.
Colby scrambled for his crossbow, scooping it off the ground. He lifted it with one hand and pulled the trig
ger.
Jack quivered as the bolt struck him, his expression softening into something akin to dismay. The tip of his weapon drooped, and he coughed. Blood spattered the feathers of his bolt and, his face crumbling with a weak cry, he stared down at the metal bolt sticking out of his chest. He tried to look at Hurley, but his knees failed, and he fell.
The unicorn blew air again, struggling to its feet. Its head drooped and its knees were locked, but it remained upright. To Colby, it was already fading: opaque through the withers, crystalline shine bleeding through its tail and mane.
I’ll never see it again, he realized.
Hurley was reloading the crossbow Jack had given him.
Colby did the same.
*
“That’s a pretty sad story.” Jennie tugged on a pigtail, hair woven through the tangle of her long fingers.
Colby’s mouth was dry from the telling as if the words had all dried up in his throat.
“I’ve heard a lot of unicorn stories recently—it’s the popular meme right now—but that one . . .” She shrugged. “It’s different. Most of what I hear are tales of wish-fulfillment. You know, sex stories for stunted adolescents.”
Colby nodded.
“Yeah.” She clucked her tongue once, punctuating the thought, and tapped her tray against her leg. “So, seriously, are your friends going to be joining you tonight.”
Colby thought of Glory, of the blood and innocence that had fallen there. In the spring, he realized, when the frost broke and the green started its assault on the city again, a different sort of recycling program would begin. Born of a single catalytic moment. One thought, one shot. The rest was simply the way the story spun itself out.
“No,” he said. “I’m the only one.”
A CHRISTMAS WISH (REDUX)
I.