by Blake Crouch
The low shudder of a car engine pulled me to the window. I split the blinds with two fingers and watched a white Lexus sedan turn into Orson’s driveway. I waited, my stomach twisting into knots. If Orson came in through the back door, he’d see the broken glass.
[Alternate ending of Desert Places begins here...]
He appeared suddenly, walking swiftly up the sidewalk in an olive suit, briefcase in hand. I stepped back from the blinds, dropped to my knees, and crawled under his desk.
A key slid into the dead bolt, and the front door opened. Orson whistled as he strode inside, and I drew back as far as I could into the darkness under the desk. His footsteps moved through the living room, then into the study. A deafening clump shook the desk and set my heart palpitating. He’d dropped his briefcase on the desktop. As he came around the desk toward the chair, I readied the gun.
A phone rang somewhere in the house. He stopped. I could see his legs now, his pointed black wing tips. I smelled him — clean, cologne-sweet, familiar. The scent of our sweat after a long day was identical. The phone rang again, and he rushed out of the study, mumbling something indecipherable under his breath.
He answered from the kitchen after the third ring. "Hello?…Hi, Arlene…. Yes, of course…. Well, why don’t you, then? We’ll put something on…. No, don’t do that. And just come on in…. All right. Sounds good. See you then."
He hung up the phone and went back into the living room. For a moment, I thought he was returning to the study, and I raised the gun. But his footsteps died away as he ran up the staircase.
Shaking, I climbed out from under the desk. As the shower cut on upstairs, I squatted down, took the walkie-talkie from the fanny pack, and pressed the talk button.
"Wilma," I whispered. "Wilma? Over?"
"Over." Walter’s voice crackled back through the speaker. I lowered the volume. "You’re Wilma. I’m Fred," he said.
"He’s here," I whispered. "Upstairs, taking a shower."
"Did you find —"
"Can’t talk now. Go, Papa."
"What?"
"Get up here and wait for the next signal."
I turned off the walkie-talkie and walked into the living room. The staircase was carpeted, so my footsteps fell silently as I ascended to the second floor. Emerging in the center of a dim hallway, I saw there was a bedroom at each end, and a closed door directly ahead, which, because it glowed underneath, I presumed to be the bathroom. Orson’s shoes, his navy-speckled brown socks, black belt, and olive suit trailed right up to the door.
He sang the Beatles’ "All You Need Is Love" in the shower.
I stepped toward the bathroom. Open the door, slip inside, and then stick him with the needle through the shower curtain….
The doorbell rang, and I froze in the hallway, wondering if he’d heard it, too. After five seconds, the shower cut off, and I heard the plop of wet feet on tile and cloth rubbing frantically over skin. I ran down the hallway, then into the bedroom on the right. Because there were clothes strewn all over the floor, I assumed this was his room. To my right, a dormer window overlooked Jennings Road and, beyond it, the snowy Adirondacks. Pillows filled the alcove, and I couldn’t help thinking that Orson must spend a great deal of time reading in that dormer nook.
A roomy walk-in closet opened to my left, and I darted inside as the bathroom door opened. The doorbell rang again, and Orson shouted, "I told you to just come in!" as he rushed down the staircase.
I did not hear him answer the door. Jostling my way between hangers of mothball-stinking suits and stiff sweaters, I finally ducked down in the farthest corner of the dark closet.
After a moment, Orson came back up the stairs and entered his room. I saw him briefly through the hangers — naked, stepping into a pair of boxer shorts and blue jeans, still conjoined on the floor, just as he’d left them. He stood shirtless in front of a full-length mirror, combing his wet hair, grown out now from the crew cut he’d sported in the desert. Grinning at himself, he bared his teeth, mouthing words into the mirror, none of which I could understand. It was the first good look I’d had of my brother, and I drank it in.
Still in marvelous physical condition, his appearance was more civilized and handsome than in the desert. He radiated charisma, and his eyes sparkled.
"Pour yourself a glass of wine!" he yelled. "There’s a pinot noir in the wine rack!"
Orson opened a dresser drawer and perused it for a moment, finally lifting out a gray box cutter. He exposed the razor, a small blade that obtruded no more than an inch from its metal sheath. Fingering the edge with his thumb, he smiled at himself again in the mirror.
"You behave." He giggled. "You behave tonight."
"Dave?"
Orson spun around. "Arlene. You scared me."
Her voice came from the top of the stairs. "Where’s the wine rack?"
"Kitchen counter." He held the box cutter behind his back. From my angle, I could see it in the mirror as he fidgeted with it, pushing the blade in and out. "Oh, Arlene. Put on some music, will you? Miles Davis, if you don’t mind."
Retracting the blade, he slipped the box cutter into his back pocket, and continued to primp.
Through the dormer window, the last strands of sunlight receded behind the Adirondacks. It was tempting to hide in that closet for the entire night, cloistered safely behind hangers, between smelly old garments. But I steeled myself, pushed my way through the clothes, and stumbled at last out of his closet.
Their voices rose to the second floor. I heard my brother laugh, and the tinkle of silverware on china. It’d taken me an hour to summon the nerve to walk out of the closet. Thank God they’re still eating. It suddenly occurred to me: The broken glass. Please don’t go into the sunroom.
Since I had his room temporarily to myself, I took the opportunity to check the dresser, the bookshelves, and the closet for the pictures and videos of the desert. I found nothing, however, to substantiate his hobby, not even a journal. In fact, the only item in his bedroom that reflected in a small way Orson’s taste for violence was an enormous William Blake print hanging on the wall across from his bed — The Simoniac Pope, a pen and watercolor hellscape of Pope Nicholas III in a vat of flames, the soles of his feet on fire. I knew this work. It was an illustration of Hell, Canto 19 from Dante’s Divine Comedy. Those who didn’t know him might be perplexed at Orson’s morbid choice of wall decor.
I walked down the hallway and entered the guest room. It was impersonal, filled with ill-matched, eclectic furniture. The closet was empty, as were the two drawers of the bedside table. I doubted if anyone had ever slept in the single bed.
Slinking back into the hallway, I turned and went down several steps. Orson spoke softly in the dining room. Chairs moved, and I heard footsteps heading toward the foyer. I retraced my steps, and when their footsteps continued in my direction, I clawed my way up the staircase, raced back down the hallway, and hid again in his closet.
They entered the room and fell together onto his bed. I heard Orson say, "I like you a lot."
"I like you, too."
"Yeah?"
"I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t." Arlene sounded as if she was about thirty, and though her voice was throaty, it retained a sliver of girlish innocence. I knew why Orson liked her. The lamp on his bedside table cut off. They kissed for a while in the darkness, and the intimate slurping reminded me of Friday nights, in high school.
"What would you think about me doing this?" he asked.
"Ooooh."
"Yeah?"
"Uh-huh." The room fell silent for a moment, excepting the moist sucking murmurs.
"Can you guess what I have in my back pocket?" Orson said finally.
"Mmm. What?"
"You have to guess, silly."
"Is it round and crinkly?"
"Actually, it’s hard."
"Mmm." She shuddered in a good way. I could hear the alcohol thickening up her voice.
"And very sharp."
"Huh?"
/>
"You told any of your friends about me?"
"What do you mean?"
"Does anyone know we’ve been seeing each other?"
"Why does it matter?"
"Just tell me." I caught a grain of anger in his voice, which I’m sure she didn’t register.
"Only the girls at work."
Orson sighed.
"I asked you not to tell anyone. You tell them my name?"
"Why?"
"Arlene, did you tell them my name?"
"I don’t remember." Her voice mellowed. "What do you think about this, sweetie?" A zipper started to descend.
There was sudden movement in the dark. "Don’t you touch me," he hissed.
The bed squeaked, and I wondered if she’d sat up.
"Turn on the light," she said. "Turn it on!" The light did not come on.
"Did you tell your girlfriends my name?"
"Why are you acting so weird?"
"Tell me, so I can show you what’s in my pocket."
"Yes, I told them your —"
"Goddamnit."
"What?"
"You can go now."
"Why?"
"Leave."
"What is wrong with you? I thought — I mean…I like you, and I thought —"
"I had something extraordinarily special planned for us tonight. And you just ruined it. I was going to open you up, Arlene."
"To what?"
"Get out of my house."
The bed moved again, the floor creaked, and it sounded as though clothes were being smoothed.
"I can’t believe I — you need help, David."
"Perhaps."
"You can go to —"
"I’d advise you to leave while you’re still able."
She stormed from his bedroom into the hallway, screamed "Fucking freak!" and was sobbing by the time she reached the front door.
25
ORSON sat for a while in the dark after Arlene left. For some reason, I expected him to cry, to come apart in pathetic flinders when no one was around. But this didn’t happen. As my eyes grew accustomed to the dark, I began to make out the shapes in his room — the painting on the wall, the bookshelves, his legs stretched out on the bed. I could see barbs of light through the dormer window, on the black slopes across the valley.
After thirty minutes, I thought he’d fallen asleep, and I began to psych myself up to crawl out of the closet and do what I’d come here to do. But when I started to move, he sat up abruptly. Stiffening, I watched his arms reach down under the bed and lift what appeared to be a shoe box up onto the mattress. Orson slipped out of his loafers and kicked them in opposite directions across the room. One hurtled into the closet and nearly struck me in the head.
I heard a mechanical clicking. He settled back onto the mattress and began speaking in a low, monotonous voice: "It is…seven forty-three P.M. on Friday, November eighth. Arlene came over this evening. I told you about her. That legal assistant from Bristol. It was going to happen tonight. I thought about it all day. All week. But she’d mentioned me — my name, I mean — to some of her coworkers, so that’s the end of that. It was an exercise in self-control. I’d never used a box cutter before, so I’m more than a little disappointed that tonight didn’t work out. If I go much longer without any play, I may resort to doing something careless, like that time in Burlington. But you made the rule never to do that in this town, and it’s an intelligent rule, so don’t fuck things up." He stopped the Dictaphone, but then pushed the record button again.
"Last thing. I was on-line today, and I saw that James Keiller’s second appeal was denied. Guess that means they’ll be setting an execution date in the near term. That’s a beautiful thing, what I did there. It really is. I may have to make the trip out to Nebraska when they juice him. And I do believe they juice ’em in the Cornhusker State."
He returned the Dictaphone to the shoe box and took out something else. Climbing out of bed, he walked toward his dresser, upon which sat a TV/VCR combo. He inserted a videotape and turned on the TV. As it started to play, he lay down on his stomach, his head at the edge of the mattress, propped up on his elbows, chin cupped in his hands.
It was in color. Oh God. The shed. I resisted a surge of nausea.
"This is Cindy, and she just failed the test. Say hi, Cindy."
The woman was tied to the pole, with that leather collar around her neck. Orson turned the camera on himself, sweaty-faced, eyes twinkling, beaming, bridelike.
"Cindy has chosen the six-inch boning knife."
"Stop it!" she shrieked.
I plugged my ears and shut my eyes. The fear in her voice sickened me. Even with the volume muffled, I could still hear the most piercing of screams. On the bed, Orson was making noise, too. I squinted and saw that he’d turned over on his back and was watching the screen upside down, jerking off.
The footage of Orson killing her wasn’t terribly long, so he watched it over and over. If I hyperfocused on my heartbeat, I found that I could block out the television and Orson’s groans almost completely. Counting the beats, I worked my way up to 704.
When my eyes opened, the room was silent. I’d nodded off, and it horrified me to think I might’ve been snoring or lost precious hours asleep in his closet. Checking my watch, I saw that 9:30 had just passed, and I felt relief knowing that Walter and I still had the majority of the night to kill my brother.
From the bed — deep breathing. I recognized the pattern of Orson’s long exhalations. Almost certain he was asleep, I withdrew a syringe and a vial of Versed. Flicking off the plastic cap, I stuck the hollow needle through the rubber seal and pulled the plunger back until the bottle was empty. I then aspirated the contents of two more vials. With fifteen milligrams of Versed in the syringe, I secured the caps and placed the three empty vials back into my fanny pack, closing the zipper so slowly, I couldn’t even hear the minute teeth biting back together. The needle in my left hand, the Glock in my right, I poked my head through the hangers and proceeded to inch my way out.
As I came to my feet on the hardwood floor of the walk-in closet, it occurred to me that he might not be asleep. Perhaps he was merely resting, breathing patiently in a yogic trance. After three steps, I stood at the threshold of the closet, staring down at Orson on the bed.
His chest rose and fell in an unhurried rhythm indicative of sleep. I went down on my knees, held the plastic syringe with my teeth, and crawled across the dusty floor. At the edge of his bed, I stopped and spurned another wave of nausea and hyperventilation. Sweat trickled down my forehead and smarted in my eyes. Under the latex skin, my hands were wet.
Squatting down on the floor, I took the syringe from my mouth, then, holding it up before my face, squirted a brief stream through the shaft of the needle to remove air bubbles. Orson shifted on the bed. His back had been to me, but he turned over, so that we faced each other. All he has to do is open his eyes.
His left arm was beautifully exposed. Withdrawing a penlight and holding it between my teeth, I spotlighted his forearm and could see numerous periwinkle veins under the surface of his skin. With great patience and concentration, I lowered the eye of the needle until it hovered just an inch above his skin. There was a chance this would kill him. Because I was attempting to inject intravenously, the substantial dose of Versed would be tearing through his bloodstream, and when it slammed into his central nervous system, he might stop breathing. Steady hands.
As I slipped the needle into the antecubital vein opposite the elbow, his eyes opened. I injected the drug. Please have hit the vein. Orson shot up and gasped. I let go of the syringe and jumped back, the needle still dangling in his arm. He pulled it out and held it up before his face, flabbergasted.
"Andy?" he whispered, cotton-mouthed. "Andy? How did you…" He swallowed several times, as though something was blocking his windpipe. Standing, I pointed the gun at him.
"Lie back, Orson."
"What did you give me?"
"Lie back!"
&nb
sp; He leaned back into the pillows. "God," he said. "That’s strong."
He sounded medicated already, and I thought his eyes had closed. I turned on the bedside lamp so I could be sure. They were slits.
"What are you doing, Andy?" he asked. "How did you…" His words trailed off.
"You killed my mother," I said to him.
"I don’t think you…" His eyes closed.
"Orson?" I could see the red dot on his arm where the needle had penetrated the skin. "Orson!" He still didn’t move, so I reached forward and slapped his face. He groaned, but it was an incoherent response, which only assured me that the drug had taken control of him.
Backpedaling toward the closet, I took the walkie-talkie from my fanny pack.
"Walter?" I said, breathless. "Walt…Fred?"
"Over."
"You close?"
"A hundred yards."
"Get up here and come inside."
I leaned against the wall and wiped the sweat from my eyelids.
Orson lunged from the bed and drilled his head into my stomach before I could even think about my gun. As I lost my breath, he drove his knee between my legs and grabbed the back of my neck with both hands. He butted his forehead into my nose, and I felt the cartilage crunch and then the subsequent burn. Cool blood flowed over my lips.
"What are you thinking, Andy? You can just do this to me?"
I’d just managed to fill my lungs with air, when he shovel-punched me in the gut, right below my navel. As I hunched over, he kneed my face, and I dropped to the floor.
Instantly, he was on me, his fingers digging under my stomach, where my hands retained an iron grip on the Glock. A sharp, brutal pinch speared through my shirt into my back, and I moaned.
"Yeah, you like that, don’t you? I’m gonna do it again and again." He’d stuck me with the needle. I felt it wiggling in me. "You’re gonna give it up," he said, "and I’m gonna spend the weekend killing you. What were you thinking, Andy? What?"
I kept thinking that I should at least try to fight him, but if I moved, he might wrangle the gun from my hands.
A hard bone pummeled the back of my head, and it hurt like hell. I felt the needle pull out and enter again.