Rubble and the Wreckage

by Rodd Clark

  They walked a quarter of a block down the busy sidewalk before either of them spoke. The gusts from the seawall were blowing stronger now, and it felt like there was a storm front brewing and it was headed their way.

  “So where do you wanna go?” Gabriel asked as his boots made a steady sound on the pavement. His stride was quick, and Christian had to hurry to remain at his side. It was just like him to expect others to follow at his pace.

  “I don’t care. I just wanted to be with you, somewhere where we could talk. But I’ll put a leash on you if I have to . . . don’t want you running off from me again.”

  “If anyone gets leashed, pup, it’ll be you,” Gabriel said stoically yet barely audible over the wind. The frailty of the words Christian wanted to say to him hung on his tongue but walking here, unnoticed by the self-absorbed passersby, seemed as appropriate place as any to begin.

  What you’ve done can’t be undone, but whatever we started here doesn’t necessarily have to end like we thought. Christian’s grim look relaxed a bit, though Gabriel couldn’t see it by his straightforward gaze. He continued because there wasn’t a stop sign blocking his path. “I was thinking about heading out of the country, maybe Costa Rico or Panama . . . I was hoping to convince you to come along.”

  After a pause, Gabriel stopping walking and turned to Christian with an expression the writer hadn’t seen before blanketing his face.

  “You’re such a shit. . .” Gabriel hissed the words, his eyes narrowed. “It’s what I was trying to tell you earlier, but you just don’t fucking listen!” Turning back to the sidewalk Gabriel headed westward, this time at a faster pace than before. Christian had to practically run to catch up.

  “Tell me then,” he begged.

  “You think I’m some twisted fuck! Even after everything I’ve told you, you still don’t understand that those poor unfortunate shits I ran across were not a product of some thrill-killing maniac. There was something bigger going on. I sought you out because I wanted everyone to know that, before I was dead and couldn’t tell the truth myself!”

  At once Christian thanked God they weren’t standing next to anyone at that moment. His conversation would be hard to explain to the innocent. Grabbing Gabriel by the sleeve he jumped ahead of him on the sidewalk and gridlocked him in confrontation.

  “What the hell do you mean ‘before I was dead’? Were you planning on killing yourself at some point while we worked on the book?” He was incredulous at Gabriel’s confession. He immediately forgot how to speak and was suddenly lost and awestruck. He couldn’t have prepared himself for Gabriel’s admission, regardless that it had already been secreted away, shelved but hardly forgotten in the recesses of his brain.

  “I just needed everyone to know the truth,” he said, ignoring Christian’s question. “I’m not crazy—there aren’t a lot screws missing from the machinery. I know how it sounded, but I always hoped you might understand, or at least try to!”

  There it is. . . the exact obstacle to our problems, thought Christian. The moment that will linger between us and eventually be the cause of our destruction.

  “I want to try and understand, Gabe, I need to. It’s just a great deal to understand . . . the white light . . . the sensations you get when you do whatever it is you do. It’s all just murder to me. They’re still heartrending, innocent victims in my head. But I’m trying.”

  “Try harder!” Gabriel said with a firm shove of Christian’s chest before turning his back and heading away down the walkway.

  It is happening again, he thought. He was losing the war for want of a single battle. He couldn’t hold Gabriel in a spot long enough to get him to understand that he loved him, was willing to forgive him all the fucking sins he’d committed . . . if he would only stop and let him explain. Just like the night before, Gabriel was leaving him standing alone and confused while he disappeared into a crowd of people. He wanted to race after him, but he’d already intermingled with the attractive, happy faces. Besides, if he ran after him, others might hear some of their conversation, which might place both men in jeopardy. He had hoped nothing he said would challenge the man, but it had. His hope that they would spend the night together was dashed, and he felt remorse for even testing the waters so early. His heart sank with worry that he might not see Gabe again, and that he had pushed back too hard and too frequently. He regretted more than ever not finding out where Gabriel was staying. His fear was that if he had known he would have followed him, but all he would have found was some empty, abandoned apartment . . . because Gabriel couldn’t take his questions anymore. There was an unknown catastrophe gaining momentum, he could feel it in his chest. A wave of gigantic size was heading inland, and if he didn’t grab Gabriel and look for shelter soon, he knew it was all going to come to some sad, watery end.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  TWO NIGHTS IN a row Shea had observed the hunk across the courtyard arriving home. She couldn’t believe her luck. Where is he coming from? She wondered because he always seemed out of sorts whenever he arrived home. Today had been her day off, and with no shift at the grocery she had been able to spend the day painting but still kept her eyes trained to the window—a building hope in her chest that she might see her sexy stranger. It was merely by chance that Shea caught sight of him arriving at all; remaining camped by her window hadn’t proven all that effective. She had stepped away for a considerable length of time only once, and that had been to take a quick shower. As she reentered her bedroom, wrapped in one towel and twisting another around her head like a turban, she caught sight of him crossing the grounds. He was barely visible as he headed up the walkway, obscured under the shadow of the heavy canopy of leaves over their courtyard. For a second her heart skipped a beat.

  Standing so as not to be seen, she pulled the curtains back and watched the big man stop for an instant as he opened his door. Her head tilted slightly when she observed him doing that thing again. Strangely, he had taken a look backward before entering his apartment. He appeared anxious, as if he half expected someone to come rushing up from behind him. That was the second time she’d noticed him do that. It was an odd gesture for someone like him, she thought. It might’ve appeared predictable for her to do that, she was a single woman living in a dangerous town, but the stranger was big, muscular . . . someone who could take care of himself. Why would he act nervous? What does he have to worry about, she wondered?

  In her mind, Shea began to fashion stories of mysterious figures and illicit secrets the stranger must be forced to live under. Shea’s artistic mind imagined how the stranger might be on the run from the law or hiding out from bookies he owed money to, or maybe he was a contract killer who had arrived in town to complete a job. Every fantasy mused up in her wild imagination should have put her on guard, but it seemed to have the opposite effect by making him even more intriguing.

  With the premature death of her mother, the young woman was deprived of certain wisdoms that every little girl should be bestowed from early on. Without a guiding hand in that area, little Shea was left defenseless about men and the danger they might represent. Shea Baltimore had developed into a teenager on her own, and even now as an adult, she was less than skilled in the ways of men, since most of what she knew came from books and television. And surely those had to be clear illustrations of life and the possibility of peril?

  The waning light and curtains hid her from being spotted. She watched as the stranger’s door closed behind him and felt somewhat cheated by the experience. The overcast skies were quickly turning that bloody bronze of evening, and she thought she would screw up the courage to introduce herself one day very soon. Possibly it was the isolation of her life, the minutiae and daily grind that was becoming her existence, but whatever the cause, there was a confidence that she wouldn’t always be that mousy girl from school who never had stories of great sexual affairs or was accustomed to being pursued by boys with flattering attention.

  Dreams of being a famous artist had circled in
her head for years, but she had never considered her life beyond that single crutching support. When girls at school gave her a cold shoulder, it had been because her perspective was skewed. Because young people were only comfortable when there was conformity among their peers. She was different, and that made her a pariah in certain cliques. She spent her lunch periods alone on the risers of the school auditorium, usually seen eating a sandwich she’d brought from home and sketching into her pad or reading a book. This alone was worthy of excommunication, but teenage girls can be the cruelest of animals.

  Without malice, Shea had watched as the parade of young girls strolled the halls in small but tidy tribes. Clear skinned girls clutching books to their bosoms, exuding every confidence she lacked but somehow admired. Each pretty face seemed to beckon to an unseen camera, each one believing they were the star of their own Hollywood scene. But it could have been worse. There were others who felt a greater wrath, those who suffered spiteful teasing and merciless name calling from a thousand taunts. Count yourself lucky, she’d thought, just to be excluded from those groups. She wasn’t the last one chosen for field hockey teams, but she certainly, wasn’t the first. There was a Hispanic girl, who Shea couldn’t remember by name, who had buffered much of the cruelty she might have been given. The girl held the status of top-target of the abuse, being poorer than most and culturally different from the norm.

  It was hard to say what young people suffered through. Some things were character building, while other damage sunk lower and created the foundation for future bitter wives and mothers. The girl was strong and suffered through it, knowing her way above it all would be due to the talent she was struggling to hone. Eventually she would move to New York and sell her name and her work throughout all the boroughs. She would rise above the trauma and become someone worthy of forgetting her painful upbringing. It was that dream that allowed her to make it from her locker to her next class, to shrug off the callous whispers at her back.

  For a time Shea even had a boyfriend in high school, although she was still a virgin when she graduated. The relationship was just the tentative steps of growing up for her, as well as her beau. It was the small town stuff of movies—fast food diners and school dances—but it helped elevate her from pariah to just being merely ignored, and that helped. She would never see her boyfriend Cole after they broke up shortly after graduation. She would never know that he would make it to New York before her . . . or that he currently lived in Manhattan with his new lover, Steve.

  Even with the substantial lack of Valentine cards and photos of friends tacked to her bedroom walls, or the brief paragraphs scrawled in her diary about boys and the uncertainty of losing her chastity, she survived. Despite her alcoholic father and the financial troubles he caused, she endured. If her mother had remained, she would have known pride in how her daughter overcame her challenges with grace and patience.

  The soft light from her bathroom blazed a path across the floor of her tiny apartment. It was her only illumination, and it was all she needed. Shea found comfort in the darkness, particularly after spending a day painting or sketching, a TV or stereo playing in the background as her only source of companionship. She always felt drained after spending time at the easel or hovering over her sketchpad. Any talent she possessed seemed to explode onto the canvas with a fury. She was held trancelike, resembling a blind monk translating verses with fervent devotion, running fingers across the braille inside a forgotten abbey. Trapped by both her isolation and dedication.

  When the talent seemed spent, she was left exhausted, and the darkness brought its own welcome mood. The young woman understood how much it was like sex, the frenzied build before a final, orgasmic release. Much like the lovers she didn’t have, she found the dark and silence soothing. With her brushes wiped clean, her charcoal sticks and pens stored away, it passed like a shower after a sexual encounter . . . some discreet restitution for her lack of lovers. It was the final act before she normally drifted off to sleep. But at that moment, Shea was not crawling into bed; she was sitting far enough from the window to remain hidden, staring intently into the courtyard and a stranger’s door across the way.

  Her hands opened the twisted turban towel that covered her hair, and she shook her shoulder-length strands free. She may have been a gangly child, but she had blossomed after graduation. Her brown hair that had once given her a timid, mousy air had changed after her breasts came in. Her locks had become a richer, mahogany tone, and with her bright, green eyes she had taken the appearance of a hellcat.

  She was quite lovely, even though her petite size had always been a cause of embarrassment for her. Shea had grown into a woman who any man might overlook at first glance, but if he looked closely when she passed him, he would surely turn his head and smile, if only to consider her feminine features and whether she was indeed a hellcat in bed. But men in her circles tended to gravitate toward other types of women; it was the main reason she spent too many nights alone. But still she was hopeful because of her talent and her knowledge that things would be different for her one day in the future. And she suspected that day was fast approaching.

  She was resolute. She would introduce herself to the stranger across the way that very evening. Maybe it had been her dull routine of late; maybe it was just because she craved human contact—voices that didn’t begin and end over a conveyor belt at the store as she blanked out making mental pictures in her mind’s eye and allowed her fingers to deftly work the register by sheer rote. There had been too much solitude, and a damned long stretch of monotony, and the artistic side of her was craving some excitement. It was settled—now all she had to do was gather herself together and dress for the occasion. What does one wear to a chance meeting encounter, she wondered.

  AS SHE was getting dressed, across the piazza Church was shedding his clothing. He was stepping into his miserable shower and trying to rinse that heated anger from his body. The water pressure was weak, and it couldn’t maintain a regulated temperature for long. His entire body engulfed the tiny stall of broken and stained tiles. He imagined this was how Communist or early Socialists had to live just to support their revolutions. It was a threadbare existence, one he might have been used to himself, but for other tenants in neighboring units of this shoddy, moldy villa, it must have been a dismal life. He had always been a rambler from his younger days. He was used to sleeping in places where most women would not squat to pee. He had seen his share of SRO hotels and run down boarding houses. He’d even slept under a couple of overpasses in his lifetime. But he had what he considered good reason to live that way. What were his neighbor’s excuses? He became tired of bending his head under the showerhead just to have it go from scalding to ice within seconds; he finished rinsing the soap off and turned the knob in disgust.

  Stepping out, he wiped the mirror and stared at his image. His beard, which he always kept close-cropped, had grown disheveled, giving him a wild-man appearance. Grabbing a disposable razor, he began dry shaving his face. He wondered why Chris hadn’t mentioned that growth; he was such a fastidious dresser himself. How strange my friendship with Chris, he thought. He was college educated while Gabe had barely graduated high school before he hit the road. But Gabe had a clever mind and a willingness to learn; he had nothing but time on his hands and a lot of that was spent reading. He didn’t want to be considered stupid or unread, and so even without the white-collar advantages that his companion had, he had made do and soaked everything up like a dry sponge.

  He liked that others saw him as a brutish fighter, but even more, he liked it when he could surprise them with all of what he’d learned. He’d seen that surprise on Chris’s face, and it made him feel as if he had more sides to his personality, and that he wasn’t just a two dimensional character who could be easily overlooked. He’d educated himself because he would never have had the opportunities of Chris’s fine schooling, or his social advantages. The writer was everything he wasn’t, and that should’ve irked him, but it didn’t. He wa
s confident enough with what he’d become and bright enough to understand that each one of us could end up with lives very different than we could’ve ever imagined.

  Whenever he was in Chris’s presence, he never felt dumb or uneducated. The look on the writer’s face had always been one of admiration, and he felt lucky to run across someone who didn’t turn up their nose or narrow their eyes whenever Gabe spoke, as if it were some derisive, scornful look by someone calculating the distance between them. That was another good quality that Chris had. The playing field had been leveled for both of them because each had skeletons in their closets. There were secrets they now shared, which had invariably become a great equalizer. No man could stand above another when both had some part in murder.

  Scrapping the remaining hairs from his face, he held the razor under the tap before shaking it off. He then dried with the same towel he’d used for his body and walked naked into his bedroom. He had stopped by a street vendor on his way home and shoved a hot dog down his gullet because his annoyance couldn’t be quelled to spend time looking for a better meal. He’d hoped he would have dinner or drinks with Chris before ending up at his place for a satisfying fuck before sleep. He was just as annoyed at that not occurring as he had been with Chris for completely missing the point about all their time together. It was strange finding out someone you thought you knew was in reality someone you didn’t recognize. Gabe didn’t like it when things went all screwy on him . . . and this pissed him off even more, making him sad in knowing his good friend thought he was a fucked up monster.

  Before he could crawl under the sheets, he heard a faint tapping coming from the other room. It was the front door. Rage seethed quickly up his throat and left a sour taste on his tongue. Chris had followed him home apparently—he obviously wanted to apologize or some shit. But he was instantly angry at the invasion to his privacy. If Chris could find him that meant others could as well, and he didn’t like people getting within arm’s reach of his collar. It was dangerous, and he’d have to explain that rather forcefully to the writer, as well as fight off his desire to punch him in the face just to illustrate that fact. Slipping into his jeans, he opened the door but was surprised to find it wasn’t his friend standing there wide-eyed and repentant, it was a young woman.