Bad Things

by Tamara Thorne

  “Carmen, from what you’re telling me, Jade is certifiable.”

  “She can hardly get up a flight of stairs when she’s herself, Ricky. How do you explain the dog we found stuck on the weather vane?”

  Ricky’s eyes widened. “Well, I guess if I can buy greenjacks, I can buy a ghost.” He looked longingly at the empty shot glass, but made no move. “I still think Jade’s doing most of this herself—and poltergeists are supposed to be directed by people.” He made a silly-looking smile. “I read a book once.”

  “You’re plastered, Ricky,” Carmen said, feeling pretty plastered herself. At least the tension had dissipated.

  “Carmen, did you know Jade makes sounds at night like she’s making love with someone?”

  “Puta.” Carmen shook her head. “I gotta apologize—I never go over there at night. I knew she used to, but I was hoping she didn’t anymore. She’s so old.”

  “That’s silly.”

  “It’s unholy.” Carmen crossed herself. “Ricky, I think she’s having sex with your brother’s ghost, that’s what I think.” She crossed herself.

  He looked unconvinced, and at first she was surprised, then she figured it made sense. If he claimed to see greenjacks, but didn’t even believe himself, why would he believe her?

  “Carmen?”

  “What?” She smiled and squeezed his hand again. He was guileless now, once again the little boy she would have given her life for. “What, Ricky?”

  “There are things I can’t remember.”

  “Like what?”

  “There was something about a baby.”

  Madre de Dios, she thought, here it is. “Yes?”

  He raised his eyebrows, then took his hands back and pushed his dark hair away from his face. “There was a baby that died.” He paused a long moment. “Evangeline had a baby, didn’t she?”

  He’s starting to remember. Carmen tried to hide her nervousness. Let him get it on his own, she prayed. She didn’t want to tell him. “No,” she said finally. “She was good at getting pregnant, though.”

  “Oh, God.” He looked at Carmen with heavy eyes. “I’d forgotten. You called her ‘Our Lady of the Abortion Clinic.’ ”

  “By the time that girl was fifteen, she must’ve been to the women’s clinic half a dozen times to get rid of her mistakes. But she never had a baby,” Carmen said harshly. “Remember? She ran off with a Hell’s Angel or something, when she was about sixteen.”

  Rick nodded. “I drank too much.”

  “Me too. I’ll make coffee.” She stood and set to work, wondering if he would remember any more on his own.

  “Did you know that Robin wanted to get Evangeline pregnant?” Ricky asked. “Jade, too.”

  She spooned ground beans into the coffeemaker. Good, he was still thinking. “Why?”

  “He wanted to make sons who had the sight. For the jacks,” Rick shook his head. “He wanted me to.... do it too. I guess he thought I’d be more likely to produce children with the gene.”

  “The gene,” she repeated. Keep him thinking about children. The coffee burbled as she set two cobalt-blue mugs on the table, then brought the pot over and poured. “You must’ve been very worried that Cody might have the gene.”

  “I was, but there was no need.” He sipped his coffee. “When he was born I talked Laura into letting his middle name be Thomas. At the time, I didn’t know why that meant so much to me. I didn’t remember until I came back.” He smiled. “Cody’s nothing like I was. He’s fearless. And he doesn’t see things.”

  “The name fits.” She smiled gently. “He’s a lot like you, Ricky. Just remember, he didn’t have a mean brother teasing him all the time.” In truth the boy reminded her very much of Robin when he was very young, before his happy, mischief-making personality soured and turned mean. She watched Ricky, thinking how frightening it was to see Robin’s chill anger on his face when he’d confronted Jade. “Ricky,” she began slowly. “Speaking of Cody, are you going to take him away Halloween night?”

  “I hadn’t thought about it.” He paused. “I want to be here . . . I want to see Big Jack.” He stared into his coffee. “That is, if I didn’t imagine him.”

  “You think you might have?” she asked hopefully.

  “I . . . no. I mean, I remember seeing him. But maybe I made it all up because I felt guilty when Robin fell out of the tree. Carmen, I think about it a lot. He did change after that.”

  “Yes, he did,” she agreed solemnly.

  “Well, he got hit on the head. Maybe he sustained some brain damage.”

  “Could be.”

  “I always felt sort of responsible—”

  “You shouldn’t. You didn’t make him climb out there.”

  “I know I didn’t. But I shut the window, then took my sweet time opening it again.”

  “Ricky, you thought Big Jack was out there.”

  He made a disgusted sound. “Yeah. And then, when Robin lost his balance and fell while climbing back in, I made up this whole scenario about how Big Jack was trying to get me, and he sacrificed himself for me.”

  “You could be right,” Carmen said soothingly. “But what about the greenjacks? You still see those, and you said your cat sees them.”

  “There might be a logical explanation.” There was hope in his eyes as he spoke. “You know that Audrey’s an eye doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I told her about a fictitious cousin of mine who sees them, and she said it’s possible for eyes to work differently, even that it could be a genetic thing. She said she’d research it.”

  “Has she found out anything yet?” Carmen asked, pleased that he’d looked for help, even in such a roundabout way.

  “I haven’t let her talk about it. I—”

  “You need to.”

  “I know.”

  “What about Big Jack?” Carmen continued. “You’re saying that though you see the little ones, you don’t believe in him?”

  “Yeah.” He paused, studying his fingernails. “Maybe I don’t. It seemed so real. Emotionally I believe, but intellectually I don’t buy it. That’s why I want to be here. If it does exist, I want Audrey to see it.”

  “Maybe you should let Hector and me take Cody up to Madelyn. My sister’s having a Halloween party for her grandkids.” Despite her love for Ricky, she didn’t want his son to be with him. If Ricky thinks he sees Big Jack, who knows what will happen? She had to make him remember about the baby, for Cody’s sake.

  “We’ll see, Carmen. I think I’d feel better keeping him with me. We’ll see.”

  They started on their second cups, Ricky silent and thoughtful. Finally he looked up. “You know when I asked you about Evangeline having a baby?”

  “Yes?” She could see him struggling to hide from the memory, and decided to prompt him a little. “Maybe you were thinking of Jade’s baby.”

  Ricky’s hand shook, slopping coffee over the rim. “Jade.” He shook his head. “There’s something about Jade’s baby, and you said it was our secret. You had on a blue nightgown and it was wet and it smelled liked the koi pond.” He shook his head. “You said it was our secret, but I can’t remember—”

  Carmen realized she was trembling, too. “His name was Paulie,” she said, trying to hide her dread. “You loved him very much. Do you remember that?”

  32

  Waves of blood thundered inside Rick’s skull as he stood, deafened and trembling. He tried to see past the black splotches swimming across his vision as he fought down rising nausea and staggered into the bathroom. He fell to his knees and hugged the toilet bowl.

  The baby drowned in the koi pond.

  He tried to save it and almost drowned too. Carmen was—Carmen was what?

  It’s our secret, Ricky.

  Rick rose slowly, his head aching, his mind clearer, and turned on the cold water, running it into his mouth and over his face.

  The laughter began deep in his abdomen, as undeniable and unstoppable as the sickness had
been. It burst into his chest, and he grabbed at his throat to stop it, but then it was bubbling out his lips, in fits and snorts, then full-fledged hysterical belly laughs that made him double over.

  He tried to stop, but he couldn’t. Tears sprang from his eyes, and he made high falsetto noises as he gasped for breath between the giggles that felt so full of hilarity, yet were utterly devoid of it. He felt Carmen take his elbow, and he let her guide him into the living room, sit him on the couch. He laughed as she brought over a box of Kleenex, he laughed as she sat down beside him and said his name once, twice, three times, commanding him to snap out of it. He couldn’t. His sides hurt, but the laughter continued like a roller coaster, up and down, rising to the brink of madness, plunging down into an abyss of despair, but it was all laughter.

  If you don’t laugh, you cry.

  That’s what his dad always said. Words to live by, Rick. Thinking it now made him laugh all the harder. If you don’t laugh, you cry. If you don’t la—

  Carmen slapped him, hard. He put his hand to his stinging cheek and stared at her, hurt. He felt real tears welling up in his eyes, and fiercely he thought, If you don’t laugh, you cry. The hilarity came back enough to make him laugh slightly.

  “Don’t do it, Ricky. Don’t laugh anymore,” Carmen said. “Cry or scream or yell, but don’t laugh. You scare me.” She reached out to pat his knee as she had a thousand times in the past, but this time he flinched back, not wanting her to touch him. He looked at her and saw that her eyes were solemn and sad.

  “I apologize,” he said carefully, “for losing control.” If it hadn’t been for the chili dogs and tequila shooters, he didn’t think he would have reacted so badly.

  “It was a very bad thing, about the baby.”

  It’s our secret, Ricky. We must take it to our graves.

  October 31, 1980

  The first time Ricky had seen Robin doing it with Evangeline was a summer day about a year after the Ewebeans had moved in. The twins were only eleven, and Rick didn’t even quite know what he was seeing.

  Everyone else was gone, and Ricky had ventured down the back stairs to find something to eat. He’d poured a bowl of Cheerios and was about to get the milk out of the fridge when he heard Evangeline giggle and start moaning. There were grunting sounds, too, coming from the family room. He tiptoed through the laundry room, past the bath and downstairs bedroom, as the noises became louder. At the edge of the family room, he stopped and peered around the corner. Evangeline was lying on the old tweed couch that used to be in the living room, her short skirt hiked up above her bare hips. Robin was on top of her, grasping her thighs and thrusting in and out, his body swaying back and forth. Shocked, Ricky stood there and watched until Robin sensed his presence and looked up. All he did was grin.

  Not long after that, he walked in on Robin and Aunt Jade doing the same thing in the library upstairs. No one saw him that time.

  Before long, Robin started telling him how much fun it was to screw the women, actually encouraging him to do it, too. Ricky was horrified.

  Now that he was nearly fifteen and had had his first encounter with Cindy McGuire, a seventeen-year-old cheerleader who seduced him one night and with whom he knew he would be in love forever, he wasn’t so much horrified by his relatives’ behavior as he was disgusted.

  Even before Evangeline ran away, most of Robin’s attentions went to Jade, who was, Ricky realized, a total nympho. In the last year, Ricky had grown six inches, his voice had stopped breaking, and lots of girls called him, either to see if he’d do homework with them or just to talk. Sometimes he’d go to matinees with one, though he still avoided going out at night. He smiled. Cindy said he had great dimples.

  The downside was that Jade had tried to seduce him too. No, he corrected, not seduce. Fuck. That’s what she did, she and Robin, they fucked. It was filthy, disgusting, and nasty. Sometimes when he passed by Jade, she’d pinch his butt or make a remark about how nice his pants fit. She made him want to puke.

  Jade and Robin were not careful about where they did it, and it amazed Rick that Howard had never caught on. But then his uncle was so far gone into his bottle of Jack Daniel’s most of the time that he wouldn’t notice anything.

  Rick had heard his aunt and uncle arguing about sex too. Jade would yell at Howard that he couldn’t get it up because he was drunk, and he’d yell at her that she was a dried-up old cunt. Rick thought they both made valid points. Jade no longer looked like the woman in American Gothic, but had taken to coating her long, horsey face with vast amounts of makeup, ratting her dyed brown hair into a big bubble-shaped helmet, and wearing clothes meant for teenage girls. She had the body for it, but not the face. She also had pictures of the Beatles all over the house, especially Paul McCartney. It was completely creepy.

  Evangeline had been gone for less than a week when Jade announced she was pregnant. She and Howard got into a screaming match that night after he asked whose it was. “It’s yours, of course,” she’d maintained, and Ricky couldn’t hear exactly what he said, but it had something to do with his preferring a maggoty whore over his wife. After that comment, there was a loud crash. The next day, Howard had a shiner.

  Now Paul George Ewebean, a handsome little boy with the midnight blue eyes of the Piper clan, was almost two years old. Jade paid no attention to the child, leaving his care to Carmen. Almost immediately after he was born, Carmen began taking Paulie to her house at night, which made Rick, who found he really liked the child, rest easier.

  As much as he could, Rick spent time with Paulie, too, reading him stories out of his old Little Golden Books that Carmen had retrieved from an attic trunk, putting him in a stroller and taking him for walks around town, and even telling him the greenjack stories.

  All the while, he wondered if the baby could see them.

  He and Carmen tried to keep Robin away from the baby, although sometimes, when Howard wasn’t around, Jade would commandeer the child and hand him to Robin straight out, giggling and sniffing and saying, “That’s your dada, that’s why you’re so handsome, not like your ugly pretend dada.” Robin would throw the baby up in the air and catch him again. If he tried to take Paul outside, Rick always followed.

  Last July Rick became fairly certain that Paul had the sight. While he and the boy were watching TV one evening—no one else was home—he opened the drapes in the living room. Greenjacks were everywhere, their movement constant and energetic. As always, he looked briefly for the quiet, still one he’d occasionally spotted over the years, but it was nowhere to be seen.

  “Here goes,” he whispered, turning Paul so that he could see out the window. Immediately the baby cooed and gurgled and began to laugh, his little arms going out, reaching for the glass.

  “See them, Paulie?” Rick asked, trying to remain calm. “Do you see the jacks?”

  Paulie laughed until several of the creatures merged just outside the window. Then he drew back and sobbed, hiding his face on Rick’s shoulder.

  “It’s okay, Paulie,” he murmured, shutting the drapes. “They can’t have you. I’m going to tell you a story about your ancestor, Thomas McEnery Piper, and how they almost got him.” He rubbed his nose on Paul’s, making him giggle happily. “But they didn’t. And they won’t get you either. I’ll make sure.”

  From that moment on, Rick knew that he had to protect this child, and in many ways, that was the best summer of Rick’s life. Having someone else to worry about helped make him strong, gave him purpose. He told Carmen that he’d like to have the toddler move into his room with him, and Carmen soon agreed. Rick became more watchful than ever.

  Then, on Halloween night 1980, when Paulie was almost two years old, everything changed.

  Since the night Big Jack had claimed Robin, Rick had been very careful not to be alone on the thirty-first. He usually spent the time until midnight, when the physical danger was over, with Carmen or at a friend’s. He preferred Carmen because he never had to drum up an excuse to not go out. That o
ther Halloween, over seven years ago, seemed like a vivid dream now, but it still worried him, especially because of Paulie.

  This year, as usual, Jade and Howard had gone to the Dew Drop Inn, a sleazy roadhouse just outside of town on Cub Road. The Dew Drop was having a party featuring bobbing for apples (in beer) and a “naughty” costume–cum–wet–T-shirt contest that promised a grand prize of a ten-dollar gift certificate to Frederick’s of Hollywood. Since the Dew Drop was where Howard spent a good deal of time with rednecked buddies, he was happy to go drink while Jade flaunted her boobs in competition for the fancy underwear.

  Rick watched them leave that night. Howard wore what he always wore: rump-sprung jeans and a short-sleeved plaid shirt. Jade had a butt-length red T-shirt on that she’d drawn a Star Trek insignia on, black panties, no bra, fishnet nylons, old Beatles boots, and Spock ears. She’d put her hair up and drawn her pale eyebrows into Vulcanian shape. Rick had to laugh: With her long-jawed face and squinty eyes, she looked like Mr. Spock in drag, rather than the Vulcan’s main squeeze.

  Carmen and Hector came over as soon as the Ewebeans left, and Robin was off with some sleazy kids from school traveling around the neighborhood even though they were too old to trick-or-treat. Robin had invited Rick along, goadingly informing him he had to bring his own eggs and toilet paper. As always, Rick declined.

  The Zapatas, Rick, and Paulie had dinner, then passed out candy until nine P.M. After that, they turned out the porch light, turned on the TV, and dug into the huge pumpkin pie Carmen had made.

  At ten, Hector kissed his wife and went home to bed. Full of pie and candy, Paulie had curled up in the old recliner in the corner. Carmen and Rick sat on the couch nearby and watched television, both glancing often at the baby, both mindful of noises from outside and in, watching for Robin, for Big Jack too.

  They were keeping Halloween vigil, as they had for seven years. Before, it was to protect Rick, and now it was to protect the baby, too. Carmen would remain here until after midnight—when Big Jack’s power dissipated—then Rick would take Paulie upstairs to his room and lock them in. Paulie slept on the sofa bed, just as Rick had, years before.