by John Shirley
“Where?” Abe said. “They’re all taken, we looked already.”
“Those guys are just killing people if they feel like it . . . ” Jeremy went on dreamily, his voice barely audible.
Did he really say that, in that admiring way? Russ shook his head in wonder and sickened fascination.
Abe snorted. “Fucking people are dead all over town and up and down the coast, don’t make much difference. My mom—”
He broke off, staring. They were all staring at the door to the gym where Mario Ferrara was walking in, looking glum and pale. Not wearing that fireman’s coat any more. Just a plaid shirt. Dried blood discoloring the sleeve of his left arm.
“Some stuff to tell you,” he said.
“What happened, Mario?” Brand asked.
Mario leaned against the wall, legs out straight. “I was looking for some liquor, in one of the empty apartments, and, uh, I heard some guys coming. Heard Sten’s voice and I wasn’t close to my gun.” He licked his cracked lips. “So I hid. I heard some women yelling. I looked out the window . . . and I saw them dragging off a couple of your women. My brother wasn’t with them. It was Sten and the Grummons and Cholo. They took that Pendra girl and Jill. If anybody’s interested.”
EIGHTEEN
Russ was pretty sure Mario wasn’t lying, but he had to look in Gram’s apartment anyway, to see if Pendra was there. Crossing through the gathering gloom to the downstairs apartment, he saw the door was broken in. Feeling a bottomless dropping feeling in his middle, Russ hurried through the door, stepping in over the splintered panels. Inside, a Coleman lantern hanging awkwardly from a curtain rod over the window showed him an overturned coffee table, a broken vase, broken teapot and broken cups, red silk tulips scattered beside Pendra’s purse, which was turned inside out like a gutted animal in the middle of the floor.
He felt a stickiness sucking at his shoes as he took another step—and looked down, realizing he’d stepped in a splash of blood, about the size and shape of a hand, on the hardwood floor near the front door.
He looked through the apartment. It seemed to have been searched—drawers emptied onto the floor.
There was no one there. Pendra and Jill were gone.
He returned to the living room, to stare at the blood, as Dale came in and glanced around. Dale patted him on the shoulder, went and looked in the other rooms, and came back.
“I already looked,” Russ said. “Mario’s not lying.”
“I was hoping maybe they were hiding in a closet or something.”
Russ shook his head. Feeling like his head was heavy on his neck—as if it suddenly weighed forty pounds.
“When are we going?” Russ asked.
Dale looked at him, eyes hooded. “You mean what I think?”
“Just a question of when, today or tonight or tomorrow. I’d like to go right now.”
Dale shook his head. “Not yet.”
Then Russ saw the piece of paper in his hand. “This was stuck on the refrigerator,” Dale said. He passed it over.
It was a note written in blue ballpoint ink, in a neat blocky hand.
They are good for tonight and maybe tomorrow. Then we start to use them up.
Day after that, they’re going to die. So by noon the day after tomorrow. OR! You can deliver everything of value to us. Jewelry is good, high quality electronics, pharm painkillers, luxury cars, cash. When we decide that we’ve gotten enough, you can have these two lady loves back.
On the other side of the piece of paper, in the same hand, was an address and the words:
Bring it to this address. Only one of you can come with each vehicle. Keep hands in sight.
“That address,” Dale said, “is where we saw Dickie and that bunch are hanging out. Just above the wave line. House is half stoved in . . . ”
“You think this was done by . . . I mean . . . this doesn’t sound like Mayor Ferrara. He’s an asshole but . . . ”
“Mario says his brother wasn’t in on this. Says he feels like his brother is dead by now. No—this isn’t Lon Ferrara doing this, Russ. This is just Dickie Rockwell’s bunch . . . ” He took the paper, folded it up, put it in his pocket. “We got the choice of seeing if they’re happy with what we give them, whatever that is,” Dale said, “or we can try to take the girls back by force. They’re giving us a day to get all the valuables their little drug-baked brains can imagine. But . . . ”
“They’ll never give the women back the easy way, whatever we pay them,” Russ said, with a deep inner certainty.
Dale nodded. “That’s right. They’ve given us a little time. And we’ll need some preparation.”
“Whatever we do—let’s keep it to as few people as possible. I don’t trust that dipshit Lars.”
Dale nodded. “But you know what we have to do, don’t you?”
Russ thought about Pendra, how she was feeling right now. He thought about his father, lying sprawled in a crevice, that night.
He thought: I feel squeezed into this. Pushed into it. But I can’t look away anymore. I can’t pretend anymore. It is what it fucking is.
The compass needle spun inside him. He knew which way north was.
“Here’s what I think,” Nella said, sitting down on the cold floor next to the older woman, handing her the bottled water. The older one wearing the thick glasses was Jill; Nella knew her from around town. The other was Pendra. “I think we’re in the end of the first part of the scary movie.”
Pendra and Jill were chained up on the concrete floor of the chilly, mostly empty garage, their legs stretching into a greasy spot, their backs leaning against the washer and dryer. There was a little slack in their chains so they could just manage to lay down in a clumsy way if they wanted. The lady was wearing jeans too short for her and a coat, buttoned up; the girl wore a paisley frock, like something an old hippy would wear, with red leggings.
They both looked angry and Pendra looked like she’d been crying, her eyes red and puffy.
They passed the bottle of water. Pendra scowled suspiciously at Nella. Just because she wasn’t chained up like them.
“If you’re helping those guys,” Pendra said, “you’re even stupider than they are.”
“I’m not helping them. I’m just here. I’ve been here.” She couldn’t think how to explain. “I think my mom put me here.”
The only light was on the wall behind them. The generator chugged from the side yard. Pendra was examining the chrome-coated chains—not the biggest links Nella had ever seen, but hard to break. Loops of chain were tight around their wrists, closed with padlocks through the links, one small padlock under each woman’s wrist. The chains ran behind them to wind around the appliances and heavy pipes.
Nella thought Pendra was wasting her time, trying to figure it out. Tools in the garage well out of reach. They had almost no slack. Just enough to raise their hands to their mouths and drink.
Pendra’s wrists were already bleeding from where she’d tried to pull out of the chains. Jill’s wrists weren’t bleeding. Maybe she was thinking about things in a more patient way. Mature people and all.
But her right eye was black, where someone had punched her, and there was blood on her fingernails and under her nose. She’d fought, and they’d beaten her when they’d picked her up.
“I’m sorry I don’t have any food for you,” Nella said. Glad of someone to talk to. “Maybe they’ll let me bring you some food later. They don’t let me do too much. We used to be different. But after the wave they just decided I was . . . ” She didn’t want to say it.
“Why don’t you just help us?” Pendra whispered, looking at Nella. “They don’t treat you any good. We’ll get you out of here.”
“Well, now, it’s a question of how a person wants to die,” Nella said. “If I help you they’ll chain me up and make me die slowly. Randle Grummon said he’d set me on fire and watch me burn and flop around. Now, if I wait, I’ll just get shot or . . . well, I’m afraid of killing myself.” She shifted on the fl
oor, trying to get comfortable. Hard with the burning pain between her legs. “Anyway—”
“Are you sick?” Jill asked. “You look feverish. You should be the one drinking this water.”
“I found some ibuprofen. I took that. I’m . . . I’ve got an infection.”
She saw that Pendra was staring at a metal toolbox sitting on a wooden shelf next to a tire rim and an old car battery on the other side of the garage. Completely out of their reach. The girl was probably thinking about using those tools on her chains.
Nella was afraid Pendra would ask her to get the tool kit for her. She was afraid she might do it. And be punished for it. She was also afraid she might not do it. And be punished in another way for that.
So she went hastily on: “But listen, listen, let me explain my idea: I just figured this out today. How in scary movies they usually start out with everything okay for the people who are the heroes of the movie. Usually early in the movie, they are okay, they’re with their family and everything’s fine. Or they’re in a situation where they can, like, pretend it is. But then the monster comes and it kills and kills, right? See, the story wouldn’t be any good if it just started with the monster killing everyone, you got to set them up. I mean in some movies they give you a sample killing out front but not for the hero. And that’s what the world is. The world starts out pretty okay for most people, and then they get sick or beat up or tortured or else just trapped somewhere and just they die all disappointed. It’s a setup, this whole world, see.” She paused, wondering if they would understand her. Figuring they wouldn’t. But she had to try, now she’d gone this far with it. “See, this world has to start out okay so the demons can enjoy it when it’s all taken away from you . . . but the part where things are good is gone for us, for you guys and me and everyone else in town here, and now we’re in the killing and killing part that the demons like. It’s just easier to see that and say, that’s how it is. Okay? That’s how it is. So now the setup part is over . . . ”
“Nella!” It was Dickie, in the doorway. “Stop your fucking babbling and get away from those bitches. Come on, get in here and cook us something! Be useful for one fucking minute!”
Nella got up and went in the kitchen. She heard Jill say, “Something like Stockholm Syndrome, maybe.”
She sensed the two women, Pendra and Jill, staring after her. She knew they thought she was crazy. That they were disgusted that she couldn’t say she’d help them.
She couldn’t get the keys to those locks to help those girls anyway. They were all going to be killed by the demons.
It was just a question of how. The part where you pretend you’re going to be okay was over.
NINETEEN
Russ couldn’t sleep. Alone now, Russ walked back and forth in his dad’s living room between candles that fluttered when he passed. Trying to believe that Pendra and Jill were safe, at least for tonight. Telling himself that the message Dickie had left wasn’t a lie.
He’d spent six hours with Dale, dry firing a Browning 12-gauge shotgun and the Winchester 92 replica, loading and unloading them. Getting friendly with the weapons as much as he could without firing live ammo. This Winchester is a working replica of the rifle John Browning made for Winchester in 1892. This one’s made by an Italian company—works pretty much the same as the ’75 that tamed the frontier, as they say, but it’s a little slicker . . .
Vaguely wondering about his Dad’s will. Then embarrassed that he was already wondering about it. Then remembering: Hell, I should have been a janitor, anything, to stay closer to you.
And then his father’s last spoken syllable. Ever.
Russ . . .
He looked at amateur photos, framed and hanging on the wall. Photos his dad had taken of wild birds, especially sea birds. Looked at his books on birds and sea animals. Stopped at his father’s neatly organized collection of CDs and records. Saw Roy Loney and the Phantom Movers, saw Hank Williams, saw Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, Loretta Lynn, the Holy Modal Rounders, George Jones; saw Country Swing Favorites. The CDs were in a columnar CD rack, the records in unvarnished wooden cabinets beside an old boom box and a dusty record player. On top of the record cabinet was an old mono cassette player. On impulse, he pressed the play button. The batteries still worked: he heard a badly recorded acoustic guitar, just finishing some twangy song, and then a smatter of applause. And his father’s voice saying, “Thank you. That was by Johnny Cash. This one’s an early number by George Jones . . . ”
Russ listened, amazed at hearing his father sing into a microphone, probably at some open mike, doing a pretty fair job with an old country song describing a cause and effect relationship between involvement with women and too much drinking.
“Wish I was doing too much drinking, Dad,” Russ said. “But you got not a drop in the house.”
He listened to the rest of the tape, savoring his dad’s obvious gratification at the patter of applause. He decided that he’d take it with him, if he got out of this town alive.
He shook his head, marveling. He’d known his father could play a few songs on guitar, but he’d had no idea he’d performed anywhere. He felt an ache, vaguely remembering his dad trying to get him to check out some of these records. His dad had sent him a mix of his favorite songs—he’d never listened to it. It had been a chance to know his dad deeper, another side of him. A person’s favorite music was a window into them. His dad had shown him the window and he hadn’t bothered to look through it.
They were his records now. He’d listen to them, by himself, alone in some room somewhere.
He picked up a plate with two half-melted candles on it, carried it into his dad’s bedroom. Not sure what he was looking for.
Pretty late to get to know him now, dumbass, he thought. But it was better than not at all.
He looked through the bedroom. Bed was made, dirty clothes in hamper, everything in its place, Dad was always much neater than he was. Russ had taken after his mom—not the worst housekeeper in Ohio, but in the running.
There were two framed pictures of him as a kid on the dresser, one with Dad, one sitting in a pedal-operated kiddie car on Christmas morning. Beaming.
Another picture of Russ hung on the wall: Russ graduating from high school. A look on his face like he resented having to pose in the green high school grad robe. An adolescent’s smug irony. But the photo was framed.
Russ thought he might sleep in here tonight. He carried the candle to the desk in the corner—and saw a letter in the middle of the desk, addressed to his mother. Stamp on it. Unmailed.
Should he? Maybe he should just give it to her, unopened. If he saw her again.
But he sat down and opened it. Squinted in the wobbly pool of light to read his dad’s slanted handwriting.
. . . Sorry about writing this by hand, but you know me and computers, it’s enough to have to deal with one for work. Hope you’re doing well and Ray too. The boy’s coming tomorrow. I can’t sleep, thought I’d write you a note about him, put my thoughts in order. If ever there was a silver lining for whatever’s happened with you guys, this is it, because he and I have needed to spend some time for a while.
I don’t need to repeat my regrets to you. We’ve each recited our regrets a few times and that’s enough. I think Russell knows we both love him and we both care about each other and always will. I want you to know I’m going to say nothing but positive things about you to him and that’s how I feel, not just putting on a front. Life can be really hard to live with and I think we’re coming to a place where we know better than to judge each other harshly.
Russell is still a little short of being a man, whatever his age—I was a slow starter growing up, myself—but I know he’ll get there, he’ll find his independence when he gets a little confidence and he’ll be okay with us when he realizes that people just do the best they can, with their marriages and their kids, and their lives. I’ve got a lot of faith in him and I hope you and I and Russ and Karen and Ray and your sister and everyone can ha
ve Thanksgiving dinner together this year. I’m talking like Russ is a little kid who needs those things but somehow I feel like there’s a lot he has to work out and that will help.
I am pretty sure I’ve got a job arranged for him. I’ve got some cash in a drawer I’m going to give him, saved it up to help him get a car. I think he’ll like California. Freedom has its peculiarities but this is nice country. You should visit sometime.
Well, my hand is cramping up but I knew you were probably having second thoughts about him coming out here so I just wanted to tell you I’m sure he’ll have a great new start but he’s never going to forget the people he loves in Ohio . . .
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Russ said, out loud. “ ‘Short of being a man.’ ”
He thought about the phrase, Life can be hard to live with . . . Seemed corny at first, but the more he thought about it, the more he agreed.
He read the letter through again. I think Russell knows we both love him and we both care about each other and always will.
He hadn’t known it, not really. For some reason, when his parents let him know that they loved him, he was always skeptical that it was real, that it was more than just obligation. Russ realized he’d stopped trusting them, somehow, when they’d broken up. Like he’d thought that if they’d gotten divorced, they must’ve been lying about their feelings for each other all along, so they were lying about their feelings for him.
But it occurred to him, now, that something broken was still real. Who knows what they’d gone through, with each other, in private?
He was especially surprised at the tone of tenderness his dad showed toward his mother in the letter. His dad taking care to reassure her that he still had feelings for her. He didn’t seem to be trying to get back with her—he acknowledged her current boyfriend, Ray—it was more like he was saying that they’d always have something and somehow that should be important to Russ.
It was important to him, he realized. Some little kid in him wanted his parents to love each other.