Murmuration

by TJ Klune

  When Mike’s fully upright, Walter says, “We should probably clean up that glass, you know? Wouldn’t want anyone to hurt themselves on it.”

  Mike needs Sean.

  Mike needs Sean because he hears the sound of shattering glass, of twisting metal. He takes a lurching step toward the kitchen, and Walter says, “Whoa there, Mike. You all right?”

  No. He’s not. He’s not all right. Because in his hand is a photograph that shows a woman who does not exist in Amorea, and as he takes another step, he knows her name. He knows her name as clear as he knows his own.

  His name is Mike Frazier.

  And she’s Nadine.

  She’s Nadine the African Queen.

  The man told him this. The man with the cigar.

  Mike says, “Sean. Sean.”

  He takes another step. And another. And—

  HE DOESN’T really know how he became so angry.

  Wait.

  That’s a lie.

  He knows how he became so angry. He just doesn’t know how he let it happen.

  He’s angry because that’s how he was raised to be.

  Sure, he had his mama, and she was a good woman, a hardworking woman, a woman who life saw fit to beat down as much as it could, knowing she would drag herself right back up and keep on trucking. “It’s what we do, bucko,” she said to him more than once, her fingers sometimes taped together or her lip split in two different places. “It’s the only thing we can do.”

  He’s not angry because of her. He loved her as much as a boy could love a strong woman who chooses to stay in a house such as this. She shielded him from the worst of it, took the beatings in his place. As he grew older, he resented her sometimes, that she hadn’t just taken him and run as far as she could. They might not have made it very far, but at least it would have been something. At least he would have known there was the steel in her spine like he sometimes saw in her eyes.

  No, he’s not angry because of her.

  His father, though.

  His father is another matter entirely.

  His father was a big man, bigger than any man he’d ever seen before. Maybe it was just the fact that he was his father, and all boys see their fathers as larger-than-life. But maybe it was also because his father was six foot something and had hands the size of the canned hams they had at Christmas. And it wasn’t just his size. His father filled any room he was in, his loud, raucous laugh, the way he bellowed when he was telling stories. He’d clap his meaty hands on your back and you’d feel like you’d been thunderstruck the way it rolled through you, the vibrations causing your teeth to clank together.

  His father was not a nice man.

  Sure, he could be nice, when he wanted to be.

  There’d be times they’d go to ball games together, or they’d go to the movies and prop their feet up on the seatbacks in front of them, shoveling popcorn and Junior Mints into their mouths because they tasted better together than separate. His father would talk through the previews, whispering things like “Oh, that one looks good, we’ll have to go see it when it comes out” or “Nah, that looks stupid, bucko, why would we waste money on that?”

  He was nice sometimes.

  But that didn’t make him a nice man.

  Because he wasn’t a nice man. They’d go to ball games, sure, and they’d go to the movies (where his father would become a minute-long movie critic during the previews), but he also made his meaty hands into meaty fists, and he’d stumble in at one o’clock in the morning smelling like he’d bathed in booze, and he’d be shouting, and his mother would tell him to be quiet, be quiet, you’ll wake up bucko. He’d hear them from down the hall in his bedroom in their shitty fucking trailer, his scratchy blanket pulled up and over his head, trying to block out the sounds as best he could.

  It never did a very good job.

  He learned very early on what a meaty fist hitting soft skin sounded like.

  It went on for years and years.

  He worked hard, knowing it would be the only thing that would get him out.

  His father rarely raised a hand to him, mostly because his mother was there, standing between the two of them, taking his lumps as well as hers.

  He hated her sometimes, hated the way her eyes were dulled. He wanted to scream at her to just run, even knowing that his father would follow them.

  She knew, too. She knew that he resented her every now and then, and she’d whisper fiercely in his ear, “You make sure you get out of this. You make sure you get a better life than this. Don’t you ever become like he is.”

  And he did.

  He graduated just as the century turned, and there was a bright and shiny scholarship waiting for him with open arms, promising him a future that his mother would never have. And his parents stood at his graduation, his mother with tears in her eyes and his father with his arms crossed over his considerable chest. His name was called and he crossed the stage, taking his diploma, shaking hands with people he’d soon forget, and there was the briefest of moments when he caught his father’s eye. His father nodded at him, and he thought, I am better than you. I won’t be like you. I will never be like you.

  He left, after that.

  Five years later, his parents were dead.

  Car accident, of all things.

  His father was drunk, of course. Ran off the road into a tree.

  They’d been arguing before, a witness said. She’d seen them yelling at each other in the parking lot of IHOP, and he thought that was the saddest fucking thing he’d ever heard in his life. That his mother’s last hours had been spent arguing with her drunk husband in the parking lot of IHOP.

  He went back for the funeral.

  Not many people came.

  They didn’t have any other family. Everyone else had died or didn’t give a shit.

  There were some friends of his. Some people from the neighborhood. The priest his mother had given Confession to every week. They hugged him, they shook his hand, they said things like “They’re in a better place” and “The Lord works in mysterious ways.”

  He almost laughed at that last one.

  He stood above them, their coffins closed. It was quiet, everyone else gone to give him some privacy, some time to say good-bye.

  They didn’t know that he’d said good-bye a long time ago.

  He looked down at the cheap wooden boxes that held his parents and said to his father, “You bastard. You fucking asshole. I will never be like you.”

  Then he left.

  Which is why, now, he’s so angry that he’s angry, he can barely stand it. He looks away from the balcony door where he saw a bird—Not a starling, he thinks, never a starling—and she’s scrunching up her face again, that way she gets when she’s really revving up for a fight. He’s so tired, he really is, and he wonders how they ever got to this point. He knows he’s partially to blame, maybe even mostly so, but not all. Not completely.

  And that’s what makes him angry. That she’s putting this all on him, that she’s not seeing that maybe they were both in the wrong.

  His palms are burning and twitching and he’s thinking, Okay, yeah, maybe I can kind of see what dear old daddy was about, because it’d shut her up, wouldn’t it?

  And he’s angry about that.

  Angry at her for being such a bitch.

  Angry at himself for being such a coward.

  Angry at the situation, this fucked-up situation where their daughter is six months gone, buried in that little patch of ground in the children’s section of the boneyard. There are little stone lambs and angels spread throughout, because kids need that shit, right?

  And he’s angry because he’s barely thirty-two years old and is standing in the ruins of a crumbling life he never wanted to begin with, holding the remains of something that was never meant to be. He was never meant to be married. He was never meant to be a father. He was never meant for any of this, because look what it’s become.

  God, he’s so fucking angry.

/>   A cell phone is ringing somewhere in the background, but they both ignore it. Him, because he’s trying to rein in that anger before he does something he can’t take back.

  Her, because—he knows—she’s about to launch into another tirade.

  He remembers when they used to be friends.

  He knows there won’t be any coming back to that.

  “This is always the problem,” she snarls at him. “You never fucking listen to me.”

  So, they’re still doing this, are they? Round and round it goes. It never ends. “I’ve been listening,” he says, and he marvels at how calm his voice is. “I always listen.”

  “Bullshit,” she says. “All I do is talk at you, never with you. You’re not here anymore. You’ve checked out. You don’t give a shit about me. You probably never even gave a shit about her.”

  And that… well. That’s almost enough to cause him to snap.

  He thinks, Remember. You are not like him.

  But that thought is mired in rage.

  He thinks, You can’t be. You won’t be. You’re better than this.

  “Why couldn’t you fix this?” she cries at him, face splotchy and red. Her hair’s pulled back in a loose ponytail, little blond wisps hanging around her forehead. He thought her lovely for the longest time, even if he never felt a burning passion for her. She made him laugh and he always appreciated that. They were buddies. Beers and wings at the bar, watching the Nats get pounded again and again, Jesus fucking Christ, why couldn’t they get it together, Bryce Harper can’t do everything, come on, Nats!

  “There was nothing I could have fixed,” he says tiredly.

  “You liar,” she hisses at him.

  It happens then.

  She’s struck out at him before.

  She’s hit him in the chest. She’s scratched his arms. She’s called him names. It’s only been in the last six months. Only after the death of their kid.

  Now she stalks forward.

  He doesn’t move, because she’s just a little thing, isn’t she? The top of her head barely comes up to his chin, and he outweighs her by a good hundred pounds.

  What harm can she do?

  So he keeps his hands at his sides.

  Because he is not his father.

  She slaps him across the face.

  There’s a loud crack of skin against skin that echoes around their apartment smack dab in the middle of Washington, DC.

  His head rocks back. He tastes blood on his tongue.

  She reaches out and rakes her fingernails across the back of his hands, shallow little scrapes that burn.

  It happens so quickly. Seconds, really.

  It’s quiet in the apartment.

  He tilts his head back up. Stretches his jaw.

  He thinks she’ll look horrified. That she’ll be disgusted by what she’s done.

  She’s not. He can see nothing but anger and hate in her eyes.

  She doesn’t even care.

  It’d be easy, he knows. To do the same back to her.

  Only it’d hurt a whole hell of a lot more.

  His father never closed his fist when he hit his wife. Closing your fist left a greater chance for bruises. Bruises brought questions.

  He doesn’t want questions.

  He could slap her, though.

  It’s close. He almost does it.

  Instead, he takes a step back.

  She whirls on her heels and heads for the kitchen.

  He sighs.

  Somewhere, the cell phone is ringing again.

  He looks out the window.

  There are no starlings.

  He’ll pack a bag. Leave tonight. She can have the apartment. She can have all his possessions. All the money. The stocks. Everything. He’ll take a few changes of clothes, his personal credit card, and he’ll go. Maybe then he’ll be able to sleep. He’ll have nothing, but that’s okay. He doesn’t need anything. He’s started off on his own once before. He can do it again.

  He’s lost in this little fantasy, this little world where he’s on the road, the window rolled down, breeze blowing through his beard and hair, and he’s happy. He’s free.

  He’s lost in it, so it takes him a moment to focus on what’s happening behind him.

  But he sees it in the reflection in the floor-to-ceiling window in front of him.

  She’s come back into the room, rushing toward him.

  And she’s carrying a goddamn knife.

  He thinks, Oh fuck.

  He starts to turn and—

  XII

  IT’S A perfectly sunny Monday afternoon, and Mike’s in a good mood. Sure, there was the little altercation at the diner this morning, and yes, Sean got a nosebleed from it, but the fight was broken apart before it could escalate, George stopped by the store to let Mike know that Daniel paid him in full, and the only damage done was to a couple of photo frames that Walter has already replaced. Sean called Mike just before noon to let him know his nose didn’t even hurt, and probably wouldn’t bruise. Mike frowned only a little bit at the thought of Sean getting hurt at all, but Sean laughed through the phone line, saying, “It’s okay, big guy. I’m not made of glass.”

  Mike knows this, but it doesn’t mean he won’t worry. He told Sean as much, and Sean sounded fond when he said, “I know, Mike. And I know you have my back. That makes all the difference in the world.”

  And maybe they just stayed quiet then, listening to each other breathe, basking in having something that belonged to no one else. If they did, it wasn’t anyone’s business but their own. Mike couldn’t even find it in himself to be embarrassed by how sentimental he was being.

  So it’s a good day. Business is brisk, he’s got a fella who can’t wait to see him, and that weird headache he had earlier is gone. He remembers the heated way Sean looked at him, the words just for him about taking charge, about catching his drift, and boy, does Mike catch it. It makes him a little hot under the collar to think about, skin overwarm and flushed.

  “You okay, Mike?” Mrs. Richardson asks rather primly. “You’re looking mighty red.”

  Damn Irish giving everything away. It’s the bane of his existence. He dislikes lying and liars in general, but he’s not about to tell the book club that he’s having some rather uncouth thoughts about a certain waiter and what his bare skin might look like spread out on Mike’s bed. He’s amongst a group of ladies, so of course that wouldn’t be proper.

  Granted, they’re not talking about Lord of the Flies like they’re supposed to. Even though Mike got the book a few weeks before its official release, they haven’t even mentioned it once. No, all that the women have been doing since they walked in at exactly half past one is grill him on Saturday’s date, acting like they don’t know every single detail already. They’re cooing at him, talking about how they heard how brave he was earlier today, breaking up a fight where fists were flying and blood was spilling all over the floor. Why, by the sound of it, Mike broke up a brawl of twenty men all in the name of love.

  So it’s not helping that Mike’s thinking rather impure thoughts. The ladies of the book club seem to rather like inflating his ego, even if he didn’t actually do a damn thing aside from what any honest person would have.

  Yes, he’s an honest person and did the right thing, but he doesn’t feel guilty in the slightest when he looks Mrs. Richardson in the eye and lies. “Yes, ma’am. Just warm day is all.”

  She hums at him before turning back to the tittering of the book club.

  “Ladies,” she says, and of course they cease at once. Hers is a voice of authority, not to be trifled with. “I think that’s enough for right now. We wouldn’t want Mike to get a big head, now, would we?”

  He barely restrains an eye roll. She doesn’t miss that, of course, and clucks her tongue at him.

  “I’m sure Mike here will ask for our assistance should he require it,” she says. “Which, undoubtedly, he will. But moving on. This week’s book is by a first-time author, William Golding. I must
admit it might not have been a first choice of mine, but that’s neither here nor there.”

  “Do people really act like the children did?” one of the ladies asks. “In such a short amount of time too. I can’t imagine turning into savages.”

  “I suppose they could,” Mrs. Richardson says with a frown. “Take away all the constraints of society and lawfulness and what are you left with? Anarchy and chaos. Order is needed in any world to maintain a balance. You take that balance away, you run the risk of bedlam. Think about it. Here, if we didn’t have the order that we did, Amorea wouldn’t be pure.”

  “What balance do we have here?” Mike asks. He rarely participates in these discussions, more inclined toward being an observer, but Mrs. Richardson doesn’t even bat an eye.

  “The people, of course,” she says, as if the answer is obvious. “We govern each other, with no one person given authority over the other.”

  “There’s Willy,” Mike says, but it doesn’t mean much.

  “Bah. He saw more excitement showing up today after everything was all said and done than he has in years. We’re all equal here, Mike. Which is why nothing devolves and Amorea remains as it does. We aren’t morally bankrupt because we have no reason to be. Each one of us knows our lot in life and takes up that mantle in an effort to keep Amorea as it is. We are happy, healthy, and whole. Balance.” She looks rather pleased with herself, and the rest of the book club is looking at her with unabashed admiration.

  “What if someone jostles that balance?” Mike asks.

  The ladies of the book club slowly turn to stare at him.

  “Why would they?” Mrs. Richardson asks, sounding confused.

  “Just to see what would happen.”

  She blinks. “I don’t know anyone in Amorea that would do such a thing.”

  Mike thinks, Of course you don’t.

  He says, “Just a thought. I wonder, though, what would happen.”

  “I don’t think it’d get as far as Ralph and Jack and Piggy,” another lady says. “Even if it’s jostled. Our eyes are open, aren’t they? The boys on the island were clouded by fear and lacked a firm hand. They needed guidance.”