by Demers, Matt
Will eyed the Pabst Blue Ribbon can and cussed it. He dug in his pockets, pulled out a crumbled white bill and threw it over the balcony’s edge. No one ever complained to James anymore. Not since his cancer relapsed. He kind of missed the complaining, even though the 20% unemployment rate seemed a ridiculous thing to worry about with the tumors growing. Mom once told James: Life always puts things in perspective, but sometimes when it’s too late.
A UPS van puttered along Riverside Drive and turned into the apartment’s driveway. It stopped beneath the balcony and Gaffer jumped out with a package.
“Only three things guaranteed in Greenville,” Will began, “The unemployment rate, STDs, and Frank Gaffer.”
Gaffer held the package up as Will reached between the balcony railings and grabbed it.
“About time — my Milwaukee circular saw — the only battery powered model worth buyin’.”
“Thought you already had one of those.”
“I do. The exact one. But we have a golden rule in the construction business — if someone hurts themselves with it, throw it out because it’s cursed.”
Gaffer grabbed the crumpled piece of paper that Will had tossed. “Woo-ee. Quite the fine you’ve got here, Will. Safety violation. Go on, what happened?”
“Jimmy Valiant lopped his hand off at the wrist today, that’s what. You know the type of guy who’s a born fuckup? That’s Jimmy. All the Valliants are great framers with the work ethic to match. But Jimmy, well…all he had was work ethic. To be honest, most of us saw it comin’.”
“Doesn’t seem right for you to foot the bill if it’s his fault,” James said.
“Well it’s no big deal,” Will lied. “That’s how safety laws work these days. Not that I didn’t warn the kid about cuttin’ against the grain. Straight beginner stuff. What else could I do? I was putting up drywall with Tim Hamlin. We heard the sound of the saw cutting something from the room over. Only this sound sounded different. Splintering. Like a wood chipper gnawing at something dense. There was silence for a few seconds — Jimmy coming to terms with what just happened, maybe.”
“Me and Tim Hamlin ran down the hall toward the screams. We had laid sheets of drywall against some of the framing, so we couldn’t see what happened yet. By the time we reached the foyer, Jimmy had run off site. We saw him charging down the sidewalk, his hand cupped around the wrist where the stump spurted. It must have jetted blood five feet, all his panicking makin’ it worse.”
“The worst thing was the school kids — just got off the bus in their Halloween costumes. Here was this man running at them, screaming, eyes wild, handless, a fountain of bright red blood spurting through the air. The kids screamed right back and scattered like a flock of pigeons in a parking lot.”
James felt relief when he looked down to see Gaffer laughing beneath folded hands. James stopped holding his breath and cackled. The thought of the children seeing a man running at them with blood flying everywhere, then scurrying away, was hilarious in a dark, morbid, guilty-pleasure kind of way.
“You sick bastards. He could’ve died!”
James gathered himself; Gaffer less so. “I’m glad he’s fine. So what happened?”
“We caught him a block down Northwood. We used his belt as a tourniquet. The paramedics said another ten minutes and he’d be dead.”
“You got an extra Pabst?” Gaffer asked with his hand saluting to block the sun. “I’m gonna be stuck here for a while.”
“Why’s that, Gaff?” Will asked, but then they heard it. The economy hadn’t been kind to the military. Cuts were being made, and now Greenville rumbled as Army supply trucks with camo-net appeared from the underpass and chugged along Riverside toward Monroe City. The strip, one second deserted, the next a squealing row of tires, metal, tax dollars, and post-dramatic stress disorder.
Grunts in passenger seats thumbed through their cell phone or tossed cigarette butts. In all, two dozen trucks trudged along. The twelfth one lagged behind. In it, a redhead sat frowning in its passenger seat. She tugged at something around her neck and flung it out the window. It clanked against the road and it landed next to the gutter.
“Were those dog tags?” Will asked.
James supposed if crumpling empires made noise, it might sound like dog tags hitting pavement.
“America is cutting against the grain, too. Don’t it seem, Will?” Gaffer asked.
The trucks bumped along out of sight. The relative quiet gave James a sense of self-awareness, an aura of sorts. The aura reminded him — vaguely so — that it might seem that he’s sitting on Will’s balcony, it was the grass of Monroe City Raceway beneath him. The aura also warned him that under no circumstances should James turn to look at Will, who was a Tweak looking to tear out his jugular the last time they met.
Where’d Gaffer go? James wondered. The UPS truck was gone. He felt Will’s eyes on him and thought of that day in the cargo van. He thought of the way the Milwaukee struggled to saw through skull. Will’s skull, cutting against the grain.
James looked anyway.
“It’s time, James. You need AIV, stat. It’s sitting in the cancer ward at John Hopkins just watin’ for ya. Only then, when you take it, will you truly understand why.” Will’s eyes clouded yellow.
“What are you talking about, Will? Understand what?”
“What we are, James. Why we’ve come.”
Will’s Pabst wasn’t in his lap. The Milwaukee sat in its place. He snapped the blade guard back.
You don’t need to do this, Will. James didn’t need to speak, because they were in a dream, and he wanted desperately to wake up.
Will grinned. Oh, but we do. Because we’ve been places, James. Places we need to show you.
Will pressed the safety switch. The blade shrieked to life. He brought the saw up and turned so the blade faced his own head. As the blade descended, Will stared at James with an empty grin. The blade’s teeth gnashed against forehead and the motor heaved. Will’s mouth formed a black O, and his arms jerked as the blade chopped and squealed. It smelled like chemo clinic and burnt toast.
Will’s forehead divided as the blade sank. Instead of gore, the split revealed nothing but blackness.
We’ve been places, James. And it’s time for you to see. Go to John Hopkins and you will know. Like I know. Like your mother knows. Like Gaffer knows too.
Something approached. Something barely visible in the blackness. It curled, and rolled, and grew like something organic, alive. It brought the roar of heavy wind and a musty scent of something very ancient. James screamed. He screamed because only one look is all it took to make you a part of it.
The motor chugged. Will grinned. The void opened.
***
James awakened to screams. It bounced off the hills and echoed through the fields.
My screams.
His head seared. The horizon streaked black and brown. He thought of climbing the top row of bleachers and cannon-balling off the top.
It’ll guarantee a quick kill — almost.
“And you ain’t gonna stop me,” James told the girl sitting beside him.
He wasn’t sure how long she sat there before he noticed her. She looked about eight, but James never guessed age well. She sat cross-legged at his feet — cute, with short bangs, black hair, and a filthy purple dress. Her hair hung tightly in a ponytail and bobbed with the wind. She cupped James’ chin, tilted his head and shined the light into James’ eyes. She didn’t move to bite him.
He never saw one so docile.
“Whoa,” James muttered. Her body stretched and thinned, then shrunk and widened. Each time James blinked, she changed shape and color.
“You’re Tweaky, ain’t ya?” James asked her, but she only responded by expanding fifty feet. “Why ain’t you going all crazy-like?” He demanded. “Why ain’t you trying to make me see?” James felt for his rucksack and dug through the contents, hoping a leftover capsule held in the lining. He turned his rucksack over and all his gear spille
d out. Every bone in his body felt like it was being crushed by a massive metal stamp with the word “cancer” stenciled on the faceplate. He gagged.
“Get the Bearcat. Make her growl,” James whispered and yearned to feel the gun’s poly grip. He reached for his body harness until his fingers traced the holster’s sheath. But where his hands should have grasped the Bearcat’s stock, there was only empty space.
“Where’d you put it?” He hissed at the girl and cursed the earth. He crawled, grabbing things. He felt a food can, a cloth.
“I’d rather die than Tweak the earth like you,” James decided. He crawled from the girl now, keeping the looming bleachers in sight. The dirt track felt cool and soothing through his shirt and against his cheek. His cheek? Crawling became lying and James passed out again.
***
Light peeked through a space between James’ forearms. He felt the earth against his stomach and the smell of dewy grass. He looked up and saw the bleachers and the blaring sun behind it. Something rolled off his back and rattled beside him. He closed his eyes and waited for his stomach to settle. He opened them into slits and saw two prescription bottles lying lengthwise in the dirt. Capsules filled them.
James gasped and cracked a smile and hurriedly popped both tabs and stuck two pills from each to his lips. He chewed, but dry-mouth turned them powdery. It stuck to his gums and tongue.
A tiny hand held out James’ canteen. He swiped the bottle and chugged. The water flooded his parched mouth and washed down the bitter medicine. He took another gulp and looked up.
Last night’s little Tweak sat cross-legged again. She traced curvy lines in the dirt.
“How the hell did you know?” James demanded, but she went on tracing. Another Tweaky mute, James figured.
But she began to hum, and the hums lead to song:
“Here it comes from beyond the shore
Its whistle now a steady roar.
The tide crashes against your feet
Eternal prisoner in Satan’s keep.”
She hummed the chorus again while she scribbled.
That’s one creepy kid, James observed. It’s what cute little kids did — just waited to be possessed or die and come back a creepy ghost or something in between. Dark formal-wear and dreary nursery rhymes came standard.
Her cloudy eyes looked right through James and probably, James supposed, beyond the bleachers and parking lot, too.
“I kill little Tweak girls like you in my sleep,” James warned her. “If you pass through Greenville, visit Mac’s Camper sales. Tell ‘em James sent ya.” He struggled to his feet and slapped dirt off his pants. He shuffled back to the median and collected his scattered gear. The pills took time, but hearing them rattle in his pouch brought sanctity. He packed, grabbed his bow and slung the rucksack over his back. James palmed his deflated holster and spun in search of his gun. He heard the Bearcat’s chamber click and looked up. The Tweak held it sideways with the chamber open. The rounds dropped to the grass.
“It’s not a toy!” James shouted and snatched the gun. Up close, her sickly thinness showed. Beads of bone dotted along her neck and shoulder. Purple-blue bruises covered her shins, James saw, as he picked the last round from the grass. He winced for her.
“Food’s hard to come by these day, eh chile?” He unslung his pack and reached in. “And I guess I owe you somethin’ for not eating me.” He tossed a sealed packet of Peppercorn BBQ Beef Jerky “Contains half the sodium of the leading brands.”
The Tweak caught it and hurriedly plopped to the ground on her bottom. She clawed at the seal. Cellophane flew. James watched in amusement as she shoveled jerky into her mouth faster than she could chew. He thought of ending her while she ate, just one hard whip of the bearcat would do it.
“I never thanked no Tweak before,” James admitted. He slung his rucksack and turned southward to the highway. “Why start now?”
#
CHAPTER 7
The Road
“Ain’t no Tweak deserves my pity,” James told the twelve o’clock sun. It blazed back at him. Sweat beaded and trailed down his neck and arms in long lines. It felt unseasonably hot, but heat held no candle to pain and withdrawal. Like or not, James felt thankful for his little night visitor.
James kept a good pace, taking Queen’s highway inland to cut time, and only stopping to fill his canteen in a puddle or ditch. A 7-11 with blown-out windows sat isolated along the road, barring little hope of bounty inside. James walked through the half-open sliding glass entrance anyway.
“Broken glass n’ condiments,” James told the empty shelving. “Sounds like a shitty hipster band.”
He set his bow on the counter and walked the aisles. He grabbed a bottle of Heinz mustard and headed for the men’s room by the back coolers, chugging the bottle and frowning as he went. He did his business, crossed the sales floor, jumped the front counter and searched for something useful below the register.
“Sick people don’t vault,” James assured himself with a smile. True, he felt relatively good today. How much of that feeling was the painkiller? Impossible to say.
A door hinge creaked and James snatched the bow with one hand and grasped an arrow from the mesh with the other. The ladies’ room stood halfway open and James wondered if it had been like that earlier.
“I’m tired of this haunted house bullshit.”
The only response came from his own hurried breath. He searched for movement. Speckled dust swirled in a beam beneath the skylight, and flies buzzed where he dropped the mustard bottle, but nothing worth killing stirred.
James sighed and fired the arrow anyway. It shot toward the back cooler and shattered the display glass. Broken shards scattered across the floor. James waited. Just after deciding the store was indeed empty, a tiny shadow poked its head from behind the back row of shelving.
***
“Fuck off!” James roared as he slipped his arrow back in the mesh. He turned his back to her and continued hiking down Route 901. Since leaving the 7-Eleven, James glanced back every few minutes to find the Tweak following him, keeping a soccer field’s distance, stopping when he stopped, moving when he moved no matter how fast or slow. He threw rocks at her and aimed his gun. Nothing deterred his newfound stalker.
It’ll come down to attrition, James reasoned and chugged from his recently filled canteen. His rucksack still held two packets of jerky, a can of mushrooms and the emergency-only Perrier. He figured another two hours and he’d dig into Ranch-House Teriyaki.
By the time the line of steel mills and manufacturing plants had sprouted on the horizon, the girl slowed considerably. When James glanced back, the Tweak was sometimes just a tiny dot. Other times, she’d gotten close enough for James to make out the white buttons on her purple dress.
James thought of jumpstarting one of many abandoned cars, but knew the thought was only theater for his heavy legs. Batteries would prove long dead, and regardless — those that trekked beyond The Wire on wheels never came back. Vroom, vroom, dead so soon.
James eyed a rusted Zippo next to a skeleton in overalls. He fast-balled it down the highway, but it landed just shy of the Tweak’s feet. She had caught up, again.
I’ve got a shot from here.
He unslung his bow, postured, set an arrow and drew the bowstring. Wouldn’t he be doing her a favor? Death by arrow was better than starvation any day.
Downwind. 80 yards. Point of aim — the ‘o’ of “Rest Stop: Exit 49A.”
James fired. The arrow whizzed. It snapped against the pavement and splintered in two pieces.
“Fuck!” James roared. He’d purposefully bogeyed the shot at the last second. Now only two arrows remained.
They stared back at each other for a few moments and the Tweak teetered. By the look of her now, she wouldn’t need an arrow to finish her off. She took a step and her ankle gave out. The girl collapsed in a heap on the road.
James waited, but her body remained motionless. He untwisted his canteen seal.
Shit, James thought and squinted at the Tweak. She lay flat-face against the pavement.
Wouldn’t take much to set her in the grass, James figured and walked to her. He turned the Tweak over. Where her face had made contact with the road a red blotch appeared. He picked her up. Holding her boney frame made him think of Spinosaurus. On a grade 3 field trip, he had snuck over the barrier onto the Spinosaurus exhibit platform and ran his small fingers over the dinosaur’s clavicle bones. It took a good thirty seconds for Mr. Hillier to pull him back over the velvet rope. “Do you know how much that’s worth?!”
James took a step toward the grass median, but something fell from the Tweak’s pocket and drifted to the road — a piece of folded white paper. The wind flipped it over revealing graphic font James recognized instantly. It read: Will Heller, Greenv— .
“One of Will’s memo pads?” James exclaimed and placed the Tweak down, hot road be damned. He unfolded the paper.
Jade,
Do not forget to drop off James’ medication. He is very sick. The address is 1201 Michigan Avenue. See you at the rehearsal.
Love,
Uncle Frank.
James crushed the note and pocketed it. “So you’re Gaffer’s fucking niece, eh?” By the time she showed up at James’ door, he had chugged the pills, and was already comatose from the overdose. He wondered how long she knocked at the front door, waiting.
An image flashed of Greenville’s aquatic center after the barricades went up. James rummaged for chairs in the storage closet when another one of Gaffer’s relatives — a nephew — screaming bloody murder and wielding an orange spine board, bolting through the atrium at him.