Darkest Minds

by Bacon, Stephen

  The yellow police tape was gone, so was the news van and the reporters with their cameras and microphones. But he hadn’t expected the boat to still be there. It unnerved him to see it so close to the shore. Close enough, he told Danny later, to wade through the breakers and touch it.

  “What’s that boat doing there, Daddy?” Kaitlin wanted to know.

  “Oh, nothing,” he said, “They’re probably just looking for something.”

  “What are they looking for?”

  “Dead bodies.” Jack turned to look at Billy. He was facing the ocean, squinting out into the harsh glare on the surface of the water. “That’s a police boat,” Billy said. “They’re looking for someone who drowned.”

  A quick feeling of panic rose in Jack’s chest. He’s not supposed to know things like that, he thought. He’s only ten.

  “I don’t know,” Jack said, trying to sound casual. “Maybe they’re looking for something else...”

  “No,” Billy said. “They’re looking for bodies.”

  “Really?” Kaitlin sounded more fascinated than frightened. “Can we go in now, Daddy?”

  He looked at the grayish-green water as it rushed at their feet and retreated, hissing, then out further where it got deeper. There are bodies out there. Dead bodies. Billy was right. He glanced out at the police boat, at the men climbing over its deck, and felt a flash of anger. Why did they have to be here today? Why did they have to ruin this for him?

  “Daddy, please...” He felt Kaitlin tugging on his hand, breaking into his thoughts. He looked down into her little round face, hopeful and impatient. “Daddy, aren’t we going in? You said.”

  Jack looked to the right along the shore and saw a man standing alone far up the beach, staring out to sea. The man wore a bright blue windbreaker that ballooned and billowed in the wind and made him look like some kind of strange bird ready to take flight. Following the man’s gaze, Jack realized he was staring at the police boat. The man was too far away for Jack to see his face clearly, but for a moment it looked like he might be crying. Oh, God, Jack thought. God, no...

  Kaitlin tugged his hand again and he felt a flash of anger. “Daddy, you said we could go in. You said.”

  He looked down the beach in the other direction and saw other parents venturing into the water with small children, laughing and splashing. He glanced at his watch. Kathy would be awake soon. Then she’d come looking for them.

  “Sure, sweetheart. Sure we are.”

  Taking her hand, he led her down to where the cold gray water rushed at them and retreated. The first wave that broke across their legs was freezing cold, and he felt his muscles cramp instantly. Kaitlin didn’t seem to mind and squealed in delight as another wave rose to meet them.

  Jack looked around for Billy and saw him still standing behind them on the shore, squinting out at the police boat that was almost directly in front of them now. “Come on,” Jack yelled at him, “Kowabunga, dude!” Billy flinched, embarrassed by his Dad’s use of surfer lingo, then walked slowly toward the water and waded in.

  Jack glanced out past the breakers. A diver had surfaced near the boat and was talking and gesturing to the men on board. Jesus, Jack thought, What if they find something? He glanced down the beach toward the man in the blue windbreaker and saw the man”s mouth contorted in a silent howl.

  Kaitlin’s squealing tore at his nerves and he snapped at her. “Stop! Don’t do that!” She quieted down, but when another wave came at them and lifted her up she started squealing again, louder than before.

  Jack heard another voice raised in anger behind him. Kathy’s voice. He turned and saw her walking swiftly toward them across the sand, her face a mask of anger. Gripping Kaitlin’s hand tighter, he said, “Come on, sweetheart,” and drew her deeper into the water, away from the shore. He felt the waves sucking the sand from under his feet, making him lose his balance and stumble. He didn’t want to fall. Not today, not here.

  Then he felt it. Something long and soft drifting and grazing against his skin underwater, twisting around his leg. Long hair.

  Panic and horror rose in his throat, choking him. He felt the thing below the water wrap itself around his legs, and he kicked wildly to get it off. He didn’t realize he’d cried out until he heard Kaitlin calling, “Daddy! Daddy! What’s wrong?” A strand of dark green rose swirling to the surface and he saw what it was. Seaweed.

  He saw Kaitlin staring up at him, fear in her eyes. Kathy was staring at him too, frozen at the water’s edge, the anger in her face giving way to alarm. “What the hell is wrong with you?” she called out.

  “Nothing,” he said. “It’s nothing.” With shaking hands, he tore the slimy strands from his legs and threw them away as far as he could, while out beyond the breakers, he saw the diver in the water wave to the men on board, then slip beneath the surface again.

  Kathy had ended up keeping the kids out of the water for only one day. She’d relented the next morning but kept watch from her beach chair, yelling at him whenever she thought he’d taken the kids out too far. He obeyed but tried to ignore her contemptuous, disapproving gaze at his back.

  Kaitlin, who’d been so fearless at first, running to meet every wave, now seemed to hold back a little, and clung to him fearfully whenever a wave came rolling toward them. On their third morning, she’d stood stiffly at the water’s edge.

  “What’s wrong, honey?” he’d asked.

  “I don’t want to go in.” Her voice was quiet but he could hear the trace of fear in it, and immediately felt a flash of anger toward Kathy.

  “Why not?”

  “I just don’t.”

  “Sweetheart,” he said, kneeling in the sand beside her. “Don’t be afraid. There’s nothing to be afraid of.” She didn’t look at him but kept staring out at the vast gray-green ocean before them. “Sweetheart,” he tried again. “You know Daddy will never let anything bad happen to you, don’t you?”

  He saw a scowl pass over her small face, though whether it was at the waves or at what he’d just said, he wasn’t sure.

  “Okay...” she finally said. Then, holding his hand, she let him lead her into the water.

  They’d been happy for a while, hadn’t they? For a few precious summer days, when she had trusted him. Even Billy had dropped his suspicious reluctance and played soccer with him on the sand. They’d both played with him and trusted him, and while those days lasted he had been happy too, really happy for a while.

  Standing on the same beach now, he watched other parents playing with their children. He saw one man leading a little girl by the hand into the waves. The little girl had long brown hair and squealed and clung to her father every time a wave rushed at them. Sadness pierced his chest, and he turned and walked back toward the boardwalk, little broken shells buried in the sand cutting into his bare feet.

  By the time he made it back to Danny’s house it was almost dark. When he saw that Danny’s car wasn’t back yet, he almost kept walking. He didn’t like being alone in the house with Vicky. But he hated feeling like a coward even more.

  Vicky was standing at the stove, stirring something in a pan, a half-empty glass of white wine on the counter next to her.

  “So, Jack,” she said without turning to look at him. “How are you? How was your day?” There was something in her tone that set his nerves on edge, a sing-song friendliness like she was speaking to a child.

  He wanted to keep walking past her, back to his room where he could be alone. Vicky thinks you’re rude to her sometimes, Danny had said one morning. She says you act like you don’t like her. So he positioned himself stiffly against the counter, acutely aware of his own body, unsure of what to do with his hands.

  “Fine, Vicky,” he said. “How was yours?”

  “Oh, you know,” she sighed, moving toward the refrigerator and opening it. “Same old shit.” Bringing out a bottle of Chardonnay, she filled her glass and then held the bottle out toward him. He shook his head and forced a polite smile. “Oh, that’
s right,” she said. “Sorry...”

  No you’re not, he thought.

  “Well,” she said, turning back toward the pan and stirring it. “Must have been beautiful out there today. Sure wish I could spend all day hanging out on the beach. I guess that’s what vacations are for, right?”

  Is that what you think this is? A vacation? He started to walk back to his room when she spoke again.

  “So, heard anything from Kathy?”

  “She’s fine.”

  “Really? Good. What about the kids?”

  “They’re fine.”

  “Well, that doesn’t surprise me. Kathy’s a good mother.”

  “Excuse me,” he muttered, and walked out of the kitchen and back to his room, closing the door behind him.

  The room had a claustrophobic, animal smell. His smell. Walking over to the wall, he yanked the window open and sat heavily on the futon, letting the soft sea air wash over his skin while the blood pounded like a drumbeat in his ears.

  Outside the light was failing, draining all the color from the sky and the houses. In a few more minutes it would be dark. The lights were already coming on in the houses across the road. He could see people moving back and forth inside the windows; a woman with curly gray hair and bare brown arms working at a kitchen sink, and in the next house, a group of young people laughing with beer bottles in their hands.

  He turned his gaze to the house right across the road. It was dark except for a flicker of greenish light in the downstairs window. Probably a TV or computer screen. But the longer he looked the more he was certain––it was the same window he’d been looking at this morning, and he was seeing straight through the house to the ocean on the other side. How could it be so bright? He decided it must be some kind of trick of the light, an optical phenomenon. The reflective quality of the water or the sand crystals trapping the last of the sunlight.

  A loud knock on his door startled him and Danny’s voice boomed from the other side. “Chow time, bro!”

  Vicky had lit citronella candles to keep the mosquitos away. Their cloying, medicinal scent clung to Jack’s nose and he pushed the candle in front of him to the other side of the table.

  “So,” Vicky said, spooning salad onto her plate, “You like having your blood sucked, Jack?”

  “Actually, no, Vicky. I don’t like having my blood sucked.”

  “Those are there to keep the mosquitoes away,” she said, measuring each syllable slowly.

  “Really? I thought you were just trying to set the mood.”

  While Danny talked on about things that had happened at work, Jack looked over his brother’s shoulder at the house across the road, trying to see into the window. But the angle was wrong, and all he could see was darkness. Danny was still talking when Jack finally spoke up.

  “Who owns that house? The one right across the road?”

  Danny looked at him, an expression on his face that Jack couldn’t read, then looked down and kept eating. “Nobody.”

  “You mean it’s empty?”

  “It is now,” Vicky chuckled, taking another sip of wine. Jack thought he saw Danny throw her a warning glance, but it was growing darker so he couldn’t be sure.

  “Did you know you can see the ocean right through that house?” Jack said. “It’s pretty cool, actually. I was looking at it all morning.” He stopped when he realized how this sounded. I was looking at it all morning...

  When Vicky had gone inside, Danny leaned forward and spoke in a low voice.

  “Jack, I was thinking...how would you like to borrow the car and go to Allentown? You know, see Kathy face-to-face? Figure things out?”

  Jack felt a twinge of panic in his chest. “I don’t know, Danny. I think it’s probably better to do that on the phone...”

  “No offense, bro, but I don’t think it’s the kind of thing you can do on the phone.”

  Jack saw a flash of the same picture he’d imagined before, of himself standing alone on the front porch of Kathy’s sister’s house, pounding on the door and calling out to be let in. The feeling of panic in his chest started to grow.

  “You could see Billy and Kathy,” Danny said. “You’d like to see them, right?”

  “Sure I want to see them.”

  “Okay, then,” Danny smiled, “It’s settled. You take the car Saturday morning, have it back Sunday night. No worries.”

  Back in his room Jack turned out all the lights and lay down on the futon. He could hear Danny and Vicky’s voices through the walls. Their voices had an anxious, angry edge. He could fill-in the words himself. You’re letting him take the car? How do you know he’ll bring it back in once piece? What makes you think he’ll bring it back at all?

  He swallowed back the anger in his throat. He was imagining things again. What made him think they were talking about him? But what if they were? He’d made mistakes, he knew, and there were consequences for those. That’s what they all said at the meetings. You have to pay for your mistakes. He’d listened and wanted to say, Yes. But when does it end?

  A small flapping sound drew his attention––the circus poster on the wall, moving in the current of air pouring in through the window. He saw how the corners were curled and stained by

  the destructive elements of sunlight, water, and air. The pretty picture was rotting away before his eyes.

  The same thing was going to happen to him. It was happening already.

  A terror he’d only felt vague hints of before suddenly rose up fully formed inside of him. It was going to happen. It was going to happen and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

  The room tilted and he was clinging to the side of a bottomless chasm, trying to keep from sliding down. It wasn’t until he felt the ache in his hands that he realized he was digging his fingers into the mattress.

  He walked over to the window, gripped the window frame with both hands and drew deep breaths of the sea air into his lungs. When he could breathe again, he opened his eyes.

  There in the house across the road, the green window was blazing bright. He stood staring, unable to believe what he was seeing. But there it was. Surrounded by the darkness of night, one small square of sunlight.

  He rubbed his eyes and looked again. It was still there. He could see the sun’s rays glistening on the waves as they swelled and rolled. And what should have felt frightening, a rip in the fabric of the world, instead felt peaceful, almost comforting.

  As he stood gazing, he saw another motion different than the rhythm of the waves. Human figures passing quickly across the frame and then disappearing. He stood still, afraid to breath, waiting for them to reappear. When they did and he saw how small they were, he knew they were children.

  They vanished from the frame and his body was flooded with a terrible yearning. The mystery of the sunlit beach in the window no longer felt important. All that mattered was those small bodies that flickered back and forth across that bright green space like moths flying in and out of a light. He wanted them.

  When the sunlight woke him in the morning, he didn’t remember laying down on the bed or how long he’d stood at the window waiting and watching. He got up, stiffly, walked over to the window and looked across the road at the empty house. He could still see the beach through the window on the other side, but it no longer looked strange or miraculous. Daylight flooded everything with ordinariness.

  He wanted to tell Danny but he didn’t dare to. What would he think? That he was drinking again? Or that something had gone wrong with his mind?

  He thought again about that bright square of daylight shining in the middle of the night and felt no fear, no confusion. It was other things confused and frightened him. People’s faces on the beach and on the street. The thought of coming face to face with Kathy again after all these weeks. The sound of her voice on the phone.

  Danny had urged him to call Kathy to let her know he was coming to see her and the kids. He took a deep breath and punched-in her number on his cell phone. She sounded confused and
alarmed when he told her.

  “You’re doing what?”

  “I told you. I’m coming there. I’ll be there tomorrow.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Jack.

  “Why not?”

  “It’s just not, okay?”

  “No,” he said, trying to keep the anger out of his voice, “It’s not okay. I haven’t seen the kids in a month, Kathy, did you know that? A month. I need to see them.”

  “It’s just not a good idea, Jack.” She paused. “It’s not going to be like you think.”

  “What do you mean?” he said, the anger starting to rise in his voice. “I need to see them.”

  There was a longer pause and for a moment he thought the line had gone dead. Finally, she spoke again.

  “Alright. Do what you have to do.” Then she hung up.

  Danny made dinner the night before Jack left. Steamed clams and crab claws, grilled corn on the cob, bottles non-alcoholic beer buried in buckets of ice. It made Jack nervous. It was the kind of meal you make for someone who’s not coming back.

  “What’s the occasion?” he asked, watching Danny moving back and forth from the grill to the table and back again.

  “No occasion,” Danny smiled. “Do I need an occasion to cook for my family?”

  Jack glanced at Vicky sitting on the far side of the deck in a lounge chair, her face lifted toward the sun, her eyes hidden by sunglasses. My family. Was this the picture Danny had in mind when he said my family?

  Later, after the sun had set and the table was littered with broken crab claw shells and empty bottles, Danny raised his drink and said, “Well, bon voyage, bro.”

  “You mean bon chance, don’t you?”

  “Sure,” Danny shrugged. “Bon chance...bueno suerte...break a leg...whatever.”

  Jack was looking over Danny’s shoulder again at the house across the road. The sky wasn’t dark yet but it would be soon.

  “What are you looking at, Jack?” Vicky’s voice was slurred. Jack hated the sound of it. Danny had gone inside to take a leak. Jack glanced toward the door, wishing he’d come back.