by Cole Alpaugh
“I have to stop crying,” Morgan told the dark, empty beach. She creased and folded the newspaper into smaller and smaller squares, then tucked it away in one sneaker before slipping both shoes onto her sandy feet. “And I’m not crazy.”
Standing up, Morgan shook out her towel and resolved to run away from home two weeks from tomorrow. A man as smart and rich as Mr. Dupont would surely see what a valuable asset a girl who could talk to birds would be.
And she knew he would help find her father.
Chapter 37
Being a lifelong alcoholic had its truly bad points. Each of Warden Flint’s attempts to quit drinking was greeted with agonizing hallucinations, both visual and tactile. His delirium tremens were not of the congenial pink elephant or miniature men variety. Possibly because of his vocation, Flint’s excruciating bouts were marred by mutant insect larvae, which invariably crawled and squirmed toward his mouth, nostrils, and ears. It was the acute sense of them “wanting inside” that drove Flint back to the bottle.
As a bug exterminator at heart, Flint was never free from his nemesis, drunk or sober. The sudden appearance of the crazy Hooduk woman’s kid in his life lifted his nightmares to a new level. He’d been able to deal with the creepy crawlers, but guilt was a surprisingly powerful emotion Flint wasn’t used to.
The empty bottle slipped from Flint’s fingers, falling over onto the wood floor with a hollow clink then slowly rolling a few feet toward the front door. He heard the sound of glass on wood, followed by a wet sloshing noise, like a fish at the bottom of the bait bucket trying to show it still had life in it. Somehow, he was standing behind the front door of the ranger shack, listening to the damp, wriggling sounds getting closer, growing in volume and intensity. The old floorboards hummed, and when he looked down at his feet, he noticed wetness spreading under the threshold, turning the bleached wood dark. The wetness inched toward his work boots.
Flint reached a shaky hand toward the doorknob, twisting the cold brass, pulling the door toward him. The sky was moving with dark, cloud-like swarms of mosquitoes, and the ground was a pulsating mass of larvae, undulating toward the shack and its wooden steps like a deep, angry ocean.
“March!” It was a woman’s voice from behind Flint, and he craned his neck to see that it belonged to that Hooduk woman he’d knocked up years back, the mother of the fat little preacher boy.
“March on out of here!” the woman demanded, and Clayton Flint looked back at the pulsating mass of baby mosquitoes that seemed ready to devour him.
“Please.” Flint was powerless to change the course of this dream, and he knew it. It was what his daddy had called a “foregone conclusion,” as in, “Son, you busted out my Buick window with this baseball, so the fact that I’m gonna whoop your ass with this here belt is a foregone conclusion.”
Allison Hooduk stood firm in the middle of the messy ranger shack, arms crossed like a dour schoolmarm’s. “Get out of here, now!”
Flint’s first step onto the front porch was like stepping in a pile of dog turds, as the mass of larvae gave way around his boot. They were now on the cuffs of his pants, squirming upward—wanting and needing—and Flint took another step out into this sea of twisting little creatures. He moved forward to where the top step should have been, the mostly brown larvae moving in waves, maybe four feet deep as far as the eye could see. The buzzing black clouds above him seemed to egg him on, taunting him to become part of them.
“Please, no,” Flint muttered to the clouds of black mosquitoes that shifted and dipped and made Flint’s stomach sick with vertigo.
Flint heard heavy footsteps from behind, as the Hooduk woman charged across the shack toward him, screaming. “You killed my baby!” The impact knocked the breath out of Flint, snapping his head back, sending his body airborne from the top step in an awkward belly flop dive. The warden landed face down in the swarm of mosquito larvae, which immediately filled his mouth and nose, making him cough and gag, as he pawed at his face. They also crawled into his ears.
Clayton Flint was spitting and sneezing phantom larvae as he woke from his dream, face down on the floor next to the ranger shack couch that doubled as his bed.
Flint checked to make sure he had all his clothes on, then searched the immediate area around the couch for last night’s bottle of vodka. Two gulps later, his head felt a little better, a little less full of those frigging mosquito larvae, for sure. His knees popped and his back groaned, as he got to his feet, then headed out the back door to piss off the deck.
Warden Flint sent a pale arc of urine out into the marsh. They were out there, he knew, billions of them, growing and squirming, turning over with little flicks of their twitching bodies. The rains did that. It filled every goddamn piece of garbage with a watery nest for them to grow and flourish. Flint zipped up, tucked in his shirt, and prepared for the war ahead of him. He could deal with half-witted, inbred circus folk, dopey bears in skirts running wild, and creepy little preachers with kooky mothers, but he would not tolerate insects of any sort disturbing his peaceful existence. His skin crawled at the thought.
As if to taunt him more, a small white butterfly, no bigger than a dime, rose up out of the marsh behind the shack and flitted every which way, designing crazy patterns in front of the gray sky. Before these damn rains, not even the most hardened of cockroaches could have survived thirty seconds in those toxic grasses. Hell, any snake eating a cockroach out there would have keeled over and died a jerking, painful death.
One more slug of Stoli vodka for the road and Warden Clayton Flint found his keys and headed into battle.
Chapter 38
It was like holding a little girl’s hand and the feeling was bittersweet.
Everything about the contortionist was miniaturized, from the overall size of her body, to her airy, child-like voice. Amira Anne was by no means dwarf-like, nor did she have the baby fat of a child. Amira’s narrow, four and a half foot frame was simply a tiny, more petite version of an average-size woman. That she must weigh no more than seventy pounds and walked with the light touch of a ballerina, made her appearance all the more wispy and ethereal. When Bagg watched her performance under the glaring spotlight, he didn’t get the same sexual thoughts as he saw on other mens’ faces, Billy Wayne’s included; Bagg thought a lot of it looked gymnastic, if not painful.
Bagg and Amira Anne sat on a thin white blanket in the soft grass at the far corner of the island. Off in the distance was the noisy hum of the game warden’s pesticide mist blower; the crazed Flint was making looping passes around the island, sometimes veering into the marsh and getting stuck. He’d throw open the door, shouting curses and then somehow managing to get himself unstuck. Bagg could see the glint of a long, slim bottle being tilted over the steering wheel.
“Something’s wrong.” Amira Anne spoke in such a small voice, and Bagg assumed she meant the game warden, since that was the direction they were both looking.
“He’s just drunk.” Bagg watched Flint’s truck disappear back over the island’s bridge. Bagg and Amira hadn’t spoken more than a few dozen words over the months, but she sometimes appeared next to the towering Bagg and he’d look down to notice a tiny white hand in his own. It made him smile.
“I meant there’s something wrong inside of you.” Amira looked up at him with almond-shaped eyes that were almost Asian. Her dark hair was swept back in a ponytail. “You’re the saddest person I’ve ever met. And working in this business, I’ve been surrounded by some pretty sad people.”
“I miss my little girl.” Bagg felt too tired to recount the history of his troubles, the loss of his daughter. By this time, Bagg’s newspaper would have officially shut its doors, its presses and office materials appraised for auction. He’d tried to reach his friend Andy Cobb—the reporter who had covered the tiger attack—but it had been too late. His number at the paper was an out-of-service message, as were Cobb’s home and cell numbers. Like people who ran off and joined the circus, disappearing into thin air was a
trick newspaper staff members seemed to be learning. With a history that went back over three hundred years in America, newspapers were sick and dying even in their Boston birthplace. Reporters, photographers, and editors charged with being the watchdogs were now out of work, suddenly stripped of the ebbing power they’d so desperately clung to, folded back into the world of regular people. A press pass made you a little special. Not much, and sometimes not at all, but it was always there to help you at least try to get through some blocked door, past some gatekeeper. Then it was over. Like an unanswered question asked at the end of a press conference, the words just awkwardly hung in the air. The reporter was sometimes angry, and sometimes embarrassed.
Bagg had gone through his phone’s list of numbers before reaching a lifestyle writer who had landed a spot at the Philadelphia Inquirer, itself in dire financial trouble. But she had no news for Bagg on any charges being filed against him. Lilly Epstein’s desk had always been stacked with a hodgepodge of arts and crafts, fashion magazines, and local restaurant menus. Bagg had teased her that her job description seemed an awful lot like someone trying to burn through an expense account. She had been the newsroom's consummate schmoozer, with a direct line to all the latest gossip.
“What happened to you?” Lilly’s voice crackled over the poor cell connection. “People said you’d run away and joined the circus.”
“What?” Bagg wasn’t certain he’d heard correctly. Did they know where he was?
“You disappeared. You left your desk a mess and somebody eventually stuck all your things in a box. People figured you said the hell with coming in. Is that what happened?”
“No cops came looking for me?”
“Why would cops be looking for you?” Lilly sounded more interested, as if there might be some good tidbits to be had. “What did you do?”
“Nothing on purpose. Listen, I had this run-in with a crazy cop and I wasn’t sure if I was in trouble. It was really nothing, but I figured there also wasn’t much reason to come back to the paper. I should have packed up my things, though.”
“What are you doing? I mean, where are you?”
“I guess I did run off and join the circus.” Bagg thought of the posters he’d helped Hooduk design, as well as a handful of press releases he’d written and delivered to the penny savers and weekly tourist rags, especially after the rains had dried up the customers. He’d also filled out the tightly creased emergency check he kept in his wallet for the remaining account balance and had mailed it to his landlord from a box out near the Parkway. Did he have until October before his belongings were boxed-up or thrown away? Would the security deposit give him until November?
“You haven’t found anything?” Lilly probably meaning a new reporting job.
“Not yet.” Bagg thought again of his daughter, knowing she meant a job.
“Well, I hope that works out for you. Hey, deadline’s coming up and I gotta run.”
People kept asking Bagg what was wrong with him. Amira’s observation wasn’t the least bit new. After Jennifer disappeared with Morgan, he’d been consumed by the emptiness. He’d learned what a doubled-edged sword hope was. Sure, it gave you something to cling to, something to live for. But it also seemed to turn everything into disappointment. Where there was hope in every late night ringing phone, there was also the utter disappointment when the caller was a wrong number, or someone wanting you to cover a shift for them.
Dreams were torture in this way, as well. Bagg would wake up in the early morning hours, Morgan calling for her daddy from the other room. Bagg would throw off his blanket, stretch his back, and then head for the door to get his little girl a fresh cup of water from the bathroom faucet. But somewhere between his bed and the bathroom, Bagg would remember there was no little girl anymore. He would remember he was alone and that it was just a voice from some dark place in his mind sent to remind him, sent to torment him. And there was the agonizing guilt from those recurring dreams. Or were they nightmares? Guilt because Bagg would wake up annoyed at Morgan, a perfectly reasonable mild anger at being disturbed from a deep sleep. But after collapsing back in bed, he’d fall asleep ashamed, hating himself. He swore he’d do anything in the world to see his daughter again, if only for a moment, but here he was getting pissed off about being woken up, even if it was by some sort of ghost.
Hope had settled in that little dark place in his mind, exposing itself every once in a while despite Bagg’s best efforts. Hope was cruel and Bagg didn’t have it in him to explain to the pretty little contortionist sitting across from him near the inlet water exactly what it had done to him.
“I miss my little girl. She’s with her mother someplace.”
“Well, why don’t you go see her? You do want to see her?”
“I don’t know where she is.” Bagg couldn’t talk about this. He’d been too close to the edge, had teetered away from it, and knew how easy it was to fall back into that hole. “I can’t talk about what happened.” A new idea swept over Bagg as he looked beyond her, out toward the ocean, not really seeing anything but a fading image of Morgan’s face. There wasn’t just one hole you fell into. When you lost your child, there was always another ledge to fall off. You had some good days, but you really weren’t going anywhere. You were always about to trip, to plunge into a worse place.
It wasn’t that long ago when Bagg had smashed half the plates in his apartment because he couldn’t remember on which side of her nose that little freckle was. He’d cut both hands falling into that particular hole.
He swore to himself he wouldn’t break down in front of this woman. His clothes were dirty, his hair was greasy, and he was living in a tent. His life had been reduced to very little worth and he tried desperately to hang on to what he could. Even saving the bear had really only been about trying to salvage something for himself.
But then they came. The ridiculous tears that robbed his pride and sliced through his dignity poured out, and he hated himself for every single one. Showing how pathetic he was sank his spirit to a new place, a new spot in a deeper hole.
“You don’t have to tell me anything.” Her feathery touch on the sides of his head was so much like Morgan’s. It was the same touch his little girl had used when he’d been sick, or when she’d woken him out of one of his bad dreams the nights she’d been allowed to fall asleep in his bed. Amira leaned forward onto her knees facing him, her large brown eyes probing his. “But you have to find her. This is no way to live. You have a kind soul and I’ve watched you look at these people.” Amira made a sweeping gesture with one skinny arm back toward the tents.
In his misery, Bagg was confused, thought perhaps she was accusing him of something, of looking down on them. He wanted to tell her these were the same people who had raised him, who he’d grown up with. “I mean you look at them like you understand the troubles that brought a lot of them to work for a traveling circus. It’s like you’ve given up and become one of them, wallowing in your own loss. Is that any way to live?”
“I tried to find her.”
“And then you quit,” Amira said flatly.
“And then I quit.”
“You’ll get your own freak show spot. They can call you Hollow Man.”
“That’s mean,” Bagg smiled.
“Sometimes the truth is plain old mean. She was stolen from you? A wife? A girlfriend?”
“Yes, my ex-wife.”
“So at least she’s safe,” Amira said carefully.
“I hope so.” There was that word hope again. “It’s been a long time. I tried to find her, but it was as if both of them disappeared into thin air.”
“This circus has been a lot of places. A lot of places that might as well be thin air.”
There was a time in his life where he would have kissed her, back when his heart wasn’t so mangled and his life so screwed up. Her body was all angles, her limbs moved in deliberate motions. She took his right hand in hers, petting the top of it with delicate strokes. Bagg wasn’t sure of the
last time he’d been touched like that. It was the way a child sometimes tried to comfort an adult. Grown-ups sometimes forgot the power of gentle touching.
“So I should start checking the thin air?” he asked.
“Of course you should.” Amira leaned close and kissed Bagg very softly on his unshaven cheek. “If all that’s left is thin air, then that’s definitely where she is.”
Chapter 39
Tommy Bonjovi was an outlaw, livin’ life large behind the wheel of a ’95 Chrysler LeBaron convertible he’d hot-wired in a pancake house parking lot in Ship Bottom. With the AC cranked and the wind whippin’ his long hair, Tommy popped out the car lighter and sparked a fat spliff, the joint catching evenly with one long, even pull. The fucking rain had left him antsy; his cabin fever had turned to full-blown swine flu. Tommy was feelin’ the need for an adrenaline jump start, as the sun had come back shinin’ bright and hard.
The pot was courtesy of his old man, a lazy, fat-ass cop. He kept a secret box in his closet stuffed full of all sorts of good shit he’d collected by shakin’ down the kids he nabbed dealin’ or buyin’. Pussies who didn’t have balls enough to stand up to that piece of shit deserved to get ripped off. Still, it was a wonder none of ’em ever snuck up and popped the prick in the back of his sweaty, bald head. It made a big enough target, for sure.
Having an asshole cop for a father did have its advantages when it came to slippin’ out of his own squeezes with the law. His old man wasn’t trying to do him any favors, though. He just didn’t want the embarrassment of a son sent to juvie for criminal mischief, whatever the fuck that meant. Criminal mischief? Like he was some sort of fuckin’ mischief-makin’ elf! And then there was the burglary, the vandalism, and the garage he accidentally set on fire. Whatever. Shit happened, then you got old and died.