by Rune Skelley
He was wary of entering the police station, but Rook kissed his cheek and went inside.
At least her legs will be warm.
After fifteen freezing minutes Fin started to get frantic. Had they arrested her? He was on the verge of going inside and risking his own incarceration for unknown crimes when she walked out, wearing her black leather jacket and a self-satisfied smile.
Fin rushed over and kissed her. “Where’s your bank?” The prospect of food was suddenly overwhelming.
“It’s Viridian. On Alder Street.”
Fin shook his head. “That’s Brad’s bank.”
“So? He’s unlikely to be standing in line right this moment. I’ll be quick.”
Until now Fin had been too embarrassed to tell her what his father did for a living. “He’s, like, vice president of the bank.”
Her cinnamon brows went up. “Well, that doesn’t change where my money is.” She started in the direction of Alder, weaving around patches of ice.
Fin snagged her elbow, “Why aren’t you listening to me?”
“Because you’re being totally irrational and I’m fucking hungry.” She shook her arm free and strode away.
Irrational? How could she call him irrational? He pulled his camo lost-and-found ski cap tighter over his ears and stomped after her. But he wasn’t going into the bank.
*** *** ***
Willow was awake when Brad opened the hatch. She greeted him brightly, but her eyes looked red. She must have been thinking about Fin. He hugged her.
“You have a present for me,” he said with a wink.
Willow tilted her head in puzzlement. Brad opened the cardboard box and handed her a tiny envelope.
“Here, honey.” She gave an exaggerated wink and held the envelope out to him. “This is for you.”
Brad said, “Open it,” and held his breath.
She slit open the flap with her fingernail and peered into the paper pouch. Her face lit up. She pulled the silver ring out and held it next to its mate on her left middle finger.
With happy tears in her eyes, Willow took Brad’s hand and slipped the ring onto his finger. The sweet, familiar tingle passed over his skin wherever she touched him. He moved her own band over one spot to her ring finger, too.
“I love you,” he said, and kissed her.
Zen stirred, stretched, and gave a small cry.
Willow beamed at Brad, then at the baby, and crawled to the back of the bunk to feed the tiny girl.
Brad sat on the edge of the mattress. “We should take you both to get checked over.”
Willow nodded as she offered her breast to Zen.
“There’s a good hospital in Donner.” He could see Kyle on the same trip, if he could slip away. “Who knows if Severin has people out looking for us around here.”
Willow looked at Brad for a long moment, but didn’t say anything.
Brad felt the silence like pressure growing in their steel sanctuary. “Of course, we can’t go until they clear the roads,” he explained, by way of opening a relief valve. “Everything’s impassable. Ice. I don’t think there’s any emergency, you’re obviously both fine, so we can wait another day. It’s just a good idea to go, as a precaution, and—”
“This afternoon’s fine,” Willow interrupted. “Or tomorrow. But I don’t think Severin has spies in the maternity ward, any more than you do.”
Brad licked his lips and nodded. Too vigorously. He needed to say more, but feared blurting out the wrong thing. Silence accumulated again, compressing Brad but not seeming to bother Willow. She stroked Zen’s head as the infant nursed.
“It’s Kyle,” Brad said quietly. When Willow didn’t reply, he took a deep breath and told her of his conversation with the doctor, told her he was scared about his son’s condition, and finally confessed that he left a message for Melissa. With nothing further to blurt, he stopped talking.
“We should go today, and hope Melissa isn’t there,” Willow said.
“You’re not angry?”
“No, that’s Fin’s job,” Willow said with a sad chuckle. “You’re Kyle’s father. You’d do the same for Fin, or for Zen. And you had to tell Melissa. You did the right thing.”
Tears burned in Brad’s eyes. He’d done the right thing. He hadn’t realized how badly he needed to hear that.
“But,” Willow said, “when you act like Kyle is a dirty secret, I feel like you don’t trust me.” She looked away.
“I have something else,” Brad mumbled. “A dirty secret.”
Willow looked back, eyebrows raised.
“You have a twin,” he said, watching for her reaction.
Willow’s eyes widened and her brows went higher. “How did you know?”
Brad blinked at her. “How did you? You never said anything.”
“She’s one of the things I learned during my captivity, listening to the bubbles.” Brad gave her a puzzled look. “It’s hard to describe. The place where I spent those years is some kind of colossal mind. I visited it once before. The night I met you. Remember, I was hitchhiking?”
Brad nodded with a smirk. “You said you were a dryad.”
Willow rolled her gorgeous jade eyes. “Yeah. Well, you knew I was on something, but I never told you any details.”
“You went to this same place?”
“It looked different but it felt the same. An endless ocean of green tie-dye fire, full of everything people obsess about. The scariest was that masonic eye thing on the dollar bill. It was hunting me. I panicked and created a swarm of spiders to hide behind.” She shook her head and chuckled. “I did mention I was high, right? Anyway, drug trip stuff aside, Severin calls it the Elsewhere, because he’s pompous. It’s like an übermind for all humanity. It’s made of people’s thoughts, but it has its own thoughts, too. I overheard what it thought about, including me and my twin. All I know is that she exists. Given my track record with family reunions, I don’t care to press the matter.” She paused again. “Now you. How did you know?”
Brad squirmed, and could tell Willow noticed. “Technically I don’t know anything. Maybe I’m wrong.”
Willow narrowed her eyes. Brad looked down.
“It’s Melissa,” he mumbled. Willow tensed. He spoke without raising his head. “On the day Fin and Kyle were born, I put it together. Like I said, I have no proof. But so many things fit, with your birthdays, and your childhoods. You look a lot alike, too, underneath the hair and the clothes.” Hearing the phrase escape his lips, Brad panicked. Looking at Willow pleadingly he said, “I mean you dress differently!”
She smiled. “The crazy thing is, that actually makes sense. It lines up with some other things I overheard.”
“I never set out to marry your sister.” Brad was evidently not done blurting things out, after all.
Willow dropped her glance, which might have been to check on Zen.
He continued, “It was a huge mistake. It almost got me killed.” Willow’s eyes flicked back to his. “Melissa was researching poisons, toward the end.” He felt Willow stiffen again and Zen made a grumpy little noise. “I hate to say mean things about your sister, but she planned to kill me.”
Willow let out a sigh. “My own mother kidnapped me. Why should I be touchy about my homicidal sister?”
She switched Zen over to the other side. “Is there anything else in the box?”
“Let’s see.” Brad folded himself in half and stretched out his arm to get a grip on the edge of the box, grunting. Willow giggled, and Zen fussed.
“Daddy made Mommy move. Bad Daddy,” Willow murmured, helping Zen latch on again.
Brad started lifting artifacts out of the box, studying each and holding it out for Willow to see.
His MBA certificate, framed. Snapshots. Some small antiques came out next. A mantel clock, well preserved but nonfunctional. A pair of small horses carved from a deep green semiprecious mineral. He told her how they had been passed down through the family and were said to be terribly valuable, but his
mother allowed him to play with them anyway.
“There’s only one more thing,” he said.
He produced an empty wine bottle. Willow glanced expectantly from it to Brad several times. Brad smiled, feeling sunshine on his face and remembering a warm campfire after skinny-dipping. Willow nudged him with her elbow and raised her eyebrows.
“It’s from our picnic.” Brad watched for Willow’s recollections to show.
“At the lake,” she breathed, a languid joy brimming in her eyes.
Brad put the bottle back in the box with the horses, and gave Willow a deep kiss. Zen protested, so he planted a gentle kiss on her head and she seemed content.
*** *** ***
“Both together?” asked the waiter. “Or separate checks?”
Rook rubbed her temples and said, “One check. I’ll have the all-you-can-eat spaghetti. Alfredo sauce. And water with lemon.”
“Same here,” said Fin. “Only I’ll have the meat sauce.”
The Shamrock Diner was famous for their cheap, mediocre lunch specials. The pasta would be bland, but they could stuff themselves for $3.99 each.
Rook was beginning to relax. Things were getting back on track. After lunch they would both be in better moods and she’d make Fin see how stupid he was being.
Then she’d be able to a take real shower. A long, hot shower. Scalding.
Seventeen days she’d been with Kyle. Over two weeks.
Rook shuddered.
A sponge bath on an asteroid full of giant spiders, and a lukewarm splashing in a locker room shower, might have rinsed away all the blood, but they were not enough to wash away her degradation.
For that she needed time. Time alone, and time with Fin to heal their fractured relationship. But now Fin was acting like an asshole, and they were essentially homeless.
And she could still feel Kyle.
Even worse than the stink of him on her skin was the stain inside her head. While the shattered cathedral filled with noxious smoke, her two husbands made her mind their battlefield.
The horrible violation of Kyle’s presence there, full-fledged and malice-ridden — the confusion caused by Brook and Bramble — the humiliating inability to be sure of her own desires — the knowledge that she nearly became the instrument of Fin’s demise —
Rook pressed her forehead against the cool tabletop and took slow breaths.
Fin worked his fingers into her hair and massaged her scalp.
If only her headache would go away. It had been a constant nagging presence since the cathedral, since the mental signals linking her to both halves of the Divided Man rang through her at the same time.
Fin’s vibration felt strong and constant, yet distorted. Kyle had left something behind, something to remember him by. He’d maintained his proprietary grip on her mind even as Fin destroyed him.
Mental shrapnel. Brittle, insidious splinters of Kyle’s psyche buried in her brain, vibrating to his unique wavelength, creating interference with Fin’s signal, and enticing her evil sister personas out of hiding. What could be better?
Rook knew Fin would want to help, but she couldn’t stomach the thought of him entering her mind while he was so irrational. Couldn’t say she ever wanted anyone in there again.
The waiter returned with their lunch. Rook sat up. Fin scooted Vesuvius’s bag out of the way and eyed his bowl like a predator. Rook sniffed her own food suspiciously. The sauce had separated, leaving unappetizing, semen-like clumps clinging to the pasta, and the cheese smelled a bit ripe. Rook poked it with her fork as Fin scooped up huge bites of his and shoveled them into his mouth.
The sauce wasn’t as bad as it looked, but the noodles were beyond gummy. Rook washed down each bite with gulps of water.
Fin noticed her distress. “The Alfredo’s no good? Here, we’ll trade.”
He swapped their bowls and dug right in with indiscriminate gusto. Rook managed to finish the remains of the meat sauce serving, but wished she had ordered something else.
When Fin was winding down on his third helping, Rook pounced.
“I’ll have about $180 after I pay for this,” she said. “That’s it.”
Fin nodded and mopped up some leftover sauce with a chunk of garlic bread. “Cool.”
“No, Fin, it’s not cool. It’s all the money we have. What are we gonna do?”
He sat back in the corner of the booth and put his boot-clad feet on the seat. “We’ll think of something.”
“We’re dressed like a couple of thrift store mannequins,” she snapped, “and I don’t even have any underwear!”
Fin glanced around to see if anyone noticed her outburst, but Rook was past caring. She blinked away angry tears and went on, “Maybe you’re happy to keep wearing the same clothes and carry Vesuvius around in a shopping bag. But I’m not, Fin! I’m not.” The tears came now, hot and choking.
Fin hurried around to her side of the table and put his arms around her. Rook wanted to collapse into his embrace, but needed to keep fighting to escape this unacceptable situation.
“Shh,” Fin soothed. He kissed the top of her head. “Rook, shh. We’ll fix it. What do you want to do?”
“I want to dye my hair,” she surprised herself by saying.
“What?”
“He did this to me. I don’t want to look like his creature anymore.”
“Well, okay.” Fin sounded flustered.
“And I don’t want to dye it in a public bathroom.” Rook shook with the force of her sobs.
Fin hugged her and was silent.
“Please Fin,” she begged. “Can we please talk to Bishop? He’ll understand, won’t he? He’ll let us in, right?”
Fin kissed her head again and squeezed her. “I never talked to him after the reception,” he confessed. “The explosion put him in the hospital, and I didn’t visit him. I was too worried about finding you.”
Rook sniffled and wiped her wet cheeks on her sleeve.
“I guess I need to explain that to him, not you,” Fin conceded.
Relieved Fin finally acknowledged the need for help, Rook allowed herself to relax against him and be comforted by his embrace and his sweetly smoky smell.
Her tears ran their course as the other diners lost interest in the melodrama. Fin cradled her and smoothed her hair. He held her hands and stroked the chess tattoos on her inner wrists with his thumbs, murmuring apologies.
After a trip to the restroom to blow her nose and splash her face with cool water, Rook felt better. She pulled her leather jacket on over the gray hoodie, grabbed her mismatched gloves and, together with Fin and poor Vesuvius, got in line to pay.
Behind the counter a wall-mounted television showed the weather. The storm had moved north to spew its wrath over New England. Sunny skies and frigid temperatures were expected for the remainder of the week.
The anchorwoman came onscreen wearing her serious face. “Search and rescue teams in Donner are combing the rubble of the Shaw Ministries Cathedral for bodies.”
Rook’s breath caught.
Over footage of the smoldering ruin, the report told about renegade reverend Declan Spitz and how, upset at being removed as the public face of Shaw Ministries, he staged a coup resulting in the total destruction of the cathedral, the grievous injury of interim leader Kyle Tanner, and the disappearance of somewhere between 2,000 and 3,000 people.
Rook gasped. Kyle is alive.
No fatalities had been discovered. Rook knew they never would be. They’d all been incinerated by Kyle’s mind and their ashes were now mingled with those of the entire building.
Fin nudged Rook forward a few steps and whispered, “Ignore it. It doesn’t concern us anymore.”
The utter bullshit of the report fascinated Rook from a journalistic standpoint.
The cable news claimed that Spitz led every single ministry employee and student, plus a few thousand worshipers, in a rebellion against upstart Kyle, and into hiding. Authorities feared a repeat of Jonestown or Waco. It was unclear whe
ther the Declanists, as they were being called, remained in the US, or had fled overseas. Anyone with information was urged to contact law enforcement.
Rook didn’t think she’d be doing that.
Fin guided her forward again as the line moved. They were almost to the register.
The anchorwoman thanked the field reporter and said, “All footage from inside the Shaw Ministries control room was destroyed, but we have obtained a home recording of the final broadcast. We apologize for the low quality of the image.”
Rook’s stomach flip-flopped and she thought she might get another look at the reviled Alfredo sauce.
Kyle’s grainy image materialized on the screen, preaching his gospel. Eyes so filled with hungry madness in a face so much like Fin’s. The color balance was off, the greens too vivid. Inside Rook’s head the shrapnel throbbed. Brook and Bramble moaned with pleasure, and Fin’s vibration wavered.
Rook felt lightheaded as whiteness overtook her vision. She sucked in a breath and realized the whiteness was just snow on the TV. The image broke down completely, replaced by a picture of a television camera with angel wings and a halo, and the message Heaven Help Us, We Are Experiencing Technical Difficulties.
Neither she nor Fin appeared in the footage. Rook smiled and took a shaky breath, then turned and hugged Fin tight.
“We’re okay,” he said, and she started to believe it.
It was her turn to pay. The reporter on TV started interviewing an expert on cults. Change in hand, Rook hurried back to the booth to leave a tip. When she dropped a dollar bill and handful of coins on the table, one of the quarters spun away from its brothers and twirled on its axis. The image rattled Rook and she turned away before it could slow and topple, deciding the answer to an unasked question.
*** *** ***
Jay Marshall collected Threshold House’s mail from the box beside the front door, then sought out his girlfriend Rainbow. He found her on the sofa in the media room, cross-legged, flipping through the Journal of Computational Physics. He sat beside her.