Point Pleasant

by Wood, Jen Archer

  A quick fiddle with the handle proved Ben’s suspicions correct; the door did not budge. Nicholas got in behind the steering wheel and cranked the engine. The cruiser’s scanner crackled with dispatch reports and ten-codes. Nicholas reached forward and switched it off.

  “Shall we?” he asked.

  “Might as well,” Marietta drawled. “There’s never anything good on TV on a Sunday when Mad Men is on hiatus anyway.”

  “The Walking Dead has its moments,” Ben said.

  “I bet you like the sheriff in that one,” Marietta replied, and she gave Ben a sly wink over her shoulder.

  “He’s okay,” Ben said, smiling despite the situation when he caught Nicholas’ bewildered expression in the rearview mirror.

  Nicholas shook his head, put the car into reverse, and pulled onto Main Street. Ben peered out of the rear window and saw Daniel was following close behind in the other cruiser. Stewart had also taken the backseat, and Ben stifled a faint laugh. This was probably not what Stewart had envisioned for his evening when he woke up that morning.

  “Says the man in the back of the Sheriff’s car,” Marietta said, twisting around to assess Ben through the mesh that separated them.

  “What?” Nicholas asked, sparing a look over to Marietta as he drove.

  “Never you mind, Sheriff.” Marietta replied.

  Ben leaned close to the mesh and raised an eyebrow at Marietta. “Do you have a button? Can you just turn it off and on?” he asked. “Say you go grocery shopping. Do you end up getting eggs because half the people in the store keep reminding themselves to pick up a dozen?”

  “Benjamin, I’m going to pretend you didn’t just ask me that.”

  “I’m curious!” Ben replied. “It must be frustrating.”

  “Oh, I don’t know about that. I think you two would benefit from a look into one another’s hearts.”

  “Pardon?” Nicholas asked, stiffening at the psychic’s comment.

  “You heard me,” Marietta said, her tone airy and noncommittal. “You’re so determined and headstrong, Sheriff. And Benjamin’s just the same, even if he’s confused about what he needs half the time. You two would stop butting horns so much if you both just took a minute to realize that.”

  “I think we’re good without the mind reading, thanks,” Ben said. He shrank from the barrier and crossed his arms.

  “Oh, you simple child,” Marietta said over her shoulder. “If you could only hear what he’s got in his head about you, you’d think twice about ever leaving again.”

  “You’re really going to leave?” Nicholas asked. His eyes darted up to the rearview mirror, and Ben could see the frown lines around them. “Ben, you said—”

  “I didn’t say that,” Ben said, cutting off Nicholas and glowering at Marietta.

  “No, but you’ve got the thought with you. Way in the back of your mind. It’s your safety net.”

  Nicholas said nothing as he steered the cruiser onto River Bend Road, but his hands tightened around the steering wheel.

  “But that’s okay,” Marietta continued, offering Ben an encouraging smile. “You’ll figure out where you need to be. You just need the time.”

  The gentle cadence of her voice was wounding, and Ben sank further against the uncomfortable seat. “Shouldn’t we talk about what goes down tonight?”

  “I’ll explain what happens tonight when everyone is around to hear it. I told you, I hate repeating myself. And besides, this is just as important.”

  Nicholas sighed, and Marietta’s focus shifted to him.

  “Don’t you roll your eyes, Nicholas Nolan. You think he’s scared without reason? Doesn’t matter how much you give him now, you still hurt him bad enough before that he doesn’t know how to just accept anybody’s love and tenderness. Not yet. You give him whatever time he needs, do you hear me?”

  Nicholas stared forward and grumbled something that sounded like an affirmation as he turned into Tucker’s driveway.

  Marietta’s words stung. Ben knew she was right; he was scared. His apprehension was the root of everything. He had built an entire career around the fears that had embedded themselves within him at an early age. There were fears of the dark and the things that dwelled in its shadows, of course, but there were other fears too. Fears not as easily defined or explained. Fears rooted in loss and abandonment and in loneliness and alienation.

  The Blue Tulip had been about all of those things. The novel was a ghost story in essence, but it was a psychological portrait of its author as well.

  An unnamed narrator speaks of Carmine—the beautiful Carmine—whose love he will never obtain. He is portrayed throughout the book as dwelling in the shadows like a strange creature consumed by his unfulfilled affection for a woman who is destined to never notice him. He slips out of rooms when she enters and lingers on her periphery long enough for him to observe her quiet grace and splendor unseen. She tends to her garden often; there is always one solitary blue tulip in bloom. Never more, never less.

  The narrator becomes infatuated with Carmine, whose blue eyes mirror the color of her beloved tulip.

  The twist—because there must always be a twist in such stories—is that the narrator is not the ghost as the reader has come to understand. Rather, Carmine is the spectral apparition of the house’s previous occupant, whose means of death is never revealed, though readers often speculate that she is buried beneath the flowerbed from which the lonely tulip grows.

  The narrator lives alongside the ghost and is careful to not disturb her repetitive routines as he is haunted by her residual presence. He convinces himself that if she ever sees him, she will realize her predicament and disappear from the house and his life completely. He observes her from the darkness as she brushes her fingertips across the petals of her solitary tulip each morning. Its singular beauty always seems to move her.

  When Carmine is not present, the garden is barren. The narrator lingers by the kitchen window in anticipation of the dawn’s wispy light for when he knows he will see her and her garden.

  The book concludes with the narrator in his darkened kitchen. His shoulders are tense as the sun rises, and he waits for the spectral blue tulip—and its owner—to appear.

  Nicholas, of course, was the blue tulip. He was Carmine. He was the ghost. He had haunted Ben’s entire adult life; he was the figure on the other side of the glass who was impossible to reach, to touch, to hold. Ben lived his life like the man who waited in a dark room for something—someone—that would never belong to him.

  His fears, from the strange experience he had shared with Nicholas in the forest during their adolescence to the image of his best friend walking away after saying ‘never’ to Ben’s declaration of love, were tied up in a bow and expressed through the symbolism and colorful wording of his first novel.

  Ben hated revisiting his own stories. He liked their covers closed so that they could be stored away, even if this meant stacking them in messy piles. But as he sat in the backseat of Nicholas’ cruiser, Ben wondered what would have happened if Carmine had ever noticed the figure in the kitchen window.

  Nicholas rolled to a stop by Tucker’s truck and put the car into park. Ben glanced up and noticed that Marietta was regarding him.

  “What a mess,” she whispered, and a mournful sigh escaped her lips.

  Nicholas frowned but did not reply. He got out of the car and opened the back door for Ben, who climbed out quickly in an effort to break free of the psychic’s penetrating gaze. Ben and Nicholas shared a look, but they turned when Tucker strolled out onto his front porch with his Remington and adjusted the red baseball cap on his head.

  “Get your shit done?” Ben called out, crossing the yard to the porch.

  “I did, thank you very much for asking,” Tucker replied.

  Nicholas hung back as Daniel pulled his cruiser to a halt at the end of the driveway.

  “You ready?” Ben asked.

  Tucker nodded and walked Ben to his truck. The bed was filled with the
bags of rock salt in addition to several makes of shotguns, two duffel bags containing their homemade salt rounds, three plastic jugs filled with what Ben assumed was holy water, and a few iron fireplace pokers.

  “Tucker, I aspire to your efficiency.”

  “You keep dreaming, son,” Tucker grumbled.

  Nicholas joined them and whistled at the plentitude of shotguns. “These all loaded, Bill?”

  “They wouldn’t be much good otherwise, Sheriff.”

  “That doesn’t exactly comply with the open carry transport code, you know.”

  “Then give me a ticket. I’ll write you a check for the fine right now, but you might not be able to cash it if you keep running your jaw.”

  “Just drive carefully,” Nicholas said. “Come on, Ben.”

  Ben hesitated and faced Nicholas. “If you don’t mind, I’ll ride with Tucker from here.”

  “Why?”

  “She’s kinda wigging me out,” Ben said and tilted his chin toward Marietta.

  The grimace Nicholas shot Ben was positively acerbic. “Thanks. Stick me with her, why don’t you?”

  “I can hear you!” Marietta called from the passenger seat.

  Nicholas’ shoulders sagged almost imperceptibly, and he let out a sigh. “Of course she can. Let’s go. I’ll lead.”

  Tucker clambered into the driver’s seat of his truck. Ben went around and got in the other side. Nicholas returned to his cruiser and reversed out of the driveway.

  Ben saw Marietta was speaking animatedly, and he wagered she was telling off Nicholas for his comment. Her head snapped forward abruptly, and she glared at Ben. He subsided against the worn bench seat as if to hide behind the safety of Tucker’s dashboard.

  “Her bark’s worse than her bite,” Tucker said.

  “I guess,” Ben replied.

  Tucker waited for Daniel to follow Nicholas before he made a left onto River Bend Road.

  “You ready for this?” Ben asked after a moment.

  “Hell no.”

  “Me too,” Ben sighed.

  Tucker narrowed his eyes at the cruiser in front of them. “Is that the mayor?”

  “Yep.”

  “How the hell’d you manage that?”

  “I can be convincing.”

  “Apparently,” Tucker said. “This oughta be fun.”

  Ben tried on a weak smile, though it faded almost immediately as the darkness of the surrounding forest encroached. Tension seeped into the truck like noxious exhaust fumes curling in through the air vents.

  “It’ll be fine,” he said, though more to himself than to Tucker. “We’ll do this. Right?”

  “You tell me, son. You’re the one who’s had all the faith this whole time.”

  “I don’t know that I’d call it ‘faith.’” Ben said. The concept fit him like those shoes that were still a size too small.

  “With faith comes doubt, I suppose,” Tucker said. He slowed, waiting for Daniel to turn left onto the derelict passage that led up to the factory. For the first time, Ben noticed that Tucker was wearing a cross around his neck. There was a small medallion connected to the chain, along with two silver wedding rings.

  “You seem to have found yours.”

  “Funny, that,” Tucker said, following Daniel’s cruiser. The headlights on the truck bounced off the thicket of trees and shrubbery, casting odd shadows on the road.

  “Who’s on the medal?”

  “Saint Christopher,” Tucker said. “Protects you on your journeys.” He paused for a moment. “It was my Shirley’s. She always wanted to go some place nicer.”

  Tucker clutched at the steering wheel. His knuckles bore scuffs and scrapes as evidence of their previous day’s labor. Ben recalled Nicholas’ gruesome revelation about Shirley Tucker’s death and took in a deep breath. He kept quiet the rest of the way, noting that Tucker’s grip never wavered.

  The dark bricks of the factory shone in the dwindling fire of the sky as the sun began its lazy descent. They climbed out of the truck when Tucker parked beside Daniel. Tucker offered a curt greeting to Stewart after Astrid let him out of the back of their cruiser.

  The door to the truck bed fell open with a loud squeak of its hinges, and Tucker doled out the shotguns. Ben took his and grabbed the duffel bags as Tucker passed the iron pokers to Stewart and heaved the rock salt to Daniel and Astrid while Nicholas took the jugs of holy water.

  Astrid and Daniel carried their loads without question. Daniel’s jaw was set tight as he scanned the tree line and shifted the rock salt in his arms. Astrid trailed close to Ben, who led them toward the factory. If they all made it through the night, Ben resolved to buy them both as many rounds of whatever they drank as they wanted.

  When you don’t see the point, go to The Point, after all.

  Ben headed to the side of the building where the tree had fallen. When he rounded the corner, he froze.

  “Where the fuck is my car?”

  Nicholas inspected the empty space where the Camaro had been parked the night before. The tire tracks were still present in the muddy slush as proof that the car had been there, but there were no marks to show it had been driven from the area.

  “It was here when we got the ammo last night,” Nicholas said.

  “Fuck everything,” Ben said, and he wanted to throw one of the bags he carried at the factory’s brickwork.

  Marietta slapped Ben’s arm when she joined his side. “Language, Benjamin. There’s an angel present.”

  At her words, the party came to a halt. Stewart clutched one of the pokers in his right hand and edged closer to Nicholas, who adjusted his hold on the holy water he carried as if preparing to drop the jugs and reach for the shotgun he had slung over his shoulder instead.

  “Where?” Daniel demanded.

  “He’s around,” Marietta replied. She entered the factory, crossing over the salt line that Ben had poured the previous day.

  Ben followed her, but he frowned over his shoulder at the woods. Andrew had given him that car. Andrew had asked about its oil changes and tire pressure more often over the years than he had ever asked about Ben’s wellbeing. Andrew would never be able to enquire about the state of its mileage again.

  Marietta cleared her throat and shot Ben another look. He glowered like a petulant child before he turned away from the forest.

  The group congregated inside the factory. Tucker headed up the rear to ensure the salt line remained undisturbed under the shuffle of their feet.

  Ben dropped the duffel bags in the middle of the floor by the pit, but he kept the Remington in his hand. He straightened and saw Astrid and Daniel were peering down into the deep hole.

  “Who dug the grave?” Daniel asked. The cadence of his voice lilted with an attempt at levity, but the humor of the question fell as flat as the reviews for Ben’s zombie novel that Daniel had brought up the night before.

  “We did,” Tucker replied, his voice brusque like he was daring the deputy to ask for a digging permit.

  “You really were digging a hole to China,” Astrid said, turning to Ben.

  Ben shrugged and noticed that Nicholas was watching him. The sheriff seemed distant as if his thoughts were settled on some weightier matter than the present topic of conversation. Ben wondered if Marietta had said something during their private ride to the factory, but he forced the thought out of his head.

  “Must have taken you a while,” Daniel said with a long whistle of appreciation.

  “Hours,” Ben replied. “So what do we do now?” he asked Marietta, who had dropped her duffel bag to the floor to sift through its contents in the dim light. The sun was setting fast, and the factory’s interior grew even darker.

  “Ford, Thomas, help Ms. Abernathy with whatever she needs,” Nicholas said suddenly. “Ben, come with me, please. We should get the floodlights from my car. I think we’ll need them.”

  “Yeah, okay.” Ben brought Tucker’s spare Remington upright and followed Nicholas outside while Marietta sent the othe
rs off around the room with different tasks.

  “We’ll find your car,” Nicholas said when they were out of earshot. His tone was soothing despite the tense set of his shoulders as they strode out to the cruisers.

  “My dad gave me that car,” Ben said, voicing his thoughts from the factory, and his hands tightened around the shotgun’s stock.

  “I know,” Nicholas said. “We’ll find it.”

  He popped the trunk of his cruiser. There was a small arsenal of rifles and handguns in addition to an array of flashlights and portable floodlights. Ben looked over at Nicholas with raised eyebrows.

  “Always be prepared,” Nicholas said, shrugging.

  “Boy Scout.”

  “Wiseass.”

  The gentle use of the nickname calmed Ben just as effectively as it had so many years ago when they had huddled together on the front seat of Tucker’s Ford. Ben draped the strap of his shotgun over his chest and grabbed as many of the lights as he could carry.

  Nicholas took the others, balanced them so that he still had his own shotgun at the ready, and closed the trunk. They returned to the factory unimpeded. When they crossed the salt line, Marietta was still crouched in the middle of the floor. She seemed to be praying.

  Ben and Nicholas set the floodlights so that they were angled toward the center of the room until the entire space was illuminated. The dirt and grime of the factory showed like never before, and Ben wondered if Raziel’s promised protection ensured their safety against toxic mold poisoning.

  Stewart stood near Marietta with his arms folded over his chest. He frowned at something across the room, and Ben followed his gaze. Stewart was staring at the wall that Ben had speculated served as the brake pad for something big when it had been thrown through the other side of the building.

  “Can I just be the one to say that this is absolutely, utterly, and completely fucking nuts?” Stewart asked, and his voice echoed through the room. “Angels? And fallen angels? I mean, just take a minute. Take a long, hard minute here, people.”

  “Silas, you agreed to come,” Nicholas said.

  “Yeah, but that don’t mean I can’t leave.”

  “No,” Nicholas said with a surprising amount of authority given that he was addressing the mayor. “We need you.”