Shadows Burned In

by Chris Pourteau

  (like a slouch)

  and cried about being punished.

  “No one likes a whiner, David,” he heard his father’s voice saying. “The world don’t suffer complainers. Do what you have to do and don’t bitch and moan about it. Learn that and you’ll save yourself a shitload of grief along the way.”

  He heard a chair leg screech from the kitchen. David sat bolt upright on his knees. The quick action pressed his kneecaps into the tile again, and pain shot up his thighs.

  At least they’re going to sleep, he thought mercifully.

  He listened intently for his father to come, bare feet slapping on the cold, hard tile. But the slapping stopped in the kitchen with the creak of the refrigerator door. David cocked his ears to every sound, projecting the events on the screen in his mind. He heard containers scraping on the thick-wired shelves of the refrigerator, the muffled hollow hum of bottles as they were moved around. Obviously his father was searching for something. And by the cursing the boy heard, he wasn’t finding it.

  David cringed at the bellowing voice, then immediately realized his fear had bent him over, so he sat straight up again, his knees more numb now but still awake enough to feel pain.

  “Goddammit!”

  The boy closed his eyes and swallowed. The slapping started again, and it was getting louder.

  “David!”

  He made sure he was sitting up straight. His knees were so numb now they didn’t really hurt anymore. He smiled inwardly at his little secret. I’ll kneel here all damned day, you sonofa—

  “I’m out of beer,” said his father as his feet slapped to a stop behind the boy. “I’m going to the store. You stay in that position till I get back. You understand?”

  “Y-yes, sir.”

  “Good,” said the man, “but just to make sure . . .”

  David heard some rustling—a paper bag, it sounded like—then felt little puffs of air wafting up from around his bent legs. He chanced a glance down once and saw his father pouring flour around his kneeling position. Why in the—

  “Eyes front!”

  He jerked his head around.

  “Move an inch and I’ll be able to tell,” said his father in a low voice. “This flour is spread for three feet around you, boy. You move an inch, you even breathe anywhere but right at the wall, and I’ll see it. And then you’d wished you was only on your knees when I got through with you. Understand?”

  All hope left David then. When he’d first heard his father announce he was off to buy beer, he’d seen a way out, at least a short parole from his sentence. But not now.

  Why didn’t you just mow the fucking yard! he screamed at himself. Idiot!

  “I’m talking to you, boy.”

  “Y-yes, sir,” he answered reflexively.

  “Mmmm.”

  slap – slap, slap – slap

  As his father’s footfalls echoed away, David started crying and didn’t care anymore. At least his father was leaving. He closed his eyes and let the tears come, leaning his head against the wall and sagging back on his haunches, totally defeated. He heard his father’s keys jingle, then the back door slam. David started at the sound. Part of him was relieved to be alone in the house under any circumstances. Most of him hated his father for outsmarting him. Even gone, the old man had him trapped.

  He looked around at the white powder prison walls. There was no way he could stand up and jump far enough without somehow disturbing the flour.

  He was so angry he could hardly breathe!

  So trapped.

  The utter silence of the house pressed in on him then. The whole reality of living here with his father, alone, weighed heavy on him. He swore he could actually feel his knees being crushed.

  tick

  Even if he wanted to get up, he couldn’t without flour going everywhere. His legs were asleep.

  tock

  Betrayed by his own legs now.

  Idiot!

  And beyond the echo in his head, he heard the grandfather clock behind him. He hadn’t thought of it before. But now, with the old man gone and only his own thoughts to scream at him, the silence was broken solely by the clock.

  tick

  The clock mocked him.

  Pointed an hour hand at him and laughed.

  tock

  Made faces

  (clock faces, with a mocking moon turning in its course to mark the seasons)

  at him

  (Mr. Moon, with one eye winking and a knowing grin)

  as if to say

  (I see you there, little boy, kneeling on the floor)

  and cracking wisely

  (each moment is worth remembering)

  and saying helpfully

  (let me count the moments for you)

  and adding its own brand of bleak humor

  (by tick-tock-ticking them off for you)

  because being a grandfather clock was so boring, and any little distraction, even a little boy kneeling, would surely help to pass the time, now wouldn’t it?

  David pictured Mr. Moon slowly revolving—so slow he couldn’t even see him move. But Mr. Moon moved, oh yes he moved, and with every

  tick

  of the tick-tock clock he moved a little more, invisibly, through the course of the seasons.

  David was suddenly very scared to have the grandfather clock behind him, where he could make his Mr. Moon clock faces at him, and the boy could sense his mocking blue-cheese grin burning into the back of his skull. He turned his head to the left but couldn’t see Mr. Moon very well. He was directly behind the boy. But David could hear the

  (tsk-tsk)

  of Mr. Moon the Tick-Tock Clock making fun of him for not doing as he was told

  (should’ve mown the grass)

  when he was told to do it.

  He tried to shift around a little more to face his accuser, and his left leg went out from under him. His dead nerves couldn’t pull it back in time. His foot shot out, cutting a wide swath through the flour. The white dust sprang into the air like the end of a magic trick.

  Horror flooded his limbs. Blood and adrenaline raced through him. His heart beat hard. His eyes, wide now at what he’d done, dried of their own accord. David glared at the clock, and Mr. Moon looked down at him with his blue-cheese, knowing smile

  (tsk-tsk)

  and marked the moments, one after the other.

  (how many left till Daddy returns)

  The thought terrified the boy. He looked at the broad path his foot had made through the flour. The pumping blood began to revive his legs, and tiny pinpricks of pain pulsed through his knees and thighs. Knowing the mess was already made, he put his palms flat on the tile and tried to raise himself up. His legs were still slow to respond, but he willed them, willed them under him. As he drew his left leg up beneath him, he saw the flour clinging to his jeans. How do you get flour out of clothes? he wondered. David stood up now, leaning against the wall, and stared at the mess.

  bong

  David almost peed himself as the clock struck the hour.

  (how long has he been gone, boy)

  bong

  (how long will he be gone, boy)

  He stared desperately around. Clean up the floor, idiot. See if you can do that right!

  bong

  David was desperate now, forgetting all about the punishment, all his thought bent on cleaning up the flour. He tiptoed through the mess and into the kitchen to get the broom and dustpan.

  bong

  As he walked back to the scene of the crime, David gasped. There was a short patch of carpet between the entryway and the kitchen, and he’d just tracked flour across it. The dirt-brown carpet was now bespeckled with white flecks. Oh my God, oh my God—idiot!

  bong

  “First the floor,” he said to himself.

  He went to the broken white semicircle and began sweeping it back into the pattern his father had made. The silence returned and he looked at the clock. It was five P.M. He had ten minutes at most to cle
an all this up. The store wasn’t that far away.

  He brushed off his pant leg, then swept the flour into a little pile and scooped it into the dustpan with the broom. Then he resumed reconstructing the barrier his father had made. He was careful not to make it quite so wide, else he’d never be able to get back inside it. He hoped the old man wouldn’t notice.

  Once he’d cleaned up the mess on the floor, he went to the coat closet, got out the vacuum cleaner, and went to work on the carpet. David tried to work fast, because with the vacuum cleaner running, he wouldn’t hear if his father returned. Maybe a little too spotless, he thought, looking at the clean patch he’d just made. It seemed just the slightest bit cleaner than the surrounding carpet. Maybe he won’t notice, David hoped again.

  He put the vacuum cleaner up and returned the broom and dustpan to the kitchen after rinsing both off in the sink.

  ding-ding-ding-dong . . . ding-ding-dong-ding

  The clock chimed the half hour.

  (better hurry, boy)

  David slipped it into overdrive, returning to the entryway and staring at the flour prison. He was free. He was out. Escaped. And here he was putting himself back in again, of his own free will.

  Idiot.

  He stared at the flour and thought his father, if he was lucky, would’ve started drinking the beer before he got back. If he’d had enough of it, David knew from experience, chances were he’d forget ever having punished the boy. On the other hand, there was all this flour here in a semicircle.

  thrrrruuummmmmmmmmm

  The distant, grinding mechanical sound startled the boy out of his options. The garage door was rising.

  His father was home.

  tick

  He stood for a moment more, reveling in the defiant thought of his father coming in and finding him outside the flour prison. He would take great pride in how upset, startled, and thrown for a loop his father would be to find the punishment abandoned. Right before David suffered retribution for his revolution.

  tock

  There was a pause from outside, then the thrumming started again as the garage door descended.

  David carefully lifted his leg over the flour wall to climb back in again.

  tick

  His heart beat faster as he heard the back door open.

  tock

  He stood in the semicircle now, staring straight at the wall. Carefully he began to lower himself to the floor. His legs, as if they knew what was coming, tried to slow him down.

  ticktock

  His father was unloading the beer into the fridge. He didn’t bother to take the cans out of their twelve-pack cartons. He just slid them onto the wire shelves.

  David put one knee down, then the other, wincing. He heard the fridge door close and two shoes being kicked off two feet.

  Knees still hurting from the last time, he sat straight up, facing the wall.

  slap – slap – slap

  So close to freedom. Tasted it. Walked it.

  “David,” said his father.

  He closed his eyes. I won’t cry, I won’t cry, I won’t.

  “You gonna mow the grass next time I tell you?”

  David bit his lip and clenched his eyes shut, trying to squeeze the tears away.

  “Y-yes, sir.”

  His father said, “Then you can get up.” He heard the old man turn away.

  David breathed deeply once and lifted himself up. He was determined not to disturb the flour when he did it. It was a test. To prove to himself that he could do it.

  What, up again? his legs screamed at him. Can’t you make up your mind?

  But he stood up slowly, using the wall for balance, and not a bit of flour was moved. He smiled inwardly. A tiny victory.

  His father poked his head back around the kitchen door. “Oh, and get the broom and dustpan and clean that shit up.”

  Chapter 9

  While his father snored an evening away in his chair watching 60 Minutes, David spent Sunday night stretching out his freedom. Sunday nights were always bittersweet for the boy. Even after he went to bed, he’d try to hold his eyes open as long as he could, savoring every moment before the school week began again.

  Tonight he lay in bed, thinking about Halloween on Wednesday. He and Theron Taylor wanted to do something really special. No treats for this one. Tricks only, he thought. That’s all we want on Halloween. A trick to end all tricks. But so far they hadn’t decided what to do.

  David stared up at the fan blades cutting blurry slices from the ceiling above him. It was nice and cool now. Fall blew into Texas like a sudden rain soaking a parched field. Chapped lips were soothed. Foreheads were dried. People came out of their houses again for the pure pleasure of standing outside and commenting on the cool.

  Which makes it the perfect time for a Halloween trick, David thought as he fell asleep.

  The boy was still thinking that the next morning in class when Mrs. McKinley repeated his name again.

  “Well, Mr. Jackson?”

  He started, looking around. The other kids sniggered. Even Theron. Freddie Martinez hadn’t, though. He didn’t want to attract Mrs. McKinley’s attention. He didn’t know the answer either.

  “I said, how do we make a fraction into a whole number?” Her attitude made it seem like she half hoped he wouldn’t get the answer right. Come on, it seemed to say. Please mess up. Let me ridicule you in front of the entire class.

  David was a deer caught in the headlights. How did he get here? The last thing he remembered was lying in bed, planning Halloween . . . and then the monotony of the morning came back to him: waking up suddenly from some dream he didn’t remember, looking at the clock, realizing he’d fallen asleep. Back to jail again, he’d thought, rising slowly to go to the bathroom. Monday morning, and time for school. New week, same old routine.

  And here he was in first period. Math. They’d just finished learning how to find a common denominator in fractions, and Mrs. McKinley, the just-out-of-college teacher and advisor for the Hampshire Junior Varsity cheerleaders, was asking them the procedure for converting a fraction into a whole number.

  Theron Taylor, David’s best friend, watched Mrs.—or “Miss,” as the students invariably called her—McKinley pace back and forth in front of the chalkboard. David, sitting next to him, was totally lost, but Theron had his mind on something else. Even as Mrs. McKinley repeated her question, he was planning his strategy.

  There. Two more feet, thought Theron. That’s all. Just two more feet.

  “Mr. Jackson, will you kindly stay awake?” she asked, finally breaking the leaden silence. “I’ll come back to you in a minute with another question.” Mrs. McKinley sought another draftee, since no volunteer was forthcoming. Her eyes lit on Theron’s face staring intently up at her. Good as any, I guess, she thought, smiling down at him.

  Theron only partly heard her repeat the question to him. She was beautiful. Young, blonde, and nice bazongas, he thought. And almost right where he wanted her.

  “How about you, Mr. Taylor? Any ideas how to make a fraction into the whole number one?”

  Was she talking to him? Had she said something? He didn’t know, but he did know that she was nearly positioned perfectly.

  Mrs. McKinley cleared her throat. “Mr. Taylor? Has your hearing problem returned from yesterday?”

  When he failed to answer her, she moved one step closer.

  Off went the pencil from his desk, and no, she hadn’t noticed that he’d knocked it off on purpose. He smiled inwardly as he noticed that he’d damn near centered the No. 2 on top of the small, almost imperceptible “X” mark he and Freddie had made on the cheap carpet with the chalk. They had then rubbed it out, of course, leaving the slightest smudge to mark the spot.

  “Oh . . .” he said. “I’m sorry, Miss McKinley.”

  She smirked slightly, sure that this had been one of those delaying tactics the boys in the class always pulled on her. They’d taught her all about such tactics in the education courses sh
e’d taken at The University of Texas. “They all think they can fool you with their little games, Jill,” her professor with benefits had warned her. “You need to take them by their freshly grown short hairs and show them who’s boss.” Yes, the boys in this class in particular were always ready and willing to test her, and she always met the test with the same resolve.

  “Mr. Taylor, answer the question, please.” Her unconscious smirk of triumph waited as the boy formed his answer. From the corner of her eye, she noticed David’s right hand finally creep into the air, but Jill McKinley ignored it. You’re not going to pull one over on me, little mister. I’ve been trained by the best.

  “Uh—could you get my pencil for me, Miss McKinley?” asked Theron.

  The smirk grew wider, more hungry, more satisfied. “After you answer the question, Mr. Taylor.”

  He shrugged. Whatever it took. “What was the question again?”

  Now she was getting angry, and her eyes showed it. They reminded Theron of the way his mother looked when she was about to call his father to come and thwack him one. He wondered if Mrs. McKinley would also call him by all three of his names and grab him up by the ear the way his mother did.

  Mrs. McKinley took a deep breath, still ignoring David’s now fully extended arm. “The question was, Mr. Taylor, how do you make a fraction into a whole number?”

  Theron actually looked pensive for a moment. Nothing like the promise of what was to come to spur his mathematical prowess, limited as it might be, into action.

  “Um, you multiply it by its inverse, right?”

  The class was silent. No one seemed to be breathing. Jill McKinley paused and placed her right elbow in her left hand, regarding Theron with an amused stare and stroking her chin with thumb and forefinger. Theron noticed that her right breast was cupped quite nicely in the crook of her arm, squeezing it up to make the slightest raised hill peeking out of her blouse. She stared at him for a moment, a smile creeping across her lips.

  “Well, Mr. Taylor, as surprised as I am, you seem to have come up with the correct answer. Now, I’ll be happy to pick up that pencil.”

  Mrs. McKinley bent over to pick it up, and in the short eternity she needed to grasp the pencil, Theron and every other boy in the class raised themselves at least six inches from their chairs. Theron, who had the best vantage point—as was only fair, since he’d taken the chance and dropped the pencil—could see right down the front of her blouse into her cleavage. A white-lace bra today, he thought, hoping beyond hope to catch a glimpse of that ever-elusive nipple. Damn. She rose and, as if choreographed with her movement upward, the boys all settled back into their seats. An audible breath, audible at least to the girls—who had all rolled their eyes in disgust—exhaled across the room.