Sparkle

by Rudy Yuly

  Joe had played it on his acoustic guitar like a grunge MTV Unplugged cover, a lot slower than the original, and kind of soulful. Eddie had come in and played his part perfectly. It had sounded great. How old had they been? Eddie was maybe still in his teens. At the time they were both living with their aunt, and Eddie was doing some strange upsetting stuff. Joe had thought he could teach him a bunch of songs, and maybe he could be in the band Joe was going to start. Not all the time, just on certain songs.

  But when Joe tried to teach Eddie another song…what was it? It took Joe a minute to remember. Oh, yeah. “Love Me Do,” by the Beatles. When Joe tried to teach Eddie the new song, all Eddie would do is play the part from “What I Like about You” over and over and over. Nothing would budge him. Joe figured out pretty quick that was the only song Eddie was ever going to play—and that was the end of that.

  The truth was, if Joe really wanted to make this change happen, he was going to have to gear himself up to pay one hell of a price. There was never any way to predict what the sticking point might be with Eddie, but there was almost always something. And once that wall was hit, it took everything Joe could muster to get around it. Most of the time, it wasn’t even remotely worth the effort.

  Eddie couldn’t take his eyes off the gun. He was desperately trying to conjure Jolie’s memory. “Remember, I’m trusting you,” she had said before she sent him home. Her voice had been sweet and caring, even as she sent him away. It crossed his mind that before this week, he had hardly ever tried to remember things in the past.

  “I know you’ll do the right thing.” Is that what she had said? What had her voice sounded like? What had she looked like when she was speaking? Why hadn’t he paid more attention? Why hadn’t he been able to look at her when she spoke to him? Was this going to be taken away from him, too?

  Eddie opened his eyes and looked at the couch next to him. The stain on the wall hadn’t changed.

  Jolie being dead was bad enough. But he hadn’t prepared himself to handle this. He had counted on being able to free her spirit, to feel her final parting touch and know he had helped her with his special gift. But her being gone, forever and without a trace, was more than Eddie could stand.

  Eddie knew how guns worked. You just pulled the trigger and things changed forever. People went away and they never came back.

  This was the gun that shot Jolie. It had taken her away. Why wouldn’t it speak to him?

  He took the gun out of its baggy and held it in his hand. He wondered how it felt to be shot. Would it hurt much? Or would you just be out of your body, waiting for someone to help you go where the spirits were supposed to go? He put his finger on the trigger and held the gun up to look at it more closely. If he used it on himself, would he go where Jolie was?

  “Just let go!” It was his mom’s voice. It was urgent, and it immediately stilled the other racket in his head.

  It was deadly quiet in the room.

  “Just let go!” The voice was more pleading this time.

  Eddie’s hand holding the gun drooped, sagging, into his lap. He put the weapon back in the plastic bag, carefully, and placed it inside his Mariners bag. Nothing in this room was going to help him. There was no escape, no fixing or taking back the horrible things that happened in the world every day.

  Whatever he did, he did for himself.

  Not for Jolie, not for his mom or his dad. Not even for Joe.

  Could all the things he had told himself he had done for other people—the wholehearted, soul-wrenching things—have been nothing but a trick? A trick to help him hide? A trick to help him feel safe? A trick he had played on himself?

  “Just let go.”

  It sounded like a whisper now, like a dying sigh. Like he might never hear it again.

  Eddie’s heart swelled and his face began to change. His eyes squeezed shut tightly and seemed to come closer together. The texture of his skin coarsened. His cheeks went crimson.

  He began to weep. He held both hands tightly against his face. It was silent at first.

  Then a small sound came out. It repeated over and over. “Huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh.”

  It went on for a long time. It was the most exhausting thing Eddie had ever experienced, and he sank down onto the floor. “Huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh, huh-huh-huh-huh.” His hands and face were soaked with tears and mucus. He tasted salt and struggled to breathe. When there seemed to be nothing left, Eddie was left sprawled on the floor in front of Jolie’s couch, gasping for air, unable to move. That, at least, was some comfort.

  He laid there and felt the tears dry on his face. He noticed how puffy and sore his whole face felt, how hot his eyes burned. His nose, which was always clear, was completely clogged, forcing him to breathe through his dry mouth and into his raw painful throat.

  Eddie had been drained of something. Something he had believed was no longer true. Something that was holding him back. It had stood like a wall between him and his memories, caged him in a small barren room with no future and past. Now that it was gone he could almost see things that were long lost. He could almost feel things he had never felt. But not quite.

  Then Eddie fell asleep. Whether it was for a moment or an hour, he couldn’t tell. There were no dreams.

  Chapter 48

  When Eddie woke up, he felt strange. Like another person. He was in a cage. He had lived there for years, but his work with the dead had been an amazing window into something beautiful and real, something no one else could see, and the window had kept him sane.

  Now, when he needed it most, the window was closed. Jolie wasn’t here. Mom wasn’t here. Even Lucy Silver was gone now, out of reach. Eddie had broken all his promises. He was in a cage and there was no way out. His heart filled with panic, similar but far worse than when he was touched unexpectedly. He rose to his knees, the adrenaline pumping and forcing him to move.

  He was trapped. He stood and looked around wildly. He’d spent his life cleaning up after other people, never asking for anything more. Just one gift. Just one window. He’d given up everything for it.

  He began to pant and his head was spinning. Jolie wasn’t here. This wasn’t her place; these weren’t her things. She was gone forever, except for one pathetic dead stain. He had never even told her how much he cared about her. He had to get out.

  Eddie reeled and knocked into an end table. A lamp crashed to the floor. It felt good somehow.

  It’s not my mess!

  Just let go.

  “No!” Eddie raised his voice. “No! No!” He had to get out.

  He stumbled through the room, not seeing or caring to see. Then everything went blank. Completely, utterly blank.

  His body started to smash things. He grabbed a mirror off the wall and threw it at the bloodstained wall. It splintered into a million fragments. He tipped over the couch. He kicked holes in the walls. He broke the lamps and knocked the pictures down and into pieces. He went into the kitchen and threw the vase full of wilted carnations and daisies onto the floor. He tipped over the table and broke a chair against the water faucet. It started squirting everywhere.

  Eddie ripped open the door of the refrigerator and pulled the whole heavy thing down, scattering its meager contents across the linoleum floor with an enormous crash.

  He moved from room to room, breaking, breaking, breaking. With everything he wrecked, his body felt a little lighter.

  He felt as if he was tearing down his cage.

  Joe’s heart sank as the cute little house came in sight. He parked in front, then lit a smoke to bring himself fully back to reality. He needed to stop kidding himself, get a grip. His silly daydreams didn’t mean a thing. Regardless of what he—or even Eddie—wanted, they’d probably be doing this same crummy job until one of them was dead. What else did they know? Who would ever hire either one of them? He had to face facts.
This was the only way they would ever make a decent living. They were nothing but janitors, and no ordinary janitorial jobs were going to properly support them.

  Joe got out and walked up to the front door. The street was quiet. He experienced a fleeting dreadful fear that the entire block was completely deserted. Every house had dead people in it, and he and Eddie weren’t going anywhere until every one of them was cleaned up.

  He knocked on the door. “Eddie, it’s four!” he said loudly. “You ready?”

  The window next to the door exploded outward with a huge crash. A dining room chair flew through it and bounced on the lawn.

  Joe flinched and cowered, throwing up his arms defensively. Had someone come in and attacked Eddie? He pushed open the door, crouched and ready for a fight.

  Eddie was in the dining room, breathing heavily, poised to throw another chair through the window.

  “No!” Joe shouted. “Eddie! What the hell are you doing?”

  Eddie froze for a second. Then he threw the chair through the window.

  “Eddie! Eddie! Stop! Stop it!” Joe wanted to move but seemed rooted to the floor. All he could do was yell.

  Eddie was looking around wildly for something else to break. But he’d done a pretty good job of it. There wasn’t much left. He had a look on his face that scared the crap out of Joe. He’d never in his life seen Eddie look like that. He looked pissed. Mad—scary mad. He looks like Dad.

  “Eddie, calm down.” Joe tried to sound calm himself. “What happened?”

  Eddie looked over at Joe, right in the eye. It was only for a second, but it caught Joe by surprise. Then he ran directly at Joe, brushed by him, and went out the door.

  “Great,” Joe said under his breath. He turned and ran after his brother.

  For a minute, Eddie seemed to be headed for the van. Joe thought he might get in and shut the door, and that would be the end of his fit. Maybe this was Eddie’s incredibly dysfunctional way of saying sayonara to cleaning. That made a sort of twisted sense.

  But Eddie reached the van, took a hard right, and kept running.

  Joe followed. “Damn you, Eddie! Eddie, stop! Come back here right now!” As Joe started to come up behind him, Eddie turned around abruptly and stopped. Joe pulled up short, gasping for breath.

  “Just let go!” Eddie yelled at him. “Just let go!”

  “What in God’s name are you talking about?” Joe shouted, panting, his hands on his knees. “Do you have any idea, any clue, what you just did in there? Huh? Do I have to spell it out for you? Like everything?”

  “Just let go!” Eddie yelled.

  “Screw you, Eddie!” Joe stood up straight and slapped a hand on the painful stitch in his side. “This isn’t what I thought you meant when you said you didn’t want to clean anymore. I’m done watching over you and cleaning up after your screw-ups.”

  “Just let go!” Eddie yelled.

  Joe grabbed him by the shirt.

  Eddie punched Joe in the nose. Joe fell down hard, holding his face.

  Eddie turned around and ran.

  “I’m going to frickin’ kill you!” Joe yelled, scrambling to his feet and sprinting after his brother. Despite his lack of wind, he was a faster runner. Without thinking, filled with fury, he took a flying dive at Eddie’s legs.

  Eddie went facedown onto the pavement at top speed.

  Oh shit. Joe was going to scream at Eddie again, but the anger drained out of him as he realized his brother was completely still. Both Joe’s arms were bleeding where they were wrapped around Eddie’s legs. Eddie just lay there on his face, his arms stretched over his head.

  Joe scrambled to his knees, rolled him over, and listened to his chest. Eddie was breathing, shallow but regular, and his face had collapsed back into the calm, peaceful expression Joe knew so well.

  Except that he was bleeding and pale, and a huge knot was forming on his forehead.

  Joe could barely catch his breath. He shook his brother lightly. “Eddie! Eddie!”

  Eddie didn’t move.

  Joe found his cell phone and dialed 911. Before he could hit send, he recognized Detective Louis’s Crown Victoria coming down the street.

  Louis had come to the job site looking for the brothers because he was worried. Extremely worried. But he wanted to play his cards slowly and carefully.

  Louis was nursing an ugly suspicion that Eddie might somehow be involved in the shooting of Jolie Walker. He’d just heard some news that would not stop looping through his brain: The Walker girl worked as a guide and keeper at the zoo.

  Louis knew all about Eddie’s weekly trip to see the animals. Joe had mentioned it to him on more than one occasion, usually in response to Louis ribbing him about taking proper care of Eddie. Louis didn’t know how well—or even if—Eddie knew Jolie Walker. But the information that she was a zoo employee, coupled with what Joe had spilled about Eddie disappearing and coming home bloody on the night of the murder, was extremely worrisome.

  It was almost impossible for Louis to imagine. But there was so much about Eddie that was simply impenetrable. Even worse, if Eddie was involved, Joe was going to get dragged into it too—although he did seem to be genuinely in the dark and irritated by his brother’s strange behavior.

  If Eddie was the shooter, Louis was going to be hugely disappointed. He really cared about the brothers, and he’d shown it in the best way he knew how: by putting himself on the line, over and over, to keep their business going.

  The last thing he expected to see as he drove up was a house full of broken windows. Furniture littered the lawn, and Eddie and Joe were in a heap, beaten to hell, Joe waving weakly and Eddie unconscious.

  Louis jumped out of his car. “What happened?”

  “No idea,” Joe drawled. He was sitting next to Eddie, eyes unfocused. Shock. “Could you call us an ambulance, please? Can I bum a smoke?”

  Louis got on his knees and put his fingers gently on Eddie’s neck to feel for a pulse. He leaned his ear to Eddie’s mouth. He seemed to be breathing almost normally, but he was definitely out cold. That was never a good sign.

  Louis dug out his smokes and threw the pack to Joe. He sprinted back to his car and made the call, then hurried back to lean over Joe, who was struggling to light a smoke. “Just sit still, Joe.” He held out his lighter.

  “So,” Joe said, “what are you doing here?”

  Best to keep him talking. “I wanted to ask Eddie a few questions. I guess that’s going to have to wait, though. What happened?”

  “I got here to pick him up and he had just gone nuts. He ran…away. I only wanted to c-c-catch him. The place is totally trashed. He…broke… everything.” Joe put his face in his hands and started to cry. That, at least, was a good sign.

  Louis took a deep breath. “You know whose house this is, son?”

  “No, I don’t know whose damn…house this is,” Joe coughed, laughing and crying at the same time. Was Louis really going to rib him now?

  “Do you know Jolie Walker?” Louis said.

  “Jolie Walker…from the zoo?”

  “I’m afraid so, Joe.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “This is her house, Joe. She’s the one who got shot.”

  Joe dropped his smoke. “I’m so stupid.” He buried his face in his hands and sobbed.

  Louis reached out and put his hand on Joe’s arm. “Listen, Joe. Listen to me. The Walker girl—Jolie Walker—she’s not dead.”

  Joe raised his head. “What?”

  “She’s not dead, Joe. She’s in a coma. I mean…her condition isn’t great, but there’s a chance she might make it.”

  Joe put his head down and started to cry again.

  Louis put his arms around Joe and held on until the ambulance arrived.

  Chapter 49

  The staff at the zoo was in a state of shock. Easygoing, pretty, likable Jolie had been shot. Right after her birthday. It was awful. It had been Mark’s job to act as point man and break the news to everyone who hadn’
t seen it in the paper or on TV.

  Everyone could tell how upset Mark was. He had stayed in his tiny office all day Wednesday, and it appeared that he was going to do it again today. His eyes were glazed and badly bloodshot, and he seemed far away, crabby, and distracted.

  Every once in awhile someone would knock on his door, which was normally never closed, and peek inside. “How’s Jolie?” they’d ask, or, “Any word on Jolie?”

  The word Mark had was that she was in a coma, in intensive care at Harborview Hospital, and her chances of making it were something like fifty-fifty.

  It was extremely upsetting news.

  When he had left Jolie’s house, he was sure she was dead. He’d accidentally shot her in the head, for God’s sake.

  But she was alive. If she survived, and if she came out of her coma, he’d be in unimaginable trouble. Why hadn’t he just called the cops and reported the accident.

  Instead, he’d tried to cover things up. Why had he done that? He’d been so shocked and drunk that he’d automatically gotten up and walked out the door. But not too drunk to carefully wipe away his fingerprints.

  Now who knew what the charges would be? First-degree murder? Second? There was no way he would be able to convince anyone it had been an accident.

  It was all Eddie’s fault. If it weren’t for that dangerous, unstable idiot and Jolie’s foolish faith in him, Mark never would have had to offer her a gun. She’d have been fine if she’d only been willing to listen to reason.

  It was a terrible situation in so many ways. He’d only been bluffing about suicide, but it was starting to look like an option.

  A businesslike knock sounded on his door.

  “Yes,” Mark snapped. “Come in.”