King of Joy

by Richard Chiem

  Corvus can see something in the water. She watches Marco furiously barking and looks back toward the mansion and the island. More and more hippos dive into the water.

  Valerie hears the sound of the terrible motor from the boat and pops over the net and the buoys. The net splinters apart in the water, the buoys separate and knock against one another. Valerie moves like a demon in the water.

  Tim looks straight ahead then back down to Amber and Marco, completely unaware of anything happening beneath the water. Valerie’s head resurfaces a few yards from the boat, popping up to take a breath, eyes mad with frenzy and a sharp black color. Blood sweat. This is his lake, and he wants the boat.

  Marco barks at the charging hippo, but Tim does not turn around, still pointing his saber at Amber. His other hand guides the boat’s steering wheel, and Corvus can finally see the hippo approaching, a rising bulge in the water.

  Marco barks and jumps to bite Tim’s hand, sinking his teeth into his flesh, as Tim screams in pain.

  Corvus rises and grabs the saber. She punches Tim in his neck, as Marco keeps his bite and holds on to Tim’s right hand.

  Valerie lunges out of the lake toward the boat, exposing his entire gigantic body, and collides with the motor. The boat miraculously does not smash to pieces, nor does it flip over, but everyone falls into the lake: Corvus, Amber, Tim, even Marco.

  Rising to the surface, Corvus can smell a strong sulfurous smell, like rotten eggs.

  Valerie, with his large canine tusks and sharp incisors, lunges again from under the lake, grabbing hold of Tim’s midsection. Tim screams into the sky. Corvus goes down and resurfaces from a close but safer distance. She can see the wiry bristles on the hippo’s snout. Blood rises in clouds from Tim’s body. Valerie shakes him like a rag doll, dragging him back down under the water again and again, crushing whatever he has of Tim in his mouth into a pulp. Tim’s organs become visible, his lungs a dark, deep red, floating from his body in the cold water.

  Corvus and Amber swim madly until they reach the boat. Amber screams like bloody murder, unharmed but wet and shell-shocked. These eyes have seen something new. Corvus reaches to pull Marco into the boat, and she kisses the dog on his head. With the motor disengaged, Corvus grabs the oars on either side of the boat and starts to row through the water with every muscle in her body. Her limbs and joints hurt as though being torn from the inside out, and even her eyes burn. After a few seconds, Amber takes one of the oars and helps her row, constantly turning her head back toward the clouds of blood in the water. Marco barks, but Valerie does not seem to be following the slow-moving boat. The hippo is still busy, dragging Tim’s body, shaking him over and over again.

  CHAPTER 3

  WHEN THEY REACH THE OTHER SHORE, IT’S AS THOUGH they have never been on land before, it’s so beautiful to touch sand. The trees tower over them, perfect, fresh air. The ravens continue to talk. Corvus takes Amber’s pale hand as they limp to their parked car, still there, with the keys resting in the glove compartment, still there. Marco follows them with his tail wagging as though it’s just another day in the woods. The light peeks through the tree branches and the fog. The radio starts with the ignition and Corvus breathes in deeply as though just getting out of the water. She leans her chair back in the driver’s seat, all the way back it can go, and reaches for the ceiling of the car, with her body feeling like jelly and nothing. Amber touches her hair and taps Corvus’s arm.

  Are you okay? Amber asks. Are you good?

  The radio plays another Robyn song as they hold eye contact with each other. Hearing the song makes them laugh hysterically until their stomachs hurt and burn. A pop song. Then they weep together, as though melting into each other. Tears and sweat and blood and runny noses. Corvus breathes in deeply again, adjusting her seat back upright. Marco barks.

  I am so good, Corvus says. So good, she says, shaking. She can hardly feel her thumbs.

  She feels the stillness of the highway as they approach it, the light flowing into her eyes. There is something invisible fueling strength into the tight grip of her hands, turning the leather steering wheel and magically accelerating the car.

  THANK YOU

  My deepest thanks and eternal gratitude to Yuka Igarashi for loving this book and for taking me on. You changed my life.

  My deepest thanks and eternal gratitude to Allie Wuest, my incredible editor and kindred spirit. You are the greatest of all time.

  Thank you so much to everyone at Soft Skull.

  Thank you to my dear friends who have provided me comfort and support while writing this book: Thom Crowley, Tara Atkinson, Willie Fitzgerald, Rebecca Brown, Christine Texeira, Molly Woolbright, Kristen Steenbeeke, Matthew Simmons, Stephen Danos, Matt Nelson, Peter Mountford, Anastacia Renee, Sonora Jha, Chelsea Martin, and Ana Carrete. I am thrilled by all of you.

  Thank you to Patty and Ron, Edith and Rauan, Rachel, Meggie and Michael, Sarah and Jake, Hannah and Spencer, and Jeremy.

  Thank you to others who unknowingly provided words and phrases and ideas for use in the writing of this novel: Thalia Field, Ciara, Robyn, Josephine Foster, and Tegan and Sara.

  Thank you to Adam Robinson, Blake Butler, and Chelsea Jean Werner-Jatzke for publishing excerpts from King of Joy.

  Thank you so much to my best friend, Frances Dinger.

  © Brooks Calison

  RICHARD CHIEM is the author of You Private Person (Sorry House Classics), which was named one of Publishers Weekly’s 10 Essential Books of the American West. His work has been published in City Arts Magazine, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Fanzine, 3:AM Magazine, and Moss Magazine, among many other venues. He has taught at Hugo House and at the University of Washington Bothell. He lives in Seattle.