they say the owl was a baker's daughter: four existential noirs

by KUBOA

  I kept my palm, fingers spread wide, to the inside of the door, my forehead against the peculiar warm of the wood, slipped my eye to the peep hole a few times, didn’t want to move. I had a vague sense of control, safety, the entire ordeal with Montgomery didn’t bother me. I just thought about the police. Thought about what they’d say when they arrested me.

  It was a waste of time, this thing with Montgomery. By mistake, I’d ended it, out of weakness I’d not made the mistake of returning to it. I was relieved, but even still, sitting on the end of my bed, the idea that I was making a mistake wouldn’t get away from me.

  I yelled out at the empty of the room, swiping at it, giving it shoves, demanding that it explain just what it was I should do, if anything else.

  My breathing got normal, the joint tick-tocked down until I abandoned it, completely uncertain what I was doing.

  How long would this idiocy last, how many stupors would I stuff myself inside of?

  I must have some kind of mechanism in me, something that would jam up, make me get it together in time to run.

  No. I didn’t have to. I doubted it, in fact.

  There were thirty-two messages on my machine, the indicator switching between the number and the word Full. I stared, reached numbly for my bourbon glass that was nowhere around, hit the button, waiting for the nothing. Instead, it was Montgomery, off key, humming a little tune.

  Or not a tune. Tuneless.

  Dum. Dah-dah. De de deet dah dum.

  Then a beep.

  I didn’t recognize a bit of what he hummed.

  The next message the same, different tuneless blurps.

  Dum dah dant dun. De. Deet deet dah bah.

  The beep.

  The next message the same, neither shorter or longer, just other nothing.

  Dah dant. Da. Deet deet bah baum dah.

  The beep.

  The next message.

  ***

  Telephone disconnected, I sat on the kitchen floor, regretting that in a rush I’d poured out down the sink drain all the alcohol I had left, except for one large glassful I’d purposefully left, unable to rid myself completely of anything.

  I should leave. I should get a hotel. But a hotel cost money.

  Did he want me to waste my money? Have no means of escape?

  He didn’t want anything.

  Waste my money on endless packs of cigarettes and coffees and bus fare and motels?

  -Do you want me to waste my money? I asked, giving the cabinet in front of me an awkward kick, my back sliding more to the ground.

  -I don’t have money to waste, you don’t want that you don’t want that I mumbled, sick past death of trying to determine his motivation.

  All that had happened was he’d realized I’d run away, felt it logical that my apartment was where I’d run to, started his little telephone game, again. A little change up to it, humming nothing instead of saying nothing. He wasn’t even imaginative in his haunting.

  -You’re a worthless little ghost, I said, sluggishly getting myself up, first to knees, getting my breath, then to my knees with hands ready to pull up on the counter, getting my breath, then standing to bourbon glass to mouth, as much as could fit swallowed, the rest poured out while I said wet and childish and taunting You’re an ugly worthless worthless little ghost, aren’t you?

  My mind had jettisoned, I had nothing to do with myself. I was disconnected from any aspect of my past. My life had been only these two days. I didn’t even have a past to recoil from, be guilty of, I was a drunk taunt across my floor, realizing I’d wet my pants as I peeled them off.

  I collapsed onto my bed mattress, reaching for and not finding the pillow.

  I didn’t want one more thought about it. None of it. Montgomery Fent no longer existed, as far as I was concerned. I didn’t exist except I was Murder, an abstract waiting to be scribble scrabbled in a notebook, a detail to be crossed off a list. I wouldn’t even have to worry about the consequences. If I could feel as I felt right then forever, there was nothing anyone could do to me that mattered. Expunging me, rubbing eraser left right left right left right left right until I was stained shaves of rubber couldn’t give anyone solace, respite, vengeance, finality, not even numb worth a nickel.

  ***

  It was a warped sleep. I got caught up trying to describe vague shifts in my thinking to myself, kept counting down, saying when I hit zero I’d get some clothes on, pajamas, but I lost track of everything. I fell asleep thinking about falling asleep, having a dream about how badly I wanted to be asleep.

  I’d hear gargles of Montgomery humming, making his unconnected chirps and cacks.

  I opened my eyes at one point, stirred, thinking it was odd my bedroom was dark. I thought I heard the faucet running or the toilet flushing. I didn’t remember if I’d just dreamt this when I woke next, if it’d happened an hour ago, a few minutes, if it was just on my mind because I was right then considering how odd it was that the bedroom was dark.

  Needing painfully to urinate, I wriggled side to side until I had the momentum to get awake, sit up, legs draping to the carpet. I turned my head up toward the door out into the hallway and stared right at Montgomery, sitting on a chair, his body a strain to it. I just stared, his image clear enough, even though it was mostly shadow, had the appearance of a lump of chewed food dropped to the floor, a cake of mud halfway dried out.

  It wasn’t until he hummed some random notes Dant Baum Dunt that I snapped back, scrambling backward, falling over the side of the bed, scurrying up against the bedroom wall beneath the window.

  He didn’t make any motion, except to wipe at his nose with tissue or toilet paper, to swallow like a rag being wrung out.

  When he hummed again, I heard the hiss of my urine issuing down my leg, settling into the carpet. I covered my eyes, crawled under my arms, screwed myself sideways like the top of my head could burrow through the wall.

  I knew he was there.

  I tensed until I couldn’t breathe, didn’t breathe until a cough jabbed at me so piercing my nose started to bleed.

  I got caught up pulling my shirt to my face to sop the blood, but heard Montgomery moving, the chair legs shift over the carpet, his throat clear, the bathroom door close, the overhead fan come cackling on.

  ***

  After I closed the bedroom door, I crawled backward to the wall, staring at the doorknob, realizing I hadn’t locked it.

  I stayed there, staring, no idea how long.

  It occurred to me that the flimsy little lock made no difference and I glanced around, wondering if I could move the dresser, the bed, everything in front of the door, do it so quietly Montgomery wouldn’t hear, burst in.

  I sat and stared at the unlocked door. Beyond it, I heard some sounds from the kitchen, smelled toast warming, a few moments later the television coming on.

  I was crying, mucus dibbling over my lip down my chin, my tongue pecking out at it, wincing back in from the hot and salt.

  Even if I barricaded the door, he could just go outside, come in the window.

  I stood, pulled the cord to lift the blinds. He’d done nothing to block off an escape route. My feet tightened around the wet carpet where I stood.

  I sat on the mattress.

  He wasn’t going to burst in. I could go out the window.

  Go where?

  -Anywhere, I whispered, but at the same time made a mocking face.

  I set my features, asked myself in dead earnest Where? and waited while I came up with nothing to reply.

  I changed in to dry clothes, nicer clothes than I’d been in, a rather cheap suit, but one of my better quality ones, something I’d not worn in more than a year, the fit of it loose.

  I could hear him in the living room, on the sofa, the crunch of what he was eating, the smack of him taking a drink while still chewing.

  He didn’t even look up to ackn
owledge me when I came in to sight. It was unsettling. I wanted to catch his attention, but the absurdity of the moment paralyzed me.

  What could the game in this be?

  It was idiotic. I crossed behind him. There were any number of implements I could have bludgeoned him with. He was not tense, waiting for me to strike, ready to counter. I stared at the moist of the back of his head, but gradually my eyes drifted to the television screen. A syndicated sitcom, more than a decade old. The sound of it filled the apartment. He chuckled, briefly gagging on what he’d been just starting to swallow.

  ***

  I was numb, didn’t feel my legs as I got to the end of the corridor, shouldered the glass entrance door open. My hands trembled while I struggled with getting a cigarette lit.

  I’d no idea what time it was, long past midnight, nowhere near morning. I didn’t feel awake, didn’t feel drunk, not high, but only because I was in shock.

  No one was on the street. I did an inventory of my pockets, glad I’d remembered my wallet, cigarettes. I threw all of the random bits of tissue, receipts, all the coins away in a trash bin affixed to the lamppost by the bus stop.

  Was this his way of taking ownership, claiming my apartment, letting me know I could no longer return?

  It didn’t make sense to think that.

  It was something, though.

  He had come looking for me. He hadn’t let me drift off. Or, at least he hadn’t let me drift off without verifying I had.

  I winced. The flow of thoughts, even just beginning, was already exhausting me, I felt dread at the calm I’d so briefly established being upset.

  No, I didn’t care. I didn’t want to think about it.

  Was he just going to sit in my apartment? Had he already left?

  I put my face to the outside of my window, squinting through the space left between the curtains, throwing looks around, not the least bit cautious of being witnessed as I could still prove it was my residence.

  The lights were all off. The television off. I started to breathe hard.

  Had he picked the lock? When could he have gotten a copy of my key?

  I had locked the door, I knew I’d locked the door.

  I stepped back around to look at the building entrance. Nothing. It was the only entrance and he was nowhere in sight up the rather well lit street.

  Another cigarette to my mouth, I went back to the window, blowing smoke, moving my head in to see past my reflection when I noticed his face was pressed to the glass. I froze, clenched down my jaw, tensed everything, determined not to show my shock. He didn’t seem to care one way or another, smiled, tapped the glass, held up his hand, one finger, tilted his head to indicate he was going to come around. I watched him go out the apartment door, watched it close.

  I took a few breaths, then, a snap, started feeling around the window, trying to figure a way to get it opened, no idea what I’d do if I could manage it.

  Keep some idiot game going, go hide under the bed? Anything? Something?

  So glad when the window wouldn’t budge, glad the attempt was worthless.

  ***

  Montgomery lingered in front of the building a few minutes, not even looking for me, smoked a cigarette, discarded it, finally pricking to attention, taking a step toward the road. His hand raised. I saw a taxi lulling at the traffic light down the way half a block. He looked over at me.

  The moment was intolerable. The most casual air imaginable, he waved me over, right away his head returning to watch for the approaching cab.

  I began toward him, mostly out of wanting to avoid the awkwardness of his getting in the cab, the cab approaching me, halting, chugging there, waiting for me like spread lips. This way, I could keep going, enter the building, after which I was no better off, but it would screw with whatever he was up to.

  At the same time, watching him there, the cab now approaching, I felt an abandon, an almost hateful snarl at myself, teased myself, pointed out to myself that it was a taxi, there was a driver, there was nothing to fear.

  I wasn’t afraid.

  Would he kill me in a taxi?

  He could have killed me in my sleep, killed me anyplace.

  Where could he take me? To do what?

  It was the taxi, which at least was something, or it was the long, formless drag of locking myself in an apartment he could unlock, he could wait outside of, it was the plodding down streets he could plod down after me, do whatever he wanted.

  Was I so completely powerless I would let him decide everything for me, though?

  It wasn’t that. It was that in his menace, he’d managed to leave only worthless crumbs of choice for me to tap through, pellets that dropped soggy from his mouth, choices I could make but only knowing full well I didn’t want to.

  I wanted to get in the taxi. Did so without a word. I did cringe, swallowing down a rise of nausea, feeling my mouth go dry just a little bit when he held the door, letting me get in first. He waited until I’d huddled as far to the door window as I could before he scummed in after me, filling every sip of air, leg touching mine, my body trying to twist away so tight it cramped bile up into the back of my throat.

  ***

  He gave his own address to the driver, but with a frowning expression, a surprise ruined. He sighed as though he should have thought of this before. Maybe he had. Maybe he’d made a special point to give the address to the dispatcher when telephoning for the cab, but didn’t want to bother with saying to the driver I told them the address already, only to have the driver have to use the walkie-talkie, have the address skushed over the speaker, everything just as much ruined.

  I thought about little things like that, eyes out, down, watching the road until my neck hurt. I turned to look straight forward, relieved I could see no smudge of Montgomery in the rearview mirror.

  In a moment of sudden silence, the driver turning down the radio to answer a call from his dispatcher, saying something, waiting and waiting and waiting for a response, Montgomery took out his wallet, got a piece of paper out of it, took a pen from another pocket, scribbled something, held it up for me to take. I did so, noticing it was a very worn receipt from a drug store, the total spent less than three dollars.

  Montgomery’s writing was feminine, very legible.

  The dirver doesn’t know anything. Don’t say anything.

  I nearly vomited from the rush of blood to my ears, the backs of my eyes, my forehead going cold and waxy.

  I didn’t move until Montgomery took the paper from my fingers, wrote something else on the reverse side of it, held it back up to my hand that had not moved except to wobble in the empty, an inch or two from the seatback, the driver’s identification displayed in a plastic sleeve.

  Five new words. Periods between them. The fourth word in parenthesis. All the letters capital. The penmanship a bit sloppier than before. The words Daffodil, Moreover, Sizzle, Enunciate, and Vizage, the misspelling to the last word seeming purposeful, the final E in it written backward.

  He let me hold the paper, my eyes watering from not being able to blink, all thought halting, a litany of the words over and over, as though there were something I should make of them and I could make nothing.

  Eventually, he took the receipt paper, but just turned it over, returned it to my fingers, the first two sentences there, but now upside down.

  The dirver doesn’t know anything. Don’t say anything.

  Only after staring at this, the cab radio going again, Montgomery saying something to the driver I didn’t hear at all, did it occur to me that Driver was misspelled, as well.

  ***

  I took the cigarette Montgomery lit and held across to me, not thinking, taking a drag from it while Montgomery lit another. I smoked it, feeling tricked, following him down the corridor, into his apartment, going ahead into his living room while I heard him shut the door, lock it, put the bolt in place.


  There was a cup on the arm of the sofa that already had a few bloated olds of cigarette in it, so I dropped mine in, watched it discolor, let off its last smoke, float.

  Behind me, I heard Montgomery say Kaspar, his hand gently touch to my shoulder. I turned, his face soft with emotion, a movement of the beginnings of a tear at the base of his left eye.

  -I suppose I should tell you about Gavin, he said. It seemed a requiem mass between the start of the sentence and the end. I suppose. Forever, death, forever. Gavin. After that, he didn’t talk, didn’t move for another few minutes.

  Supposing he was waiting for a prompt, I started to speak, but only managed the Guh of Gavin’s name before he brought his fist hard into my left ribs, winding me, collapsing me to my knees. In the next instant, he’d lifted a thick book from his kitchen counter, swung it full force into the side of my head. Blood filled my mouth, I lost any sense of spatial relations, felt rolled over myself, Montgomery’s shin thundering in to the same set of ribs he’d punched.

  He began to bulbously dance around, making grotesque squishing noises, letting farts of airs out of puffed up cheeks. In clear glimpses I got of him, his hands were raised high, arms jiggling. He retched my name Kaspar Kaspar Kaspar two distinct words made of it, the first elongated, imbecile sounding, Kas, the second a staccato, stifled sneeze, Par, pronounced Purr. Then he freely warped the name, laughing, wheezing, stomping on the back of my right calf once. Kuss Pur Ket Plert Kess Pess Klar Plar Kurd Pest Kesser Pear Krack Plack Kurd Plau a jumble of nonsense, flabby laughter, blows stuck to me here and there.

  Finally, I’d crawled, hobbled, over to his sofa, arms around my head, body raw and pulsing as I spit blood out over my upper lip, felt it slip down into my nose, the top of my head trying to dig into filthy hardwood.

  I could hear Montgomery, still giggling, completely amused with himself, sucking long, furious dredges of phlegm up, squeezing spits of the slop out into what I supposed was one of his filthy tissues, almost a seizure of hyperventilating delight.