“I’m sorry, Fiona. I apologize. I apologize. I’m under a lot of stress. Too much stress. I apologize for my language.”
“I see, Detective. I see.” She placed her hand on the front door’s brass handle. “It’s quite all right. Would you like to speak to the lady of the house now?”
Ben’s heart stopped.
“No, not right now. I’ll be back later. I need to follow up on another couple of leads that have come to our attention. You’ve been very helpful, Ms. O’Reilly. Thank you.” Ben started back to the automobile.
“Excuse me!” A different voice. Softer, higher.
Ben made like he didn’t hear. Hunched up his shoulders to the February chill. Didn’t want to turn around. Didn’t want to see the face there. The mouth. The eyes.
One.
Two.
“Excuse me, Detective!”
Three.
Four.
He kept walking.
Five.
Six.
“Detective! Wait, please?”
Fuck!
Seven.
He stopped mid-step. Glanced over his shoulder.
Fuck!
The mother standing on the stoop. She’d aged a lot since the photograph in the file, or since the kid had been snatched. Ben would’ve put his cash on the latter. Her blonde hair restlessly swept across her head and old mascara running black from her eyes. A hand pressed to her cheek as though she had a toothache, and the other hanging limp at her side. The fist opening and closing like a heartbeat on the cream nightgown. Her nipples visible through the silken fabric in the chill of the day.
Ben waved quickly and looked away quicker. Fumbling in his pocket for the keys to the Cadillac.
“Good evening, Mrs. Goodman. I’ll be in touch soon.” He tried to smile, cursing underneath his breath.
As he swung open the door to the automobile, she ran out into the street barefoot. The desperation in her voice brittle and hard. Hysterics thinly concealed. A growling whine rumbling from Ben’s throat like a stray dog dying alone at the side of a freeway.
“Please, Detective. Please just a moment of your time. I’m simply going crazy in this godforsaken house without my son. Please won’t you give me a little of your time. I need to know what’s going on. No one is telling me anything. Nothing. Please, Detective.”
She placed a hand the same color of the nightgown on his shoulder to stop him from getting into the automobile. He froze. Let the hand remain there. He didn’t know why. Looked into her eyes. Holding little ghosts of gold from the dying sun in the deepest blue of them. His mother’s eyes. He looked down the street, stuttering “Mrs. Goodman, I just needed clarification about certain aspects of Miss O’Reilly’s statement. Another detective will be in contact with you in a couple of hours.”
Her hand still on his shoulder. Eyes narrowing. “Are you one of those vultures?”
“I’m sorry?”
Her hand still there on his shoulder as though it had always been there. Since London. He could feel it burning through his jacket.
“Another one of those no-good reporters from the press?”
Her fingers still on the fabric covering his skin. Limp. Exhausted. Elegant.
Ben pulled out his badge, flashing it quickly and then hiding it back inside his jacket.
“I’m so sorry, Detective. I just hadn’t seen you before. You’re not one of the detectives we’re dealing with. Mr. Mellon and another detective. Can’t remember his name. It’s an Irish surname, I think.”
Ben didn’t know what to say. He nodded, slid into the front seat of his Cadillac, the leather squeaked. He fumbled with the ignition and started the engine up.
Mrs. Goodman stood, holding the door open.
Eyes the deepest kind of blue. He remembered the way his mother’s eyes had felt when they had fallen on him. As though it was only the two of them in the whole world.
“Please come inside for a moment, won’t you, Detective? Please.”
Ben stared out of the windshield, down the street, gripping the steering wheel so hard it hurt his knuckles. Switched off the engine, got out and followed Mrs. Goodman into the house that seemed to tower over him, making his heart hammer, and his guts twist up.
The maid stopped sweeping. Smiled, showing her black front teeth, and waved at Ben as he entered the house. A ghost. The early evening suddenly haunted by vicious ghosts that ate pieces of you while you tried to find your way out of a thick fog.
Ben closed his eyes as he crossed the threshold. Into the upper-middle class home. Holding his breath as though expecting a blow to the face.
The boy’s eyes snapped open. Wide. His bedroom cold. Freezing. Goosebumps speckling his pale skin. Toys on a shelf with eyes that glistened in the moonlight. Model airplanes twisted on string like dead men hanging from the ceiling. His blanket had fallen from his bed. Or had it been dragged from him? He lay naked, staring at the purple darkness spread thinly over the ceiling too afraid to bring his gaze down to the foot of the bed. Knowing by the atmosphere of the room that the Beetle Man was there again. Had come for him. In the doorway.
Floorboards creaked. The priest at Sunday School told him the noises he heard were the house’s foundations relaxing after a day of constant activity. Ben knew different. Staring at the blank ceiling of the small room, breath leaving his mouth and nostrils in tendrils of icy smoke. Listening to the sounds that edged their way through the silence. Closer. There, moving twisted through the dim. Close. The sound of fabric against fabric. Skin against skin. Another creaking of floorboards. The dragging of feet sliding softly, delicately over the carpet of his bedroom floor. He felt it then. The heavy, magnetic atmosphere of being watched. Observed. He couldn’t move. Frozen in place. The dragging of feet moving closer to his bedside. Closer. The wet sound of something breathing. Staring at the ceiling. Too frightened. Too cowardly to look at the thing looming there, leering down at him with eyes that glistened like black glass. Something brushed against his leg. Trickled. His bowels unclamped. The stench of shit and sickness filling the room
His eyes screamed. His mouth screamed. He screamed into an abyss. He screamed the word ‘mother’.
“Detective, are you all right?”
Ben snapped his head towards the woman. Gripping at the oak stair bannister. Woozy. Told himself it was the whiskey. Mouth full of a metallic saliva. He swallowed. Coughed, clearing his throat.
“Yes, yes, I’m quite fine. Just a dizzy spell. Haven’t had time to eat something today. Running myself somewhat ragged. Please don’t worry yourself, Mrs. Goodman.”
“Please let me fix you something. A sandwich? A glass of water, perhaps?”
“No, no, Mrs. Goodman. I’m fine, fine. Thank you. I’ve not much time.”
“Are you sure? You’re looking rather peaked.”
“All right, a glass of water then, thank you,” he said, to shut her up.
She nodded, went down the hall towards a large kitchen and Ben stood staring at the front door before following after her. Wiping at his hand with a handkerchief he couldn’t even remember yanking from his pocket. A grandfather clock chimed, Ben startled, chewed at his bottom lip. A snippet from a dead author’s novel repeating in his head, ‘You can never go home again.’ But he was home. The atmosphere. The light. The smell. He was home. Feeling like a young child, he shuffled further into the home as though it were the mandibles of a slumbering creature.
The kitchen was large, traditional and joined to a lavishly furnished dining room. A chandelier captured light and scattered reflections.
Mrs. Goodman smiled, her eyes dull and unchanged, motioning him to the large mahogany dining table.
“Please rest yourself, Detective,” she said, running the faucet over her fingers. She followed Ben’s gaze to a large painted family portrait hung on the far wall. “Had that painted last year. Can’t for the life of me remember the name of the artist, but he’s very skilled. James was a little monkey and wouldn’t sit still for a sin
gular minute. As though he had ants in his pants.”
Ben blanched, pulled at his collar and undid another button. Suddenly choked. She placed the glass of water on a leather coaster in front of him. Leaning her breasts close to his face. Ben breathed in the scent of her. The natural scent of a woman. Blanched again. Thought of his mother. Pushed the thought away. Li Yu then. Her hands to his face. She’d deceived him. He squeezed his eyes shut. Counted. Counted. Counted. Reaching for the glass, he noticed a fingerprint smudged at the top near the rim and withdrew his hand again, pushing the coaster a few inches away from him.
“My apologies, Mrs. Goodman, I really appreciate your hospitality, but I’m very pushed for time.”
“I’d like to show you James’ room, if I may.”
“Come again?”
“I’d like to show you his bedroom, please. James’ room. I’d like for you to see it,” she massaged her throat as she said it. Her lips quivered. Maroon red. Desperate. Beautiful. Heartbroken. Needy.
Hi sbedroom cold. Freezing. Goosebumps speckling his pale skin. Toys on a shelf with eyes that glistened in the moonlight. He stared at the model airplanes twisting on string like dead men hanging from the ceiling.
Fabric on fabric.
Skin on skin.
“I'm sorry, Mrs. Goodman, I really don’t see how that would be helpful in finding your son,” Ben began to scratch at his face. Tried to stop himself but couldn’t. Mrs. Goodman’s eyes sucked him in. Drowning him. Icy blue. Desperate. He looked down at the table. The way the light crept from the window across its surface. A milky white figure reaching out to him. Chest tight. Breath struggling out of his nostrils in waves. He gripped at his thighs, squeezing until the muscles ached, unable to gaze into those drowning eyes again.
“Anything to have my son back again. Anything that’ll help. Possibly help. Please!”
Her scent again drifting across the table. Intoxicating. Dizzying. He made a show of glancing at his wristwatch. Their eyes locked and he felt like a small boy again.
“I’m very sorry. I’m sorry. Mrs. Goodman, I am very sorry, I am. But I have another appointment that just, it just won’t wait,” he stuttered.
“Please don’t go.” She wailed it out. Pathetic. Heartbroken. Beautiful.
Ben got up quickly and walked towards the front of the house. She pursued him. Her hand on his shoulder again as though it had always been there. A childhood memory he’d carried with him always.
“Please, Detective. Please. Please. Please,” she begged, clinging to him. A woman suffocating in sorrow. “Please, just look at his room. If you see what a good boy he was… He is! If you see what a good boy he is. You won’t give up. You’ll find him. Please find him.”
Ben spun around, grabbed her by the shoulders, “I’m going to find him. I promise you.”
“You swear it? You swear it to God?”
“Yes, I swear it.”
“On your soul?”
He let her go. Stepped back. “What?”
“Do you swear on your eternal soul, Detective?”
The boy’s face pulsing like a heartbeat in his mind, Ben put his hands on her shoulders again. Heat radiated off of the mother like sickness. His arms tremored for him to release her, but she pushed her body against his. Her breasts heavy against his chest. The air seemed to shimmer. A mother to a missing child. Mother. The boy. It was wrong. He wanted to move his body away from hers but, as if by magnetism, was compelled closer. Could feel her heart beating. Her eyes bathing him. She needed him.
“Yes,” he breathed.
“Say it! Swear on your soul!” Her mouth so close to his. Her breasts. The inside of her thigh elegantly sliding around his.
“I swear on my soul, I’ll bring your son back to you.”
She exhaled hard. Ben tasted her breath. The natural scent of a woman. Mother. Her eyes sucked him in. Drowning him. Icy blue. Desperate. Beautiful. Needy. Intoxicating.
Ben pulled her closer. Kissed her mouth. She fell hard against him. Pushing and pulling at each other’s bodies and clothes. Then at the bottom of the stairs he was inside her. His hands to her face, seeing Li Yu there. Hurting Li Yu. Needing Li Yu. Loving mother. Li Yu. Mother. Her whispering the words “Please, please, please, please, please, please, please,” over and over again as he thrust into her with each exhalation. And then finishing inside her. As though plummeting from a great height. In the emptiness after, horrified by what he had done, the guilt in him like a disease, he yanked up his slacks.
“What did you make me do?! What did you make me do?! We shouldn’t have done that. It was a mistake. A mistake. It wasn’t right. It’s not right.” The voice not his own. Higher pitched. Unbroken and broken all at once. The mother stared at him dreamily. Eyes half shut to the light. Ben whining under his breath. Drenched in contaminated sweat. Filthy flesh burning. Needing to wash. Scrub. Soap. Purify.
Ben stumbled out of the hallway entrance and slammed the front door on her frantic eyes. A jolt of pain ripping through his guts. His fingers to his face hysterically trying to scratch away images from his childhood and the desperate promise he had just made to a God he wasn’t even sure he believed. Gambling his soul, unsure of how much it was worth in the first place. The maid was still outside and caught him in her arms as he staggered out onto the sidewalk.
“Are you all right, Detective? What on earth is the matter?”
He screamed into her face and shoved the filthy bitch into the gutter. She let out a startled cry as her skull cracked against the curb silencing her. Ben felt her pulse. Dragged her onto the sidewalk. The blood made a trail like a child’s drawing. Tripping over his own feet to the Cadillac. He beat his fists down on the bonnet. Hyperventilating. Counting to seven. Lucky seven. Fucking lucky fucking seven. Squeezing his eyes shut. It seemed as though he was losing everything about himself in this case. Everything. If he didn’t find the boy, he didn’t know how much of himself would remain. Barely a stain on tarmac.
London, England
Saturday, February 20th, 1926
Her face in the crowd. Paris. The City of Light. Place de la Concorde. He, in his dress uniform. Stomach filled with bread and wine. Lungs full of crisp fresh air and good tobacco. Their eyes met. Blue on grey. The crowd surged and she was gone for a moment in the waving of flags and hands. Faces contorted with joy. He pushed his way through the bodies. Her again. She held his eyes longer. Smiled. Swaying. Electricity on the air before thunder. Lightning. Flowers in her hair. Daisies tied into a crown. Like drops of snow against the gold of her hair. Full-lipped. She mouthed words to him, but they were meaningless in the elated roar of the crowds, gathered to celebrate the end of The Great War. Her lips so completely red against her cream-colored skin, creating intricate shapes. Giggling. Two words or a single two-syllabled one. He shrugged theatrically. She beckoned to him. Drawing him in.
Only weeks ago, he was in the Hell of the trenches. The Somme. The dead. The rats. The constant bombardments, infinite shelling. The stench. The fear. Going over the top. The whistles. The crack of rifles. The unforgiving roar of machine gun fire. The overwhelming mud. Damp. Rot. Decay.
Now Paris. The sunshine warm on his face. A beautiful girl smiling at him with lips painted a rich blood red. Golden hair like English Summer. He shoved a grinning old fool out of the way, elbowed through the mass of bodies to get to her. As though he had been wading through the shit, the madness and the dying from the front line all the way to Paris just to find this girl. An absurd notion in his chest where the dog tags clattered against his skin, he was going to marry this woman. And then he was next to her. His hand on the small of her back. The fabric of her blouse as smooth as skin underneath his fingertips. The scent of her perfume bringing tears to his eyes. She threw her head back and laughed into the space above the crowd. Eyes sparkling, dancing like flares ablaze over No Man’s Land.
“What’s your name?” he shouted.
She cupped a small, long fingered hand around an ear adorned with a pear
l.
Someone fell into his back and he elbowed them away. Repeated himself, closer, his lips touching the side of her face as he spoke. Almost tasting her. She didn’t pull away. On the contrary, leaning closer into him, engulfing him, she shouted her name and the sound of it was like church bells he heard a long time ago, somewhere beautiful, “Margaux.” The girl he was going to marry.
Fingers dragged spitefully across his face, startled him awake.
A song sung whispered, strangled. Gurgled from somewhere beneath darkness.
A flash of white rippling through the air like smoke.
A creak of staircase. A dog barked repetitively and crazed from somewhere in the neighborhood. His throat an old leather dry.
A whisper of words. Hushed. Confessional. Conspiratorial.
William reached out, placing his trembling hand on the sleeping form of his wife beside him. Kicked back the covers cursing. The boy was out of his bed again. He heard the footsteps making their way down the stairs, dragged softly over the oriental rugs and shined hardwood flooring.
He would give the simple child a clip around the ear, drag the little bugger back to bed. He’d regretted his actions the previous night. Dragging the boy from the bathtub to the cold street outside. It wasn’t right. He’d been under too much pressure. Drinking too much. How he needed a drink. The constant feeling of thirst, maddening. He’d put the boy back into bed, make himself a drink. Just something to help him sleep again. Warm him up. The moon burning as bright as the sun through the bedroom windows. Yes, he needed a drink to sleep. Thirsty all the fucking time.
He made his way through the chilly darkness and down the stairs. Not caring if his footsteps awoke his wife. Light coming dimly from the lamp in the kitchen. He’d told the bloody boy not to touch the fucking lamps. Disobeying little... A giggle floated down the hallway then. William froze, gripping at the bannister. Swaying. His head cocked to the side, listening. He heard the ticking of clocks, the demented dog barks, the pipes in the walls humming softly. Nothing more. No, no, nothing more. Just a touch of gin, that would set him right. Stepping down from the stairs into the hallway still using the banister railing for support. Edging his way towards the kitchen. The light from the lamp a flickering ghostly yellow like the gas the krauts had pumped over the ruptured, torn asunder fields of France. So bright and yet so damned cold. Seeping across the floors and walls. An icy finger ran its nail up his spine and into the back of his scalp. He shuddered. Needing a drink like lover’s kiss. He pushed at the door and it creaked open wide slowly.
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