[Darkthorn 01.0] Pond Scum

by Michael Lilly

  Panic sets in, and I imagine the worst; finding Beth’s lifeless body swimming in a pool of blood, half her skull missing from the gunshot wound. Todd, face down and trying to squeeze out a couple of final words before being finished off by his assailant. And Sanders, doing everything he can to help us, even at the risk of his career, only to be forcibly removed from this plane.

  I stand beside the front door and peer out the window, but I can’t see much movement, and that which I can see is most likely a trick of shadow and rain.

  I yearn to go out and find them, but my proximity to them may put them in danger, until they’re safely here. It’s best if I wait.

  I pull out my phone to check for any messages before I remember that it’s dead. In the wake of terror and fear, routine is the route back to sanity, right?

  I look through Todd’s pantry and, after some struggle, procure a bag of rice, and in the third cupboard that I open, I find a bowl that looks wide enough to accommodate my phone. I pull it apart and remove the battery, as you’re supposed to (I think), and submerge both pieces in the rice.

  I hope he doesn’t mind. He probably will, being the apparent neat freak that he is, but he likes me too much to say anything anyway.

  Restless, I go back to the front door and peer out the window once more.

  My heart skips a beat; there are two dark figures making their way up the road. Wait. Why not three? I identify Beth’s walk right away, even though her ‘shielding from the rain’ walk is notably different from her normal ‘fear my wrath’ walk.

  I’m pretty sure the other is Todd; while the silhouette is rough and difficult to discern, his build and height are different enough from Sanders’ to assure me of his identity.

  I watch anxiously as they close the remaining distance to the house; I fight the compulsion to count their steps. At last, they hit the end of the walk.

  I fling open the door and yell to them: “Come! Hurry!”

  “Oh thank god,” says Beth, startled at first, then relieved. There’s a shiver present in her voice that isn’t from the cold.

  They rush up the steps and in the door. I close and lock it behind them. Aside from the violent shivers, they look relatively unscathed.

  I say, “Todd, do you have anywhere in your house where the light isn’t visible from the outside? A powder room, maybe? A walk-in closet, a cellar?”

  “P-p-powder room,” he manages, through his own fit of shivers. He points at the first door on the right in the hallway ahead of us, its frame barely visible in the darkness.

  “What happened?” I ask, as we squeeze into the powder room. I turn on the light. Even underneath the buckets of water that Beth has on her person, I can tell that those eyes are wet with more than water. That’s a puffiness that comes from crying. I’ve never seen it on Beth before.

  “Sh-sh-shot him,” she whimpers, almost inaudibly. The look in her eyes is painfully beseeching: What do we do? He’s dead.

  “Is he gone? Is there a chance that we could get an ambulance to him?”

  She shakes her head, releasing a downpour of water onto the powder room floor. Todd looks equally devastated, but in a different way. His devastation manifests in a wide-eyed stare, as though he’s trying to look into another dimension to give him a goddamn clue to understand this one. His strong jaw quivers slightly.

  “Let’s dry off,” I say. “Todd, do you have a dryer? We can throw all of our clothes into it and clean off in the meantime.”

  Beth buries her face in my chest and lets loose a hysterical bout of sobs. I sense that this isn’t just Sanders. This is the dam that’s been filling her whole life. This is all of the emotion she’s refused to show, finally succumbing to the pressure of losing a friend and colleague in a gunfight. It’s Patrick, too. It’s the mask she has to put on as a woman in law enforcement. It’s the remnants of her childhood dreams. It’s a family she barely knows gathering once in a blue moon to pretend they’re a real family.

  It’s Beth. All of her. It’s all I can do to hold her there, against my chest, and cry with her. Todd buries his face in his hands and joins in the sobbing.

  When the sobs begin to subside, I say, “Todd. Towels?”

  He disappears for a few seconds and returns with a neatly folded stack of white towels. Beth takes two, and Todd and I take one apiece. We offer to leave Beth alone while her clothes are drying and, while she’s incredibly vulnerable, she also doesn’t want to be alone, so she sits in the corner of Todd’s bedroom wrapped in a blanket, quickly followed by me. Having shed our sopping clothing and toweled off, we warm up fairly quickly. Todd excuses himself to the bathroom to change into dry clothing. He offers me some, but as mine is drying, I decline. I can wait half an hour for my own clothes.

  When he returns, he sits against the wall next to me. Beth has migrated to the bed. I can feel warmth coming off of Todd’s arm. Due to exhaustion, physical fatigue, adrenaline crash, and just overall being a tired person, I nearly drift to sleep.

  I’m jolted awake by sirens. Someone must have found Sanders’ body. Todd glances at me, then tosses his head against the wall, gazing up and through the ceiling.

  The dryer turns off with a charming chime and Todd goes to retrieve our clothing.

  “I think he’s got a thing for you,” says Beth.

  I would think she’s making jokes, but she’s in no state to be her sarcastic self. Even that demon must rest sometimes.

  “Huh,” I say. I don’t know what the proper response is, but that’s all I can come up with.

  Apparently that’s not enough for Beth, though; she props herself up on her elbows. Todd returns, holding an armful of laundry. He sets it on the edge of the bed and quickly plucks out Beth’s clothes, undergarments and all. When he does the same with mine, his blush is visible even in the dark of his bedroom.

  Beth raises an eyebrow at me and gives me a half grin. He tosses his own clothes into a hamper, but not before wrapping up his own underwear in his freshly dried shirt and stealing a glance at me to see whether or not I saw them.

  Holy shit. She’s right.

  “I’m going to shower,” says Beth. She shoots me one more look before disappearing into the bathroom.

  “Fuck,” says Todd, returning his face to their home in his hands.

  “I’m so sorry,” I say. “If I just … let it go, none of this would have happened.”

  “Yeah, you’re right,” he says. “And then your dad would have gone on raping and molesting and abusing and killing and trafficking innocent children.”

  He sits down next to me again, and continues, “Sanders was a good man. He knew what the stakes were. He knew what he was fighting for. He was willing to make that sacrifice. If he wasn’t, he never would’ve come along. He knew, Remy. About us. And your dad.”

  His gaze sweeps the room, but settles on me. His eyes tear up. “We won, Remy. We did it. You did it. While it hasn’t been acknowledge as such, this has been an ongoing war here for as long as we’ve been alive. And you thwarted the general. This evil, this perversion can come to a stop now. Yeah, we lost Sanders. But don’t you fool yourself into thinking that this was a selfish move with needless consequences. The people on your side are here because we want to fight for the same things you’re fighting for.”

  A tear rolls down his cheek.

  “Remy,” he says, “let’s finish this. Let’s get this fucker and move on with our lives. That’s what we’re here for. That’s what Sanders died for.”

  I nod. We sit in almost-silence, listening to make sure that Beth’s shower-in-the-dark adventure doesn’t turn up any unnecessary bruises or fractures.

  Both Todd’s head and mine are angled upward, toward the ceiling, our minds split between reality and fantasy thirty different ways. Every now and then, out of the corner of my eye, I see him glance at me. I decide I don’t mind.

  I’ve never had a girlfriend before. I’ve always chalked my lack of interest in sex up to my intensely negative connotations with t
he concept from my experiences as a child. Maybe I was trying to open the wrong locks but with the right key, while using the wrong key on all the right locks. Maybe intimacy is an option for me. Maybe I need a psychiatrist to pump me full of Abilify and Freudian theory. Maybe all I want is this.

  My usual thoughts don’t often lead me to my own mind. My shower thoughts typically center around things exterior. Other people, current events, work. Forces of influence beyond my control, but that affect me.

  This experience, dipping into my psyche, is new for me. I’m intimidated, but simultaneously, intrigued. And more than anything, I’m revisited by the sensation that I had when I first met Todd: a calm sense of trust. Maybe he is what I want. But maybe I’m just emotionally vulnerable and ready to accept the first bit of affection that comes my way.

  I don’t know how to handle these … emotions. I don’t know what to do with them. Do they stop on their own? Do I need to do something to stop them? And if I end up liking them, how do I perpetuate them?

  It’s my turn to thunk my head against the wall. Is it my present exhaustion and vulnerability that’s allowing me to explore these emotions, or is it Todd?

  Beth finishes her shower and emerges from the bathroom, dressed in the same clothes that she was wearing before, but one shade of melancholy removed. She doesn’t seem to fill them out like she normally does, as though her body senses her mental vulnerability and is thus inclined to withdraw. Her presence, which could normally fill an outdoor amphitheater, remains in this room a whisper, nothing more than her physical stature.

  “Who’s next?” she says.

  Todd stands up. “If you don’t mind,” he says to me.

  “Nah, go ahead.” I smile at him. He returns it and retreats to the bathroom.

  “So?” Beth says before the acoustics of the door’s closure are at a complete rest.

  “I don’t know, Beth,” I say. It’s no use asking what she’s talking about. There’s no question about that, and playing dumb will get me smacked.

  “Oh come on, he’s cute.”

  This surprises me. “I don’t know what I feel, Beth. I don’t know what I am. Who I am has never been a mystery to me, but if you ask me where my affection lies, it’s hard for me to give any specificity in my answer. I don’t know.”

  “Do you like being around him?”

  “Well yeah, but I don’t know what kind. I feel at ease around him, but I feel at ease around you, too. I don’t know what it’s like to love. Intimacy doesn’t happen for me.” That last bit rings in the room for a minute. It’s a truth of which I’ve always been innately aware, but verbalizing it gives it substance, tangibility. I don’t like it.

  “Maybe,” she says. “Ten bucks says you’re wrong.”

  “Yeah, maybe,” I say. I ignore the bet.

  “I bet I know someone who’d be willing to help you figure it out,” she says, nodding toward the bathroom door.

  “Can we just … talk about it another time? Sanders just died, we still don’t know how we’re going to nail Keroth, and I’m pretty sure that if we don’t get something done fast, I’m going to jail instead.”

  “Okay,” she says. “But first, you need to explain this all to me. I trust you, and I didn’t ask questions back at your place, but now I need to know. Now is the time to lay it all out. Let’s hear it.”

  I sigh. I tell her … well, everything. I tell her about my childhood. I tell her about trying to have a functional life with zero functional family members. I tell her about my mom leaving, and all the different kinds of my dad’s abuse. I even tell her about stuff that I don’t think is important, like the parkour obsession I had as a teenager. I tell her about stories that I would write about magical places where nobody had parents and everyone was friendly. I tell her about my failed attempts at intimacy throughout my upbringing, and the mockery that my dad made of them. I tell her about the mere smugness and arrogance my dad had.

  I tell her about my school experience. I tell her about getting bullied and just taking it because the way I was raised, resisting and fighting back weren’t options. I tell her about a mentor whom I met in college, and that I only went to college in the first place as a means to escape my dad’s domain. I tell her about my career choice and she already knows the motivation behind it. I tell her about the case of the girl floating on the pond last year. I tell her about my method and, lastly … I tell her about my secret life. I tell her everything.

  I mentioned before that Beth can do sympathy and empathy when she wants to. Well, she listens, and she does empathy. She holds off on sympathy, because she knows that that’s not helpful.

  My name is Jeremy Thorn, and I think I may have just incriminated myself.

  But her name is Beth Connors, and she’s a good friend.

  Todd emerges from the bathroom wearing the same clothes that he put on an hour or so ago. He takes a moment to attempt to gauge what she and I have been talking about, and I can only imagine the conversation that the two of them are about to have. But I decide not to make it my business. At this point, they could speculate intimately on the size of my genitals and I wouldn’t care.

  I suppose it’s my turn to shower. Miraculously, there’s plenty of hot water left. Good; I need a good, long think.

  What to do about Keroth.

  What to do about Todd.

  What to do about me.

  I do still have the one comb planted in my dad’s house. If Keroth jumps the gun and sends forensics out there, they’ll find it. But all that does is create a connection. Keroth has most likely buried any connection he has to the child porn ring; hell, I don’t know if he even is still involved. I need my other evidence again. But I can’t go home. For all I know, Keroth has had his boys go and retrieve it anyway.

  Some of it can be recreated, however. Without his fingerprints, we can’t do the pen or the lighter again. But the map can work. That can be recreated without much difficulty at all. It doesn’t necessarily need his fingerprints, although they would certainly help.

  I’ll collaborate with Beth and Todd on this one.

  My mind isn’t as good at expanding with the steam this time around. Perhaps it has something to do with being in a shower that doesn’t belong to me, or maybe it’s that Sanders just got murdered, or—wait. Sanders. Sanders was definitely shot by one of Keroth’s guys. The boys in homicide will have him within the day.

  Keroth may be going to jail, after all. If his boy will talk, there’s a chance. And there’s not much Keroth can do with either blackmail or bribery when his subject is on the brink of going to jail. Keroth will offer him money, but the court will offer a reduced sentence, and freedom is something worth much more than even Jeremy Keroth could afford.

  Beyond that, if I find a five-inch blade and plant it somewhere where it’ll be found among Keroth’s possessions, along with a map that we can make … we can tie him to my dad’s murder. At least enough to open the investigation. And there’s no way Keroth’s boys don’t talk at that point. They’ll spill everything they can to spend as little time as possible in jail.

  The problem with artificial loyalty is that, once your supply of currency hits its limit, so too does the loyalty that you purchased. It has no substance to it, no lifespan. And on that note, Keroth is going to be losing currency soon, and fast.

  All we have to do is capitalize on the deficit.

  And … what do I do when this is finished? Am I done? Will Riverdell’s vigilante finally be sated? Or will my services be required again?

  I don’t know. I need to bounce ideas off of Beth and Todd. I finish up my shower and dry myself, grateful to be removing hot water from myself this time, rather than the gallon of near freezing water from earlier.

  I put on my clothes and step out of the bathroom. Todd and Beth are both on the bed now, Todd lying on his back and Beth sitting cross-legged, clutching a pillow to her chest.

  “God I needed that,” I say.

  “Yeah you did,” Beth jokes.


  They seem to be doing okay, the both of them. I half expected to walk out and find them both sobbing uncontrollably, but this is definitely the preferable outcome. I smile at them and sit down against the wall again.

  “So,” Beth says. “Now what?”

  “Now we need some goddamn sleep,” I say.

  Beth says, “Are there any other beds, Todd? Maybe an air mattress?”

  “Oh, no, I’m sorry. I can sleep on the floor,” Todd offers.

  “Ah, fuck it,” she says. “This bed’s big enough for the three of us for a night. I call an edge.” She winks at me quickly.

  Todd blushes again. “Umm, are you … sure you’re comfortable sharing a bed with us?”

  She shoots him a look with which I am all too familiar: Oh please.

  I laugh, and after seeing my reaction, so does Todd. Dear god this is awkward. Fuckin’ Beth.

  I get in the middle, and Todd takes my left side while Beth takes my right. I am a stomach sleeper, but this mattress doesn’t accommodate stomach sleeping while there are three occupants, so I lie on my back, instead. And before I can assess how much room I have in each direction, I’m out.

  Twenty-One

  I wake up actually feeling refreshed. The stress of life in general and the crushing inevitability of an imminent resolution, the outcome of which may determine the path of the rest of my life, takes some time to trickle in, which is a nice break from the wave of anxiety with which I’m usually greeted upon waking up. Beth has already gotten up; maybe she’s making coffee.

  It’s weird to think of ordinary things such as coffee at critical times like this. Though I suppose if we abandon fundamentals, the complexities don’t matter much at all, do they?

  When I sit up, Todd wakes up. He looks surprised, then confused, then defeated. Poor guy. He sits up, too.

  “Mornin’,” he grunts.

  “G’morning,” I say. “I’m going to check if the rice fairies came to fix my phone while I was sleeping.”

  “Ah, but did you present a proper offering of human souls?”