Ashes and Entropy

by Laird Barron

  “Okay, sure.” I return to the kitchen and bump into Beth, the manager-on-duty, waiting for me by the sink. Bitch is eager to pounce, like she’s been hiding in the back watching the whole time, just waiting for me to screw up.

  “You care to explain what’s going on with that...kid?” She grimaces at that last word, like it physically disgusts her just having to say it. Beth works the night shift because she is the only manager who doesn’t have a family waiting for her at home. The other managers, they all got loved ones who depend on them. But Beth. Beth’s more like me. Neither of us has got a single soul other than our own. She goes home every morning to an empty apartment and eats junk food while watching some dumb shit on Netflix then falls asleep on the couch. If she never wakes back up, the only person who will feel anything at all is the poor sap who ends up having to cover her shift. And I’m no better.

  “I don’t know who he is.” I gesture to the dining area, keeping my voice low. “He just came in here. Saying he was hungry.”

  Beth sighs and rubs her hands through her hair. “Everybody who comes in here is hungry, Owen. That doesn’t explain why you’re feeding him trash. Or why you even gave him a seat. He smells awful.”

  “What was I supposed to do? Make him leave? He’s just a kid.” It’s then that I realize for the first time who he reminds me of. Of course I’d known it the second he walked inside the diner, but a wiser part of me had refused to acknowledge the similarities until now.

  If I’d never gotten behind the wheel that night, back in 2013, Bobby would be about this kid’s age now.

  Jesus Christ.

  “He’s not our responsibility. If he can’t pay, then he has to go. Call CPS if you have to, I don’t care, just make him leave.” She pauses, cheeks swelling like she’s swishing wine. “And besides, given your history, do you really think it’s a good idea to be...socializing with children? Especially the way you look right now. I mean, God.”

  She’s talking about my fading black eye, my broken left pinkie still in a splint, yes, but she’s also talking about much, much more.

  Right fist tightens at my side. Teeth grind against teeth. Flashes of cuffs, flashes of my P.O. shaking his head and telling me I blew it, I blew everything. Fist loosens. Teeth remain grinding. I turn and stomp back out into the dining area, back to the kid who looks like my son, but isn’t my son, can’t be my son. I lean over the booth and whisper into his ear, ignoring the rancid stench clouding so close to his face.

  “Sorry, kid, but my boss says you got to leave or she’s calling the cops. You got some place to go?”

  The boy does not respond, only stares down at the table as if still expecting more food to appear.

  I reconsider, feeling Beth’s eyes on my back, mean and acidic. “Tell you what. Go out the front door, then walk around back, in the alley? Hang out there, by the dumpster. I’ll meet you in a couple minutes with something else to eat. Cool?”

  The boy nods, stands, leaves.

  “There, was that so hard?” Beth says, suddenly right behind me, breathing down my neck.

  I sidestep away from her and head for the timeclock. “I’m going on my break.”

  ~

  The boy’s waiting by the dumpster, just like I told him to. Arms at his sides, back stiff, face blank. The wind’s picking up and I start shivering as soon as I step into the alley, but the boy doesn’t seem the slightest bit bothered. The homeless, they get used to the cold. They learn to adapt. I met plenty ex-hobos during my time in Centralia. A lot of them there on purpose, terrified of freezing to death out on the street, would rather commit a sloppy B&E than wonder whether or not they’d wake up the next morning. Chicago winters are a gamble nobody wins, except maybe Satan, and that motherfucker rigged the game from the get-go, anyway.

  “Hungry,” the boy says as I approach him, hoping like hell Beth doesn’t get any wise ideas and peek her head out the back door. I hand him the brown paper bag I’d brought from my apartment. We’re allowed to eat the food at the restaurant, but management makes us pay for it, and the discount’s an embarrassment, so I just bring my own lunch. The boy rips the bag from my hands and tears it open, devouring the peanut butter sandwich within seconds. I light up a cigarette and take long, slow drags as he nibbles on the apple.

  “Where’d you come from?”

  No response.

  “You all alone?”

  “No.”

  “Who else is with you?”

  The boy hesitates. “Friends.”

  “Friends your age or older?”

  No response.

  “Okay. Where are they, then?”

  “Hiding.”

  “Hiding from me?”

  He nods.

  “Because they’re afraid?”

  Nods.

  “Well. They don’t need to be. I’m not gonna hurt them or nothing. But you all should be careful about the places you walk into. Almost got the cops called on you.”

  “No cops.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Afraid. Afraid of the Bad Man.”

  “The bad man?”

  Nods.

  “You mean me?”

  He shakes his head no.

  “Then who?”

  No response.

  “Did someone hurt you, kid?”

  “Hungry.”

  “Sorry, kid. That’s all I got tonight.”

  “Tomorrow.” It’s not a question.

  I shrug, weirdly uncomfortable with denying his request. “Yeah, sure. Just wait out here, though. Don’t come in. Beth sees you again, she’ll call the cops herself.”

  “Friends.”

  “Yeah. Bring your friends. Sure.”

  He points at me. “Friend?”

  “Me?”

  Nods.

  “Yeah. Okay. My name’s Owen. And I’m your friend.”

  The boy steps forward and hugs me and I wait until he leaves the alley before crying.

  ~

  My apartment door is ajar when I get home later that morning and I stop in the hallway thinking fuck, not today, but thoughts like those didn’t help Becky, nothing helped her, so I clear my throat, making my presence more obvious, and the hands of my intruders reach through the door crack, waiting for me, always waiting for me, and grab my shirt and drag me inside the apartment. The door slams shut a second later and I’m flying, not an inch of me touching the floor, then all of me’s slamming down—going bang against the hardwood and skidding forward—another victim of gravity, another idiot of stupid, terrible decisions.

  I flop like a fish until I’m on my back. Standing above me: Kenneth and Mallory Noble, sixty-eight and sixty-three, faces dripping of tears, bodies trembling, determination fierce in their gaze.

  The parents of Nancy Marie Noble Matilla.

  Once upon a time, before I killed their daughter and grandchild, I’d been their son-in-law.

  Kenneth stomps his boot in my face and my nose crunches and warm blood pours into my eyes, my mouth. It tastes like pennies. I drink it all in, telling myself I don’t deserve to spit it out. Mallory raises a cane and slams it into my ribs and I curl into a ball as more blows strike. Everybody’s sobbing, including me, but not because of the pain. As blood and snot choke my lungs I try to scream, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” but they can’t hear me. It doesn’t matter how loud I say it. They’ll never hear me.

  Fifteen minutes later, once they’re both exhausted, we clean up the blood from the floor and I take a shower and bandage my new wounds. When I get out, they’re sitting on the couch, three cups of coffee on the table in front of them. I sit on the floor, Indian-style, and sip at the cup closest to me. My body throbs. My nose is caved into my brain. My teeth ache. My innards moan. But it’s okay. This is the way it’s meant to be. This is the only way it can be.

  They ask me if I’m okay and I tell them no and I ask them the same question and they echo my response.

  Conversation evolves to other topics. How’s work? Work is fine. Ho
w’s your parole officer? A hardass. Are you doing okay on money? I’m doing fine. Will it ever stop hurting? No, it won’t ever stop hurting.

  I consider telling them about the boy I met last night and how much he reminded me of Bobby, but my body’s not ready for another beating, not yet, not now. We hug and say our goodbyes and I watch them leave down the hallway, toward the elevator. I don’t bother locking the door as I turn and search for safety within the blankets on my air mattress.

  Sleep does not find me for several hours.

  ~

  Before heading out into the alley, I grab the trash bag I’d stashed under the sink earlier in my shift. The boy’s waiting in the same spot as last night, next to the dumpster. A group of children similarly aged hide behind him, cowering in the shadows. They all stare at me as I approach, filthy, emotionless. The boy who looks like Bobby but isn’t Bobby says, “Hungry,” and I hold up the trash bag in my hand. He reaches out to take it but I pull away, lift the index finger on my other hand.

  “Not yet. You want to eat, you gotta answer some questions first.”

  The boy’s brow bends into a V. “Hungry.”

  The kids behind him all step forward, staring at me, and the boy shakes his head no and the kids return to the shadows.

  “Hungry.”

  “What’s your name? Tell me that, and you can have some of what’s inside.”

  The boy hesitates, and for a moment I don’t think he understands the question, then: “Nameless.”

  “Nameless?”

  The boy nods.

  I wave my free hand at the kids behind him. “And what about the rest of you? You all nameless, too?”

  They don’t budge. Continue watching my every movement. Cats hunting flies.

  “Okay. Where are you from?” The question’s for all of them, any of them.

  “Nowhere,” the boy who is not Bobby says.

  “What does that mean?”

  “Nowhere.”

  “You haven’t always been in this alley. Where do you live?”

  “Everywhere.”

  “What are you? Runaways?”

  Nothing.

  “What about the bad man? Who is he?”

  They all flinch and look over their shoulders, as if expecting to find the bad man waiting behind them.

  “Bad Man is bad,” the boy says. “Bad, bad, bad.”

  “But who is he? Why is he bad?”

  The boy reaches for the bag again. “Hungry.”

  I sigh and surrender the trash bag. The boy takes it and rushes behind the dumpster with the rest of his group. Camouflaged by shadows. Loud, wet chewing noises. A desperate feast of leftover pancakes and rolls. I shuffle my feet in the alley, shivering and lighting a cigarette, and try to remember the last time I’ve actually eaten. My stomach growls. Ignore the emptiness. Ignore the ache. Everything hurts just as it should.

  I wait, hoping they’ll come back out and talk to me a little more, but my break ends before they’re done eating, so I flick my cigarette butt on the ground and head back inside the diner, wondering if I should do something more, if I should call somebody. Then Beth stomps toward me and shoves a plunger against my chest.

  “Someone clogged the shitter.”

  ~

  Every night I feed the kids, their group seems to expand. I lose count at twenty. How the hell do they get here without being noticed? Twenty kids can’t travel in a group around Chicago at 2:30 in the morning without drawing some kind of attention, yet they somehow manage to move around the city undetected. Sometimes people, they choose not to see things they don’t want to be involved in. Sometimes it’s easier to ignore a problem than to try solving it. The homeless are masters of stealth. Thinking about them makes people sad and angry, so they just don’t think about them. It’s easier that way. But I can’t ignore these kids. I can’t be that kind of person. I can’t.

  “I was thinking about maybe contacting a shelter,” I tell them one night as they devour old hamburger patties behind the dumpster. “You know. A place you can all stay. It’s too cold to be sleeping outside. Once the snow hits, you’ll freeze to death. I’m surprised you haven’t already.”

  The boy who is not Bobby steps out of the shadows and shakes his head. “No shelter.”

  “But where will you go?”

  No response.

  “You know, I can’t just keep feeding you guys like this. Someone’s going to notice all the missing food soon. I...I can’t get in trouble. I used to be in jail, and if I get in trouble for something like that, they might send me back. Back to jail. And besides, don’t you guys want to do something else besides just eat trash every night? You never talk to me. What do you do all day? Where do you go?”

  Where do you hide? I almost ask.

  And the boy cocks his head, expressing curiosity for the first time since we met. “Jail?”

  I retreat back, embarrassed. “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  He continues staring like that isn’t a good enough answer.

  “It was...it was a bad time in my life. I’m trying to do better. Like by helping you guys. But you gotta let me, first.”

  The boy’s face goes blank again. I’m not going to win this. These kids are stubborn. They’re used to living out here on their own. They don’t want to change their lifestyles. They just want someone to feed them.

  “Listen.” I raise my hand like I’m going to place it on the boy’s shoulder, then think better of it. “I won’t be here tomorrow. It’s my night off. So don’t freak out when I don’t show up, okay?”

  “Hungry.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “Hungry.”

  “I’ll be back in two nights, okay? So not tomorrow, and not the night after, but the night after that, I’ll be back. You’ll be...okay, right?”

  Of course they won’t be okay, but they’re not going to die because I take two nights off from work. They survived long enough before finding me, and they’ll survive long after I’m gone.

  (after I’m gone)

  If the boy understands what I’m saying, his facial expression doesn’t alter to show it. Sometimes when I talk to him, I get the feeling he doesn’t exactly know English, only bits and pieces he’s picked up over the years while living on the streets. But he doesn’t seem to have an accent. When he speaks, his voice comes out in a monotone.

  “Where will you guys go?” I ask, not expecting an answer.

  But I get one, anyway:

  “With you.”

  ~

  I tell them they’re nuts, but they either don’t understand or don’t give a shit. I try to make them see things my way. How weird and suspicious it’d look, me, not only a grown-ass man but also an ex-con, being trailed by two dozen small children who are obviously homeless. People are going to have a lot of questions, I tell the boy who is not my son. They’re going to intervene. Society just doesn’t work like that.

  And the boy says, “It fine.”

  I still don’t agree to the idea, but there’s no way for me to prevent them from following me on their tiny dirty feet as I walk to my apartment a little over a mile from the diner. It’s seven in the morning and the sun hasn’t quite decided to rise, which I get the feeling the children are grateful for. I’ve never seen them during the day and when I try to picture it in my head I get nauseated. I don’t know why. But maybe I do, maybe I know exactly why.

  This morning the city is surreal. Usually, walking home at this time, the sidewalks are crammed with other people, students and workers and joggers, everybody. But today the sidewalks are empty, as if reserved for me and the kids. And, while there’s an odd car driving past every now and then, the normal busy traffic does not seem to be present, and those who do drive our way don’t even look in our direction. Like we’re under some kind of cloaking spell, invisible to the public eye.

  There are far too many of us to fit in the elevator, so we take the stairs up to my apartment. Again, we pass nobody. Once inside, I lock
the doors and show them around. It isn’t much, not by any stretch, and with them all in here there’s barely any room to breathe, much less move around. Some of them cram together on the couch, and others sit on the floor, taking up all of the living room. I stand in the kitchen and they all stare at me, expecting something.

  “Well, this is my home. You’re all welcome to stay here as long as you wish. I know, there’s not a lot of room, but it’s all I got. Just...try not to make too much noise or draw attention. I don’t think my lease allows for so many people to live here at once. But, uh, if you need to shower, feel free. I’ll try to stop at Goodwill later and pick up some clothes that might fit some of you. Uh. There’s not much food here, I’m sorry to say, but you can help yourselves to whatever you find.”

  The boy who is not my son points at a framed photograph of my actual son hanging from the living room wall. “Who?”

  I ignore the question, pretending he hasn’t spoken, but he continues pointing at it, waiting, so I swallow and try to remain calm. “That’s my son. His name’s Bobby.”

  “Where at?”

  “He. Uh. He’s dead. My son is dead.”

  “Dead?”

  “Yeah.”

  The boy lowers his hand, doesn’t say anything else.

  My cell phone starts ringing, and all the kids flinch in unison. The caller ID says it’s my parole officer. Fuck.

  “Okay, guys, don’t say anything, all right? I have to take this. Seriously. Don’t make any noise.” I don’t know why I’m telling them this. I’ve never heard any of them even speak besides the one who originally showed up inside the diner. The rest of them, it’d be difficult to tell they existed if not for their odor.

  Gonna have to buy some candles if they’re staying here. Some Febreze and shit like that. Money I don’t have.

  I answer the phone. “Hello?”

  “Owen. I was starting to think you weren’t going to answer.”

  “Yeah, sorry. I just got home from work.”

  “And how is your job doing?”

  “Oh. You know. It’s okay. It’s a job.”