If You Go Down to the Woods

by Seth C. Adams

  The stains; the pictures; the smell from the garage.

  I knew what had happened to the old couple, in broad strokes if not in the details. Escalation had happened. Escalation and business.

  In the dining room was a sofa facing an entertainment center taking up one half of the room. The other half hosted a long dining table with frilly place settings and a glass vase with flowers at the center of it. The furniture was seen and registered almost by rote, though, like when you walk into your own home and you see the furnishings there but you don’t really pay them any mind because they’re always there. It’s just something you see, but don’t really see.

  Because although I saw the room itself, what I really saw were the people in it, and I probably would have turned and tried to run then if Brock and Perrelli weren’t right next to me like a wall.

  On the sofa facing the entertainment center was Dillon Glover and his friends: overweight Stu, and pimple-specked Max. Each had a can of beer in their hands, frosted and beaded with condensation, arms splayed on the armrests or back of the sofa, legs on the table before them. The three older boys looked at me when I walked in and smiled wicked smiles that would make a snake cringe. Dillon’s smile was particularly eerie, that crooked smirk punctuated by a still fading yet noticeable blue bruising around his nose and eyes where my forehead had pounded his face some weeks ago. The bluish tint to his countenance made me think of zombies in movies, and his grin looked hungry.

  On the other side of the room, the half dominated by the long dining table, sat Sheriff Glover, Dillon’s father, facing me at the head of the table. It struck me that this was the first time I’d seen them together. Son muscled, father fat, the resemblance was still unmistakable in the vicious glint of their eyes, and the malice that radiated out from behind them like a hidden spectator peeking through curtains. Sheriff Glover was in his tan and brown uniform, which I thought was bold of him when in the presence of killers. Bold or stupid, or maybe he didn’t care.

  He too smiled at me, and I didn’t care for that smile anymore than the winks he gave, or the tip of the hat. His every feigned display of propriety was a nuanced mockery and as much as the Collector or Mr. Perrelli and Brock, I knew Sheriff Glover wasn’t really human anymore. Not in the ways that mattered. Whatever had been in him as a kid, whatever intangible is in each of us when we’re born into this world, that made him human had long since rotted away.

  The implications of his presence, along with that of his son and his son’s friends, raced through my head. I wasn’t sure about the how or why of it, but this whole thing was far bigger than a car full of money in the woods.

  Or a car full of money was a far bigger deal than we kids had ever imagined.

  “Have a seat,” Mr. Perrelli said to me, and whether he meant the sofa with Misters Smirk, Pudge, and Pimple Head, or at the dining table with Sheriff Fatty, I didn’t know. It was left up to me, I guess, and that was one of those lesser of two evils choices.

  I chose the table, taking the seat at the far end across from the sheriff.

  Don’t ask me why I chose one over the other. I held no pretenses about one part of the room being safer than the other. I knew that not only had the shit hit the fan for me, it had short circuited the fan, caused a big fucking fire, and now I was smack in the middle of a shitfire that would probably burn me alive, and I’d die with the smell of shit in my nostrils.

  Life is pretty shitty that way sometimes.

  “Now,” Mr. Perrelli said when I was seated, he and Brock remaining at the threshold of the room, still standing, like guards on high overlooking a prison yard, “let’s hear about the money.”

  I took a deep breath, knowing what I was about to say wasn’t what he wanted to hear. The Glovers and Glover Junior’s friends weren’t going to be very happy, either. They obviously had some sort of arrangement with Perrelli. I was about to stir up a hornet’s nest, and this hornet’s nest included a big bull of a hornet named Brock who broke fingers for fun, and I thought I was pretty much fucked.

  “We burned the money,” I said.

  Looking up at Mr. Perrelli, I hoped against all odds that he’d see the truth in my face, that maybe Jesus would appear to him with this revelation, and he’d be moved by the Spirit to let me go. The look on his face told me he was definitely seeing something, but it wasn’t the Lord Almighty.

  “I see,” Vincent Perrelli said, and his hands in his coat pockets withdrew and went behind his back, like a man idly thinking and measuring things in his head. “That is unfortunate.”

  I dared look away from Mr. Perrelli to Dillon Glover and his pals, then swung my gaze from them to the sheriff. No one was smiling anymore. I don’t know if that was a good thing or not. I didn’t miss their crocodile smiles much, but the flat looks on their faces weren’t exactly winning any beauty pageants either.

  “You promised me payment,” Sheriff Glover said from the other end of the table. “You said I’d get a cut. I’ve been keeping an eye out for that car of yours a long time, Vinnie. I was to let you know if it was ever found, keep people away from it, and you’d send someone to collect. That was the deal.”

  “Yeah,” said Glover Junior. “You said we’d get a cut if we took you to the kid.”

  The sheriff shot his son a hard look that wordlessly told the older boy to shut up, and shut up he did. I didn’t feel vindicated by the confirmation of my long held suspicion of the less than loving nature of the Glover father-son relationship. This wasn’t the time for me to gloat in anything.

  This was a time for me to watch, carefully, and wait.

  “It’s not my fault your collector fucked things up,” Sheriff Glover added. “Payment’s still due, Vinnie.”

  Dillon, Stu, and Max vigorously nodded their agreement.

  Mr. Perrelli didn’t so much as look at any of them. I was the center of his universe and, right then, I wished for one of those Star Trek wormholes that could take me to an alternate universe.

  “Now, what I think we need here,” Mr. Perrelli began, “is another example of just how serious I take my business affairs, Joey.” He pursed his lips as he looked at me, like he was considering something. Then he gave a quick little nod like he’d come to a determination. “Yes, I think I need to show you just how much ten million dollars is worth.”

  His hands came out from behind his back.

  In his right hand he held a black pistol with a long and slim cylinder of metal attached at the muzzle. He held the gun out at me, and I stared down the muzzle of a gun for the second time in my life. That dark eye at the center was like a glimpse into eternity. He would pull the trigger, and with the silencer there’d hardly be a sound. He’d blow off a hand or a foot, or maybe he’d just kill me and go after my friends. Seek the answers from them that I didn’t have, that none of us had.

  Either way, great pain or the final darkness, it was going to suck big time.

  Then the pistol swung away from me in an arc sweeping from the dining room to the living room. Towards the sofa and the three guys sitting there, holding their cool beers like the masters of everything.

  Stu dropped his beer just as the pistol let out a hiss and pop and a brief jet of fire coughed out of it. His chubby head spit out a cloud of red behind it. He fell and rolled off the sofa to the ground. The can of beer followed beside him, liquor and blood pooling on the carpet.

  The pistol spit fire twice more.

  A bullet went through the beer can Max had in his hands, spraying the foamy amber liquid all over his pockmarked face. Then the second bullet went through his face, spraying everything behind it in red.

  Dillon Glover watched his friends fall and, even as the surprise of it broke the comfortably drunk serenity on his face, he rolled off the sofa and the third bullet meant for him struck and chipped the fireplace behind him.

  “Whatthefuck?” Sheriff Glover muttered, streaming the words together so that it came out like the muddled syllables of a primitive language. His eyes were wide and
he watched the scene before him with disbelief.

  He fumbled at his belt holster even as Mr. Perrelli swung the silencer equipped pistol his way. The sheriff looked like a kid caught jacking off, trying to reach down and pull his zipper up even as his mom or dad came into the room.

  Gun at his belt, or gun in his pants, it didn’t matter what Sheriff Glover had been reaching for, because the pistol sent out its lick of flame once more, the hiss and pop of it like a campfire crackling at the last twigs, and a bloom of red spread across his shirt like a blossom. The sheriff toppled sideways, sliding off the chair and hitting the floor with a thump.

  Silence followed. Wisps of smoke curled from the pistol like spirits rising.

  Sitting at the table, I watched all of this frozen in my seat, afraid beyond words, but at least I hadn’t pissed my pants like with the Collector, and so I figured I was making progress.

  Vincent Perrelli’s eyes fell on me for a moment, and the pistol began an arc back in my direction. His eyes sparkled with a sinister satisfaction.

  “This is escalation,” he said.

  Movement from near the sofa. Dillon Glover rising, turning, running.

  Mr. Perrelli swung the gun back that way. Brock also reached behind his back and his slab-like hand returned with his own silencer-tipped pistol.

  Dillon dove past the dividing wall into the living room. Bullet holes appeared like magic in the plaster where he’d just been, trailing him.

  Both men turned in pursuit.

  Across the table from me, behind the now empty chair where the sheriff had been, a sliding glass door led to the backyard. I leapt up from my seat, dashed to the door, gripped it and slid it open.

  Motion and a rustle of movement from behind me.

  Darting into the backyard, I commanded my legs to move fast, faster. The sliding glass door shattered behind me, raining down on the paved patio in a million tinkling sounds like fairy music.

  A set of heavy footfalls coming my way stomped a fast beat. I darted to the left, away from the remains of the glass door, towards the far side of the house and the alley there.

  The pursuing footfalls slapped heavily onto the concrete patio behind me.

  More hisses and pops from the whispering gun.

  A pull of air and heat near my right ear made me yelp as I turned the corner into the alley between the house and the brick wall bordering the property. A jump of a spark flicked off the wall inches away. Far down the alley were a fence and gate and I ran for them.

  Somewhere out of sight behind me, around the corner but close and getting closer, the heavier footfalls stomped after me.

  My hands reached for the clasp holding the gate shut. I pulled at the contraption and the metal slipped through my fingers, wouldn’t unlatch.

  The plodding feet turned the corner, entering the mouth of the alley behind me.

  I could almost feel the gun rising, taking aim.

  The clasp lifted and the gate swung open. Ducking, I ran through.

  More snags of air passed close by my head. I stumbled, bringing my hands to my head, feeling there like a boy on a first date checking his hair.

  I ran, saw the black Cadillac, saw Mr. Perrelli some yards down the road, and Dillon even further, turning the far corner and disappearing out of sight. Standing at the center of the cul-de-sac, I shifted from foot to foot, took a step this way, then the other.

  Brock’s heavy footfalls were coming again, heavy and fast and determined.

  Pivoting, I turned and darted around the end of the wall, leaving the property of the poor dead old couple lying lifeless somewhere in the garage behind me. A cement and dirt easement ran between the wall and the adjacent property, and I dashed down the narrow path. At the far end, a length of chain-link fence separated the neighborhood from the highway beyond. I ran for it, anxiously aware that the brick wall provided cover only until Brock turned the corner. Then, my back would provide an all too easy target in the narrow path of the easement.

  I heard them calling out to each other, Perrelli saying that the Glover kid was gone. Here was the Hayworth kid, Brock shouted back, followed by two pairs of footfalls coming my way.

  To my left, the old dead couple’s nearest neighbor had an immense lawn, and several fruited trees. Recently watered, run-off from the sprinklers of the lawn had spilled across the concrete easement. Running at full speed, I hadn’t the presence of mind to watch my footfalls, and I caromed from one side to the other as my rubber soles sought purchase on the wet concrete.

  I fell hard, rolled, scrambled to my feet.

  Grasped the wire of the chain-link, hoisted myself up and over. Dropped, landed awkwardly, almost fell again, then ran straight into the highway.

  Traffic intermittent yet regular, I chose my path purposefully. With more than enough time to plot their courses around me or to slow down, drivers nonetheless greeted me with rude honks of their horns and ruder gestures out their windows.

  I didn’t stop until I was on the other side. Even then it was only a moment, a second or two, turning and looking back across the highway, over the hoods and roofs of the cars, past the honking, gesticulating motorists.

  Peering through the links of the fence I’d leapt, staring across the highway at me, stood Mr. Perrelli and Brock. The older man waved. The big man only stared.

  Perrelli mouthed one word at me, and even from the distance between us, I could read his lips and hear the word.

  “Escalation.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  1.

  In comics the heroes are always in the right place at the right time to save the people that need to be saved. Oh, sure, you have the exception of the origin stories, in which almost every hero becomes a hero because of someone he or she lost. Spiderman is Spiderman because he failed to save Uncle Ben. Batman is Batman because he watched helplessly as his parents were murdered. Even Superman, before he decided to put on the cape and tights, watched his earth dad die of a heart attack. But after those early failures, the heroes always rise to the occasion. They take down the bad guys and save the world, no matter how diabolical the plot or seemingly insurmountable the odds against them.

  But I wasn’t a hero, and I was about as far away from the right place as could be. I was on foot while Mr. Perrelli and Brock had the Cadillac. To further complicate this, my family and friends lay in several different directions, and who to go to first, how to prioritize the value of their lives—not knowing who Mr. Perrelli would go after first, how he’d prioritize his killing, his escalation—made for a predicament that tore at my heart and mind.

  * * *

  I ran the two miles home as fast as I could. My chest was heaving, my heart pumping and thudding so hard there were echoes of it in my ears. Sweat drenched my shirt like it was a wash rag by the time I turned off the shoulder of the highway and into my neighborhood.

  Dad’s truck was in the driveway, and I realized he must be home for lunch with Mom, and the fact that they were together and Dad would never let anything happen to her lifted at least one responsibility off my shoulders. As I pushed through the front door and saw my parents at the dining table, I briefly thought about telling Dad everything, letting him carry the burden of figuring out how to deal with Mr. Perrelli and Brock.

  Then I thought of Dad being pummeled by Mr. Templeton. That had been my fault also, and Dad had paid the price for it. I knew I might yet have to pass the burden of my troubles on to him but, before I did that, I had to get everyone together in one place.

  That much at least was my responsibility.

  “Joey, you alright?” Mom asked as I walked briskly past them and headed for the stairs.

  “Son, you’re sweating like you’ve run a marathon,” Dad said.

  “I’m … fine,” I croaked.

  Taking the stairs two at a time, I glanced back, eyeing the clock hanging on the wall in the foyer. Dad must have just arrived before I had. It was only a few minutes past noon, which gave him another forty-five minutes or so for
his lunch hour before he had to leave again. That would be cutting it close for what I had planned.

  Very close.

  I headed straight for Sarah’s room and pushed the door open. Like last time, she was planted in front of her dresser mirror, compacts like a painter’s palette in front of her, and a tube of lipstick in one hand. Again, the sudden opening of her door made her jerk, and the lipstick nearly went up her nose, leaving a red streak over her upper lip and a smear across her nostrils.

  “Can’t you knock?” she barked at me.

  I struggled to catch my breath. Taking my silence as defiance, she got up, fists clenched. Then reading something in my demeanor other than brotherly annoyance, she stopped short.

  “What’s wrong, Joey?”

  I didn’t immediately answer.

  Thoughts of the dead froze me in place. The older couple that were probably putrefying in the sweltering summer heat in the closed garage. Mr. Pudge and Mr. Pimple, shot in the head and face. Sheriff Glover and his chest blooming red, like the fireworks exploding in color on the Fourth of July.

  Then I thought of Mr. Templeton at the bottom of Lookout Mountain, twisted and broken. That took me even further back to the Collector and his knife at my throat. Which in turn led to the Haunted House and Dillon’s switchblade prodding me in similar fashion.

  The money.

  The bound body in the trunk of the Buick, and the hole in its skull.

  Everything that had occurred that summer came rushing back in one great tidal wave of terror. No longer did I feel like a teenager on the brink of something greater, those mysterious years past school, summer breaks, and days spent with friends. No longer did I feel like being brave and strong as my dad had taught me to be, not taking shit as I’d told Fat Bobby that first day by the stream in the woods. The boy who’d shattered an older boy’s nose in the mirrored dark halls of a haunted house seemed far and distant.