Where the Devil Says Goodnight

by K. A. Merikan

  He closed his eyes, taking a drag from his cigarette to a silence so perfect suspicion made him look up to the trees growing around his property. For once, there wasn’t a single crow in sight, but before he could have considered possible reasons for their unusual absence, Adam’s shadow climbed down the sandy road before the man himself jogged from between the trees. This was the halfway point of a route of approximately six kilometers, but he wasn’t out of breath yet. The sun shone through the short blond hair at the top of his head, and since it was now behind the running figure, the front of Adam’s body remained shadowed. Emil couldn’t stop staring at the shapely legs that stirred dust with each step.

  As Adam approached, passing Emil’s small fruit orchard and continuing along the low wooden fence, his face emerged from the shade—a ripe peach with rosy cheeks, ready for picking. He looked as if he was in the most pleasant of trances, about to take a deep breath and let the air carry him above the ground, away from the troubles of mere mortals.

  Emil took a long drag from his cigarette and held the smoke in his lungs when Adam slowed down and met his gaze.

  “Mornin’,” Emil said, and wouldn’t even blink from the excitement curling in his stomach. He wouldn’t chase the lamb, but he wouldn’t hesitate to lure it to his doorstep.

  Adam rolled his shoulders back, briefly showcasing his pecs under the yellow T-shirt, and walked into Emil’s yard. “Good morning. May I ask for some water? It’s getting hotter every day.”

  Emil put out the cigarette in an ashtray and got up. “Yep. Hotter every day.” He made a point of undressing Adam with his gaze. “Wait a sec.”

  Adam licked the tiny beads of sweat from above his lip and shifted his weight, for a moment acting as if the wandering chickens were more interesting than Emil himself. Nice try.

  Emil filled a whole jug at the kitchen tap and came back with it to find his unexpected guest scooting next to a couple of dandelion blowballs while the rooster circled him with curiosity. He hadn’t noticed Emil’s return yet, which gave Emil plenty of time to ogle the way Adam’s running shorts clung to his ass. Did he come here to torture Emil or to get some?

  “Your water.”

  Adam rose and stepped on the porch with a small smile. “Do you have a glass?” he asked, eyeing the large container in Emil’s hands.

  “Just drink from the jug. Jeez. You’re not a prince. Are you?”

  “It’s just a bit too much for me.” Adam’s brows lowered in disapproval, but he accepted the pitcher and took his first sip. Emil leaned against the porch railing, watching Adam swallow over and over while sunlight reflected off the sweat on his neck.

  “No one tells you to drink the whole thing. Sometimes… a lot might be on offer, but you can have just a little. That’s fine.”

  Adam choked on the water and put the pitcher on the wooden table, coughing from deep in his chest. Emil’s gaze followed droplets of water down Adam’s throat, all the way under the collar of his top. He imagined them rolling through the middle of Adam’s chest, into his shorts, and wished those were his kisses. He felt silly over developing such an intense crush—he was no teenager—but no one needed to know what was inside his heart.

  “Are you okay?” Emil stepped closer. If only Adam had the courage to admit the sparks between them existed, they wouldn’t even have to say anything. Emil would have opened the door, and Adam would have entered. If no one else knew it happened, would it still be a sin?

  Unaware of Emil’s thoughts, Adam nodded, but as he kept on coughing, Emil patted his back several times, and that seemed to have done the trick.

  Sucking in air, Adam rolled into Emil’s chair and pulled up his T-shirt to wipe dampness off his face, but showcased his abs in the process. Adam had a beautiful body. Naturally trim, with a dusting of blond hair marking the path between his navel and the shorts. No harm in staring, but if Emil was to stay sane and cut the insistent daydreams about fucking Adam in the old confessional, he needed to get laid. There were too many charming guys out there to waste time on obsessing over the one he couldn’t get.

  Then again, all those available men didn’t live in Dybukowo. Cracow would offer a much-needed break from the isolation of the valley.

  “Those are some interesting tattoos,” Adam said, changing the topic yet keeping it close to matters of the flesh. It made Emil smile.

  “Which ones?” he asked, presenting both his arms. He was aware none of them were works of art, but not ugly either. The friend who’d given them to Emil had used his skin for training purposes. He’d been kind enough to cover the worst of his early designs with something better before he moved to Warsaw and became a big name in the industry. Or so his sister claimed, because Emil hadn’t heard from him since. Either way, Emil wouldn’t have been able to afford this much ink, so he wore it with pride. Even the small pentagram with Mickey Mouse ears at the back of his shoulder.

  Adam swallowed. “The skulls. I guess I rarely see animal and human ones together,” he said, indicating the collection of bones on Emil’s right arm. The artist had inked smoke all over and added a variety of skulls, based on Emil’s preference. It wasn’t the greatest of designs, but it looked cool enough to give strangers an excuse to approach him—pretty useful in this Grindr desert.

  “I like this better,” he said and presented his other arm. The image on this one was far more complex and had been finished just before the artist had disappeared from Emil’s life. Crows flew up from behind a topless man wearing a mask made of a goat’s skull. A skeletal bird sat on his shoulder, and he raised one hand into the horns gesture, to drive home Emil’s interest in heavy metal music. The rest of the tattoo was an homage to his heritage and depicted fog in the mountains and wolves running up a hill to catch a skeletal fox.

  Adam cleared his throat, sweating more than he’d had throughout his jog. Adorable. “It’s… it fits your style.”

  Best thing Emil could ever hear about them from a priest. He’d let him off the hook for now. “You’ll quickly get bored of this place. Let me know if you ever want to change things up and go horse riding,” Emil said. But you’d need to wear those shorts.

  Adam laughed but took the pitcher again and had a couple more sips. “I’d rather start with a smaller horse.”

  “I didn’t know there were other horses on offer.”

  Adam met his gaze, contemplating it for a moment, and his flush seemed to darken, climbing down his neck like wine soaking into fabric. “You know small towns. People get overly excited about a new priest sometimes. Even you got caught up in it.”

  Emil swallowed his embarrassment. “Me? I’m not bothered. I’m off to Cracow today, so you’ve got a whole week to think about that ride.”

  Adam’s lips remained open for a bit too long. “Really? Is there… something you need to deal with there?” he asked, leaning back in the chair.

  There it was. Adam was curious. “Just visiting a good friend. You know, the kind of friend who is actually gay. And interested.”

  Adam cleared his throat and squeezed the armrest. “Oh. Well, I hope you have fun. Safely,” he said in a flat voice.

  Emil snorted and rubbed the hump on his nose. “Wow. A progressive priest from Warsaw. Never thought I’d see that in Dybukowo.”

  Adam’s nostrils flared, and he crossed his arms on his chest. “I believe God wants people to be happy. And you’re not a practicing Catholic, so I don’t think it’s within my rights to berate you.”

  “Are you happy?”

  For a moment, Adam’s blue eyes dulled, but he rose from the chair and stepped off the porch. “It’s sunny, I’ve had breakfast prepared for me, and I have more free time than I used to as a student. What’s there not to be happy about?”

  Maybe not getting his dick sucked like, ever, but Emil would leave that thought to himself, since this doe was skittish.

  “Exactly.” He smiled and picked up his cold coffee as he watched Adam back away to the main path. It brought Emil lots of satisfaction
to see just how reluctant Adam’s footsteps were.

  The rest of Emil’s day was slow, and he let himself enjoy the simple things. After a ride through the woods, he brushed Jinx and cleaned his hoofs, and then enjoyed a meal of fresh fruit and whipped cream before stepping into his house to pack for the weeklong trip. He’d never been away for so long since his grandfather’s death nine years back, but his excitement grew as he chose the best clothes to wear while clubbing. He wouldn’t disclose his evening plans to his employer, but he was meant to only stay in Cracow for a week, and he could survive on four hours of sleep for that long.

  Excitement buzzed through his veins like warm oil, but when Zofia hadn’t arrived at the scheduled time, it dampened somewhat. He called her house to make sure she hadn’t taken a nap, but she didn’t pick up. He waited an extra ten minutes, then another ten. He would have gladly waited some more, but if he wanted to make it for the train, he couldn’t allow himself any more leeway. And if Zofia forgot he was leaving today, then maybe her next-door neighbors could point Emil to where she’d gone.

  There was nothing to worry about—at least that was what he kept telling himself throughout the hurried jog along the dirt road, because dread was already clenching its claws around his heart. Had she changed her mind and had been too embarrassed to tell him? Had she gotten ill and her family hadn’t notified Emil? Whichever scenario popped into Emil’s head was disastrous and ended with him stuck in Dybukowo.

  But whether he managed to leave town tonight or not, he needed to at least check up on her, because what if she’d broken her leg or fallen over and was unable to get up? With a cigarette fueling his fast-paced march, he traversed the fields between his home and the most populated area in the scattered village, passing through one of the neighbor’s yards to reach the main road.

  His heart slowed, as did time, when he spotted a large crowd of people congregated around a ditch close to Zofia’s home. Breathless, he looked up, alarmed by the concert of cawing, and when he saw a tall tree that had more crows than leaves in its crown, his pulse galloped as if he’d been given an adrenaline injection straight to the heart.

  Emil walked faster and then ran to the rhythmic thud in his ears. A woman rushed out of her house, screaming something Emil couldn’t hear through the buzz in his head. She dove into the crowd of onlookers and dragged her two small children away, tugging them back to their home. Another woman declared someone should call the police, but Emil could barely understand even the loudest of their voices, as if he were behind a glass wall.

  A shiny Range Rover drove past Emil and stopped in the middle of the road. It belonged to Radek’s dad, but before Mr. Nowak managed to step out of the vehicle, Emil reached the gathering and stood still, wishing he’d just stayed home after all.

  Zofia’s twisted body rested in the shallow water. Her face had been ripped to pieces, one eye a bloody hole, red marks of torn flesh on her bared arms.

  “They did that!” cried one of the children Emil had noticed earlier. His gaze followed its index finger all the way to the tree above. To the crows that for once hadn’t been waiting for him in the morning. Which meant they must have been here.

  Nausea rose in Emil’s throat, cold like icy syrup that tasted of bile, but no matter how mutilated Zofia was, she could still be alive, so he jumped into the ditch and touched her hand.

  But no. It was cold. As if she’d been here for hours, a grim feast for the birds.

  His breath stopped as he took in the small holes poked in her skin, the torn flesh of her mouth. She was dead.

  She’d been the one person to reach out a helping hand to him, and now she was dead.

  “Killers often return to the place of their crime,” came as a whisper, and Emil looked up, his throat thick with a scream he tried to hold back. The shallow water had soaked into his boots and encased his feet with its icy grip. He only realized the words were meant for him when he met the gaze of one of the women.

  “Well? Aren’t those your birds?” she asked, with panic settling in her voice despite the way she stood unflinchingly above the ditch.

  Emil’s thoughts were a mess. He still held on to Zofia’s hand, wishing deep down that maybe if he managed to make it warm, her remaining eye would open. When… how could something like this happen with so many neighbors nearby? It had to be a dream, and all the eyes looking at him in accusation—an illusion. They couldn’t honestly think he’d done something so gruesome, could they?

  “W-what? No, they’re not my birds! The fucking things follow me, which is hardly my fault.” In a fit of frustration, he rose, grabbed a stone, and threw it at the crows which flew up in a black cloud, as if they were one body.

  This couldn’t be happening. Not in Dybukowo, not in this quiet valley where nothing ever fucking happened!

  “Death follows him since he was a child, Father. He was only eight when he set his house on fire, and both his parents died. Not long after, his grandmother went missing. This can’t all be a coincidence. Poor Zofia agreed to take care of his horse this week, and this is where it got her. May God rest her soul.”

  It was a whisper, but Emil heard it well enough and spun around, about to confront the man who dared to say such things in his presence, but when he faced the crowd, Adam’s blue gaze was the only one he could see. His handsome face, while pale, bore no judgment, but his eyes told a different story, betraying that Adam was assessing the poison poured into his ear.

  Nowak must have finally rolled out of his Range Rover, because he asked the villagers to disperse and draped a white sheet over Zofia’s body before stabbing his gaze into Emil.

  “Stay here,” Nowak barked. A short, balding man in his sixties, he didn’t project much authority, but he was the village head, a person who could make Emil’s life difficult if he wanted. There was no point in aggravating the situation further so Emil stepped back and sat on the other side of the ditch.

  He had nowhere to go anymore. In the face of such horror, the week away he’d planned was just a fancy. So he sat there and listened to people’s whispers, stricken with a frost that reached all the way into his bones. He’d lived here all his life, yet his neighbors didn’t see him as a part of their community, maybe even feared him, and he rarely felt confronted with that fact as intensely as he did now.

  Time passed beyond his comprehension, but he must have been there for a while. Even Mrs. Luty came over to gawk at the body despite always claiming she had a ‘bad hip’. The news of Zofia’s death was spreading like wildfire, and more people left their chores behind to gather around the bloodstained sheet covering the body that lay in the ditch like a rag doll torn open and shaken until all its soft insides spilled out.

  “I knew his grandmother. A good woman, but he’d been too much to handle after the fire. No wonder Zenon ended up in the grave early too.”

  Emil hid his face behind the curtain of hair, unwilling to engage in spats about his grandfather when Zofia lay dead at his feet. How could this have happened? Had she fallen into the ditch, broken her neck, and the opportunist birds attacked her corpse for food?

  A hand squeezed his shoulder, and he pushed it off before looking up into Adam’s face.

  “Are you okay?” the young priest asked, his brows lowered in an expression of worry. Emil did not want his pity.

  “I’m fine,” he said, his shoulders as rigid as if he were ready for a fight. He could already sense the burn of judgment as he rose to his feet. It wasn’t enough that he was the devil himself, attacking elderly ladies and feeding them to crows. Now he also disrespected priests.

  Adam sighed and once again touched Emil’s shoulder, as if he’d never heard about the concept of personal space. “Were you friends? Maybe you’d like to join me at the parsonage to cool off? This must have been a huge shock.”

  Emil gritted his teeth and jumped over the ditch, making some of the good people of Dybukowo step back in response. As if he could infect them with the stench of death that had clung to him sin
ce childhood. For once, he didn’t see Adam’s proposition as an opportunity to get under the man’s cassock, because nobody deserved to interact with a waste of space like him.

  He would fail Radek and embarrass him in front of the friend who’d agreed to take a chance on Emil. Zofia lay dead, mutilated as if she were a character in a horror movie despite the sun shining brightly, the sky being blue, and birds chirping happily in a bush. And maybe it wasn’t his fault. But what if it was? What if it hadn’t happened to her if she’d stayed home knitting sweaters for her grandchildren instead of heading his way?

  He couldn’t stand even thinking about it, and his dream of a short time away now appeared like the most selfish decision of all.

  “I don’t need company.”

  He could hardly breathe, let alone speak, so saying those few words left his throat raw and tasting of copper.

  “I said stay there,” Nowak repeated in the same tone he used whenever he told Emil to stay away from his son. It was easy to ignore him most days, but the imperative tone made Emil ball his hands into fists and wish he could punch Nowak’s moustache off his face.

  But he wouldn’t. Because this day was bad enough without being arrested for assault.

  Adam swallowed. “Emil, come on—”

  But Emil sped up, head lowered, hands stuffed into his pockets. Maybe he should have anticipated this. The only reason hope ever entered his life was to crush his dreams like a ball of fire and smoke.

  Maybe he really was cursed?

  He managed to tear himself away from the mean voices, but the motor of a car buzzed ever closer, and Emil moved to the side of the road, heading toward the dark hills ahead. It was time to get drunk and wallow.

  He grunted when the Range Rover rushed past him and blocked his way as if Nowak believed he was a policeman in an American action flick. The door on the driver’s side opened, but Nowak didn’t bother to leave his vehicle. “I said stay, you punk! The police will need to talk to you.”