Hungry

by Daniel Parme

  I felt like a parent trying to get his kid to fess up to taking twenty dollars from the nightstand. “Walter…”

  “You have to understand, Travis,” he set his wine glass on the bar so he could use his hand to help him speak, “I had to make sure you weren’t trying to go to the authorities or the press.”

  I never thought about going to the press, and I was pissed at myself about it. I’d always thought I was a pretty sharp guy.

  “I had Mr. Devereaux follow you to make sure our secret was safe. You have to understand, Travis, that you didn’t exactly take to us right away. We were tremendously concerned that you might try something to expose us.”

  I liked knowing that I already knew this, but that he was telling me like it was some huge revelation, though I was slightly offended that he thought I wouldn’t be able to understand his motives.

  “I guess that makes sense,” I said, doing my best to let a weight fall from my shoulders, or to show the pieces snapping together in my head – some visible sign that I was thinking about it this way for the first time, and it was just now making sense. I should have been an actor.

  “I hope you aren’t offended. We were merely being cautious. Also, I feel I should let you know that I am truly sorry about your friend, the gentleman with the long hair. Again, we were merely looking out for ourselves.” He meant it, I think.

  I refilled both our glasses. “So, if you’re so sorry about Adam – the long haired kid – what was with the polaroids and the letter?”

  He cocked his head. “Excuse me? Polaroids?”

  “Yeah. Pictures. Of Adam’s decapitated head.” I really wanted to call him an asshole.

  “And a letter?”

  “More of a warning, I guess, not to let anyone else know the password.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “That would have been Mr. Devereaux. I believe he found out from your friend – Virginia? – that he was a friend of yours. I’m afraid he’s a little, well, irrational sometimes. He was never asked to do that. I hope you believe me.”

  I believed him. “Irrational? Seems a little more like psychotic to me.”

  “Yes, well…”

  He was cut off by Dick, who seemed to have some sort of problem. His face was red, and he was sweating.

  Synchek and I both noticed that Dick was, well, out of sorts. I opened a fresh bottle while Synchek reached his arm behind the bar, grabbed a glass for the panting man.

  “Are you all right, Dick?” It may have been Synchek who said it, or maybe it was me. I couldn’t tell. I was still stuck in that bizarre, out of body type thing.

  Dick sipped the wine, caught his breath, but still said nothing.

  “Dick?” I snapped my fingers at him.

  He looked at me, then Synchek, then me, then Synchek. “Sorry. I just sort of choked. On a breath mint.”

  Dick was a lousy liar.

  Walter was surprisingly gullible.

  I was, well, I guess it doesn’t really matter.

  Synchek raised his glass that inch or two that is almost a toast, but really just an acknowledgement, like nodding at someone instead of actually saying hello. “Oh. Well, it’s good to see you, Richard.”

  “Yeah, boss. How was the shop?” I tilted my glass as well.

  “Busy. And we seem to be missing a jar of hydrogen cyanide.” He was definitely talking to me.

  “Missing a jar of what?” I think I had a problem with my tone on that one. I meant it to sound like I didn’t even know what hydrogen cyanide was, but I think it came out a little too much like I was really concerned about it.

  “I’m sure I had Eli order two jars, but there’s only one. We’re almost out after today.” He still didn’t even look at Synchek.

  I tried my best. “Well, you know Eli. He was probably too busy being creepy to pay much attention.”

  “Maybe. But boy, were we busy today. A lot of old folks. Heart attacks, mostly. One cancer. Two car accidents.” He never looked at Synchek.

  But that didn’t matter to the president. “Well, you know, people are just dying to work with you.” He, and only he, laughed at his joke. He noticed as Dick and I rolled our eyes and sipped our wine. “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to talk to Mr. Devereaux about those pictures.” And he left.

  Dick took his spot, leaning against the bar. “Pictures? Did that jack-ass send you a threatening letter, too?”

  “I guess you could call it that.”

  “That guy’s crazy. We should have kicked him out a long time ago.”

  “And by ‘kicked him out’, you mean?”

  “Don’t get smart with me about that, Travis.”

  “Sorry.”

  Dick cleared his throat. “The strangest thing happened on my way here.”

  “Oh? What’s that?”

  “I ran into David at the diner down the road.”

  “David?”

  “My nephew.”

  It took everything in me, but I managed to swallow my wine without choking on it. “Dave’s around? I wonder what he’s doing out this way.”

  Dick wasn’t fooled, exactly. I think he was just giving me the benefit of the doubt. Still, I suppose he had to make sure. Dave was, after all, this man’s kin. “He said he stopped for a milkshake on his way to some waterfall.”

  “Oh, right.” I searched for something. Anything. “McConnell’s Mill is out this way. There’s this waterfall you can go behind. We smoke there with Tommy sometimes.” I was lying, of course. I didn’t know anyone named Tommy, and I don’t think Dave did, either.

  “Promise me he’s not – this has nothing to do with you, does it?”

  “No, Dick. Nothing to do with me. I swear. Although it is a hell of a coincidence.”

  “Yes,” he said. “It is.”

  Time to change the conversation. “So that thing with Gregor went well last night. I feel much better about things.”

  Dick nodded. “That’s good.” He sipped. “You better not have gotten Dave involved in this.”

  I suppose there are those conversations you just can’t change.

  “If you got him involved in this,” but he stopped just short of a complete sentence, just short of furious. I think he wanted to threaten me, but then realized that, if I did happen to get Dave involved, threatening me would do nothing to help the situation. Dave would probably die.

  And you know Dick. He was really a great guy. He loved his nephew.

  I could see it all going through his head. He was putting it together, albeit slowly. And then it registered. You could almost see what was happening slap him in the face.

  “What are you up to, Travis?” He was panicked, starting to sweat again.

  “Dick. Relax, Dick.”

  He looked close to tears. “What are you up to?” This wasn’t really a question.

  “Listen.” But I couldn’t think quickly enough to diffuse the situation. My hesitation, I knew, was all the reason Dick needed to know something was about to go down. He wasn’t a total idiot, you know. So what could I do? Choose my own adventure. Mad Lib. I made sure no one could hear. “Listen. Adam and Virginia were Dave’s friends, too. And Dave – I know he smokes a lot of pot, but he’s not stupid. He knew something was up.”

  You know how he’d stopped short of furious last time? Well, not this time. “How dare you – I’ll – I’ll –” But he still couldn’t get the threat out.

  “Dick, this all has to stop. It’s wrong, and it’s totally fucked up. I mean, eating people that just happen to already be dead is one thing, but people are being murdered. Murdered, Dick.”

  There was a commotion. People were seating themselves. I was running behind schedule. I still had to talk to Angela, to get her out of the building. And this thing with Dick, it was dangerous.

  “They’re going to kill Dave if they find out about this. He’s going to knock on the door, tell the guy the password, and his name won’t be on the list.
Then, they’ll kill him.”

  Dick couldn’t take his eyes off the crowd as he tried to figure out what to do. I’d put him in a tight spot, and he knew it. “What are you up to, Travis? What are you up to?” It was all he could get out of his mouth, the poor guy.

  I had no choice. I had to tell him. It was either tell him or squirt some of the acid into his wine glass while he was too distracted to notice. Killing him now would be far too detrimental to the rest of my plan. This would only work if I could get everybody at once. So, like I said, I had no choice.

  “Ok, Dick, here’s the deal. That missing hydrogen cyanide, it’s in the food. I poisoned it last night while Gregor wasn’t paying attention. Supposedly, it’s really potent stuff, so I’m hoping it will, well, kill everyone in just a few minutes.” A few weeks before, I’d have never believed that anything like this could ever come out of my mouth. Of course, a few weeks ago, I wasn’t the same person. “So don’t eat the meat, ok?”

  He snapped out of it. “You stole hydrogen cyanide from work, and you poisoned the food with it? And what does David have to do with any of this?” He was staying calm, but it was taking a lot out of him.

  I tried to make it seem like Dave would be safe. “Dave. He’s sort of a backup plan. He’s supposed to get here at twenty till ten. Hopefully, everything will be finished by then.”

  “What, exactly, is he supposed to do once he gets here?”

  I wasn’t winning him over. He was losing the cool he was working so hard to maintain, and I pulled my hand up into my sleeve to get my fingers on the nozzle of the hose. My plan, it seemed, really sucked.

  “Listen, Dick. It’s just a distraction.”

  “What’s a distraction?” It was Walter, who had appeared out of nowhere and had his arm over Dick’s shoulders.

  I froze, nozzle in my hand. This wasn’t the plan. This was not what I meant at all. I knew I’d never get out alive if I did it, but I was about to squirt them in the face with the acid. Dick was about to squeal. I just knew it.

  But he didn’t. I don’t know why he didn’t. Maybe my story wasn’t the only one that was changing. He just looked at me, waiting for me to get out of this.

  And then, salvation. Angela emerged from her spot in the podium, and I had my way out. “Your niece, Walter. I can’t get her out of my head.”

  Synchek turned to see Angela as she strode calmly toward us, wearing a long black dress, tight at the hips, slit to her left thigh. “Oh,” he said. “I see. She is beautiful, isn’t she?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, she is,” I said, taking my fingers off the hose. “She’s all I’ve been able to think about, Walter.” And, just for good measure, “Has she mentioned me at all?”

  He smiled and put his hand on my shoulder. “Once or twice, young man. Once or twice.”

  “Well, what did she say?”

  But she was already at the bar. “What did who say about what?”

  “Mr. Eliot here was just asking if you’d mentioned –”

  I stepped between them. “Hi, Angela. It’s uh… It’s nothing. Right, Walter?”

  He laughed. “Of course it’s nothing. Now, sit down. It’s almost time to eat. I believe I just saw Michael poke his head in. I must speak with him, if you’ll excuse me, please.”

  I was nervous. Nothing good had ever come of Devereaux’s presence, and I was sure this trend would continue. At the moment though, I had something more important to worry about.

  Angela and I had found ourselves seated and alone, and we talked in hurried whispers.

  “Don’t eat the food. Any of it.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I already did it. Just don’t eat, ok?”

  “I never do.”

  “You look fucking phenomenal in that dress, by the way.”

  “Nice suit.”

  “Thanks. Now here’s the plan. In about fifteen minutes-”

  A hand fell on my shoulder like a guillotine’s blade falling on a wrongfully-sentenced prisoner’s neck. How could I have possibly been in the wrong here?

  It was Walter. Always Walter. “In about fifteen minutes… what, Mr. Eliot?”

  Oh shit.

  Another hand, Devereaux’s, found its way to my other shoulder as Walter cleared his throat. “Excuse me, everyone, please. I would like everyone to take a moment to welcome back Travis Eliot. Mr. Eliot has come to accept our invitation and strengthen our group, and I do believe that he will.”

  There was a round of applause. They were all very excited. They didn’t know what I knew. They didn’t know that I’d be strengthening the group the way Synchek meant it. They didn’t know they’d soon be eating me.

  But I did. The jig, as they say, was up. Somehow they found out about…

  “Now,” he continued, “everyone enjoy your meals.”

  They wheeled out the carts and passed out the food as Synchek and Devereaux led Angela and I towards the kitchen. As certain as I may have been about our impending doom, I couldn’t help but smile. Twenty-two cannibals in one go. Not a bad start for the new me. Not bad at all.

  Chapter 46

  If you’ve ever spent any time in the mountains of Canada, you know that everything can go to hell in an incredibly short amount of time. You’ve learned that even the best laid plans can fall apart, come crashing down around you in a heap of metal and fire and pain. You’ve learned that intentions, no matter how good in theory, amount to jack fucking shit.

  If you’ve ever spent any time in those mountains, you’ve learned that it’s important to remain calm, even when, especially when, there is a good chance that your story is about to come to an end.

  This is an important lesson to remember should you ever find yourself in the kitchen of a cannibal’s banquet hall, an enormous man’s 9mm aimed at your head, and there, on the table Virginia lay when you butchered her, your friend Dave, unconscious, but tied down just in case.

  It’s important to remain calm should you ever find Walter pacing the floor of the kitchen, big-ass meat cleaver in his hand, saying something you can’t quite hear because you’re just coming to, and there’s this awful ringing in your ears, but you can tell by the look of him that he is more than a little miffed.

  Remain calm if you see Angela, bound and gagged on the floor in the corner. Calm if you see Dick, standing near the door, silent and staring at his shoes.

  It’s important to remain calm.

  As the ringing fades and Walter’s increasingly angry voice comes into focus, remain calm. As you hear him screaming things like “poisoned the food” and “treated you like a son” and “treacherous little bastard”, remain calm.

  Lose it now, and you’re dead. Just like that. And nobody will ever know. And a story is only a story if you can tell it to someone.

  So it’s important to remain calm when you finally realize exactly what’s going on here. Remain calm when you remember Walter opening the door of a thousand locks, only to find Gregor dead on the floor, his own personal plate spilled all over. And when you remember Walter running into the banquet room, only to find a good twenty people dead, some sprawled over the tables, some on the floor, some just sitting there. At least they were already dressed for their funerals.

  Remain calm when you remember Walter’s face, the way he looked at you when he put it all together.

  It’s important to remain calm when you remember yelling at Angela to get the fuck out of here, now, and then pushing Walter to the floor. It’s important to remain calm because you weren’t calm when you did this, and it got you a pistol-whipping from a very large man who’d fucked and killed a friend of yours.

  If you’re alive, you’ve learned that getting knocked out by the handle of a gun is unpleasant, and the hangover is even worse. You’ve learned it’ll fuck with your short term memory, and you might need a few minutes to figure out what’s going on.

  It’s amazing what you can learn.

  I, for one, learned
that my plan was almost a total success. Almost. All that was left was the cool kids’ table, the prom court, the royalty. All that was left was to figure out what to do from here. All that was left was one last Mad Lib.

  Chapter 47

  Sitting there on the floor, I finally got back to normal, if you could really call it that. Let’s just say I returned to this current state of reality.

  Walter noticed that I was finally coherent enough to comprehend the situation, and he made his way towards me with that gigantic knife. He was determined to do, well, something, and he looked really pissed off, but clear-headed.

  It’s important to remain calm because when you don’t, when you start flailing around in an effort to get to your feet before Walter can get to you with that knife, Devereaux will shoot you in the right arm, and you’ll end up exactly where you started, only with more blood.

  “Don’t worry about that arm, Mr. Eliot. It’s really quite amazing what you can do with only one.” He waved hello with the cleaver. “You can, for instance, decapitate a young man who helped another young man, a Judas, a Brutus, murder two dozen people.” He turned around and walked slowly towards Dave, saying, over his shoulder, “I’ll show you. Pay attention.”

  I looked over at Dick, whose eyes were no longer on his laces, but now huge and almost connected to this man who was about to kill his nephew, my friend, Dave. Poor Dave. I’d totally fucked him over, and now he was about to be headless.

  I looked over at Angela, and she looked sadder than she did in the podium. I suppose the circumstances were a bit more severe now than they were back then, when life in a secret cannibalistic society was all nice, cozy routine. I understood where she was coming from. I also made a mental note of her in those ropes…

  I looked up at Devereaux, his gun still pointed at my face. He was watching Synchek, watching the mammoth blade in the man’s hand, and he was grinning. Big. Man, it was sinister, that crazy bastard. Unfortunately, he could still see me with his peripheral vision, so I was stuck on the floor, about to watch the beheading of my friend.

  And then the most wonderful thing – the banquet room door, across from the hall door where Dick stood with clenched jaw and everything else, directly behind where Devereaux stood with his gun on me, the banquet room door opened with Conicella in tears, wailing, “She’s dead! She’s dead! All of them! I went to take a shit, and shit! What fucking happened?!”