by Mav Skye
She laughed and tried to touch one as they buzzed about her head. It zipped around her body, once, twice, and on the third time around it grew until it was the size of her palm.
She touched it, feeling nothing but warmth as her fingers passed thru it. And as they did, May’s face popped into the tiny star.
Her eyes were closed. Sweat dripped down her face. She was chanting. Her voice sounded as if it were coming from far away. Supergirls stand together. Supergirls stay together.
Startled, Jenn drew back her fingers. The line and hook still dragged her upwards in the dark, and the star with May’s face kept up with it.
“May?”
May’s eyes opened, the same brilliant blue as ever. Love filled them. She smiled the girlish smile that Jenn had always loved. But then her face grew dark—as if a shadow had fallen over it. Her lips moved rapidly, intently. But this time, instead of hearing May’s voice, Jenn heard something else.
Something familiar.
A light whistling, she recognized it as Bernard Herrmann’s Twisted Nerve from Kill Bill. That was another movie she and May had liked to watch together. But what did it mean?
But, it struck a memory chord, one from years before when they’d gone out for a treasure hunt.
What was May trying to tell her? By the way her lips moved it seemed to be a repeated phrase over and over. Finally, May pursed her lips as if in a whistle.
And the whistle came through. “Whistle.” Jenn said.
May smiled when she saw Jenn understood.
Then May’s fingers were beside her face, making devil horns out the side of her head.
Jenn said, “Horns?”
May dropped her fingers and nodded, repeated the phrase, then pursed her lips in a whistle.
Jenn shook her head. “Whistling…horns?”
May shook her head. She looked disappointed. Then put her fingers up by her head again, and pursed her lips at the same time.
Jenn suddenly knew what her sister was trying to say. The Twisted Nerve whistling tune crawled inside her skull and chilled her insides.
She took a deep breath and said, “The whistling deer head?”
May froze. Dropped her hands. Nodded, sadness filled her face.
The whistling continued its haunting tune.
“But where? I don’t understand.”
May’s eyes grew huge, and her lips trembled. She mouthed a single word, and somehow, Jenn knew immediately what the word was. But instead of a word, it was a name. Tony.
Jenn remembered the children then, her sunshine. Tony and Tina. Something bad had happened.
Very bad.
May nodded her head yes. Her face grew shadowed again, and then started to fade. She mouthed another word, and Jenn knew this one, too: Hurry.
The star popped like a bubble. May was gone.
Jenn grabbed the hook wrapped around her waist and tossed it aside. She wrapped both hands around the line like a rope, and twisted her legs over it.
She didn’t know where she was, but Tony and Tina needed her. If the whistling deer head had anything to do with them, there was trouble.
As if being summoned, the whistling began again. Repeating the Twisted Nerve tune over and over.
Jenn had to find Tony and Tina.
Soon.
11
Whistling in the Closet
The earth yawned open before him. Tony leaned into the gaping mouth, wailing, “Tina! Oh, Tina! Please answer me!”
The darkness ate his words. There was no response.
After Tina’s initial scream, only a cold silence met his cries. Shivering, Tony sat on the earth beside the monster’s mouth and brought his knees to his chest. He wrapped his arms around his legs.
He cried on his knees, begging and pleading with whoever was in charge of the world to listen to him. Just for once.
Tony was afraid. Afraid for himself. Afraid for Tina.
He needed his sister, not just to save him from people like the wolf man, but because, deep down inside, he was becoming the wolf man.
After a while, the clouds broke up and moonshine stroked the night sky just as it had hours before, when he had been eating pansy blooms on the porch steps with Auntie Jenn and Tina.
Tony lifted his head and looked at it. The monsters might have eaten the stars, but it hadn’t eaten the moon.
He wiped away his tears and stretched out his legs. He leaned down into the hole. “Tina, I got to go back and get Auntie Jenn. I won’t leave you down there. I promise.” And then, he told her his Buzz Lightyear promise, “I promise to the stars and beyond.”
He waited, hoping to hear her voice, but the only reply was a brush of breeze on his cheek.
Tony stood, glanced back up at the moonshine, then turned and made his way down the same trail he had come. Once past the gate, he picked up the big knife and wolf mask, but this time he didn’t put the mask on.
When he burst through the front door, Auntie Jenn wasn’t there, but a long trail of fresh blood was.
He followed the blood out of the entrance and into the living room where Jenn had collapsed in front of the closet door.
He kneeled down and felt her forehead. It was still warm. A deep purple bruise spread across her temple. “Auntie Jenn?” He shook her shoulder, but she didn’t stir. Out again.
He rubbed his arms in his cold Buzz Lightyear pajamas and suddenly felt the urge to pee. He could hear Tina’s voice in his mind. Put on dry clothes, silly! How else are you going to save the world?
“I’ll be right back, Auntie Jenn.”
He took a blanket off the couch and gently wrapped it around Jenn’s shoulders, then ran to the bathroom, wishing Tina had remembered to bring in the water earlier. He sure was thirsty.
After, he scrambled up the ladder, careful not to slip in the wolf man’s blood. The memory of the assault sank deep within him. It wouldn’t leave his mind.
Tony dressed in jeans, a Ninja Turtles t-shirt, then pulled a dark blue sweatshirt over top. He also changed his socks, which were sopping wet. His shoes were wet, too, but with dry socks on, he didn’t notice.
He heard a noise downstairs. Not a footstep or a door opening, but a voice…and yet, it wasn’t a voice, but more like a tune…like music.
He suddenly felt as if he were inside a cartoon.
He drew near the ladder, listening. It wasn’t music, but whistling. Tony was sure of it. He slowly retreated down the steps, pausing to listen. With his face at the level of the loft’s floor, Tony gaped at the puddles of gooey blood (bad man’s blood), before descending the rest of the way down the ladder. First, he checked the bathroom, but there was no one in there. He looked in the small kitchen and was caught off guard by the normalcy of it.
White curtains hung over the kitchen window like angel wings, glowing in the soft light of the oil lamp on the cabinet. Three dinner plates sat drying on a rack beside the sink alongside forks, spoons, and three cups. A pan full of soapy bubbles sat in the sink with an empty water bucket below the counter.
The small kitchen table still held a vase of wildflowers that Tony had picked for Auntie Jenn earlier in the day. Tina’s pink-patched coat still hugged her dinner chair. A deck of cards still waited for them on the table.
A feeling of deep sadness crept into his heart; things would never be the same again. The whistling was fainter in here, so Tony left the kitchen and headed back to the living room.
The whistling was louder in there, so Tony began to investigate. He looked behind the couch, checked the locks on the window behind it. He touched a David Bowie poster thumbtacked on the wall. It was red and ivory with David Bowie’s face coming out of a red night of bone colored stars. Above his head were the words: WE CAN BE HEROES.
It was a birthday present for Auntie Jenn from Father Wraith. He also had given Jenn an old Walkman with a David Bowie cassette tape. She’d always listen to it when she washed the dishes or scrubbed the floors.
Tony and Tina liked the Starman song,
and sometimes they’d sing it with Jenn when sitting out on the porch, looking at the night sky before they went to bed.
He wondered if the Starman was afraid of the wolf man. Tony touched his mask, thinking of his blood anointed cheeks, then turned away from the poster. He ran his fingers along the wall to the corner, along the other wall down to the closet door Auntie Jenn had collapsed in front of. It occurred to Tony that perhaps she was crawling towards the closet. He stepped back, careful of Aunt Jenn’s legs, and examined the door closely.
The door was painted black. Whether it was always that way or Auntie Jenn had painted it herself when she’d first moved in, Tony didn’t know. When she had first brought Tony and Tina to the cabin, Jenn had specifically told them never to look in the closet.
He had never been tempted to. It just blended in with the living room. Tina used to talk about breaking the knob lock and peeking in when Auntie Jenn was working outside, but she never had.
They both loved Aunt Jenn. She trusted them, and neither wanted to betray that trust.
Tony touched the door, and then drew back when the whistling got louder.
The whistling was coming from behind the closet door.
He examined the doorknob. It had the tiny hole in the middle, where if you stuck a tiny screwdriver inside, it would pop the lock.
He glanced at Auntie Jenn on the floor, feeling guilt. She obviously wanted something behind this door, perhaps it was a matter of life and death.
Speaking of life and death, Tina was still down in the monster’s belly in the field, and he needed to get her out. Maybe something inside the closet would help.
Mind made up, Tony sprinted to the kitchen and took out the toolbox sitting beside the water bucket under the sink.
He rustled through the tools. He didn’t find a small screwdriver, but he found a thin long nail. He jumped up and ran back to the closet.
He skewered the tiny hole in the knob and felt the latch begin to give, then slip.
The whistling was louder than ever, and on the floor Auntie Jenn whimpered.
Tony maneuvered the nail around, catching the lock mechanism. “Don’t you worry Auntie Jenn. I’m going to get you a box full of kittens when this is over, after we get Tina outta the hole. And there will be lots of them. Ten, I bet. And there will be every color a person could want. Black, white, the gray ones with stripes, even the orange ones!” The lock popped, and the doorknob moved freely.
Jenn whimpered again and moved her arm.
“Auntie Jenn?”
She was quiet again, so he turned back to the door.
He twisted the knob and opened it just a crack.
It was dark inside.
He opened it all the way, letting the oil lamp light shine in.
The first thing he noticed was the color of the closet walls.
Black, just like the door.
On the wall was a hook with a pair of ratty looking jeans hanging from them. Blood and ash was smothered across the denim. A few dollar bills hung out of the jean’s front pockets.
Curious, Tony touched a dollar bill and withdrew it. It was burnt around the edges. He thought it might be one hundred bucks, that maybe Auntie Jenn had a special stash of money, but it was only one buck.
Why would she keep that locked away?
Behind the jeans, was a picture. He picked the jeans off the hook, and drew in his breath.
On white canvas, Auntie Jenn had sketched a picture of a scary looking pig man face. The eyes were slanted and evil. The pig snout was daunting, and an evil smile drew up over crooked teeth. A bubble came from the evil smile. It said, “Eat the Bitch!”
At the very bottom of the sketch, in Auntie Jenn’s handwriting, were the words. “Mother, help me.”
Tony gulped and hung the jeans back up over the picture, moving the pant legs so that it fully covered the pig face.
Auntie Jenn moaned again.
Tony said, “I don’t remember my mother, but sometimes I wished she’d help me, too.”
His eyes wandered down from the jeans and picture to the floor of the closet.
A dark blue duffel bag draped, no concealed something. He picked up the duffel bag, looked inside it. Something long and lean was inside a zippered pocket. He unzipped it and gently removed the object. It was a dagger with a unicorn shaped handle made out of rock; he wasn’t sure what kind. He took it out and set it aside.
A dusty black blanket covered something large and lumpy beneath it. It was a weird shape, and Tony didn’t think it was another of Aunt Jenn’s drawings. This was going to be big, huge—he could sense it.
Like a man taking his hat off in respect, Tony took off his wolf mask and placed it gently beside the doorframe.
He grabbed the edge of the blanket and whipped it off quickly.
“Holy Cow!” Only it wasn’t a cow. It was a deer! But not the whole deer. It was a deer head with real life horns.
The strange, eerie tune whistled and whistled, and suddenly, Tony knew the whistling was coming from the deer head.
It was the most amazing thing.
Why would Auntie Jenn want to hide this?
“No, Tony,” whimpered Jenn.
Startled, Tony just about jumped to the ceiling. He whipped around towards Auntie Jenn.
One trembling hand covered her mouth. She stared at the deer head. Her eyes were huge and round.
“Do you like it?” asked Tony.
He reached into the closet and lifting it by the bottom of the horns, he drew the heavy head out.
“See?” He held it to her. “It even whistles, Auntie Jenn!”
Jenn dropped her hand, her mouth opened, closed, and opened again like a fish. He said, “Auntie Jenn you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” Tony frowned and set the deer head aside the wall. Then sat down beside Jenn, taking her hand.
She didn’t take her eyes off the deer head. She shivered. Her lips trembled. And it dawned on Tony that she was afraid of it. “Oh! Oh, I see now.”
He stood and took the dusty black blanket off the floor and covered up the deer head, then sat back down on the floor beside Jenn.
“I’m so glad you’re awake, Auntie Jenn.” He felt tears once more dribble down his face.
She had stopped shivering. “Tony,” she whispered, but that was all she said.
He thought maybe she wanted help up. When he lifted on her arms, she rose, and he helped her into a sitting position. He moved in front of the deer head, so his face was in front of hers now. Slowly, he watched his Auntie come back to life.
“Auntie Jenn, something terrible happened and Tina is stuck in a hole.”
Jenn looked confused; she tried to speak and coughed instead.
“Wait right here, Auntie Jenn. I’ll get you a cup of water.”
Tony jumped up and raced to the front door, when he touched the knob the door flew open. He was surprised because he thought he had shut it all the way, but then he forgot and ran to the well pump. He dipped the tin cup into the barrel.
The wind picked up, and it blew his hair in all different directions.
“Whoa!” he yelled into the night, scrambling back inside the house and made sure to close the door all the way.
He brought the tin cup to Jenn and placed it to her lips. She sipped. When the water was gone, color had come back into her skin and her eyes were bright. She avoided the blanket with the deer head underneath and spoke to Tony.
“What’s happened to Tina? Where did it—he—” she struggled with words. “Where did he go?”
“We killed the bad man. See?” He reached across to his wolf mask still sitting at the doorframe and showed Jenn.
Jenn frowned and nodded. She touched the blood on his cheeks. Worry fretted her face, and she looked into her empty cup as if reading the future, or perhaps the past.
“Okay, so the bad man is gone?”
“Yes, Ma’am. Tina took care of him all right!” He paused and added. “Me, too.” Although, that wasn’t completely true.
But, he had helped get rid of the body, which reminded him of Tina. Where she was. “But you got to help Tina, Auntie Jenn. We put the bad man’s body in the wheelbarrow and dumped him in this huge hole outside the fence.” Jenn’s eyes grew huge. “You did what?!?”
“But Tina fell in, too, and now.” Tony felt tears spring from his eyes. He couldn’t help it. He was scared again. “And now Tina is stuck down there all alone and—” He stated his biggest fear, the one he’d been avoiding. “And I’m afraid she might be dead, too.”
He threw himself into his aunt’s arms and sobbed. He hadn’t meant to cry, but once the sobs started he couldn’t stop.
“Ssh…ssh…” Jenn rocked and hugged him, much like she had when he’d first moved in with her, and he had the scary nightmares. She’d sit in bed with him and hold him, letting him cry until he felt better.
“Sweetheart, I need you to be strong for me. Brave.” She wiped his tears, but they kept coming. “We need to go save Tina right now, okay?” He nodded.
She said, “There’s rope inside the closet, it was beneath the moose head. Fetch it for me.”
“I thought it was a deer head, Auntie Jenn.” She kissed the top of his dirty head after he helped her to her feet, and said, “I’ll teach you the difference one day, but not now. Right now, we gotta get out there and fetch your sister.”
He nodded. “Okay, Auntie Jenn.” He turned towards the closet, spotted the rope, leaned for it, and paused. He turned towards Jenn, who was limping towards the kitchen. “Aunt Jenn?”
“Yes?”
“I meant what I said when you were asleep. I’m going to get you a big ol’ box of kittens. All different kinds and colors. Will that make you happy?”
Jenn turned towards him, and for the first time that night, a small smile broke upon her lips. “Yes, Tony, that would make me very happy. Now hurry.”
Tony smiled back. It felt good to smile. He felt less afraid. He leaned into the closet for the rope.
12
Birth
In the belly of the beast, Tina lay in the quiet and darkness for what felt like years. She didn’t call for help or cry from the pain. She merely focused on her breathing: out, in, out.
