Point Hollow

by Rio Youers

  Matthew gave his head a little shake, as if he hadn’t heard clearly. He had, though. He must have, because the room rolled slowly and—like Tansy—he needed the support of the desk to keep from falling.

  “As soon as those kiddies went missing,” Sheriff Tansy continued. “When I saw their pictures in the newspapers and on TV, I knew that Oliver had taken them. And I knew exactly where they were.”

  “I don’t understand,” Matthew said. He looked so weak and small and this made the sheriff feel a little better. He puffed out his chest and sneered.

  “Of course you don’t understand,” he said, “because you left town twenty-some years ago. You forgot how we do things in Point Hollow. Like I told you before . . . country folk take care of their own.”

  “No,” Matthew uttered.

  “Yes,” the sheriff said. “And the mountain . . . Abraham’s Faith . . . it’s demanding, Matthew. It’s hungry.”

  “No,” Matthew said again.

  “Oliver has been keeping it settled for the best part of twenty years. And when the mountain is settled, the town runs smooth. It’s a happy place.”

  Matthew blinked and swayed. Sheriff Tansy took a step toward him.

  “But now you’ve come along and fucked everything up.” He held one finger up to Matthew’s face and breathed all over him, a foul odour of beer and coffee. “So now we’re going to have to throw you—and those goddamn children—back in the mountain, otherwise there’s going to be hell to pay.”

  The light flickered again.

  “Hell,” Matthew said weakly.

  ———

  Matthew took three steps backward. He needed to get his thoughts together and that was hard to do with the sheriff’s finger in his face. Not that it was any easier having retreated a few steps. His mind struggled. It reached for anything that was solid, but everything broke apart. He was a drowning man, grabbing onto ropes that crumbled like sand. Nothing was real and he was going down, swallowed by waves. Endless waves. From the shore, a thousand miles away, he saw Courtney and Ethan looking at him expectantly. He remembered the way she had moved ahead of him in the woods, her hair like a ribbon. And that memory was real. The only real thing in the world. Her hair like a ribbon. Matthew reached for it. Bright red and streaming. He felt it in his palm. And it didn’t crumble, and he pulled himself free.

  The fluorescent light sparked like a moth flying into a bug zapper. The sheriff looked at it, scowling, and that little snap—that flash—brought Matthew closer to reality. I’m in Point Hollow. This soulless place. No hope for us here. He looked at the sheriff and saw malice: a voluminous cloud the colour of everything bad; a diseased aura. His eyes then dropped to the pistol on his hip. A Glock 20, he thought. 10mm, and more power than I need. He knew this because the sheriff had told him—had taught him, in fact, how to hold it . . . fire it. The darkness that had lived inside Matthew for so many years surged again. It rushed violently from him, and it wasn’t Kirsty feeling his wrath this time, but Sheriff Tansy. Matthew imagined grabbing the Glock, pointing it at Tansy, and pulling the trigger. He felt the pistol jerk in his hand and saw—all too colourfully—the top of Tansy’s head peel away, blood peppering the walls and ceiling, pieces of skull pinging off the coffee pot, little chunks of brain speckling the Charlie Chipmunk poster for a Safer Community.

  Imagining had always been easy.

  Matthew couldn’t move, save for little winks and flinches from his exhausted muscles. He didn’t even have the will to pray. I’m in Point Hollow. This soulless place. He looked at the children and shook his head. No hope for us here. And just when he thought the situation couldn’t get any worse, the door crashed open and Oliver Wray stumbled in.

  ———

  Matthew looked bad—a cracked, bleeding eggshell—but he was a picture of vim and vigour compared to Oliver Wray. Barely recognizable, broken out of shape, Oliver reeled across the floor, bopped against the water cooler (left a splat of blood on the bottle), and settled against Deputy Sheriff’s Masefield’s desk. He bled all over it, and all over the floor, from multiple traumas, most notably a hole in his stomach large enough the slot the business end of a baseball bat into. He tried to seal the wound with his left hand, to little effect.

  “Glurb,” he said.

  His body was sticky red, with just a few pale flashes on his chest and throat. It disguised his nakedness, but made his eyes gleam. Wild pinpricked circles. The gun in his right hand gleamed, too. Blue steel and blood. His jaw was swollen and kinked, as if it had been kicked by a horse.

  “Look at the goddamn state of you,” Sheriff Tansy said. His heart drummed with sick rhythm while his mind assessed the situation. One hell of a mess to sweep under the rug.

  “Glurb.”

  He had hoped, initially, that Oliver could take care of his own mess. Looking at him now, he realized that wasn’t going to happen. The dumb son of a bitch was hammering at death’s door—had minutes left, at most. Which meant that the sheriff was on clean up duty. Not how he wanted to spend his Saturday.

  Matthew, meanwhile, had shifted protectively in front of the children. His final stand, for all the good it would do. Oliver grinned and lifted the gun. He pointed it at Matthew, and those pinpricked eyes flicked in Sheriff Tansy’s direction.

  “Don’t stand in my way, Sheriff,” he warned. Broken sounds: Dome tan im my yay, Shurf. Blood leaked from his mouth and something pink and ropy oozed from between the fingers of his left hand.

  The sheriff deciphered what Oliver said. “Stand in your way?” He barked laughter, false and dry. “I’ve watched you serve the mountain for Christ knows how many years. Why would I stand in your way now?”

  Oliver narrowed his eyes. His broken mouth hung open.

  “You think I didn’t know?” the sheriff asked.

  The fluorescent light winked again and Oliver sagged, as if several ribs were removed from his chest. He shook his head and looked at the sheriff. The exposed portion of his skull flashed like a cracked mirror.

  “You . . . you knew?” The gun dipped, aimed at Matthew’s feet, blood dripping from the barrel. “All this time?”

  “The mountain speaks to me too, Oliver.” Tansy’s upper lip flared, showing stained teeth. “It speaks to everybody, even if they’re not aware of it. You’ve seen their faces, their fragile smiles. The mountain demands reverence. It makes people scared, fills them with darkness. And sometimes it makes them do evil deeds. Like Jack Braum, shooting up Main Street in ’53, or Eugene Gold funnelling acid down his wife’s throat.”

  Oliver shuddered, spilling blood. It spattered Masefield’s desk, his computer keyboard, the photograph of his twin boys.

  “I don’t know why this town is cursed,” Tansy said. “I’ve never known—never cared to know. I’m guessing some ungodly shit hit the fan back in the day . . .”

  Oliver nodded and said, “Burr,” but it might have been Burn or even Bird.

  “But I do know that the mountain has touched you, Oliver, and that you serve it, like a good little doggy. You’ve been taking kiddies up there for Christ knows how many years, and I’ve been watching you, making sure nobody gets in your way. And I assume you’re doing exactly what it wants because we haven’t had an incident in Point Hollow for a long time. That’s just the way we like it, of course. Blue skies and happy days.”

  It was impossible to read Oliver’s expression. His mouth was out of shape and his eyes were wide and mad. But he keened—a crushed sound. More animal than human, Tansy thought. Or the way some animals can sound human when they’re hurting.

  “Who else?” he asked.

  “Who else what?”

  He lowered the .45 to steady himself on Masefield’s desk. “Who else knows what I’ve done?”

  “Jesus Christ, nobody knows.” Tansy said. “Everybody thinks you’re the cat’s balls, Oliver. Thanks to me. I’ve been protec
ting you all this time . . . protecting the town.”

  The little girl spoke again, saying—oh so sweetly—that she wanted her mommy and daddy. The sheriff looked at her. Oliver looked at her. Matthew didn’t; his eyes were fixed, not on the crazy motherhumper pointing the gun, but on the sheriff. He’d even taken a step toward him.

  “All the pain I went through,” Oliver said, looking away from the little girl, back to the sheriff. “For years . . . years. And you knew. You let it happen.”

  “You’re damn right,” Tansy said. “You were keeping the mountain settled. I didn’t want another church fire. Another Main Street massacre. I did what was best for the town.”

  “What about me?”

  “What about you? Nobody cares, Oliver. You’re a servant. A fucking dog.”

  “I was chosen.”

  “Yes.”

  “Because I’m strong.”

  “No, Oliver, because you’re weak. Easily led.” Tansy grinned again. “You have no foundation. Your mother was an emotional cripple and your old man has always been a waste of goddamn space. You needed something powerful in your life and the mountain was there. It knew you couldn’t resist, that you would do whatever it wanted. That’s not strength, Oliver. That’s subservience. Weakness. Subjection.”

  “No—”

  “You stupid son of a bitch.”

  “You don’t know what happened on that mountain.” Oliver swayed and spat blood. “You don’t even know what it wants, yet you watched me all these years and never tried to stop me. What does that make you?”

  “Smart,” the sheriff said.

  “Weaker than me,” Oliver said.

  “Is that what you think?” the sheriff said. “Well, maybe. But I’m still going to be drawing breath in five minutes, and you’ll be deader than yesterday’s turds.”

  The clock ticked. Not even six o’clock, and the sheriff felt like he’d already lived through a full day of hell. He was definitely going back to bed after this. His head whirled and his heart continued to boom hard. He was angry, but more than anything he was scared.

  “You’ve left me one hell of a mess to sweep under the rug,” he said to Oliver.

  Oliver swayed again. His legs buckled but he stayed on his feet.

  “All for a peaceful life,” Tansy said.

  And Oliver said, “That’s all I ever wanted.”

  ———

  Matthew knew what he had to do and waited for his chance. It came just after Oliver said, “That’s all I ever wanted.” The fluorescent light buzzed and flickered and the sheriff growled—actually growled—and turned his stony eyes up to it.

  Less than a second: the window in which Matthew had to act. And in that time his heart must have drummed fifty times. Every dark thought he’d ever had stormed through his mind. Several happy thoughts, too: fishing with his old man on Lake Ronkonkoma; when Kirsty first said that she loved him; Bobby taking him to the clearing in the woods, his glowing, chubby face. I thought you needed to—

  Less than a second.

  “Motherfuck—” Sheriff Tansy said. That was all.

  Matthew leapt at him, one hand in his face, the other reaching for the gun on his hip. He came from the side and was able to release the retention strap quickly, but struggled with the gun, fumbled the grip. Tansy realized what was happening and put up a fight. Matthew’s window closed and there followed a struggle that lasted no more than three seconds but felt, for both men, like three hours. But Matthew’s determination (not to mention the fact that he jammed his thumb in Tansy’s eye) prevailed. He snatched the gun and pointed it at the sheriff’s face.

  “You sick son of a bitch,” Matthew said.

  Sheriff Tansy backed up, his shoulders rolling with fury, the eye that Matthew had poked squeezed shut.

  “You all-out ballsy dicksucker,” he said. “And still a stick in my ass.”

  “Here’s what’s going to happen,” Matthew said. “I’m going to lock you two in a holding cell while we blow the fuck out of this shithole town.”

  “I don’t think so,” the sheriff said. Fluid oozed from his eye.

  “I do. So let’s go, fat boy. The keys.”

  The sheriff threw back his head and brayed moronic laughter. His good eye rolled toward Oliver. “How about you shoot this asshole, Oliver? Or one of the children?”

  Matthew stepped forward and pressed the Glock’s muzzle into Tansy’s cheekbone, directly beneath his squinted eye. “There’s no conventional safety on this gun. No levers or buttons. Am I right, Sheriff Tansy?”

  “You pint-sized prick.”

  “I should keep my finger away from the trigger until I am absolutely one hundred percent ready to shoot. Am I right?”

  The sheriff tried to pull away but Matthew kept the gun locked in place.

  “And would you look at that—my finger is right on the trigger.” It was Matthew’s turn to grin. “How do you like that?”

  “You couldn’t even shoot a dying deer,” Tansy said, spittle flying from his lips. “You expect me to believe you’re going to shoot the High Sheriff of Hollow fucking County?”

  “That was a long time ago,” Matthew said. “Things have changed.”

  “I’ll take my chances.” The sheriff opened his eye, bloodshot and crazy. “Look at you: five-foot-nothing and trembling like a dog shitting razor blades.”

  “That’s adrenaline,” Matthew said, still grinning. “Seventy thousand amps of pure adrenaline bolting through my system. I’m pumped.”

  “Shoot this son of a bitch, Oliver. NOW!”

  “A loud noise could cause my finger to twitch.”

  “OLIVER!”

  “He might miss. I know damn well I won’t.”

  “NOW!”

  Perfect calm fell over Matthew, from out of nowhere. A dusky, easy blanket of calm. He took a step backward, keeping the gun levelled at Tansy’s face, noticing how the tip of the barrel—his arm, his whole body—had stopped trembling. He felt extremely cool. Not cool like Bootsy Collins, but like a bird of prey in an arctic aerie, so high he could see the earth’s curvature, feel the wind in his icy feathers. He’d gained an intense awareness of his surroundings, as if he had eased from his body and was ghosting around the room. Morning light reached through the blinds and touched the floor. He saw the imperfections in the walls, the stains on the ceiling. A frayed flag stood in one corner. Off-white stars and faded stripes. The children were balled like two sheets of newspaper, pine needles in Courtney’s hair, a drop of blood on the strap of her right Croc. Oliver sagged to one side and pumped blood, a blazing red devil-man with a part of his stomach slipping between the cracks of his fingers, but swinging the .45 upward, his finger looped around the trigger.

  This is the end for someone, Matthew thought, knowing that Sheriff Tansy would sooner take a bullet than concede. This is how it feels.

  He exhaled with bird-of-prey coolness and looked at the sheriff through the gun’s steady sights.

  Perfect calm.

  “What are you waiting for, Oliver?” the sheriff said, wheezing and sweating. “Do as you’re told, boy. Pull the goddamn trigger.”

  This is the end.

  Oliver did as he was told. He pulled the trigger.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The bullet hit Sheriff Tansy in the middle of his chest and pushed him backward so hard and fast that he left one of his boots standing empty by his desk. He slammed into the wall, bounced off it, then jigged sideways, three shaky steps, before falling. He was dead before he hit the floor. The American flag toppled from the corner and draped over him, covering his face and chest. Blood flowed among the stars.

  Oliver dropped the gun. It was empty now, and useless. The final bullet had been used. And in a most satisfactory manner, he thought.

  “I never liked that asshole,” he said.

&nb
sp; “Me, either,” Matthew said. The calm had dispersed. Not so cool anymore. He lowered the Glock, taking his finger off the trigger, struggling to process what had happened. He looked at the sheriff’s empty boot, the laces untied, one eyelet missing. It didn’t seem real. Nothing seemed real. He looked at the children, wrapped together, their faces turned away from everything.

  “Let us go, Oliver,” he said.

  Oliver shook his head. “It won’t let you go, Matthew.”

  “Abraham’s Faith?”

  “It wants you. It will find you.”

  “Maybe one day.”

  “One day.” Oliver rolled his eyes to the ceiling, then slumped to his knees with a red splash. His hands dropped to his sides and a figure-eight of intestine slithered from the hole in his stomach.

  Matthew went to the children. He lay his palm on Courtney’s trembling back, feeling her heart run, the knotted rope of her spine.

  “All I wanted was to be left alone,” Oliver said. Hard, ragged words. He coughed blood. His chest rattled. “When I was . . . three months old, my father . . . put a pillow over my face.” His gaze dropped to Matthew and his mouth twitched. “I wish to God he’d kept it there.”

  Matthew lowered his head. A tear rolled from his eye, fell, and splashed on Ethan’s leg. The boy opened his eyes.

  Sunlight moved deeper into the room. Oliver turned toward it, looking out the window, to the east. He managed one final, rattling breath. “Boom,” he said. “I’m a hellbound cunt.”

  He closed his eyes and said nothing more.

  ———

  Matthew considered using Sheriff Tansy’s phone to call the New York State Police, but that would mean waiting for them. They would arrive promptly, no doubt, but he didn’t want to stay in Point Hollow any longer than he had to, and he certainly didn’t want to risk another crooked townsperson showing up at the station.

  “We’re going,” he said to Courtney and Ethan. “Right now.”