Southern Ouroboros

by Matt Kilby

  “I’m sorry,” he shook his head. “My mind went somewhere else.”

  “That’s okay,” she patted his arm with a sweet grin. “I’ll just send her to you when she gets into town.”

  Before he could protest, she shuffled away, and his eyes drifted back to the page with Eric’s tortured stare. The Lord spoke to him then, but he couldn’t figure it out as he finished his errands and went back to the church. In the office, he opened the Saturday newspaper on his desk next to his Bible. This was how he chose his sermons, deciding by the week’s current events which direction to steer his flock. The prevalent stories were about a public shooting the week before. Some man walked into a shopping mall in Oklahoma with an automatic rifle and killed five people, one a 12-year-old boy with his whole life ahead. Some people said the shooter had terrorist ties and others that he suffered from schizophrenia. The reasons ranged from not enough gun laws to keep the weapon out of his hands to too many to keep them out of the hands of people who might have stopped him. The music he listened to. The movies he watched. Everyone had an opinion, but no one had answers. The only undeniable truth was the lines dividing people were drawn thicker and darker. The further they drifted apart, the more likely it would happen again or something worse, like what happened in Pine Haven, North Carolina. With the weight on his heart, Brandon picked up his Bible.

  He asked the Lord for guidance and thought about the book in his hands, looking for a connection with the news story. This one seemed a no brainer. People were dead and others struggling for sense out of the senseless, driving ideological wedges between their neighbors. More than anything, they needed the Golden Rule, to love each other as they wanted to be loved. The words came from the mouths of Moses and Jesus, the foundations of his faith, but his mind drifted another direction. Instead of those cherished figures, he found himself thinking about one of the most despised—a man so vile he needed God’s mark to survive the world.

  He opened the Bible and found the verse where the still voice led. Genesis 4:9. Then the Lord said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” He said, “I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?” But he didn’t think about the mall shooting or the debate consuming the country. His mind went to the boy in the room above his house, alone and frightened of something he couldn’t control. At that age, Brandon lingered in a similar place, looking back on his life and ahead. Though it hadn’t been easy, he found a way out. He found God and, once saved, took it as his duty to save others. Now he had an opportunity and cowered far from the calling. Sighing, he said a reluctant “Amen” and put the Bible down on his desk. Then he walked out and to his house.

  Passing through to the hallway, he didn’t hear a peep upstairs and hoped Eric slept. He could go up prepared to serve God but turn back to try some other time. He had the day to talk himself into or out of it, but life wouldn’t work that way. When the Lord wanted something, He saw it done, so Brandon wasn’t surprised to find his guest on the air mattress with his eyes on the floor.

  Eric didn’t glance up, though he must have heard the steps creak. Brandon stood at the top as if he had a chance to change his mind—to lose his nerve. Both stayed silent until he took a step forward.

  “I wondered if I’d see you again,” Eric spoke without looking up.

  “I’m sorry,” Brandon came to the chair across from him and sat. “I’ve treated you like a prisoner.”

  “I am, even if I’m not yours. He got to you, didn’t he?”

  Brandon nodded. “I haven’t heard that name in a long time.”

  “Tuck,” Eric said and looked up to see his reaction.

  “Short for Tucker. My daddy called me Tuck, and the people I hung around weren’t much for multiple syllables.”

  “Sounds like you needed better friends.”

  “They weren’t mine. They weren’t even his. If he needed them, even to save his sorry life, he used one of his girls to bargain for their help. He was a pimp, his friends all customers instead of the other way around.”

  “Is that why you’re a preacher?” Eric asked.

  “No,” Brandon shook his head. “When he sold sex, I was more than happy to follow his footsteps. With all the dirt he had on the most influential people in town—businessmen, police officers, politicians—he ran Creek Hollow. He had a different girl every night and didn’t care whether they’d give him the time of day if they didn’t work for him. I dropped out of school to take some for myself. I thought I had it made until a few years after.”

  “What happened?”

  “Grady Perlson.” Brandon paused at the recognition on Eric’s face.

  “You knew him?”

  “I grew up with him,” he said and mirrored Eric’s shock. “He’s the reason I am who I am today. How do you know him?”

  “He destroyed my hometown,” Eric muttered.

  “Pine Haven,” Brandon tried to make sense of it. “That was him?”

  “More or less,” Eric nodded. “The thing inside him, what’s in me now, convinced a lot of people.”

  “You said he tried to convince you, but you resisted.”

  “I still ended up taking his burden when I shot that son of a bitch in the head. Sorry for the cussing.”

  “Don’t worry about that. You really killed Grady?”

  Eric nodded. “I guarded his prison cell. It’s how he tried to get to me, those dark eyes staring between the bars. When they looked at you, it was hard to say no.”

  “The eyes,” Brandon said, a flood of memories washing behind it. He saw himself as that troubled boy, back behind the old Orion factory with Bobby and Mike beside him and Grady ahead but someone else too. “His brother had the eyes.”

  “I don’t know anything about a brother,” Eric shook his head. “All I can say is Grady’s eyes would turn black whenever this other thing was around. It called itself Wolgiss.”

  “A demon?”

  Eric shrugged. “How else did it get inside me?”

  “Then it might have been in Henry and got into Grady after,” Brandon said, unsure if he talked to Eric anymore. He lost his focus and almost forgot why he went up to begin with, drifting into a past he thought he let go. “That would explain what happened the night I tried to kill him.”

  “You did?” It was Eric’s turn to squint confusion.

  “Not for any good reason,” Brandon huffed. “Definitely not to save Creek Hollow. I blamed him for everything wrong in my life and went to settle the score while my daddy did the same to his. Only one of us succeeded, but I cut Grady’s cheek pretty deep in trying. I never told anyone, but the wound healed as quick as I made it.”

  “That’s him,” Eric said with a firm nod. “The only damage he kept was what I gave him. On top of that, my leg got better after.”

  “Your leg?”

  “I was crippled. An old football injury. I could hardly walk, and that’s why I even considered doing what he wanted. I thought that would be the best thing for my family, but I came to my senses before I did something I couldn’t take back.”

  “Good for you,” Brandon smiled.

  “Good,” Eric repeated. “Instead of a little dirt in my conscience, I got a full-fledged demon and had to abandon my wife and newborn baby.”

  “You left them?” Brandon tilted his head.

  “I didn’t have a choice. Wolgiss hurts people, and I couldn’t take the chance he’d hurt them. As soon as I understood what the nightmares meant, I got out of there.”

  Brandon wished he could take what happened to Eric and wear it like a backpack, setting him free. He deserved it more. He spent all those years tormenting Grady, making sure he got his daily dose of pain. In his shoes, he might have sought help, and maybe Grady had. Maybe the Devil came or sent something in his place. As much as that dark adversary twisted his nature, maybe he took Henry. It had to be what he noticed in his eyes the day Henry wanted to kill him. But didn’t Grady stop him? Brandon told himself the details didn’t matter as they threatened to consume him
. They were another window to Tuck Marshall, and looking too long risked becoming him again. He breathed, the sound deafening in the silent attic. Eric didn’t look at him anymore, his eyes on his feet but mind much farther, probably in Pine Haven with the wife and child he left behind.

  “We were in the truck driving through Oklahoma when I met God,” he said and waited for Eric’s attention. “I couldn’t tell you how many towns came before or how many names me and my daddy wore. I was Jack McCall in Houston and Billy Hicks in Dallas. He called me Junior in Abilene and Jep in El Paso, but then I stopped paying attention. Every time he got spooked, thinking the local police stared a little long, we picked up stakes and moved further west. He thought we’d land in California, but somewhere in New Mexico, he changed his mind to New York. So we cut north and east and then something in my head started talking.”

  “That doesn’t always mean God.”

  “No, but this did, whispering in my ear, the breath so relaxing I could have shut my eyes. But it wanted me to do something first. I told you about when I was young, and that living gets old. Your friends leave and you’re not in the best position to make new ones. In another life, Grady and I might have gotten along, but I listened to my daddy. He wanted me to make sure Grady didn’t go home, but I messed that up, or your Wolgiss did for me. Every day after, my daddy would shake his head and tell me how bad things could have turned out. What if Grady got home before he killed his daddy? What if that big idiot stopped him? The more he talked, the more I wished I let him. Then that whisper told me to make it right. Mistakes are only mistakes for as long as you make them. Once they’re in the past, they’re lessons. I told my daddy I had to use the bathroom. He cussed me until he found a gas station. I went inside and told the man at the counter to call the police. I was in the bathroom so couldn’t tell you what happened next. Maybe the cashier stared and made my daddy suspicious or a darker voice whispered to him. Whatever spooked him, I walked out to see his tires peeling out of the parking lot. I thought I might be the stupidest person on the planet. My daddy could disappear as well as anybody. He proved that, but I cut myself loose and painted an arrow at myself. There was no question I was going to jail, and alone in that parking lot, I got on my knees and asked the voice what to do next. It didn’t say anything. So I squeezed my eyes and prayed harder. ‘What am I supposed to do?’ Its answer was a cloud of dust coming back down the road to pull in. ‘Get in the car,’ my daddy told me. ‘No,’ I said. Sirens came, and he looked to the highway. ‘Boy, get in this car before I come out and drag you.’ ‘No daddy,’ I shook my head. To this day, I wonder why he didn’t leave me. Love? It would make a nice footnote, but I think God understood what I needed, and the name for that is closure. My daddy got out and tried to pull me into the truck, but all those flashing lights pulled in to block every way to run. Daddy put his hands up and got on his knees beside me, muttering as he did ‘Look what you’ve done to me now, boy.’”

  “Why are you telling me this?” Eric asked, though the tears rimming his eyelids proved part of him knew.

  “There’s a picture of you at the post office.”

  “What are you talking about?” Eric furrowed his brow.

  “While I was out today,” Brandon said. “You and some girl named Suzanne. Someone is looking for you.”

  “Vick,” he closed his eyes and shook his head.

  “I didn’t want to come up here, but God put His purpose in me again. He wanted me to tell you for His reasons, and all we can do is speculate what those are. I think my job is to remind you the things you almost did aren’t the same as things you did do. You made the right choice when it mattered, and that’s worth plenty. Daddies can make things right as easy as they mess them up. Mine came back.”

  “So you think I should go home?”

  “I’m not saying that,” Brandon shook his head, “but if nothing else, you can talk to this friend who came for you. It’s something to consider.”

  Eric appeared to do that a quiet moment, nodding until his decision went the other way.

  “Not with this thing inside me.”

  “Then we should work on getting rid of it,” Brandon said and wanted to offer another smile but couldn’t summon one. He didn’t know how to exorcise a demon. The only person he believed had was Jesus when He sent a gang of them into a herd of pigs. But all things were possible through the Lord, so he set his mind to trying—even if this one almost leveled a town and was set on killing him next.

  5

  Days or weeks passed in the claustrophobic dark, the sun rising and setting beyond the bars and the wooden steps up. Suzanne couldn’t tell anymore and got dizzy when she thought about it. Did anyone realize she was missing or did Vick still wait for her to come to her senses? Had it been long enough for people to give up hope of finding her? There might be an empty grave over at Memorial Hill, waiting for her bones to fill it. Worse was the possibility her time in the dark cell could best be measured in hours.

  She clung to facts as if losing them meant losing everything. At some point after the stew incident, she pissed herself and marinated in the stink until the ogre checked on her. His response was a couple of canine sniffs before he trudged back up and came back later with a clean pair of jeans and store-bought bag of underwear. He came into her cell and squatted to unchain her legs, clamping a hand over her ankle to warn her against fighting him. She knew better than to think she had any chance, closing her eyes and holding her breath as he dug his hand under her waist to unbutton her soiled pants. He peeled them and her underwear off in a single bundle, and she shivered more at the thought of being vulnerable than the sharp cold of the floor biting where her legs touched. She gritted her teeth against the inevitable violation, but he only guided her feet into the leg holes and slid the clean clothes up her body. In her relief, she reminded herself that didn’t make him a saint.

  When done, he didn’t chain her legs again but slid a plastic bucket close enough for her to see. Her breath hitched as she understood: a toilet for however long they let her live. Gone were the days of toilet paper and plumbing. Gone hot showers and fogged-over mirrors. Her heart sank in knowing this was her best alternative.

  “Try to escape,” he muttered, “and I’ll kill you.”

  That went without saying but still beat the grunted “Eat” he repeated last time. One day, he might manage a full conversation, telling her his hopes and dreams of wearing her skin as a suit under a shirt made of her hair.

  She waited until he left again to test her new freedom, dragging her knees under her to kneel and look around. Even with her face off the ground, it was too dark to see, though her eyes adjusted to make out the white bucket beside her. She reached as far as her chained wrists allowed and ran her fingers along the rim, hoping he made a single mistake, but found only solid plastic. With a handle, wiry and metal like a pail’s, she might have a chance. Vick once showed her how to unlock a pair of handcuffs with a small piece of metal, and she had plenty of time to figure out how to pick the door lock. Even if she couldn’t, she might make a weapon, sharpening its point on the bars and waiting for the perfect moment to stick it into her jailer’s eye. Removing her hand from the bucket, she maneuvered to sit with her back to the bars, telling herself not to lose herself in fantasies.

  Instead, she focused on surviving, figuring the best way was to endure. Her mother had been a study in that, maintaining her composure when the Judge was at his most temperamental. He never raised a hand to her, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t be cruel when his face drained of blood and eyes drew sharp. They did that when she refused to be the prop he wanted and went about living her independent life. When she gave too much money to charity and not enough to the historical society he helped create. When the mayor invited them to dinner but she wouldn’t go because Suzanne had a stomach bug and wanted her to read stories instead of some babysitter. When the boy he despised turned his daughter into a blubbering mess and she said Vick had as much right to mistakes as t
he rest of them. His tantrums were silent and deliberate: canceling checks he didn’t approve and spending entire evenings avoiding every room she passed through. Every time, she gave Suzanne a sliver of a smile as if they shared some unspoken secret. And they did. Bluster took more energy than sitting on the other end. Eventually, the Judge always wore himself out, leaving her mother well rested and ready to do things the right way.

  So Suzanne did the same. She saved her strength and waited until the big bastard came with her next meal. Breakfast, lunch, or dinner didn’t matter because he always brought the same plate of fish stew. She avoided speculating whether it was always the same batch. Those thoughts led to gagging, and she didn’t want to christen her new toilet with vomit. So she stared into the dark when the heavy footsteps came down. When he reached the bottom, she saw his outline but something better. He reached for the bars, hands waving to find them. The dark made him blind, but she was used to it. She just needed to decide how to use that to her advantage.

  First, she had to get out of the cuffs. Vick taught her to use something small and strong to force the mechanism away from the metal teeth that fastened them. Without that, it wouldn’t be easy but wouldn’t be impossible. She heard of people dislocating their thumbs to slip their hands through, grabbing her right thumb and wondering if she should yank or push toward her palm until she felt the pop. The thought turned her stomach, so she let go and closed her eyes to rest.