“You’re not answering my question. You’re stalling.”
Chris rubbed his eyes. “Yeah, I am.” He took a deep breath. “All right. The guy on the tapes, the stuff that got me started… you could tell just from the sound of his voice that he was crazy. Everything he’d done had driven him nuts. Happens a lot.
“He talked about things from somewhere else. Walls between worlds, that’s what he said. He talked about things from the other side crossing over, fucking up time and space from the inside out.”
He stopped talking, waited for Shadow to respond.
“I don’t see what that has to do with me,” Shadow said.
Chris laughed, a different kind of laughter. He was scared.
“I rented a room in a farmhouse in Iowa one time. There were dogs running all over the place, a fresh litter of puppies just getting old enough to make trouble, but there was just one cat, a kitten. I don’t know what happened to its mother, I didn’t ask about it. The kitten ran around with the puppies just like it was part of the pack. All it saw were puppy dogs around it, so it thought it was a puppy dog too. I just remember thinking how confused that little kitty was going to be when all its brothers and sisters grew teeth and got bigger then she was.”
Shadow didn’t say anything. She was listening to Chris’ heartbeat. He wasn’t lying. She didn’t think he was lying. She didn’t know.
“You still don’t get it,” he said. “You’re the kitty cat that thinks it’s a dog. That poor kid has you thinking that you’re something you’re not. Think about it. He says that you’re a she. How the hell are you a she? What about you is female? You’re an it.”
He kept talking, but she stopped paying attention. She just kept listening to his heartbeat. It was getting faster. Maybe he was lying. That was what happened when people lied, their heart beat faster.
He started yelling at her. “That’s it. That’s really all I know, goddamn it. We had a deal. I don’t give a shit if you liked what I have to tell you, kill me, do it now, because I don’t want to be stuck on this rock when you…”
She destroyed him, all of him, except for one tiny part. She lifted what was left up into the air in front of her. She wondered if he was right, if he was still in there, trapped inside a speck so small only she could see it.
She felt the anger surge up inside of her again. She could leave him like this.
No. They had made an agreement, her and Andrew, and she would follow it.
The room went dark, and Chris was gone.
Andrew hadn’t taught Shadow anything about being angry. She’d seen him angry, but the anger she remembered belonged to Paul, his giant, leering, shouting face, towering over her in the dim recesses of her memory.
She didn’t want to be like that. She didn’t want to be like he was.
She left her body and traveled to the bottom of the river running through the middle of the city. She made a space for herself, a bubble the size of the dead man’s head, and scooped up a handful of mud from the riverbed. She pulled and shaped it, stretching and spinning it around like cotton candy, entering and leaving each new shape.
Trying them on for size.
#
Paul rang the doorbell at the gate. It had taken him a couple of hours to walk here. There were little bits of gravel stuck in the soles of his shoes. He'd left town a while ago, nothing but trees for a long time. He'd enjoyed the walk.
He was carrying a green duffel bag. Clothes and essentials, and a couple of books, and a few magic tricks that didn't take up too much space, coins and cups. He was a little over-packed for hitchhiking, and not quite prepared to be staying in any one place for too long. He'd compromised.
He ran the doorbell a second time, and then a third, and then he just waited. For another hour.
He heard something gently kick to life in the speaker. Someone was listening on the other side.
"You know who I am," Paul said.
CHAPTER 12
#
Andrew wasn’t going to visit Shadow today. Ms. Rehes had told him he was still failing her class, and he wanted to spend the day in his room making up more old homework. So today was the day she started her project.
She lifted herself out of her body and looked down upon it. Her head was leaning to one side and the plaster was starting to chip. She looked ugly, abandoned.
She couldn’t look at it anymore. She left the gazebo, went to Andrew’s house, and spent time watching Andrew's grandmother.
#
Getting ready for church took Cynthia about forty-five minutes. She sometimes wondered if she really needed to take that long, if she wasn’t just killing time. Maybe she could skip the eye shadow, but she wasn’t sure. She’d feel strange going out with nothing on her face.
Figuring out what to wear was easier. She had eight dresses that were nice enough for church. She’d had them all for a long time; she’d never had too much of a figure, so as she got older it turned out she could pretty much wear the same clothes she always had. There were still a couple of people at church who had been around long enough to know what she used to look like, but if they thought she was being vain, then they were wrong. It would be silly for her to buy new clothes when she didn’t need them.
She put on a light blue flower print dress that made her feel like having a picnic. She grabbed her purse and left her room.
She peeked in on Andrew before she left the house. He had his nose in a book, he always did lately. She wondered if he’d be like this if he was still in Chicago, if he’d be outside playing with other kids. Sometimes when she thought about his parents, everything around her turned red. They said he’d be staying for the summer. They had no right to do this to her. She should send Andrew home, let them do their job. But she didn’t know if she could do that. She didn’t know what the house would be like if it were empty again.
She didn’t even let him know she was leaving. He knew where she went on Sunday morning. She drove to church and sat down in the back row just as the minister started talking.
“…and that’s why it’s important that we gather together, that we affirm…”
She liked the new minister. She had heard some of the people complaining about him over the last couple of weeks, but she liked him. The service ended and all the people began to file into the basement. She waited a moment before she got out of her seat. She didn’t want to go down there until there were people there, didn’t want to make it seem like she was sneaking down and sneaking free cookies and coffee before anyone else had a chance to, and when she did finally make it there, she found herself surrounded by people she didn't know or didn't want to see. She didn’t want to be at church anymore. She could feel her hands moving before she even got in the car, turning the wheel.
She’d met Harry at church. Her husband always worked late on Saturday night and slept in, so he never knew about him. They’d gotten to know each other talking over coffee. Harry was a mailman. He wasn’t married, he was really very shy. They’d made love in his house, every Sunday for three months.
When Cynthia found out that she was pregnant, her husband hadn’t touched her in a year, except to hit her. She took all the money she could get and went away, but she was lonely and scared, and when the money began to run out she was sure that if she just went back and told him what happened everything would be all right.
She circled the block a dozen times before she went home. Andrew was still in his room when she got back.
#
She didn’t know where Josh’s mother was; she flew through the hospital looking at nametags until she found her. She’d been arguing with a man in a suit upstairs. There was another man— he was older, he wore a yellow T-shirt like a mental patient, he had blue eyes and messy white hair— but he never said anything, just stood behind the younger man and stared at her briefcase. She was just starting to raise her voice when an orderly came by to give her a message.
She opened the door to another doct
or’s office and sat down to face him.
She looked the other doctor in the eye.
“Don’t even start…”
“Let me say it one more time. I run this hospital. If I say that those men need access to our Harry Doe, you need to respect that.”
“He’s a patient. Until somebody…”
“How many hours have you been working, Rebecca?”
“Sixteen. When I was interning, I once worked thirty-two hours on Christmas.”
“How long has it been since your son’s funeral?”
The words only filtered down to her a moment after he said them.
“You’ve been working long hours right after a horrible tragedy. It’d be amazing if you went through all this without it affecting your judgment. Have you thought about taking some time off?”
She got up and turned her head as she walked out of the room.
“I’m not done with this.”
She punched out and left the hospital.
She sat in her car until she was no longer too mad to drive, pulled out her cell phone and called her husband at the first red light. A black flower burst out of the cell phone as it dialed out, casting everything around it into a dark haze. It concealed Rebecca Murdock’s face, but Shadow could still see everything else, could still hear her voice.
“...you have no idea the garbage I just had to swallow at the hospital…”
“…you’re not at home… I thought you were going to be home tonight…”
“…well, I’m glad you’ve got a high roller coming into the hotel, it’s a shame we’re not in Atlantic City.”
“…don’t tell me…”
“…forget it.”
She turned off her phone and the dark space disappeared.
When she got back to her house, there was a note on the kitchen table from her daughter. She owed her fifteen bucks for the pizza they’d ordered for dinner. She put down her briefcase.
The kids went to bed in about an hour. So she had that long to do everything.
The door to Josh’s room was closed. When she opened it, he was lying in bed, reading something like he always was lately.
“Hello, Josh.”
He glanced up at her, surprised.
“Hi, Mom.”
He looked right back down at his book. She watched him, couldn’t think of anything to say.
She slowly closed the door, kept watching him until the crack of light between the door and the frame was gone. She lingered for a moment on the closed door, then turned away and walked into the kitchen. She took some money from the glass jar on the fridge and went to the twins’ room.
Grace was sleeping over at a friend’s house, but Sandy was still here. This wasn’t how it usually went, she wasn’t sure why Sandy stayed home. Maybe they weren’t getting along, maybe she’d missed something.
She knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
Sandy’s voice. She was sitting in front of her computer.
“Hi, Mom.”
“I’m sorry I’m home so late. Thanks for ordering the pizza. I thought your father would be back sooner than this, or else I would’ve left you money.”
“It’s all right.”
“Let me pay you back.”
“It’s fine, Mom.”
“I’ll just give you a twenty, you can keep the change.”
“I used some of my birthday money, it’s fine.”
“Sandy, you shouldn’t have to pay for dinner.”
“Mom.”
She didn’t make eye contact, didn’t raise her voice.
Rebecca was quiet for a moment.
“I’ll just put it on the table in case you change your mind.”
She closed the door. She opened it again almost immediately.
“Sandy, is something bothering you? I’m sorry you guys had to fend for yourselves tonight.”
“No, Mom, that doesn’t bother me. Everything’s fine.”
“Sandy, do you feel like…” She stopped, started again, tried to finish. “I don’t know, I just feel like a couple of years ago we could’ve talked to each other about something like this.”
Sandy kept her eyes on the computer screen. “About what?”
She was quiet again. Sandy finally looked up at her. “Mom, I think you’re tired.”
Her mother stared at the window on the far side of the room for a minute, then nodded her head.
“You’re right. Good night. I love you, honey.”
“Good night, Mom.”
She closed the door. She walked towards her bedroom, left her briefcase where it was on the table. She passed Josh’s room, then Tom’s.
“I love you too,” she whispered.
Then she fell into bed.
#
Sandy watched the door close. She turned back towards her computer and exhaled. It worked. Thank God. Making her feel guilty was the only thing that got rid of her anymore.
Grace was still talking to her on the computer. Grace was with their friends at somebody's house. They still wanted to know why Sandy wasn’t there too, they wanted to know everything was fine. She’d said she had homework to do, she’d said so four times already, but Grace ignored her. Sandy wasn’t sure if she knew she was lying or if she just didn’t think that homework was a good enough reason not to be with them. The conversation went on for ten minutes before Sandy could get her to just say goodbye.
She closed the messenger window and suddenly everything felt quiet. She started thinking about her brother. Just getting near it made her feel cold. It wasn’t that she was sad. She was sad, but… was she even sad? She was something. She didn’t know what she was. All there was for her was not seeing a face she’d seen so much of, wondering how it is that suddenly someone can be gone. And of course she was sad, she just couldn’t say how much or how little, didn’t know how to separate it from everything else. She was sick and tired of everybody telling her how she felt.
It all seemed to just wash off Grace— she’d mastered the art of grieving in public the way she mastered everything else. Sandy was glad she was gone tonight. It was so nice to have the place to herself, to be alone and clean her half of the room without anyone looking over her shoulder and mess around with her computer and cut pictures out of magazines and write in her journal.
She did that until eleven o’clock, when she knew her mother would be asleep. Then she went to Josh’s room.
There was no lock on the door. He was lost in his book, didn’t notice her after she’d shut the door behind her. His glasses made him look stupid, like a cartoon character.
“It’s your fault Mom feels bad,” she said, looking into his eyes. “She was just talking to me about it.”
He looked down at the carpet, and she wondered if she hadn’t finally done it this time, if she’d… she didn’t know. Broken him, maybe. But he just looked right back up at her, angry like he always was. Nothing new.
She didn’t know why she did this. It just made her feel better.
She stepped towards him. He closed his eyes and exhaled sharply. He closed his right hand into a fist and waited.
She laughed at him and went back to her room.
#
Shadow flew back to the gazebo, back to her body. She took stock of what she’d seen over the course of the day. Shadow didn’t want to hurt anyone, but she didn’t want to be hurt either. That was the whole point.
Josh’s sister hurt people. Josh’s mother let people hurt her. And Andrew's grandmother just seemed to hurt, without doing anything. So Shadow didn’t know what to do.
The answer came to her suddenly. It was something Josh’s mother had said. A couple of years ago, Sandra was different, better. She would’ve been about Andrew’s age then. Which meant that the answer had been right under Shadow’s nose the whole time.
That was all right, though. She’d made a mistake, people did that all the time. She was becoming more human already.
&n
bsp; She stayed in the gazebo until Andrew came to visit her the next day.
#
Mike the Kid took one hand off the steering wheel and tapped his fingernails against the inside of the dashboard. He thought about whistling something, thought about closing his eyes for a few minutes to see if he could navigate just with his fingertips.
“So this guy owns these woods?”
Luke the Bastard didn’t answer. He was sitting in the passenger seat, staring at the windshield. Fat Rob was in the back seat; he’d fallen asleep twenty minutes ago.
Suddenly, Luke sat up straight.
“Pull over the car.”
Mike turned off the radio and pulled over the car. He got out and slammed the door behind him. Rob woke up with a jump and looked around frantically, like he wasn’t sure where he was.
Michael glanced at him through the window.
“Remind me why we brought him along?”
Luke was already out of the car, staring at the trees.
“Because I don’t want to do this without help and I don’t trust either of you alone. Follow me.”
He stepped into the woods. All the trees had seemed bigger, when Paul had been remembering them. Even as a teenager, they'd still had magic.
Not the real kind, of course. The kind that children thought would take them away to Narnia. For Luke, they were just a bunch of plants where he wished a road could be.
They pushed through the branches for ten minutes; about a hundred feet in, weaving between the trees so that you couldn’t see it until you got close, was a barbed wire fence. Above the fence was a steady string of tiny blue lights, hovering in place like fireflies trapped in a jar. Hidden behind a pair of trees was a gate. Luke closed his eyes and touched his face with his fingers. The gate swung open.
CHAPTER 13
#
Thomas woke up, laid in bed, trying to decide whether or not he was awake. It took an hour. He threw on his bathrobe and went downstairs to where he kept his records.
He sat down in his usual spot by his turntable. He'd been in the habit of watching the news before breakfast instead, but with everything happening lately, keeping track of current events had become work, and he refused to let work be the first thing he did in the morning. So his new ritual was music.
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