The Grave House

by David Garaby

  He blushed.

  "It's alright to acknowledge one's gifts and appreciate them before they are taken away."

  "So this is the story of the Devil?" asked Adam.

  "Well not the conventional one anyway," began Margo. "In my world the Devil was beautiful, indeed. A vision of radiant, aesthetic bliss. Perfect features, perfect skin, everything that enticed both men and women. And wouldn't this anger God? Wouldn't this perfection make you question your own inequities? It certainly would me. To think that something you created could surpass you? I know people think it's a compliment when their students become their betters, but that would not be the case with me. I'm far more callous than that. I'm not one to share the spotlight. In that at least, God and I are quite the same. I believe the Devil fell in love with a man, not an angel, a beautiful man who mirrored his own aesthetic virtue. And when God learned of their love he banished the Devil, for man can love no other immortal higher than He. God was, and still is, a jealous little bitch. So he cast the Devil into the deepest level of the earth. But the human found a way to join his angel. He dug the ground for so long and with such force that everything—his skin and bones and all the things that made him beautiful were covered with rot and dust and ash. He was not handsome anymore, but he made his way into Hell, and the Devil and his love were one again. Ah, but while distance is a factor of which we, the living, have control—Time, unfortunately is not. In the years that followed, the human began to decay, in his place, a motionless skeleton laid next to the Devil in his bed. The man died. And the rage that erupted from the Devil's eyes was a thick lava. A glowing red serpent that filled the bowels of hell, the lava became an endless fire. The fire, she became his home."

  Margo gazed into Adam's eyes, he was entranced by her words. He was a little bird who had flown into her hands for a few morsels of bread.

  "The Devil can know love. But in the end, my dear Adam, his love will always meet the waiting fire."

  Margo reached for a photograph from the massive table. "This is my Daniel."

  Adam took the photograph. He could see the similarities, he did bear a slight resemblance to the young man staring back at him.

  "I decided to purge an idea," she said. "It's an idea I've had for a long time. I know this will never happen and I know this is an unattainable dream, but it lives inside me none-the-less, and somehow it fuels my own fire. I have to begin by saying that this painting is not one that I can create. I have the idea, it's sizzling, but the truth of the matter is it can be no one but you. I want my son. There's not a day that goes by when I don't see Daniel's face. I still picture him in his room, much smaller, and without Nina. And he had such life in him. He was immaculate. And someone took his light and I'm trying to bring that back. I've always been fascinated with the 'Pieta', the Holy Virgin mother cradling the wounded and dying Jesus. I think that's where the idea sprang from. The idea of wanting to feel his bones against my skin. To touch his hair and to breathe life back into him. They killed, not a piece of me, a chunk, a vulgar chunk of me. An obscene amount of my heart left this earth when my son passed away. These cowards didn't even have the decency to deliver him whole to me. They left him in pieces, they left him broken and bloodied in a foreign land."

  There were tears now, she was raw, it was the most pitiful thing Adam had ever seen. The crumbling pillar, his tear stained heroine.

  "You need to help me, Adam. We are going to immortalize my Daniel."

  "What can I do?"

  "You will give him life on the canvas. You will paint mother and child, create a new 'Pieta.' I want you to paint me giving back my son life. I want his body seated on a throne while I am holding up his head, attaching it back to his body, giving back the life that was taken. Symbolically bring him back to me. I don't want this to be grotesque—I know it sounds morbid and savage, but there is nothing strange about this; it's a mother wanting back her son. Let the critics analyze and judge my pain. It's something I want shown, something which needs to reveal itself. I have pictures. This was taken two weeks before he went missing. These are bone fragments the FBI sent to me. I want you to begin sketching. Follow the contours of his face, bring his bones life. I want a resurrection!" Adam felt the pain, the agony in her words, for a moment he wanted to hold her, take her into his arms and cradle her. This was a bizarre request, but somewhere deep inside, he knew there was nothing strange about it. It was almost beautiful, this idea of resurrection. But then he looked into her eyes, there were tears and a somber glare; there was also a hollowness, a cold and empty place inside those eyes.

  Adam took the photographs again, but this time he felt an intense coldness. His heart almost stopped when he saw Daniel's face, it looked almost exactly like his own. Adam's hands trembled when he came to a photograph of Daniel's severed head and the frightening smile which grew on Margo's face. Daniel swallowed hard, his insides were gnarled, he looked back into the severed head and thought he saw the mouth move, smile menacingly. The trembling continued, Adaaam, the hissing voice from earlier returned and echoed from all corners of the room. The lights above flickered wildly. The flood moved slightly, keeping balanced seemed almost impossible.

  Adaaam.

  Beads of sweat began sprouting across his forehead.

  Adaaaam. The crescendo. There was sweetness, he had heard that tone before.

  He could feel his body grow colder. His breathing was heavy and his mouth dry. The walls were coming closer, the room was slowly closing in on him.

  Listen for me. Adam. The voice was much deeper now. It sounded familiar, hoarse, maddening. Don’t you hear me?

  I love you. It was a familiar voice.

  He looked back into the photograph, back to the bloodied head.

  I love you, Adam. The eyes in the photograph flew opened. Hollow, black sockets. The blood oozed down the photograph and onto the floor. And the grin that formed across its face widened. The teeth grew sharp.

  Adam.

  Adaaaamm, crooned the voice.

  The voice was Justin's. He knew that voice well.

  I still love you. Come to me. There was blood on its teeth.

  "Stop," shivered Adam.

  A sudden, heavy blink brought back to normal in the world again, except for wet hands and the pounding heart which began to slow.

  "Are you alright?" Margo's voice was clear now, and deep concern in her eyes. "Is everything alright?"

  He paused for a moment, the photographs were sprawled on the floor. "I...I feel strange."

  "You scared me for a moment. You just dropped the photographs."

  "I'm sorry. I thought I," his mouth was dry, "'I thought I heard something."

  Margo looked around. "There's no one here but us, dear."

  "I'm sorry," he bent over to pick up the photographs. "I'll start working on the sketches."

  Margo forced a smile. "I'll have Bertha make you a cup of tea. Are you sure you can work?"

  Small sweat beads crowned his foreheads. "Yes,” he broke off. “I just need to catch my breath. Go outside for a bit."

  She nodded. "Take all the time you need."

  Margo waited until he was outside the door, "Leave him alone." She turned to the door of her studio, the wood grains came alive. They formed a woman's face.

  "Leave him alone," she hissed at the woman in the grains.

  Bring him to me said the voice said.

  "No. I will bring someone. Leave him alone. Leave the boy alone."

  Tomorrow ordered the voice.

  Margo raised her head with a sigh. She placed her hands in her pockets and walked towards the bay window. Adam was below, his hands holding the top of his head, staring blankly into the sky. She wondered what might be stirring in his head. Margo remembered how maddening it was when she first heard the voice speak to her. She could only imagine what terror was lurking in his mind. On the other side of the hacienda she could see Nina reading a book under a giant mesquite tree. Margo’s eyes narrowed as she grimaced at her daughter-in-law. />
  "Tomorrow," whispered Margo. The face disappeared.

  She walked towards the intercom system and pressed the TALK button. "Bertha," she said, "We have work to do. Call the Agent."

  Instant Gratification is for Pussies

  "WELL, HELLO-HELLO," said Nina. She sat crossed-legged on a bench in the courtyard reading a magazine. Adam replied with a weak, “Hey.”

  "You look like shit."

  He shook his head. "I'm off today. Been off ever since I got here."

  "This place will do that to you."

  He pulled out two cigarettes. He extended one. "I knew I liked you," she eagerly accepted.

  "What do you do all day?" he asked suddenly,

  She scratched her head lazily. "Not much. I go to the library when I'm well enough. But I haven't gone in a while. Do you want to come with me?"

  "I can't. I have work to do."

  "Oh, the painting. Must be nice. Nice to have things to do. Jobs to do," her voice drifted. "I wouldn't know. I don't really do much since I got here."

  "I'm sure there are things for you to do around here."

  She shook her head, "No. I used to be in Marketing back in Boulder."

  "Pretty girls usually are."

  "Make it work while you've got it,” she giggled playfully. “I liked it a lot, but then I married Daniel. I wanted to stay home. You know that same stupid story. Girl wants to start a family, girl has four miscarriages, girl finds out her husband got chopped and his body found in a barrel in Mexico."

  His smile dissipated. "Jesus."

  "Jesus Fucking Christ."

  "I can't imagine what you're going through."

  She inhaled. "I used to dream and took steps forward, sometimes I leaped. I usually did that when Daniel was by my side. But now the leaps are gone, so are the dreams, and they have been replaced with television and binge-watching. I swear, giving high-speed internet to someone is the worst thing anyone can do. Why dream when you've got other people's dreams filling the ever shifting television screen?"

  "I like binge-watching...I hate the suspense. The suspense of waiting, that is. Just put it all on the table."

  "But what fun is there in knowing everything? Instant gratification is for pussies, and I'm afraid that's what I've become."

  "I hate that word."

  She smirked, "You gays can't even hear the word? What, do you think it’ll bite or something? Believe me, kid, it doesn't have teeth. Well, at least mine doesn't."

  "Gays?"

  "Oh, please," she said. "Don't play coy with me, Mister Sister. I used to have one like you back in Boulder."

  "I guess we are just one big cliché."

  "Everyone is. There's about thirty of me in the world right now. I hope you didn't get offended, I was just teasing you. Just trying to lighten to mood here."

  "You didn't. It's fine. I just think it's an ugly word." Nina reminded him of Amber. He needed a friend since getting a decent signal in this place was almost impossible.

  "Well, so is the word 'goodbye,' but I'm afraid that's what I'm going to have to say."

  "Do you really have to go?"

  "Yes," she said. "The warden does not approve of this union," Nina signaled towards the second floor.

  Adam turned and caught Margo staring at them. Her glare was menacing, her jaw tightly clenched.

  In the Studio

  HIS NAIL BEDS were a vision of self-mutilation. He remembered the way Ashley would smack his hands away from his mouth. "Stop doing that, it’s so disgusting," she shamed. "Get your shit together. No one wants to fuck a Nervous Nelly!"

  He really did need to get it together; sometimes he nibbled and gnarled his cuticles so badly they bled. The habit had been so persistent that the pain became numbness. The only indication of pain was when the blood came. And it did, crusting around his nail-bed. When people pointed them out, he would lie and say it was paint. He could pull it off, the artist has no time to rinse his work, but in all honesty, when people walked away, they often left with drops of his deepest anxiety.

  His mouth was moving, he realized this slowly. Lost in thought, he carefully removed the tip of his index finger from his mouth. A stream of saliva, laced with blood, joined digit and orifice. He stared in disgust as the string darkened.

  Adam wiped his hands against his pants.

  "Think, you fucker," he said lightly and tapped his pencil lightly.

  He thought about the old Michelangelo quote: "I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free." Adam always had to wait for that pesky angel to fly from heaven onto his canvas. For this project though, the angel was already waiting, Margo knew exactly what she wanted.

  Despite the studio’s large size, he always chose a lonely corner, carefully moving Margo's battered easel next to the window. He saw the muddy Rio Grande River wrap around the estate, forming its own tiny peninsula, a place which had been isolated from the world, cocooned as it were, with the hopes for transforming into something more, something greater.

  There was rain on the afternoon of the first day, that was when he took his charcoal pencil onto the canvas. He spent the morning with thumbnails, different scenes, different ways Margo could be holding her son. The different positions. He understood what she wanted, there was something tender and poignant in the premise. To give her son his crown, to reinstate his life. But how could he depict this without making it seem gruesome. Was there a way? Would he even want to? Some things should be tackled head-on, why not show this horror, look into its cold eyes. Anyone even remotely familiar with Margo Sullivan heard the horror that befell her almost two years ago. The brutality, splashed over every major North American newspaper, and some European Art reviews, traveled fast. Would the people deem it too macabre? The idea flashed before him: the image of Margo holding the head of her dead son, the black blood, broken skin and bones placed gently on a serving dish. No, was that something too dark? Too chilling to manifest. He took the photographs Bertha delivered and inspected them. There was something in Daniel's eyes, something frightening in the lining of his pupils, as if they held more secrets than truth. Something stirred inside them, waiting to emerge. He was indeed handsome, and did bear a striking resemblance to Adam, but it was superficial, anyone could see that Adam had a softer jaw line, his eyes were deep set, and the nose was steeper than Daniel's.

  And Margo, who stopped aging at forty stared back at him, too, her frothy hair and trademark glare, the aristocratic presence and the striking features present in every photograph. She was a piece of art herself. He set the photographs back down and sketched until night.

  Consciences are Liabilities

  February 6, 2014 (Later that afternoon.)

  SHE DID NOT SMILE to show affection, she did it to bear her teeth. Margo extended her arms, it was a crucifixion pacing towards a tiny-framed, balding man. His hands stiffened, palms faced the ground.

  "Huuuuuddd," it was an unnecessarily loud call. The sound of dished clanked in the kitchen.

  They were in the vestibule, the embrace was both seemingly friendly and undoubtedly ferocious. An emotional farce, this was a house of contradictions after all. It was a hug that could have ended in blood-shed or tears.

  "So long," Margo said.

  Hudd's eyes beamed red now.

  "So long." Hudd was crying now. Margo did not reciprocate the tears. She widened her eyes and examined his falling features. His teeth were a dull, coffee-stained zigzag of calcium walls. The pores, those were the worse of age's vengeance—craterous bowls carrying their weight in oil. He was a mutilated version of his youth. Margo stepped back, disgusted by what had become of Hudd.

  He bent his back crossing his arms and shook his head. "You haven't aged," he perused every portion of her face. She had clearly sliced a few inches off her years. There were scars (lasered away almost out of existence) but a tightness where a tightness should not be. The fullness of her cheekbones was an exaggeration, but still an acceptable aesthetic badge. Everyone could tell she
was not the summer blossom of her youth, but she had the necessary foundation to make the revitalization acceptable and, indeed, a necessity. She was a beauty worth preserving.

  "You're too kind," she replied and looked away.

  "I haven't been in this house for a very long time," he placed his hands in his pockets, shrugged. He stared at the floor for a moment.

  "Over twenty years," she said.

  "Twenty-six," he corrected, his face never left the ground.

  "Twenty-six," she repeated, pressing her lips to the side. Margo shrugged, "something like that."

  Hudd’ shot his eyes up, they bulged angrily. "I remember everything. I'll never forget what I lost."

  She stepped forward, placing her hand on his shoulder, "What you gained." Margo felt a slight repulsion, b as she touched his face. "What we all gained," she lowered her hand and wiped it inside her pant pocket.

  Hudd nodded solemnly, pressed his lips together, "Yes," he placed his hands on her shoulder, Margo saw sun-spots and thick white hair. She allowed it to remain on her silk blouse and forced a smile.

  "How's Adam? Has he started your painting?"

  Margo beamed, whisked his hands away lightly, "He really is a dream."

  Hudd scoffed. "A dream," he crossed his arms, eyebrows shooting North.

  "A dream," she affirmed, crossing hers.

  "Well, who can judge another's dream. The dreams of some are the night terrors of others."

  "You are the last person in the world I expected to see this afternoon. I didn't even know you were down this way. A courtesy phone call is still the socially acceptable thing to do, Tom. You modern artists and your insipid disdain for propriety."

  "My apologies, I forget how rigid you can be. I have a job interview at the University. Dean of the College of Fine Arts. I thought I'd drive a bit further and come see how Adam was doing. Make sure he was all right, possibly find out just what has you so captivated by his work." He smirked, "He must be worth his weight in gold."

  She tapped her shoes against the cold tile. "He most certainly is. Why don't I just take you to him? He's taken residency in my studio for the past week. He's already started the painting."