Thirst

by Benjamin Warner

  He looked at Steve McCarthy’s shoulder and his face full of scabs. His hair was too thin to cover the liver spots on his forehead. He was an old man, Eddie saw.

  In the kitchen, he poured some of the water into a mug. Then he stood in the hallway holding it, looking at the two of them: Laura, and Steve McCarthy on the carpet.

  “Eddie …” Laura said, looking at the mug.

  He bent down and tipped it to Steve McCarthy’s lips. At first, it bubbled back and poured out over his cheeks and onto the sheet beneath his neck, but when he tried again, he got it down. Eddie watched his Adam’s apple move.

  “Be careful,” Laura said. “You’re wasting it.”

  “It’s okay,” he said. “Maybe he can talk.”

  “Don’t give him too much,” she said. She stood above them, holding her hands together—one cupped beneath the other.

  Then she said, “What are you doing?”

  “Letting him drink.”

  “With your fingers.”

  Eddie hadn’t noticed. He was touching Steve McCarthy’s hair.

  Laura stood there for a long time, frowning, as Eddie sat next to Steve McCarthy.

  “Not too much,” she said. Eddie tipped the cup up hard against Steve McCarthy’s lips, and the water spilled out over his mouth again.

  “Come on,” Eddie whispered hotly. “Tell me where.”

  Laura went back into the kitchen. Eddie could hear the chair move when she sat down at the table.

  After a while, Steve McCarthy’s breathing came more steadily, and he opened his eyes. They were still red, but he was lucid.

  “You’re okay,” Eddie said. “You can tell me where it is now.”

  “Don’t let me die,” Steve McCarthy whispered.

  “You’re better than you were.”

  “My throat hurts. It’s dry.”

  “We’ll help you. But you have to tell me where it is. The water,” he whispered. “Just tell me.”

  “I need more,” he said. “A little. Or I won’t make it.”

  “You’re okay.”

  “God gave it to me,” he said.

  “Laura,” Eddie called.

  When she came in, her eyes were pink and swollen.

  “Pour me a little more,” he said.

  “We don’t have much left.”

  “Just enough to wet his throat.”

  She went to the table and came back with the jug. “Look how much you used already,” she said.

  “It’s important.”

  “We need enough for us. We’re leaving. That’s what you said.”

  “You wanted to help people. Let’s help him.”

  He gave her the mug, and when she came back with it, he held it and looked inside. There was a thin layer of water at the bottom. He tipped it to Steve McCarthy’s mouth, and Steve McCarthy closed his eyes as it went in.

  “Go on,” Steve McCarthy said. “Give me some.”

  “I just did.”

  Steve McCarthy looked at him. “There was nothing there.”

  “There was,” Eddie said. “A little bit.”

  “Please,” Steve McCarthy said. “I’m not your enemy. I helped you before. Didn’t I help you?”

  Eddie put his hand on Steve McCarthy’s good shoulder and shook it against the floor of the living room. He said, “Tell me where it is, goddamn you.”

  “I was kind to you,” Steve McCarthy said. He leaned his head back against the towel and parted his lips.

  “Laura,” Eddie called again.

  He got up and went to the kitchen. She was sitting on a chair. “Don’t,” she said. “Don’t let him do this to us.”

  “He’s not doing anything.”

  “He’s going to take everything,” she said.

  “He needs our help.”

  “Until you need help. Then what happens?”

  “He’s a Good Samaritan. This is the right thing to do.” He poured a little more into the mug and took it back into the living room. Laura followed him in. Steve McCarthy had opened his eyes back up, but when he saw Eddie, he closed them.

  “Did you see that?” Laura said. She stood up close to Eddie and spoke directly in his ear. She was excited. Eddie could feel her heartbeat. “His eyes were open. Did you see? He closed them for our benefit.”

  Steve McCarthy breathed through his nose in fits. “I have it,” he said. “My strength is coming back.”

  “He’s faking,” Laura said. “He’s putting us on.”

  “ ‘Whoever has the world’s goods,’ ” Steve McCarthy said, “ ‘and beholds his brother in need and closes his heart against him … how does the love of God abide in him?’ ”

  Laura knelt beside him and stared into his face. “What is that?” she asked. “What are you saying?”

  “The word of God.”

  “Oh, Christ,” she said. “What do you want from us?”

  He closed his eyes again, and when he opened them he said, “Just a little more. That’s all I need.” He reached out and touched the rim of the mug with his finger. “It’s helping me. I can feel it. I’m getting stronger.”

  Eddie took the handle of the cup, but Laura pushed his hand down, pinning it where it was on the carpet.

  “It isn’t right,” she said. She was speaking loudly. “He’s faking. Can’t you see that? He lied to you the first time and now he’s lying to you again. He threatened you.”

  “He didn’t,” Eddie said.

  “You had to throw him down the steps.”

  Eddie sat up on his knees. “No,” he said. “That was a different man.”

  “Eddie …” Laura said. “Please …” She stood with her hand clenched at her chin and walked back and forth between Eddie and the bedroom.

  “I can get the rest,” Steve McCarthy said.

  “Where do you live?” Eddie said. “You can trust me.”

  “It’s not at home,” he said. “I can feel my legs. My legs are coming back.”

  “What’s he saying?” Laura said.

  “He’s saying he has more.”

  Eddie took the mug into the kitchen, and Laura followed at his ear again.

  “You can’t,” she whispered.

  “You think that was all he had? One jug? For the whole neighborhood?”

  “He’ll say anything, Eddie. He’s trying to live.”

  “So are we.”

  “He’s desperate.”

  She held his shoulders and softened, so that for a moment he thought she might lean in and press her forehead against his.

  “We need to save ourselves,” she said. Her eyes weren’t pink anymore. They were clear. “I was wrong. It’s just us now. You were right about that. We have to go.”

  “He’s giving us a chance,” Eddie said. “If we get what he has, we have a chance.”

  “You’re not thinking. Listen to me. He’s taking advantage of you.”

  “I saved him out there. You didn’t see him. He would have died.”

  In the living room, Steve McCarthy’s breath was steady and Eddie bent down to look at his lips. The skin had splintered like old fiberglass. There was a moldy fragrance coming from his insides, but it wasn’t as bad as Laura had said.

  “We can get him better, at least,” he said. “Then we’ll see what he’s making up. When he’s better, it’ll be easier to tell.”

  He pressed the mug to Steve McCarthy’s mouth again, and it pushed his lip up and exposed his overlapping teeth. The water welled at the corners of his mouth before it sunk in.

  “Stop it,” Laura said. She was standing above him, her voice quaking. “Look what you’re doing.”

  Eddie heard a boom outside, and Laura’s body tensed.

  The noise struck again.

  It was someone knocking at the door.

  “Who you got in there?” came a voice.

  It was Mike Sr.

  “Just be quiet,” Eddie whispered to Laura. “Don’t say anything. Don’t move.”

  Eddie stared at the rise and fa
ll of Steve McCarthy’s chest.

  “Who’s in there?” Mike Sr. bellowed.

  “It’s just us, Mike,” Laura called.

  “Shhh …”

  “Go back home,” Laura called.

  Mike Sr. knocked some more. Then he yelled, “I saw your husband take him. I’ll kill him for it. I’ll kill them both.”

  They could hear his footfalls down the steps.

  “There are three of us and one of him,” Eddie said.

  “I know,” she said.

  They took little sips of water and stopped talking to save their strength. Steve McCarthy kept his eyes closed. The sun had dipped outside and made the lawn look fiery.

  Eddie put his head between his knees and regarded the floor, watching its patterns shift. Laura’s hand was on the back of his head, but it felt hot and he shook it off.

  Something hit the kitchen window behind him and he sat up straight again. It sounded like the thump of a bird, but then he saw knuckles at the end of an arm.

  A fist.

  Mike Sr. was reaching up from the driveway.

  They watched it. He pressed his fingers against the windowpane and the tips flattened and turned white. They sat very still, though the window was too high for him to see them. The hand retracted, but then came back and knocked again.

  “God,” Laura said. “Just give him to him.”

  “No,” Eddie said. “Not until he tells us.”

  “Tells us what?” Laura cried.

  He went into the living room and touched Steve McCarthy on the shoulder. His eyes didn’t open, but Eddie could see he was awake.

  “Tell me,” he said. “I’ll leave my wife here with you. She thinks you’re lying. If you’re lying, there’s no point giving you any more.”

  Steve McCarthy whispered something.

  “What?”

  “In the woods.”

  Eddie looked over at Laura. She was staring out the window and hadn’t heard.

  “Where?” Eddie whispered.

  Steve McCarthy smiled. “I hid it.”

  Eddie took hold of his wounded shoulder.

  “Was it yours, or did you find it?” he said.

  “What?” Steve McCarthy said.

  Eddie squeezed his shoulder, and a light puff of powdered blood released above it.

  “Did you find it there? Was it a jug? Like from a cooler?”

  Steve McCarthy breathed in and out. If there was pain, his face showed no sign of it.

  “A jug,” he said.

  Eddie banged the shoulder up and down on the carpet.

  “Where? Where did you hide it?”

  Steve McCarthy breathed out and moaned. “A little more,” he said. He opened his mouth and touched his wrecked lips with his fingers. “I need a little more water to talk.”

  “Goddammit!” Laura yelled. She bent over Steve McCarthy and pointed a finger in his face. “You’re lying! You don’t have any more!”

  Steve McCarthy put his hand back at his side. He was silent. The knocking on the window had stopped.

  “Just give him a little more,” Eddie said. “Then I’ll make him tell us.”

  “Eddie.” She held up her hands. “There’s nothing for him to tell.”

  He went to the kitchen and poured more water into the mug.

  “He’s killing us!” Laura shouted.

  “He knows where it is,” Eddie insisted. “He’ll tell me and then I’ll go and find it.”

  He put the mug to Steve McCarthy’s lips and he gulped the liquid greedily.

  “Look,” Eddie said, nodding toward the window. “It’s dark already.”

  Laura slumped against the wall.

  There was a shot outside and the kitchen window shattered. Glass sprinkled on the floor.

  “Stay where you are,” Eddie yelled to Laura.

  He pressed his back into the wall and climbed over her to get to the kitchen, standing up slowly beside the window.

  “Eddie …” Laura called.

  “He can’t get in here.”

  He turned and saw Laura with her hand at Steve McCarthy’s hip. She was going through his pockets.

  “He’s got a knife!” she called.

  “Hold on,” Eddie said. “Just hold him there.”

  He could see Mike Sr. standing on his porch in the dusk. His arms were resting on the railing and the gun was in both fists, pointing at their window, but his head was hanging down. His belly sagged beneath him.

  Eddie heard a thumping on the floor and turned to see Laura pressing the towel down on Steve McCarthy’s face. The man’s feet pulled frantically against the carpet. His hands grabbed at the air and flopped open on the floor.

  “Laura!”

  “Stay away!” she screamed. She pointed the knife at Eddie. It was the knife from between Bill Peters’s ribs.

  “Let him up!” he cried, circling around behind her. He took her shoulders and pulled back. When she was off him, he flung the towel away. Steve McCarthy’s eyes were open, staring blankly at the ceiling. He didn’t move. Eddie put his cheek to his mouth and felt nothing, smelled only the faintest trace of breath.

  Laura sat with her back hunched and scratched at her palms, staring into them.

  “It wasn’t an accident,” she said. “Nothing is.”

  “Oh, God,” Eddie said.

  “I saved you from him. I had to.”

  Eddie sat on the floor and watched her. Her hair was in her face. She was breathing hard.

  “We can give him to Mike Sr. now,” she said. “He’ll have what he wants, and we can leave.”

  Eddie stared up at her. “He knew where it was,” he said. “I can’t get it for you now.”

  “I wasn’t doing it for me.”

  They dragged the body to the front step and closed the door when they were back inside. They sat on the carpet and listened for the sound of the body being dragged away. Eddie had the backpack next to him. Once the body was gone, and they felt rested, they would leave.

  But there was no sound.

  They listened and listened, but heard nothing. Instead, they fell asleep. They were asleep when the door blew open. The gunshots in the air were trapped in Eddie’s dream.

  A black shape blotted out the starlight. It hadn’t yet become the shape of Mike Sr.’s body.

  “Eddie,” Laura gasped.

  There was a standing lamp next to the door, and it wobbled when Mike Sr. grabbed it.

  “Give it to me,” Mike Sr. said.

  “Mike …” Laura pressed herself to sitting against the back of the sofa. “We left him outside.”

  Mike Sr. fell and the lamp crashed to the floor. “I know you have it,” he said, not getting up. He wheezed airily, as if his chest were full of holes.

  “He’s dead,” Laura said. “We left him out there for you.”

  “The water,” Mike Sr. said.

  “Just take it easy,” Eddie said. “We’ll give you some.”

  Mike Sr. sat up. He reached his arm out to them. “No,” he said. “You’ll give it all to me. I made all the sacrifices.”

  “We can’t give it all,” Laura said.

  A shot cracked over Eddie’s head, and he pressed himself into the carpet. He grabbed for the strap of the backpack in front of him.

  There was a motion of shadows beside him as Laura scrambled to the kitchen.

  “Stay down!” he yelled to her.

  Another shot went off and shattered the clock off the wall behind him. Mike Sr. was aiming too high. Or maybe he was firing at random. Eddie brought the pack closer and reached inside for the knife. He felt something hard in the side pockets.

  The canisters of wasp spray.

  “I’ve made my sacrifices,” Mike Sr. said weakly. “You haven’t made any.”

  “Eddie?” Laura called.

  “I’m okay.”

  “We’ll help you, Mike,” she said. “Just stop. Please stop.”

  “You could’ve helped before, but you didn’t.”

  E
ddie could see Mike Sr.’s shadow as it straightened upright and lurched toward him.

  He put his thumb on top of the canister and flipped onto his back. Then he pressed the button and sprayed where Mike Sr.’s face would be, waving it back and forth. There was a hissing sound and Mike Sr. said, “What the … ?” and then began to scream. He fired shots around the room, and Eddie pressed himself harder against the carpet.

  “Get behind the wall!” he yelled to Laura.

  When the shots stopped Mike Sr. fell forward and hit the sofa. He grabbed Eddie’s calf and Eddie bashed at his fingers with the can of spray. When he let go, Eddie took the backpack and stumbled to Laura in the kitchen. She had the water jug against her chest.

  “Go,” Eddie said.

  Mike Sr. moaned from the floor.

  “Is he out of bullets?”

  “He had a box of them. There might be more in his pockets.”

  They knocked the sofa away from the back door. When it opened, the can alarm fell to the linoleum and clattered.

  Outside, they stood in the grass and looked back up into their window. Eddie had his arm through the backpack strap.

  “We’ll wait till he goes home,” he said. “We can hide out here until he leaves.”

  “Why would he go home?”

  Eddie thought. “We could stay at his house, then. I can break in if he didn’t leave it open.”

  “He’s got a gun. We’re not safe in either house. Not as long as he’s alive,” she said.

  “What, then?”

  “We have to leave.”

  “We haven’t rested.”

  “We have.”

  “Not enough, though.”

  “Do you know where you’re going? Can you get there in the dark?”

  Eddie could see the empty street, like a stream leading to the tributaries of the neighborhood. They’d follow it to the park, and then follow the trail in the park as far as it would take them. “Yeah,” he said. “I can get us there.”

  At the end of the street, they took the intersection down the hill, just as he’d done before. There were voices in the dark, and he pulled Laura into the shadows of one of the yards. They knelt near the house’s foundation and didn’t move.

  The sounds were coming from down the hill, near the entrance to the park.

  “If Mike’s dead we can go back and take his gun,” he said.

  “And if he’s not dead?”

  “I don’t know.”