Kind Nepenthe

by Brockmeyer, Matthew V.

  God, he wanted a hit. Needed something to keep him going. Why hadn’t he brought his pipe and a stash?

  He got out and hobbled as quickly as he could around the truck to the passenger side and swung open the door. Carefully, he helped her down, out of the truck, and into the pouring rain.

  When her feet hit the ground, she grimaced and clutched her swollen belly. A couple of long-haired metal-heads sitting in a van blasting Slayer and passing a joint back and forth looked up at them as they shuffled down the sidewalk. One of them, a skinny dude in a blue-denim jacket with black patches sewn all over it, made eye contact with Diesel and gave him a knowing nod. Diesel looked quickly away, not knowing what the nod meant, if it meant anything at all.

  The asphalt and concrete stank of rain as they made their way past the ornamental shrubs—just dark amorphous shapes in the gray light of the evening—and around to the hospital’s brightly lit entrance.

  17

  Spider was right. Calendula found the money right where he said it would be.

  He peered into the open duffel bag. It was brimming with cash. A few big bundles of hundreds, giant chunks of twenties clasped together with rubber bands. Had to be at least a couple hundred grand. Minimum. Off of pot he grew. That he harvested. Only to have Coyote sneak on back and rob him. The fucking balls, the sheer goddamn audacity, the fucking scum-bag piece of shit.

  He zipped up the bag and swung it over his shoulder. He’d have to hide this somewhere, but first things first.

  He turned back to Coyote, lying face down on the ground. “Motherfucking thief.” He slipped a foot under him and kicked him over onto his back. A gurgling sound rumbled up from Coyote’s chest as rain splashed down on his pale, bloated face. “Teach you to steal from me.”

  Calendula poised the blade of the shovel against Coyote’s throat, balanced it on a lump there, and used his weight to press down on the shaft of the handle. The wet blade slipped off, slicing down through skin and muscle before striking the earth. Blood began to trickle out of the wound, pooling on the ground.

  “Damnit,” Calendula said, lifting the shovel and once again positioning it over Coyote’s neck. As he steadied himself and prepared to thrust, Coyote’s eyes sprung open, locking with his.

  “Don’t. Please…”

  He reached up and grasped the shovel. A pathetic attempt, because it was too late. This time Calendula used his foot to send the blade down. He felt the cartilage in the windpipe crack, but again the edge slipped off, ripping a huge red gash into the side of Coyote’s neck that released a violent stream of blood. Calendula was amazed how high the blood sprayed. A good six feet, two steady geysers, pulsing with Coyote’s heartbeat.

  Coyote’s mouth opened and closed frantically in choked screams, then his arms and legs began to flail like an overturned insect’s. Calendula fell on top of the thrashing body, pinning Coyote’s shoulders to the ground with his knees. “Fucking thief,” he said again, slamming the shovel into his neck.

  18

  The first nurse was an older black woman, stern eyed, with short graying hair. She had a clipboard and wanted all of Katie’s information. The other one, who brought the wheelchair, was short with her hair in a tight French braid. They both made pained expressions and exchanged cross looks when Katie lifted her battered face to them.

  The black nurse locked eyes with Diesel. “Who did this to her?”

  He looked away, glancing down at his dirty hands, streaked with oil and grime, the tips of his fingernails chipped black crescents, thinking: It ain’t supposed to be like this.

  “My son. The father. He ain’t here.”

  She nodded and jotted something down on her clipboard as the other nurse eased Katie into the wheelchair. Katie whimpered and put her head in her hands again.

  “Let’s get you to the maternity ward, sweetheart,” the short nurse said, pushing her down the hall.

  19

  Calendula gasped for breath, lying on his side, covered in Coyote’s blood. He watched as the stars and dirty moon revealed themselves, and then were swallowed back up by dark clouds. Rain again began to patter the earth. The exertion involved in killing Coyote had not been unlike a sexual one; and with release, doubt and remorse began to flood his brain.

  What have I done? What do I do now?

  He noticed the bag of money was stained with splatter marks and lying in a puddle of blood. He pushed himself up off the ground, stinking of death, and standing upright, pulled the strap of the duffle bag over his shoulder.

  Coyote’s body lay before him, headless and still, no longer twitching. He stepped forward and grasped Coyote’s head by the hair, lifted it up, and cradled it in his hands, staring down at it, mesmerized for a moment—the glassy sheen of his hooded eyes, the small trickle of blood leaking out his left nostril and dripping off his lower lip, such a deep shade of red—then looked away, a nauseous feeling boiling in his gut as Coyote’s mouth began to slowly open and close, as if trying to speak.

  “I didn’t do it,” Coyote said.

  Calendula looked back at the head. “What did you say?”

  Coyote blinked, licked the blood off his lips. “It wasn’t me, man. It wasn’t me.”

  Calendula felt his anger returning and shook the head. “Bullshit. If it wasn’t you, who was it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I know it was you,” Calendula said. “Spider told me. Who else could it have been?”

  Coyote stared up at him, his sad eyes wet and glistening.

  A sudden burst of lightning and the land was bathed in light. Calendula looked up to see Rebecca there, a few yards away, frozen, staring at him open-mouthed.

  The thunder clap was almost instantaneous, the roar so resounding, so deep and penetrating, that the land itself shook, the vibrations rippling up into his knees so that he staggered. Then there was darkness.

  20

  The maternity ward was packed. The halls filled with visitors bearing flowers and balloons, expectant mothers trying to walk down their babies, their partners at their sides nervously whispering to them, beaming grandparents looking slightly lost, doctors and nurses hurrying among them all. Katie could sense heads turning, feel their eyes looking at her, and she kept her head down, chin pressed down into her chest, covering her face with her spread fingers.

  “It’s a busy night,” the nurse said, pushing her down the hall past bulletin boards covered in photos of newborns, the wheelchair rolling smoothly over the gleaming floor. “Haven’t seen it this crowded in quite a while. You’re lucky this room is available. We were booked solid last night.”

  Katie pondered that word “lucky.” She didn’t feel lucky. She felt terrified and desperate and, though Diesel was with her, she felt very alone and lost. And most definitely very, very unlucky.

  The short nurse steered Katie into a brightly-lit birthing room where another nurse in bright-purple scrubs was already at work unwrapping instruments and devices from their sterile plastic sheaths. Katie peered through her fingers, watched as the nurse in purple glanced quickly from her to Diesel, her mouth a down-turned line.

  As the short nurse helped Katie take off her blouse and pull off her jeans she asked her when she was due.

  “I don’t know. Can’t remember. I think around now. It’s February, isn’t it? I haven’t been to a doctor in a while.”

  The nurse slipped a hospital gown over Katie’s head and helped her lay down on the bed. There was a poster of the human body pinned to the wall. Katie stared at the snaking strands of sinew as the nurse in purple rubbed an alcohol pad on the underside of her arm, inserted an IV, then went between her legs and began examining her.

 
“Oh, oh, it hurts,” Katie moaned. “Ohhh…”

  “That’s just a contraction,” the short nurse replied. “Don’t push yet. Just let it pass.”

  “Okay, your cervix is dilated three centimeters. When was your last contraction?”

  “I don’t know. Coming off the highway into town maybe.”

  “About fifteen minutes ago,” Diesel said. Both nurses looked over at him but neither said anything.

  The short nurse disappeared out the door and then reemerged with a large Styrofoam cup of ice water, a straw sticking up out of it.

  “Sip this, it will make you feel better.”

  Katie sucked hungrily at it.

  “Okay, okay, that’s enough. Not too much now.”

  Strapping a transducer to Katie’s belly with elastic straps, the nurse in purple began to slowly move the device across the swollen hump, the tense look of concentration on her face giving way to concern.

  “I’m not picking up a heartbeat.”

  21

  Rebecca ran down the road screaming. She looked over her shoulder, stumbled, fell to her hands and knees, and got back up again. He’s crazy, she thought, still screaming, feet beating against the mud and gravel.

  He killed Coyote. And then stood there with the head in his hands…talking to it.

  When she’d walked up the sloping road toward the headlights, Rebecca had heard the fighting, the grunting and howling, the horrific cries. But she told herself they were changing a tire or trying to push the Navigator out of a ditch.

  And then everything had gone quiet. So very, very quiet. Even the relentless beating of the rain abated for a moment.

  It wasn’t until that flash of lightning that it all became clear. In that brilliant pop of luminescence, she saw Calendula drenched head to toe in blood—such a bright shade of red, so unmistakable—and the amorphous shape steaming by the open door of the SUV. A body. Coyote’s body.

  It was like a dream, when you’re paralyzed and unable to move. You struggle to do something, anything, the panic building and building inside you. But you’re frozen.

  Then she’d remembered Megan sitting back there alone in the old Dodge Ram pickup. She started screaming. Screaming and screaming as she turned and started running down the road.

  —

  Calendula was too tired to chase her. She’d come around. He loved her and knew she loved him. She just needed some time to sort it all out. Once she calmed down and saw the money, everything would be different. He just had to get her relaxed and show her the money. All that money. Then she’d realize it was all worth it. Everything was worth it. Now they could get their own land, their own piece of the dream. And they’d do it right. Organically, sustainably. Growing with the sun and not some diesel generator and high-pressure-sodium lights.

  He tossed Coyote’s head aside, leaned forward and put his hands on his knees, taking in great gulps of wet air. It’d taken nearly everything he had to kill Coyote like that. Some inner fury that unleashed itself. It felt good. Powerful. All that rage and hate that swelled within him released in a sudden rush, a frenzy where he was in control, he was the one calling the shots. He just had to somehow convince Rebecca of his logic.

  The contusion on his forehead itched and he dug at it with his fingernails, wondering if a hole in his head like this could be letting in the ghosts that seemed to be seeping into his brain.

  Then he laughed. Silly delusions.

  He had to get rid of the body. Drag it out to the woods and bury it deep, with all the others that littered the property. Spider would tell him how to do it. Where to put it. He’d miss Spider, but he’d be glad to be gone from him.

  He licked his lips, salty and metallic with blood, his left eye twitching again.

  Time to get to work. He could have all this straightened out by morning. No one would be the wiser. As Spider had told him, the cops let folks out here settle their own problems.

  Then, from up on the hill, another set of headlights. What the fuck? Who in the hell could that be? This was not a good time for visitors. Not a good time at all.

  22

  “This is fucked. I can barely see.” Ivy squinted through the rain-streaked windshield, struggling to see past the wipers beating quickly back and forth. “I hope we can get back out of here.”

  “Don’t worry,” Sunbeam said. “I’ve seen worse. You’ve got four-wheel drive. We’ll be fine. Nothing more than a good old Humboldt County winter and a muddy dirt road. Just think, in a couple of days we’ll be sitting on a beach in Kauai.”

  “Jesus. I can’t wait.”

  “Yeah, this fucker just better have my money. Look, we made it. Here’s the gate.”

  The Four Runner bounced and shuddered as they passed the gate and pulled down the driveway. As they veered around the bend, the headlights cut through the darkness and there was Coyote’s Navigator parked on the side of the road, interior lights glowing, the driver’s door and back hatch open.

  “Huh. There’s his car. Pull up behind it and I’ll go see if he’s there.”

  Ivy pulled to a stop behind the Navigator. Sunbeam slipped on her parka, pulled up the hood, and ducked out into the storm.

  “Hello? Coyote?” She struggled to make her voice heard over the metallic beat of heavy rain smacking down against the Navigator. “Coyote, are you there?” It was empty. She went around the other side and looked around, shielding her eyes from the whipping wind and downpour. “Coyote?”

  Lightning cracked the darkness and she spied a shape lying on the embankment, the rough outline of a body. Was that Coyote lying there? What the fuck was he doing?

  “Coyote?” she asked. “Is that you?”

  23

  “Let me see that,” the short nurse said, taking the monitor and moving it across Katie’s belly. “Let’s try it with her on her side.”

  “All right,” said the nurse in purple. “We’re going to need you to lay on your side.”

  They eased Katie over on her side, sliding the monitor against her belly. The short nurse looked at the nurse in purple. “Go get the doctor.”

  Katie couldn’t stop crying. “What is it? What is it? Is my baby all right? Is my baby all right?”

  Diesel felt helpless in this sterile room with its spotless, shiny instruments. Dirty and foul. Wrong. Even worse because he wanted a hit. Wanted a hit of speed so bad it tightened his bowels, strained his eyeballs, and made him set his teeth against each other till they hurt.

  “It’s going to be okay, sweetie. Just hang tight. The doctor is coming.”

  He watched as Katie bit her lip and nodded her head.

  The nurse came back into the room with the doctor, a young, handsome guy with closely cropped blonde hair and the beginnings of a beard. A stethoscope was slung over one shoulder. He went to the sink and, as he washed his hands, asked Katie her name, age, due date. Drying his arms up to the elbow with paper towels he slipped on a pair of rubber gloves, explained to Katie that his name was Dr. Fleming, and approached her while slipping the ends of the stethoscope into his ears.

  He placed the metallic bell on her swollen belly and began to slowly move it back and forth, up and down, his head cocked to the side, eyes half shut. He took a deep breath and looked up at the nurse. “Do we know who did this to her face?”

  “The father. This is the grandfather.”

  The doctor glanced up at Diesel quickly and then back to the nurse. Diesel did not like the way he looked at him, as if he was some kind of insect that had found his way into the doctor’s kitchen.

  “Have you taken any blood yet?”

  “No.”

>   “Okay. Do that. I want a drug test done.” The doctor looked down at Katie. “Have you been taking any drugs?”

  Katie began to weep harder.

  The doctor gave a stern look at the nurses. “How far apart are the contractions?”

  “Nine minutes.”

  “And how dilated is she?”

  “Three centimeters.”

  “When the contractions get to be five minutes apart come get me. If it takes more than a couple of hours we might need to do a caesarian, so alert the surgeon. I want to get this thing out of her.”

  Diesel shuddered. His grandson had just gone from being a baby to a thing.

  24

  When Rebecca reached the Ram pickup a wave of shock ripped through her, leaving her shuddering and numb. The door was wide open. Megan was gone.

  “No, no, no. Megan? Megan?” She searched the truck, growing more and more desperate, crawling through the front seat and then frantically into the back bed. “Megan? Megan?”

  “Mommy?”

  Did she hear that, or was it the wind?

  “Mommy?”

  Yes, she definitely heard it—Megan’s sweet, tinny voice—coming from down the escarpment. She raced over to the edge of the steep embankment, looked down, blinking into the night, and saw two shadowy figures: Megan and another child, walking hand in hand towards the darkness of the rushing river. Megan looked over her shoulder, blank faced, and called one more time, “Mommy?”

  25