by Nash Summers
“There is something wrong about that man,” Ward said.
“I know.” I couldn’t meet his eye.
“You can feel it too.” It was a statement, not a question.
“It would be hard not to. His eyes—his soul—they’re covered in soot and tar. They’re molten and poisonous.”
“He is just a man, Levi. There is something deeply wrong with him, but he is just a man.”
I looked up into the sky. Starlight twinkled above my head, flecks of glitter tossed across an impossible black canvas. As I ran my hands up and down my arms, I thought of the snake that crept from that man’s darkness, the way it slithered and crawled across his body like it was part of his whole. Maybe it was.
As we walked home in silence, I wondered what a person could’ve done to have that kind of taint on their soul.
Chapter 4
MAMA STOPPED cold. “Poirier, you said?” There was a flicker of unease in her voice.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Then he must be….” She sat across from me in the living room, her slender frame rigid on the old plaid sofa, her eyes staring up at nothing above my head. Her brows furrowed as she wrung her hands in her lap and squeezed her knees together tightly. Tension radiated off her.
“Mama?”
“You can’t go near him, Levi. He’s a bad man.”
It was rare that I’d ever seen her look—and sound—so worried. Her voice shook when she spoke, and if I didn’t know any better, I would’ve said she was frightened.
Ward stood in the wood-framed doorway between the kitchen and the living room, his arms folded across his chest. He remained silent, but his eyes were focused with intent.
“Who is he?” I leaned forward in the old reclining chair I perched in.
“Monroe,” she said. “Monroe Poirier. He’s a bad man—a wicked, dangerous man. Promise me you won’t go near him.”
“Poirier—like the old Poirier house down on the edge of the swamp?” Even talking about that house, thinking of its rickety shingles and its dark, empty doorways sent shivers up my spine.
“Yes, that Poirier house. It’s haunted—he’s haunted, and I don’t want you to go anywhere near him. He’ll darken your soul.”
“Why’s he like that? Has he always been that way?”
“No. He’s cursed, Levi. Cursed right down to the bone. The curse runs deep in his family, so deep it’s all folks around here remember about the Poiriers. The smart ones, anyway.”
“So he was born into a cursed family?”
“No. He was the one who brought the curse upon his family when he was just a boy, and that’s why it’s the darkest within him.”
I leaned back in the chair, unease settling in my stomach. “What could a boy do that would curse him so deeply?”
She didn’t want to answer. Her eyes, though unfocused, strayed from where she knew I sat. She turned her head and began playing with a fraying thread sticking out of the sofa cushion.
My mama had never been passive about anything in her life. While she wasn’t exactly outspoken, she never strayed from telling us what she believed, especially if she thought it was something that could hurt my sister or me.
“I’ll find out eventually, Mama,” I pressed. “This is a small town. People will talk. I hear things all the time at the diner.”
Reluctantly she turned her head back toward me. “Stay away from him, Levi. If you value your soul, you’ll stay away from him.”
“What did he do?”
“He murdered his father.”
THE BURNING fragrance of incense wafted through the air. Lilac, bark, and the natural, herbal smell from when something organic burned filled the room. Strange that smells like those, uncommon to most, brought a sense of lightness to my body, a reminder of warmth and home to my heart.
The room was silent, as silent as a house as old as ours could be. Nothing moved or stirred. The sound of our own breathing was subdued. Even the small branches that often rapped against the window were silent.
My mama and I sat in the room on the main floor that she used for readings. It was a small room, with wood-paneled walls and a small table in the center that was constantly littered in clutter. Posters and astrology charts lined the walls. Some were real, and some were for show. A tiny Buddha statue sat on the end of a dresser. It was black and shiny and had my mama’s initials carved into the underside. Silvi had seen it once, fallen deeply in love with its color, and insisted on giving it to Mama for Christmas a few years back. Mama loved the thing, even though Silvi, now older, thought it to be much too shiny for her tastes.
Other figures lined the dresser next to it: a porcelain cat, a golden bell, a folded, ornately sewn handkerchief. Mama told me once that most first-time customers were surprised when they walked into that small room and didn’t see a crystal ball in the center of the table. I’d laughed and said I’d get her one for Christmas. She hadn’t found it very funny.
Now when we sat in the room, though, the air was different, thicker, laced with something close to wariness. I’d told her about what happened two days before at the diner with Monroe, and how when he turned his cold eyes on me, I felt something in the pit of my stomach. She’d insisted on giving me a reading. She always said it was how she felt closest to me. I never had the heart to argue with her.
“You’ve been exposed to something,” she’d said earlier that day.
“Exposed to what?”
“A curse. You’re a magnet for darkness, Levi. You know that. Being near that kind of evil can do nothing good for the soul. Let me do a reading on you.”
“Mama—”
“You know I’m right. You know it ain’t gonna get better all by itself.”
She was right, of course. A soul wasn’t like a human body. It couldn’t kill infections the same way. A tainted soul stayed tainted, right up until the day you died—or the day the curse was lifted. It was usually the former.
“Close your eyes,” she said now. When I did she continued. “Focus internally. Focus on nothing. Let your thoughts and feelings guide you naturally to the edge of the darkness. Do not step past that edge. Be aware of the edge. Be wary of it. And as much as you might like to, do not step over that line.”
I thought of Monroe, the man who’d murdered his own father. I thought of the way my body became electric when he was near, how his frozen gaze led to ice fields that covered his soul.
Every time I tried to force my mind blank, images of his cold stare and those dark waters of the swamp filled my head. They were my consciousness now. They were what I saw when I closed my eyes, what I dreamed of when I slept, what I lusted after when I was awake.
“Now,” Mama said, “reach out and cut the deck of cards in front of you.”
I reached out in front of me. My fingertips brushed against the smooth tops of the worn cards.
Mama gasped and I opened my eyes, startled. A strong gust had burst the window open, leaving the curtains to flutter toward us in the heavy breeze from outside. The bare branches of the tree outside shot and rattled against the glass pane of the window. Cards flew up into the air, scattered around us on the table, the floor, on my lap. It rained tarot cards. They flipped in the air like trapeze artists tumbling down, down to the safety net below.
“Levi.” Mama had a serious note to her voice.
“I know.”
“Make some mojo bags, Levi. Give one to your sister too. Keep them with you always. Never let one be further than your pocket or under your pillow.”
“Don’t be afraid, Mama.” I had a slight shake in my voice I hoped she couldn’t detect.
“Something evil wants you, sweetheart,” she said pleadingly, as if willing me to never leave our small house again. “Something worse than evil.”
“Maybe it’s the devil,” I replied, trying to lighten the mood.
Her blank stare remained fixed above my head, her brow furrowing, her jaw locked tight.
“Maybe,” she said. “Maybe.�
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SILVI LOVED sunflowers.
They were just about the only thing with color she tolerated. She hated the bright flickers of fire, but loved the colorless smoke it brought. She loved to look at untouched coloring books and press her tiny fingers against the blank page and black ink. She loved tales of ghosts and goblins and all things wicked, and could barely sleep at night without me first telling her an old ghost story that Gran told us a million times over.
But sunflowers—Silvi loved sunflowers.
“Look at this one, Ward!” Her pale blond head of hair barely crested the top of the flowers.
Ward left my side and strode over to where she was. He bent forward and looked at the bright yellow petals of the smiling, open-faced flower that pointed up toward the clear blue sky.
“That is a good flower,” he said.
I smiled. Ward knew nothing about flowers and couldn’t care less if we were standing in a field of flowers just then or a vacant desert made only of sand dunes. But Ward always humored Silvi. It was in his nature.
The sunflower field was only a short walk from our house. It was an oddity, that sunflower field, because it stood in a vacant lot surrounded by nothing but miles and miles of dirt and plains.
The first time I’d ever laid eyes on that sunflower field, I had only been about five or six. That hot summer day, I’d turned to my mama and asked, “Who planted this sunflower field, Mama?”
She’d turned to me and smiled as she tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear. “No one planted it, Levi. It was born from the driest, most cracked parts of the earth. When there’s nothing but nothing, some good is allowed to grow.”
The day was hot, the sky was clear, and the air was humid. That morning, Silvi had said it was the perfect day to visit the sunflower field. She’d said the same thing countless times before, sometimes during the hot, summer evenings, or when the autumn sunset laid its eyes on the field. According to Silvi it was always a good time to visit the sunflower field.
“Ward, look at this one!” Silvi yelled. She grabbed his hand and hauled him toward a sunflower whose petals, she claimed, were even better than the rest.
As they grew smaller into the distance, slowly something cool began to pierce my stomach. I turned to look around, seeing nothing but sunny petals.
But then, there in the distance, a shadow loomed. It was dark and only a speckle, but growing larger as it approached.
The figure walked down the old dirt road that ran alongside the field. It was a man. He kicked up dust as he walked, dirt clouds billowing behind him. A sharp bark pierced the air. My gaze found a white and gray dog at the man’s side.
I couldn’t help but stare, even though the closer he drew to where I stood, the less calm I began to feel. My skin prickled as goosebumps covered my skin.
I knew the moment he spotted me because the small cloud of dust around his boots began to settle. His dog barked and looked up at him, its pink tongue hanging out of its mouth.
We stared at each other, transfixed, across the wide expanse of sunflowers.
I knew he’d walk over to me even before he planted his heel into the dirt surrounding the flower stalks. His dog followed close behind him, its electric-blue eyes constantly glancing up to his back. The dog nudged against his calf, its gray fur speckled with black glistening in the sunlight.
Monroe stopped a few feet in front of me.
“Hello again,” he said in that low, low voice.
His nearness licked jolts up my spine and made my bones ache. “Hello.”
“I wanted to thank you for the other night. For calling the sheriff.”
An amber-colored bruise, purpling in the middle, decorated one side of his face. Two thin pieces of white tape marked his brow, redness from dried blood coloring the center of each strip. His symmetrical face was offset by the busted, swollen redness of his lower lip and the cuts along the bottom of his jaw.
“I didn’t,” I said honestly. “I just told them I did.”
“I thought they might kill me, or at least try. Didn’t realize I cared until you showed up.”
A flicker of something dark drew my eye down. I thought it was the tail of a black snake, but when I looked down to his ankle, all that was there was his dog staring up at me.
The unease in my stomach grew.
“I’m Monroe,” he said. “Poirier.”
My gaze locked on his face. “I know who you are.”
Monroe removed his hands from his tight jeans pockets. “I guess that means you’ve already made your mind up about me.”
“I don’t trust minds. I trust souls. And your soul is the darkest monster I’ve seen.”
He reached his hand out. Like a knee-jerk reaction, I looked at the crack in his lip and the bruise on his face, and then I slipped my hand into his.
In that moment I missed my gran so damn bad. I missed her deeply and wanted her there, telling me what to do, telling me how I could fight off this feeling. Because when our skin touched, and his large, rough hand wrapped around mine, I felt a flicker there, something so right buried beneath layer after layer of something so wrong.
I snatched my hand back and fumbled backward, almost tripping over a stone on the ground.
Monroe smiled sadly. “You really can see souls, can’t you?”
My hand that had touched his shook. “That curse is in too deep. It’s become you. You’re laced together. You’re already turning into the monster it wants you to be.”
His eyes turned impossibly colder. He worked his jaw, the thick muscles in his neck flexing.
“Do sweet words ever slip out of that mouth of yours, or are they all threaded with venom?”
“That’s not something you’ll ever find out.”
“Tell me the darkest story you know, Levi.” He took a step toward me, his cold stare fixed on my face. “Tell me about the hauntings of dead things, the shrieks that echo through black woods, the endless stream of pain and suffering felt deepest in bleeding hearts. And then, when you tell me the darkest tale you know, I’ll tell you about my life, and you’ll look at me like I breathed fire.”
A low growl came from the dog’s throat, followed by a couple of rough barks and a long howl. It darted through the sunflowers, running at something—someone—and then back to its owner. Only staying still for a beat, it suddenly flashed out between tall sunflower stems once more.
Ward stood off to our side, his arms crossed as he stared at Monroe.
Monroe whistled sharply, the sound losing itself in the wide-open field. Immediately the dog returned to his side, but none of its anxiousness seemed to have left.
“What’s gotten into you, Coin?” Monroe looked down at the frantic dog.
Coin began to whine.
The way Monroe smiled at the dog—there was something about it, something so loving and real that for a flicker of a second I wished he’d turn that smile on me.
Monroe reached down to scratch behind Coin’s ear. He then tipped his head toward Ward, who was out of hearing distance, and said, “Your friend doesn’t talk much.”
I wondered then if I was staring at a man or a monster. He slipped between the two, not allowing me to see his true self. Maybe he didn’t even know who he was.
What the hell happened in the Poirier house all those years back?
“What happened?” I blurted out before I could stop myself.
Monroe stood up straight, eyeing me again. And like it had before, the world slipped away. Silvi laughing in the distance, Ward saying my name, the sky, the sunflowers, time… it all slipped away.
And we were all that was left. I wasn’t sure if the world belonged to us, or just him.
He said nothing. Silence expanded between us.
I hadn’t said the words, hadn’t asked him what happened years ago with his dad, or why he’d been cursed to live a life of darkness, but he knew. The flame in his eyes told me he knew exactly what I’d meant. And I knew he wouldn’t tell me—not that. But he was aching
to let it out, to share his pain and torment with someone who could handle that darkness.
He said nothing, only turned and walked away from me, Coin following close behind. As he weaved through the tall sunflowers, the puzzle pieces of the world began to fix themselves back together.
“Who’s that?” Silvi asked as she came to stand next to me.
“No one you are to go near,” Ward answered. His gaze was still locked on the dot in the distance that was the back of Monroe’s head.
“It’s time to go home,” Silvi stated. She began walking toward our house.
Ward and I followed in her silence for a few steps before Ward said, “He makes you feel afraid. That curse of his, it brings you pain.”
“I’ve never felt anything like it,” I admitted, my shoulders slumping.
“I do not like him.”
“You don’t like anyone, Ward.”
Ward immediately stepped in front of me. His dark eyes looked down at my face as he placed his hands on my shoulders.
“I like you enough to make up for all the dislike I have for others,” he said.
I smiled then.
Whatever darkness Monroe brought with him into the sunflower field, Ward brushed it all away. He was sunshine and glee, an ease in my bones, lightness in my mind. He would always be able to take away my darkness, turn my nightmares into daydreams.
Chapter 5
A CRY sounded in the distance—a voice that called my name.
I couldn’t tell if it was a whimper or a scream, but it rang and echoed and felt like lips speaking against my ear. I reached out to touch it, but there was nothing there. The impression of dry, cracked lips pressed against the side of my neck. Rough wisps of hair brushed against my cheek, while the smell of burning meat filled my nostrils. The toxic, acrid smell stung my eyes, making them water.
It laughed as it toyed with me. Wrapping its thick, blue spirals of smoke around my neck, it cloaked me, leaving slick traces of swamp behind. My skin beneath the swamp water sizzled, ablaze from the wetness. The vapor squeezed tightly, and I began coughing and choking. My hands were useless against the blue tendrils. They slid right through it like a diver into a pool of water.
