Forgotten Bones

by Vivian Barz

“I’m sorry to just show up like this, but . . .” Eric paused. “I wasn’t sure this could wait.”

  Milton frowned at the trunk. “You bring that here?”

  “That’s, uh, kind of what I wanted to talk to you about. It’s difficult to explain.” Eric chuckled nervously. “It’s about your brother, Lenny.”

  “Lenny?” Milton chewed on the inside of his cheek. He seemed to be contemplating his reaction, flip-flopping between irritation and flinty amusement. At last he opened the door for Eric. “Guess you’d better come on in.”

  They left the trunk on the porch.

  Inside, Eric took a seat on the sofa, and Milton asked, “Would you like some tea?”

  “Tea?” A rush of relief flooded over Eric. The old man couldn’t be too upset if he was being hospitable. “No, it’s okay. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

  Milton looked around his empty home. “Son, what else do you think I’ve got going on?”

  “I thought you were doing woodwork or . . . ?”

  “The wood isn’t going anywhere,” Milton said. “I live way out here by myself. Tell you the truth, I’m happy for the company.”

  “Tea would be great,” he said with a pleasant smile, though he had no interest in a visit. What he wanted most was to get the hell out of there, to put as many miles between himself and the trunk as possible.

  Milton ambled toward the kitchen on bowed legs, a cowboy’s walk. “You fine with green? It’s all I have. Doctor says it’s good for blood flow or something. I could make you coffee, if you like. I’ve got some instant stuff—nothing fancy as what they’ve got in town.”

  “Green tea is great. Thank you.”

  Eric’s pocket broke into happy song as Milton went into the kitchen. He pulled his cell out to answer—it was Susan—but then Milton poked his head around the doorway, looking peeved about the noise, wanting to know if Eric took sugar with his tea. Eric silenced the call and told him no, plain was fine.

  Susan called again as Milton was telling Eric that he also had honey, if he preferred. Apologizing for the interruption and declining the honey, Eric powered his phone off.

  Milton came out with two steaming mugs. He handed Eric his tea and then sat down on the ancient paisley armchair opposite. He cleared his throat, prompting Eric to get the show on the road.

  “The thing is, Mr. Lincoln—”

  “Call me Milton.”

  “Okay, sure.” Eric sat back and took a sip of the tea, which was a lot bitterer than he was accustomed to. He sipped it to be polite and to warm his bones. It was meat-locker cold in Milton’s old house. “The thing is, Milton, that I keep seeing your brother.”

  Milton blinked. “Oh? More dreams?”

  “No, not dreams.”

  “Then what?”

  “Well . . .” Eric’s eyes shifted toward the porch. He sat back in the chair, took a sip of tea, and let out a little laugh. Shaking his head, he said, “You know what? It’s late, I’m exhausted, and I’m sure you’re eager to get back to your woodworking. I’m just going to throw it all out there, if that’s all right?”

  Milton shrugged.

  Then, like a dam had burst inside his mouth, Eric spilled everything. He took his time and was methodical recounting events, leaving no detail neglected, starting with the purchase of the trunk and ending with his latest interaction with Lenny. He talked about the screaming in the field, the spilled sugar, Lenny’s visits with the horse, the young dead mob with the woman at Luna’s. The wheezing. The ceaseless tormenting . . . and on and on.

  When Eric finished, he folded his hands over his lap. “I know it sounds crazy,” he said, feeling just like a crazy person. “Completely insane. I’m totally aware that it does.”

  Milton cracked a dry smile. “Then why come here and tell me all of this?”

  Eric didn’t have to think long about his answer. “Frankly, Milton, I’m scared. As much of a nuisance as Lenny has been, he still terrifies me. I’m at my wit’s end.”

  Milton frowned. “Why?”

  “I don’t think he’s going to stop—at least, he wouldn’t stop if I didn’t come here.” Eric held up his hands, showing Milton his damaged fingertips. “Like I said, Lenny has gotten a lot more aggressive. Physical. It’s like he’s trying to tell me something but can’t quite figure out how to do it.”

  Milton made a move to examine Eric’s fingers but then seemed to think better of it. “Lenny do that to you?” he asked, almost sarcastically, peering at the nails.

  Eric shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably. But I think everything that has been happening, all this stuff with your brother, it’s because of that trunk outside. I’ll be honest with you, Milton: I would have just left it on your porch with a note, had I thought that it would do some good.”

  “But you didn’t think that it would?”

  “No.” Eric shook his head. “No, I didn’t. I think there’s more to it—that there’s a message I’m supposed to deliver, possibly to you. But for the life of me, I can’t figure out what it is. Why me, you know?”

  Milton shrugged.

  “So that’s why I brought the trunk over,” Eric said. “I’m wondering if it might have some significance to you—or to Lenny?”

  “Hell, I don’t know,” said Milton. “We’re talking about over fifty years ago. My mother had a trunk kind of like it, I think, but I don’t remember us ever playing with it.”

  “Oh.” Eric didn’t know what to do next. Suddenly, he sat up very straight. Lenny Lincoln had followed him.

  Milton leaned forward, watchful of his guest. “What? What is it?” Milton did not seem to trust him, and Eric really couldn’t blame him.

  “Lenny.” Eric inclined his head toward the window, keeping his eyes lowered.

  “What about him?”

  “He’s here now, standing right over there. By the window.”

  Milton turned his head, frowning. “I don’t see anything. What’s he doing, then?”

  Eric swallowed. He didn’t want to antagonize the boy. “He’s stomping his feet, pointing.”

  “At what?”

  Eric shook his head. “I don’t know. Your barn, maybe? Is there something out there?”

  “Sure. All my farming equipment.”

  Eric set his mug on the coffee table, and Milton nudged a coaster toward him. He could have as easily handed it to Eric, but he seemed to be avoiding touching him, as if his type of crazy were communicable.

  They sat for a moment in awkward silence.

  As Eric reached out for his drink on the table, Lenny ran up and slid the mug away from his grasp. Eric caught it just as it was about to go sliding over the edge.

  Milton yelped sharply.

  Eric barked out a demented laugh. Such a weird day, and it kept getting weirder!

  Milton wasn’t amused. The old man’s skin had blanched to the color of mashed potatoes. “Was that . . . ?”

  “Lenny,” Eric said with a nod. “Like I said, he can be rather mischievous.”

  “You mean . . .” Milton placed a hand over his heart, his breath hitching. “Lenny is actually here . In this room.”

  “That’s right.”

  He caught his breath and said, “Son, I don’t mean any offense by this, but I figured you’d been putting me on.”

  Eric took a sip of the tea. “I have no reason to put you on, Milton.” He went to set the mug down and reconsidered. Lenny would probably just go after it again.

  No, Eric saw, he wouldn’t. Lenny was gone.

  Milton asked, “How can you be so calm?”

  “I guess I’ve just gotten used to it.” Though he was still scared shitless.

  Milton, however, looked like his ticker was about to explode. The man was already riddled with cancer, so adding a heart attack to the mix would not be a good thing.

  Eric asked, “Are you sure you’re okay? It’s quite a shock, I’m sure.”

  “I can’t . . . Lenny is here! Here .” Milton gaped around the roo
m. “Where is he now?”

  “Actually, he’s gone. He sort of dissolved after he tried to knock my tea off the table.” Eric shrugged. “He does that sometimes—vanishes, I mean.”

  This seemed to relax Milton a little. He sat back and took a sip of his drink, opened his mouth, and then closed it.

  “I did some research on steamer trunks earlier, before I came over here,” Eric said.

  Milton frowned, lost in thought. “Steamer trunks?”

  “Like the one outside.” Eric nodded toward the porch. “Anyway, I found that they were mainly used from the late eighteenth century to early twentieth century. Some are worth quite a lot of money—for example, an early Louis Vuitton trunk can fetch well over fifteen, twenty thousand dollars. But of course, that trunk isn’t designer, and the bottom is damaged, which is why I got such a good deal . . .”

  Milton seemed lost.

  “I’m digressing,” Eric said. “The point is I tried to research the trunk’s history because I thought there might be some other tie to it, something that maybe doesn’t have anything to do with you and Lenny.”

  “A tie?”

  Eric flushed. “I know this is all outrageous—trust me, I can hardly believe I’m even saying it. But I’m wondering if maybe there’s an unrelated . . . presence from a different era that’s latched on to the trunk and somehow using Lenny to communicate.” Eric sat back and sipped his tea, cupping the mug to warm his hands.

  “Hmm.”

  “I’ve been assuming everything is tied to Lenny and all that’s been happening at that farm next door, but what if I’m way off? Excuse me.” Eric patted his chest and let out a belch.

  Milton raised an eyebrow. “So you’re saying, what, that the trunk is haunted?”

  Eric coughed and then sipped his tea to soothe his itchy throat. He hoped he wasn’t getting a cold after spending the night in the bathtub. Come to think of it, he was feeling a little under the weather. “I don’t know what I’m trying to say,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s just an idea I had. But I thought you should have the trunk regardless, because that seems to be what Lenny wants.” Eric did not add: And I’m hoping that if you take it off my hands, your little-shit brother will stop tormenting me .

  Milton paused. “Frankly, I don’t know if I want it.”

  Fuck.

  (Okay, don’t panic.)

  “Really? But your brother—”

  “Seems the trunk hasn’t brought you anything but grief,” Milton said mildly. “I’ve got a peaceful life out here. I’m not so sure I want to spend what little time I have left on earth surrounded by ghosts.”

  Eric had already thought up a plan B before he’d arrived. He’d haul the trunk down to the beach and let the tide take it away, if Milton refused to accept it. But he’d rather not, if he could avoid it. “I don’t know that it’s truly ghosts. It was just a silly—”

  “You ever catch bugs when you were little?” interrupted Milton.

  Eric pinched the mug between his knees, warming the flesh of his thighs through his jeans. “Sure. I think most kids do, right? Caterpillars and lightning bugs and beetles and whatnot.”

  Milton smiled, sly. “My favorites were butterflies.”

  “Ah, I tried to catch a few of those, but they were always too fast. My fat little hands were too clumsy, I think. I always ended up tearing off their wings.” Eric grimaced at the memory. “You know that’s a myth, right, the thing about butterflies dying if you rub the powder off their wings? Butterflies are extremely resilient despite their delicate appearance. They can also lose a good portion of their wing scales and keep on flying . . .”

  Milton provided Eric a bland stare: Why are you telling me this? “No, I didn’t know that.”

  Eric flapped a hand. “Sorry, I’m babbling.” At this rate, I’ll never get out of here.

  “They will die, though, if they don’t get air,” Milton commented.

  Eric nodded. “That’s right.”

  “I learned that when I was about seven or eight,” Milton continued. “I caught this big, beautiful monarch in one of my mother’s canning jars. I’d been after it for days, but it kept eluding me. I wanted it as a pet. Of course, there was no way to know if it was the same butterfly that kept coming around, but I liked to think that it was. I even had a name picked out: Hank.”

  Eric stifled a yawn. “That’s a different name for a butterfly.”

  “That’s what my mother said, too—that a butterfly should be named something pretty like Lucille or Eileen . But Hank was the name that I liked best.” Milton pulled a bandana out of his pocket and coughed into it.

  “Hank is nice too,” Eric said noncommittally.

  The spidery skin around Milton’s eyes bunched. Eric couldn’t determine if Milton was amused by his comment or irritated by the banal interjection. “Hank loved my mother’s flower bed. Some days, I’d wait there in the dirt, eyes leaking from pollen, for what felt like the whole day—though I know it was just a few minutes, because my stepfather, spiteful bastard that he was, never would have allowed longer. Then here would come Hank, just when I was about to give up! He’d land on my mother’s roses and suckle nectar. Taunting me. I’d come sneaking up behind him, crouched like a lion, ready to strike, with a glass jar in one hand and a lid in the other. And just when I was going to clap down over him, he’d flap off toward the treetops.”

  “Sounds like The Old Man and the Sea . You know, Hem—”

  “Yes, I know Hemingway. I may not be an educated college professor like yourself, but I can read.”

  “No, no, I wasn’t implying—”

  “I’m sure you weren’t,” said Milton, his smirk wily.

  Eric thought it best to remain silent. There was something not quite right with this man, and it wasn’t only terminal cancer.

  “One day I caught that sneaky bugger. He almost got away, but the wind turned against him. I nearly took Hank’s goddamn wing off when I finally got the jar closed.”

  Now Milton was looking at Eric as if expecting him to speak. Eric offered a half-hearted “Well done.”

  Milton nodded solemnly. “Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to keep Hank long. Not alive, anyway.”

  “Oh no.”

  “My mother used to get so angry when I’d sneak her jars. They were expensive, you see,” Milton explained. “Some folks may have not thought they were expensive, but they were expensive to us —we weren’t a family with money to burn. By the end of most months, we didn’t have two nickels to rub together. But we never took charity. Not once in all those years of struggle.”

  “And your mother got angry because you broke the jars?” Eric said, keeping them on topic. They’d gotten about as personal as he wanted. Too personal. “Kids and glass are never a good combination.”

  Milton shook his head. “No, I never broke the jars. But I destroyed plenty of lids.”

  “Right, right. You have to poke holes in the metal so the insects can breathe.”

  “Exactly.” Milton scratched his chin and set his mug aside. “My mother had gotten really angry the last time I’d caught a bug—a beetle, it was. ‘If you keep this up, we won’t have any canned goods for winter,’ she’d said. ‘You want to have food for us to eat, don’t you?’” Milton flapped a hand. “She was always going on about us starving. ‘Don’t ruin your shoes, else we’ll starve buying you a new pair. Don’t lose your library books, else we’ll starve paying your fines.’ And so forth. When you’re poor, every mistake you make always comes back to money. I doubted we would have starved, but she’d put enough scare in me that I didn’t poke holes in any more lids.”

  Eric sipped his tea. The fewer interruptions, the faster he’d be out of there.

  “Hank was the first insect I caught after my mother’s scolding about the lids. I was young, so I didn’t realize how quickly Hank would suffocate if I didn’t give him air. My real father had died before teaching me about that kind of thing, and I’m sure you’ve gathered what sort of man
my stepfather was. Not exactly the teaching type. My mother, she didn’t like insects too much, not even butterflies. She said the caterpillars destroyed her plants.”

  Eric pulled his phone out to surreptitiously check the time while Milton spat into his hankie. He was now regretting his earlier decision to power it off, seeing nothing but a dark screen. But it had to be getting late. It felt like he’d been there for hours.

  “No, it didn’t take long for Hank to die,” Milton said. “No more than a day. I remember that he’d started to fly funny in the jar, like he was drunk. My stepfather drank plenty, so I knew exactly what that looked like.”

  Eric hiccupped, feeling very much drunk himself. “Excuse me.”

  “Then Hank got really lazy. He’d only flap his wings when I shook the jar. How I loved seeing Hank riled when I gave him those little earthquakes.” Milton clapped his hands together. “I suppose some small part of me knew that Hank was dying. And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t understand that the most humane thing I could have done would have been to take Hank out into the flower bed and set him free.”

  Eric yawned. The sleep he’d lost the previous night was catching up to him fast.

  “But Hank was mine.” Milton shrugged. “And I liked it.”

  “You liked it?” Eric wasn’t sure he was understanding correctly, as he was having a hard time staying focused. He set his empty mug down on the coffee table, making sure to use the coaster.

  Milton continued, “Oh yes, I liked it very much, observing death. It was fascinating to me, because it was something I hardly saw. As a farmer, everything you do—the only thing you think about morning, noon, and night—revolves around making life : sprouting seed into stalk, raising calves into cows, turning eggs into hens . . . it’s tiring. Hank’s death was a break, I suppose.”

  Eric shifted in his seat. “That’s very—”

  (Crazy. This guy is fucking crazy.)

  “—interesting. I never thought of it like that, but of course I’ve never run a farm. I’m a city boy, through and through.” He laughed nervously.

  Milton didn’t seem too fascinated by Eric’s declaration. He gave him a brisk nod. “After Hank, I upgraded. I stuck to little nothings at first. Centipedes. Beetles. Moths. I eventually stopped giving them names.”