Serpent's Sacrifice

by Trish Heinrich

  Though small businesses still existed, no one would say they flourished, and no one envied the owners, who had to pay protection money to the latest in an ever-lengthening list of petty crime bosses.

  Alice, like most children who lived in Park Side, knew all of this and, like most of the children, chose to ignore it for the pleasure of an afternoon of play with friends.

  Lionel slowed just a little to go around a corner, and then put on more speed, past the small grocer, around the bright bins of fruits and vegetables; people shouting at them as they dodged out of the way. Soon they arrived at what all the children of Park Side called the Warehouse.

  It had once been part of the paper plant that had gone out of business during the depression. Several people had bought the old plant, but nothing ever came of it. The latest owner had constructed a huge brick wall between the Warehouse and the old plant, trying to keep the teens out. It only succeeded in antagonizing the bored ruffians, and so, just last week, the new owner had installed barbed wire over the top of the wall.

  But the Warehouse was left untouched by any of this, as if someone had taken the ugly old building out of time to preserve it.

  Lionel skidded to a stop before the abandoned brick building, whose windows had been busted out by baseballs and rocks. Scraggly grass and weeds shot up through the cracks in the cement floors. There were places in the wall where the brick had crumbled, exposing old pipes.

  The heat was a little less oppressive inside and the wide-open space was perfect for baseball or clandestine meetings. It had rained that morning and the brick was a dark red that reminded Alice of dried blood. She shivered as she jumped down, remembering her mother’s face that morning and how her split lip had cracked open when she tried to smile.

  It was empty inside and Alice hoped they would be the only ones to show up this morning. Since her father had started beating her mother, the neighbor children hadn’t been kind.

  “About time,” Lionel said, watching Marco pedal toward them like crazy.

  When he got close enough, Marco swerved and nearly fell off his bike trying stop without slowing down.

  “The Dorn brothers!” he shouted, pointing behind him.

  Alice could hear them now. Hoots and shouts as they neared The Warehouse. There were six Dorn brothers, all huge and mean. The oldest was sixteen and would’ve kept the others in line, but he wasn’t around much these days. For as long as Alice had known Marco, the Dorn brothers had hated him, taking every opportunity to let him know it. From the way the five of them were yelling and laughing, Alice knew that they had seen Marco and were relishing another opportunity to torture him.

  Lionel grabbed Alice’s hand and pulled her toward his bike. She’d barely settled on the handlebars before Lionel was peddling for his life, whipping around the corner and down the opposite side of the street from the brothers. Marco was trying to keep up with them, but he was falling behind fast.

  “They’ll catch him!” she yelled.

  Lionel glanced back and swore. The brothers were in pursuit, the younger ones on bikes, while the older ones ran. Lionel slowed down enough to grab a lid off a garbage can, then he sped toward the brothers, and tossed the lid at the brother closest to the front. It hit him square in the face, knocking him violently off his bike. The rest screamed in rage and put on more speed.

  Alice gaped at the accuracy and strength of the blow. “How did you do that?”

  Lionel didn’t seem to hear her, coming up behind Marco to protect him as best he could. “Hurry up!”

  “I’m...trying...”

  A rock flew by Alice’s head, and then another. The third one hit Marco square in the back, and then another stung Alice’s upper arm. If they could just make it to the end of the street and around the corner they’d be in the relative safety of a group of adults shopping.

  They were nearly there when Marco’s bike hit a garbage can, launching him over the top of the handle bars. Alice jumped off as soon as Lionel slowed down and ran to him. Marco lay in a pile of garbage, a gash just above his eye was oozing blood. Lionel rushed to him and picked up the baseball lying near Marco’s bike.

  “You think that’s funny!” Lionel shouted, throwing the baseball with more force and speed than Alice had ever seen. It connected with the face of one of the boys rushing toward them, and Alice saw a rush of scarlet cascade from the boy’s nose.

  “You gonna pay for that!” the largest of the Dorn brothers yelled.

  Lionel tensed, bringing his fists up.

  “Lionel, no,” Marco mumbled, trying to get up.

  “Look out!” Alice screamed, jumping to her feet.

  A younger brother ran up to Lionel and swung a bat down toward Lionel’s head. Lionel caught it and pulled on the bat so hard the boy was lifted off the ground and tossed to the side in one swift motion. The oldest swung a meaty fist to Lionel’s face. He dodged and punched the boy in the face. The oldest brother fell to the ground, and the other two still standing stopped dead, as if realizing this wasn’t the easy pickings they thought.

  Alice stared in shock. Lionel was more muscled than Marco, but he was still lanky for his age. And he was definitely not stronger than the Dorn brothers, who were built like bulls.

  “What’s wrong with you guys?” asked the Dorn boy, who tried to hit Lionel with the bat. “C’mon!”

  He stood up and punched Lionel in the face, then another brother ran up and kicked Lionel in the stomach. A third grabbed the abandoned bat and brought it down hard on Lionel’s back.

  Without thinking, Alice ran into the fight. She’d never thrown a punch in her life, but in the past year she’d seen plenty of them. Balling up her small hand and letting all the pent-up fury in her little soul loose, she punched the smallest brother in the stomach. He fell to the ground in shock and Alice swung her foot viciously into his gut. The boy yelped, and Alice didn’t see another brother come to his aid, or hear Marco’s warning yell in enough time. The boy grabbed Alice and threw her to the cement. She tried to put out her hand to break the fall, but she landed awkwardly. The sound of the bone snapping reached her ears seconds before the pain registered and once it did her head swam with it.

  Lionel took one look at her and roared with anger, grabbing one boy and tossing him to the ground, then punching another so hard he was lifted up before falling hard to the cement. He advanced on the Dorn boy that had punched Alice and pulled him up by his shirt. Lionel’s face reminded Alice of her father’s last year, when she thought he was going to kill her mother.

  Marco scrambled over and grabbed Lionel’s ankle, a look of deep concentration on his bloodied face. For just a moment, Alice thought she saw Marco’s eyes become dark, almost black. She blinked hard and when she looked again, Marco’s eyes were normal.

  Slowly, Lionel put the boy down. “If you ever lay a hand on Alice or Marco again…”

  The boy nodded, all bravado gone.

  Before Lionel had let go of the brothers’ shirt, the other four had started running away as best they could with bloodied faces and at least one broken arm.

  Alice tried to stand up and succeeded only in vomiting all over her shoes, the pain in her arm making her dizzy.

  “Oh my gosh,” Lionel said, grabbing her before she fell to the sidewalk.

  “My arm...”

  Alice looked up at Lionel and frowned. His lip was split and he was favoring his right side a little.

  She opened her mouth to ask if he was alright, but only managed to vomit again, this time on Lionel’s shoes.

  “She needs a doctor,” Marco said.

  “I’ll go to the grocer and see if someone can take us to the hospital,” Lionel said, running around the block.

  Marco sat down on the curb with Alice, letting her rest her head on his shoulder. It helped to not be moving, though the pain still made her feel nauseous.

  “Are you ok?” she whispered.

  He shrugged a little.

  “Lionel...he was...”

 
Marco let out his breath in a huff. “Yeah.”

  Alice bent forward and threw up what little was left in her stomach, heaving at the end. Marco’s cool hand gently rubbed her neck as she sat there, still too sick to move. After a moment, the pain lessened just enough to let her stomach relax. She leaned on Marco again, who put his thin arm around her and squeezed. He could always make her feel better. No matter how sad or angry or scared she was. One hug from him and the bad feelings seemed to melt.

  “I’m sorry you got hurt because of me,” Marco said.

  She managed a shaky smile. “I’m not.”

  The cast was heavy and made it hard to hold the large book Marco had loaned her. Alice slammed it shut and grabbed a pencil, shoving it into the cast to extinguish the burning itch on her skin.

  Her mother had been angry when she’d arrived at the hospital, especially when she’d heard how it happened. Lionel tried to defend Alice, but her mother wouldn’t hear it.

  “After all you’ve seen these past years, you go out and harm someone and get hurt in the process!”

  Alice had started to cry, and after a few minutes, her mother hugged her close.

  “Hush, sweetheart,” she said. “I’m sorry I yelled. You can’t do this though. Fighting doesn’t solve anything — never has, never will.” She’d wiped Alice’s tears away and kissed her on the nose.

  It had been a fairly clean break, according to the doctor. Once the cast had been applied, Mrs. Seymour drove the three of them back to Marco’s house, where Mrs. Mayer had a similar reaction as Mrs. Seymour.

  That was a week ago, and since then, they’d been careful to avoid The Warehouse, just in case the Dorn brothers were looking for payback. Staying near Marco’s house, the three of them had desperately looked for new adventures, only finding that there was even less to do close to home.

  This afternoon the rain had kept them indoors. After looking through the boxes of old clothes and pictures in the attic, they settled into the front room, which served as a library and office for Mr. Mayer. It was Alice and Marco’s favorite room.

  Huge bay windows showed the carefully manicured lawn and hydrangea bushes, red and white curtains were pulled back to let in the hazy summer sunshine. The wood floors were covered in thread-bare rugs, their designs faded long ago. The chairs had been patched and re-stuffed several times, but Alice felt that made them all the more cozy. A small roll top desk sat in a far corner, papers and photographs in neat piles on its scratched surface. The walls were mostly taken up with towering, mismatched book shelves that overflowed with books from every genre imaginable. Any remaining wall space was covered with photographs. Some were obviously family, their stern faces staring out at Alice as she read. Others were from Mr. Mayer’s work as a war photographer, though nothing disturbing. Mainly buildings and people he’d met, a few famous faces, such as Patton and Churchill, but they held little interest for Alice. Who had time for photographs when there were so many books to read?

  Unless your arm itches something awful! I hate this cast!

  She redoubled her efforts with the pencil when Lionel threw himself on the rug in the Mayers’ study.

  “I hate it when it rains!”

  “You live in the wrong place,” Marco said, not even looking up from his book. “Jet City is known for its wet climate.”

  “Thanks, Mr. Science,” Lionel snapped.

  It was rare that they got summer storms, but when they did, the rain came down in sheets. A bright flash nearby was followed by a rumble of thunder. Alice looked up at Marco, who smiled at her over the top of his book.

  Lionel huffed again and tapped his fist on the floor, looking for all the world like a twelve-year-old about to have a tantrum.

  Alice carefully took down the checker board. “C’mon, let’s play.”

  “No, you always win,” Lionel said.

  “Not today, I won’t.”

  “Letting me win is no fun!”

  “Then, what do you want to do?”

  Lionel huffed once again and sat up. “Checkers is fine.”

  Alice tried very hard to lose, but she ended up winning two out of three games and Lionel stomped out of the room.

  Marco shook his head. “At least Ma left some cookies for him. That should cheer him up.”

  Alice knelt in the chair by the window, squinting outside through the wet glass. “I think it stopped raining finally. Why don’t we go to the diner? I bet my mom will give us pie!”

  “Pie?” Lionel said from the kitchen.

  Marco laughed. “Let’s do it.”

  They ran to the bikes on the front porch. Alice settled herself on Lionel’s handlebars, careful not to lean too much on her broken arm.

  With the rain gone, the air felt thick and clingy as they rode down to the small diner. The sidewalks were slick, so they didn’t go too fast, but still, Alice could feel the tires skid around the corners in Lionel’s haste.

  As they pulled up at the diner, Alice had the same thought she always had: this was the oddest shaped building she’d ever seen.

  Round in the front like an oval, the middle of the building suddenly became square-shaped, as if the builders could never decide exactly what they’d wanted out of it. When they entered, the three huge ceiling fans provided a little relief from the sticky heat. The blinds that usually covered the huge front windows in the summer were half open. The smell of hamburgers and pie made the three of them forget the sweat on their little bodies and the way their clothes stuck to them. They each sat on worn, red leather seats at the counter, waiting for Mrs. Seymour to notice them.

  When she came around the corner from the kitchen and saw the three of them, she grinned. The bruises had started to fade just enough for her to hide them with a little extra makeup and her split lip was nearly gone. But, Alice noticed the careful way she walked this morning and wondered if her father had taken a belt to her over the burnt dinner last night, after all.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” she said, planting a kiss on the tip of Alice’s nose. “You boys want apple pie? Just took one out of the oven.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Lionel said, bouncing on the seat.

  Her mom smiled, and Alice actually heard a low chuckle. It was so rare to hear her mother laugh!

  In a moment, large slices of pie and glasses of milk appeared before them. The pie was still warm, the crust golden and the apples with just enough crunch as they nestled in the sweet syrup.

  Alice gulped her milk, the cold fluid feeling so good as it traveled down her throat. Her belly full, her best friends around her, her mothers’ smile. She felt contentment so rare that she closed her eyes to hold onto it for just a moment longer.

  “Now, Alice,” her mother said, hugging her close, “you keep these boys out of trouble, alright?”

  “Yes, Mama.”

  “Till next we meet, sweet,” she said, planting one last kiss on Alice’s nose before scooting them out the door.

  Alice had just hopped on the handlebars of Lionel’s bike when Marco bolted from his and ran to the door of the diner. He stared at the door, and then back at Lionel and Alice.

  Once again, Alice could swear something strange happened with Marco’s eyes, but it happened so quickly she just couldn’t be sure.

  “What?” Lionel asked.

  Marco opened his to mouth to say something as gunshots rang out, followed by screams. Alice fell off the handlebars, and Lionel pulled her to the wall of the diner under the window. Marco dove next to them. People walking on the street ran into nearby shops or ducked down in fear. They heard several more gunshots before Alice realized it was from inside the diner.

  “Mama!” she said, squirming out of Lionel’s grip.

  Lionel pulled her back. “No, Alice!”

  “My Mama’s in there!”

  “The police will be here soon.”

  The silence was worse than the gun shots and the longer they sat there, the more Alice felt her stomach roil. Her heart beat so fast that she began to feel dizzy
. Marco grabbed her hand and squeezed. Within a few minutes, her breathing evened out, but the fear that something awful had just happened remained.

  An instant later, the door to the diner burst open and a man in a ragged jacket, clutching a dirty bag, ran out and disappeared down the street.

  They crouched a few minutes more, as the sound of sirens became louder. People began standing and pointing across the street.

  Someone inside the diner called for help.

  Alice jumped up and ran in before Lionel or Marco could stop her. She looked around. Broken glass from the display cases glittered in the sun, plates lay in smashed heaps, and food was smeared on seats.

  She saw Will and another waitress crouched down by someone lying on the floor.

  Someone was calling for her, but Alice felt as if they were very far away. She ran to the spot where Will was kneeling.

  “No, don’t Alice!” Will said.

  She jerked her broken arm out of someone’s grasp and slid to a stop in something sticky.

  Sprawled awkwardly on the floor, blood spreading out from her body like petals on a flower, was her mother. Alice was surprised to see how peaceful she looked, all the tension and worry gone. For a strange moment, Alice felt relieved for her, no more pain, no more shame.

  But then, the knowledge that she was dead, gone forever, slammed into Alice’s mind.

  “Mama! Mama!”

  Alice knelt, not caring about the blood on the floor or the hands trying to pull her away.

  “No...no...no...”

  She laid her head on her mother’s breast, sobs shaking her small frame. A bony arm embraced her, and the blinding grief eased just a little.

  People were talking all around her, some of them crying, some yelling, but none of it could penetrate the fog that Alice’s mind had become. Before she was ready, someone with large, calloused hands was lifting her up and away from her mother.

  “No, don’t...!” she struggled, tried to hit whoever it was.