Blood In Electric Blue

by Greg F. Gifune

  “Won’t heal.” Jackie Shine gazes down at it. “It never heals. Why is that?”

  Pain pulses in Dignon’s fingertip. The Band-Aid has fallen off, revealing the same raw circle of skin that’s been there all along. “I was hoping you’d know.”

  “I’ve heard stories. People talk. They say sometimes what we imagine is far worse than anything the world can throw at us.” Jackie Shine sighs wearily. “Maybe that’s true for some, but not us. Load of crap. Way I see it, doesn’t much matter anyway. Me, I just keep my head down and drive my van.”

  “Did I do wrong, Jackie? Have I done some wrong that’s—”

  “It’s not about right and wrong, kid. Never was.” He fiddles with the toothpick in his mouth, drops the column shift into drive and revs the engine. “You just remember what I always told you. Never go out afraid. Don’t give them the fucking satisfaction.”

  Hand on the door release, Dignon returns his stare to the tenement. “What’s waiting on me in there?”

  “Pain and sorrow,” he says softly. “Whole lot of pain and sorrow.”

  Dignon steps out onto the curb. With a halfhearted wave, he slam shuts the door and the van pulls away in a cloud of exhaust, ambling down the otherwise empty street before turning and disappearing around the corner.

  Behind him, the front door of the tenement opens.

  “Welcome back.”

  He recognizes the pompous accent immediately. The older man in the smoking jacket stands in the doorway, a mixed drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other. He smiles with his horse-teeth dentures, his silver hair meticulously combed back, each strand in place, and his pencil-thin mustache so perfect at first glance it looks as if it’s been drawn on.

  I’m always listening, Dignon. Always.

  “Come inside,” the man says. “We’ve been expecting you.”

  Dignon moves slowly across the sidewalk, up the tenement steps and follows the man into the foyer. The door to the apartment is open to reveal shuffling shadows within, the same as in his nightmare. Hesitating at the door, the man makes a theatrical sweeping gesture with his cigarette hand for Dignon to proceed. “After you.”

  The apartment is not as he remembers it. When he and Jackie Shine had delivered here, but for the sparsest furnishings in the dining area and one of the bedrooms, the apartment was empty. It’s now fully furnished with nicely preserved but drab and wildly dated furniture. The sitting room Dignon steps into resembles something from a gloomy Victorian gothic thriller, and houses several people, some sitting on ornate loveseats and high-backed chairs, others standing and milling about. Most have drinks in their hands or are smoking, and though Dignon cannot locate the source, soft classical music plays in the background. Some of the people present are in the middle of what appear to be intense conversations, but they speak under their breath and he cannot make out anything they’re saying. Others stare at him with cold, emotionless eyes.

  Roy, the policeman from his nightmare stands a few feet away, a mixed drink in his hand despite being in full uniform. Through a derisive grin he chuckles, “What do you say, counselor? Hey, no hard feelings, right?”

  Standing next to him is Clarence, his old boss from Tech Metropolis in his usual nylon sweat suit and high-top Nikes. Both driving teams from work are there too: Outlaw in full biker regalia, Boo at his side, shaved head shiny and reflecting the dim light; Adam, dapper as ever, and his partner Blondie, her bleached hair wild and harsh, a Pall Mall dangling from her lips. All are gathered in a circle and chatting quietly. They smile and acknowledge Dignon in turn, but he can’t be sure if they’re complicit in all this or simply pleased to see him.

  The man in the smoking jacket closes the door to the apartment behind him and joins another well-dressed man roughly the same age over by a fireplace on the far wall. Dignon recognizes him as the same man who was here the night of the delivery, the one who’d been sitting with the children having dinner. The man in the smoking jacket leans in, whispers something and the other man laughs quietly, watching Dignon with a cruel smirk all the while.

  Dignon stands in the center of the room, unsure of what to do.

  From the shadows of a doorway leading out of the room and deeper into the apartment, a filthy and disheveled child appears, a young boy of perhaps eight or nine in tattered clothes and no shoes. There is something awry in the boy’s face. His eyes, a deep blue and probably once quite striking, are dead and empty, a feature particularly upsetting in one so young. Dignon moves closer to him, unable to break eye contact as a swell of memories rise in him. He sheepishly touches the boy’s face, cupping his chin and cheek in his hand. Dignon knows this look. He’s seen it before. He’s felt it himself. The little boy looks up at him, expression void of emotion. Such things have been thoroughly ripped away from him long ago, and they both know it.

  As Dignon battles away tears, he feels a tiny hand slide into his own, and the boy leads him slowly through the doorway along a narrow, sparsely-lit hallway. Other children, some as young as his guide, others a bit older and others still in their early teens, sit on the floor throughout the hallway. Some scratch mindlessly at the walls, others whisper gibberish or simply stare at the floor, helpless, hopeless. All are in need of a bath, better general hygiene and new clothes, yet they seem not to care. Few notice Dignon and the boy at all for that matter, and those who do show little interest in their presence.

  At the end of the hallway is a small room. Empty, the only light comes from a candle encased in a glass globe sitting in the center of the floor, its flame bending flickering ghosts along the walls and ceiling. There are two windows but they’ve been boarded up from the outside. Beyond them, Dignon can still hear the gusting, crying wind.

  The little boy releases his hand and points at the floorboards on the far wall.

  Dignon moves closer and sees a small window built into the bottom of the wall. It reminds him of a cellar window, particularly the kind in their home growing up. He shudders and forces a nervous swallow as the boy crouches down, pulls the pane completely out of the window frame and sets it on the floor. From whatever area this small portal leads to, more flickering light seeps free. But this is not candlelight, rather something artificial. Dignon recognizes it immediately as light cast from a television.

  After scurrying away, the boy sits with his back against the wall and stares at him, waiting.

  With a knot forming in the center of his chest, Dignon carefully takes a knee and peers through the opening.

  In the limited light he sees a cramped cement cellar. Someone sits in a wooden chair before a small television placed atop a crate. Though the person’s back is to him, he can discern it’s male, but little else. To the man’s left, an old rusted furnace, silent and broken as the lost souls haunting this horrible testament to depravity and endless suffering. Tension squeezes the back of Dignon’s neck, and the raw skin on his fingertip begins to throb and ache.

  He looks to the little boy.

  The child points to the cellar.

  Not certain he can fit through such a small opening, and frightened of what else lies within the little space, Dignon squints in an attempt to see more. But the light from the television is insufficient, bathing the man in the chair in quick intervals.

  He wants nothing more than to leave here, to grab as many of these poor children as he can and run back out into the snow and cold and scream for help. He knows these feelings of wickedness and unrest all too well, these palpable things that hang in the air to create a sensation so disturbing and foul that it leaves one no choice but to do exactly the opposite of what human nature dictates, which is to flee. Because beauty is not alone in its hypnotic qualities. Authentic evil can be even more spellbinding.

  Candlelight flickers, mixing with the small patch of light leaking from the opening.

  Controlling the fear as best he can, Dignon draws a deep breath, holds it a moment then exhales. With his usual lack of grace, he pushes his head through the window and forces the
remainder of his body into the opening, twisting and writhing about like a rodent trapped in the jaws of a snake. Barely managing to fit, he struggles through, and with great effort and a final thrust, slides free and crashes to the cold cement floor. He breaks his fall with his hands and forearms then flops over onto his back, lying breathless like a helpless giant overturned turtle.

  It smells musty here, the air dank and stale. The ceiling above him is dark and covered in a thick maze of cobwebs. The floor is cold and bare, the walls rough cement block. Dignon rolls over and up onto all fours, raising his head so he can see the man in the chair and the television on the other side of him.

  Even before he regains his feet and moves cautiously around the side of the chair, he knows this is his father. Continuing his slow approach, Dignon looks to the television, and now better able to see the screen, freezes.

  He’s looking into his own eyes. The scene is a live shot of the cellar, and as he moves and slowly raises an arm, the image does the same. He takes a step back. His TV self steps back as well. Dignon searches the room quickly for either a door or a camera. He finds neither.

  “I told you,” his father says, voice raspy and exhausted, “once you heard you’d have to act on it, that you wouldn’t be able to keep it buried anymore.”

  Dignon notices feet of barbed wire snugly wrapped around the arms and legs of the chair. It coils up over his father’s forearms and calves, holding him in place and forcing him to watch the horror that is his youngest son’s life play out on the old black and white television. Trails of dried blood course along his flesh, lead to small circular stains on the floor. His father’s face is drawn and pale, the dark bags beneath his eyes thick and heavy, and his receding black hair is mussed and oily and stands up straight in places. His pockmarked skin and wiry build are just as Dignon remembers them, but his once intense eyes are distant, his rage replaced with what he can only hope is regret. Gone is the long coat, the polyester slacks, the lace-up Florsheim shoes, the pressed white shirt and the Timex watch with the fake gold face and cowhide band. Gone is the arrogance and malice, the self-righteous assuredness of a god with absolute control, able to do whatever he pleases whenever he pleases with no chance of consequence or reciprocation.

  His father is nothing, a rotting shell.

  “You said I had to go back and find the truth about your death,” Dignon reminds him. “And that I had to make it right.”

  “Do you really think I fell down those stairs, Dignon? Do you really think it’s a mistake that Willie found me?”

  Flashes of him tumbling down the stairs in their old home blink in his mind, the old man’s body slapping the stairs on the way down then landing at the bottom, limbs and head twisted. He has always suspected. Now he knows.

  “Willie pushed you.”

  His father nods wearily.

  “Good.”

  “You still don’t get it, do you? You have to make it right.”

  “I don’t have to make anything right,” Dignon tells him. “You do.”

  “I can’t,” he says. “Only you can.”

  “I’m supposed to forgive you, is that it? That sets you free?”

  His father bows his head, closes his eyes.

  “What sets me free? Answer that, you fuck. What sets Willie free?”

  “It’s facing the truth that’s hard. That’s where the danger is.” He raises his head, glances at the television then shifts his eyes to Dignon. “Forgiveness is a gift. This is something else. This is punishment…mine, and yours. Experiencing someone else’s pain, the pain you inflicted on them, is the greatest punishment of all. Having to relive it again and again for all eternity, to feel what they felt, to know what they knew, to hurt like they hurt, to experience it endlessly, to live what they live…or would have lived…and to never be able to escape any of it. Not ever, do you understand? Not ever. Don’t you see that’s what this is? It’s what it’s always been.”

  Dignon backs away, into the shadows. Reaching behind him, he feels the rough wall against his palms. “You’re a liar.”

  “Running is easy. It’s truth that’s hard.”

  He looks to the window he crawled through, sees the little boy’s face peering down at them. Next to him is the man in the smoking jacket, grinning.

  Tell me Dignon, where do you think people like me go when they die?

  His father thrashes about violently. The wire only cuts deeper.

  “Let me out,” Dignon says, his back to the cement wall as he slides through the shadows in search of a door. “Let me out!”

  The man in the smoking jacket turns away and the little boy replaces the window, pushes the pane back into the frame until it snaps into place. He watches a while longer, expressionless as Dignon’s screams grow louder and more frantic.

  And then he moves away.

  THIRTEEN

  The crawlspace…that god-awful tomb…he and Willie packed into it like fish in a tin, struggling to get out and praying for release. Can’t move. Can’t breathe. Help us. Please, someone get us out. Stale air, spider webs, rough cement, dirt and glimpses through the filthy narrow window to the world outside, in light or darkness, freedom so close yet never within reach, dangled there cruelly.

  And screams. Always the screams.

  Free. No, not free. Loose. There’s a difference, isn’t there?

  Sitting on the toilet, Wilma stands over him, attending to him like a nursemaid, a washcloth in her hand moving across his face and neck, cleaning the blood away. “Hush now,” she says. “Stop fidgeting.” With surprising composure she finishes wiping the remnants of Barry’s blood from Dignon’s face then turns her attention to scrubbing it out of his shirt. Once completed, she tosses the washcloth into the sink. It hits the porcelain with a splat and she runs the water until the blood escapes down the drain in a swirl of crimson. “The police,” she says in monotone. “The…police.”

  “Yes,” Dignon answers, more cognizant of his surroundings with each passing second. “Sooner or later someone will call the police, won’t they Willie? Won’t they?”

  Wilma nods. All the muscles in her face tighten.

  Somewhere, Dignon thinks, angels look down upon humanity, watch over and guide people with the promise of something better, protection, deliverance and renewal from all the evil that haunts and so tirelessly pursues them. But not here, he thinks. Not here.

  “I have to go,” Dignon says.

  “I know.”

  He stands, takes Wilma’s chin in his hand and slowly raises her head until their eyes meet. With his other hand he carefully straightens his sister’s wig and slides the renegade strands from her eyes. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

  “Of course it will, love,” she says halfheartedly.

  Somehow, Dignon manages a smile. “You’re beautiful. Never forget that. Always remember, Willie. Always, OK?”

  Teary-eyed, Wilma whispers, “Always.”

  * * *

  Yellow police tape twists and flutters in the breeze along Borges Lane, the only reminder of Kyle’s death jump. Once secured between nearby telephone poles, it has since fallen free and lies in the snow, one end captured by the wind. Dignon watches a while, notices its grace of motion and how its vivid color contrasts with the otherwise white backdrop. There is something terribly lonely about this, he thinks. Not the act of studying an inanimate object on a deserted icy street, rather the object itself, left behind at the mercy of the elements to dance on demand, its existence no longer relevant or akin to its original purpose.

  But the wind, he now knows, is not innocent. Not this wind. This wind has brought him here. She has brought him here. He pictures Bree waiting in her apartment, knowing it’s only a matter of time before he’ll succumb and arrive, a subservient puppy summoned to her feet.

  This book belongs to Bree Harper.

  Obediently, Dignon approaches the building, follows the icy pavement to the front door and hits the appropriate buzzer.

  * * *

/>   She answers her door dressed in an oversized black and red fleck sweater, tight black slacks and heavy gray socks. Out of shoes he is struck by how short she is. In heels the height difference between them is negligible, an inch or two at most, but now it’s at least double that. This is the worst he’s ever seen her, hair mussed, eyes bloodshot, nose running and nostrils red, face pale and void of even the light makeup she’d worn previously. One hand clutches the shredded remains of a used tissue, the other the box from which it came. Still, when their eyes lock, Dignon feels his knees weaken and his stomach clench, rapt as ever by her beauty.

  “Dignon,” she says helplessly, throwing her arms around him. “Kyle, he…”

  “I heard. I’m sorry.” With a rigid posture, one hand slowly rises to find the small of her back. Her arms tighten around his neck and his palm barely makes contact with her, brushing her sweater. Warmth spreads through his body, along the tops of his shoulders, across his chest and back, down along his stomach and into his groin. She smells wonderful, scrubbed and fresh and powdered and clean, with just a hint of cologne thrown in for good measure. She is everything he’s ever imagined feminine beauty and allure to be, and for a moment, Dignon’s eyes roll back into his head, his mouth falls open and his bottom lip quivers as he embraces the glow passing from one mythical being to another.

  But then she releases him and the electricity is gone. She flashes a look of confusion. “Was it on the news already?”

  “A friend of mine was in the neighborhood when the police were here and she told me.”

  “Come in.” She steps away from the door so he can enter then closes it behind him, dabs at her nose with the tissue and motions to the couch. “Can I get you anything, coffee, tea maybe?”

  “No, I’m fine. Thanks.” He sits on the couch. Something heavy presses against his outer thigh and he realizes the hammer is still in his coat pocket. His palms begin to sweat.