by Rook, Rowan
Mason bit his tongue before remembering his fangs and clamping his mouth shut. He walked quietly for another few moments, deciding if he really wanted to make the offer he was about to. “There’s an old park just a little ways down the street. I was thinking about stopping there on my way home. You could come, if you want.”
He hadn’t visited the park in years, but in his younger days, it’d been his go to retreat when he’d needed a break from everything else. Perhaps it was how badly he needed that now, or perhaps it was lingering traces of nostalgia, but he wanted to go there, if just for a little while.
Her gaze perked up. “Oh! You mean that place with the carousel that stopped working ages ago, that mossy pond you can’t swim in, and that big wooden jungle gym? What was it called now? Willow…”
“Willowood.” He finished. “You’ve been there?”
A grin spread across her cheeks, blue eyes sparkling. “Of course! I used to hang out there all the time when I was a kid!” She dashed away before he managed an answer, twirling on her heels. “Let’s stop talking about it and go!”
****
Willowood Park waited at the neighborhood’s eastern outskirts, where the residential area merged with greener roads leading away from the city.
The carousel sitting by the woods had supposedly worked once – when Martin had been a young boy – but now lay dead beneath a layer of vines and moss. Everything else was there. A rusty swing set. A jungle gym. A wooden slide. The willow trees the park was named for sheltered a syrupy pond with a rope fence that discouraged children from swimming. In theory, at least.
Mason smiled. The pond had always been like that – thick and nasty – but during one particularly hot, elementary school summer day, he and Merril had braved a dip. They’d come out with nothing to show for it but itches and bug bites that’d lasted for days.
The park was nearly deserted now – forlorn even in the last traces of light – but it hadn’t always been that way. Not in the days before the plague. As old and beat up as it was, it’d once breathed with life.
Mason didn’t notice that Sorrel had left his side until the swing started creaking. He spun to find her not sitting, but standing on the seat.
She flashed him a grin. “This place seems lonely, but at least I have the swings all to myself. I used to get in fights over them sometimes. It needed more than just two seats…but I suppose it doesn’t really matter now.” She rocked her body back and forth, gripping the tarnished chains and pushing against the seat with her feet. It started to sway, moaning.
“Be careful!” He tensed. He’d gotten in trouble for standing on the swings when he was younger, told that it wasn’t safe.
She stuck her tongue out. “Worrywart.” She kept swaying, lifting higher off the ground. “They are made for kids, after all. Even if I fell, it’s not like the mud would split my skull open, and nothing else can hurt us anymore.”
Well, she was right, he supposed. He watched a while longer. Her ponytail danced behind her, chasing after her as she flew forwards and curling around her chin as she fell back. She wasn't looking at him anymore, eyes trained on the sky without a care in the world. How could she still feel so light when his single killing left so much weight on his shoulders? It almost wasn't quite human.
He swallowed a chuckle. No, perhaps that was one of the more human things about her. Humans could be monsters. Humans could kill and still sleep well at night. That wasn't a vampire trait. What had she been like before, he wondered. Was she really a monster? Was he?
He found his eyes following her back and forth. She really was pretty, he realized. The sun was starting to go down now, and the orange light carved shadows on her angled face. It framed her silhouette, too, painting her lean curves in black. There was power there, in her strong limbs, but the arch of her hips and chest softened it. Her breasts stuck out just enough to bounce when she pumped her legs, loose and –
Nope. He wasn't doing this with his own killer. And not when he had Merril.
He looked around the park a few times, feeling newly awkward, and took the remaining swing. He wrapped his arms around the chains and lazily rocked with his feet on the grass. He was quiet for a while. The two of them alone in an empty park at sunset. It really could've been quite romantic. Maybe he'd bring Merril there sometime.
“It’s funny.” He realized. “I used to come here for time alone, but even though it’s been quieter than ever these last couple years, I stopped going, since…”
“Since?” She pressed, turning to him with inquisitive eyes.
He grumbled. His tone made it clear that he wasn’t talking about anything pleasant. How could she still look at him like that – so curious and innocent?
“Well, since Mom died.” He finished. At least he could say the words now without forcing them – it’d happened four years ago.
“What happened to her?” She prodded, as much a nosy child as ever. “You live with your brother now, don’t you?”
He snorted. No tact at all. “If you must know, it was Martin’s fault.” The anger in his own voice caught him off guard. “It was five years ago, before the plague. Martin was twenty-one, but he still lived with us. Mom…worried a lot. He used to get into trouble. He spent nights in jail after getting caught with pot a couple times and another handful of nights in the hospital after drinking until he passed out. I never knew my father – he ran off with some other woman just before I was born – but Martin did, and changed after he left. That’s what Mom used to say, at least.” He stopped and swallowed a breath.
“Martin went off to some party that New Year’s Eve, saying he’d be back before midnight. He wasn’t, of course. I watched the Seattle fireworks on TV with Mom, like always, but she refused to sleep until he came home. When it got to three in the morning, she rang up his friend’s house, and they told her they hadn’t seen him all night. She freaked out and took off in her old blue Jeep, convinced that he’d gone and passed out somewhere from alcohol poisoning again. Hell if I know how she thought she could find him, but she was always like that – completely single-minded.” He bit his lip. “Some drunk bastard coming home from the bar slammed into her car with a pick-up not two miles down the street. She died instantly. I was alone when the police came. Martin didn’t even know about it when he finally crawled back with a hang-over the next morning.” He gulped down more air. It seemed to be running out faster than usual. “If he’d gone where he’d said he would, if he’d at least come home when he’d said he would, she wouldn’t have been out on the streets that night.”
A last snort. “Heh. That's what it took for Martin to change. I was still young and didn’t have anywhere else to go, so he tried to look out for me after that, and now Merril, too. He’ll never be Mom, though. Not even close.”
Sorrel said nothing for a while, her swing creaking to a halt as she listened with intent blue eyes. “I’m sorry.”
He looked away when he saw the first genuine trace of sympathy in her gaze. Somehow, it felt wrong.
“At least Mom never had to see the plague, I guess. Merril’s parents did…they died two years into it, one right after the other.” He smiled again, just slightly. “Even though I liked coming here by myself, our families – Merril’s and mine – used to come here a lot, too. We had tons of summer picnics here, all of us. Everything was so different back then. It seems like a strange dream now.”
She started swaying again, the chains groaning in protest. “At least you have those memories. My mother died giving birth. I don’t think Dad ever forgave me.” Her hair trailed behind her as she swung. “They were happy before I was born. Well, according to Dad, anyway.”
He stopped and looked up at her, not knowing what to say. “Sorrel…”
She watched the horizon. “It’s okay. He’s not a part of my life anymore, and I like it that way.” Her lips curved into a small grin. “I always came here alone, so having you here is actually a step up. It’s nice.”
He flushed, eyes
retreating to the grass.
She giggled impishly. “Maybe I’ll have to come back and search for that rogue some more, sometime soon. Will you stop here with me again?”
“I…suppose.” He answered, nervously scratching at his chin. He gripped the chains tighter.
She laughed, her voice swallowed by the empty evening air. The only sound in the park was the slow, steady weeping of the swing.
****
“Martin!” Mason’s eyes stretched when he saw the red Dodge pull into the driveway. He’d hurried home only to see his brother beat him there.
Martin plopped from the truck and slammed the door with a thud. “Mason?” His eyes narrowed, staring past him. “Who’s that?”
A few seconds ticked by before Mason realized that he was talking about Sorrel. Her return route to the prison ran past his house, so they'd ambled that way together. He looked over his shoulder to find her squinting at Martin through suspicious slits.
What was with her? Was it the accusatory tone in his brother’s voice? Was it what he’d told her about him earlier? Either way, neither of them looked happy to see the other.
He scratched his neck and tried not to wince when his fingers rubbed against the rash he’d forgotten was there. “N-no one. Just a friend from school.” Why did he always feel so clumsy beneath his brother’s stare? “I ran into her while out walking Molly, and we decided to hang for a while.”
Martin scoffed. “You say that like you actually have friends from school.”
“Hey!” Mason spat, face red. It wasn’t that his brother’s words weren’t true, it was just… “It’s not like I tell you everything, you know!”
Another incredulous snort. “This the same friend that sold you medicine?”
“No! But –”
Sorrel blinked to diffuse the heat from her eyes. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but I’m in the class just below his. We’ve been friends for quite a while, really. We were just out grabbing a bite to eat.” She flashed a mischievous wink. “We weren’t up to anything shady. No need to panic.”
Martin glared, but miraculously enough, he did seem to back off. “Fine, but it’s getting late now, and if we don't hurry up, we'll be going to bed without dinner.” He fiddled with his sleeves as he spoke. “Mason, make yourself useful and get at it.”
Eh? Something tugged at the back of Mason’s mind before Martin’s frown broke the thread.
“Uh…sure.” He sputtered, turning towards the stairs. He passed Sorrel a last glance before heading inside. “Err, later.”
Sorrel just nodded, not looking at him.
When he got to kitchen, ready to help prepare a meal he’d eat nothing of, he realized Martin hadn’t followed. He looked to the door with a sinking stomach.
Was he still talking with Sorrel? Shit – what sort of things was he saying now?
Sure enough, two sets of loud voices seeped in from outside. He froze, listening, but the words avoided him, blurred by the walls. He was about to creep closer to the door when it slammed open and shut. Martin stomped to the kitchen and practically threw the bags on the counter.
“Mason, I don’t want you seeing that girl anymore.” His nostrils flared. “Something’s off with her.”
Mason blinked, pupils wide. “W-what? But –”
“Enough.” Martin snapped, yanking frozen shrimp and packets of noodles from the plastic. “Let’s just get dinner done with and call it a day.”
Chapter Nine: Snare Trap
The sun never rose that morning. If there was any light to the sky at all, Mason couldn't see it. There was nothing above him but clouds – miles and miles of gloom that shrouded the horizon above him with secrecy. For all he knew, it might be the purest summer blue he'd ever seen, or it might be ablaze with fire. Maybe the sky was so swollen with death it'd become a window to the afterlife. If he looked up - if the clouds parted - he'd be able to gaze up right into Heaven. Or Hell, perhaps. For now, it was as gray as the ground beneath his boots. As if there might be nothing behind the clouds at all. Nothing but an emptiness that equaled his own.
He stopped, looking around him instead. It was the same, as far as he was concerned. More overgrown yards and vacant houses cast in gray shadows and solitude. No light came from behind any windows. Some doors hung open, but no traces of movement came from inside. And when he was still, the world was completely silent. His body, so much of it dead, made no sound. Even the breeze had long since passed away. He swallowed, a strange grunt escaping his mouth, and the noise made him shiver. With no other human voices around, his own sounded alien. He didn't like it. It reminded him of how alone he really was.
He kept walking, chasing the yellow line in the center of the hushed highway – just about the only trace of color left. He'd walked on for hours now, but no matter how far he wandered, nothing looked any different. No color. No life. No one. He sucked in useless air and breathed nothing but road. He couldn't even smell the faint scent of decay anymore.
“Martin!” He called, braced for the sound. It ricocheted through the emptiness like a gunshot. “Merril...!”
No answer. It wasn't like he'd expected one. He'd called out so many times now that his throat ached. And he'd keep calling out until his already broken lungs completely withered, despite already knowing it was useless. He was the only one left. Not just of his family, but the only person – the only 'living' thing – left in the world. He wasn't sure how he knew that, he just did. The isolation was too great. Too much a living thing itself, too much of it pressing down on him.
Sweat beaded on his cold forehead.
“Martin!” He screamed, voice somehow more desperate than before. “Merril!”
They were gone, spirited away like they'd never existed. But he was there. The sole survivor of the end of the world.
He should have stayed with them. He should've let the plague take him, too. Death was a scary thing – the great unknown – but he couldn't imagine that what lay beyond it could possibly be worse than this: his own empty purgatory.
Suddenly, something took shape in the distance. Two looming mounds of darkness, oddly beckoning - welcoming, almost - in the abyss of nothing. He blinked, quickening his pace. There were plenty of shadows and shapes in the ruins, but something about these was different. And as he neared, he realized why, and any hope dissolved into despair in his stomach.
Gravestones. Two gravestones stood alone in the middle of the street, wildly out of place amongst the somehow orderly chaos, as if they'd been placed there just for him. Perhaps they had. He swallowed, knowing what names he'd see inscribed upon them before he dared look.
Merril Siege. Martin Mild. There was nothing else - no dates or comforting quotes. Just two familiar names, and in the stone solace, their meaning was all too clear.
He bowed his head at the cement. His spirit followed his eyes and sunk all the way down, melting out of him with that last cold finality. Martin and Merril were gone forever - hidden behind that same impassable barrier that had taken his mother. He really was alone.
Then he saw the two envelopes lying near his feet, under the meek shadow of the stones. A simple phrase labeled both, 'to Mason'. He took the one below Martin's name with trembling fingers and ripped it open. The tear seemed impossibly loud - a deep, throaty growl - amid the silence.
Mason,
Did you ever realize how hard it was to keep going for you? After Mom died, I tried to change who I was, to become something better. But it wasn't for me. It was for you. Maybe I'd rather have died the way I wanted to live - free and happy, pain dulled by alcohol - instead of tied down to a brother like you, dragged through these final years of slow suffering and death. But you know what? If it'd been anyone but you, it might've been worth it. No matter what I did, you'd already decided to hate me. I tried to protect you and raise you into someone stronger than I was, but you fought and resented me every step of the way. And in the end, how did you thank me? With lies. By feigning life and leading us down
the last mile to death. I'm not sure why I bothered with any of it.
Just forget me,
Martin
Paper crinkled beneath clenched fingers. Mason reached down and snatched up Merril's - slicing it open with one slick rip - without allowing himself the chance to think.
Mason,
Did you ever really love me? Or was it just that our relationship was easy? That was how you lived, wasn't it? Whatever was the easiest was good enough. And I guess death hasn't changed that for you, has it? My Mason. You won't ever change. You'll kill if it lets you live. Why? Because it's easy. It's what serves you best. You aren't brave enough to accept death like the rest of us. It's hard to stare down fear and face it, too hard for someone like you. And so you'll choose the selfish option and kill instead. It's cowardly, lazy - like everything about us always was. And even still, you tried to stay with me, willing to put me in danger for yourself and your easy little life. Was it that you wanted to be with Martin and me, or was it that you were too scared to leave? I'd like to think that you loved me, but if you did, then why did you lie?
Please don't forget me,
Merril
Mason closed his eyes, letting the paper - filled with clean, flowery handwriting - fall to the tar with a rustle that roared in the stillness. Wrong. “You're wrong!” He shouted at the great gray nothing.
And yet, they weren't wrong, even if they weren't entirely right, either. He had loved Merril. That he had been too afraid to leave her, to try anything else, didn't change that. It was a default - a dependence - he'd been happy with. And Martin...he had loved Martin, too, in the way someone loves the big brother who tried to push them forward against their will.
All the same, he never had been able to get over the anger he held for Martin. When his mother had died, his relationship with him had already been written in his mind with immutable ink, a resentment he'd never quite been able to wipe away. One he'd never tried to. Because that would've been too hard for someone like him, who always stuck with what was easy.
