Mansion of High Ghosts

by James D. McCallister

  “You made this situation.”

  Billy, frustrated almost to tears—all he’d wanted out of the evening had been to tell his band mates to go screw themselves once and for all eternity, walk out of the bar in a moment of triumphant so-what, fuck-all closure on a chapter of his life no longer seeming to have any meaning. His quitting scene, it had been planned as a big post-show surprise to Mucky and the rest of those dickhead poseurs, now interrupted by the chance to see Libby. How when she’d appeared, he’d been rehearsing the way he’d tell them—the accusations, the epithets, the declarations. But now had to put that off to deal with this other stressful emotional crap.

  Billy, irritated. He wanted to kill her as much as kiss her. Bothersome; that he felt unprepared for this confrontation; a new apotheosis of understatement. So much pent up shame and desire ready to pour out of him, his body feeling as taut as an overfilled water balloon about to burst at the slightest change in air pressure—the river of draught beer he’d consumed over the course of the evening didn’t help. Nor had his recent cessation of pleasurable self-abuse for a routine of painful flagellation at his morning erections with a stiff hairbrush.

  A lapse tonight, this drinking. Another reason to bail on Meat Mallet—Mucky, denying it, but still shooting heroin. A bad scene. Hooked. What a schmuck. Way off course—smack? What, was it the 70s again?

  Besides—look where the drinking and drugging had led with Libby.

  They stopped at the corner by a bus stop bench. Palms clammy, dying to touch her, if only in the smallest of ways, Billy, all but tumbling forward into those eyes of hers.

  Allowing a kernel of hope to overwhelm his caution: “Oh, god—how can I earn your forgiveness?”

  “You can’t.”

  “Don’t you realize how I’ve suffered? What you mean to me?”

  Flabbergasted, scoffing, backing away. “Hasn’t anyone ever told you ‘no’ before? You have no idea what it feels like as a woman.”

  “Not really, but that’s beside the point.”

  She laughed, a small, mirthless snort. “You don’t understand—I wasn’t only frightened. I was also disappointed.”

  “Oh, but I do understand—I’ve been in agony.”

  “This happening wasn’t all bad.”

  Shocked by her perfidious notion. “Maybe for you.”

  “No, really—since you haven’t been hanging around, Devin doesn’t drink as much. He makes more time for me. And me for him. If you know what I mean.”

  Billy, his chest tight, felt his breath rush out. Wheezing: “Awesome.”

  “So here’s my advice. Stop thinking about me.”

  Trying to ignore the devastating and grievous insult of hearing how close they felt to one another, Billy, seizing on a new tack, offered in a hot rush:

  “Ruck, now, that’s who we need to talk about—he seems to have forgiven me. Truly.”

  “Devin grew up in Edgewater County. He’s a tough Carolina boy. You’re lucky, Billy. Maybe luckier than you know. That’s all I can tell you.”

  Devin loved Billy. Her intimations of violence skittered off him. “He knows I know right from wrong. How we were all fucked up, and the show was so intense and you looked so beautiful, see? You get it? Luminous, amazing. And I misunderstood the signals.”

  “Billy—what signals?”

  “That’s right. I misunderstood where we were. Who we were. Who I was. It was an accident.”

  She took her time digesting that. Billy, his knees weak, sat down on the bench. Noise from up the block, his bandmates continuing the load-out.

  Libby finally spoke. “This is tragic all around. Want to know how?””

  His eyes bulged with anticipation. His sat on the edge of the bench, stolid, motionless, his spine straight. “Please.”

  “Besides you ruining your friendship with Devin? And screwing up the scriptwriting class?”

  Billy, flummoxed and groping. “I beseech thee.”

  “Don’t you realize you were stealing my heart? Against my will?”

  This, no admission of affection. He couldn’t speak. His throat, closed like all the bars at 2am.

  Libby, marching away down the sidewalk: “There hasn’t been one fair thing about our relationship. Now—leave us alone. I’m not asking.”

  Billy, swooning, rose to follow, took two lurching steps like Karloff in heavy Frankenstein makeup. Watching her jaywalk to meet Devin down the block, he staggered back like a blind man to again sit down, heavy, onto the bench. He watched in sorrowful resignation as they vanished into the deepening night, the slap-slap sound of Libby’s flip-flops echoing with finality.

  The crying started. He fell to his side on the bench. He nearly convulsed with grief. If anyone saw him, they’d think him mad.

  Maybe she’ll come around. Maybe I’ll get another chance. So long as we all still draw breath, it could happen.

  Billy, pulling himself together, got fired up to finish the I’m-quitting scene. It would be so epic they would never forget it.

  Fuck ’em—I’ll split without a word. I just won’t show at the next practice, won’t show at the next gig. Won’t return phone calls. And stupid as they may be, they’ll get the message. Bunch of lousy punks.

  As devastated as he felt after this debacle with Libby—it would turn from despair to anger, soon, if his moods followed the typical pattern—he needed to get away from his bandmates before one accidentally ended up dead, if not all of them.

  He had to walk a narrow path. Stay out of trouble. No accidents. Not while Libby only a few blocks away. She might still forgive him, if he explained it a different way, next time.

  Forty-Six

  Devin

  Devin, sitting on a low wall across from the music club with an asphalt parking lot at his back, smoked and watched as Libby and Billy strolled in and out of the pools of rust from the high-pressure sodium streetlights.

  Besides the coarse grunts and clicks of Billy’s bandmates continuing to roll out their gear, he heard other voices—a group of loud drunks came ROLLING out of the Back Porch a block away. As they got closer, he saw that one of the group was his roommate, Mike Cassidy, the enigmatic fourth bonehead taking up space in the University Terrace apartment. Devin had made no real connection with Ohio Mike, as they called him behind his back, other than shooting the shit and drinking beer and ditching classes together, here and there.

  “Ruck.” Mike, thick-tongued, plowed under, grabbing his hand in a bro-shake. “Where’s the rest of the crew?”

  Devin, dry, a cool greeting. “Waiting on my gal.”

  Mike squinted across the street at Billy and Libby standing down at the opposite corner. “Not Steeple. I wouldn’t trust that player with my girl, dude.”

  “He won’t lay a hand on her.”

  “You sure? I saw them a dozen times last semester, walking around together near the State House. Going into the Coffee Shack this one time.”

  “Holding hands?” Devin asked, impassive. He blew smoke in Mike’s face and licked his lips. “Were they skipping along arm in arm?”

  “You better keep that tail on a short leash. Or else him on a longer one.”

  “Taken under advisement. It’s under control.”

  Scoffing. “Ain’t nothing under anybody’s control.”

  Mike caught up to his friends, pausing long enough to turn over a newspaper box with a grinding, loud crash. The group of young men, howling like wild dogs loosed upon the night, ran in their pack up the hill toward campus. Their carefree attitude made Devin sick.

  Libby, appearing at Devin’s elbow, surprised him with a big hug. She said, now that’s that with Billy Steeple once and for all.

  Forty-Seven

  Creedence

  Startled and intrigued by a telephone call from one Roy Earl Pettus, Creedence got a flurry of stomach-butterflies from irritation as well as intrigue. At last, she thought.

  A typical afternoon in Pine Haven: Dusty, watching The Brady Bunch on TBS, pouted; Creede
nce, not feeling like messing around, either the main way or any other, for that matter. For all his disappointment and whining, you’d have thought Dale Earnhardt had gotten killed in a racetrack crash.

  “At least tickle him under his chin.”

  “Nuh-uh. I got a headache.”

  She took the call from Roy in the kitchen where Dusty, engrossed and drooling over Marcia, couldn’t hear.

  Whispering: “I sat for hours waiting for you. Hours.”

  His voice, soft and gentle. Sweet. “I really screwed up. I know that.”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t show.”

  “I told your stupid brother he should’ve gone.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  “Can’t say on the phone why, but I couldn’t drive. He could’ve, if he’d wanted to. But me, I couldn’t have drove to save my life, Creed—or, Colette. Or is it Chelsea? Devin said you were going by Chelsea, now…?”

  Charmed by the apology, and the way his voice shook—months late, true, but the chivalrous nature of the effort, assuming the Roy Earl hadn’t been coerced, prompted a touch of forgiveness. “Call me Creedence, if you want.”

  “That’s cool. I like that nickname.”

  “My dad gave it to me.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “Because of my initials—CCR.”

  “Oh, I get it. That’s awesome.”

  “So now, why couldn’t y’all drive?”

  “Too much, too fast.”

  “Do you even remember the concert?”

  “Not really. Aw, it wasn’t so great, anyway.”

  “Really?”

  “Your brother even left early. Didn’t he tell you that?”

  “No—well, dang.”

  “See?”

  Creedence gagged as she watched Dusty picking his nose and flicking the booger off in the direction of the TV screen.

  “So, I reckon that’s all. And I—”

  “Yes?”

  “If you ever wanted to go out again, or something?”

  “Yes—?”

  “I could make it up to you.”

  Lowering her voice. “I have a boyfriend.”

  “Oh, shit.”

  “But that’s not—it’s not that serious.”

  “Dang it. Just my luck.”

  “Roy Earl?”

  Waiting; silent.

  All courage leaving her. “Nothing. Thanks for saying you’re sorry.”

  Dejected, he rang off by saying he reckoned he’d see her around. When he came to see Devin. Sometime.

  Creedence, slumping against the kitchen wall, hung up the handset. She scratched at a zit on her forehead, which she swore had appeared over the course of the conversation—a stress-bump.

  Dusty, shouting over a Captain Crunch commercial: “Creedence? Fix me a glass of Pepsi and bring it on over here.”

  Chelsea, pouring the soda, stared into the glass and watched tiny bubbles burst on the surface, vanishing as soon as they appeared. Creedence, wishing herself to disappear, to vanish into the air like her mother’s cigarette smoke.

  Forty-Eight

  Devin

  Libby and Devin, after a hectic month of gradual transition, now all moved in to the new pad; exam week, over and done, with a housewarming party planned for the second Saturday of May, the tenth.

  Libby, trying out the new kitchen by baking cookies, sang along to the radio playing classic rock. Devin, in the living room setting up folding lawn chairs—they only had one couch, bought for twenty dollars at a thrift store. Time enough later for further furnishings.

  All the time in the world.

  The still nameless kitten, fuzzy, white paws, darted in and out of Devin’s feet. The kitty-cat, priming herself, sprang onto a scuffed coffee table rescued from the Meade family garage.

  “Meeee,” the kitten called, yet to grow into her full meow. “Me.”

  “Watch it, little one,” Devin admonished the gray cat. “Don’t wanna squish you.”

  “Here, angel. Don’t get under Daddy’s feet, now.”

  Libby, squatting down, beckoned. The cat leapt across the coffee table and dashed over to her on little white cotton-ball paws.

  “What are we going to name it?”

  “Her. Not it.” Libby, squinted at the squirming feline. “Her purr-fect name will come to me.”

  Devin, taking the cat. “So, I wanted to talk to you.”

  Libby bent over to pull a tray of overcooked peanut butter cookies out of the oven, rows of dark little hockey pucks. “I can’t get used to this damn thing. These are fucked.”

  “So, now that you and Billy have finally talked?”

  Dumping the cookies in the trash Libby turned, a slow-burn. “What about him?”

  “Didn’t y’all get it all worked out that night outside Lupo’s?”

  “I let him apologize. I didn’t say I accepted it.”

  “I thought about inviting him over.”

  Stricken. “Tonight?”

  “Tonight.”

  “Are you shitting me?”

  Devin put down the kitten, where it chased crazily across the laminate kitchen floor after a darting housefly.

  Libby slipped off her oven mitts and threw them onto the counter. “Let me ask you something—what if you hadn’t been there to stop him that night?”

  Devin, silent, held no wish to contemplate said hypothesis, which indeed took the air out of notions of welcoming Billy back into the fold. “But it did happen.”

  Repeating. “But what if it hadn’t?”

  Wishing to change the focus. “All I really did was fall off the roof.”

  “That was enough,” touching his face. “Forget it, angel man.”

  And so ending the discussion regarding Billy’s presence. Later, Devin made a furtive call, gave his buddy the bad news. He took it well, best as he could hide the sadness in his voice. Billy Steeple was a nut. Better he stayed away.

  Dobbs, arriving first, poured himself a glass of white wine out of a box of Franzia. He pulled out the so-called ‘white’ Beatles album and put side two onto the turntable. Singing to the kitten in a pure and steady voice: “Dear Prudence… won’t you come out to play-hey-hey…”

  Libby, a fit of finger-snapping, ah-ha excitement, ran into the living room. “That’s our baby’s name.”

  “Prudence?”

  “Prudy,” Libby saying in clarification. “Prudy-kitty.”

  “Me likey. Cute.”

  And so it would be.

  Roy Earl arrived, as did a new friend of Dobbs’s named Aaron, quiet until getting a touch lubricated, after which he became gregarious and funny; from his flamboyance, he seemed a good match for the emerging, but still self-conscious and tentative Dobbs.

  Devin, waiting for Dobbs to simply say the words to him. What his boyhood pal was, or wasn’t, didn’t matter—friendship, and trust, trumped all. But still that layer of secrecy, in a sense. An open secret. All very strange. It must be tough to be gay, is all Devin could think.

  Of course it was. Look at the way most guys talked among themselves.

  Some dorm friends of Libby’s showed up, a couple of cute girls; later, other folks from the neighborhood rolled down the block and joined in, Deadheads who brought weed and got excited to hear the Southeastern Dead show, tapes of which Billy had left in Devin’s campus mailbox and which were discovered sitting on the stereo console shelf.

  Much conversation bubbling around, and beers consumed; Libby, on a Bergman kick, tried to discuss The Seventh Seal with a room full of cinema philistines who hadn’t seen the classic, one she and Devin screened at the Bijou the week before during their Art House Classics festival.

  She described her favorite scene: stalked by Death, a medieval knight and a troupe of vagabond actors gather on a sunlit hillside to rest and eat:

  “The doomed travelers, eating strawberries and milk, enjoy a last instance of peace and grace before the dark-cloaked one again looms into the frame, inexorable. It gave
me the chills.” Almost in tears, she recounted Max von Sydow’s fated knight, smiling and speaking of how he’d always remember the lovely afternoon on the hillside—the food, the light, the people with whom he’d shared the bread of life, a last respite before the end. It’s about appreciating those simple moments for what they are,” nodding and explaining. “Being in the moment.”

  Devin, grunting. “Be here now. I get it.”

  Roy Earl, after catching a decent buzz on some skunk weed he’d brought, said to Devin outside, “We should have run that sister of yours over here for this.”

  “Well—you shoulda asked her, Romeo.”

  “I tried, but she said she had a boyfriend.” He raised his eyebrows asking for verification. “Right?”

  “This little dicknut back home named Dusty. Would love to see you break them up.”

  “Not my style.”

  Devin, laughing, grabbed Roy Earl around his chubby neck. “I’ll tell Creedence you were thinking about her. We’re going home tomorrow to get some more of my gear out of the house. Maybe I’ll see her.”

  “I was planing to ride back home, too, but my folks are coming over here to go out to eat—tomorrow’s Mother’s Day.”

  “Oh, shit. Guess I should get a card.”

  “If I know your Mama, she’ll have your ass if you don’t.”

  Everyone drifted away, leaving Dobbs and Aaron downstairs. Getting ready for bed, Libby carried Prudy on her shoulder like an infant; Dobbs, planning to sleep over and ride home with them the next day, crashed on the thrift store couch, bidding a private goodnight to what Devin thought of as his friend’s first real boyfriend.

  “Hey, y’all still awake?” Dobbs, whispering, came midway up the creaking, aged mill house stairs.

  Devin, grumbling, leaned out of the bathroom with a mouthful of toothpaste. “What is it?”

  “I don’t want to waste time in Edgewater County too long tomorrow.”

  “Who in their right mind would?”

  “Aaron—he wants to take me out to a movie.”