by Kim Powers
A long foreboding hallway was in front of us, with display cases broken out, glass littering the floor. Lockers hung open, every wall a fantasia of color and graffiti. Impossible to imagine that this was the place where my brother had grown up, where he had once been his happiest; this place where I could have been, if we’d just switched places at birth. Now that I’d seen Aaron’s pictures in his file at Bruckner, I could imagine him here, even in the dark. That sensitive little boy with huge eyes and dark circles under them, forced to drag his feet along or walk on canes and crutches. Always having to be on the lookout. Always ready.
Now we’d switched places. Now I was the one on the lookout.
Mizell and I hugged the walls as closely as we could, edging our way along them, past the animal droppings, the spider webs, the bird shit that slicked everything. I could hear them, night animals. Outside and in.
And something else, at the end of the hall. That low jumble of sound I’d heard earlier.
People sounds.
People smells. Shit and urine.
And now, something moving in the room. Something flickering.
Mizell pointed her pistol out in front of her and pivoted around the doorjamb.
Then stopped. Gasping.
“What?” It was the first sound I’d made in minutes, what felt like the first breath I’d taken in hours. I swung around too, no precaution, no safety net, into the room and . . .
. . . I saw myself. Looking back at me. On the walls, cut-out pictures of me from years ago, on slick magazine stock. Black-and-white newspaper photos. And film too, taking over our bodies like we were the projection screens.
Lights, camera, action . . . everywhere.
Cones of light in our faces, bodies moving over our bodies; the room was alive.
All those images, filling the room like air, blinding us—but I finally got used to the light and saw where it was coming from. Two old-fashioned film projectors, set up on a desk in the middle of the room, each aimed at different walls. Four metal reels, moving in sync, the celluloid rasping and squeaking as it moved from one spool to the next.
“What the hell is this?” Mizell still whispered, like she’d lost the ability to speak.
On one wall, an old Hercules movie from the ’60s was being projected. Flexes and grunts. Greased-up he-men, in loincloths.
On the other wall, me. In Sydney, at the Olympics. In short shorts and a sleeveless shirt, flying over the pole vault bar like a half-man, half-bird.
But it was all mixed together, the projectors positioned so they crisscrossed each other. Me, in a Hercules movie; those greased-up actors, in Sydney.
Madness.
Mizell was scrunching around on the floor, trying to find cords and outlets and plugs, to turn them off. But the film ran out before she could: strips of celluloid whipping against the metal reels and then finally unspooling onto the floor. A tsunami of brown and gray plastic, now falling off and tangling around our feet, like snakes. Blinding white-hot light still shooting out of the projectors, warming the room and . . .
“Shit. There’s more.” I saw it first.
Only now did we see what the darkness had hidden, what those projected images playing on the walls had obscured: the Labors of Hercules, like a sick exhibit in a sideshow. Aaron’s version of them, displayed up on the walls in twelve separate panels. Grown-up versions of what he’d first made back at the Bruckner Home, each one telling a story drawn from the past few days. Antlers from a deer, hammered into the wall. Shards of broken pottery. An unbroken peeling from a golden apple, still wet and fresh and dangling like entrails, like he’d just carved the apple and left it waiting for us before he departed. Like he’d known we would make the pilgrimage to the Bruckner Home first, all the clues leading us there, before they’d lead us here.
Twelve macabre chapters, all but the last one crossed over with giant neon Xs, declaring that he’d been here.
So had Skip. So had Wendy.
They were right there in front of me, in the final, unmarked panel.
Two separate photos of them, snapped in a moment of terror, as if he’d captured them mid-scream, the flash of the bulb blinding them. Each one tossed over the shoulder of some mammoth man, like sacks of potatoes.
Mizell angled the light from one of the projectors, so we could see every detail.
The full mural, into which their photos had been pinned.
Underneath them was the drawing of a sort of dragon with three heads, covered in real snakeskin, the see-through, scaly kind that a snake sheds and leaves behind, ragged and torn with the effort of transformation.
“The final Labor. Cerberus. The three-headed monster. He guards the entrance to the dead, by keeping out the living.”
Pinned to the top of the two outermost necks, like heads, were the photos of Skip and Wendy.
And on top of the middle neck, twisting and reaching up the highest, was a photo of me. And Aaron, age three or so, dressed up in our matching cowboy shirts and sitting on top of a sagging pony at the kiddie zoo.
I was beaming; he was grabbing onto my waist for dear life, his mouth open and screaming into the camera.
Mizell reached out. “But why isn’t this one all crossed out like the others?”
“Because he’s not done yet. I’m not done. There’s one more Labor left to do. You get help. I’ll head here.”
I pointed to a place on the bottom of the panel, where a signature would normally have gone. In what must have been the very last thing he added, eked out in the last few dribbles of spray paint, was a final map for me.
A real map, of the Canaan College cemetery, spray-painted with two shaky rectangles in DayGlo orange.
Two graves.
And two final words, A to Z, nothing else left to say.
Womb.
Tomb.
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
The massive iron gate that guarded the Canaan cemetery was locked this late at night.
A tall, grillwork fence circled all the way around the perimeter, but it couldn’t keep me out. It never had. In college, when I ran through here late at night, scaling that fence was just another part of my workout; there to keep out vandals and college kids on a dare, but not me. Now though, everything was different. I finally understood the fence’s true purpose: separating us from them. The living from the dead.
I barely knew which one I was anymore.
Every movement I made inside the gates set off a swirl of fog that seemed to reshape itself into monsters and gargoyles. Faces in the air, or on grave markers? I couldn’t tell. They seemed to leap out at me, guarding the way.
And now, a voice, just as wispy and impermanent as the fog.
“Just a few more. Steps.”
The voice I’d heard on the telephone.
My monster.
My brother. Luring me to the mausoleum at the top of the hill. Exactly the place that he’d marked on the map.
The words seemed to come from everywhere, and I could only call back in kind, looking everywhere. Searching. Lost. Half-dead. And panting so much I sounded like him.
“I did. My part. I did. The Labors.”
“Did you . . . get the golden apple? A mocking laugh. “Did you . . . find my. Lair?”
There, at the top of the crest, eternal flames on torches shot out on either side of the mausoleum’s heavy marble door; the fire was so overwhelming it was all I could see at first.
Before I saw the person behind the flame.
Behind these last three days.
Behind these last thirty-six years.
Aaron. Iphicles. Him, in front of the mausoleum, in his wheelchair throne.
“My God.”
Nothing Mamarie had said could have prepared me for the reality of this.
We were together, face to face, for the first time since childhood. We were the same. Like looking in a mirror, but one that was broken, the silver plating behind the glass worn off.
Even he seemed dumbstruck.
“We meet. Not for the first. Time. But certainly. The last. Pardon me for. Sitting already.” His voice, his lips moving in front of me. No phone between us anymore, no words on paper, to get in the way. Just graves of the dead. “They took me away. Before I could. Even say your name. Ethan.”
“I didn’t know, I swear . . . how could I? I was too little. I didn’t . . . oh my sweet Jesus in heaven . . . ”
“What’s so. Sweet about him? I knew. I never forgot. How could you? You were my brother and you. Left me.”
“I didn’t know! Nobody told me!”
“They shouldn’t have to. Tell you! Three years and . . . here today. Gone tomorrow. I tried to . . . reach out. So many times. Here, and . . . there.”
“Why didn’t you just step out and . . . ”
“Stepping isn’t my . . . forte, as you may have. Noticed. I tried to . . . get your attention. In college. The Olympics. My fan letter. Letters. From the home. Rebuffed. When you were. Married. When it was . . . snowing. When you were . . . happy . . . ”
My house, five years ago. Dusk. Magic hour.
A snowball fight. Bodies, laughing and falling in soft snow mounds.
A wonderful smell, winter and fire smoke and evergreens in the yard.
“How I wanted to . . . join in . . . the fun. You tossed the keys to your. Lovely wife, and she . . . caught them . . . ”
An arc of silver, through the air. A jangle, like a wind chime.
Those keys, her death sentence. Patti detoured from her car and got in mine.
“That small twist of fate: ‘Take mine. The chains are on.’ The mishap . . . was intended . . . for you. My way of saying, ‘Forget something?’”
Patti, in my car.
“One snip of a brake belt, and. A bang. Not a whimper. That I regret. Truly. She hadn’t. Hurt me. It took a little more. Ingenuity. To take our parents. Boom.”
The house on fire, killing them.
The car, skidding on ice, killing my wife.
I lunged at him, the moment it all came together in my head.
“I will. Fucking. KILL you.”
I was just feet away from him when the door to the mausoleum flew open, as if on cue. A muscled behemoth was practically pulled out, barely able to restrain three snarling pit bulls on leashes.
Cerberus, the watchdog of Hell.
“Of course, the real Cerberus has three heads and snakes all over its back, so I’ve had to . . . improvise.”
Iphicles—I couldn’t think of him as Aaron; this man wasn’t my brother—wheeled himself to a small wooden box on the ground, almost a miniature coffin. He opened the lid; inside was a mass of writhing snakes, a jumble of guts come to life.
“Hercules and Iphicles. Together again. With snakes. Remember? I cried at them. You snuffed them out. Held them in your hands. Played. With them.”
He put the box on the ground, ready to be tipped over.
“But that . . . that’s a story out of mythology,” I pleaded with him. “That’s not real.”
“It is real. It’s our story. Lights, please.”
The muscle man grabbed one of the smoking torches from the mausoleum and came down the steps, light in one hand, the snarling dogs of hell in the other. He held the flame over Iphicles’ head, almost like an umbrella, and . . .
I could see. I could finally see everything.
At the edge of his wheelchair, a grave. Six feet deep, four or so feet across. A mound of dirt to the side, where it had been dug.
A brand new grave, with Skip and Wendy tossed down in a heap on the bottom, their eyes closed, arms and legs bound.
His final mural, come to life. Or death. It was so dark, I couldn’t tell if they were breathing.
“Are they . . . are they . . . ”
“Spit it out. Sleeping . . . for now. But I’m sure the snakes will. Wake them up. Or the dogs. The choice is. Yours.”
“Let them go. I’m the one you hate.”
“Hate hardly begins to convey the . . . range of my feelings. Of course, there’s another. Option.” He pulled out a gun, from where he was sitting. “My pronunciation may be a little. Rusty. Latin wasn’t. Required. At the home. But . . . Fui quod es, eris quod sum.”
I stared at him. “‘I once was what you are, you will be what I am.’ The note your guy gave to TJ.”
“Sums things up pretty. Nicely. Don’t you think? A swap. I live. You get the. Chair. This chair. My chair. My wheelchair.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I shoot you. In the spine. Not to kill. Just to. Paralyze.”
“You’re insane.”
He looked down at my family, asleep in that grave. Waiting for me. “Finally—he notices.” Then back to me. “Your legs. For their lives. So you can. Truly. Walk a mile in my shoes. Tradsies.”
“And then what? We’re both in wheelchairs?”
“Just you. I’m soon to . . . depart. I’ve got nothing. To lose. This disease you cursed me with. Left the door open for so many. Other. Infections. A perfect storm. Of shit. In my body. Killing me.”
A million words in my head, but none of them were coming out of my mouth. I fell to my knees—on his level now, looking straight into his eyes—and started crawling toward him. I was the prodigal brother, begging forgiveness for a sin I hadn’t even known I had committed. A sin of omission.
A prodigal brother with a plan.
The dogs strained, the closer I got.
The snakes whipped up, hearing those low-throated growls.
“I would have saved you, I swear. I still can.” Part of what I was saying felt real. Part of it wasn’t a ploy. Part of it was every ounce of grief I’d ever felt.
“You left me! You forgot me! You should have. Remembered.” Every word he said, choking in the night air. Every word he forced himself to say, using up the last words he had on earth. “You came to the home. Mother brought you. Did you ever think. To ask yourself. Why? And why I was there. In the first place? Your umbilical cord. My neck. Voilà.”
“You’re right. I should have known. I should have . . . remembered. Us. In the womb. Together. It’s my fault, so take me. Just don’t hurt them. I’m begging. My legs, for their lives. Just let me do it my way. Let me brace myself for it. Let me look at my girls one last time.”
Every word I spoke, getting closer and closer to him.
I stood up and put my hands full out to my side, in surrender.
“Let me be close to you, so it’s a sure shot,” I said, hoping I was right with my plan. “A righteous shot. You’ve earned the right. Don’t miss. Don’t kill me. Just . . . take my legs.”
His mouth open in shock at what I was doing—at what I was letting him do—I was now just a few feet away from him.
“No. Don’t look in my eyes. I don’t wanna see it coming. I don’t wanna see you pull the trigger.”
I slowly faced away from him, my back a perfect target.
Him—a perfect target.
I kicked backward with all my might. My right leg felling him like a sledgehammer, knocking him out of his chair with all the might of the strongest man in the world.
He went flying, and so did I.
Every decathlete says the 1500-meter run, the very last event of all ten, is the hardest. That the decathlon is “nine Mickey Mouse events and then the 1500.” Maybe because it comes at the very end. Maybe because you’re running faster and harder than you’ve ever run in your life, three and three-quarters laps around a track 400 meters long. Maybe because it’s the one last thing left between winning—and losing. A Wheaties box and—who?
Now, it was the one thing left between life—and death. Skip’s. Wendy’s. Mine.
I was running the 1500 again, thirteen years after the last time, with a gimp leg and a pack of feral pit bulls on my tail, and I had to win.
Or else.
Arms pumping, feet flying like pistons, muscle memory took over.
Instead of being chased by three mad dogs, it was the seven other men I raced ag
ainst in 2000. All of us in a row, evenly spaced, but the minute the gun sounded, we edged toward the innermost track, closest to the heart of the circle.
But here, in this cemetery, it was like I was running the last lap first, already at my breaking point before I even started. No more time to pace yourself, no feeling out the pack, just a needle-sharp, stomach-churning hunger to master the pack.
I conjured up every bad thing that had ever happened to me to push me on; I turned them all into a monster that was nipping at my heels, just inches from taking me down.
I forced those tattoos of flames on my ankles to come to life.
I forced myself to remember my father holding that cigarette lighter so close to my skin, close enough to singe off the hair on my legs before he turned it on himself.
I forced myself to remember what he did to my brother.
I forced myself to remember what he did to me, turning me into a machine that had to win.
The barking, mad dogs of Cerberus were almost on me. So close, I could feel the rabid saliva flying out of their black-speckled mouths and onto the back of my legs. Whippet-thin tree branches flogged my face, as I ran past the graves I always saw on my daily runs.
That’s when it came to me what I had to do.
The excavation pit, where I’d landed just a few days ago, on my run through the cemetery. On my way home to a daughter who had already been taken. I’d made my silly bargain with God just before I jumped: if I landed on the other side, then everything would be okay with Skip when I got home. Our tiff would be forgotten.
Then God had failed me. I hadn’t made it. Skip was gone.
Now, I made that bargain again, praying with everything I had: God, if only I can jump over this pit—then everything will be okay with Skip.
It had to be.
I had to be. Good enough to fly through the air, and land on the other side.
I was almost there, every last muscle at the breaking point, my hurt ankle almost melting in pain . . .
I screamed one last time, in agony, adrenaline pushing me into overdrive . . .
I flew . . .
. . . over the pit, my legs peddling for momentum, through thin air . . .
And landed, hard. On the other side.
