Wolf Land

by Jonathan Janz

  “All of them.”

  Duane gathered an armload and made his way to the bed, where Jake had assumed official reading position. The boy had propped himself up on four fluffy pillows, the pillowcases white with the exception of one, which featured brown cowboys on a light blue background. Jake had also placed an enormous chunk of slanted foam next to him.

  Jake nodded at the stiff foam pillow. “Mommy leans back on the wedge.”

  “Ah. The wedge.” Duane climbed onto the bed, leaned back. The wedge wasn’t particularly comfortable and was about as soft as a hunk of plywood. Additionally, there was no head support, so Duane had to worm around until he found a position that didn’t make his back ache.

  “Curious George first,” Jake said.

  Duane nodded, opened the book—a bright yellow anthology—and said, “‘Curious George and the Ice Cream Shop’.”

  “Not that one,” Jake said immediately.

  Duane looked at his resolute little face. The boy had Savannah’s freckles, but his hair was already darker. He also had his mom’s blue eyes, dimples and obstinate expression. Her nose too.

  Jake certainly looked nothing like Mike Freehafer.

  “I don’t like the ice cream one,” Jake explained. “The guy gets too mad at George.”

  Duane flipped a couple pages, studied the irate ice cream shop proprietor. “Doesn’t someone get mad at George in every story?”

  “Yeah, but not that mad.”

  Duane turned the page and saw Jake’s point. The ice cream shop owner looked like he was about to have George drawn and quartered.

  “Go to the table of contents,” Jake said.

  Duane drew back a little. “How do you know what a table of contents is?”

  Jake shrugged. “Mommy told me.”

  “You sure you’re only five?”

  Jake wrested the book from his hands and flipped to the table of contents. “This one,” he said, tapping a finger on “Curious George Visits the Aquarium.”

  “That one’s better, huh?”

  Jake nodded earnestly. “There are penguins in it.”

  “Yeah?”

  “And a beluga whale.”

  “Cool,” Duane said. He turned the page and cleared his throat. “‘This is George. He was a good little monkey and always very cur—’”

  “Hey!” Jake snapped.

  “What now?”

  “Mommy lets me say ‘curious’.”

  “You mean—”

  Jake rolled his eyes. “You read the first part and I say ‘curious’ at the end.”

  Duane went on, glancing quickly at Jake’s Spiderman wall clock. They’d been at it nearly five minutes and they’d read a grand total of two sentences.

  But they soon settled in, and Duane found his groove. They read three stories from the Curious George anthology, then switched over to Clifford the Big Red Dog. Duane tried to read The Berenstain Bears and the Green-Eyed Monster, but halfway through Jake seized Duane’s wrist.

  “I just remembered,” Jake said.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t like the monster.”

  “The green-eyed monster?”

  Jake nodded, his face the color of ash.

  Duane flipped a couple pages, careful to keep the images concealed from Jake. He found the green-eyed monster and decided Jake was right. Not that he would’ve forced the kid to hear the rest of the story anyway, but seeing that ghostly green skin, the blazing yellow eyes, the arched black eyebrows, he wondered why adults had to make kids’ stories so scary. The green-eyed monster looked creepy as fuck.

  He tossed that book aside and went on to Thomas the Train. They read a couple stories about cheeky engines, then segued into Frog and Toad. It was going on forty minutes, but Duane found he didn’t mind. The kid was solemn much of the time, but when Jake cracked a smile, Duane found it difficult not to smile too.

  At around the fifty-minute mark, his throat started to feel scratchy, and it reminded him just how seldom he talked in his day-to-day life. He had coworkers at the school, of course, and he shared an office with the other two tech guys, but most of the time they were immersed in their own work, content to exist in a virtual world rather than the real one. By the time Jake’s eyelids started to droop, Duane’s voice felt downright lousy, and he was coughing every half page. He asked Jake if they were done, and the boy nodded, already drifting toward sleep. Not wanting to freak the kid out by hugging him, Duane caressed Jake’s forehead once and whispered “Good night.”

  When Duane left Jake’s room, he smelled popcorn, hot and buttery and maddening. Not like movie theater popcorn and especially not the way it was at the drive-in, but still damned good. Duane’s stomach rumbled.

  Savannah was washing dishes.

  “Want some help?” he asked.

  Without looking up, she said, “Took you long enough.”

  “Mind if I steal a beer?”

  Savannah didn’t answer.

  He retrieved a bottle of Budweiser from the fridge, said, “I’m detecting a stormy mood over there.”

  She flipped a pot over and let it clank on the counter. There were still soapsuds on the bottom of the pot. “I’m tired, all right? I’ve been dealing with a lot of stress.”

  “I understand.”

  She grunted. “I doubt it. Unless you know what it’s like to be a single mom.”

  “I wouldn’t know anything about that.”

  She was quiet a moment, moving dishes around.

  He said, “You feel bad we’re gonna miss Mike’s funeral?”

  She turned on him. “Do you?”

  “Yes.”

  She scowled, went back to her dishes. “That’s the wrong answer.”

  “Sorry.”

  “After all the crap we’ve had to deal with…talking to the state cops, being asked the same questions by two different sets of people, I figure I’ve earned a little time away from it.”

  He nodded. “You’ve got a point. You ready for the movie?”

  “Is it all blood-and-guts?”

  “Not at all,” he said, plucking the DVD off the kitchen table and holding it up for her to see. “I picked out a classic tonight.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “What is that?”

  He inspected the DVD. “Bubba Ho-Tep. It’s about Elvis fighting an ancient Egyptian mummy in a nursing home.”

  She stared at him.

  “Elvis’s friend,” he went on, “is this black guy who thinks he’s JFK.”

  “Elvis and JFK are both dead.”

  “Well,” he said and gestured vaguely, “not in the world of the movie.”

  “Sounds lame.”

  Duane frowned at the DVD cover. “I’m not really doing it justice.”

  “Who’s in it?” she asked as she made her way past him to the living room.

  “Bruce Campbell,” he said.

  “Who?”

  “Bite your tongue.”

  She sighed. “Put it in then. I don’t have anything else to do. Might as well watch Elvis fight some mummies.”

  Melody stood in the center of the cavernous pole barn. To her right was a sheet metal wall and her baby brother Robbie. Behind her was an automatic door tall enough to accommodate a full-size RV. John, her second-oldest sibling, was stationed there. To her left was the largest open space, which led to where the cars were worked on. Her oldest brother Donny manned this area because he was the strongest and the meanest, even worse than John, who had a temper like a switch.

  Before her, barring the illuminated storage area and the back door of the pole barn, stood her father. Robbie had once started out there, and she’d made the mistake of darting past him, had even managed to make it out the door and most of the way to her Chevy Beretta, but Donny had brought her down, and despite
the fact it hadn’t been full dark yet, he’d taken her right there in the driveway. A car or two had whooshed by, but if the drivers glimpsed the incestuous rape occurring in the deep bed of gravel, they hadn’t cared enough to stop. More likely they hadn’t even noticed the cluster of Bridwells in the drive. Folks went way too fast down their road, often topping out over eighty.

  “You’ve been acting inconsiderate of late,” her father said. When she didn’t respond, he added, “Making us wait so much.”

  “Lotta bullshit,” John put in.

  Donny snickered, but Father Bridwell held up a hand. “It’s not funny, Donny. Not a bit.”

  A chill went through Melody. Father Bridwell looked severely pissed off. And, she realized, even drunker than usual. Which was why it was dangerous to delay the festivities. The later they started, the drunker they got. And the drunker they were, the worse the treatment.

  She glanced over at Robbie, who stared back at her expressionlessly. If there was any emotion in him, it wasn’t showing tonight. He looked bored by all of it. Or maybe he was resigned to it. She hoped that was it. Because if Robbie stopped caring…

  “Dad spoke to you, girl,” Donny snapped. “What have you got to say for yourself?”

  Again she looked at Robbie, who was now, she realized with a jolt, glaring at her in much the same way as Donny was. “Answer the question,” he demanded.

  The desolate sense of betrayal his words brought on was worse than anything he could have done to her.

  “Something wrong with you?” a voice asked, and Melody turned in time to see John closing on her, his strong arms shooting out and sending her sprawling onto her side.

  “Look at her,” Donny said, standing over her now. He toed the seat of her jean shorts with a work boot. “Been shakin’ that tush all over town. Now she’s too uppity to do right by her own kin.”

  “Dumb cunt,” John muttered.

  Another shadow fell over her. She looked up.

  Robbie.

  His lips were twisted with disdain.

  Donny crowed laughter. “Whoo-hoo! Look at poor Robbie. I do believe he’s jealous.”

  John’s eyes were hooded, impersonal. “Got no more claim to her than any one of us.”

  “Course he don’t,” Donny said. “But you know how Robbie is. Always actin’ like him and Melody’s different. Like they’re married or something.”

  Melody eyed Robbie, scoured his wintry expression for some sign of tenderness. Even a slight one, something so subtle only she could pick it up.

  Robbie’s eyes flashed. He reared back, kicked her in the stomach.

  Melody was caught off guard. She collapsed around his shoe, coughing and wheezing and wondering what she’d done wrong. Thinking it was how they treated the dogs, the ones they penned behind the pole barn. Often Father Bridwell or her brothers would give one a kick for no other reason than boredom or maybe sport. And the dogs would look up at them with those sad, uncomprehending eyes, and Melody knew if she looked up now she’d resemble one of those dogs, and she’d be damned if she’d sink that low.

  So she got control of herself. “Let’s get on with this.”

  And John, who seemed the horniest tonight, had begun to take her up on the offer when her father spoke up. “Never thought I’d hear it.”

  John, who’d been fiddling with the apron in an attempt to get at Melody’s shorts, hesitated. “Hear what, Dad?”

  Father Bridwell produced a pack of cigarettes, shook one out. Lit it. Slid the red Bic lighter back inside his hip pocket. He smoked soundlessly for what felt like forever. Everyone waited.

  Father Bridwell said, “I never thought I’d hear my daughter talk like that. ‘Let’s get on with this.’” He made a scornful sound. “Sound like some kind of streetwalker.”

  And so subdued were his tones that they all turned to stare at him, even John, who hadn’t risen but seemed to have forgotten about sex for now.

  “What do you mean, Dad?” Donny asked. Donny was a disturbed cretin, but where their father was concerned, he was as worshipful as any zealot.

  Father Bridwell looked strangely formal back there in the lower-ceilinged storage area. The lighting there was muted, umber-colored. Good enough to see but with a shadowy quality that seemed appropriate for their Wednesday night horror shows. But behind her father the down-hanging fluorescents shone so brightly that the man seemed rimmed with a heavenly corona, as if he were bathed in the glow of righteousness.

  He spoke righteously too, though if he’d ever set foot in a church, Melody wasn’t aware of it. “We’re family, and family’s supposed to have fun together. When your mama passed on, you had to take on more than your normal share, and for that I’ve always been proud of you, even if I might not have said so.”

  He’d never said so, had never complimented Melody in any way, but she kept quiet, listened.

  “You’ve changed, daughter, and not for the better. You’ve become acid-tongued. Sarcastic. And sarcasm is something I won’t abide from any of my children, least of all my only girl.”

  Is that so? Melody thought. Never mind that Donny’s the most sarcastic jackass in the county. Never mind that you, Father Bridwell, could cleave granite with your biting words.

  He was going on. “But you’ve been getting worse. And don’t pretend you’ve been behaving yourself in town either. I know the kind of shenanigans you’ve been up to. I talk to plenty of the old-timers, and they know which girls are giving it up too easily.”

  A boot nailed her forehead without warning. Melody’s head snapped back. So unexpected was the blow and so severe that she lay dazed on her back for several moments without a clue as to what had happened or who had attacked her. Then, through the blanket of grogginess, she heard the scuffle to her right, glanced that way and saw both Donny and John subduing her little brother, who looked nothing at all like Robbie now and more like an enraged beast, with spittle frothing from his mouth and his red-rimmed eyes shimmering with tears. Robbie was incensed, she now realized, because he was jealous.

  “Just calm it down, Rob,” Donny was soothing. “Just take ’er easy.”

  Her father’s voice was meditative. “See what you’ve done to this family, girl? See what kind of pain and torment you’re putting your kid brother through?”

  Robbie lunged toward her, but John and Donny were too strong for him. They drove him back toward the sheet metal wall, their combined force denting it, Robbie’s kicking heel bowing it out at the bottom, so that a delicate crescent of twilight peeked through. From her place on the ground, Melody fancied she could scent the influx of outside air. The atmosphere in here was dank, chalky, like an old schoolhouse. But out there it was crisp and exhilarating and perfumed with the fields and the forests and beyond that the lakes, with their fish and their cooling brown waters.

  God, how she longed to be outside.

  “I’m gonna give you a chance to atone for your mistakes, Mel. I’m gonna let you plead for my forgiveness. Your brothers, I can’t speak for. What they decide is up to them.”

  “Forgiveness for what?” she asked.

  Robbie darted at her, but John and Donny reined him in. Barely.

  Her father nodded. “I don’t blame you for being agitated, Robbie. But maybe that’s just the kind of person she is. Leadin’ everybody on. Making every man who lies down between those legs of hers think he’s special.” He tilted his head back, chuckled mirthlessly and blew out smoky air. “You know what old Fred Kershaw called you?” He glanced at her, his eyes twinkling. “You remember old Fred?”

  Of course she remembered him. Fred was Glenn’s father, and Glenn was one of the many guys she’d dated, though dated wasn’t really the right word for it. Hooked up was more like it.

  Melody thought of Fred Kershaw, who wasn’t evil or anything. Just typical. Blue collar. Misogynistic. Always watching her with that lascivio
us glint in his rheumy eyes. Always undressing her mentally, creating scenarios. And passing that on to Glenn, a shitty example like so many men of that generation.

  “What did he call me?” Melody asked, her voice as dry as dust.

  She knew the answer before her father said, “The village bicycle. You know what that—”

  “Of course I know what it means,” she interrupted. “Everyone’s had a ride. It’s older than you, that saying.”

  Her father sucked on his cigarette, breathed out a ghostly puff of smoke. He was holding the cigarette like a joint, something she doubted he’d ever tried. In fact, he didn’t smoke a lot either, preferred chewing tobacco instead. Unless he was stressed about something, in which case he smoked several packs a day.

  “You know the saying,” her father said, “but you don’t seem bothered by it. Am I to understand that’s correct?”

  She closed her eyes. “Sure, Dad.”

  Even with her eyes closed, Melody sensed a drastic change in the room. It wasn’t until the hackles on the back of her neck had begun to stir and her skin had tightened into goose pimples that she realized that everything smelled different too. Her little brother smelled like anguish. Donny and John, they smelled like fear. When Father Bridwell got mad, he got wildly unpredictable, and the way he was talking, bad things were afoot.

  And speaking of her father, he smelled of violence. So she wasn’t surprised at all when he said, “Donny, go fetch me that branch from the office.”

  Donny blinked at Father Bridwell. “Branch?”

  Father turned his flinty gaze on Donny. “The fir branch,” he explained. “The only goddamned branch in the office?”

  Donny hesitated. “What about Robbie?”

  She noticed that Robbie was still straining against his captors.

  But Father Bridwell said, “Robbie’ll behave himself or Robbie will get the same treatment that Melody here’s gonna get.”

  Donny’s eyes glittered, a small, horrid smile appearing on his wet lips. “What kinda treatment?”