Bleeders

by Anthony Bruno

  He finished his beer and went back for another one, once again astounded that the biker chicks just gave it to him. He drank and strolled around, starting to get a buzz. He found another serving table loaded with cookies and pies as well as a make-your-own sundae station with every topping imaginable from hot fudge to butterscotch to crushed candy bars to walnuts in syrup. He was too full to think about dessert. He also had more hiking to do to find a place to camp for the night. But he didn’t have to go just yet. He had time.

  He wandered toward the barn and leaned on a split-rail fence at the edge of a field where five horses grazed peacefully in the distance, unfazed by the loud music. He walked around the barn to the front of the property where dozens of cars and vans were parked along a gravel driveway—everything from stretch limos to Volkswagen Beetles. The driveway was next to a large pond speckled with hundreds of water lilies with dark pink blossoms. He peered across the water to see where the property met the road, but it must have been a long way off. This Michael must be pretty damn rich, he thought.

  He started walking back toward the party, thinking about making a sundae, when he noticed that the front door was wide open. No one seemed to be around. He was curious to take a peek at the inside, see what else this rich guy Michael had. He mounted the wooden steps that led up to a spacious wrap-around porch with groupings of cedar Adirondack chairs and old-fashioned sliders. He approached the front door cautiously, feeling like a trespasser. He poked his head inside.

  The front room was huge but intimate with clusters of sofas, rocking chairs, and piles of pillows on the floor where people could gather in conversation groups. An assortment of acoustic guitars, dobros, banjos, and mandolins hung from the walls near a fire-engine red grand piano. An enormous fieldstone fireplace large enough to burn the whole piano dominated one side of the room. Lassiter killed off the rest of his beer and parked the bottle on the porch just outside the door. He stepped inside and crossed a large round rug with a geometric tribal pattern in burnt orange, blue, and ivory. As he approached the piano, he could feel the thrum of the music outside resonating with the instruments in the room. He stared at the black and white keys and imagined this Michael guy making music here.

  He walked over to a wide winding staircase with a whimsical balustrade—a carved horse’s head on the newel post and irregular veins and knots in the exotic light-colored wood. He peeked behind the staircase and peered down a corridor that led to a bustling kitchen. The catering staff, he assumed. He noticed the skinny biker-chick bartender sitting at a high counter, eating something from a bowl, and he ducked out of sight. He didn’t think she’d spotted him. Too busy eating.

  He considered going back outside before someone caught him there, but he was curious to see what was upstairs. He started climbing the carpeted steps like a burglar, careful to keep his fingers off the railing. They were a little sticky with barbecue sauce.

  Framed photographs hung on the wall along the staircase, and it was like a slide show, the same guy in every photo. Slender and fit with floppy brown shoulder-length hair that swept over one eye. And the same knowing grin in each shot. Lassiter figured this must be Michael. Michael with Mick Jagger. Michael with Ringo. Michael with Tina Turner. Michael with Jack Nicholson. Michael with Stephen Spielberg. A very young Michael with Jim Morrison. Michael with President Carter.

  On the second-floor, hallways branched off in three directions. Several large abstract paintings hung from vanilla-white walls in one hallway. The other hallways were painted misty rose and a purplish pastel blue. He headed for the blue hallway, careful not to make noise. The first room he came to was a library, floor-to-ceiling shelves crammed with books, mostly well-worn paperbacks. A black leather couch and a matching armchair were in the middle of the room. An open copy of Stephen King’s The Stand was face down on the arm of the couch, a hardcover edition of The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran in the seat of the armchair.

  Lassiter left the library and peeked into the four other rooms on that hallway, each one a bedroom with a king-sized bed and a private bath. The beds were unmade, and the presence of suitcases and duffels indicated that guests were staying over. He turned around and headed for the misty rose hallway.

  He sensed that this was the wing where the family slept. It felt more lived in. Photographs of Michael and what Lassiter assumed were his wife and children hung on the walls. His wife was a pretty, petite brunette. His two daughters appeared at various ages in the photos—as toddlers, as little kids, and as homely middle-schoolers with awful hairstyles and braces. The older girl had light brown hair like her father. The younger one had dark coffee-colored hair, like her mother. The sound of the band outside was louder in this hallway.

  He poked his head into the first room on his left. One of the daughters’ rooms, he guessed. The bed was made and had a ruffled purple bedspread. Tidy desk. Bottles and jars arranged neatly on the dresser. Galloping horses on the wallpaper.

  He crossed the hallway to the opposite bedroom, which looked like a tornado had blown through. Bedspread mostly on the floor along with random articles of clothing. Dresser drawers open. Electric guitar propped in a corner, the amplifier’s power light glowing red. Every inch of wall space was covered with pictures clipped from magazines—famous people, people he didn’t recognize, bands, cats, dogs, guitars, surfers, scenery, sunsets, moonscapes, oceanscapes, all kinds of stuff. He wondered if this chaotic collage reflected the girl’s personality. He had pasted a bunch of pictures over his bed in his dorm room, but nothing like this.

  He stepped closer to the bed and spotted a black satin bra in the tangle of sheets. He stared at it, the sound of bass and drums pounding in the distance. He picked it up and rubbed the slinky material in his fingers. He wondered which girl owned it—the older one or the younger one. He held a cup in each hand and crushed them.

  “Are you sure, Natalie?” A woman’s voice out in the hallway.

  He dropped the bra and froze.

  “I can stay, Natalie. I don’t mind.”

  Lassiter tiptoed to the door and peered out. A plump middle-aged woman stood in the doorway of another room, facing in. She wore a floor-length, sleeveless black-and-white batik dress and had long red hair tied in a single braid down her back.

  “Really. I don’t mind.” She was talking to someone inside the room.

  “Go on. I’ll be fine,” another woman said, her voice fainter. “Go join the party. Have some fun. I promise, I won’t go anywhere.”

  The plump woman laughed, but it was a sad laugh.

  “Go get something to eat and leave me alone for a while. I want to take a nap. I’m tired.”

  “Okay, you take a nap,” the plump woman said. “I’ll come back in a little while to check on you.”

  “No, don’t check on me. Go have some fun and let me rest.”

  “Okay. I’ll be back later.”

  Lassiter ducked back into the bedroom. He didn’t move, his breathing shallow as he listened to the plump woman’s departing flip-flops. He stood absolutely still for at least five minutes, listening, staring at the bra on the bed. He thought about taking it but decided not to. That was sick, he thought.

  He peeked out the door. The hallway was empty. He could hear the band playing a ballad, just a lonesome voice, an acoustic guitar, and a mellow electric bass. It was time to get out of there. But then he heard something. Someone moaning. The woman in the other room.

  He stepped quietly toward the room, thinking she might be in some kind of trouble. He peeked around the doorjamb, and as soon as he saw her, he stopped breathing. Not what he expected. A small woman in a hospital bed, her head sunk into the pillows at an uncomfortable angle. Her dark, shoulder-length hair was threaded with silver; her face was pale, almost translucent. Her hands on top of the covers were thin and delicate, and her shoulders seemed as fragile as a small bird’s.

  He just stared at
her. She seemed to be sleeping, but her brow was furrowed. He wondered if she was having a nightmare. Maybe she was in pain.

  Outside the band stopped playing, and raucous cheers replaced the music. Lassiter took a tentative step toward the window next to the bed. The stage was right across the lawn, a bird’s eye view. The musicians were taking their bows.

  A collection of amber-plastic prescription bottles along with a drinking glass and a white plastic carafe cluttered the woman’s night table. He leaned in closer to read the labels, but the names of the drugs meant nothing to him. Clearly she was very sick.

  Behind the pill bottles was an 8 X 10 photograph in a rustic oak frame. It was another family photo—Michael, this woman, and the two daughters—but the sisters were older in this one, teenage. Their names were burned into the frame—Cindy, Michael, Natalie, and Trisha. Cindy, the older daughter with the light-brown hair, was about seventeen, and she looked like her father. Trisha, the younger girl—fifteen, maybe sixteen—was the spitting image of her beautiful mother. The same straight dark hair, fair complexion, and wide blue eyes. The family was seated on a sofa, parents in the middle, kids on the ends. The older girl smiled and leaned her head on her father’s shoulder. The younger girl and her mother tipped their heads together, the light catching their eyes. Daddy’s girl and Mommy’s girl.

  Lassiter compared the woman’s face in the flesh to the face in the photo. She seemed thin and drawn in the photo, sick but not as sick as now. He looked out at the stage where a new group of musicians was setting up. Time to get going, he thought.

  He walked softly toward the door, but when he glanced back at the woman, his heart leapt. Her crystal-blue eyes were staring at him. He thought she was dead, but then he saw her fingers moving on the sheets. He sensed that she wanted something, but he didn’t want to be caught here with her. When he started moving toward the door, she frowned, putting deep creases in her brow.

  “Don’t go,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper.

  His heart thumped. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you. I…” He didn’t know what to say. He had no excuse for being there.

  “It’s all right,” she said. She closed her eyes. She seemed to be fighting pain.

  “Do you need something?” he said.

  She opened her eyes and nodded. “Yes… I need you…” She squeezed her eyes tight until the pain passed. “I need you to kill me.”

  He stared at her. Had he heard her right?

  “Please… kill me.”

  “But—”

  “I can’t do it myself.”

  He studied her face. She was serious.

  “I’m sick of this,” she said. “I’m dragging everyone down. I’m never going to get better.”

  Her bones looked like delicate sticks beneath rice-paper skin. He could snap them in his hands, he thought.

  “Please.” A sob caught in her throat. Her head rolled to the side, and hair spilled over her face.

  He inched closer. He could see her sad blue eyes through the strands of hair.

  A swell of cheers from the backyard distracted him. He glanced down at the stage where a man and a teenage girl, both holding acoustic guitars, stood in front of microphones.

  “Yeah, yeah, you know who I am,” the man said to the crowd with a wry chuckle. “This here’s the star of the show.” He jerked his thumb at the girl. “My daughter, Trisha.”

  The girl did a bashful curtsy, and as she bowed her head, her dark hair fell over her face. Just like her mother. Lassiter started to get an erection.

  Thin fingers gripped his wrist, and he jumped at her touch. The woman’s eyes begged. “Kill me,” she whispered. “Please.”

  Outside Michael and his daughter started to play.

  “Kill me.” She squeezed his wrist. “Please.”

  He could have pulled away from her grip, but he didn’t. Her touch excited him. He looked at her name on the frame. Natalie.

  The room glowed with golden late-afternoon light. The guests crowded around the stage, swaying to an upbeat folk-rock song, Michael and Trisha singing together. Lassiter stared at the family photo. He was attracted to Trisha, couldn’t stop looking at her. She was Natalie but younger and not sick.

  Natalie’s eyes pleaded with him. “It won’t be hard. I’ll tell you what to do.”

  He shook his head. “I can’t… I… just can’t. You have to tough it out. You’ll get better.”

  Her hand slid off his wrist. Her forlorn expression made him feel bad. “I will not get better. Why won’t you help me?”

  “I can’t kill you. It’s against the law. I’ll get in trouble.”

  The fierceness in her eyes scared him. “Are you a virgin?”

  He blushed. He wasn’t, but he resented the question. Why would she think that? Was there something wrong with him? He remembered Steph’s attempt to tie him up and the scalding humiliation he’d felt. He was feeling it again.

  “You act like a virgin,” Natalie said. “You have to stop being so careful with yourself. You have to take chances.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Yes, you do. You know exactly what I’m talking about.” Her words were slow, but they hit like hammers.

  He snatched up one of the prescription bottles and shook it in her face. “Look at all these pills you have. Just take a bunch. Do it that way. You don’t need me.”

  She shook her head. “I can barely swallow the ones I’m supposed to take. I could never keep that many down.”

  “Look, I’m sorry for your… situation. But I gotta go.” He started toward the door.

  “Wait!” She’d tried to raise her voice, but she sounded like a wounded crow, and it stopped him in his tracks.

  “What?” He wheeled around to face her. “What do you want from me?”

  “Just hear me out. See that drawer?” Her eyes pointed to the night table. “There are syringes in there. Take one out, pull back the plunger so it fills with air, then inject it into a vein. When the air bubbles get to my heart, sayonara. It’ll only take you a minute.”

  “But—”

  “No buts! You don’t know me, I’m nothing to you. I’m only asking for a little favor. Like bumming a cigarette for God’s sake. I’d do it myself if I had the strength.”

  “But—”

  She scowled. “Christ, just get the hell out. You’re useless.”

  “No, I…” He thought of Steph and those foreign girls on the trail. “I want to help you, but—”

  The amplified sound of Trisha’s voice distracted him. “Mom, if you’re listening up there, I wrote this one for you.” Her voice was husky but girlish.

  He looked down at the stage. The teenager was standing at the mike by herself, looking up at this room. He immediately stepped away from the window.

  “It’s called ‘I Need You,’” Trisha said.

  She strummed slow bittersweet chords on the guitar, then started to sing—a clear, unadorned soprano, nothing like her speaking voice.

  “When the sun is low,” she sang, “and all you know is the beating of your heart…”

  A tear appeared on Natalie’s cheek. “I don’t want my girls to see me any worse than I am now. I don’t want them to remember me this way.”

  An aching lump formed in his throat. He hated to see people cry. But this wasn’t his problem. He didn’t know this woman.

  Natalie’s tears seemed unnaturally large as they coursed down her sunken cheeks. She sobbed quietly but uncontrollably.

  Trisha’s voice filled the room. “When the pain that you feel rolls on like a wheel…”

  Natalie’s lips moved, but she couldn’t get the words out. Her face was contorted, all traces of her former beauty lost, and a horrifying image flew into his head. The old black
-and-white horror movie, The Fly, the insect with a man’s head crying for mercy. When he was a little kid, he’d seen that movie on TV, and that scene had haunted him for years. It still upset him, and Natalie was just like the tiny man-fly pleading for help when there was nothing anyone could do.

  His head throbbed; he felt nauseous. He heard the man-fly screaming, saw its tortured face behind his eyelids, and couldn’t stand it. “All right, all right,” he finally said. “I’ll do it.” He whipped open the drawer. Anything to make her stop. But deep inside he really wanted to do it.

  The drawer was full of all kinds of medical supplies, but he didn’t see any syringes.

  “Those,” she said. “In the white wrappers.”

  “These?” He picked up a thin white packet. He’d thought they were tampons.

  “Open it.”

  He tore it open and pulled out a disposable syringe. His hands shook.

  She tapped the inside of her arm with her bony fingers. “Find a vein.”

  He swallowed hard on a dry throat and pulled the plastic cap off the needle. It seemed too small to do the job.

  She kept tapping her arm.

  “When the nights are long and deep, and your thoughts won’t let you sleep…”

  He wished Trisha would stop singing. He couldn’t think straight. But part of him didn’t want her to stop.

  “Do it,” Natalie whispered. “Do it now.”

  He held the syringe like a pencil and gripped her wasted bicep, trying to hold her arm steady, but he was the one who was shaking.

  “Take a chance,” she whispered. “Do it.”

  He put the needle on her arm, sweat dripping off his forehead and onto the sheets. He didn’t know how to begin.

  “Stick it in. Go on. Just do it.”

  He scratched at her flesh. Beads of blood rose from her skin.