by J. Thorn
“Samuel,” his father said, this time with more force.
“Yeah, Dad. That would be awesome. Really cool.”
His father nodded at the clerk.
“Lemme box that for ya.”
“Can I just put it in my pocket, Dad?”
Samuel felt his father’s hand ruffle his hair and then move to the middle of his back, where it guided him out of the store. Samuel did not even notice the transaction, the receipt or the small talk between Billy and his father. He gripped the knife in his palm and for the first time, he felt like a man.
Photographs rolled through Samuel’s head – a slideshow of his life. Each one brought a remembrance of the Scout pocketknife and how it had become part of him. Samuel always kept it in his front right pocket, where it clattered together with loose change. Through his early teen years, Samuel kept the knife clean and polished. He maintained the blade and would buff the mother-of-pearl inlay. He remembered losing the knife several times, the last time in college after a night of heavy drinking. He had to scour the basement of a frat house the morning after, in a haze of hangover, stale beer and the occasional used condom. He found it next to the toilet. He rinsed it off in the sink and placed the Scout back in his pocket, where it belonged. The images shot across his mind, some lingering longer than others, until the procession slowed and finally stopped on one. A picture of Samuel in the funeral home, kneeling in front of his father’s coffin.
Samuel looked down at his father’s still face.
He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see his mother. She held a tissue in both hands, having given up trying to keep her makeup in check. She opened her mouth, but no words came. She shook her head instead and gave Samuel a quick rub on the shoulder before turning to greet another distant relative in town for the funeral.
Samuel blocked out the quiet sobbing and muffled laughter of those gathered in the room. He looked again at his dad’s face, forever asleep amidst the fragrant, arranged flowers, complete with ribbons strung across the front.
“I know you loved John more. It’s okay. You didn’t know what to do with a son like me. I’m not really sure how you managed. You and Mom struggled to understand what went on in my head, what the hell I wanted from life.”
He felt himself chuckle and turned to make sure his outburst did not garner attention from the rest of the family.
“I mean, even now, with you lying here dead, I don’t fit in. Nobody will approach me. But that’s fine. I’m not here to mend fences with Uncle Frank. I think you loved me. I mean, you did as any man loves his son, but I think there was a time when it was unconditional. You bought me the Scout. I didn’t deserve it. The deal was three hits, and I went 2-4. But you bought it anyway, and you bought it with your poker winnings. Mom wouldn’t have allowed that purchase to come from the family budget. Don’t think I don’t know that.”
He looked over his shoulder to confirm the chasm of space still existed. None of the relatives would come near the coffin until he finished. None would risk a possible conversation with him.
“I wish we could have had this conversation before cancer got you, but I guess I’ll have to settle for it this way. I mean, I need to thank you. If I hadn’t been so different than you and Mom, my siblings, I would still be stuck living in the same shit-hole suburb, wasting my life away.”
He paused.
“Sorry. Even now, it’s hard for me not to take shots.”
Several relatives gathered near the table with the photographic collage and other remembrances.
“I’ll miss you, Dad. Even after everything we’ve been through, I’ll miss you.”
Samuel stood and shoved both hands into his front pockets. His right hand struck his phone and then the Scout. He wrapped his fingers around the pocketknife and held it in his palm. The tears created a wavering last image of his father in the casket.
“I want you to take it with you. You never know when you might need to open a package or cut a string in the afterlife.”
Samuel slid his hand into the casket and tucked the Scout underneath the edge of the satin pillow, where the head of his dead father rested.
***
Samuel shook his head as if to dislodge the cobwebs gathering inside and licked his lips, which felt dry as petrified wood. He glanced down at his palm and opened it. The knife remained, as real as the fingers grasping it.
Samuel did the only thing he could think of. He placed it in his right pocket, where it sunk into the familiar space. He felt the coolness of the object through thin fabric as it rested against his leg. He stood and used his hand to clear the surface of the window, revealing the original, grey landscape of this place. The snowstorm and all its fury were gone. The ground was dry and he began to wonder if it had happened at all.
He looked around the cabin and noticed it was almost identical to the first cabin. The stove, the food, the coffee, the clothing, the photographs hanging on the wall had all disappeared. Nothing remained but the chair, the table, the hard bunk and a faint smell of burnt coffee beans.
Samuel opened the door and stood on the threshold of the cabin, which faced the western horizon. The advancing cloud loomed overhead, and the landscape sat in soundless solitude. He turned to face the east and recognized the path he hoped would lead to the Barren. He was determined to reach it and survive, unsure if meeting Major there would really matter.
This cabin is clearly done with me, he thought.
With his rucksack full of a handful of meager belongings, Samuel set back off upon the path toward the Barren. He hiked for hours around the base of the mountain, putting the second cabin and its memories behind. Every so often, Samuel would thrust his hand into his front pocket and feel the pocketknife nuzzled there. Then he’d shake his head, as though more surprised it remained there than that it appeared in the first place.
***
The pale yellow flame caught his eye as it danced silently in the distance. Samuel sensed movement, but could not see anything around it. He hiked the path and realized it was close to night, based on the aches that come after hours of hiking.
The fire grew in size as he got closer. After another hour of hiking, Samuel could discern the hot ash floating upward into the still trees. He saw a campfire and a pack sitting beside a fallen tree. A thin line of rope stretched from one sapling to another, weighted down in the middle by a shirt flipped over the top and dripping water to the ground.
“Anyone here?” he asked as the pack slid from his shoulder. He stretched his arms and looked around the camp. Before he could ask again, a figure pushed through the trees.
“You made it. So glad you didn’t veer from the path,” Major said.
Samuel cast his eyes down into the fire, avoiding Major’s.
“That fire. It makes things worse here.”
“I’ll take my chances,” Major said.
Samuel sighed.
“What happened to you?” he asked.
“Duty.” Major shrugged. “The visitor I expected did not make it.”
“What happened to him?” Samuel asked. Major ignored the question and stared into the fire. “I’ve been hiking all day. Can I rest?” Samuel said.
Major swept his arm across his body and dipped with an exaggerated bow.
“Mi casa, su casa,” he said.
Samuel knew what he meant, even if he didn’t know how he knew it.
“I’m sure you’ll wake me when I need to get up,” he said to Major.
“I don’t think we have a lot of time to mess around. The cloud is coming east at a good clip. I was worried it might have pulled you under. It can do that, like those huge waves on the Atlantic seaboard. I remember standing in the surf as a kid thinking they weren’t so scary, until the current tugged at my ankles on its way back out.”
“A few hours?” Samuel asked.
“One or two, if I can keep track. Then we’ve got to jump back on the path and get to the Barren.”
Samuel nodded and rubbed his e
yes.
Major watched Samuel fall asleep. He tossed several twigs onto the fire before looking over his shoulder at the massive cloud inching closer.
***
Samuel felt a hand shake his shoulder. His leg hurt and he couldn’t feel his right foot. He opened his eyes and saw that Major was kicking dirt onto the remaining coals of the fire. It was still dark, as it had been since the sky swallowed the last of the light over the eastern horizon.
“How long?”
Major shrugged. “How long what?”
“How long was I asleep?”
“I’m not really sure. The fire is burning differently now, too. If the reversion is moving at the same pace at the Barren, we may already be too late.”
Samuel pulled himself upright and rubbed the pins and needles from his foot. “Too late for what?”
“Too late to slip.”
Samuel waited for an explanation. When Major remained silent, he pushed. “What’s a slip?” he asked.
“I think we should wait until—”
Samuel slammed his fist into the soft dirt and dry leaves. “I think you need to start filling me in right now. I don’t know where the hell I am. I don’t know who you are. I don’t remember shit. Some things disappear and other things come back.”
“What did you say?” Major asked.
“I said you need to start—”
“No,” Major said. “What did you say about things coming back?”
Samuel paused, disappointed his tirade had no effect on Major. “A pocketknife.”
“From where?”
“From my father’s casket, where I left it ten years ago.”
Major bent down, his knees creaking. He grabbed Samuel by the shoulders and stared at his face. “Do you still have it?” he asked in a hushed whisper.
Samuel nodded. He reached into his front pocket and gripped the contents. He opened his fist to reveal a paperclip and several coins, but no knife.
“I felt it just before I came into camp,” Samuel said, his words trailing as he brushed the dirt and leaves aside, expecting to find his knife where it had fallen from his pocket.
“It’s a reflection. It’s gone,” Major said.
“I had it with me during the hike.”
“Are you sure you had it?”
“I don’t know,” Samuel said. “I guess I’m not sure of much anymore.”
Major stood and rubbed his chin. He gathered a few items together and nodded at Samuel, instructing him to do the same.
“I’d feel better if we got moving, put some distance between us and the cloud. We can talk as we go. I’m guessing we’re a five- or six-hour hike from the Barren. I can explain a lot before we get there.”
Samuel brushed the dirt from his pants and put both hands to his ears as if trying to keep his head together.
“Whatever. I think it would be easier if I just ended it. I’m tired of dealing.”
“That’s what got you here in the first place.”
Those who fell from the noose after a suicide had a certain look about them. After speaking with many people through many reversions, Major could identify them by the look in their eye. The majority of souls in the reversion were suicides and the ones that weren’t, like Mara, remained a mystery to Major.
“C’mon, let’s move. I still worry the cloud hasn’t gotten to all of the wolves yet.”
***
“Seven.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“No, I’m not. Seven women.”
“At one time?”
Major smiled. The laugh lines in his face told Samuel the man had enjoyed the finer indulgences in life.
“It was mostly me watching, but I jumped in when I could. Needed to recharge the battery a few times. Those little pills sure helped with that. The only problem was getting it back down. That’s where the whiskey on the rocks came in handy. I’d wake up and they’d all be gone. It would take my brain thirty or forty seconds to recalibrate, determine where the hell I was and what happened the night before. I never remembered everything, but enough to know the high-grade call girls don’t come cheap, and I’d have some explaining to do to my accountant.”
Samuel pushed ahead as the path widened. He came up on Major’s right as they curved around the base of the mountain. The path descended with a gentle slope Samuel assumed would empty them into the Barren. Samuel felt a renewed bounce in his step as he let the reversion take a backseat to Major’s tale.
“How far back?” he asked Samuel.
“Huh?”
“Childhood? High School? The drug years? How far back do you want me to go?”
“How long until we reach the Barren?” Samuel asked.
“Long enough to get into the good stuff,” Major said.
He pushed his headband up on his forehead and looked over a shoulder as if measuring the progress of the cloud advancing from the west.
“The path turns southwest for a bit before straightening out back to the east. Just want you to know I’m not walking us straight into the cloud.”
Samuel nodded. He drew a deep breath and exhaled an exaggerated gust of air into the otherwise silent surroundings. “I can’t get used to the silence.”
Major smiled. He paused for a moment while his brain decided what he would share with Samuel. “We grew up in East Harlem, Spanish Harlem, before Clinton moved his office there and made it trendy again.”
Samuel frowned, becoming impatient with his own memory. The names struck a familiar chord, like recognizing the face of a lost acquaintance but not remembering his name. He decided to let Major continue, and he hoped his memory would eventually catch up to fill in the gaps of the world he once knew.
“My dad was a son of a bitch. He’d come home from the corner bar and beat the shit out of my mom. My brother and I, we’d hide under our beds. Not because he didn’t know we were there. He knew. We stayed underneath it because he couldn’t get his barrel-chest far enough in to grab us. Anyway, my mom was from the barrio, and I don’t ever remember finding out how they hooked up. Quite a scene, right? Some pale, red-haired Irishman with a sassy, Latina girl on his arm.”
Samuel looked at Major’s face and saw the mix of cultures. The man’s nose was bulbous and red, but roots of black hair snuck out from under the ponytail.
“By the time I was sixteen, I was running with all the wrong folks. You know the story. We’d break into bodegas and go right for the register. Later on, we’d even take a crack at those little ATMs shoved in the corner of the market. You remember those? The ones that would nail you with a five-dollar fee on top of what your bank would charge?”
Samuel sniffled.
“School sucked, and by the time I was seventeen, I’d had enough of the petty shit. I got greedy, just like everyone else. The subway stop at East 90th would provide us some sweet marks, the assholes that lived on the Upper East Side in their multi-million-dollar townhomes with iron bars on the doors and a blinking security pad at the front. We’d jump ’em and get the cash when they came out of the station. Not sure why so many got out on the wrong side of Broadway, but we’d make the most of it.
“Summer of ’88 I headed to the Jersey Shore with the guys in the crew. They had a few dago contacts in Atlantic City getting into the hooker and blow trades. Seemed like slapping bitches around was easier than risking a cuff in Manhattan. That’s when I first realized I had it.”
“Had what?” asked Samuel.
“The nose. I could smell deals a mile away. Drug deals at first, which I eventually turned into legit businesses, like used cars.”
Major laughed at his own joke. He looked at the confused look on Samuel’s face and decided to continue. “I was great at the table games, too. Five- and ten-dollar blackjack led me to the high-roller rooms. I played where winnings came with a chick on your arm and a vial of blow. AIDS was breaking then, but when you’re strung out on crack and cards, it’s not much of a concern. Not sure how in the hell I escaped that, but I did. Y
ou tag so many asses without a jimmy hat, you’re rolling the dice.
“I wasn’t much of a family man. I mean, I had a wife and kids, but I wasn’t part of the family. My money provided housekeepers, pool boys, nannies, whatever we needed, but the money couldn’t listen to my wife or help my kids with homework. The family made me legit, somehow gave me the air of a responsible citizen. That’s the thing with the white-collar criminals. They sit next to you at the PTA meetings, you see them in the grocery store, you wave at them as they walk their dogs. Hell, some of them even pick up dog shit with a blue plastic bag, yet they were robbing taxpayers blind.”
“The bailout?” Samuel asked. His face twisted, as if someone else had used the term.
“Oh, you bet I got a chunk of that. We all did. By the time the mid-2000s rolled around, I had several business holdings in various countries. I had secret offshore accounts and enough capital to pay my mid-managers hundreds of thousands in bonuses. We had holiday blowouts that made the gangster movies look like children’s birthday parties. Women everywhere, and not the skanks from the street. I’m talking top-notch girls, good pussy. The kind that makes you forget your name.”
Samuel smiled.
“By 2008, I had offices in Manhattan and Newark. Jersey was a dump, but it was easier to hide assets there than it was in the five boroughs. I had departments trading mortgages for years, and we all knew that shit was going to crash. Anyone—including the Fed—that claims they didn’t know is a bullshitter. An unspoken panic rippled through our ranks about six months before the shit hit the fan. Guys were getting out fast, selling assets, liquidating the adjustable-rate loans. We all knew those were going to kill us. By the time Goldman Sachs became the media’s whipping boy, I had stashed four hundred million I thought would be invisible. That’s what I thought.”
Samuel noticed a hitch in Major’s throat. His pace on the trail quickened as they turned directly into the path of the cloud soundlessly rolling over trees as it approached the east.
“But then a few of my guys turned. They had been working with the FBI the entire time. I had no idea. These were guys that had been with me a long time, going all the way back to our private bordellos and roulette wheels in the shadow of the boardwalk in Atlantic City. These were guys I trusted with my life.
