Echoes of Darkness

by Rob Smales

  “Seems to me,” said Saltz, finally sidling around the desk to stand next to Downs, “killing a kid would be the kind of thing to stick in a person’s mind. You trying to pull the ‘confused old man’ defense or something? Or are you really just confused, old man, and this is just a bunch of horseshit you made up in your own head?”

  Downs held up a hand again, trying to get control of the situation, but he wasn’t quite there yet. Hickey was looking straight into Saltz’s sneering face—exactly where he hadn’t wanted to be at the start of all this. But he was hot now, not just annoyed, and the words slipped out before he could stop.

  “No, you little asshole. I can’t remember because I’m . . . I’m . . .”

  Aw, shit, he thought. I’ve started, I’m just going to have to say it.

  He thrust out his chin, unconsciously mimicking Saltz’s own belligerent stance. “I’m a goddamned werewolf.”

  “I’m a goddamned werewolf.”

  Silence fell over the police station, so thick Kyle didn’t think he could have moved through it if he tried—but he couldn’t try. He was frozen in place with horror, just as sure as if Mr. Freeze had hit him with his cold ray. I wish this was a Batman comic, he thought. Then maybe Mr. Freeze would just kill me, and I wouldn’t have to—

  The cops looked at each other, and Kyle’s horror kicked up a notch, his already shriveled balls gaining a sudden coating of ice. He knew what that shared glance meant, could read the expressions on their faces, and in his mind’s eye he saw his worst fear unfolding:

  “Now, you stay away from that Hickey place,” Mr. Downs would tell Bonnie. “I know old man Hickey looks harmless, but that’s one crazy citizen over there. Why, he came into the station today and confessed to being a werewolf. Can you imagine that? Slap-ass crazy. So I want you to just steer clear, okay? And don’t you go talking to that boy Kyle, either. You know what they say: the nut doesn’t fall far from the crazy tree.”

  He’d have to tell her. He was a cop, and her father, and he was supposed to tell her stuff like that, right? But the kids at school already made fun of Jennifer Powell for her crazy aunt, and that was just because the woman owned a half-dozen cats. There was no way Bonnie Downs wouldn’t come into school full of stories of crazy Old Man Hickey, and his whole crazy family. Just no way.

  And it was crazy. It had to be. One of James’s favorite television shows was something called Being Human, on the SyFy channel. Kyle had watched it a couple of times, and when his mom found out she’d sat him down to talk. Yes, she’d said, it was a show with a ghost, a vampire, and a werewolf in it, but those things weren’t real. Those were actors playing their parts, people pretending. She’d even gone online to show him the same people in different shows, where they weren’t ghosts, and vampires, and werewolves. Mom had told him, and Dad had agreed: ghosts and vampires and werewolves were not real.

  But here was Grandpa, flapping his arms in the middle of the police station, confessing to being a werewolf. He wasn’t an actor, he was Grandpa, and he wasn’t pretending, either. Kyle would have known just from Grandpa’s grip that he wasn’t kidding, never mind that they were in a police station, and that was as serious as you could get. And he was talking about Billy Spellman, which was weird, and Kyle would think about that later on, but he was busy now, wondering what was going to happen next. Were the cops going to slap the handcuffs on Grandpa? Or a straightjacket? And did Spreewald General have one of those rubber rooms, with the padded walls so the crazies couldn’t hurt them—

  “A werewolf?” said the smaller cop, his voice shockingly loud from such a small frame—so loud Officer Downs actually flinched beside him. “You crazy, old man?”

  Kyle’s eyes closed. There it was. Someone had said it. Grandpa was crazy. Kyle wondered for a moment about the rubber room, and for an instant how his father would take the news, but that was all crowded out by images of the pointing fingers and jeering faces of his schoolmates. Some part of him knew it was selfish, just as some other part of him was still trying to point out the stuff Grandpa had said about Billy, but he just couldn’t help it. There was a slight scuffing sound, the tiniest squeak of shoe against floor, and Kyle opened his eyes, still looking toward the officers, expecting to see the little cop’s sneer again.

  All he saw was the back of Grandpa’s grizzled head, and the surprised look on Officer Downs’s face. His grandfather had closed the distance in a single stride, and now stood hunched, nose-to-nose with the little bully.

  Oh, crap!

  “A werewolf? You crazy, old man?”

  There it was. That goddamned derisive tone—just what he knew he’d get from the prick. Hickey’s knees had been practically knocking leading up to his admission, at the thought of saying it all out loud again, especially in front of the boy. Especially in the wake of the last time he’d said it all.

  But that tone firmed his old legs right up. It was the same tone Buck Townie had used more than forty years earlier, when the mill foreman had pointed to little Teddy Burgess and informed his crew that the mill paid their wages, and the day some mill hand like Teddy wanted to cut out after only a half-day’s work, just because his wife was squeezing out their first child, that was the day that mill hand could go looking for a new job, ’cause he damn well didn’t have one at the mill any more. Carl Hickey had stepped up to the foreman, looked him straight in the eye, and punched him in the jaw just as hard as he could.

  He hadn’t quite knocked the big man out, but he’d laid him down and put the woozy into him. Teddy had gone off to hold his missus’s hand while she gave Teddy a son, and Hickey had been docked two day’s pay for assaulting the company foreman. Mr. Stark, the mill owner, had considered it provoked, so he hadn’t pink-slipped Hickey—or Teddy—but for the rest of the time Buck Townie worked at the mill, he walked wide around Carl Hickey. Townie had kept a civil tongue in his head, and Hickey had done as he was told, and that had been that. They’d reached an understanding.

  Saltz’s voice still hung in the air as Hickey took one long stride and bent to put his face right into the smaller man’s. Saltz’s thin-lipped mouth, still open and just starting to form a wide, smart-ass grin, snapped shut in surprise, and Hickey’s clenched fists itched to smash him in it. But he wasn’t that man any more—wasn’t even a man any more, really—and he needed these cops. He needed them to listen to him, and they weren’t going to do that if one of them was lying on the floor spitting out teeth.

  Besides, he could feel the tail-end of the sunset, actually feel the scarlet light playing over his skin, and he had the sense that if he started hitting this little waste of spunk, he might not be able to stop. And the hitting might lead to clawing, and then on to biting, and then they might never get him into a cell, never mind that there were two of them, and they had guns. And he needed to be in a cell when the moon came up. He sensed his grandson behind him, frightened and confused. He thought about the Spellman boy, and what had happened to him—what Hickey had done to him—and he kept his clenched and trembling fists down at his sides, elbows locked, thumbs tight to his thighs.

  “You keep a civil tongue in your head, or you and I are going to have a problem, skippy. You don’t want that at the best of times. You sure don’t want it now.”

  The sudden move shocked the grin from Saltz’s face, or maybe it was the intensity in Hickey’s voice, but whatever it was, the cop’s cocky mask slipped. Carl Hickey found himself looking into the face of a small, scared boy; a boy who had been beaten up at school, and passed over for sports teams, and had quailed at asking girls out because he’d have been looking up at them to do so. That boy peeked up at Hickey with wide, frightened eyes; and in that moment, Carl Hickey understood Saltz, understood what had made him, and, just for that instant, he pitied him.

  Then the arrogant mask slammed back into place, like one of those security grates the shop owners used in Frenchietown, to protect their front windows at night. Saltz’s eyes narrowed as color flooded his face, and Hickey knew
that Saltz knew his mask had slipped, and Hickey had seen, and he hated the older man for it. Saltz’s hard slash of a mouth opened—

  —and a hand slipped between them, barely fitting through the gap separating their noses, to drop, very gently, onto Hickey’s chest.

  “Please, sir.” The Downs boy’s voice wasn’t quite as gentle as his touch, but it was close. Gentleness mixed with respect, and just a hint of reluctant firmness, like an honorable man doing a distasteful duty. It was this tone, more than the soft pressure of his hand, that caused Hickey to back up a step.

  “That man just threatened an officer of the law!” Saltz exploded. “Get your ass in a cell, you crazy old son of a bitch, I’m—” He reached for his belt as he shouted, though whether for his gun or handcuffs, Hickey couldn’t tell. The gentle hand had left his chest at the first word, though, and shot out to grab Saltz’s shoulder. From the whitening of the knuckles, Hickey guessed the gentle was gone, and the angry little man froze before he could take anything from his belt.

  “You’re provoking him,” said Downs, his tone a match for his grip. “And you know it. Just let me handle this, okay?” Though phrased as a question, it was clearly a command, and Timmy Saltz just blinked up at his partner for a moment, eyes round. Then some of the asshole crept back into his face and voice, and he jerked his shoulder away. “Fine, then. You handle it.” He stepped halfway back around the charge desk and leaned against the wall, arms folded across his chest, sour expression on his face. Downs turned back to Hickey, gesturing toward a visitor’s chair in front of one of the desks beyond the counter.

  “Mr. Hickey, if you’d like to make a statement, then please take a seat. If you do intend to make a formal confession of . . . some kind, then I need to read you your rights, okay?”

  The changing sunlight clung to Hickey’s skin like warm syrup, but it was rapidly cooling. He glanced at the window. The rosy ambiance of the setting sun was almost gone. He didn’t have much time.

  “Read me my rights, boy; that’s fine. I want to confess. But I want to do it in a cell. Now. I want to go to a cell right now.”

  Saltz huffed a snort, but Downs just nodded. He took hold of Hickey’s upper arm and led the way deeper into the building. It was a gentle, guiding grip, but part of Hickey’s mind identified it as a taking you into custody grip, and something inside bellowed for the old man to break and run. Hickey swallowed hard, and stepped toward the cells.

  I came here of my own free will, he thought. This is where I want to be—for the boy’s sake. For everyone’s sake. This is where I need to be.

  But as the sun disappeared from the sky, and the moon’s edge crested the horizon, that voice inside grew louder, the wild feeling stronger, and all it wanted to do was run, run, run . . .

  And kill, of course. And kill.

  Kyle’s eyes were a hair’s breadth from falling right out of his head. First that little bully cop had sassed off to Grandpa, and nobody sassed off to Grandpa, not even Pop. Not ever. But then Grandpa had gotten right up in the cop’s grill, and it had looked like he was about to give the man the hard side of his hand. Grandpa never started out with the hand, like some of the kids at school did—all the time!—but he wasn’t shy about taking what he called a little corrective action, and if Kyle had ever seen someone in need of some correcting, it was that mean cop.

  But then Officer Downs had stepped in, and Grandpa had backed off—and when the cop had started to shout, wanting to arrest Grandpa, Officer Downs had made him back off as well. The little cop was still mad, and Grandpa was breathing heavy, but Officer Downs looked calm, and Kyle thought he was calling the shots at the moment.

  He’s the only one not mad, he thought. If he’s in charge, and he doesn’t look like he’s arresting Grandpa or anything, maybe we’ll get out of here and go home.

  Kyle’s spirits rose slightly—he might get back to his Minecraft server before all his friends had quit for the night—but the next thing he knew, Grandpa himself demanded to be put in a cell. With a heavy heart and dragging feet, the boy followed the group toward the back of the building, his insides all a jumble. He’d started out mostly worried about school, and the story of this night spreading around, but now he was more worried about what was actually happening to Grandpa. This was . . . this was bad, and real. This wasn’t just his old grandfather coming down to the police station to tell them crazy stories any more. They were locking him up. Officer Downs was reading him his rights off a little card he took from his pocket, just like they did on TV. The little bully cop was following them, strolling along in front of Kyle with his thumbs hooked in his belt like some kind of gunfighter. A word popped into Kyle’s head, one his father used sometimes that Kyle had never really understood, though his father had tried to explain it to him: strut.

  Well, he understood it now. If this cootie-riddled, bullying, mean man of a cop wasn’t strutting his way back to the cells, then Kyle thought he’d never understand the word.

  They got to the cells, and Grandpa entered one and sat on the cot. Officer Downs turned to fetch the folding chair that leaned against the wall facing the cells, and saw Kyle bringing up the rear. He froze for a second, hand outstretched, eyes wide with surprise.

  “Oh! Christ, I forgot all about Kyle.” He paused a moment, then put on a more official cop voice. “Officer Saltz, can you bring young Mr. Hickey home, while I—”

  “No,” said Grandpa, and though he was sitting in a jail cell, there was command in his tone, like he was back home, tossing orders across the kitchen. “The boy stays. He’s why I’m doing this, after all.”

  Mr. Downs looked at Officer Saltz, but Saltz just shrugged without turning around, like he’d known Kyle was there all along. “I say we let him stay, then. Besides.” His back was still to Kyle, so the boy couldn’t see the officer’s expression, but his voice grew jolly, like he was almost laughing. “I don’t think I want to miss this.”

  “Kyle.”

  The open cell door was right beside him, but Grandpa had chosen to thrust a hand through the restraining bars instead, leaving them separated. Kyle was shocked to see the old man looked close to tears.

  Grandpa never cries.

  This, more than anything else, left Kyle stranded in uncertainty. All thoughts of Minecraft were gone as he wondered just what was going on here, and what in the world could make Grandpa cry? His own eyes welled as the great mass of callused knuckles enveloped his hand. His grandfather gave a slight tug, and a little squeeze, and his voice, when it came, was as gentle as Kyle had ever heard it.

  “Now, boy, don’t you cry. I need you to listen, and watch, and remember, okay? I tried explaining all this to your pop, but he didn’t want to listen. He was pretty clear about that. I would have tried to change his mind, but”—he cast a glance over his shoulder, at the small, wire-threaded window set in the cell wall, and shuddered—“I’m runnin’ out of time awful quick here, and we Hickeys can be some stubborn assholes on occasion, so you’re gonna have to do.”

  A tiny smile flicked across his old mouth, and was gone.

  “Probably wouldn’t do you any good to repeat that to your ma, though, okay?” Kyle nodded, fighting back the tears. A parade of questions marched through his head, but he daren’t ask any: the intensity pouring off of his grandfather was enough to leave him tongue-tied.

  “Good boy.” Another hand squeeze, harder this time. “You go over in the corner and you watch, and listen. And remember.” With a sudden jerk, he yanked Kyle almost nose-to-nose, and the steel crept back into his voice. “And when you get in that corner you don’t come out, you hear? You do not come back near this cell, understand? You do and I’ll tan the hide right off your backside.”

  At Kyle’s frightened nod, the big hand pushed him, only half gently, away from the cell. Grandpa turned and took his seat on the cot again, just as Mr. Downs carried the folding chair into the cell.

  “No,” said Grandpa. “You sit outside. And close the door—you can hear me just fine
from out there.”

  A snort came from Officer Saltz, leaning against the corridor wall, a derisive sound with a lot of flapping lips, but Officer Downs just swung the chair out into the corridor, pushed the cell door to without latching it, and planted himself in his seat.

  “This better, sir?”

  Grandpa reached out and gave the barred door a yank, closing it with a decisive click.

  “Is now. You ’bout ready? ’Cause I’m ’bout out of time.”

  Officer Downs pulled out a small, gray object, about twice the size of the Zippo lighters they sold down at the corner store. He pressed a button, and a small, red light winked into existence.

  “Do you mind if I record this session?”

  The question was asked with the air of one who already knew the answer: Kyle had seen cops on TV and figured it didn’t matter what Grandpa said, that recorder was staying on. Grandpa just flipped a hand toward the little thing.

  “You can put it on a billboard up by the highway for all I care—just listen, and let me talk. I’m running out—”

  “I just have the official stuff to get through, sir. One moment.” Officer Downs looked at the little red light in his hand. “This is Officer Joshua Downs, of the Spreewald P.D., accompanied by Officer Timothy Saltz, also of the Spreewald P.D., and we’re sitting with Mr. Carl Hickey Senior, also of Spreewald. Mr. Hickey has come to the station of his own free will to make a statement of confession, and has been informed of his rights.” He looked at his watch, added the date and time, then looked up at Grandpa, holding forth the recorder like a reporter’s microphone. “All set, sir, thank you for your patience. It’s your show.”

  “It’s about damn time,” said Grandpa—then stopped. He looked about a moment, as if searching for words, but when his eyes fell upon Kyle he seemed to settle down, and took a deep breath.

  “I been having dreams for years. Long as I can remember.” His gaze swiveled from Kyle to Officer Downs. “Always during the full moon. Took me a long time to figure that out, when I was younger, but I did. Might have been that a lot of ’em were about the moon, but whatever. Three nights every month, I had these moon dreams—I called ’em moon dreams, even when they wasn’t about the moon—and for the longest time, they was just fine. Enjoyable. Runnin’ through the fields and the woods, mostly. It wasn’t like anything really happened in ’em, it was more the feeling they gave me. Woke up feeling, I don’t know, just great. Relaxed and happy, like after the first time a young gal let me take her for a tumble. Three days a month I could count on waking up feeling like everything was right with the world, you understand? Been like that for ’bout as long as I can remember.”