The Superintendent jangles his keys, searching for 202. He hasn’t used it often yet, still hasn’t memorized its shape, and tries three different keys, all black stainless steel. The first two get stuck halfway in; the third slides in like cutting through butter. The knob creaks a little as it turns but not too loud, and the hinges whine softly as the door swings open.
The inside of the apartment is even more spartan than his own. White walls. No table. No fireplace. Just three mirrors, each on a wall of its own. And a single wooden chair.
Tied to that chair with brown leather straps is Mr. Fitzpatrick.
Fitzpatrick is a nebbishy man. A small man. Wiry. Like a bundle of sticks pieced together beneath khaki pants and a polo shirt, each stick ready to snap under the slightest pressure. His hair buzzed close, balding around an ailing widow’s peak. Skin pale, chin weak, eyes a little too close together. Trembling, he looks up at the Superintendent, lip quivering, a scream caught in his throat.
“Please don’t kill me.”
“What did I tell you?” asks the Superintendent, his voice croaking, deep with bass.
“Please, God, don’t kill me. Just let me go.”
“What. Did. I. Tell. You.”
Fitzpatrick looks shamefully down at his ragged tennis shoes. “Not to make a sound.”
“So why am I up here?”
“I made a sound.”
“You made several.”
“You’re just going to kill me anyway.”
“I don’t want to,” says the Superintendent.
“But you will.”
“I don’t have a choice. Not now.”
“You don’t have to kill me.”
“This is all on you, and you know it.”
“Please,” begged Fitzpatrick, “I have a family.”
“No you don’t,” he says coldly. “Not anymore.”
Fitzpatrick’s eyes go wide, his mouth yawning in terror.
“What did you do?” he whispers.
The Superintendent slowly opens the ebony box, eyeing Fitzpatrick all the while. Inside is a twelve-inch wooden dagger, blackened by fire, sharpened from hilt to tip, decorated with symbols and scrawl, letters from a long-dead language. He grasps the hilt, squatting to set the box gently on the hardwood floor. Then he springs across the room, holding the blade against Fitzpatrick’s neck, rage spilling out from calm waters. “Who are you?” he bellows.
“Jerry Fitzpatrick!”
“No! I didn’t ask who you were. Who are you now?”
“Jerry!” Fitzpatrick bounces around in his chair, screaming. “I don’t know what you want me to say! Tell me and I’ll say it! I’ll say anything! Please!”
“I want the truth.”
“I told you the truth. You want me to lie.”
“You’re full of lies. Nothing but. Tell me who you are and this can all be over.”
Fitzpatrick looks down at the knife. Wooden, but carbonized and razor sharp. He wets himself.
“Jerry Fitzpatrick,” he says meekly, knowing full well what was coming.
The Superintendent clenches a tight fist, punches him square in the jaw, knocks the chair over onto its back. Fitzpatrick’s head bangs against the floor, the sound like a hollow being hit by a hammer. Tears stream down the side of his face into his hair, piss turning half of his khakis a deep soaking brown.
The Superintendent looms over him, pointing the blade like a wand directly at his heart. “Who are you?”
THUMP. THUMP. THUMP.
They both look up, Fitzpatrick’s eyes wide with surprise, the Superintendent furrowing his brow, scowling at the ceiling. Three oh one. Goddamnit. The Superintendent leans over, grabs the back of the chair with his free hand, flinging it upright in a single motion.
“Stay here,” he says. “Stay quiet. Or this will all get worse. Much, much worse.”
Slamming the door behind him, he stares down the hallway at his reflection in the mirror. He seethes, breathing heavy, teeth clenched, dagger clutched tight in a white-knuckled fist. Then he storms down the hallway, his shoes sounding a far brisker clack-clack-clack than before, his mind desperately retracing the steps back to the elevator in order to then find his way to 301—the one with the Spanish cedar door.
The Desert
The daylight was harsh, the heat unbearable, barren earth stretching as far as the eye could see, broken only by shacks and stone buildings. His team leaned back against the mud-brick wall, crowded around the door, M4 carbines held close against their chests. Their packs were heavy on their backs, sweat pouring down their brows, dripping onto their hard plate vests.
Miller nodded, his pale blue eyes revealing only confidence. Jackson nodded back, kicking in the door before he could even finish the nod. The wood was old, barely serviceable, and it shattered around the knob as the boot came crashing through. Splinters rained down as the team barreled in, shouting, rifles trained. Arms went into the air, white and black and cream-colored robes hitting the floor, begging in Arabic for mercy. Claims of innocence; accusations of a mistake.
It was shadowy inside. Some of the rooms didn’t have lights. The Superintendent wasn’t sure what he was more afraid of—someone dangerous lurking back there . . . or something. He remembered his training, fell back on instinct, tried to bury the images of claws and lithe oblong shapes back into their deepest recesses so he could focus on his job. His job was what mattered, it was all that mattered. Everything else was just fear. And fear is only in the mind. Do the job, do the job, do the job.
He crept slowly on unsure feet into waiting dark.
301. The Spanish Cedar Door
The key crowds into the lock like a drunk in a packed subway car, bumping and scraping against every tumbler along the way, trying to settle in, find its place. The door is plain, a polished sandy blond with only a handful of nicks. Everything about it seems as if it has seen very little use at all, as if it were either long neglected or a recent cheap replacement. It swings open slowly, a bit crooked on its hinges, squeaking rather than creaking.
The inside is as plain as the door, and every bit as plain as 202. Three full-length mirrors, one mounted on each of three walls, and a chair, facing the doorway. Strapped to that chair, much like the one before it, was a woman: thin, pretty, with high cheekbones and hair almost as sandy blond as the door. Her eyes closed, lips drawn tight.
“You moved your chair,” says the Superintendent, waving the dagger in one hand as he talks, closing the door behind him with the other.
She says nothing.
“We talked about this.” He walks over, spins her chair 180 degrees so it faces the mirror on the opposite wall. “You’re not to move. Not a muscle. Not an inch.”
“I don’t like looking at myself.”
“You’re not supposed to. That’s the point.”
“Just get it over with.”
“Not yet. Not until you tell me. Not until you show me. Tell me the truth and it’ll all be over.”
“You think you know, but you don’t. You don’t know anything.”
“Who are you?” he asks.
“Emma.”
“Emma what?”
“Emma Goerte.”
“When were you born, Emma?”
“What? What does that matter?”
“When were you born?”
“In eighty-seven.”
The Superintendent sighs. “Which eighty-seven?”
“What?”
“You heard me. Which eighty—”
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt! sounds the old intercom, cutting him off midsentence.
“You should get that,” she says.
The Superintendent clenches his fist, punches her square in the back of the head. The force lifts the back legs of the chair off the ground, her head flopping around limply as if her neck was broken. She doesn’t move.
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt!
He walks over to the old brass intercom, presses a well-worn button, leans in to the corroded old speaker. “Yes?�
� A soft, lingering silence hangs in the air, small pops crackling over a light static. In the background, just beneath it: wails, moans, tiny distant screams. “YES?”
Nothing. That could only mean one thing. The Landlord.
The Desert
“She was great, you know,” said Burke. He smiled so wide that all thirty-two perfect teeth showed. His hair was black, cropped short but styled, his eyes always glassed over as if they didn’t give a shit about anything they had seen. “Really fuckin’ great.”
“I don’t want to hear about it,” said Miller, his hand gripped tight on the wheel, the Humvee rattling with every bump on the bomb-blasted, rubble-strewn road.
“Well, what the fuck else do we got to talk about?”
“I want to hear it,” said Jackson, who sat in back with Burke.
Miller swore beneath his breath, shook his head a little.
“We’re talkin’ tits out to here, beautiful big brown nipples—you know, like perfect slices of thick meaty cooked sausage—narrow waist, a stomach like she was doing Pilates, and one of those yoga asses. You know what I’m talking about? The yoga asses? With the pants?”
Jackson giggled like a thirteen-year-old boy. “Yeah, man. I love those.” He did. He’d seen them online but never in person. Not out of the pants at least.
“And she was tight. Hairy as fuck, but tight. I mean virgin tight. That pussy just gave and gave and gave like it had never felt a dick before. Gripped me like a fucking pro. It was like being in high school again. That’s the thing about these fucking haji girls, man. No one knows what they’ve got hiding under those burkas. I was probably the first one there. Her face wasn’t nothing to look at, but those tits, man. Just thinking of those perfect fucking nipples is getting me hard all over again. And the jiggle and bounce of those tits. It was like porn-star shit. And man, do they train those girls right. They just lie there and let it happen. Wait for it to be over. Whisper haji talk in your ear. It sounds like they’re begging for it.”
“Burke! Goddamnit!”
“I bet she was,” said Jackson.
Burke’s head bounced up and down like a dashboard bobble toy. “That’s the thing, man. American girls. You’ve got to fucking woo them. Empty your wallet just to get them to lie there like a limp fish. But these girls, all you need is a firm hand and a gun. And they’ll fucking writhe in all the right ways.”
“You listening to this shit?” muttered Miller, glancing at the Superintendent. He wasn’t, not really. He only pretended to. His eyes were out on the road, watching the setting sun, hoping they got back to base before the dark set in.
“Did you get her number?” asked Jackson.
Burke laughed. “Nah, I did the only thing you can do. Did her in with a rock and set her on fire. You know she has four or five angry brothers. When they find out sis isn’t a virgin, they always go out and waste some poor sap in a uniform. Can’t have that on my conscience. Waste of a perfect set of tits.”
The Landlord
He wears a white cotton suit, a pair of horn-rimmed glasses, speaks with just the hint of a southern accent, all lilt and no twang; sits in the rocking chair, next to the fireplace, where a blaze now roars; pulls his glasses down from his face, steams them up with a breath, cleaning them with a handkerchief. “How’s occupancy?” he asks.
“Fine,” says the Superintendent. “A little busier than usual, but nothing I can’t handle.”
“Anyone new?”
“Two oh two. Fitzpatrick. I don’t know much about him yet.”
“Right upstairs. That’s cutting it a little close, don’t you think? I don’t want this building full.”
“I’m taking care of it.”
“Taking care of it?” he asks sharply.
The Superintendent nods nervously. “Yes.”
“Do you want me to take you back? To where we found you?”
“No,” says the Superintendent. “I don’t.”
“Why haven’t you done it yet?”
“It’s easier if I wait.”
The Landlord finishes polishing his lenses, then slowly slides his glasses back onto his nose. “No. It’s harder if you wait.”
“It’s trickier if I wait. But it’s easier once I see who they really are. The longer they’re here, the more real they become, the more their true nature shows through. It’s easier to kill someone when you know he’s not innocent.”
“No one is innocent, especially not them.”
“But it’s easier when I can see it for myself, see what they’re willing to do, how far they are willing to go to get out.”
“The more of them you have and the longer you wait, the more dangerous this all becomes.”
“I know why I’m here. I know what I was hired to do.”
“Because we can put you right back where we found you. In a bus station, shivering, covered in your own piss, your last few worldly possessions clattering around in a tattered old pillowcase. I will drive you there now and this can all be over. You can beg in the streets and chase the light after sunset to hide from the things that call to you from the shadows, that tell you all of those horrible things, that show you all of those horrible things.”
The Superintendent shudders. “No.”
“What is it you want?” asks the Landlord.
“I want to go home,” says the Superintendent, his voice cracking with a childlike tenor.
“You don’t want to go back there. Not after how they treated you, the way they cast you out, tossed you into the streets like garbage. Tell me what you really want.”
“I want a clean white room. With a bed and a desk. A window would be nice, but I don’t need one. A rec room with a good TV. My medicine. The kind that makes everything quiet, not the one that makes me tired all the time. I want the voices gone. I want the noises gone. I want the things gone. I just want to be left alone in my room, my clean white room. And maybe watch a little TV.” The Superintendent scratches his head, eyes cast down in shame.
“And we’ll give you that room. That was the deal. We’ll pay for that room for the rest of your life. But you have to do this for us first. You have to go upstairs. You have to kill them. You have to kill every last one of them.”
“It’s hard.”
“If it were easy, then everyone could have his own room, his own quiet. It takes a certain kind of person to do this job, a certain kind of person who doesn’t come along every day. You’re that certain kind of person. That’s why we chose you.”
The Superintendent purses his lips, nodding slowly.
“I’m your man.”
“All right. Take that knife. Go upstairs. And do what you have to do. Do your job.” The Landlord looks around the room, listening closely to the creak of the building, the pop of the embers in the fireplace. “Sometimes I think there’s very little life left in this old building. I’d hate to have to start all over again. From scratch.”
The Desert
The Humvee smoked, broken, tires flayed by shrapnel, fires crackling, moments away from exploding. Jackson hung half out of the window, body crushed, guts showing in places, eyes wide like he was still surprised—like he could still feel surprise. Miller hung upside down, still strapped in, chest blown open.
It was dark now and the smoke billowed, disappearing above them into the night.
The M4 jumped in the Superintendent’s hand, gunfire popping. He wasn’t aiming at anything in particular; he just wanted everyone away from him. He prayed silently for the choppers to arrive, to spirit them away, to take them back into the light.
Burke screamed, firing, laughing, the bullets tearing through two men as they ran. “Get them! Don’t let them get away!” His rifle roared, his teeth clenched tight.
“We don’t know they did this!” the Superintendent called back.
“Yes they did! Yes they fucking did! They all did! Ain’t none of them innocent! Not a goddamned one of them! Get ’em! Fucking get ’em!”
And that was the last thing h
e said.
The sniper’s bullet tore through his neck, almost taking his head clean off. He fell to the ground, knees buckling like jelly, legs bent backward beneath him, boots to ass, his arms wide like he was crucified into the dirt. His mouth hung open, gurgling, throat shredded.
The Superintendent dove for cover, not even bothering to scan for the sniper.
The night went quiet, only the Humvee making any sound. It would blow at any moment, he knew it. It was all over.
Then it came. Shrieks. Howls. The bloodthirsty slavering of a gibbering beast. He’d heard it before. Cowered from it beneath his covers since he was a kid. It was a thing from the shadows. He knew what it looked like even before it crept out into the flickering firelight.
It was tall, terrible, impossibly thin. Mangled hands with razor claws as long as its fingers. Bulbous eyes like black glass set in umbral, pallid flesh. Wings three times the size of its body. Once out of the shadow, its gray skin seemed to glow even in the slightest illumination. The thing pounced upon Burke, tore his chest open through his vest, pulled his screaming soul out through a shattered rib cage. Its head splayed, a mouth that wrapped around from cheek to cheek growing wide, rows of razor-sharp needle teeth glinting.
And it shrieked again, long and loud.
Then it leapt into the air—straight up twenty feet—diving right back down into the shadows behind the Humvee, Burke’s soul grasped tight in its arms.
The Superintendent wrapped himself into a ball, tears streaming, begging quietly for help into his radio as he waited, desperate for the choppers to arrive. He whimpered, he cried. But he couldn’t hear the choppers. Not yet.
202. The Ironwood Door
The door flies open and the Superintendent bursts through, his right hand tight on the dagger. “When were you born?”
Fitzpatrick startles in his chair, wriggling against his leather restraints. His skin cold and clammy, the smell of his piss hanging stale in the air. Narrow-set eyes look up at the Superintendent, pleading.
We Are Where the Nightmares Go and Other Stories Page 15
