by Scott Carter
“The first few years, I’ll give you. But the last couple books are soulless. He’s selling on his name, and once the readers see a better product, they’ll realize that.”
Barrett looks at Martin for a moment without saying anything. Then he rises from his seat. “I’ve got to go.”
“You just got here,” Don says.
Barrett holds up his phone. “It’s a work thing.”
“A work thing?”
Barrett nods intently.
“Good to see you, Barrett.” Martin raises his wine glass and Don flashes Barrett the content smile of revenge. It’s difficult to tell who’s playing him more.
Craving a cigarette, Barrett steps outside and takes out his pack just as his phone buzzes. He looks at his screen to see a text from Sidney: Meet me at my office immediately.
When Barrett reaches Sidney’s building, he is surprised to find him waiting outside. Sidney steps forward and extends an envelope with BARRETT FULLER in the centre.
“This was under my windshield wiper when I got back from lunch.”
Barrett looks at the envelope for a moment before opening it and removing a letter.
OPPORTUNITY #6: LOVE YOURSELF. “Only when Mil admitted his secret did he feel the weight lifted from his chest.” I see that you have a new woman in your life. One that lasted more than a night. Admit to her who you really are or she’ll find out with the rest of the public. You have twenty-four hours to upload your taped confession.
Barrett looks at Sidney with the same combination of rage and disappointment that he would if he caught him stealing from his wallet. “You found this under your wiper?”
“Don’t bother.”
Barrett holds the letter at eye level. “This is someone with access to every detail of my life, and you’re telling me you found it under your wiper?”
“You know I have nothing to do with this.”
“Maybe fifteen percent isn’t enough.”
“Really, stop before you offend me.”
“Who else on the planet knows enough about me to do this? Who else knows my rhythms enough to arrange all this? And now I’m supposed to believe a demand was stuck on your windshield?”
“This is sad, Barrett. Do you think I like that some wacko knows where I work? I’ll check the security cameras to see if there’s anything that can help, but you need to get it together, or this is going to break you. What I want is this to end so we can get back to long lunches and making ridiculous amounts of money. What I don’t want is you looking at me like I’m not your best friend.”
Barrett watches Sidney walk away and immediately feels guilty about the accusation. He folds the letter, puts it in his pocket with dismay, and craves the company of someone innocent. What he needs is to be around the kid, to clear his head for a bit, and then to face this latest demand fresh.
When he arrives at the apartment, Carol answers the door and regards him spitefully.
“This isn’t a good time, Barrett.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Richard’s grounded.”
“He told me. I was hoping I could visit him here.”
She arches her neck slightly so that she is as tall as possible and looks at him like her stare can burn through him. “I don’t want you to see Richard anymore.”
“What?”
“His teacher called and said you threatened him.”
“Did he tell you why?”
She turns to enter the building and Barrett puts a hand on the door.
“He likes it at my place.”
“You’re out of control. You smell like cigarettes and beer and he comes home smelling the same. Your advice got him in trouble at therapy, and now his teacher called and said you interrupted class and threatened him.”
“Has Richard told you how he treats him?”
“He’s a kid, Barrett. Kids complain about their teachers. That doesn’t give them the right to swear at them or have their uncles threaten them.”
“Listen ...”
She pulls the door open despite his arm. “You’re a bad influence, he’s at a crucial point in his development right now, and I can’t have you around him.”
“What?”
“I don’t want him to see you anymore.”
“Wait. Shouldn’t you give him a say in this?”
“I’m his mother.”
The seriousness of her words sinks in and Barrett feels sick. “I don’t do anything around him other than smoke, and I can start going outside if you want. He doesn’t like therapy. I was just trying to help him express himself. And with the teacher, I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t getting bullied.”
“A couple visits with him and you’re an expert now?”
“He’s a great kid, I’d never …”
“Goodbye, Barrett.”
“Can he at least call me?”
She walks inside without answering, and he feels like he might float into the grey sky and drift into the nothingness. The extortion leaves his thoughts tainted with insecurity and fear, but even in the confusion he is sure that he has to see the kid again, he simply has to.
Barrett wants to make it up to Carol and Richard, but to do that, he needs to end this extortion and to do that he needs to write a manuscript by the end of the week. One brick at a time, he tells himself. That little phrase saved him many times as a writer. Whenever he feels overwhelmed or wordless, he tells himself, one brick at a time. And he needs that crutch more than ever. He reads the latest extortion letter again, but for the first time, he hears a woman’s voice. He had hoped it was a man, and a part of him was sure it was Brouge, but now he hears Rebecca in every extortion. Their random meeting at sensitivity class, her probes about writing, her position as head of the fan club, and now a demand to tell her who he really is. A chill runs through his body, quickly followed by rage. Fuck her for captivating his attention, and fuck her for making him care. He hales a cab and gets in with more purpose than he’s felt in months. It’s not enough to confront her — he needs to know why she’s extorting him. The challenge is to get his anger to override how disappointed he is that they don’t have a future.
He enters fan club headquarters with taut shoulders and approaches a mousy-looking woman in her early twenties stuffing Mil Bennett stickers into envelopes.
“Is Rebecca in?”
“She’s in her office.”
The woman points down the hall, but he’s already on his way. The door to her office is open and Rebecca sits behind a desk. When he knocks on the door, she looks up with surprise.
“What are you doing here?”
He tosses an envelope on her desk. “I brought you this.”
She opens it and looks inside. “An empty envelope?”
“It’s what everything you’ve arranged is worth.”
“What?” His aggression provokes a reciprocal response.
“All this drama.”
“Don’t be weird.”
“Don’t fuck with me anymore. You just happened to be at sensitivity class?”
“Where is this coming from?”
“And now I get a demand that just happens to want me to tell you who I am?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Here you go. You want me to admit who I am? Fine. You want to hear me say it? Done. To put an end to this fucking nightmare, I’m happy to. I’m Russell Niles. At least that’s my pseudonym.”
Rebecca looks at him closely for a moment before bursting into laughter. This isn’t a laugh-with-somebody laugh, this is a full-blown laugh-at-him laugh. “You’re Russell Niles?”
The implication of her laughter triggers a defensive response. Who is she to think it’s impossible for him to be that skilled? He gestures around the room to the various Russell Niles paraphernalia. The dolls, posters, bed sheets, video games. For a moment, he feels good about himself again. “All this is me.”
Rebecca still chuckles. “You don’t have to do this. I’m sorry I was condescending about you being in m
arketing before, but you don’t have to lie to me. I already like you.”
Barrett’s face is passed flushed. A vein in his neck bulges, and a nerve in his left eye twitches incessantly. “Russell Niles is my pseudonym. This is the truth. For the first time since we met, this is the truth.”
“Are you high? Because this is pathetic.”
The realization sets in with an acidic quality. She has no idea. No matter how good it would feel to discover the extortionist, despite the implications, it’s clear from the purity of her disappointment with him that she isn’t the culprit. Drowning in humiliation, honesty never felt more appropriate. He leans against the wall like he’ll drop to the ground without the help.
“Someone’s been extorting me.”
“Extorting you?”
“Making me do things or they’ll reveal who I am to the public. That’s the only reason I was at sensitivity class.”
“Are you serious?” She inspects him for signs that he is drunk, high, or crazed.
Barrett offers an exhausted nod.
“You’re saying you’re a world-famous children’s author? You?”
Barrett nods again, and suddenly her smile is gone. She steps towards him with a tongue ready to spit flames.
“I don’t know why you’re doing this. I don’t know what’s a lie and what’s the truth. All I know for sure right now is that you’re an asshole.”
She picks up the empty envelope from the desk, tosses it in the garbage, and leaves him alone in the office with the irony of being surrounded in Mil Bennett products.
Twenty-Seven
Richard is stretched out on his bed rereading the first Mil Bennett book for the tenth time when his mother enters the room.
“You’re supposed to be packing that up.”
“The side effects are getting worse,” he says without taking his eyes from the page.
“What do you mean?”
“My tongue is filling my mouth.”
“Let me see.” She gets closer, and he opens his mouth so she can get a good look at his scaly tongue. Her fingers trace his jawline, hoping to bring him the relief of touch. “Nothing’s changed since you first started with the medication.”
“It looks bigger to me.”
“I promise you, it’s not.” She gestures to the shelf, which is full of books that she’s bought him over the years. “Will this be easier for you if I pack them up?”
His eyes return to the page and he reads the same sentence again and again while she picks up a single packing box and begins taking the Mil Bennett books from the shelf. Mil sat on the bench in despair, but something about the way the tree’s branches swayed in the wind made him hopeful.
“You’re getting a little old for these books anyway.”
The first book drops into the box with a thud that Richard feels in his bones.
“I mean, you’re a pretty advanced reader for your age, and these books are only a hundred pages or so.”
Another thud.
Richard’s tongue feels like he has an entire pack of gum in his mouth. He presses it against his palate, and it feels so full that he expects the pressure to push fluid out of his ears when there’s another thud. This time, he decides to read the sentence aloud.
“Mil sat on the bench in despair, but something about the way the tree’s branches swayed in the wind made him hopeful.”
The thuds stop. Carol pivots from the shelf and looks at him. “I want to talk to you about something.”
The tone warns him that he’s not going to hear good news, but he looks up from the page anyway.
“You’re not going to see your uncle for a while.”
“Why?”
“Because I want you around positive people right now, and he’s not in a positive place.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means he’s not a good guy.” She tosses another book into the box and the thud returns.
The news brings Richard to his feet. “He’s a great guy.”
“People aren’t always what they seem.”
“He’s not just my uncle, he’s my friend.”
“There are things about him you don’t know.”
“There are things you don’t know about life too.”
A surprisingly aggressive tone leaves him shaking, and it’s clear he’s too worked up to remain composed.
“There are many things I don’t know about life, my dear, but it doesn’t change my opinion about your uncle.”
The need to tell his secret flows through him with an unstoppable urgency. This is the time he’s been waiting for, this is something he has to do, and his frustration allows the words to flow naturally.
“I know why Dad left.”
“Richard ...”
“I know why Dad left.”
“What?” The change of topics to something so upsetting shocks her.
“I came home early from school the day before he left and saw him kissing a man on the bathroom floor.”
He isn’t sure what to expect, but her response definitely confuses him. With her eyes closed, she sits on the edge of the bed and rubs at her face. “Listen to me. You shouldn’t lash out, okay? Trying to hurt me by making up a story like that is mean, it’s upsetting, and it’s not going to change my decision about you seeing your uncle.”
“I’m not making up anything. It was a blond man he was kissing, and they had their shirts off.”
The liquid in his eyes and strain in his voice makes her realize this is more than rebellion. “You swear to me you saw that?”
Richard nods.
“You swear? Because this isn’t something to lie about. This is our lives.” He nods again, and an explosion of panicked anger surges through her so strong that her hands shake. “Why didn’t you tell me when he left?”
“Because you were so sad and I was scared it would just make it worse.”
“Because he cheated on me?”
“Because it was a man.”
“It doesn’t matter that it was a man.”
“I know that now, but I was confused.”
“What matters is that he broke our bond. What matters is that he left our family. You should have told me.”
“I’m sorry.”
She is yelling now, and everything about the contortion of her face and anger in her voice startles him. “That was my marriage.” She leans into his face and he turns his head. “My marriage.”
“He’s my father,” he says, deadpan.
“And him betraying me is something I should find out, not you.”
She leaves the room, and Richard has never wanted to cry more in his life. His eyes sting and his nose is stuffed, but the medication leaves his eyes dry.
He walks to the bookshelf and hooks the remaining Mil Bennett books into the box with his arm. The next target is the cactus Burns gave him to take care of. He tosses it in the box upside down and drops the thickest Mil Bennett book on it so that its plastic holder shatters. The box is heavy, but he shuffles his way to the bathroom and locks the door. His tongue feels like sandpaper, so he sticks it out as far as possible until his distorted reflection in the faucet looks like a cartoon character, but nothing about it is funny. What he should see is the well-rested face he’s grown fond of over the years, but instead he looks at purple bags under his eyes and feels like he might choke on his tongue. Hatred fills him.
Hatred for his father for leaving, hatred for his mother for making him go to a therapist, and hatred for Dr. Burns for drugging him. He hustles to the kitchen and flips through the counter drawer until he finds a box of matches. The next stop is the hall closet, where he reaches behind a container of bleach to the back of the shelf for a small bottle of lighter fluid. And with the matches in one hand and the lighter fluid in the other, he walks back to the bathroom like it’s the most natural thing he’s ever done.
He picks up the box of Mil Bennett books and the broken cactus and dumps them awkwardly into the bathtub. The sight of the books
with bent covers, open spines, and pinned pages makes his lips curl. He moves to the spot on the floor where he found his father kissing the bearded man that life-altering day and looks down at a series of smudges on the tile. What he wants to do is beg anyone that will listen for his father to come back, but what he can’t stop himself from doing is worrying that he will swallow his massive tongue. A quick twist of the lighter fluid cap and he’s hovering over the white porcelain. Without hesitation, he squeezes the bottle until the fluid covers the tub and drips down every cover. This is an all-hands operation now. Put down the bottle, pick up the matches, remove one, and strike it against the box’s flint. He holds it for a moment, appreciating the flame’s power, and makes a wish that it was as easy to erase history. To burn the last year, brush off the ashes, and start fresh with his father back at home. But that’s fantasy, so he focuses on what he can do and drops the match into the bathtub.
Flames burst upwards, the tallest ones stretching for the ceiling. Immediately, it is hot enough that he needs to take a step back, but he’s not worried about the heat.
The flames are efficient and definitive in their ability to destroy anything in front of them, but they aren’t content in their home. They flow over the tub’s side and he watches as they move towards the floor in search of a new connection.
The door shakes when his mother tugs on the other end, but Richard is too entranced to notice.
“Open the door, Richard,” she screams. But he doesn’t. He hears her kick the door three times, he hears her scurry down the hall, and he hears her strike the wood again and again until she enters with a hammer in her hand. The flames are at their peak as she steps into the room, which prompts a scream that spills out of her mouth the whole time she runs back to the kitchen for the fire extinguisher. Thick smoke fills the room, and Richard can hear the panic in her voice, but he still stares at the tub, and only when she nudges him in the chest with an elbow and sprays the extinguisher at the flames does he move.
The hiss of the extinguisher breaks his trance. White foam and the smell of chemicals make up his focus now, and while he’s sad to see the flames gone, there is a moment of relief that they’ve done their job until his mother shakes him by the shoulders.
