Death Rhythm

by Joel Arnold

  As he neared, the sound grew. Dozens, maybe hundreds of flies. Andy tried looking up into the window, raising himself on his toes. All he saw was darkness.

  He stepped closer, sniffing the air, trying to catch any scent of rotting meat in case some animal had crawled in there and died. All he smelled was dust and wet grass.

  He stepped closer. Brought his hands up to the empty window hole. It was only about half a foot above his head. He lifted himself up and peered in, into the darkness, the sound of the flies, hundreds of them, mesmerizing him, drawing him closer. The buzzing intensified as he strained to pull himself forward. He struggled to see into the shadows, to peak at the bowels of the stone shed.

  A fly buzzed past his head, making its way into the building. Then another. All he was black, but the blackness urged him forward. The buzzing of flies held him in its grip.

  A fly landed on his forehead, but Andy didn’t want to let go of the ledge to swat at it. He blinked, hoping the movement of his brow would irritate it into leaving, but no such luck. Andy held his breath, the muscles in his elbows and wrists straining, but he wouldn’t let go. His head started to go through the empty portal of the small deteriorating building, and his eyes began to adjust to the darkness. The pulse in his forehead quickened, the sound of it audible in his ears, playing in time to the lull of the buzzing flies.

  And then it spoke.

  “Hey, be careful you don’t cut yourself.”

  Andy dropped from the window ledge, jumped back and tripped over a headstone.

  “Hey!” came the voice again. “Sorry.”

  Oh Jesus, Andy thought. It’s someone talking to me. A person, not the building.

  A form hovered over him. “Are you okay?” The voice belonged to a woman, robust and earthy. She quickly came into focus, her pleasant curving shape, her long, cascading hair - red cascading hair.

  The woman in the window.

  “Hi.” Andy squinted. The woman spun slightly. He put his hand to his head. “I think I’m okay.”

  The woman offered her hand. Andy grabbed it and was hoisted to a standing position. His legs felt shaky. The world swam, the trees revolving about him as if horses in a carousel, Andy at the center.

  The woman’s laugh warbled through the air into Andy’s ears. “Sorry if I scared you.”

  “No, that’s all right.” Andy looked at his feet, concentrating on them, trying to calm the spinning world down. He shut his eyes, relaxed, and opened them again. The earth finally fell still and silent.

  The woman said, “I just thought I’d warn you about the glass. There’s still some bits of it around the edges.”

  Andy’s face flushed.

  “Oh, geez - I think you’re bleeding.”

  Andy looked at his hands and saw a long red gash in one of them.

  “It looks bad.” She grabbed his injured hand and examined it. “I’ve got some bandages I can wrap that up in.”

  “No, I – ”

  “It’s no problem. Really.” She lightly shook his injured hand in greeting. “My name’s Natalie. Natalie Plant. I live past those trees.” She nodded towards her house.

  “I’m Andy.” He couldn’t look too closely at her eyes, feeling guilty about spying on her. What if she'd seen him?

  “Are you okay? You don’t look so good.”

  Andy looked up, realizing how ridiculous his thoughts had been.

  “No, I'm fine. It’s just that I didn’t notice the cut until you mentioned it.”

  “Oh, well - I’m sorry.” She laughed. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  A drop of blood dripped from Andy’s hand and disappeared into the grass at his feet.

  Natalie looked toward the shed. “Did you lose something in there?”

  A second drop issued from his wound and landed on his shoe, leaving a dime-size splatter stain. He clenched his hand into a fist. “No. Just curious.”

  “It’s empty.” Natalie squinted from the climbing sun. “Got any relatives here?”

  Two more drops of blood trickled between Andy’s clenched fingers, landing on his pants. He pretended not to notice. “Sure,” he said.

  “Me, too.” She held a fistful of daisies and walked over to the granite figure of Apollo, the grave Andy had noticed the night before.

  Andy watched another drop of blood fall into the grass. A dull ache spread across his palm.

  Natalie placed the daisies in front of the headstone. “My mother died a long time ago. I didn’t even know her. Dad’s in a wheelchair and has trouble maneuvering through the trail. I put most of the flowers here for him. I sometimes drive him over here on the road.” She lifted her chin slightly toward the gateway, with the gravel road leading off to the highway.

  Andy walked over to the headstone. The cut in his hand throbbed, as if it had a pulse of its own. He opened his hand to take another look at his wound, and released a thin stream of blood, which fell onto the dull granite of the marker. He pulled his hand away quickly. “Oh, Jesus - I’m sorry.”

  Natalie bent down to wipe off the redness with her hand, but a light pink stain remained.

  “It’s all right. I should be the one who’s sorry. Why don’t we go get a bandage before you bleed all over everything.”

  “I don’t want to be a bother.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I insist.”

  Andy shrugged.

  Natalie asked, “By the way - which are your relatives?”

  Andy used his good hand to point. “These two are my grandparents.”

  “You’re a Stone?”

  “My last name’s Byrd, but yeah, these are my grandparents.”

  Natalie looked carefully at Andy, studying his face. She turned away and walked towards the trail that led to her house. Without looking back, she said, “Coming?”

  “I really don’t want to be - “

  “Hush!”

  The sun slipped behind a thin white cloud.

  Andy followed.

  SEVEN

  “Mae? Can you help me with this? Please?”

  “Not now, Evvy.”

  “Mae? Come on. My snare’s broken.”

  Sometimes she couldn’t remember her sister Evelyn, and it scared her. She’d try to conjure her up, try to recall the way she talked and laughed before things went so bad, tried to remember the smell of her favorite perfume, remember the way she looked. Many times she couldn’t. Despite the photographs that remained, Mae could sit concentrating for an hour, and nothing would come, as if that part of her memory was lost forever.

  But other times, like now, vibrant pieces would come rushing back and almost knock her over with their clarity. They’d come rushing back with the ferocity of a beat from Evelyn’s drum.

  “How did you manage to do that?” Mae asks.

  Evelyn holds up her drum, a present from her father. One side of the snare on the bottom has flopped off and hangs there like an entrail.

  “I think Edna did it.”

  “How do you know I didn’t do it?”

  “Did you?”

  Mae doesn’t answer.

  “Did you?”

  “Why would I care about your stupid drum?”

  Maybe that’s what she was afraid of. With Andy here, the memories had started rolling in like an avalanche.

  “Could you help me fix it?”

  “I don’t know anything about it. Ask Dad.”

  “He’s in his workshop.”

  “So? Ask him anyway.”

  “You know I don’t want to go down there,” Evelyn says.

  “Why?” Mae is teasing her now.

  “You know why.”

  “Because you’re scared?”

  Evelyn doesn’t answer.

  “Because you’re a 'fraidy cat?”

  “No.”

  “'Fraidy cat.”

  “Shut up.”

  “'Fraidy cat. Furrrraidy cat.”

  “Shut up!”

  Mae shook the memory away and finished unloading
the groceries. She went upstairs. The door to Edna’s old room was ajar. Mae kept it shut most of the time, and out of habit went to close the door. But when she saw Andy’s duffel bag on the floor and the sheets pulled back on the bed, she stopped in the doorway.

  How much does he know?

  Does he know anything?

  Everything?

  What has Edna told him?

  She saw Tom Sawyer lying on the dresser, a piece of paper next to it.

  It was the child’s drawing of a snarling face.

  Look out for Big Ed, it said.

  Look out for Big Ed.

  Mae closed her eyes. Oh my God - poor Evelyn.

  The drawing hovered behind her eyelids, it’s teeth growing and dripping.

  Look out for Big Ed.

  Mae heard the distant beating of a drum in her mind. The sharp violent crack of a striking stick.

  Look out for Big Ed.

  She shook her head. Opened her eyes. Clutched the edge of the dresser.

  Jesus.

  Why did I let him stay here?

  She saw the dresses in the closet. The closet had always been shut before. Why was it open now? And the book. That had been in the attic. What was it doing here?

  Andy must have been looking around. Snooping. Perhaps his mother sent him over here. What did she want? What was she trying to do?

  Stop it, Mae. Stop being ridiculous. The poor guy had an accident. The sheriff brought him over here.

  It’s just that the memories...

  She had spent so long in therapy dealing with the memories, but now that she was faced with them again, not with Edna herself, but with her son -

  It was going to be harder than she thought.

  She stepped out of Edna’s old room and into her own room. Looked out her window. Her breath caught in her throat. Her mouth dropped open.

  At first she wasn’t sure what it was she was looking at, but then it hit her.

  Even from up here, she knew.

  She took a step back from the window, her hand rising to her neck, her eyes growing wide, her gut feeling as if something was alive in there trying to get out.

  “Uh – ”

  There were no words, just pitiful sounds escaping her mouth.

  “Uh – ”

  She saw the picture in her mind again, the child’s drawing of the snarling face, the big dripping teeth, the words, scrawled by her dead sister -

  Look out for Big Ed.

  “Ah – ”

  Her knees buckled under her, and she fell back onto her bed, then shot up off of it, ran into the bathroom, and dry heaved over the toilet. Bile burned in her throat, bringing tears to her eyes. The bright whiteness of the porcelain made her dizzy.

  Oh Jesus, oh God...

  Her heart raced in her chest. It felt like it would explode from her ribcage.

  She tried to get the image out of her mind. Tried to push it as far away as possible.

  It can’t be, it can’t be, it can’t be, she told herself over and over again. She wiped the spittle off her lips with a shaking hand.

  She began to cry. The sobs wracked her body as she shook her head. No, no, no. It can’t be.

  But it was and she forced herself to face it once again. If she had learned anything in therapy, it was how to face the things that frightened you, the things that sickened you.

  “Holden,” she finally whispered, looking out the window, the tears dripping salty into her mouth. “Holden.”

  Andy followed Natalie through her backyard, passing a large vegetable garden, about thirty by twenty feet, and a cluster of apple trees. The yard was clear of fallen apples, and a few clusters of rotten, bird-picked ones clung desperately to the uppermost branches.

  Natalie opened the back screen door and went inside the house. Andy waited outside, expecting her to reappear with a bandage. Instead, the screen door opened. Natalie leaned against the doorframe. “You can come in,” she said. “It’d be a good idea if you washed the blood off your hand.”

  They walked through the kitchen; dishes piled high in the sink, the garbage can filled to the top. T-shirts and a pair of boxer shorts lay strewn across the living room couch. The remnants of a meal sat on a chipped coffee table. The television was tuned to a football game.

  “Excuse the mess. You can wash up in the bathroom.” Natalie led Andy through a door to the left.

  She turned on the faucet in the sink and grabbed Andy’s hand, holding it under the running water. It was hot. Andy jerked his hand away, but Natalie forced it back under, rubbing a bar of soap over the cut. It stung.

  “You don’t want it to get infected,” she said.

  She turned off the faucet and patted Andy’s hand dry with a towel, then took a large gauze bandage from a drawer beneath the sink and wrapped Andy’s hand in it.

  The way she held him, the pressure as she applied the bandage - her skin touching his. He remembered her the night before; her long hair falling over her shoulders, the same hair that now brushed against his lips as she held his hand. He couldn’t take his eyes off her, off the back of her head as she checked the tightness of the gauze wrapping.

  “How does it feel?” she asked.

  He flexed his hand, raising his head quickly as she looked up. “Feels good,” he said.

  She patted his hand. “It should be all right.”

  “Thanks,” Andy said, wishing she hadn’t let go.

  He followed her into the living room, his eyes trained on her ass.

  “Who’s this?” The voice was gruff, heavy.

  Andy looked up, embarrassed. An old man sat in a wheelchair in front of Natalie, wearing light blue boxers and a white T-shirt. He sat hunched over, his stomach erupting in a potbelly. His hair was a thin white wisp that flopped forward from the back of his head, his face wrinkled and red, full of gray stubble.

  “This is Andy Byrd, Dad,” Natalie said. “He cut himself at the cemetery on that window ledge. I brought him here to fix him up.”

  Andy held up his bandaged hand, smiling slightly, wondering if the man’s dull green eyes had caught him staring at his daughter’s ass.

  “What the hell were you doing looking in there? There’s nothing in there.”

  Natalie answered for Andy. “He’s here visiting Mae. He’s got relatives out there.”

  Natalie’s father narrowed his eyes. “Mae Stone? You a relative of Mae Stone?”

  Andy looked at Natalie, then back at her dad. “I’m her nephew.”

  “This is Hector,” Natalie said, motioning to her father.

  Andy held out his un-bandaged hand.

  “What the hell were you looking in there for?”

  “Just curious.” He shrugged. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  Hector emitted a phlegmy grumph from the back of his throat. He quickly backed his wheelchair out of the living room. He rolled himself out of view down a hallway that led towards the front of the house, the wheels grinding over the wooden floor.

  “Did I say something wrong?” Andy asked.

  “He just gets that way sometimes. Don’t worry about it.” Natalie lowered her voice. “He’s getting senile. I don’t like to admit it, but – ” She glanced at Andy’s hand. “How are you doing?”

  “Oh, fine.”

  “Want something to drink?”

  Andy was about to accept when Hector called from down the hallway. “Natalie!”

  “Hold on a minute,” Natalie said, excusing herself from the room.

  Andy stood there imagining the old man telling Natalie of his roving eyes. He shifted his weight nervously back and forth, straining to hear their conversation. Bits of barely audible mumblings were all that reached his ears. He waited about five minutes until he made out a word.

  It was the word ‘out’.

  “Out.” He heard it again, for certain this time.

  Then he heard, “No, Dad. It’s all right.”

  Then, “Out,” again.

  Suddenly, there was the sound of wheels
grinding against the wooden floor.

  “No, Dad, leave him alone.”

  “Out! I want that boy out of here!”

  Hector and his wheelchair flew into the living room, the grinding noise stopping as the wheels rolled onto the green carpet. Natalie followed close behind.

  “I want that bastard out of here!” Spit flew from between Hector’s dentures. “Out!”

  “Dad, stop it!” Natalie grabbed the handlebars of Hector’s wheelchair, stopping him from colliding into Andy. “Andy, I’m sorry.”

  “Out, you bastard. I want you out of my house!” The flab in his arms swished back and forth as he strained at the wheels.

  “Sorry, Andy,” Natalie said, her eyelids drooping.

  “You ain’t sorry about shit!” Hector screamed, his face growing purple.

  “You better go.”

  “Goddamn right, you better go.” Hector strained forward. Sweat poured off his face. Natalie struggled to hold him back. “Get the fuck outta my house!” Veins stood from his neck like cable. “Out! Out! Out!”

  Andy backed out of the living room, stumbling through the kitchen, pushed by Hector’s verbal assault. Natalie tried desperately to calm the man down as Andy let himself out the back screen door, his hands shaking. He tripped on a step, and then sprinted across the tall-grass field to Mae’s house.

  A minute later, Hector had shut himself in his bedroom. His phlegm-filled voice came through the closed bedroom door. “Get him away!”

  Natalie stood on the other side. “He’s gone, Dad. He’s gone.”

  She tried opening it, but her father and his wheelchair blocked it on the other side. Natalie leaned her head against the wall, her skin glossy with sweat. She was afraid he might hurt himself, afraid that his heart was racing too fast.

  “Let me in.”

  “No.”

  “Dad?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Dad? Come on.”

  His voice came out tired and hoarse. “Why did you bring him here?”