August's Eyes

by Glenn Rolfe

  The same thing happened with her hopes of one day becoming a writer herself. She’d gone to college at USM in Gorham for a year when she met John and fell head over heels. He asked her to move in with him and she did. Sarah took the first job she could find and dropped out of college with every good intention of going back.

  She was still young enough and had plenty of time to pursue a degree, but she only ever wanted to be like her heroes. She’d never even written more than one short story. The already long miles between her and Rice or King seemed beyond infinite.

  Still, there were moments like this morning when she allowed herself the small pleasures of the bookstore or the library. Today, she’d ventured over to the how-to section for writers. She found King’s On Writing and about a dozen books on how to start and finish your first manuscript or how to publish your first book. She’d browsed the section before, but it was different this time. It was as if they’d called to her. She took pictures of the ones that sounded the best and would look for them at the library later.

  Unfortunately, it was the section a couple shelves down that had punched her in the gut – the pregnancy books. Books on baby names, and what to expect, and even books on the best yoga to do while with child. Thinking of it now made her sick to her stomach.

  She walked to the kitchen and poured a glass of Merlot. Morning or not, wine always leveled out the hurt. Besides, it was her day off.

  She and John had tried so hard to get pregnant. They even went to doctors and had a million tests run. According to medicine, they should have been able to conceive, yet they never could. She’d been pregnant once and had a miscarriage. She was only fifteen at the time and it was from the first time she’d ever had sex. The guy’s name was Roger Dansby, and she never heard from the asshole again. She’d lost the baby eight weeks after finding out. She’d never told John about that. While they were going through their tests, she’d confided in her doctor, but he assured her that the miscarriage had no bearing on her current condition.

  She finished her wine and considered a second glass, but since she genuinely did feel better, she passed and fetched her car keys from the counter instead. She’d go to the library and get lost in the old scents of dust and yellowed-paged tomes that held gateways to a million dreams.

  There was a story inside her. She knew it. She just didn’t know if she’d ever be able to write it. Maybe today she would find the courage to try.

  By the time she got home, her arms full of books and her head full of ideas, it was nearly time for John to get out of work. She’d read nearly half of King’s writing memoir in the James Spears Room at the library. She’d only meant to read a chapter or two but got lost in his tales of the writer’s toolbox. When she was younger, the library back home served the same purpose as her attic in the dog days of summer when she’d melt just thinking about going up to her reading nook. Through the summer months, Sarah took her refuge in the library. They didn’t have air-conditioning but there were fans throughout that kept it cool enough to be comfortable.

  Today took her back to those days.

  Besides the King book, she also grabbed a new one from Stephen Graham Jones and one from a new author who had just won a Bram Stoker Award, Gwendolyn Kiste. The book was called The Rust Maidens and the cover alone had drawn her in. She always left with an armful of books, and though she rarely managed to find the time to read them all, she liked to have options. The only thing she picked up that didn’t really fit in was a book about dreams. It caught her eye as she was on her way to the desk to check out. Dreams and Nightmares: Our Reality’s Creations. John had been having bad dreams a lot lately. She had talked him into seeing her old therapist, Dr. Soctomah, but it couldn’t hurt for her to do a little research of her own. Books were knowledge, and thus, power. John would never read it, but maybe she’d earn herself some brownie points if she unlocked the mysteries for him and helped to bring his strange dreams to an end.

  There was a reward she had in mind.

  She wasn’t prepared to admit it to herself yet, let alone whisper it to John. Despite the great depression each failure brought on, Sarah knew she hadn’t closed the book on either of her own dreams.

  Chapter Five

  I need your time sheet in by 3 PM. This is the second week in a row and third time this month that I’ve had to email you about getting your work done on time. If it’s not in by 3, I’ll have to write you up.

  Alison Dumars

  * * *

  John slammed his fist down on his desk.

  “Is everything all right?” Kaitlyn asked. Kaitlyn Skehan was the hot brunette who transferred to Kennebec Community Comfort last fall. She’d been very sweet from day one and seemed to be one of his only competent colleagues since the big turnover the company faced two years back. She knew how to do her job and she actually gave a shit about her families, not just the paycheck.

  Alison Dumars’s ascension to boss disrupted an otherwise smooth-running establishment. And the evil bitch was desperate to keep her mismanagement hidden from her bosses. The numbers didn’t lie, but if Alison was good at one thing, it was placing blame.

  “Is Alison up your ass again?” Kaitlyn asked.

  He ran a hand through his hair, sat back in his chair, and sighed. “At least this time it’s not total bullshit. I’ve been sleeping like crap and falling behind with my damn time sheets.”

  “Well,” Kaitlyn said, “I wasn’t going to say anything, but you have looked a bit ragged lately.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “No, not really, you’re still hot,” Kaitlyn said, rolling her chair over beside his.

  Kaitlyn was the kind of attractive that made men, even happily married men, nervous. She had long dark curls, deep brown eyes, and a smile that held the hint of the devil. It didn’t help that she didn’t even try to hide the fact that she was into him. John was fine until moments like this when she got close to him. He started sweating instantly. She knew he was married and didn’t care. Most of the time she was pretty busy with her own caseload. Unlike some of the employees who had come and gone over the years, Kaitlyn worked her ass off.

  “Don’t you have vacation time?” she asked. “Maybe you should take some time to yourself. Get away from here.”

  “Yeah, maybe that’s not such a bad idea. Thing is, having the caseload I do, she’d never let me go. Not anytime soon, at least.”

  “Well,” Kaitlyn said, placing her hand over his, “I could help you out.”

  “You already have plenty of work on your plate.” He eased his hand free.

  “What if I got Brandon to help, too?” she said.

  “What, the new guy?”

  “He’s been here almost a year, and he knows what he’s doing.”

  “Didn’t you guys go on a date?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “But I’m really into older guys.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he said, feeling his cheeks warm again. “Well, I know a couple of ’Nam vets at the hospital that might be willing to take you out sometime. Do you want me to give them your number?”

  “Fuck you,” she said, grinning as she rolled back to her desk.

  “Listen, you might be right. I’ve earned a vacation.”

  “Good for you.”

  He closed his eyes and saw August and One Eye standing over an open grave.

  “Fuck,” he said, jumping up from his seat.

  “Yeah, maybe you could take that lucky wife of yours to the Bahamas. Get away from this place and recharge.”

  Kaitlyn was right. He had at least three weeks of vacation time. He and Sarah could go anywhere they wanted – if Alison approved it.

  “I’m gonna get a coffee. You want one?”

  Kaitlyn held up her Jack and Sally coffee mug. “All set, but cheers.”

  He nodded and went out the door. He’d get some caffeine and bust ass getting Aliso
n her damn time sheet. Then he’d ask for the time off.

  Standing in the breakroom after setting a fresh pot to brew, John gazed out the window. The decommissioned railroad tracks sat behind the property between the office building and the Hanson Union River. The water glistened in the sun. It was mesmerizing. Maple trees along the backside of the building swayed over the wrought-iron fence.

  A shape sidled up next to one of the metal posts.

  It hadn’t dawned on John that there was normally no fence of any kind between the tracks and the river, just rocks and brush.

  The tall, lanky shape waved.

  The coffee maker began to beep in time with each pass of his hand, a metronome lulling him into delirium.

  “August?”

  “John?” The shrill voice of his boss broke him from his daydream. When he looked out toward the train tracks again, the fence and the shape waving to him were gone. The river sparkled beyond.

  “I trust you received my email,” Alison said, standing in the doorway. Her needling, beady eyes seemed to simmer with wickedness.

  He thought of August’s hollow sockets.

  “John,” she barked again.

  “Yeah, yeah, I’m working on my time sheet right now.”

  “Hmm, you sure could have fooled me. It looks like you’re staring out the window daydreaming about recess.”

  For fuck’s sake, cut me some goddamn slack.

  “I don’t care what you’re doing,” she said. “Just get it to me by three. I mean it.”

  She turned and left the room.

  As John looked out the window, he could swear he heard a voice whisper: “Johhhhhhnnneeeee….”

  Chapter Six

  That night, after going out for dinner at Margaritas Mexican Restaurant and having three drinks too many, Sarah made her way to bed early. John considered following her but wanted a smoke first.

  He stepped off the porch and pulled the pack of cigarettes he’d bought on his way to work yesterday from his occasional hiding spot beneath the bottom step. Shaking one out, he eyed the shadowy area by the trees where he thought he’d seen movement the other night when he was out here with Pat.

  Nothing shifted. It was just pure quiet contentment. He took a long drag and thought about what Kaitlyn had said today at work. Take a vacation. He’d toss the idea out to Sarah in the morning if she wasn’t too hungover. If he did it, it would certainly be more of a staycation, like Tom Hanks’ character in The ’Burbs. John didn’t have an urge to travel anywhere. He just needed some rest, and a break from being prodded by Alison.

  He’d gotten his time sheet in at the last possible second, bringing it to Alison’s office and dropping it on her desk rather than taking any chances with the office email. She’d rolled her eyes and effectively let him know that he was still on her shit list until told otherwise. He thanked her and wished her a good night.

  The thought had occurred to him that she might deny his request for vacation time, but he’d made up his mind that he was taking the time off or leaving the company. She could have it one way or the other. He was pretty sure she wouldn’t let him quit; he still had a significant caseload, one that Kaitlyn offered to help shoulder if he needed it, and he was the longest tenured caseworker in the office next to Alison herself. She’d be up shit’s creek if he quit.

  That thought brought a smile to his face.

  He stamped the butt out, picked it up, and walked back up the driveway to place it in the can under the porch. Reaching into the dark space, he felt light feet scurry across the back of his hand.

  John gasped and jerked his hand out. A spider fell to the dirt and hurried from the moonlight.

  Johnneeee…. Johnnneeee….

  The whisper from earlier echoed in his head (or could he hear it now?).

  A branch snapped somewhere behind him.

  Scanning the bushes where he and Sarah had buried Buster, his old gray and white Tabby, last year, John swore he saw something. The harder he looked, the more his eyes seemed to lose focus. Amorphous shadows shifted like clouds, looking like one thing one second before changing to another the next. The outline of a face, eyes…then a branch, a pointy hat, an animal….

  He closed his eyes.

  It’s all bullshit, he told himself. There’s nothing there.

  John clenched his teeth at the sound of scuffling feet.

  Open your eyes. There’s nobody out here but you—

  “Johnny!”

  The voice was like someone shouting a whisper from a dream.

  He cried out, spinning, and throwing his arm back to swat whoever it was away.

  Coming up with nothing but air, John clenched his fists and waited for the voice to come again.

  “Who’s there?” he asked.

  Another twig snapped near the bushes.

  “Pat? Is that you?”

  He didn’t know why the kid would be out here now, but he called to him anyway.

  John crept around Sarah’s Subaru and over to his Saturn sitting next to it. He opened the driver’s side door, snatched up the knife he kept tucked under the front seat and shut the door as quietly as he could.

  He flicked the four-inch blade out and started toward the edge of the yard.

  “Listen,” he said, “I have a knife.” The words sounded stupid and weak as soon as they fell past his lips. “I don’t want to call the cops. Just show yourself and no one has to—”

  A pale face smiled from the darkness.

  “Who…who….”

  He stumbled backward, the knife trembling in his hand.

  And just like that, the face was gone.

  John no longer wanted to see what was out there. He closed the blade and hurried back inside, glancing back once before closing the door.

  Nothing stirred.

  * * *

  He watched out the living room window until well after midnight, when exhaustion and inebriation finally overtook him. He poured the last few ounces of tequila from the bottle into his glass and swallowed it down.

  It was all in my head, he said to himself, laughing.

  He turned out the dim lamp across the room and made his way to bed.

  Chapter Seven

  August watched the light go out before making his way back to Graveyard Land. Passing through the gates, he felt their eyes upon him. They didn’t understand why he could leave, and they could not. It was not his place to tell them.

  “What did you see out there?” One Eye asked.

  The scrawny little loudmouth sidled up next to August as he strolled past the graves and toward the fog that always surrounded his favorite tree.

  The massive oak sat alone above the front cemetery. A memory always just out of reach had drawn him to this spot for as long as he could remember being here. Not that any of them recalled how long they’d been here or when they first arrived.

  “Well?”

  August would have rolled his eyes if he had any. Instead, he gave One Eye a shove.

  “Leave me alone. I don’t want to hear your annoying voice tonight.”

  The kid’s silence spoke volumes. August spied him with his head bowed, shoulders slumped. One Eye was sensitive. While they were all on the meek side, One Eye seemed even more so than the others, at least when he wasn’t talking nonstop.

  August sighed and said, “It’s not for us.” They stopped at the base of the little hill. He gazed at the eyes peeking out from the gravestones. “It’s not for any of us. Not anymore.”

  The little farmhouse, an innocent-enough-looking silhouette, stood out through the fog. The house rested at the edge of the cemetery. The evil within always keeping watch over them.

  “Let me rest,” he said to One Eye, placing a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “Being away makes me tired. Besides,” he said, nodding toward the farmhouse, “we don
’t want him checking on us, do we?”

  One Eye shook his head.

  “Go on,” August said.

  As the boy shuffled away into the fog, August faced the farmhouse a minute longer.

  Something was going to happen soon.

  Something bad.

  Part of him wondered if he could stop it. If he refused to go along….

  No, he told himself. There was no refusing here.

  The fog rolled over the gravestones, little heads bobbed in and out, disappearing into the haze.

  He sighed and made his way to the base of his tree.

  He lay there and imagined what it would be like to still be among the living.

  Then he remembered his last moments of that life…and wished he’d left it in the dark corners of his mind.

  His body shivered with the tainted memory.

  As he lay beneath the tree, he thought that here in Graveyard Land it seemed like time was standing still.