August's Eyes

by Glenn Rolfe

  “That’s time,” Dr. Soctomah said.

  John wiped the tears from his cheeks. He couldn’t believe he’d cried, let alone twice. First while talking about his parents’ divorce, and then again about his father’s passing.

  “That was, uh, heavier than I thought it would be,” John said.

  Dr. Soctomah squeezed his shoulder and said, “It is amazing what we’re able to power through when we’re focused on surviving the day.”

  “Yeah. We don’t have to do that again, do we?”

  “It shouldn’t be so bad going forward.”

  “Thanks, Doc,” John said, stepping to the door.

  A photograph on the wall next to the door caught his eye.

  “Is that Fairbanks Cemetery?”

  “Yes,” Dr. Soctomah said. “That’s my great grandfather’s tribe in 1846.”

  “The Passamaquoddy used to be in Spears Corner?”

  “I’m afraid the history of this town is not a pretty one, especially for my people.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  “A story for another time, perhaps,” Dr. Soctomah said.

  “Well, I gotta run, Doc,” John said. “Literally.”

  “Good. Make sure you hydrate. Tell Sarah I say hello, won’t you?”

  “Of course…if she talks to me tonight.”

  “Give her time. And give yourself a little, too.” He winked.

  Chapter Sixteen

  John’s first run reminded him why he’d quit. He made it just over a mile down Hinkley Road before a cramp bit into his side. He pulled up to give himself a break. A horn blared, causing him to nearly jump out of his new Nikes. Burt Marsden drove by in his Silverado, laughing and waving.

  Burt was an old school nemesis. He smashed John’s left knee in a Hall-Dale/Spears Corner rivalry football game back in ’96, effectively ruining John’s already ultra-mega slim chance of making his way out of this tiny small-minded town. Back then, John had been one of the fastest kids in school and after two years of track in junior high, Coach Hersom asked him to try out for the high school football team. With his parents on the fast track for divorce, his home life on the brink of destruction, John tried out and landed the starting tailback position. Freshman year, he ran like hell. Running with grit and guts and speed like he was desperate to get the fuck away from it all. He was projected to annihilate the state record for yards in a season when Marsden dropped a shoulder to the side of his right knee.

  The knee still ached a little when it rained, but damn if it didn’t feel good to run, almost like he was shaking off years of rust. Marsden now owned a beef market up the road. John forgave him years back, but the old grudge resurfaced for a few weeks every September when the NFL season started.

  Dredging up his own potential from the past combined with Marsden’s timely presence gave John the fuel he needed to press on. He wiped his mouth with the bottom of his Guns N’ Roses t-shirt, took a deep breath and shoved off.

  ‘Running with the Devil’, the old Van Halen song, played on a loop from his phone serving as musical motivation. His Fitbit – a birthday gift from Sarah – tracked his miles, heartbeats per minute, and the time it took to make the distance between Jenkins Cemetery, which was the tiny graveyard two houses down from his place, and Fairbanks Cemetery over on Spears Corner Road.

  It seemed insane to be out in this heat under the afternoon’s white-hot threat, but it felt like his penance. After acting like such an ass to Sarah, he deserved a little suffering. Slowing to a snail’s pace, John glanced down at his soaked t-shirt. It looked like he’d just stepped from the shower fully dressed. His bandana was doing a shitty job of preventing the moisture from stinging his eyes.

  He gave up on the dream of running the whole trek and walked his ass to the entrance of Fairbanks Cemetery. Slowly catching his breath as he strolled along the pathways, he stopped the music coming from his cell phone. It seemed somehow sacrilegious or rude to disturb the dead. The sudden quiet derailed him.

  The graveyard had easily quadrupled in size compared to what it had been in the photograph from Dr. Soctomah’s office.

  “The history of this town is not a pretty one.”

  He’d known the photo had been taken here because of the massive oak tree at its center. The thing still stood like a monument.

  John had never noticed any native names on the headstones here.

  His gaze landed upon several of those engraved on the markers. Jim Greeley. Date of death August 15th…. Preston Peacock, August 23rd…. Greta Hinkley, August 5th…. Finally, he saw a veteran that died in September…. For a few seconds, the coincidences were fucking with him.

  He’d had dreams the other night of August and One Eye and the task of picking a grave…. It had to mean something. Either that or he truly was losing his mind. In which case, Doc Soctomah could hopefully prescribe him a remedy and at least make things easier on Sarah. She had given him the cold shoulder each night since their argument about trying for a baby. He wasn’t budging and so far, neither was she. He tried to talk to her about the dream the other night and she straight up shut him down, telling him to save it for his next session.

  Whether he deserved it or not, it stung.

  He managed to jog most of the way home, a total of two miles, and was happy to find Pat waiting there on the porch.

  “What’s up?” John asked, taking a seat next to the water bottle he’d left under the shaded overhang.

  “Jesus, Johnny,” Pat said. “You’re drenched, man. Why are you exercising in the middle of the day?”

  “I’m a masochist. And I told you not to call me that.” He gulped down a couple swallows of water, gasped his satisfaction and went back for more.

  Pat said, “I was cruising around. Got my work done early today, and….”

  His hesitation caught John’s attention. “What is it?”

  Pat was fidgeting, a nervous tic he had back when John first came to his family. Something was bothering him. John hoped to Christ his mom hadn’t slipped up. It happens, but he just didn’t want to see it happen to Trisha.

  “Okay, okay,” Pat said. He wasn’t looking at John. Instead, his gaze bounced all over the place. “Okay and I’m, like, probably just being crazy, but….”

  John stood. “Do you have any smokes?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Pat said, reaching into his pocket.

  “I’m out of smokes. Mind if I bum one of yours?”

  “For real? Are you sure it ain’t gonna finish you off?”

  John knew his body would prefer he didn’t, but it was more to help Pat relax. “I’ll be fine.”

  Pat handed him one and lit it for him before lighting his own. After a few drags, John did indeed regret it, but Pat stopped fidgeting and met his gaze.

  “I think someone’s following me,” he said.

  “What? Like who?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, after taking another drag. “I could swear I’ve seen this van around town recently. I’ve never seen it before this past week, and I don’t know, maybe that’s why it sticks out, but it feels like it’s watching me when I see it. It stopped in front of me at the gas station the other day and then it passed me on my way home and just sat in the middle of the street out front of my trailer park.”

  Despite the heat, John’s insides turned to sludge like a bowl of day-old ice cream left in the corner of a teenager’s room. The curdled feeling was too much to keep from his face.

  “Are you okay?” Pat asked.

  The green van from the other day outside of the Tap Room. The shadowy figure behind the wheel….

  “John?”

  “Oh, yeah…you were right.” He tossed the remains of the cigarette to the ground and stamped it out.

  “Yeah,” Pat said, putting his hands in the pockets of his black cargo shorts. “Well, like I was saying, it’
s probably me being paranoid or whatever but…I don’t know.”

  “Have you gotten a look at the driver?” John asked.

  “No, it seemed like I was at a bad angle both times, or it was too dark inside the van or something.”

  “Have you told your mom?”

  “No,” Pat said. “She doesn’t need to be worrying about me riding all over town for work being chased by some boogeyman.”

  The term induced another sinking feeling in John’s stomach.

  “Do me a favor,” John said. “If you see it again, try to get a look at the plate.”

  “Yeah,” Pat muttered.

  “I believe you, you know.”

  “I’m probably nuts.”

  John saw the van in his mind. He shook his head. “No, I think I’ve seen it, too.”

  He saw the glimmer of excitement in Pat’s eyes.

  “Really? Where? When?”

  “A few days ago, downtown by the Tap Room.”

  “Weird.”

  “Yeah, but it’s like I had this strange sense of déjà vu. There was something so familiar about it, but I can’t figure it out.”

  “It is an old van,” Pat said. “Maybe it belongs to someone in town, or someone that’s come back to town?”

  “Hmm,” John said. “I don’t know. Just be careful, all right?”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “Well,” John said. “What are you doing now?”

  “Nothing, really. You?”

  “I’m on my staycation. I got in my run, now I was just gonna sit on my ass for the rest of the day and watch movies while Sarah’s at work. You want to stick around for a bit?”

  “What are you watching?”

  “Have you ever seen The ’Burbs with Tom Hanks?”

  “Is that the Forrest Gump guy?”

  John put his hand on Pat’s shoulder. “My friend, come on in. You are in for a treat.”

  * * *

  Later that evening, John gave Pat a ride home. The kid had loved The ’Burbs and they followed it up with another eighties horror comedy classic, The Night of the Creeps. On the way over to Pat’s house, they were both looking around, scanning the roads and sidewalks like a couple of paranoid fools. Pat took his bike out of the backseat and hurried to his house. John drove away, thinking back on the two of them watching the 80s flicks together. He felt like it was a bit of a father-son moment or at least a big-brother thing, introducing Pat to a couple of films he considered to be classics.

  Father-son.

  He shook the thought away. No way, he wasn’t going back down that road. But how cool would it be to have…a son?

  Damn you, Dr. Soctomah.

  He remembered what he’d told the doc about his own father. Sure, his dad was there, but at the same time, he kind of never really was. Roy Colby worked fifty hours a week. From four thirty when he got home until seven p.m., he sat in his recliner in the corner of the trailer chain-smoking Marlboro Lights and drinking through a six pack of Schlitz. John would sit on the couch watching TV with him, everything from M.A.S.H. or Coach re-runs to A Current Affair or parts of Entertainment Tonight. On the weekends, it was auto racing, or Clint Eastwood movies. John stuck around for most of the films, but he couldn’t stand watching cars zoom in circles. Rides to the store included his dad’s coffee cup, which was always filled with beer, and his father crooning along to the oldies station. They never really talked, but just being with him in some sense was better than nothing.

  When his mom left, and dad found a new girlfriend half an hour away, they drifted the rest of the way apart. It was bad enough when his mother gave up and left, but somehow, his dad getting dressed up and going out for the night crushed him more. Their TV time evaporated and eventually so did his dad.

  Now that he was a grown man who dealt with broken families and sometimes got to glimpse what a loving, functioning unit looked like, even in the face of economic strain and healthcare hardships and all the normal things burdening families every day, a lot of whom also had to take care of kids with special needs, it finally occurred to John that good parents don’t give up on their kids. Ever.

  At barely sixteen, he’d been without either of his.

  Shortly after John’s football injury thanks to Marsden, John’s father suffered a stroke. He died two days after Thanksgiving that same year. John would give anything to sit down, have a beer and watch an episode of Coach with him again.

  He was surprised to find himself crying as he pulled into his driveway.

  * * *

  That night, he mixed himself a stiff drink and called it an early evening. Emotional shit had a way of draining him twice as fast as anything else. He was already half asleep when Sarah came home, got into her pajamas, brushed her teeth, and lay beside him.

  Neither budged.

  Stubbornness was a fucking bitch.

  He heard her sigh before he fell asleep.

  Chapter Seventeen

  She’d be crazy if she didn’t admit that John’s stubbornness didn’t piss her off. They’d both been run through medical tests. Biologically, they should be able to conceive a child, but it had yet to happen. Sarah always figured it had something to do with her losing her first and only pregnancy as a teen. Maybe God was punishing her for her premarital sex. That seemed a bit extreme and ridiculous, but religion, belief and faith were funny things. They seemed to find a way to exonerate men for such behavior and devour women for the same.

  John slept like the dead at her side. Unable to quiet the thoughts shooting through her mind, Sarah got out of bed and went to the kitchen for a late-night glass of Merlot.

  They hadn’t seen much of each other in the last two days, purposely giving one another some much-needed space. Unlike their usual little fights, this one continued to loom over them. She had never conceded to giving up the hope of them having a family. She may have gone along with the idea for the sake of moving forward, but the desire simmered when it wasn’t burning. Right now, it was a four-alarm emergency.

  Sitting in the dim glow of the stove light they left on at night, Sarah tried to pick at the scab a little more. Why not? Her brain wouldn’t shut off; she might as well force the issue. Why now? Why was the desire so intense?

  What was making it so do-or-die this time?

  It wasn’t like John didn’t have other shit he was dealing with, he did, but even so, she couldn’t tamp this down.

  So, what was it?

  While John was pretty self-sufficient, their relationship was strong.

  She’d known a girl when she worked at a cell phone store who got pregnant to trap her boyfriend. She confided in Sarah that she’d caught him texting other girls, and she figured having a baby would lock him down.

  John hardly made comments about celebrities he found attractive. She never saw him ogling ladies even when they were half-naked at the beach. He was still human; there had been porn, but nothing that concerned her.

  Maybe it was their opposite schedules. Some days they didn’t really get to see each other except to say goodbye or good night.

  She poured another glass and stared at her Chromebook.

  The idea of writing was always exciting for her. Yet, she hadn’t really tried, at least not in a while.

  Write away the pain.

  She’d found it cathartic when she was in high school.

  She looked at the clock on the stove. It was just after midnight.

  What could it hurt?

  She gave herself a half hour just to see what happened.

  Starting the computer, Sarah opened a new document and typed the first title that came to mind:

  ‘Walking into Spider Webs’.

  She knew it was a song from her teenage years, but it somehow felt appropriate, considering the tangled mess she and John seemed to be wrapped up in at the moment. A
smile cracked her face in the blue light of the Chromebook’s screen.

  No one would see this, she reminded herself. King said something to that effect, something about writing with the door closed, right? She took a sip of her wine and began to type.

  * * *

  By the time she saved and closed the document, she was finishing her third glass of wine. The stove clock read nearly three in the morning. But something miraculous had happened. She’d written a story. And she felt…better. She was also having trouble keeping her eyes open.

  When she carefully made her way back to bed, she saw John twitching under the covers, unable to stay still. This is what he did when he was having one of his bad dreams. Sarah considered waking him, but she would be useless in her current exhausted and buzzed state.

  She was out as soon as her head hit the pillow.

  * * *

  “Johnny, you don’t look so good,” August said. He was standing by the overgrown oak tree between the front two graveyards.

  Could you be sick in a dream? Or sad?

  “I was looking for you,” August said, still leaning against his tree.

  “Yeah? What for?” Johnny asked.

  “Yeah, August,” One Eye chimed in. “What were you looking for Johnny for?”

  August reached up to a branch and held his hand palm up for something there to crawl onto him. Johnny couldn’t make out what it was from where he stood. One Eye stepped forward as the ever-present fog crept around their feet.

  “Better you mind your own business, don’t you think?” August replied. His tone was dark; his focus remained on the eight-legged creeps wandering across the palm of his good hand.

  “Why don’t you leave them spiders alone,” One Eye said. “They give me the heebee jeebees.”

  “Everything gives you the heebee jeebees,” August said.

  He let the spider, a rather large black one, Johnny could see now, crawl across his palm and down his thin, bone-white arm.