Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth

by Ray Garton

  He limped into the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face, then began to clean himself off so he could decide what to do next.

  36.

  "We have to clean this up," he said, his voice unsteady, standing in the hall and facing the mess.

  Sondra stood at the window staring at the night, twisting a strand of hair around her finger.

  "They'll be coming soon," she muttered.

  A burst of adrenaline surged through Roger because he knew she was right, and he clapped his hands together sharply and said, "C'mon, c'mon, get cleaned up, let's go."

  He looked out the window and saw Marjie's car parked on the street in front of his house. He paced as Sondra slowly made her way down the hall.

  This would be a lot more difficult than cleaning up after Sidney the bread man.

  The phone rang and Roger ignored it. The answering machine picked up.

  "Roger?" It was Betty and she sound upset. "Roger, if you're there, please—"

  He picked up the phone. "Betty?"

  "Oh, Roger, Roger—" Her words smeared together drunkenly. "—it's the police! They're everywhere! Running around with their chemicals and little brushes and—"

  "Betty, what are you talking about?"

  "The police! They're here at the deli going over everything. They called me, got me out of bed, said they had a search warrant and that they, they've brought some men in from San Francisco, lab men, they said. It sounds like they're looking for blood," she hissed, lowering her voice. "They're in the Munch Room talking, whispering to each other, and Roger, they keep talking about you, they keep saying your name. I'm scared, Roger, what's going on? What have you done?"

  Roger clutched the receiver so hard, his knuckles ached and he was struck with the urge to laugh, to throw back his head and guffaw. It was so absurd, all of it.

  "Look, Betty, just...just, uh..."

  "You're keeping something from me, Roger," she said. "What is it? Does it have something to do with the brick through the window? What is it?"

  "No, no, that's something...that's a...oh, Jesus." He did laugh, then, a giggle at first that built to a deep belly laugh, and he had to sit down, holding his sides with one arm, his eyes filling with tears as Betty spoke his name again and again.

  Then he heard voices.

  There were several of them outside, all male. First one spoke, then another, then several at once, as if in disagreement.

  Then silence.

  Footsteps.

  Roger stopped laughing in time to hear one of them say, "I still think we should call the police."

  Another said, "As long as you don't use that gun, we'll be okay."

  Gun?

  "Betty," Roger whispered, "hang on a sec." He put down the receiver with Betty's pinched, insect-like voice still coming from the earpiece. Pulling the curtain aside slightly, Roger peered out the front window and saw five men coming across the lawn toward the house. Bill was leading them with a shotgun cradled in one arm. "Christ," Roger hissed, returning to the phone. "I'm sorry, Betty, but I've gotta go."

  "You can't! Roger, I don't know what's—"

  "I'm sorry," he said again before hanging up and rushing to the bathroom. Sondra stood naked before the mirror brushing her hair, her eyes heavy-lidded and distant as she whistled tunelessly through her teeth. "C'mon, we've gotta go," he said.

  "Hm?"

  "Get dressed, we have to—shit, you don't have any clothes." He led her to his bedroom where he took a pair of sweats from the closet. They were baggy on her, but there was no time to be choosey.

  The doorbell rang.

  Sondra turned to Roger with panic in her eyes.

  Roger put a finger over his lips. "The back door," he whispered.

  The bell rang again, three times in rapid, impatient succession

  After putting on his coat, Roger went to the living room and got his gun from the coffee table, loaded it, and stuffed it in his pocket. He got his car keys, then led Sondra through the kitchen, out the back door and around to the side of the house. A drizzle was falling and an icy breeze made Sondra's teeth chatter.

  As they rounded the front corner of the house and approached the car, Roger could hear Bill's deep, unfriendly voice.

  "Roger? Open up. I've come for Sondra."

  Sondra took Roger's hand and squeezed fearfully.

  He quietly opened the door on the driver's side and waved Sondra in. Behind the wheel, he softly clicked the door shut and slid the key into the ignition.

  Someone pounded on the front door and Bill shouted, "Roger? Sondra!"

  "Let's go, Roger," Sondra whispered frantically, "please, please, please hurry, let's go, if he takes me home he's gonna be so mad, so mad."

  Roger started the engine, punched the car in reverse and sped out of the drive.

  Even in the car, Roger could hear the burst of voices from the porch. The men turned and jogged to a pickup truck and an old Pinto parked across the street. Bill hobbled behind them on his cane, glaring at Roger as he put the car in gear and drove away.

  "He has a gun," Sondra said tremulously. "He means business. We have to go to the police, Roger, we have to—"

  "No. Not the police."

  "Why not?"

  "I just killed somebody, remember? And now they think I killed Sidney Nelson, too." He quickly told her about Betty's phone call, glancing in the rearview mirror to see the truck and Pinto coming after him. "If they've got a warrant to search the deli and they've brought a bunch of lab guys in from the city, they mean business, too."

  "Then...what're we gonna do?"

  Roger took a sudden left off Beakman, then another left onto Watson.

  "First, we've got to lose them," he said, taking yet another turn, zigzagging past warmly lit houses with smoke rising from the chimneys. "Then we've got to get rid of this car."

  Then what? he thought. Leave town? Hide out? Take a minor across state lines and make things even worse?

  Headlights appeared in the rearview mirror.

  "Damn!" Roger barked, hitting the wheel.

  "Where are we going?"

  He rounded another corner, increasing his speed, making his way toward Silverado Trail. He thought for a moment, going over his options, which did not take long, then said, "To see my friend Josh."

  37.

  Josh lived in one of a row of small bungalow-like houses on the south side of town, behind which ran a narrow alley.

  Roger parked his car in the alley where it would be invisible from the street, went through the gate that opened onto the small rectangle of grass that served as a backyard, and knocked on the back door. When there was no answer, no sound from inside at all, he knocked again and called for Josh.

  "Maybe he's gone," Sondra whispered, shivering as she looked around them nervously.

  "No, he's very sick." Roger knocked again.

  They had managed to stay far enough ahead of Bill and his friends to get to Josh's without being tailed, but now Roger began to think perhaps he had brought them there for nothing.

  When he tried the door, it opened.

  "Josh?" Roger called, taking Sondra's hand and going inside. He checked all the rooms, but the small house was empty. When he looked out the front window, he muttered, "His car's gone. But where could he—" Then he turned to the sofa where he had seen the neatly placed clothes the day before, and he knew.

  I'm going to disappear...

  Roger slumped onto the sofa and scrubbed his hands over his face, hating himself for being so blinded by his own problems that he did not see what Josh was about to do—even after Josh had told him he was going to do it.

  "My...God," Sondra whispered.

  Her voice startled Roger. He had forgotten he wasn't alone. She stood across the room looking at a row of pictures on the mantle over the small fireplace.

  "What?" he said.

  "Him." She pointed at one of the pictures, backing away slowly.
>
  Roger stood and looked over her shoulder at the picture. It was Josh at Disneyland, a healthier Josh but still very thin and quite obviously ailing. He stood between Mickey and Minnie, arm in arm, grinning like a thrilled little boy.

  "It was him," she whispered. "The man. In the woods. Tonight. It was him."

  38.

  Roger stumbled backward and fell onto the sofa again, his arms loose at his sides.

  "He's...the one...you killed?" He weakly lifted an arm and pointed at the picture. "That was his blood?"

  Four fingertips over her mouth, tears sparkling in her eyes, she nodded. "He looked really sick, but yeah, it was him."

  "He was sick," Roger whispered. "He had AIDS."

  Sondra turned to him slowly, very slowly, her jaw slack, face blank, eyes disbelieving.

  "Whuh...what?" Her head bobbed with a dry gulp as she leaned against the wall. "What did you say?"

  Roger repeated himself.

  They looked at one another for a long time, their eyes speaking for them, both thinking about the same things: The blood that had covered Sondra when she arrived at Roger's...sex on the floor...the cuts and scratches on both their bodies as they writhed in the blood...

  Sondra went to Roger. "I'm sorry," she rasped.

  "You couldn't have known."

  She took his hands in hers and made a futile attempt to smile.

  "We're gonna die, anyway," she said.

  "I know."

  The gun resting heavily in Roger's coat pocket suddenly felt comforting—not as a means of defense, but of escape.

  They held each other for a while until they heard a vehicle slowing outside. Sondra pulled away from him and said, "That's Bill's pickup."

  39.

  When Roger looked out the window, Bill was limping toward the house. He met Roger's eyes with a smile as cold as a tomb and called, "I figured you'd be here with your fag friend." Bill's voice was padded by distance. He still held the shotgun in his arm but appeared to be alone now.

  Roger dropped the curtain and turned to Sondra.

  "Let's go." He grabbed her arm and rushed her through the house, out the back door, across the yard and to the car. She got in and slammed her door as Roger hurried around the front of the car—

  —and staggered to a halt.

  The left front tire had been slashed and was now flat.

  So was the right.

  And the two in the rear.

  "Out, out," he said, waving her from the car, "they've slashed the tires."

  "What?" she cried, panicked.

  "C'mon." He pulled her out and, clutching her arm, led her toward the north end of the alley—

  —where two men were headed toward them taking long rapid steps. One of them carried a baseball bat, the other a flashlight.

  Sondra backpedaled, whispering, "No, no, no, no."

  "Just give us the girl," one of the men said.

  They walked with such purpose, such force, that Roger wanted to cringe, frozen in place, like a frightened animal. Instead, he steeled himself and led Sondra in the opposite direction. His heart battered his ribs as he broke into a jog.

  For a terrifying, brain-searing instant, he was a child again, the child of his nightmares, weak-kneed with the debilitating fear of a hunted animal looking for a place to hide.

  He reached into his jacket pocket and clutched the cold, heavy gun, holding it like a lover in a last embrace.

  Sondra began to cry, coughing sobs that made her stumble against Roger and nearly fall. He held her up and dragged her with him until they reached the cross street.

  "This way," he gasped, pulling her to the right—

  —and stumbling to a stop when Bill rounded the corner before them.

  His stiff leg clicked as he neared them, hefting the shotgun threateningly.

  Once again, Roger and Sondra began to walk backwards, clinging closely to one another.

  "Sondra!" Bill shouted. "Come here. Now. Annie's worried sick."

  Roger said, "Bill...Bill, you've gotta listen to me."

  "No. No, I don't." He raised the shotgun, aimed it at Roger.

  "You don't want to do that, Bill."

  "Maybe it'd be good. You're both as evil as the night is dark."

  Roger thought with chilling certainty, He's insane.

  "Listen, Bill, Sondra is sick. What you're doing is only making her worse. She needs help. She needs—"

  "She needs to get away from you, that's what she needs. She's always been a problem, but you've only made it worse. She needs to get down on her knees and plead for God's forgiveness. Isn't that right, Sondra?"

  Digging her fingers into Roger's arm, groaning miserably, Sondra leaned forward, clutching her stomach. Roger put an arm around her shoulders to support her.

  "No, Sondra," he whispered, "hang on, don't let it happen now." He turned to Bill. "We're both sick. It's not our fault, Bill. You've done this to us. To both of us. You and people like you."

  Bill laughed, shaking his head.

  There were hurried footsteps behind them. The other men were closing in.

  Roger remembered the baseball bat and, holding Sondra close to his side, he drew his gun, spun around and leveled it the man who was holding the bat over his head, preparing to strike.

  The men froze and their faces registered shock. Both of them were large and cast an imposing shadow in the glow of the single yellow sodium light in the otherwise dark alley.

  Roger advanced toward them, aiming the gun as he shouted, "Stay back!"

  The bat dropped to the ground as the other man tripped over his own feet and fell over backward.

  Sondra struggled in Roger's embrace as he turned toward Bill. She hid her face against his shoulder, her voice a muffled growl as she began to chew on his coat.

  "Why have you done this, Bill?" Roger shouted. "Why do you—"

  Sharp teeth broke through his coat and pierced his flesh. Sondra writhed in pain against him and Roger felt blood trickling from his new wound, soaking into his shirt. He grunted as he felt her teeth gnaw deeper into his arm. Then he felt something else, a blade-fingered fist of pain closing around his entrails, squeezing, crushing.

  No, Roger thought, no, not now.

  The pain raged and Roger bent forward as hot bile rose in his throat. He swallowed, coughed, and continued.

  "Why do you keep doing this, Bill? Why don't you leave me alone?"

  Bill started toward them as they staggered backward, the shotgun aimed at Roger's midsection. Bill wore an icy smirk, but said nothing.

  "It's gone on too long," Roger gasped, trying to talk through the pain. "It's time to stop now, time to...to just...leave me alone."

  Still no response.

  Roger screamed, "What do you want from me—a fucking apology for being myself?"

  A door slammed somewhere on the block and a voice shouted, "Take it home or I'm calling the cops, asshole! People are tryna sleep!"

  Bill spoke softly. "It's too late for repentance now, Roger. You're too far gone and you've taken too many souls with you." His prosthetic leg clumped as he walked. The rubber end of his cane made sloppy kissing sounds on the wet pavement. "The books you've written, Roger...they're evil. 'Developed by agents of Satan.' Recognize those words, Roger? Know what that makes you, Roger? An agent of Satan. Bewitching the minds of your readers 'with theories formed in the synagogue of Satan.' Recognize those words, Roger?"

  Roger was crying now, overwhelmed by pain as he stumbled off the sidewalk and into the street with Sondra still leaning on him heavily, her cries garbled against him, fingers digging into his chest now, tearing his shirt.

  "They were written by Ellen White," Bill went on. "God's prophet. Heaven's scribe. Leader of the remnant church. She used her gifts for him, for his glory. But you...you've used yours for the prince of darkness. You are an agent of Satan. You have put his words into every book store and supermarket in the country and you hav
e trampled the truth to do it! You've rejected God's word and his plan for you in favor of leading precious souls to the lake of fire!" His voice was rising, trembling with righteous indignation. "Every person who reads one of your books is a step closer to eternal darkness and you are responsible for their loss!" He kept coming steadily: Step...clump...step...clump... "You're a disease, Roger, and you're spreading, infecting minds, turning thousands, maybe millions, away from the plan of salvation by corrupting them with the devil's dictations!"

  The man who had fallen into the bushes struggled to his feet and warily approached Bill, saying, "Bill...c'mon now, Bill, that's enough, don't you—"

  "Back off, Matt!" Bill snapped. He turned to Roger again, pointed his cane at him, and shouted, "You have to be stopped!"

  Sondra bit Roger through his clothes again, squirming in agony, but he didn't feel the bite because it was eclipsed by the pain spreading and worsening inside him, digging its way into his testicles and down his arms as it had earlier that night.

  Bill dropped his cane and lifted the gun with both arms, put it to his shoulder.

  "Run!" Roger cried, pushing Sondra across the alley to the other side and whispered, "Run, just start running."

  "No, Bill, wait!" one of the men shouted, afraid now, apparently unaware that Bill would go to such an extreme. He rushed Bill and grabbed the shotgun.

  Roger ran after Sondra in a half-crouch, the intensity of his pain making him unable to stand upright. He felt spittle dribbling down his chin, felt himself quickly losing control over his own body.

  There were shouts and sounds of struggle behind them.

  Roger shouted Sondra's name but it came from his mouth a thick and mangled sound: "Shon-daaah!"

  The shotgun exploded behind him.

  40.

  Time slowed to a heavy crawl after the gunshot.

  Roger tried to run fast when he heard the shotgun go off, but he was hit. He felt the burning sprinkle of buckshot over his back and legs and he fell, skinning his palms on the ground. His skin felt like fire and his clothes clung to his bloody wounds.