by Chris Raven
“Get the hell out of here!” He yells at me. “Leave my aunt alone. Haven’t you done enough damage to my family?”
The situation is so surreal that I am paralyzed, not knowing what to say. He approaches even more and is placed one step away from me. The only thing I can think of is that he’s much taller and stouter than me. If he plans to bust my head with that hammer, I won’t be able to do much to stop him.
“Can’t you hear me? I want you to get out of this house, to leave this town forever.”
“You can’t ask me that.” I try to talk to him quietly to make it more reasonable, but I notice that my voice trembles. “I’m not doing anything wrong.”
“All that comes from you is evil.”His gaze conveys hatred. “You wrecked my family and you left. You ran like a rat.”
“I didn’t decide to leave. By God, Jake... I was twelve years old.”
For a moment, it gives me the impression that his gaze changes. I think I perceive fear, anguish, loneliness and an infinite sense of injustice. I understand. Nothing that happened to us was fair. That shattered our lives but blaming me is not going to bring his brother back; it is not going to bring back those years of childhood that were snatched from us. While I’m still thinking of how to make him understand, the front door opens, and Eloise appears on the porch.
“Jake, leave my guest alone.”
“He doesn’t have to be here. He is poison, he will only bring misfortune to us.”
“I said leave him alone. And finish fixing the roof, since I have already paid you for it.” Eloise’s voice is so firm that it does not admit an argument. “Eric, come into the house. Now.”
Without saying another word, Eloise goes back into her house, leaving the door ajar for me to pass. I step to one side, trying to dodge Jake’s imposing figure, avoiding his gaze. He holds me by the shirt, making me look up from the ground.
“You’re a damn coward.”His gaze conveys such contempt that I feel insulted as if he had spat on my face. “You didn’t even have the guts to go to Dave’s funeral.”
Swanton, August/September 2001
I
I didn’t even have the guts to go to Dave’s funeral. All the people were there, even people from Richford and St. Albans came. Dozens of journalists also came, not only from the Vermont media but even from national networks. The case of the serial killer who drowned Swanton’s children was the news of the moment.
There was such amount of people that the funeral had to be held behind closed doors, only for relatives and close friends. Everyone was there, except me, one of his best friends.
Since his death, two days ago, I had been unable to leave my room. I was just lying on the bed with my eyes pinned on the ceiling. I would have given anything to be unconscious, not to think. Most of the time I got it. My mind got disconnected and when I came around, I realized that it had been hours. I spent the rest of the time tortured by grief, shame, guilt...
I had not killed Dave, but I felt as responsible as if I had been the one who kept his head under the waters until his life escaped. I could not help remembering his protests when I proposed that we patrolled the town, his constant complaints so we would drop out that madness. The pain of Anne’s death had me so blinded that I had refused to listen to him and the only thing I had achieved was more pain, so much so that I felt that I was drowning, that I could not bear it.
That’s how a couple of weeks went by. My mother was trying not to disturb me. I think, at first, she understood that I needed to be alone, that I needed time to heal my soul. In her mind, I was like the cocoon of a worm, locked in itself as it changed. She just had to wait that I decided to get out of my confinement, turned into a butterfly. However, as the days went by, she began to worry more and more. She brought my favorite meals, she proposed to go to the garden or go to the park, she sat on the bed beside me, talking to me about anything while she was stroking my hair... And every night she came to take me to her room and put me in her bed, to sleep between her and my father. I thanked her with a smile and answered her direct questions, but I still could not talk about my pain, my feeling of guilt... Neither I had the strength to get out of that situation. In my mind, I kept telling myself that it should be me who should have died.
One day my mother showed up in my room carrying several books under her arm. In spite, I had never read anything else than what I was assigned at school, in her desperation for helping me she had gone to the bookstore to ask about books for boys my age. I sat on my bed and stroked their spines with a dull gesture. I mumbled a thank you and waited for her to go out. I took the first book of the heap and I stayed a few seconds contemplating the cover. The Three Musketeers, by Alexandre Dumas. I didn’t know what the story was about, I didn’t even know what a musketeer was, but I opened it and started reading. And the miracle worked.
When I realized, the night was beginning to fall on Swanton. For a few hours, I had left my bed, my room, and my people behind. And, most importantly, I had left myself behind. During the time I was living in the Paris of the 17th century, immersed in palatial intrigues, sword fights, romances, and adventures, I disappeared. It was not that my conscience was drowsy in the background; it vanished completely. In those hours there was not a tormented, sad, guilty Eric... I didn’t exist at all.
That was what I was looking for, a way not to think, not to be me. I devoted myself to reading in body and soul and during the following weeks devoured whatever fell into my hands: Treasure Island, Around the World in Eighty Days, Moby Dick, the Prisoner of Zenda, The Mines of King Solomon... My mother, seeing that I was no longer a wraith who devoted his life to looking at the ceiling, took care that I always had something to read. During mealtimes, only moments in which I closed my books and related to others, I told them excited about the adventures I was reading and talked about the new words and information I had learned.
I think reading protected me from madness, which was a salvation board for my tortured mind. My parents also had to start thinking about it because, on a Sunday at noon, while we were enjoying at the garden of some fantastic burgers and I was telling my mother about the adventures of A Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, my father interrupted me:
“I’m glad you’re feeling better, Eric. Don’t you think it’s about time you go back to sleep alone?”
After tucking me in, my mother left the room and stayed a few seconds on the threshold, looking at me, worried. I smiled at her, trying to convince her that everything would be okay.
“Do I leave the light on?”
“No, it is not necessary.” I answered as I lit the lamp on the bedside table. “This is enough for me. I’m going to read a little.”
“All right, honey, but don’t read too late. Good night.”
As soon as she closed the door, I took out my book and laid face down to read. Even though I would never confess it to my mother, I did not intend to try to sleep or to turn off the light for the whole night. I planned to read until it was day. When the light started coming through the window and I was sure they weren’t coming, it would allow me to sleep for a few hours.
When my father had proposed that I should go back to sleep alone, I did not protest nor try to convince him otherwise. Even though I was still scared to death, I understood that I could no longer sleep with them all my life. I was 12 years old. I couldn’t keep behaving like a little kid. Also, I had the faint idea that parents would do things at night in bed, during which I would not want to be present.
I spent the next few hours reading, so immersed in the story that I didn’t think for a moment in my fears or possible appearances. Little by little I was overcome by sleep and, without realizing it, I fell asleep.
I woke up a few hours later, not knowing at first what had gotten me out of sleep. Then I heard again: a long hiss, similar to the noise made by asking for silence. After a few seconds, the noise stopped. I was still stunned and numb, so I closed my eyes again to continue sleeping. And then I heard it again.
I sat up on the bed in a jump and I was paralyzed, looking at a corner of the room, next to the window. Dave was there, standing in a firm position, his head tilted to the ground. He carried something white in his hand and, every few seconds, he pressed it, producing that strange sound. It was his asthma inhaler. I thought that it had to be a nightmare. Ghosts don’t go around with asthma inhalers. That was ridiculous, just as it was the fact that Dave had spent half his life carrying that gadget to avoid choking and he had ended up drowned dead anyway.
Dave lifted his head, little by little, until he fixed his gaze upon me. I don’t know what I expected to see, maybe an empty, lost look like Bobby’s. It wasn’t like that. He looked at me with hatred, with a grudge, blaming me in my face that I was alive, and he was not.
He started moving towards me very slowly. I heard the noise of his footsteps on the room’s wood. It wasn’t a dream. It wasn’t a hallucination. He was there, he was real, and he came to take me with him.
I managed to get out of my paralysis and crawl back until I met the headboard, which prevented me from running away. Dave was still coming closer. He had reached the bed’s foot and had climbed to the mattress. Now he was crawling towards me, without haste, sure that I had no escape. In the light of the bedside lamp, I distinguished his whitish and moist flesh, the muddy stains of his clothes, the algae that hung from his limbs... He opened his mouth and the air in the room was impregnated with mildew and rotting odor. Dave raised his left hand and extended it to me, clumsily trying to find my neck. He wanted to choke me and take me with him, to make me share his destiny.
When his hand was about to touch me, my mouth opened, and I started screaming and screaming, desperate, not knowing what I was saying. I heard something that fell to the floor in my parents’ room and their rushing steps down the hallway. I was afraid they wouldn’t make it in time. Dave hadn’t vanished when I started screaming. He was still in front of me, fixing on me his gaze, laden with hatred and craving for vengeance, willing to allow no one to stand in the way of his desire to take me with him.
The door of the room opened, and I turned my head. My mother was there, round-eyed. I asked her for help with my eyes and I looked back at the bed, but Dave was gone. He had vanished, without leaving any trace of his presence.
My mother threw herself at me and hugged me tightly, while I sobbed uncontrollably. I noticed a hand on my back and I turned. My father had sat next to us and he was trying to comfort me. I think he felt guilty for making me sleep alone. I looked at him, trying to express to him that I was not angry with him and he seemed to understand me because he came even closer to surround me and my mother with his strong arms. When I was calmer, they both got up from the bed, they extended their hands and guided me to their room so that we could all go back to sleep together.
I woke up many hours later. The sun shone radiantly and was very high in the sky. It must have been almost noon, but I assumed my parents had preferred to let me rest. The house was silent as if there were no one, but from the kitchen came the scent of pancakes and freshly brewed coffee.
I got out of bed and approached the window to look out the street. It was a beautiful day at the end of August. Even though it was Saturday and the street should be full of people, there was hardly anyone. As much as the sun shone in the sky, the inhabitants of Swanton had been behaving for days as if we lived in a perpetual night as if the people had been engulfed by a thick fog that robbed from us the desire to live and it frightened us.
No one went out on the street if it was not necessary. The children were locked up in their homes, like treasures to protect. There were no kids riding bikes or girls playing rope or laughing childishly. The swings of the parks were abandoned and only a sad wind made them sway. Women didn’t dare to go out alone. Every now and then a group of two or three of women was seen, gripped by the arm and continually looking over their shoulder, fearing that someone might be following them. The people had ceased to belong to their inhabitants to become the dominion of fear and paranoia.
That landscape made me sad, so I turned away from the window and, barefoot and in pajamas, I walked towards the kitchen. As I approached, I heard the voices of my parents speaking in whispers. I figured they were talking about me, so I kept getting closer on my toes, so I could listen to them without them noticing.
“We have to do something with him...” My mother’s voice broke as if she were trying to contain the weeping. “I’m told there’s a very good child psychologist in St. Albans.”
“He doesn’t need a psychologist.”My father stopped her. “The kid’s fine.”
“No, he’s not right. He does not relate to anyone, he does not want to go to the street, he does not want to see his friends...”
“No one is relating to anyone, Evelyn. Have you seen the street? Everybody’s scared to death. It’s normal for Eric to be scared. He saw those dead boys, but it’ll pass. The only thing we need is time.”
“Do you believe that? Did you see his face last night? He’s going crazy.”
“My son is not going crazy. We will take care of him and not allow anything bad to happen to him, as we have always done. Don’t worry, everything will pass away.”
I heard my mother start crying and how my father comforted her. I felt very guilty about worrying them so much, but I couldn’t think what I could do. I could not sleep alone, I could not pretend that nothing happened. They were there, waiting for the night to come and get me. I wanted everything to stop, but I didn’t know how to do it. Besides, I was agreed with my father. I wasn’t going crazy, I didn’t need a psychologist. She wasn’t going to believe what was happening to me, either.
I returned to my parents’ room on tiptoe and then walked back to the kitchen and humming a song to warn them of my arrival. When I came in, my mother had dried her tears and she was waiting for me with a smile, even though she still had red eyes. My father shook my hair and pretended to read the paper.
“How are you today, Eric?” My mother asked me as she served me a bowl of my favorite cereals.
“All right, mom,” I said, with a huge smile on my face. “I slept very well. Where’s Lissie?”
“In her room. She’s had breakfast hours ago.”
“Could we all go for a walk or to fish together? I’m bored of being home all day.”
I looked at my father to see if he agreed with the plan. He nodded and smiled, interpreting my desire to come out as a step towards my recovery. My mother gave me a strong kiss on the cheek and, then she grabbed my face with both hands and stared at me enraptured as if I was the prettiest thing she had ever seen. At that time, I decided: whatever would happen, I had to pretend that I was fine and that nothing happened to me.
II
Summer is over and it’s time to go back to school. It had been a couple of weeks since Dave’s death and Swanton had been returning to normal. The streets continued to remain deserted as soon as getting dark, but, during the day, the neighbors had gradually retaking their territory. People would go out to their gardens and go back to barbecues on Sundays. The children occupied the streets again, though always under the attentive eyes of an adult.
That morning I woke up in a good mood. I was already bored of being at home. Going back to school meant reconnecting with my friends, being surrounded by people, laughter, conversations... Although it would also mean spending eternal hours of boredom listening to heavy explanations, mountains of homework and difficult exams, I was willing to do all that to get back to normal.
While I was having breakfast, my father went into the kitchen. His hands were stained with oil and he spent a couple of minutes at washing them off in the sink.
“Have you been trying to fix that damn motorbike again?” My mother asked. “Is that why you woke up so early?
“Exactly. I woke up to give it one last review and it’s ready. Eric, do you want me to take you by motorbike to school?
I almost jumped out of the chair before that question. Of course,
I wanted to ride his Harley. I loved that motorbike. I couldn’t imagine anything better than getting to school on the first day on that machine, with its shiny black bodywork and silver handlebars. I was going to be the envy of the whole school. While nodded with my head, I drank in one gulp my glass of juice and, without giving time for my mother to protest, I ran to pick up my backpack.
“You know I don’t find amusing that you take Eric on that old crock,” protested my mother.
“Did you see how excited the boy is? Give us that whim.”
I showed up at the door with the backpack hanging on my back and the eyes sparkling with emotion, throwing my mother my best look of an abandoned puppy. She laughed and nodded:
“All right but be careful.”
We both promised and left home before she changed her mind. My father helped me put on my helmet and he hoisted me up to the seat as if I didn’t weigh anything. Then he climbed up, he turned on the engine and made it roar a couple of times, in front of my mother’s disapproving gaze. We went off down the street. The world seemed to slip blurry on both sides. Even though I was enjoying the feeling, I grabbed my father’s jacket tightly, fearing that I would fly away if I didn’t. In less than five minutes we had reached the school’s entrance. There was still a quarter of an hour to get in. My father got off the bike and helped me down.
“Jeez! That was fast. Couldn’t we take another ride?”
“I’m sorry, I have to open the workshop at nine o’clock.”He helped me to take off my helmet and shook my hair with affection. “Another day we do it again.”
“If mom allows it.” I said, crossing my arms and frowning, frustrated.
“She would allow it to us. I will convince her. One day, you and I will tour all Swanton. Promised.”
I saw him getting away on the road, waving his right arm as a farewell. I smiled, happy with that promise. At that time, I could not conceive that soon I would lose that motorbike, I would lose Swanton, I would lose the father I knew, so, carefree, I tightened the backpack straps and entered the school.
