by R.M. Haig
September 10th, 2016. 1:00PM
Burlwood, Indiana
"God, I hate that fuckin' tree!" Clyde Rambo remonstrated.
His lumbar region objected to the angle at which he leaned to take in the entirety of the oaken monster despite the supplemental support he provided by pressing his hands against it as he looked up to the leaves hanging high in the sky. The tree was a giant, nearly a hundred feet tall and at least as many years old, and it rose up from the Earth just ten yards beyond his property line.
Just ten yards, just thirty goddamned feet beyond his jurisdiction. Thirty feet to the north, as fate would have it. As a result, it cast a thick and heavy shadow across the entirety of his largest, most fertile garden. The soil was perfect, moist and rich in nutrients, just begging to take in bulbs or bushes and furnish them with everything they needed to live long, happy, healthy lives. The only thing missing was sunlight, thanks to the influence of that godforsaken tree.
When he called the first surveyor to determine whose tree it was -- whether it was on his plot of land or that of Zack Brown, his neighbor -- the fool tried to say it was twelve yards on the wrong side of the line, the side that belonged to Zack Brown. That was crazy. Ludicrous, really.
A second surveyor concurred with Clyde in the fact that he had mismeasured, determining that it was, in fact, only ten yards that kept that blasphemous tree alive. Ten yards might as well have been ten miles in the scheme of it all, though, he couldn't touch the dastardly thing. Couldn't do anything about it.
Rambo's relationship with the tree had started out peacefully enough, he actually found it rather majestic. Thought it added character to his retirement estate when he purchased it in 2005, when he finally had to have that pacemaker put in.
Ron Boudreaux had been elected to fill the position vacated by Sheriff Dickinson in 2004, and had thus taken his seat upon the throne as ruler of all law enforcement in Elsmere County. He was all but shouting gimme the loot when he started urging the citizens of Burlwood to dissolve their cumbersome and meager police department. His campaign was successful, of course, largely because Clyde Rambo was too tired to put up a fight. He found he just didn't care enough anymore, he wasn't interested in trading blows with his former partner. With the big six-zero closing in quickly anyway, he figured it was just time to hang up the gloves and put the past to rest, to be interred with the remains of those poor young souls that were murdered so brutally while he was at the helm.
He stood relieved of his duties on the first day of January, 2005, and purchased his sprawling retreat in February. It wasn't until the spring that things went sour with the tree. Taking up an old hobby, one he'd neglected for the duration of his tenure as sheriff, he planted two hibiscus bushes in the patch of land that seemed eager to make their acquaintance. Within a month, that beastly tree had brutally murdered them by starving them of sunlight.
Deciding that some modest concession to the shade was obligatory, he'd tried a set of peonies thereafter, only to have them slaughtered just as viciously. Still trying to maintain order, trying to see that cooler heads prevailed, he resolved to settle for butterfly bushes. They had made a valiant effort, had held on for several months, determined to persevere. The task was beyond them, though, and they eventually succumbed to the stranglehold of that infernal tree, just as those that went before them.
Now it was after his hydrangeas, and it was winning the war. The leaves of this, his bush of last resort, which had struggled to thrive for nearly three years now, were beginning to turn yellow. The blooms were withering and looked pathetic, like discarded scraps one would find in the dumpster behind a florist's shop. For them, the end was extremely nigh. All four of his bushes were obviously making amends and coming to terms with their pending demise.
The damned tree wouldn't be happy until he was reduced to planting hostas, a level to which he refused to stoop. Something had to be done about that tree. Something drastic, something final.
It didn't respond to being shot, he'd tried that on several occasions. Many a miniature bonfire had witnessed him sucking down Budweisers to drown out the whispers of the ghost of murders past, the flames just crackling away indifferently as he emptied all fifteen rounds from the magazine of his Glock 22 into the trunk of his archenemy with malice and premeditation.
Zack Brown didn't much like it when he did that, and he once threatened to call the cops if he heard shots ringing out in the middle of the night again. He really lit the tree up that evening, and -- surprise, surprise -- there wasn't a flashing light bar to be seen. No beat cop had the balls to reprimand Sheriff Clyde Fucking Rambo, he could pop off as many caps as he wanted without fear of redress or recompense.
It's not as though Brown's person or property were in any peril, his home was nearly fifteen hundred yards removed from the damned menace. That put it well beyond the effective range of his former service weapon. The horses Zack had purchased so much land to raise had all been sold off and divested -- probably because they proved to be the drizzling shits, once they hit the dirt of the downs -- so there would be no innocent bystanders to speak of, either.
Bearing this vacancy in mind, Clyde had made an offer to purchase the southern tenth of an acre that was now no more than wasted space. He had no interest in the property, really, beyond his desire to bask in the pleasure of cutting that fucking tree down and watching his garden spring to life in the golden rays of the sun. It was a generous offer, too, one almost too good to refuse. No reasonable man would've walked away, leaving more money on the table than the land could ever possibly be worth.
Knowing what he was after, though, knowing how badly he wanted it, Brown had turned it down just to spite him. He was a vindictive bastard, he probably loved the fact that his tree was such a curse to Clyde and his chosen hobby. He probably laughed every time he rode by smugly on his tractor, probably reveled in being an accessory to murder most foul, the rotten cocksucking hick.
Since there was nothing else to be done, Clyde resigned himself to the fact that this particular garden was simply doomed to be the domicile of coral bells, ferns and astilbes. The dregs of all foliage and flowers, those which can survive and flourish in the cover of suffocating shade. With those things taking residence, the patch would be of very little appeal to him. Who would care to sit and read a good book in the dark shade of an old oak amongst the bottom feeders of all flowering plants? He'd simply plant them and write them off, pay them little attention... simply walk away, as he did from the case that was just too big for him to handle so many years ago.
Determined to fight it out until the last, though, to try for the win all the way to the wire, he stalked the struggling hydrangeas with his trimming snips in hand. The blossoms that were beyond salvage would soon be laid to rest. Amputated with surgical precision, they would be collected in a plastic shopping bag and pitched into the inferno as he sipped his brew and smoked his Marlboro later in the evening. Perhaps he'd take more target practice then as well, if the spirit happened to move him. After all, who knows just how much lead is too much for an old and well plugged tree to endure? There's always that last straw to be placed upon the camel's back, the one that would prove one too many to bear.
Having found a particularly wilted stem, he crouched down and prepared to start his pruning. Just as the sounding of a snip had marked the death of another friend, the approaching clicks of lifters begging for oil announced the arrival of an uninvited visitor.
His body sore and stiff with age, Clyde swiveled his head as far as his arthritic neck would allow without requiring any other joints to pivot or flex. He saw a beige sedan pulling up his gravel drive with only the very corner of his eye, not bothering to determine the make and model as he would've been inclined to in days gone by. Whomever it was, they were a stranger to him, because this car was unfamiliar. He disliked even visitors he did know, when they showed up unannounced. He didn't take kindly to strangers at all, not anymore.
>
Returning his attention to the patient, he waited to hear the car's door open and then close to signal the emergence of the intruder as he made a few additional snips. The sound of footfalls that came next were far off, at first, since his garden was a good distance from the spot where the grass began. When they grew near enough to him that his voice could cover the distance, he made his declaration with no qualms and no ado.
"Whatever you're selling," he said expressly, "I'm not interested in buying it.
The visitor, who was really no stranger to him at all, continued his approach. Taking in the man he'd idolized in his youth, Jake felt his heart warming in the moment. Rambo's hair was white in its entirety, and long locks of it spilled from underneath a distressed canvas sun hat he was wearing. He was still tall, but his huskiness was new. What had been a potbelly in the past was now a full grown barrel, extending all the way up to his chest which was thicker and more burly than before. He had himself crammed into a set of denim overalls that were perhaps a size too small, and it looked as though they were begging to split as he knelt in genuflection. His face was filled out now as well, Jake could see his puffy cheeks with wrinkled skin upon them protruding from the sides of his head as he looked upon him from the rear. They were accented with snow colored curly hairs, indicative of a thick and scraggly beard that hadn't felt the shearing of a razor or a clipper for the passing of many moons. From his vantage point, Jake would've sworn it was Uncle Jesse of Hazzard that he was visiting instead of Clyde Rambo.
"I've got nothing to sell you, Sheriff," he replied, nearly shouting to be sure that he was heard.
This gave Rambo pause, he hadn't been referred to by that title in over a decade's time. He didn't hesitate for long, only halting his trimming for a matter of five or six seconds before he continued with the work.
"If you want to talk about Jesus, you're barking up the wrong tree just the same," he advised.
Jake smiled, drawing leisurely closer. "Nope, not here to preach about The Lord either."
"What, then?" Rambo asked. "Wanna tell me about Jehovah? It's certainly not Allah, you're definitely in the wrong neighborhood for that!"
"None of the above, sir!"
"Then you want to tell me how to vote, right? Want to peddle the bullshit rhetoric of Hillary or The Donald? Abortion, gun control, gay rights or immigration? What's your poison, pal? Either way, I should tell you up front that I don't vote -- not anymore."
"I'm not much interested in politics either," Jake remarked with less volume in his voice, since he was now within ten yards of the man.
"Well, unless I pulled a Rip Van Winkle, it isn't 2020 -- so I know it isn't time for the census yet."
"That's true," the visitor agreed, stopping just a few feet behind the gardener.
"Then excuse my Swahili, son," Rambo began, taxing a few additional joints to rotate ninety degrees toward the man accosting him. "But what the fuck do you --" he stalled mid sentence, his crow's feet fading slightly as his eyes widened in surprise. "Jacob!" he exclaimed in immediate recognition and delight.
Jake smiled a grin far beyond anything he'd worn in quite some time. "Howdy, Clyde!" he said with glee. "How the hell ya' been?"
Getting a full look at the man's face, he realized that he was, indeed, a doppelg?nger of Uncle Jesse en toto. In his old age, he was as far from the Sylvester Stallone of Chucky's imagination as he could possibly be. He looked worn down and overcome by the years, as though the rest of his retirement had done nothing to soothe his soul. His face showed fatigue, as though he were still caught deeply wrapped up in the tumult and commotion of a full blown inquisition, an inquest into matters of murder and mutilation. He looked as though he was haunted by The Butcher... by the victims, by the struggle, by the malignancy of Burlwood itself, circa 1993.
"Oh my God," Rambo exclaimed in disbelief, never taking his eyes from Jacob's as he pushed off of his knee with both hands to force himself erect. "What in Sam's Hell are you doing back here, son?" Looking him over further, he saw what only a cop would notice and addressed it immediately. "What the fuck kind of gun are you wearing, boy? What, you couldn't anything bigger?"
"A Beretta 92," Jake answered with his smile. "Never leave home without it!"
A smile broke through Rambo's whiskered lips, a hint of his elation in a reunion long overdue. The man he saw hovering over him as he struggled to his feet looked strong and proud. He was a victor, a triumphant survivor of dark days and long odds. He was thriving, unlike his embattled hydrangeas, and he came as a delegate of the children he hadn't failed to protect and save from the demons of the past. The pleasure of seeing him in full bloom was tempered, though, by the thought that he might've been Gary Duncan coming home to roost instead. He could've been Joshua Banks, Nathan Dawson, Kirk Wade or Ricky Marshall. Or, it could've been the last of them... oh God, the last of them...
Any one of those boys standing in his presence, returning home after so much time away, would look vastly different than the man representing their legacy now. Their flesh would not be so vibrant and full of life. Their limbs would not move so freely, would not be so loose and unincumbered. They would not smell so fresh and manly, the wind around them would not carry the luxurious fragrance of Acqua Di Gio.
They would be a rotten shade of purple, showing signs of lividity well set in and festering. Rigor would be in full effect, their bodies fixed and rigid, stiff with atrophied finality. They would stink of rot and decay, of maggots and formaldehyde. Glutaraldehyde, methanol and phenol, the serum of death and preservation. The juices of pickling and mummification.
These thoughts, these images in his mind's eye, wrenched the smile from his face and returned the scowl -- the atrophy of his own, the atrophy of shame and failure.
"I'm here for Chucky," Jake replied. "Came to make things right."
Clyde's face didn't change any further at that, it remained fixed and frozen, but his eyes were overcome with a hint of concern and worry.
"What's wrong with Chucky?" he asked, fearing the worst.
Clyde knew the man was unhealthy, was unsupervised an ill prepared for self reliance and independence. He was supposed to be watching over him, was charged by his Momma from her deathbed with helping to maintain and monitor him, was enlisted to be a caretaker and steward. He had neglected that duty, had disavowed his responsibility in the shadows of his own struggles.
Was he responsible, now, for the death of another son of Burlwood? Had he failed Chucky, like he'd failed the others? Had he delivered another soul unto the void in his ineptitude?
Jake's face was the one to change, now, taking on a look of befuddlement. Surely, old Sheriff Rambo was aware of what had happened... of what was transpiring in the town he'd taken an oath to serve and to protect.
"You don't know?" he asked, confused. "You haven't heard?"
Rambo's eyes widened further and lost focus, clouding over and drifting off.
"How did he die?" he asked in a cracking voice, preparing himself to bear another heavy cross.
"No no!" Jake cried, trying to spare the man the torment of the thoughts stirring in his mind. "He's not dead, it's not that!"
This brought an obvious relief to Clyde, seemed to lift a weight from his chest and shoulders. Still, it was amazing to Jake that he hadn't heard... an outlandish idea that word had not spread. There had been enough of a media presence in the courtroom to tell all of the world about the stirrings of suspicion, about the verdicts rendered prematurely and judgements passed hastily. Surely, the small town of Burlwood -- the epicenter of the quake -- was enraptured with speculation and gossip. The rumor mill must be cranking and chugging along at full bore, spewing out its toxic cocktail and inviting all to drink of the Kool-Aid.
How would it be possible that Rambo didn't know about Billy Marsh? About Boudreaux's campaign to take down Chucky? About the possibility that The Butcher was back in business...
"You don't know about Billy Marsh?" Jake asked. "Don't know anything about what's going on? It must be all over the news out here, Clyde, how could you not know?"
Relieved of the immediate anxiety, Rambo rubbed his hands together to clear them of the soil and floral debris, to wash them of the garden as he had washed them of society and the world at large.
"I don't have a television, Jacob," he began, tying off his plastic bag of dead blooms once his hands were as clean as he could get them, as clean as Pontius Pilate's were of the blood of Christ. "I don't subscribe to any newspapers, to any periodicals or digests. I don't have a computer, I'm not on the web. I do not own a cellphone, and I do not talk to my neighbors -- who are all a good distance from me anyway, as you can see. I have a radio, but I rarely turn it on. I stay away from town most of the time, would do so altogether, if it were feasible and possible. I spent thirty seven years of my life knee-deep in the shit and dirty dishwater of this town! When I turned in my badge -- when Ron Boudreaux saw to it that The Burlwood PD was dissolved so that he could seize the throne -- I also turned my back on this place, on this world. These eyes have seen enough, Jake. Seen enough of the refuse, enough of the tailings of vice and perversion. I've seen enough of the entrails, both the figurative and the literal. I don't desire to be involved, to be complicit -- not any more. All I want is to be alone, young Jacob, to convalesce in my solitude. I come out here, I tend my gardens and I read my books, and I keep to myself. I'm out of the shadows, now, save for that of this one goddamned oak tree... the last villain of my life, one that refuses to step aside just as vehemently as the ones of old, the ones of my antiquity."
Turning to face the criminal topiary, Rambo seemed to cast the aggregate of all the hate and despair in his heart toward it with the fire in his eyes. With a heavy grunt of pain and displeasure, he spun the plastic bag containing the most recent of the tree's victims, like a softball pitcher winding up, and chucked it at the beast in the distance. It fell well short... as he himself had fallen short in his quest to bring an end to the bloody reign of The Butcher.
"It lives to kill!" he cried. "It exists only to remind me of my failings."
Uncomfortable and uneasy under the heavy weight of Rambo's sorrow, Jake examined the garden near which he stood and looked for any sign of goodness, for any hint of brighter things.
"Those are pretty," he said plainly, pointing to a patch of umbels that seemed content in their earthen home. "Those white flowers, there. What are they?"
Rambo pulled his gaze from the tree, looked to where Jacob was calling his attention. He stared for a moment, then spoke with unchanged inflection.
"Daucus carota," he explained. "Better known as Queen Anne's Lace... and it's a fuckin' weed."
Jake curled back his finger in submission, let his hands drop to his sides in resignation. There was nothing he could say, nothing he could do. He understood the man's state of mind, knew what it was like to live in that cold and lonely place... that mausoleum... that crypt reserved for the cremains of hope and peace, where all optimism goes to die and rot in solitude.
"That's all that remains anymore, Jacob!" Rambo continued. "All of the flowers are dead in this world, in this time. It's only the weeds that survive. Masquerading, deceitful, pretentious weeds that have no value and nothing to add. Just a bunch of fucking Queen Anne's Lace and Poison Hemlock. Just the Masque of the Red Death! Toxic, mephitic and virulent! Contagious and consuming, decimating and disastrous! I don't associate with weeds anymore, son! I don't look at them and I don't hear their whispers! I exist for me, now! To Hell with all the rest... to Hell with it all."
Jake didn't respond, let the silence do the talking. This was something he did often, because the silence usually said all there was to be said. Eloquently and fluently, too... in a language that most people can easily comprehend.
Rambo looked up to his face and locked eyes with him, and their eyes were brethren in their awareness. There was another osmotic symbiosis -- one similar to that he'd shared with Nikki -- but one that covered different territory, different emotions altogether. Without a word, Rambo understood the nature of the problem... the crux of the matter... the bodies that would need to be unearthed.
When the exchange was complete, the transaction fully processed, Jake placed his hand upon Rambo's shoulder as he had done to Boudreaux before. His grasp wasn't the tight vice that it was in that instance, nor was it acrimonious or sarcastic. It was benevolent and comforting, loving and philanthropic.
"I need your help, Clyde," he said softly. "Chucky needs your help."
Rambo sighed and quailed, not eager to wade in the dark waters once again... not inclined to tread there, where wise men feared to be. Through his mind ran the voice of Father Carl Lovett and verses that lingered in his ears for all the years gone by. Just as double indemnity called to Jake, the words written in The Book called to Clyde. Those words, so cold, that were given unto Man as Revelations. Revelations that brought fear to his heart and anxiety to his mind:
And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened. And the sea gave up its dead, and Hell delivered up the dead which were in it. The kings of the earth hid themselves in the dens of the mountains and said to the rocks "Fall on us! Hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne! For the great day of his wrath is come!".
Now, the great day of wrath had come for him... the wrath of Gary Duncan, Joshua Banks, Nathan Dawson, Kirk Wade, Ricky Marshall... and the last one, merciful lord, the most painful of them all... little Timothy Lane.
"Let's go inside," he said, choking back his tears and drawing from the strength of Jacob's hand to steady him. "We'll have some tea, and we'll talk."
NINETEEN
Timothy Lane, Part 1
September 24th, 1994. 4:30pm
Burlwood, Indiana
Darkwing, Launchpad, Drake and Louie sat in the nave of Our Mother Of Sorrows, the church of Father Lovett and the only house of worship in all of Burlwood. Darkwing and Launchpad settled in the second pew from the pulpit, Drake and Louie in front of them, in the first. The hall was wondrous and glorious, the ceiling vaulted in a tremendous arch over the chancel. Every square inch of the place was ornate and magnificent.
Behind the regal walnut lectern at the ambo was a towering effigy of Christ upon the cross. To its left was a colorful stained glass depiction of The Annunciation, to its right the same of The Piet?. Along the periphery of the apse were frescos of The Adoration Of The Magi and The Coronation Of The Virgin.
Not far from the lectern was the holy altar on one side and the baptistery on the other. Icons decorated the walls on either side of the nave, adorning them in sacred images that stretched all the way back to the narthex, except where interrupted by the entrance to the confessional.
On the whole, this building seemed much too elegant for a town as backwoods and reclusive as Burlwood. The citizens were very reverent, though, very spiritual and engaged with their faith. They filled this hall to capacity on any given Sunday -- most Wednesday's as well -- and made the compulsory tithes, even when doing so strained their finances direly. Cognizant of the hardships that many of his parishioners endured, there were often masses at which Father Lovett called off the deacons when they took up their long-handled offertories, intending to collect the alms. When the cup of the diocese runneth over, Father Lovett stopped demanding water... it's just the kind of man he was.
As they waited for Chucky to be released from his duties, the boys sat silently and patiently.
Darkwing was thinking about Tracy, about a conversation they'd recently had upon returning to school. They shared many classes this year, and always chose adjoining desks when the seating chart wasn't assigned by the teacher.
He had overcome the nerves that kep
t him from speaking with her in the seventeen months since the meeting at the Civic Center, the meeting at which he'd been embraced by her parents as a potential friend for their daughter. They chatted regularly, now, though usually not about anything of substance. He often told her about his experiences playing hockey in a local youth league, and she generally spoke of music she liked or things that happened on her favorite television program, Blossom. More profound issues, like his continuing struggle to maintain the sanity of his mother, Janet Gigu?re, were usually not topics that came up in their conversations. .
With her ongoing responsibilities as the block captain of sector 7, Jacob's mother was required to call Ron Boudreaux on his cellphone twice each evening. She was in much more regular contact than that with him, however. They often spoke for hours on end, and talking with him seemed to cheer her up a bit. As a result, he hadn't heard things like touch me, Jacob spilling from her stupefied lips in the days of the recent past. She hadn't asked him to fondle her, hadn't tried to grope him like she did in the past. Thank God for that, he didn't think he could deal with that anymore.
Deputy Ron was a stand-in for him when it came to that, now... one that was happy to oblige when she wanted someone to touch her... one that was happy to have her touch him... one that spent the night at their house quite frequently, in fact, and didn't seem to mind when she cried out harder, Garrett, harder -- apparently thinking it was her long dead husband riding her -- in the heat of their passion. Nor, apparently, did he mind that a thirteen year old boy could hear every sound they made.
That made Jacob sick... the fact that Deputy Ron, a righteous man of the law, would take advantage of a woman who was clearly vulnerable. That he would do so knowing that her young son was listening in an adjoining bedroom. What a man of scruples he was, this high and mighty officer. What a winner, what a role model... what a creep.
If he made her happy, it was fine... the problem, though, was that he sometimes seemed to do her more harm than good. If he snubbed her or rushed her off the phone before she was satisfied, if he decided not to come jump in the sack with her when she wanted him, she would melt down instantly.
The resultant episodes were similar to the ones she'd always had, the ones that required Jacob to feed her pills until she passed out, but these new ones were much darker -- the bottom much deeper. There were moments at which Jacob felt she was headed for the rubber room -- that she needed to be carried off by the men in the white coats, to protect her from herself. She spoke of suicide regularly when her relationship with Boudreaux ebbed, spoke of her desire to just give up when things weren't going the way she thought they should. There wasn't any more mention of taking Jacob with her, presumably because she thought he was old enough now to take care of himself, if she decided to see it through.
Watching her ride this rollercoaster, seeing her rise and fall with the tide of Deputy Ron's treatment of her, he prepared himself to find her dead every day when he arrived home from school or after visiting with his friends... prepared himself to become an orphan, to be alone. He didn't want that to happen, but he sometimes wondered if things would be better that way -- for the both of them. It weighed heavily on him, brought him down -- made him depressed, just like she was.
He tried to put it out of his mind -- tried to focus on better things, happier things... like his shallow conversations with Tracy. She could always bring him up, elevate his mood, so he leaned on her a bit. Doing so scared him a little, though, because he understood what it meant to be leaned on. He didn't want to be a burden to her, as his mother was to him.
Launchpad wasn't thinking about anything as they waited, he just sat with his face rested in his hands and his elbows digging into his knees. Nothing had really changed, for him. Life was pretty much just as it had always been. His parents still fought a lot, still smoked cigarettes like they were going out of style and drank malt liquor like it was an elixir to cure all ills. They were smoking something new now, too, something he hated the smell of even more than the cigarettes. The odor was slightly sweet, but there was another layer to it that wasn't pleasant in the least. To him, it smelled like cleaning chemicals. Sometimes it was like nail polish remover or cat piss, it seemed to evolve and revolve from time to time. Whatever it was, it usually gave him a headache when he smelled it. That gave him all the more reason to find things to do away from home.
Louie Rambo was just relaxing as well, thinking about how much he'd enjoyed his second summer vacation in Burlwood. This one, which had just recently expired, had been much more laid back and gratifying than that of 1993. Coming on the heels of Ricky Marshall's murder -- and marking the beginning of a very taxing time for his father -- that respite from study had been spent much more sedately and nearly in seclusion.
In those days, the FBI was everywhere you looked around town. Wearing their fancy suits and patrolling in their unmarked cars with the deeply tinted windows. They were omnipresent and dictatorial, especially when it came to matters that concerned young males like him and his friends. That meant there was little chance for The Burlwood Boys to do their thing, they were on a tight leash, that summer. Kept close to the heel, they were essentially confined to their homes, with only limited opportunities to get together and play outside. Even when it was allowed, it could take place only under the watchful eye of Big Brother, of the Federal Agents.
Since Louie's father was the sheriff and an adult, he could move around a bit more freely. Sensing Louie's loneliness, he often drove his cruiser around Burlwood Meadows to pick up Jacob, Donnell, Chucky and Timmy so that they could just hang out at his house. The boys always enjoyed that, since Louie was the only one of them that had cable television -- the only one who could get Cartoon Network. They spent many an evening laughing and talking, growing closer and cementing their bond.
With seventeen months separating them from the last murder committed by The Butcher, things had lightened up a bit as of late. The Feds were still around, but not nearly as many of them. They were more inconspicuous, now, and mostly unobtrusive. They hadn't cracked the case -- hadn't captured the killer -- but keeping him at bay was a small victory in and of itself. With the matter still unresolved, they would not be leaving town entirely, not just yet. There was a little more slack in their bridle, though, and the minor concessions they made allowed boys to be boys. Allowed the children to enjoy their break from school as they desired.
Special Agent Gomez had taken up residence in the town, and nothing happened in Burlwood without his permission. Sheriff Rambo seemed surprisingly okay with that, apparently at peace with the fact that he wasn't the king of the hill anymore.
When Gomez insisted that they cancel the annual Our Mother carnival in '93, Clyde essentially said so let it be written. That was a major disappointment to The Burlwood Boys and all of their contemporaries, because the carnival was the most exciting event of the year for them. Everyone loved the rides, loved the games, loved the fried food and the small circus that accompanied it all. As the time to plan for the festivities of '94 approached, Gomez wanted to call it off again. He claimed it was still too risky, that it would be difficult to manage and patrol with their sizably reduced resources. This sparked a rare disagreement between the agent and the sheriff, a contest of wills that Rambo had eventually won after much debate and rumination.
As a result, the sounds of the midway were echoing through the hollow expanse of the chantry around them. They were eager to join the fun, to see the sights and partake in the conviviality. To do so without Chucky -- their brother in arms, investigations and amusements -- would be wrong, though, so they simply sat and waited.
He had taken a job at Our Mother Of Sorrows when the latest summer vacation began. His Momma insisted that, since he was sixteen now, he needed to contribute to the family and help to carry the load. She had gone to Father Lovett seeking advice on where to find a job that he was capable of doing, and he had smiled in s
aying look no further, Misses Murphy!
The church had only one employee besides the priest, a man called Rusty who was in charge of making repairs and keeping the facility maintained. He was overworked with those duties, had no extra time to clean and make things as presentable as Father Lovett believed that they should be -- the way that his parishioners deserved them to be.
As a result, he offered Chucky a job on the spot. It paid minimum wage, $4.25 per hour, and would amount to no more than twenty or thirty hours a week during the summer. When school resumed, they would meet to discuss how things were working out and how they would proceed moving forward. When Momma drove him back to the church on the eve of the new school year, Father Lovett praised Chucky's work and begged him to remain in his employ.
That was excellent news, because the extra money was really helping out, and having a job bolstered Chucky's self esteem. Working with the staff at Burlwood High, the Father was able to hammer out a co-op arrangement under which Chuck could leave class three hours early three days a week and spend that time working at the church. He would earn credit and money both, helping prop up the household and learning what life would be like beyond graduation all at once. He loved the job, and he took pride in the work he did there.
Occasionally, though, he would arrive home in the afternoon and not go out to join in the playing of Darkwing and the other Burlwood Boys. They thought, at first, that this was due to his being tired and worn down from a hard day spent polishing the pews. When they were together, as a group, and asked if this was the case, he told them that it was. Only when he was alone with Darkwing did he reveal the truth... the real reason that he sometimes just wanted to be alone.
"It's Rusty," he said tearfully. "Sometimes he's really mean to me!"
Jacob asked him why, asked him how he was mean. Asked what he did or what he said. Chucky couldn't explain, really, not in a way that made much sense to Darkwing. It seemed that it wasn't so much his words or deeds that were malicious, it was more his general temperament on certain days that bothered him.
Some days, he would be nice. He would praise Chucky for his work and thank him for his help. On other days, though, he seemed totally different. Grumpy and dismissive, rude and unfriendly. He would yell at things -- at nails that bent while he was hammering them, at drills that lost hold of their bits while he was using them -- and just be crotchety in general. It scared Chucky when he was like that, made him uncomfortable and nervous.
Sometimes, Rusty would yell for no reason at all, would shout things that didn't make any sense. He would say things like FALL BACK! or THEY'RE IN THE TREES! Once, he started yelling at people when there was nobody in the building besides the two of them. He would bark orders at the invisible people, warning them that others named Victor or Charlie were coming. That really scared Chucky, because it made him think there were ghosts in the church that were coming for him... the ghosts of Victor and Charlie, whoever they were.
Knowing that his not coming to hang out meant it had been a bad day with Rusty, Darkwing would always leave the group and go to Chucky's house to comfort him. He gave lots of hugs and kisses on those days, which was starting to get a little weird considering Chucky had the beginnings of a beard coming in and Darkwing was thirteen years old, now. He obliged him anyway, because it was the only thing that seemed to make him feel any better and get him to go out to play.
Darkwing had met Rusty, and he didn't seem scary to him at all. He was a short man, not terribly much taller than Chucky, and was as skinny and wiry as Launchpad. His hair was short and messy, as was a full beard that he wore. Both were blonde with a tinge of red, which could've explained why he was called Rusty. He looked to be in his mid 40's, and had lived in Burlwood for only a few years. Based on the slight twang in his voice, Jacob imagined he was from somewhere in the south.
He'd been perfectly kind to Darkwing, had shook his hand and smiled when Chucky introduced them. This side of him that Chucky described, this crazy side was in no way evident on the occasions that they ran into each other in passing. It seemed like Chucky was speaking of someone else entirely when he sobbed and begged for kisses, like there was a completely different Rusty that came to work sometimes than the one that Jacob knew.
Darkwing didn't believe that Chucky was lying, he had never known him to lie before -- not about something serious. Little things, maybe, like whether he'd remembered to put on his deodorant or to wear a fresh pair of underwear when his Momma asked him, but nothing on such a grand scale.
He did wonder, though, if he was, perhaps, misinterpreting the man... was filling in the gaps of actions or behaviors he didn't understand with trumped up notions or assumptions. He hadn't spent much time with anyone besides his tight-knit group of friends, didn't fully appreciate the diaspora of quirky personalities that was the small town of Burlwood. He had been sheltered, not exposed to the people of the world at large. That combined with his unique psychological challenges could certainly lead to misunderstandings, to misgivings and uncertainty. He hoped that was what was happening... hoped that it was all in his head, that he wasn't really being subjected to the things that he perceived.
Expecting him to be done for the day at any minute, anticipating their opportunity to go enjoy the carnival, The Burlwood Boys just waited in silence in the nave as the muffled sounds of people laughing and screaming in joy outside echoed all around them. Time seemed to creep by once four-thirty had passed, once Chucky was overdue.
The only one of them who didn't seem irritated with the passage of time was the one they called Drake. Timmy was in a trance, not unlike the one he'd experienced when he first met Mister Simmonds and was stricken with fear by the scar upon his face. This time, though, it was the giant effigy of Jesus upon The Cross that kept him transfixed.
This particular depiction, the largest in all of Burlwood, was the most gruesome and grotesque that he had ever seen. Most of the households in town had a small one hanging over their door, Timmy's father actually had two -- one at Butcher's Lane and one in their modest trailer in The Meadows. Those idols, which still depicted either a dead or dying Christ, were tame and serene as compared to the one in the hallowed hall of Our Mother Of Sorrows.
The alabaster man upon this cross, who was much larger than life, didn't look like an exalted deity or glorious figure at all. He looked, instead, like a tortured victim of The Butcher -- covered in blood and ghastly wounds -- from the top of his drooping head to the bottom of his awkwardly contorted feet. His ribs were bruised and emaciated. His left wrist was pulled far from his body and driven through with a giant spike, his right arm held at more of an angle and similarly tacked to the dogwood from which he hung. His chin was pressed fully to his chest, as though he were utterly and completely deceased, and his hair seemed to be wilted around his head. The skin on the right side of his abdomen was sliced open and gaping, the majority of the blood upon him leaking from it and soaking the white drapery he wore around his pelvis. His knees were dirty and black with soil and blood, his ankles cocked unnaturally to position his feet one atop the other, a third large nail piercing them and locking them in place.
And that plaque over his head... that one that read INRI... that was a mystery to him. He didn't know what the letters stood for, Father Lovett was probably the only man in town who knew they stood for Isvs Nazarenvs Rex Indaeorvm, words Timmy didn't know and wouldn't understand. What he did know, though, is that the letters were supposed to declare the man Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews. That was the mystery... what sort of king could he be, looking like that?
If the crown of thorns upon his brow signified his position as the King of the Dead, that could make sense. If he was alive as he hung there, he was in torment and begged for death. If he was dead, he had suffered a miserable passing and was relieved to meet the end when it came. He could, therefore, be the king of those who have passed on so brutally... the King of the Tortu
red... the King of the Descecrated... the King of the Damned.
If he was the king of anything besides those things, he didn't look it... if he was a god, he didn't resemble one... if he was a lamb, he was the type that his father had hanging in the cooler... one that was bound to meet with the saw of The Butcher, and then to be consumed... to be eaten... to be destroyed...
After what seemed an eternity to the other boys, their friend finally emerged from the door that led to the sacristy with Rusty by his side. Timmy wrestled his eyes from the statue to see him, still feeling detached and entranced by what he'd been studying at length.
"Hey guys!" Chucky shouted, his voice booming through the empty space.
Rusty laughed and smiled, wiping grease from his hands with a dirty rag.
"Maybe a little louder next time, Chuck," he said, chuckling. "I'm not sure that Father Lovett heard you all the way in the rectory!"
Thinking this was an instruction instead of sarcasm, Chucky repeated his greeting in a considerably louder voice. This made Rusty laugh harder, almost as loudly as Chucky had called to them the first time.
All four of the others stood and stretched their legs, eager to get on the Tilt-A-Whirl and Ferris Wheel. When they did, Rusty realized that the shirt Jacob was wearing wasn't just a plain blue short-sleeve. Emblazoned in white on its front was the design of a leaf, the outline of inflammatory words knocked out of it and showing proudly.
"Ohhhh shit!" Rusty cried, his face pulling down in a frown. "Please tell me that you're not standing in my church wearing a Toronto Maple Leafs shirt!"
Jacob looked down at the emblem on his chest, smiling slyly and declaring that The Leafs were his favorite team. His father had been from Ontario and was a big fan of the club, so he figured he was paying homage to him by becoming one himself.
"This is Blackhawk country, boy!" Rusty joshed spiritedly. "Don't nobody around here like The Leafs! Blasphemy! Right here, in the house of God! Blasphemy, I say!"
Jacob laughed, but then poked back by citing the six game conference quarter-final series of the previous season -- the one in which The Leafs had knocked The Hawks out of Stanley Cup contention.
"A fluke!" Rusty rebutted. "It won't go that way this year, just you wait and see!"
Hearing the rides spinning and twirling outside, hearing the people having fun and devouring funnel cakes, the boys made it clear with non-verbal cues that they weren't interested in Darkwing and Rusty's conversation. As a result, Jacob let the comment stand, despite his desire to express his conviction that Toronto would go all the way this season.
Chucky unbuttoned his khaki over shirt and ditched it on a pew, an action that displeased Rusty and brought a mild scolding.
"After all the cleaning we did today, Chuck, you're just gonna pitch that dirty shirt onto the pews and leave it?"
"No sir," Chucky replied politely. "I'll come back in and get it before I go home, I promise!"
"Be sure you do!" Rusty advised, "Because it'll be hell to pay if the father finds it there in the morning while he's preparing for the mass!"
"We'll make sure he gets it," Darkwing replied. "We're just excited to get out there."
Rusty smiled and nodded, putting aside their difference of opinion as relates to the politics of the National Hockey League and taking him at his word.
"Behave yourselves out there, guys!" he said more seriously. "I don't want to see any of you in the paper tomorrow morning as suspects in a case of stuffed-animal-napping! And be careful! Above all else, by God, be careful! Look out for each other, just like Sheriff Rambo told you!"
TWENTY
