echo The pigeon still watched him, that blasted thing. It cooed like a rat, snow white wings fanning out against the dilate horizon. He’s reminded of something sinister, unnamed and hungry. Beaded eyes. Stubby talons. It dug into the telephone wire the same way a vulture did to carrion intestines. It was wrong, the way it looked at him. It didn’t blink. It didn’t move.
He turned. The bird took off, limber and lithe, to squat on the brick wall in front of him. Slyly slinking back into his line of sight again.
Jack Harmon wasn’t dramatic by nature. He preferred to swallow his words, push them deep down into the cavernous cradle of his chest, and untangle every sparse thought that crossed his mind like a skein of thread. But he became what he made himself to be. His heart thumped sodden in his chest. Sweat, salty and sweet, was sharp on his tongue.
He counted to ten. In his head, it’s still the steps of a waltz. He’s reminded of the squeak of heels against linoleum, unscuffed shoes shuffling over cherry wood. Prom night was over two decades ago now.
The itch of the suit’s fabric was still vivid in his mind, the arctic crispness of the white boutonnière scratching against his chest. He also remembered Tom Lisman spiking the fruit punch, leading to a cascade of events– better off unrecalled– that ended with Emma wailing like an Irish banshee as Jack’s best mate Alfie planted a drunken kiss on his cheek, lost to the ether all the while. He missed them. He hadn’t seen either of them for years. He wasn’t entirely sure he deserved to.
What would they think of him now? Every glimpse of his reflection told him plenty enough as it jeered at the tight lines of his face, the premature wisps curling over his temple like the greyscale ghost of a fire. His nerves crawled as he shivered with disgust and shame and something molten enough to be anger. There would always be that part of him that wanted to– to gouge himself apart and peel back the layers like the skin of an apple.
It wasn’t the physicality. It was what lurked inside. There was something terrible in his hands, in his smile. He cradled a shadow. It inhabited him from the inside out. That’s why he did all of those things. The question remained. Why? Why. That’s what they always asked, wasn’t it? So fascinated with the broken wiring that made him fundamentally wrong.
He told himself it didn’t matter.
It didn’t. It didn’t.
Because he also wasn’t an idiot about it.
He leant against the street lamp and dialled his wife’s phone number. She didn’t pick up. The only sign of his exhalation into the autumn chill was the faint escaping smoke. He tried again. Voicemail. Again. Again. The pigeon cocked its uneven head and laughed, a caustic splash. And so beneath the shadowed underbelly of the clouds above, certain he was being followed, Jack walked the rest of the way home.
He taught Avery to lie.
Jack was two years older. When they were ten and twelve, their parents finally divorced. Weekend custodies became a psychological fight – their mother was very good at twisting her emotions in like a gutting knife and their father was, well, largely transparent about how the whole affair really made him feel. He learnt to distrust the rumble of the Chevy car engine. The miles were fleeting as sparse gaps of trees between traffic turned into long hours of sickeningly green countryside.
The cabin in the woods always lay in wait, a wooden spider in a snare of overgrown ivy and gorse, shaded by bruised leaves the size of his small palm angling in the weak sunlight. The gravel path crunched like baby bird bones beneath the rolling tires. The lake was black no matter what time of day it was – fathomless in depth as the water lapped away at the extended stilts and planks where the moor for the boat stood vacant.
He came back in rashes, once. He never once forgot the feeling of being so utterly hideous, skin split and oozing, spent raw. That ointment lathered all over him, sticky and hot, as he’d writhed on bare sheets in the bunk bed. He lost the memory of his mother’s comfort, and only recalled the singe of loathing as he suffered.
But that was before.
It was quieter, after.
The cabin breathed with his father’s anger. The ashen floorboards rattled with weight, the lights awash with the same amber hue as the bottles in the cupboard, and the sum of their agitation left scratches and welts against the walls. In the dead of night, he sat on Avery’s bed and pulled the blanket over them both. He flicked the flashlight beam on and off, and they watched, hypnotised. On and off. On. Off. On. Off.
“I miss mom.” Avery confessed.
“I don’t.”
A lie, but only he knew that. On. Off.
Jack said, “We’re big boys now, Ave. We don’t need anyone else.”
Avery’s voice was small. “Because we have each other?”
“Yes.” He nodded confidently.
“Okay.”
Avery’s fingernails left crescent indents against Jack’s arm. His heart beat shallowly, as the lull in conversation meant the sounds of outside grew louder. Thunder trapped within tree barks, the wind whistling dark and hungry over the sound of the cicadas hissing in the shadows. His face was pinched and terrified, as he whispered, “They’re coming. The monsters.”
“No.” Jack said. “Those monsters can’t get to you.” The light flashed over both of them again and there in the pool of his brother’s pale eyes, he saw his own spooked expression. And that’s the other lie he tells.
Two days later, he’s covering Avery’s mouth with his hand as they huddle beneath the bed frame and pretend to be anywhere else but there. The picture frames roar with anger, the glass splintering against the kitchen floor. He counted to ten – measuring the seconds before lightning hits, staying as still as a mouse until it travels further and further away. He waited until it was gone.
“Follow after me.” Jack said, and they tip-toed down the hallway.
By the time dusk and dinner fell, their father was as burnt-out and bleary as a candle. Before he even asked about where they’d been, Avery repeated obediently, “We went exploring in the woods.”
Avery doesn’t look away or even blink. Jack trained it out of him.
“Oh.” Their father said at last. He picked at the gumbo with his spoon. “That’s good, boys. Maybe I’ll make men out of you both after all.” He chuckled, eyebrows wrinkling at his own joke. He patted his sons’ heads, a master to a dog, before heading to bed and at that moment, Jack dreamt of only this – one day, I’ll be strong enough to make you sorry.
A trickle of ice-cream poured down his wrist. He was fourteen, sitting with his back to the wrought iron fences around the park. The edges poked into his back, skinny as ribs. He rolled the graphite pencil with his other hand. He’d carefully set down his sketchbook on the grassy knolls. It wasn’t damp that day. Anything other than a drizzle was scarcely more than a memory at that point, the weather marked by a dry spell stretched to fit over the whole city.
Jack was wary, so wary.
From his vantage point, he had a secret view of the row of food trucks near the pavement. The smells wafted with the early morning air – buttery and thick, oily – and only faintly tinged with the hint of coffee. He had a pocketful of rocks he liked the colors and shape of. He was staring down at the people moving like ants.
“Don’t go anywhere.” He told Avery, as he buried the Cornetto wrapper into the ground. The indent dug by the front of his sneakers, he kicked the bronze leaves nearby over the small mound to hide the earthy scar. His curiosity won the silent struggle.
He moved fast as he skid down the slope, barely avoiding tripping into pavement. Disappearing into the throng of bodies, he slipped easily through the currents. The crowd thickened in a particular spot and that was the destination he had in mind as he determinedly pushed his way forward. The shouting just kept getting louder and louder.
There was a difference between wanting something, and wanting the consequences of it, he’d soon learn.
At first, he thought he understood what was going on. There were two men in the middle, a wide berth around them. The smaller one staggered, his back to Jack. When the man turned, Jack saw he was injured. His skin was grey, almost ashen. His nose swollen and dripping fat patters of red onto the asphalt. Jack’s eyes followed the rain. It spread open like the bloom of a flower but then became alien as it surged to fill in the cracks.
There was fear in the man’s eyes. But rage surged more beautifully.
“Leave me the hell alone!” The crack of an elbow was a thunderclap. Jack’s eyes snapped up to the brawl, mouth hanging open slightly as a strange mix of fear, anticipation and eagerness set his veins alight with renewed energy. He found himself leaning forward.
The din was overwhelming from up close but it didn’t matter because Jack had never seen anything like this.
The harsh sunlight cast a shadow across both the men’s faces as they circled each other at the center of the ring that had unwittingly opened up around them. It boxed them in, hemmed in the thrum of violence that threatened to spill over. The wire of the fence criss-crossed the space between them like lines of charcoal.
“All you had to do was stay out of my way.” The taller one growled and countered with a swift strike to the stomach as he threw himself forward. His eyes were wild, alive.
They crashed together against the wiry wall and the links rattled with the combined weight. One twisted away as the other bent double. All of a sudden, the man had the other against the bars, slamming his opponent’s head into the metal like pummeling a punching bag. A vicious kick crunched and elicited a howl. Then the taller man slipped, sliding down, leg twisted at an unusual angle. White shirts were completely stained with blood up to the collar at this point.
A dark chill ran through Jack. The thought pounded in his head to an archaic rhythm, keep him down.
Make him stop.
It was as if the victor somehow heard the cry of Jack’s heart. Rock steady hands found the other’s face and thumbs searched for the eyes, extracting a sharp groan for a split second, before he was driven down hard against the coarse ground. That was all it took. The man went slack. Then someone screamed as dark boots stomped down on the neck without hesitation.
That was when the police arrived in a hail of sirens, guns up and raised. But it was too late.
Arms grabbed Jack from behind. The shock of it paralyzed him and he very nearly kicked out. At the last second, he registered the familiar register of his mother’s voice. He went limp. “Jack.” She said, pale and shaking. “Oh my god. You shouldn’t have seen that.” She suffocated him in her embrace. Her voice soured with bitter guilt. “I’m so sorry, I should have never left my boys alone-”
Jack didn’t hear her. The man was on his knees as cold silver handcuffs clicked his arms behind his back. As he was hoisted to his feet by an officer, he turned and his eyes suddenly locked on Jack. The shared glance was electrifying. There was a terrible calmness carved in his expression, the peace of a placid lake in the dead of winter. It shrewdly whispered that it had heard. Heard him.
Heard the thoughts inside his head.
Made it come to pass. Made it real.
He let his mother plaster platitudes of comfort and apologies all over him. He went home and scrubbed off everything in the shower. Hot trickles of water clung to his back as he drew figures in the steam condensed in the glass. His mother insisted on buying both of them another ice-cream on the way back. She pulled the cone out of the freezer after he came downstairs, pressing it into his hands alongside a kiss to the crown of his head.
He sat obediently, and ate.
The vanilla tasted like blood.
He was thirty years old when he married Phyllis Grace. They meet during a boating trip at Lake Wānaka and when he falls in love, it’s amidst perfectly mirrored waters and magnificent snow-capped peaks. It’s the happiest time of his life. He remembered the blue horizon stretched out into infinity as the ripples knocked against the boat, rocking as reverently as a newborn’s cradle.
It was a whirlwind of dominos and he’s giddy from the thrill of it.
Before he knew it, there was a house in Virginia registered under both of their names. It’s a rhythm that just falls into place, and he and Grace grow to fill in the spaces of each other. He paints every picket fence as white as a lamb by hand, and plants pristine bushes of dahlias and roses along the perimeter of his home. She has a better eye for the furniture. He was more skilled at cooking.
He even got himself employed on paper as a manager in a company office.
Four years later, he held his infant daughter in his arms.
It was as if he lived within a dream. He held onto it fiercely, his home and family. It was a life he should have been content to live. He loved them. But in his mind, it meant that everything he did, it was for Grace and Faroe. If this was the price he paid to keep them safe in the dark, then he would fulfill it.
Or maybe that’s the lie – the comfort of just another bedtime story he told himself in justification.
Every day, he put on a tie and fixed the collar of his shirt. He picked up the empty briefcase and kissed Grace goodbye. He walked out the door and drove the car in the correct direction.
The only thing he didn’t do was arrive where he’s meant to go.
To be alive was to lose.
It’s a reminder he kept close to heart. Someone he once looked up to had told him that. That person was lost to him now, if not already dead. Jack never had the heart to actually check. As he threw down the last of the cash he deemed as an acceptable loss for the night, he allowed himself a tight, frustrated sigh.
It’s an act. He knew his losses in advance long before the game began. That’s just how the trick needed to be in order to flourish.
At the card table, he kept track. His gaze was sharp as it flicked from one opponent to the next, tracking every twitch of facial muscle. Once he had a measure of the people right in front of him, he chose when to deem the risk as worth it. He folded twice beneath the golden ambience of the private club – the fourth he’s scoped out that year – and won thrice more.
He doesn’t touch the glass of whisky.
Sam whistled, laughing, “Not bad, Johnny.”
John Faith. That was one of the many names he assumed for his work. Getting his hands on the fake identification cards to hold up to casino scrutiny was surprisingly easier than he’d imagined. Having the right contacts helped. Having the right reputation did even more. He left his body language open as he returned the smile. It never reached the corners of his eyes.
He suggested lightly, “Once more then?”
“And break your streak?” Sam chuckled again, but the gleam was reignited in his eyes. He reached forward and placed a meaty palm over the deck. It was a possessive motion, nearly a leer. “It’s tempting, old friend. Alright then. Let’s see how good your Blackjack is.”
Jack’s lip curled. “Deal.”
He waved for the dealer once again.
It’s never as smooth sailing as he would have liked.
He paid for it dearly.
Pain surged through Jack’s skull like a thunderclap, leaving him slumping bonelessly against the cold restroom tiles. He breathed raggedly, sucking down oxygen and fighting against the metallic surge of blood from his lungs and mouth. He coughed it out, curling over as he grabbed the edge of the sink and dragged himself upright.
His fingers were not broken. At least, he hoped it wasn’t.
Above him, the world danced in a terrifying vision of shadows and light. He squinted past the aching in his head, desperate to etch the face of the man that would have killed him tonight. Grey eyes. Pitch black hair. Leant against the wall opposite. Just watching him. Smiling at him.
Jack couldn’t remember the name, not at that moment. But he knew who this was. He’d played on the opposite side of this man at the poker table at the bar before cleaning him out of his money. It had been a satisfying win because something about Jack’s opponent had irked him enough into playing the round ruthlessly.
Double or nothing, and Jack had walked away with it all.
He thought of dark boots again. The sound it made as it ended the fight. His fists closed by his side, blood gushing hot over the lacerations of his palms. He couldn’t say a single word. It was stuck inside his throat, making it impossible to even breathe. Instead, he bared his teeth in warning. He’ll bite if he has to. He’ll kill. But he won’t die here. Not like this.
He didn’t dare think of Grace and Faroe. He needed them to be the furthest thing from his mind. It made sense because they didn’t belong in the same world he did. It was inconceivable to even dare to place both in the same breath. All Jack knew was bruises and blood, and paying the price of whatever it took to win. His wife and daughter would never know the pain, the addiction, of that existence. He ensured that.
He barely heard the words, barely felt the fingers graze his scalp as it dug into his hair. The face of the void promised, remember. Remember? Yes. Consider this. This. A warning. Or… or you. You. Pay. No. No? No. Next time. You. See. I win.
The dark hissed again, “Remember.”
Remember.
Gravity pulled at his eyelids. Sinking deeper, a rock to sleep among stones at the bottom of the vast sea bed. He doesn’t recall closing his eyes but he must have, because the next thing he knew, he was in a room with very bright lights. Definitely not heaven though, because the next thing he knows, Sam’s leaning over him and he’s telling Jack that he found him in the casino restroom that way and brought him to the ER to get patched up.
“Not that bad. Just a couple of stitches and hairline fractures.” Sam said dismissively. “Looked worse with all the blood though.”
The patient chart was for John Faith. Just another mask of the ghost he created, an empty slate for him to ruin. No paper trail. No emergency contact. Easily passable as a victim of mugging. The realization shot through him like ice shoring up his spine.
Jack went very quiet. “How long have I been here?”
Sam told him.
Jack’s mind raced quickly. He lost himself to his thoughts, already formulating what cover stories he could come up with. Parsing through the tangle of truths and lies, trying to form a coherent story. The voice of guilt was negligible. He was doing the right thing, he knew that. And Grace trusted him. He could use that. For her sake, he needed to.
Faroe loved the color red. The same shade of her bedsheet and most of her clothes. He’s grown accustomed to small ruby gloves in his, stark against the white of winter as the snow falls. He shares the brick red crayon with her when she wants to draw. Her favourite fruits were raspberries and apples, and maybe sometimes lemon.
Jack thought about this as he reached his home. Right before he climbed the patio steps, he reached over and eased a single rose free from the bush. He ignored the thorns prickling shallowly into his skin, drawing beads of a different red. He held the faces of his wife and daughter in his mind’s eye, swallowing hard, as it drew him closer by that allure. But he stopped, with his hand hovering over the knob.
All of a sudden, he’s hit with the sudden fear that once he opens that front door-
The dream will do what it’s always done.
It ends.
Written By Trishta
