Devil Red (9 page)

25

I threw up out by the car because the stench of the dead man was still in my nostrils. It wasn’t the first time I had seen anyone dead or smelled death, but tonight it clung to me like shit on a stick.

Driving home, I could still smell it.

Several times I thought about pulling out my cell and dialing the cops, or calling Leonard, or Marvin, telling them what I found, but I didn’t. I don’t know why. I was overwhelmed with the feeling that had I arrived at the trailer just a little bit earlier, I could have ended up like Bert. It wasn’t my first close call, but it seemed to me there had been a bunch of them now, and that my string was bound to be running out.

As I went along the road that led out to the main highway, I kept feeling as if I were disconnected. A part of me kept wondering if I was still asleep, dreaming about all this. But I knew better.

When I got to the highway, I saw a dark SUV pull out and move up quickly. Maybe it was the one I had seen before. Maybe not.

I put my foot on it and sped up. I might as well have been walking. The SUV passed me like I was standing still, but when it got in front of me, it kept going.

Moving along like a jet. Pretty soon, it was out of sight.

My cell rang. I almost crawled out of my skin when it did.

It was Bert’s number.

I said, “Hello.”

The phone went dead.

Shit. They had Bert’s phone, and they had my number. If they had a way of tracing it, they could find me, and these days, with all the Internet stuff, that would be easy. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like what I did for a living. I didn’t like me. I didn’t like most anything I could think of at that moment.

I thought about Bert, and I thought about a person, or persons, who could do to him what they had. He’d been tortured. Maybe he did know something important, or maybe it was back to what I had thought before, they thought he did. Now maybe they thought I knew something.

Damn.

When I got home, I got out of the car and went carefully inside with my gun drawn. I looked around, went upstairs, looked it over.

I went back downstairs and looked out the living room windows, and then the kitchen windows, but didn’t see anything that made me want to start shooting. I felt strangely weak, in a way I had never felt before.

I thought about Brett. I could call her. I could tell her what I found.

I didn’t.

I sat in a chair in the living room and laid the automatic on the chair arm. I kept telling myself to get up and go to bed or make a call to someone. Leonard. Marvin. Brett. But I didn’t move.

I didn’t want to go upstairs.

I didn’t want anyone sneaking up on me.

I wanted to be near the front and rear doors by being in the center of the living room in the chair. I tried to sleep in the chair, but I couldn’t. I felt like I wanted to go to the bathroom, but I couldn’t.

I sat there.

And sat there, and then I realized I had gone to the bathroom. I was in the chair and I hadn’t got up, and I could smell myself. My mind seemed rational. Like it knew what was going on, but it wouldn’t connect to the physical. My emotions were on holiday.

Time folded in on itself. I didn’t move. I sat there and smelled myself and thought about getting up, but still I sat.

I had a feeling vampires were in the room. That they had turned to shadow and slid under the door and were behind me, but I couldn’t turn to look. I couldn’t move. I felt them come closer and closer and closer. They were crawling along the walls. I could see them out of the corner of my eye. When cars drove by on the road out front their headlights moved the vampires away and washed them into the walls, and as the lights passed, the vampires returned and melted down the walls and into the floor. I sensed they were flowing along close to my feet.

But still, I sat.

The sun came up. It reddened the curtains.

The day passed in what seemed like instants. I watched shadows moving along the wall again. They weren’t vampires this time. They were glimpses of time being stolen from my life. The room was as dark and heavy as if it were covered in thick black velvet.

I heard the door open, and Brett called out, “Hap?”

I tried to answer, but all my answers, like my emotions, were still on vacation. I kept thinking I would gather them up and weld them together and be myself, but I didn’t move. I might as well have been a turnip waiting to be plucked.

The room grew suddenly bright.

Brett touched me and called my name, and then I saw her nose wrinkle up from the smell of me, and I wanted to say I was sorry, but it just wouldn’t come out. Then I climbed into my spaceship and stretched out on my bunk and buckled in and looked through the windshield at the stars and colorful planets moving closer. I was cruising through the great black star-studded forever that was space. Twinkle, twinkle, little star, vampires suck blood, and humans make war. Ducks have feathers, goats have hair, pigs have pink feet, and Davy Crockett killed a bear.

A big black planet swung in from the right, and I could see the planet had eyes. The planet moved closer and I could see the planet had a resemblance to Leonard. The planet Leonard had arrived, and the knowledge of that made me feel better.

I heard Brett say, “I found him like this. I checked his vitals. They seem okay. Maybe I should have called nine-one-one.”

“I got him,” Leonard said.

I wanted to say something back. I could hear them and I could understand their words, but what they said were like trains passing in the night. I could see their words go by, but no way they were gonna stop and let me ride.

I was pulled right out of my spaceship. I felt myself floating upward (antigravity, baby), and I could see Leonard’s face clearly, and he was looking right at me. Brett said, “I’ll call the doctor.”

“He don’t need no doctor,” Leonard said.

“But—”

“I got him. Open the bathroom door.”

Yeah. That would be nice. I need to go to the bathroom. Again.

And then I was sitting on the floor by the tub and Leonard was leaning over the tub running water. I finally turned my head. It was no more trouble than trying to screw a large bolt through the center of the earth.

“Throw this shit away,” Leonard said.

I saw Brett’s hands taking my old clothes.

I felt cold. And then I was lifted, and I felt wet. But it was a warm wet. I didn’t feel cold anymore. I was drifting comfortably through space, and the great black planet called Leonard was leaning over me in the tub.

“He going to be okay?” Brett said.

“Goddamn right he is.”

I closed my eyes, and as I drifted down into the wet warmth, I heard Brett say, “What … what is it? What’s wrong?”

“Life,” Leonard said.

26

When I opened my eyes I was still warm, but I wasn’t wet. I was warm because I was in bed with the covers pulled up to my chest. Leonard was sitting by my bedside reading one of my paperbacks. I said, “What are you doing here?”

“Well,” Leonard said. “I finish this book, I’m gonna steal everything you got while you’re lying there like a dumb ass. And then I’m gonna turn heterosexual and me and Brett are gonna run off together, but not until we sell your organs to science and burn the house down and collect the insurance money. I was thinking we might buy a pig to take with us, start a hog farm.”

“You need two pigs,” I said. “One male, one female.”

“Guess I hadn’t thought that through.” Leonard reached out and took my hand. “You back, brother?”

“Was I gone?”

“Oh yeah.”

“Brett? I remember seeing her, hearing her, but I couldn’t answer. Where is she?”

“Downstairs fixing me and her some breakfast. Want me to add you to the list?”

“That would be nice … But, what happened?”

“You had what some people call a nervous breakdown, and what I call a major fuckup by way of an easy chair and crapping your pants. You peed too. The world got hold of you and whipped your ass, Hap. But only for a round. You’re back now and pretty soon you’ll be off the stool and back in the fight. Though you may have to start with some tomato cans and work your way up to the contenders.”

“I’m glad Brett called you.”

“I’m not. I had to change your clothes and bathe you, wash the shit off, and then dry your ass with a towel, put you in your jammies, and carry you upstairs. I tell you now, boy, you got to lay off the pancakes if you want me carryin’ your fat ass up a flight of stairs. Let me have Brett fix you some eggs or somethin’.”

Leonard got up and walked toward the bedroom door.

I said, “Leonard.”

He paused, looked at me. “Yeah?”

“A man couldn’t ask for a better brother.”

“Hell, I know that.”

27

I was halfway through my scrambled eggs and bacon, sitting in bed with a tray, enjoying it, looking forward to my coffee, when suddenly I felt there was something I was trying to remember, something I wanted to say. It roamed around the alleys of my mind like a drunk trying to find where he’d dropped his car keys.

Brett was in bed with me, stretched out beside me, a pillow propped behind her head. She wore shorts and a sweatshirt. She smelled like perfume and fried foods. Leonard was in the chair next to the bed. He had been talking about things that didn’t matter, and it was exactly what I wanted to hear. Those things that didn’t matter were really good conversation right then. I knew Leonard thought I was bad off because he even asked me if I would tell a joke. He hates my jokes.

I didn’t have a joke. I was too weak to have a joke. I could see he was actually relieved, and so was Brett.

“Did Leonard tell you I wanted to put you down, but he insisted you were going to be all right? I was about to call the vet and have it done, and he showed up.”

“There was a moment there when I would have invited it.”

She pushed my hair off my forehead and kissed my cheek.

Right then I loved her more than I had ever loved her.

I was sipping on my coffee when I had a flash as clear as daylight. I said, “Bert’s dead.”

“Bert?” Brett said.

“Mini’s stepfather,” Leonard said.

“He’s dead,” I said.

“You just have a psychic vision or something?” Leonard asked.

I put my cup of coffee on the tray. “No,” I said. “I saw him dead. Last night.”

I told them what I had seen.

Leonard said, “Maybe you never left the chair. Maybe you thought you saw what you saw. You told me vampires were after you.”

“I did?”

“You did.”

“It all seems like a dream. I think I remember thinking I’d call the police, then Marvin, then you, Leonard.”

“Was I on the list?” Brett asked.

“You were next.”

“But you didn’t call,” Leonard said.

“I guess not.”

“It was a kind of trigger, Hap, you seeing Bert’s body, or thinking you did, or dreaming you did. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back. And in case you’re not following my cliché, you’re the camel.”

“You really think you saw a dead man?” Brett said. “Or are you screwed in the head, honey?”

“Sympathy like that,” Leonard said, “is why you’re a nurse.”

“I’m just sayin’,” Brett said.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I really don’t. I’d have a hard time trying to remember my shoe size right now. But it seemed real. I had this feeling that things weren’t right, and I went out there. He called, see, and I went to sleep, and I woke up feeling like it wasn’t right.”

“But you don’t know for a fact you went to see him?” Brett said.

I shook my head.

“You been kind of goofy lately,” Leonard said. “I saw this coming, but I wasn’t expecting it to be like this.”

“What were you expectin’?” I asked.

“It didn’t involve you shittin’ yourself while sittin’ in a big armchair,” Leonard said. “That much I can tell you.”

“Which, by the way,” Brett said, “I have disposed of the chair. I took it to the dump. You owe me a chair, Hap.”

“I’ll get right on that,” I said.

Leonard got up and started for the door.

I said, “Where are you goin’?”

“To get Bert’s Camp Rapture address from the folder, then I’m going to go see if you’re nuts.”

28

Sometime later, Leonard came through the bedroom door. Brett and I were snuggled up together under the covers.

“Glad I didn’t come back fifteen minutes later,” Leonard said. “Or was it fifteen minutes earlier?”

“Whatever time you came in, it would have been the same situation,” Brett said. “His little friend is as tired as he is.”

I said, “Do we need to get me sized for a straitjacket?”

“It was just like you said, including the devil drawing on the sheets. The place was thrown about, maybe just to look like a robbery. He was tortured good. His tongue was cut out. Air conditioner was running, which might have muffled screams and it would keep the body from going to rot too fast. That happened, you could smell that stink for a mile. And maybe Bert just liked it cold. Bottom line, though, is he’s dead.”

“Jesus,” Brett said.

“Good to know I’m not going to be spending Christmas in a rubber room. But, on the other hand, bad to know Bert really is dead.”

“Yeah, with his passing, the world has really lost a big bit of charm. As for you, you’re not off the nut hook yet. I think you need to stay where you are for a while. Get your marbles back together.”

“Yeah, you’re kind of fucked up,” Brett said. “You boys want more coffee?”

“That would be nice,” Leonard said.

“Well,” Brett said, “I want some too, so I’m going to do what any good domesticated woman does, I’m going to have Leonard make it.”

“Hell with that,” Leonard said. “I’m going to the coffee shop.”

“You know what?” Brett said. “I think I was just bitten by a ghost of women past. I’ll go down and make the coffee. You two visit.”

When Brett was downstairs, Leonard pulled his chair closer to me. “You feelin’ better, brother?”

“I think so. I’m just not entirely certain what’s real and what isn’t, but more and more things are coming back to me.”

“Do you remember that five hundred dollars you owe me?”

“Nope. That isn’t coming back.”

Leonard grinned and gave my hand a pat. He said, “Now, while you’re weak, I can smother you with a pillow.”

“Way I feel, you could smother me with a thought.”

We sat silent for a few moments.

“Sometimes in war,” Leonard said, “there are soldiers who killed too much and saw too much, and they have nervous collapses. Sometimes they have it right there, right after they killed someone, or lost a buddy, but mostly they come home and have it years later.”

“And you never had any of that?”

“Once I woke up in a sweat remembering that I had lost a harmonica in the war.”

“A harmonica?”

“My uncle gave it to me, and I had it over there. I never played it. He gave it to me when I was a kid. That and a cap gun and cowboy bandanna. I lost the cap gun, and once when I was in the woods, hunting, and had to shit, I wiped my ass on the bandanna and lost my sentimentality toward it. But I had that harmonica, and though I couldn’t play a lick, I took it to war with me. It was kind of like a charm.”

“So, you’re telling me I lost my harmonica and had a nervous breakdown? I don’t own a harmonica, Leonard.”

“In a way, I am telling you that you lost your harmonica. There were guys went over there to war and came back and went along fine for years. I was once told by an army buddy that anyone killed someone had some kind of hole in them, even if they felt the person killed needed to be killed. Because on some level, human beings identify with other human beings to such an extent they start to see themselves as the dead human. You may be okay for a while, but in time, those things you do, things you’ve seen, they come home to roost, like pterodactyls.”

“Do you have moments like that?” I asked.

“I don’t. Not if I thought what I did was the right thing to do. I’m pretty self-righteous. I mean, there are guys out there, sociopaths that end up in war, and for them it’s like a free hand job every day. They like it. They don’t feel. That’s different. I think it needs to be done, I don’t brood. You, you’re always digging into your feelings. You leave them raw, mess with them so much. You’ve seen plenty, but last night you saw one too many. And I think Vanilla Ride, meeting her, may have been a big trigger, not just poor old Bert. She was the gun. Bert was the bullet.”

Vanilla had been a while ago, but he was right, she was in the back of my mind all the time.

“Vanilla is a beautiful woman,” Leonard said, “charming, very feminine, and she can kill you with an ice pick or a gun, maybe her bare hands, and sleep like a baby. And I know you. In the back of your mind you’re thinking: Once she was a kid like me, and she grew up to kill, and she grew up do it for money and not care who she killed or why. You feel like you might be slipping over into her bit of darkness. I tell you, man, no way. You ain’t comin’ from, and ain’t never been comin’ from, the farm where she was raised.”

“Farm?”

“Figure of speech.”

“How bad was I?” I said.

“I’ve seen a lot worse. But, know what I think? I think you might have sat in that chair for days, maybe starved to death if Brett hadn’t come along, called me.” Leonard swallowed and his facial expression changed. “You know what Brett said to me when you were in the chair? She said he’s your brother, he loves you, maybe more than me. Fix him.”

“And you did,” I said.

“I put a Band-Aid on it. You got to be your own doctor. A little bed rest perks you up. A little experience helps you deal with it. But it’s like a super staph infection. It gets better, but it doesn’t go away.”