Scream (8 page)

Finally, the last Saturday of the summer arrived. School
started Monday. If he remembered right, which of course he
did-he would never forget that day-it was a warm, clear day,
with a light breeze that rustled the treetops and blew straw
around outside the barn. The smell of freshly bailed alfalfa was
thick in the humid air. They had spent the day cleaning out the
two horse trailers and refilling the water troughs for the cows.
At four o'clock on the dot (he remembered it was exactly four
because he had been waiting all day for the hour to strike) he
looked around and asked Katie to go to the barn with him ...

"There's something I need to tell you," he says, his voice
wavering.

Katie's permanent smile widens, and her eyes sparkle as if
she knows exactly what he is up to. (Is there a more beautiful
girl in all the good Lord's creation?) "Sure. What is it?"

He shoves his hands in his pockets and kicks at some straw on
the hard-packed dirt. "Just something I need to tell you is all."

They walk to the barn in silence, he with his hands buried in
his pockets to hide the trembling (this cursed trembling, and I
probably have red blotches all over my neck too), she with her
hands clasped behind her back, head turned skyward, watching
the clouds as she likes to do.

When they arrive at the barn, they step inside, and he walks
to the far corner, where a wall of barley bales stands over ten
feet high. He faces her, slips his hands out of his pockets, and
wipes his sweaty palms on his jeans. "Um-"

Unexpectedly, the moment judge opens his mouth a lump
rises in his throat, and for a second he thinks he is going to cry.
(Cry! In front of Katie! Don't you dare.) He swallows hard and
tries to continue. He has to say this.

"Um, there's something I been wanting to tell you."

He looks around the barn nervously. The breeze has swung
the door shut, and the only light comes from a thick shaft of
sunlight pouring in from a missing board in the loft. Dust
floats lazily through the ribbon of light, sparkling like glitter.
A sparrow flits around up in the rafters, its tiny wings beating
against the still air. Judge is suddenly very aware of his heart
banging in his ears and the sound of his own breathing.

Katie reaches out and takes his hands in hers. It's the first
time they've ever held hands, and it makes his pulse spike. She
smiles again (an angel's smile), her perfect teeth glowing in the
muted light. "It's OK. You can tell me anything."

He swallows and shifts his weight. "Um, well, I just wanted
to say that-" His palms are sweating like a spigot. (Why can't I
make them stop?) She has to be grossed out. And his heart feels
like it's in his throat. (This is not going well at all, I should
bail now.) For some reason, he glances over at the sunbeam
and finds the glitter floating carelessly through the air. Oddly,
it seems to calm him just enough that he can continue without
making a complete fool of himself. "-this summer has been
great and, well, and, um-"

Katie gives his hands a squeeze and leans just an inch closer.
He can smell her now, all flowers and farm. "Just say it. It's OK."

He forces a nervous smile. "O-OK" It is at that moment, the
moment when he determines to just say it, that the world stands
still. He swears the earth has stopped spinning on its axis,
clocks have stopped ticking, the sun stands still, that floating
glitter has frozen in space, and the sparrow has hushed its
beating wings. Even his pulse seems to stop. It's a moment that
will change his life. (Nothing will be the same again.) He will
never be the same again. He looks her right in those foreverblue eyes and the words just ease out. "Katie, I love you."

Judge stroked his soul patch slowly, aware that his hand was
shaking and his breathing rate had increased. The words sat
in his mind like a lump. Katie, I love you. He'd really said it,
hadn't he? At least she knew how he felt. At least he'd had one
chance to speak his mind ... his heart.

I'm not a monster.

Here he was again, at another funeral. Jeff's was just days ago
and still so fresh in his mind. He didn't have to come to Jerry's;
no one expected it of him. Heck, he barely knew the guy, except
to buy auto parts from him. Jerry seemed nice enough, though.
Always willing to go out of his way to make a delivery. And
for that, Mark had given him all his business. Even when that
chain store moved into town last year and Jerry lost a ton of
patrons, Mark made it a point to let the older man know he'd
never lose Stone Service Center's account.

Now Jerry was dead, and Mark would have to go to the chain
store. He hated the thought.

The minister was going on about what a religious man Jerry
was. What did he know? Just a few months ago, while delivering
a carburetor, Jerry had gotten Mark on the subject of religious
fanatics and had admitted to not setting foot in a church in
over fifty years. Said he was born and baptized Episcopalian,
and that's all he needed. Mark had agreed with him, but deep
in his heart, where a man really knows what's what, where the
soul communicates with the mind, Mark knew he was wrong.
There was more to it than that. But who was he to say anything?
He was no theologian and definitely no Bible scholar. Unless
eighteen years of Sunday school qualified one for Bible scholar
status. And he hardly thought it did.

Reverend Wutsisname was still spouting off. ..... an honest
businessman, a devoted family man, a loyal husband... "

That made Mark flinch. Loyal husband. If it were him lying in
that brown box, and his loved ones and friends standing around
dabbing at their eyes, that part would have to be left out. Mark
was a lot of things, mostly positive, but loyal he was not. And it
killed him to admit it. But it had killed Cheryl even more.

-Cheryl, when are you coming home? We-

-You don't get it, do you? I'm not coming home, Mark. Not
now, not soon, not ever.

-We need to talk about this sometime. You can't just throw
our marriage away.

-Me? Throw our marriage away? You're the one who killed
our marriage. You killed what we had. Don't you dare try to
put the blame on me.

-I'm not blaming you, but...

The realization burned in his stomach like an ulcer. How
many times over the past few months had he wished he could
turn back time, tell Rachel no, avoid her, do whatever needed to
be done, anything to save his marriage.

He'd give anything-literally anything-to have that one
moment back again.

Cheryl. Dear, sweet Cheryl. I'm so sorry, baby. You have to
know that.

Mark looked around the small group that had gathered.
Jerry's wife-he didn't even know her name-was standing
across from him, black dress, black hat, black veil. She was a
petite woman with olive skin, small features, fragile hands, and
very dark eyes. Through the veil he could see her red-rimmed,
swollen eyes and red nose. She kept bringing a laced handkerchief to her nose and struggled to choke back the sobs that
wanted to rack her frail frame. Beside her stood a tall man,
middle-aged, with jet-black hair. Must be Jerry's son. He talked
about him from time to time. An accountant or something.
Bob. Or was it Rob? He was wearing dark sunglasses, had his
arm draped over his mother's shoulders, and his head bowed
low. The bright sun glistened off his silky hair. Beside Bob-or
Rob-was a slender, attractive woman that must have been his
wife. She leaned into him like a frightened little girl. Like Sara Beaverson had leaned into Wendy, finding some solace in the
strength of her mother.

A gentle breeze tossed Mark's hair to the side, and the sound
of children playing in the distance carried across the cemetery.
They were screaming and giggling with delight.

Screaming.

The sound of those screams suddenly filled Mark's ears again,
reminding him again of the two phone calls he'd received.
One from Jeff; one from Jerry. Both were interrupted by those
screams-weeping and gnashing of teeth-and both had died.
What they were or where they came from, Mark had no idea.
He'd spent the last two days searching for possibilities, probabilities, answers of any kind, and had come up with nothing.
They were just screams from somewhere ... or nowhere. Maybe
some weird crossed-wire thing. Maybe some nut job prank
caller with the techno skills to pull it off. But how would he
know Jeff and Jerry would die? Maybe the screams were from
another dimension. Yeah right. Twilight Zone stuff. At the end
of it all, he was right back where he started-with nothing.

The good reverend was wrapping it up: "In the name of the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, amen and amen."

Jerry's wife laid a rose on the casket, dabbed at her nose
again. Her son gave her shoulder a little squeeze and guided
her away from the burial site.

When they came to where Mark was standing, Jerry's wife
stopped and looked up at him. There was a look of emptiness
and despair in her dark eyes that Mark had never seen before.
They were hollow, blank, like someone had sucked the life right
out of them and left her with two empty orbs.

She reached out with a thin, shaky hand and took his hand
in hers. It was cold and dry and bony. But her grip was surprisingly strong.

"Are you the man who tried to save my Jerry?" Her voice
was strained and weak, and she struggled to rein in a sob in the
middle of the question.

Mark squeezed her hand gently and nodded, fighting the
baseball in his throat. "Yes. I'm sorry."

After calling 911, he'd given Jerry CPR until the paramedics
came. When they finally arrived he had collapsed with exhaustion, sucking wind like a man who'd just finished running a
marathon.

"Sorry?" Her eyes widened and chin quivered.

-Sorry? You're sorry? What does that mean, Mark. What
does sorry do?

-What do you want me to say?

-Nothing. Don't say anything at all.

She placed her other hand on top of his. "Son, you don't have
to be sorry. His time was up is all. I've been harping on him for
years to get that heart of his checked out, but Jerry was such a
stub'rin man." She paused and nearly smiled, and Mark saw,
for just an instant, a flash of life in those eyes, like when the
sun breaks through on a stormy day, but just for a moment and
then is gone again. "He was so stub'rin."

She patted his hand. A tear slipped from her eye and traced
a track down a deep groove in her cheek, finally lodging near
the corner of her mouth. "His time was up is all. Jerry was
never a religious man, y'know. I tried and tried to get him to
come to church, but he said he never did like being around
churchgoin' hypocrites."

She looked up, and her eyes met his directly. They seemed to
bore holes in his brain. Mark tried to loosen his grasp on her
thin hand, but she only gripped tighter, refusing to let him go.
She leaned closer, and he now noticed a fleck of spittle on her
lower lip and the tight set of her jaw. "Everybody has a reck'nin' hour, young man. Everybody has an appointment with God. It
was time for Jerry's appointment is all. Is all." She then released
her hold on his hand and burst into a fit of silent sobs, nearly
collapsing if not for the steady support of her son.

"C'mon, Mom, let's get you to the car." Her son smiled and
nodded a thank-you to Mark, then led the old woman away.

Mark was left standing there alone with nothing to comfort
him but the screams of the children still bouncing from headstone to headstone and the eerie warning of a grieving old
woman-Everybody has a reckoning hour. Everybody has an
appointment with God. Maybe he should talk to someone about
it. The reverend here seemed like he'd be able to help. Maybe
he'd make an appointment with him, tell him everything, get
his slant on it.

He'd call the church tomorrow-St. Agnes Episcopal Church.