It was not particularly convincing that he started out with “not here” and ended with “dead.” She decided to take a gamble. “Look, I lied. I’m a friend and I really am trying to find him—”
There was a quaver in the voice. “Go away. I don’t want any of this at my door. I’ve told all of you—I don’t know anything. Most nights he didn’t even sleep here, and he didn’t leave anything behind. Now, go away.” The intercom stopped crackling.
Charlie pressed the buzzer again, and again, but he didn’t return.
She looked over at her car but walked around the back of the building instead, where the trash cans were kept. It didn’t take her long to find one that had junk mail addressed to apartment 2B among the coffee grounds and eggshells and takeout containers. A glossy catalog of scrubs, only slightly smeared with old soup, had the name Liam Clovin, MD, printed on the back.
18
THE PAST
Born as a wisp of a thing, ephemeral as smoke from a cigarette. Succored with blood, with scraps of horror and self-disgust. Embarrassing desires. I want her. I want him. I want that.
Catch the ball, he says, and I catch it. Are they my hands or his?
Chase me, he says. Find me. It’s too easy. To lose him, I’d have to lose myself.
He wants me to laugh. Shows me how. Shows me funny things. Cats that fall off tables. Teenagers skateboarding into lakes.
You’re my only friend, he tells me sometimes. But that’s only true because his mother keeps him home from school. Because he has dirty clothes. Because he can’t invite anyone over.
I’m scared she’ll die. I want her to hold me when I am crying, when I am feverish, when I am afraid. Want her to smooth back my hair. Kiss my forehead. I hate her. Maybe I’d be better off if she were dead. None of those feelings are mine, but they become mine. They become me.
Sometimes she takes us to the supermarket and only puts the cheap, heavy stuff in her cart. Sugar. Flour. Milk. She tells him to shove packages of chicken breasts and pork chops into his backpack.
No candy, she says. They expect kids to steal candy. That’s how they catch you.
There are mirrored pieces of the ceiling that let people watch. There are security cameras.
But none of them are watching me. We take what she wants. We take candy. We take everything.
Then his grandfather takes us to his big house, where there is a girl to play with and enough food for everyone. If Remy is hungry, someone makes him food. If Remy cries, someone will come. But Remy doesn’t cry anymore. He gives all his tears to me.
The arrangement is simple. We can stay here so long as I do bad things. People have a spark inside of them, and what I have to do is put it out. Every time I do, some of the spark gets on me, in me like the smear left behind from crushing a lightning bug. Killing is easier than stealing, but I don’t like the way that Remy looks at me when we’re done.
I am changing. The sparks are doing something.
I am having trouble going back to sleep when Remy doesn’t need me.
I am restless. Something is wrong with me. Something is right with me. I can do things that Remy doesn’t know about. When he’s asleep, I wander the house, the thin tether never growing taut. I can juggle oranges, and turn on the radio like a poltergeist. Read books, draw a picture in the condensation on the windows.
It’s my idea, the first time. I want to see what will happen. Cut the cord. And then when it happens, I am scared. There is an emptiness where Remy was, and it feels like falling through the night. I have never been alone. There isn’t enough of me to be alone.
Each time it happens, I forget things. Little things. Where I was. How long I was gone.
Adeline tells me things, but they’re not all true. I don’t want to listen to her anymore.
Sometimes, the air around me feels charged, like a storm coming on. I think I might be angry. I think I might be furious. I think I might be about to do something I am going to regret.
Remy makes me a promise. Shhhhh. We’re going to run away. Then it will be just me and not me and not him. He’s going to fix me. He’s going to help me.
But first, blot out a few more sparks. Drown a few more stars.
19
CANDY CRACKS TEETH
Charlie texted Doreen that she’d gotten the ring and then took herself to Blue Ruin to wait and think through what she was going to do with Knight Singh’s book.
The bar was in a tiny, grotty brick building, far from the downtown. On the outside, a faded sign proclaimed it “The Bluebird.” No one ever called it that, though. It was a third-shift bar, opening at five a.m. and announcing last call at two a.m. Between two and five, it became a restaurant with an extremely limited menu. If you ordered enough cocktails to get you through the three-hour lull in service, you could drink for twenty-four hours straight.
The five a.m. crowd were usually nurses and doctors from Cooley Dickinson Hospital, mixed in with maintenance workers, hospital concierges, and second-shift restaurant workers looking for a place to go after exhausting all other venues.
Blue Ruin wasn’t pretty. The scarred bar and tables in it had been purchased during the liquidation sale of an old tavern and didn’t fit well into the space. The floor was sticky all the way to the door, the liquor was served in plastic cups, and the only thing they had for garnish were sad-looking limes.
If ever there was a bar that perfectly captured how Charlie felt that afternoon, it was Blue Ruin. She sat down on a stool, reassured to know she could stay all night.
* * *
A n hour later, she was three Maker’s Marks in, with no desire to slow down.
Doreen had texted to say that she was on her way over and a lot of other things that Charlie hadn’t bothered to read. Charlie had another text from her high school friend Laura about missing her barbecue, plus one from her mother about her new boyfriend’s birthday and how she was hoping they could all get together. Maybe the girls would like to host, since their place was bigger?
There were two voice mails from work, asking about her coming in on Monday night. She tried to imagine being back there behind the bar, making drinks. Trying not to think of the glass and the blood and choking on shadow. Trying not to think about the sound Hermes’s neck made when it broke.
She ignored the messages and went into the bathroom to wipe off her makeup. She managed only to turn it into a glittering charcoal smear that covered her eyes and part of her cheeks. Exhaustion and irritability were creeping in on her faster than the alcohol could stave off.
There was always a dizzying high immediately after a job, followed by an adrenaline drop. Then everything felt a little too dull and you became a little too sensitive. Like right then, when she looked at herself in the mirror, staring into her own dark eyes and drawing a finger over her own scarred lip, she felt unexpectedly and humiliatingly like crying.
It wasn’t because of Vince. It had nothing to do with him.
She went back to the bar and ordered another drink. If you were going to drown your sorrows, you needed a lot of liquid.
The bartender was a friend of Don’s and tried occasionally to make conversation, but Charlie wasn’t doing a good job of keeping up her end. At some point she realized he might be flirting.
“Kyle,” he told her with a grin, looking up from his phone. “That’s my name. Maybe Don told you about me.”
Charlie was suddenly sure that Don had told Kyle about her.
Kyle had a head full of thick, wavy brown hair. A tattoo of a rosary climbed his arm from the wrist. His shadow appeared utterly normal. He’d be better at erasing her dread and horror and sadness than all the whiskey in the world.
For fifteen to twenty minutes, at least.
She ought to call someone. Laura, so she could apologize for not showing up for the barbecue. Barb, who could make her laugh. José, who was sad too.
“Did you know,” she told Kyle, trying to make conversation, “a few grains of salt are supposed to take out the bitter in coffee. Isn’t that strange, to think it works better than sugar?”