Deke waved a hand at him. Don’t be silly, his expression said. Some of the old Deke was filtering back into his features now. His eyes looked less dead than they had just moments ago.
“Why don’t you get to bed and I’ll lock up on my way out,” David suggested. For some reason, he was growing increasingly uncomfortable about being in Deke’s house. Coupled with that discomfort was the feeling that he was overlooking something very obvious—and very important—and that feeling was setting him on edge.
“Okay, boss. Whatever you say.” Deke got up from the armchair in a huff—it seemed to take great effort—and handed David the towel. His rounded gut glistened with rainwater. “I got some long johns around here someplace,” he said, pausing to peer behind the TV.
“You keep your long johns behind the television?” David said.
Deke stood upright, as if suddenly considering the absurdity of it all. When he turned to look at David, his eyes were unfocused again.
“Maybe I should call for an ambulance,” David suggested.
“Do it and I’ll brain you. I’m no invalid.” Deke’s voice had gone deadly serious.
“Something’s off with you.”
“Who the hell asked you to come in here, anyway?” There was real malice behind Deke’s words, enough to make David consider bolting from the house right then and there. It was as if some switch had been flipped, instantly altering Deke’s personality.
Drugs, David thought . . . although he had never known Deke Carmody to abuse narcotics. Alcohol, maybe, but not drugs. What else could it be?
Deke slammed a palm against the TV and the screen went dead. Then he turned and grinned idiotically at David. The large man opened his mouth, presumably to say something, but nothing came out. Instead, he liberated a fart that sounded like a trumpet blare, sustaining it for a good five seconds.
“Jesus Christ,” David said, too stunned to show emotion.
“Go home,” Deke said, turning around. “You shouldn’t be here.” He ambled down the darkened hallway toward his bedroom, his hands dangling limply at his sides, the canvas of his broad, pallid back speckled with pimples and reddish striations. Like a ghost fading into a fog bank, Deke Carmody vanished into the darkness at the far end of the hallway.
David stood there in the living room for perhaps thirty seconds, listening to the grunting sounds of Deke climbing into his bed. Almost instantly the man began snoring.
David went to one of the windows and untied the curtains. They fell away from the pane, only to reveal a series of carpentry nails that had been pounded into the sill. The sight caused a thick lump to form at the back of David’s throat. He went to the next window, untied the curtains, and found a similar display of carpentry nails there, too.
Go home. You shouldn’t be here.
David returned to the bathroom, hung the towel back on the hook, and was about to turn and leave when he happened to glance down into the toilet. What he saw there caused him to freeze—and not solely in a halt of his movements, but he could literally feel his entire body suddenly grow cold.
The toilet bowl was filled with blood.
Not just a little bit, and not the superficial hue of a flesh wound or a nosebleed diluted in water. The blood in the bowl was the startling Christmas red of arterial blood, and as David stared at it, he thought he could see small clumps of fibrous material in it. There were spatters on the seat and some reddish spray down the side of the toilet tank. A few bright stars stood out sharply on the ecru tiles. One particular spill had been smeared by David’s own shoe, most likely when he had first come in here to get the towel; he had inadvertently left a shoe print of blood on the pale green bath mat. His gaze levitated until he saw splotches of blood in the sink, too. Crimson droplets littered the countertop. The mirror was speckled with red teardrops.
How had he missed all this just moments ago? Had he been so focused on helping Deke that he had just overlooked it all? Given the condition of the bathroom, it seemed impossible.
He wanted to wash his face and hands—just looking at all that blood, not to mention the blackish clumps floating in it, made him feel unclean—but he wouldn’t touch this sink. Instead, he went down the hall, into the kitchen, and scrubbed himself at the kitchen sink, where there was nothing more ominous than dirty dishes and empty glasses in the basin.