When Shadows Fall (9 page)

Chapter
18

A BULLET WHIZZES
past my head like a supercharged bumblebee and strikes the elm tree to my right, scattering bark and wood chips. The birds shoot into the air and I duck instinctively, ripping the hat off my head, cursing myself for forgetting it. It was clearly the target. I toss it away. It hangs on a bush and spins lazily.

I am not a fan of guns. I know how to use them, all kinds, from sniper rifles to shotguns, semiautomatic pistols to six-shooters. And I know how well they work, as a deterrent, or to bring down dinner. But when they’re pointed at human flesh, something rises in me and I feel the urge to scream. So much hatred, so many deaths that could be prevented. Wars and school shootings and suicides and gangs. It hurts me.

Then again, everything hurts me.

Before the bullets, the forest was quiet. In mourning, as if it knows my loss, feels it along with me. It normally shelters me, hides me from the bad people. I know it like the back of my hands and they don’t. Yesterday, I think it was yesterday, or the day before—they’re all running together now—they got caught up in the limbs and bogs and finally, finally, gave up.

I retreat deeper into the woods, back toward the river, knowing they can’t follow long. So I can grieve properly, in private, without them breathing down my neck. Revisit my memories, my life, with all its twists and turns and hurts.

More bullets fly, but they’re high and back to the right, away from me. Toward the chalky cliff, where they’ll assume I’ve retreated. No one in their right mind would go up, instead of down toward the road and escape.

I don’t stop to wonder who is shooting at me. It doesn’t matter. It used to be us against the world, and now it is only me. Me, and no one else. I have no allies. No friends. No family. No one even knows I still exist.

Five minutes of rough terrain, my legs burn and throb, but I’m on the high ground now, approaching the edge of a steep cliff where I’ve been sleeping, looking down toward the cabin. They’ve defiled it. I will never feel safe there again.

The gunshots are over now. The forest is returning to normal. The birds resettle in the high meadow, chirping madly; the deer creep from their thickets. I push onward, higher and higher, to the one place I know I’ll be okay. Closer to heaven. Closer to him.

I don’t see the branch coming. When it hits me, with the force of a baseball bat, I go down in a heap. Blood pools in my mouth, two molars on the backside are loose, I’ve bitten my tongue. My nose is broken; I can feel blood spurting from the wound.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

Every ounce of my being panics. That voice. The voice I’ve been running from for so long, thrashing and screaming in the night to get away from, is here. It’s over. It is all over.

I roll to my hands and knees, still stunned, scrambling backward. My heart pounds so hard it drowns out my thrashing. I can’t speak, my tongue is swollen and in the way. Bloody saliva spills down my chin and mingles with the forest floor. I am afraid to look up, knowing what I will see.

“Where have you been, little one? I’ve been looking for you for such a long time.”

The voice laughs, and my blood freezes. I can’t be taken. Not again. Never again.

I inch toward the edge of the cliff. It is my only hope. I hear the water rushing; the waterfall is less than twenty feet away.

“Just where do you think you’re going?”

I have one chance here, one chance to get away. I look up, and there is sudden recognition in the blue eyes facing me, but it’s too late. I leap off the edge, tumble backward into the air. The free fall is sickeningly long. These may be my last moments, so I shut my eyes and allow the air to buffet me as I drop steadily, toward the water.

Death or freedom. There are no other choices for me now.

Chapter
19

1987
McLean, Virginia

IT WAS HOT
for June. Working construction was supposed to be a stress reliever, a good way to get a tan, make some money and learn a trade. His father always said learning a trade will be your greatest asset later in life. Work with your hands. Figure out how to build things. You won’t regret it.

His best friend, his only friend, really, was lifeguarding at the local country club. Adrian tried to apply with him so they could spend this last summer of high school together before they became seniors and their world changed forever. But the club was adamant; they only hired the children of members. So Adrian’s choice was a summer of mowing lawns or building houses. He didn’t have the temperament to be a waiter. He chose houses.

He liked seeing something created, liked knowing it was going to stand for years to come. After a day’s work, there was discernible progress. Foundations were poured. Wall frames went up. Trusses were laid, roof beams installed, and shingles and drywall; then suddenly they were finished and on to the next house.

His foreman was a dick, but who liked their boss? Frank was a heavily muscled jarhead who chewed gum like a cow, mouth open, the elastic wad of tasteless Juicy Fruit snapping back and forth like cement in a mixer, and barked orders while sitting on his ass, watching everyone else work. He’d slide in when the heavy stuff was going on, take all the credit. Adrian knew to keep his mouth shut, and take his lumps along with the next guy. The pay was decent, he got to be outside all day and if Frank needed a favor, he usually came to Adrian first, the youngest, least experienced member of the crew.

Adrian was no dummy. He knew how to work being in someone’s debt.

The first day, when Frank sent him to the 7-Eleven for cigarettes and a twelve-pack of Budweiser, he wasn’t carded. The bored man working the counter never gave him a glance, never questioned him about his age, just rang up the beer and smokes and tossed them in a bag. Adrian saw an opportunity. He was already big, six-four and two-twenty at the tender age of sixteen, a year younger than the rest of the kids in his class. His build worked to his favor when he decided to pick up his own party accoutrements. He and Doug would take the nasty cheap beer he bought to the top floor of the parking deck of the Bennigan’s restaurant in Tyson’s Corner, where the servers hung out after their shift. They’d share the beer and get hammered with them. The servers were mostly freshman and sophomores at George Mason University and Northern Virginia Community College, older and more sophisticated and certainly felt it wasn’t cool to befriend high schoolers. But they tolerated the younger boys because they could score the beer.

He’d party hearty, then drive home, weaving along the back roads, pass out for a few hours before he had to get up at dawn to drive his beat-up pickup over to the build site. A couple of hours in the sun sweated out his hangover, and by noon, when they were all a sweaty, nasty mess and Frank sent him for lunch, Adrian would go willingly, grateful to let the breeze from the open truck windows cool him off as he drove toward town.

He didn’t have a care in the world until the day Frank approached him for a favor. Adrian was up on the roof, straddling a beam, nailing together the edges of the truss they’d just laid. The
pa-pap
of the air gun slamming nails into the wood was rhythmic and smooth. He had a bad hangover, but he’d found if he timed the pressurized blast to coincide with his heartbeats, it was more like a drum tattoo and much less offensive to his aching head—
bump, hiss, da-bump, hiss, da-bump, hiss, da-bump.

He was annoyed when a shadow loomed over him, interrupting his rhythm. He shielded his eyes and looked up. Frank, actually up on the roof, sunglasses on, bald head covered in a red bandanna, sweat streaming down his cheeks, looking like he had at least three sticks of gum wedged into his cheek.

“Kid. I need you after work. Meet me here at 10:00 p.m. Leave your truck at 7-Eleven.”

“I have plans.”

“Yeah, you do, dick weed. With me. Don’t be late, or I’ll fuck you up.”

“What are we doing?”

“Do I pay you to ask questions?” He leaned over, the gum wad going full speed, little flecks of spit launching from his mouth onto Adrian.

Adrian wiped his face and shook his head. “No, sir.”

“Good. 10:00 p.m. Don’t be late.”

After work, Adrian showered, drank a beer with Doug, made an excuse about not feeling good, dropped his truck at 7-Eleven as instructed. He smoked a cigarette on the corner of Spring Hill and Old Dominion, then walked to the building site. He tried not to be curious about what Frank wanted with him after dark. Tried to be cool.

The half-built houses looked different at night. There was a sliver of moon, a thin half crescent giving off a feeble light. Frank was sitting on a pylon, waiting for him. He was edgy, jumpy, his thick hands clenching in and out of fists.

“Finally. Thought you might pussy out on me.”

“You told me to come, so here I am. What are we doing?”

“In a few minutes, a car’s gonna drive up with a dude in it who owes me some money. I need to get a point across. You ever been in a fight?”

Adrian snickered. He’d been in plenty of fights, especially when he was younger. The collective pack, finding their appropriate places. Even as he got bigger, boys liked to test him, to see what he was capable of. He liked fighting, but he kept that under wraps, because his dad went ballistic every time he came home with a busted lip or a black eye.

“Good. If I ask you to hit him, do it. No hesitation, just pop him one. If I decide I want to pump him up myself, you hold him. Got it?”

“Why do you need me for this?”

Frank looked at him like he was an absolute idiot. “You see anyone else on the crew your size? Size matters, kid. Don’t let the girls tell you different.” He guffawed and spit out his wad of gum, tossed it in the bushes. Adrian wanted to tell him not to, that birds would eat it and get sick, like when they ate wedding rice and their bellies blew up, but he held his tongue. Something was weird about Frank tonight. He didn’t want the negative attention focused on him. And he kind of liked being singled out to back up his boss in a fight.

Frank flexed his shoulders and cracked his knuckles. “Besides, I’m betting you can keep a secret. Am I right?”

Adrian didn’t see the harm in telling the truth. “Yeah.”

“Good. This is just between you and me. There’s a twenty in it for you if it goes well.”

And that’s how, ten minutes later, he found himself with his arms wrapped around a strange man’s neck, holding him in an unbreakable half nelson, as Frank tuned him up. The punches weren’t easy; Frank’s fists were like anvils, diving into the man’s soft flesh like a baker punching down dough.

Adrian held on for dear life, and was embarrassed to realize he had a raging hard-on. He was holding this struggling man from behind, and every bump and groan and cry and flinch made him harder and harder until he didn’t think he could bear it. The punches were landing with regular thuds, and the man was trying to cry out, trying to fight, to do something, but he was struggling less and less, and Adrian didn’t want to let him go, didn’t want to stop squeezing. It felt so good. He didn’t know why he was so angry, so full of righteous fury. The man in his arms was so much smaller he couldn’t even fight back anymore. Adrian squeezed, realizing dimly he’d pulled the man off the ground. His feet were in the air, kicking wildly and Adrian forced his forearm tighter against the man’s throat.

“Jesus, kid, stop. Let him go. You’re killing him. Adrian, you little shit, stop it!”

He heard the words in a fog, like the buzzing, annoying whine of a mosquito. He realized he was breathing hard, had actually climaxed in his jeans. Frank was pulling on his arm now, trying to release the man from Adrian’s death grip.

Adrian finally released his arms and stepped back, and the man dropped to the ground with a thud, gasping and wheezing for breath.

“What the fuck was that? Are you insane? I said hold him, not kill him. Idiot.”

Frank took one look at Adrian’s face and reared back. He fell on his ass, eyes wild, grabbed a piece of rebar and held it out in front of him. Adrian took a step toward his boss and laughed, a sound he’d never heard out of his mouth, high-pitched and crazy. He had no idea where it came from; he found nothing funny about the situation.

Frank shouted, “Get the fuck outta here. Don’t come back. You hear me?”

Adrian stopped. Frank was scared of him. Of him!

“Frank, it’s fine. I’m sorry.”

Frank waved the rebar. “No, it’s not fine. You’re gone. You get me? You’re fucking nuts. I shoulda known it. Too quiet, watching everyone, doing everything you’re told. Fucking freak.”

Time stopped. Adrian didn’t know what happened, what came over him, just that it was blackness and rage. He snatched the piece of rebar from Frank’s hand and brought it down on his head once, twice, three times. The wet splats told him to stop, but he couldn’t. He was riding high again, the pure energy of fury driving his arms up and down.

When he came back to himself, neither of the men were moving anymore, and Adrian was panting, covered in blood and sweat and tears.

His first and only thought was for himself. He’d just killed two men. He was going to go to jail. Forever. No one would let him see the light of day again. His breath hitched and he started to cry. What had he done? What had come over him? What had just happened? He began turning in circles, frantic, trying to decide what to do, when a voice spoke to him, quiet, calm, gentle.

That won’t happen. Look where you are. You know they’re pouring the foundation for Lot 8 tomorrow. You’re okay. You can cover this up.

Without hesitating, he dragged the two bodies forty feet to the edge of the foundation on Lot 8. He rolled them over the edge, then grabbed a shovel, jumped down and dug as if his life depended on it.

It took him an hour to get them in place, dirt two feet deep over them, leaves and branches laid down around the site just as they’d been before. He shoveled off the blood-soaked dirt into the bushes, scattering it around, found a half-empty bottle of Gatorade and washed his hands, then, realizing it wasn’t going to be enough, stripped off his shirt and pants and buried them, too.

All the while, the voice spoke, telling him what to do next.

There was nothing he could do about the man’s car, but where it was parked was safe enough, off the beaten path behind the 7-Eleven. By the time anyone connected it with the build site, the cement would be dry. Frank’s behemoth truck was nowhere to be seen, so he didn’t worry about it.

He snuck back to his own piece-of-crap truck and drove home, showered then went out to the truck and wiped it down. Bleach. Scrub. He made sure there was nothing,
nothing,
that could tie him to the two men. Showered again, thankful as hell his dad was out.

There. He was safe.

Surprising himself, he slept soundly. He woke the next morning, certain the police would be standing in his bedroom, but his room was empty. He went into the kitchen, and there was just his dad, home early, looking vacantly at
The Washington Post,
a half-eaten apple cruller and a cold cup of coffee at his elbow.

Adrian choked down some eggs, went to the site, stood around with the rest of the crew waiting for Frank to show, then getting to work when he didn’t. He stayed on the roof while the cement was poured at Lot 8, keeping a hawk’s eye on the proceedings.

It went off without a hitch.

When the police finally came around asking about Frank, he shrugged along with the rest of the men. And then there was nothing. He was off the hook.

Adrian thought back to that night all the time, analyzing, wondering, trying to figure it all out.

It took a few weeks before it hit him, an insight so frightening it took his breath away, a terrible, awful, wonderful truth. The universe opened, a giant black maw, and the blackness of the sky suddenly had texture, depth, feeling. It caressed his skin and licked softly at his neck.

He’d liked the feeling of the man struggling, because he’d liked the power he felt, being bigger and stronger and holding a stranger’s life in his hands. As for what happened after, when he lost control, well, that was simply the situation. Frank had pushed him over the edge. Right?

Maybe. Maybe not. Adrian wasn’t going to lie to himself. The more he thought about the power he’d felt in those brief moments, the more excited he got. He’d liked it, more than a lot. He’d liked it so much that for the rest of the summer, all he could think of was trying it again.