Maybe it was the movement, visible out of the corner of his eye, or the soft sound of footsteps on the forest floor, but the figure stopped what he was doing. Froze. So did Aaron.
Time crashed to a halt. To Aaron the moment smelled like spring rain and flowers and earth and blood, and then the person in the meadow turned his head slowly and rose in one smooth, serpentine motion. Aaron recognized him right away.
“Hello, Aaron.” Sevren was holding a pocketknife smeared with dark blood. More blood dripped from his hands and forearms down onto the leafy forest floor.
Aaron let his eyes follow the descent of the drops of blood. And that’s when he saw what his roommate had done to the cat. Somehow the poor creature was still alive. It flopped what was left of its head back and forth feebly, finally facing Aaron. Tried to look at him. Had no eyes left to do it.
“What are you doing, Sevren?”
“A little experiment.” Sevren cocked his head slightly and shook out his fingers, splattering warm blood onto the young leaves. “You won’t tell, will you?”
For a moment, just a moment, Aaron thought of running. Somewhere deep beneath the gurgles of the dying cat he could hear the sounds of the jungle and the screams and pleading prayers of the dying children. And the babies crying in the dark.
Somewhere beneath the sounds.
The dream called to him. He thought of running from Sevren, from this meadow, from everything, escaping like he had when he was ten, running and running and running forever, but this time he stood still. Something kept him there, drew his eyes toward the gruesome scene.
Sevren’s voice turned dark. “If you tell, Aaron, I might have to explain what happened to Jessica. What really happened.”
The words slammed into him like a fist in his stomach, taking all the air out of his reply.
“What?” Aaron searched Sevren’s eyes. He couldn’t possibly know.
“Jes-si-ca.” Sevren said the word slowly, deliberately, savoring every letter. “What really happened to her.” Sevren grinned and drew the pocketknife across his wrist, not to cut the skin, only to demonstrate that he knew what Aaron Jeffrey Kincaid was certain no one could possibly know.
Sevren continued. “I saw your scar, there on your wrist, last week when you were changing clothes, and I remembered what happened to Jessica Rembrandt last month. It wasn’t too hard to piece together. At first I thought maybe you’d planned to die with her, and then at the last minute you chickened out and couldn’t go through with it. But.. that’s not what happened, is it?” He paused, but not for long. It wasn’t really a question. “You talked her into it, didn’t you?” During the last few words, his voice, his posture, his tone had shifted from cool judgment to warm admiration. “You convinced her to do it.”
When Aaron didn’t reply, Sevren nodded. Shook some blood off his fingertips. “Yes. I thought so.”
Aaron couldn’t think of anything to say. He didn’t know if it was rage or fear or disgust that swarmed over his soul. “I loved her,” he said at last.
Sevren nodded. “Yes,” he said simply. “I know.” A pause. Then, he continued. “So I won’t tell if you won’t tell. We’ll have two little secrets between us: the girl and the cat.” He placed a bloody finger to his lips to signify their pact of silence. “Shh.”
Aaron scratched absently at the fresh scar on his wrist. He nodded. “I won’t tell.”
Sevren looked down at the writhing cat whose paws he’d tied down to four stakes. Then, he looked back at Aaron. “Cross your heart and hope to die?”
Aaron nodded.
Sevren pulled a yellow ribbon out of his pocket and turned back to the cat. Then he glanced back at Aaron. “You can stay if you want. It’s just now getting to the good part.”
And Aaron had stayed. Until it was over. And then a little longer even.
Long enough to listen to Sevren tell him about his mother.
45
The two boys were sitting together by the campfire pit. They’d built a small blaze and were smoking, swapping stories. Aaron told Sevren about his parents, about the jungle and the babies and his destiny.
And then, as Sevren slid a long stick into the fire, he told Aaron about what he saw when he finally got out of the closet.
July 15, 1981
Memphis, Tennessee
7:17 p.m.
The nine-year-old boy watched his mother lean down toward him and felt her smear a wet kiss on his forehead. She smelled sweet with perfume. “Now you be quiet and be a good boy and don’t be interruptin’ your mama’s work. You understand?”
The young boy had nodded.
“You know what’ll happen if you interrupt your mama?”
He nodded again.
The air conditioner coughed and sputtered in the windowsill of the double-wide trailer they called home.
She grinned, her mouth big and gaping. She was missing five teeth. “I knew you’d listen to your mama. I knew you’d be a good boy.”
Once again Sevren nodded. He didn’t want to be a bad boy. He didn’t like what happened to him when he was a bad boy. He didn’t like having to stay in the closet overnight. He wanted to please her, of course he did, just like any good boy would want to do.
“I’ll get you out as soon as I can,” she said. And then the change came over her, the strange change that turned her into someone he didn’t recognize. Sometimes it meant she hadn’t been taking her pills. Sometimes it meant she’d taken too many. Her face turned terrible and red, her voice became angry and hard. “You don’t make a sound, boy! Don’t you dare let me hear you. Your mama has to work, you understand?”
Another nod. His eyes wide, his heart hammering.
And so, Sevren went willingly into the bedroom closet and sat on the floor. It wouldn’t be long if he did as he was told. Then his mama shut the closet door and locked it. Now he couldn’t get out. Now she was in control.
He stared at the narrow band of light slicing through the space between the bottom of the door and the floor. It would go black soon, when his mother shut off the bedroom light.
Sevren heard the outside door open and the gruff voice of a man and the girlish giggles of his mama pretending to be interested in him. It was her job. The boy knew that. Then, he heard the bedroom door open and close. A few minutes later the light in the bathroom went out, and his mother began doing her job.
And then came the noises that he didn’t really understand. Somehow frightening and beautiful and soft and comforting all at the same time. But he didn’t like hearing them, so he sat in the closet doing what he always did: playing games in his mind. At first, when he was younger, it was tic-tac-toe. He would play both sides, first the X side and then the O side, rotating the board in his mind so he could see the game from the perspective of his opponent, which was really just him. But eventually, he figured out that in tic-tac-toe if you know what you’re doing, you’ll never lose. And since he was playing both sides, he could also never win. That got old pretty quickly.
Then he learned checkers. At first it was much more difficult to keep all the pieces straight in his mind, to remember where he’d moved and which checkers he’d taken. It took him a long time to be able to train his mind to remember the progress of all the red and dark circles as they moved across the board, but in time, he was able to do that too. He had plenty of time in the closet to practice when he didn’t do his homework or when he didn’t please his mama.
But in time he discovered that the strategies for winning checkers were limited too. So eventually he’d landed on chess. In chess the possibilities were almost limitless. And it didn’t matter so much who had the opening move. Yes, white had a slight advantage because it went first, but either side could win. Either could lose. He could actually beat himself.
But on this night, the night with the Angry Man, something was different. Normally Sevren was pretty good at
