Bad Glass

And a sly, knowing smile slid across Charlie’s face.

God.

Sitting here, now, writing this shit down, I marvel at the depths of my stupidity.

Sneaking into the city, I wasn’t being noble. I wasn’t chasing down an elusive artistic ideal, shunning corporate anonymity for art and passion.

I was just being stupid.

That’s it. End of explanation.

For all of my romantic notions—bullshit self-betterment, reaching for my potential, making a name for myself—what I did, what I pursued—leaving my life and sprinting blindly into the dark—was nothing but death and confusion and insanity.

I was running in the wrong direction.

I was fleeing the wrong things.

We had makeshift jambalaya for dinner: canned sausages and rice cooked in crushed tomatoes and seasoning. Served with crackers on the side; Sabine had been adamant about that. We gathered around a sturdy dining-room table and smoked pot between bites. It was a good meal. Maybe it was just the pot, or a reaction to what I’d seen earlier in the day, but I felt genuinely comfortable here, surrounded by these people.

While we ate, Floyd and Sabine took turns telling me stories, dishing dirt about everyone in the room: how they’d found Charlie in the southern district, Amanda in the park, Floyd skating lazily through an abandoned shopping mall. And Devon, half naked, yelling at the top of his lungs. I felt a bit self-conscious being the center of attention, but they seemed happy spinning these tales, transforming their individual ordeals into humorous quips. Even Devon got into the act, surfacing from his stupor long enough to curse out everyone in the room.

Halfway through dinner, I glanced up and found Sabine taking pictures. She was holding the camera above her head, aiming it down the length of the table. Just random, blind shots, not even glancing through the viewfinder or checking the images in the LCD screen. I told myself that I’d have to clean off the memory card once I got it back.

There was a lot of laughter. The pouring rain, the quarantine, the hotel—these things seemed worlds away. It was just the eight of us, here and now, floating through this warm candlelit haze.

After dinner, we returned to the living room and once again built up the fire. It was quiet now. The food and pot had taken their toll, and it wasn’t long before people started to retreat upstairs, toward beds and blankets. Amanda and Mac left together; I gathered that they were a couple. Then Devon stumbled away, followed by Charlie, then Floyd. And then, reluctantly, Sabine.

Leaving Taylor and me all alone.

We sat in silence for a couple of minutes, me on the sofa while she warmed her hands at the fire. I listened to the crackling coals. In this perfect calm, the long day finally caught up with me, and I let my head loll back against the sofa cushions.

“Why are you here, Taylor?” I asked. I rolled my head back and forth, basking in the drugged, comfortable motion. “I told you my story, but what about you? Why do you stay when everything’s so …?” And I thought for a moment about the body in the ceiling.

She let out a loud sigh, and I looked up to find her watching me carefully. “Family, I guess.” She paused for a moment, then nodded up toward the ceiling and the people gathered in their rooms upstairs. “I can’t abandon them. Not now. I … was dealing with some shit when the quarantine hit, and I couldn’t leave. By the time things settled down, I had Sabine and Mac here with me. Then Amanda. Then Floyd and Charlie and Devon …

“I think they need me. And I’m not going anywhere, not if that means leaving them behind.”

I grunted, and she flashed me a smile.

Family.

Her heart must be huge, I thought, to have room for so many. She turned back toward the fire and added more wood to the hearth.

I drowsed off for a moment, and when I opened my eyes, I found her standing over me. She was holding out a quilt. It was an old quilt—squares of faded color, its hem ripped into ribbons on every side. “You should sleep here tonight, in front of the fire. Tomorrow we can make you up a room … if that’s what you’d like.” Her voice rose, twisting the words into a gentle question.

“Yeah,” I managed, still half asleep. “That would be good.”

She nodded, handed me the quilt, and turned to go.

“And … Taylor?” I said. “Thank you. For everything. Without you … if you hadn’t—”

“Don’t sweat it,” she said, keeping her back to me. “It’s what I do. In that, at least, Devon’s got me pegged.” Her words were soft and distant. It was as if she’d already left the room.

Later, as I drifted off to sleep, I wondered if she was seeing anyone.

And I wondered if I was her type.

I jolted awake, chased by nightmare.

Just brief images. My hand reaching out, touching the trunk of a tree. Watching as my flesh sank in, all the way up to my forearm.

I didn’t know what time it was. The room was dark, and the fire had burned down to embers; it was nothing but a dim bed of orange crackling to itself in the hearth.

Still late, I thought, or very, very early.

I pushed the quilt aside and stood up. My entire body was trembling. I paced from one end of the room to the other, trying to shake the remnants of dream from my limbs.

I was still high. It felt like my head was filled with cotton and loosely wound balls of yarn. My mouth tasted like bread and ashes.

The house felt different somehow, and for a long moment I couldn’t place the change. Then I noticed the silence. The pounding rain had stopped.

I moved to the window and found the street out front bathed in moonlight. The wet asphalt reflected the crescent in the sky, illuminating the upscale houses in shades of gray. All still. All deathly silent.

Then an animal appeared from the east, trotting down the middle of the road. It was a large dog or a wolf— some type of canine. At least it seemed very doglike. But not quite. The way it moved was wrong. There was something wrong with its legs. An extra joint, maybe? It seemed like each time it took a step, its legs went through an extra motion—paws violently clicking down, toward the road, at the height of each arc. Almost curling into fists. The animal looked powerful, strong. The way it moved … it was attacking the ground with each whirl of limbs.

It stopped in front of the house and turned its head toward me, as if sensing my watching eyes. It presented a wolfish silhouette, outlined against the gleaming asphalt.

Its eyes caught the light, shining a faint, glimmering blue. And even from this distance, I could see its muscles quivering, a barely restrained tornado of motion, trapped in animal form, straining to break free.

And then there were more, following in the animal’s wake, moving with those odd, violent steps. A whole pack of canines—fifteen, twenty, twenty-five—flowing down the street, parting around that initial animal as if it were a boulder in the bed of a stream, its head still turned my way, watching.

They moved in complete silence, a graceful play of shadows, gliding through the night.

The animal watched me until the last of its pack had disappeared down the street. Then it turned and followed, those odd, explosive legs carrying it out of view.

“You saw them, didn’t you?”

It was a breathy whisper coming from the room at my back.

I turned and found Amanda standing in the doorway, a dimly lit ghost, lost in shadow. Her face was a pale crescent, only one eye visible in the moonlight. That eye was wide, hopeful.

I nodded—yes, yes they were there—and she returned the gesture, providing me with the same assurance. Then she faded back into the darkness.

I didn’t hear her footsteps carry her back through the house. I didn’t hear the stairs creak as she climbed up to the second floor.