Alex Barclay - Darkhouse

‘Never is,’ said Joe.

Joe went to a bench by the harbour and read the article about the tragic disappearance of schoolgirl Katie Lawson and the concern of anonymous neighbours.

Anna stood in the kitchen at the chopping board, with a pile of sliced onions in front of her. She had stopped to watch the sun set.

Joe walked in, frowning, pressing his jaws with his thumb and middle finger. Then he used both hands to massage the area above his eyebrows.

Anna turned around. ‘Not again.’

He nodded and pulled open the medicine drawer.

‘That can’t be right,’ said Anna, pointing to the decongestants. ‘No-one takes those for that long.’

He shrugged, then knocked back the decongestants with two prescription painkillers and a glass of water. He tapped his watch and pointed towards the sitting room. He lay down on the sofa and waited for the effects to hit. The pain had intensified in the last year. He had seen doctors in New York that between them had diagnosed sinusitis, earache and the standard stress they threw out when they read his job description. One young doctor suggested yoga. Joe would have laughed out loud if he thought his jaw wouldn’t shatter. He was happy to walk away with a script for painkillers. Anna was putting him under pressure to see a specialist in Dublin, but he hadn’t got around to it and he used the breaks from the pain to slip into denial.

After half an hour, he walked back into the kitchen. ‘I forgot to say to you — what the hell is wrong with that guy, Miller?’

‘John Miller?’ said Anna, throwing the onions into a hot pan.

‘Yeah, the alco.’ He slid his lower jaw back and forth.

‘Why do you ask?’ she said, going back to the window.

‘He was saying some weird shit to me in Danaher’s the other night.’

‘Like what?’ she said, slicing into a red pepper.

‘He was giving me a hard time, saying stuff about you. Have you met him or something?’ Anna looked at him.

‘He’s John,’ she said patiently. ‘I told you. The John I went out with when I was here the first time?’

‘Oh,’ said Joe. ‘What happened there?’

‘I left for New York, he ended up in Australia,’ said Anna. ‘You were grinding your teeth during the night, by the way. I tried to wake you up, but you just turned over and kept going.’

‘How long were you and this Miller guy together?’

‘Eight months.’

‘Oh. Must have been pretty intense.’

Anna said nothing. She kept chopping.

‘So was it you who drove him to drink? My baby break his heart?’ asked Joe, standing behind her, wrapping his arms around her, kissing the back of her neck.

Anna smiled.

‘I don’t think so, somehow,’ she said.

‘Could have,’ said Joe, teasing.

‘Can you bring up a Merlot?’ she said.

‘Sure,’ he said, walking out the door and down to the cellar.

Anna put down the knife, closed her eyes and breathed out.

Stinger’s Creek, North Central Texas, 1981

Geoff Riggs lay on his back on the sticky carpet, his right arm bent high above his head. A grey T-shirt rode up his chest, exposing his pale, hairy stomach. Donnie rushed in as he had done so many times before, shaking his satchel from his shoulder, sliding it down his arm to the floor. He fell on his knees beside his father and put his ear to his heart. Then he pushed up each of his eyelids with his thumbs. He never knew what he was looking for when he did this, never knew what would be a dangerous thing to see. He rolled his father onto his side, then stood up and scanned the room. The TV was on mute. He took the remote control and turned the volume up loud. Then he threw it on the sofa, quickly grabbed his satchel and went back out into the porch. Geoff came to, his right arm dead, his neck rigid. He twisted it slowly, then brought his arm down to his side.

‘Hey,’ said Donnie, sticking his head in the door.

‘Didn’t hear you come in,’ Geoff snarled, rolling onto his back.

‘That’s ’cos you got the TV up too loud,’ said Donnie, switching it off. ‘Can I fix you somethin’?’

‘Sandwich,’ said Geoff. ‘Beef.’

Duke sat by the treehouse door, watching a spider crawl up the frame. He held out his hand and let it move across his palm, guiding it down onto the floor where it skittered across into a dark corner.

‘You there?’ called Donnie from below.

‘Come up,’ said Duke. ‘Where were you?’

‘At the store. Where were you?’

‘Uncle Bill’s. A friend of his was taking pictures of the hawks. What’s in the shoe box?’

Donnie knelt in front of him. His eyes darted left and right.

‘Look what I found in the bottom of Daddy’s closet,’ he whispered, taking off the lid. The box was filled with small packages.

‘Blackpowder,’ he said.

Duke’s eyes went wide.

‘Don’t worry!’ said Donnie. ‘I know what I’m doin’.’

‘What are you doin’?’

‘Lightin’ it on fire. What do you think?’

‘Here? Why don’t we blow somethin’ up proper?’

‘We will, later. I just wanna see this first.’

He squatted down and motioned for Duke to stay back. He put a capful of the powder on the floor and struck a match. He turned his head away and closed his eyes, reaching out to put the flame to the powder. It flashed instantly. He roared. His hands, arms and one side of his face and neck were black. His eyes were huge. Part of his T-shirt gaped across his chest. Duke started to laugh. Donnie laughed with him, but it hurt. Neither of them noticed the pile of comic books on fire behind them until it was too late.

‘Holy shit!’ said Donnie. ‘My treehouse!’ They looked around the small room for something to stamp out the fire, but they had nothing. The flames crackled and spread quickly across the dry timber.

‘Let’s get outta here,’ said Duke, ‘before the ladder goes up.’ They scrambled through the door and skipped most of the rungs, jumping free from the heat. They stepped back to watch the treehouse burn. The flames shone in their eyes. They stood transfixed until it finally collapsed, leaving burning embers and tiny wisps floating around their heads.

‘Well, shit,’ said Donnie. ‘I can’t go home to Daddy like this. And he spent ages buildin’ that. He’s gonna kill me.’

‘No he won’t. It was an accident,’ said Duke. Donnie looked at him.

‘We’ll go to my house,’ said Duke. ‘At least you can wash up some.’

When they got there, Wanda was asleep on the couch. The bathroom was a mess. Underwear and filthy towels covered the floor. Donnie filled up the sink and grabbed a bar of soap and a face cloth. As he scrubbed away the black residue, he looked into the mirror. Tears sprang up in his eyes.

‘Oh shit, Duke. Oh, shit, oh shit.’

Duke jumped up from the edge of the bath. ‘What? What?’

He looked at Donnie and through the black he could see angry red skin with white blisters, some of them torn open by the cloth. They both looked down at Donnie’s arms. He started to scrub at them too, ripping at more blisters.

‘Oh, shit,’ said Duke. ‘I’m gettin’ Mama.’

‘Wait,’ said Donnie. ‘We need to get our story straight.’

Wanda tried to have a conversation with Geoff Riggs. Her hair was tousled behind, backcombed over a dark greasy patch. She wore a vest top with no bra on underneath. Her hips swayed in her cut-off jeans.

‘Can you believe it?’ she was saying.

‘No, I can not,’ slurred Geoff. ‘Unbelievable.’

His hands were in his pockets and he rocked back and forth on his heels over the edge of the bottom step.

‘Unbelievable.’

‘Doctor says they’re first and second degree,’ said Wanda. ‘Might scar his face and arms in places...’ Donnie looked horrified.