Lisa Unger - Darkness My Old Friend

The stinging slap his mother landed on his face sent a shock through Michael. It was white lightning, electrifying him. Then she was running up the stairs, with Mack bounding after her. Michael heard her shrieking.

“I hate you! I hate this place! I hate this life!”

Michael stood there stunned, feeling the heat on his face, listening to them screaming at each other. What were they saying? He didn’t even know. He was in that place where all the anger seemed to build from inside his belly, boiling and rising up into his brain. She’d hit him. She’d taken all her love away from him. She was going to leave them, leave Michael .

Marla came down the stairs with her packed suitcase. He knocked the bag from her grasp and the clothes spilled out on the floor… her lacy underthings, a pair of shoes, a few skirts and blouses. He knew he had to stop her, and he grabbed her hard by the shoulders.

“Don’t leave me,” he said. He was sobbing, sounding just like a child.

“Michael,” she said. Her eyes were wild and desperate. “Let go of me. I’ll come back for you and your sister.”

But she was lying. He knew that. She’d come back for Cara, but not for him-now that she knew what he was inside, now that she knew that his rage could be directed at her. He outweighed her by fifty pounds at least, was already much taller at fourteen. She could never control him.

“Michael,” she said. Her voice was just a jagged inhale. “You’re hurting me.”

Mack stepped in. “That’s enough, Michael.”

But Michael couldn’t. He wouldn’t let go of her. His grip on her grew so tight that she cried out. Somehow, in a struggle among the three of them, she broke away. She ran out the back door and into the Hollows Woods, the place where he now wandered.

She had been fast. All those years of trailing her on his bicycle, he knew how fast she was, even though she thought of herself as slow and clumsy. He was after her. There was no thought in his head at all, no malice really. He just wanted her, needed her to stay with him.

She turned into the clearing, and he was right behind her. But Mack caught up quickly. His father caught ahold of Michael with strong arms, tried to keep him back.

“Stop it, son,” he’d said. His voice was a cough. Mack was panting, sweat pouring down his face and neck. “What do you think you’re doing? You need to calm yourself.”

Mack had a hard lock on Michael’s wrist. But then Michael punched him mercilessly in the stomach, and Mack doubled over, falling. He moaned and writhed on the ground as Michael ran into the chapel. In the total darkness, he could see nothing. He could only hear her weeping.

“Mom,” he said. “Mommy. Don’t cry.”

He thought of all those nights he’d slept beside her while Mack was working, or sleeping on the couch after they had been fighting. And Michael would lie there and listen to her crying, pretending that he was asleep. She would hold onto him, seeking warmth and comfort from him. And he cherished those moments with her, because she belonged only to him. He could see that she didn’t need Cara in the same way, that Marla didn’t draw the same kind of comfort from her that she did from him. She needed him. She couldn’t leave him. What was he? Who was he without his mother?

He might have come back to himself if she hadn’t tried to run from him again. But she burst from a hidden corner and tried to make it to the door. He caught her easily and his hands wrapped themselves around her neck. It was so small, so delicate under his powerful fingers.

From another place, another world, he watched himself. He watched her flail and struggle. He listened to her horrifying rasp for air, felt her weak pounding at his arms and kicking at his legs. He watched her eyes go wide, bulge, redden. And then he watched them go blank. Her body slackened, and all the fight, all the life, drained out into his hands. But it hadn’t happened to him. It didn’t happen at all. It was a dream, a terrible dream. It happened to someone else, another Michael-one who didn’t even exist on a normal day.

He didn’t remember anything at all after that. Even now, wandering in the rain, carrying the memory of what he had done to his mother, he remembered nothing else of that night. What had his father done? Why had Mack hidden it all from the police, from Michael himself? Why? He could never answer those questions for his father. He could never make amends to his mother. There was no more chance of his ever living in the light again.

It was then that he saw her running.

“Don’t go,” he said. “I just didn’t want you to go.”

He walked out into her path, and she stopped short, stared up at him with blank, nearly uncomprehending terror. On some level, he could see that it wasn’t his mother. It was just some girl, a stranger who couldn’t hold a candle to Marla because no one could. She issued a panicked scream that sent a jolt of fear through him. And she started to flee, nearly tripping once in her panic to get away from him. But this time, he didn’t give chase. He wouldn’t. He’d let her run, just like she had wanted so long ago.

“Heavy rainfall in the region tonight,” the radio announcer said. “We have reports of flooded streets. Some local roads are washed out completely.”

Jones hated the way newscasters always seemed to enjoy giving bad news. They had this faux-somber delivery that wasn’t in the least bit sincere. “It’s been thirty-five years since the Black River overflowed its banks. But authorities say the levels are rising. Folks, I’m sure I don’t have to say it, but I will: If you don’t have to go out tonight, stay home.”

Jones brought the SUV to a stop in front of the Carr house and sat. He remembered the hours spent waiting and watching, sometimes alone, sometimes with a partner, the endlessness of it. Though often, when Ricky was young, he’d cherished the silence and solitude of it. But sometimes being alone with his own thoughts was the last thing he wanted. It was in those quiet, empty spaces that all the things you didn’t want to think about paraded before you, demanding to be noticed.

Maggie had already called twice, first to ask him when he’d be home. She was worried about him out in the weather. Next she called to ask him to look in on her mother. Cell phones were working, but some of the landlines in the older parts of town were out. Elizabeth’s phone was always one of the first to go in a storm. And of course, like the stubborn old mule that she was, she refused to get a cell phone-because that would make things easier on Maggie and Jones.

“No problem,” he told Maggie. “I got it covered.”

“And don’t fight with her.”

“I won’t.” And he wouldn’t-unless Elizabeth started with him. Jones had always had a somewhat contentious relationship with his mother-in-law. But since the events of last year, it had gotten much worse. They could barely make it through a meal without arguing. It was another thing Maggie was angry with him about, even though he didn’t think it was entirely his fault.

“Even if she starts with you, Jones,” she said. “And see if she’ll come back to the house with you.”

“She won’t.”

“Just ask,” she said. “And where are you now?”

During their last conversation, he’d told her about Robin O’Conner and the money he’d given her. You old softie. Was she cute? He’d told her about his trip to the doctor, what the other man had said about Jones finding his father. It’s true we don’t talk about your father much. Maybe he’s right-it bears looking into . Now he told her that he was sitting in front of the Carr house. It was a dark, empty space in a street of warmly lit homes. In other houses he saw open garage doors, television screens flickering. Somewhere he heard the faintest sound of a ringing phone.