Elizabeth Hand - Black Light

About him the night was still. From the woods a whippoorwill hooted. Inside the Orphic Lodge a clock softly chimed. Very slowly, as though settling into sleep, Balthazar crouched beside the broken herm.

Wind rustled the trees and sent the first autumn leaves flying. A cricket leaped onto the fallen stone. At the edge of the lawn something moved in the high grass; something that made a guttural sound. There was a smell of the sea, and roasting flesh. Balthazar extended his hand to where dark liquid pooled in the hollow of an ivy leaf that had blown against the pillar. Tentatively he dipped his finger into it, then brought it to his tongue.

And tasted wine, a fire that seared his mouth and made his eyes water even as he thirsted for more: wine and earth and the coppery taint of blood.

HILLARY’S PARENTS WERE STILL out of town, taping an episode of The Love Boat, so after we left Jamie Casson’s house he came over for dinner. I was relieved. I felt exhausted and a little sick from drinking, and was glad to let Hillary chatter with my mother about industry gossip—whose agent was screwing whom, which characters were going to be killed off next season when the cast of Perilous Lives boarded an airplane that would crash into the Bermuda Triangle.

My father seemed to have caught my mood. He sat brooding at the head of the table, picking at his spaghetti carbonara. He watched me so closely that my stoned paranoia went into overdrive. I decided to feign illness and flee to my room.

“Umm, you know, I sort of don’t feel so hot—” I cleared my throat, fidgeting in my seat, when Hillary turned to my father.

“So, Unk—did you hear Kern’s back in town?”

My father hesitated. “Yes. I’d heard,” he finally said.

“Is he? That’s nice.” My mother tore off a tiny piece of Italian bread and nibbled it, gazing at tomorrow’s script beside her plate. “Who’s he married to now?”

“I didn’t ask—”

“You should have. I was so embarrassed that time with Marlena Harlin, you really should think to—”

“He’s mounting an opera,” my father went on. “I think he said Die Fledermaus —”

Hillary shook his head. “ Ariadne auf Naxos. ”

Unk glowered, the same look he gave recalcitrant customers—usually zombies—at the Bar Sinister. “Would somebody let me finish? Whatever the hell it is, he’s gotten backers for it and he wants to rehearse it here—”

“Where, dear?” My mother poured herself more Chianti. “I mean, here in Kamensic, but where?”

My father sighed, defeated, and reached for his coffee. “The Miniver Amphitheater.”

“Oh, I have been longing for someone to restore that place! At the last town meeting I—”

“So there’s a party there tomorrow, or something?” Hillary asked, all innocence. My mother stiffened. After a moment she shot my father a look.

“Oh, surely not. I mean, he hasn’t been back in years, Bolerium must be an absolute shambles—”

“It’s time,” said my father. “You knew he was coming…”

My mother’s lips tightened. She shook her head emphatically and stared back down at her script. My father turned to Hillary, his voice as archly guileless as Hillary’s had been a minute before. “So. Where’d you hear about the party?”

“Uh—this new guy at school. Jamie Casson. His father told us. I gave him a lift home—”

My father’s voice rose sharply. “Ralph Casson?”

“No—his son, Jamie. He’s in my—”

“Ralph Casson? He’s here? You met him?”

Hillary fell silent and glanced at me for help. Thanks a lot, I thought; then said, “Yeah. They’re staying in the caretaker’s cottage. Ralph Casson’s designing the sets for the opera.”

“No, he’s not.” My father’s voice was fierce, almost angry; but for some reason that only made me want to argue with him.

“Yes he is. He told us he was doing the sets.”

“He may be building them. He’s not designing them. He’s a goddam handyman—”

“He’s a master carpenter,” my mother broke in gently. “And he’s very good—he studied ancient architecture at university, before going into the theater.” She turned to Hillary and explained, “This is just another example of masculine rivalry that goes back long before you children were even born…”

“Oooh la la,” said Hillary.

“ Not that kind. And it doesn’t even involve us, really—” She gave my father a warning glare. “It’s between Axel and Ralph and—some friends. And it goes back a very long time. Unk sided with Axel—”

“And Ralph went independent,” finished Hillary. He looked very pleased with himself, but when I watched my parents I saw something complicated, almost disturbing, pass between them. My stomach lurched: all I could think of was that snowy morning when Hillary had whispered that Ali’s parents were getting divorced.

“Right,” my father said after a moment. “Ralph remained—independent.”

I knew by his tone that he was talking over our heads. Hillary didn’t even notice. He speared some spaghetti, wolfed it down and asked, “So this party’s tomorrow? What time?”

My mother’s delicate eyebrows rose. “Are the children invited?”

“Everyone’s invited.” My father sighed. For an instant I thought he was going to leave the table. He pushed his chair back and stared out the darkened window behind us. In the distance the ragged bulk of Muscanth Mountain blotted out the stars; but at its very tip I could see a faint glimmer of gold, as though bonfires burned there. My father stared at it for a long time. At last he said, “It’s not an invitation you can turn down.”

“Cool.” Hillary grinned. “Too bad my folks’re out of town.”

My mother shook her head, striking her best Livia Defending Her Young pose. “Darling, are you sure ? After that trouble in—”

“Absolutely.” My father turned with such force that everything on the table bounced. “Axel hasn’t seen Lit for years. He’s her goddam godfather, Audrey—”

My mother set her mouth and glanced down at another page of script. “Do you have something nice to wear, Lit?” she asked calmly. “We’ll have to go to Lord and Taylor if you don’t.”

“I can always borrow something from Ali.”

“Fine.” She nodded without looking at me, and I almost pointed out that any dress that fit Ali would only come up to my crotch. But my mother had deliberately lost herself once more in Livia’s world, slitting her eyes as the wickedest woman in daytime television plotted her family’s downfall.

When we finished eating I walked Hillary next door, the two of us scuffling through piles of leaves and hunching our shoulders against the chill. “What the hell you think was going on at dinner?” he asked.

“I don’t know. I—Do you think they’re getting divorced?”

Hillary laughed. “You nuts? Your mom and Unk are, like, the only people in this whole town who would never get divorced! No way .” He grabbed me and rapped my head with his knuckles. “You idiot. Is that what you’re worrying about?”

“I guess. I don’t know. They were just acting so weird.”

“What, somebody in Kamensic is acting weird? Wow, alert the media.” He shook his head, clambering atop the tumbledown stone wall that was the dividing line between our property and his. “ Everyone here is always acting weird. No, this is something about Ralph Casson. He’s bizarre, man. Jamie hates him. I mean, he really hates him.”