Josh Malerman - Bird Box

“He believed that the people’s reaction to them was psychosomatic. In other words, all this insanity fuss isn’t caused by the creatures at all, but rather by the dramatic people who see them.”

Insanity fuss , Malorie thinks. Do these two dismissive words belong to Gary’s former housemate?

Or are they Gary’s?

“I’d like to tell you guys about my experience at my former place,” Gary continues. “But I warn you, it’s a dark one.”

Malorie wants to hear this. They all do. Gary runs his fingers through his hair. Then he begins.

“There was no ad that we answered and we weren’t as young as you all. We had no communal sensibility, no group effort. My brother Duncan has a friend who took the Russia Report very seriously. He was one of the early believers. It went well with his conspiracy theories and paranoia that the government or somebody is out to get us all. As goes myself, I still have moments where I can’t believe it’s happening. And who can blame me? I’m over forty years old. So used to the life I was living, I never fathomed one like this. I resisted it. But Kirk, my brother’s friend, was certain of it from the very start. And nothing, it seemed, would sway him. One afternoon Duncan called and told me Kirk suggested we gather at his place for a few days, or until we learned more about this ‘thing.’

“‘What thing?’ I asked.

“‘Gary, it’s all over the television.’

“‘What thing, Duncan? The thing that happened in Russia? You can’t be serious.’

“‘C’mon,’ Duncan said. ‘We’ll throw back some beers, eat some pizza, and humor him. You’ve got nothing to lose.’

“I told him no thank you. Hanging out with crazy Kirk as he analyzed sensational stories didn’t sound like a good time to me. But I showed up soon enough.

“I’d heard the reports just like everybody in the country did. They started to worry me. There were just so many of them. Still, I foolishly attempted to maintain my disbelief. These kinds of things just don’t happen. But then came a report that forced me to take action. It was the one about the sisters in Alaska. You might be wondering why it took me so long to be convinced. Alaska was relatively late, but Alaska was also an American report and I’m just provincial enough not to worry until it happens close to home. Even the reporter was clearly scared of what he was saying. Yes, even the man delivering the news did so trembling.

“You know the story. A woman saw her two elderly neighbors, sisters, leaving the house. She assumed they had gone for their daily walk. Three hours later, she heard on the radio that the sisters were in front of the hospital, crouched on the stone steps, trying to bite people as they passed. The woman drove to the hospital, fancying herself closer to the sisters than anyone else and likely able to help. But that wasn’t the case. And the photos on CNN showed the woman with her face removed, literally on the sidewalk beside her bloody skull. Beyond her were the two old ladies, dead, shot by the police. That image chilled me. Such normal people. Such everyday environs.

“For Kirk, the Alaskan incident validated all paranoid fantasies. Despite my own growing fear, I wasn’t ready to exchange the life I’d known for this new, militia-like existence he was espousing. I was prepared to drape the windows, lock the doors, and hide, but Kirk was already coming up with plans to combat what he believed was an ‘invasion’—whether that be alien or otherwise was never clear. He talked about weapons, gear, and guns like a veteran soldier. Of course he wasn’t one; he’d never enlisted in anything in his life.”

Gary pauses. He seems to ponder.

“Soon the house was crowded with quasi-militant males. Kirk was enjoying his newfound position of general, and I watched a lot of the buffoonery from the sidelines. I made a habit of letting Duncan know he ought to keep his distance. A man like Kirk was liable to send his friends into harm’s way. The men grew increasingly contentious, juiced with the fantasy of overthrowing the villains of Kirk’s ‘invasion.’ Days passed, and yet nothing came of their boisterous claims that they would protect the city, eliminate the cause of this global madness, and secure their place in history as the band who fixed the ‘big problem.’ Yet, there was one man in the house who took action for what he believed. His name was Frank, and Frank believed that the creatures Kirk prepared for were no threat at all. Still, he came to the house, fearful, he admitted, of the inevitable lawlessness that could sweep the country.

“As Kirk planned useless daily drills, Frank became something of a shut-in, hardly leaving the bedroom on the second floor. And in there, he wrote. Day and night Frank wrote with pencil, pen, marker, and makeup. One day, walking the upstairs hall, I heard something behind his closed door. It was a furious sound, laborious, angry, unflagging in its pace. I eased the door open a crack and saw him hunched over a desk, whispering about the ‘cultish, overreactive’ society he loathed as he scribbled. I had no way of knowing what he was writing. But I wanted to find out.

“I talked to Duncan about it. My brother’s face was painted with ridiculous camouflage. By then he was truly infected with Kirk’s ravings. He didn’t believe Frank was a threat. Frank who bugled phrases like mass hysteria and psychosomatic idolatry as Kirk and the others pantomimed target practice, weaponless, in the basement. Everyone dismissed Frank as a useless pacifist.”

Gary runs his hands through his hair again.

“I set out to find out what Frank was up to in his room. I began looking for an opportunity to read his secret writings.

“What do you think would happen to a man who is already mad if he were to see the creatures outside? Do you think he’d be impervious to it, his mind already fractured? Or do you suppose his madness would reach another, higher echelon of insane? Perhaps the mentally ill will inherit this new world, unable to be broken any more than they already are. I don’t know any better than you do.”

Gary sips from a glass of water.

“My moment presented itself in this way. Kirk and the others were occupied in the basement. Frank was in the bath. I made my decision to snoop quickly. I entered his room and found his writings in the desk drawer. This was no little feat, as, by then, I was frightened of the man. The others may have dismissed him, found him laughable, but I suspected more brutish possibilities therein. I began reading. Soon I was overwhelmed with his words. No matter how long ago Frank had begun writing, it seemed impossible that he had already written this much. Dozens of notebooks, all in various colors, each more angry than the last. Tiny cursive couplets were followed by giant highlighted phrases, all declaring that the creatures were not to be feared. He referred to the rest of us as ‘those with small minds’ who ‘needed to be exterminated.’ He was dangerous, indeed. Suddenly, hearing him rise from the bath, I hurried out of his room. Maybe Duncan wasn’t so wrong to fall in with Kirk. Those notebooks showed me there were much worse reactions to the new world than his.”

Gary breathes deep. He wipes his lips with the back of his hand.

“When we woke up the next day, the drapes had been pulled down.”

Cheryl gasps.

“The doors were unlocked.”

Don starts to say something.

“And Frank was gone. He’d taken the notebook with him.”

“Oh fuck,” Felix says.

Gary nods.

“Was anybody hurt?” Tom asks.

Gary’s eyes grow watery, but he maintains himself.

“No,” he says. “Nobody. Which I’m sure Frank would have included in his notes.”