Joe Hill - Heart-Shaped Box

The room darkened, then brightened. The sweat on his body cooled rapidly. He was on his back. He didn’t remember lying down. He distantly felt a tugging on his right hand. When he realized that this tugging was Arlene doing something to the stump of his finger—clamping it, or putting hooks through it, or stitching it—he said, “Gonna puke.” He fought the urge to gag until she could place a rubber trough next to his cheek, then turned his head and vomited into it.

When Arlene was finished, she laid his right hand on his chest. Wrapped in layer upon layer of muffling bandage, it was three times the size it had been, a small pillow. He was groggy. His temples thudded. She turned the harsh, bright light into his eyes again and leaned over for a look at the slash in his cheek. She found a wide, flesh-colored bandage and carefully applied it to his face.

She said, “You been leakin’ pretty good. Do you know what type of motor oil you run on? I’ll make sure the amble-lance brings the right stuff.”

“Check on Marybeth. Please.”

“I was going to.”

She clicked off the light before she went. It was a relief to be joined to darkness once more.

He closed his eyes, and when they sprang open again, he did not know whether one minute had passed or sixty. His father’s house was a place of restful silence and stillness, no sound but for the sudden whoosh of the wind, lumber creaking, a burst of rain on the windows. He wondered if Arlene had gone for the amble-lance. He wondered if Marybeth was sleeping. He wondered if Craddock was in the house, sitting outside the door. Jude turned his head and found his father staring at him.

His father’s mouth hung agape, the few teeth that were left stained brown from nicotine exposure, the gums diseased. Martin stared, pale gray eyes confused. Four feet of bare floor separated the two men.

“You aren’t here,” Martin Cowzynski said, his voice a wheeze.

“Thought you couldn’t talk,” Jude said.

His father blinked slowly. Gave no sign he’d heard. “You’ll be gone when I wake up.” His tone was almost wishful. He began to cough weakly. Spit flew, and his chest seemed to go hollow, sinking inward, as if with each painful hack he were coughing up his insides, beginning to deflate.

“You got that wrong, old man,” Jude told him. “You’re my bad dream, not the other way around.”

Martin continued staring at him with that look of stupid wonder for a few moments longer, then turned his gaze to the ceiling once more. Jude watched him warily, the old man in his army cot, breath screaming from his throat, dried streaks of shaving cream on his face.

His father’s eyes gradually sank shut. In a while Jude’s eyes did the same.

43

He wasn’t sure what woke him,but later on Jude looked up, coming out of sleep in an instant, and found Arlene at the foot of the bed. He didn’t know how long she’d been standing there. She was wearing a bright red rain slicker with the hood pulled up. Droplets of rain glittered on the plastic. Her old, bony face was set in a blank, almost robotic expression that Jude did not at first recognize and which he needed several moments to interpret as fear. He wondered if she’d gone and come back or not yet left.

“We lost the power,” she said.

“Did we?”

“I went outside, and when I came back in, we lost the power.”

“Uh-huh.”

“There’s a truck in the driveway. Just settin’ there. Sort of no particular color. I can’t see who is settin’ in it. I started to walk out to it, to see if it was someone who could maybe drive somewhere and call emergency for us—but then I got scared. I got scared of who was in it, and I came back.”

“You want to stay away from him.”

She went on as if Jude had said nothing. “When I got back inside, we didn’t have power, and it’s still just some crazy talk radio on the telephone. Bunch of religious stuff about ridin’ the glory road. The TV was turned on in the front room. It was just runnin’. I know it couldn’t be, because there isn’t any power, but it was turned on anyway. There was a story on it. On the news. It was about you. It was about all of us. About how we was all dead. It showed a picture of the farmhouse and every-thin’. They were coverin’ my body with a sheet. They didn’t identify me, but I saw my hand stickin’ out and my bracelet. And policemen standin’ ever’where. And that yellow tape blockin’ the driveway. And Dennis Woltering said how you killed us all.”

“It’s a lie. None of that is really going to happen.”

“Finally I couldn’t stand it. I shut it off. The TV came right back on, but I shut it off again and jerked the plug out of the wall, and that fixed it.” She paused, then added, “I have to go, Justin. I’ll call for the amble-lance from the neighbors. I have to go…. Only I’m scared to try anddrive around that truck. Who drives the pale truck?”

“No one you want to meet. Take my Mustang. The keys are in it.”

“No thank you. I seen what was in the back.”

“Oh.”

“I got my car.”

“Just don’t mess with that truck. Drive right over the lawn and through the fence if you have to. Do what you need to do to stay away from it. Did you look in on Marybeth?”

Arlene nodded.

“How is she?”

“Sleepin’. Poor child.”

“You said it.”

“Good-bye, Justin.”

“Take care.”

“I’m bringin’ my dog with me.”

“All right.”

She took a sliding half step toward the door.

Then Arlene said, “Your uncle Pete and I took you to Disney when you were seven. Do you remember?”

“I’m afraid I don’t.”

“In your whole life, I never once saw you smile until you were up in them elephants, goin’ ’round and ’round. That made me feel good. When I saw you smile, it made me feel like you had a chance to be happy. I was sorry about how you turned out. So miserable. Wearin’ black clothes and sayin’ all them terrible things in your songs. I was sick to death for you. Wherever did that boy go, the one who smiled on the elephant ride?”

“He starved to death. I’m his ghost.”

She nodded and backed away. Arlene raised one hand in a gesture of farewell, then turned and was gone.

Afterward Jude listened intently to the house, to the faint straining sounds it made in the wind and the splatter of the rain falling against it. A screen door banged sharply somewhere. It might have been Arlene leaving. It might have been the door swinging on the chicken coop outside.

Beyond a feeling of gritty heat in the side of his face, where Jessica Price had cut him, he was not in great pain. His breathing was slow and regular. He stared at the door, waiting for Craddock to appear. He didn’t look away from the door until he heard a soft tapping sound off to his right.

He peered over. The big yellow heart-shaped box sat on the floor. Something thumped inside. Then the box moved, as if jolted from beneath. It titched a few inches across the floor and jumped again. The lid was struck from within once more, and one corner was knocked up and loose.

Four gaunt fingers slipped out from inside the box. Another thump and the lid came free and then began to rise. Craddock pulled himself up from inside the box, as if it were a heart-shaped hole set in the floor. The lid rode on top of his head, a gay and foolish hat. He removed it, cast it aside, then hitched himself out of the box to the waist in a single, surprisingly athletic move for a man who was not only elderly but dead. He got a knee on the floor, climbed the rest of the way out, and stood up. The creases in the legs of his black trousers were perfect.

In the pen outside, the pigs began to shriek. Craddock reached a long arm back into the bottomless box, felt around, found his fedora, and set it on his head. The scribbles danced before his eyes. Craddock turned and smiled.