Black House

5

WE GLIMPSED A janitor on our whirlwind early-morning tour of Maxton Elder Care ¡ª do you happen to remember him? Baggy overalls? A wee bit thick in the gut? Dangling cigarette in spite of the NO SMOKING! LUNGS AT WORK! signs that have been posted every twenty feet or so along the patient corridors? A mop that looks like a clot of dead spiders? No? Don't apologize. It's easy enough to overlook Pete Wexler, a onetime nondescript youth (final grade average at French Landing High School: 79) who passed through a nondescript young manhood and has now reached the edge of what he expects to be a nondescript middle age. His only hobby is administering the occasional secret, savage pinch to the moldy oldies who fill his days with their grunts, nonsensical questions, and smells of gas and piss. The Alzheimer's assholes are the worst. He has been known to stub out the occasional cigarette on their scrawny backs or buttocks. He likes their strangled cries when the heat hits and the pain cores in. This small and ugly torture has a double-barreled effect: it wakes them up a little and satisfies something in him. Brightens his days, somehow. Refreshes the old outlook. Besides, who are they going to tell?

And oh God, there goes the worst of them now, shuffling slowly down the corridor of Daisy. Charles Burnside's mouth is agape, as is the back of his johnny. Pete has a better view of Burnside's scrawny, shit-smeared buttocks than he ever wanted. The chocolate stains go all the way down to the backs of his knees, by God. He's headed for the bathroom, but it's just a leetle bit late. A certain brown horse ¡ª call him Morning Thunder ¡ª has already bolted from its stall and no doubt galloped across Burny's sheets.

Thank God cleaning 'em up isn't my job, Pete thinks, and smirks around his cigarette. Over to you, Butch.

But the desk up there by the little boys' and girls' rooms is for the time being unattended. Butch Yerxa is going to miss the charming sight of Burny's dirty ass sailing by. Butch has apparently stepped out for a smoke, although Pete has told the idiot a hundred times that all those NO SMOKING signs mean nothing ¡ª Chipper Maxton could care less about who smoked where (or where the smokes were butted out, for that matter). The signs are just there to keep good old Drooler Manor in compliance with certain tiresome state laws.

Pete's smirk widens, and at that moment he looks a good deal like his son Ebbie, Tyler Marshall's sometime friend (it was Ebbie Wexler, in fact, who just gave Jack and Henry the finger). Pete is wondering whether he should go out and tell Butch he's got a little cleanup job in D18 ¡ª plus D18's occupant, of course ¡ª or if he should just let Butch discover Burny's latest mess on his own. Perhaps Burny will go back to his room and do a little fingerpainting, kind of spread the joy around. That would be good, but it would also be good to see Butch's face fall when Pete tells him ¡ª

"Pete. "

Oh no. Sandbagged by the bitch. She's a fine-looking bitch, but a bitch is still a bitch. Pete stands where he is for a moment, thinking that maybe if he ignores her, she'll go away.

Vain hope.

"Pete. "

He turns. There is Rebecca Vilas, current squeeze of the big cheese. Today she is wearing a light red dress, perhaps in honor of Strawberry Fest!, and black high-heeled pumps, probably in honor of her own fine gams. Pete briefly imagines those fine gams wrapped around him, those high heels crossed at the small of his back and pointing like clock hands, then sees the cardboard box she's holding in her arms. Work for him, no doubt. Pete also notes the glinting ring on her finger, some sort of gem-stone the size of a goddamn robin's egg, although considerably paler. He wonders, not for the first time, just what a woman does to earn a ring like that.

She stands there, tapping her foot, letting him have his look. Behind him, Charles Burnside continues his slow, tottery progress toward the men's. You'd think, looking at that old wreck with his scrawny legs and flyaway milkweed hair, that his running days were long behind him. But you'd be wrong. Terribly wrong.

"Miz Vilas?" Pete says at last.

"Common room, Pete. On the double. And how many times have you been told not to smoke in the patient wings?"

Before he can reply, she turns with a sexy little flirt of the skirt and starts off toward the Maxton common room, where that afternoon's Strawberry Fest! dance will be held.

Sighing, Pete props his mop against the wall and follows her.

Charles Burnside is now alone at the head of the Daisy corridor. The vacancy leaves his eyes and is replaced with a brilliant and feral gleam of intelligence. All at once he looks younger. All at once Burny the human shit machine is gone. In his place is Carl Bierstone, who reaped the young in Chicago with such savage efficiency.

Carl . . . and something else. Something not human.

He ¡ª it ¡ª grins.

On the unattended desk is a pile of paper weighed down with a round stone the size of a coffee cup. Written on the stone in small black letters is BUTCH'S PET ROCK.

Burny picks up Butch Yerxa's pet rock and walks briskly toward the men's room, still grinning.

In the common room, the tables have been arranged around the walls and covered with red paper cloths. Later, Pete will add small red lights (battery powered; no candles for the droolers, gosh, no). On the walls, great big cardboard strawberries have been taped up everywhere, some looking rather battered ¡ª they have been put up and taken down every July since Herbert Maxton opened this place at the end of the swingin' sixties. The linoleum floor is open and bare.

This afternoon and early evening, the moldy oldies who are still ambulatory and of a mind to do so will shuffle around out there to the big-band sounds of the thirties and forties, clinging to each other during the slow numbers and probably dampening their Depends with excitement at the end of the jitterbugs. (Three years ago a moldy oldie named Irving Christie had a minor heart attack after doing a particularly strenuous lindyhop to "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree with Anyone Else but Me. ") Oh yes, the Strawberry Fest Hop is always exciting.

Rebecca has all by herself pushed together three wooden flats and covered them with a white cloth, creating the basis for Symphonic Stan's podium. In the corner stands a brilliantly chromed microphone with a large round head, a genuine antique from the thirties that saw service at the Cotton Club. It is one of Henry Leyden's prize possessions. Beside it is the tall, narrow carton in which it arrived yesterday. On the podium, beneath a beam decorated with red and white crepe and more cardboard strawberries, is a stepladder. Seeing it, Pete feels a moment's possessive jealousy. Rebecca Vilas has been in his closet. Trespassing bitch! If she stole any of his weed, by God ¡ª

Rebecca sets her carton down on the podium with an audible grunt, then straightens up. She brushes a lock of silky chestnut hair off one flushed cheek. It's only midmorning, but the day is going to be a genuine Coulee Country scorcher. Air-condition your underwear and double up on the deodorant, folks, as George Rathbun has been known to bellow.

"Oi thought you'd never come, me foine bucko," Rebecca says.

"Well, I'm here," Pete says sullenly. "Looks like you're doing fine without me. " He pauses, then adds:"Foine. " For Pete, this is quite a witticism. He walks forward and peers into the carton, which, like the one by the mike, is stamped PROPERTY OF HENRY LEYDEN. Inside the box is a small spotlight with an electrical cord wrapped around it, and a circular pink gel that is meant to turn the light the color of candy canes and sugar strawberries.

"What's this shit?" Pete asks.

Rebecca gives him a brilliant, dangerous smile. Even to a relatively dull fellow like Pete, the message of that smile is clear: you're on the edge of the gator pool, buddy; how many more steps do you want to take?

"Light," she says. "L-I-G-H-T. Hangs up there, on that hook. H-O-O-K. It's something the deejay insists on. Says it gets him in the mood. M-O-O ¡ª "

"What happened to Weenie Erickson?" Pete grumbles. "There was none of this shit with Weenie. He played the goddamn records for two hours, had a few out of his hip flask, then s

hut it down. "

"He moved," Rebecca says indifferently. "Racine, I think. "

"Well ¡ª " Pete is looking up, studying the beam with its intertwined fluffs of red and white crepe. "I don't see no hook, Miz Vilas. "

"Christ on a bicycle," she says, and mounts the stepladder. "Here. Are you blind?"

Pete, most definitely not blind, has rarely been so grateful for his sighted state. From his position below her, he's got a clear view of her thighs, the red lace froth of her panties, and the twin curves of her buttocks, now nicely tensed as she stands on the fifth step of the ladder.

She looks down at him, sees the stunned look on his face, notes the direction of his sight line. Her expression softens a bit. As her dear mither so wisely observed, some men are just fools for a flash of panty.

"Pete. Earth to Pete. "

"Uh?" He looks up at her, mouth agape, a dot of spittle on his lower lip.

"There is no hook of any kind on my underwear, I'm sure of that as of few things in life. But if you will direct your gaze upward . . . to my hand instead of my ass . . . "

He looks up, face still dazed, and sees one red-tipped nail (Rebecca is a through-and-through vision in strawberry red today, no doubt about it) tapping a hook that just gleams out of the crepe, like a fisherman's hook gleaming murderously out of a gaudy lure.

"Hook," she says. "Attach gel to light, attach light to hook. Light becomes warm pink spotlight, as per deejay's explicit instructions. You get-um message, Kemo sabe?"

"Uh . . . yeah . . . "

"Then, if I may coin a phrase, will you please get it up?"

She comes down the ladder, deciding Pete Wexler has gotten the biggest free show he can reasonably expect for one lousy chore. And Pete, who has already achieved one erection, pulls Symphonic Stan's pink pinspot out of its box and prepares to achieve another. As he mounts the stepladder, his crotch rises past Rebecca's face. She notes the bulge there and gnaws the inside of one cheek to suppress a smile. Men are fools, all right. Lovable fools, some of them, but fools, all the same. It's just that some fools can afford rings and trips and midnight suppers at Milwaukee nightspots, and some fools cannot.

With some fools, the best you can get them to do is put up a lousy light.

"Wait up, you guys!" Ty Marshall calls. "Ebbie! Ronnie! T. J. ! Wait up!"

Over his shoulder, Ebbie Wexler (who really does look like Nancy's not-too-bright boyfriend, Sluggo) calls back: "Catch us, slowpoke!"

"Yeah!" Ronnie Metzger yells. "Catch us, po-sloke!" Ronnie, a kid with a lot of hours in the speech-therapy room ahead of him, looks back over his own shoulder, almost crashes his bike into a parking meter, and just manages to swerve around it. Then they are fleeing, the three of them filling the sidewalk with their bikes (God help the pedestrian headed the other way), their racing shadows fleeing beside them.

Tyler considers a final catch-up dash, then decides his legs are just too tired. His mother and father say that he will catch up in time, that he's just small for his age, but brother, Ty has his doubts. And he has had increasing doubts about Ebbie, Ronnie, and T. J. , too. Are they really worth keeping up with? (If Judy Marshall knew of these doubts, she would stand and applaud ¡ª she has wondered for the last two years when her bright and thoughtful son will finally tire of hanging out with such a bunch of losers . . . what she calls "low-raters. ")

"Suck an elf," Ty says disconsolately ¡ª he has picked up this harmless vulgarity from Sci-Fi Channel reruns of a miniseries called The 10th Kingdom ¡ª and dismounts his bike. There's no real reason to speed after them, anyway; he knows where he'll find them, in the parking lot of the 7-Eleven, drinking Slurpees and trading Magic cards. This is another problem Tyler is having with his friends. These days he'd much rather trade baseball cards. Ebbie, Ronnie, and T. J. could care less about the Cardinals, the Indians, the Red Sox, and the Brew Crew. Ebbie has gone so far as to say that baseball is gay, a comment Ty considers stupid (almost pitiable) rather than outrageous.

He walks his bike slowly up the sidewalk, catching his breath. Here is the intersection of Chase and Queen streets. Ebbie calls Queen Street Queer Street. Of course. No surprise there. And isn't that a big part of the problem? Tyler is a boy who likes surprises; Ebbie Wexler is a boy who doesn't. Which makes their opposite reactions to the music pouring out of the pickup a little earlier that morning perfectly predictable.

Tyler pauses at the corner, looking down Queen Street. There are shaggy hedges on both sides. Above those on the right rise a number of interconnected red roofs. The old folks' home. Beside the main gate, some sort of sign has been placed. Curious, Tyler remounts his bike and rides slowly down the sidewalk for a look. The longest branches of the hedge beside him whisper against the handlebar of his bike.

The sign turns out to be a great big strawberry. TODAY IS STRAWBERRY FEST!!! is written below it. What, Ty Marshall wonders, is a Strawberry Fest? A party, something strictly for old folks? It's a question, but not a very interesting one. After mulling it over for a few seconds, he turns his bike and prepares to ride back down to Chase Street.

Charles Burnside enters the men's room at the head of the Daisy corridor, still grinning and clutching Butch's pet rock. To his right is a line of sinks with a mirror over each one ¡ª they are the sort of metal mirrors one finds in the toilets of lower-class bars and saloons. In one of these, Burny sees his own grinning reflection. In another, the one closest the window, he sees a small boy in a Milwaukee Brewers T-shirt. The boy is standing astride his bike, just outside the gate, reading the Strawberry Fest! sign.

Burny begins to drool. There is nothing discreet about it, either. Burny drools like a wolf in a fairy tale, white curds of foamy spit leaking from the corners of his mouth and flowing over the slack, liver-colored roll of his lower lip. The drool runs down his chin like a stream of soapsuds. He wipes at it absently with the back of one gnarled hand and shakes it to the floor in a splatter, never taking his eyes from the mirror. The boy in the mirror is not one of this creature's poor lost babies ¡ª Ty Marshall has lived in French Landing his whole life and knows exactly where he is ¡ª but he could be. He could very easily become lost, and wind up in a certain room. A certain cell. Or trudging toward a strange horizon on burning, bleeding footsies.

Especially if Burny has his way. He will have to move fast, but as we have already noted, Charles Burnside can, with the proper motivation, move very fast indeed.

"Gorg," he says to the mirror. He speaks this nonsense word in a perfectly clear, perfectly flat midwestern accent. "Come, Gorg. "

And without waiting to see what comes next ¡ª he knows what comes next ¡ª Burny turns and walks toward the line of four toilet stalls. He steps into the second from the left and closes the door.

Tyler has just remounted his bike when the hedge rustles ten feet from the Strawberry Fest! sign. A large black crow shrugs its way out of the greenery and onto the Queen Street sidewalk. It regards the boy with a lively, intelligent eye. It stands with its black legs spread, opens its beak, and speaks. "Gorg!"

Tyler looks at it, beginning to smile, not sure he heard this but ready to be delighted (at ten, he's always ready to be delighted, always primed to believe the unbelievable). "What? Did you say something?"

The crow flutters its glossy wings and cocks its head in a way that renders the ugly almost charming.

"Gorg! Ty!"

The boy laughs. It said his name! The crow said his name!

He dismounts his bike, puts it on the kickstand, and takes a couple of steps toward the crow. Thoughts of Amy St. Pierre and Johnny Irkenham are ¡ª unfortunately ¡ª the furthest things from his mind.

He thinks the crow will surely fly away when he steps toward it, but it only flutters its wings a little and takes a slide-step toward the bushy darkness of the hedge.

"Did you say my name?"

"Gorg! Ty! Abbalah!"

For a moment Ty's smile falters. That last wo

rd is almost familiar to him, and the associations, although faint, are not exactly pleasant. It makes him think of his mother, for some reason. Then the crow says his name again; surely it is saying Ty.

Tyler takes another step away from Queen Street and toward the black bird. The crow takes a corresponding step, sidling closer still to the bulk of the hedge. There is no one on the street; this part of French Landing is dreaming in the morning sunshine. Ty takes another step toward his doom, and all the worlds tremble.

Ebbie, Ronnie, and T. J. come swaggering out of the 7-Eleven, where the raghead behind the counter has just served them blueberry Slurpees (raghead is just one of many pejorative terms Ebbie has picked up from his dad). They also have fresh packs of Magic cards, two packs each.

Ebbie, his lips already smeared blue, turns to T. J. "Go on downstreet and get the slowpoke. "

T. J. looks injured. "Why me?"

"Because Ronnie bought the cards, dumbwit. Go on, hurry up. "

"Why do we need him, Ebbie?" Ronnie asks. He leans against the bike rack, noshing on the cold, sweet chips of ice.

"Because I say so," Ebbie replies loftily. The fact is, Tyler Marshall usually has money on Fridays. In fact, Tyler has money almost every day. His parents are loaded. Ebbie, who is being raised (if you can call it that) by a single father who has a crappy janitor's job, has already conceived a vague hate for Tyler on this account; the first humiliations aren't far away, and the first beatings will follow soon after. But now all he wants is more Magic cards, a third pack for each of them. The fact that Tyler doesn't even like Magic that much will only make getting him to pony up that much sweeter.

But first they have to get the little slowpoke up here. Or the little po-sloke, as mush-mouthed Ronnie calls him. Ebbie likes that, and thinks he will start using it. Po-sloke. A good word. Makes fun of Ty and Ronnie at the same time. Two for the price of one.

"Go on, T. J. Unless you want an Indian burn. "

T. J. doesn't. Ebbie Wexler's Indian burns hurt like a mad bastard. He gives a theatrical sigh, backs his bike out of the rack, mounts it, and rides back down the mild slope of the hill, holding a handlebar in one hand and his Slurpee in the other. He expects to see Ty right away, probably walking his bike because he's just . . . so . . . tiyyy-urd, but Ty doesn't seem to be on Chase Street at all ¡ª what's up with that?

T. J. pedals a little faster.

In the men's room, we are now looking at the line of toilet stalls. The door of the one second from the left is closed. The other three stand ajar on their chrome hinges. Beneath the closed door, we see a pair of gnarled, veiny ankles rising from a pair of filthy slippers.

A voice cries out with surprising strength. It is a young man's voice, hoarse, hungry, and angry. It echoes flatly back from the tile walls: "Ab-balah! Abbalah-doon! Munshun gorg!"

Suddenly the toilets flush. Not just the one in the closed cubicle but all of them. Across the room the urinals also flush, their chromed handles dipping in perfect synchronicity. Water runs down their curved porcelain surfaces.

When we look back from the urinals to the toilets, we see that the dirty slippers ¡ª and the feet that were in them ¡ª are gone. And for the first time we have actually heard the sound of slippage, a kind of hot exhale, the sort of sound one hears escaping one's lungs when waking from a nightmare at two in the morning.

Ladies and gentlemen, Charles Burnside has left the building.

The crow has backed right up against the hedge now. Still it regards Tyler with its bright, eerie eyes. Tyler steps toward it, feeling hypnotized.

"Say my name again," he breathes. "Say my name again and you can go. "

"Ty!" the crow croaks obligingly, then gives its wings a little shake and slips into the hedge. For a moment Tyler can still see it, a mixture of shiny black in the shiny green, and then it's gone.

"Holy crow!" Tyler says. He realizes what he's said and gives a small, shaky laugh. Did it happen? It did, didn't it?