Apeshit (6 page)

The first thing they see when they enter the cabin is

hands.

There are dozens of bronzed ornamental hands hang-

ing from the walls of the entry room. They are attached to

the walls by the insides of their wrists, appearing as if the

hands are reaching out of the wallpaper to grab them.

“What the fuck?” Desdemona says.

“Your grandpa was
weird
,” Crystal says.

Jason examines the hands.

“I’ve never seen these before,” he says.

“They’re creepy,” Desdemona says.

They go into the living room. The walls in here are

also covered in hands.

“There used to be deer heads and fish trophies all

over these walls,” Jason says. “Grampy must have gotten

eccentric in his old age.”

The house is filled with orange-ish brown and mus-

tard yellow furniture. The wall paper is a shiny copper color.

It all looks like it came out of the Seventies. All of the bed-

rooms are empty except for the master bedroom, which has

a queen bed, a nightstand, and a lamp.

“It’s changed a lot since I was a kid,” Jason says. “I won-

der if he redecorated it so that he could rent it out or something.”

Jason takes them out on the second floor balcony.

“This is the coolest part,” Jason says.

The balcony is huge. Bigger than the living room. It

is hanging off of the cliff. It overlooks miles of forest. Not

a speck of civilization can be seen.

“The view is amazing,” Crystal says. “It’s like one

of those scenic viewpoints on the highway, but its all our

own.”

All six of them approach the edge of the balcony and

look out at nature. They breathe in the fresh air.

“You’re right, this is awesome,” Desdemona says.

She kisses Kevin. Whenever she sees something pretty she

is compelled to kiss somebody. She tries to kiss Rick, as

well, but he steps back before she can get too close.

“I don’t trust this balcony,” Rick says. “If it collaps-

es we’re fucked.”

“I’m sure it’s fine,” Jason says. “My grampy invest-

ed a lot of money into this place.”

“When?” Rick says. “40 years ago?”

“Well, you better not be chicken shit about heights,”

Jason says. “Because this deck is where we’re doing all of

the partying.”

“Hells yeah!” Kevin says. “Let’s get the beer out of

the car and start partying right now.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Jason says. “Why don’t all of

you unload the van while I figure out how to get the genera-

tor going.”

“I’m on it,” Kevin says.

They start drinking early. Rick and Des get drunk the

fastest, drinking shots of vodka and mountain dew. Kevin

and Crystal drink beers slowly while they get the barbeque

going. Jason takes a while turning on the generator. He’s

not really sure how it works. He’s also not sure why the wa-

ter isn’t working. After an hour or so, he gets the generator

going but gives up on trying to figure out the water.

“You mean I’m going to have to shit outside?” Des-

demona asks, her head on Rick’s lap.

“Yep,” Jason says. “And no showers for a few days,

either.”

“We might as well have just gone camping,” Desde-

mona says.

Then she takes a shot of vodka.

Stephanie is in the upstairs bathroom crying again.

She is brushing her teeth while crying. She needs some-

body to talk to but she doesn’t know who. She’s really not

that close with anyone. Crystal is the closest thing to her

best friend but Steph is listed as sixth or seventh on Crystal’s

best friend list. Stephanie saw the list in Crystal’s diary last

year.

She looks in the mirror and pretends that her mirror

image is a close enough friend to confide in. She tells the

mirror image friend her problems. She tells it about how

she’s sleeping with her brother. Not because she wants to

but because she’s scared of what he will do to her if she re-

fuses. She tells it about how he beats her and humiliates her,

about how he makes her lick black ants off of his dick after

school before their mom gets home. The ants bite her tongue

as she sucks him. They bite his penis as well, but he says he

likes the pain. He says that she should like it, too.

She brushes her teeth until her gums bleed, crying at

herself in the mirror. Punching herself in the stomach until

her bellybutton swells and bruises.

Jason takes Kevin aside out on the balcony.

“Hey, I’ve been thinking,” Jason says in a whisper.

“You should try to hook up with Stephanie this weekend.”

“Stephanie?” Kevin asks.

“Yeah, she totally likes you, man,” Jason says.

“But I’m with Des, man,” Kevin says.

“Come on, Kevin. Desdemona is Rick’s girl. Just

because he lets you fuck her every once in awhile doesn’t

mean you’re together. You need to finally find your own

girl.”

“Like Stephanie?”

“Yeah, dude,” Jason says, strengthening his whisper.

“She totally wants you. I promise. She keeps hiding out in the

bathroom because you make her nervous. I see the way she looks

at you. She totally wants it. You
have
to hook up with her.”

“Whatever dude,” Kevin says, laughing.

Kevin doesn’t know what else to say. He just smokes

his cigarette, shaking his head and laughing to himself about

how clueless Jason is.

“I can’t wait until we do it later,” Desdemona says to

Rick.

Rick ignores her. She kisses him on the neck.

“The infection’s all cleared up now,” she says. “We

can do it all night.”

Rick takes another shot of vodka as he holds in his

stomach. The alcohol is causing stabbing pains in his guts

and throbbing pains in his bones. Just barely eighteen and

Rick already has ulcers. Rick’s little sisters, who are only in

middle school, also suffer from ulcers. It’s a hereditary thing.

Rick is usually fine to drink whatever alcohol he wants with

his ulcers but never on an empty stomach. He’s always hurt-

ing if he drinks alcohol, eats spicy food, or ingests anything

with too much citric acid while he has an empty stomach.

“When the hell’s dinner?” Rick cries, rubbing his

belly and cringing at Des.

Desdemona can tell what’s wrong with him. She

shakes her head, thinking about how wimpy he is when it

comes to pain. If he wasn’t so sensitive about everything,

she would make fun of him for being such a wimp. But she

knows that would be a mistake. She knows he would pout

about it for the rest of the night and probably withhold sex.

“Twenty minutes,” Crystal says.

Crystal is sitting in a chair behind them. They didn’t

realize she had been there the whole time, listening to them.

She is sticking labels on all of the food that is hers. She

doesn’t like other people touching her food. Everyone else

is sharing the food, but she decided to divvy her share and

put it in plastic bags with labels. If anyone touches her food

she’s going to freak. She can’t handle eating anything that

other people have touched. The labels have her name on

them as well as pictures of kittens and puppies. She created

the labels days ago.

“I need to eat,” Rick moans.

“Twenty minutes,” Crystal says, carefully sticking a

label in the exact center of a plastic baggy filled with deviled

eggs.

“Booyah!” Kevin says as he enters the living room

with Jason.

Jason belches.

“You guys aren’t done with that bottle
yet
?” Jason

asks Rick and Des.

Desdemona sits up from the couch and picks up the

bottle. 60% of the vodka is gone. “What do you mean,

we’ve practically finished it?”

“It’s still half full,” Jason says. He grabs the bottle

away from her. “I’ll show you how a man drinks.”

As Kevin digs two flashlights out of his backpack, Ja-

son chugs the rest of the bottle of vodka and tosses it across

the room. Then he blows the fumes rising from his throat

into Desdemona’s face. She wipes away the air like he had

just farted at her.

“What’s your problem?” Desdemona says.

“I’m just too damn awesome, that’s what,” Jason

says.

Desdemona rolls her head against Rick’s shoulder.

She doesn’t care that much about the vodka. She’s already

drunk. Rick writhes in pain next to her, but she pretends

he’s just cold and wraps her arms around him to make him

warm.

Crystal gives her boyfriend a dirty look as she places