Dwellers of the Night: The Complete Collection (89 page)

“I can’t sleep,” she says.

“Neither can I.”

There is silence.

“Do you think we’ll get used to it?”

“Get used to what?”

Anthony Barnhart

Dwellers of the Night

413

“People dying. I didn’t even cry for Anthony. Not much, anyways.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s
not
okay. I used to care about other people.”

“You still care about people.”

“Did I care about Anthony?”

“Yes. You just didn’t cry that much.”

“He died. I should have cried.”

“You did.”

“Not a lot.”

They stand in the quiet. Wind makes the walls creak and groan.

“Maybe,” Katie says, “we’re just so… desensitized.”

“Maybe.”

“A year ago, his death… It would have traumatized us. We were his friends. We cared about him. But now… Everything’s changed so much. Death, it’s just… It’s not even frightening anymore.”

“It doesn’t frighten you?”

“No. It does. It’s just… We’ve come to accept it.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think we’re all going to die?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is that really what you believe?”

“I think we’ve done all right so far.”

“A lot of people have died.”

“We haven’t.”

“But we’re just a handful. Most of us… Most of us have died.”

“But we haven’t.”

“Does that mean we’re stronger than everyone else?”

“Maybe.”

“I don’t think so. I think it means that we’re luckier.”

“Maybe.”

“But luck doesn’t hold out. Not for very long, anyways.”

“Let’s hope it holds out long enough for us to get to Alaska.”

“That’s quite a thing to hope for.”

“I’m going to hope for it anyways.”

Silence.

Katie yawns.

“You should try to get some sleep,” Mark says.

“So should you.”

“I’m not tired.”

“My body is tired. My mind isn’t.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s how you feel?”

“Yeah.”

Silence.

“Do you think Anthony’s in heaven?” Katie asks.

Anthony Barnhart

Dwellers of the Night

414

“I don’t know.”

“Do you believe in heaven?”

“I don’t know.”

“I never did believe in Heaven. I’ve never believed in Hell, either. I think heaven and hell, those are moments in our lives. When we feel alive, when we are loving and being loved,
that’s
heaven. But when we want to do nothing more than curl into a ball and die, when we don’t love and when we’re not loved in return,
that’s
hell. I think the afterlife concepts of Heaven and Hell were created to give people hope. That those whose lives are a living hell can look forward to a paradise in Heaven once they die. And those people who are wicked and who hurt and abuse other people and live a life of luxury and wealth… Those people will get what they have coming. There’s a promise of revenge, and that makes people feel better when their lives are rotten.”

“I don’t know,” Mark says. “Maybe.”

“So you don’t know if you believe in Heaven?”

“I used to,” Mark says. “When I was younger, my life was horrible. I was always depressed. Even suicidal. I prayed and prayed that God would take it away, that He would make me happy. My prayers were never answered. So I thought to myself, ‘Maybe I’m just being selfish, and that’s why God isn’t answering my prayers.’ I kept praying for myself, but I prayed for other people, too. And you know what? My prayers for others,
they
were answered. But my prayers for myself? Things just kept getting worse. Eventually I stopped praying altogether. I started working to change things on my own, not leaving it in the hands of a… Higher Being… who may or may not exist. That’s when things got better. God didn’t change things for me.
I
did. Ever since then, I never really believed in heaven or hell. A god who won’t answer peoples’ prayers, who will treat them like ants under the magnifying glass… How can He be good enough to make a place called Heaven and Hell? I know it’s not logical, but… But that’s when I stopped believing in Heaven and Hell.”

Katie is quiet for a moment. “If God doesn’t answer prayers… Then what about all those prayers for other people that were answered?”

Mark thinks for a moment. “Either God is a sadistic being, torturing people for their selfishness, or… Or those answers to prayer were just coincidences. They were just sporadic and ironic moments of luck.”

“The same luck that we’re trusting in?”

“Yeah. Except let’s hope that our luck doesn’t run out like theirs. Their luck was only shortlived. Chances are, every one of them died with the plague… and then came back.”

Mark yawns. “If you’re right,” he says, “and heaven and hell aren’t real places, that they’re just experiences of life… Then maybe we’ll never again know what heaven feels like. Maybe we’re doomed to live in this hell forever.”

“I think that’s why Anthony took his life. Because he knew he’d never experience heaven. He knew that his life would be nothing but running, hiding, trying to survive, longing for something more, waiting for a resolution that would never materialize. So he took his own life. He ended it there. Nonexistence is better than suffering.” She takes a breath. “Maybe that’s what our ultimate hope should be. Not Alaska, but Death.”

Mark extinguishes the flame. Darkness crowds among them.

Katie’s voice comes in the darkness: “You know what my aunt always told me?”

“No.”

Anthony Barnhart

Dwellers of the Night

415

“She told me that I should always live for the moment, that I never should get attached to anything. She said that whenever we find something worth keeping, it is bound to be taken from us.”

Mark doesn’t say anything.

“I think she was right.”

Mark thinks of Cara. Sees her smiling face. Hears her laughter. His heart melts, and a knot forms in his throat. It has been a while since he’s thought of her, and now the memories of their time together are as sharp as a double-edged sword, peeling back the shadows and shining into his life like a perpetual sun. He pushes the thoughts away, fears tearing up. “I think she was right, too,”

Mark says. He gets no response. “Katie?” She is gone.

III

The night passes without incident. When morning comes, they move the furniture blocking the stairs and descend down into the kitchen. Sarah rummages through the cupboards, finds canned fruit and vegetables. She, Katie, Mark and Kyle sit at the BONAPARTE dining room table, pulling peaches and pears and sliced oranges from the cold tin cans. The man smokes a cigarette and stands by the far wall, examining bottles of brandy, cognac, and Scotch in the charcoal-colored dining chest. He crunches the cigarette on the wooden top and grabs a small cup from the overhead cupboard. He screws off the cap to the Virginia Scotch and begins pouring a glass. Mark, not even looking over at him, says, “If you drink, you’re not driving today.”

The man fills the glass to the top, sets the bottle down with the cap still off. He stares at it for a long time, then lights another cigarette. “Fine,” he says, staring at the bottle. “But I’m bringing it with us.”

Mark says, “Bring the brandy, too.”

It is eleven in the morning by the time they reach the highway, the cornfields on either side lined with gnarled trees barely bristling with spring leaves. It isn’t eleven-thirty before the man curses, the gas light coming on. “I thought I fixed the fucking leak,” he says. He pulls off at the next exit. They drive down the abandoned road for several minutes, the man’s eyes searching. He pulls up INDUSTRIAL AVENUE and into the parking lot of a TOYOTA car dealership. He stops the vehicle and turns off the engine. Everyone piles out, and the man kneels down on the pavement, can smell the stench of gasoline. He squints as he rolls onto his back and examines the fuel tank along the undercarriage. Gasoline drips from several spots. He weasels his way out and stands, hands on his hips.

Kyle says, “This is a FORD. This dealership might not have the right parts for the model.”

“We’re not here for parts,” the man says. “We’re getting a new car.”

“Do you think the cars here have gas in the engines?”

“Maybe. Probably. But find a bucket and get underneath here and try to collect as much gas as you can. It’s dripping out pretty steadily.” He looks over at Mark. “What’s your dream car?”

The only S.U.V. in the display room is a red TOYOTA RAV4. The man finds the keys behind one of the desks, and he crawls inside. It still smells of fresh leather and has the new car scent. He leans back in the seat and puts his hands on the wheel, wrapping his fingers around its curvature. Mark stands beside the open door. “What do you think?”

Anthony Barnhart

Dwellers of the Night

416

“I’ll take it,” the man says, looking over at him. “How much?”

The boy smiles. “Is there any gas?”

The man turns on the engine. It chugs for a moment; the gas light comes on; the engine dies. He twists the key back into the OFF position. “We need gas,” the man says.

They go outside.

Sarah and Katie are looking at some of the cars in the lot.

Kyle’s feet are sticking out from underneath the Explorer.

The man kneels down, asks how much gas he’s got in the steel bucket. Kyle tells him that the leak is nothing more than a few droplets now. The man curses and stands. He tells Mark to get inside and find the red gasoline container he’d nabbed at the gas station a night or two ago.
It seems so long ago
. Mark opens the door and climbs inside.

The man turns and shouts at the women: “Start unloading the car! Take everything inside, to the red car with the door open!”

They exchange glances and trot over.

Mark and the man head towards a gas station across the street.

Kyle, coming out from underneath the vehicle, asks what he’s supposed to do. The man pauses, looks around, points to a STARBUCKS located on the corner. “See if they have any ground-up coffee,” he says.

Kyle nods and heads away, thankful to be alone.

Kyle walks across the street, and as he reaches the median, he stops. Something tickles the back of his mind, and he looks back and forth, sees cars driving up and down the road, headlights on in the dying evening light. The moment passes, déjà-vu. He stands in the middle of the empty road, and suddenly he remembers. His head jerks around, and he stares at the coffee shop with its windows catching the light of the sun and reflecting its rays sharply into his eyes. He moves forward, walks through the overgrown grass, across the solid pavement. There are few cars. Maybe three. He walks along the side of the building, under an overhang, passes the above-ground speaker that once served the drive-thru customers. He half-walks, half-jogs to the Taurus sitting in the back lot, facing a MENARD’S grocery store. He takes his time as he walks around to the driver’s side window. The glass isn’t shattered. He doesn’t know if that’s good or not, and he gives a feeble glance towards the building. He kneels down, puts his hand to the glass to block the sunlight, peers inside. The car is empty. Along the ridge of the front seats squat two stuffed green frogs. He bites his lip and stands again, looks over at the STARBUCKS building. He looks back across the street to the TOYOTA dealership. Sarah is propping the door open with a tire, and Katie is sauntering past with a bundle of equipment layered over outstretched arms. Kyle takes a deep breath and moves forward, past the speakers, under the overhang. He stops and looks into the store through the bay windows. There is a mop bucket lying on its side, the wooden mop with its dried and bristled tendrils lying on the tile floor beside it. He walks over to the door and tries to open it. Locked. He walks back over to the car and smashes open the window with a fist-sized rock, unlocks the door, opens it, reaches down, flips the latch for the trunk. He searches through the trunk and finds what he is looking for. He carries the car-jack to the window, and gripping it with both hands, smashes it into the glass. The glass webs outwards, groaning. He swings again. Flakes of glass fall at his feet. He bites his lip and swings for the last time. The glass shatters, raining down over his hands. He drops the car-jack at his feet and steps through, into the stale warmth with the faint scent of residue coffee. Anthony Barnhart

Dwellers of the Night

417

He’s been here before. He tries to piece together the dates. At least a few years. Before he ever met his girlfriend Sarah. He stands silently amidst the tables, the artwork covered in dust. He walks over to the bar, next to the cash register. There are espresso machines and coffee grinders and bottles of coffee syrups. He has stood here before, in this exact spot. He had come here on a cold November evening. Night had fallen early, as it always did in the winter-time. He had come in through these doors. He had shed off his leather jacket and set it upon one of the chairs. He had bought some spearmint gum and ordered an iced tall vanilla latte. He had sat down and read a book. What book was it? He remembers: Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men. One of the baristas had just gotten off work, and she sat down next to him. They chatted for a few moments. Her name was Jessica. He remembers just staring at her, thinking,
She’s beautiful. She’s so fucking beautiful
. They went to a local bar. He wasn’t old enough to drink, but she had recently turned 21 and had an Apple Martini. They left the bar and went to CRACKER BARREL for chocolate pecan pie
a la mode
. The vanilla ice cream had been delicious. They crowded into a movie theater. A romantic movie called

“Twilight.” A movie about vampires.
It was nothing like the real thing
, he thinks to himself, lost in the transcendent memories. Preteen and teenage girls thronged at the entrance. They slipped through when the doors opened, got good seats. Whenever main characters appeared, the little girls would scream in excitement and glee. He would smile, mocking them, found it obnoxious and annoying at the same time. He rested his arm on the armchair of the seat. He wanted to hold Jessica’s hand. But he didn’t think she wanted it. After the movie they went to THE SUNSHINE DINER. It was around midnight, 1:00 in the morning. Four cups of coffee. She shared her French Toast with him. They went back out to their cars. They spoke for a few moments. He desperately wanted to hold her. The cold was biting. He wanted her warmth against him. He said good-bye. He had a two-hour drive home for the weekend. She said bye. They loaded into their cars. He never saw her again.