Dwelling (19 page)

“Johnathan, are you still there?” Jake asked again, blocking out his thoughts and the heated sounds next door.

“Yes.”

“Well?”

“You’ve seen—ghosts?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know. I all know is that I’ve seen that dead soldier, Johnathan, I’ve seen that poor kid, but he’s not so innocent or young anymore. He’s pissed about…I don’t know, dying, I guess,” Jake pleaded.

“And it wasn’t Ricky?” Johnathan asked, stoic, unnerving.

Jake was taken aback. “Ricky? Why would it have been Ricky? No. It was Renfield. The Private who got hit by the mortar. Why did you ask if it was Ricky?”

“What else happened?” asked Johnathan, ignoring Jake’s question.

“I…don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Listen, he was…I don’t know, teasing me, I guess. He was angry, pissed even, like I said.” Irritation snuck into Jake’s voice.

“Teasing you?”

“About being a minister. I’ve been having…
doubt
,” Jake confessed, uneasily.

“Doubt about, what? God?” prodded Johnathan.

“Look man, I don’t really want to get into that right now. I called because I’ve been seeing a dead man walking around my church and…”

“And?”

“And a bar, this place called Hoister’s. I saw him there. I was sitting at the bar, having a drink. Minding my own business
(hunting for an easy lay)
and there he was, sitting on the other end. Still dead.
Undead
. Rotting. And he toasted a drink toward me and smiled this green toothed smile,” Jake said, falling back into the memory of today. Next door, the woman and man departed, first the man, walking briskly by his window, tucking back in his neat and trim button up, and then the woman followed behind, walking bow legged. Jake thought about tapping on the window, flashing a couple of twenty-dollar bills, but decided against it.
Had enough excitement for one night, don’t you think, Padre?

“Did
Renfield
say anything?” Johnathan asked, chillingly undisturbed.

“Like what?” Jakes responded, confused.

“Renfield, your ghost. Whatever. Did
It
say anything else to you? Did
It
mention anything about a house or…Mags?”

“Mags? You’re scaring me a little here, man. What—what house? What about Mags?”

Silence.

“Johnathan, come on, man.”

“I don’t know—maybe it’s nothing or maybe…” Johnathan hesitated, caught in a thought. “Look. I’m still in Washington, but I’m flying back tomorrow afternoon. Can you meet me then?”

“Sure, I guess, but—”

“We’ll talk more about everything tomorrow. I need some sleep.”

Silence fell between them again. The only sounds came from the crackle of having a long distance call and the passing of cars over the bypass bridge. Jake looked out the window again and watched the underpass with suspicion. He found only shadow there, deep and black and merciless. His own thoughts again began to swirl, thoughts of ghouls and dead men coming back from the grave. Ghosts of dead soldiers seeking vengeance like in some B-rated horror flick,
or like in that one movie Ricky had mentioned before he…died. In his last letter he sent to me, he mentioned this movie…what was it called? Deathdream, I think.
Over the phone, Jake could hear something being poured into a glass on the other end. A muffled swig and a hiss.
Pour one for me too, buddy.

“What the hell is going on, Johnny-Boy? Can this be real? Dead soldiers coming back from the grave? Or have we gone completely bonkers? Must be, right? The dead don’t come back. That would defeat the purpose of death, wouldn’t it?”

“I don’t know.”

“But—”

“See you tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

The phone clicked. Jake listened to dead air for a moment until the dial tone picked back up. He watched the underpass. Someone far away was laughing.

CHAPTER 17

DUKE’S DEAD

Maggie

Moxie whined the entire drive south from Hood. The temperamental-stomached Shih Tzu had ralphed twice before even reaching Round Rock. Now the dog lay whimpering wrapped in a towel in the passenger seat. Maggie wasn’t feeling too hot, either. But the questionable growls coming from her gut weren’t from the drive, but from an overwhelming surge of anxiety filling her head with all sorts of uncertainty.
Moving on…leaving woes behind. The big change
. Or so those two-dollar twenty-something-year-old therapists liked to call it back at Hood. Packing up her home, or what remained of it, was harder than she had anticipated. Memories and wounds opened and reopened spilling out all the sadness and anger and regret and utter loneliness. Seeing all of Ricky’s things in boxes felt—
surreal
. Not euphoric or cathartic as she had hoped. Numb would probably be the best word to describe how she felt now. Numb and perhaps maybe even a little pissed.

And now she was on her way south, to Jotham, to finalize a new start. If it was up to her, Maggie wouldn’t have even come down for an open house. If it was up to
her
, she would have bought the damn place over the phone, no middle man, no muss, no fuss, and no bullshit. When she called Butters & Sons after they got off the phone the first time, when she had hung up on base housing and arranged movers, she asked then if they’d be willing to start the paperwork. They had agreed, but old Duke insisted she see the place first. He didn’t want the
lass
, as he called her, to jump into the pool without looking. She didn’t understand his reference, yet she agreed nonetheless. She would do the walk-through, the open house, the dog and pony show, and then they’d make a little trip to town and sign some papers, clear some checks, and hopefully hand over some keys. Maggie had little doubt the house would be hers before sundown. Call it intuition. Or, call it a big dead-husband check in the bank just aching to be cashed. And, from what she could gather from her internet research, the house had been on the market for some time. Duke would obviously want to sell it to whomever would be willing to buy. Still…there were formalities to jump through.
Yes, quaint and annoying formalities
.

As Maggie pulled down Main Street, past a maroon colored sign that said
‘
Meat Market
,’
hanging a left on Route 77, abandoning the small, quaint town for the wilderness, her mind wandered back to the faint glimmer of the last time she had seen the house. Summer of 1995, the summer of TLC and
Waterfalls
and Coolio’s
Gangsta’s Paradise
and Michelle Pfeiffer and Soul Asylum, the summer the boys played
Mortal Kombat
until their fingers bled, and they’d all gone to see
Braveheart
and
Apollo 13
, and even snuck in to watch
Se7en
and, not forgetting Ricky’s personal favorite,
Batman Forever
at least a dozen times. It was odd—to have forgotten the house when so much else from that summer remained. The same summer she somehow conned her parents into letting her friends tag along on their annual family trip to Papa’s and Memaw’s house in Giddings.
How did I pull that off? To convince them to bring four boys, adolescent boys at that?
But for the life of her, she could not recall.

At best, she had offered some kind of collateral, such as extra chores perhaps, or not being mean to her younger sister, Karen, and making sure she took her on their little adventures. Whatever it had been, they had obviously agreed to it.
Suicide Squad
had spent the entire summer together that year. Johnathan came because he wasn’t far removed from Ricky’s side, and Ricky came because, though his and Maggie’s love had yet to fully mature, the seed had been sown—it would take another summer to fully bloom. And Bobby was able to get out of going to fat camp, and Jake, by nothing short of a miracle, convinced his parents to let him skip Church Camp.
Jake, I think he told them they were going on the Painted Church tour…Yes! That’s how he did it. Painted Church tour, jeez. What a square!

Maggie hung a right down the unpaved Oak Lee Road. She searched deeper, but the memory she found of the house was similar to the photo of
Suicide Squad
she had found in Ricky’s room, the photo with the gang in front of the old farm house, fading with age.
Twenty or so years…Jesus, has it been that long?

Swerving the Jetta, she dodged a precarious pothole. Moxie lifted her head slightly and whined.
Shit. Road’s seen better days, I guess.
Maggie righted the car, continuing down the road. It would take another few miles before she reached the turn off for the house. Again, her mind wandered back to her Papa and Memaw’s RV trailer park off Route 77 on the south end, and the day they went exploring, bicycling across Giddings and into Jotham. They’d come upon a two-hump hill, dodging cow patties and laughing in the afternoon sun. She recalled perching on top of the crest that overlooked an open field with tall stalks of wheat. There may have even been a tire swing or a barn down there, she couldn’t be certain, the memory was still fuzzy at best, like static on a television that’s lost signal. And then the house came into view, the old country farm house that sat in a clearing besieged by weed and vine. The porch looked haunted, she remembered that. The swing rocked in the wind, moaning on rusty metal chains.
What did we do? What happened…?
In her mind she pictured Jake and Ricky running down the hill first, followed by Bobby and Johnathan, leaving Maggie to tend with her sister, Karen. Neither of them wanted to go near that creepy place.
That’s right, I didn’t want to go…that much I remember at least…

But the boys went and so the girls followed.
And who had gone inside? Didn’t someone go inside? Was it Ricky…only Ricky? Sounds about right…Was it a dare?
It was a hot and humid day, but somehow she remembered feeling cold standing near the place. She and Karen had both stood there rubbing their arms with their hands watching the boys daring each other to go in.
And Ricky, up on that porch, but then what?

A bright white-picket-fenced house peeked over horizon. The
must-be-new
paneling shimmered in the glow of the afternoon light. And the—just as she remembered them—rows and rows of wheat stalks. Maggie followed the road and then rounded up the drive of 1475 Oak Lee Road. The gravel here was softer, more inviting than on the road. Moxie lifted her head again, but instead of whining this time she growled, low and faint.

“Easy, girl. We’re here. We’re
home
,” Maggie said the word and with surprise, actually felt it was true. This was home. She didn’t have to look down at Moxie to know she was giving her that dumb, glazed-over look.
Home?
Maggie’s gaze was fixed ahead, mesmerized by the beautiful, white farm house, the golden stalks that moved with the wind, the large oak tree with the rotting bits of rope that perhaps once belonged to a tire swing. She came to a halt with a little cry from her brakes. Everything looked new and freshly painted. Even the porch looked like it had been recently updated. She killed the Volkswagen’s engine; it sputtered slightly before exhaling in defeat. Her eyes searched for Duke, the larger-than-life Texan from the Butters & Sons Real Estate website. Another car was in the drive, a Buick sedan, and black as night, coated in country dust. A man stood near the porch, silhouetted by the house in the afternoon sun. He was tall and thin, dressed in a black suit with a white dress shirt and black tie. His shoes would have yielded a high shine, but out here…in the dust, nothing shone.

Who is that?
Maggie wondered, squinting at the thin frame man before cautiously exiting her car.
That’s not Duke, no way.
Though Maggie and Duke had never official met, she remember the jolly dancing man with the robust midsection and even larger cowboy hat from his commercial, and his glowing, meaty face from the website, the one she had found deplorably clownish.
Or was it Duke who suggested such a thing?
She couldn’t remember.

“Hello?” Maggie called out, stepping onto the soft rock of the driveway. The discomfort of not knowing the man standing on the porch was not well hidden from her tone. “You’re not Duke Butters, are you?” She tried her best not to sound rude, but when you’re expecting someone, it’s hard not to sound put-off-ish.

The man simply smiled. His lips curved upward exposing yellow stained teeth. Despite the unusually warm fall and the dust from the wheat field blowing in the wind, his suit looking as black as coal, Maggie felt her spine lock in a cold breeze. The white of his dress shirt seemed to glow. His shoes had a muted shine, deafened by a soft coat from the decaying crop in the field nearby. He looked well-to-do, but there was something else about the man that Maggie found unsettling. Something unseen. She had the strangest notion that she ought to run away. Jump back into the Jetta and drive far, far away, back into Jotham, past Giddings.

But why?

Where? Where would I go? Houston? Heavens, no!

“Mr. Butters will not be joining us today, I’m afraid,” said the thin tall man. “My name is Eugene Parsons and I will be taking over his account for this property.” He spoke clear and concise. Every word, every syllable enunciated, in a way that could leave one wondering if English was perhaps not his first language.

“Okay—” Maggie said, taken aback. “What happened with Mr. Butters, with Duke, I mean?” She held Moxie tight against her chest. The dog growled in a dull, almost mute purr.

“Unfortunately—well, I do not know if it is really my place to say. It certainly is not conducive to our business with the property for you to know.” The tall man, Eugene, spoke again, very clear and concise,
too concise
.

“I don’t care what you think is
conducive
. I’d like to know, Mister Parsons. Please.” Maggie kept her cool, but the unreal quality of the man struck a strange cord in her heart, pulling on the back of her eyes, tickling her nose.

“Will this information impede our business with the property?” asked Eugene.

“Not unless you don’t tell me what’s going on,” Maggie said hotly.

“Then, at your behest, it is my regrettable duty to inform you that Mr. Duke Butters of Butters & Sons Real Estate Company has recently passed away.” Eugene spoke without emotion, as hard as it is to imagine when speaking of such things as mortality.

“Dead? What? When?” Maggie placed her free hand over her mouth. Moxie remained tucked between her armpit and her forearm, glaring at the tall man with her small, black, beady eyes.

“Last night. His body was discovered by his cleaning lady, one Mrs. Ybarra. As I’ve heard, she was quite distraught.” There was only a glimmer of emotion this time. A small faint grin across his thin rosy lips.

“Jesus—what happened?”

“Suicide.”

“
Suicide?
”

“Mr. Butters hanged himself with a manila rope, one half inch thick. He tied it on the banister overlooking his living room. And then, supposedly, tossed himself over. Mrs. Ybarra came in through the front door at around six in the morning and
saw him
.”

“Oh—God…What about his son? His business is
Butters & Sons
, I’m assuming he’s got a kid or two, right?” Maggie was guessing. She couldn’t quite remember ever talking with Duke if he had kids or not.

The tall man, Eugene, glared with an air of nonchalant impudence, unsettling in the cruel grin spreading across his narrow well-groomed face, exposing finely pointed stained teeth. In the field, the clicking of locusts
(or are they cicadas?)
sung around them. But in a strange way, Maggie could swear the clinking was coming from the man in black suit.

“Dead as well, I’m afraid. Suicide, just like Duke. His youngest, Glenn, was found in his bathroom with his wrists slashed open. He bled out in minutes, or so I’ve been told. Mark, the oldest, was discovered in his garage. He’d left his truck running with the doors closed,” said Eugene turning toward the house.

“Jesus—” Maggie breathed, the news rushing over her like a freight train. She couldn’t be sure if it was empathy or sympathy. Again, she didn’t know Duke very well, or his boys, but in the minimal amount of time she did spend with him, she’d liked him right away. She could imagine probably liking his sons as well, had she’d had the chance to know them. But, now they’re gone. Dead. All suicides, as hard as it was to believe.

“Where are you going?” Maggie called out, noticing Eugene retreating toward the house, climbing the porch steps.

“You are still interested in the house, yes?” he asked, concise and cold as ever.

Maggie looked at him for a moment. Then she looked at Moxie grumbling in her arms. She thought of Hood and the asshole housing folks and the movers already on the way. She hadn’t expected this. She had expected Duke to be standing here showing her the place. And then the trip to Jotham proper, signing the deed. The loan was already set, the blood money spent, the check written with her husband’s blood that came with a neatly folded American flag some funeral detail officer handed her the day they buried him in the Houston National Cemetery.
What would Ricky do?
Would he even have thought about buying a place like this if I had bit the dust? Maybe, maybe not. Doesn’t matter, does it? He’s gone. I’m not. He left me here alone. Me and Moxie. Fuck ’em.