Dystopyum (The D-ot Hexalogy Book 1) (14 page)

He in fact tightened at her touch.
She puts me through hell for a solid
month, and I’m supposed to act like everything is normal?
Then he
realized what he had just thought. The horrible month she had subjected
him to was not remotely close to the month of hell in the torture room she
had experienced.
Still —

Martha sensed the obvious emotional distance that Griswolt had. It
did not dissuade her. She smiled pleasantly and said, “I’ll go back to my
cooking. You two can have fun in here.”

They both watched this new person walk out of the living room and
into the kitchen. Griswolt looked as if he were in a trance. He kept staring
towards the kitchen after she left. He looked confused.

Jan silently watched the scene, studying his father’s reaction. “I think
she’s getting better,” he offered to his dad.
Griswolt blinked and shook his head, as if Jan just woke him up.
“We’ll see, he said.” It was too good to believe.
Nobody changes
overnight,
he thought to himself.
The dinner was actually quite nice. Martha tried to make small talk,
but Griswolt just passively went along with it.
Something’s going to go
wrong,
Griswolt kept thinking to himself.
After dinner, while still at the table, Martha brought out the yama
wine, chilled and ready to go.
Griswolt felt like he was being trapped.
Maybe she wants to get me
drunk so she can kill me,
he thought.
Martha could see that she was getting nowhere with Griswolt.
I know
what he likes,
she thought, and she got up to rub his shoulders from
behind. “Here dear, you look so tense. Let me —”
Griswolt jumped out of his chair as she put her hands to his upper
shoulders to massage them. “Don’t! Just don’t,” he barked, shaking his
head. He backed away from the table, and moved to another part of the
kitchen. He looked at her in confusion and anger. “How — how do I
know you won’t stab me?”
Martha looked at him, and was tempted to respond in kind.
Because if
I wanted to stab you I would have done it already, you idiot!
These
thoughts and others came immediately to her mind, but she was keeping
them to herself now.
I won’t let my dragon rise,
she thought to herself.
Martha took a deep breath, and said, “I’m feeling much better, Griswolt,
and I wanted to share it with you.”
Griswolt believed her for a moment, and then spat out, “Share it with
yourself! I’ve been living without it for a month now. I don’t need it now,
and I don’t need you!” He left the kitchen in a huff, and went back to the
bedroom, as he had not changed out of his uniform yet.
As soon as he was out of the kitchen, Martha found herself fuming.
“Of all the ungrateful — I
should
have stabbed him,” she said, gritting her
teeth. She found herself looking at a knife on the table, and got a mental
flash of grabbing it, and running into the bedroom to stick it into
Griswolt. Then she realized the dragon had indeed been raised.
Shit! I’ve
lost it. Help me, please,
she prayed silently. The dragon started to subside.
It was then that Martha realized,
Griswolt has a dragon of his own.
She muttered, “With what I’ve put him through this month —”
She looked at Jan, who had been observing the entire episode. “Jan,
what do we do about Daddy’s dragon?” The absurdity that she was asking
a child crossed her mind. “I can’t tell him about love, so what do I do?”
She was not really expecting an answer, but she received one.
Jan looked at her thoughtfully. “Dad’s been pushing his dragon down,
because if his dragon rose, you both would be crazy, and something even
worse would happen here.” He paused to think and said, “Now that your
dragon is smaller, his dragon can rise without fear of disaster. His dragon
can get even now.”
Martha stared at Jan in amazement. “How do you come up with these
things?” she asked incredulously.
Jan shrugged his shoulders, “It just makes sense. I see it,” he said. He
went back to picking at what was left on his plate.
Martha studied him. He seemed to know what he was saying.
I took
his advice, and it helped me today,
she thought. “Do you have any idea
about how we can bring Daddy’s dragon down?” she asked.
Jan thought about it. “Love,” he said. “You can use love for Daddy,
since he can’t use it for himself.” He chewed on another bite. “It won’t
help right away, but it will help.” Jan mused a bit more, and then he said,
“His dragon will come back at you at first. Then he’ll stop the dragon,
because he really loves you.” He looked at Martha and smiled. “He’ll love
you again, and his dragon will get weaker.”
Martha was sitting with her mouth agape, in a daze. She gazed at Jan,
who was still nibbling, wondering. He made so much sense — it seemed
so simple. Was it true?
Am I just listening to the simple ramblings of a
child? It seems so right. What else can I do?
“Jan, I need you to help me with this, OK?”
Jan looked up at her, “Sure Mama, I already know what I need to do.”
“What’s that, dear?” Martha asked.
“Give him love,” Jan said, and he smiled at her, “Just like you.”
Martha’s heart warmed. “You are one amazing little boy,” she said
with a smile as she tenderly rubbed his crest.
Jan looked pleased. “I’m going to go see Dad,” he said, and he
hopped off his chair, and went back to their bedroom.

he past year had gone by much too quickly for Rebecca and
Jan. Martha had a difficult time of her own, still upset over
Rebecca’s recent departure.

It was a day off work. Martha was in the living room,
listening to some NOV sanctioned music on the radio. She did not care to
expend the energy on the music player. Jan was at school. He would not
be seeing Rebecca there anymore. Martha sighed one of many since
Rebecca’s departure a couple of weeks ago. Jan was still very depressed
at the loss of his best friend. Rebecca’s mother Salom had returned home
a week ago, but Martha was giving Salom time to settle before she
visited. To be truthful, she resented Salom for Rebecca’s unfortunate
departure.

“Salom, what —” She could not think of the words — no one was
there to hear them anyway. She tried a few endings — “why would you
come back, knowing what was going to happen to Rebecca?” That was a
good one, but a line she would never use. “What kind of person are you
now? How sane are you now?” Martha was emotionally drained from
attempting to sort out the meaning of a little girl that she dearly loved,
being sent off to — God only knows. She would have done anything to
keep Rebecca with her own family at her young age, but NOV law
prohibited it.

Then there was Hais. He had to make her cry on her last night home.
What a bastard, Martha thought. She remembered Salom again, now stuck
with Hais.
I really should do something. After all, it’s been a week since
she returned.

Martha brightened up with a simultaneous statement, “I know! I’ll
bake a cake, and invite her over. I’m sure she’s ready to get out of there
for a bit.” She had just purchased the latest cake mix that had a new
highly refined yama fraction. It was supposed to produce the lightest and
fluffiest cake.

After preparing it, Martha spent the rest of the morning and early
afternoon cleaning while the cake was baking in the oven. Hais was not
home, so this would be a good time to go over to Salom’s house. When
the cake cooled down and was finished, Martha went over to see if Salom
might want to come out. She went to Salom’s door, and knocked. She
waited for a while, and knocked again. There was no answer. “Salom, it’s
me, Martha!” she called out towards the door.
Do I hear something
inside?
Then she heard footsteps coming up the stairs. Salom opened the
door.

Martha was prepared for something bad, but nothing like this. It was
not Salom. The wretch in front of her did not even seem to recognize
Martha. “Salom, it’s me, Martha,” she said with care.

Salom stood there, staring at Martha’s chest. “Martha?” she asked as
though to herself.
Martha bent down to meet Salom’s gaze, and with a smile said, “I
wanted you to come over to my house. I’ve baked a cake for you.”
Salom’s face gave way to a slight smile. “Cake?” She took a furtive
glance at Martha’s eyes. “For me?” Then she looked at Martha again,
with heartbroken eyes, and said, “Martha?” Salom was bent over, as if she
was ducking, and she was covered with scars upon scars. Her weight was
that of a child.
A noisy four-contiss cargo wagon came by, and it startled Salom. She
showed a fleeting look of dread at the loud sound as it passed.
Martha reached out to hold Salom’s hand. Salom began to pull back,
but Martha insisted, and Salom did let her hold her hand. “Why don’t you
come out of the house for a while? You’ve been in there for a week now,
you know.”
“It’s been the best week of my life,” Salom said slowly.
Martha could hardly imagine a week with Hais being the best week of
her life. “What about Hais?” she said.
Salom’s face got ugly. “I’ll kill that keesh if he touches me!” she
shouted. She got into an aggressive posture, with her hands semiclenched, claws at the ready.
Martha thought to herself,
Well, I guess that answers that question.
“So come over, please?” she asked with a charming smile.
Salom looked at her, then at Martha’s house.
“Is there anyone over there now?” she asked.
“No,” Martha replied.
Salom looked deep in thought. “Ok, I’ll come over.”
Salom then followed Martha over to her house. Salom was lifeless in
her walk, and did not bother to cover her scarred crest with a hood or
scarf, as she had always done before. When they arrived, Salom was keen
to look around at first. She acted as if she believed someone was hiding
somewhere there. Martha had decided to not bring up the prison at all.
She tried to lift Salom’s spirits, but it was a difficult task. She could not
talk about prison, or Jan, or Rebecca, so she talked about Griswolt, and
then asked about Hais. “So how is Hais treating you?” Martha asked.
Once again, Salom instantly changed. “Hais? I’ll kill that stick!”
Well, I guess Hais is definitely off limits, Martha thought.
Just then, Jan came home from school. He would come home from
his new school about thirty minutes before his mother, so there was no
more need for daycare. When the door opened upstairs, it made Salom
jump, and she went into a stiff defensive posture, still sitting at the
kitchen table.
Jan came romping down the stairs as usual, but stopped cold when he
caught sight of Salom’s intense stare focused directly on him. He walked
down the last few steps more carefully. She looked scary. “Hello, Salom,”
he said, testing her out.
“What’s that doing here?” Salom shrieked, looking frightened and
cornered.
Jan stopped dead in his tracks. He looked at Martha, who defensively
moved in between him and the raving eyes of Salom.
Martha was startled by Salom’s sudden change from bad to worse.
I’ve never seen a look like that,
she thought.
“Salom!” Martha said with a raised voice, “You are not in prison
anymore! You can relax.”
Salom turned her attention to Martha, and with an incredulous look,
said, “Relax? I’ll never relax again as long as I live! And it’s all because
of those,” she spat, pointing past Martha at Jan.
Jan was still standing there, at the entrance of the kitchen. He knew he
was safe with his mom there, but wasn’t sure whether to continue through
the kitchen or not.
“Come on, Salom. It’s not the children’s fault. It’s the stupid laws we
have,” Martha countered, trying to bring some logic to the situation.
Salom took her gaze away from the direction of Jan, and worked on
forming a smile on her face. She looked at Martha, and said, “You’re
right. You were always right.” She kept the smile frozen on her face, and
turning back to Jan, said in a syrupy sweet voice, “It’s all right, Jan. You
surprised me, that’s all. Why don’t you come closer, so I can get a good
look at you?”
Jan gave Martha a skeptical look, and really did not want to get any
closer to this crazy lady. He just wanted to get around her, so he could get
to the stairs that went down to his bedroom.
Martha was thinking about how to handle this, when Salom, whose
eyes were riveted on Jan, said sweetly again, “Come here, boy. Have a
seat on Auntie Salom’s lap, and let me take a good look at how big and
handsome you are now.” Her voice became very high pitched at the end
of her sentence, and was the definition of creepy.
Martha was obviously concerned. She said, “Wait, Jan.” She looked
at Salom and said, “Salom, I want to help you, but I don’t think you’re
ready for children yet.”
Salom looked pleadingly at Martha, “I just want to hold him, I just—”
Martha interrupted, and said, “I don’t think Jan wants to do that right
now, Salom. Why don’t we give him, and you, more time?”
Salom’s face became contorted. She boiled at Martha with insane
rage, and started screaming, “You’re love-lovers! I know it!” Then she
lowered her voice, and repeated, “I know it.” She glared at Jan. “I’ll
report the both of you love-lovers. You’ll both fry!” Then she started
laughing hysterically. “You’re going to fry!”
Martha panicked, “We are not love-lovers anymore! Get out! Get the
hell out of here!” She pounded her fists on the kitchen table in right front
of Salom, and Salom cowered.
“I said get out!” Martha roared as she grabbed Salom’s blouse by the
shoulder and lifted her out of her chair. “I want you out now!”
Salom gave a shriek as if she was injured. Martha, undeterred, escorted her up the stairs and out of the house.
When Martha came back downstairs, she found that Jan was still
standing in the kitchen. “Come over here with me,” she said to Jan, while
motioning towards the table. When he came over they both had a seat and
she said, “I want you to listen very carefully to me.”
Jan recognized her grave expression, and was paying attention.
“Jan, you must stay away from Salom,” Martha said, tapping her
thick, light red polished fingerclaws on the table.
“I don’t want to be around her anyway,” said Jan.
“No, Jan. It’s more important than that. She can’t think right now.
She may try to hurt you, so it’s important that you do not trust her. Don’t
go into her house, even if she says she needs help. And lock the door
behind you when you come home from school, all right?”
Jan promised that he would. After that, he went downstairs to change
out of his school clothes.
Later, Martha told Griswolt about Salom, and Griswolt was concerned as well. They agreed that until Salom returned to an ordinary life,
she was not to be trusted.
Jan, on the other hand, was not very concerned. He did take precautions, and always locked the front door when he came home, but that was
about all he needed to do. Over the next few weeks, he had other things
on his mind. One of those things was a new kid that just moved back into
the school district. He heard that his name was Barab, and that he picked
on smaller kids when he was living here before. Barab was two years
older, but had been held back in school twice. This new kid had been
targeting Jan’s unusual crest. Today, while in the school’s cafeteria, he
did it again. Barab laughed at Jan, calling him a clown-freak.
Jan did not know how to take this new kid. He had become accustomed to receiving simple stares from other children and adults. Once Jan
was with the same class for a while, the kids would stop paying attention
to his crest. He could only hope that the new kid would stop, too. He
noticed that Barab was really limping on his bad leg today.
Just home from school, as Jan opened the refrigerator — he heard
something in the hallway. He turned to see a shadow coming his way and
his heart jumped and started racing at what he saw. It was Salom, coming
into the kitchen. He looked for an escape and ran into the living room,
shouting, “How did you get in here?”
Salom followed him, smiling with incongruently hateful eyes. “I
found Rebecca’s keee-eee-eey,” she answered in a screechy high voice.
As soon as she said that, she got a forlorn look to her face, as if she had
lost something. “Rebecca,” she said into the air. She looked at Jan, “Do
you have Rebecca?”
Jan had run to hide behind the sofa once again and yelled, “No! Rebecca went away! Go away!”
Salom became more confused. She said, “Rebecca? Rebecca, come
out of there!” Then she proceeded to pull the sofa away from the wall. Jan
tried to get away, but she was able to grab him. Skinny as she was, she
was still much bigger than Jan. She was holding him from behind,
screaming, “Stand still!”
Jan stomped on her right foot with his boot, and she yelped and loosened her grip. Jan ran through the kitchen and down the hallway to his
parents’ bedroom.
Salom immediately went after him, but stopped in the kitchen. “Here,
this will do,” she said to herself as she took hold of a heavy meattenderizing hammer. “Rebecca! Come here, Mama will punish you if you
don’t come —” she called out, now making her way down the hallway to
the bedroom door that Jan had locked. She started banging on the
lightweight door with the hammer.
Jan was terrified, and had gone to hide under the bed.
What am I
going to do?
he asked himself fearfully.
A sword!
He found a short sword
of Griswolt’s sitting next to a metal stick. He grabbed the sword with both
hands, the tip up in front of his eyes, and waited under the bed.
Bang! Bang! Salom was using the big black hammer to break through
the door. In short time, she had a big enough hole to reach in and unlock
the door. Once in, she started looking for Jan. “Rebecca,” she said in a
stern tone, come out right now!” Then her voice became eerily sweeter,
“It’s time for your punishmeeeee-ee-eent.” She went around the room,
checking the closet, and then she turned and looked at the bed. Salom got
on her hands and knees, and saw Jan under the bed, sword in hand.
Jan was alarmed when her eyes met his. He displayed the sword
defiantly and yelled, “Stay away! You’re crazy! I’m not Rebecca — I’m
Jan!”
Salom crawled over to the foot of the bed, and swung the hammer at
his feet, keeping away from the sword. Jan was kicking at her, and his
bootlace became caught on the hammer. In a flash, she yanked hard on
the hammer, pulling his foot out from under the bed. She grabbed his foot
and pulled him out violently. Before Jan could react, Salom was able to
jump on him, snatching the sword from him, then throwing it behind her.
Jan fought, but she had him. He was struggling to get away. “Let me
go!” he yelled, futily.
Salom flipped him over on his back, and quickly sat on his chest.
“Now I’ve got you, you bad girl,” she laughed with an evil grin and
glistening eyes.
Jan froze, eyes wide in terror as she lifted the hammer high, focusing
on his forehead, and said, “You need a scar like mine to straighten you
out,” and suddenly her expression changed. It changed to one of shock.
The hammer fell dead out of her hands, bouncing off the floor right next
to Jan’s head.
It was then that Jan saw the sword tip extruding from her abdomen,
and blood started spilling out from the spot. As she slumped, he saw
Griswolt on his hands and knees, eyes wide open. His look was fierce.
“Dad!” Jan yelled in wonder.
“Fucking bitch!” Griswolt barked, and he got up and kicked her dying
body off Jan. He turned his attention to his son. “Jan, are you all right?
What did she do?”
“I thought it was over, I was dead!” Jan got up and wrapped his arms
around Griswolt tighter than he ever had before. “Thank you, thank you,
thank you!”
Griswolt was only now coming to grips, and the whole thing was
dawning on him. He said, “It’s a miracle. My boss sent me home early
today — I was the only one.”
He paused, surveying the scene. “We need to call the police and
report this,” Griswolt said. “Let’s get you out of here.” He looked down at
Salom and shaking his head remarked, “We’re never going to get that
blood stain out of the carpet.”
They left the bedroom as it was, and Griswolt called the police.