Raveling (58 page)

“You’ll never catch me,” he said back. “You will never fucking catch me, you piece of shit.”

“Pilot,” I said, “you have to let me explain.” I knew he would be out of breath soon. I knew he hadn’t exercised a day in
his life. “You don’t understand,” I said. “Let me tell you what happened.” We were nearing the path that led to the highway,
toward the tunnel, exactly where I knew he would run. “Pilot,” I begged, “
please
. Let me tell you what happened to her.” Which is when I saw him disappear into the opening. And when I followed him in, I
felt myself losing all reason, a numbness overtaking me, a physical absence, language itself leaving me, like it was escaping
through the pores of my skin, the sentences leaving my body through my hair follicles.
Pilot
, I wanted to say, but it was like I couldn’t remember my own brother’s name.

He was in the tunnel, my brother, and the water beneath us was frozen, and there were bits and pieces of things—wood, trash,
aluminum cans, cardboard boxes, an old packing blanket, what remained of the Tunnel Man’s effects—all caught in the ice. It
was animal-dark in here, but we could see each other, each of us silhouetted against an opening of the tube, with the grayish
starlight coming in from behind. I lost everything but my senses then, my eyesight sharpening. My hearing intensified. I could
listen to his breathing, heavy from running. I could even smell his sweat. Was there fear mixed in? I could make out his eyes,
and I could see that he could see mine. The instant froze like the water we stood on. One of us said the other’s name.

“Who do you think you are right now?” he said. But they were only sounds, meaningless noises erupting from his throat.

“Who do you think you are?” my brother asked. And I didn’t know what he meant.

“Right now. Who are you? Who the fuck—”

I’ll tear out your carotid artery
, I wanted to say,
with my bare hands
.

Can you love someone so much that you can see through his eyes, that—just for a fraction of an instant—you become him?

Can love blur life at the edges?

I didn’t know the answer. I didn’t know who I was.

“You have to listen to me,” he said. “Brother, you have to listen.
Please, please
listen.”

I stood at the opening of the tunnel and saw his body easing, his muscles relaxing, his head drooping, his chest heaving,
catching the cold air. I knew he was my brother, and I knew I was his. I knew only that.

“Do you remember pretending,” he said now, “pretending to be a wolf? Do you remember that?”

“It wasn’t pretending,” I said. I had found the words somewhere, like I had pulled them out of a well inside me.

“Do you remember
being
a wolf, then?”

“Yes,” I said. “I remember.” I closed my eyes. I remembered crawling through the fall leaves, baring my teeth, my knees in
the mud, the traps, the animals’ traps—

“Do you remember when that started?”

“After Fiona. It was—”

“No, it was before.”

I shook my head, eyes still closed. I could smell my own skin beneath these clothes. There
was
fear.

“It was before Fiona,” he said. “It was right from the beginning, right from the time anyone could ever remember.”

“No,” I said, “it was after Fiona. It was a very common childhood response—”

“Brother, you have to—”

“—a response to trauma, very common.”

“—to listen, please.
Please
.”

“I’m listening.”

“Pilot, Jesus Christ, Pilot, it was you. Don’t you get it?” I opened my eyes, shaking my head—not to say no, but as if to
get something off of me, as if I had been walking through the woods and felt a spider drop on my head. He was coming toward
me, feeling his way across the ice. “That night you, you freaked out, Pilot, you went fucking crazy. You were just a little
kid, I know, and that’s why you don’t remember, but that’s what—”

“That’s impossible.”

“—happened, you killed—”

“No,” I said.

“—her. You came and got the—”

“No.”

“—hunting knife and little brother—”

“There’s no way,” I said. “Because I—”

“—you cut her throat.”

“—remember.” I could hear my own breathing, loud. I could smell my own blood beneath my skin. I could feel my arteries pumping—

“You only think you’re sane, Pilot.”

—pumping my own blood. I could feel my bones wrapped inside my muscles. I leaned back against the curvature of the tunnel,
and my body slid onto the ice. Eric stepped toward me, his hand touching the curved wall of concrete to guide him.

“I found her,” Eric said. “That night I came home late from the party and found her body in the backyard, just there by the
trees, and, and, and I went and got Mom, I got Hannah, and we wanted to protect you, brother. We knew that if people found
out what happened, if the police knew what you did, you’d be in institutions for the rest of your life, and Mom, and Hannah,
she didn’t want that for you. I was just a kid, too, but, but neither did I, Pilot, neither did I.” He was
near me now, standing over me. “You have to understand that I loved you, that it was because—”

“Where did you put her?”

“—I loved you.” He sighed. “We put her in the garage, for a while, for a few years, anyway, and then—”

“She didn’t—I mean, didn’t she—”

“We embalmed her. I did, anyway—with formaldehyde from school.”

“How did you—what about all the blood?”

“That night I had to work quickly, and Mom wasn’t any help, you know. It all went down the drain in the laundry sink. I put
her body in there and did what I could to keep things clean, pouring bleach down after it, and wrapping her in as many plastic
trash bags as we had. I didn’t want there to be a smell.”

“And what about the knife,” I said, “and the sneakers?”

“I forgot them.” Eric slid down beside me. “I had left them by the patio that night, on the flagstones, and went out to get
them later, and then I just stashed them under the desk. And, and I guess you saw them there, and you didn’t remember what
happened, that’s all. You repressed it. You thought you were a dog.”

“The wolf boy.” It suddenly felt cold. I had been out in this weather all night, and only now did I feel the temperature.
I looked up at Eric. “She helped you?”