Songs of the Dead (23 page)

Jack is dreaming about boundaries. He is dreaming about God. He is dreaming about God telling Israelites—His Chosen People—to kill women who have had intercourse with men. He is dreaming about intercourse. He is dreaming about men having intercourse with women. He is dreaming about Israelites killing women who've had intercourse. He is dreaming about God telling Jack—one of His Chosen People—that he must do the same.

Jack knows why. Even in this dream he knows why. He has always known why. It all comes down to boundaries. Who has them, and who does not. Virgins have intact boundaries. Those boundaries must be broken. And when those boundaries are broken, the women must be killed. Why? Because their boundaries have been broken. Because the women have been contaminated.

So many people think God hates women. But Jack is dreaming of God, and God is dreaming through Jack, and Jack knows the truth. God hates women, all right, but God especially hates men. Why else do you think God wants men to kill women who have had sex with men? Isn't it obvious? The women have been contaminated. By who? By men.

Jack stirs, wakes up enough to check whether Missy is making any sounds, then falls back into his dreams, of God, of women, of men, of hatred, of boundaries breaking like glass.

Colleen is thinking about the old Jesuit saying: if you put yourself in a position of prayer long enough, you might start feeling like praying. She has tried. She has tried that so many times. And she is going to try it again tonight. That's why she's driving these long hours. She wishes she would have left earlier, so she would have arrived before Jack went to bed. She would have walked into the house, not said a word, and led him into the bedroom. She would have taken off his clothes, and then hers. She would have pulled him on top of her, and she would have opened wide.

That is exactly why she didn't leave earlier in the day. That's why she dawdled. That's why she took her mother grocery shopping, and that's why she filled up her parents' car with gas. All so that through no fault of her own she would get there too late to do any of this. Jack will be asleep, and she will wake him with this offer. With any luck he will be too tired to take her up on it.

She knows she shouldn't think that way, but she does.

Colleen pulls into the driveway, opens the garage door, drives in. She parks, takes out her keys, picks up her purse, and opens her car door. She'll bring in the rest of her things in the morning. She gets out, walks around the front of Jack's truck, then hesitates when she notices dark droppings on the concrete floor. She continues to the door, opens it, sees a feathery stain of what looks like blood on the jamb. She looks more closely. It is blood.

Jack must have cut himself.

She steps inside. Jack left the door to the basement open, left the light on over the stairs. She calls softly to him, waits, listens carefully. She thinks she hears breathing. Maybe he fell asleep down there. She's going to go check. She takes one step, then hears his familiar slight snoring from their bedroom. She moves back up, turns off the light. The stairs don't go completely dark, though, as he also evidently left on the light in the basement. She wonders for a moment if someone is downstairs. But then she hears her husband again, and knows it must have been the wind.

She stands at the top of the stairs thinking about going to turn off the light and to check if there is anyone there, when suddenly the full weight of the night comes down on her. She's too tired. She'll do it in the morning.

Jack hears a woman say his name. “Jack,” she says. “Jack.”

He opens his eyes, sees a woman silhouetted against the light now on in the hallway. He recoils. “You!” he says.

“Jack,” she says.

How does Missy know my name?
He slides across the bed away from her. Finally his eyes focus. It's Colleen. She's naked. He says, “What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to surprise you.” She runs her hands down her body. He presumes she presumes this is sexy.

“Why?”

“I've missed you so much.”

“You should have called.”

She stops. “What's wrong?”

She stops. “What's “Nothing.”

“You don't seem happy to see me.” She steps slightly away, changes the subject: “You left the light on in the basement.”

“No, I didn't.”

“Yes.”

“No. Maybe. I don't remember.”

“Do you want me to turn it off?”

“No!” he exclaims.

“What?”

“Leave it till morning.”

“What's wrong?” she asks again.

“Nothing.”

She scratches the end of her nose, says, “How's your cut?”

“What?”

Her voice softens, and he can tell she's trying to recapture a mood: “I'll kiss your cut, make it better.”

Now Jack frowns. “Kiss my cut?”

Did you cut yourself?”

“No.” He thinks. “Yes.”

“Where?”

This isn't happening
, he thinks. But it is, and every answer is making it worse. He reaches out, takes her hand, squeezes, holds it tight. He thinks. Finally he says, “You frightened me.”

“I'm sorry.”

“I was dreaming.” He thinks as quickly as he can. He says, “I was dreaming you were gone. I've missed you so much. I was dreaming you were . . . you were kidnapped.”
Dumb
, he thinks.
Why did
he say that?

“I was? By who?”

Be smart, Jack
. “It's horrible. You were kidnapped and you were happy because you didn't want to come back to me. You wanted to stay with the other man, the man who took you away.” He searches her face, thinks he sees a flicker of recognition, realizes he's succeeded in shifting the focus off himself.

She leans toward him, puts her free hand around his shoulders, hugs him. “I don't want anyone else.”

He hugs her back. She kisses his cheek, his chin, his lips. She pulls slightly away, starts to unbutton his pajamas. He helps her remove his clothes, helps her into bed, and rolls on top of her, the whole time glad his wife is no longer asking questions, and the whole time hoping Missy doesn't make a sound.

Afterwards, and after Colleen has fallen asleep, Jack gets up. The whole time he thought not of his wife, of course, but of Missy, wondering what he would say and what he would do if she woke up and moaned. Twice he thought she did, but each time he was wrong. He made sure things with Colleen were loud and they were quick. He was glad Colleen was tired and fell asleep almost instantly.

He goes downstairs. Missy still breathes. He dare not wake her. He dare not leave her. When he was inside his wife he figured out what he would do. He puts a tarp down in the bathroom. Then he quickly kills Missy and carries her to the tarp, wraps her up. He picks up the plastic he'd laid down to protect against bloodstains, urine, and feces, folds it, puts it in with the body. He shuts the door. He can't come up with a reason to barricade the door, so he'll just have to get up when Colleen does and steer her away. He goes upstairs, into the garage, looks at the floor, sees the spots. He goes back into the kitchen, picks a steak knife from a drawer, holds it in his right hand, and touches it to the third finger of his left. He goes to cut himself, but just can't do it. No matter how he tries he can't force himself. He doesn't want the pain. Thinking about his own blood he almost passes out. So instead he puts away the knife, puts water and a little bleach on a rag, and cleans the spots on the floor. Finally done, he goes back to bed. He tells himself to awaken if he hears Colleen stir, then like Colleen, falls asleep almost immediately.

Jack awakens with a start. It's still dark. He can't keep the body in the house. He wouldn't be able to survive the morning making small talk with Colleen, each moment fearing she might go downstairs, go into the bathroom. What would she do? Would she scream? Would she look at Jack with disgust? Would she call the police? Jack knows he couldn't kill her. Or at least he doesn't think he could kill her. What would he do if she picked up the phone? He'd rip it from the wall. Then what? He'd cuff her down, hold her till she calmed, and then he would explain it to her. He would explain it to her fifty times if he had to, explain it to her till she understood. And he knows she would understand. Maybe it would even draw them closer.

He stops. He thinks about it. Maybe he should leave the body there, let her find it. That would force the issue. No more hiding. He could explain it to her and she would understand.

No. It's not worth the chance. What if she doesn't understand? He would lose her. The risk is too great.

He slowly lifts off the covers, slides his feet out and onto the floor, sits upright, stands, waits, listens. There's no change in Colleen's breathing. He makes his way to a dresser, soundlessly opens a drawer, pulls out a pair of sweats. Then to the closet, where on the left side he finds an old t-shirt. He carries them from the room, shuts the bedroom door without latching it, turns on the hall light, changes, and takes his pajamas to the laundry room to put into a partially full basket. He listens again.

Nothing.

He goes to the front door, puts on an old pair of shoes. He's not wearing socks or underwear, but there's nothing he can do about that. Then to the garage, where he opens the rear of the truck. He goes to the kitchen, grabs his keys, puts them in his pocket. After that it's down the stairs and into the bathroom. He lifts her. Now's the hard part. He walks back up the stairs, listens carefully, goes back down, picks up the body and carries it step by slow, heavy step up the stairs. By the top, his arms and lower back ache. He carries her to the garage, puts her in the back of the truck, softly closes the rear. He unhitches the automatic garage door opener, opens the door manually, gets partway in the truck, puts it in neutral, and rolls the truck down the driveway and into the street, where finally he starts it.

He doesn't know where to take her. He can't take her to the quarry, to where he grabbed Nika, or to any of the places he dumped the others who came before: they're all too far away. He needs to get back home as quickly as possible: he has no idea how to explain his absence should Colleen awaken.

He decides to drive to the park near the river beneath the interstate. He twists through paved roads to get there, never rolling through stop signs, never speeding. He finds the park, turns in.

From here on the roads are dirt. If he sees anyone, he'll obviously go elsewhere. Nothing. He finds a secluded spot, stops, turns off the domelight, grabs the maglight from the glovebox, gets out, walks to the back. He can't leave her here: the dirt holds perfect impressions of his tires and footprints. He looks around, sees a very small road off to the side.

Not knowing what else to do he gets back in, starts the truck, turns it into the road. Thick underbrush fills in either side. He wonders if there's a turnaround.

And then the road ends. Jack laughs out loud. Perfect. He's on a ledge over the river. He couldn't have planned this better, so long as the water is deep enough to carry her away. No one will know where she was dumped, which means no one will know where to search for tire tracks. He gets out, walks to the overlook, shines the light down. It's about ten feet. He can't tell how deep the water is, but it will have to do.

Back to the truck. He pulls out the tarp, carries the load to the edge, sets it on the ground, stands on one end of the tarp, and pushes the body over. The tarp unwinds as the body rolls down the steep slope until the body spins free and into the water with a splash.

God is good. Already the body drifts into the main current, floating feet first, hair trailing behind, spread like a fan.

This was the perfect place
, Jack thinks as he drives back home.
I'll have to use this place again and again
.

He turns off the engine, coasts up the driveway and into the garage, stops, puts the truck in gear, and engages the emergency brake. He gets out, shuts the garage door, reconnects it. Then he goes to the door to the house, opens it, listens. Nothing. Back at the rear of the truck, he takes off his shoes and clothes, puts them in the back with the bloody tarp that had been Missy's shroud. He'll get rid of them soon. He covers them with another tarp to keep Colleen from casually observing them.

Naked, he goes in to the house, into the laundry room. He quietly washes his hands, puts on his pajamas, and heads to the bedroom. The door is still shut, still not latched. He turns off all the lights, softly opens the door, and creeps inside.

Colleen still breathes heavily. He makes it to the bed, starts to get in.

She stirs, says sleepily, “Where'd you go?”

He keeps his voice from showing fear: “I used the toilet.”

She gives a moan of sleepy understanding.

“You were right,” he says.

“Yes?” Still very sleepy.

“I left the basement light on. I turned it off. It's all taken care of now.”

“That's nice.”

He crawls in, spoons behind her, and soon she is back asleep.

The next morning, over breakfast, Colleen asks Jack about him leaving on the lights overnight, something she's never known him to do. He says he was tired. She understands. She can see this inside her head. She sees Jack sitting downstairs—doing what, it never occurs to her to wonder—growing more tired by the moment until he staggers upstairs under the weight, not of a dead woman—for why would this possibly occur to her?—but of fatigue, and simply forgets to turn off the lights.

Sheepishly she mentions hearing someone downstairs, hearing someone breathing. He responds by telling her how grateful and happy he is that she drove all the way late at night just to be with him. He's sure that's what caused her to hear that: it was fatigue and the lingering echo inside her head of tires on asphalt, of the engine's hum. It's an interesting and common phenomenon, he says, almost like hearing the wind or the ocean in a seashell, or your ears ringing after a loud noise: if you drive long enough, your ears play tricks on you. Mentally she puts herself again in that position, and the sound she hears no longer resembles human breathing at all, no longer resembles anything but tires, a car, her own fatigue. Jack's right, as he so often is.