The Man Who Watched the World End (25 page)

Other than the table and bloody sheet, the rest of the garage looked normal. Their collection of camping gear was missing from one of the corners. The sleeping bags, tent, lights, and axe were all gone. It was safe to assume they took it all in case their SUV broke down and had to be ditched. A spare pillow had been left behind, but a cat or some mice had torn it apart. I assumed at first that it was random destruction before finding tiny bits of blood and bones and realizing a family of mice had made it their home before being ambushed by the cat. The constant reminders all around me made it impossible to forget that every living thing was one step away from being eaten by something else.

I opened the door leading from the garage to the house. A stench hit me. Even after putting the painter’s mask back on, the odor was overwhelming. I found myself gagging in the same hallway in which I had taken bottles of wine over for dinners. And to think I used to take my shoes off when they were wet to keep from tracking dirt into their house! It reminded me of the smell of lima beans when I was a little boy. As soon as I got a single whiff of them I was conditioned to gag because I knew that was what I would do when I put them in my mouth.

“Hello?” I said, even though I knew the house was empty. I don’t know what compelled me to say that other than dumb, old habits. a nice, quiet neighborhood

There were no sounds. Everything was still. With the blinds down I could see the dust floating in the air. Part of me expected a pack of German Shepherds to appear out of a bedroom doorway, but the house seemed free of wildlife. Like everything else in the neighborhood, it was a matter of time until the animals penetrated the walls and the Johnsons’ house became just another extension of the wilderness.

The kitchen left me as confused as the garage. A large butcher’s knife and a smaller serrated knife were in the sink, both covered with dried blood. The flies had long since feasted on anything of value. The only explanation I could think of was that the Johnsons cut packs of raw meat before leaving so they were assured of not running out before they got to New Orleans or Miami.

The living room carpet was also covered with blood.
As was the sofa. I started wondering if a band of murderers hadn’t made their way into our neighborhood and, left with the choice of two houses to pick from, randomly selected the Johnsons’ house to butcher everyone. Then the murderers had taken the Johnsons’ SUV and left. I kept that thought in mind until I got to the steps leading to the front door.

A note was there. Of course they would have thought I would enter through the front door. I picked up the piece of paper and mumbled the words out loud.

We’re very sorry for not saying goodbye, but we couldn’t stop by your house on the way out of the neighborhood. We knew you wouldn’t understand. We barely understand it ourselves. I know it’s impossible, but please don’t think any less of us. Times have been difficult on everyone, but tougher on some than on others. You always seemed to take everything in stride. We were always jealous of the way you made it seem easy to take care of Andrew. We always wondered how you did it.

PS: We thought about just burning the place down.

That was the entire note. I wished they had known how much I struggled to take care of Andrew by myself. One of the dinners together would have been better spent talking about how discouraged I got by growing older and not being able to take care of my brother as well as I used to. Maybe that would have changed things. Maybe they would have sympathized with the sadness and anxiety that comes from being forced to make every decision for yourself and for another person, a person who is always affected by your plans but never has a say in them.'>
I went to Mark’s bedroom. The drawers and closet were empty of clothes. I went to Mindy’s room. It was in the same condition. The only bedroom remaining belonged to the Block twins. At that point I still thought Mark’s note was apologizing for all of them leaving the neigh
borhood without saying goodbye.

Then I got to the last bedroom and saw the twin sisters. The girls were lying on their beds. I thought of them as girls, even though they were Andrew’s age, because I had known them for so long and because they had to be taken care of as though they were little girls. The blankets were gone from the beds. Only a thin sheet covered
each girl up to their shoulders. My hands involuntarily clenched. It was only then that I realized my knees and hands had been shaking ever since I’d entered the house.

Their skin was rotting. Maggots were slithering all over them, making it look like their flesh was twirling in small circles, a thin sheet of life draped over the remains of a person. Both twins were in the same condition. Seeing them made the smell even worse. It’s funny how that happens.

I gagged again. Positive I was going to throw up, I bent down and put my hands on my knees. Nothing came out. I still didn’t understand where all the blood had come from, so I took another step toward one of them—I couldn’t tell which because they looked as much alike as deteriorating corpses as they had when they were alive.

“You poor thing
,” I said to one of the bodies.

But when I took that step forward I must have stepped on the edge of the sheet because it tugged slightly against the body underneath it. I bumped against the bed frame. In the short moment it had taken me to forget I was an old, bumbling man, I quickly remembered. The Block’s head was jostled toward me when I bumped against the mattress and frame, causing it to turn to the side as if it were going to look at me. The momentum carried it even further, though, and before I knew what was happening, the head slid completely off the edge of the pillow and fell to the floor. It thudded against the hardwood like a coconut. I’m not even sure which curse words I yelled. The head ended up on its side, staring blankly at the wall across the room.

Everything made sense: the table in the garage with the bloody sheets, the knives in the kitchen sink, the note. I pulled the sheet away from the body to make sure. The girl was cut into pieces: foot to knee, knee to hip, torso, arms, head. Something must have made the Johnsons decide to move to one of the group communities. Maybe the Blocks were already sick at that point and the Johnsons didn’t know how to take care of them. Perhaps they didn’t want their Block sisters to suffer. One of the Block sisters could have already passed away and yelled, “April Fool!”

Whatever it was that happened, the Johnsons thought their Block sisters would be better off with a quiet death rather than struggling to continue. Once the decision was made, they must have thought it would give their sisters a more dignified burial if they could sleep in their beds one last time.
But how to get the bodies up the steps? Mark and Mindy were as old as I am. They would never, even as a team, be able carry the sisters up the steps. They had long since gotten into the habit of keeping their Block sisters downstairs on the sofas the same way I did with Andrew. One of them must have come up with the idea to cut the bodies into smaller pieces that could be carried more easily. Maybe the Blocks were already dead when they were cut to pieces, but maybe they were still alive, unable to cry out or ask why their brother and sister were doing this to them. Once upstairs, the bodies were reassembled. It would be important to Mark and Mindy to see their Block sisters look peaceful one last time. The look of serenity as the sisters lay on their own beds would give the Johnsons a sense of comfort.

Luggage and clothes must have been filling the backseat of their SUV as they drove away that night
, not bodies. My mind saw whatever it had hoped to see.

I threw up then. The urge came over me before I had a chance to take off the breathing mask. The cotton protector around my nose and mouth filled with vomit before the rubber band broke. The mask, along with my throw-up, splashed all over the floor like a carelessly tied water balloon. Vomit covered my face, making me want to throw up again. I wiped it away with my hand, but chunks w
ere still in my mouth and nose.

The Block sister’s head was at my feet. It too was now covered in my puke. I gagged on my way down the steps and out the front door. I stumbled and choked the entire way back to my house, not a single thought given to being attacked by animals.

The first thing I did was get myself cleaned up. Without the smell of vomit following me everywhere, I went and sat next to Andrew. I stayed by his side the entire night. All night, there was only one thought that circled in my head—what could make them decide that was their best course of action? Until then they had been no different than me. Every time we sat down for a dinner together they understood my goals and the things that worried me. I understood the same things about them. And yet, when the time came, they gave up and decided enough was enough. Neither of them had ever made the slightest comment, even a joke in passing, to hint this might happen. There was never a Freudian slip or a troubled look to tell me they were capable of killing their Block sisters and leaving the neighborhood.

I thought about going back down the street, picking the head off the bedroom floor, and putting it back on the mattress where it belonged, but I couldn’t bring myself toq. aof leave my house again that day. It was sunny and bright outside the following day. The light was rude; anything other than rain clouds seemed inappropriate. I couldn’t bring myself to open my front door that day either. When I did eventually go outside it was only to walk around my lawn in circles. The smell, even though it had to be out there still, no longer registered with me, and I wondered how much of it had been real and how much my mind had exaggerated.

How did the Johnsons come to their decision? How can I ensure I don’t go down a path that leads to the same conclusion? I’m a normal guy. They were normal people. Will illogical thoughts start creeping in until I pay them too much attention and end up doing something I would never have thought possible? Is this what happens when you’re isolated from other people for too long?

My goal is to go back down the street and burn the entire house down. I’m rational enough to realize the wind could catch the flames and set the next house on fire, and then the next house, and then the next, until suddenly my home is on fire too. Andrew would be burned alive. If that happened, I would be okay with it because I would be there next to him. At least I would be with my brother at the end. At least Andrew would have me sitting on the sofa with my arm around him.

It didn’t dawn on me earlier, when I had these thoughts, that this line of thinking could have been exactly how the Johnsons morphed from normal people to monsters.

I made my way down the street again today, this time to do what the Johnsons should have done. The jug of gasoline in the wheel barrel was part of my final reserves from the days when I thought I might still leave
Camelot. It sloshed the entire way down the street as if complaining that it didn’t want to be used for this purpose. A book of matches was kept safe in my pocket. If the animals decided to attack me, my only defense would be splashing gas in their general direction. A large dog watched me from down the street. It must have sensed I was on a mission because it seemed nervous and chose not to approach.

I only managed to circle the garage, front porch, and the side of the house before the gas was gone. I left the plastic container on the ground where some of the gasoline had pooled. The book of matches gave a scratch when I rubbed one of the sticks against it'aspsp es side. A small flame appeared. Then the line of gasoline burst into flames. The fire, unlike everything I had seen in movies, was slow to spread. At first I thought it might put itself out. Hollywood had taught me the house would explode into a ball of fire with me ducking for cover.

I knew I could have burned the house down more easily if I went inside and poured the gas there, but nothing could have made me go inside again. Eventually, the flames got bigger, crawled up the side of the house. Happy with my work, I walked back down the street, to my home and to Andrew. From my porch, I watched the fire spread. It only took a couple of minutes before the house was completely engulfed in flames. After half an hour it burned to the ground. The other nearby houses never caught fire. No sirens sounded. No fire trucks arrived. No other neighbors came out of their houses to see what was happening. I went back inside after the house collapsed on itself. The fire kept burning for another three hours after that. It is still smoldering.

As happens so frequently these days, the Labrador arrived on my patio again this afternoon. It sat on the other side of the door as though expecting to be let inside. Its scarred flanks, a reminder of what it does when it isn’t relaxing on my deck, were highlighted pink under the sunlight. As I stood by the glass door the dog panted and stared at me the same way Oscar used to when he had finished doing his business and wanted to come back inside. My initial reaction was to do just that, to open the door and let it in. Anything else seemed neglectful of the dog’s wellbeing.

I’m not sure why I feel like its health should fall on my shoulders. Minus the scars
on its side, it looks like an animal I would take for walks, let sleep at the foot of my bed. But it comes from the forest, a grey wolf stuck in the adorable yellow costume of man’s best friend.

“What’s it like out there in the woods?”
I asked it. I gave a pause for a response that would never come. “Do you run into a lot of bears out there?” Another brief pause, another non-response. “If I didn’t think you’d bite me, you could come inside and get some food.”