Dead Souls (22 page)

Judson took a quick sip of coffee, paused, then leaned forward and clasped his hands together. "Johnny…this is all going to come as a shock to you, but I feel it's best that I come right out and tell you." He took a deep breath, and at this moment Johnny imagined Judson telling him that he was going to die of some form of incurable cancer, and that he had only ten days to spend his newfound fortune before dropping dead. But as Johnny realized how foolish that contemplation was—considering that Judson was a lawyer and not a doctor—Judson pinned his gaze and said, "Johnny Petrie is not your birth-given name. Your real name is Bryan Conroy. Benjamin Conroy was your father. And you are the sole living heir to his estate."

Johnny froze for a moment, then placed his coffee and bagel on the desk, his interest in food instantly diminished. His hands started shaking, and he could feel his heart-rate speeding up. He sat back, feeling a unique level of fear that was both indistinct and precise, as though he were engaged in a dream, stripped of his clothes and vulnerable in some strange public forum.

"Johnny, I want you to know that I'm here to help you, that it's my job to see you are rightfully taken care of in the eyes of the law. Benjamin Conroy was my client, and I've been paid to make certain his will is properly executed. I assure you that every last detail will be thoroughly outlined for you so that you may understand everything correctly."

Again Johnny thought of his mother. Mary Petrie. Formerly Mary Conroy. And again he wondered if she were lying in her hospital bed, praying to the good Lord Jesus Christ to heal her of her ails, all the while looking for Ed or Johnny to appear at the door and take her home. Then he thought:
Has she been released? Is she now home in the apartment, passed out on the floor beneath Ed's hanging body?

Ed Petrie:
not
his father.

He looked at Judson and asked, "What about Mary? Is she my real mother?"

Without pause, Judson answered, "Mary Petrie is your aunt. Benjamin Conroy's sister. Your real mother's name was Faith Conroy.

Johnny clutched his chest with the tips of his fingers, his heart seemingly attempting to leap into his throat, his scar tingling on the surface of its tireless beat. "No…no way. There must be some sort of mistake. I mean…I have memories of my parents since I was little, three, maybe four years old."

Judson grinned solemnly, then opened his desk drawer and brought out a photograph. He showed it to Johnny. What he saw in the lawyer's hand was a dull color portrait of a man and a woman. They were dressed nicely (Sunday wear, Mary would say), standing in a small flower garden in front of a farmhouse.

Johnny noticed the resemblance at once: he looked just like the man in the picture. Additionally, he could see the man's resemblance to Mary.
Which is where
, Johnny realized,
I thought I'd inherited my features from.

Jesus.

"The resemblance is uncanny," Judson remarked. "Wouldn't you say? I really couldn't believe it when I came out to see you just now—there was no question in my mind at that point, and there is no doubting it now. Johnny, you are Benjamin Conroy's son. Bryan Conroy."

Johnny leaned forward and took the photo. He stared at the picture, into Conroy's far-away eyes. Inexplicably, he interpreted their firm dark stare as an accusatory inquiry from the past. He could virtually hear the man's deep voice,
what is your real purpose?
The woman, his real mother, stood meekly at his side, one limp arm cradled loosely through the crook of his elbow. She'd blinked just as the photo was taken, which made her look as though she were wincing in pain.

"These people, they are my real parents…" Johnny stated dully, eyebrows pinched with bewilderment.

Judson nodded.

"So…if Mary is really my aunt, then Ed—"

"Ed Petrie is your uncle. Married her right here in
Wellfield
over thirty years ago."

Shaking his head, Johnny laughed uncomfortably. He placed the photo down on Judson's desk, then sat back and looked out the window;
Wellfield's
locals paced busily along Main Street. He let a few moments of silence pass, Benjamin Conroy's face

…I have his nose, his eyes, his hairline…

imprinting itself upon the surface of his mind.

What is your real purpose?

Johnny pulled his gaze away from the window. His brain knocked and whirled, and he began to feel sick to his stomach. He opened his mouth to speak, the words falling out without restraint: "So, Mr. Judson…what is my real purpose?"

Judson grinned and looked at him intently over his folded hands. "Your purpose is to claim your estate. But first…you need to know exactly what it is we're dealing with."

"Okay, I'm ready."

"All right then…so, in a nutshell, you've inherited Benjamin Conroy's farmhouse, as well as all five acres of his land, which, if you look out the window, down Center Street, you can catch a glimpse of. It used to be a thriving farm, but has remained untouched since Benjamin's death seventeen years ago."

"Wait…seventeen years ago? My real father died seventeen years ago, when…when I was one?"

Judson nodded. "As did Faith Conroy, your mother. Benjamin Conroy's will stated—which I myself prepared many years ago—that in the event of Benjamin's and Faith's untimely passing, Ed and Mary Petrie would become the lawful guardians of their children. So, they legally adopted you, and had your name changed to Johnny Petrie. Soon thereafter, Ed and Mary Petrie moved to Manhattan. Being that I had also been assigned to hand over Benjamin's estate, I had to keep close tabs on Ed and Mary all these years, which really wasn't all too difficult, since they hadn't moved since arriving in New York all those years ago."

"Andrew…you said his
children
. Does this mean that I have…siblings?"

Judson hesitated. Oppressive silence descended down upon them. Dimly, the lawyer replied, "You had a brother and a sister. They too are dead." Judson tilted his chair back; it made an uncomfortable creaking noise, matching the look on his face.

Johnny was about to ask
how?
,when there was a light knock on the door and Susan poked her head in. "Your guests are getting impatient."

Judson saw the tears filling Johnny's eyes—tears of sadness, tears of anguish, tears of so many diverse emotions. "Perhaps now is not the time we talk about finances, John. If you'd like, I can reschedule them for later today. They've waited seventeen years, they can wait a few more hours."

Judson rose up and circled around the side of the desk. Standing alongside Johnny, he asked, "You okay?"

Johnny nodded. "I'm a bit overwhelmed, but I'm trying to keep it all in check."

"That's good, Johnny."

Johnny stood, then walked to the window. He looked out beyond the small drug store across the street, toward the sloping land a few hundred yards behind it.

His
land.

A single black bird landed on the fence, just above the
No Trespassing
sign. It fluttered its wings once, then quickly flew away in the direction where Johnny imagined his very own abandoned farmhouse to be.

August 24
^th
, 1988

4:13 PM

E
rotic assault.

It seemed the only way for her to rationalize the affliction, with her means of feeding it growing to proportions far beyond mere self-gratification. She wished not to speak of it, but to only assuage it using any means necessary. Without question, she felt
chosen
by the superior influence, as if it looked down upon her and guided her with its protective hand. Yes, she believed in God, and loved God, but judged Him not responsible for this blissful intervention. No, something else was at work here, something previously laying dormant within her, now out to cultivate what had always lingered within. She felt unreservedly alluring: a sexual creature for whom no rules applied. She retained a level of buoyancy that insisted she not waste time ignoring her insatiable desires.

And now, at exactly forty-eight minutes after fleeing her home, she stood between a parked Dodge pick-up and a beat-up Harley, outside of the
The
Bull Pen Tavern
, the closest public establishment to the Conroy house—and one with a notorious reputation that had reached even Benjamin's ears—where she felt she could make her passions known to the world.

Opening her bathrobe, Elizabeth paced across the graveled lot, her
slippered
feet crunching mutely. Without being seen, she pushed opened the front door and went inside. The interior, dank and dark and stinking of stale beer, was presently home to eight men, all of whom the very type one might find getting soused on a weekday afternoon.

They all halted their activities—throwing darts, shooting pool, snuffing out their Marlboros—and looked at her. The men, with their swollen beer bellies, their tattoos and full beards that challenged the length of their hair, gazed at her unwaveringly, this pristine, strawberry-smelling teenaged peach from town.

She dropped her robe to the sticky floor, a move that elicited wide incredulous grins upon the Bull Pen's clientele, all of whom had had no such good fortune in the past, now feeling as if their lottery ticket had finally been pulled. She sidled alongside the closest man, a burly waster stinking of cigarettes and body-odor, and grabbed his huge hand. This brought forth a gap-toothed grin and guffaws from the others (including the bartender, who, Elizabeth noticed, was already stroking himself through his worn denims). She led the man to the pool table (but not before he downed the rest of his beer), where she sat, legs spread apart, her glistening wetness pooling out upon the cigarette-burned frame.

In her mind she saw no wrong, no personal crime in her actions. She saw and felt only a means to remedy her unceasing desires, her unbridled lust. And she proceeded toward performing the deliberate act as God had intended her to do so: with a goal toward fulfilling her yearnings.

She spoke no words, just gazed into the man's
unthoughtful
eyes, knowing he would now never allow her to cease her feat should she decide to do so. Keeping her gaze firm, she reached forward and unbuttoned his jeans; out fell his dark, filthy, (and more-than-ready) manhood, which she expertly led inside her.

At once, Elizabeth drifted off into a state of mind she never knew to exist, her fragile virginity shattered, making way for a newfound existence, one she eagerly accepted. The wide-eyed men howled, their tattooed arms raised, cheering on their comrade as he shamelessly emptied his venomous seed inside the no longer sweet-smelling girly-girl from town.

With the front door now locked, and the windows drawn, Elizabeth offered herself to the next brute willing to come to bat. The shouts and laughs grew, and the beer flowed, free for everyone in celebration of this miraculous event. They took her, and she them, sometimes more than one at a time as they filled her every orifice. An hour of brutal, animalistic behavior passed, after which she lay hoarse and bleeding…and even after every man had had his fill, she writhed and thrashed atop the saturated pool table, unfeeling of her bruises as she masturbated furiously, stinking of much more than beer and burnt tobacco.

The men…she could hear them talking now, not laughing anymore, some of them in fear of having to return to the county lock-up, in fear of contracting the other's diseases. Arguments rose, muscles flexed. Still, they unanimously agreed to keep this event a secret—a pledge soon to be forgotten. The bartender, in his post-orgasmic lethargy, found the common sense to return Elizabeth her robe and send her on her way, out the back door so those presumably waiting in the parking lot for the bar to open wouldn't see her.

Tattered, torn, and bloodied, a filthy Elizabeth Conroy, a virgin not an hour prior, left The Bull Pen Tavern, finally feeling sated of her desires.

"O
h yeah!!!"
he shouted.

The words came out strongly and triumphantly. Eddie Carlson gripped the steering wheel of his father's Mustang convertible with the same vigor he would a football while crossing the end zone of the opposing team. He pressed down on the accelerator, taking it up to sixty despite Mill Pond Road's thirty mile-an-hour speed limit. He honked the horn playfully, Steve Miller's
The Joker
blasting loudly from the stereo speakers. The wind whistled in his ears. His wavy blond hair blew back from his head in a rippling wave.
First string quarterback
, Eddie thought happily, knowing that carrying the team to a winning season would propel him into the local spotlight. Which in turn meant passing grades, lots of friends, and
girls
. Not to mention the possibility of a scholarship.
Yeah!

The local farmland sped by in a blur, adding to his gleeful rush. The Mustang gripped a tight curve effortlessly, and he cruised by a stop sign that had never proven itself useful in this very-lightly traveled section of
Wellfield
. Ahead, a mile of straight, single-lane blacktop met his eyes. In the past he'd taken the car up to eighty here, and for a moment considered taking a crack at breaking his speed record (the adrenaline pumping through his veins begged him to do so), but he decided to ease up on the gas instead, and fire up the congratulatory joint Jimmy Gibson had given him for a 'job well done'.