“Yeah. No. Yeah. I think a little harm was done.” My teeth felt like a mouthful of Skittles.
Unfortunately, none of this changes the fact that my pearly whites are now falling out of my head at an alarmingly rapid rate for my age.
Looking at my gap-toothed smile, I think about what Adam might have done to deserve such a thing.
I call Dr. Wilmington. I pulled a favor for him a few years back—right before I left town the first time Valerie and I split up. He found himself mixed up in a relationship with an eight-toed stripper in Vegas named Mandy who had an anomalous infatuation for needles, and a big shot semi-pro golfer named Shark. The whole situation birthed around a mistake Dr. Wilmington made back in college, and all he needed was a guy who knew his way around the Internet for a few hours to make it go away. I didn’t ask too many questions, just for free dental care for life. I’ve got bad teeth. Not crooked like a bowl of broken glass, just rotten. Genetics. Ma’s had dentures since she was eighteen, losing every molar and incisor before high school graduation. In her Senior Prom photo she’s got a gap in her smile, and her date still married her.
I walk over to the window. I stare into a liquid blue sky I swear to God I could dive into from here. I ring the office three times before I get anyone, and all I get is an answering machine. It’s Monday morning. Maybe it’s a holiday I don’t know about. Or Dr. Wilmington is on vacation. I tongue the hole in my gums, tasting copper blood, wondering if this classifies as an emergency—the answering machine politely informing me to contact the nearest ER if this is, indeed, such a thing.
I hang up.
I don’t notice the silence or the stillness outside.
But I do notice the birds.
2
NOTHING MUCH EVER HAPPENS AROUND HERE
Nothing much ever happens around here. Terry Holmes scratched his way to five thousand dollars on a two-dollar lottery ticket three weeks ago, and bought rounds for everyone at Blue Rockne’s Tavern to celebrate. Every now and again someone gets divorced, dies in their sleep, falls down a well, has an affair. Mrs. Davidson had triplets last summer when she thought she was only having twins.
Of course, the Canfield Fair comes every September for five days, but if you’re not in high school or nine-hundred-years-old, you don’t really notice. There’s the hot rods that gather on Market Street near the fifties root beer shop the first weekend of every August. Alex Jones married an eighteen-year-old girl last year. You couldn’t walk into a hair salon or buy a single slice of deli meat without hearing about that slut Suzy.
And there was that accident on Hopkins Road. Two teenage girls slammed a stolen Honda into a pick up truck carrying twenty-six caged-up chickens in the bed. There were feathers and blood and tiny bits of beak everywhere. The newspaper listed all twenty-six names of every single recently deceased chicken involved. I’m pretty sure both the girls are dead now – from alcohol poisoning years later.
Other than that, things stay pretty quiet around here. The occasional tornado comes tearing through every now and again, and someone loses a house, a dog, or a small child. The Ladderback’s nine-month-old son, Phineas, spent two days in a tree after their trailer was lifted thirteen feet off the ground and ripped in half. That was big news for a while. Newspapers said they found him with a smile on his face. I wasn’t there.
Stranger things have happened, I guess.
Not here, though.
Definitely not here.
Dr. Wilmington is out of the office. Leslie isn’t home. I’ve got one hundred birds vacationing on my front lawn. And there’s a burning sensation between my toes. Something’s not right. Could be Athlete’s Foot. I don’t like it one bit.
I look for some ointment in the medicine cabinet, but it turns out I’m no physician. All I’ve got in there is a half-smoked soft pack of cigarettes and a single, unopened condom from the nineties. I kept it in a back-pocket wallet for when my queen, the now vanquished Valerie, the Andromeda of my galaxy, decided she was finally ready to commit herself fully to me. Valerie flexed and practiced her Christian values to the best of her ability, until the afternoon her father came home from work and announced he was leaving, moving to Cleveland to be with the object of his desire, Paul. Valerie proceeded to spend the following twenty-four hours having sex with me every hour until my skin turned red, and we developed rashes from all the friction. I should have done the right thing and asked her how she was feeling, told her she should see someone, talk to someone she trusts, but it’s hard to do the right thing when you’re nineteen and naked. She was my first and I believed she would be my last, so I told myself it was okay I’d left my wallet at home that afternoon.
Before you start jumping to conclusions about me, I’m no more of a sex-addicted maniac than any other warm-blooded American male who can’t let go. I simply keep the condom in question as a reminder of the way things would be today if I’d never forgotten my wallet. I lose everything I touch. I’ve had to replace my driver’s license four different times since I turned sixteen, and I’ve had my identity stolen twice on account of a misplaced wallet—but I stole it right back, with interest. Ma says it’s the creative side of my brain. “You’re an artist. Your brother, Russell, keeps a meticulous journal and calendar he can’t live without, but I don’t even think you know how many days are in February.”
“Thanks, Ma.”
“Regardless, I love you both the same.”
“Yeah, I love you, too, Ma.”
I step into the living room, sunlight burning up all my belongings, illuminating the dust I’ve collected throughout the months. I’ve got a t-shirt pulled halfway down my head, eyes peeking from just above the collar like I’ve been buried in sand.
I yank my shirt down, and look back out the window. My apartment overlooks what could be considered a relatively bustling small town neighborhood. It’s the only street in town with apartment complexes, and this morning there are no cars. No traffic. No children running screaming from their homes to enjoy a fine summer’s day after consuming a breakfast of champions: chocolate chip pancakes and cereal with marshmallows. There’s been nothing except that damn dog barking earlier, and even he’s found something better to do.
Just birds.
I stick a finger in my ear and dig a little.
“Hello?” my voice reverberates like I’m living in a dark, empty cave. I half-expect bats to come barreling out of my bedroom, so I duck a little.
I scrape a clump of wax onto my jeans.
I lift the window. A warm breeze rushes in. I stare at the birds standing there, mimicking what must be their best impression of their long-extinct cousin, the dodo.
“Hey!” I call out.
Nothing, but what was I expecting here?
I look around for something to throw. I settle on an empty beer can, and drop it into what qualifies as the apartment complex’s front yard.
The can startles the birds enough to jump, and even flap their anxious little wings, but none of them take off for the nearest telephone wire. They only squawk their concerns to one another before falling silent, keeping distance from the mysterious can recently introduced into their community.
It’s as if they’ve forgotten how to fly.
The vibration of my cell against the counter shatters this unstable bout of mysterious silence. I pick up the phone. It’s not a call. Just a reminder of my messages.
I dial, looking back out the window, and listen.
First message. Received Sunday at one-thirty-seven a.m.
I step into my room, take a beer from the fridge.
Ma wants to know if I’ve heard anything. She wants to know where I am. “Did you hear it? The helicopters. Your father said it was helicopters.” She asks again and again. “The Clarks are here. Kathy says there was an incident at the market. Joe Marshall collapsed. You remember Joe.” This isn’t a question, and I have no idea who Joe Marshall is. “There’s something on the news about staying indoors. They’re trying to contain it.” She just wants to know that I’m okay. That I’m indoors where the news has told me to stay. “Please call.”
I’m mid-sip, lifting couch cushions and over-turning wastebaskets; my interests officially piqued, looking for the remote. I haven’t turned the television on in months.
Next message. Received Sunday at two-twenty-two a.m.
It’s Dad. He’s got more of the same to say. “God damn you, why haven’t you called us?” His breathing is hard and labored. “Your mother…she’s…something’s wrong…I think it was Mrs. Clark…” There’s commotion in the background, but I can’t decipher it over his wet, lungs-filling-with-water breathing. Until I hear the screaming. It could just be the television. “We’re coming over. They’re saying something about evacuation…can’t make up their goddamn minds…” the line goes.
I kick over the coffee table like it’s actually going to help before trudging over to the television itself and clicking it on manually.
Static.
On every channel.
I haven’t paid my cable bill since I put all my money on that dice game those college punks play in the basement of The Salty Grog every Wednesday at 4 a.m. That little shit Stevenson told me he was rolling loaded dice, and how many times do you have a run at a sure thing?
He skipped town, and I passed out in a gutter somewhere before I could catch up to him.
The cable bill was the first thing to go after that.
Next message. Received Sunday at two-twenty-six a.m.
“Hey. It’s me. Listen. Where are you? Are you leaving? Oh, God. I just need…I just…I’m so scared. Look…” there are tears. Too many tears. I can’t make out what she’s saying next. And the line goes.
Lines are always going.
My heart stalls. Stops. Starts again.
To hear this message again, press eight.
I scramble for the number eight on the keypad. I can’t remember where the hell it is.
“Hey. It’s me. Listen. Where are you? Are you leaving? I just need…I just…I’m so scared. Look…”
I hang up; dial. Thoughts frantic. My heart sweating, and stomach twisted in the worst kind of knots.
I am forwarded straight to voicemail.
Hi. You’ve reached Valerie Anderson. You know what to do.
Beep.
Contrary to your popular assumption here, I do not, Valerie, know what to do at all. Enlighten me.
I look back outside at the birds, at the static on the television, and hang up, deciding to play it cool. I’ll just drive by her house, make sure everything is okay.
I grab my jacket. I’m out the door, and there’s a wolf in the hallway.
3
SIMPLY A SIDE EFFECT OF THE INSOMNIA
A wolf. In the hall.
Elucidation escapes me. The aforementioned statement speaks for itself.
At first it’s just a dog, right, because, well, a wolf? Please. Someone must have let his or her dog out and forgotten about the stupid mutt. The Allens down the hall, they’ve got a dog. A monster of a thing. Big as a house. Seriously. So I’m thinking, Bernie is out, again.
Not that I’m scared of dogs or anything.
Russell is allergic to everything from gluten to horses. Fearing for his life, our folks never brought any sort of loveable creature around the house for us to cherish. As a result, I’ve never been fond of animals, nor had the chance to feel compassion for them.
Not for Bernie.
Not for wolves.
Speaking of wolves, imagine my complete and utter surprise.
And I’m thinking, the zoo. This animal must have escaped from the zoo. The one thing this town has going for it is a half-decent acre of betrayed and caged animals. Then I’m thinking, “No sudden movements,” because the last movie I watched with animals on the loose was Jurassic Park. I swear to Christ I count three hundred razor sharp teeth all the way from here, and the thing is still fifty feet down the hall. All right. I get it. I’m impressed. Now shoo.
I have yet to close my door. My hand remains on the knob, my grip coming loose, the brass lubricated with perspiration. I’m making movements so minimal you’d have to observe me under a microscope to see the distance I’m traveling back into the apartment.
My adversary remains steadfast. I consider the possibility I’m being hunted. The beast’s sides flex in, flex out, like he’s breathing heavy after a hard and devious escape from the local zookeeper’s clutches.
Maybe, just maybe, this is simply a side effect of the insomnia.
I blink a few times over and over, and with each shudder of my eyelids the wolf appears ever closer. It’s as though he’s moving beneath strobe lights. I put the palms of my hands to my eyes, pressing them into the back of my head—as deep into the sockets as they’ll go without squashing—and I wish the monster away, only to find my vision has doubled, and he’s closer than ever before when everything comes back into focus. The hallway seems to bend and tilt as if I’m on a boat lost at sea. The wolf has replicated itself, and instead of reuniting into one as my eyes correct themselves, his halves grow apart.
Either my vision is getting worse inside this nightmare, or my furry friend isn’t alone.
I hear footsteps behind me, and for a moment, just a moment, I believe everything is okay. The zookeepers or animal control have arrived, and they’ll scold me for not staying indoors as was probably instructed, but I didn’t know because I don’t have cable and of course that’s what my parents were talking about on the phone with all their concern about staying inside. I turn to greet my rescuers and see someone else has, indeed, joined the party. Another wolf emerges from the stairwell at the end of the hall like he’s been living here all along, and I’m the one who doesn’t belong.
Two seconds, tops, I’m back in the apartment. The wolves make their move. I slam the door, and a dull thud hits the other side. A man with less wisdom would simply assume a guest has arrived and answer. I spin the locks fifty-seven different directions just in case the damn dogs learned how to turn a knob or disengage a dead bolt. I jam a chair beneath the handle, wondering where the rest of the pack might be residing. I have no recollection regarding the duration of time I stood dumbfounded with the door open. Another wolf could have snuck right by me, now waiting patiently in the bedroom, lights off, under the covers and big teeth all the better to eat me with.