Shadow Man (6 page)

I called the twins to tell them that their cousin is dead. Randy said, “Dad, you've got to go over there. You have to forgive and forget.”

I can't. That house is so full of hate that you can feel it when you walk through the door. Why do people want to live like that? Katherine and Franny should've gone their separate ways. It was different in the old days. Before Timmy died. They were happy. Fran was making good money in construction and quite a bit on the side. He bought that Chevy pickup, the one he's still driving. He even wears his hair like he did back then, too long for a man his age.

I've picked up the phone a couple of times. I even started dialing. But it's been too long. There's too much to say. And nothing to say at all.

19

Gerald McCloud

I can't find James. He must be hiding. I stopped by the Lockhorn for a quick snort. Inside, it was as dark as a cave.

I sat at the bar. Everybody was watching me. Then I said, “Anybody seen James?”

If they had, they weren't saying. Bunch of old losers, sitting around getting tanked all day. One old boy—Fritz—said, “Better go home, Gerald, before you get yourself in trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?” I gave him the look Frank used to give us just before he started swinging.

Fritz looked so scared I almost laughed. He stared down inside his drink, mumbling.

The bartender, a fat broad, says to me, “We don't want no trouble here.”

“I was just asking Fritz what kind of trouble did he mean! In case you haven't heard, my brother's dead!”

“Have another drink, Gerald,” Fritz said. “On me.”

“I don't want another drink! I want to find James! That bastard killed my brother!”

Susie Richards was down at the end of the bar. She's thin and witchy with long twitchy legs. I used to picture them wrapped around me. Then Gabe came along and screwed that up.

“I'll buy you a drink,” I said to her.

“Hell, no.” She stuck another cigarette in her mouth. I used to picture putting my mouth on her mouth and kissing her so hard she couldn't talk.

That ticked me off, but I didn't show it. “I know how you feel,” I told her.

“No, you don't,” she said. “I'm glad he's dead. Now he's dead for everybody, not just me. Comes around acting like he loves me so much, then dumps me like I don't mean nothing. The hell with him. The hell with you!” She'd been holding down that barstool for a while.

“Maybe we could go for a ride,” I said. “I'm looking for James. You could help me.”

“What good's that going to do?” she said. “It's not his fault your brother couldn't hold his liquor. Besides”—she looked right in my face—“I wouldn't ride with you if you was the last man in the world. You can go straight to the devil.”

I started toward her.

“Hold it, Gerald.” The bartender opened a drawer that I happen to know holds a gun.

I said, “That bitch better quit bad-mouthing my brother!” Everybody was staring at me. I knocked over some chairs on my way out.

He's dead and he's still getting me in trouble. We got in a big fight last week. He walked in while I was slapping David around. I work hard for my money and David always takes it, getting in my wallet and my dresser drawers. He blows it on booze and buying drinks for everybody, playing the big man at the Elbow Room and the Lockhorn. Let him work for a living. It don't grow on trees. I sell firewood, meth, abalone out of season. Anyway, I wasn't hitting him hard; I was just making a point.

Gabe runs into the living room and jumps over the couch like he's Superman or something. He's always showing off.

“What the hell are you doing?” he says.

I let go of David. He slumped on the floor, blubbering. It was just a big show; he was too drunk to feel a thing.

“Butt out,” I said. “This is none of your business.”

David said something, but you couldn't tell what; the words were all slobbered up.

“He steals my money and gets drunk,” I said.

“I don't care what he does. Don't hit him,” Gabe said.

“Who's going to stop me?”

“I am.” Gabe's chest was all puffed up. He thinks he's really something.

“Just run along and play with your girlfriend,” I said. “From what I hear, she don't put out. I guess that's why you keep Susie on the side.”

I knew that would get him. He said, “Shut your dirty mouth!”

“I hope Jennie don't find out,” I said. “That would break her little heart.”

It was almost a relief when we started punching, like our hands was finally doing the talking. David was lying on the floor, hollering. Then like magic a knife was in my hands. Gabe saw it and started laughing, like it wasn't for real, like I was some big joke. I wanted to rip his smile wide open. David was yelling, “Gerald, don't!”

Then Ma was in the room. She threw groceries at me, out of a paper bag she was holding. She kept hitting me with a long loaf of bread. You wouldn't think bread would be that hard.

“Stop it, stop it, stop it!” she said. “Get out of here and don't come back! All of you! Go ahead and kill each other! Just leave me alone!”

She went into her room and slammed and locked the door. Gabe knocked and knocked, but she wouldn't answer.

So I left the house and drove around. Sometimes it seems like I live in this truck. Like it's the only place that's really mine. I listen to the radio. I hate the talk shows. People blabbing on and on.

I find some song I like and crank up the volume until the music's screaming in my mind. The windshield's rattling and the steering wheel's shaking, I go faster and faster, and it's like anything could happen, the truck could blow up or the world could explode.

20

David McCloud

All hell's broke loose. It turns out Jennie's pregnant. Her father was over here, almost busted down the door. You'd think we had something to do with it.

I said, “My father's not here. You better come back later.”

Mr. Harding's face was red. “He's probably down at the bar!”

“You better quit yelling. My mother's real upset.”

“My daughter's five months pregnant!” he shouted. “We've got to find her!”

He thinks she's going to kill herself because she's pregnant. Turns out her mother went into her room, looking for a clue to where Jennie might be, found her diary and read it.

I said, “It seems kind of funny you never noticed she was pregnant.”

“Not with the clothes the kids wear today! Big baggy things! She didn't want us to find out!”

“You don't need to get so mad about it.”

“Don't tell me what to do! I could sue you McClouds!”

“Go ahead,” I said. “Go on down to Morrison's and sue my brother, for all the good it'll do you.”

I felt sorry for him, but it wasn't my fault. I get tired of people yelling at me.

He said, “In her diary she mentions some place she and Gabe always went, somewhere on the coast. Do you know where it is?”

“No, he never said.”

“Well, you better start looking!”

“There's a hundred miles of beach around here!”

“I don't care if it's a million!” He was spitting, he was so mad. “We've got to find her!”

“I've got to stay here with my mother.”

“I should've known you people wouldn't give a damn!” Mr. Harding tore up the driveway, pulling out.

I thought Ma might come to see what was going on. But if she'd heard about the baby, she didn't let on. The door to her room stayed closed.

Gerald called a while ago to see how Ma was doing.

“The same,” I said. “Why don't you come home?” If he talked to her, she might say something.

“No,” he said. “I'm looking for James.”

“What for?” I said. “That won't do any good.” But he hung up.

I felt so bad I went out to pet Jack; then I remembered I'd let him off his rope.

Frank came back to check on Ma. I told him about Jennie's baby. “That stupid kid,” he said. Which one did he mean? Probably all of them. He went down the hall and opened my mother's door and told her the situation.

He said, “She and Gabe had some special place, on the coast somewhere. Do you know it?”

I could hear her not answering. I could feel her staring at him.

He said, “Damn it, Katherine, he was my son too!”

He came back into the living room. I told him Morrison had called. He said to go down there and see what Morrison wanted. Money, probably, or maybe he needed to know some stuff, like how do we want the funeral. I told Frank he should go down there himself because Morrison sounded like he was in a hurry. That made Frank really mad.

“What's the rush?” he roared. “Gabe's not going anywhere! You tell that bastard—” A bunch of stuff. Then he left. So I have to go down there. I don't want to go. I've never been around a dead person before, especially my brother. I hope Morrison don't ask me if I want to see him, 'cause I don't. Anyway, that body ain't really Gabe. It's like the shell on something or the husk on corn, or like dropping your dirty clothes on the floor and stepping into something brand-new. I hope so. Or maybe it's like nothing at all.

I wish Uncle Tom would call so I could ask him to go with me. You'd think he would; we're family. But he acts like we all died years ago and he don't even see us. That's not right. Ma loves him, but she'd never call him, not after the things he said. She knows he was right, at least about that car, but he shouldn't have said all that other stuff. It just hurt everybody's feelings.

I better tell Ma I'm going, even though she don't care. I hate going in there. She's acting so spooky.

“Ma?” She's sitting on the edge of her bed, her feet on the floor, her eyes straight ahead, looking at me like I'm a stranger, like I'm selling something she don't need.

“Mama, I'm going down to the funeral parlor, to see about Gabe.”

I hear what I'm saying. The words explode inside my head. I'm dying, my brain is bleeding.

“Oh, Mama! Gabe's dead! I'm sorry, Mama!” I'm down on my knees, my head in her lap. “Oh, Mama! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Please, Mama!” I can't stop crying. I hurt so bad. “Why's he dead? I'm sorry, Mama!”

Her hand comes down and strokes my head.

21

Gabriel McCloud

Dear Mrs. Sanders,

I really didn't like what you said in class that stuff about the trees and the loggers. You don't know much about it just because your a teacher doesn't give you the right to tell people what to think. That's not fair.

The problem is these damn stupid tree lovers who think trees and birds are more important than people. They've really screwed things up. What are the loggers suppose to do? That's the only job they ever had. Now you say well that's too bad they'll have to do something else. Like what? Thats all they know. At the mill where I work if they don't get the wood the people will be layed off and lots of them have familys. Its not like they can be brain surgens or something they work with there hands that's what they do. Like my brother David he worked in the mill pulling green chain till he hurt his back. Then they let him go and didn't give him nothing. They don't care about us they just want the money and he can't even get disability.

Look in the woods there's plenty of trees. You probly think I'm rude but it makes me mad. These people come up from the city and tell us what to do a bunch of hippys they don't even work. Me and James got into it with some people in Ukiah last week. They were standing around with sines Save The Forest Stop The Logging stuff like that. This one guy had real long hair and James tore up his sine then the cops came but we didn't get in trouble.

We went over there to get the new Shadow Man. The liquer store here didn't get thier shipment. So we went over there and go in this store and the guy acts like were going to rob the place. That allways happens to teenagers. The new issue is great Shadow Man wipes out this gang all by himself and everybodys glad because they were selling drugs to kids. Shadow Man helps kids he says the're to little to help themselfs. To bad these people who want to save the trees don't care about the kids instead.

So anyway I hope you don't think I'm ragging on you its just that if it wasn't for the loggers you wouldn't have a house or planter boxes or things like that. Yours Truely,

SHADOW MAN

Gabriel
:

I'm sorry you were offended by my remarks in class. But the trees have been cut down too fast for years. What will happen to the loggers when the trees are gone
?

We all need to plan ahead. Even you. Have you given any thought to the junior college
?

C.S
.

22

Francis McCloud

I figured I might as well look for Jennie. It was obvious Katherine didn't want me around. Even with her door shut I could feel her staring at me. So I got in the truck and started driving.

Katherine's never going to smile at me again. There was always the chance things might change. Now they won't. She'll always be sad. Gabe will always be dead. This is just the kind of stupid world that would take him and leave David.

I know it's a sin to wish your own son dead, but when I see him around town, stumbling and mumbling, it makes me feel like a failure. Like God's laughing at me, saying, See what you done? He should talk. He left his own son on the cross. Jesus died for our sins, but the world's still a mess. He wrestled the devil and lost.

I swear to God I'm losing my mind.

I wish Jennie would turn up. Her folks are scared. A nice girl like her, she wouldn't do nothing crazy. But kids are funny; they feel stuff so strong. She looks at Gabriel like he's so great. That's how Katherine used to look at me, before everything got screwed up. Now her eyes are like bullets. What does she want from me? Haven't I supported her all these years, given her a home and a family? Why does she hate me?