Short Story Descriptions
Rocket Fish
© 2011 by Duncan Weller
Kerr stopped at the crest of a mound between two tufts of tall grass. The tufts on his right were an auburn dying yellow. The tufts on his left were livid green, an autumn discrepancy.
“What are they?” he asked, almost inaudibly, nodding towards the beach. Annie, a woman ten years his younger at thirty, glanced at Kerr to ascertain where to look, briefly admiring Kerr’s face. The brisk wind lifted the collar of his coat and caused his short hair to dance erect on his head. Annie brushed aside her long blond hair with her right hand and wrinkled her ski-jump nose as she squinted into the distance down the beach. Black creatures floundered on the wet beige shoreline stretching before the steel ocean, the horizon line lost in the mist.
They had been anticipating a pleasant stroll down the beach. Having left the narrow path along the edge of an expansive green field, Kerr and Annie passed through a gap in a line of pines. They climbed over the sandy mounds where they came across the sight.
To get a better look at the creatures they began to cross the flotsam pushed against the dunes by the ocean. The long bend of this stretch of the shoreline was not groomed for tourists. It was left in its natural chaotic state. Beyond the flotsam before them was a wide patch of animated creatures. The creatures flopped their heads up and down where the last lips of the waves came ashore. Kerr and Annie walked across the pebbles then along the white logs. They continued without discussion crossing the larger stones, hopping from rock to rock.
The sounds of applause could be heard as the flapping fins slapped the drenched sand. As soon as Kerr got a better view, he held out his right arm, stopping Annie. She was slightly startled by the suddenness of his move. She looked at him with concern.
He flinched at the sight of the fish, not quite believing his eyes. He instinctively scanned the beach, surprised at the sudden sense of alarm that had seized him. Unconsciously he knew the answer. He was feeling a terrific pull towards the beach as if grabbed by some preternatural animalistic force. He didn’t like it. Kerr was a man of great self-control and generally reserved in nature, and not easily shocked or surprised. But the creatures were so unusual that he could feel rational thought leaping aside creating a vacuum. He worried what would fill the vacuum. He felt the onset of confused and fearful instinct.
He had no memory of the shapes, the colours, or behaviors of the creatures seeming to gasp for breath before him. These dying sea beasts were something he had never seen and would never have imagined. Curiosity and repulsion combined. He stood looking at his surroundings as if he were being drawn into a trap by some kind of thinking enemy. The debris on the beach was ordinary. The sky had turned bony gray above the steel sea. The air had a crisp chill. The sun was about to burn through the padding of clouds at any time. Everything else was as it should be.
Looking about him, Kerr was comforted that nothing larger, some kind of animal or force was about to jump at him. His heightened sense of panic made him feel as if he had entered an alternate reality.
Annie hadn’t yet seen the fish as she had her head down looking for where to best place her feet. Annie looked up as Kerr continued forward, slowly. She thought Kerr had stopped to help guide her over the rocks. When she looked towards the fish, she leaned forward as if to better force the image into her mind as if the image needed analysis. Involuntarily she put her hands over her open mouth. Her eyes widened in a mixture of fright and stunned amazement.
Kerr felt his stomach assess its contents. He could feel his throat prepare for the content’s passing. Like Annie, he also put his hand over his mouth, not in preparation for vomiting, nor out of shock, but out of concern for the invisible, the virus, the bacteria, the deadly particulate matter that he thought might accompany the unfamiliar stench that hit him. He was afraid he might suck something unwanted into his body, forever condemning his body to malfunctions brought on by an unknown disease.
Like crimped heads of stuffed dolls made of old stockings, the fish flopping on the beach had exaggerated folds and rolls of elderly people’s flesh. The heads looked as if they had been cut from humans, shrunken and reattached to the bodies of elongated fish, brought back to life, and thrown indiscriminately on the beach and left gasping for air. Their fat bodies tapered to a thin tail. The eyes were black dots, like the wet backs of black beetles with eyes on either side of a nose. The eyes shimmered with a reflection from the thinning section of clouds where the sun was beginning to break through. The folds of skin above the eyes varied on each fish giving some a look of anger, others pain, other sadness. The gasping pasty pinkish white lips were Congoid shaped with exaggerated expressions of anguish. The rows of saw-like teeth gave the faces an added freakish look. The heads slapped and jerked their bodies.
Kerr’s started a conversation in his head that was a mix of reason and unreason. What are these things? Are they are deformed fish? Are these experiments gone badly wrong? They look like accidents of human invention, intentional maybe, or the result of chemical waste pumped into the ocean. They could be a school of million year old creatures never seen before that washed up on the shore. They have to be destroyed. They should never have been created in the first place.
“Annie, we have to get some kind of... I don’t know, a scientist down here.”
“This is so disturbing,” Annie said, shaking her head as she walked forward, standing next to Kerr, with her eyes transfixed on the fish.
“What are they? What are they?”
“Do you have your camera?”
“No. No. I didn’t bring it.”
Kerr was thoughtful for a moment. “Then we’ll have to take one of these things with us. We’ll get some plastic bags and get somebody out here to look at these things. I’ll call the university. There’ll be somebody there who’ll be interested in these... these fish. Really interested. Maybe in the biology department.”
“I’m not touching one of those things,” Annie said.
Kerr looked at Annie with a furrow in his brow, not clearly registering what she had said. “This could be really important. Maybe we should take a few of them with us.”
“Look, why don’t you call a television company. Get them to come out here and then everybody can see these… creatures. Then anyone who really wants to can have a close look. They can come out here and see for themselves.”
“Yeah, well...” Kerr bit his bottom lip. His eyes were transfixed on the dying fish.
Annie stepped closer to Kerr’s side and held his arm with both her hands. She gave a tug. “Come on. Let’s get out of here. We can get someone else to come down here. I don’t want one of those things in my truck. They look diseased. Where would you take one of them anyway? You can’t put one in the bath tub at home?” Kerr looked at Annie as if she had come up with a good idea. “Oh my God! Don’t even think about it!” she said perplexed with no humour in her voice, removing her arms from Kerr’s.
“It wouldn’t work anyway,” Kerr said. I’d need to haul enough salt water from the ocean for one of them survive.”
Annie looked out across the ocean into the dissipating mist. “How come these things came ashore? They’re fish aren’t they? They’re not whales? I’ve never heard of fish beaching themselves. It’s crazy.”
“Where else could they come from?” Kerr glanced at the ocean briefly. “I don’t believe this. I’ve never seen anything like this. Never.”
“I don’t think anyone else has either,” said Annie.
“That makes us blessed in any way. These are like warnings, like we’ve gone too far.”
“What do you mean?” asked Annie.
“I mean too far with technology, too far with chemicals and pollution and overfishing and trying to fix things that don’t need fixing. Know what I mean? Christ! It’s like these things are goading us, I mean like the whole human race. They’re using ugly and old human faces. Look at them. They look like they’re in intense pain, like they’ve carried pain for generations. It’s like some kind of… premonition. A warning, that something awful is going to happen to us, like some higher animist intelligence exists, an animist spirit that is going to kill us off.”
Annie looked at Kerr with fright. She backed away. He was fixated on the scene. She held her head in her hands for a moment, took a few deep breaths, looked solemnly at the fish, then at Kerr. “You’re probably right,” she said firmly, trying hard not to give the appearance of placating him. She stretched one arm around Kerr’s neck and buried her chin into his chest. “Let’s go. Those things will give me nightmares. You do whatever you want, except don’t take any home.”
“Okay. I’ll make a few phone calls. I’m going to come back here with the camera though. I’ll need some proof in case I can’t get someone to come out here straight away.”
Annie closed her eyes and pushed Kerr back so he was forced to turn and walk. “A photo won’t do much. A photo doesn’t mean anything these days anyway. You show someone a photo of those fish and no one will believe you. They’ll say you were playing on the computer.”
“All the more reason to make sure someone official gets down here,” Kerr said. They walked quickly across the field where their sports utility vehicle sat roadside.*
“What is that?!! WHAT IS THAT?!!”
“It’s a fish, dummy. What do you think it is?” Adrian held the fish up to his eleven-year-old friend, Owen. Owen backed away.
“So gross. It looks like my Grandmother, but dead. That’s not a fish. Is this a joke?” Owen scowled at Adrian.
Adrian held the fish higher, “HEEEYYY MATTIEEE!! C’M’ERE!!!”
Matilda was midway into the field of short green grass, crouching in front of her rocket. “WHAAAAT!!!” she yelled back.
“CHECK THIS OUT!!” Adrian yelled.
“Just a minute!” she yelled back.
Owen touched the eye of the fish. “GROSSSSSS!! UGH!!” He wiped his finger vigorously on his coat. “That is so gross! It’s real. Yuck!
"Where did you get it?”
“Over there. On the beach. There’s a whole bunch of them. A few of them are still alive and moving around. They look like they’re trying to talk too. You should see them!” Adrian exclaimed.
“Yeah, okay.” Owen turned to the field. “MATTIEEE!! GET OVER...” he gulped some air. “HEEEERE!!!”
“OKAY! OKAY! I’M COMING!” She stood up. She touched the tip of her red rocket, testing its stability to ensure it would stand on its own while she left it temporarily. She bolted across the field. As she got closer to the fish in Adrian’s hands her face turned to a scowl. She stopped centimeters away from the fish’s face and arched her neck forward to stare at it. Adrian jolted the fish so that its face lightly slapped Matilda’s cheek.
“EWWWWE! You’re sick!” She wiped her cheek with the sleeve of her coat. “What is that!? Is that a fish!? Sick! That is sooo sick!” Matilda stroked its back and played with one of its fins. “Wow, it’s real. Where did you get it?”
“Over there. On the beach.” Adrian jogged the fish’s head as if it were indicating the direction. Matilda looked over to the ocean sky, visible on the other side of a line of trees. “This is just a small one,” Adrian added.
“Who caught it? Did you catch it?” asked Matilda.
“No. They’re just lying on the beach,” Adrian said.
“Let’s go,” said Owen, and he ran forward.
With a heave, Adrian tossed the fish up into the air. It landed on the ground, face first, with a thump.
The three children raced each other to the beach. Matilda, at twelve, with the longest legs, was the fastest. The rocks, logs, and seaweed they clambered across hampered their run. Within a few meters of the nearest fish, Matilda slowed her jog. She stood on the toes of her running shoes as she got closer. She held up her arms, shoulder level, and tiptoed around the fish, as if her motions were giving her extra distance. Mimicking the sea gulls she arched her head forward, studying the fish. Owen and Adrian came near and immediately bent down to poke and prod.
“They’re all dead now,” said Adrian.
“Do you think they were talking to each other?” asked Owen.
“No. They were just trying to breath, you know...” and Adrian mimicked the fishes movements, throwing his head to the side, rolling his eyes back and up, opening and closing his mouth with as big an O as he could.
Matilda lifted the back end of a smaller fish up by the tail. “Hey Owen, this one looks like your mother,” she said without an ounce of humour.
The boys stepped over the dead fish and stood next to Matilda. They bent down to have a better look at the face. “Not really,” said Owen. “My mom is better looking than that.”
“That one’s really ugly. Look at that one,” Adrian said.
Matilda clasped the fish with both her hands and tossed it up the beach. It slapped into the sand with a slight squishy thud.
The three of them stood over Adrian’s fish that he had pronounced very ugly. “That’s really sick. Look, it’s got a chin and hairy eyebrows.”
“Yeah. It looks like it’s in pain. Like it died studying economics,” said Matilda.
“Hey, that one’s moving!” Owen exclaimed and he jumped forward and skipped over a few of the other fish. He crouched down in front of the one fish, its mouth making gasping movements, but its body relatively still. The others followed and the three of them crouched watching the fish slowly die. Adrian spun on his heels and frogged himself up the beach a few hops to tug a length of driftwood out of the drying sand. He hopped back to the dying fish and stuck the stick in its mouth. The fish flinched. The skin around its eyes widened and the mouth moved to change the face’s expression. It looked as if it had come alive to stare them down, as if they were being admonished for waking up a sleeping and aged uncle. The children all fell backwards. Owen was shocked and his surprise wasn’t quelled by Matilda’s sharp scream of fright. Adrian was silent, but his mouth was open in disgust.
“Oh my God! That was so sick!” Matilda exclaimed with a real look of anguish on her face. The one fish continued to move. Adrian had impulsively thrown the driftwood stick away, somewhere behind him. He looked around for it and picked it up from the sand. He walked towards the fish and stood over it with the stick at his side. He watched it with a frown on his face. Matilda and Owen came to his side, as if to comfort him. He looked a little shaken. A seagull ran along the beach alternating between a slow plodding walk and a cartoon run, nervously watching the children.
“What should we do?” Matilda asked.
“This one’s still alive. Why don’t we throw it back…” Owen nodded towards the ocean.
“Go ahead,” Matilda said, scowling at the suggestion that she be involved.
“I don’t want to touch it,” Owen said.
Adrian bent down and lifted the back end of the fish by the tail, dragged it backwards down the beach creating a trail. With a heave and real effort written on his face he swung the fish up shoulder height and let it fly. The fish wriggled mid-air and plunged into the water head first.
“What do we do with the dead ones?” asked Matilda.
“I don’t know. Let’s take some back to the field,” suggested Owen. “Hey. We forgot about your rocket,” he added for Matilda’s benefit.
“It’s not going anywhere. No one’s around,” she said shrugging to show her ambivalence and to indicate an amountof inner strength.
“They’re pretty weird huh? How come they’re all ugly?”
“Hey! That one is alive too ¬– I think,” said Owen. He hiked a few paces up the beach and kneeled over the fish. It made repulsive faces as it gasped.
Matilda came over and knelt down next to him. “They’re pretty yucky, huh? It’s like your ancestors coming back to scare you cause you’ve done bad things in your life.” The fish’s mouth stopped moving. She and Owen looked at each other. Matilda shrugged.
Matilda smiled a sinister smile, which caused her to close one eye. “I know what we can do with the fish.”
“What?” asked Owen. Adrian joined them and looked at the dead fish at their feet.
“C’mon. Grab a couple and take them with us,” suggested Matilda.
“That’s what I said, already. I said we should take the fish with us,” whined Owen.
“So?” Matilda responded with a shrug. Owen frowned.
With difficulty, the three each carried two smaller fish by their tails. A few were big enough that their heads trailed in the sand. Owen, being smaller, had a little more difficulty than Matilda and Adrian. He wasn’t able to lift the fish, above the rocks and debris, as Matilda and Adrian had. The fish faces had picked up dirt and flotsam from the beach, some of it cleaned off by the short wet grass as they crossed the field.
Matilda dropped her fish a few meters from the red rocket, dotted with white insignia. The boys did the same. Matilda pulled an encased Leatherman out of her pant’s pocket. She tugged the steel tool out of the case and unfolded the knife from one of its sides.
“What are you doing?” asked Owen.
“You’ll see,” she said with a grin. She stuck the knife into the fish’s neck.
“Oh gross,” said Adrian, matter of factly.
Owen, crouching between the others looked back and forth at his friends. He shook his head imitating his father’s look of disapproval.
Matilda bit her bottom lip to exaggerate the effort. Blood spurted onto her hands but she kept digging with the knife. “Oh yuck,” said Owen, as he and Adrian accompanied every tug and squirt with comments on the disgustingness of it all. “AAACK!”
Matilda cut off the heads of two more fish when Owen and Adrian, after some badgering of bravery decided they could cut off the head of a fish as well.
“Dass whayya get when ya dead. Ya gawnna lose yoh head,” Matilda then made some spitting and hissing noises with her mouth as her head rolled around on her shoulders. “Wid yaw liddle biddy eyes yoh gawnna see dah skies, cawz daht’s whay heaven lies. Phhish phhish - shtitch datch - wha wha - pssshh pssshh.”
“GROOOOOSSSSSS!!!!” Adrian yelled as loudly as he could as blood squirted over his arm. He immediately dropped the knife and swept his arm back and forth in the moist grass to wipe off the blood. Owen laughed a good belly roar and almost fell over, from humour and shock.
“Now you have to take out the brains and stuff,” said Matilda.
“What!?” which was a statement rather than a question from Owen, who had to contain his nervous giggling.
“Here,” said Matilda. She lifted the severed head from where Adrian sat. He managed to erect himself. She picked up the knife. “Like this.” She dug her hand into the open neck and expertly swiveled the knife in a rounded motion pressing the fish down between her left hand and the ground. Some guts and brain matter spilled onto the grass.
“AAAACCCKKK!!!” exclaimed Adrian and he fell backwards, arms thrown out. Owen burst out laughing again at Adrian’s dramatics.
Adrian held his tongue out in disgust and stared up at the sky.
“See, it’s easy,” said Matilda.
“Why do we have to take his brains out?!” yelled Owen from where he sat.
“To make him lighter, otherwise he won’t be able to go to outer space,” she responded.
“Space!” yelled Adrian. His head came up to look Matilda in the eye. “That rocket doesn’t go to space.”
Matilda ignored Adrian and started on the next fish. Soon she had all the brains gutted from the heads.
“How are you going to get them on the rocket?” asked Adrian who erected himself and stood next to Matilda. She wiped both her hands vigorously in the grass.
“I don’t know,” she shrugged. She stood then bounded over to the rocket. She opened up her X-men lunch box featuring a dramatic picture of the mutants Wolverine and Storm on its side. The box was filled with what looked like the inner workings of an electrical appliance. There were various tools amongst the jumble, and she pulled out a length of string, a tiny round plastic package of fine wire, and a small roll of black hockey tape. “Bring the heads over here,” she demanded of Adrian.
Owen got up quickly to help carry heads with Adrian. He ran a little ahead of him to show how committed he was to help out. But when he bent down to pick a head up he suddenly lost the former courage he had earlier when he’d helped cut the heads off. The head looked up at him and it really did look like a dead little man’s head. Owen swallowed. Adrian came to his side and looked at the little man’s head that had caused Owen to freeze. “Hey. I know who that looks like,” started Adrian. “That looks like my gym teacher, Mr. Ridge, but way uglier.”
Owen, tugged his shoulders back and slowly nodded. He smiled. “Yeah.”
“Mr. Ridge barks like a dog at school. He’s always yelling like he thinks he’s in the military or something.”
They both reached down to pick up the same head. Adrian’s hand got to the fish first. Owen held back. “Mr. Ridge is mine,” Adrian said with a smile and grabbed the head by a piece of bone that stuck out of its severed end.
Owen watched Adrian walk away with Mr. Ridge. He looked at the next head, which was looking away from him into the sky. When Owen picked the fish up with both hands cupped under it, his feeling of disgust caused him to moan. “Eeewwee. Shhhyuck. Eeeeeewwwwe. So gross. So gross.”
“Oh c’mon. You love it,” snorted Adrian.
They dropped the heads and stood next to Matilda as she crouched over the lunch box. “Pass me the instructions,” she pointed to the tall flat package where the clear plastic window of the box had been roughly ripped open above the red coloured illustration. Owen brought it over to Matilda. She pulled out the tall booklet inside the package and began to read down the list of warnings. “Do not launch the X-1 indoors. Do not launch X-1 at people. Do not launch X-1 near roads or highways. Do not launch rocket within densely populated areas. Do not... do not... do not....” She looked at Adrian and Owen and said with a curl of her frowning mouth, and with a furrowed brow, “You know if I didn’t have this list I wouldn’t know what to do with this thing.”
Adrian snorted a laugh.
Matilda took a Phillips headed screwdriver out of the box and stuck it through the side of one of the heads next to her. Thin lines of blood were still wet within the crevices of the folds of skin while the small bloodied faces were staring up at the children. The length of the steel rod at the end of the screwdriver wasn’t long enough to go through the entire head so she turned the head over and poked a hole through the opposite side. She put down the tool and snatched up the wire. She straightened it and poked it through. Matilda cut one end of the wire with the bite mouth of the pliers and used the pliers to curl the wire ends. She gave the fish head to Adrian. “Tie a string this long,” she said holding her hands up to indicate an arms length. She gave Adrian a small spool of string from the box. “Make a loop at the ends of the wire and tie the string to it.”
In the rocket’s side there was a ridge between cap and body. It was just deep enough to harbour a piece of wire. Matilda cut a short piece of wire long enough to circle the ridge of the missile twice. After a few minutes, Owen and Adrian had tied strings to the wire ends protruding from the fishes heads. “We’re done!” called Owen.
Matilda gathered four fish heads at the base of the rocket. She took the string ends and looped them around the short piece of wire, and lifted the wire to the ridge in the rocket. She pushed the wire with her fingers into the ridge. Her fingernails turned red with the pressure.
“Give me the pliers,” she said. Owen got to the pliers. With these Matilda twisted the wire ends together further tightening it into the ridge. There was a look of intensity screwed into Matilda’s face as she worked.
“What’s going to happen?” Owen asked.
“You’ll see,” said Matilda as if she had tied fish heads with human faces to a rocket before.
“It won’t take off. It’ll be too heavy,” said Adrian.
Matilda was silent as she sat next to the rocket’s package and pulled out the ignition switch. She attached the switch wire to the rocket’s small launch pad.
The boys followed Matilda as she walked away from the rocket uncoiling the rest of the ignition switches wire. “This is going to be so cool,” said Matilda to herself. Owen and Adrian looked at each other as they noticed how Matilda was so immersed in her project. They had fired off rockets with her before, but she wasn’t her usual chirping boisterous self. She was quiet and fierce in comparison.
Owen stuck his tongue out at Matilda. She didn’t see him do it. Adrian snickered. Matilda looked at them. The boys were staring at her with smiling faces. “What?” she said. The boys laughed.
She ignored them. “Ready?” she asked. The boys nodded. The boys dropped to the ground, laying flat and facing the rocket. Matilda stood and spread her feet to give herself a power stance look, like a rock star. There was a small pile of dead beheaded fish next to the rocket’s base. The human looking heads dangled at the rocket’s side, moving ever so slightly in the wind.
“COUNTDOWN!!” yelled Matilda. Owen stuck his fingers in his ears.
“Oh man. These fish are going to fly,” said Adrian with a huge grin.
Matilda called out the numbers, “TEN! ... NIIIIINE! ... EIGHT! ... SEV-VEN!” She looked at the boys who were wide-eyed and still. “SIX!!!” She yelled louder. “FIIIIIIIIVE!!! ... FFFFOOOUUUR!!!” Her yelling became a scream. Owen stuck his fingers in his ears. “THREEEEEEEE!!! ... TWOO-OOOOOOO!!!! ... WWWOOOOONNE!!!! BLAAASSSSTOOOOFFFFF!!!!!”
Matilda jumped dramatically to the ground, lying flat next to the boys. She flicked the switch. A sharp sizzle sounded as if water were dropped into an oiled and flaming hot frying pan. The rocket took off. At the base of the rocket a puff of white smoke burst into the air with a burst of red fire. A thin orange flame tailed the rocket’s base. Within three seconds of flight at a height of about twenty meters it jerked to one side, tilted at a steep angle and began spinning, at which point the fish heads, which had clung to the sides of the rocket as it rose, whirled around. The rocket’s cap popped open and the parachute unfurled. The children were on their feet. They laughed and whooped while they ran to collect the rocket as it fell with the fish heads still attached slopping and bouncing off the ground.
As they were running Adrian yelled out. “HEY MATTIE!!! YOU KNOW WHAT WE SHOULD DO?!!!”
“WHAT?!” yelled Matilda.
“WE SHOULD MAKE IT SO THAT THE FISH HEADS COME FLYING OFF IN THE AIR!!!”
“YEAAAAHHHH!!!” yelled Owen and he began laughing.
They got to the rocket. The four fish heads were staring in different directions, one of them ominously at the children.
“Oh man. We could have so much fun with these,” said Adrian.
“I want to take one to school. No. Give me two. No four. I want to take four to school,” said Owen.
“I want to give one to Blackie,” said Matilda.
“Your cat?” Adrian thought a moment. “Yeah. That would be funny. Maybe she would take it in your house...”
“OH! MY MOM WOULD FREAK!!!” Matilda made a tall O with her mouth and began hopping with excitement. “And my idiot step dad...” she laughed. “He would lose it. He’s such an idiot.”
“HE’S NOT AN IDIOT!! STOP SAYING THAT!!!” yelled Owen.
“Yes he is! He’s an idiot! Remember how he left you at school. I had to find you. He doesn’t care about you. He doesn’t care about us.
He doesn’t care about anyone.”
Owen’s chin dropped to his chest. He shut his eyes tightly. His arms dropped in surrender.
“He’s nawwwt worth crying about.” Matilda rolled her eyes and walked over to Owen. She put her arms around him, burying his head into her chest. Owen remained still and silent, his arms at his sides. Adrian looked with disgust at the display of affection. Matilda started teetering. “Ohhh. Ohhh. I’m going to faaawwll. I’m going to faaawwll. Ohhh, I’m going to faaaawwll.”
Owen started giggling.
“I’m going to faaaawwll. Ohhhh, which way am I going to faaawwll?” Matilda pulled Owen tighter. He struggled to get free from her, his giggling muffled by Matilda’s coat. She fell backwards without bending her knees, landing on her rear end and back as Owen fell on top of her. Owen rolled off Matilda’s front. Adrian stood watching, bemused.
Matilda jumped up as Owen laughed, forgetting the comments she had just made. “Let’s get the rest of those fish before the seagulls do,” she said.
“Yeah,” said Owen, excited.Seagulls covered the beach displaying fierce competition with upflung white wings and a raging cacophony of noise. The horror-show sounds of squealing doors on rusty hinges emanated sharply from the birds gaping yellow beaks. The calm sounds of the ocean could not be heard amongst the racket. Most of the fish had been torn apart, but there were no heads left.
“Someone’s cut off their heads,” Kerr said as he turned to professor Rist, imploring him to believe his story. “I swear. These fish had heads that looked just like a human’s. They had to be genetically manufactured or... it was some kind of amazing coincidence of mutation, or the results of some kind of chemical pollution... I don’t know.” He held his palms up on extended arms.
The professor was cordial. “Look, it’s not that I don’t believe you. What do you want me to do?”
“At least take back one of the bodies before they’re all gone. Don’t you think the bodies look unusual?” asked Kerr.
“I guess, but I don’t know much about fish.”
Kerr had gone to the trouble of driving to the University, and with some help from staff managed to locate professor Rist in the biology department. Dr. Rist was practically dragged away from his office. He taught molecular biology. “Tell you what,” offered Rist, “We’ll bag a few fish and I’ll get a colleague to look at them.”
Kerr and Dr. Rist took plastic bags out of Kerr’s gym bag. Kerr took out his camera. He played with its controls. The shape of the sleek camera intrigued Dr. Rist. “Oh, that’s new,” he said. He walked over to Kerr. “What sort of functions does it have?”
Kerr leaned towards the professor to let him have a closer look at the camera.
A fish head with a human face fell out of the sky. It struck Dr. Rist on his forehead. Some unscooped fishy brain matter and blood splattered across his face and down Kerr’s blue jacket.
Arcade Impressions
© 2011 by Duncan WellerG.O.D. was second best, whoever that was. GOD was either an immodest pen name or an acronym, but these were the initials that glowed below the signature, R.G.C., of my eight-year-old brother. I was never as good as my brother. I never made the top twenty ranking, but I did feel some vicarious pride as my brother was able to hit the top position consistently at his favorite games. I cannot remember the name of his favourite, but it was centrally located and singularly positioned to draw attention. I remember the glowing caterpillar-like machines on the screen that dodged its enemies and fired hundreds of little laser shots from its nose. My favourite game was encased in the big black box against the wall at the back of the arcade.
My victorious brother avoided the unpredictable outburst of surly manners and mean spiritedness from the older kids and my peers. They were enamoured by my brother’s gaming skills. Younger kids like him were usually completely ignored or your second best choice of friendship. But they could end up the victims of cathartic outlet for pent up anger or thoughtless rebuke.
During summer, my brother and I played together more often, as my friends headed to camp or simply avoided congregating near our neighbourhood. In Thunder Bay, entertainment for kids was spread at great distances – never a short bike ride. Bike and bus rides were weekend occasions, usually with the goal being a movie theatre. The rest of the year I paid less attention to my brother. It was fall, school was in, and I preferred to play with friends my age, and a few who were a year or two older than I.
In the years before home computer games took over, the arcades ruled as an entertaining distraction. There were a few young guys at the arcade who were there all the time, and when they lacked finances they stood over other kid’s shoulders, offering advice, and asking for loans. The serious gamers had a system of lining quarters along the most convenient and visible ledge of their favorite game, alternating the heads and tales sides in order to recall the sequence of players. The popular games might have ten quarters lined along their top or lower ledge. The unpopular, none. I avoided games with long lines of quarters. Practice and perfection of a video game was not a high priority for me. Learning all the rules, tricks, and proper motions of joy sticks, buttons, pedals, and visual clues took too long and ate up too many of my coins to make gaming worthwhile. I saved my few dollars for books and comics. When I did game, I stuck to older games, like Space Invaders and Tetris and rarely had quarters lined along their tops. Games got old quickly. Every year, sometimes every six months there was some new game and new challenges for the serious gamers. I lacked the interest and the money necessary to develop the hand eye coordination required to make me as good as my brother, or GOD.
When I played, I made intense breathing sounds, sucking the air through my teeth and letting out exaggerated sighs and moans as if these expressions helped me focus. My brother would laugh at me for adding these sound effects, but controlling the involuntary within me was near impossible. Others told me I was fanatical with my music. It was most obvious when I listened to Queen. Wearing my headphones, I would hum so loudly my family could hear me from the basement. My gaming abilities may have been hampered when, not wanting to look neurotic, I became self conscious about the noises I was making. When I played, I was so enraptured the world around me faded like the walls within tunnel vision before fainting. I was completely enthralled when I surpassed my former high score. My hair would feel like it was rising. A sweat was ready to break and my eyes could begin to water. I would blink furiously. I loved it. When the game got good, suddenly losing would feel like being thrown off a precipice. For me, one enthralling game was enough.
For my brother, I can only imagine how intense it must have been for him. He had a fierce grin when he played. His teeth would clench and his little chest would heave. He would sweat and only when the sweat ran into his eye would he risk removing his arm to wipe the itch away. I doubt he heard his fans behind him offering him support. And he did have fans. There was the no-name gawky kid who I never heard utter a word and never saw play a game. He journeyed from one game to the next. He and a few other regulars would wisk past my brother to cast casual glances at his gaming. When the game got intense and a new high score was in the making, a crowd would grow. Then came the exclamations of support, near cheering. Watching his hands was fascinating. He had an odd technique where he would release his hands occasionally from the joystick and button and let both hands hover for a moment, then slam them to the controls. It was obvious why joysticks were made of metal. The sticks and buttons took quite the beating.
My brother had another amazing ability in those days that may have required some skill. He would find money. Just find it. Everyone in their lifetime has come across a few good coins or a dropped bill, but my brother had a special gift for it. He would occasionally burst into a speed-walk and run ahead of a group he was with to scour the unruly minutia at the edges of a well worn path of one of the many fields of our developing suburb. It seemed that on an average of every three days he would find money, in gutters, front lawns, on the sides of concrete paths, in the short grass of the landsite for the church, under tables in restaurants, in cracks of car seats and hamburger joint booths. He would find money in the obscure pocket of a winter coat, not always his coat, “Can I keep it! Can I keep it!” he would yell. Hell, one time we were standing at a bus stop. A car flew by, and through an open back window a slip of paper was sucked outward. My brother chased it down the street and came running back with that winning smile of his, “Look! Look! It’s twenty DAAAAWLLERS!” I’m sure I pursed my lips and frowned fitfully, but he was smart enough not to brag. He just sat there, gleaming. And every once in a while I would walk ahead of him and mimic his technique. He made no comment. After all, he had more than his fair share of finding money.
I remember coming to the realization then that it was just as easy to lose money as it was to find it. To find it you had to be eager. I imagined hundreds, no thousands of people, losing some money on a regular basis. I had the positive outlook that it was an indication of good times. Everyone had some money and everyone could stand to lose some once in a while. And whenever I lost a bill, which wasn’t often, I believed there was someone somewhere that benefited.
However, I didn’t think losing money was all that beneficial to me. I was beginning to learn that saving it had worthwhile results. I was learning delayed gratification. I began to guard my money: I put the coins into a little pouch instead of loose at the bottom of a pocket where inconvenient holes could develop: where because of bad design, the money would slip out when roughhousing outside. Sitting at too steep an angle in the back of our parent’s car, or on the bus didn’t help either. After losing a few I kept my bills in a wallet, rather than rolled up or crunched into a ball as I did normally. My brother was nonchalant about losing money. Probably because he thought it fell like leaves.
In the fall, after school, we all congregated at the arcade. Winter coats, hats, and gloves were thrust at us, but we delayed wearing them until the cold was unbearable. As it got colder, we took more opportunity to congregate at the arcade, sometimes ducking into it, en route, as a warming depot.
On the way home one day, I passed the arcade. It was essentially a square hole beyond glass doors in the side of a huge blank concrete wall on the dead side of a small shopping mall. It was the only retail space on that side. The green dumpster at the back of the mall sat next to a row of large red doors of the loading docks. The ad hoc bottle return depot there had a garage door for an entranceway, wherein was the most prominent feature, a long belt ladder of shiny metal rollers. Tall stands of blue and red plastic containers for the empty bottles were occasionally snatched by the gamers and taken to stand on, either for playing a game or observing over a crowd of fans. A wide asphalt road for the delivery trucks circled the mall and the mall backed into a field which every child who lived in our neighbourhood chose to cross in order to walk between home and school. The field was crisscrossed with worn paths. Beyond the field was suburbia, slowly replacing the forest. The fresh pine smell of the skeleton woodworks of incomplete houses was never far away. The Northern forest beyond went on forever.
I stopped at the arcade to see friends. I found my brother standing tiptoe on an overturned red plastic crate. His head was arched forward, almost into the machine. The screen had sucked in the upper half of his body, like an immobilized frog in a snake’s mouth. I left him alone. He was busy, and I knew he would be upset, sad actually, if I interrupted him. He would read the interruption as hostility, knowing I knew he loved the games so much. Anger was never the outcome if we roughhoused or if I refused to play with him. He would sulk, not cry, if I was malicious. He was sensitive, quiet, but driven and vocal when he really expressed an interest. I rarely heard him yell. So I left him to it.
When I opened my wallet to get change I discovered I was short the bill I thought was there. My wallet could remain unexamined for days as it was usually empty. I waited till my brother was finished with his game and borrowed a couple dollars from him, got change, and played a few games. The two dollars lasted me all of twenty minutes, at a quarter a game. I watched a couple friends play, and then I watched my brother play. It was fun too to see the respect he garnered from the other kids around him.
“Hey man, you’re the kid who’s better than GOD!”
“Right on. Kick GOD’s ass.”
“I hate GOD. He thinks he’s so cool.”
My brother became invisible in the throng. A wall of three kids thick arched into the machine as if it were some kind of monstrous vacuum cleaner designed to swallow children.
After he finally finished the game, he stepped down off the red crate with a big successful grin. Kids, some more than twice his height, slapped his back and patted his shoulders in congratulation. Another kid got up on the crate and was going to try, probably in vain, to beat his high score.
My brother came out of that little hole into the dimming evening light with a brimming little ego: eyes bright, grin wide, and walk enervated. I quickly jogged ahead of him to scour the ground. I did it playfully and did not expect to find money. He had the gift and it was hard to see into the shadows of the scruffy edges of the path.
“Hey, look!” my brother called. I turned to watch him jump down to the ground to all fours and pick up a slip of paper - a five dollar bill. He held it up stretched between two rows of tight fingers.
“No way! I don’t believe it. No way,” I said. I got creative with startled exasperations of surprise all the way home, partly to have fun in the moment, but also in an effort to cover for what I knew was becoming jealousy. He had just confirmed that he was simply luckier than I, and that luck as a human trait was obtainable for some. “I owe you two dollars too.” I said.
“Naw,” he said. “That’s okay. I don’t need it.”
I smiled. I envied him and admired him. He was, despite being two years younger, which was quite a gap, worth looking up to. I was proud to be his brother, and I knew I could always rely on him to be brotherly. We headed home. We played with our cars on their tracks in my room while Queen blared from my little stereo.
Not only did I have no talent for finding money, keeping it was a problem. Pocket money was scant. I made a few extra dollars distributing flyers, and I managed to sell a pile of comic books that year. The money went and I had no memory of how it was spent. So like a good chince I decided to keep track of it. When I had amassed thirty-four dollars I felt great. I remember the amount but not the wonderful object I wanted to buy. I remember the number to this day because the next morning the number, amazingly, had changed. I put it down to poor memory.
After school, the lower number bothered me. I couldn’t remember when I had last counted my money or what I might have spent it on. And I hated thinking that I had that bad a memory. I felt it was akin to being stupid. I went straight home and mentioned it to my parents. “Hey, I’m a hundred percent sure that I had thirty-four dollars in my wallet. Now I’ve got twenty nine.”
My parents were sitting together on an ugly, overly bright striped and lightly tattersalled second hand couch, watching a small Zenith black and white television. Other families had new colour televisions surrounded by a wood exterior to double as a table. My parents looked at each other. My father gave a little grin and said. “That’s funny, we’ve been missing money from our wallets too.”
I stood confused. I looked back and forth at their faces trying to read their emotions. They both had poker faces.
My father asked, “Have you been taking money out of our wallets?”
I could feel my face flush. I was being accused of stealing. I had never stolen anything, except for a singular instance when I was two years old. I filled my winter coat with chocolate bars while standing with my mother at a cash checkout at the grocery store. I did not understand then that people had to pay for candy. I assumed the chocolate bars were so low on the shelf because they were being offered feely for kids like me to grab. But I must have known it was wrong somehow, because I made an effort to hide the act from my mother. I was caught as we walked up the street. A chocolate bar slipped out from under my jacket. My mother tugged my arm, very angry. She opened my coat and threw the chocolate bars on to the sidewalk. I remember thinking that wasting chocolate like this is a bigger crime, and we should really take them home anyway before crows, the size of cows, ate them.
I was being accused, as a thinking, well-intentioned human being, of sneaking into someone’s room and taking money from their wallets. That was conspiratorial and required real effort. I did wonder, why did they never say anything to me or my brother earlier? I suppose it was because they were not all that tight with money. They were generous for all the little I knew about adults and money. I realized that if they were losing money, and I was losing money, there was only one other possibility. My brother.
I knew where he would be. Without a response I left my parents staring at each other as I ran out the door and straight to the arcade. My fury grew as I ran. I began to realize that doubts about my own memory were aggravated, if not caused by, my brother taking money from me. I found him surrounded by the usual crowd of tall youngsters. I broke through the group, so angry I reached up and knocked the row of quarters off the ledge next to the controls of the machine. I was overly dramatic, attempting to get an audience, and mimicing the antics of a scorned hero from a movie.
I pulled my brother by the hood of his coat off the red container. He fell on his knees. I pulled him up and dragged him out of the arcade. His face was full of shock. “What are you doin’?” he said sheepishly. The other kids stared silently. They knew I was his brother and said nothing. Domestic squabble. For dramatic purposes, I said nothing either and kept pulling on him, to the field across the back lane. As we got to the path that ran diagonally through the field, I let him go as he was keeping pace with me. “What are you doin’?” he said sobbing, having begun to cry.
“You’re stealing money from me. You’re taking money out of my wallet,” I said, as if a matter of fact.
“No I’m not,” he said gasping.
“Yes, you are. And you took money from mom and dad too.”
I remember how quiet he was then. His sobbing stopped. I picked up the pace, so he had to run to keep up. As we neared the end of the field, he ran past me. I let him go. He looked frantic. I remember reflecting on how angry I was. I didn’t usually get this angry. I was beginning to regret having been so brutal with him, dragging him out of the arcade in front of everyone, embarrassing him in front of his admirers. I assumed he would run home, jump into bed and bawl his eyes out. But as soon as my feet hit the street I realized he might be running ahead in order to be the first into the house, the first to explicate himself, falsely, in front of our parents. I thought he might try to accuse me of stealing money. I remember my head turning to fire when I anticipated might happen when he got through the front door and into the living room.
As I came into the house, he was standing in front of mom and dad, and with the most pathetic face, and with tears streaming he pointed at me as I walked through the front door, and said with an unusually energetic delivery, “He says I’m stealing! I’m not stealing! I didn’t do anything! He’s stealing! He owes me two dollars!”
It was literally the first time I had heard him reach such a decibel. My heart sank.
“You two sit down,” said my dad, rather dramatically pointing to the longer second-hand couch, directly facing them on the other side of the small room. We sat at opposite ends of the couch, as far away from each other as possible. I crossed my arms to be dramatic. I sat erect and kept a stern strong face. My brother slouched. He had his chin on his chest, and he was weeping.
“I didn’t do anything,” he said.
“All right then,” my dad started calmly. “Which one of you has been taking money out of our wallets?”
My brother pointed at my head and blurted out “He did! He did!” His mouth was open to say something else. I could tell he was trying to formulate ideas in his head, so I jumped in before he could articulate them.
“I’m missing money from my wallet, and I was the one who told you and I never stole any money from anybody.” I pointed to my brother. “He’s the one who plays all those video games. Where does he get the money to play all the time?”
My mother leaned forward, “Are you still playing video games? We told you not to play those games. You remember the talk we had?” She looked very concerned, her elbows on her knees and her hands clasped together. This was the first time I had heard that my brother was barred from playing arcade games.
My brother was silent. “Are you still playing video games?” she repeated.
“No,” my brother said almost inaudibly.
“Yes he does!” I yelled. “He plays them so much he’s better than GOD!” I quickly realized how I might have sounded as my parents would not know, that within our insular world of the arcade, GOD was a high ranking scorer of arcade games.
“Are you better than God?” my father asked. I looked at my brother, knowing the smile on my dad’s face would take the seriousness out of the situation. I wanted vindication. I wanted to be right, and I wanted to know if I was being robbed by my own brother. I needed to hear my brother confess, so I was glad he had his eyes closed. He was trying to look as pathetic as possible. I could not believe he was putting on such an act. I had never seen him do this before.
“One of you has to tell us the truth, or we’ll cut both your allowances,” my dad said.
I was horrified. That was not fair at all, and I was pretty sure they knew I was innocent, at this point, so I pointed dramatically at my brother and yelled, “You took the money! I didn’t take it! You took it! Admit it! Because of you I don’t get my allowance! That’s no fair!”
My father leaned forward towards my brother, affecting a look of great concern. “Have you been taking money from our wallets?”
There was silence for a moment. Then a hummed kind of whimpering came out of my brother’s closed mouth. His mouth opened, and a wail came out along with tears. He attempted to say something, but the words were just mouthed. He realized nothing was coming out, so he tried again, “I’m sorry,” was what it sounded like.
My father needed to check. “Did you take money from us?”
The wailing came out again. My brother fell sideways into the cushion by the arm rest and hugged it, burying his face into the cushion. He was nodding in a manic, overly repetitive fashion, like a toy with a spring for a neck. The corners of the cushion mimicked the motion as if pulled with puppet strings.
I crossed my arms then, to look serious and appear vindicated. I knew the culprit. I exposed the crime. I had dragged the criminal into court and thrown him at the mercy of the judges. The case was closed.Soon after, I took to beating my brother. At school, I was getting picked on – nothing serious – bullying is too strong a word for it. To redeem myself, I employed misdirected payback – a quick punch to my brother’s stomach or a surprise smack to his head would do the trick. His silence and humbleness were parts of an act to hide his real character. His bursts of tears didn’t phase me at all. I beat him often. Circumstances changed for me from one school year to the next, and guilt stopped me from continue to persecute him. We grew older, and better qualities came from both of us. We became brotherly again, and I no longer looked down on him. We loaned each other money, and spent time together. My interest in arcade games had vanished the day my brother professed his guilt in front of our parents. And today I understand the desire – the need to play the games and to be good at them – maybe better than GOD, whoever that was.
Sense in Fear
© 2011 by Duncan WellerThe door swung shut behind Malcolm with a metallic thud as he approached the half table with an innocuous plastic palm on a perilous tilt into a square recess of the wall. The culprit who left the pot leaning had dropped the stack of community papers that hogged the rest of the table’s surface. The paper’s corners draped the edges, pointing towards the carmine carpet. The header of the cover story boldly announced further leads into an investigation of a local murder. As he righted the plant, Malcolm glanced at the photo of a dour policewoman. A yellow boundary ribbon stretched behind he, covering the tips of the vista of the Rocky Mountains of North Vancouver in the distance.
Malcolm grunted. The same paper covered the same story months earlier, which at that time was a five-year-old investigation. They’re really stretching this, Malcolm thought, wondering if this was actually a good sign that there were very few murders in the area. He had never read or heard of statistics to say either way.
He cut a glance to his mailbox’s little cage. He had no mail. Malcolm two-stepped up both short flights of stairs to reach the top floor where he dug into his pocket and withdrew his keys. With two floors, the building had no elevator.
The door opposite his swung open. The apartment building manager, Jerry, a man in his fifties with a round bemused face, stepped out from the one bedroom apartment, similar to Malcolm’s and soon to be occupied with new tenants. Jerry was cleaning it in preparation.
They caught each other’s gaze.
“Hey Malcolm,” Jerry started.
Malcolm knew he wouldn’t get into his apartment without a brief chat.
“How’s your day going today?” Jerry asked rubbing his bald head. A rasping sound emanated from the friction of hand-on-stubble.
Malcolm was accustomed to Jerry’s perennial concern with tenant’s ability to pay rent.
“Good. The job is working out fine,” Malcolm replied, forcing a smile, but knowing Jerry would eventually question him on – the new job. When Malcolm first moved in he made the mistake of casually complaining to Jerry about the inordinately high cost of living in Vancouver. He gave Jerry a little rant about how good jobs for young people were scarce, how the rent easily took half a young person’s income, and how it was no wonder young people weren’t having children until later in life, if at all. To which, Jerry had simply shrugged, and Malcolm realized he had sounded too defensive.
Not wanting to part company on a bad note before entering his apartment, Malcolm added, “Great day, huh? Too bad I was indoors all day. Looks like you got some sun though?”
“A little. I’m doin’ some gardening.”
Malcolm pushed his door open and was about to step behind it.
“Hey, Malcolm,” Jerry said calmly, with his head cast down and his eyes to the floor. “We’ve got a little bit of a problem in the building,” he said, his voice less audible.
Malcolm turned in his doorway and leaned against the frame with genuine curiosity. “Oh yeah? What’s up?”
“Two of your neighbours are... well... how do I put this... disturbed by something. It doesn’t seem to be much to be disturbed about, but it’s really bothering them, and they want me to check into it.” Jerry shook his head to affect a look of disbelief. He looked up at Malcolm, eye to eye, searching. “Have you seen anything strange in the hallway at all, just... around here?” he asked waving his hand to indicate close proximity. He cast his eyes down the stairs.
Malcolm couldn’t help but look towards the first floor as well. He recalled being in the apartment months earlier, when it was vacant. He had considered trading his apartment for the other, on a whim. He frowned when he realized he was mimicking Jerry.
“No. I mean... nothing that I can remember,” said Malcolm shrugging.
“It’s probably... nothing. I think it’s some kid playing a prank. Probably just... a relative of someone who visits the building.” Jerry was quiet for a moment.
Malcolm had his eyebrows up waiting for Jerry to meet his gaze – hopefully to get the message that he was still standing in the doorway waiting for an explanation.
“Yeah?” quipped Malcolm with a little impatience in his voice.
Jerry raised his right hand. His index finger and thumb were held up to indicate the size of something rather small. Jerry looked Malcolm in the eye.
“It was only about... yay big. It was in front of the door of your neighbours in two-oh-four there.” Jerry turned and nodded in the direction of the closed door at the bottom of the short flight of stairs; part of the door just visible from where Malcolm stood.
“It was a rock.”
“A rock?” queried Malcolm, eyebrows up.
“Yes. A rock,” said Jerry.
Malcolm sensed Jerry was playing detective – looking for a reaction that might indicate who the culprit was, but Malcolm didn’t have enough information at this point to fake a reaction if he felt any culpability. He held Jerry’s gaze.
“On top of this rock was a witch,” and Jerry’s fingers expanded a little to suggest the object was actually a little taller than he had first described.
“A witch?” repeated Malcolm. Somehow Malcolm’s interest was sparked. Okay. Weird. Some people are spooked by witches, but... “That’s a pretty small witch.”
“Yeah. It was a toy. Maybe from one of the fast food joints. But it’s nowhere near Halloween is it?”
Malcolm shook his head.
“Someone put this... little witch outside two-oh-four’s door.” Jerry let a little space fill the air again.
Again Malcolm felt Jerry was searching for some reaction. This is getting silly. How can this be worth bothering the other tenants? Malcolm pursed his lips and lifted his eyebrows once again. For added effect he shrugged when Jerry didn’t respond.
“At first they thought the witch was just put there, or I should say, dropped there by someone... accidentally, but you see, it happened again a week later,” and Jerry shuffled his feet slightly.
Malcolm leaned closer into the doorframe, as if bracing himself. Oh come on! What am I standing here for? Malcolm considered excusing himself. I’m hungry buddy, come on!
Jerry must have seen whatever reaction manifested on Malcolm’s face, so he continued. “The Little Mermaid was put in that little... that slot... the peek hole.” Jerry was referring to the small, hinged panel attached to each tenant’s door revealing a hole when opened, a precursor to the much smaller one-way glass version. On the outside of the panel there were two little bars to prevent someone sticking something through the hole, like fingers.
“So?” Malcolm said. He felt a little let down that Jerry’s inquiry wasn’t more serious, something worth relating to a friend.
Jerry did a little two-step on the spot and held himself a little more erect. “You’ve met Darren and his girlfriend, Cynthia? They’ve been here about three months now. Nice couple. No trouble at all. They both work. She mountain-bikes in competitions. Well they’ve been getting these toys – figurines – just outside their door. It happens a little more often than once a week.”
So, are you accusing me? Malcolm thought, putting his left palm up on a slightly extended left arm. “Well, you know I work all day. I get home at about six and I’ve never seen anything in front of anyone’s door. When do these toys turn up?” Malcolm asked.
“Oh, I’m not accusing you of anything. I mean, maybe if it was you putting these toys there, you thought you were just giving, I don’t know, a little gift to Cynthia, or something.”
“Well, like I said, I haven’t seen anything. Cynthia’s cute, but she’s got a boyfriend. We just say ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ and that’s pretty much it. I don’t have any interest in her at all. When were these objects dropped by their door?”
“Darren gets home around four thirty – five. He’s found most of them. Cynthia’s the one that’s upset by it. Darren hasn’t told her about the last two he found,” said Jerry. “Darren’s getting upset because Cynthia’s getting upset.”
She sounds pretty flakey. “Well, I get home a little later, which is why I haven’t seen anything. If I see something I’ll let you know,” Food! Food! Food! And Malcolm pushed himself away from the doorframe to indicate that he was heading into his apartment. “I’ll let you know if I see anything.” Then Malcolm thought, That can’t be all they’re afraid of. It’s too minor. “Was there a note?” Malcolm asked.
“Note?” asked Jerry.
“Yeah. Was there a note with the toy – with some kind of threat or something?” asked Malcolm, and he had to ask, because he thought the toys alone couldn’t be causing this much trouble, and it was likely that Jerry was keeping some information to himself. Otherwise it didn’t make sense.
“No. There’s no note. I know it seems pretty minor, but they’re getting really worried. It’s sort of a mystery why someone would do this,” said Jerry as if attempting to continue the conversation and keep Malcolm in the doorway.
“Well, it’s a minor mystery,” said Malcolm holding the door open, but slowly trying to close it without being rude.
Jerry, motioned as if preparing to have a door closed in his face, finalized the conversation with a much more audible, “All right! You have a good evening then, Malcolm. Take care of yourself.”
“Thanks. You too. Take care.” said Malcolm quickly, then regretting it. Take Care! Like the world is about to fall apart. It was almost to admit that the little witch or the little mermaid were some kind of actual threat.The next day Malcolm burst past the little table in the entranceway. The stack of yesterday’s community newspapers had disappeared from its top. He didn’t bother to check for mail. He bounded up the wide carpeted steps, three at a time and immediately a bright little yellow object sitting near the bottom of the second set of steps in front of his neighbour’s door came into view. Oh no. Don’t tell me! It was like a little fleck of annoyance in Malcolm’s mind, a disruption on a determined journey towards his supper. He made for the second flight of steps, passing the yellow object on the floor, but stopped, stepped back, bent down, and picked up the little toy. What the hell! This is it? It was a tiny cartoon bear with a goofy smile and eyes tightly shut. This is what they’re afraid of? He held on to the little bear, stared at it as he continued up the steps to his apartment, one step at a time. He hadn’t reached the top step when he heard the sound of the lock, spin and clunk.
The door vanished, swinging into the apartment. In its place appeared Darren, hair unkempt, half dressed, with a look of hostility on his face. It took Malcolm a second to place Darren in his mind. Malcolm had only seen him twice – the last time maybe three weeks earlier.
“What... whattaya doin’!” Darren said, stepping out of the doorway into the hall. Malcolm glanced at Darren’s bare feet.
To ease the tension, Malcolm stepped slowly down two steps. He casually held up the little toy and looked at it himself, as if he’d never seen it before. “Oh... I ...uh, found this in front of your door,” and Malcolm realized that in showing Darren the toy, he was incriminating himself. He could feel his face blush slightly.
“Yeah! And what are you doin’ with it?” Darren stared.
Great! Now I’m responsible for those other toys as well. “I don’t know. I guess I was trying to help you out. Jerry told me you guys were getting these toys in front of your door, so... I don’t know... I guess I was just trying to... I don’t know, help somehow.”
Darren looked a little relieved. “It’s been there for a while. I left it there cause I was waiting for the police. They’ll be here soon.”
Malcolm stepped down a couple more steps. Darren put one arm up to hold the door frame. Malcolm handed over the toy and Darren took it, blinking a few times. “Hey, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you guys were being so bothered by this,” Malcolm said. “I guess I just didn’t take it seriously. You know... Jerry, he explained what was going on, but I didn’t know you were... I mean I didn’t think it was that bad, you know.”
Darren’s shrug was exaggerated. “It’s not me so much. It’s my girlfriend. She’s spooked by it. You know, people are pretty crazy around here. All kinds of shit goes on.”
Malcolm nodded, feigning understanding, and withdrew the inclination to say what had popped into his mind, which was a criticism, that people were too easily spooked. He hoped Darren would give more detail. None came. “Okay. Well... when the police get here, you can send them up to talk with me, if you like. It’s probably a neighbour’s kid, you know, just playing around.”
Darren nodded, reached for the door handle, but remained in the doorway. Malcolm shrugged, turned, and climbed the steps to his apartment door, pulling out his key. Malcolm turned his head to see Darren’s apartment door close. Darren had taken the toy inside with him. The hallway carpet looked rather empty and dull. You’ve got to be kidding – the police? They can’t possibly be interested in this. Malcolm pictured Darren on the phone to the police trying to make his case. Malcolm shook his head, rolled his eyes, and smirked.
Malcolm entered his apartment and shut his door. The image of the little yellow bear with its eyes tightly shut and the big silly grin came to his mind. Malcolm snorted a laugh that indicated closure on the subject, but as soon as he had taken off his coat, the face of the little bear and Darren’s in the doorway combined as if they were one in the same. As he made tea Malcolm reflected on the oddity, the silliness of so much worry placed around simple objects. Not only were two people spooked, the apartment manager was looking for a culprit and no doubt probing all the neighbours, involving them, and now the police were coming. Malcolm played with images of the police talking to Darren and Cynthia and imagined the conversation. Malcolm huffed several laughs as he started making his spaghetti. Later, while eating, he was surprised how much better it tasted. He hadn’t been paying close attention to the measurements of the ingredients.
The police didn’t come to interview Malcolm the night before. He entered the apartment, emptied his mailbox of flyers and two envelopes. He climbed the stairs slowly, organizing the mail in his hands. Jerry, along with another man crouching on the floor, was in the hall in front of Darren and Cynthia’s door. The man Malcolm didn’t recognize had a tool belt that weighed down his pants, revealing more than Malcolm cared to see.
“Hey Jerry.” Malcolm said.
“Hey Malcolm.”
Not being able to figure out what they were doing, he stopped and asked, “What’s up?”
Malcolm then saw a hole drilled below the round panel that acted as a peek-hole. Jerry shrugged and Malcolm nodded a knowing response. A glass door eye would be better a method of observing who was at your door, without revealing that anyone was home. The old peek holes had to have their panels manually opened.
Malcolm headed up to his door. He stopped at the top of the steps and turned to ask Jerry, “Hey, did the police come by last night?”
“Yes.” Jerry responded without looking up at Malcolm. “They were here around eleven.”
“Really. Eleven eh? I was talking to Darren last night around six. He said he called the police then.”
“Yep,” Jerry said, looking at the other man doing the installation of the door eye. “They were busy last night. There was a man running around shooting off his gun down on Third Street.”
“Sheeesz! Seriously?” exclaimed Malcolm. “Was anybody hurt?”
“No. It was on the radio this morning. The guy was crazy. Just lost it apparently. He fired the bullets into the air.”
“That’s lucky, or... I mean... that’s good.” Malcolm heard his own voice with annoyance. “I mean that’s bad. Okay, goodnight.”
“Oh. Malcolm.” Jerry said more audibly. Jerry looked up the stairs at Malcolm. “What were you planning to do with the toy last night?”
Malcolm wanted to roll his eyes. He wanted to swear and say, ‘Get over it!’ but all he said was, “I don’t know. I wasn’t planning anything. I probably would have given it to you later. I thought I’d try to help by… I don’t know, just, you know, not letting them know there was a toy there.” Malcolm knew the excuse sounded lame, but the act of picking up the toy seemed so minor it didn’t warrant an examined and reasoned response.
Jerry cast his eyes back down nodding. Malcolm retreated to his door. He realized that his picking up of the toy now might make him suspect number one, but Malcolm didn’t really care. The annoyance he felt this time sloughed off by the time he was eating from the same batch of spaghetti he made the night before. He’d spent enough mental energy on the silliness of it all. Darren and Cynthia are neurotic flakes, caving in to their own exaggerated fears of a situation.A week passed. The local paper sat on the little table by the front door as Malcolm walked by. What a trashy paper, he thought. Malcolm had read the last edition where a former cop, turned reporter, had an opinion column and was always unfairly censorious. Without facts the former cop accused local youth of setting fires to empty old warehouses slated as heritage sites. The crime rate amongst youth was apparently dropping, but it didn’t stop the cop reporter from comparing the Columbine tragedy with local youth, as if they were about to repeat the same crimes committed a country away, and a culture removed. Malcolm got the gist from locals, and their suspicion was that the fires were more likely started by developers. It was suggested to Malcolm that city counselors might be involved. Any empty heritage building that went up in flames was replaced with a tall condominium. It was all too easy for the local paper to accuse miscreant youth than to suggest that greedy adults might be putting other people’s lives in danger. Local youth had no means, nor wherewithal to defend against attacks by the local paper. Malcolm thought that if the paper had the courage to print what was really on people’s minds, the paper would be viciously attacked, and without facts, they’d be in a heap of trouble. The idiotic articles in the paper – all opinion and no facts – made Malcolm doubt its credibility. He rarely picked it up. And it seemed others in his apartment building felt the same. The entire stack appeared in the recycling bin on more than one occasion.
Malcolm didn’t stop to look at the little blue toy that was sitting in front of his neighbour’s door. He gave it a casual glance to see that it was some sort of popular animated cartoon character. It was smiling with an idiotic grin. Malcolm sniggered. They toy looked as if it was pulling the prank itself, smiling at its own mischievousness.
In his room Malcolm watched television while eating home made tacos and trying to get keep the contents of each bite in his mouth. The television played only what he rented from the video store or borrowed from the library. He broke the antenna on his set seven years earlier. His entertainment was reading, generally books or the Internet. He hated advertising and sensational news stories. Television played too much of a manipulation game and he didn’t want it in his home. He felt happier and clearer headed without it.
There was a knock on the door. Malcolm’s head bowed and he shook it with his eyes shut tightly. He lumbered up and over to the door exaggerating his movements as if someone was watching. He was watching a documentary on the Aztec ruins of Machupichu in Peru.
He opened the door knowing it was Jerry.
“Hey Jerry. What’s up?” Malcolm said.
“Hi Malcolm.” Jerry bowed his head slightly and fixed his eyes to his right down the hall. “I’m sorry to bother you, but...”
“Look,” Malcolm put a frown between his eyes, “I’m really... I don’t care about this toy problem you’ve got. I’m not involved. I think they’re...” Malcolm jerked his chin in the direction of two-oh-fours door, “...too serious about this. You know, if it were me... if someone was putting these toys in front of my door I would just start a collection, you know. I would line them up on top of my stove or something. I’d give them to my niece. She’s got a few Kinder egg toys, you know.”
Jerry shook his head slightly. “Okay. Sorry to bother you. You won’t have to worry about them any more though...”
“I’m not worried about it. I’m disinterested,” said Malcolm.
“Well, they’re moving out. They’re moving to Montreal, so I don’t think it will be a problem any more.”
“Well. Good for them. They must be pretty spooked to move all the way out there from here. Vancouver’s pretty nice. Did they find work out there?”
Jerry shook his head. “I don’t know. We... uh, I haven’t really asked about that.”
“Oh well, good luck to them, eh?” said Malcolm lengthening his back.
“Oh, I wish them the best,” said Jerry with audible concern thrown in and recognizing Malcolm’s impatience. “But you didn’t see or hear anything, earlier?”
Malcolm let a few moments pass. He entertained different responses he could make. He sighed. “No,” he said.
Jerry nodded. “Well, have a good evening. Take care.”
“You too,” said Malcolm as he shut the door.
Malcolm sat down to rewind the tape he left running. He paused the tape when the video focused on the many roofless dwellings of the ruin atop the mountains. It was quite a beautiful scene in spite of the emptiness of the place. I wonder what the rent was like there? Must have been really high, he thought. He got up and went to the stove to get a couple more taco shells.
On his way to the stove he stopped in the middle of the room. Rent. Rent? He bantered a few thoughts around in his head. The image of the smiling blue toy he’d seen earlier came to mind. I had to sign a yearlong lease to get this apartment. He thought of Darren and Cynthia. Malcolm remembered looking into their apartment three months ago, before they moved in. He asked Jerry to open the door to see if the layout was any more appealing than the apartment he was currently living in. So soon, Malcolm thought. And they’re going to Montreal.
Malcolm walked across the room and opened the door to the hallway. He looked down the steps to two-oh-four’s door. The blue toy was gone.
A wide grin came over Malcolm’s face. “Smart,” he laughed. “Very smart.” Malcolm closed his door. “Good going,” he said aloud.
