Personal Effects: Dark Art

30

“Katabatic!”

I grinned at my brother’s exclamation as I placed the last of our spoons into the silverware drawer. He and Rachael were performing some technical tomfoolery in the living room; something involving Lucas’ laptop and her monstrous widescreen television. True to my road-trek promise to Rachael, I’d cooked dinner and washed the dishes.

When Luc had learned of this penance, he’d cackled and christened me “The Dish Slut.” Har-dee-frickin’-har.

At least Lucas had asked no questions about my bashed-and-patched body earlier this evening. My brisk “Greatest Hits” recounting of last night and this morning—including the standoff with Daniel Drake, Dad at The Brink and my suspension, but excluding details about nearly everything else—had satisfied him. Much like his uncanny ability to know when it was time to depart a social setting, Lucas also knew when it was best to skip the fine print.

He had asked about Daniel Drake’s condition; I think he felt for the fallen son, just as I did. I’d called Haverstraw’s hospital on my way home from The Brink. Daniel was in stable condition.

I leaned into the living room and silently watched my tribe as they giggled at the TV, admiring their creativity and resourcefulness—and loving the themness of them.

Lucas had rigged the laptop to the tiny parkour cameras he’d shown me at Well7 on the night of Gram’s memorial service. With Rachael’s computer sorcery, the Toughbook now streamed wireless video to the television. The jittery footage was separated into four boxes on the screen, one for each of Lucas’ feet and hands. It was like the title sequence from “The Brady Bunch”… if a spastic dog had filmed it.

“Dig it, Dish Slut,” Lucas said, pointing at the screen. The contents of one sub-screen jerked, now recording its own on-screen footage. The image was a whirling visual feedback loop, video filming video filming video.

“Awesome,” I said, and sat beside Rachael on the couch. She _ leaned her head against my shoulder. I held her hand. Bliss hopped into my lap and purred. Dali looked on from the well-worn “Zach chair” in the corner.

“How long must I endure this crass moniker?” I asked my brother.

“A whole month,” he snickered. He gave Rachael a wink. “That’s the deal, right, Hochcrot? Z’s doing ’em for a dirty thirty. You’re Palmolive’s bitch, bro.”

“He’s getting off easy, at that,” Rachael said.

I nodded, squeezing her hand. Oh, how I knew that was true. Oh, how I loved this woman and her patience—and her acceptance, if not understanding, of how I was wired.

Lucas bounced in place before us; the footage from his toys stuttered and pixelated, trying desperately to keep up. Dali bolted from the room.

“Ahem. Your resident wunderkind has a new creative vision,” he announced, beaming. “I’m using my ParkourCams as monster POV footage for… a horror thriller.”

He raised his hands, made them into playful claws and growled.

“Snarl,” Rachael deadpanned.

“Is this movie about a black figure that stalks prey who’ve been ‘marked for death’ by a blind man?” I asked.

Lucas nodded furiously. His curly hair rocked like a shabby shrub in a hurricane.

“New genre: parkhourror. Title: Obsidian Vengeance. ‘Based on a true—’”

“I’d work on it,” I said. “A lot.”

The three of us laughed. For the first time in days, I felt safe. Warm.

Latin music blared from my brother’s pocket. Shakira. The chica. Lucas raised his eyebrows appreciatively and fished the cell phone from his baggy pants.

“Heh, nine o’clock sharp,” he said, placing the phone to his ear. The TV behind him blurred brown, an IMAX close-up of his shaggy hair. I smirked. I didn’t think the technology was quite “there” yet.

He spoke into the phone for a moment, hung up, and began disconnecting the cameras from his limbs. The gear was soon stowed—and the television screen, thankfully, was now black.

“Mustn’t keep the brilliant, exotic young lady waiting,” he said. “We’re catching a new sci-fi movie tonight.”

“Ahh, young love,” Rachael cooed. She turned to me. “When was the last time you took me to a late-night flick?”

I nodded to the bookshelf near her home theater system. It brimmed with our video collection.

“Up for some James Bond?” I asked.

Now she squeezed my hand.

“Kiss kiss, bang bang comes later,” she said. “After we fight.”

Lucas made a sour expression as he walked to the door.

“Ick. Glad I won’t be around for the make-up. You guys have a welcome up night, dig?”

“Dug,” Rachael and I said simultaneously.

He grinned and stepped into the hallway.

“’Dore you,” he said.

I grinned. “’Dore you back, bro.”

“Martini shot, everybody.”

The door latched shut and he bounded down the stairs, rolling thunder, just as he had when we were kids.

I turned to my woman—my anchor, my sail, the second half of my heartbeat. I gazed into her eyes.

“Are we going to fight now?” I asked. I wasn’t playful. I was worried.

“Do you want to fight?” she replied.

“No.”

“Doghouse rain check, then.” She pulled off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. “Tired.”

“Me too.”

“Do you really think Peterson is going to fire you?” she asked. “I mean, I can pull in more shifts, more writing gigs if we need the money. See about more sponsorship for PixelVixen707. We’ll be okay for a month or so, but… Z, you can’t be out of a job for long.”

I nodded, somber. Rachael and I allowed ourselves many luxuries: dinner out, damned good beer, feeding our creative needs for more art supplies and techno-gizmos. But this life didn’t come cheap.

“I know, babe. And I don’t know. The old man knows a lot. A helluva lot, stuff from well beyond The Brink. I don’t know how he got it all. Guess he’s not as daffy—or removed—as we Morlocks think he is.”

I pulled her close, sighing. Bliss hopped from my lap.

“Listen to me. ‘We Morlocks.’ Let me put it this way: I’d fire me.”

“Not good,” she whispered. “But you saved Drake.”

“In a way,” I agreed, and this was true. I kissed her head. I inhaled her scent and closed my eyes, wanting nothing more than more, more of this, for as long as I could. “He needed the blood washed from his hands. The blood of a Russian and his family. Eye for eye, punishment, remorse. Paid in full. I hope.”

The silence between us now was both comforting and anxious. His past had been put to rest. My future was in tatters. Had it been worth it?

“Yes,” Rachael whispered, as if reading my thoughts. “I hope so, too.”

We held each other, silent again, surrounded by our glowing chili pepper halo.

“Did you see it?” she asked. “Did you really see it?”

The Dark Man. Chernobog.

“I’ll tell you what the therapist saw,” I said. “Paranoia. Superstition saturation. My fear of the dark, cranked up past ten. But if you want to know what Z saw… and felt… yeah. It was as real as it gets.”

“Mmm.”

Her breathing became softer, as did mine. Sleep, finally. Sleep.

Bzzzzzz.

We perked up, confused.

My cell phone vibrated against our steamer trunk table again, then stopped. Skeleton song chimed from its speaker.

I pulled away from her, already missing her warmth, picking up the phone. A text message, from…

“Dr. Peterson?” I said.

We leaned against each other, shoulders touching, as I slid open the phone’s tiny keyboard. The message blinked to life on the LCD screen.

LEAVE OF ABSENCE CANCELED. NIGHT SHIFT R.N. REPORTS ERRATIC BEHAVIOR IN YOUR PATIENT, JAMES VAN ZANDT. REPORT TO BRINK, TOMORROW AM. IT WOULD BE PRUDENT…

There was more to the message. I clicked the keypad’s “down” arrow.

…TO BRUSH UP ON YOUR MONOPOLY, it read.

“Jimmy Van Zandt,” I said. I turned to her, grinning. “They call him ‘Park Place.’ Autistic, impenetrable, obsessed with that board game.”

She smiled back, and leaned in. We kissed.

“So, ‘James Bond Will Return,’” she said, quoting the line at the end of nearly every 007 film. “What’s this adventure going to be called, hottie artist?”

I chuckled. “I’ll tell you in the morning, geek goddess,” I said, and we kissed again, more passionately this time.

We stumbled through our apartment, a tangle of rushing hands and half-kisses, far too tired for lovemaking, too far in love to care. The cats scattered, leaving us to the bedroom and our impatient romance. We needed this, this closeness, this being.

The bed was cold, but not for long, and when it came time to dim the bedside “Zach light,” I twisted its knob further and further, until I could barely see her exquisite face.

“Are you okay?” she asked, gazing down at me.

“I’m learning to live a little dangerously,” I said. “I’m okay. I’m… I’m okay.”

And for now, this was also true.

The light clicked off. We glowed bright, in the darkness.