The Dead Reckoner : Volume Two: Urban Underworld

Bran.” She came up to her father, who was now standing over the garbage pail with a handful of broken glass. Alice pointed to the cupboard above him. “I’m going to get a bowl from the cabinet, okay? I need to get a bowl from the cabinet and put it on the counter so I can have my cereal.”

  Her brother said, “There’s no milk.”

  “We need milk.” said Alice. “We need milk for the cereal. Dad, you have to get milk right now. We can’t have cereal without any milk.”

  The old man shot a look back to his son.

  “Well?” he said.

  “What, that’s my job? I’ll pay for it, but why don’t you get out of the house and get it.”

  “Alice, your brother can’t get any milk right now.”

  Little John raised his hands. “No, no, stop, I’ll get it.”

  He knew what would come of this if he let his dad manipulate Alice in that way. She’d start screaming and she wouldn’t care if it was her dad or her brother who was at fault here. John wasn’t the most mature young man, but he knew that this fight with his father wasn’t worth upsetting his sister in that way. He gave the old man a dirty look, not knowing it was the last time he’d do that, and stormed away.

  John walked down Broadway as the sun was rising above the buildings on his right. In front of him was the great green trestle of the Tobin Bridge. They called Chelsea the City Under the Bridge. The Tobin left Boston and crossed the Mystic River. Then it crossed over nearly all of Chelsea before landing in Revere. The city was just a few square miles, and its inhabitants were the sad figurines you might see milling about below you as you traverse between Boston and richer suburbs to the north.

  He stopped into the Broadway Spa, a convenience store on the corner. The price of milk here was a scam, but at least it was close and John could get his cigarettes. He didn’t pick up Rares this time. He had only a ten and some ones and there was milk to buy. He thought about getting the Camel Wides, but that didn’t add up either, so he grabbed a carton of his dad’s Winstons and hoped that wasn’t a sign of things to come.

  People always said you become your parents whether you like or not, but they never warned you how that reality crept up on you in unexpected ways. John had always been smart enough to avoid getting some girl knocked up. He learned that lesson from his dad. Once upon a time, Little thought that was enough to keep him out of trouble long enough to make a future for himself. As he walked to the counter without his Camels, he knew that this was his life from now on. It didn’t matter if he didn’t have kids of his own; the world would find a way to screw him in the end.

  On his way home, John noticed something in the alley between his apartment block and the one next to it. There was a chain link gate spanning the gap and bits of shredded blue denim stuck in the twisted wires at the top. John tried to open the gate and found that the latch was bent. He slammed it three of four times until he bent it back far enough to let him lift it all the way. The alley led to the place the residents called the “backyard”, though there wasn’t a blade of grass in it. A concrete retaining wall lined the back, making the place into a pit. One of the kids from the building had drawn a map of America on the asphalt ground. Two plastic tricycles stood in the corner. One was pink the other was blue and both were caked in mud made impenetrable by repeated rainfall.

  Another corner held a tiny aluminum shed where the caretaker kept some of his supplies. Its roof had suffered a couple big dents. Those weren’t there before. John went over and looked around. The thin gap between the shed and the retaining wall was full of glass beer bottles and pages ripped from porn magazines.

  John looked up. A small hill extended from the other side of the wall. There was a grassy field, a couple trees, and several low brick buildings. There was a home back there for the deranged and mentally handicapped. It was the sort of place he feared his own sister would end up one day, or the sort of place he hoped his dad would end up. The strange thing was, John was the only member of his family who had been to the home – years ago, the dour brick building had been his elementary school. Perhaps there was some law that decreed the site should always be one kind of looney bin or another, because when the city built a new school they turned the old one into that asylum.

  Sometimes, kids from the neighborhood liked to hang out in the secluded field where the playgrounds had once been. They'd dumped their trash over the wall. John started to pick through it. He found that the tattered pages weren't from porn magazines after all; they were shreds of catalogs for sex toys and male anatomical enhancements. These kids weren't even old enough or smart enough to get the real stuff. Maybe both. One of the crazies must've seen them back here last night and spooked them. Maybe they booked it over the retaining wall, down the alley and out into the street. They ripped their pants on the fence and broke the latch. John guessed they were too stupid to perform the simple action of properly opening an unlocked gate.

  John found some other stuff back there too. There were firecrackers, both unused and unused. He also saw lighters - and something else a little more dangerous. He picked up a butane hand torch, like the kind used by jewelers. He bet one of the kids found this and it became a prized possession. This little treasure was likely the entire reason they’d been back there last night. They must’ve been finding out what things they could set on fire and that's what raised hell with the inmates at the institution, or their keepers. So the kids tore off and left their prize. John slipped it into his pocket.

  He turned to the back door of his building and stopped. There was a strange sound. It was a sort of hissing noise, or maybe a low breathy moan. The building wasn’t large, about four stories high by two apartments wide. His place was in the back, and he could see the kitchen window where his dad had put the fan. Though the fan was gone, there were a couple of broken shims still left in the window that prevented it from closing all the way. The moaning was coming through the open sliver under the window, from John’s apartment.

  He raced up the stairs and burst into the kitchen. There was Alice, belly and hands pressed against the counter. Her sweatpants were around her ankles and Big John had pushed himself against her back.

  Little John roared. Before the old man could even turn his head, Junior had grabbed his shoulder and flung him into the fridge. The man sat there, back against the fridge, legs sprawled on the floor, fly open and ragged, limp boxer briefs pushed down to make a space for exposing his parts. Little pulled his dad up by his pants, yanking them and zipping them so it hurt. The old man yelped, but that wasn’t the last of it.

  Little reached and fumbled in his pocket for the butane lighter.

  For once, the sound of Alice screaming didn’t stop him. He didn’t even hear it, not over the sound of his father crying in torment as the tiny blue flame melted the skin off one side of his face.  The old man was too skinny and too weak to resist. His son let up when Alice reached for the pair, and he shoved Dad to the floor again.

  “Get out.” he said. “Get out. Don’t even speak, just get out.”

  Big lay there for a moment, not moving or speaking or thinking.

  Little said, “If you even open your mouth, I will burn off the other side of your face.”

  Dad scrambled up and went for the door. His bare feet banged the steps in a disorderly shuffle as he found his way outside. John looked out the window, the one with the shim where the fan had once been. One of the kids had come out to claim his tricycle and was wheeling it around the map of America. Big burst into the backyard and the two froze and locked eyes. It was the man who looked horrified, afraid to be exposed for what he was to an innocent kid. He turned away and ran into the alley like some kind of cheap movie monster escaping the light. John heard the latch on the gate clank and that was the last sign of their father that either he or his sister ever heard.

  THIRTY TWO

  At the back of the Tomb, there was a door propped open and Reggie came thr
ough it, covered in George's insides. Reggie had a gun and John Smith had a two foot screw driver. Jason shivered in his skivvies and kept his hand fixed to the switch that would douse the whole room in water. Reggie turned the muzzle to Jason, shouting,

  “Get your hand off that switch.”

  Jason said, “She told me not to move.” He breathed in and when his breath left it rattled in his throat. “Unless someone tried to make me move. Then she told me to pull the switch.”

  For the last few minutes, John had wondered why Jason had undressed himself. And he wondered why Jason had listened to the woman. What else had she said to him that made him behave this way?

  Then Jason said, “She told me there was a bomb in the basement. And I saw it so I know.”

  From the other side of the door, Dale spoke.

  “Reggie. The building's been evacuated. Go see for yourself.”

  Rosalind said, “A bomb?”

  “Yeah, we're the only ones left in the building. My daughter's out there and she says the bomber threatened to bring this whole building down if anyone moved.”

  “Why?”

  “Ask him.” said Dale, pointing to John.

  John said, “Someone here suckered me in.” He pointed at Reggie. “I think it's this guy.”

  “It's true.” said Reggie. “You have a