Black Chuck Page 6

  Blood-warmth runs down his neck, across the wing of his collarbone, soaking his shirt. He looks down. The front of his clothes is stained dark and dripping. His feet are bloody and bare. He coughs, trying to get up whatever blocks his windpipe. He folds to his knees in the snow.

  The deer don’t move. They don’t come closer, just watch his struggle with their pale eyes. He coughs again, heaving, and up it comes at last. In his hand hangs a lump of bloodied flesh. He stares at it, gasping for breath, bright red slipping through his fingers…

  Réal sucked air as he woke, jerking back in the bed and knocking the lamp off the night table. Deer shadows fell over his walls. He gripped the sheet under him, white-knuckled, blinking and blinking until the room slid back into shape, and the demons melted away.

  Fuck.

  He breathed hard, trying to slow his heart, eyes bulging. He was home; he was okay. He sagged against the cold wall at his back. Relief washed through him.

  And then anger.

  Why the hell had she done that? Just sat down in the dirt in the dark, and let him go on without her for God knows how long.

  He threw the covers aside and swung his legs off the bed. The red glow on the night table said he’d only been asleep a couple of hours.

  Before that, he’d just lain on his back and stared into the dark, working his bottom lip between his teeth.

  He hadn’t even noticed she was gone. And when he had noticed, he had no idea how to find her again. He’d just swung his stick back and forth, calling her name, until he’d tripped right over her and they were both on the ground.

  “What are you doing, Ev?” he’d spat, wet earth soaking the seat of his jeans, elbows pointing into the dirt. She hadn’t replied. When he’d shaken her, she’d rocked back and forth like she was already dead.

  “Evie!” He’d scrambled to his knees, grabbing at her, touching her to see her in the dark. She’d been lying on her side, head in the dirt, hair full of sticks, but she’d been warm, breathing. “Evie, say something!”

  He’d gathered her up into his arms, all dead weight and flopping. He’d pinched the skin of her waist. Only then had she gasped and come alive, like a swordfish in his arms. “Don’t touch me!” she’d shrieked, thrashing away. “Don’t ever touch me!”

  Far cry, he’d thought bitterly, feeling that sweet moment in the car slipping away.

  He got out of bed now and padded downstairs quietly. In the kitchen he drew a glass of water and stood at the sink, looking out the window through the hanging crystal doodem—Ojibwe clan animals—that his mom liked to collect. Marten and bear and elk.

  The backyard was blue, getting paler with dawn. He could see the shapes of all his brothers’ toys scattered across the garden, returning to color. What was he supposed to do? If Evie was gonna be crazy, how was he supposed to take care of her? He swallowed the water, feeling it cool him from the inside.

  Part of him wanted to just say, Fuck it. Fend for yourself. Not my problem.

  But it was his problem. It was completely his problem. None of this would have happened if he hadn’t fought with Shaun. Hadn’t let himself get so damn mad.

  He set the water down and raised his fingers to his lips, remembering her lips, remembering her weight on him, her skin and muscle and arch. His stomach tightened. Then he turned and went back upstairs. He dressed quickly and went out to his car, careful to close the door quietly behind him.

  Réal took the long way. He hadn’t driven past Nan’s since the night he’d found Shaun. He came south along the cross street, then turned at the cemetery, coming up outside Evie’s a minute later. He parked on the shoulder and sat staring up at her black windows from the driver’s seat. The little gable in the attic stared back, empty-eyed.

  When he’d finally got Evie home it was late.

  They’d still had to walk out to the gas station, but on the second attempt he’d held her wrist so she wouldn’t slow them down again. She didn’t protest, so he’d fanned in the dark with his other hand, pulling her along like a dinghy.

  When they’d emerged into the flickering fluorescents of the Mohawk, they were a disaster. Mud and twigs and little bloody scrapes, Evie dragging her feet behind him. But he hadn’t cared what they looked like by that point—he’d just wanted to get home.

  And she hadn’t said another word. Had just loomed like a ghost while he’d thrown money down for the gas and hauled it, bumping against his leg, all the way back to the damn car. By the time they’d got to her place, he was beat. He’d pulled into the drive, dumped the car in Park and looked at her.

  “Need me to come in?” he’d asked.

  “For what?”

  He’d rolled his eyes. “Not that.”

  She’d blinked, then looked through the windshield. “Thanks,” she’d said. “Sorry.”

  He would have answered, Don’t worry about it, or I’m sorry too, but she’d jumped out of the car before he could decide which.

  Just before dawn, he shifted the driver’s seat back and leaned into it, crossing his arms and tipping his chin to his chest. He’d gone home angry all over again and lain awake, and then that dream, that mouthful of flesh…

  He shuddered.

  He closed his eyes and breathed, trying to let it all slide away.

  E

  Evie dreamed it. The sound of a car. That destroyed muffler. She rolled over, pulling the blankets and drifting back into sleep. Her hair smelled like lake against the pillow. Leafy and wild. Pictures shuffled past and disappeared. Darkness. Réal.

  When she woke, the sun was bright and hot, her skin slick with sweat. She sat up, rubbing her eyes. Last night’s clothes were flung across the floor, filthy and wrecked. When she saw them, the whole strange night came laughing back. She groaned, stomach fluttering.

  She crawled out of bed and went to the window, pulling the lace curtain aside. The window always stuck, thick layers of paint expanding in the heat. She banged it with the heel of her hand and rattled it open to let in cooler air. Across the street, the empty field stretched off into sunshine, the smell of dirt rising with the dew.

  Her mouth filled with saliva.

  She barely made it to the wastebasket. There wasn’t even much trying to get out—only those two cans of beer—but it was enough. She stared at the watery mess, saliva hanging from her lips. God. When will this stop? She crossed the short hallway to the attic bathroom and emptied the basket into the toilet, holding back another rotten, half empty heave.

  Evie showered and went downstairs. Her mother would have gotten home just after dawn, crawling into bed long before Evie woke.

  Evie padded quietly around the kitchen, used to the soft rhythm of the clock, the sleeping silence of the house. When her cell phone buzzed against the breakfast table, she nearly jumped out of her skin.

  It was Sunny. How was the lake?

  Evie stared at the text for a long time before answering, her thumb hovering over the screen. She could tell Sunny everything. Wasn’t that what friends did? She could tell her about getting drunk and skinny-dipping and kissing Ré. She could tell her about the car, the gas. About wanting to die.

  Fine, she answered back.

  Ooh la la, Sunny replied. Pepé Le Pew said it sucked.

  Evie’s chest tightened. Had he already talked to Sunny? Had he told her all about how awful the whole thing was? She almost burst into tears on the spot.

  She hesitated again before typing the next message.

  Did you tell Sunny about last night?

  There was no reply. She took the phone out to the front porch and set it next to her on the steps. She sipped her tea. She waited. The tea went cold.

  When the phone did buzz again, she grabbed for it. Taking the puppy for doggy treats. Should we come get you?

  Evie worried her thumbnail between her teeth. If Sunny knew anything about last night, she wasn’t saying yet. Sure, Evie typed back.

  She stood and went back into the house, dumping her cold tea in the sink. In the l
iving room, she threw herself down on the sofa. She traced the fuzzy red pile with her fingers, watching patterns form under the weight of her hand, catching the light, brighter and darker. She traced a looping letter E, with a little accent aigu on top.

  Then she scrubbed it out roughly with her palm. Pills of dust and sofa fuzz rolled up under her hand, and then one long bright-yellow hair caught the sun. She stretched it out between her fingers. It was perfect gold, like thread from a fairy tale.

  It had been almost two weeks since they’d found Shaun’s body. She pictured him lying here, legs thrown over the armrest, blond hair spilling across her lap. His blue eyes staring up at her, and that perfect smile, where his bottom lip touched his teeth.

  She wound the golden thread around her fingers and tucked it into her pocket just as Sunny pulled into the drive.

  8

  E

  “Sup, Evie.” Alex nodded from the front seat of Sunny’s dad’s sedan.

  Evie moved to get in the back seat, but Sunny punched Alex hard on the shoulder. “Get in the back!” she shouted.

  “Ow!” Alex shot back, rubbing his arm. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Boys in the back, girls up front,” she said.

  “Since when?”

  “Since now. Get in the back.”

  Sunny turned her face from his, discussion over, and he gave her a childish sneer but opened the door anyway. He wore a stretched-out black T-shirt that made him look paler than usual, and his hair fell in his face as he shuffled past Evie. “All yours,” he grumbled.

  Evie slid into the front seat. “I don’t mind the back.”

  “I don’t care,” Sunny said. “I want you next to me.”

  Alex slammed the back door, and they pulled out of the drive.

  “Are we going to the Olympia?” Evie asked.

  “Where else is there?” Sunny shot back, laughing. She seemed anxious. Or, at least, more electric than normal. She sat too far forward in the driver’s seat and tapped the steering wheel, energy barely contained.

  Her fingers and arms were decked as always in silver rings and black leather bracelets. Dark-red triangles adorned her nails, making them look like bloody claws.

  “You did your hair different,” Evie said.

  Sunny ran a jeweled talon over it lightly. “I’m trying a thing,” she said. “Does it look stupid?”

  Normally Sunny wore blunt-cut bangs that hung down into her kohl-black eyes like a mask, but she’d pinned it all back today, and the ends were slick with gel. It looked like a New Wave pompadour. “I saw it in Italian Vogue,” she said.

  “It doesn’t look stupid,” Evie told her. “Just…different.”

  “I’m thinking about dyeing it purple. Like, mauve, actually. Lavender.”

  “That would look really cool,” Evie said.

  “Yeah?” Sunny’s hand went to her head again.

  “Totally,” Evie said, nodding.

  “Cool. Maybe I’ll do it. So the lake sucked, huh?”

  Evie pricked awake. “What? No! It was fine.”

  “Yeah, that’s what your text said. Fine. But what does fine mean?”

  Evie blinked at her. “It means okay. It was fun.”

  Sunny glanced at her sideways. “Really? ’Cause that’s not what Ré said.”

  “Oh.” Evie’s heart began to race, remembering it all. “I guess maybe it was a little weird, not having you two there. And then I didn’t feel well, so we left.”

  “Huh,” Sunny said. “And what was Ré like? Was he flirty?” She laughed again, a little too brightly.

  Just as Evie started to squirm, her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out.

  You okay?

  Evie breathed. Ré, finally. She typed back, Did you tell S??

  Why TF would I do that?

  Come to the Olympia, we’re there.

  She put her phone away. “Ré says he’ll meet us there,” she said.

  Sunny didn’t reply.

  Alex stuck his head between the two seats. “What?” he shouted. “I can’t hear anything back here!”

  “Oh, shut up, Alex,” Sunny said, pushing his face away. “No one was talking to you.”

  He shrugged and slumped back into the cushions.

  They pulled into the parking lot behind the Olympia and piled out of the sedan. Sunny marched ahead, saying nothing, and Evie started to feel like she was crashing a really awkward date. Alex, as usual, was oblivious.

  Inside the café, Réal’s brother Ivan sat with a group of skate punks in a booth near the back. If he recognized Evie from his kitchen the night before, he didn’t show it.

  The skaters all said “hey” to Alex as he went past, and Alex waved his lanky arm back.

  “Hey, hey, Tiny Ré,” he said to Ivan, who was taller than his big brother by several inches.

  They slid into a booth near the front, Sunny and Alex on one side, Evie on the other.

  A dark-haired waitress brought menus. “Sup, Holly,” Alex said to her.

  “Stop being so fucking friendly,” Sunny snapped at him.

  “What?” Alex reared back as though slapped.

  “Just—you’re getting on my nerves,” she muttered, grabbing one of the menus.

  Evie wanted to shrink into the vinyl.

  “What time did Ré say he was coming?” Sunny asked her.

  “Uh, he didn’t say,” Evie admitted. Soon, she begged.

  Everything on the menu made her sick to think about. Frozen or fried or from a box, covered in salt and sauce. Nothing’s good here. Evie’s guts lurched again. She took a breath with her eyes closed, trying to tamp down the feeling.

  “God, I’m not even hungry,” Sunny said with a sigh. “Get out of my way. I have to pee.” She poked Alex in the shoulder until he stood and let her out of the booth.

  When she was out of earshot, Evie asked, “Are you okay?”

  “Me? Why?” Alex grinned, looking confused. “Do I look fucked up or something?”

  Evie smiled back, shaking her head. “No, you look fine. Sunny just seems a little harsh today.”

  Alex glanced past her shoulder toward the bathrooms and shrugged. “Yeah,” he said. “She’s kinda always like that.”

  Evie felt rotten for him anyway. Sunny was right—he was such a puppy. The way he loped around, all limbs, like a baby Great Dane that hadn’t grown into his own body yet. He was goofy and cheerful, and maybe not the sharpest knife, but he chased Sunny’s heels with total love. That had to count for something, right?

  Sunny returned from the bathroom and slid back into the booth. For some reason she’d abandoned the hair experiment, and her blunt bangs were now back where they always were, falling into her dark, pretty eyes. But she didn’t mention it, so Evie didn’t either.

  “Are we eating or what?” Alex finally said. “I’m frickin’ starving.”

  R

  About the last thing Ré felt like doing was squeezing into a tiny vinyl booth with Sunny. Just like the lake, it used to be Fun. Her toes creeping up his leg under the table, resting where they shouldn’t. But he didn’t know how to feel now, after last night.

  Which was stupid, because the only way he should have ever felt about it was Bad. Alex was his friend, one of his best friends. It had been Shaun and Alex first, and then Sunny, a distant fourth, and only because she was Alex’s girlfriend. But you try stopping a hurricane.

  So he’d let it happen. A lot.

  So. Now what?

  What was Evie thinking? What the hell had just happened? Ré licked his lips, remembering hers. He looked out his windshield and across the park behind the Olympia toward the empty band shell.

  It felt like maybe only a year ago they’d all been little kids still. Hanging out at the park, doing skate tricks on the hollow planks of the band shell, the sound exploding like artillery through their brains. Shaun skating so close to the edge, not even looking, ’cause he never looked. If he went over, he’d land on his feet. He always did.
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  Ré looked down at his clenched fists, fighting the sharp feeling in his chest. His knuckles had pretty much healed. So had his face. Why had he even fought with Shaun in the first place? Let himself get that angry? It had been none of his business, and now it was nothing but his business. His and no one else’s—he couldn’t tell Alex about the baby, and he sure as hell wasn’t telling Sunny. And anyway, he’d promised Evie he’d keep his mouth shut.

  He shook his head. How had Shaun left such a big mess behind? The one guy who never looked, who always leaped, who, no matter what, always seemed dipped in gold—how did that guy leave such a mess of a life behind?

  Ré felt his throat closing. That painful, humiliating desire to bawl like baby filled his chest. He squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth.

  The Olympia’s back door flew open, and Ré’s armor snapped shut with a bang.

  His little brother and crew spilled out into the parking lot. Ré sniffled and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. Lucky Ivan, he thought, no idea whose messed-up life is out there, just waiting to take him down.

  He opened the car door and shouted to his brother.

  The taller Dufresne ambled over and put his hand on top of the Buick.

  “What’s up, Ré?”

  “Your friend Mark—which one is he?”

  Ivan looked surprised, but he turned and pointed at a black-haired kid who was skating away with the others. “In the Ramones shirt,” he said.

  Ré looked, took note. “You told me once his mom is a healer,” he said. “Is that true?”

  “Yeah, I guess so. That’s what Mark said.”

  “And his sister too, that waitress?”

  Ivan shrugged.

  Ré said, “Next time Mark comes to the house, tell him I want to talk to him, okay?”

  Ivan shrugged again. “Okay, Ré. See ya.”

  He threw down his skateboard and mongo-footed back to his friends, gangly limbs all flapping like some kind of freakish bird’s.