Bird Box (22 page)

There is a goodness in him, she thinks. There always has been.

Gary has been the devil on Don’s shoulder for weeks. Don
needed
someone like this in the house. Someone who sees the world more like him. But couldn’t Don’s skepticism prove to be helpful here? Hasn’t he thought, in all his talks with Gary, that something might be wrong with the newcomer?

Gary sleeps with the briefcase within arm’s reach. He cares about it. Cares about and believes the writings inside
.

Everything in this new world is harsh, she thinks, but nothing so much as her discovering Gary’s notebook while Tom is away.

He could be away for a long time
.

Stop it
.

Forever
.

Stop it
.

He could be dead. They could have been killed in the street right outside. The man you’re waiting for could be dead a week, just a lawn away
.

He’s not. He’ll return
.

Maybe
.

He will
.

Maybe
.

They mapped it out with Felix
.

What does Felix know?

They all did it together. Tom wouldn’t risk it unless he knew he had a chance to make it
.

Remember the video George watched? Tom is a lot like George
.

STOP!

He is. He idolized the man. And what about the dogs?

We don’t know that dogs are affected
.

No. But they could be. Can you imagine what it would be like? A dog going stark mad?

Please . . . no
.

Necessary thoughts. Necessary visions. Tom might not come back
.

He will he will he will
. . .

And if he doesn’t, you’ll have to tell someone else
.

Tom’s coming back
.

It’s been a week
.

HE’S COMING BACK!

You can’t tell Gary. Talk to someone else first
.

Don
.

No. No. Not him. Felix. Don will kill you
.

What??

Don has changed, Malorie. He’s different. Don’t be so naive
.

He wouldn’t hurt us
.

Yes. He would. He’d take the garden axe to you all
.

STOP!!

He doesn’t care about life. He told you to blind your baby, Malorie
.

He wouldn’t hurt us
.

He would. Talk to Felix
.

Felix will tell everyone
.

Tell him not to. Talk to Felix. Tom may not come back
.

Malorie leaves the foyer. Cheryl and Gary are in the kitchen. Gary is at the table, sitting, scooping pears from a can.

“Good afternoon,” he says, in that way he has of making it sound like he’s responsible for the good afternoon.

Malorie thinks he can tell. She thinks he knows.

He was awake he was awake he was awake
.

“Good afternoon,” she says. She walks into the living room, leaving him.

Felix is sitting by the phone in the living room. The map is open on the end table.

“I don’t understand,” he says, confused. Felix does not look well. He hasn’t been eating as much. The assurances he gave Malorie a week ago no longer exist.

“It’s such a long time, Malorie. I know Tom would know what to do out there—but it’s such a long time.”

“You need to think about something else,” Cheryl says, peering her head around the corner. “Seriously, Felix. Think about something else. Or just go outside without a blindfold. Either way you’re driving yourself mad.”

Felix exhales loudly and runs his fingers through his hair.

She can’t tell Felix. He’s losing something. He’s lost something. His eyes are dull. He’s losing sensibility, thought. Strength.

Without a word, Malorie leaves him. She passes Don in the hall. The words, what she’s discovered, come to life within her. She almost speaks.

Don, Gary is no good. He’s dangerous. He has Frank’s notebook in his briefcase
.

What, Malorie?

Just what I said
.

You were snooping? Going through Gary’s things?

Yes
.

Why are you coming to me with this?

Don, I just need to tell someone. You understand that, don’t you?

Why didn’t you just ask Gary? Hey, Gary!

No. She can’t tell Don. Don has lost something, too. He might get violent. Gary could, too.

One shove
, she thinks,
and you lose the baby
.

She imagines Gary at the top of the cellar stairs. Her broken, bleeding body crumpled at the bottom.

You like reading in the cellar, DO YOU?? Then die down there with your child
.

Behind her, she hears all the housemates are in the living room. Cheryl is talking to Felix. Gary is talking to Don.

Malorie turns toward their voices and approaches the living room.

She is going to tell them all.

When she enters the room, her body feels like it’s made of ice. Melting. Like pieces of herself fall away and sink under the unbearable pressure of what’s to come.

Cheryl and Olympia are on the couch. Felix waits by the phone. Don is in the easy chair. Gary stands, facing the blanketed windows.

As she opens her mouth, Gary slowly looks over his shoulder and meets her eyes.

“Malorie,” he says sharply, “is something on your mind?”

Suddenly, clearly, Malorie realizes that everyone is staring at her. Waiting for her to speak.

“Yes, Gary,” she says. “There is.”

“What is it?” Don asks.

The words are stuck in her throat. They climb up like the legs of a millipede, reaching for her lips, looking to get out at last.

“Does anyone remember Gary’s—”

She stops. She and the housemates turn toward the blankets.

The birds are cooing.

“It’s Tom,” Felix says desperately. “It
must
be!”

Gary looks into Malorie’s eyes again. There is a knock at the front door.

The housemates move fast. Felix rushes to the front door. Malorie and Gary remain.

He knows he knows he knows he knows he knows
.

When Tom calls out, Malorie is trembling with fear.

He knows
.

Then, having heard Tom’s voice, Gary leaves her and heads to the foyer.

Once the questions have been asked and the housemates have their eyes closed, Malorie hears the front door open. The cool air rushes in, and with it the reality of how close Malorie just came to confronting Gary without Tom in the house.

Dogs paws on the foyer tile. Boots. Something smacks against the doorframe. The front door closes quickly. There’s the sound of the broomsticks scratching the walls. Tom speaks. And his voice is deliverance.

“My plan was to call you guys from my house. But the fucking phone was out.”

“Tom,” Felix says, manic but weak. “I knew you guys would do it. I knew it!”

When Malorie opens her eyes, she doesn’t think about Gary. She doesn’t see the perfectly manicured letters that wait in his briefcase.

She sees only that Tom and Jules are home again.

“We raided a grocery store,” Tom says. The words sound impossible. “Someone had been there before. But we got a lot of good stuff.”

He looks tired, but he looks good.

“The dogs worked,” he says. “They led us.” He is proud and happy. “But I got something from my house that I hope will help us even more.”

Felix helps him with his duffel bag. Tom unzips it and removes something. Then he lets it fall to the foyer floor.

It’s a phone book.

“We’re going to call every number in here,” he says. “Every single one. And somebody is going to answer.”

It’s only a phone book, but Tom has turned it into a beacon.

“Now,” Tom says. “Let’s eat.”

The others excitedly prepare the dining room. Olympia gets the utensils. Felix fills glasses with water from the buckets.

Tom is back.

Jules is back.

“Malorie!” Olympia calls. “It’s canned crabmeat!”

Malorie, caught somewhere between two worlds, enters the kitchen and begins helping with dinner.

thirty-six

S
omeone is following them.

There is no use asking herself how much farther they have to go. She doesn’t know when she will hear the recorded voice that tells her she’s arrived. She doesn’t know if it still exists. Now, she only paddles, she only perseveres.

An hour ago, they passed what sounded like lions engaged in battle. There were roars. Birds of prey screech threats from the sky. Things growl and snort from the woods. The river’s current is moving faster. She remembers the tent Tom and Jules found in the street outside their house. Could there be something like that, so astonishingly out of place, here, on the river? Could they crash into it . . .
now
?

Out here, she knows, anything imagined is possible.

But right now, it is something much more concrete that worries her.

Someone is following them. Yes, the Boy heard it, too.

A phantom echo. A second rowing, in step with her own.

Who would do it? And if they meant to harm her and the children, why didn’t they do it when she was passed out?

Is it someone escaping their home as well?

“Boy,” she says quietly, “tell me what you can about them.”

The Boy is listening.

“I don’t know, Mommy.”

He sounds ashamed.

“Are they still there?”

“I don’t know!”

“
Listen
.”

Malorie considers stopping. Turning. Facing the noise she hears behind them.

The recording will be playing on a loop. You’ll hear it. It’s loud. Clear. And when you do, that’s when you’ll have to open your eyes
.

What
follows them?

“Boy,” she says again. “Tell me what you can about them.”

Malorie stops rowing. Water rushes around them.

“I don’t know what it is,” he says.

Still, Malorie waits. A dog barks from the right bank. A second bark answers.

Wild dogs
, Malorie thinks.
More wolves
.

She begins paddling again. She asks the Boy again what he hears.

“I’m sorry, Mommy!” he yells. His voice is cracked with tears. Shame.

He doesn’t know
.

It has been years since the Boy wasn’t able to identify a sound. What he hears is something he’s never heard before.

But Malorie believes he can still help.

“How far away are they?” Malorie asks.

But the Boy is crying.

“I can’t do it!”

“
Keep your voice down!
” she hisses.

Something grunts from the left bank. It sounds like a pig. Then another one. And another.

The river feels too thin. The banks too close.

Does
something follow them?

Malorie rows.

thirty-seven

F
or the first time since arriving at the house, Malorie knows something the others don’t.

Tom and Jules have just returned. As the housemates prepared dinner, Tom brought the new stock of canned goods to the cellar. Malorie met him down there. Maybe Gary kept the notebook because he wanted to study Frank’s writing. Or maybe he wrote it himself. But Tom needed to know. Now.

In the cellar light, he looked tired but triumphant. His fair hair was dirty. His features looked more aged than the first time she was down here with him. He was losing weight. Methodically, he removed cans from his and Jules’s duffel bags and set them on the shelves. He began talking about what it was like inside the grocery store, the stench of so much rotten food, when Malorie found her opportunity.

But just when she did, the cellar door opened.

It was Gary.

“I’d like to help you if I can,” he said to Tom from the top of the stairs.

“All right,” Tom said. “Come on down then.”

Malorie exited as Gary reached the dirt floor.

Now everybody is seated at the dining room table. And Malorie is still looking for her opportunity.

Tom and Jules describe their week slowly. The facts are incredible, but Malorie’s mind is fixed on Gary. She tries to act normal. She listens to what they say. Each minute that passes is another in which Tom doesn’t know that Gary may be a threat to the rest of them.

It almost feels like she and the others are intruding on Gary’s space. Like Gary and Don had the decency to invite them into
their
dining room, their favorite place for exchanging whispered words. The two have spent so much time in here that it smells of them. Would they have joined the group if dinner was served in the living room? Malorie doesn’t think so.

As Tom describes walking three miles blindfolded, Gary is affable, talkative, and inquisitive. And every time he opens his mouth Malorie wants to yell at him to stop.
Come clean first
, she wants to say.

But she waits.

“Would you say then,” Gary says, his mouth full of crab, “that you are now convinced animals are not affected?”

“No, I wouldn’t say that,” Tom says. “Not yet. Maybe we just didn’t pass anything for them to see.”

“That’s unlikely,” Gary says.

Malorie almost screams it.

Tom then announces he has another surprise for everyone.

“Your duffel bag is a veritable clown car,” Gary says, smiling.

When Tom returns, he’s carrying a small brown box. From it, he pulls forth eight bicycle horns.

“We got these at the grocery store,” he says. “In the toy aisle.”

He hands them out.

“Mine has my name on it,” Olympia says.

“They all do,” Tom says. “I wrote them, blindfolded, with a Sharpie.”

“What are they for?” Felix asks.

“We’re inching toward a life of spending more time outside,” Tom answers, sitting down. “We can signal one another with these.”

Suddenly, Gary honks his horn. It sounds like a goose. Then it sounds like geese, as everyone honks their horns chaotically.

The circles under Felix’s eyes stretch as he smiles.

“And
this
,” Tom says, “is the grand finale.” He reaches into his duffel bag and pulls forth a bottle. It’s rum.