Epiphany Jones (16 page)

And as the small tugboat moors to the pier, under a beautiful full moon on this warm Caribbean night, I stand over the lifeless bodies of two people I hardly knew.

Jerry, this is your life.

I’
m in the hospital room with Emma. This is way before I acted like a stupid hero and tried to save Epiphany’s life on the pier. This is before I became a murderer. This is seventeen years earlier. This is before I’m cruising across the ocean in a freighter ship. This is before I find out the boat I’m on is full of electronics and toys and contraband. This is years ago when I’m in the hospital with my dying little sister.

This is when I’m twelve. In the hospital room I’m reading Siddhartha to Emma. She falls asleep twenty pages before the end, but I read anyway. I don’t want her to wake and not hear my voice. When I finish the book I look around for another one, but the nurses haven’t brought us any in a while. So I pick up
TV Guide
and begin reading that. The next thing I know, Emma is shaking me.

Excitedly, she is saying, ‘Jerry, Jerry!’

And you know how it is – waking when you didn’t want to be caught sleeping. You pretend you weren’t. You fake it and quickly start talking about anything. So I’m going on about a new mini-series that
TV Guide
mentioned. Emma, she’s patiently waiting for me to stop babbling. Her skin has some colour to it and there’s this serene smile on her face – the kind of smile that shows just lightly on the lips and around the eyes. I haven’t seen her look this well in months.

‘They made you go to sleep, Jerry!’

‘Who?’ I say.

‘Joan of Arc!’ she squeals. ‘She was with two angels. They made you fall asleep so she could talk to me alone.’ Emma squeezes my arm. ‘Joan said don’t be afraid. She said I was just as brave and strong as her. She
said I only have good things to look forward to because God’s waiting for me. And I told her I didn’t want to leave you, but she said you’ve got your own path to go down.’

I’m speechless. How do you explain to a dying nine-year-old that something only feels real because she wants it so badly? How do you tell her a dream is just a dream?

I take her little hand in mine. ‘That’s great.’ I smile as big as I can.

‘She said I was
just
as brave and strong as her,’ Emma repeats, keeping that serene look on her face until she falls back to sleep.

Now jump forward a year, this is after my sister is dead but way before the pier thing. This is when I’m thirteen and enrolled at Sunday school because my mom and dad don’t have a clue how to deal with death and dying and everything that must be going through the head of their remaining child. This is when, even though your little, innocent, never-hurt-a-fly sister died from a cancer eating her body like fungus eats mouldy bread, the nuns expect you to believe that there really is a Christian God and everything that happens – all the bad shit happening to good people all over the world, and in your life – it’s just all part of
the plan
. They talk like God is your agent and He’s working all the time for you, but you just don’t see it because your little, puny, mortal mind is so limited it can’t comprehend His Glory.

This is when the nuns tell you: this loving God, this glorious, all-powerful creator of everything, this ultimate source of love and forgiveness, well, you want to be careful around him, though. Because, despite being pure love, this God who created and then killed your innocent, nine-year-old little sister, He still wants your undivided allegiance. You see, despite all the good stuff they say about Him, He also created a place of eternal torment. It’s called Hell, and the people who fuck up, they go there and never see their loved ones again.

The nuns say, yes, the burning alive for all eternity is horrible, but the real punishment of Hell is being separated for all eternity from the little sister that you just lost. They say, look, if we go by averages, you’ve got another sixty years on this earth if nothing happens to you sooner – no accidents, or nuclear war, or cancer. Sixty years is a long time to
miss your little dead sister, but just think of what it’s like to miss her for eternity.

This is when you realise the nuns are not so much about helping with the grieving as they are about making sure they save your soul. They tell the thirteen-year-old boy who just lost his sister that he wants to be very careful now. He wants to make sure he never makes God angry so God never sends him to Hell. So he’s not separated from his little sister forever. They tell you the way to go to Hell, if you’re interested, is by committing a mortal sin. Then they list off all the mortal sins. All the seemingly arbitrary things you can do that piss off the caring, loving God in the sky so much that He sends you to the place of eternal torture He created.

This list is so long, I say, ‘Give me the CliffsNotes.’

I say, ‘What’s the abbreviated version?’

I say, ‘What’s that main thing I should avoid if I want to see Emma again?’

The nuns, they say, ‘Just one?’

‘Just one,’ I say.

They say, ‘Murder.’ They say just be sure I don’t murder anyone and I should be good to go. No matter what, they say, never kill anyone. Even if it’s an accident. There’s no difference. Murder is taking away God’s greatest gift and that pisses him off more than anything. You just can’t imagine.

I say, ‘Does that include suicide?’

They say, ‘What do you think?’

I say, ‘What about if you jump out at an old person, to surprise them and all, and they have a heart attack?’

They say, ‘Did you cause it?’

‘I guess, in that situation, I guess I did, yeah.’

They say, ‘That’s a ticket to Hell, then. Best avoid any surprise parties for old people.’

I say, ‘What about animals? Do they count?’

They say, ‘Are we talking something like a dog or more like a bug? A fly?’

I say, ‘Either.’

They say, ‘The jury’s still out on that one. Just in case, don’t buy any kind of mosquito spray or roach motels or fly traps.’

‘Bacteria?’

‘Just given their large numbers, there’s like a million in a square inch, He’d probably consider that mass genocide. That’s a ticket to Hell. No hand sanitisers.’

And the Christian nuns, they’re so convincing. They’re so brainwashing, the way they say everything to the vulnerable thirteen-year-old boy who just lost his little sister.

Even though you’ve never seen any proof that God exists, even though all the praying everyone did in the hospital clearly didn’t do anything, their stories get you so paranoid and so fearful that it’s always in the back of your mind that they might be right. It’s always, what if they’re right and I’m wrong? So no matter how shitty your life is, just as a backup plan, you remember you never want to commit a mortal sin to piss God off. Just in case the nuns who you’ve been told know everything, every truth, are right, and there’s a God and a Heaven where you get to see your loved ones again.

And going on about your life, this stuff, you keep it in the back of your mind. It never really bothers you until you come close to breaking one of the Big Man’s rules, even unintentionally. Then you get shit scared.

This is why I wanted to make sure the bum didn’t die when I accidentally made him choke in the coffee house. Call it my safety net. My backup plan. Just in case the crazy Christians are right. It’s not the pain and the torture that scare me, it’s blowing my chance to see Emma again.

Now this is sixteen years after Sunday school. This is when I’m on the pier in the Caribbean and two people are lying around me all dead. One is just normal dead. That’s Epiphany. The other is mortal-sin dead. Dead the way a guy gets after you hammer his skull with a heavy, rusted toolbox. If the nuns are right and there is a bipolar, really, really conflicted God and murder is murder no matter what, then I’m out of
luck. If I was ever going to see my sister again, I’m not going to any longer.

And maybe that’s why I feel so weird right now. Maybe that’s why I’m in such shock. Or maybe this is just how someone always feels whenever they murder someone in Epiphany’s defence.

Me, I’m looking at the dead man, I’m prodding his lifeless body with my foot, just checking, just making sure, but I’m the one who feels all dead inside.

Behind me, on the pier, a voice shouts, ‘Jerry? Are you Jerry?’

It’s the guy who’s come from the tugboat that’s just docked at the pier. He’s got camouflage pants on.

He says, ‘Are you Jerry or is that Jerry?’ and points to the dead guy.

I say, ‘I’m Jerry. That’s the guy I killed.’ Nico’s blood puddles underneath his head the way balled cookie dough melts and spreads when you bake it in the oven.

And the guy in the camo pants says, ‘I don’t care about him then. I need to get you and her to the boat.’

‘She’s dead,’ I say.

‘No, she’s not,’ the guy says, his fingers pressed against Epiphany’s totally dead-looking carotid artery. ‘But she will be if she stays here.’

I don’t say anything. Epiphany looks so dead.

‘I’m the ship’s doctor,’ the man in the camo, the man who looks more like a soldier, says. ‘We need to get her there.’

And I look towards where ‘there’ is: the little tugboat that came from the freighter. The soldier doctor, he first throws Epiphany’s yellow bag into the tugboat and then he makes for her body and beckons me to help lift her. And I do, in the end. But first I do the most unusual thing. Before I help the man carry Epiphany to the tugboat, I reach into Nico’s pockets – the man who I just murdered – and I steal his money.

And, as we speed over crests of surf towards the freighter, I watch as Nico’s body shrinks in the night until it and then the whole pier are engulfed in darkness.

S
hadows grow and lean and shrink along the walls, bending when they meet the metal frame of the bunk. Sometimes the shadows spin clockwise; sometimes they swing side to side, like a cross.

When we docked with the freighter there were a few crewmen who met us and helped the man in camo pants drag Epiphany on to the deck. They brought us to this cabin. We’ve been here ever since. In a way it reminds me of the Grey Room back at the museum. Except for the bunk bed, the sink and a toilet, it’s bare. The walls are an ugly marine green, the paint is peeling. The only thing that connects this cabin to the rest of the world is a small circular patch of sky that shows through the porthole. On a thick black wire a light bulb sways from the ceiling.

This is now three days after we got here. The freighter has long since left the pier and Mexico and my murder victim. According to Sarge we’re somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. That’s his name, Sarge. The guy in the camo pants. He really is the ship’s doctor. The first night aboard he spent most of it with us, making sure Epiphany was stable. He put ice around her head and gave her several shots of something. Then to me, he said, ‘Take off your shirt. I want to look at your wound.’

So I did.

‘This’ll go easier if you talk. If you keep your mind distracted,’ he said and gave me some kind of shot into my side. He said, ‘Your latissimus dorsi is punctured.’

‘My what?’

‘A big muscle that covers part of your back and ribs.’

Oh.’

‘That’s gotta hurt.’

No, it doesn’t. Not now. Not the way my mind is. Shock is a great painkiller. It works like any addiction, I guess. It distracts you from the agony you feel.

‘You’ve got quite an infection. I’m going to need to sew you up. So talk to me.’

‘How do you know her?’ I said, looking at Epiphany all passed out, looking all dead still.

‘I don’t,’ Sarge said. ‘The captain does. I just look after the boat’s crew. I don’t ask questions.’

I said, ‘Must be a big crew. It’s a big boat.’

And Sarge told me that ninety-five percent of the boat is storage. It’s cargo crates. It’s consumer products. It’s electronics and toys and cheap souvenirs and clothes made in sweat shops bound for America and Europe. He said there’s only a dozen or so crew on the whole ship.

I said, ‘Are you American?’

‘I used to be.’

In my back I felt the needle threading in and out of my skin.

‘Where’s the captain?’ I said. ‘The guy that knows her.’

‘He’ll be along later. Someone’s got to steer the ship, right?’

‘Yeah,’ I said, immediately not remembering what I was replying to.

‘Do you speak Russian? Like her?’ he said.

‘No. Why?’

The needle pricked my skin.

Sarge said, ‘The captain, he speaks Russian. And Spanish and Arabic. I don’t suppose you speak any of those?’

‘No.’

‘Well, I’m going to have to translate then,’ and he looked at Epiphany, ‘since she can’t.’

Outside the cabin door a few crew walked by. One of them had a PSP, the other had a toaster.

Sarge, he said, ‘Yeah, we dip into the cargo sometime. There’s plenty of stuff to go around. The companies aren’t going to miss one or two
items. Besides, you can only look out at a beautiful sunset over the ocean so many times before it gets old.’

On the sink Sarge laid out three syringes.

‘OK,’ Sarge said. ‘The hard part is over.’ And he ran his finger over my stitches, testing their strength. ‘But you have an infection and a bad fever. You need sleep. Your body won’t heal if it doesn’t sleep. I’m going to give you some shots. Some are for pain, some are for infection, and some are to knock you out.’

I looked at him and he said, ‘Don’t worry. I’ll keep checking on you. It’s not like there’s a lot to do on this boat anyways. And we have eight days before we get to Portugal.’

So now this is three days, no, probably four, since we’ve been on the boat. It’s hard keeping track. Epiphany stirs on the floor in the corner of our cabin. She hasn’t woken since we’ve been here. We had put her in the lower bunk but she kept rolling out. The second time she hit her head. Since then, I’ve just left her on the floor.

And from the floor Epiphany, her eyes closed, she begs, ‘Please!’

In her mind, she’s still on the pier. She yells and, as if on cue, the light on the thick black wire hanging from the ceiling sways, fuelling the repeating cycle of shadows clawing and scratching their way like demons towards her body.

When I sleep, I have nightmares. I dream the dream of Epiphany in the silverware factory. When I’m awake, I’m never quite sure I am awake. I feel like I’m a figment of a figment of a figment. And it’s all because of her. All because I’ve killed a man.
For her
.

And in the corner of the room, right by the sink, I think I see something. Or someone. She’s just there for a moment. Rachel with her anime-red hair. But when I look again, she’s gone.

Today I finally get a visit from the captain, though the way he looks at me I suspect he’s checked in on me when I’ve been out. He and Sarge show up at noon. Well, I think it’s noon. Outside the porthole the sun is high in the sky over the ocean.

Abdul, he’s this dark-skinned Arabic guy. He enters the cabin, looks at Epiphany, then says something to Sarge in what I assume is Russian.

Then Abdul looks at me and Sarge translates, ‘He says it’s good to finally see you on your feet.’

‘Uh, thanks,’ I say.

‘He wants to know where LaRouche is,’ Sarge says.

‘She’s dead,’ I say, and Sarge just looks at me.

‘Let’s not tell him that.’

And whatever Sarge does say to Abdul makes him look satisfied, like everything is A-OK.

‘Can you ask him if I can walk around? Get some fresh air?’

‘Unfortunately, that’s not possible,’ Sarge answers without asking Abdul, as if the two of them already spoke about this.

Abdul says something again and Sarge says, ‘He says that he expects your friend to be better by the time we reach Porto and he expects you to let LaRouche know how well the journey went, because she’s given him a lot of money and he would like business from her in the future.’

And part of me feels like I didn’t get the memo on something.

Sarge translates that Abdul has to go back up to the helm, but one of them will bring food around later in the evening. And, as Abdul steps out of the cabin, he picks up something that they obviously left in the hall on purpose, as if they weren’t sure they were going to give it to me. Then Abdul, he hands me Epiphany’s yellow bag, which Sarge grabbed from the pier.

When Abdul leaves I say, ‘Why didn’t you tell him LaRouche is dead?’

Sarge looks around all frustrated for a second. ‘Jerry, I don’t know who LaRouche is, but I know he really likes her. I know she’s given him business in the past. He wants to retain that connection. Abdul isn’t the kind of guy you want to make angry. He’s not the kind of guy you want to give bad news to.’

‘I thought this boat shipped toys and electronics and stuff?’ I say.

‘It does,’ Sarge says. ‘But it also smuggles whatever Abdul wants. Like drugs or guns, or you and her. I don’t ask questions. I just look after the crew.’ And he leaves, locking the door behind him.

So here we are. A few days left to go. Me, locked in this cabin with
the dead-looking but alive Epiphany. Me, the murderer. And again, in the corner of the room, I think I see a red-headed model ex-girlfriend. I think I hear a voice.

I dig through Epiphany’s yellow bag. It’s got her trainers, her Fanny Jones passport, some euros, and a notepad with Abdul’s name and an address in Spain scrawled on it. For some reason she’s also got a tornout clipping of the photo of Donald and Roland and David Lang with me sitting in the background. It’s the one from the
Chicago Tribune
article in February. The one with the picture-in-picture of the Van Gogh painting. I fold it back up and stick it back in the yellow bag. I keep digging. Finally I find them beneath her folded-up hoodie. My 486s. I swallow three. All I want to do is get knocked out again. I want to sleep forever.