Two and Twenty Dark Tales (30 page)

People were able to keep in touch for a little while—giving reports of who’d died or who was infected. Then the emergency generators stopped humming. No one wanted to leave the safety of their sealed homes to fill their generators with fuel. I will never forget the day our generator went quiet. I felt the void in my skin. The quiet made me itch.

We all thought I’d contracted The Shiver.

I even texted Courtney that I’d finally gotten sick. My last text from her read: Mom died last night. My mouth is bleeding now. It sucks we’ll never go to prom.

I cried into my pillow until the sun came up.

Courtney and I had been best friends since third grade. Her father had moved their family up here from Florida to mine for gold. My parents had done the same thing before my brother and I were born. Neither of our fathers had ever struck it big, but we used to say it didn’t matter, because we’d struck it rich when we became friends. Corny and dorky, but true.

Sometimes, I lie in the dark and hold entire conversations with Courtney in my head. We make plans, we laugh, we talk about our crushes, homework, shopping, and our annoying older brothers. In these imaginary moments, we never talk virus. Dying at sixteen doesn’t come up. Ever.

I’m still here. Jack is still here.

I hear the sofa cushions squeak. My brother is up. “We’re low on firewood, Jack,” I shout over my shoulder. If I had to go climb that steep hill to gather the crowberries, then he was going to do
something
to help.

“We’re low on water,” he mumbles as he comes into the entryway. We’d been sleeping in the living room to stay warm, to be close to our makeshift fire pit. Before we sealed ourselves off, Jack had rolled a rusty steel drum up from the garage. It sits in the center of the living room.

I stare at my brother. Did he think I didn’t know we were low on water? I’m shocked
he
noticed. “Yeah, I know.”

“Do you have to sound like you hate me every second of every day, Jill? What the hell? God, I just woke up.” He rakes his hand through his hair. “Don’t you think I’m as miserable as you are? I didn’t kill everyone. The virus did.”

I laugh in his face.

“You’re a bitch,” Jack says. He turns on his heel and heads into the kitchen.

It’s in these moments that I crave my evil wish: that Courtney had been immune instead of Jack.

The fact that Jack was three and a half minutes older than me has everything to do with how I feel about him. He clawed his way from my mother’s womb, leaving her bleeding to death in the tub. Her body had gone still. Or so I’ve been told.

Despite the fact that not a single soul knew I was still inside of my dead mother—the silent and mysterious fraternal twin—I’d wanted to be born as well. My entry into the world was far less violent than Jack’s. I simply slid out on my own into the warm bathtub water. Slick and bloody and new. Well, that’s the story Nan always told me as she tucked me in with her icy hands and warm brown eyes.

When Jack and I were only two days old, the grief of losing his beloved wife had caused my father to dive headfirst into the old, dried-up well at the top of our hill—the hill I was about to climb. For months, no one knew my father’s fate. Everyone, including Nan, believed he’d simply run away. The talk in town was that the stress of infant twins mixed with the sudden death of his wife sent him over the edge.

The irony of how my father actually died, falling over the edge of a well, plummeting to his death, hadn’t been lost on Nan. She told me so on my tenth birthday, along with the haunting fact that my father’s bones were still at the bottom of the well.

His crumpled body had decomposed. No one knew he was down there. By the time our neighbor accidentally discovered my father’s remains, my Nan thought it better to leave him undisturbed. The rain and the flies had stripped dad’s flesh and muscle, leaving only his bones.

Jack is slamming kitchen cabinets. That’s usually my job. I’m the miserable twin. He tells me so every day.
He
seems angry today, which makes me angry.
What the hell does he have to be angry about?
I do almost everything around here, while he locks himself in the bathroom for hours, crying like a damn baby.

I stomp into the kitchen. “Hey, you know what?” My sudden yelling startles him. “The fact that I am forced to spend the rest of my days on this empty planet, alone with you, makes me want to join Daddy at the bottom of that well!”

“I’ll push you in,” Jack deadpans. “It’ll be a win-win.” He glares at me and then pops a handful of crowberries into his mouth. “You know what? You make me sick.”

I slam the front door on my way out.
I
make
him
sick? I wasn’t the golden child, the one everyone loved, the one showered with compliments and adoring looks. He was the one every teacher gushed over. The one Nan adored, always making his favorite moose stew with crowberry pie for dessert. I don’t even think Nan realized I didn’t like meat until I was twelve.

Nan. I tromp past her grave. The wood of the cross has yet to darken, its sandy color a reminder of the day we were forced to unseal the house. Nan’s body needed to be buried. At that point, Jack and I were pretty confident in our immunity to the virus, but we weren’t one hundred percent sure. We agreed that giving Nan a proper burial was worth the risk of dying.

When the sun rose the morning after putting Nan in the ground and neither of us felt sick, we opened up the house.

I look over my shoulder as I trudge up the steep hill. Jack doesn’t follow me. The thick summer grass makes no sound underneath my boots. What fills the air is the clank of the metal pail hitting against my thigh with every step I take. The solitary sound is thick and absolute. There are no animals or rustling leaves. No planes or birds overhead. The road just beyond our property line has been empty since spring.

I dig my boot into the ground to steady my footing, and I look out over the valley. I swat away the flies circling my head. The beauty of the landscape—the snow-capped mountains off in the distance, the bright blue sky—saddens me deeply. Why did we survive? Why us? Why couldn’t Courtney have survived instead of Jack?

I reach up to bat another fly. The pail falls from my grasp and tumbles down the hill. “Crap.” Without thinking, I lunge for it. I need it to hold the crowberries. I lose my footing and land hard on my butt. Then I slide a few feet before coming to a stop. “Ahhh. Ow.” I exhale and slowly stand up.

My sweatpants have ripped. I can feel the crisp morning breeze hit the back of my thigh. I reach back to assess the damage. The hole is huge. I switch the pail to my other hand and notice the blood on the wooden handle. I must’ve cut my leg.

Like sharks to crum, the flies show up. They love blood. My Nan used to call them mini-vampires.

I look down at the house and wince. I’d rather continue up the hill with a bloody leg and flies trailing behind me like rats than go spend unnecessary time with my brother.

I limp my way to the top. I lean on the cold stones of the well to catch my breath. I’m lightheaded. The flies tickle the back of my thigh. I swish them away. It’s no use. My knees give a little and I grasp the well to steady myself. My hand is covered in blood.

I scream my brother’s name.

The sun shines directly overhead. A bright light illuminates the depths of the well, lighting up my father’s remains. I blink and stare down at his white skull for what feels like forever. The sun inches across the sky.

“Jack!” I shout again. Random thoughts torture me as I hopelessly swat the flies and do my best not to pass out. I wonder what my father’s voice would’ve sounded like. How his hug would’ve felt.

Where is my brother?

I drop the pail and hear it bounce down the hill. I turn to watch. There is the top of Jack’s head.

My brother goes white when he sees the blood. “You’re infected?”

Little white spots twinkle when I shake my head. “I fell.” I don’t think I can stand anymore. Jack runs to my side and catches me before I hit the ground. I go limp in his arms, my legs no longer able to hold me up. Jack stumbles a bit and we both slam into the side of the well.

I let out a scream. My wound took the brunt of the impact. Jack reaches up and puts his hand over my mouth. “Shhhhh. You’re too loud,” he whispers. “Be quiet. Shhhhh.”

I nod.

He slowly takes his hand away, but continues to grasp me tightly with his other. “It looks like you’ve lost a lot of blood, Jill.”

I nod.

“I don’t know how to fix your leg,” he says flatly.

I nod.

He exhales into my face and nods along with me. I can smell the sweet crowberries on his breath. “You know what I have to do right?” He smiles and gently moves the hair out of my eyes.

I stop in mid-nod. I
didn’t
know. Why was I nodding? “Help me back to the house.”

His lips tighten and his nostrils flare. He shakes his head. Slowly.

“Jack, I can make it.”

He leans down and whispers in my ear, “I don’t want you to make it.”

My eyebrows pinch together. “What are you talking about? Help me down.”

“You won’t…” his voice trails off. He looks over at the well. “Dad. You can be with Dad. You always visit him anyway.”

My brother has broken with reality. Lost his mind. Snapped.

I twist from his grip and hang my head over the lip of the well. A loose stone breaks free and lands at my feet. My father’s skull stares up at me. I don’t want to die.

Jack yanks me back by my hair, and I cry out in pain. We land in a tangled heap. My blood is now smeared up and down his arms.

“Jack! Stop! What are you doing?” I shriek. His grip on me is firm. I can’t break free. “You’re hurting me.”

My brother has madness in his eyes.

“Help!” As soon as the word leaves my lips, he laughs.

Through clenched teeth he says, “There is no one to help us, Jill. No. One.”

“You want to live alone? Be by yourself? That’s crazy, Jack.” My chest heaves, yet I’m breathless. “What about Nan?” I didn’t even know what my question meant. What
about
Nan? What did our dead grandmother have to do with anything right now?

But this gives my brother pause, and he releases his hold on me just a little. “Nan? Nan?” he murmurs. With every ounce of energy I have left, I roll out from underneath him and scurry away on my hands and knees. Jack is on his back, his arms crossed over his face, and he’s sobbing.

“I was g-going to be an architect, Nan,” Jack chokes. “You told me I was your prince. Everything’s ruined, Nan. It’s over.”

Bile shoots up my throat. I gag and vomit into the grass. The flies descend. I watch them crawl through my pile of goo, and I retch again. My leg throbs. I just want to get off of this hill and lie down on the sofa. “Jack, I have to stop the bleeding. I need your help. I can’t make it down without you.”

He uses the heels of his hands to wipe away his tears, and he sits up. We watch each other. Tears roll down my cheeks. I’m in agony. “Please,” I say. Jack shows no reaction to my tears or my begging. Instead, he tilts his head and stares through me.

“I don’t want to die up here, Jack. You have to help me down.”

Like a spring, he hops to his feet, and he gets me standing without saying a word.

“I’m sorry,” I say. He wraps his arm around my waist and leads me to the lip of the hill. “Go slow, okay?”

Jack ignores me.

I look up at him, but he continues staring down toward the bottom of the hill. “Jack?” I tug on his shirt. “Go slow.”

“I know you blame me for our parents’ deaths,” he says. “You are a bad person, Jill. A very bad person. You’re twisted and… and…” He goes quiet.

My heart should be pounding and thudding, but it’s not. Most of my blood has left my body, sliding down my thigh and saturating my sock. My knees fail and I take hold of my brother’s shirt. Jack grabs my shoulders and squeezes me so hard that I feel his fingernails pierce my skin. “You have always hated me!” he shouts in my face.

My eyes cloud over and I can feel myself collapsing. I must get him off me. If he loses his footing, he’ll drag me down with him.

I smash my head into his chest to surprise him. He lets me go. And with all of my might, I push my brother backward.

His body folds in half as he reaches for something to grab onto.

I instinctively take a step back.

I watch him bounce and smash down the hill. His head takes the brunt of his landing. Blood shoots from his skull in slow motion.

“Jaaaaaack!” I cry out. Oh my God, what have I done? What have I done? What have I done?

I suspect that Jack is dead. The unnatural angle of his leg makes me cringe. His body is as still as stone.

“Jack. Jack. Jack.” I moan.

I stumble to the well. My blood is everywhere. How
I’m
not dead already is a miracle.

“Daddy, I-I’ve killed Jack,” I whisper down to his bones. “What do I do?”

I have the clawing urge to dive into the well. To crush
my
skull. To land in a tangled heap on top of my father’s remains. Pain on top of pain.

I try to lift myself over, and my legs give way. I slide to my knees. “I’m sorry, Jack. Daddy, please help me.” Pleading to my dead father feels right, so I repeat myself.

The flies have reached a swarming level, and I don’t have the energy to swat them away anymore. They crawl over my eyes, buzz in my ears.

I need to see if Jack is alive. Maybe he didn’t die. Maybe he needs my help down there. Since I’m unable to stand, I roll, as if I’m on fire, and make it to the edge. I lift my head to try and spot my brother. The hill is too steep, and I’m too low to the ground to see down to the bottom. “Jack?” I shout. Well, I’m shouting it in my mind, anyway. There is no volume to my voice. My throat is only able to produce a low groan.

I turn over onto my back. Tears slide down my temples and into my hairline. I choke on my sobs. The sky looks fake, too perfect. The clouds too fluffy. The blue too blue.

I push off with my hand and set myself in motion.

Downhill.

– The End –

The Wish

Suzanne Young