Bottled Abyss (13 page)

As soon as dawn broke, she planned to call the police. Seeing cops in her home again would not be easy, but Herman’s absence had gone beyond even her thin reasoning about him running off.

Something had happened to him.

If he never came back, what then? What next?

She needed a drink, she decided. Or maybe a strong rope.

After a moment her eyes drifted over to stare at the bottle’s shape: beautiful, painful, useful. Janet was so glad it was here.

7

Janet tapped her teeth to the point of irritating her gums. How long ago had Faye left to go check the gym for Herman? Five minutes? Ten? That still gave her enough time to throw on a coat and shoes, jump in the car and grab a couple Jim Beam travelers from the college liquor store. Just traveler size, nothing bigger. Whiskey didn’t sound very good at the moment but if any bad news came about Herman, she would need it.

She promised Faye she’d call the police if Herman didn’t turn up at the gym, but that possibility still terrified Janet. If the cops got involved, this thing became more real, more in-your-face.

But she couldn’t wait another day without doing something. Herman hadn’t taken anything from the house, not even his toothbrush, and he was damn picky about having the electric GE model he’d had to buy on the internet—yet, maybe this had finally been his clean break for his awful wife. It just didn’t sound like him; Herman liked to hide under a rock sometimes but he’d always come back out at some point to prove he was unhurt. If he did come walking back through that door, he would focus on how she’d driven him away.

That was fine. She deserved the blame. Bring it on.
Just come back, Herman. Come back
.
I can’t die until I know you’re still alive.

She wrung her hands and paced the bedroom. The bottle, which she’d kept hidden from Faye in her master bathroom, poked its long fluted neck into her peripheral vision. Janet had been second-guessing herself all morning about uncorking it. Not like she’d had a chance until now. Earlier, she had to sit down with Faye for breakfast, a lecture, and an ultimatum.

“As soon as I come back, we’re on that phone, babe. He could be really hurt. Evan’s probably out of his mind by now.”

Evan was out of his mind, all right.

Now that Janet was alone and ready to throw herself headlong into liquor again, she marveled that the answer might be waiting in her bathroom. It was a long-shot the bottle’s contents turned out to be a beverage, but she had to at least check before sneaking to the store. Yes,
sneaking
, that’s what she’d been reduced to, but who the hell cared?

Janet walked into the bathroom and turned on the light. The darkness of the bottle had such a presence that the bar of bright vanity lights hardly eked out any luminosity. With some measure of caution, she picked up the bottle and grabbed the cork between her thumb and forefinger. It didn’t take much to pull the long, sodden cork free. There wasn’t a pop, not even a release of trapped air.

She sniffed carefully over the mouth of the bottle, hoping to get alcohol’s nice flaming bee-sting in the nostril, but the soft scent from inside somehow watered her eyes without the pungency desired, like a flower could. In spite of the sloshing around, she couldn’t see any liquid and with how very light it was, she wondered if this was a trick bottle. That would make sense, for all its magical, otherworldly appearance. Some kid might have bought it at a gimmick store and dropped it in the field behind their house.

She cupped her hand and tipped the bottle. At once her palm filled with a thin caramel broth. She didn’t have time to examine the gruel thoroughly—Janet grabbed the sink and an arrow of burning puke shot from her mouth.

She stared down in complete shock. A splash of bile had slapped the porcelain basin with flecks of the bottle’s brown fluid, and there, leaning against the sink’s plug, was a dark bronze coin with a human skull imprinted on its face.

Sometimes you meet a person and immediately don’t like them. Sometimes you go to a place and immediately feel uneasy. Sometimes you catch an old fragrance and it brings back a hated memory. Sometimes somebody touches you in a way an enemy has touched you in the past.

The coin did all of these things.

It was ugly. For all her disdain, Janet didn’t care to know what it was or how it came from her own throat; she just didn’t want the coin in her house. Not for a second longer. There was a deep sense of ownership with it, despite just laying eyes on it. This was her coin and it would always be her coin. She thought about throwing it in the waste basket or into the field outside, but what if it somehow showed up again? She didn’t want to fucking see it. Not ever! Seeing it again would be unbearable. A poison-tipped sword through each eye. Keeping the coin for even another moment was too much of a burden to bear.

A light knocking came at the door. Janet took the coin with a disgusted swipe that made of arch of putrescence in the sink. She hit the water to rinse off her hand and then hurried out to the front room.

Another knock.

Faye.

She never got the hint, did she?
If you have a house key, it means you can come in whenever you like.
Otherwise, they would have never given her one.

But the person through the peephole, Janet found, was not Faye.

She opened the door and blinked through the obnoxious sunlight. “Hi, Sam. How are you?”

The old widower stood on the porch with a sad, fatherly shine in his eyes. He handed over a bouquet of wildflowers.

“I… heard, this morning from your friend Evan. It’s good to see you up and at ‘em. That whole hospital thing was pretty scary sounding.”

Janet looked uncomfortably down at the flowers. “It was.”

“There’s all sorts of blossoms in there. I don’t know their names but I think every color of the rainbow has a representative.”

“Did you pick them?”

Sam snorted through his untamed gray mustache. “Hell no, bought them!”

She smiled. “You’re so sweet…”

“I would have come down to the hospital if I’d known sooner.”

“No, no that’s okay. Things have been tough. Tough year.”

“God you’re right, it’s been about a year now,” he said. He awkwardly turned his eyes out to the empty street. “It still makes me sick to my stomach, thinking about that day.”

“Yes.” Janet leaned into the door jamb.

“Saw someone come plowing down the street just the other day. The dumb jerk. Yelled my ass off at him.”

“Oh Sam.”

“Well it isn’t right. People just have no clue about safe driving. Really, they have
no clue
. Especially teenagers, which being a high school teacher, you know already.”

“I was just an aide.”

“You were close enough to smell their crap,” he said pointedly.

“That I was.”

“So you’re doing better now?”

“I’m fine now, just had one too many was all.”

“I don’t know how you even had
one
. You and me used to be the only dry people on this block!” Sam laughed a little too much and went silent.

“Yeah, my tastes changed.”

“It happens, I reckon.” He took a step off the porch with a lurch. “I hope your tastes go back, and you keep safe.”

“I’m trying.”

“I do understand.” Sam’s eyes glinted and he nodded then. “Well, say hi to Herman for me.”

“I will.”

He turned away—Janet swallowed something as dry as dead leaves, her voice scratched her throat— “Sam, um, do you still collect coins?”

The wind picked up at that moment, blowing Sam’s shoulder length gray hair and his retro Boston Red Sox t-shirt. He grinned faintly.

“Sure do,” he said.

FURY

Need to get to the store today to get some hand soap, can’t keep using dish soap, the stuff’s eating up my hands—too many stupid trips to the store for one item—how did Gabriele manage getting everything in one trip every Saturday—? Unbelievable—gets a little easier to bear each day but sure miss that gal—later, get the photo album out, if I’m up for it—

Glance out my window to the Erikson’s house—that poor woman needs help, both of them probably—none of my business—what the hell do I know—? Never had kids, never knew my parents, not much of an authority—I’m a sixty-seven year old retired self defense instructor who went from having a wife and a life, to watching bad science fiction movies every night, perched over processed TV dinner food— don’t know what life-lessons I could to offer to anybody, except several great chokeholds and “don’t eat the two Hungry Man dinners in the same day”—seeing Janet like that, damn, I need to get out there and start challenging myself—life ain’t over—life is still good—love my life—loved it better with Gabby, but there’s no changing that now—

Guess I have to get into some better clothes if I go out—damn it, shoulda got the soap when I was out buying the flowers—
goofball,
that’s what Gabby woulda called me—yes, I’m gonna have to get that album later—need to see her face and remember her— can’t understand how some other men just go right out and get another woman—well, keep it real—certainly wouldn’t turn down one to come by and keep me company again—not being unfaithful, or even feeling like I would be—but how do these other widowers start from scratch—? Seems like a really difficult place to begin a relationship from—ah well, she’d have to be special—nobody could be Gabby, but special they’d have to be—

Stomach feels wrong—go to the kitchen for some Pepto—well double shit, that’s gonna have to go on the list with the hand soap—where are my damn keys—? best get going before the stores get crammed with impatient cross-town traffic—they really ought to refrigerate Pepto in the store—hate it at room temperature, and by how warm this winter’s been, by the time I get home, gonna have to drink it lukewarm—guess I could drink it in the parking lot—can’t imagine how that would look—some old fart self medicating out in the open because he’s not too proud, oh no—but it really might have to be done just like that because my gut is feeling nasty right about now—

Fact is, everything feels nasty, it’s all of a sudden, and thinking of lying down a bit—things are blurry here in the kitchen, so I go to the bedroom, get on top of the unmade bed, dig out the comforter from under my back, just the movement makes me want to puke—outta nowhere, emotions are running high now, I’m thinking of Gabby not being here, feeling sorry for myself, tears in my eyes—feel so bloated, yet want to keep drinking until I black out—holy Christ is my gut bubbling—did I have any lemon lime soda left—? I should have checked—

Vomiting over the side of the bed, more liquid than I remember drinking,
ever
, and it tastes strange, like an astringent chemical—I’ve been poisoned—somehow, at some time, I’ve been poisoned—ate at the diner this morning and had pancakes and turkey bacon—nothing tasted weird—oh god, just thinking about that food and I’m puking more of the vile stuff—

Need to call for help—waves of dizziness overcome me, just when there’s another sickly tug at my stomach—fall off the bed and bang the back of my head—doesn’t hurt, my body’s numb—is this what dying feels like—?

Can’t remember where I put the cell phone—don’t look for it, just go you idiot, go outside, go to the neighbor’s house, the woman, Janet, you got her flowers, go and ask for help, she will help—

Crawling through the bedroom, feel something staring at me from the darkness in my bathroom—it’s a bad thing, a monster, the eyes, the eyes are cold and wicked and black and unreal and I have to be imagining its gray flesh and shark teeth—the smell from it, the putrefaction of a corpse washed up on the shore of a contaminated river, my stomach jumps up into my mouth again, and all the dizziness returns, images marry together and my soul rips in half and those pieces in half and then those in half—and then I’m remembering—