Bottled Abyss (42 page)

2

Rebecca Davis lived in what might have once been called a “starter home.” The yard was kept up. A yellow pinwheel tilted in a bed of stumpy blue flowers. Every sprinkler had been neatly edged around. Oil stains on the driveway were scrubbed. The graying house needed new paint, but it wasn’t an eyesore. This was a house of someone trying to ignore the surrounding neighborhood of gated yards and glowering pit-bulls beyond chain link fences, an environment that Evan’s two new companions probably felt most comfortable in.

“
In the ghetto
,” Jeremy sang deeply and Arturo snickered.

“I knew a dude from around here once. Back in middle school. Long time ago.”

Arturo killed the engine. Jeremy opened the glove box and took out a handgun, which he stuffed into the back of his pants.

“Sure don’t look like no place Vincent would come,” said Arturo.

“He’s hiding out.” Jeremy’s mouth opened wide with a lazy yawn. “Probably donkey-punching this chick as we speak.”

“Or worse,
that fucker
.” Arturo turned around in his seat. His ample brown forearm was hairless with a thin luminescent scar that circuited the flesh. He studied Evan for a moment. “You gonna be sick, huh? Nervous? What’re you leading us into,
pendejo
?”

Evan just shook his head, thinking of Faye, nothing but Faye, over and again, and again and over, her face, her smile, even her embracing that Mexican man with those nauseatingly kind eyes, because Faye had been real then, been alive, and now she wasn’t.

Why had he brought these two here? This innocent woman shouldn’t have to be subjected to Art and J.P. It’d been stupid impulsive thinking and they were dumb enough to go along with it. If there’s any woman in the world that deserved to meet these two—

“Tell me you ain’t trippin’ back there? You better not chuck in my car, shitass.”

“This place doesn’t look familiar. I don’t think Vincent’s here,” said Evan, voice trembling. “I know a better place. There’s another woman. Janet is her name.”

“Nice try, fugly.” Arturo swayed with a gesture to get out. “You show the way.”

Evan reached for the well polished handle and swung open the long door. Its end scraped against the sidewalk.

“Watch my door, bitch! It’s worth more than you,” Arturo growled. He threw the bottle up and snatched it enthusiastically out of the air. No sloshing sounds came from inside it.

“You’re taking that in?” asked Jeremy.

Arturo’s eyebrow bent. “You know someone will jack it out here.”

“That’s what a trunk’s for.”

“You bitch like my girl. I got plans for this bong, fuck you very much.”

Careful to shut the door, Evan tried to straighten his posture. No such doing. His lower back muscles had reconfigured him into a perpetual stooping position.

The two gang members followed close behind. Evan could smell their heartbeats racing.

“Remember what I said, hunchback. If this is some bullshit, you’re over,” Jeremy warned.

They reached the door and Evan knocked (knuckles wider, black and white hairs poking through the follicles).

 
Arturo and Jeremy waited just left of the door, out of sight. Under a bush, the bottle sat against the wall, a stray shadow winding over it.

After a moment the door opened on the chain. Rebecca’s eyes lighted as she recognized Evan. “Oh, Mr. Ledbetter,” she said and unchained the door.

She was in a pair of gray gym shorts and a blue and white stripped work out t-shirt. Not being sweaty, out of breath or flushed, Evan assumed she’d probably just dressed into the skimpy clothing, unfortunately for her.

“I… came to talk,” said Evan.

“About Janet?”

“No…uh, this is about someone else.”

Evan sensed Arturo and Jeremy exchange knowing glances.

“Well he…”

“Is this about Josue Ramirez?” she asked.

Arturo lunged through the doorway. “We’ve got a bingo, bitch!”

Rebecca swung left, grabbed Arturo around the throat and put him into a headlock. “Oh holy shit!” he cried out in surprise.

Jeremy bustled past Evan, gun trained on Rebecca. “Hands off.”

Rebecca glanced at Evan and then to the gun. “What’s going on here?”

“We’re here for the guy you’re hiding. He might not call himself Vincent, but he was Josue’s partner.”

“I’m not hiding anybody.”

Jeremy pulled back the gun’s slide. “You still haven’t let my friend go.”

“Yeah,” Arturo said, “let me go.”

Reluctantly she pushed Arturo away. The man bounced right back at her like a wind-up toy. “Fuck is that shit, bitch? I oughta cut your fuckin’ throat right here, laying hands on me, the only thing you’re gonna touch is my dick, you fuckin’ little ho!”

She stood there, looking at him eye to eye, fearless. Arturo huffed. Jeremy watched the two with an amused grin. Evan tried not to notice the reptilian tail extending from his tail bone and slithering down his pant leg.

Arturo looked to a bureau against the wall with assorted pictures of a young boy. He slapped one of them facedown. “Who’s that? Your kid? Where is he?”

“Not here,” she said with a smile.

Evan knew everything about Rebecca by now. Her son was doing a visitation with his father. This was their weekend together. She’d just been trying to take advantage of some time alone and squeeze in a work-out, since she’d missed so many lately and had noticed some of her clothes getting snugger. Countless nights she’d stayed up, thinking about Melody Erikson, about Janet and Herman. What if that had been her? She probably would have died from the outfall of it…

Thoughts divided in his mind and it overwhelmed him. Evan lost balance and crashed to the floor.

Jeremy looked over his shoulder. The man’s pasty face was wide and blunt on every surface, the acne pocks on his cheeks making his eggy head resemble some sad, hideous planet. “Get up, sketchpad. I’ve got some shit to sell you when this is all through.”

“Are you okay, Evan?” asked Rebecca. “Is Janet okay?”

Arturo clutched her arm. “Who’s this Janet woman everybody’s talking about?” Rebecca glared at him as a response and Arturo sighed. “Hey J.P.”

“Yeah,” said Jeremy, who had just bent over to help Evan up.

“Forget that asshole. He ain’t goin’ nowhere. Check the house. If you find a cell phone, bring it to me. Let’s give Ms. Janet a call.”

“Have the bitch get it. Who said I was your slave?”

“Really? You’re doin’ this shit now, J.P.? I’m the man with the fuckin’ golden mind. You better not forget that shit.”

“Do you want money?” asked Rebecca. “I have a safe. We could work something out here.”

“Go check everything out,” Arturo reinforced. He took his own gun out of his pants and tucked its barrel under Rebecca’s left breast, then brought his body closer to hers.

Jeremy watched them in sick wonder for a second before taking off into the house. Arturo slammed the front door with his foot and dead-bolted it. He motioned for Rebecca to move to the gold-flowered couch in a sunken den area. He kicked Evan’s thigh. “You too, Ratty McCrackhead.”

Evan pushed up on the tile. His claws scraped it subtly.

“You have some nice titties, woman,” Arturo praised Rebecca. “Little, but sweet.”

Evan sat on the edge of the couch and looked away.

“Take off your shirt,” Arturo instructed. He rubbed his gun-hand on his thigh as though he had an itch there.

Rebecca went into a business mode. “What about that safe? I’ve got my kid’s college savings up there. Let’s talk about that.”

“That’s all good. After the titties. Show me them.”

Rebecca sighed, as though bored. “You’ve never seen tits before?”

Arturo frowned. “Don’t get stupid on me. Take off your shirt before I rip that shit off you.”

“I don’t think Vincent is here,” called Jeremy from upstairs.

“Keep looking
cabron
,” Arturo yelled back. He ducked closer to Rebecca, joyful to a point of his wide black eyebrows rising comically high.

“Found her phone,” called Jeremy.

Arturo’s joy faded at the interruption. “Good, good, good, shit!”

He unzipped his pants and pulled out a short, yet fat brown penis. He began nodding and grinning like a lunatic. “Huh? Huh? You want this shit, right bitch?”

“I’ve seen better.”

“The hell you have.”

“Without that gun, I’d so fuck you up right now,” she said.

Arturo put himself away and sniffed. Rebecca shook her head sadly.

Jeremy came walking down the stairs with an inquisitive expression. “What have you been up to?”

“Slapped her with my dick, eh!” Arturo laughed. The two met on the tile entryway in a mock version of an important business transaction.

Jeremy grinned past Arturo at Rebecca. “That’s all? I’d have done way more.”

“Bullshit.”

“You’ve seen me in action. Did you already forget about that party in
Upland
, with those gothic chicks and the beer bottles? Huh? Vincent could make the dirtiest chick feel cheap. It’s a gift, dude.”

“You’re so homo for that guy, really. Vincent ain’t shit. Pulling a train on whores is unclean. Now shut up. Where’s that phone?”

Jeremy handed over a flip phone. Arturo navigated the device for a couple minutes. “Use to have one of these,” he remarked, “piece of shit phone…ah, here, only Janet in here.”

He dialed and tossed it into Rebecca’s lap. “Tell her to meet us here, but don’t tell her we’re looking for Vincent. Don’t pull any shit.”

They waited, watching Rebecca closely as she held the phone to her ear.

Muscles rippled through Evan’s back. He leaned away and bit his fist. They’d been right about his front teeth. Longer, wider and closer together than before… and his lower teeth had thinned and grown pointed. His lips itched. Something was growing there, something hard and hair-like—whiskers? He tried to dismiss the sensation but others plagued him. Legs hard and cold with scales; lower and upper torso growing with long fur; face reconstructing by each passing moment, becoming more rodent.