We Live Inside You (19 page)

The sign tells me I’m now entering the Kah-Tah-Nee reservation and I start to cry. Last time I saw a similar sign Sage was sitting there next to me, sipping on her coffee, planting sweet kisses in the soft spot by my ear. Now she’s gone, cooking away in a little tent in the desert until the wind spreads the smell of her and other campers come calling.

And I’m back here, smelling gun oil in my nervous sweat and hearing the drums inside my blood. The wound has scabbed over again and the drumming is so loud I’m having a hard time staying focused on the road. I can try and think in the space between the drums, but I keep losing the plot and these words keep repeating in the place of logical thought.

Wokova.

Balance.

Revenge
.

Fifteen miles. Seven. Almost there. These drums are smashing around in my head. I feel heat on my lips and chin and realize I’m bleeding from both nostrils. Bloodshot eyes stare back at me through a vertigo haze that makes me feel like the world is on permanent tilt.

My body is in the grasp of tremors, shaking to this rhythm that was never mine. The sun drifts behind a mountainous ridge and dusk floats down, spreading gray light across the Sheenetz River. I can see the rest stop. My pulse is the sound of long dead tribesmen calling down the flood.

They are still here. The men in the shade. But now they aren’t laughing. Can they hear the drums too? Apparently Mr. FBI is their permanent mouthpiece for tribal affairs, because he’s stepping forward with his box cutter in hand and saying, “Man, you get in an accident or something? You deaf? I told you not to come back to our place.”

The drums are so loud now. Can they see me shaking? With the sun gone there is no more shade, just dim light and dark shapes. I feel a drop of blood slide off my chin. The four-hundred-pounder shouts out from beside the tree.

“You lose your pussy somewhere, little man?”

I raise the gun up with my ravaged arm. They register it quickly and appear more angry than scared. I level off at Mr. FBI and he doesn’t flinch. I’m not the first sick white man to aim a gun at him. He’s resigned to it. He looks straight at me with his one focused eye.

“Pull the trigger, man. Because when you do, my friends will fucking kill you, and I’ll be free.”

The dancers are around me now. They’re surrounding Mr. FBI and I, and they seem real. The drums get louder, too loud, and I grind my teeth together and I can feel the enamel cracking, my teeth splitting down the middle and now there’s this pain that accompanies each beat of the drum, this soaring red fire that courses up my gut every time another invisible hand falls to a skin pulled tight, and there’s only one way to make this stop before it tears me to shreds.

Wokova. Balance. Revenge
.

They watch me as I lift the hand that isn’t holding the gun and plunge the fingers into the wound on my forearm. I’m scraping. I’m digging. Get the sound OUT.

The wound opens and instead of dripping to the ground the blood sprays out fast, too fast, and too much of it, forming this thin mist that spreads quickly through the air.

We are all in it now. The dancers. The Indians. Whoever I’ve become. We are all standing in this red mist, breathing in the drums. We are breathing my blood, our lungs pulling a lost pulse from the sky.

Wokova. Balance. Revenge
.

REVENGE
.

I aim at Mr. FBI’s head and pull the trigger on the .45. His good eye goes wide as the hammer falls on nothing.

Click.

I pull the trigger five more times, letting each empty click echo through the sound of the drums.

Revenge is here. And it is theirs.

They are upon me in seconds, all of them. The sound of the drums, the mist we are breathing in, the sight of the gun, all of it has brought forth an old rage. Not anger and booze and cheap, easy hate.

Rage.

Box cutters become talons. Fists become great stones. Their ancestors dance around us while they consume me. My teeth crack against smooth river rock. They float away, broken bits of white bone flowing over red clay. A fist grabs the front of my dusty mohawk. Claws enter my scalp at the top of my forehead and then I feel fingers sliding under my skin and pulling up, pulling back. I can feel them sawing it free and my head drops down to the river stones as the men raise my scalp in the sky. They drink the blood that drips from the shank of skin and hair. They are chanting a name. Wokova. Bringing a flood to cleanse the Earth.

Mr. FBI is chewing at the back of my neck, tearing at the skin with his few remaining teeth.

They are becoming as hungry as we are.

And I can see by the light of the new moon that the waters of the old river are rising fast.

Thirty deep black strands of hair from the bedroom carpet.

I am collecting what remains of my beautiful Zhao-shi, just days ago murdered by her defective heart.

Before her passing, Zhao-shi was capable of flight. Toured the world as part of the Dynasty Circus—The Suspended Woman. 747’s her daily commute. Paris, Tokyo, London. Seldom earthbound, whether borne by flying metal behemoths or her own luxuriant hair.

Acrobats, contortionists, fire eaters—none matched her radiance.

Fifty hairs entangled in her brushes (I’d combed her hair for an hour before calling the paramedics; held my face to it, swallowed its cherry scent).

She was the girl with feather bones, floating before red backdrops, her arm-length purple-black hair tied tight to a silken blue rope, arms and legs fanned, swimming against gravity, winning. I would watch for the drift of butterfly dust crossing the stage-lights’ beams.

Could I sleep, I would pray this image into my dreams.

Twenty-seven hairs from the shower drain, gently washed until they squeak.

I’ve been offered dope and therapy. Her friend Bai, equally confused by Zhao-shi’s early death, even offered me sex as sympathy.

All are empty solace.

Seventy-two hairs on her clothes.

Zhao-shi’s been dead three hundred fourteen hours as of… now.

Time will slide past like nothing, then constrict; every second is suddenly stark, cold. And
lonely
like I’d never imagined.

It’s all quicksand. Just a matter of how long I can drift.

Ninety-four strands are hiding, entwined with silvery party tinsel, coiled around the motorized carpet-scrubber in our vacuum.

The tensile strength of a single hair fiber is equal to copper wire.

There’s not enough left of her for a hangman’s knot, but any knot will do.

The chair topples beneath me. I hover for a moment before gravity asserts itself.

Although I can’t breathe, I taste the scent of cherries.

Zhao-shi holds me again.

We float home.

INTERNAL MEMO: 08/07/2010

CASE: F-DPD0758 (CDC NORS-Water Report ID VEC147, Received 08/03/2010 via State Report OMB No. 0920-0004, Submitted by: Dr. Lorena Santos of Pacific Grace Clinic)

ETIOLOGY: Unknown (comparative specimen analysis in progress, genus/species/serotype may require new designations)

CONTAMINATION FACTOR: C-N/A, Unknown

SURVIVAL FACTOR: S-N/A, Deaths can be attributed to case though comparable pathogens have displayed symbiotic behavior

DOCUMENT INSERT: Verbatim transcript of post-containment etiology determination interview with Subject 5 (Matthew Hall). Due to active vector status (transmission mode remains classified as Indeterminate/Other/Unknown although enteric Phase 1 possible) subject interviewed in iso via 2-way audio. DPDx program active/engaged. Elimination & Control team at ready.

Recorded at Director’s Request/Classified Confidential 1-A. Speaking: DPD Director Cliff Selzer, Matthew Hall

CS: Hello, Mr. Hall.

MH: [No response]

CS: I’m going to be frank with you, Mr. Hall… Can I call you Matthew?

MH: You can call me whatever you want.

CS: Very well, Matthew. I need you to understand the situation we’re in right now. How important you are. How much you can help us.

MH: I’m not important. I’m the least important person you’ve ever met. And I don’t give a shit about helping you. And if you don’t get me something stiffer than this glass of fucking tap water then I’m not saying a word.

CS: Matthew, I’m afraid that water is all we can provide you right now. But if you cooperate there could be adjustments to your Stay Profile.

MH: You get me a bottle of Maker’s and a shotgun. You promise that. Then I’ll tell you everything.

CS: You know I can’t do that.

MH: I don’t know what you can or can’t do. I don’t even know who the hell you are. You strip me naked. You spray me down with some kind of goddamn fire extinguisher and make me sit in the dark in three smaller and smaller rooms. I thought you were cooking me alive in the last one.

CS: Matthew, that was all for standard decontamination protocol. We’re trying to protect you and others.

MH: So am I safe now?

CS: “Safe?”

MH: Decontaminated?

CS: [Long pause] We’re not sure, Matthew. That’s why it’s so important you tell us what you know.

MH: [Garbled] fucking shitbirds. Just let me die. Please.

CS: That’s very selfish, Matthew. There are millions of people in this country who don’t want to die, and you’re putting them at risk. If you won’t speak with me will you at least consider filling out the form we’ve placed in front of you?

MH: [Sound of pen being thrown across room, striking floor. Sound of Subject 5 expectorating on form CS115.]

BREAK IN RECORDING

MH: Now that’s more like it, chief. Aaah, that’s more like it.

CS: I suggest you slow down, Matthew. We don’t know how alcohol will affect the specimen or its interaction with your body.

MH: [Sound of gulping.] Shit on your specimen, chief. [Sound of belch.] Oh, Jesus, that fucking burns.

CS: It’s 100 proof, Matthew.

MH: No, not the booze. That stuff is silky. It’s the fucking crawler. Sonofabitch never stops working on me. I knew it. Your precious little detox rooms were a waste. [Sound of fabric rubbing on skin.] See, my mouth is already bleeding. Then I’ll get the fucking seaweed eyes. Then you guys will wish you already would’ve given me that shotgun.

CS: “Seaweed eyes?”

MH: Yeah. It’s like lace under the eyes, or like… like they’re bloodshot but the blood is dark green.

CS: And your wife displayed this condition?

MH: Claire had it first, and then…

CS: Then your daughter?

MH: [Long pause. Sound of gulping.] Yeah… Myra.

CS: We’ve performed a full sweep of your apartment, Matthew. We’re aware of your loss and I promise you we understand how difficult this must be.

MH: Did you burn them?

CS: No. Our procedure dictates a course other than destruction…

MH: Quit fucking around and burn them. Please. Give them that. Claire always wanted to be cremated and… I was going to do it myself, before you guys booted in my goddamn door… please. It’s the last good thing I can do for them.

CS: The sooner we know what you know, the sooner we can honor your request.

MH: Promise?

CS: We will do our best to keep funeral processing in motion.

MH: Well, cheers to that. [Sound of gulping.]

CS: So, at what point did you notice the discoloration in your wife’s eyes? And were there any notable signs or symptoms prior to that? Vomiting? Fever? Abdominal cramps?

MH: There are probably some symptoms I didn’t even notice. To be honest, we weren’t talking that much. I mean, this all happened last week and it happened so fast. But she was always bitching and crunching on Tums and popping Tylenol, so… I mean, running a daycare center is hard work. She used to joke that children could only grow by stealing your energy and happiness. But she liked it, she really did. Hell, she was pretty much raising Myra without me.

CS: Our records indicate you lived together.

MH: [Brief laughter.] Depends on how you define living, chief. We split rent on an apartment and had the same last name, you know... Sometimes I’d take Myra to the park. She was too little to go on the swings or anything, but she liked to smell the flowers and watch the other kids play… But Claire would have been the second person, after me of course, to tell you that I’m a piece of shit. A real charity case. So the truth is that I didn’t notice how wrong things were until they’d gone way past wrong.

CS: What did you observe first?

MH: Well, I woke up after Claire every day, and I’d make the bed to pretend I was useful in some way, and I noticed some little spots of blood on her pillow. Nothing too serious looking. But then she got home that night and had a hefty cough. Plus, her breath had become pretty toxic. She’d block it with her hand but the smell would float across the whole room. And this smell, chief, it was like a dead hooker’s pussy stuffed with old shrimp. But worse. It crawled into your nose like it was living. She started burning nag champa incense, so she must have smelled it too.

CS: Is that when she decided to go to the hospital?

MH: No. Claire is… Claire was a tough one. I was starting to feel a little sick, too, and Claire figured we had some food poisoning. It was her birthday a few days before, and I’d been out “job hunting” at the Pussycat Palace. You know the place?

CS: I’m aware of it.

MH: So you’ve seen Cherry Headrush dance before?

CS: No, Matthew. But I’m aware of many venues and chains because of their prominence on our regional disease vector maps.

MH: Oh. Shit. [Sound of gulping.] Well, I’d flipped for this girl, Cherry. And they’d just extended my unemployment for another three months so I was feeling flush. Spent almost my whole check in one afternoon, hogging up the lap dances. Milking a cheap beer buzz for hours. And then my cell started vibrating and a Reminder message pops up: CLAIRE B-DAY DINNER TONIGHT. Only the “tonight” is spelled like 2-N-I-T-E which means Claire programmed this into my phone so I’d remember. [Long pause.]

CS: Please continue. The food poisoning?

MH: So I’m running late, very buzzed and most of my cash is already in the Pussycat’s sterilizer. But I have to try and pull myself out of this so I hit Chinatown and looked for something fancy to cook up. Chan’s Market has a beautiful red snapper on discount, so I cop that, pick up some lemon and capers, and get two fancy chocolate Cupcakes at Dreampuff’s.

SEE SEPARATE DOCUMENT INSERT FOR RELATED DIRECTOR ORDER: DPDx multi-venue deploy/search/surveil. Full containment authorized. Andolini appointed Team Leader.

CS: Sorry about that break, Matthew. You’ve been very helpful.

MH: Do I have any choice? Really? I appreciate the second bottle, but you might want to give me a bucket if I’m going to keep going. Although I’d have no problem shellacking your little desk here.

CS: Consider us well-advised. Please continue.

MH: Shit, man… it seems obvious, doesn’t it? I barely had any time to bake the fish before Claire got home with Myra. I brushed up and changed my clothes and put on some Alicia Keys even though I can’t stand that shit. Lit a couple of tea lights I found under the sink. But I still fucked it up. I still fucked it up. [Pause] The fish looked good by candle-light. Looked delicious.

CS: You think the red snapper was the original source of the sickness?

MH: Thing is, I was pulling off the sober act, but I had to burp. And that just ruined it. One hundred percent. Like a strip club came out of my mouth. Claire pegged it, and laid into me, even though Myra was sitting in the room in her little bouncy chair and we’d sworn not to fight in front of her. And I mentioned that and we tried to enjoy the dinner and pretend that something was okay and nice and we didn’t even notice how raw the snapper was until we’d taken out half of the fish.

CS: So Claire was guessing that the raw fish had given each of you food poisoning?

MH: Yeah. She was toughing it out until Myra got sick, too. Because that didn’t make any sense. Myra was still breastfeeding, so she never had any of that nasty snapper. But she was coughing and having the blood speckles just the same.

CS: That’s when she visited Pacific Grace, toward the beginning of August?

MH: I think so. I was sort of on my own thing while this was happening. Sleeping on the couch at night. Hiding at Pussycat’s during the day. I told myself I was in exile, giving Claire some space to forgive me. But I was really just doing the same old shit. Living in a worn down strip club booth, paying Cherry to hip-hump me. Hoping that Claire and Myra would start feeling better. That maybe Claire would start feeling so good she’d build up the mojo to finally drop me.

CS: When did you find out she wasn’t feeling better?

MH: Well, Pussycat’s kind of extradited me back to my family. I was already putting off that rotten jellyfish smell and… let’s just say there aren’t enough dollars to make a stripper let you cough blood in her face. I didn’t even see it coming. Just sitting there half-chubbed and dead drunk and BOOM! No tickle in the throat. No warning.

CS: Do you happen to know Cherry Headrush’s real name?

MH: You’re kidding, right? [Sound of bottle opening/sound of gulping.] All I know is that I was home and starting to feel pretty rotten myself, and I can’t imagine how Claire was managing to run the daycare like that. All those little people screaming. “I want. I need. Watch me. Love me.” Jesus.

CS: This was the Morning Sun Daycare on Stanton?

MH: Yup. So, Claire stumbles into the house and she and Myra are both coughing and they have those triple-dark circles under their eyes, and seeing them like that makes me feel like I managed to sneak into Hell without dying. Just worthless. No, worse than that—fucking evil. [Long pause] Claire said the lady at the hospital gave them both two I.V. bags to rehydrate them, and that they needed to go back tomorrow for more diagnostics. But she thought it might be a parasite, like one of those squiggly little gut worms you get from eating sushi in Ohio.

CS: Did she suggest you go with them?

MH: Of course. And I was thinking it was the right thing to do. I was starting to feel weak in my bones. But the next morning I wake up and they’re already gone and there’s a text on my phone saying that they’re both “feeling much better.” Which was weird, because they’d been coughing like crazy all night. Just brutal sounding. Wet. Like I’d guess TB used to sound.

CS: So… a productive cough followed by an apparent return to vigor?