Vespers Page 5

  I took the stairs alone before she could say anything more. I walked up to the fourth floor and could feel my pulse beginning to speed up. Almost nothing in the world could do that to me besides visiting my aunt. I took a minute to calm myself but it didn’t help. I knocked at her door and a young, pretty, terrified nun opened it a crack. She eyed me for a minute before deciding to let me in. Behind her, seated and reading the Bible, was another young woman with thick glasses and deep acne pits. Sister Katherine and Sister Ruth Joyce. They knew who I was. I told them I wanted to speak to my mother alone. They nodded and left.

  My aunt sat in the corner of the main room of her suite, near the window, but facing the wall. The sunshine lit up her back and the black garments seemed to drain the light away.

  ”Hello,” I said.

  She glanced up at me and for an instant I almost saw her the way she was before Christ had fully gotten hold of her. She smiled in that easy way she used to have about her. She’d once been comprised of a great grace and calm even when serious troubles were hitting. Now her eyes held a hint of delight.

  A strange tightness filled my chest. It might have been sorrow or regret. Or an eagerness for action. I wanted to talk about my father again. I wanted to talk to my father. I wanted to run back to the compound and throttle the Ganooch. I had a catalogue of laments stacked up behind my heart.

  “I wasn’t sure if I’d ever see you again,” she said.

  “Can’t get rid of a bad thing.”

  “You’re not a bad thing.”

  “It’s nice to hear you talking again.”

  “I’ve always talked since I’ve been here. It’s just that no one ever heard me before.”

  I grinned. My grin made some men shit themselves. My aunt merely smiled more broadly. Her smile made priests head to confession.

  She swung her gaze to the window. “The children–”

  “The virus is mutating. People are reacting differently.”

  I could see that she hadn’t been sleeping. Dark circles framed her eyes. She rose wearily, her face haggard, fatigue written into her features, but before she managed to stand she fell heavily into her seat again. I took her hand and she smiled again briefly. I sat beside her and she tightened her grip. It was almost enough to make me flinch. She had real power.

  “What have you been dreaming?” she asked.

  “I can’t always remember,” I said.

  It was true that over the past couple of weeks I’d awoken from nightmares, sweating and groaning, unfamiliar words trapped in my throat. I dreamed of the Middle East. I dreamed of wars in the hills of Meggido. I saw myself killing a priest. I saw my aunt’s teeth thick with fresh flesh.

  “How did this begin?” I asked her. I couldn’t make myself say the words. Demonic intervention. Satanic influence. Biological warfare. Nerve toxins. Red Death. Apocalypse. Armageddon.

  Her eyes tilted aside. She was looking into the places where no one could see without giving up a large part of themselves. Sweat dappled her forehead and ran down the creases that outlined her mouth. Heat emanated from her, and like flames passed from treetop to treetop, her fever set fire to my own.

  “Ah shit,” I said.

  Within seconds my scalp prickled and I had to undo my tie and take off my jacket. Sweat slithered across my chest and threaded down my back. I watched the pulse in her neck snap against the cowl. Mine snapped against my collar

  She began to whisper prayers and blessings. I knew them well, and a part of me wanted to recite along with her. I had to force myself to keep from doing it, but the words grew louder and louder inside my head. My aunt took my hand and pressed it to the side of her face. I wanted to shout for my mother. We always want to shout for our mothers. I wondered how we had ended up this way. It had something to do with my parents. Something to do with our heritage. We’d been blessed and cursed and forgotten by God. She forced her head down and drew my palm across her eyes.

  “You make them tell their secrets, in dark hot rooms full of dust and blood.”

  “Yes,” I admitted.

  Images flashed in my mind. It was a familiar feeling even though this hadn’t happened to me since I was fifteen. I watched light break upon the darkness. Blood splashing upon a tree. A strange black bug bouncing inside a glass jar. I saw the nuns feeding her. I saw an altar boy delivering a basket of fruit and cheese to her quarters. She took his hand. She didn’t bite him. She kissed his palm. That was enough.

  My aunt’s prayers became something else. Her words twisted and grew less decipherable. The language was no longer English. It wasn’t Latin. It wasn’t Greek. It might not have been human. I watched her and could feel the fever burning her alive, and I began to hiss out against Christ.

  A gathering of crows flapped their black wings against the window. Screeches of laughter from the school yard took a more vicious turn, as if they were killing each other now. The temperature dropped. Our breath frosted in the air. Still we burned. The room dimmed. Ash blew harshly against the glass. A few drops of rain spattered and ran down through it like tears on a grime-covered face.

  I frowned. I said, “This isn’t your fault. This can’t be your fault.”

  I glanced around at the Catholic iconography around me and could feel the eyes of the saints and martyrs, Jesus and his parents, the cardinals and the bishop, the Pope, staring meekly with forlorn hearts. I lashed out with right fist and shattered a group of them. Plastic and plaster exploded across the floor.

  My aunt’s mouth was full of tongues. I wondered if she’d infected me already. I wondered if I could hold out like Nicky or if I was going to grow too hungry. I was already hungry for death. I ate it daily. She spat and growled and then there were many voices rising from her. I’d lived through this before as a boy. Like then, I tried to focus on what they were saying, what they wanted from me.

  My mother, I thought I heard my mother among the divine throng.

  I spoke to them, “I’m here, I’m listening, just spit it out, damn your asses.”

  The din continued. In the midst of the noise I could hear my father arguing in Italian with other voices. I knew it was him. He sounded strong and competent. He wasn’t a wimp shoemaker, you sons of bitches, he didn’t go easily. He hung on for four days after you shot him to shreds. I’d never known that before. I was thankful to know it now. I heard my name mentioned. The argument continued and I couldn’t be certain if he was winning or losing. He seemed to be giving it her all. So did the others packed into my aunt, whoever they were, whatever they wanted. I thought maybe I heard my mother there for a moment. My name was a curse. They all choked on it like broken glass.

  “The bonemeal from the place of the skull covers the earth.”

  “Oh fuck that,” I said.

  The crows continued to flap against the window, screeching like flayed men.

  And then the spell was over.

  The heat dissipated. Sweat cooled on my face and the crows flew on. The children’s screaming sounded even more like killing and torture.

  I shook my head. “What do I have to do?”

  She came out of her trance in an instant, her eyes clearing. “I can’t tell you that. You’ll find your course. The same as you always have.”

  Then she slumped forward in her seat and nearly hit the floor. I caught her in my arms and carried her to her bed. I laid her on the mattress and sat beside her watching her sleep for a while. She deserved better than being married to Christ. She certainly deserved better than having me for only relative.

  I got up, straightened my tie, and put on my suit jacket. Distant thunder rumbled the roof. Or maybe the fighter jets were firing missiles now. The blessed heart pictures all seemed to clatter in time together, beating to a particular rhythm.

  She wasn’t going to be safe here. None of them would be safe here. I should gather them up at gunpoint and force them to follow me to the Ganooch’s complex. But I wasn’t sure it would be safe there for much longer either. The world was covered in
the bonemeal of Golgotha, the hill of skulls where Christ was crucified. Evening prayers would go on forever. Vespers was here to stay.

  I stepped back into the street, surprised to see all the buildings still standing. Despite the obvious horrors, some folks remained unaware of how bad things had gotten. Looters raided the stupidest shops, stealing gourmet coffee, microwaves, HDTVs. They drove by with their cars and SUV’s stuffed with stereo systems, blaring music instead of news reports. Green-stained bandages unfurled all about, trapped in trees and stuck against the sewer grates. Some of the sick crawled. Some wept. Some cried. Others snickered. Corpses sat propped up like millionaires dozing carefree in the sun.

  I called a number I was never supposed to call. It went to voicemail in half a ring. There was no message, simply a click and silence. I said, “This is Flowers. I need an extraction. Now.”

  I waited for Renning or one of his scurrying clerks to pick up. No one did. They might have gone into lockdown quarantine. Or they might have simply decided to let me die out here on my own, a goombah among goombahs.

  “Fuck you, Renning. You’d better move into a nuclear silo. I swear I’ll ice your ass before this virus or the shamblers can.”

  I found the nearest car parked on a side street, smashed the window, pulled down the dashboard, yanked the wires, and drove back to the estate. Bodies were scattered along the sidewalk, their flesh ravaged. I didn’t know if the disease was doing it to them or each other.

  The mob had grown. Some of them weren’t sick, they were just trying to get help from the don, who always promised to help the people of Brooklyn. Others were gaunt-faced wretches, begging for aid. The rest were giggling, shambling, biting. It was madness.

  I parked, got out, drew the 9mm and snapped off five quick shots. I always hit what I aimed at. I aimed between their eyes. Brains spattered. I stood at the gate and signaled the three family soldiers inside the bulletproof security booth to let me in. I could see in their faces that they considered leaving me out there to die. Why not? I was nothing to them. Opening the gate only meant a chance for the plague to get inside the complex.

  But they needed all the help they could get, and they knew it. I was a perfect shot. I had been in jams where I’d been alone inside a city populated by the enemy, and I’d managed to slither out.

  They opened the gate. I ran inside, spun, and fired three more shots before the gate shut behind me again. Three more of the biters crumpled outside the wall. I stood there and listened to them mewling and wailing and laughing. I heard my name.

  “Tommy Flowers, we are the resurrection.”

  “Tommy Flowers, we eat of the flesh, in remembrance.”

  “Tommy Flowers, deep cover infiltration is your specialty. You need an extraction. We all need an extraction.”

  I rushed to the security booth and gave the guards orders. “Park the stretch limos out front to block the gate. Drain most of the fuel afterwards and store it in the groundskeeper’s shed. Get more men to help you with security detail. At least another twenty. I don’t give a shit if they’re made guys, capos, or lieutenants. You tell them this is a directive from me. I want roving patrols walking the entire estate perimeter. Pass out the heavy artillery too. Rifles, full autos, everything. Anybody bitches, you send them to see me.”

  Two of the guards said, “Yes, sir,” and rushed off to do what I’d told them.

  The third was a bold-eyed youth of twenty, with a bad 70s porn actor mustache. His name was Nolan. “My wife… she’s over in Ozone Park with her mother. We’re newlyweds. But we… had a fight. I’ve been trying to reach her all day, but she hasn’t picked up. I need to get to her and bring her back here where it’s safe.”

  “You step out there then that’s where you stay.”

  Nolan drew his chin back, scowling at me. “But that’s–”

  I got up in his face, nose to nose. I head-butted him lightly and he fell back. “Unfair. Unreasonable. You’re right, kid. But that’s how things are going to be from here on out. If you want to live you need to understand that. I’m sorry about your wife. She’s either dead already or she’ll ride this out like anybody else.”

  He wasn’t cowed by anything I said. I knew he wasn’t going to listen. He whispered a harsh, “Screw you, Tommy. I know you’re the torpedo, and I mean no disrespect, really, but I’ve got to get to Sarah.” He tried to shoulder past me. I swung my forearm around and caught him across the temple with my elbow. His eyes spun. He went down to his knees but managed to brace himself on the floor of the booth. He lifted his chin and glared at me. He was tough and kept struggling. We needed him here.

  I said, “I’m saving your life.”

  He shook his head trying to clear it. He gritted his teeth. For a second I thought he’d already been infected and might try to take a bite out of my legs. I drew and put the muzzle of the 9mm against the double indents between his eyes.

  He growled, “I’ve got to go.”

  “Just stay there. Sit down.”

  But he wouldn’t. He raised himself painfully, blood dripping from the side of his scalp. He pushed back against the muzzle of the gun leaving a welt thick as a thumb print on his brow. It looked black as the thumb smudge of ashes you received on lent.

  I said, “Stop, Nolan.”

  “It’s not your decision. It’s my decision. I’m going after my wife. I’m gonna bring her back here. Her and her goddamn loudmouth bitch of a mother.”

  There was ammunition hidden in the booth in secret drawers the cops weren’t likely to find. I reloaded and grabbed extra clips. I handed him a 12-gauge.

  He glanced up the driveway at all the cars of our staff and troops parked around the garages. There were so many that the Ganooch kept two full-time mechanics on the payroll. I wondered where they were hiding.

  He said, “Mine’s the black Honda Accord. Don’t give me any shit about driving a nip car, right?”

  “Sure,” I told him. “But you can’t take it. We can’t open the gate that far. They’ll all come rushing in.” I gestured at the spear-shaft fencing. Hundreds of hands gripped the bars. Leering faces tried to shove their way through. Blood and colorful pus was already seeping across the cement. Teeth fell like gravel across the sidewalk. They were trying to bite their way in.

  “What are they doing?” Nolan asked. I could see the fear trying to take him over, but he controlled it well, just not well enough. “Why are they doing that?”

  “It’s the disease.”

  “What disease makes you bite like that? Rabies? Is that what’s making them all so fucking nuts?”

  “Could be.”

  He looked back at his car like he might make a run for it anyway. “How am I supposed to get all the way to Ozone Park?”

  “You’re not. Give up the idea.”

  “I told you, I can’t. I won’t.”

  “If you’re serious, I’ll cover you. When you’re clear, find someplace to hole up for a while. Then steal a car on the street.”

  With a wave of shame working inch by inch across his features, he admitted, “I don’t know how to.”

  “You’ve never stolen a car?”

  “Didn’t I just say that?”

  For the first time in weeks I felt a real smile tugging at my lips. “How the hell did you wind up working for the Ganucci family, kid?”

  “I’ve been asking myself that since they took Nicky’s body out of here.” He racked the shotgun. “Okay, okay. Let’s do this.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “I am,” he said with less conviction than he had before. But his eyes were full of resolve and his face had hardened. “I wish I wasn’t but, I am.”

  “All right. Let’s move.”

  We ran toward the gates. I flipped up the outer covering of a keypad lock on an inside column of the wall. The Ganooch had had the stones flown in from Sicily thirty years ago when he bought the mansion. I touched the rock and could feel the hum of my own history within me, all the millennia of my forefathers dow
n through the ages inside my DNA.

  The plaguers were scratching and mewling, trying to fit their thin hands through the spear shafts of the gate. The kid kept shouting for them to get away. He promised to get them help. He trained the shotgun muzzle on them and kept shifting from face to face, mouth to mouth. They snarled and howled. They tittered like they were sharing in a joke that the rest of us just hadn’t figured out yet.

  “Tommy Flowers, we are the rock of your church.”

  “Tommy Flowers, we eat your memories.”

  “Tommy Flowers, the weak in the dark cry for mercy, for mercy.”

  I opened fire. I pivoted from one sneer to the next, firing through the teeth, if they had any left. Firing for the spewing green gap if not. Bodies spun away, dropped away. Shards of teeth and skull rained through the fencing.

  “Stop!” Nolan shouted. “Wait! You mean you’re just going to shoot into the crowd and kill everybody?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Don’t you see what’s going on, kid? The streets are drenched in blood.”

  “Jesus,” he said. “Holy Jesus. What is this? I thought they were sick. I mean, I thought they’d be dying. I’m not afraid of dying, but this.” He turned to look at me. “They’re saying your name. Why are they saying your name?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Tommy Flowers, talk to us. Talk to us. Tell us.”

  “Why do they want to talk to you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What are you supposed to tell them?”

  Their voices were the voices of women raped whose husbands and fathers gathered the neighbors for a stoning. Their laughter was the laughter of abomination and sacrifice. They were like earth and blood themselves. I understood it. All soldiers, in all armies across the face of the earth did.

  “Are you going or not?” I asked.

  The kid said, “Yes, goddammit, yes yes.”

  I hit the code on the inner column and the gates swung open. A few of the biters shoved their way in and I snapped off another six shots while Nolan blasted the shit out of the crowd. He punched a hole in the throng and ran straight into it. He didn’t take more than a couple of steps before I heard him cry out sharply in pain. One of the biters had sunk its teeth into him. I thumbed the door shut button as they tried to slip through. I recognized them. I knew their names. I had shopped in their stores. I had danced with their daughters. I had beaten, stolen from, and murdered their sons and brothers and cousins. The gates clapped shut like edges of the world closing.