The Sorrowstones, page 9
In that car ride, Noah’s hypothesis about hungry monsters returned to me. I desperately wanted the statues back. I needed them. The more I thought about holding the laughing monkey, the more I began to fiend for its power. Without it, I felt like a vampire starved of blood.
Mom tried her best to comfort me, but her words had little effect. She gave up and just held my hand tightly as she drove.
And so it went for the remainder of my freshman year: my bullies tormented me by day and my guilt tormented me by night. My stomach problems returned. Eventually, my parents began to fight again.
At a special PTA meeting, we learned Mrs. Cordero had undergone a CT scan at the emergency room, and doctors discovered a small brain tumor called an astrocytoma. It had caused her to behave strangely, including trying to “itch” her brain by sharpening a pencil and jamming it up her nose. Mrs. Cordero was placed on leave, and no one knew whether she’d return. I assumed her illness was my fault, having shown her the statues’ inscriptions, and this belief fed the self-hatred that already festered within me.
Kill yourself, my guilt implored each night. Don’t think about it. Just do it.
I spent the summer between my freshman and sophomore years alone in my room, brooding behind closed drapes and vanishing into video games. My mother tried her best to attend to me, but she found less and less time for me as our financial problems re-emerged. The doctors altered Cassie’s treatment program, dramatically increasing the cost of her stay at Brackenhurst, and my dad’s company fell into chaos. The golden snake wasn’t around to shower us with cash. Mom started taking art commissions and giving piano lessons to help with bills. Meanwhile, I rotted in my bedroom like an abandoned corpse.
Then, war broke out in my home. My parents began screaming at each other—something they’d never done—and I sometimes went to bed to the sound of plates shattering. One afternoon, even with my TV blasting the video games I’d purchased with the money I’d found, I could still pick up fragments of their argument.
“Well, look who’s talking!” my mother yelled. “You’re the one who spent three hundred dollars on booze last month! And let’s not forget your four-thousand-dollar golf club set. You couldn’t hit balls if you were swingin’ into a crowd of male strippers, you moron!”
“I bring in the God damn money!” my father replied. “It’s mine to spend! Five hundred dollars on art supplies to sell a forty-dollar painting? You’re a real businesswoman, Lily. Such a mystery why I drink!”
“You’re gonna lose your job, Rick,” Mom snapped. “You drink because you know you can’t handle the new responsibility, and your star is fading. Pretty soon my paintings are going to be the only thing keeping you from sharing a bottle with that homeless guy who sleeps in front of the arcade!”
The arcade, I thought. Man, that sounds pretty good right now.
I’d avoided Kevin and Squeeze for weeks, and they were mad at me for it. They thought I’d picked up new friends, but truthfully I just didn’t know how to open up to them about what was going on with me. Who would believe my story about curses and magic figurines? But tonight, I needed to escape the house or I’d lose my mind. My guts knotted up as I grabbed the phone.
“Foster Residence,” Squeeze chirped in a well-rehearsed voice. “Scotty here.”
“Squeeze,” I said. “It’s Cole. What are you d—”
“Yo, Kevin!” Squeeze shouted away from the receiver. “Guess who this is!”
“For real?” Kevin replied. “Gimme that son of a bitch!” I heard cursing and tussling over the phone.
“Well, well, well,” Kevin said in a teasing voice. “If it isn’t that one kid from school... What was your name again?”
“Oh fuck off, Kevin,” I replied. “Listen, I gotta get out of here. It’s bad right now.”
“What’s going on?” he asked, his tone becoming serious.
“I’ll tell you later. You guys wanna hit the arcade tonight?”
“Fuck yes!” Squeeze shrieked.
“I’m down,” Kevin added, “but I need to swing by my house first. Gotta grab money and a few things.”
I could hardly contain my excitement. It had been a long time since I’d looked forward to something.
My parents didn’t notice me leaving. They were too busy fighting in the kitchen over my sister’s medical bills. Apparently, her care in the psychiatric hospital cost more than the mortgage each month. The fragile joy I felt mutated into anxiety when I imagined the hospital dumping Cassie on the street. I envisioned her stalking toward our house through a dark storm, clutching a knife and giggling madly.
A few minutes later, I skidded up Squeeze’s driveway and parked my bike behind his trash bins. Inside, I was surprised to find Alison lounging next to Squeeze on the floor while he played his PlayStation. Their body language told me they were something of an item now.
“Uh, hi, Aly,” I said timidly. We hadn’t seen each other since the night Kelly’s house had burned down. I wasn’t sure if she was one of the kids who held me responsible.
“Hi,” she said. “How are you, Cole?” Her voice was warm enough, and there was no malice in her eyes.
“I’m okay, I guess.”
“That’s good,” Aly replied. “Are you holding up alright?”
My knees almost buckled right there in the doorway to Squeeze’s bedroom. The only other person who’d asked me that question in weeks was my mother, and I simply could not talk to her about all this.
“Fine,” I mumbled, choking back a surge of painful emotions.
Alison sensed my pain and invited me to sit next to her. I obliged.
“I got to visit Kelly a few days ago,” she said, putting her hand on mine.
My heart felt like it died in my chest. My mouth wouldn’t move.
“She’s recovering,” Alison went on, answering the question she saw in my eyes. “It’s gonna be a long road. But she’s talking now, and her grandparents are with her. They’re good people.”
I nodded, unable to express the jumble of thoughts in my head.
“Kelly says thank you,” she added, gently rubbing my hand. “To you and your dad. You guys saved her life. She said she loves you both.”
The dam in my soul burst. I covered my mouth with my hands, trying to hold back the wailing that flushed out of me. I felt Alison’s arms wrap around me, and then Squeeze’s, but I kept my eyes shut. The three of us sat there on the floor in a long embrace.
Then, it all came out.
A deluge of frantic, unbelievable words spilled from my mouth as tears spilled from my eyes. I told them about the statues, about Noah, about Kelly’s dad. I told them about my father’s promotion, and the remarkable improvements in my health. I told them I was cursed, and it had something to do with a man in a white mask on Halloween. As I spoke, I felt the hug loosen, and their hands pulling away.
When I finally opened my eyes, Squeeze and Alison were looking back at me like I was a raving lunatic in some forlorn alley. They had no idea how to regard my story and glanced at each other awkwardly. Alison asked me a few hesitant questions and became even more incredulous when I tried to answer. Squeeze fumbled through an attempt at changing the subject.
“I believe you, Cole,” a voice said from across the room.
I looked up and saw Kevin in the doorway. I couldn’t tell how long he’d been standing there. He was wearing a big black jacket—an unusual thing for a sweltering August night. The look on his face was grave but sincere.
“You do?” I said.
Kevin fished a piece of gum out of his pocket and tossed it into his mouth.
“I’ve known you since sixth grade,” he replied. “You’ve never lied to me about anything. All the crazy shit that’s happened in the past few years, well, this kinda explains it.”
“Thank you,” I said, my voice breaking with sorrow.
He nodded.
“You know I’ve got your back.”
Squeeze’s mom dropped us off at LaserPlex a half-hour later. She noticed my expression as I hopped out of the car and asked, “Cole, why are your eyes all red? Is everything okay?”
Kevin pulled me away from her and offered, “It’s okay, Mrs. Foster. He’s just really high.”
Squeeze’s open hand soared like a whip and cracked against the back of Kevin’s head.
“Why the hell are you wearing that stupid jacket?” he demanded. “It’s like ninety degrees out.”
“Safety features,” Kevin replied flatly.
“I’ll be back at nine,” Mrs. Foster said over the idling engine. “Pick you all up right here.”
She drove away, leaving the half-empty parking lot in view. Beyond it, dark pillars of cloud rose up the dome of the sky, where the glowing white rind of the moon hung in a ribbon of stars. The night’s beauty gave me a bit of solace, and I dared to allow myself a moment of relief. But even as that seed of comfort took root in me, my thoughts returned to the laughing monkey statue, and I knew I’d feel even better if I could just hold it again.
As we entered the arcade, we passed the homeless man who occasionally sat outside it. Thankfully, there were no bullies here tonight to harass him. He sat on the entryway steps, off to the side so as not to bother anyone, and casually bounced a little green superball against the wall beside him.
“Hi, Michael,” I said with a wave.
“Oh, hi there,” he replied with a big smile. “Cole, right?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” I said. I couldn’t tell if he was happy to see me because I’d been kind to him in the past, or simply because someone had remembered his name.
“No girlfriend this time?” he asked.
The gigantic flames that had devoured Kelly’s house erupted in my mind.
“She’s, uh, she’s gone for a while,” I said.
“Shame. That one’s definitely a keeper.”
“She is,” I replied, wishing Kelly was here with us tonight. I waved goodbye and headed inside with my friends. The building was hot and smelled like every dying arcade in America: a nauseating mixture of popcorn, pizza grease, cheap vinyl, and sweat. Rows of video games blinked and chattered from all directions, only a quarter of them manned by players. On the far wall, a lone employee stood behind the prize counter, surveying the depressing landscape of his career. Attendance had dwindled over the years, and I knew any visit to LaserPlex could be my last.
“Gentlemen,” said Kevin, “lock and load.”
For the next hour, the four of us rained down leaden hellfire on all manner of zombies, mutants, aliens, and enemy soldiers. All the while, my friends tried to distract me from the sadness they knew I carried. As I returned from the drink station with a big root beer, I noticed Simon Strunk frantically battling robots on a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game. My friends would have wanted me to ignore him, but I knew Simon was probably here alone. After what he’d done for me, I owed him at least a hello.
“Hi, Simon,” I said, dropping a quarter into the machine and joining his quest. “How long you been here?”
“Just got here,” he said without taking his eyes off the screen. “What about you?”
Before I could reply, a cacophony of hooting and shouting cut me off. I looked over my shoulder to see a group of six guys barging into the arcade, causing a scene at the entrance.
“Oh, shit,” I mumbled. I could feel the blood draining from my head.
Simon looked at me, then over his shoulder.
“Oh, shit,” he echoed.
Griffin Senters, Craig Toleman, and four other guys from their team piled into our gaming sanctuary, drunkenly shoving each other and laughing. Simon and I froze as the crew headed straight toward us.
“Just look away,” I said, praying they were too drunk to notice. Out of the corner of my eye, I watched the group drift up the carpeted path that led to our section of the game floor. They occasionally slapped joysticks or mashed buttons on random games as they moved, disrupting the kids trying to play them. Griffin led the way, conspicuously missing the lanyard on which he usually carried his car key. I felt his gaze move over me.
“Ninja Turtles!” he shouted boorishly. “I could never beat that damn thing!”
Oh no, I mouthed.
Just as Griffin drew close enough to recognize me, a girl’s voice called out from the row of games along the opposing wall.
“Hey, guys! Hi, Griffy!”
I risked a glance and saw one of the popular senior girls from school. She worked here at the arcade, and was loading a roll of tickets into the skee-ball machines.
“Vanessa!” Griffin bellowed, his shout turning every head in the building. His crew flowed around our game cabinet like water around a stone and drifted away. Simon and I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
“That was close,” I whispered.
“They never play games here anymore,” Simon replied. “They’re too old. Now they just hit on the girls who work here.”
I spent three more quarters with Simon, afraid to risk Griffin’s crew spotting me while I looked for my friends. They hooted and hollered so loud it was a miracle they weren’t thrown out. I assumed Griffin and his buddies must have been harassing a new victim over there because some kind of argument ensued, and the word “faggot” was thrown around with reckless abandon.
But then, I heard a sound that would have been commonplace in an arcade, except for its deafening volume:
BAM BAM BAM!… BAM!…… BAM!
Flashes accompanied the noises, but not the sort emitted by a game. These were brighter and yellower, like the bursts of fire in Kelly’s house. Simon pulled me down to the floor, and we listened as hideous screams arose from the skee-ball area. A woman shrieked for help. A man cried out in agony. All around, gamers screamed and ran for their lives.
“Oh God, no!” someone shouted over the din. “Oh my God, you fucking psycho!”
It took me a moment to recognize the voice.
Squeeze.
I broke free of Simon’s grasp and poked my head around the corner. There was Kevin, standing alone in an aisle of games with his coat pulled open. One of the games flashed a bright red screen, illuminating his sweaty face and a wicked, satisfied grin. His eyes were wide and fixed on something I could not see. The smell of burnt things invaded my nostrils, evoking visions of the flames that had brought Kelly’s life to ruin.
I stood up and approached, moving slowly on rubbery legs. The air felt thick enough to wade through. Squeeze continued shouting his lungs out somewhere nearby.
“Kevin,” I whispered, unable to command my vocal cords.
Kevin turned to regard me. A metal object glinted at his side when he moved.
A gun.
“Kev—” I whispered again, this time choked by the knot forming in my throat.
I passed a sparking game cabinet, its monitor shattered by a bullet.
“I got ‘em, bro,” Kevin said in a hauntingly cold voice. “Nobody’s gonna fuck with us anymore. Look.”
I took a few wobbling steps before a gruesome sight halted me. Lying at Kevin’s feet was Craig Toleman. The kid’s face had been torn open, his nose and upper lip now a gaping hole. Some of his teeth had broken off. His lifeless eyes gleamed back at me under the flickering lights of nearby games. His fingers twitched at his sides.
I gasped and fell back, bumping into a waist-high corner that dug into my tailbone. I whirled around and saw an air hockey table with another kid, Blake Becker, sprawled face-down upon it. He was alive—barely—his whole body trembling with shock. His hands swam frantically across the game surface, looking for purchase against the slippery layer of blood they’d fanned everywhere. All around him, blood bubbled and popped as it seeped into the hissing air holes. Blake made wretched gasping and gurgling sounds as he strained for breath, flaring his mouth like a fish on dry land. The hole in his back was a mortal wound, and before I could even think to compress it, he went still into the silence of death.
The knot swelled and blocked my throat altogether. I held my breath. My eyes scanned the nearby area. Lying on the floor on the other side of the air hockey table was a third person. Kevin threw the kid’s head toward me with a flick of his tennis shoe. It was Griffin Senters. A hole in his forehead made his skull look like a cracked egg. Another hole in his side still trickled blood onto the old carpet, darkening it to a deep crimson. Griffin’s honey-brown hair was now red and glistening, and his baby-blue t-shirt had drunk its fill of the blood still welling from his torso. Vanessa lay curled up in a shivering ball a few feet away, drenched in sticky, pink gore.
Oxygen came rushing back into my lungs in a terrified gasp, and I found the words that had piled up in my mouth.
“Kevin… What have you done?”
Kevin raised the gun to show me. It was an old, silver revolver with a wood-colored handle.
“I warned them,” he replied in a shaking voice. “I told them I’d introduce them to my pop’s Magnum if they ever fucked with me again.” Reality seemed to gather around Kevin as he regarded the cruel scene. He began to hyperventilate.
The pattern of gunfire echoed in my mind:
BAM BAM BAM!… BAM!…… BAM!
I glanced over the bodies of my schoolmates once more and counted four bullet holes. Kevin had fired five shots.
Squeeze’s wailing finally drew my full attention. I looked over to the car and motorcycle-racing games and saw my friend sitting halfway out of the Cruis’n USA machine. His back was turned to me, and he seemed to be clutching himself tightly.
“Fuck you, you crazy asshole!” he screamed over his shoulder. The side of his face was covered in blood. Kevin and I both hurried over to him, compelled by the sorrow in his voice.
“You shot Squeeze,” I hissed. “You shot your own God damn friend.”
“Scotty!” Kevin cried. “Scotty, you okay?!”
“No,” he sobbed. “Look what you’ve done.”
Squeeze turned and revealed a lifeless Alison draped in his arms, her eyes bulging and her lips blue. Kevin’s stray bullet had struck her in the chest. A lattice of cuts on Squeeze’s arm told me Alison had clawed for breath like a drowning animal as she slowly suffocated.
