[Oxrun Station] The Orchard Read online

  "I'm crazy," he said and heard the catch in his voice.

  "I'm sick, that's all," and that sounded much better.

  One step, one step, scraping the cast over the floor, looking into the other rooms and seeing nothing but white, hearing no voices but the rasp of his breathing, not even the smells to tell him where he was; one step, and he swerved when his left leg gave way, stiffened before he toppled and the sweat ran from his chin.

  God, he thought.

  "Oh, god, please help me."

  Dragging the cast.

  One step at a time.

  Staring at the window at the far end of the hall, watching it steadily, watching it grow, not caring that all he saw was a shabby white ghost with curious wooden arms and a laughable gait and a head of wild hair that gave his skull spikes. Watching it,pacing it, once tilting his head sharply to be sure it was him, and laughing until he heard the hysterical trill and shut himself off before the scream came again.

  One step, dragging; one step at a time.

  Thinking about his father, hearty and loud and chasing off the night demons with a flick of his hand; thinking about his mother, slim and always grey and banishing the night creatures with a smile and a lamp.

  Thinking of Cora-no! She's dead, you didn't see her.

  Thinking of Rory when he reached corridor's end and looked at the fire door and knew without trying it was going to be locked.

  Rory.

  He had to get Rory out of this place, and nothing his fear told him could change his direction as he passed the door with a groan and rounded the corner.

  On his right, an alcove lined with monitors and dials and things he'd never seen that watched the rooms across the way. There were numbers on each screen, a name taped above, and when he saw the boy's place, he moved on again, veering toward the blinded windows that looked in on the dying until he reached an open door, stopped, and looked in.

  The bed was small, and Rory even smaller, his hair completely covered by a red-stained cap. Wires. Tubes. A soft-beeping tone that matched a wriggling line on a pale green screen. And no one inside, on the chair by the bed or the chair by the door.

  He rapped the jamb with a crutch, not wanting to startle the kid, and when the sound died, he heard the scratching behind.

  Sharp wood on tile; a nail along the wall.

  "Rory," he whispered, and took a step in.

  "Rory, old pal, it's me, Mike. Wake up."

  Scratching, much softer, steady and sharp.

  To the bed and leaning over, seeing the eyes move beneath the closed eyelids, seeing the chest rise and fall, and seeing the thin red stain on the cap stain the pillow.

  "Rory," he said as he shook the boy's arm.

  This time, when the pain came, he refused to admit it, widening his eyes for a clarity that was frightening, breathing slowly and deeply and feeling winter air pass over his teeth. He leaned down and touched the boy's shoulder, pushed it, pushed it harder, and turned when he heard something stop in the door.

  "Michael, you should be in bed, you know."

  Rory stirred, muttered something.

  "Carolyn," he said, and sagged onto the bed. "My god, I'm glad to see you. I'm-" The pain; his head expanding. "God, I hurt so bad. You don't know. And I'm scared. I've got to have something, I gotta get Rory, I've got to-"

  "Michael," she said, the white against her white, seemingly floating. "Michael, I do think you should go back to bed."

  Scratching, intermittent and turning softer still, turning Carolyn around to put a hand to her mouth.

  He was off the bed at once, swinging toward her like a sailor fresh to dry land, damning the headache, damning the pain, damning Rory, who was groaning and asking for him.

  "Carolyn, listen, I've got to tell you something."

  Her arm lowered and she shook her head. "Not now, Michael. Can't you see I'm busy?"

  Angry, suddenly and uncontrollably angry, he grabbed her arm and turned her, pulled her close to his face so she could better see his eyes and the taut slash of his lips. "I don't give a shit if you're busy," he said, spraying her with spittle. "I am in agony, goddamnit, and we have to get the boy out of here before something else goes wrong!"

  "Something else?" she said, easily pulling away.

  "I'm going to kill you," he muttered. "I swear to Christ, I'm going to kill you."

  The scratching was gone; the sound of wings now, and Carolyn lifted her arms, threw back her head, and he told himself it was only the pain he was seeing, only the pain that made him crazy, only the pain that lifted her slowly off the floor and turned her long hair into long shimmering feathers, turned her hands and arms into long outstretched wings, turned her face to a demon's face that spat acid on the walls and met his gaze with slanting eyes before sweeping away, out of sight.

  Rory whimpered.

  The pillow reddened.

  Michael held onto the doorframe and watched what was Carolyn meet what was following in a slashing of claws and a slashing of beaks and a shrieking that resounded like screams against stone; a whirling, a thudding, the clear rending of flesh that splattered against the walls and made him duck back inside. Look out and see a wing lying on the floor, feebly twitching, convulsing, making him retch and pull back to see Rory lift his arms and grab for the ceiling.

  Where do monsters come from, Mr. Kolle?

  It hurt. Dear God, it hurt.

  From here, pal, in your head.

  Wailing in the hall, and the crack of snapped bone, the thud of collisions and the rainsplash of blood.

  No, he thought, as best he could think through the fire in his brain; and he took a step toward the bed, lost a crutch, and fell. He landed on his side, his cast striking the floor in time to his scream, the scream driving off the pain as he crawled for the footboard and pulled himself to the boy's side.

  "Rory!"

  Grabbing an arm and yanking, digging his nails into the wrist and yanking again.

  "Rory, wake up!"

  No, he thought again as he climbed onto the mattress and stared down at the boy, who was shaking, not trembling, so that the flesh of his cheeks quivered and his arms flopped about and his ankles drummed the sheet until Michael clamped them down with the weight of his legs. Then he slapped him. And again. And the skullcap seemed to bulge while the noise in the hail rose to a keening, and held there, and held, until Michael slapped the boy again and drew blood at his mouth.

  And no a third time. Imagination wasn't real, and monsters weren't real and a little boy in a small hospital couldn't create them just because he was afraid of what he didn't understand.

  More gently: "Rory."

  And there was silence in the hall.

  He heard it when he heard the beeping in the room and saw the boy's shaking calm and finally end.

  "Michael?" It was Janey.

  "Michael?" It was Carolyn.

  "I'm sorry," they said, "but you'll have to go to bed."

  He looked over and saw them standing in the doorway, not changed, just as always, with a wheelchair between them and faint smiles on their lips. For a moment he couldn't move, then he looked down at Rory, who was smiling in his sleep, the bandage cap on his hair white and untorn. A finger to the boy's cheek, an apology, and he crawled off, waited for the chair to take him, and leaned back and sighed.

  "Am I crazy?" he asked as they wheeled him from the room.

  The white was gone, no blood, no feathers, no talons, no fangs.

  "You're tired," Janey told him, leaning over to kiss his cheek. "You're not a superman, Michael. That stuff's for kids."

  "But the hallucinations," he said, and tensed as he waited for the migraine to return.

  "Your leg," Carolyn told him, stepping around the side to rap a hand against the cast. "You ignore the pain there and it'll cause stress and eventually find a place somewhere else. It was foolish, Michael. You're not a kid anymore."

  "I want to go home," he said when they reached his own room. "I want to go home, take a bath
-I don't care if I have to hang my leg over the side-get a bottle of scotch, and listen to my records. I want to-"

  "No," Janey said, pursing her lips as she lifted him to the bed. Stripped off his gown and pulled another, a white one, from the bedtable drawer. "I'm sorry, Michael, but I don't think you can. Not for a while."

  He lay back, then sat up. "Wait a minute."

  "She's right," Carolyn said, picking up his chart and tucking it under her arm. "I think . . ." She put a finger to her lips and looked at the ceiling. "No, I think not."

  "Well, why the hell not? Jesus, do you know, do you have any idea what the hell I've been through tonight? Christ, I'll be lucky to get any sleep at all here." He lifted a hand, pounded it angrily on the mattress. "First thing tomorrow, I'm checking myself out."

  Carolyn shook her head.

  Janey waved a careful finger.

  "Why not?" he demanded, feeling heat on his face, feeling his heart racing. "Is it the leg? I don't have to walk. I can stay in bed there just as good as here? Medicine? Aspirin, that's all. The stuff you gave me sent me into orbit."

  "Michael," Janey said sternly.

  "No," he said. "I am not going to stay."

  "Oh, yes you are," Carolyn said. "You'll stay until I'm good and ready to let you go."

  He couldn't believe it. He'd just been in and out of hell, and they were scolding him, actually scolding him as if he'd stolen cookies from the kitchen or tied a can to the family dog. It was nuts. And he told them so, and told them further he'd be damned if he'd see either one of them again.

  Janey laughed.

  Carolyn laughed.

  He clenched his fists and held his breath, determined not to lose the rest of his temper. ''All right, then," he said when he knew he wouldn't shout. "All right, doctor, why can't I leave?"

  Janey left, and he heard her still laughing, softly now but laughing.

  "Doctor?" he said again, as coldly as he could.

  "You can't leave because you're not finished."

  "Oh, really? Not finished with what?"

  "Michael," she said as if he should have known. "Honestly, Michael, when are you going to learn?"

  And she switched off the light over his bed, walked out, and closed the door behind her. He gaped at the knob, the jamb, and floor, and his fists; he slapped aside the covers, and when he couldn't find the crutches, he swung his legs over and inched his way along the mattress until he reached the bottom. He waited, listened, narrowed his eyes, and counted. When he hit ten he pushed forward and caught himself against the wall.

  "Not bad," he said grimly.

  And opened the door.

  "Oh, my god."

  The white was gone, and so was all the light.

  The corridor was dark, unrelievedly black, and not even his memory could tell him where he was, where the elevators were, the nurses' station, the fire exit, the opposite wall.

  "Oh, my god."

  Nothing but the black, and step-tap and scratching, and the flap of leathered wings and the hiss of scaled limbs and the murmuring of voices, rasping and cold.

  As slowly as he could, not thinking, barely breathing, he closed the door and hugged the wall, waiting until he was sure he wouldn't ruin it by screaming.

  Then he reached behind him for the bed, found it, felt it to be sure and finally climbed into it, quietly, so quietly, so he wouldn't attract them, so they wouldn't know he was here, all alone in his room.

  Deep breath, he told himself; deep breath, don't panic, don't panic, you're all right.

  Freezing when the sheets rustled don't panic, breathing through his mouth as he pulled the sheet and blanket to his chin, don't panic you're all right, ignoring his aching legs as he slipped down, slipped under, pulled the covers over his head and closed his eyes, and waited.

  Praying for Rory to wake up, or for Janey to come and save him, or for Marc to give him a call, or for Carolyn to take him home where everything was safe and everything was fine and Jesus, Dear God, he thought as the headache returned, suppose it isn't the kid, suppose it isn't him.

  And when he heard the door open, and when he felt the bed move, there was nothing more to do but open his mouth and start screaming.

  Michael screaming in the dark.

  And no one left to hold his hand.

  Epilogue

  It was evening, in November, and I should have been cold.

  Perhaps I was, but I held it at bay with a roll and lift of my shoulders while I watched that old man sift through the orchard like a black ghost on a black night seeking its grave. Pausing. Touching a branch, stroking a bole, putting a hand to his stomach when the coughing was too great. Looking up at the stars, at the slow rising moon, his lips moving slowly, his right foot marking time to a tune I couldn't hear.

  I knew what he was doing.

  He was saying goodbye.

  I didn't want that, of course. I didn't want him to leave me to face the winters on my own, to walk ahead of the shadows with no one beside me, to dial his number and have no one answer but a recording that told me he wasn't there, and would not be.

  I also needed him to tell me that things were still perfectly normal in the Station, the way it was everywhere else, that it was only my imagination that gave it the masque out of which stared a scream. And to be honest, I've often wondered how much of what he gave me was a wink from a New Englander to a gullible child in man's clothing.

  But on the other hand, there is always that damned other hand.

  Judge Alstar and his wife, for example, still live over on Raglin, and though I've shared an occasional drink with them at the Mariner Lounge, they don't talk about the nephew who some say is dead and others say has run away and still others whisper has a home in an asylum. What he does talk about is the tomb the boy made out of a block of solid wood, the promise and talent it exhibits, the uncanny way it has captured the image of a girl the boy loved and lost. He won't show it to anyone; he keeps it in the cellar.

  I went to Amy Niles's funeral because she was one of the few in the village who knew my work and read it, and I was saddened by her passing and by the closed coffin at the viewing. Brett was there, too, with his second wife, Victoria, and the day after the service he handed in his resignation and they moved back to her home, someplace in Vermont.

  Les, I understand, is on a scholarship at Yale.

  One of my closest friends here is Callum Davidson-close because we're neighbors, and friends because we share a similar love for old and new movies, primarily the bad ones he shows late Friday nights for a group of like-minded fools who love to laugh at disasters and beautifully bad lines.

  The night of the storm that knocked the power out of the village for almost eight hours he closed the theater after the first show. Two days later, Iris and Paul Lennon, the owners of Yarrow's Bookshop, advertised in the Station Herald for a new manager, and the day after that, Melody Records and Tapes had a new clerk behind the counter.

  I shifted the papers from one hand to the other, caught a sheet as it slipped out, stuffed it back, and shook my head.

  Marc and Natalie Clayton were the ones who brought me to the Station over a decade ago. I remember him telling me about this overaged kid he'd hired for the newspaper last summer, an old friend who was in need of a good boost in morale. The day before Abe called me, I met Marc on the street and he told me that Mike Kolle had run away again. That's the way he put it, and he sighed, because Mike had been running most of his life.

  Rory Castle and his pals play in my front yard now and then.

  I don't know.

  But I'm cold.

  And I can't see Abe now, back there in the orchard, and I think I'm never going to see him again.

  Nevertheless, it's still a long way back home, and I'm moving as slowly as I can in case he wants to catch up. In the dark. Under the moon. With the lights of Oxrun Station barely visible through the pines, and the crack of brittle weeds snapping under my heels, and the shadows, always the shadows, that pace at my
side and whisper without words and touch without feeling.

  I suspect that when I get to his house, he'll be standing in the kitchen with that bloodhound under the table and he'll grin at the surprised look on my face, point at the files he gave me, and grant me a rare laugh.

  But I know that when I get there, I won't find anything at all.

  He's gone; and I never said goodbye.

  He's gone; and I only shook his hand.

  Leaving me alone in the field, watching the stars and the moon, and listening to the sound of hoofbeats behind me, quiet and soft, listening to the step-tap of something moving on my left, listening to the scratch of something moving on my right.

  And there's someone over there, standing by the brambles, the shadow of a young girl untouched by the moonlight and unruffled by the wind and reaching out her hand to give me an apple.

  There's nothing to say.

  All I can do is keep walking.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Part One: My Mary's Asleep

  Part Two: I See Her Sweet and Fair

  Part Three: The Last and Dreadful Hour

  Part Four: Screaming, in the Dark

  Epilogue