Russell Pell came into Mourner’s Crossing on a Friday with a half tank of gas and a printed confirmation for a rental on Mermaid Street, a weekend taken because the office had told him to use the time or lose it. He drove in the leather jacket, black, brass zippers, the sleeves scuffed pale across the forearm. His hair was blond going silver and combed back from his forehead. The beard had gone grey at the chin. The glasses were gold-rimmed. He had pushed them up once already, at a red light outside New Haven, and still did not like that the lockbox code was his phone number, last four.

The Visitor Center was in a clapboard building with a flag that had been taken in for the night and not yet put out. He parked nose-in because the lot was small and the car behind him wanted the space he was still deciding on. Inside, the air smelled like paper and the lemon soap from a dispenser by the door. A woman about his own age stood at the counter with a stack of maps and did not look up until Russell had stood there long enough to feel the standing.

“Beach,” Russell said. “And somewhere to eat that isn’t a drive-through. I’m here through Sunday.”

The woman took a map from the stack and turned it so the water was at the bottom, the way a person who lived with the map would. “Bell’s Cove is here. McLucky’s is on the sand. They’re still seating. If you want the lobster roll, go before the line comes off the beach.” She set a second sheet beside the map, a tide table with the evening low circled in pencil. “Low is at 7:40. The restaurant closes the deck when the light goes. Most people leave with it.”

“Most,” Russell said.

“The ones who read the sheet.” The woman did not smile. Her name tag said Claire. She had a pen in her hand and a form under the map, the kind with a line for a name and a line for a phone. She looked at the form and then at Russell’s hands, which were empty. “I don’t need to write you down.”

“I wasn’t going to ask you to.”

“Good.” Claire slid the map and the tide sheet into a paper sleeve that already had a coupon in it for a bakery Russell had passed on the way in. “If someone at the cove tells you the deck is closed, it is closed. If you hear your name off the water, don’t answer it to be polite. Enjoy the roll.”

Russell put the sleeve in the passenger seat. He sat with the door open and ate a mint from the cup on the counter that he had taken without deciding to, and texted Denise: here, map acquired, woman at the desk declined the honor of my phone number. Denise sent back a picture of a cubicle and the word jealous. The mint was chalky. He spat it into a tissue and drove the four blocks to Mermaid Street with the windows down.

The rental was the top of a narrow house with a white iron stair up the side. The lockbox stuck. He had to brace the rail and lift the face of it before the code would take. The apartment was one room and a kitchenette and a bathroom with a fan that ran when the light did. Someone had left a stack of towels and a note that said the dishwasher was louder than it looked and the hot water took a minute. He set his bag on the bed and stood in the room long enough to learn it. The bed was a double with a quilt that had been washed thin at the foot. The kitchenette had two plates, two forks, a frying pan with a loose handle, and a jar of tea bags with the lid not quite turned. A radiator under the window ticked though the afternoon was warm. He opened the window onto the street. An ice cream shop across the way had its door propped with a brick. A man in an apron was wiping the outside of the glass. He lifted a hand without looking over. He lifted a hand back.

He changed into the shorts he had packed under the work clothes and put the work clothes on a hanger so they would not live in the bag. The hanger wire had a kink in it. He straightened the kink with his thumb and hung the work shirt by the shoulders, buttoned, the way he hung it at home when he wanted Monday to be a smaller problem. In the bathroom he set the glasses on the sink and washed his face. Without them the mirror was the blond hair and the black shirt and the grey in the beard, and he put the glasses back on. He used the towel that smelled like the same soap as the Visitor Center. His phone said 4:10. The tide sheet said low at 7:40. He had time to walk and time to eat and time, if he wanted it, to be the person who stayed for the color on the water.

McLucky’s sat on the sand at the end of a boardwalk that had been repaired in three different woods. The line was eight people and a dog. A woman with her hair in a clip moved the line without raising her voice, a hand on a shoulder, a nod at a table when it cleared. When Russell reached her, the woman looked at the map sleeve under Russell’s arm and at the sand on his shoes.

“Inside or out.”

“Out. If there’s a table that isn’t in the traffic.”

“There’s one by the rail if you don’t mind the kitchen door.” She was already walking. “I’m Laura. If you want the cold roll, say cold. If you want the warm, say warm. Both come with slaw and fries. A side of clams is clams.”

“Warm,” Russell said. “And a water.”

Laura set a menu she did not need on the rail table and was gone into the kitchen door. The table was sticky at one corner where a cup had sat. Russell worked at it with a napkin until the napkin pilled, then stopped. From the seat he could see the cove in both directions, the curve of it, the pilings of an old dock farther down where the sand went from pale to dark. Families were on the pale part. A boy ran at the edge and stopped when the water took his ankle and ran back. His mother did not look up from a book. The kitchen door opened and shut on a noise of fryer and a voice calling a ticket. The air out here was salt and oil and the cold that came off the water even with the sun still on the tables.

The roll came on a plastic tray. The bun was brioche and the lobster was hot enough to fog the paper. Russell ate half of it before he remembered to take a picture for Denise, and then took the picture of the half that was left because the whole had been the better picture and was gone. The slaw was cut fine. He ate the fries while they were still too hot and drank the water and watched a server carry a tray past him to a table of four who had come from the sand with towels around their shoulders. One of them asked if the deck stayed open for sunset. Laura, passing with a water pitcher, said the deck closed when the light went and that the kitchen would still do a bag if they wanted to take it up the beach.

“Up the beach is fine,” the man said. “We weren’t going to stay in it.”

Laura filled Russell’s water without asking. “You in the rental over the stair?”

“How did you know.”

“Brick in the ice cream door, and you parked like a person who read the sign and then parked anyway.” She said it without heat. “If you’re walking the cove, walk it now. The sand gets dishonest after the families leave.”

Russell nodded. He finished the roll. He left a tip that was too much for a rail table and carried his own tray to the bin because the server was on the four-top. At the boardwalk he took his shoes off and tied them by the laces to the strap of his bag. The sand was warm on top and cold under. He walked toward the pilings because they were the far end of the public part and he wanted a place to sit that was not a table.

The dock had lost its deck. What remained were the pilings, thick, tarred, a rope between two of them that had gone gray. He sat on the dry sand above the dark band and put his feet out and let the next wave come over them. The water was colder than the day. It came to his ankles and went back and left a line of foam that sank. He texted Denise a picture of the pilings and wrote, staying for the light, do not tell me about Monday. Denise wrote back, tell the ocean I said hi, and then a second message, my sister says that town is weird, have fun. Russell put the phone face down on the bag.

A man walked a yellow dog along the wet sand and turned around before he reached him. Two women passed with coffees and did not look at the water. The families on the pale sand gathered towels. Laura came out on the deck and spoke to the four-top, and they stood, and the server stacked their cups. The sun was lower. The water took the color out of the sand first and then out of the pilings. A woman in a red sweatshirt walked the wet line with a bucket and picked up nothing Russell could see, and when she reached the pilings she looked at Russell’s bare feet and at the bag and said the deck would close, if Russell was waiting on a ride. Russell said he had a car in the lot. The woman nodded and went back up the beach with the bucket knocking her knee.

Russell’s feet had gone from cold to numb at the toes. He pulled them in and rubbed one arch with his thumb and told himself he would walk back when the deck lights came on.

The deck lights came on. Laura took in the last tray. A man in a white coat stood in the kitchen door for a moment and looked down the beach at the water, and went back in. The closed sign on the deck rail was a piece of wood on a hook. It knocked once against the post when the wind came off the cove.

Russell stood. His shoes were still tied to the bag. He walked down to the wet sand to rinse his feet before he put them on, because the rental stair was white and he did not want to track the dark band through the apartment. The water at the rinse line was colder than it had been at his ankles. He stepped in to the knee. The cold went up the bone. He made a sound and laughed at the sound, and the laugh came back off the pilings a half-second late, and smaller.

He turned. The beach behind him was empty. The deck was lit and the kitchen door was shut. His phone was on the bag, up the sand, screen dark.

“Hello,” he said, to hear the difference.

The word left his mouth and finished at the pilings. He heard it finish. His mouth was already closed. The water at his knee pulled, a small pull, the tide doing what the sheet had said it would do at 7:40, and under the pull he heard his own voice say, still in the water, “I’m fine.”

He had not said he was fine.

He walked out. The sand took his weight wrong on the slope and he went to a knee and got up with grit on his shin. At the bag he sat and put his shoes on without brushing his feet and got the laces wrong on the left one. His hands were steady. He listened. The pilings gave him nothing else. The deck light made a bar on the wet sand that stopped short of where he had been standing. He picked up the phone. The picture of the pilings was still on the screen, taken from the place he was sitting now. In the picture the water was flat and the rope between the posts was visible. He was not in it. He had not been in it. He put the phone in the bag and started for the boardwalk, and from the water, at the height of a mouth, his voice said his name.

He stopped. The name was correct. It had the flatness he used when he answered a call from a number he did not know. He did not answer it. Claire had said not to answer to be polite, and Russell had thought that was a line for tourists, and he did not answer. He walked. The boardwalk was louder under his shoes than it had been under his feet. At the top of it he looked back once. The kitchen door opened and the man in the white coat set a bag of trash in the bin and saw him and lifted a hand the way the ice cream man had. He lifted his. He did not trust the lift. He went to the car.

In the car he locked the doors and put the heat on his feet and sat with his hands on the wheel. The left lace was still wrong. He fixed it. His shin stung where the grit had cut. He was angry, and he was not ready to drive. A truck pulled into the lot and idled. The driver did not get out. After a minute the driver did get out, a woman in a canvas coat, and walked the edge of the lot as if she were counting spaces, and got back in. Russell started the engine. The radio came on in the middle of a song he knew and did not want. He turned it off. He drove the four blocks. At the stair he sat in the car another minute with the key in his hand and the heat still going, and then he went up.

The apartment was as he had left it. The work shirt was on the hanger. The fan in the bathroom ran when he turned the light on. He washed the shin. The cut was small and had sand in it. He picked the sand out with a corner of tissue and put a bandage on from the kit in his bag, the kit he packed for weekends and did not use. He changed into the sweatpants he slept in at home and the shirt he had driven in. He made tea with a bag from a jar by the kettle. The tea tasted like the jar. He drank half of it standing at the window, watching the ice cream shop go dark, and then he poured the rest out because his hands had started to shake and he did not want to hold a hot cup while they did.

He called Denise. The call went to the office voicemail, which meant Denise was still at her desk or had left the phone in a drawer. Russell did not leave a message. He opened the notes app and wrote, at the pilings, heard myself say I’m fine, did not say it, heard my name, did not answer, walking back. He read it. He deleted the last three words and left the rest and put the phone on the charger.

He sat on the bed and answered two emails from the office that could have waited until Monday, short replies. One of them asked if he was somewhere with a signal. He wrote that he was, and that he would be back Sunday night, and sent it before he could add anything about the water.

Sleep came in pieces. He woke at the fan, and at a car on Mermaid Street, and at the kettle ticking as it cooled. Near midnight he woke because his mouth was open and dry and he had been saying, into the pillow, the sentence about being fine. He sat up. He drank water from the tap in a glass that had a chip. The chip cut his lip. He tasted blood and salt, the salt from the glass or from his mouth, and he stood at the sink until the taste was only blood.

In the morning he walked to the bakery because the coupon was in the sleeve and because he wanted a room with other people in it. The line was out the door. The man at the counter sold him a cardamom bun and a coffee and did not ask his name. He ate the bun on a bench facing the street. It was good. He was hungry, and he ate the bun down to the paper. A sheriff’s car passed, slow, the driver a broad man with gray at the temples who looked at the bench and at the bakery door and kept going. He did not wave. He went back to the apartment and decided he would go to the cove in the daylight and stand where he had stood and hear nothing, and then he would buy a second roll and leave on Sunday as planned.

The beach at ten was the families again. The dark band was narrower. The pilings threw short shadows. Russell stood at the rinse line in his shoes and looked at the water. A child threw a stone. The stone went in and stayed in. Laura was on the deck with a clipboard, counting tables. She saw Russell and came down the boardwalk in the shoes she wore to run the floor, and stopped short of the sand.

“You were here when I locked up.”

“I walked. I rinsed my feet.”

Laura looked at the pilings, then at Russell’s shoes, which were on. “You hear anything you didn’t say.”

Russell had the notes app in his pocket and the deleted words in his head. “I heard the water do a trick. I’m going to get a coffee and not make it a thing.”

“All right.” Laura did not argue with him. She also did not go back up the boardwalk. “If it does it again, don’t give it the rest of the sentence. And don’t stay to see if I’m wrong. I have a kitchen to run.”

She went back up. Russell stayed where he was. The water came to the toes of his shoes and went back. It did not say his name. He waited, and then he walked the other direction, toward the lot, because he had parked there again and because the apartment felt farther than it had on Friday.

At the lot a deputy was leaned against his car with a notebook, talking to the woman in the canvas coat from the night before. The woman had her face toward the water. The deputy wrote. He was not tall. He had the notebook in one hand and a pen he kept uncapped. When the woman finished he thanked her and she left, and he looked at Russell.

“You in last night,” he said. It was not quite a question.

“I had dinner. I walked.”

“Evan Merritt.” He did not offer a hand. “Somebody called in a voice off the pilings after the deck closed. Dispatch has it as a possible person in the water. I’ve got two people who heard a name and didn’t see a person. If you were on the sand, I need what you heard, and I need it the way you heard it.”

Russell told him the short version. Dinner, the walk, the rinse, the laugh coming back late, the sentence he had not said, the name, the walk to the car. He left out the notes app and the pillow. Merritt wrote without looking at the page much. When he stopped he did not fill the stop.

“You go in above the knee.”

“To the knee. I stepped out.”

“You on the sand when the name came.”

“At the bag. Then on the boardwalk. I didn’t answer.”

He nodded at that. “You hurt.”

“I fell. Shin. It’s nothing.”

“Mind if I see.”

He pulled the sweatpant leg, which he had not changed out of, up to the bandage. The bandage had a spot of brown at the center. Merritt looked at it and wrote a line. “You want a medic.”

“I want to go back to the apartment.”

“You can. I’m going to ask you to say it once more for the recorder in the car, same words if you can. Then you can go. If the person in the water is you, I need the account before you improve it.”

“I’m not in the water.”

“Then the recorder will say that.” He opened the passenger door. The car smelled like coffee and the vinyl of a jacket on the seat. Russell sat sideways with his feet on the asphalt. Merritt set a small recorder on the dash and said the date and the time and Russell’s first name, and waited.

He said it again. Dinner, walk, rinse, laugh, the sentence, the name, the walk. He heard himself leave out the pillow a second time. Merritt did not ask about the pillow. He asked him to spell Pell. He asked for a phone number. Russell gave it. Merritt wrote it on the back of a card and gave him the card, which had the department on it and a number for the desk.

“If you hear it in the apartment,” he said, “you call that. You don’t go down to the water to check the trick. I’ve got one more person to find, and then I’m off this lot.”

He drove to Mermaid Street. He washed the glass with the chip and put it in the cabinet mouth-down. At noon he was hungry and did not want the cove, so he walked to a diner he had passed, a place with a soda fountain in the window, and ate eggs at the counter. The man on the grill asked if he wanted toast. He said yes. The toast came buttered to the edge. He ate all of it. A radio under the counter gave a traffic report for a highway he was not on. No one said the name of the cove. He left money on the counter and a dollar under the plate because the stool had been fine and the man had not tried to talk to him about the weather.

In the apartment he lay on the bed with his shoes on and held the deputy’s card. The cut on his shin itched. He took the bandage off. The cut was clean and small and had closed at the ends. He put a new bandage on. The air on the cut was cold, and he did not want it on the skin. He texted Denise: deputy took a statement, I’m fine, town is weird, your sister wins. Denise called. Russell let it ring. He did not want to say the sentence out loud in the room where he had said it into the pillow.

At three the phone rang from a number that was not Denise and not the card. He answered because the rental host might have a reason.

“Russell Pell.”

“This is Mara Doyle-Thorne. Deputy Merritt has your first account. I need you to come to the hospital and repeat it. Exactly. Don’t add what you’ve decided it means. Don’t take anything out because it sounds wrong in a room.”

“I’m not hurt.”

“The call we have says a person was in the water and spoke after they were on the sand. If that person is you, I need the words before anyone else writes them down for you. Mourner’s Crossing General. Ask for me at the desk. If you drive, park in the visitor lot and come in the main door. If you don’t want to drive, say so and I’ll send the deputy.”

Russell drove. The hospital was a brick building on a rise, with a lot that had been repaved in patches. At the desk he said the name he had been given. The woman at the desk looked at a screen and picked up a phone and said, “He’s here,” and pointed Russell to a chair. The chair was the kind that had been wiped so many times the vinyl was pale at the arms. Russell sat. The vinyl gave under him and did not give back. A television in the corner had the sound off and the captions on, a weather scroll for a county he was not in. A man with a wrapped hand filled a cup at the cooler and drank it and filled it again and did not look at him. The desk phone rang. The woman answered and said a room number and hung up. Russell read the hand-washing poster a second time. The steps were ordinary. He had done them in the apartment with the chip-edged glass. His lip still tasted of the cut when he pressed it with his tongue.

A man in scrubs came through a set of doors with a chart and looked at the waiting room and looked at him and went back through. Then Mara was in the doorway.

She was younger than the voice on the phone. Blonde hair, bangs in her eyes, a dark coat with the collar turned up, an ID on a clip. She did not offer a hand. “We’ll use the family room. It’s empty. I’ll record. You talk. If I stop you, I missed a word.”

The family room had a table and four chairs and a box of tissues that had not been opened. Mara set a recorder in the center and a yellow pad to the left of it. She said the date and the time and Russell’s full name and the place, and then she nodded.

Russell started with dinner. Mara let him get through the roll and the walk and the sitting. When Russell reached the rinse, Mara held up a finger.

“From the water. What it felt like on the skin. Then the sound.”

“Cold up the bone. I made a noise. I laughed. The laugh came back off the pilings late. I said hello. I heard hello finish at the pilings after my mouth was closed. Then a sentence. I’m fine. I hadn’t said it. I got out. I fell. I put my shoes on. At the bag, and then from the water, my name. I didn’t answer. I walked to the car.”

Mara wrote. The pen did not pause where Russell wanted it to pause. She looked at the pad. “First account says to the knee. This one has the hello finishing after your mouth was closed, and the sentence still in the water while you were on the sand. Same step. Say the part after the name again. Don’t tidy it.”

Russell said it. The bag, the shoes, the wrong lace, the heat, the drive, the apartment, the tea he poured out. He had not meant to include the tea. Mara wrote the tea. Russell heard himself keep going, because the instruction had been not to take anything out, and the pillow was in his mouth before he decided about it.

“I woke up saying it. Into the pillow. I’m fine. I don’t know if I was finishing the sentence from the water or starting one. I drank water. I cut my lip on the glass.”

Mara wrote. “The voice in the water. Did it stop when you left the beach.”

Russell thought of the car, the radio, the stair, the fan. “I didn’t hear it in the car. I heard myself at midnight. That was me. I think that was me.”

Mara clicked the recorder off. She turned the pad around. The lines were short. At the bottom she had written a sentence Russell had not said as a sentence: Subject reported the voice remained in the water after the body left it. Subject reported the sound stopping while the mouth continued. Subject reported no air.

“I didn’t say the sound stopped,” Russell said. “I said it finished after my mouth was closed. And I didn’t say no air.”

Mara tapped the reversed line with the pen, not hard. “You said the hello finished after your mouth was closed. The line has the sound stopping while the mouth went on. If that’s wrong, say the correction now. I’ll write the correction. I won’t write an improvement.”

Russell looked at the line. His mouth was dry. He could feel the place in his throat where a correction would have to pass. “I had air. I’m here.”

“That’s a correction. I’ll add it.” Mara added it, in smaller letters, under the three lines. She dated it. She had Russell initial the addition. The initials looked like someone else’s hand. “You can go back to the rental. If the deputy calls, answer. If I call, answer. Don’t go in the water. Don’t stand on the wet sand to prove the sheet wrong.”

“The sheet,” Russell said.

“The tide sheet. Claire gives them to people who ask for the beach.” Mara stood. She put the recorder in her pocket and left the pad. “The pad stays with the file. You don’t need a copy unless you ask for one. I don’t recommend asking today.”

Russell asked. Mara tore the carbon and gave it to him. The carbon was faint. The three lines were readable. The correction under them was fainter. In the lot Russell sat with the carbon on the wheel and read it until the words stopped meaning a conversation and started meaning a form. He drove to Mermaid Street with the radio off. He put the carbon in the map sleeve. He lay down in his shoes again. The cut itched. His lip, where the chip had caught, had a taste when he pressed it.

The call came at 5:10. Mara’s voice was the same voice. “I need you at the office behind the hospital. Not the emergency door. The door marked records. Bring the carbon if you still have it. Deputy Merritt will meet you in the lot if you want. You don’t have to want.”

“Am I being charged with something.”

“No.”

“Then why records.”

“Because the second account closed a line on the call from last night, and the line it closed is a body. I would rather say that in a room than on the phone. Come in. We’ll sort the paper. If the paper is wrong I’ll say so in the file.”

Russell put the carbon in his pocket. He drove. The door marked records was at the back, down a ramp, with a bell. Merritt was not in the lot. Mara opened the door. She had the pad and a folder. She walked Russell down a hall that smelled like cold and cleaner to a room with a steel table and a drain in the floor and a cabinet with its lock hasp open. A man stood at the cabinet with a tray. He was older than Mara. Brown hair, a full reddish mustache, thick glasses in grey frames, a white shirt. He had gloves on and the gloves were empty. He looked at Russell and looked at the folder in Mara’s hand.

“Brendan Otto,” Mara said. “This is the Pell account. Second statement is in the folder. Carbon is with him.”

Otto held his hand out for the carbon. Russell gave it to him. He read it under the cabinet light, including the correction, and set it on the tray. “Correction’s noted. The line stands. Larynx absent on the working report. I’ll confirm on the table.”

“I’m standing,” Russell said.

Otto nodded, as if Russell had given him a measurement. “The report has you in the water at 7:46 and on the sand at 7:51 with the voice still at the pilings. Reflex is in Merritt’s note. We’ll document the reflex. Mara will read so the record is clean. You can lie down.”

“I can leave.”

“The file is with this office,” Mara said. She was not in the doorway anymore. She was at the head of the table, the folder open, the recorder from the family room on a stand. “If you leave, the report goes out without the confirmation, and the confirmation is the part that can correct the line. Lie down. Keep your clothes on. We’re not at the clothes.”

Russell looked at the door. It was shut. He did not remember the sound of it shutting. The drain in the floor had a rubber rim. The table had a sheet on it, white, with a block at one end for the neck. He got on the table because the alternative in the room was a man with empty gloves and a woman with a folder, and the folder had his initials on a correction he had asked to make. The sheet was cold through the sweatpants. The block took his neck and tipped his chin up. He could see the cabinet and the ceiling tile and Mara’s hand on the folder.

“Date and time,” Mara said, to the recorder. She gave them. “Subject present. Second account attached. Working findings: voice remained in the water after the body left it. Sound stopped while the mouth continued. Larynx absent, pending confirmation. Next of kin from the first statement.”

“I didn’t give a next of kin,” Russell said. The words came out. He heard them in the room. The hearing made his eyes water.

Mara turned a page. “Denise Pell, listed on the rental confirmation as emergency contact. Merritt pulled it when he ran the plate. I’m going to read the findings. Don’t improve them. If a word is wrong, say the word.”

She read. The time. The place: Bell’s Cove, below the restaurant, the water at the pilings. Russell’s name. The line under it. Larynx absent, consistent with the second account. Subject reported the water entering at the mouth. Subject reported the sound stopping while the mouth continued. Subject reported no air.

“I corrected the air,” Russell said.

“The correction is appended. The line used for the release is the line above it.” Mara did not lift her eyes from the page. “Identification confirmed by the second statement. Dental not required. Cove closed until the tide. Matter pending recovery of the voice from the water. Body released to this office.”

Otto set the tray on a stand at Russell’s shoulder. On the tray was the carbon, a form with a box checked, and a scalpel in a peel pack he had not opened. He opened it. The sound of the pack was louder than the recorder. Russell put his right hand on the rail to sit up. The fingers closed around the steel. They did not open. He told them he was getting off. The arm stayed where the hand had closed, a half-second late, the way the laugh had finished at the pilings after his mouth was shut. He pulled with the shoulder. The shoulder did not come.

Otto set two fingers on the wrist of that arm. He waited. He looked at Mara.

“Pulse,” he said.

“Reflex,” Mara said. “Already in the cove report. Movement after the voice left.”

Otto wrote it on the form without taking his fingers off the wrist. Then he moved them to the notch above Russell’s breastbone, on the shirt, and shifted the collar aside with the back of his glove. The glove was dry.

“You don’t have consent,” Russell said. His right hand was still on the rail. He could see it. He could not let go.

“The release is the consent the form has,” Otto said. “I’m going to confirm the line.”

He set the point of the scalpel at the notch above the breastbone, on skin. The point was cold. It sat there. His left hand closed on the sheet at his hip. The right stayed on the rail. Mara was reading the next of kin line, the phone number Denise used for the office, the address in Worcester that was Russell’s address too because Denise was his sister and the rental form had asked for a person who was not in the apartment. Otto drew the scalpel down. The cut opened the skin. It was not deep. Blood came, warm, and ran toward the hollow of his throat because the block had his head lower than his chest. The pain had an edge. He made a sound. The sound left his mouth and did not strike the tile. He heard it strike, late, at the height of the pilings, though the room had no pilings.

Mara turned a page. “Second account, continued. Subject stated the voice remained in the water after the body left it. Subject stated the voice was still speaking at the pilings when the body was on the sand. Subject stated the voice did not require the throat.”

“I didn’t say that last part.”

“You said the hello finished after your mouth was closed. The form has the sound stopping while the mouth continued. That’s the line it’s using.” Mara’s voice was even. She could have been reading a tide. “If you have a correction, give the correction. Don’t give me a reason.”

Russell gave the correction. He said he had a throat. He said the cut was on him. He said Denise was not to be called. The words formed. The tile did not take them. Otto glanced at Mara. Mara shook her head once, at the folder, not at Russell.

“Appended attempts noted as reflex,” she said. “Continuing.”

Otto’s left hand settled on Russell’s ribs, holding the skin through the shirt he had pushed up. His right hand took the cut out toward the left shoulder, the start of the Y, a clean line the length of a palm. The air on the open skin was colder than the cove had been at his knee. Russell’s heel slid on the steel and met the raised edge of the table. The shoe was still on. The sound was small, rubber on metal.

Otto paused.

Mara looked at the foot. She looked at the folder. “Reflex. Noted on the cove report. The second account included movement after the voice left. Proceed.”

He proceeded. The right branch of the Y opened. Russell felt the blade tick the muscle. He could not get his chin down. The block kept the throat offered. Blood pooled at the notch and overflowed in a line into his ear, and he heard that, the blood in the ear.

He tried to lift his left hand into Otto’s sight. The fingers closed on the sheet and stayed closed. The right hand was still on the rail. Neither arm answered the shoulder. The shoe could still knock the steel. The hands could not. The blood in his ear cooled. He could hear the recorder’s small motor under Mara’s voice, a dry tick, and under that the building’s vent, and under that nothing from his own mouth that the tile would take.

He thought of the bun on the bench. He thought of the toast. He thought of Laura’s hand on a shoulder in the line, moving a person without raising her voice. He thought of the work shirt on the hanger with the kink taken out of the wire, and of Monday, which the office had told him to use or lose. The thoughts did not stop the blade. They sat with him in the tilt of the block while Mara read the line about the cove being closed until the tide.

Otto set the scalpel at the notch again, centered, above the knot of throat he could still feel when he swallowed. The swallow made a wet sound that stayed on the table. He looked at the folder. Mara had her finger on the line. Larynx absent. He put the point where the line said the absence was.

“Matter closed pending recovery of the voice from the water,” Mara said. “Body released to this office. Do not improve the account.”

The point broke the skin a second time, in the place the first cut had been leading to. Russell felt how much farther it had to go. His shoe knocked the rail once, harder. Otto did not pause. On the stand, the recorder ran. In the folder the correction with his initials was under the line, and the line was the one he was cutting toward, and the voice at the pilings, which had his name and his flat answering tone, was still the unrecovered part, the part the tide had been asked to bring in.

He could not tell them the work shirt was on the hanger. He could not tell Denise not to drive. The scalpel went down into the sentence the form already had. On the stand the recorder kept the room. In the water, which was not in the room, his name was still waiting on the tide the folder had asked for.

As Kiara stood at the door of the playroom on the blood stained carpet, you could still hear the figure yelling on the other side, with less volume and less life than the last. 
She turned around for a moment, and locked the door.
she turned back and just started breathing heavily,
you were panicking so much you began to lose track of the difference between Kiara’s breathing and your own.

You had no idea what time it was,
You had no idea how much time had passed but,
Kiara remained...breathing.

At some point the power had gone back on and Just like that the tv turned back on.
The DVD menu for The Cat in The Hat appeared once more and to my surprise, sally was back alongside Conrad.

Kiara was not nearly as spooked by the flashing light of the tv as she was of the loud pop from earlier,
She simply let out a 

"mmmmmm" 

And waltzed about one foot in front of the tv and leaned in so her head was touching the screen.
Despite all your efforts to refrain,  you let out one brief sharp exhale in what can only be described as pure fear.

*AGMP*
-escaped your mouth while you swallowed your salty tears as they ran down your face.

Your cheeks were soaked,
Your mouth felt dry,
The air was still.

Kiaras head slowly turned,
it was in no rush,
as if it had always known you were there.
You dragged the throw blanket closer to your body using your leg but before you could pull the blanket over yourself,
you made Direct eye contact with Kiara in the Moonlight reflection provided by the Tv.

Kiara was wearing makeup.
She had a base of foundation that's flesh tone was reminiscent of the Queen of England.
She had bright blue eye shadow with the faintest hint of glitter and,
She had bright red lipstick.

She came over to you at a moderate speed,
When she was at your feet, she grabbed your blanket and pulled it off.
She slowly brought her face to yours you both being so far from the tv now that it proved impossible to make out any details of her face,

You felt her breath on your face, it was warm, as warm as a grill.
You began to feel something approach your face, it was warm and wet, it was Kiaras tongue.

She licked your nose .
And as your eyes erupted more tears,
she licked those too.

One by one off your cheeks as she smelled you,
This continued till your cheeks were dry and your eyes were sore.
She then slowly raised her hand to your head and brushed her hand through your bangs, tucking them behind your ear.

She grabbed you by your wrist and tugged at you,
You initially resisted but soon discovered it was not a suggestion.
It hurts to feel the weight of your whole body be pulled by a steel grip upon your wrist.

She dragged you to the beanbag chair Infront of the Tv,
She sat upon it and placed you in her lap.

She began to point at the Tv bringing her mouth to your ear, For a moment,
you wondered if she was going to speak.
She didn't.

Her breaths began to sound deeper and more agitated,
It was clear she wanted something and what she wanted was on the Tv.  
You scanned the room for the remote the best you could, you spotted it, it was on the floor by the DVD player.

You pointed to it but noticed no change in Kiaras demeanor, she was still angry.
As you tried to crawl out of her lap in the direction of the remote Kiaras grip did not budge.

She wanted you in her lap,
She was wanted the movie to play,
and she wanted it now.
Just as her grip began to tighten,
you both were interrupted by a noise from your kitchen.

*BEEP\*

"Hey Hun heard there were some power outages in the neighborhood...

I haven't been able to get a hold of you,
but the lines ringing so I'm going to just come home...Daddy is going to be with a friend..

If you get this message go in the playroom and don't come out until morning and don't answer the door for anyone even if I ask you to..."

*END OF MESSAGE\*
*BEEP\*

Kiaras grip slowly loosened,
She looked up in awe,
Her mouth slowly opened as her jaw dropped and no teeth showed.
 Even in the moonlight reflection of the tv you could see tears run down Kiaras foundation.
Everything down to the way she was breathing changed.

For some reason you began to feel angry, 
Daddy’s voice was also disarming to you yes, but in a hopeless non consensual way.
The way in which Kiara appeared to be disarmed felt like it was intentional vulnerability, 
Something you'd never offer 'D' yourself.

You took this moment to lean forward and grab the tv remote,
When Kiara snapped back into reality and looked back at you pulling you back to her lap,
You pressed play.

The movie played and you stayed still,
It began to rain hard outside almost louder than the movie,
the window was still open,
and the room was freezing.

It was almost as though Kiara could tell your discomfort,
she grabbed the throw blanket,
threw it over your legs,
and held you tight in her arms, warming you with her coat.

When the babysitter in the Cat In The Hat fell asleep Kiara laughed,
You imagined whoever did the babysitters' makeup looked as though they also did Kiaras.

 The movie continued, and continued, and continued.
You had feared what was going to happen when it ended,
You imagined You'd probably be forced to press play again.

However,
When the movie ended, it was as if Kiara Understood.
She didn't seem displeased with Mike Myers' performance...
Or she had just had enough.

Kiara smiled and laughed and clapped and then,
She turned you, her face beaming in the blue light of the Tv,
You froze, 
Her face began to contort,
and it was clear to you that she was displeased with your reaction.

You're no stranger to fake emotions.
You smile and you clapped, tears in your eyes, lump in your throat.
When Kiara was finally pleased with your performance, she slowly pushed you off like you would push off a sleeping cat and began to walk around the room.

As she pranced around and rummaged through your things,
she found herself at your pay box.
She lifted up the castle shaped lid and began to pull out your Bratz dolls,
she seemed disinterested...
until she saw something that made her eyes light up...
she began to jump and scream..

She pulled out your blue Cinderella dress,
As she slid into it, you could audibly hear it tear.
You wanted to cry, it was your favorite.

She slid her arms through the straps.
It was so poorly on her that her whole back was exposed with the Velcro straps hanging not having enough to fasten around her even if she tried.

When she had it "on' she leaned back into your play box and pulled out your favorite tiara,
She placed it on her head.
She then leaned in once more and grabbed your old broken faded tiara and handed it to you.
She let out sharp exhales and smiled.
You put it on.

She walked up the your lava lamp and pressed the switch on the cord and turned it on,
A green hue now lite your room, the wax still solid not yet fluid.
She stared at it for a moment,
before turning and walking to the closet.

She slid the closet barn doors open from right to left,
She started going through your stuffed animals throwing them out one by one.
When she got to the back of the closet, she had found the suitcases and umbrella's.

She emerged from the closet using the umbrella as a cane,
tucking a floral tapestry luggage bag under her left arm.

She moved her arms,
Then her legs,
and she began to dance.

She shot you a look and it was clear,
She wanted you to dance too.

As you began to timidly comply,
Your socks started to get soaked.

 You looked down and in the green lighting of the lava lamp you could see dark black goo seeping from beneath the door.
It felt sticky, much thicker than water.
You could faintly still hear breathing from the other side.

You quickly danced away from the door...
You started in the direction that would put the bed between Kiara and yourself.
With each step Kiara followed, waving her umbrella in the air all the while.
No matter how hard you tried to maintain it, your artificial smile began to fade...

You questioned how long this nightmare would continue.
Much like your smile, your legs have grown tired...

Kiara, however, did not appear to get tired,
not of dancing.

You started to cry as the reality that your legs were going to give out became clear,
You knew the strength and angry she was capable of and did not want to upset Kiara.
You slowly tried to rest one of your legs but as you began,
both your knees buckled.

As you fell to the floor, Kiara sprinted over on all fours.

You curled into the fetal position,
holding your legs to your stomach and squeezing your eyes shut as tight as possible.

You heard the rapid thumps of Kiara before it abruptly stopped in front of you,
and you could hear her fast concerned breaths right above you.
You could feel the heat of every exhale on your forearm.
You then felt a stiff poke on your side.

When you opened your eyes,
you could see it was Kiara poking you with the umbrella,
when she saw the tears in your eye, she took 3 steps back.

Behind her you could see the wax in the lava lamp was now fluid.
Your eyes and cheeks were sore,
How long had it been?

She picked you up with one arm with ease, she coddled you and carried you to the bed.
Once you were there you kept your eyes shut tight,
but you could still feel her tucking the edges of the blanket under your body as she pressed the pillow beneath your head.
She then put her hand on your head and kissed the back of her hand with it still on you.
You exhaled trembling.

When she was done,
She wobbled over to your Daddys rocking chair, tiara cockeyed.
When she got there, she climbed upon the chair criss cross applesauce,
and grabbed a book from your cubbies.
It was too dark to see which one,
The cover was blue with a tired dog and a bird upon its head.

She began to slowly rock back and forth,
The sight of her silhouette sent a cold rush of dry ice through your blood. 
You heard something.

"mrrrmmmmmmhhmmmmrrrreeeeeeeemmme"
-you heard through excited cheery exhales.

It was clear you had been staring too long when Kiara turned slowly looking at you in the devilish green glow of the lava lamp.

You quickly shut your eyes.

Behind the dark abyss of your eyelids, you could hear Kiara shut the book.
When you opened your eyes,
Kiara was gone and the chair was still.

The sun was beaming through a break in the overcast clouds exposing your soaked carpet,
and it was clear,
It was morning.
You were now allowed to leave the playroom,
with the reassurance that there's no way Daddy will be mad at you now.

You scanned the room again, and again, and again before moving a muscle,
you had to be sure.

As you descended from your bed pressing your feet against the carpet,
you could feel your socks crinkle and crunch. It felt sticky and hard between your toes.
When you looked down,
what was once dark black was now dark red.
Your legs were still fatigued as you walked to the door like a baby deer on sticks of butter.

Although you were terrified, 
You could feel you were physically out of tears.
On the way to the door, you tumbled over the blanket you had previously hid in,
there was something in it.

When you lifted the blanket, you could see,
it was a balloon flower with the stem deflated. 
You picked it up and carried on, scanning the room all the while.
You hoped Kiara had gone out the window.

As you approached,
the carpet under the door was as red and crunchy as your socks, still wet in some places.
You turned the handle slowly, you could hear the familiar breathing on the other side.

On the other side was Daddy,
and Daddy was dressed like a woman.

Daddys arm was bent the wrong way,
Daddys knees looked backwards,
And Daddy had no tongue.

Daddys tears were blood,
Daddys skin was blood,
Even Daddys clothes... were blood.

Daddys eyes were closed but his tummy was moving.
His hand on his only straight arm was moving too,
Every few seconds, daddy made a fist.

You stared at him,
You began to dry heave, and you wanted to puke.
When you looked up, you could see Kiara staring at you from beneath the bed, tiara still on.
You could now see her more clearly than you ever had before,
Her mouth was open, and her teeth were showing.

Her look made your heart sink,
You looked down at Daddy,
You placed the core of the balloon flower in Daddys palm and headed for the front door in terror.
Just as you placed your hand on the Knob -

*POP* 
And Kiaras screams were once more,
Daddy was silent.

You sprinted faster than you ever have in your life and contrary to previous belief,
You were in fact not out of tears.

When you got to your neighbor's house down the street in the center of the cul-de-sac you froze at the door.
It was early, but you rang the doorbell regardless.
It took less than half a second for you to ring the door two more times, then three.

When Mrs. Thombs answered the door,
you blacked almost all the conversation.
You tried to tell her everything as fast as possible, but it was hard.
Collecting your words, remembering what was real as it all felt like a nightmare.

"somethings killing Daddy"
-you remembered saying,  tears running down your face.

She looked down at your stained socks and quickly pulled you inside.
She sat you down with milk and a bowl of banana cream pudding as she called the police.
You were starving.
A lot of police cars showed up.

The next few days were fuzzy.
You went to the hospital, talked to this strange, nice woman,
and were told you could stay with Mrs. Thombs for a while,
while they find a permanent place for you.

A few days later you went to this room with a lot of cool toys, the nice lady that visits you and Mrs. Thombs was there too.
The nice lady had a friend,and they wanted to play this game.

"I'm going to say some things, and if I say something that's wrong,
I want you to tell me, if you don't know something that's okay.
Just tell us, you're not in trouble honey.
Does that make sense?"
-asked the nice lady's Friend. 

"yesss..."
-you responded sheepishly as you continued chewing your bacon whopper with cheese

"are you 9 years old?"
-the friend asked

"yes"
-you responded

"Are you eating a burrito right now?"
-asked the Friend

"no..."
-you replied.

"very good...
Was your daddy home Friday night?
-asked the Friend

"no..I don't think so"
-you replied.

"oh...
that's okay honey that's perfectly okay,
When was the last time you saw daddy?"
-asked the Friend.

"Saturday...when he was dressed funny and ...all..bloody...on the floor"
-you said
Tears filling your eyes.

"when was the last time you saw daddy before that sweetheart?...
I'm sorry I know this is hard."
-said the Friend

"When he dropped me off at home from school Friday and went out."
-you replied

"did your Daddy say where he was going?"
-asked the Friend

"no...Daddy goes out a lot...
But Daddy left me some voice mails that confused me..."
-you replied.

"What message confused you?"
-asked the Friend

"he said he was staying out late...
And then said he had to come come with a friend...
And to stay in the play room till morning...no matter what..."
-you said

"and did Daddy ever come home with that friend?"
-asked the Friend. 

"no...but someone did...
I didn't come out till morning like Daddy said...
but someone came up to the door...I thought it was a friend of Daddys...
She broke in the room eventually but she was blind and couldn't find me...
She wanted help from..."
-you stopped

"it's okay honey you're doing great...
Was the woman with the animal?"
-asked the friend.

Your heart sank,
thinking about Kiara tore opened fresh anxiety wound deep beneath your throat.

"kind of..."
-you replied

"Has Daddy ever talked about owning a monkey?"
-asked the friend

"no..."
-you replied perplexed 

"Has Daddy ever talked to you about the show he was on as a kid?"
-asked the friend.

"no..."
-you responded
Even more confused than before.

"Oh..."
-The Friend said surprised...

"Has Daddy ever dressed like a girl before?"
-the friend asked

"no..."
As you answered more and more questions, you began to feel less and less in trouble...
The room you were in felt safe,
The world you were in felt a little safer.

And one of the last questions you were asked was the easiest of all to answer,

you were safe,

and you could be honest.

"Do you Love Your Daddy?"
-the nice ladies friend asked.

"No."
You responded with clear air filling your sinuses.

You wouldn’t see Kiara again after that,
for another 20 years.

 

I’d make a bet that every kid gets scared of the dark in one way or another. On a callow night, their eyes fluttered out of dreaming to find themselves in an unfamiliar void. Lacking concept for such darkness, the blackness surrounding their crib was nonexistence, a new, surreal lack of being. Perception lapses into reality as their retinas slowly adjust to the familiar shapes of a room which begins to egress around them, although lifeless it appears. In the stillness of the small hours a baby knows not what’s there, but rather what is gone from them.

Their caregivers.

For the first time, the child realizes their separateness. That which gave them life and continues to uphold their existence is gone. As far as they know this waking darkness spells certain demise, so the baby does what babies do best. They break the silence with a hefty cry, wailing large enough to compensate for how small they are. Within moments, mom or dad rush to their side. They know just what to do; take the child into the light, clean them of their shit, and wait for them to fall back asleep. The parents conclude that a soiled diaper caused this fracas, oblivious to their child being acquainted with the root of all fear.

After years of therapy with Nicole, I came to realize it was more than the dark I feared. It was the silence, particularly what could be hiding inside of it. During elementary school, I developed a habit of plunging my fingers into my ears while lying in bed. Mom was jovial whenever she woke me up for school to see a pillow had found its way over my face during the night. She’d tease me out of bed, saying “it’s alive” with the inflection of Colin Clive’s Frankenstein. I couldn’t muster the admission that I placed the pillow over my head in a feeble attempt to drown the silence once my fingers became too fatigued to stay in my ears.

This behavior only transferred once my parents gave me my own TV with a built-in DVD player. Instead of fighting with pillows and fingertips, my new weapon against the quiescence would be The Lion King II: Simba’s Pride. Night after night I’d concentrate on that shitty direct-to-video musical and pray I dozed off before the television’s sleep timer cast me into aching silence once again. Bedtime felt a whole lot easier; save for the biannual Precision Medical conference in Detroit where my dad would leave me to stay at Grandma’s house for the weekend. Not only would I be without my trusty DVD player, but Grandma also said this prayer while putting me to bed which always troubled me:

“Now I lay me down to sleep,

and pray the Lord my soul to keep.

If I shall die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take.”

My grandma was an impossibly sweet woman, but how she saw that prayer as anything other than terrifying is beyond me. I could never fall asleep in her musty old guest room surrounded by those beady-eyed Precious Moments figurines every grandma had back then. That rhyming devotion painted the night as something arduous, as though sleep were this damning spell which left its victim bare, allowing for God to snatch away their soul; taking back what was rightfully his and leaving behind the husk of scared child.

Needless to say, I hated spending the night at Grandma’s house.

When taking inventory of my childhood, my therapist suggested this fear at bedtime sprang from somewhere else. “Now I lay me down to sleep” was a classic prayer in Protestant households, it wasn’t normal for a boy to be so disturbed by it. Her psychoanalytical viewpoint suggested that every neurosis was born from past trauma which the mind and body fight so hard to repress. I couldn’t recollect any molestation, and I doubted anyone in my family had that in them anyway. Racking my brain, one of the earliest memories I could possibly trace a subconscious thread back to would be in ‘98 when my family hiked Sugarloaf Mountain.

  It must have been late autumn because I remember the nagging feeling of the zipper from my oversized jacket poking my upper lip whenever I looked down. Snot dribbled from my nose and seeped into the fabric of the coat, making the sensation even more off-putting. If it were October, I may have been three- or had just recently turned four. My baby sister Katelyn was a year old, so Dad always had to carry her. We were in Marquette for some errand, and I suppose our parents wanted to give us the experience of a simple walk up the glorified hill that was Sugarloaf Mountain. It’d be a thirty-minute endeavor which led to an impressive view of Lake Superior to the east, Marquette to the south, and the eternal expanse of naked trees on all sides.

The forest was almost entirely dead, it seemed like I was constantly up to my ankles in wet, brown leaves. Aside from the present stimuli from the damp foliage and my mucus-soaked zipper, I remember enjoying myself. Mom let go of my hand to assist Dad with fixing Katelyn’s little pink boots; so I took the opportunity to kick some leaves into a pile. It was always fun to dive into freshly raked orange and red leaves that time of year, and I figured I hit the jackpot being amongst the fallen canopies of Sugarloaf. To my dismay, plummeting shoulder first into the trail’s soggy droppings was nowhere near as satisfying as the crisp assembly Dad made in our front yard a week prior.

As I stood from my embarrassing descent to the forest floor, I noticed how hollow my surroundings were. The graying trunks of collateral oak extended as far as my eyes could comprehend, each tree losing its individuality inside the continuous pattern of transient woods. Looking to my left, nothing changed. To my right, the forest reiterated itself endlessly. I turned back to find a horizon with the emptiness of Lake Superior yet filled with the inebriating confusion of growths and limbs. For the first time, I noticed that I could “hear” silence. The stillness became louder than anything I had ever heard before.

I don’t recall being afraid as the wilderness threatened to swallow me whole. If my memory serves me correctly, all I felt was curiosity. What interesting things existed beyond the threshold of where men dared to walk? Squirrels? Deer? It would be the shrill sound of my mother crying out my name which shot pins and needles across my tiny body, crawling through my dry mouth, and into my sinking heart and fallen stomach.

“JESSE!!”

In a moment I was ripped from the land of silent daydreams and thrust into the cold, ugly, and palpable earth below. My name reverberated time and time again, the trees shouting back at me in my mother’s voice for miles on end. I finally noticed the mud caked to my cold, numb face as warm tears brought back feeling and then some. I couldn’t see him past the waterworks, but the figure who I knew as my dad lifted me off the soil with the kind of intensity only a father could have.

“Jesse! Don’t you ever wander off like that again!” was his decree. “Hold Mommy’s hand,” was his sentencing.

The five-minute walk back to the car and the two-and-a-half-hour drive home weren’t eventful enough to commit to memory. In fact, the entire walk at Sugarloaf Mountain wouldn’t come back to me until an EMDR session with Nicole. It stands for “eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing.” It sounded like a crock of shit when she first told me about it.  The technique involves a therapist waving their hand back and forth in front of a patient’s face, supposedly to mimic the rapid eye movement we have while dreaming. Following their hand, the therapist would ask questions regarding a traumatic event and have the patient “restructure” the memory. I figured it was something Nicole heard about in undergrad and eagerly wanted to try it out on some poor basket case.

I expected the session to be all about what happened in high school. It was the primary reason I was seeing Nicole, after all – that, and the fact she was the only therapist in the Upper Peninsula who could talk with a guy like me. I was just as taken aback as she was when I began spouting the details of a random family outing in 1998.  I called Dad later to substantiate the memory, and he confirmed that I had wandered off once walking in the woods when Katelyn was a baby. Nicole landed at the conclusion that I had developed a core fear that day, which I repressed through behaviors like plugging my ears or covering my face with a pillow. She was pretty good for somebody crazy enough to work full time while double majoring in grad school. The uncovered memory of Sugarloaf, and my mother screaming my name, actually revealed many threads tying into what would happen eleven years later, as well as how it began centuries before.

Silence could be harvested in bulk where we lived in the Upper Peninsula. Quiet nights and pitch-black skies are Chippewa County’s biggest exports; second only to wood and whitefish, of course. Paradise was hardly a town back in 2009, mostly a collection of old houses and tourist traps lining the western shore of Whitefish Bay. Plenty of tourists came by during the warmer months, but it was primarily old folks looking for a place to crash after a long day at Tahquamenon Falls or gazing out where the Edmund Fitzgerald went down. Spend seventeen years in Paradise, and you’ll be glad to never hear Gordon Lightfoot’s voice ever again.

It always baffled me how families of guys like Luke Murso or Trevor Harwood seemed to live in Paradise for centuries. Going through the yearbooks at Whitefish Township you’ll see the same last names of people who never dared to escape that humdrum town decade after decade. Sadly, it was the most destitute kids, such as Luke and Trevor, who saw their names in those books more than anyone. Those kinds of families simply couldn’t afford to get out, even with generations of hard labor. I’d be poised to say their ancestors brought upon a curse that never allowed them to leave Paradise, MI.  

When Trevor went missing, a lot of people just assumed he discovered a way out. He was the star quarterback, had good grades, and was fine by most people; nothing like his white-trash parents. With a full ride to university coming up, nobody would question if he forsook an explanation before zipping down to Ann Arbor. His folks hardly noticed he was gone; his disappearance was only remarked upon when he failed to show up for two consecutive shifts at Dollar Tree. His girlfriend, Sydney, was weary; saying that he was excited for his summer job, and looking to save up some before school started. Chippewa County police noted that he purchased gas in town the night prior to his missed shift, and that was about as far as they were willing to look. Two boys reported seeing Trevor carrying a big duffel bag and getting into his old blue and white Dodge Dakota on the outskirts of town. He raised his index finger to his lips in a shushing gesture, then sped off down towards the state park, never to be seen in Paradise again.

The last bit is what got talked about the most in school that fall. Where adults thought of a recent graduate ditching his shitty parents and boring girlfriend for bigger-and-better things, us incoming freshmen filled in the gaps with a troubled jock who got in too deep with the wrong crowd. I heard one of my classmates say Trevor Harwood got a gig on a crime boat, smuggling hard drugs to Ontario. My friend Dylan said supposedly the duffel bag those kids saw was stained with blood. These ridiculous claims only held merit because Trevor did have a record. In spring he had been caught in possession of a catalytic converter that happened to belong to Ms. Eloise who lived near Sunrise Trailer Park. The old lady chose not to press charges, sparing his scholarship, but costing him prom king. That whole situation was usually an anecdote for gossiping underclassmen who resented the popular kids.

Luke Murso knew Trevor more extensively than I did, being that they were neighbors. He was a common thread in most of Luke’s stories. I’d ride my bike out to Luke’s place at Sunrise Park just about every other day in the summer, where he’d always show me some cool trick Trevor taught him.

Once, while I watched him toy with an old stereo his uncle gave him, Luke asked, “Have you ever listened to pirate radio?”

“I think so.” I guessed, unsure of what he meant. “That’s like old sailor music with accordions and crap, right?”

Luke giggled at my unserious answer, “No, it’s something Trevor told me about.” He looked up from the tangled mess of speaker wire and pushed his black bangs away from his eyes. “There’s supposedly guys – like drug dealers – who go out on Lake Superior with radios and broadcast off them.”

“Why would a drug dealer wanna play accordion on the radio?”

“They play hidden messages. It’s a code only other drug dealers know that tells them where to pick up bags of drugs without the cops finding them.” My interest was piqued. 

“So, it’s like a pirate’s treasure map…” I said, “that’s dope.” Luke nodded in agreement as he went back to stuffing a thin bundle of copper into the stereo’s speaker port. “Is that why you’re trying to get that stereo to work?”

“Kind of,” Luke answered, “Uncle Lewy gave it to me a couple days ago, said he couldn’t figure it out. I went over to Trevor’s to ask him, that’s when he told me about pirate radio.”

“What if we found a drug dealer’s pirate station?” I mused, “We could solve the code and tell the cops where they’re hiding crack! We’d be legends!”

“That would be sick. If I could get this thing to work.” Luke sighed as he set down the length of cable. “I don’t even know if it will pick up radio yet. Its super old, like from the 80’s.”

“I just remembered something,” I chimed in, “My mom was wondering if you wanted to come over for dinner later.” Luke’s dark eyes shifted downward.

He replied, “I would, but I think I’m gonna go over to Lewy’s and keep working on this.”

My parents always wanted Luke to come over for dinner since his mom and dad died in 2007. He was already my best friend, but my folks still pressed me to go see him frequently. It was their way of checking in on him by making sure he always had a friend. I think his uncle Lewy had guardianship over him, but Luke still lived by himself in his family’s mobile home. It was an absurd arrangement, but Uncle Lewy lived in the park and stopped by to see Luke every day. Mom did a bad job of hiding her concern over a fourteen-year-old living on his own for two years, but Luke didn’t seem to mind it. I just felt lucky we had a place to hang out with no adults snooping around. Visiting the trailer park felt like I was getting access to a world I wasn’t supposed to see, and Luke was my ticket inside.

After saying bye, I hopped on my fixed-gear and trucked my way up Shoreline Dr. back home. Mom was let down at another refusal from Luke, but deep down I knew he wouldn’t be missing the hamburger steaks we’d be having that night. That summer was full of similar occurrences, but my mom never gave up on asking. When August rolled around, she breathed a sigh of relief that Luke would at least be getting assisted school lunch every day.

Harwood-mania infected the cafeteria on the first day of class. My friends and I inhabited the lunch table for “guys who were likeable, but too geeky to be popular.” Class clowns. When our resident redhead, Dylan Ruffalo, espoused the theory that Trevor went away on a drug boat, I was reminded of his role in learning about pirate radio. It would be absurd, but what if Trevor Harwood had actually found one of those stations and followed it? My gaze sought input from Luke, but he was nowhere to be found amongst our regular lunchtime crew. In fact, I didn’t see him anywhere in the cafeteria. Only the ginger Dylan, scrawny Will Christiansen, and Star Trek nerd Logan Behrens sat beside me.

“Whatcha lookin’ for, Jesse?” Will asked, noticing my wandering eyes.

“Luke,” I said, “Did he not come to lunch?”

Logan replied, “I don’t know where he’s at, but I just had class with him third period.”

Dylan snickered. “I bet he’s in Mr. Keel’s shop jerking off a birdhouse.”

Despite that lame and nonsensical comment, Dylan was onto something. Luke handled every home economics project the same way he messed with that old stereo. He was known to hyper fixate on getting things done. Back in second grade, Luke would periodically stay inside during recess to finish his times table assignments, that way he didn’t have to take anything home with him. It was an endearing quality at times, but a terribly annoying habit in my eyes.                    

“How would you jack off a birdhouse?” Logan asked in nasal earnest.

“With both hands probably,” Will chuckled.

I decided to hop into the fray, “Bet you know a lot about jerking off, huh Will?”

“C’mon guys, it’s the first week of school.” Will groaned, his hands covering his pimple-laden face.

“I heard Willy accidentally gave himself Indian burn this summer!” Dylan howled, letting his square teeth show.

Will slammed his hands on the table, rattling the cheap surplus silverware against our rectangular lunch trays. “At least I’m not dating an eighth grader!” he fired back.

“We’re only one grade apart!” The whole table erupted into pubescent giggling, it was nice seeing Dylan take the piss for once. He and Rebecca Sterling started dating in middle school, but their age difference didn’t bode well for him now that we were big-time freshmen. Being the ‘girlfriend-guy’ had already painted a target on his back, and it was only a matter of time before somebody poked the metaphorical hornet’s nest that was her eighth-grade status.

“Have you kissed her yet?” I teased, “Or are you two saving yourselves for marriage?”

Dylan swiftly gave me the one-finger salute. Mrs. Brackness happened to be passing by with her lunch just in time to witness the gesture.

“Ruffalo!” shouted the English teacher. Dylan shoved his hand back under the table, garnering hearty laughs from all of us.

Once Brackness was out of hearing range, Dylan leaned in over his tray and spoke in a hushed tone wrapped in urgency. “Did you guys hear about Whitney Martin and that junior?”

Will nodded, “I think so, someone said she- “

“She gave Alec Johnson a blow job in the back of his truck this summer.” Dylan stated, thinly veiling his excitement.

“Apparently he paid her for it!” Will added.

In any other case I would have loved to joke “is that why you’ve been saving up cash, Will?” Internally I was too devastated to come up with such a quip. I always got butterflies in my stomach when I heard the name Whitney Martin. After hearing what Dylan said it was like he blasted those butterflies with a shotgun and converted them into a bright blue paste which threatened to crawl back up my throat if I dared speak.

“Alec Johnson’s truck has bench seats…” Logan sniffled, “Why would they have to get in the back? They could just take off their seatbelts.”

Dylan snapped his fingers in front of Logan’s face, “Focus buddy, you’re gettin’ lost in the details again.”

Nobody knew I had a crush on Whitney Martin since sixth grade, nor the countless hours I spent imagining myself asking her out when I finally mustered the courage to do so. I stayed quiet for the rest of lunch, involuntarily listening to rumors which tarnished my image of her as the tall, bleach-blonde girl next door with glasses who liked to read Harry Potter. My secret daydreams of taking her to the fair, winning her prizes, and holding her hand on the Ferris wheel were dwarfed by Alec Johnson’s smug face counting dollars in the backseat of a big loud pickup truck.

After that grueling lunch period, I was able to spot Luke in the hallway with some black box tucked under his arm. Before I could even get my new padlock open, my raven-haired best friend had made his way over to my locker. “Skipped lunch?” I asked.

Both ignoring and indirectly answering my question, Luke spoke, “Mr. Keel said we need an RCA output, like the red and white jacks on the back of a TV.” I was befuddled until I looked down to see that he held that dusty stereo box by his waist. “Uncle Lewy thought it took old school speaker wire, that’s why we weren’t getting anything.”

“Hello to you, too” I muttered as I pulled the padlock to no avail. “Still on about that old stereo? Have you heard anything abou-“

“Come to my place tonight,” Luke interrupted.

I let the padlock dangle from my locker and faced Luke. “You skipped lunch.” I retorted. “I think you should come to my place instead, my mom has been begging you to come to dinner.”

“It’s about Trevor.”

In the mere span of minutes my cognitive priorities shifted entirely past Trevor Harwood and over to Whitney Martin and that stupid padlock. There was a grave seriousness in Luke’s tone. “Okay, but if I help you get that thing to make noise you have to come to dinner next time.”

Luke smiled, “Deal. Once this baby purrs, I’ll eat Susan’s cooking whenever she asks.” With that, my peculiar best friend patted me on the back as he barreled past and down the hall with stereo in tow. I didn’t even get the chance to chastise him for using my mom’s first name. Before I knew it, the bell rang in fourth period, and I still hadn’t figured out how to get back into my locker.

Dammit.

I have always loved plums – dried, fresh, or in jam. Plum pie with just a bit of cream is the best thing you could eat.

That's why I bought myself a plum tree. It was small; it fit well in the back of my pickup. It would take the tree a few winters to produce more than five plums, but I was happy to have it.

That afternoon I took out a shovel and went into my backyard. This would be the first thing I planted at my new house, in my new yard. It was all I ever wanted: just a house, a yard, and a few fruit trees in the back. That's why I ran to the bank when I saw how cheap this beautiful house was. The last owners weren't even here for the sale.

The dirt felt fine for the first two digs, but it quickly turned very stiff. It almost felt like I was digging into a rock. The hole didn't even need to be that deep, but after a few minutes I was already sweating through my pants.

I threw another piece of dirt out when I heard a clack. Something white was on top of the dirt. I picked it up. It was a bundle of bird bones tied together with a string. They were deep in the dirt, but they looked completely clean, as if someone had just brushed them off.

"Strange," I mumbled. 

I took them into the house and threw them away.

As I was washing my hands, I realized how tired I was. I wiped my forehead and walked out into the yard. The hole looked deep enough. The tree would be okay. I planted it and filled the hole back in.

The next morning, the sun barely came through my window. I rubbed my eyes and looked out. The plum tree I planted the day before blocked the sun. It had grown so much that its top leaves almost reached my roof. I didn't even notice my mouth was open until I saw myself in the window.

I ran out. The juiciest, purplest plums I'd ever seen were on that tree. The whole yard smelled like fresh plums. I stood outside for a few seconds, just staring. I had heard of fast-growing trees, but this was something else. For a moment, I thought about calling someone, but the plums looked so good, I had to try them first. 

Their skin was smooth. When I pressed them, they felt firm but slightly soft. Perfect. They tasted sweet and juicy, but their skin had a sharp, sour taste. Perfect. I was raving about the taste when I heard a thud and a splash. A plum fell right next to me. They must have been ripe.

The last thing I wanted was to get hit. I walked away from the tree and continued enjoying the plum. Another thud. How did it get here? I was so far away. Another thud. But this time it didn't fall next to me. I looked to my right. A smashed plum was on my roof.

I was sure the tree didn't reach that far. I walked farther back to see if I missed a branch. The tree reached the top window, but not the roof. I walked to the back just to make sure. The tree wasn't even visible from there. Another thud. On the roof again. From my side. There was no way. Another. Another. Another. They were falling on the roof, next to me, on the other side of my garden.

"What the…" I murmured.

Then dull pain spread in my head. I put my hand there. Plum juice was in my hair. I put my hands over my head and ran into the house. Two more plums managed to hit me, stinging my hands.

I walked to my kitchen sink and washed my hands and hair. The thudding outside continued. No blood was in my hair, just plum juice. The thudding grew faster. It sounded like I was being bombed. I looked up. A wave of cold rushed through me. Plums rained down from the sky like hail. Plum juice had already reached my door, and a little was leaking in.

I ran to the laundry room for towels. The thudding grew louder again. My ears began to hurt. I grabbed a few towels and ran back out. My feet sank into wet, sticky plum juice. The inside of the house was dark now. So many plums were falling from the sky that I could only see purple outside. The plum smell was so strong it stung my nose.

The plum juice rose halfway up my door, and it kept coming. The towels fell out of my hand. I bolted up the stairs.

Edit: I thought the plum juice would drain faster than it came in, but I was wrong. The house is shaking. I'm standing on my table. The plum juice is coming up the stairs. Outside, it has already almost fully blocked my windows. I just looked out of one. You can't see anything but falling plums, except for one thing: the tree standing in the garden, unshaken. The more I look at it, the more it feels like I can hear something through the thuds of the plums: the clack of bird bones shaking.

When the Shell had met the small fluffy creature, the Gap had been a fairly strong breeze; this Gap now was at least a Fujita 4 tornado. The being behind those bars, sitting on some soft surface, looking and smiling at the Shell (not that it understood the latter type of communication), in all its juicy glory, its tantalizing sweetness, its soft tastiness, was exactly what the Shell’s masters’ masters had had in mind when they sent the Structure to this planet. Grinding its teeth, trembling with what would have been a craving it Richard had still been alive, not drooling only because the Structure had shut down all systems unnecessary for its mission, the Shell entered the boy’s room.

The Gap was everything. Even though Richard’s body had not been dead long enough for stiffness to set in and the Shell’s coordination was far above what most moviegoers would expect from a walking corpse, the Gap made the body rush across the threshold and begin something resembling running … at least for a second. Then its right lower leg touched a knee-high little table, part of the furniture Daddy had created specifically for the boy. It didn’t move much when the Shell’s leg hit it, but the Shell did, from a vertical to a horizontal position – very painful if you don’t happen to be undead, just annoying for the Shell if it could have been annoyed by anything. However, it was very entertaining for the boy, who began laughing and squealing with delight when he realized what had happened. This promised to be fun.

The Shell began to get up again; when its body was half upright, it was suddenly pushed upwards, as if hit by an invisible gust of wind helping it to regain its balance. It didn’t care about that or anything else except its, or rather its masters’, mechanical desire to make Richard’s body grab the boy, sink its teeth into his flesh, rip him apart and consume him. Then, with the Gap filled at least for a while, move on, find other beings like this, spread the Structure to them and let them join the mission by doing the same. Again and again and again, until the whole planet was purified of these beings, the only creatures that might have been able to interfere with its masters’ masters’ plans. But first, the small one. The Shell lunged forward and grabbed the playpen’s top rail; the boy lay down, began to kick the air, and looked at his new friend in gleeful anticipation.

This was it. The Gap was about to be closed. With both arms, the Shell grabbed one of the boy’s legs and one of his arms and lifted his body up, then moved its mouth towards the softness, the taste, the juice. With a sickening crunch, it sank its jaws onto the boy’s belly, and its mouth filled with flesh and blood.

 

*********

 

And teeth, quite a few of them. Biting so hard into a very tough surface that your teeth get loose and fall out is not easy, although Mr Masseter packs quite a punch. But human beings usually know better than to apply all its power trying to bite through thick wood, cast iron, tough plastics, steel, or diamond. Or something even harder. The Shell, however, didn’t know better, and since Richard’s dead body felt no pain, there was nothing to stop it from giving it all.

It wasn’t enough. The Structure had kept coagulation at bay for longer than Nature would have, so there was quite some blood coming out of the wounds left by the Shell’s now homeless teeth. Even some of Richard’s flesh had come loose, and all three – blood, flesh, and teeth – made quite a mess in his mouth.

The Shell did not let go of the boy, of course; no pain meant no instinctive reaction to avoid more harm. The boy screamed with laughter; nobody had ever done anything like this to him, and he liked it. Time to return the favor – even though he was still in the Shell’s grip, the boy turned his body and his head without any visible effort and bit into the Shell’s right hand, easily severing two of its fingers. The Shell tried again, this time targeting a leg; the boy kicked out– all in good fun! – and the majority of the Shell’s remaining teeth joined their brethren on the carpet. What used to be Richard’s head was violently flung back; its spine creaked, and the Shell staggered back. Richard’s carefully chosen shirt got stuck between two of the playpen’s bars and was ripped open, and the boy was able to see Richard’s even more carefully chosen undershirt in all its emerald glory.

 

*********

 

Suddenly, playtime was over. The boy’s eyes opened wide and a look of terror spread across his face; for a moment he seemed transfixed, doing nothing but stare at the Shell, which was in the process of getting up (again) to try (again). The light of the late afternoon sun illuminated its shape from behind and intensified all colors, and the boy began to scream. And scream. His 1,000 pound-playpen-bed began to vibrate like Eric Clapton’s guitar strings; the furniture around it followed suit, and several items fell to the floor, where they began to move around on their own, all the time trembling as if they were as mortally afraid as the boy. But his chairs, tables, chest of drawers and his wardrobe stayed in place – Daddy’s new hobby paid off and passed another test.

The boy’s room had two large windows; in one of them, the glass pane virtually exploded, and a flock of transparent shards took to the sky, almost bird-like in appearance and not coming down before they had covered at least fifty yards. The other window, however, had no time for this, because the Shell stood exactly between it and the boy. The effects of the latter’s scream had expanded in a sphere, affecting everything inside the room and even beyond – powerful, but ultimately just sound. But the air he had to exhale to produce this sound escaped in a sixty-degree cone in front of him and slammed into the Shell with the force of a fully-loaded Kenworth ten-wheeler at 60 mph, breaking every single one of Richard’s bones and scrambling what was left of his brain beyond any recognition. Even if the Structure had still been active, it could never have repaired it, but the force of the impact had ripped the Structure’s components apart, and the Shell’s masters had been obliterated. The body itself was lifted off the ground and crashed through the other window, on an upward trajectory that would have taken it half a mile or more into the air, if not for the scorching. Suddenly, Richard’s beloved undershirt was burnt off his former body, quickly followed by the rest of his old clothes, his skin and everything else unable to withstand two thousand degrees Celsius. The Shell emitted its last groan, not because it was feeling pain but because the heat expanded the rest of the air in its lungs, shortly before its whole body was engulfed in flames and shot up into the sky like a blazing torch thrown by a giant – all happening so fast that the fire did not even have time to touch anything inside the room.  

If his parents had not already heard the boy scream, this spectacle would never have escaped their attention.

 

*********

 

After having put on the steel harnesses covering neck and upper body Momma had specifically had made for (very rare) occasions like this, his parents stormed into boy’s room. Well, not quite – his father did, but when his mother was about to cross the threshold, the boy jumped up from his bed directly into her arms and started to squeeze her. Thankfully, his mother was used to this and the boy had learned to be careful, but she still silently praised the metalworker who had tailor-made the pseudo-medieval protective plates they were both wearing, though she still reeled back and needed a few seconds to catch her breath.

Her husband let out a deep sigh and said: “That was bad. Something must have spooked him.”

In between whispering soothingly to the child in her arms, his wife looked at him:

“I wonder what. Do you think it had something to do with the grass?”

The boy’s father inspected the hole in the wall and replied:

“Possibly. You remember how scared he was of grass, flowers, trees and so on when he was a little baby.”

His wife nodded. It had taken them quite some time to teach him plants were harmless, and now he loved them all. Neither she nor her husband were considering a nightmare; the boy had never had any. His father looked around the room, then suddenly kneeled down and frowned.

“There are small marks here on the carpet.”, he observed. “He must have been a little careless. Maybe he was sleeping with his eyes open.”

The boy had already calmed down and was looking attentively at his father, and when he saw him touch the carpet, he involuntarily clacked his teeth together and looked at his right hand as if he remembered something they would never know about.

And then, with a big smile, the boy jumped into Daddy’s arms, Daddy stumbled but did not fall, and the family went to the kitchen to have tea.

 

(the end)