Alma’s hands were shaking as she tried to pour water into the back of the coffee maker. She spilled liquid over the side and had to use her other hand to steady the container. “I don’t remember what happened there. I get flashes of things from time to time, but nothing ever seems to make sense. There’s a whole chunk of time missing from what I can remember.”
“Okay then, what can you remember?” Paul went around the counter and took over making the coffee. He pointed at the stool, commanding Alma to settle down and take a seat without having to tell her to.
“Well, I guess before I go into that, I should ask you what you know about Widowsfield. Have you ever heard the legends and all the bullshit?”
Paul nodded as he wavered his hand. “Some of it. I know you get pissed off and stop taking calls on March 14th because there’re a lot of people that think you know what happened. I looked up some of the websites about the place, but it all seems like conspiracy bullshit.”
“Do you know why people think I know something?” she asked.
He looked hesitant to answer. “Every time I brought it up you told me you didn’t want to talk about it.”
“I know, but did any of the sites you looked at talk about my brother’s disappearance?”
Paul poured the ground coffee into the filter and turned the coffee maker on. “Yeah, but every site had a different version of the story. I’d rather hear the truth, if you’re ready to tell it.”
She wasn’t sure she knew the truth anyhow, and started to draw circles on the counter with the corner of Rachel’s business card. Each circle started large, and then shrunk with each revolution, like a serpent’s coil. “Like I said, I don’t remember much of what happened, but what I can has fucked with me ever since…” she was overwhelmed by a sense of sadness that she hadn’t expected. Her eyes welled with tears and she dropped the business card to wipe them away.
“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.”
“Should I leave?” asked Jacker from the floor in the hallway.
Alma laughed. Jacker’s unintentionally comedic timing was a welcome relief. “No, Jacker,” said Alma. “Come here and sit down with us. Are you okay?”
The big man grumbled as he stood up. His frame encompassed the width of the hall, and he looked embarrassed by what happened. “I’m fine. Sorry, I have a problem with blood. It’s pretty pathetic. I feel like such a dork.”
“Want something to drink?” asked Paul.
“No, I’ve got a beer around here somewhere. Ah, there it is.” Jacker retrieved his beer from the end table beside the couch. “Honestly guys, I’ll take off if you want me to. I’ve already done enough damage here.”
Paul looked at Alma for an answer. She shook her head. “No, you can stay. I don’t think you should be driving right after passing out anyhow.”
Paul reached across the counter and set his hand over Alma’s. “We can talk about Widowsfield later if you want.”
“No,” she said. “We can talk about it now. I don’t mind if Jack’s here.” She looked over at the giant as he downed the rest of his beer. “Do you know about Widowsfield?”
“I heard you guys talking about it,” said Jacker. “I think I’ve heard something about it before. The people there disappeared, right?”
Alma led them into the living room and the three sat down around the coffee table. There were stacks of old magazines littering the table, along with several half full glasses situated atop plates that should’ve been washed days ago. That, of course, reminded her of Paul’s spotless apartment, and she felt suddenly shamed.
“Sorry,” she said as Paul and Jacker sat down. “Let me clean this stuff up real quick.” Alma gathered the dirty dishes and carried them to the kitchen where she checked on the coffee machine. It had hardly started brewing, but the smell was already filling the apartment. She was about to get creamer from the refrigerator when she realized that she was stalling. Alma was trying to avoid confronting her past, even by only the time it would take to make coffee. She forced herself to go back into the living room.
“Okay,” said Alma before she took a deep, exaggerated breath. “It’s about time I talked about this.”
Paul moved to the side of the love seat for Alma to sit with him. Jacker was lounging on the center seat of the sofa, and managed to usurp most of the space there. Alma sat beside Paul and he pulled her to his side with his arm around her shoulder.
“My father used to take my brother and me on fishing trips to Missouri every spring, during our break.” Alma started to absently rub her thumb over a ring on her right hand. It was a simple silver ring with holes bored through it in random spots. The ring was the only thing of her mother’s that Alma still owned. “It was supposed to be a vacation for us, or at least that’s what he used to tell my mother.” Her voice cracked and she took a deep breath to steady herself.
Paul squeezed her shoulder and Alma smiled up at him before continuing. “We didn’t do a lot of fishing. I was pretty young at the time, I was eight and my brother was ten. We’d been going there for a few years, and my mother would stay home. It was supposed to be a chance for my father to connect with us.” Alma twirled the loose fitting ring around her bony finger. “That’s not what it was really about. I didn’t know it at the time, because I was so young, but my father was using the vacation as an excuse to meet up with one of his girlfriends. God, just talking about it makes my stomach turn.”
“You don’t have to, Alma,” said Paul.
Alma was quick to respond. “No, I do. I know this sounds nuts, and maybe it is, but it’s time for me to deal with this; to get it all out in the open.” She took off the ring and started the slip it onto other fingers and then back again, as if her hands were desperate to be active. “My father’s girlfriend owned a cabin, and they’d rent movies for my brother and I to watch while they did their thing. They would go upstairs, and my brother and I would sit in the living room, watching those fucking movies while they…”
She pointed up and had trouble continuing, but forced herself to say it, “While they went upstairs and had sex. We could hear them, but I didn’t understand what was going on. They would spend all day up there sometimes, and my brother and I were left to fend for ourselves. We’d make our own food, and put ourselves to bed every day while at that cabin. If we ever dared go upstairs we would get screamed at. I made the mistake of going up there a few times, and I’ll never forget the acrid stench of the drugs they were smoking. My father’s been a meth addict for as long as I can remember. That smell, that chemical, ozone-like stink that came out of the room is something I’ll never forget.”
“Damn,” said Jacker. “That sucks. Sorry to hear your dad was such a prick.”
Alma laughed inappropriately and shook her head. “You don’t know the half of it. We used to get beatings for seemingly random shit. One day it was no big deal for us to wear our shoes in the house, and the next we were getting whipped for not taking them off at the door. He used to have this belt that he cut holes in, and he only used it for whipping us. He would carry it around with him, and said that the holes made it easier to swing, and made it hurt more. I remember him standing in the kitchen, in his dirty white t-shirt, making breakfast with that belt over his shoulder, like he was just waiting for an excuse to use it.”
Paul kissed the top of Alma’s head and continued to try and be supportive, although nothing he could do would help her forget.
“I know lots of people had shitty fathers,” she said and slipped her mother’s ring back onto her right ring finger. “And at least my mother was good to us before she went crazy. A lot of kids don’t even have that. But, you get the point: My dad was a Class A piece of shit.”