KILLDEER
The world’s not gonna end with a whimper but with a bang, Hank said. It was just a thought. It came to mind and he said it, channeling deep into Old Hank, who knew that the best way to cut into the illogic of Rake when he was super high was to throw a non sequitur back at him, pushing him further away from a train of thoughts, because a train of thoughts always led to violence. They’d been exchanging non sequiturs deep into the night.
The only way to die is to kill the death within, Hank said.
You hear a whimper you want to make a bang, Rake said.
A good ship has a captain who doesn’t know he’s a captain, Hank said.
The only bad war is a war that I haven’t started yet, Rake said.
Drugs that really hit hard hit the hardness first and the softness second, Hank said
Meg’s a token of something I want to feed to the slot machine of death, Rake said.
A tree that needs to be cut says so before the wind picks up the scent, Hank said.
When I feel a hankering to kill I appreciate the fact that blood is still flowing from the top of the state to the bottom, Rake said.
If I kill Haze it’ll be because he’s already close to dead, Rake said. I still have a little bit of honor left, such as it is.
June is the month of killing. April might be cruel, but June is pure murder, Rake said.
The day had been hot and the evening was only a bit cooler and there was a strange, unnatural silence. The lake sat shimmering and quiet, unusually smooth — two days straight of no movement, nothing at all — and in the woods the birds were silent, too, even the chickadees, and because of the airlessness he hadn’t caught the scent of a single tree, not one, on which to pin his hopes. Meg was inside resting, tired, her face healing. His father was out there, navigating by starlight or with a compass, reading charts, whatever he did as second mate.
What do you mean by that? I’m going to make damn sure it ends with both a bang and a fucking whimper, Rake said. He gripped the chair and screamed. That’s how it was in Nam, not that I want to talk about it, not that I give a shit, that part of me is dead and buried in the best way. You’d hear a little whimper and that meant shoot.
* * *
For two days he had been packing his gear, readying himself for another drug run, and then unpacking and repacking, testing everyone. When they could, Hank and Meg whispered assurances to each other, or exchanged meaningful glances. A plan will shape up, Hank assured her when he could. We’ll take action soon, but the timing has to be right or we’ll be the ones who end up dead.
Haze staggered around the yard with his arms out and practiced being blind because that’s what Rake had told him to do. Get used to what it might be like because that other eye of yours has seen almost all it’s gonna see, he said.
I’m not sure I’m sensing what I’m sensing, but it might be that one of you is trying to scheme against me, Rake said one afternoon. He held an ax over the kitchen table, swung it around. A sound came from outside, high-pitched, canine.
In the yard, MomMom was throwing another fit. She spoke of God as a friendly presence, as someone right on the edge of the yard, as a deity she knew personally, someone who would come charging to her rescue when the time came. Then she said she was the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Seven bowls of angels will be fed the lamb of God.
Tell her to shut up. Make her shut up, Rake said, lifting the ax.
Hank went to her and lifted her off her feet and carried her back to the shed.
Mom, he said. MomMom, please, please, it’s me, Hank, you remember Hank, he said, and then he watched her eyes sway, unable to focus, up at the sky and then to the east and then, finally, when he lifted his index finger and waved it, asking her to follow it, she focused.
Sweet Hank, she said. Your mother loves you.
Rake sat in a lawn chair with his ax across his knees.
You get her fixed? If I hear the word God again I’m going to remove her head.
She’s might continue to mention God, but you know she’s crazy so it doesn’t mean anything.
Well, it means to me what it means. And I’m on edge.
I’ll keep her away, Rake. Whatever works. Or I’ll get rid of them both if that’s what you want.
Yeah, whatever works, Rake said. Meg was approaching from the house and he fixed his eyes on her and touched the blade and began to explain how it was going to be him first who took care of the girl, if anyone, and that was an order, and that if he wanted both MomMom dead and Meg dead he’d do it himself. To keep himself calm, Hank looked into the sky and tried to catch the scent of a tree. He imagined a group of men tearing into the trunk of an old tree, not cutting with a clean notch on top and then another on the bottom but hacking at all angles, opening a big fat wound, and leaving the tree standing to be invaded by insects. The image forced him deeper into the role. He shook his head in agreement and Rake gave him a brotherly nod, as if to say: We’ll both do what we have to do, and we’ll do it together as brothers in arms.
If he doesn’t kill her I might, Meg said, her voice loose and casual.
That’s a good girl, Rake said. That’s what I want to hear.
* * *
Hank glanced back at the trees and told her to pull away, to make it look as if she wanted to lunge for the water. She did as he asked and he pushed her down, holding her shoulders gently, but pushing hard, and then he gave her a fake kick to the groin and she gave a fake response so that Rake, who was up in the trees, hiding, watching, could rest assured. He had been trailing them daily — his footprints along the path, the feeling of being watched, his eyes in the trees, down in the grass.
Now let me help you up, he whispered.
I really do want to go in the water. I want to hear Billy-T again. I need to hear him.
The lake was shimmering with the last light of the day. It was still cold but would slowly warm up, the sunlight plunging down through the water, searching in vain for something solid.
Don’t cry. If you cry, he’ll know something’s wrong. I’m going to move you over there and I’m going to lecture you on that bird, you see it, the killdeer. He pointed, keeping his hand up so Rake could see if he was still watching. The river came out through the trees and spread in a small delta.
You clear forest and they come to nest, he said. Rake is going to go out on another run because he’s like that bird. He has to follow his internal compass, however messed up it might be, he said, pulling her. Now stumble a little bit and resist and let me pull you back again.
They made a show of it. The bird was glancing nervously in their direction, freezing still and then hopping, poking and probing in the rocks for food and glancing back intensely, fearful and yet free. As they moved closer, it hopped out into the flat, hard sand, dragging one of its wings.