“Look, this thing was not a golden retriever, okay? The golden retriever was outside barking its ass off. The golden retriever wasn’t even in the house. And that dog is not capable of knocking those doors off their hinges.”
Silence again.
And then Officer Clarke said, “Mr. Ellis, the dog was in the house—we found him in the kitchen.”
The officers were asking the children what they had seen.
When Sarah shyly turned away from them, I said, “Honey, you don’t have to say anything.”
Sarah told them she had seen “a lion.”
Robby shrugged, uncertain. When asked by Officer Boyle if it could have been the dog, Robby kept shrugging. Robby did not look at me when he made this gesture. Robby did not look at me when he confirmed that what had invaded the house was not human but an animal and that it could have been the dog. But, Robby stressed, it was dark and he had kept his eyes shut during most of “what happened.”
I realized I was the only witness at this point.
Officer Boyle asked me, “Have you had anything to drink tonight, sir?”
Push the trapdoor open. The gulls are squalling. The wind gusts toward you. Your father is standing on the walkway of an interstate overpass.
“Pardon me?”
You heard him, the writer hissed.
Boyle moved closer and, lowering his voice, asked, “Have you been drinking tonight, sir?”
“I don’t have to answer that question. I’m not operating a motor vehicle.”
(I realized I had never used the term “motor vehicle” in any sentence I had spoken or written during my entire life.)
Marta was still holding Sarah as she listened carefully to this exchange.
I was also highly aware of Robby’s presence at this point.
Look at how dignified and sexy you are, the writer said. Quite the dad you turned out to be. Drunk and spazzing out over some kind of monster in the hall. What a guy.
The officers were becoming less concerned and more remote.
“Listen to me, whatever this was came in from the woods,” I pressed. “And it was not our dog.” Helplessly, I turned to my son. “Robby, tell them what you saw.”
“Dad, I don’t know what I saw,” he said, anguished. “I don’t know what I saw. Stop asking me that.”
“There was a half-empty bottle of vodka on your nightstand, Mr. Ellis.”
I didn’t know who said this.
“And you think this is evidence of—what?” I managed.
“Mr. Ellis, are you on any medication?”
“Yes. I am. Actually, I am.” This was answered in the defensive manner of the guilty addict.
“What is it that you’re taking?”
“It’s really none of your business, Officer, but I’m taking very low dosages of Klonopin for an anxiety disorder.”
(The irony: I had never felt more sober in my entire life than at that moment.)
The four officers looked sharply at one another.
“And you were drinking while taking this medication?” one of them asked.
“Look, I can see where you’re going with this.”
Officer Boyle was looking at me with a very basic and casual disapproval.
“Mr. Ellis, I think maybe you should call the doctor who is prescribing this—”
“Funny. That’s really funny. In front of my kids. Great, guys. Really nice.”
“Why should Daddy call a doctor?” Sarah was asking Marta.
“Mr. Ellis, all I’m suggesting is that if this thing comes back, you should call your doctor—”
“I did not hallucinate anything tonight. Something—and it was not our dog—in fact it was something very undoglike—was in this house.”
“Mr. Ellis, calm down—”
“Listen, um, thank you, Officer O’Nan and Officer Boyle and Officer Clarke and”—I gestured at the fourth—“whoever you are and you’ve all been a fabulous help and I’m—”
“Mr. Ellis—”
“Look, something invaded my home tonight and attacked me and my kids and scared the living shit out of us and you think I hallucinated this thing? You’ve been a big help. You can all go now.”
(This was all for show, I realized. This was me playing the concerned parent. This was acting for the kids and for Marta, who would relay my performance as the concerned parent to Jayne. The cops were not to blame. Considering what was actually happening there was nothing they could do. I should have never called 911. It had been a tactical error. I should have bundled the kids up and just driven to a hotel myself.)
But you needed an alibi to get out of the house, the writer was reminding me. How else were you going to explain your “escape” from 307 Elsinore Lane? The thing in the hall gave you a very convenient reason.
“We think it was probably your dog, Mr. Ellis.”
“We’re checking into a hotel,” I said curtly. I turned to Marta. “Right?”
She nodded her head, staring at me wide-eyed.
So this was their theory: Drunk out of my mind on a combination of vodka and Klonopin, I had woken up my children because I believed we were being attacked by our pet. That was so lame-ass I could not even dignify it with a response.
But even the writer thought this was plausible.
The writer told me that the policemen thought I was taking advantage of them.
The writer told me that one of the officers had laughed when they came upon the green light saber on the floor of my office.
The writer told me that two of the officers had masturbated to sex scenes in American Psycho.
Boyle stayed with Robby and Sarah as O’Nan escorted Marta and me into the house. Marta would go to the kids’ rooms to gather their things (uniforms, backpacks, schoolbooks) while I grabbed whatever I needed.
But first I followed Marta into Sarah’s room and stood by the bathroom door.
Marta glanced at the door and paused.
O’Nan noted the pause and made a gesture—just a shrug, just a sympathetic glance—that indicated we would wait and see.
I wanted to shout, “Wait and see for what?”
The door had burst off its hinges, and slime glistened horridly from its doorknob.
The worst thing: the door had been gouged because the thing had splintered it with its mouth.
There were clumps of fur dotting the hallway—hair the thing had shed.
From the window in the master bedroom I watched as two of the officers scanned the field behind the house, looking for nonexistent clues. They were not going to find any trails. Nothing led up to any of the “unbroken windows” and “locked doors” of the house. They were gossiping about Jayne Dennis and her crazy husband. O’Nan made a sound that suggested I start packing my things. I blindly filled a large duffel bag with a suit, my wallet, my laptop. I packed toiletries and medication. I glimpsed myself in the mirror as I changed into a pair of sweats, a T-shirt and a leather jacket. The side of my face was a crescent of burgeoning purple. My lower lip was split in the middle by a thin black line. My eyes were fluttering.
After leaving the bathroom, I looked one last time at the bed the Terby had crawled under.
The writer was with me in the room.
Tell them you have information about the horse mutilation in Pearce.
Tell them about Patrick Bateman calling you earlier tonight, the writer suggested.
Tell them about the girl in Room 101 of the Orsic Motel.
Go ahead. Make the leap. Maybe you’ll save yourself.
I piled the kids into the Range Rover, along with Victor, who would be staying in a kennel located in the basement of the Four Seasons. Marta left her car in the driveway and drove. This decision was made after the officers threatened to give me a Breathalyzer test. They also insisted on escorting us to the hotel, where the night manager would be waiting for us.