Close your eyes, p.2
Close Your Eyes, page 2
But he wasn’t human. Not quite.
After the evil had been expelled from Leo’s body, traces remained. Pain, mostly. Blinding cluster headaches. Cramps that doubled him over. Flare-ups of old, healed injuries that had likely never fully healed.
But the deepest scar, the deepest pain, was emotional.
Memories of the atrocities he’d committed, though his will hadn’t been his own.
Nightmares of having power, and losing power.
Suicidal thoughts that tortured him with their clarity.
Visions of ending my life are constant. Every hour, day and night, awake and asleep.
But I haven’t done it.
Not because I lack the guts.
But because I haven’t figured out a way to die as painfully as I deserve to.
He had money in the bank, linked to an account he no longer had access to. But even if he did get another debit card and reestablish his identity, Leo chose to remain homeless, living outdoors and letting nature have her way with him. He could shiver and get cold, but he didn’t freeze, never got frostbite. He could walk through a heatwave and get sunburn the color of a stop light, but he didn’t succumb to dehydration. If he cut himself, it healed almost immediately, adding to his growing collection of scars.
Leo tried to lose himself in drugs, but they didn’t work for him.
He stopped eating for a month, and then woke up in an alley surrounded by the bloody pelts and pointy bones of dead rats he’d devoured. Sleep-eating. His body forcing him to live even after his mind had given up.
So he wandered. He reflected. He suffered. Aimless. Living in a hell he hadn’t fought hard enough to reject.
Until, one day, purpose found him.
His travels had taken him across the United States, wearing out a dozen pairs of hiking boots, heading no direction in particular until he found himself in Madison, Wisconsin, on a warm summer night, sitting on the sidewalk behind a vintage clothing store and crunching on an uncooked square of dry ramen noodles.
That’s when Leo felt it.
The Tug.
He looked around, trying to understand what tugged at him. All the nearby pedestrians—skaters and pink hairs and college stoners—gave him a wide berth, but this wasn’t the same as someone pulling on his arm or grabbing him by the shirt.
This was akin to standing in a fast-flowing stream, feeling the water relentlessly push in a direction. Or like the force behind two magnets when their polarities were reversed.
Something is summoning me.
Leo had an idea who it was. His cells could almost sense it.
The loss.
The longing.
The disgust, and the sick pleasure that was even more disgusting.
He could feel his DNA being plucked like microscopic guitar strings, playing a rancid, evil tune older than the earth.
Leo did his best to ignore it. He got up and began walking in the opposite direction of the flow.
The effect was instantaneous.
His skin itched. His mouth went dry. His crisscross network of scar tissue burned.
He turned a corner, walking parallel to the Tug, and his discomfort lessened.
Curious, Leo turned again, walking into the invisible force.
All pain ceased.
Leo halted, and the itching returned.
Can’t get more obvious than that.
It wants me.
Living so long without any direction, suddenly having one, Leo considered his options. He realized there were three.
Ignore the Tug.
Head in the opposite direction and embrace the pain.
Go to it and see what happens.
He glanced down at his hands, the knuckles scarred.
I don’t deserve to still be alive.
The things I’ve done. Things I can’t undo. Things I can’t make up for.
I have no redemption arc.
The Universe will never forgive me.
I will never forgive myself.
I need to suffer.
The Tug picked at him, at his cells, at his soul.
Succumb?
Resist?
Fight?
Leo chose to fight.
I will find out what is beckoning me.
And I will destroy it.
Or it will destroy me.
If I’m lucky, it will be both.
Leo lifted his chin and followed the Tug.
DUNCAN
NOW, AND HERE…
The noonday Northern Wisconsin sun cut through the reddish haze in the air and continued its brutal assault, and there wasn’t a sliver of shade to hide from it on the forty-year-old pontoon. Duncan VanCamp had removed the folded bimini top—the canvas cover used to protect boaters from the UV rays—and left it on the shore to make it easier for everyone to fish. But a breezeless lake, coupled with a temperature hovering around ninety degrees, conspired to make him rethink his decision.
We’re sitting on a rectangular, floating broiler. The bimini sure would be nice right now.
Good thing we brought water.
“Can you toss me a water, Stu?”
His friend leaned over the cooler and took out a bottle. “Last one,” he said, throwing it over.
Duncan caught it. “We’ve gone through six bottles of water?”
Stu shrugged. “I only brought six bottles. Didn’t expect the sun to be so bad with all the smoke.”
The sky’s dim hue, pretty but unhealthy, was due to ongoing and widespread Canadian wildfires. The smoke had drifted over most of the Northern US and hung there, stinging the eyes and irritating the lungs.
Earlier the trio had awoken to simultaneous automatic text messages.
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is recommending Wisconsinites to reduce their time outdoors due to ongoing air quality alerts.
They recommended wearing an N-95 mask if staying outdoors for extended periods of time. They weren’t fooling, either. An AQI over 200 was declared unhealthy, even for healthy people. That morning it had hit 315.
But they weren’t going to let that stop them.
They’d been working the lake since eight am, thrown at least five hundred casts among the three of them, and hadn’t hooked a thing. The plan had been to wake up at dawn and start fishing early, but beering past midnight kept them in bed later than expected, which meant a late morning, with high noon approaching fast.
No worries.
It’s the first morning of a three-day brocation. Me and Stu and Chuck.
No families. No girlfriends.
Just the boys, clowning around, maxing and relaxing.
We have plenty of time to catch those elusive bass.
But it was really bugging Duncan that nothing was biting. He opened the water bottle and took a long pull, draining half of it.
Hot as it was, and smokey as it was, Big Lake Niboowin still radiated peace and tranquility. It boasted good fishing, with weed beds aplenty for the lunkers to hide. Part of a chain of seven connected lakes that stretched across Safe Haven, where Duncan’s parents owned a lakefront home, to the sister town of Spoonward, where Duncan lived. Over ten thousand acres of sporting paradise, water as far as you could see in every direction.
Duncan hadn’t noticed any other boats, and they seemed to have the lake all to themselves.
Odd. Niboowin is renowned for fishing. The previous state record Northern Pike had been caught here back in the 1960s, nearly thirty-nine pounds.
A combination of heat and air quality must be keeping people off the water.
It wasn’t going to stop Duncan. He was used to heat. For a few years he lived with his family in Hawaii, where heat was omnipresent and omnivorous.
But tropical heat and Midwest heat are two different things.
On an island, surrounded by saltwater, the weather is energizing.
In Wisconsin, the sun beat on you like you owed it money.
He put the water bottle in the cup holder next to the steering column and tossed out his lure once again, his baitcast reel whirring as the line played out, his crankbait landing exactly where he’d intended. Then he began a jerky, erratic retrieve, working the lure hard, trying to imitate a baitfish in distress, cutting it back and forth over the nearly waveless mirror of lake surface.
Perfect spot. Perfect cast. Perfect bait action.
No hits.
Not a single bite all morning.
And not normal for Niboowin.
After the move, Duncan had briefly lived with his parents at their lakeside home, where he was currently staying with his buddies while Mom and Dad went to a craft beer festival in Madison.
They’d chosen to move back to Safe Haven and live on the lake chain because it had been a weekend getaway spot for the family, years ago.
Duncan couldn’t reside in Safe Haven. While the fishing had been great memories, other memories that weren’t so great often overrode them. He moved to nearby Spoonward to be close to his parents, and would visit often, even keeping his pontoon on their property.
Earlier that summer, fishing had been good.
But this was the opposite of good fishing.
It’s like a giant net came and scooped up all the fish…
His cell buzzed, and Duncan winced. He put his hands on the lumps in his pockets—his EDC of multitool and flashlight and a lockpick kit for later—hoping his friends thought he was reaching for one of those instead of his phone. They hadn’t glanced at him, so he quickly slid the phone out of his shorts and peeked at the text.
Katie.
LOVE U, GOOD MORNING! FLIGHT GOT CANCELLED. CREW SKED HAS ME ON CALL. FINGERS CROSSED THEY SEND ME SOMEWHERE WITH A BEACH. HOW’S THE AQI?
“No phones.” Stu used an accusatory, parental tone and pointed a stubby finger.
“I thought it was off,” Duncan lied.
“You know the rules.” Stu held out his palm. “Captain’s rules, Captain.”
Duncan looked to Chuck for support. Chuck shrugged. “I left my phone back at your parent’s house. Captain’s rules.”
“And mine’s off,” Stu said. “Captain’s rules. When we’re on the boat, no phones. Or does the captain have rules for everyone else but not himself?”
“That’s not it. I need to keep it on in case—”
Chuck laughed. “In case your girlfriend needs to sext you from California after her flight lands?”
Duncan didn’t want to discuss the real reason, the scary reason, so he went with a weaker excuse.
“She’s gone half the month.”
“Sounds like the perfect partner.” Chuck laughed at his own joke.
“You guys don’t know what it’s like to be in a serious, committed relationship.”
“Serious and committed?” Stu asked. “You put a ring on it without telling your buds?”
Duncan shook his head. “Come on, man. I woulda told you guys.”
“Moving in together?” Stu pressed.
Duncan looked away, across the endless expanse of water, feeling his neck get even redder under the blazing sun.
Stu pointed again. He was a pointer. “You’re asking her to move in!”
Duncan went sheepish. “Maybe.”
“When?” Chuck demanded.
“I’m thinking after this trip, when I get back to Spoonward.”
“Is she gonna say yes?”
Duncan predicted she would. It made no sense to have two apartments, especially when Katie was gone so often. They’d discussed it, casually, but neither had pressed the issue. They were in their mid-twenties and enjoying the current chapter of their lives. But a few weeks ago Katie had a really bad flight. Some guy went bonkers and pulled out his own eye. Since then, she’d been pretty freaked out and basically stayed at Duncan’s place the entire time.
And it has been… nice. Really nice.
She’s practically living with me anyway. She has half my bedroom drawers and most of my closet, and had taken over almost all of the bathroom.
We should make it official.
Hopefully, Katie will agree.
Hopefully.
“She’ll say yes,” Duncan said.
“You are so whipped,” Chuck told him.
Duncan rolled his eyes. “Whipped? How old are we? Sixteen?”
Then he quickly texted back:
AQI SMOKEY, LUV U 2, GOT 2 DO GUY STUFF, KEEP ME POSTED
“Shut the front door, you’re whipped as hell,” Stu said, laughing. “Gimme the damn cell.”
Duncan handed his phone to Stu. Rules were rules.
“I promise not to send her dick pics and steal her away from you,” Stu said.
Duncan smiled. “If you do, the camera has a macro zoom.”
Chuck snorted. Stu tucked Duncan’s phone into his backpack. Fishing resumed.
I’m not whipped.
I’m in love. And protective.
And I want Katie to be happy.
Shit. That does sound like I’m whipped.
Duncan shifted his wiry frame in the hot, vinyl captain’s chair, adjusted his sunglasses, then made another cast. When he was eleven years old, Duncan caught his first keeper on this lake; a bass that tipped the scales at nearly five pounds. He’d landed much bigger fish since, but that was still his favorite angling memory. The surprise of the strike. That epic tug of war. His stepfather, Josh, urging him on, ready with the net. That swell of pride when he was holding his trophy and Mom took a picture. A picture that—over a decade later—was still tacked to the wall in his old bedroom.
Duncan had caught more than just a fish that day. He’d also caught the fishing bug; a lifelong obsession that consumed his free time and much of his recreational income in the form of reels and poles and lures and the latest purchase; his vintage boat. The pontoon they were currently fishing on—essentially a three meter by seven-meter flat platform covered with green plastic carpet and sitting atop two large, cylindrical floats with a 25 horsepower Mercury outboard attached to the back—was a Facebook Marketplace find. Even though the vinyl bench seats were faded and cracked, and the aluminum railing held together in spots with plastic zip ties, and the dashboard instruments semi-functional, and the motor not fast enough to tow a kneeboarder, and the plastic carpet looking like worn out 1970s Astroturf, it was worth every penny.
Some feelings you just can’t put a price tag on.
The cherry on top; Katie loves to fish. If we move in together, maybe we could rent a place on a lake, and I won’t have to keep my pontoon at my parent’s house.
After a tough childhood, and a few near-death experiences, life is finally coming together for me.
The future has never been brighter.
It’s as bright as this unrelenting sun in my face.
Duncan finished his retrieve, considered changing lures again, considered changing locations again, and decided to give the area a few more casts. He threw out his bait, reeling in slowly along the top of the water, making a zig-zag pattern known as walking the dog.
It was a more laborious, and time-consuming, way to fish, but the method sometimes worked when the bass were being picky.
This time, it didn’t work.
Duncan sighed, though he wasn’t sure if it was from frustration or contentment. Along with learned skills, angling required luck, patience, and perseverance. Some never discovered the appeal of fishing. They found it boring, or stupid, or inhumane.
For Duncan, it was an addiction.
He made another cast.
There was a slapping sound, accompanied by a muttered obscenity. Duncan glanced at Chuck, who’d stood up and gone to the bow. He had the lanky frame of a varsity basketball player, his sleeveless Johnny Cash tee boasting a dark strip of damp sweat down the spine, all the way to his swim trunks. Chuck made a Mr. Yuck face as he stared at the black smear on his palm.
“Frickin’ flies.” Chuck wiped the dead bug onto the Man in Black.
Stu adjusted the bill of his Science Pimp ball cap and asked, “Was it Chrysops callidus or Hybomitra micans?”
Not as wiry as Chuck or Duncan, Stu had outgrown most of his teenage pudge but retained most of the social awkwardness. Like his friends he wore a swimsuit and a tee, his sporting the classic photo of Einstein sticking out his tongue.
“Captain’s rules. No phones on the boat, no work on the boat.” Chuck threw his Bloody Eye Minnow lure next to the weed line, and began a slow retrieve. “I don’t talk cars, Duncan doesn’t go on and on about cutting off drunk townies—”
“Last week I got sucker punched by a seventy-seven-year-old woman who thought her Old-Fashioned pour was too light,” Duncan offered.
“—and you don’t break into bugspeak.”
“It’s Latin.”
“It’s annoying.”
“It bugs him,” Duncan laughed.
Stu shrugged. “Just wondering if it was a deerfly or a horsefly.”
“It didn’t look like a deer or a horse.”
“How big was it?” Stu asked.
“The size of a freakin’ toaster. Maybe it was a toasterfly.”
Stu pushed the bridge of his slipping eyeglasses. “The bigger ones are Hybomitra micans. Horseflies. The females have six chitinous stylets with serrated edges that slice side-to-side to cut through skin. Like scissors, or wire snips. They don’t have a proboscis like a mosquito. A proboscis penetrates to suck blood. Horseflies just slice a big hole in the skin, then feast on it when your blood seeps out.”
Chuck snorted, then scratched at his hipster beard. “Honest question, Stu; when was the last time you got any? Because when you talk like that, I picture chicks just peeling off their panties and launching themselves at you.”
Stu shrugged. “I’ve got a doctorate in entomology, and you work at the Quickie Lube. Just sayin’.”
“And I make as much as you and don’t have to pay back a billion dollars in student loans.”
“It’s only half a billion. And my fingernails are clean, while yours are that lovely shade of black. I bet that’s a real panty peeler. Is smelling like 10W-30 a turn-on these days?”
“Is smelling like butterfly shit a turn-on?”
“Do me next,” Duncan interrupted. “What do small town bartenders smell like?”
