Author's Note: Sorry for being slow about updating. I've been working on a Clockwork Orange fic (which I'll post soon as I come up with a title, and decide whether to keep it a one-shot or follow it up) and I'm in the process of rewriting the last few chapters of Cradle to the Grave (none of the chapters currently posted will be replaced, though). And on top of that, there's school and splitting computer time with my sister, who cannot POSSIBLY use any other of the five computers in my damn house! Without further ado, here is an update.
"Pauline?"
"Uh huh."
"You'll be a good girl, right? No more fighting with Capricorn."
"But Capper-corns got cooties."
"Sweetie, don't worry about that. You can watch TV if you want, with Ruby. But go to bed when she wants you to."
"Okay," she sighed, her exasperation a façade unearthed by giggling and lip biting.
"I love you."
"Love you, mommy."
"Do I get a goodnight kiss?" She wrapped her tiny arms around my neck, and kissed me gingerly on the cheek.
"Night, sweetie."
"Goodnight," she answered, and ran off in the direction of Aries and a shredded collection of doll parts. Ruby followed, and waved goodbye to me.
Outside, the night was tepid, lukewarm, thick and stupid. I wore jeans, to give the appearance of your average, everyday twenty-something-in-a-desert. They were impractical, and stiff with lack of use, but I did look much like I used to before I was pregnant and able to wear low-rise things.
Lizard waited for me, he in the driver's seat of some beat up range rover, I climbing into the passenger's seat. He squeezed my hand in reassurance, and then stepped hard on the accelerator, taking off haphazardly.
Before we were in view of the trailer, we stopped, parking the car under the rocky hollows of an overhanging peak. We stepped out into the darkness, and each gave the trashed fender a swift kick, furthering the damage by small increments. Skirting the edges and shadows of the cliffs and hills, we walked on to where we'd agreed to meet Pluto, Goggle, and Mercury. From behind tumbleweed and sagebrush, they stared out at the trailer. My heart pounded in my gut, my conscious outside my head.
"When?" I asked.
"Soon as Jupe radios," Mercury answered, grinning mockingly, questioning my ability to carry out what I had promised. And time passed, until I was alarmingly unnerved, and still ticked on.
The radio came alive, abruptly, and Jupiter's voice said faintly, "Now, now. Go."
I stood up, squeezed Lizard's shoulder, and traveled the expanse of desert between us and them, anxious and fearful and doubtful all at once.
Within disquieting proximity of the trailer, I paused one last time. I breathed in, out. In, and out. Again, and again. Before I could stall longer, I shouted, in as haggard a voice as I could manage, "Help me!"
Surely, I told myself, if there is indeed a hell, I will burn for what I'm about to do. A wild thought. I saw the headlights. I heard the engine.
"Please! Help!" I repeated.
Crashing through the side door the first one came, gun in hand. "What?" he yelled. "What's wrong? Who is it?"
Another followed, also firearm-clad, then a wife and son standing in the doorway.
"Oh! Thank God!" I told them, my words convincing even myself. "I'm – I'm stuck out there. My car – it's wrecked, won't drive. I was – oh, thank God!"
They were too nice. They took me in. "Coffee?" the woman offered.
"No, thanks."
I explained my situation. I'd been driving in the desert ("Why?"), because the man at the gas station told me this was the most time efficient road to travel ("Really? Us, too."). At one point or another, my tires popped ("Ha ha, I guess that happens all the time out here!"). I had a spare, could they help me fix it? I'd not the faintest idea how, myself.
"This can't wait 'til morning?"
"Well, not really. Sorry, could you still help?"
The men agreed. Of course they would. I'd be doing them a huge favor if I could get back to a gas station and call them a tow truck. Of course I could. I thanked them over and over. If it hadn't been for them, who knows what I'd have done?
"Do you mind if I stay here? I'm a bit shook up. I nearly crashed after the tires went, and my cars just behind that hill." I spoke with suck painstaking formality it was difficult to think of anything beyond the next word.
"Oh, sure," the first man responded. I threw him my keys, and he and the other, with a flashlight, took off. I was only a young girl; why not trust me with their family?
Until they were out of sight, I made small talk, though every word from me contributed to one lie or another. I'm from New Mexico, yes. Oh, no, I'm twenty-two, I was just heading back home from college. Yes, this humidity is uncharacteristically heady. Aren't deserts supposed to be dry and hot? It must be about to rain.
By then, the two men must already have been dead. I could see the woman getting agitated.
"What's your name?" I asked the boy.
"Dylan."
"And you are...?"
"Marsha. You?"
I fumbled. "Eh – Elise."
"I had an aunt named Elise," Marsha said, distractedly. "I wonder what's taking them so long?"
"I'll go check."
I insisted I didn't need a flashlight, and left the side door open. I walked until they couldn't possible see me anymore, then doubled back. All four were gone from behind the tumbleweed, and I could see movement through the distant windows of the trailer.
I was curious. Closer, closer, the windows seemingly larger now. Were they dead? Could I go back home yet? I approached.
Brilliantly, astonishingly, a frigid crack! sounded. My throat tightened. Again, closer, 'til I was not far at all from the trailer. Screaming within, the wrong kind of screaming.
"Oh no, please! Oh, God, God! Let him go!"
Another bang, and another. The first; a gunshot. The second, the door colliding with the side of the trailer, Dylan spilling out, scrambling away.
"Run!" he shouted to me, pulling my arm. "You gotta – oh, fuck. Run!" He sobbed and convulsed, dragging me.
"They killed mom!" he repeated, over and over. "They – they – oh, shit. Shit!"
Lizard, now, ran out of the door, yelling, "Where he go? Where?" The boy sprang back, gave up on me, and ran.
"What was that – that weird screaming?" I asked, brisk, before Lizard could chase the poor kid.
"Woman," Lizard said, and spat. "Was Mercury. Not me. Was Mercury."
"What? What did Mercury do?"
Too late. He'd run off. I followed, not sure why, but I followed, my question in need of an answer.
Cornered. Poor thing. Absolutely trapped.
Against the rock, he pleaded. "Please, don't kill me! Don't kill me!"
"Lizard!" I screamed.
He aimed, and out of the corner of my eye I saw an airy green and white dress.
"Ruby?"
In her face was the most inhuman determination.
"No!" she shrieked. "Don't!"
She ran, jumped, collided, was very nearly shot. Lizard was thrown back, gun out of his hands, explosion into the rock face. Lizard swore, and Ruby punched and kicked.
Without thinking, I took up the gun. The boy had not missed the opportunity, his back now to me, bolting. I knew, then, what was necessary. I did not want to, but I would because I loved them best. I loved them best, and that boy could not be allowed to get away. He's seen so much. He'd have to die.
I gave chase. He did not even realize I was a danger to him. He turned, saw that I had the gun, and was gladdened. Good thing she's on my side, he must have thought. Such a miscalculation, such a flaw in assessment. I fired, and he was struck square in the chest. Backwards, backwards, then hard scaly ground.
Behind me, Ruby shrieked, "No! No!"
He huffed away on the rock, squirming and crying. The blood had been shot Pollock-like beneath him, the rest running, running. It formed, in tide-rock pools, in dents in rock and ground. He stared up, uncomprehending, and then through the pain understanding that I'd never, never been on his side.
"I'm so sorry," I told him, my voice drowned by my regret. Not for my actions, but for the necessity of them. His face, twisting horribly, inscrutably, was alight with the gut-wrenching torture of sharp air through injury.
I aimed, now, at his head, and pulled the trigger. The chamber clicked, the barrel empty. I tried again, only to be met by the same lackluster tick.
"Shit!" I screamed, and threw the gun to the ground. Ruby fell upon the boy, taking his hand, the blood on her dress. She glanced at him mournfully, petting his head. She said, over and over, "Now he'll never want to live with us."
As if there was any hope for him now.
Lizard, rubbing the back of his head, approached. "Where's Pluto?" I asked. "And Goggle?"
"Wit' Jupiter. Ambushed men."
"And…" I trailed off, dreading the answer. "What was that awful, awful screaming?" Mercury, still, had not left the trailer.
Quietly, Lizard answered my question, to keep Ruby from overhearing. She was beyond caring, but I was not. I stood stock-still, and could nearly have thrown up.
"How long have they been doing that?"
"All this time," he said. "Neptune, Mercury, Preach."
"Preach?"
"Preach, too. Preach no good."
"But you-"
"No. Not me."
Ruby pressed her hand to the bullet hole, attempted to clear away the blood; a pitiful sight. Dylan coughed, and it became obvious he was drowning in his own blood, deep within the lungs. Methodically, Lizard took the butt of the shotgun, paced over to the boy.
"Don't hurt him!" Ruby moaned.
"Already hurt," Lizard replied, and, with a resounding thunk, slammed the shotgun down to crush his skull. A sickening crunch ensued, killing him instantly.
I'd never seen Ruby so hateful, all her rage vented at Lizard. Not at me, who had kept him from escaping. But he, who had only ended his suffering. I waited as the nausea defeated itself, the roiling stomach calmed, and then turned back, walking the distance to the village.
&&&&&&
"So, what, do you just let it happen?" I yelled at him, pacing around the dimly lit bedroom, stomping angrily.
"Not at first," Lizard said, his tone almost pleading. He sat on the bed, his expression begging me to keep quiet, to understand. I couldn't. The moment he'd returned, I'd directed my escalating rage at him.
"What?! What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"First, no. Then, had to let them."
"No! No, you didn't!"
"Yes. For you."
"For me?"
"Had to stay on they good side. To protect you."
"But they never did anything to me. They never have."
"Didn' know that then."
"You could stop them now."
"No," he said, almost to himself, so that I wasn't sure if he'd meant me to hear. I didn't admit it, but I knew why there was nothing he could do. Almost four years prior, when the deal was agreed upon, it had been a favor on Neptune's part. He didn't have to offer. He could have exacted his revenge. Lizard was, still, in no position to keep them from doing anything.
"Do you see it happen?" I asked, needing to know, I suppose, the extent of his innocence.
"What?"
"I said, have you ever seen it happen?"
"No. Avoid it, much as I can."
I was silent, then whispered, "Tonight was a disaster."
He nodded in agreement.
"Where's Ruby?"
"Her room."
"Has she changed out of that dress?"
"Dunno."
I sighed. "Poor kid," I said, and wasn't sure if I meant Ruby or Dylan. I'd done a good job keeping myself from dissolving into tears, but I didn't know how long that would last. I thought, and, disgusted with myself, laughed.
"What?"
"I'm just glad were us, and not them."
Lizard chuckled. Both of us, I think, were content enough to simply forget. Of course, I couldn't. I still look back on it, after these years that divide the present from that moment. I can recall, with infallible clarity, the boy's head thrown back, the blood welling from his nose. And, after that horrifying crunch, the absence of bone structure, of a face, of thought or consciousness. Lizard, of course, thinks of it as hardly different from the other deaths. He thinks of it more as my kill than his. I can hardly fathom the ability to live and let live, to not care about such things. I envy it.
One always finds it easy to forgive that which she cares for. But I've forgotten, haven't I? It was more difficult that time. Though not by too much.
I conditioned myself then. I made myself have to be more like Lizard, more like Pluto. So, I'd shot a boy. Oh well. He would've died, whether or not it had been me or Lizard or Mercury who'd completed the task. I had to think only of family, of survival, of the necessity of things. Fuck conventionality; fuck right and wrong and all those things that hadn't mattered for ages. Not since my last life, not since normality. And, fuck normality! I lived like they lived. If that meant having blood on your conscious, killing those who may or may not deserve death, so be it. There were no consequences, no shame or guilt. Only one person was disgusted by my actions, and that was myself.
No. I was wrong. Ruby, too.
"She left Pauline," Lizard said, shaking his head.
"It's okay. She was with Big Mama and the twins."
"Said she'd take care of Pauline. Lied. Never done that before. Stupid girl almost got shot. Don't know what got into her."
"So what're you going to do? Punish her? Banish her to her room? She'd prefer that to being with us. She hates you, and me."
"Never been like this. She never act this way."
"She told me that she thought he might stay. The boy. She didn't think you – we'd kill him." I shuddered. Was I really speaking of this as if I'd done it on a regular basis. By all means, I should be going completely out of my head. The look on his face, stricken eyes, bloody teeth, came to mind; I flinched. I clapped my hands together, as if this would make the image pop! and disappear.
"You okay?" he asked.
Slowly, I let my breath out through my teeth. "No, not really." I could have laughed, to let him know that, with time, Ruby and I would be all right. I could have. I didn't.