ART OF THE DARK - PART 31
Silence binds the trio as they drive along, a truly pregnant pause, full of anticipation, about to give birth to...something. Fresh air swirls around them, providing them all with that natural high.
Roseanne keeps her face turned towards the open window, eyes closed, letting the wind play with her hair, feeling good. Oh, so good. Life is beautiful right now, a piece of cake that she's about to take a huge bite out of.
For Todd and RJ however, things are very different. No longer friends, but not quite enemies, making for a most uncomfortable ride. Mostly for RJ who simmers as he tries to keep his eyes on the road, as he tries to forget that Todd and Rosie are even there, wondering exactly what will happen when all of them are face-to-face. He's not sure why he's doing this, he should have refused to drive. It's almost as if he's being driven by an outside force—
No, no, he will not give credence to any of this hocus-pocus shit.
There were reasons.
Plus he's got his nine and if anything goes sideways he'll pop Todd AND Roseanne.
At that comforting notion, he steals a glance at Todd who's slumped in the seat next to him, just staring out the window. He's quiet and still. It should make RJ feel better...but it doesn't. Not even close.
He sighs, looking back at the road just in time to see the deer crossing in front of them.
"Oh, shit!"
The truck swerves to the side, going into a small, muddy ditch on the side of the road. The tires are caught in the mud and Todd leans out of the passenger window to watch the wheels spin, digging them in deeper. He glances at RJ who punches the gas and curses, and then takes a gander at Roseanne sitting in the back seat. Todd focused on her sparkling black eyes, her windblown ebony locks shining.
She's amused by the difficult situation they're in, by Todd's childlike stare.
He turns back around and watches down the road, the present fading, the past coming to life.
He'd walked down a similar road once before, not too far from here actually, and the land had been clear, spacious, the beauty heartbreaking because it was too brilliant to be real. The colors of a muted rainbow could be seen in the mountainous ridges and the rocks high above reflected danger and commanded a heavenly awe. The surroundings had humbled Todd back then. He had felt small and protected, part of something so much bigger than he could ever hope to be, could even imagine being. The sight of such splendor made his crimes seem petty...and his thoughts, his corrupted mind, seem...normal.
In that moment he knew without doubt that he was part of the world, a necessary part. He was one of the colors painted there against the sky. He mattered, the darkness inside was called for, created. God, he had embraced that moment, pulled it into himself and thought it wasn't possible to ever forget it so long as he was alive.
He worked with Dr. Atherton, Joely to him, worked hard on getting better, healthier. Then he bought that property down this road and started building a house that he hoped would become a home. Everything lay spread in front of him, ready for the taking. He'd felt as blessed as a starving man would feel standing before a king's feast, having just been made KING.
A recall of Starr's laughter tickles the innermost chambers of his heart and he smiles at the memory of it. And he hears Téa, too, hears her tell him she loves him in a breath of passion. He recalls learning she was pregnant and he cups his hand as if placing it on her round belly, the twins rumbling beneath her skin.
The light in her eyes wets his.
It's all gone, Todd.
The cuts on his abdomen waken and while they're no longer weeping blood, they flood his conscience with guilt, horror, and excruciating sorrow. So much so that he doesn't even flinch when Roseanne places her cold hands on the back of his neck, her tongue running along the folds of his ear, the lapping sound loud and cruel. She's reaching from behind him, buzzing, the clamor of her whole self deafening.
It's all gone, my dark lover.
"Will I survive?"
She whispers the words and Todd finds himself frozen under her spell. He wants to run away like a child, wants to pretend his life is a play he can walk out of any time he wants.
Close the doors and hang a sign that says, Closed for Revisions.
R—R—R—R
She chortles with no concern about who can hear her, "God, I'm so turned on, and I'm so glad we're home, darlings!"
The sentiment is preposterous and exasperating, and RJ, the only one trying to get them out of the mud, growls angrily, "Girl, you better shut your hole before I make YOU get out and push this thing."
Todd watches his old friend and says distractedly, "It's okay, Gannon. She's right. We're home. What could go wrong?"
Stress from Todd's mounting weirdness and Rosie's blatant manipulations makes RJ violently punch the gas one more time before finally quitting, throwing his hands up in frustration. He leans back and grips the steering wheel tightly, white-knuckling it.
They're trapped in these seconds just like the truck's hopelessly trapped in the mud.
He asked himself again...WHY did I bring these fuckers here?
Reasons. See, the decision had been forced on him by circumstance.
If Roseanne was let off far away, they ran the risk of her revealing the truth about the breakout, about Todd's assault on her.
What truth?
Well, sure, they had their alibis, except with his and Todd's criminal records, they were worth the arrest. They were worth the time to harass. Bringing her along carried its own dangers but at least RJ felt more in control of things. He has the gun.
Todd later suggested yet another option.
During a stop for gasoline, Rosie had slinked off to the use the john. Todd had grabbed a soda and leaned against the truck drinking it, his eyes boring into RJ who stood in the still air and watched the numbers fly by on the gas pump. After crumpling the empty can and tossing it away, Todd got close to RJ. Breathed the same words from the pub.
"Drop her. Just fuckin' drop her."
He recited details of the job in perfect sync with RJ's own mental incantations.
"Take the gun and blow her brains out and bury her body out in the open, unspoiled land. She'll never be found. We'll be free of her savagery forever. Think on it, Gannon."
"Think on it, MANNING, think on what it would mean for Téa," RJ spat back, as he grabbed Todd's shoulders to give him a good hard shake.
And even though he hated the man with everything he had, he slapped Todd's rough cheeks like he really cared and looked into those fear-filled pools of blue-green, pleading, "Snap out of it, man, come on, don't do this to me now. Don't pull me into your hell."
The brotherliness in that instant hadn't been borne of friendship but of pure desperation for his own limited sanity. RJ felt the wish for Rosie to be made dead, feeling them deeply now. He wants the same thing, wants Rosie gone, but he wants Todd gone, too.
And he works against his instincts, fights frantically against them. Grabs onto a slippery slope leading straight to a death sentence.
RJ sighs in aggravation. What IS he doing?
The situation doesn't feel in control anymore no matter the firepower. Todd seems to have lost more and more of his connection with things on the way in. Perhaps it's the anticipation of seeing Téa, perhaps it's knowing he's lost her.
In some perverse way, RJ brings him to see Téa, thinking maybe she can bring Todd back to himself. As stupid an idea as the one about RJ being able to control things just because he has a gun.
And Roseanne, trustworthy Roseanne? Well, at the very least, she's maintained her manic euphoria.
A sensation of not having any choice overwhelms RJ. He's strapped to the roof of an out-of-control train, hanging on for dear life, heading straight toward a miles-high cliff.
Todd glances over at him and just says, "You always have choice, Gannon."
RJ shoots him a deadly look, then kicks open the door to the truck, not wanting Todd in his head. And not wanting to be in Todd's head either.
He starts wrenching stalks of tall, dead grass from the comfort of their final resting place, shoving them under the tires. He scrambles to fill the space, to give the tires some traction so they can drive up the road.
So they can get this over with.
"How much farther is it?" RJ asks, through the open window.
Todd just gazes into the distance and says, "Not far. Two feet can take you there inside of twenty."
"Well, get out here and help me, then."
"Yeah."
The door swings open, the hinges squealing.
RJ is down on his haunches stuffing grass and stones underneath the tires. Across the underside of the truck, he sees Todd's boots landing in the mud.
… and moving away from the truck.
RJ stops what he's doing and stands up to see Todd walking away, heading up the road by himself.
Motherfuck, he says to himself before yelling, "HEY! GET BACK HERE!"
Except it isn't happening.
Todd trudges along the road with one goal in mind: to get to Téa. To let her know that he understands her fears, that he's problematic, that something went horribly wrong with his mind at some point, and that all his energy shot out of him like...like fireworks, yeah.
Like Chinese fireworks on a barge outside the city, lighting up the night skies, showing his madness for all its dazzling truth.
"It's okay," he says to an imagined reflection of her, touching the cuts through his jeans, feeling the pull of new scabs. "It's okay that everything's gone. It's okay. We'll get it back in bits and pieces."
A loud crack in the sky shifts the clouds and within seconds the rain starts.
Todd looks upward, his eyes roving the darkening clouds.
His hair is longer than when he left and it brushes well past his collar, remnants of blood, sweat and tears running through it, the dark brown strands draping his tense, indecipherable features.
The bottom of his black coat glides through the air as he walks and the span of his shoulders gives him an aura of pure unstoppable aggression.
He's tall and the soil crushes beneath his heavy boots. Through the strings of hair, his eyes gleam with determination, with a fire that can burn destructively or lovingly.
Which is it? It's all gone, Todd.
He pushes ahead.
Behind him a specter straight out of hell follows and he can't see her. Her steps are light, like those of a ruined, twisted fairy.
In no time at all, he's made the turn off the main road and starts up the access road to Joely's house, his home once, a home full of love, acceptance, wistful soulfulness.
But it's been destroyed right along with the other place, the one standing empty mere miles away.
Wind picks up and he imagines it tearing through unfinished rooms, a plastic tarp whipping against unpainted, raw wood. From Todd's position, he's looking at a skeleton of his life, and he cracks at that. The fire intensifies as reaches for what used to be, saying aloud, his voice as frayed as he looks, "It's all gone, Delgado."
The canopy of trees recedes into the distance, a small opening of light at the end and after a few more minutes, he sees the main house. It stirs something in him, some flicker of memory. He recalls coming to this place for the very first time, as broken then as he is now. He remembers checking himself into a hospital before coming here, being alone in a sterile room for what seemed like years before Joely agreed to help him.
He'd fractured into pieces, each part taking control of a certain aspect of Todd, parts she helped put back together.
Strange, he suddenly thinks, how Joely's work could be so successful and yet fail so miserably at the same time. Despite all he's been through, all this shit with Roseanne, he hasn't fractured like before, at least, not in that way.
Instead of becoming five personalities, he's just morphed into one terrible whole.
And where was this personality hiding the whole time?
The shadow of the trees disappears as he emerges into the clearing, and there, in front of him, is the main house, big as life.
And there SHE is.
He sees her standing on the front steps where gray, rainy light drip-drops over her in a cloak of goodness and badness mixed up. He smiles delicately, feeling the edges of love and hope, grazing him as the wings of a butterfly would, and he thinks maybe, maybe there's something to the idea of rising from ashes.
Yeah, things would right themselves. He'd let Téa go like he was thinking, and he'd survive it. So would she. They'd each be on their own two feet. And maybe then they make their way back to each other.
Sure. Yeah.
But then the thoughts wither like sunflowers at sunset because standing right next to Téa is fucking Shelton. The one wish that didn't come true was his wish for that bastard to be gone, for her to leave him, for her to turn him down flat.
And it's the one thing that can smother the light, like blowing out candles on a cake.
It gets dark again. And he shakes his head because things have been let go of inside and they're scratching him all up and blood is seeping, staining, saturating him.
R—R—R
Run, retreat...ruination.
"Oh my god," Téa whispers.
And Dean happens to look up as he finishes his cigarette, flicking it away. He squints at the dark figure coming toward them, walking the path to the house alone. He glances over at Téa, and sees the look of horror on her face.
"Who the hell's that?"
"Ohhh... no, no, no...it can't be," she whispers again, and Dean looks back at the person approaching, suddenly recognizing…
"Oh, what the FUCK is THIS," he mutters, looking back at Téa for the briefest of instances who looks right at him, the terrified expression still there.
"I'm looking at him, I know him… but… I don't know what I'm seeing."
Her eyes are drawn back to Todd's ever-nearing, shadowy self.
He's everything her nightmares showed her, all humanness seems to have faded from her husband, all the love has vanished from his eyes, all his darkness is in his strut.
He intentionally buckles his knees and knocks his head back, hands coming up like he's offering something to the gods, and he drawls, "Oh my, oh my, what fresh hell have I found myself in now?"
Téa can hear him and his raspy voice stirs the air around him, the ground seeming to shake with his force, and she's breathless at the ugly revelation of his unsheathed soul.
Dean turns her by the chin, making her look back at him. "Téa...WHERE IS GANNON?"
"I don't know," she says, starting to run her words together in a building panic. "RJ told me he wasn't WITH Todd and Roseanne anymore! He was going to come back ALONE, that's what he said! I swear, I swear, I have NO IDEA what's going on!"
She shakily motions towards Todd with her hand, whispering more to herself, "It's even worse than I thought. I don't KNOW who that is...Jesus...it's Todd but it isn't."
They both look at each other...then back at Todd who's showing them that indeed he sees them and he sees them clearly. He sees everything clearly, so he's stepping up the pace.
For their benefit, teeth glint, canines flash. He's coming home, baby, and it's been such such a long journey.
Dean and Téa exchange glances again, each of them thinking the same thing: that if RJ isn't with him, he is most likely dead. Had to be because nobody would survive THIS man, and they may very well be next.
Keeping an eye on Todd, Dean carefully takes the car keys out of his pocket and slips them to her.
"Get the kids in the car," he says, trying not to move his lips too much.
Téa takes the keys, but hesitates...her eyes keep getting pulled back to Todd, to what's left of him, to all he's willing to connect to anymore: the hatred, the worst part of himself, pure evil.
Or so it seems.
Dean has to bump her with his elbow to snap her out of it.
"Téa, GO!" he hisses.
She looks at him, wide-eyed, then back at Todd like she could change what she sees…
… except it's pointless, useless.
She tears herself away to go back into the house, moving slowly, working to not look spooked, to not FEEL terrified.
Dean eyes Todd as he gets closer, and Todd eyes him right back. The silence is soon broken by Todd's gravelly voice, words simmering with deadly animosity.
"I blew out candles on a birthday cake and wished like a motherfucker that you'd be gone, that Téa woulda come to her senses. But lo and behold, the universe has fuckin' failed me again!"
Téa hears his voice but not the words, fearing what he's saying. She dashes down the hall, grabbing the side of the doorframe to the kitchen and launching herself inside. She grabs things in a furious rush, stuffing the baby bag and hurriedly bundling the boys up. She starts to cry as she does it, at the senselessness of it all, blinded by the horror of it.
The dreams, the visions, were accurate, truthful.
Guess what, kids...your father's here… and I think he wants to kill us all.
Todd actually stops when he gets within a certain distance, but he doesn't say anything more.
Dean glares back at him, game face on. He cocks an eyebrow at Todd, nodding ever so slightly in acknowledgement as he reaches behind him for the door handle. He answers Todd's taunting words.
"Yeah. Funny how those candles don't ever seem to work."
Todd doesn't advance further, nor does he continue the dialogue. He just takes it all in, sizing up the situation, assessing the threat level. Eyes on Dean, he listens for anything at all...and hears something… a thought, a singular betraying thought, sending its unintentional signal out…
That's it...you just stay there, Manning. Don't come any closer. Be a good little dog...and STAY…
… and Todd picks up on it, even in his beaten-up state.
He changes his expression, spooking Dean in its timing, and then he says in a low tone, mockingly…
"Woof."
Oh, he DID NOT just hear that...tell me he DID NOT just hear what I was THINKING, the fuckin' FREAK…
Dean then sighed… "Oh SHIT."
Todd grinned, and growled, "I bite, Shelton. I most definitely DO."
TO BE CONTINUED...