I really enjoyed writing this chapter. The reader gets his/her first real glimpse of the monster in action, which
Wolf has been rather short on. The story's main themes--discrimination, alienation, lust, self-consciousness, transformational integrity (i.e., the validity of a change)--are all present in this chapter. I'm not really sure what's in store for Harry, but rest assured, it's probably not good.
...
Chapter
Seven
She walks into the bar, a girl of
twenty-two, a four-year-old child back at home, safe in the care of grandma.
This place is a loser's joint, a steady cloud of cigarette smoke, pool tables
with felts like apocalyptic wastelands, denizens with teeth as yellow as the
pathways to their hearts. Hank Williams plays on the radio, an ancient dead
crooner of tear-in-your-beer ballads, but she doesn't know this. She walks up
to the bartender, calls him by name, gets a smile and a pint on the house. An
ex-boyfriend hangs out in the corner with some of his buds, real go-getters,
the kind of guys you have to watch your liquor around lest they throw you over
their shoulders and carry you off to their caves. She didn't come here to
tangle with them, but she should've known better. There are only so many
watering holes in this backwater town. She was counting on one of the richies
from the enclave to make an appearance, some good-looking guy tired of cocktail
waitresses and his nagging wife, maybe needing to have a midlife crisis, start
another family, raise a nice single mother out of poverty and wage slavery.
Little Eric would breathe much easier in a big home with air recyclers and
top-notch filtration systems. Her mother's house was like living in a barn.
At
the far end of the bar there is a black guy she's never seen before. He's got
high cheekbones, a smooth face, a professional demeanor. Looks strong, like he
lifts weights. Wearing a collared shirt and slacks. Put together. Handsome. A
real man. She gives him a smile, and he looks straight at her. She can't tell
what color his eyes are, but they are vivid like living coals. He lets his
stare linger for a second longer before walking straight toward her. Out of the
corner of her eye she sees Brent (the ex-boyfriend) take notice with his
trucker buddies, probably whispering something about coons or spooks or God
knows what, but who cares, this guy looks like he could handle himself and
Brent could use a good ass-whooping. The black man sidles up to her at the bar,
extends his hand, introduces himself as Harrison Deforest, says he couldn't
help but notice her, and would she please excuse his being forward, but he
thinks that she is absolutely stunning. This is music to her ears; the guy
looks rich and seems open to a good time. He buys them beers and they go and
sit at a booth in the back. He tells her that he's an IT guy for the casino and
that it's boring but it pays well. She tells him that she's currently in
between jobs at the moment, but that she used to work at the casino golf course
a couple years ago. The conversation flows well, consisting of the usual
minutiae of life. He gets up and gets them two more beers. While he's gone,
Brent and his buddies appear and sit down at the booth, all reeking of whiskey,
their trucker caps resting atop greasy, sweat-stained locks.
“Baby,”
he says, struggling to not slur his words. “What're you doin' to me, baby?” The
two goons on each side stare at her like she's a piece of meat.
“Jesus,
Brent, get the hell out of here,” she says. “You're drunk.”
“First
you break my heart, then you try to pick up a nigger,” he says, shaking his
head, his mutton chops curly like wool. “And not just any nigger, but one that
lives in an enclave like he's better than everyone else. One with an attitude.
You know he attacked the bartender at the Bear over nothing? Now he's doing his
prowling 'round here.” Brent shows her his tobacco-stained teeth. He's gotten a
little fat since she left him, after he slapped her. Never was much of a
looker. Funny how standards change quickly.
“Is
there a problem here?” says Harrison, two beers in hand. “You three are in my
seat.”
“Well
hell, I guess that is a problem, ain't it?” replies Brent. He reaches across
the table and snatches a beer out of Harry's hand and puts it to his lips,
while his buddies laugh. They are all large men used to throwing their weight
around, tall, ponderous, lunkheaded.
“You
want to step outside, Hoss?” says Harry. A throbbing vein has appeared across
his forehead.
“Get
outta here, blackie,” says Brent, tossing the rest of the beer at Harry,
soaking his shirt. They all hoot and holler, slapping each other, confident and
enjoying themselves, bullies back in grade school, stealing lunch money, but
she sees something in Harry's vivid eyes, recognizes the unmistakable look of
death. He reaches for Brent, grabs his arm, and pulls him out of the booth and
onto the floor. His left hand comes down, hitting Brent square in the jaw,
bringing blood to his lips, but the big man's been hit before; his meaty arms
cover his face, preventing further damage, while his buddies seize Harry,
pulling his limbs back, dragging him toward the door. Harry screams, curses,
spittle flying from his lips, but no one makes a move to help, and Brent's back
on his feet, vengeance in his eyes, following outside. She watches the door
slam shut, observes the willful ignorance of the patrons, wonders if she should
call the cops, flee, or just sit here and see who comes back.
Outside,
the men have dragged Harry out into the back of the parking lot, closer to the
woods than the road, and have proceeded to take turns wailing on him, mostly
taking body shots, but Brent can't help himself, he strikes Harry in the face
repeatedly, because this goddamn nigger represents everything that is wrong with
his life; he isn't a man, he's the personification of entropic destiny; he is
the powerful powerlessness than drapes itself around men like Brent, soiling
their every deed, dampening their dreams, making them not into human beings but
machines of meat, floundering in their own dumb inertia. Soon Harry's lips
burst like ripe tomatoes, and blood streams down his chest, but his eyes gleam
with a livid ferocity, even as his consciousness wans and waxes with every
blow. They have likely broken his ribs and jaw, these fevered men, cracked his
teeth and concussed his brain, yet with those eyes peering back at them, those
green, glowing eyes, they cannot stop themselves, they cannot control the
weakness in their hearts. Suddenly she appears, running toward them, her
screams bringing them out of their violent stupor. Her hands are on Brent's
raised arm; he pauses, turns toward her, a baffled look on his face.
“Jesus
Christ, you've killed him,” says the girl.
“He
ain't dead,” says one of the brutes holding Harry. “He's still breathing. Look
at his eyes.”
They all look at his eyes. Harry has fallen
away, melted into a distant dream, a soft foggy land of dispassionate
observance, having shed his self from his body. The eyes that look back at them
are not Harry's eyes, in the sense that Harry is a person, a union of flesh and
soul. The windows close, shuttered with a snap. Something manic and dumb, a
reactive beast of the abyss, peers out at them now, its only instinct to run
and sniff and reap and maim. The two who hold it release their hands, having
felt the tremors in its skin, seeing the hair sprout from its arms like insects
crawling out of a bone. They step back, keeping their distance from it as it
writhes on the ground, foam oozing from elongating jaws. One of the men runs to
his truck to retrieve a gun, but the others stand mesmerized, captivated by the
pale light shining down on it, moonbeams illuminating the mechanical workings
beneath its flesh, the bizarre twists and turns of muscle and bone as they
distort into an alien shape, a haphazard chimera of a beast built from the
innards of man. Suddenly it ceases its gyrations and stands on wobbly legs, its
head a mass of scraggy black fur, the proto-snout of a canine sniffing the air
with raw nostrils. Its teeth are huge and twisted, stalactites emerging from
the bleeding gum line. The girl can't help but stare at its genitals dangling
at the bottom of its cavernous torso, its penis pink and wet like viscera. They
have backed away from it, moving as a herd, eyes locked with those of the
beast, when it suddenly lurches forward and seizes hold of Brent, plunging its
fangs into his skull. The girl and the remaining man turn and run, their piqued
curiosity vanished with the gruesome crunch of Brent's cranium; they can hear
the crackle-snap of every bite as they flee toward the refuge of the bar. As
they run, the vanished trucker returns from his vehicle, a .45 caliber Taurus
Judge handgun loaded and ready, and takes aim at the creature, who is ignoring
his presence, busy feasting on the remains of Brent. Boom goes the
firearm; blood squirts from the neck of the beast, the shot wide of its head.
He fires again, but the creature has moved already, leaping forward, the bullet
only grazing its shoulder as it rams into him a half-second later, sending him
sprawling to the concrete, the Taurus falling from his hand. He sees only the
great jaws descending before blackness obscures his vision, the pain immense
but brief, the distant mastication of his own flesh his last living percept.
…
We
are nothing but stomachs on the move
Teeth
with limbs
Bones
that walk and talk and crawl on the earth
A
thousand generations pass without a whisper
A
death in the forest
A
death by the waterhole
A
drowning
A
decapitation
A
goring
A
heart severed by a human hand
What
can we do but wander the earth
Deaf,
dumb, and dead to the suffering of others.
…
The
girl enters the bar, followed by Brent's remaining friend. Everyone turns and
looks at them, taking note of their wide eyes, of how they clutch their
stomachs and pant like they've fled for their lives. He starts blabbering,
speaking in tongues, latching on to random patrons, spittle flying from his
lips. They push him away, unsure how to proceed, his speech unintelligible, the
raving of a madman, but then she speaks. “He changed,” she says, and they all
look at her with muddy eyes, the salt of the earth, day laborers, men and women
with calloused hands and hearts. “What do you mean?” they ask, speaking with
one voice. “Brent is dead,” she says. “How?” they ask. Men have ceased their
pool games; conversations are on pause. “A monster ate him,” says the girl.
Someone laughs in the back, a shrill sound, and then others join in. The
bartender picks up the phone; he doesn't know what happened, but he's calling
the cops. “You don't understand,” she says, her voice deadpan, her eyes
reflecting shock. One man comes up to her, bearded and burly, and asks what he
can do for her. “Look outside,” she says, and the man waves at his friends, and
soon most of the bar has formed together, a posse intent on investigating the
source of discord. The girl, however, refuses to leave the bar. The burly man
opens the door, and there it is, the monster, resting on its haunches, a mere
foot away from them all. They stare at it like children behind the glass at the
zoo. Its claws rest laconically on the concrete; its crooked teeth give it the
expression of a foolish dog. Goblin ears rise from its matted skull. The stench
of blood hits them like mace, and suddenly they are scrambling back, shutting
the door, removing their revolvers. “Jesus Christ,” they say, looking at each
other, befuddled. “What the fuck is that?” No one knows; no one knows what to
do. It decides for them, crashing through the door, taking the nearest man's head
off with one snap of its jaws. Shots ring out, blindly fired; several are
wounded, but the creature is not, it moves with preternatural speed and fury,
and no one knows what the hell is happening, it is incomprehensible, this
chaotic situation, and they make animal sounds, primal pleas, pressing up
against each other, pushing each other to their doom, hoping in their hearts
that it will stop after one more meal, that its hunger has limits, but they
bargain for seconds, and it takes no respite. The girl is the last; it finds
her crouching beneath a table, her head down, her arms wrapped around her
knees. “I didn't want them to hurt you,” she says, feeling its breath on her
face. She raises her head up, looks at it, sees the eyes burning. When the
police arrive, no one can identify her body. It took her life and her name.
