of your Nondisclosure.”
I dig my nails into my palms and bite my lower lip until the pain punches through the static.
“I can’t barter with what I don’t know, and I don’t know anything.” My words are solid and clear. I scrape my tongue across my teeth and force sensation to return. I taste blood.
“You’re right, I probably was responsible for shrinkage because I’ve done some serious damage to my brain, so you can forget about my saying anything. I’m guessing Hoyle can’t use the fire as a tax write-off, if I’m hearing you correctly. And I’m in no position to compensate Hoyle or the chain for the damage you say I’m accountable for.”
“The police are saying it as well, so I don’t think that issue’s in dispute.”
“Right. So what are you and I discussing?”
“One of two things,” White says. “First, you say you’re unprepared to compensate for the loss of the lab, but you’re mistaken. You were one of our highest-salaried nonexecutives. You were also a workaholic with a modest lifestyle. So, it’s fair to assume that you are, in fact, capable of compensating for the damage. We’re prepared to wait until you’ve recovered from the incident in the desert and can access whatever offshore accounts or storage units you’ve invested your earnings in.”
“And if I can’t?”
“There’s the matter of some research and development. Again, you’re in possession of some intellectual property of ours.”
“I’m not in possession of intellectual anything.” My spit tastes like I’ve been drinking from a metal can. The electric numbness gives way to a fire beneath my bandages. If I hurt them when I collapsed, the skin grafts might not take.
“I’ve known you for a while, Eric. I have faith in you.” He stands and, without a word, Toe Tag once again helps me to my feet.
“Nonetheless, in your present state, your Nondisclosure Agreement remains uncompromised. It’s my job to see that, as your mental condition improves, you’re able to solve our issue of compensation while maintaining the integrity of our trade secrets.”
“What’s my job?”
“Remember. And keep your mouth shut.”
“That’s exactly what the cops, and my lawyer, said. You’d all get along. Want me to introduce you?”
“Once more, I see the old Eric coming through. Trust me, this will work itself out sooner than you think.”
“I need to get back.” I never made it to the Glass Stripper.
“Where’s back?”
Whether Anslinger’s tailing me or White, I don’t want them dropping me at the hotel.
We drive in silence. Moths cluster against the streetlamps, throwing shadows the size of vultures against the stucco fortress walls protecting Shady Pointe and Vista Acres. The anthill houses are all the same color of dark once the sun has set. White never looks at me or at his son. If Toe Tag is awake, he’s studying the back of my head.
“Here you are,” White says. I said anywhere, so he drops me back at Ford’s. “Let’s grab a latte some time.”
MEMORIES SWARM TO THE BRIGHT POINT BURNING IN THE DARK LIKE A SHELL of dust around a dying star. I see patterns in the formation, gaps between the humming wings and antennae. The code in the patterns is as real as your skin pressed next to mine, and the code tells me I’m a boy again.
I’ve doubled my hit from yesterday, bracing myself to fall from the sky in flames when the rush wears off, but it’s worth it to feel your arms coiled around my chest, your nose and lips pressed to my neck. It’s worth it to feel the kiss of the universe surging from my stomach, up through my heart and down through my legs.
Jack was right, I can hear the current in the wires. I’ve unplugged the lamps and unscrewed every bulb, but the currents hum like an angry locust trapped in my ears. I can walk my room blindfolded, guided by the drone of the currents and the taste of rancid tin. I stuff a towel beneath my door and cover the wall sockets with pillows, but the sounds intrude the way a leaking pipe taps through my sleep.
I bought a piece of God, ground to dust and mixed with alcohol in a glass bottle the color of molasses. It said “Poison” above the red skull and crossbones, and “Arsenic” below.
“Rat shit.” Dad crouched on the floor of our cellar darkroom, pinching a bead like soft, brown clay between his thumb and forefinger.
I heard them during night, the scratch of their claws and the drag of their tails like leather ropes across our roof. We dripped arsenic onto sugar cubes and smeared seltzer tablets with peanut butter. We planted the bait in pie tins on our roof and in our cellar. Some rats ate the tainted sugar, others ate the peanut butter and ruptured from the inside, their innards swelling out of their dead, gaping mouths. I experimented on my own, my curiosity leapfrogging from combining different poisons to new methods of disguising bait. Arsenic, I learned, was an element, one of ninety-eight atoms composing the entire universe. God, I reasoned, was part arsenic. That part of God killed vermin and sent people into convulsions.
While other kids my age mowed lawns or delivered newspapers, I shoveled hairy lumps of meat from our rooftop and cellar. Storm season had arrived and Mom was terrified of being trapped underground with a single rat, dead or alive, much less a colony.
Dad taught me about the sirens. My job was to open every window in our house when they sounded, and to keep the outside entrance to the storm cellar unlocked. Each second between the sky’s flash, one thousand, two thousand, three thousand, and the thunder equaled one mile between you and the wrath of God, and God was nothing if not faster than your change of heart. He could be flooding the next county or burning the next state then, six thousand, three thousand, one thousand, before you can slide the deadbolt shut and whisper for mercy, His dogs are on you.
You haven’t heard loud until you’ve heard God’s jackbooted angels kicking down the door to the sky, ripping yours from its hinges and your house from its foundation. Angels don’t knock or ask for paperwork. They cleave the biggest tree on your property down the middle, blow your fuses, smoke your television, radio and phone lines and leave you for dead.
Sometimes thunder sounded that wasn’t thunder, but a slamming door that made the windowpanes, drywall and picture frames shudder. Mom and Dad never shouted or raised their voices. Anger was a sin. If they didn’t shout, it wasn’t anger. Being drunk was a sin. Drinking was not. Having a drink doesn’t make you a drunk, Mom said. So they drank in secret, each of them hiding it from the other. Following an afternoon of clandestine drinking, they’d be not drunk and not fighting. They hissed through clenched teeth and flaring neck veins. The wrong question, Where’s Dad, What’s for dinner, Can I watch TV, tripped the tension wire. The explosion with a belt or wooden spoon wasn’t anger, but discipline, so it wasn’t a sin, either.
The force and volume of routine activity marked the tension, whether food was served or slapped onto plates, dishes stacked or dishes dropped. The tapping and scraping of silverware were the only sounds during a wordless meal. Their rage was as tangible as a change in the weather. Between the clatter of the coffeepot and the descending silence I counted, one thousand, two thousand, three thousand, before a door slammed or a plate exploded without a word. I glazed shattered windowpanes, spackled walls and hung doors without being asked, complicit in whitewashing the quiet hate crushing our house.
In the red glow of the storm cellar, Dad and I heard the sirens. I ran upstairs, opened the windows and grabbed my radio. Dad was gone when I returned. I heaved open the doors leading outside, hail stinging my face and my ears popping, calling for Dad. My voice was a whisper buried in the roar, the sound of a train engine all around me.
Dad stood, snapping pictures beside the pear tree in our yard, ignoring the sirens, the wind, hail and sound