Cuckoo.

Cuckoo.

 

I have seen pure evil twice in my life. This is the second time.

It was just towards the end of what most folks would consider the American dream. Or at least, what most people figure. I can tell you for sure, it never existed. We had a white picket fence, and we were real friendly with all our neighbours. We were quaint and peaceful and happy. It was about that period – but just as it was dying. Just as front porches seemed to become less trendy, just as fathers were just starting to mistrust their daughters boyfriends. Still, it was an interesting twilight. I was heading home in the car. It was so hot that day – it was so damned hot. My wife Barbara and I were counting down the days til our grandson was to be born. Sure, Lucy was young and still living at home, but she had herself a good man who treated her right and had a bright future. It was so danged hot that day, I swear, I had taken off my tie and was unbuttoning my shirt before I even walked through the front door.

And there he was. Sitting at the dining table, hands folded, with the same, huge grin I remember he had. I remember he was cleaner than the first time I saw him. I don't know whether I preferred that. It would be a mistake to try and describe him to you. I can say he was very black. Now, not as in the skin colour or anything. Just... Pitch black. Couldn't tell his coat from his skin. His teeth were clean though, real clean. Whiter than mine, that's for damn sure. Of course, I got a good look at them. He kept smiling like that. His voice was real gravely, like his throat was filled with concrete. “Evenin' mister Rosenfeld”.

Now you'll notice one thing I haven't described was how I was. Well, I suddenly wasn't feeling so hot no more. I stood in the door, and my hand refused to leave the handle. It was iced shut to it. It took me a good thirty seconds to actually pull it free and start buttoning up my shirt again. This seemed to amuse him greatly. Or at least, slightly more than most things must have amused him. I looked over towards the kitchen. There was Barbara, white as I ever seen her. She had both arms spread wide, leaning as far back on the farthest area of the kitchen she could. Neither of us were expecting him to come by. I remember smelling the sweetest cherry pie. Barbara usually made a pie Friday. Sometimes Lucy and I would sneak a bit before supper. That's how Lucy met Daniel, actually, new boy smelt the pie from three houses down and was curious. He's a good boy, that Danny. For some reason, that's what I kept saying in my head, over and over. He's a good boy, that Danny.

“Hot, ain't it?” He didn't laugh so much as... I don't know, it looked like he was pushing his teeth outwards, closer to me. God damn, that smile. I looked over to Barbara - “Where's Lucy?” I managed to wheeze. Barb didn't say anything, but she looked towards Lucy's room. Good, I thought. She should stay there. “Now mister Rosenfeld, it's been so long...” he began. It hadn't felt long, not to me anyway. “Where's my hello?”

“Hello.” I chewed the word. That was not the kind of pleasantry I ever expected to extend to him. Barb was still as stone. Still as stone. You would of thought she had taken a peek at Sodom. “Is that a fine cherry pie I smell?” He turned in his seat. I'm pretty sure we threw that seat out. We tossed a lot of things out after that. Some soot flaked off him onto the chair – I think it was soot. “Missus, is that your baking? Are you baking that fine cherry pie?”

Now, I didn't see what kinda look he gave my Barbara, but I know from her face, that I'm glad I didn't see it. I didn't think a face could get any whiter, til he looked her away. Ain't any make-up in the world that could redden those cheeks. She didn't say anything, but she stared him down. Something about that look said she couldn't even blink. He turned around. “Damn, that's one nice smelling pie.” He cupped his hands and lent forwards a little. “You mind I have myself a slice?”

“Barbara” I choked out after a few uneasy seconds. “Get the man some pie”. I looked over at her, and she must have taken a good minute before she started moving. Not that the fella minded, he just sat there, grinning as he always did. She was so stiff in the way she moved, but she kept her calm. That's my Barb, I thought, don't show him nothing more than he's already seen. Don't show him nothing and he'll leave. She kept the knife way steadier than I could, much steadier indeed. But she was slow. Real slow. Everything was so much louder – the knife slipping into the pie, the stickiness from peeling it back, the cold clink of the plate on the kitchen table. The she just looked at me. After a while I regained my land legs and walked over to her. I weren't ganna make her get close to him. We gave each other this look, this look. She wanted to hold me. But if she did, she'd close her eyes. There weren't no way she was going to close her eyes now.

I walked over to him and put the plate down in front of him, and gently placed the fork down. He looked at it a moment, like he was about to start drooling. He didn't though. He just looked. He looked like he loved looking. Like all the fun came outta looking. Barb opened her mouth, but then closed it. She didn't want him to give her that look. Maybe he gave her the same look earlier he was giving the pie now. That would have turned me to stone, I can tell you that. I wanted so bad to speak up. To just tell him to take a bite, but nothing. I couldn't hardly hear my own thoughts, over my own thoughts. I was shaking so bad, I walked back to the door. I was hoping it would be bright enough behind me he couldn't see me shake. Every now and then he'd mutter to himself “Damn fine pie”. Then more nothing. After about four minutes, he finally picked up the fork. He ate it with such care. He was so delicate with it you'd think he were painting something. He was so steady with the fork, he made such clean cuts. Then he would put it in his mouth. That was the only time I saw him not grinning. He kept his mouth closed when he ate. At first I thought it was southern manners, that that's how he was raised. Now I figure different. The actual eating of the pie – the chewing and the swallowing – that was for him. He weren't ganna let me see that. I don't know how careful he was when he came to chewing... Lord, I don't want to know.

Barb and I never looked at each other while he ate. We couldn't bear it. When he was done he neatly placed the fork on the plate. The clink – dear Christ, it echoed. They heard it down on front street. They heard that awful echo all the way back in East Harlem. They heard that clink every damn place I've ever been. “That was some sweet pie, Missus Rosenfeld.” He didn't turn to look at her, he just kept his eyes on the plate. He wasn't full yet, he wanted more – but he waited. He savoured the after-taste. When he finally open his mouth, I could see some red still there. His teeth were complete white ceptfor the cherry now. I remember every damn piece. Everything stuck between his teeth. My heart was a loose screw being bounced around a jet engine. “Mister Rosenfeld” he lifted his head. “How you doing mister? Sure is hot today.”

“It sure is, son.” I knew his manners allowed me to call him that. I was his elder, after all, and I wanted to try to be as dominant as possible. Still, saying that, calling him that, just gave me chills. I wondered how old he actually was.

“You sweating mister Rosenfeld? They got that air conditioning where you work?”

“Yes, they do. It's mighty comfortable” I was trying to be humble, too. I don't know what I was trying to be. Safe, mostly.

“My daddy would loved air conditioning were he worked. Oh well, changing times I suppose. Still, I'm real glad you're comfortable.”

“Son... Is there a reason you came by? Not that we don't enjoy company, it's just a little unexpected.” I held my breath. Please, dear Lord, please don't take offence to that.

“Oh I'm sorry, were you expecting company? I didn't want to intrude or nothing.” He pointed towards himself. I don't know if that meant something to him, but for whatever reason I almost jumped.

“No, we're not, it's just...” I looked over to Barbara, she was digging her nails into the kitchen table now.  Then she finally spoke up “Did you enjoy the pie?”

Mistake, I figure. He looked at her again. Oh God, all these noise. All this buying time. It was revolting, it was terrifying. But Lord, we had to keep doing it. Maybe he would forget why he was here, maybe he'd leave. Don't make me shake his hand, I thought. I don't wanna touch him when he leaves. He said something to Barb, and she never said nothing else. Something about the pie. I weren't paying attention – my hand had found its way to the door knob again.

He turned to look at me. “Mister Rosenfeld, you know why I come down here?”

I did know. But I hoped he had forgotten. “Yes, I do sir”. Look at me. Suddenly he was sir. Suddenly I needed a new door knob. He looked up at me and I got a good look at his eyes for the first time. I ain't ganna bother describing them. They made me feel small though. Like there was this... big, immovable... thing. Like it was in front of me and it was bigger than me and bigger than Barbara and bigger than front street and bigger than the biggest fear I've ever had, and it was bigger than the twilight of the American dream and bigger than the death of it. It was like his eyes were trying to tell me to calm down – like I was so small and they were so big that in the long run this didn't matter. But they didn't do that. They reminded me of this quote from the Bible - “Oh Lord, your sea is so big and my boat is so small”.

My entire life was the boat adrift in the ocean of his eyes.

They told me everything. “Give me five minutes.” He said, very politely. “With your missus, and I'll be on my way.”

I looked at Barbara. We both knew this was what he wanted. But Jesus Christ, the look on her face almost matched the look in his eyes. She was bone white, and I expect if she dug her nails into the wall any harder they woulda broken off. I wonder how he would have reacted to that. I opened my mouth. I was ganna tell him there was no way – that he couldn't, that this was an unfair trade. I was ganna tell him how dare he get into my house with that kind of filthy talk. Then I saw his teeth, and then I looked him in the eyes again. His eyes that told me to stop. His eyes that said no matter what I do, I ain't doing nothing, really. His vast eyes that made me so cold, so empty, so alone in the largest, blackest, most dead star in all the universe. Floating in a petrifying nothing. His “skin” - he when blinked his skin matched the darkness of the space I imagined. Then his eyes would open, and the imagining stopped.

I am nothing. I am all I can say.

But then I look at Barb. Her eyes, so much wider than his, saying something so much more human than his. The something in her eyes are nothing to the nothing in his eyes. I lose myself. I stop being a person, and I start being afraid. There is no other part of me now than fear. I can remember nothing, I know nothing, I can say nothing, I can feel nothing besides fear. I don't think anyone ever said that before  - I became an emotion. I became an idea. It was the single worst moment of my entire life... And I revisit it. Nowhere near as awful, of course. But I revisit it, at least five seconds, of every day, for every day of my entire life. His eyes. Her eyes. I imagine my own eyes. Sometimes I can make myself cry over it, but most of the time, that's because I can't bring myself to blink. I apologise for dragging this point out, but the thing is, I know. I know nobody can never, ever understand that kind of fear. Not to say nothing of the vast suffering of human beings, but I can't begin to imagine something as bad.

It was this moment I knew: I never believed in ghosts. I still don't. I don't think regular people have ghosts. But people who have spent time with him... THEY have ghosts. They MUST have ghosts. The unending unimaginable human anguish that arises from his God-damned maddening terrifying eyes, it can't be expressed with just one lifetime of pain. Count the seconds between each blink;

one, two, three... What was the question? What was the question?!

“I'll do it”. That wasn't a voice of Barbara's, that's for sure. Not now anyway, she couldn't talk now. No way. I knew that voice though, and it made me go real cold. Colder than before, even. That was Lucy's voice.

Barbara and I had spared her the horror of ever having to meet him face-to-face, but she knew about him. She had heard the stories. Watered-down versions, sure, but she'd heard them. She knew, almost, what this fella was. What he really really was. She sounded scared, but not enough. Not as much as someone who'd met this man would be – should be. It will sound strange, but I was so proud of her at that moment. I was so proud. She's so strong, she's just like her mother – except stronger. Braver. She was going to conquer the world, some day. That's my girl, I thought, that's my girl, so much stronger than her papa, so much braver. Such an amazing girl, I had. I looked at Barb, her eyes were tearing up. She didn't want our baby girl to have to... to...

But at the same time... She wasn't made of the same stuff as our daughter. She had always been tough, but our Lucy... She was something else. She had steel in her blood. But she was young – dumb... Comfortably numb to the knowledge of what she was agreeing to. She didn't know that this man... Wasn't... She couldn't have known, what he was. What he was like. He eyes glittered something magical. Something wondrous. “Oh my.” he said. “Is this little Lucy? She's grown up, I see. She sounds so young. How old is she, mister?”

I didn't say anything. I was going to throw up. I looked at Barbara, she was looking at the ground. She must have been panting, or something. She could hardly hold herself up. The man looked at me. “Well... if she's as fine as your Missus...” He smiled wider than he usually did. Five minutes. Am I really condemning my daughter to five minutes of those eyes? Could I really do it?

The answer was I couldn't not. I couldn't not do it. I couldn't speak. I couldn't move. Barbara was silently crying. She was sitting on the floor now. “Five minutes...” he leant back. “With your sweetest, sweet lady...” He was silent a moment. “Is that okay with you, mister Rosenfeld? Changing the deal like that?”

How dare he ask me. How could he possibly ask me that. I would have stared at him. I tried, but ended up looking at his teeth. Still some pie there. It was still clinging to his glistening white teeth. My lips are sewn together. I don't say anything, but I think they got a bit looser. It hurt, but I pulled them apart a bit. “Well, okay then.” He got up. Something creaked. I don't know whether it was the chair or his back, but I heard it. He looked over to me, his eyes weren't hardly visible anymore. “Okay mister Rosenfeld. You got yourself a deal.” He looked over to my wife. “Ma'am. I won't be long...” Barbara was crying. She reached an arm out as he turned away from her, and she mouthed something. Something like “My Lucy” or something. I couldn't stand seeing her. I had to turn away.

And then he walked off. Into the direction of my daughters room. The room I had caught Danny sneaking into one night, when they just laughed and said I caught them. The room where Danny became part of the family. The room where my little girl took her first steps. The room where my soon-to-be granchild was conceived. What the hell am I? I heard the steps he took, I heard the floorboards creak. I counted each vile thud. I counted them like the seconds. One... Two...

On three I collapsed. I was on the floor, with me head in my hands. I was panting. What have I done, oh Lord, what have I done? What kind of monster am I? I looked over to Barbara. She was in shock. She was just standing there, face so cold, movement so frigid. She never blamed me for what happened. She never looked at me like I share a hint of blame. It was my fault though. It was all my fault. Lucy neither. For some reason, I was innocent. I was an innocent monster. In her shock, in her grief, Barbara went over to the table and picked up the plate and fork. She went over to the kitchen sink and started to rinse it. It was all automatic. She was numb now. I don't know if she was still crying or not. When she was done, she just stood there, back to me, looking out a window in front of the sink. I couldn't stay there. I had to leave, I had to get out of the house. Needed air that hadn't been near him, couldn't risk... Hearing her... Oh Christ...

I ran outside, and I heaped over. I thought I was ganna throw up, but instead I just screamed. I screamed into my hands. I screamed as loud as I could into my own chest. I couldn't scream very loud, it turns out. I was wheezing, panting, crying – not screaming. I couldn't take it. I couldn't take what was happening. After being hunched over a while, I got up. Everything was so... So peaceful out here. So calm. So quiet out on the front porch. It was as if this whole world ain't never known that man existed. It was... small, out here. A bird chirped happily in a tree.

I had one of those seats. The kind that hang, that you swing on, for front porches. I sat down there and observed everything. The American dream. The twilight of the glistening age. Oh, the beauty of it all. Of my kingdom. I looked at the tree. I think I could have cried, if from contrast alone.

I would give anything. I would give my entire life, my family, my friends, every fibre of who I am, to be that bird. To live only a few years, I wouldn't even care. Just let me be that bird. That specific bird. Let me fly away from this house and never, ever come back. Let me fly until I'm almost dead, let me as far away from here as possible, let me happy and ignorant.

I remember when I was little, I went to a log cabin with my pa. He told me I was ganna be a great pa. He pointed up at a birds nest, he said “Son, you know why you're ganna be a great daddy?”

I said no. “Because you're like me – you're like that little robin there.” He lifted me onto his shoulders, and I saw. A little red bird, hopping around its next. “You look out for your kind. You're like me like that, you know? We pass it on. We look out for our family.”

Lucy did. Lucy looked out for her family. I did. I used to. I reached for the bird - “You see him look at you? You see him peck?” I nodded.

“See, you so much bigger than him, you're so huge and he's so small, be he ain't ganna have none of your humbug if you pick on his babies!” I laughed. I said it was probably a momma bird. My dad said I was smart. He said he was proud of me. The little robin hops around its nest. It's now long dead. It's children long dead. It's children's children though? Maybe they're around. Maybe the next generation. They survived though... I'm sure of that. If robins can be happy, they're probably happy too. This bird, now, wasn't a robin. I can hear my father though. Saying he's proud of me.

I don't think about anything for a while. It's been more than five minutes. I want to go in. I want to tell him his time is up. But I can't risk it... Risk seeing...

Hop, hop, hop, little robin. This bird wasn't a robin. Hop, hop, hop. I wanted to scare it away. I wanted to scare it so bad it never came back, and hope that I became the bird. Hope that as it made it's escape, I would too, and I would look back and see my body collapse. I would see Barbara run out. I wouldn't know who she was though – I would forget. I would fly... Fly... Fly...

I knew that that was fools talk, though. I knew it was coward talk. I knew I was a coward. I remember the drive home, my dad telling me about robins. Lots of facts about them. We started talking about birds. How penguins walk so far, and how their babies recognise their voices. How some birds they gotta fall to learn to fly. How baby ducks latch onto the first thing they see. Birds treat their babies right, my papa said. He said we were birds. I remember the ocean... How does an albatross treat its young?

I looked ahead. My kingdom. My kingdom of empty bird nests.

The chair rocked gently. The little bird flew away. I closed my eyes. No, nothing, still here. The feeling began to come back to me. I wiggled my toes inside my shoes. It felt like they were filled with hot sand. Hot sand and some little bits of glass. It was hot again. I unbuttoned my shirt three buttons. I wonder what's for dinner?

Everything was quiet now. How many leaves were on the car? One, two... three... Four. Just four.

I am calm now. My daughter is going to be a robin. She will be better than me. Stronger. My granchild is going to be a fighter, too. Danny won't ever find out. He's a good boy, that Danny. A real good boy.

I look to my left. There's a shadow in the doorway, the He steps out. I look at him, with the sun behind him. His glittering teeth, his infinite eyes. There is no birdsong. The light behind him makes him so much bigger. Makes his smile, his eyes, become one. This faceless monster. I knew what I was looking at. For the first time, I really, truly knew. I knew what it was I was looking at...

It was wrong.

“Afternoon, mister Rosenfeld.” He grabbed the tip of his hat, and nodded to me. For a moment, we both looked out towards the street. This was a shared kingdom now. All the birds had flown away. In one instant, I saw every bird in every tree along the street suddenly fly away. Like smoke. Fly... Fly... Fly...  He looked at me again “Their eggs are ganna freeze, mister Rosenfeld, just you wait”. He started to walk away, his hands in his pockets. “Next year will be a birldless summer.”

One, two, three... I never took my eyes off him. As he walked down the street, every now and then leaving ash when he placed his foot down. He never looked back at me. He never cared to see what he had done, the carnage, the evil he had left in his wake. It wasn't his business to intrude. It woulda been impolite. I never take my eyes off him. As he shrinks and gets smaller, as he becomes a blot on the canvas of my kingdom, as his shape becomes less human and more a figure. I never look away. I never look away, because if I do, then I know he'll be looking at me when I look back. He can feel it. He feels my eyes burn into his back. If he were to look at me, even at this distance, his eyes would shrink me. I would become the boat once more, to be rocked by his unwavering iris.

Then he is gone.

The fear, though – that remains. Every day, for a couple seconds, the fear comes back. My daughter ain't gone, Barbara ain't gone. I stay on the swing a little longer. Eventually, I would bring myself back. I walked inside to see Barbara, standing there. We embrace. Neither of us went to see Lucy the rest of that day. I notice the black smudge he left on the chair. I wonder if he ever took his shoes off. We stay there, hugging. Barb closes her eyes. She told me a couple years later that it took her two weeks till she stopped seeing him when she closed her eyes.

Lucy didn't talk for a while. We told Danny she was sick. He tried to creep in her window a few times, but she wouldn't let him. Lucy tossed a lot of things in her room. It took a while, but she eventually became herself again. But every now and then, she'd look away from us. Like she weren't paying attention. I don't know what caused that. If it's just her, or it's him.

He was right though. We didn't see no more birds for a while. The next year was a sullen one. Waking up to silence. Going to bed in silence. Sitting with Lucy in silence. I deserve it though. I deserved not having no more birds to cause sweetness in the air, I truly do.

I remember Danny telling me once, that the first time he kissed her after that, it was like she was an actor. It felt like some kind of big Hollywood kiss at the end of a picture. That it was out of place, surreal. He changed his mind later, after he had time to think about it. In a romance, where there are two guys competing for the lady. He said he was the other guy. He was the one who didn't get the girl in the end – not really the bad guy, but the less favourable of the two. That when he kissed her... it was meant to be sad. Or like it was meant to make someone else angry... That she was elsewhere... Either way, when they kissed, that next time... It was for him.

It was two years till I heard birdsong again. I collapsed when I did. I had come back. I really did fly away. I really did fly away and I was safe and loved and warm and safe and never had to think and... and I... I was... Then I was back. I felt like I had missed out on so much, but I was safe. I was safe without flying now.

Years later, Lucy spoke to me about the day. She told me... When he was... “with her”... In that sense...  The kicking stopped. The baby stopped.

Several weeks later, it started kicking again.

But it was different.

The End.