Read Online The New Dead by John Connolly, Various - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: John Connolly, Various
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tax reassessment time, the city is right at my door.’
Of course they send him to talk to Copper.
‘I’ve got one question, officer.’
‘What’s that, Mr Cyrus?’
‘What’re you going to do when they come after my house?’
If there is a reply, he doesn’t stay long enough to hear it.
The screen door slaps closed without a whisper from the hinges. Copper keeps everything shipshape; no squeaking door on his watch.
It doesn’t matter. The cop is on his heel and away, too. His polished shoes are too smart on the tarmac; the crease of his pantlegs are sharp as a paper cut.
He shakes his head and mutters something I can’t make out, and his cop cronies make some wisecrack back at him, and they all have a hearty laugh at Copper’s expense.
Anything to clear the air of the old man’s comment, ignore the truth of it, pretend it wasn’t said or heard or didn’t matter.
I lay low and watch the old man’s porch.
I dream of Mount McKinley.
I dream of fucking, and climbing, and cold, and pain and cold.
I dream of my dick splitting in half.
I wake up on the bare cement floor in the basement of the Baker house.
No pain.
No cold.
I hear Fetus moving around upstairs.
I stand up. Go to the window.
Still have to tell myself I’m home.
Home.
My hometown didn’t used to look like this.
It’s looking more like the east side of Baghdad every day. Damn near every house looted, gutted, no electricity, no running water.
I look past the row of shells.
Every house on this street is abandoned but one.
It’s the same for blocks.
A neighborhood of shells.
Windows boarded up, sheets of plywood over doorways, broken panes, sagging clapboards, chipping paint, ragged shingles.
All but one.
I see Copper across the way and up the street, sitting on his porch.
Copper sits on his rocker on his porch.
I remember I have something to do.
‘So what you want from me?’
Copper sits on his rocker on his porch, still as a stump. One spot- flecked hand over his other wrist.
It’s an odd position, and he changes hands to cup the opposite wrist, if you are with him long enough to notice.
Copper later tells me that’s how the cold hits him: it stabs his wrists.
His wrists get cold, a deep cold that starts slow before it bites to the marrow and lingers. ‘Started when I was in my mid fifties,’ he later says, ‘and the damned thing is, it’s same as when I was in Korea. Same cold, as if I’d never left it. Like it followed me here.’
But that is later.
Today, he sits with one hand over t’other, over the wrist, and gazes at me with those milky blue eyes of his.
‘You’re here all the time,’ I say. ‘I see you keeping watch.’
He turns his head and spits without taking his hand off that wrist. Over the rail it goes, a shimmering clam arcing into the perfectly trimmed grass.
‘Yep, I’m home, always home. What of it?’
‘So, we’re looking to start a neighborhood watch.’
His eyes don’t so much as quiver.
His lips are tight, white, top and bottom.
‘Keep an eye on one another’s houses, watch out for one another,’ I offer.
‘I’m home.’
Another lunger over the rail, into the perfect green grass, somehow without breaking gaze with me.
‘Always home.’
‘Yes, sir.’
We let that hang in the air.
We let it hang a while, let it slide to quiet and seep in, like his spit on the blade of grass below is hanging then seeping, though I can’t say for sure it is or does, as I’m watching Copper.
Copper doesn’t move a notch, and he won’t.
Up to me, since I’m the one intruding, to break the silence.
‘Since you keep an eye out, it seemed—’
Without breaking the gaze, another lunger, over the rail.
Though his milky blues don’t so much as
Of course they send him to talk to Copper.
‘I’ve got one question, officer.’
‘What’s that, Mr Cyrus?’
‘What’re you going to do when they come after my house?’
If there is a reply, he doesn’t stay long enough to hear it.
The screen door slaps closed without a whisper from the hinges. Copper keeps everything shipshape; no squeaking door on his watch.
It doesn’t matter. The cop is on his heel and away, too. His polished shoes are too smart on the tarmac; the crease of his pantlegs are sharp as a paper cut.
He shakes his head and mutters something I can’t make out, and his cop cronies make some wisecrack back at him, and they all have a hearty laugh at Copper’s expense.
Anything to clear the air of the old man’s comment, ignore the truth of it, pretend it wasn’t said or heard or didn’t matter.
I lay low and watch the old man’s porch.
I dream of Mount McKinley.
I dream of fucking, and climbing, and cold, and pain and cold.
I dream of my dick splitting in half.
I wake up on the bare cement floor in the basement of the Baker house.
No pain.
No cold.
I hear Fetus moving around upstairs.
I stand up. Go to the window.
Still have to tell myself I’m home.
Home.
My hometown didn’t used to look like this.
It’s looking more like the east side of Baghdad every day. Damn near every house looted, gutted, no electricity, no running water.
I look past the row of shells.
Every house on this street is abandoned but one.
It’s the same for blocks.
A neighborhood of shells.
Windows boarded up, sheets of plywood over doorways, broken panes, sagging clapboards, chipping paint, ragged shingles.
All but one.
I see Copper across the way and up the street, sitting on his porch.
Copper sits on his rocker on his porch.
I remember I have something to do.
‘So what you want from me?’
Copper sits on his rocker on his porch, still as a stump. One spot- flecked hand over his other wrist.
It’s an odd position, and he changes hands to cup the opposite wrist, if you are with him long enough to notice.
Copper later tells me that’s how the cold hits him: it stabs his wrists.
His wrists get cold, a deep cold that starts slow before it bites to the marrow and lingers. ‘Started when I was in my mid fifties,’ he later says, ‘and the damned thing is, it’s same as when I was in Korea. Same cold, as if I’d never left it. Like it followed me here.’
But that is later.
Today, he sits with one hand over t’other, over the wrist, and gazes at me with those milky blue eyes of his.
‘You’re here all the time,’ I say. ‘I see you keeping watch.’
He turns his head and spits without taking his hand off that wrist. Over the rail it goes, a shimmering clam arcing into the perfectly trimmed grass.
‘Yep, I’m home, always home. What of it?’
‘So, we’re looking to start a neighborhood watch.’
His eyes don’t so much as quiver.
His lips are tight, white, top and bottom.
‘Keep an eye on one another’s houses, watch out for one another,’ I offer.
‘I’m home.’
Another lunger over the rail, into the perfect green grass, somehow without breaking gaze with me.
‘Always home.’
‘Yes, sir.’
We let that hang in the air.
We let it hang a while, let it slide to quiet and seep in, like his spit on the blade of grass below is hanging then seeping, though I can’t say for sure it is or does, as I’m watching Copper.
Copper doesn’t move a notch, and he won’t.
Up to me, since I’m the one intruding, to break the silence.
‘Since you keep an eye out, it seemed—’
Without breaking the gaze, another lunger, over the rail.
Though his milky blues don’t so much as
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