The River at Night(64)

“I don’t know.”

“My opportunities were limitless, dear ladies. On your stupid log raft. All night long by the light of the moon. Early this morning. But I am discreet. Everything has its time and place, especially death.” She picked up the gun and stood to her full height, shells tumbling from her tattered skirt. Good God, I’d forgotten how big she was, all over but especially through the shoulders and chest. “The fact is, I thought the river would do me the honor, but no. Here you are, so, I still have homework to do.” Her arms hung by her sides, one stretched-out sleeve obscuring the gun.

“We never did anything to you,” Rachel said. “Just let us go.”

Simone’s mouth dropped open. “Never did anything to me?” She raised the gun and trained it at Rachel’s head. Eyes wide, Rachel scuttled backward on the dirt. Simone tilted her wrist skyward and fired.

Birds flew off, chirping and screeching as the sound ricocheted through the forest. Watching them scatter, I noticed what looked like a mummy’s head hanging from a branch not far from the one where the owl had landed the night before. A hornets’ nest. It shuddered and droned as insects circled it, entering and exiting the ragged gray holes.

“You ruined my life,” Simone declared. “That’s all you did. Took everything from me. Stole my only son from me. My family. You think this is nothing?”

“We didn’t steal—” Pia started.

“Then where is he?” Simone roared. “What have you done with him?”

“We sent him back to you,” Rachel cried. “That’s what he wanted. To be with you.”

“Bullshit,” Simone snarled. “I really should shoot you for that. If he wanted to be with me, he would be with me. But you changed him. You changed all that.” She took a step closer to us, her hair clacking together, her stench wafting over us. “Where is he?”

“We’re telling the truth,” I heard myself say. “He ran off after we buried Sandra—”

“If you’ve hurt him—”

“He was fine when he left us,” I said. “He was going back to you. Where else could he go? Maybe he’s at your camp, waiting for—”

“I think I would know if he was there,” she said with disgust. She waved the gun in our direction as she spoke, like it were part of her hand, like they were one organism. She seemed so aggrieved, so distracted by her thoughts, that I’m not sure she remembered the gun was even in her hand. “He’s got something in his head now, all because of you. Lies, fairy tales, all manner of claptrap. His mind has been poisoned with the fantasy of civilization. Of society,” she said sarcastically. “What a joke. There is more barbarism in one city block than in all these woods.” She squared her shoulders. “It’s simple. You’ve destroyed us. Our beautiful life. Nothing matters anymore.” She gesticulated at me with the gun. “You. Get up.”

I began to tremble uncontrollably.

“Now. On your feet. All of you.”

Rachel and I exchanged glances. As she pushed herself up, she put her hand over mine and squeezed it briefly. I knew she felt me shaking. Her eyes said, I love you, but get your shit together. This is bad. I reached my good arm down to help Pia, who was struggling for leverage against the tree in order to stand. I smelled warm urine and dirt and felt desperately ashamed—even in my terror—that I had peed myself.

“Get down by the river,” Simone grunted. “Hurry up.”

A fine drizzle had begun, misting the air over the river into a bluish smoke. It buzzed with ozone and I could taste the rain. Simone followed close behind me as we stepped down the cantilevered rocks in silence.

We stood at the river’s edge, three lost souls. It raced by under the rocks we stood on, brown and dark and full of trout. Simone’s humid breath steamed at my neck.

“You,” she said to me. She shoved the gun into my spine, as if she thought I’d forgotten she had it. “You’re first. You started this whole thing. Signing to him and whatnot.”

I looked into the water, stricken; in it swollen clouds moved across a blue expanse.

“Turn around.”

I did as I was told. Stared at the top of her worm-eaten hat thinking, I am going to die here by this lunatic’s hand, my life wasted on fear and worrying about the wrong things and not enough love in it at all. Followed by an odd flash of embarrassment, of all things, to be slaughtered in front of my friends.

“Get down on your knees.”

“I’m sorry,” I blubbered. “I didn’t mean to—”

“Get down on your knees.”

I actually began to do it. Brace myself for my own execution. It was like standing on a precipice, preparing to fall from a great height. So easy; seductive even. Shuddering, I resisted the image of a bullet tunneling through my brain and lodging deep inside. Willed myself to lift my head and find some way to live. Any fucking way I could. Simone ground the barrel of the gun into my forehead, a cold, lewd circle.

The hornets’ nest hovered like a full moon just to the right of Simone’s head. I caught Pia’s eye. With a flicker of my own I glanced up at the nest, praying Pia understood what I needed her to do. Good God, please, Pia, you’ve done it before—you need to do it now: read my mind.

With a basketball player’s grace Pia sprang from the rocks. Airborne, bellowing like an animal, she arced her long arm through space as her fist crashed down on the thing. It disintegrated in a hellfire of raging insects, of parchment-colored scraps, dust, and ash. Hornets screamed out everywhere, a black cloud that spared no one. Shrieking, Simone threw her arms skyward—never letting go of the gun—as the insects swarmed her. She ran a short ways into the woods but they followed her there, seething and humming. The three of us spun in circles, flailing and bleating.