Chapter 16
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
Jack fought back nausea. If he threw up, there was no way Boris would bother cleaning the seat. Scrubbing it with one of the towels in the trunk wouldn’t be enough. And Jack couldn’t condemn anyone to a lifetime of driving a car that stank any worse than this one already did.
Not that it mattered. If Jack’s theory was wrong (and it probably was), the vomit would be gone by tomorrow. Regardless, the car was on the verge of falling apart. Sooner or later, Boris wouldn’t be able to drive it anymore.
They pulled onto the main road and Boris said, “This was my dad’s car. I haven’t cleaned it since I got it.”
“Oh,” said Jack, turning to look at him. “I’m sorry. How long—”
“Four months, maybe.” Boris drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “I dunno. I don’t really remember.” He sighed. “Whole fucking duplex was a disaster. I barely had the energy to deal with that, let alone the car.”
“What happened?”
“Massive heart attack. I guess he couldn’t reach the phone. It took a few days for anyone to find him,” said Boris, staring straight ahead, knuckles white on the steering wheel.
“I’m sorry,” said Jack again. A thousand responses raced through his mind. None seemed adequate.
“It’s OK,” said Boris. “He was a mean motherfucker. I mean, obviously he fucked my mother.” A ghost of a grin. “But he was a fucking dick. We never talked.”
“I get that,” said Jack, ignoring a pang in his chest. He only spoke to his own father out of necessity, mostly because his parents were still together. If he wanted to talk to his mother, he sometimes had to acknowledge his father. “It’s not your fault.”
“I didn’t say it was.”
“I know, I just—look, I’m trying to be nice.”
Boris scowled, brushed a strand of hair from his face. “I know.”
“You seem like you want to fight.”
A frown. “Yeah. Maybe. Feels better than crying, ya know?”
Jack didn’t know. “I hate conflict.”
“Ugh,” groaned Boris. “That sounds so boring. You’re boring.”
Silence. Jack leaned his forehead against the glass and closed his eyes.
“Fine. I won’t try to fight you anymore. You never take the bait, anyway. Listen,” said Boris, running a hand through his hair. “You wanna stop at mine before I take you back to the hotel? You need a fucking shower.”
“Oh,” said Jack, too shocked by this newfound generosity to decline. “Sure. I guess. I mean, are you gonna be able to bring me back?”
Boris shrugged. “I gotta go back, anyway. I wasn’t really done with work. I just said that because I wanted to know what you were doing.”
“You still weren’t done with work? How long is your shift?” Jack cried, exasperated. He shouldn’t care. But there was something cruel in the amount of time Boris spent at the hotel. Something completely ridiculous and probably illegal.
“I didn’t want to go home,” Boris said sheepishly. “I took a twenty-four hour shift on purpose.”
“It’s been more than twenty-four hours,” said Jack. “Trust me, I know.”
“Been keeping tabs, huh?”
“There’s no other employees.”
“Yeah, there are. Just not while you’re here.”
They turned onto a residential street, where the houses were stuccoed, painted in pastel colors.
A few reminded Jack of something one might see in a small European village, with dark trim and shutters on the windows.
Ivy slithered up trellises, engulfing Juliet balconies in brilliant foliage.
Though small, the yards were proud and maintained.
Willows wept, grass was cut, shrubs were trimmed, fences freshly painted.
They passed this street and turned onto another. Here, the pastel paints had faded in the salty air. Fences were broken, warped. Lawns were overgrown, their grasses creeping over sidewalks and into the street. Dandelions sprouted between cracks in the cement.
Boris pulled in front of a white house with a single car garage, easing onto the narrow driveway.
Jack observed the double doors at the front of the house and wondered which side belonged to Boris.
Silent and dutiful, Jack followed him to the door closest to the garage and waited for him to unlock it.
“Crime rates are high, huh?” he asked, because his head ached and he couldn’t think of anything else to say. It was the sort of thing his father might have said when he came to visit Jack in the city, far from the suburban paradise he so often boasted about.
Jack hated it then and he hated it now, even as the words spilled from his mouth.
“Something like that,” mumbled Boris, twisting the key in the lock.
The door creaked open. From somewhere in the depths of the house came a high-pitched yap.
“That’s Florian,” said Boris, shoving the door open with his shoulder. “He’s old as dirt and he has no teeth, but he’ll gum you to death. Be careful.”
Sure enough, a tiny white poodle came staggering around the corner, eyes milky, nose twitching, pink gums bared in a snarl.
“Hey, Florian,” said Jack in his nicest voice. The one that appeased even Rainy after a stressful vet appointment. “Hi, buddy.”
An unconvinced woof echoed across the entryway.
“Yeah, yeah,” Boris grumbled, dipping to lift a snarling Florian, who flailed in his beefy arms like an enraged cotton ball. “Let’s go outside, you old bag of bones.”
They disappeared around the corner, leaving Jack alone in the living room.
Boxes were stacked floor to ceiling against one wall, and the couch was well and truly soiled, but the floors were spotless.
The pictures hanging were free of dust, the coffee table clear of clutter.
The wallpaper was peeling, and the carpet on the stairs was stained and coming loose, but overall, it was better than Jack expected.
Based on the state of the car, he’d expected to find himself in a cross between a frat house and a hoarder’s den.
The television was locked away behind heavy wooden cabinet doors, but the bottom shelves were open. Jack squatted down to examine the brand of the speakers, then the receiver and dusty old record player.
A door slammed. Florian’s barking faded. Boris reappeared. “Shower’s this way,” he said, directing Jack to the bathroom. “I’ll be downstairs if you need me.”
And then he was gone, creaking his way down into the basement.
Jack started the shower, then moved to stare at himself in the mirror. Dirt streaked across his face, his neck. Mud was caked in his hair, on the side of his ear. His suit was torn and rumpled, to say nothing of his shoes, which were not made for hiking and reflected it.
There was a wildness in his eyes; red-rimmed, with the pupils so big that his irises were only a thin grey circle.
Jack disrobed while the water heated. Noted the scratches on his abdomen, the five o’clock shadow on his jaw.
Lean, black-haired, and pale as the mist crawling up Boris’s front lawn, Jack was nothing special. His face was a little too youthful to be taken seriously, even though he was nearing thirty.
It struck him that he should look so much worse than this. Days of nothing but gas station food and free lobby coffee ought to have led to weight loss, acne, greasy hair, circles beneath his eyes. Considering the circumstances, he looked spectacular.
In the shower, Jack scrubbed under his nails with a bar of yellow soap. There wasn’t any shampoo, so he used the soap to lather his hair.
The water going down the drain was tinted brown. Grave dirt everywhere, he thought, and winced.
After three passes with the bar of soap, the water finally ran clear. Jack scoured himself again for good measure, wishing he could rinse away the blister on his hand, and the sensation of cold, stiff skin beneath his fingertips, the sight of the dead woman.
He would never be clean again. Never be freed from this absolute hell.
They shouldn’t have meddled. His regret stretched fathoms deep, already a scar.
A knock came at the door. “I left you some clothes!” Boris shouted, barely audible over the running water.
“Thanks!” said Jack, both surprised by this gesture of goodwill and afraid to question it.
A few minutes later, he forced himself to turn off the water. He’d already been in here a long time and now his fingers were pruny, the water going cold.
Outside the door, Boris left a pair of sweatpants that were entirely too big. Even with the drawstring pulled tight, they hung on Jack’s frame. The shirt was a little better. Extra fabric puddled at his shoulders, but it was more reasonably sized. Probably too small for Boris.
After gathering up his suit, Jack exited the bathroom.
A long, empty hallway awaited him.
The door must’ve creaked, because Boris called, “You good?” Florian yipped in response. “Not you, dumbass.”
“Yeah.” Jack followed the sound of the yipping to the living room, where he found Boris sprawled on the couch, staring at the blank television screen. Florian sat at his feet, tongue lolling, milky eyes staring into oblivion. “I, uh… Thanks. For the ride and the shower and everything.”
“Don’t mention it,” said Boris stiffly. “Like seriously. Never again.”
Jack flashed a grimace. “Don’t worry, I’ll be gone tomorrow.”
Boris scowled at him. “Are you fucking serious? All that bullshit and you’re just gonna fuck off?”
“That’s the idea,” said Jack.
“Thought you said you were fucking cursed.” Boris raised his eyebrows.
“Yeah,” said Jack, arms crossed. “I am.”
“Thought you couldn’t leave.”
“I can’t!”
“Then how are you leaving tomorrow?”
Jack shrugged. “I’m probably not.”
“Sounds like bullshit, man.”
“Well, it’s a curse, so…”
Boris rolled his eyes and stood, startling Florian, who began barking again. “Fuck it. Let’s go. I just needed to let this fucker outside.”
Florian wagged his tail, pleased to be acknowledged.
“How late are you working?”
“Until six a.m.,” said Boris around a yawn.
“What time is it now?” For all the clutter in the room, there wasn’t a single clock. Old vases and piles of magazines and even a partially disassembled typewriter, but no clock.
“Like two a.m.,” said Boris without consulting his watch. “Let’s go.”
“So is Florian your dog or your dad’s?” Jack ventured after several minutes of awkward silence, in which one of them would start to speak, then sigh or grunt instead.
“My dad’s,” said Boris. “Vet says he has cancer. Isn’t long for the world. I was gonna rehome him, but what’s the point? Little fucker’s already half-dead.”
“Shit,” said Jack, stricken at the thought of Rainy being abandoned in the event of his unexpected death. “I’m sorry.”
“It is what it is,” Boris said, pulling onto the main street.
The fog intensified. Only the faint outlines of streetlamps and shops were visible.
The road itself was gobbled up by mist. “I decided he didn’t need to spend his last few months in the pound.
Gives me time to make some money while I decide what to do with my life, anyway. ”
“Oh,” said Jack. Disappointment flared in his gut. “You aren’t staying?”
“Fuck no. This place is a shithole. I’m gonna fix up the duplex and sell it, then go back home. I just didn’t want to drive back and forth all the time.”
“So, you have a house?”
“Apartment,” Boris corrected. “Paid off till the end of the year. Was kind of a stupid decision, in retrospect. I should’ve just broken the lease and moved out here for a while. I kinda…” He trailed off, grit his teeth and mumbled, “…didn’t realize how bad the house had gotten.”
Jack frowned and found that he didn’t want to acknowledge the state of the house, so instead he said, “Must be nice to have that kind of money. To pay off an apartment, I mean.”
“I don’t,” snapped Boris. “I work for a contractor. But I guess I got an inheritance now. Kinda weird.”
Ah. That explained the biceps. Jack very carefully did not imagine what Boris would look like after a long day of hauling construction materials around, because then he’d be distracted from… whatever this was. “Sorry.”
“It’s OK,” Boris sighed, pulling in front of the hotel. Through the fog, Jack could just make out the neon sign, a faintly glowing pink beacon. “I know how it sounds.” He glanced at Jack. “What about you? Where are you from?”
“Billington,” said Jack. “Kinda far.” Three hours by train, to be exact.
“Yeah, I know Billington.” Boris killed the engine. “Been there before. It sucks.”
Jack huffed a laugh as he threw open the door. “Better than this place.”
“Yeah,” Boris agreed. He shuffled his feet, caught Jack’s eye with such intensity that a wave of anticipation ran through him.
“You’re ever in Hallard, hit me up, OK? I got a couch you could stay on.
Or, uh, somewhere more inviting, if you’re up for it.
” His voice trailed off, but his gaze never wavered.
“Oh,” said Jack. He rubbed at the back of his neck, couldn’t help but grin. His cheeks heated. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, that, um, might be good. Thanks.”
“Might be good, huh?” There was something feral in Boris’s smirk, a little too knowing, a little too pleased. Adrenaline rushed through Jack’s belly alongside a flare of arousal.
They pushed through the door. The bell rang out in cheerful opposition to the empty lobby that greeted them.
“Yeah,” said Jack, blushing up to his ears. “If you’re saying what I think you’re saying.”
Boris grinned over his shoulder as he headed for the front desk. “Pretty sure you know what I’m saying.”
“Yeah, I—I got it. Thanks. I’ll keep that in mind.”
“If you ever get out of town, that is.” A wink. A flash of perfect teeth. Boris still didn’t believe him.
Right. This wasn’t the time or place, no matter how interested he might be.
Boris didn’t know what was going on, so he couldn’t exactly consent, could he?
Besides, Jack was hesitant to start anything he might not want to stop.
Guilt churned in his stomach. “I’ll let you know,” he promised and started for the stairs.