Machines of the Little People - Chpt 2

Chapter Two

  

     The next morning I was tired, irritable, uncertain about what had taken place the night before, I had slept like crap.  I ran the images of Roger and that tree over and over in my mind all day.  The morning passed slowly, my thoughts tangling with those of my task and of Roger.  Replacing the rotted floor around a toilet took much longer than usual and I received no joy from its completion.

           Everything seemed to be working against me.  All the traffic lights were red, all the cars were too slow or cut me off too closely.  My skin itched for a fight with almost anyone.  I drove in circles, trying to clear my head or kill time.  Either was okay with me.  Before long, I found myself on the street heading for Roger's house.  I wasn't certain if I wound up there because of Roger or because of Audry.  Hell, for all I knew it could have been because of Jessica.  But I was there... again.  Only this time I had company.  

          The tires of my truck crushed the leaves piled against the curb as I parked.  Jessica and Audry stood in the front yard.  They turned to glance at me, beckoned me closer and then turned their attention back to the house.

          The front door stood wide open as if they had left in a hurry.  

          "I'll bet Roger has his pants off again," I muttered to myself.

           Parked across the street, a black car with a broad white swath down its side and the words 'Riverside Police' written in reflective gold letters stretched across it.  

          "Oh, Christ." I cursed, getting out of the truck.   

          "What's going on?" I said softly as I drew closer, as if I shouldn't be talking out loud.

          "Roger called the police.  They're with him now."

          "What the hell?  Why?  What's wrong?"  I asked.

          Audry and Jessica exchanged a strange look between themselves.

          At that moment, Roger and two officers came out of the house.  The smaller of the two went to the left and was speaking into the walkie-talkie at his shoulder while the other followed Roger to the right.

          "Ben, thank God you're here,"  Roger said and changed his path, coming straight to me.

          The officer stopped where he was, his hand resting on his gun.

           "Come on.  Give us a hand," Roger ordered and before I knew it he had a hold of my wrist and was pulling me along.

          We marched around to the side of the house to the side gate.

          Just past the other side was the screened inspection panel to get under the house.

          The cop moved suddenly between it and Roger.  His right hand gripped his gun more firmly while holding his left out to hold Roger and me in place.  He knelt down to peer under the building.  He shifted several times in an effort to see every angle possible.  With his hand still resting on his weapon, he reached for the walkie-talkie on his shoulder.

          "Bill, nothing here.  How about you?"

          "Negative."  The voice crackled loudly.

          The cop with us stood, brushing the dirt from his knees.

          "Sorry, sir.  The vent doesn't appear to have been used.  There are still spider webs in place and the soil is moist, no depressions.  Are there any other entrances?  A door in the floor?"

           "No," Roger said.  He appeared to be confused as if the officer was suddenly speaking Chinese.

          We followed him around to the backyard where the second officer was waiting.

          Roger and I stood near the tree that was the focus of our evening the night before.  The cops stood face to face several feet away, talking to one another.  Their chests appeared unnaturally large because of the bullet proof vest under their shirts.  Each held their thumbs in their belt to support their oversized arms as they spoke.  They glanced toward us and then turned a shoulder our way.  In final agreement, the larger came toward us while the other headed toward the car.

          "Everything seems fine, sir.  We made a thorough search of the house and the grounds.  We can't find anything out of the ordinary,"   he said,   making full eye contact with me, pretending Roger wasn't there.

          "What was the problem, Roger?  Why are they here?" I asked, still trying to figure out what had happened to make him call the cops.

           The officer shifted uncomfortably, staring at the ground but said nothing.

          "Roger?  Why are they here?" I asked, pulling him by the arm, turning him to face me.

          "I heard voices under the house," he said flatly.  It was clear his mind was struggling with it.

          "What?" I couldn't believe my ears.

          "I heard voices under the house," he repeated, giving me a stern look.

          The officer kicked at the ground as if waiting for me to give him permission to leave.

          "Roger," I began...

          "They were talking about me.  Three of them.  I could hear them shushing each other.  But, Ben...   I heard them."  His voice held a level of desperation.  His face twisted, his eyes begging me to believe him.  "Benjamin.  I swear to you... I heard them."  His voice, little more than a whisper, quivered.

          Before I could react the harsh crackle of  the  officers walkie-talkie burst to life.

           "Ten four," he said into his shoulder.  His eyes, clearly serious, shot to me.

          "Thank you, Officer." I barely got the words out of my mouth and he was marching toward the gate.

          I turned to follow him but Roger made a beeline in the opposite direction.

          "Benjamin, come over here.  They've just begun working.  Come on.  I don't know how long it will last.  Hurry," he called excitedly, running back and forth.

          He had run to the end of the house with the garage.  There, in that corner of the building, was a small offset in the design that held six or seven medium sized bushes.  In the side wall of that corner, the opposing inspection vent.  The soil was damp here as well.

          "Stand right here," Roger said, bouncing in place on the balls of his feet.

          I stood were he asked.

          "Feel it?" he asked expectantly.

          "Feel what, Roger?"

          "The machines."

           My mind raced to find the right response.

          "Their machines.  Feel it?  The hydraulic vibration?  They're running full bore," he said with admiration.

          "I don't feel it," I answered but I wanted to.  I wanted to feel it for Roger's sake.  I wanted this to be more than just in his head.

          Dressed in his business suit, he removed his jacket, throwing it to the ground.  He sprawled out, pressing his ear to the dirt.

          "Listen to them.  Listen to the power.  My God, it’s exhilarating," he yelled as if speaking over the drone of some powerful, massive machine.  "Come on, Ben.  It's only dirt."

          I moved to lay next to Roger, pressing my ear to the soil.

          At first, all I heard was the rhythm of my breathing and that of Roger.  I held my breath breaking the pattern.  Faintly, barely audible came a steady even pulse.  I pressed my ear harder to the ground, trying to sort out what I heard.  It did have a faint, repetitive, mechanical sound.

           "Ben?" Audry called from the far gate.

          "Here, Audry," I said, getting to my feet.  

          Roger did the same. 

          By the time we made it to the front yard the police were driving away.

          Jessica and Audry approached us, each slipping an arm around Roger and me. 

          "Jessica, Audry.  I..." Roger stammered before he broke down into tears.

          Arm in arm we went into the house.

          "Come over here, all of you," Roger said, rushing into the living room.  Opening the wall cabinet that held his computer, he flipped it on.            "Let me show you.  I have proof."

          The girls moved, one to each side of him and I in the center, just far enough not to interfere.  The monitor hummed to life.

          Audry silently wiped tears from her face and held my hand tightly.

          Roger opened file after file until reaching one called 'Katoy.'

          Excitedly, he got up, knocking over his chair, and rushed to turn on the stereo.  He adjusted it, making it a little louder than usual before righting the chair, retaking his place.

          "You must promise never to speak of this outside of these four walls," he said, covering the screen with his left hand.

          We looked at each other and vowed our oath of silence.

          "Ok, Bob," Roger said and a new image jumped to the screen.

          "Bob is your computer?" I asked a little bewildered.

          "Yeah.  Cool huh?" he said, grinning, half turning to me.  "I have him hooked up all over the house."

          "And the yard?" I asked, certain of his answer.

          "Of course, the yard.  How else would I know when the watchers are there."

          He typed his password and a flood of pictures flashed by.  One after the other, hundreds of them all opened at the same time.  Like an overflowing scrapbook, they had piled one on top of the other, filling the screen.

          The one on top was a picture of the tree in the backyard.  It appeared to have been taken by someone laying on his back looking up into the branches.

          "There.  Can you believe it?"  Roger said, bouncing in his chair.

          I strained, looking at the picture on the screen.  The girls moved closer, trying to see what Roger saw.  Time passed slowly.  No one spoke, no one moved.  We were all riveted to the picture before us.  Finally the girls turned to me.  Audry jerked her head slightly toward the screen.  It was up to me.

          "Roger...." I hesitated, trying to think of the right words to use but there was only one set.  "I don't see anything."

          "You're kidding,  right?"   He said, turning quickly in the chair.  "Look, you can see them right here."

          He tapped repeatedly on the screen.

          "I'm sorry, Roger.  I just don't see it." 

           "You have to.  Look.  This one is in and out of the house all the time." He was almost shouting.  "You'd have to be blind.  Just look.  Look right here."  He took a felt pen and outlined an image on the screen.

          His delineation was a dark, shadowy part of the overall picture.  The girls moved their faces closer to the screen trying to make heads or tails from his outline.

          "See it?  You have to.  Just look.  It's right here.  Right in front of your face."   His voice rose, almost cracking, becoming angry.

          "It looks like it might be a tiny face," Audry offered and she was right.  Looking at it that way, it could be argued that it was a tiny face attached to a fuzzy, unfocused tiny body.

          "Roger, what are we talking about?  What are we looking at?" It was becoming clear the pictures weren't going to help.

          "What the hell is wrong with you people?  It's right here.  Here's one of them, right here.  Proof, right in front of your faces."

           The three of us stood mute.  We just weren't getting it.

          "Roger dear.  Is it a person?" Jessica asked, placing a hand on his shoulder.

          His head slumped to his chest.  He drew a deep breath before beginning to speak.

          "Jessica, this is proof beyond proof.  This, my love, is a Katoy, for lack of a better description, a being of dynamic dimensions.  Proof that man is not the only evolved being living on this little water droplet," he said, raising his head.  He looked at us like we were idiots, like children confronted with a physics problem.

          "A Katoy?  Like an elf or leprechaun or fairy of some sort?" Audry asked.  The tone in her voice rose beyond disbelief.

          "No,   God damn it.  No.  They're not f*****g elves just because they have wings. That doesn't mean... look this isn't pretend.  I'm not making this s**t up.  There are dozens and dozens of them if not hundreds.  These are real, living, breathing creatures with IQ's off the charts and they are living in my yard, in my house, riding in my car,"  

 he screamed, jumping up from the chair.  He stomped about, waving his arms in frustration.

          "Roger, this is a lot to take in all at once.  Let me ask a couple of questions so I can wrap my head around it.  Is that okay?" I said in hopes of settling him down.

          "Look there's more," he said, frantically changing the picture to the next in the pile.  "Look at this and tell me you don't see them."   He was standing now, pounding at the keyboard, forcing it to do his bidding.

          The next picture was of the ground,  a thick pile of damp wood bark, a dense mass of mulch gathered at the base of a day lily.

          We stared at the photo.  Again no one spoke.  We just stood there.

          "Roger..." I began.

          "God damn it, Ben.  What the f**k is wrong with you?  Look at this.  Look right here.  You can't say you don't see it.  Not you.  Them maybe but, God damn it, not you," he screamed, pounding his fist on the keyboard.  He grabbed the felt pen again, clutching it in his fist like a knife and scribbled a rough circle around a central image on the screen. 

          "Right there.  I'm telling you, look right there," he shouted,   pressing his index finger defiantly to the glass.  His chest heaved, his nostrils flared wildly.

          I moved closer.  With a little imagination, the wood chips and the shadows they created formed a face...  of sorts.  Two eyes, a tiny nose and a slit of a mouth.  A set of decaying leaves formed the image of its hands.  A shadow from some unseen object off camera could be the outline of a body.

          "Roger, it's just a bunch of shadows.  They form an image, kind of... it's just a coincidence.  It's not... not whatever it is you think it is.  It's not a creature... not an elf or Katoy or whatever it is you call them.  It's just a bunch of sticks and their shadows."

          "God damn it, Ben," he screamed, flipping the chair over.  He stomped about the living room in a fit of anger.  He screamed incoherently, making his way to the foyer and to the baseball bat.  Grabbing it, he swung it about the room smashing the brass lamps into submission.  "God, f*****g, damn it,"   he screamed and swung the bat again smashing the glass coffee table into a thousand pieces.  "This is the culmination of my life's work and all you can say is it looks like a bunch of sticks," he screamed and began to beat the pieces of the table into smaller pieces, swinging over and over.  

          We watched in shock.

          "Roger," Jessica wailed.  She held her hands to her mouth and began to cry.

          He ignored her.

          "Look, look, at this one.  You can think I'm crazier than f**k and lock me up and throw away the key if you don't see what I see.  I'll never mention it again,"  he said, tossing the bat to one side, returning to the keyboard.  He flipped through picture after picture before finding the one he was looking for.  He stood erect, stepping back to make room to see the screen.      

          There on the monitor was a picture of Roger driving his car. 

          On the passenger side or more accurately, leaning over the back of that seat was a small, child like figure. To my disbelief its shoulders were blurred by what I could only imagine to be wings in motion, its tiny arm pointing behind them. In that photo, in the car just behind Roger, barely visible, was the man I saw in the Cashel's kitchen, only wearing a Hawaiian shirt instead of a suit.

          My heart jumped in my chest. This didn't make any sense.

          "Roger, I've seen this guy... just yesterday."

          "He's a watcher," Roger said with total glee.

          "Who took the photo?  I asked.

          "Wouldn't you like to know?" he asked indignantly and snapped off the screen.

          "Roger, who is that guy?  And riding in the car with you... was it a doll?" I asked.  My mind raced between the two images.  Of course, it had to be a doll, a staged picture.  What else could it be?

          "I told you.  He's a watcher." Roger answered calmly.  "And riding with me, Benjamin, is a Katoy.  If anyone should know, it should be you.  They live at your house too."

           "Roger, let's start at the beginning.  Help me understand." I offered.  My head had begun to spin.

          "What the hell happened to the table?"    He asked, pushing past us.

          "Roger, you just broke it up," Audry said softly.

          "I did?  Why would I do that?"

          "Dearest, don't you remember?" Jessica asked, slipping an arm around his waist.

          "You people are all crazy.  I could never do this.  Never in a thousand years,”  had he said, pulling away.  His voice was horrified at the accusation.  His eyes were wide, filled with a level of concern, perhaps even fear.   

          "It’s not important, dear.  It was just an accident.  We'll clean it up," Jessica offered, slowly reaching out for his hand.

          Roger's eyes seemed to spin, his face went lax.  He nodded as if listening to a voice we couldn't hear.

          "I'll be out back if you need me," he said and walked down the hall to the kitchen and then outside.

           We watched him through the windows.  He followed the fence line, tapping the bushes with the bat from the kitchen, searching for God only knew what.

          "Yikes," I said, half to myself, half aloud.

          Jessica buried her face in her hands and sobbed.  Audry wrapped her arms around her sister-in-law, holding her close.

          "Benjamin, what do we do?" she asked as tears ran down her face.

          The truth was I had no idea.  Roger had always been a little off center because of his intellect but it had never been like this.  He was way out over the edge now and I had no idea how to bring him back or if it was even possible.

          "It'll be okay.  We'll figure out something," I lied. 

          Jessica tried to stifle her tears and began to pick up the pieces of the table.

          "We'll do it, Jess.  Ben, get us a trash bag, will you please?" Audry smoothed her hand over Jessica's back, helping her to the couch. 

         The poor woman buried her face in her hands and began to cry again.

          Her sobs cut to the core of me.  It was going to be a long evening.

          I went to the kitchen to get a trash bag.  As I searched the cabinets, opening door after door, Audry entered.

          "In the bottom left, I think," she said.

          "Thanks."

          "What are we going to do, Benjamin?"

          "I don't know." I said, taking her in my arms.       I'll think of something but under the circumstances I don't think you and Jessica should be alone here."

          "You can't possibly think Roger would hurt us, do you?"

          "The Roger I know wouldn't but I don't know who he is right now.  I think it's better to be safe than sorry."

          "Maybe you're right.  I just don't know what to think," she said, wiping her eyes, pulling free of my embrace.

           Reluctantly, I let her slip from my arms and followed her down the hall.  Halfway to the living room I caught her arm and turned her to face me.  Without saying a word I pulled her close.  I held my breath; time seemed to stop.  She leaned into me.

          At the moment our lips were about to touch there was an audible snap, a spark of electricity that jumped between us.  We kissed a long deep kiss.

          I held her tight, trying to pull her closer to me.  I wanted to protect her from the world.  

          The kind of loneliness I felt after Kate died..., nothing... no one could ever fill that emptiness.  But with Audry the hole in my soul wasn't as deep.  The loneliness didn't seem so vast and there seemed to be a light, a warm light, at the end of the tunnel.  I wanted her to become a part of me, to love me.  If had become such a huge word but if she would, I could be free and I would be able to love her in return and be alive again.

          She squeezed me all the harder.

          A second snap, louder than the first, jumped between us as we separated.

          "What the hell was that?" she asked with a laugh, pressing her fingers to her lips.

          "Audry.  I..." the words got stuck in my throat.  I had been in this position a hundred times.  My mind spun, grappling for the right explanation.  

          "I liked it." Her eyes sparkled as she spoke and though I had heard it before, I believed her.  We kissed again and again each was partnered with a loud snap.   

          "My God.  Now I know... Sparky." Audry giggled like a school girl as she pulled away, pressing her fingers to her lips.

          We were laughing as we entered the living room.

There, standing in the far corner was Jessica.  At first, I thought she was standing there crying.  Then as her hand slid up to separate the drapes, she bent slightly to look outside.  It was clear she didn't know we were there.

          "Tomorrow at one... Garwood's," she said into her cell phone.

           "Jessica?" Audry's voice held a curious tone.

          "Wrong number," Jessica said, slipping the phone into the front pocket of her vest.  "Give me the bag.  I'll do it.  You two kids go do something fun."

          She took the bag and began filling it.  She seemed suddenly stronger, in control.  There was no sign of the tears or the concern that had enveloped her earlier on.

          The three of us cleaned up as the women chatted lightly.  It was as if we were cleaning up after a recalcitrant child rather than a raving lunatic.

              As I watched them it suddenly struck  me.  This was were I wanted to be.  More than anything, I wanted to be with Audry.

 

 

 

 

Reviews

[Wendy Seames Garner]

This is really starting to get interesting, Tegon. I like Sparky!

[Autumn T.]

"The tires of my truck crushed the leaves piled against the curb as I parked. " This is one of those little details that make the story so much better. Love it!

This is a very good story so far. It's developing more and more; sinking its hook deeper and deeper into you.

The one thing that I found in this chapter was that I didn't really feel a connection to Audry. I would make a flashback or two of the more intimate moments that the main character and she shared, just to give the reader a better connection with Audry. Because I kind of felt like, when they kissed, they had just met, although you briefly mentioned that they had known each other for a long time. I would expand that, of sorts. Explain it more. Make it more known to the reader. (: