An Axis Oblique - Chapter Six

It's that time again, boys and girls. Here's chapter 6:




–– Six ––

In times of crisis people often looked to the Good Book. Some in search of support; others, explanation. But most everyone did so for meaning. Perry never really understood that. The Bible offered few answers, if any; mostly just questions. In more than ten-thousand spins of this godforsaken rock, he’d lost track of how often that preachy piece of flowery prose thumbed its sanctimonious pages at the scores upon scores of wretched little followers.
What puzzled him to no end was their inability, or perhaps, their unwillingness…to learn…
Take death for example:
Only the stunted mortal mindset could conjure a concept so flawed and inaccurate as eternal paradise for a life built upon service; or by the same token, perpetual damnation for lack thereof. For whatever reason, so many of them felt entitled to kindly continue forever in some form or fashion – without any real proof. Talk about self-importance.
Someone might suggest that with all his experience, Perry would have grown accustomed to their antiquated quirks. But for all his expertise, he found the exact opposite was usually true.
“Better run through the jungle...”
He had to admit though; despite vague discomfort, this was a welcome change of pace, (or at least scenery). It was chilly with all the windows rolled down, (so the idiot could smoke himself silly). There were subtle, yet distinct differences between the outlook of a healthy young man on the cusp of his prime, and that of an habitual chain-everything on the fast track to middle age, (or maybe the grave). For one thing, the colors seemed to sparkle a little less in here. And the world as a whole had a slightly more ‘lived-in’ feel to it. It wasn’t so much a criticism, as…an observation...
“…un through the j’ngle…”

Keith was singing. Sort of. His voice was barely audible against the song itself and with the windows all the way down, plus the noise of his car, (which sounded about ready for a tune-up), he could scarcely hear himself inside his own head. “…don’t look back…”
He was halfway surprised to catch himself inside a lyric, but continued just the same, all the way through the chorus and into the next verse. For days, the sunshine had been falling on him in an entirely new way. There were moments where everything seemed to sparkle, and tingle all over, as though he could feel his own cells in mitosis.
He wondered how he’d failed to see things this way before; his body replenished from the warmth of Earth’s ever-guiding star. The world was a wondrous place. The sights, smells and sounds were all so invigorating, so…simple, yet deceptively complex; so…
“What the…?”
…goddamned…annoying––
From out of nowhere, this plastic, hybrid Volkswagen piece of shit thumped his rear bumper. “Fucking Christ!” The Cutless was stopped at the stop sign, and Keith caught sight of the rear-view mirror; where a small, awkward-looking man waddled nervously toward him.
“Yikes, I’m…really sorry…” he blathered. “I guess I was…I don’t know, daydreaming and didn’t see your brake-light, are…are you okay…?”
Keith looked up, rubbing the back of his neck.
“License and registration please.”
The pudgy man sort of swallowed. “Oh. Um…I beg your…”
“What are you, blind and deaf? Show me your driver’s license, sir. And your vehicle registration before we do this the hard way…”
“Well I, ah…is that really necessary?” The fat oaf was starting to sweat.
“Do you want me to step out of this car, sir?” Keith snapped, adjusting the sun-visor to play off his gleaming Maplewood shield…
“Okay! Okay, Officer. I certainly don’t want any trouble, I didn’t…” The man began fumbling around his back pocket and finally emerged with an overstuffed wallet. “If you’ll just bear with me a moment...” Flipping through all that clutter, cards fell clumsily to the pavement and the awkward character scarcely seemed to care; (although the impatience in Keith’s voice might have had something to do with it). “This is my, ah, license…and, um, the registration…is, I believe here in the glove––”
Keith snatched it like a pigeon in Central Park. For a moment there was silence as his fingers scanned the laminated card, long enough for the sweaty buffoon to take clear notice of the holstered Berretta on the passenger’s seat.
“Says here you were born in Montana.”
The fat man attempted to relax.
“What’s that? Yup. Yes, siree…moved here about…two years ago, I guess…and I, um, haven’t––”
“And it’s expired.”
“Oh. Yeah, well, I…can explain, see…”
“Save it. Now listen, I don’t know how they do it out there in Backwoods, Bumblefuck, Mr. um…‘Prescott…’but here in Connecticut it’s a federal offence to operate a Class D vehicle without a valid driver’s license…”
“Oh…well now, come on, Officer, I hardly––”
“Hardly what, Harold? You calling me a liar?” he baited, glancing back at the card.
“Liar? What––no…oh, Dear God no, I would never––” Keith made certain the sweaty hick saw him reach for his gun before grandiosely stepping out of his vehicle.
“If there’s one thing I hate worse than laziness, it’s a no-good criminal…” He crowded the man.
“I didn’t…say anything, Officer, sir, I just…now, ah, you’re not planning on using that, are you?” Keith could all but smell the intimidation. Intoxicating...
“What, you mean this?” he challenged, bringing the pistol against the man’s pudgy, round face. “This frighten you, Mr. Prescott? ‘Cuz there’s no reason it should. Not unless you’ve got something to be frightened over…” The barrel slid up and down Prescott’s stocky torso. Keith could literally feel the poor slob’s sweat forming with urgency under his mustard-colored shirt. Polyester. Figures...
“Whoa! What are you…you’re not going to––” Keith smiled. Here was a man moved to blind panic over little old he; spineless…cowardly…expendable…
“Tell me something,” Keith asked, the barrel sinking…pushing deeper into Prescott’s Pilsbury flesh. “Who in God’s name would miss you?” The question was met with a giggle.
“I beg you’re––”
“Oh come now, Harold, don’t give me that, it’s a simple question.” Keith moved just a tiny bit closer, “If I pulled this trigger, right here, right now…would anyone actually notice? Can you honestly name even one person?”
“Well…I, ah…hmm…”
“Do it! Just give me one name; one genuine and, well obviously pathetic excuse for a fool that’d shed so much as a single tear if I wiped your fat, sweaty ass from the planet right here and now on the side of this suburban back street.” Keith could feel his thumb growing increasingly itchy on the trigger... Oh come on, who would know…?
“I’m not sure if…I mean it would probably…wh-wh-what gives you the right, sir, to pull out your…your pistol there and play God with my life anyhow? Officer, um…”
“This isn’t about me, Harold. Now name someone. I really don’t see why it’s so difficult. Throw out one goddamned name and we can forget this whole thing...”
“Well I…really don’t see why I should even have to play this ridiculous––”
“I don’t really give a shit what you see, Harold…now do it or I’ll shoot you. Is that clear enough?” Keith cocked the weapon slowly, loudly enough to be heard beyond the shadow of a doubt. “You think this is a game? Am I playing with you now?” Harold, meanwhile, looked about ready to burst into tears. “I could kill you, you miserable waste of existence. You do nothing, understand? Nothing but take up space.” He stopped. “And you wanna know something? I’d probably be doing you a huge favor.” then ominously went into his back pocket for a tiny Swiss army knife…
“Whoa! Now what are you––?” A single tear rolled down Prescott’s rosy cheek.
“Yup. I could start you off on…an indescribable adventure. How bout it, Harry? You up for it?” The blade pressed into Harold’s fat face. “Aw, who am I kidding. You’d only fuck it up!” Okay, enough foreplay...
“Ow!” The man yelped. “What the…?” The mark was small and hardly noticeable, like a paper-cut. But it certainly bled easily enough.
“Whoops. Sorry about that, friend. Here, let me get that…” Gently, he wiped the fresh blood from the man’s quivering cheekbone, then licked his finger clean.
Tastes like fear…
“Alright! Sir, I’ve had just about en…enough. Now I don’t know the law very well. Certainly not to the extent that you do, but I’m pretty sure that this…” Prescott swallowed hard, determined for once to finish his thought. “…these scare tactics of yours are not standard procedure. Now if you’re going to charge me with something I suggest that you get on with it because, I have to say, I’m quite looking forward to speaking with your superior down at that station of yours…”
“Shut up, Harold. And speak when spoken to.” The blade, featured so prominently only moments ago, was now nowhere in sight. Ditto for the gun.
*
“Your license’ll be up for renewal in a few weeks,” he said, sounding different; calmer… “I’m gonna have to hang on to this, I’m afraid.” The man’s tone had miraculously become much friendlier and more subdued as he retreated back into his car for a pad and pen. “I’m issuing you a temporary permit. See to it you’re brought up to date by then…” he said, tearing away the hand-written permit…
“Yeah…ah, yes. Yes, absolutely…Officer...will do…” Prescott noted his eyes were now back to a shimmering green. Somehow, he could tell this was a different man all of a sudden. It was the damdest thing, but he decided not to rock what was obviously a very unstable boat. “Th-thank you…” he managed. “You know. I mean, for not…”
“You just be certain to heed what I said, okay? Next time I might not be so forgiving. Now go have yourself a pleasant day, and drive careful.”
Harold watched in amazement as the crazy cop got back in his car. Almost instantly, he could hear some tedious, seventies rock riff, blasting without boundary…
–– layin in a travelin band, yeah!
Well, Im flyin cross the land, tryin to get a hand,
Playin in a travelin band...
Driving off into the very oblivion from which he’d come, the officer kindly waved. Harold simply stood there, dumbfounded on the side of the road, trying his best to wrap a stressful and now exhausted mind around the sudden one-eighty––when a gold Toyota rolled up to the stop sign behind him at long last.
Bad timing, he thought. Story of his life.
–––––––––––––––
“I don’t understand any of this. How does a man behave one way in broad daylight and turn into something completely different after dark? It doesn’t––”
“Alright, Raymond, that’s enough.” A voice spoke from the shadowy alcove. Raymond turned to face his Uncle Paulo before shrugging him off in frustration. “What’s done is done.” The old man continued. “There’s no sense in second guessing so far after the fact. Now, the police will be here any minute. What we need to do; and what Juanita needs us to do, is gather our composure and present a united front, understand?”
The core of the Duvaliente family was gathered in the kitchen. Most of the mourners had gone home; some on their own volition; others practically forced by intense discomfort. The rest remained to help with what had become an even more serious predicament than first thought––or ever imagined. Among them were Paulo, Cesaro’s oldest living relative; with her on that awful day more than twenty-five years ago in Manatzas; a place so close to what she imagined Hell must be like, it would burn in her memory forever. Edward was there too; her brother-in-law of almost forty years––and of course, Raymond, Edward’s and her late sister’s son, now in his mid-thirties.
“Oh, Sonny...” Juanita groaned softly, reemerging at long last after a lengthy absence. “Sonny, my dear, sweet Sonny, how could you have been so…” But she could not yet bring herself to speak the thoughts in her head; thoughts that betrayed her. Instead, she just cried. To the others, it seemed like all she’d been doing for days.
“Juanita.” Edward finally spoke. “What do you want to do?” he asked, and as simple a question as it may have been, no one had actually thought to pose it.
“Yes,” Paulo echoed. “Everyone’s been talking around you, but no one’s been talking to you. Now Sonny was special to all of us, and we all want to protect his memory…”
“Not to mention your privacy,” Raymond added.
“Yes. But, as much as we all loved and cared for him as though he were our own, he was your boy and only you can decide how to proceed with this…new information…”
The room went eerily silent. She seemed lost in heavy contemplation, as though attempting to weigh her own wishes against those she speculated Sonny’s might have been. From time to time, the men looked at her, and each other; trying to show respect while underscoring the rising urgency. The police, after all, would be there soon.
“We will show them,” she said after almost five full minutes. The others traded looks before finally, one of them decided to ask the question on all of their minds.
“Yes, of course.” It was Paulo. “But…how much?”
“Everything,” she replied definitively. “No more secrets.” Edward was the first to approach, gently placing a hand on her pale, bony shoulder.
“It’s the right thing to do,” he said. “God will be with you.”
“Yes,” added Raymond. “And so will we.”
*
“Good afternoon, Mrs. Duval. I’m Detective Merrimac, we spoke on the phone, and met briefly the other day.” Keith was in reasonably good spirits, despite the fact he was standing in the doorway of another murder victim in his once-peaceful town. He hadn’t expected to return here so soon after notifying the family of Sonny Duval’s untimely demise, but there was something in the mother’s tone of voice that morning––something that went beyond grief. To Keith, it had sounded more like…blind panic…
“Duvaliente.” One of the men spoke under his breath as he made his way inside. A white-haired gentlemen, who spoke with a thick Latino accent.
“Beg your pardon?”
“You said Duval. It’s Duvaliente.”
“Oh. I’m, ah, very sorry. It’s just that the, ah…Sonny had the name ‘Duval’ on his driver’s license when we…my mistake…”
“Sonny preferred a more American name for business and well…I suppose just to blend in more seamlessly,” his mother explained down the hallway and up the stairs.
“I see. And, um, what business would that be?” Keith inquired.
The woman paused in stumped contemplation.
“Sonny was involved in all kinds of endeavors. To be perfectly honest, Detective, I’m not sure how he made most of his money.”
“Well it’s not entirely unusual for a young man to keep things from his family,” he replied, trying not to offend––and yet somewhere inside, a strange skepticism––and familiarity…lingered…

Old Ghosts…
It was strange being here. This house. That woman, and the others. They all seemed so… familiar; so frightfully distant, though oddly comforting at the same time. Moving through the modest dwelling, Perry took in all the sights, the sounds and even the faintest smells of what constituted a whole nother lifetime. Everyone there was a stranger to him and yet, in some capacity, he felt as though he’d known them all for years. This is the way to my old room, he thought. I wonder if anything’s been changed…

“––’d never thought to look but I––well, I suppose I was just afraid of what I might find...” The woman had been speaking but Keith’s mind was temporarily elsewhere; a problem with which he’d been dealing, off and on, for a few days now.
“It’s perfectly understandable, Mrs. Duvaliente. I can only imagine how difficult this has been for you.” He hoped his reply was somewhere in the ballpark.
“Thank you, Paulo,” she said, turning sternly to the entourage in the doorway. “I’d like you to leave us alone now.” The white-haired gentlemen appeared uneasy, but after a few tense seconds, left quietly, and took the posse with him.
“Be careful, Detective. It’s not quite dry yet.” She said once they were alone, and slowly made her way to her late son’s closet, doors open just a sliver.
“So I’ve noticed…” The smell was consistent with disinfectant. He watched her fragile fingers slowly pull the doors apart.
Keith looked on in disbelief. At first glance, the closet seemed ordinary enough, packed with clothes, a few old board games and other childhood keepsakes, but in the far left corner, up on the shelf, he saw a Tupperware container about the size of a cereal box. It was filled halfway with water, or more likely, melted ice, and from his approximate distance, gave off the muggy, yet distinct scent of formaldehyde…
“What in God’s name…?” But he trailed off in mid-sentence for he could easily make out the contents by then... A hand. “When did you––?”
“Yesterday.” She interrupted. “Late last night, I should say. I suppose I was in shock, or something. So I waited a little longer than perhaps I should have.” Keith was in close, examining but not touching. He had little doubt it was recently severed, but for what possible purpose he could not yet begin to speculate. Late night snack? Fun, maybe?
“Mrs. Duvaliente, please listen to me carefully. Do you have any idea how, or more importantly why Sonny would want a human hand packed in ice to keep in his bedroom closet?” He couldn’t believe he was asking such a question.
“Detective, I can assure you with every fiber of my being that I do not.”
“Of course,” he said quickly, suddenly realizing something peculiar about all this; (well, more so). “Why would he pack it in ice if he knew it would melt?” He posed aloud, though the question was really rhetorical.
“Well…” She was thinking. “We do have a chest freezer––but the motor’s been broken for some––” She stopped. Keith tried his best to be gentle––but firm…
“And where exactly is that?”
* * *
The woman was visibly shaking. They were standing in the garage before a large Kenmore freezer buried under boxes and clutter. Carefully, Keith began clearing them away, then tried the stubborn lid, which seemed frozen shut––
“It’s still plugged in,” he said, feeling the top, and tracking the long, hidden chord all the way to the wall outlet. “How long did you say it’s been this way?” He struggled in a more or less futile attempt to pry the door open with his bare hands.
“I’m sorry? Oh, um, at least a few years. Since we lost the key. I can’t tell you how many times I asked Sonny to throw it away but he just…” Her voice trailed off and again, she looked about ready to cry. Keith looked around for something––anything to pry the stubborn lid.
“Here...” A voice called from the doorway, startling them both. Keith turned around to see the younger man standing there holding a crowbar.
“Raymond, I thought I told you to wait inside.” Juanita snapped.
“You’re trying to get that open, right?” He moved forward, ignoring her, and graciously helped jimmy the heavy lid with their combined strength.
“Good God…” Keith whispered, the strong smell triggering a wave of nausea, (which he fortunately managed to control). The young man wasn’t so lucky. Juanita simply gasped.
The freezer was packed with an assortment of what appeared to be, (and certainly smelled like), human body parts; arms, legs, appendages of every shape, size and color.
And then of course, were the heads.
At least three, at a glance. One in particular seemed almost to be staring back at them; its features kept eerily intact by the freezer’s rigid cold. Packed along the bottom were several carefully placed freezer bags containing everything from human tissue, to full sized organs.
“I’ll, ah, need to call in the coroner,” Keith said after a fairly long pause. The mother remained silent, staring into the frozen grave her own flesh and blood had apparently dug for a whole host of unsuspecting victims. She was now his latest, and hopefully last, wearing an expression the cynical detective would not soon forget.
Keith felt something similar, though not quite as emotional. When he’d woke up that morning, Sonny Duval was a victim of senseless murder; a man to whom he’d intended to bring justice. Now he was merely one of what seemed like a number of disturbing components to a much larger puzzle.
So much for loose ends… a familiar voice sparked indifferently from within; not quite so deep as before. It was true enough. This was most certainly, no end at all. Not by the farthest cry.
For Keith Merrimac, it was only the beginning.