Page 50 of The Spiral
The windows fly open behind me, the bluster of wind swelling the curtains into the room as I watch on then turn for the stairs again. “A little dramatic, baby, don’t you think?” I snark, chuckling to myself at her theatrics and beginning to climb. “You just need to damn well talk to me. Ask.”
Jack.
“Madeline, where are you?”
The old doorbell chimes back along the corridor, half halting me as I consider just going and grabbing the fucker and pulling him up this spiral so he can rot with the others, but I suppose there could be more than just him. Madeline might be right with her thoughts of the guns.
I swing back and head for the hall table, ready to swipe the revolver, but it’s already missing. She must already have it, which amuses me more than I’d like to admit. She’s ready to kill. She sure as hell wasn’t when I first met her, but then she has Selma now. Selma’s courage. Selma’s animosity and hatred, and fear and pain do strange things to people. Just as they did to me. She can join me in her quest for madness. Join us.
We’ll rid the planet of vile thugs and their needs.
“You still here, baby?” I ask, my feet climbing the black carpeted steps again to get to my dogs. I snort, wondering if I should set them loose, let them hunt something and kill prey. They haven’t eaten properly for weeks, not that they damn well deserve anything to fill their repugnant stomachs, but maybe this could amuse us all.
I chuckle again and watch the frost creep over the floor as I keep turning the spiral, ready to let it consume any thoughts of reality I had left. This is what we’ve become now, a torrid disarray of half in, half out. It’s Madeline we both want. Madeline we need. And no one’s taking her away from us.
Before I reach the top, I hear the main door being kicked at, its one catch holding fast against whatever intruder is trying to get in. Stupid fucker. He only needs to turn the damn handle and it’ll open, just like it always does. We’re all ready for him in here. All of us are ready for anything that dares take my sanctuary from me again.
The door to my dogs is open by the time I’ve arrived, Madeline hovering in the entrance and staring into the room. I watch for a minute, wondering how she opened it, and then decide not to care anymore. There’s no point in hiding it now. If she doesn’t know already, then Selma would have soon shown her what my life has become about. She probably feels it already regardless of my attempt to shield her. Like she said, she knows now.
My hand eventually reaches for her shoulder, the fur of the coat reminding me of the fucking that ensued on top of Lenon’s treehouse—beautiful, rampant fucking, all of it happening in our son’s favourite place. She doesn’t even react to me as she carries on staring, a strange sense of shock written all over her beauty until I push on her to make her step into the dimly lit space.
She might as well smell it as well as see it.
“Jack?”
“Dogs.”
“But…” She looks at me with eyes full of confusion, her hand covering her mouth and nose as we walk in.
“They’re here because of you. You’ll understand soon enough.”
Footsteps echo in the hall below us, making me look back at the door and then close it quietly. Perhaps if we wait in here he’ll come find us and let me show him what happens to intruders.
“Will he be armed?”
She glances at me, and then walks forward a few small paces until she reaches the metal bars.
“I don’t know,” she mumbles, too intent on the sight in front of her to care.
Dog three cowers in the darkened corner like he always does, whimpering and whining, waiting for dog one to show him what to do. I sneer at him, thinking about what use he’s ever been to me other than for amusement and revenge. Two waits patiently, his nearly torn off clothes dropping from his piss stained frame as he sits like a good dog, knowing his damn place. But one, he’s as intent as he always is as he creeps closer to her. I watch him sniffing the putrefying air, hoping for a taste of something other than me. Some element of pride mixes with the loathing I feel for them, perhaps chased with the memories of what they’ve meant to me all this time. They’ve given me credence up until Madeline came here. Given me purpose.
He lunges unexpectedly, an enthusiastic grimace idling his features, causing Madeline to scamper away, his face coming to the bars and hands grabbing at them.
“Jesus,” she pants out, quietly backing into me and pulling her coat tighter around her.
“Hardly,” I mutter, looking at his filthy face at the bars as I reach for the zapper.
His tongue licks the side of the caging they’re behind, nose sniffing again to pull in Madeline’s perfume. It pisses me off that he’s even trying to smell her. He smelt Selma enough when he raped her, and sniffed the blood pooling on Lenon’s chest when he shot him. Fury wells inside at the mere thought, but I quiet the havoc I want to let loose, knowing this isn’t the time with other intruders in the house.
“What is this, Jack? This is… I don’t know what to…”
“Memories and death,” I mutter, listening to the continued echo of footfalls below us, a few voices coming with them. “The past. My present, until you.”
She looks at me, just stares, barely noticing anything other than me in this room of rot and hatred. And she’s so beautiful like this. She’s all I ever wanted. Her and Lenon. All of us together, filling this place with more children and harbouring our love. “They took you away from me, baby, Lenon too. You must remember that.”
She backs away a step, tugging her coat tighter in and glancing at the closed door.
“This isn’t right. They’re people. Why are they in there?”