Chapter Twenty Two

Zach was plummeting through cyberspace. Imagine, he thought dazedly, I never needed a computer at all; you can get here just by drinking a cup of coffee and having someone hit you in the head hard enough to knock your eyeballs out.

He was going faster and faster, at the speed of light, of information, of thought. Beyond that there was no consciousness, no identity. There were no federal spooks, no United States, no New Orleans or Missing Mile, no one named Zachary Bosch. There was no such thing as a crime, no such thing as death. He felt himself dissolving into the vast web of synapses, numbers, bits. It was complex but unemotional, easy to understand. It was comforting.

It was so cold. . .

Zach struggled against the web in sudden panic. No! He didn't want to stay here and be assimilated into cyberspace, or Birdland, or the void-whatever it was, he did not want to become a small part of a greater good or evil, a streamlined fragment of information that meant nothing on its own. He wanted his troublesome individuality, with all its attendant difficulties and dangers. He wanted his body back. He wanted Trevor.

With every particle of will left in him, Zach strained toward the waking world.

He felt a cold electric flash, became aware of his body's weight and the mattress under him, felt his heart hammering in his chest. He was uncomfortably sure that it had just started back up. Blood was draining from his nasal cavities into his throat, nearly choking him. His head buzzed and throbbed. His hands felt as if someone had gone at them with coarse sandpaper.

Either everything he remembered had really just happened, or this was one intense motherfucker of a trip.

Zach forced his eyes open and saw Trevor sitting on the edge of the bed staring vacantly at the opposite wall. His tangled, sweat-soaked hair streamed over his naked shoulders and down his back. His arms and hands were still bloody, but the scars seemed to have closed.

Clutched in his right fist was the hammer, glistening with blood and other matter. Zach knew Trevor hadn't hit him: if all that gunk was his, he wouldn't be breathing now. But what had Trevor done? And what did he think he had done?

He propped himself up on one elbow, felt his head spinning, his vision going blurry. He realized he had lost his glasses somewhere. “Trev? ” he whispered. “Are you okay? ”

No response.

“Trevor? ” Zach's hand felt rooted to the mattress. He managed to lift it a few inches, extend it for what seemed like miles. His fingers just brushed Trevor's thigh. The flesh felt cold and smooth as marble. Zach's fingertips left four parallel smudges of blood on the pale skin.

He had scraped the hell out of his hands. There was nowhere in the house he could have done that. Of course not, he thought, it happened falling on the sidewalk in Birdland, trying not to bust your teeth out on the curb. Joe pushed you, remember?

And if he had met Joe, what had Trevor seen?

He pushed himself closer to Trevor, tried to sit up. “Trev, listen, you didn't hurt me. I'm fine. ” A wave of dizziness washed over him, threatened to become nausea without further notice. “Are you okay? What's going on? ”

Trevor turned. His eyes were like holes drilled in a glacier, black gouges going down deep into the ice. His face looked hollow, haggard, used up. His skull seemed to be trying to wear right through the skin.

“He saw me, ” said Trevor. “He saw me in here. ”

“Who? When? ”

“My father. ” There was recognition in Trevor's eyes, but no warmth. Looking into them was like falling through the void again. “He saw me come in here that night. He talked to me. ”

Oh man, thought Zach, bad trip. Bad, bad trip. “Where were you? ” he asked cautiously.

“Birdland. ”

Of course. Where else? “No, I mean. . . ” What the hell did he mean? “I mean, where were you on the space-time continuum? When were you? ”

“This house. That night. I saw my mother dead. I saw my brother dead. Then I came in here and Bobby was alive, was sitting on the bed deciding whether to kill me. He saw me, spoke to me, and decided he couldn't do it. It was my own fault. ”

“I don't understand. You mean you woke up and talked him out of it? ”

“NO! He saw me the way I am NOW! He talked to ME NOW, and then he went and HUNG HIMSELF! LOOK AT THIS! DON'T YOU SEE? ” Trevor gestured wildly with the hammer. A tiny gobbet of gore hit Zach's already-bloody lip. He shrank back against the wall and surreptitiously wiped it away.

“He talked to you at age twenty-five? ”

“Yes. ”

“He was haunted by your ghost. ”

“Yes. ”

“Shit. ” Zach's head was beginning to clear a little; it almost made sense. He thought of loops, which were computer programs designed to repeat a set of instructions until a certain condition was satisfied. Zach had previously suspected that hauntings, if they existed, might operate on much the same principle. This was borne out by most of New Orleans' famous ghost stories, in which the ghost usually appeared in the same place and repeated the same actions again and again, such as pointing at the spot where its bones were buried or rolling its decapitated head down the stairs.

The idea still seemed to make sense somehow. This was one hell of a complicated program, but maybe Trevor had managed to break into the loop.

A drop of blood landed on Zach's chest, trickled in a wavy line down his ribs. Then Trevor reached out and laid the head of the hammer ever so gently against Zach's face. He traced the curve of Zach's jawline with it, stroked the underside of Zach's chin with the claw. The metal felt cold, slightly rough, horribly sticky. Trevor's face was exalted, nearly ecstatic.

“Trev? ” Zach asked softly. “What are you doing? ”

“I'm getting ready. ”

“For what? ”

“The puzzle of flesh. ”

Whatever that means. “Okay. I'll help you with that if you want. But could you put the hammer down? ”

Trevor just looked at him with those drilled-ice eyes.

“Please? ” Zach's voice was little more than a hoarse whisper now.

Very slowly, Trevor shook his head. “I can't, ” he said, and raised the hammer high. His eyes never left Zach's. They were full of lust, pleading, naked terror. Zach saw clearly that Trevor didn't want to be doing this, hated doing this; he saw just as clearly that this was the only thing in the world Trevor wanted to be doing.

He also saw the trajectory of the hammer: next stop, Zach's own beloved pineal gland, the spot where his third eye would be. Zach slid off the other side of the mattress, scrambled around the bed, and tried to get to the door, but Trevor followed and blocked him. The hammer crashed into the wall, tore through a drawing. Brittle fragments of paper sifted to the floor.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING? ” Zach yelled.

“I'm finding out what it feels like. ”

“WHY?! ”

“Because I'm an artist, ” Trevor said through gritted teeth. “I need to know. ” He caught Zach's right arm and forced him back against the wall. Trevor was only slightly bigger and stronger, but he seemed to have the mother of all adrenaline rushes pumping through his veins. He raised the hammer again.

“Trevor-please, I love you—”

“I love you too, Zach. ” He heard genuine truth in Trevor's voice, saw the hammer descending and flung himself sideways. The blow glanced off his shoulder, and the muscle sang with pain.

Trevor pulled the hammer back. Zach got his left arm up, grabbed Trevor's wrist, locked his elbow and held Trevor's arm away with all his strength. It was slippery with sweat and blood, hard to hang on to. He stared deep into Trevor's eyes.

“Listen to me, Trev. ” His heart felt like a ripe tomato in a blender. He gasped for breath. Trevor strained against him. “Why do you need to know how it feels to kill somebody? You have an imagination, don't you? ”

Trevor blinked, but did not stop shoving his body against Zach's.

“Your imagination is better than Bobby's. He might've had to do it to find out how it felt. You don't. ”

Trevor hesitated. His grip on Zach's arm eased the slightest bit, and Zach saw his chance. Fight back for once! his mind screamed. Don't think about what he'll do to you if you fuck up! You'll be dead for sure if you don't try, and so will he. Just DO IT!

Zach let out a long wordless howl and drove his knee straight up into Trevor's crotch. At the same time he shoved Trevor's arm backward as hard as he could. The angle of the knee thrust was bad, but it caught Trevor by surprise and threw him off balance. Zach twisted Trevor's wrist brutally, and Trevor lost his grip on the hammer. It sailed across the room, hit the opposite wall with a loud crack, thudded to the floor.

If Trevor went after it, Zach decided, he would make a break for the door and try to get out of the house. Maybe Trevor would follow him. Maybe things would be saner outside.

Trevor's eyes were very wide, very pale. He stared at Zach with something like admiration, something like love. His gaze was hypnotic; Zach could not make himself move.

“Fine then, ” Trevor said softly. “I always imagined doing it with nothing but my hands. ”

He lunged.

Zach dodged aside and managed to get to the door, then through it. Trevor was right behind him, blocking the way out, driving him down the hall. He tried for the studio, thinking he could go out a window. Trevor caught a handful of his hair and yanked him off his feet. Zach's neck snapped back. He stumbled heavily against Trevor, and Trevor pinned his arms.

“I just want to know how you're made, ” Trevor breathed in his ear. “I love you so much, Zach. I want to climb inside you. I want to taste your brain. I want to feel your heart beating in my hands. ”

“It can only beat in your hands for a few seconds, Trev. Then I'll be dead and you won't have me anymore. ”

“Yes I will. You'll be right here. This place preserves its dead. ” Like hitting a SAVE key, Zach thought, and that reminded him of loops again. Had some kind of homicidal loop been set in motion in Trevor's head?

And if it had, how could he interrupt it?

He felt Trevor's sharp hipbones pressing into his buttocks, Trevor's arms wrapped tightly around his chest. For a moment the contact was nearly erotic. He thought Trevor felt it too; his penis was stirring against the back of Zach's leg, growing half-hard.

Then Trevor lowered his head and sank his teeth deep into the ridge of muscle between Zach's neck and shoulder.

The pain was immediate, huge, hot. Zach felt fresh blood trickling over his collarbone and down his chest, felt muscle fibers twist and rip, heard himself screaming, then sobbing. He tried to drive his elbow back into Trevor's chest, but Trevor had his arms clamped tightly to his sides. He tried to kick, and Trevor lifted him off his feet and dragged him into the bathroom.

He's taking me to his hell, Zach thought, and he's going to eat me there, he's going to rip me apart looking for the magic inside me, and he won't find it. Then he'll fulfill the condition of the loop, he'll kill himself. What a stupid program.

Trevor kicked the door shut. The tiny room was dark but for the fragments of mirror in the tub, which seemed to suck in light, infect it with noisome colors and send it swirling back over the leprous walls and ceiling. The sink was stained black with blood. Zach wondered if the come was there too, dried to a translucent scale.

The pain in his shoulder ebbed a little. Zach stopped struggling. He felt dizzy, remote. Trevor's hold on him was shoving his ribs up and crushing them inward, making it difficult to breathe. He was going to die right now. These sensations of pain and disconnection were the last he would ever feel, these fleeting, panicky thoughts the last he would ever have.

Stupid fucking program. . .

Then Trevor slammed him into the wall face first, and Zach grayed out completely.

Yielding flesh in his hands, hot with fear, sticky with sweat and blood and already smelling of heaven. Helpless bones his to crack, helpless skin his to rip open, sweet red river his to drink from. He had to do it. He had to know. With his eyes and his hands, with all his body, he had to see.

Trevor shoved Zach into the space between the toilet and the sink, his space. He clawed at Zach's chest with his fingernails, ripped furrows in that smooth white skin. Blood sparkled on his hands, sprayed across his face. He pushed his mouth into the spray, lapped at it, then tore at the skin with his teeth. It was easy. It was right. It was beautiful.

Zach's hands came up and tried to push Trevor's head away, but there was no strength left in them. Trevor slid him farther back into the corner, into the cobwebs, felt tiny multi-legged things skittering away. He ran his tongue over the long shallow wounds his fingernails had made on Zach's chest. They tasted of salt and copper, of life and knowledge.

He stroked the concavity of Zach's stomach. All the body's bountiful secrets, cradled between the pelvis and the spine. He would sink his hands in to the wrists, to the elbows. He would reach up under the rib cage and make the heart beat with his fingers. He would find the source of life and swallow it whole.

“Trev? ” said Zach. His voice was weak, paper-thin, barely there. “Trevor? I can't fight you. But if you're gonna kill me, please tell me why. ”

Trevor closed his teeth on Zach's earlobe and pulled at it, wondered how the soft little mass of flesh would feel going down his throat. “Why what? ”

“Why pain is better than love. Why you'd rather kill me for the thrill of it than try to have a life with me. I thought you were brave, but this is some pretty cowardly shit. ”

Tears were trickling down the side of Zach's face, into the fine hair at his temples. Trevor traced their salty path to the corner of Zach's eye, flicked his tongue over the lid, then sucked softly at the eyeball. It would burst in his mouth like a bonbon. He wondered if that amazing green would taste of mint.

“To see everything, ” Zach whispered, “you have to be alive. If you do this to me, you're gonna die too. Tell me you're not. ”

Maybe he was. Of course he was. But hadn't he always known this would be the last panel, the crucifixion and conflagration, the way his life was supposed to end? And wouldn't it be worth it?

But suddenly Trevor remembered something Bobby had said to him in the other room, in the other house. Birdland is a machine oiled with the blood of artists.

He looked down at Zach. Blood had run down over Zach's face in thick black rivulets from a wound in his scalp. Blood leaked from his nostrils and his torn mouth. He had a lurid purple knot on one shoulder, an encrusted bite mark on the other. His chest was crisscrossed with furious red scratches. Where it wasn't cut or bruised, his skin was absolutely white. His eyes held Trevor's. His expression hovered somewhere between terrified and serene.

“Whatever you want, ” said Zach. “It's up to you. ”

The words jarred Trevor completely from his dream of rending flesh, of crawling inside the body to find its secrets. Because it wasn't just a body, he realized. It wasn't a puzzle or an anatomy lesson or a source of mystical knowledge, it was Zach. The beautiful boy he had watched strutting and moaning onstage tonight, smartass and criminal anarchist and generous soul, his best friend, his first lover. Not a box of toys to tear apart, not a rare delicacy to rip open and devour still steaming.

And Zach was right. Whatever Trevor did next would be his own choice, and he would have to live with it until he died, even if that was only a matter of minutes. And if he died, would he go to Birdland? He thought of Bobby, alone with those two broken bodies forever. What if Trevor ended up in his own house, trapped with his own dead?

Yet Bobby had put the hammer in his hand and told him to go find out what it felt like.

Trevor imagined a crisp new autopsy report: Zachary Bosch, transient, 19 yrs. . . Cause of death: blunt trauma, exsanguination, evisceration. . . Manner of death: Murder. . .

Was that what his father considered art these days? Or was Birdland thirsty for blood to grease its cogs?

He shoved himself off Zach, out of the cramped space between sink and toilet. He stared at his hands, and for a moment he thought they were slicked with Zach's blood, that he had sunk them deep into Zach's insides, that he had really done it, and woken up too late. If I have any talent, any gift left at all, he heard his father saying, it's in you now.

Fuck that, he thought. I'm not doing your dirty work.

He turned away from Zach and stepped into the bathtub. Broken glass gritted and scraped beneath his bare feet. Trevor stared down into the fragments of mirror, into the swarming light. “I won't do it, ” he said. “I don't need to know what it feels like. I don't need to draw it. I can live it. ”

He made his right hand into a fist and drove it straight through the wall.

The damp old plaster splintered, sifted away, disintegrated beneath his knuckles. It hadn't hurt at all. He wanted it to hurt; he wanted the pain he had been so ready to inflict on Zach.

He fell to his knees and began slamming his fist again and again into the hard porcelain, into the broken glass.

Zach thought he heard a bone crack in Trevor's hand. He tried to push himself up. His head felt numb and leaden, his vision blurry. He could not get off the floor to go to Trevor.

So, with the last of his strength, he crawled.

The tub seemed very far away, though Zach knew it was only a couple of feet. He had to grab its edge and drag himself the last of the distance. The porcelain felt loathsome, slick as teeth and cold as death, shaking with Trevor's blows. Trevor's fist hitting the tub sounded like raw meat slamming into a stone floor now. Zach clung to the edge with one hand, reached out and touched Trevor's back with the other.

Trevor whirled on him. His face was contorted, his eyes crazed with grief and pain. This is it, Zach thought. He's gonna kill me now, and then beat himself to death like a moth against a windowpane right here where Bobby can watch. Haw stupid. How utterly useless. He felt no more fear, only a great hollow disappointment.

But Trevor didn't grab him again. Instead he just stared at Zach, his face almost expectant. Something I said made him stop hurting me, Zach realized. What can I say to make him stop hurting himself?

“Listen, ” he said. “Bobby killed the others because he couldn't take care of them anymore and he couldn't let them go. Then he killed himself because he couldn't live without them. Right? ”

Trevor made no response, but he didn't look away. Suddenly Zach had a flash of intuition, the way he sometimes did when hacking a troublesome system. He thought he knew what was on that loop in Trevor's brain. “Is it about love? ” he asked. “Trev, do you think you have to make all this keep happening to prove you love me? ”

At first he thought Trevor wasn't going to answer. But then, ever so slowly, Trevor nodded.

We're so fucked up, Zach thought. We could be the Dysfunctional Families poster kids if either of us lives long enough. Thanks, Joe and Evangeline. Thanks, Bobby.

“But I know you love me, Trevor. I believe you. I want to stay alive and show you. I don't need you to take care of me; I can take care of myself. And if you come away with me I won't leave you ever. ”

“How. . . ” Trevor's voice sounded husked out, used up. “How can I know that? ”

“You have to trust me, ” said Zach. “All I can tell you is the truth. You have to decide the rest for yourself. ”

Trevor looked up from the hypnotic swirling pattern in the mirror shards, looked into Zach's battered face. The pain in his right hand was enormous, hot as a skillet on the burner, then cold all the way to the bone. His knuckles were torn to bleeding ribbons. He thought he had broken at least one finger. The feeling of it made him heartsick. But the terrible anger was gone.

He had been ready to go plunging down, down, down. And he had nearly taken Zach with him.

Zach was kneeling before him, naked and bloody as if he had just been born. Pain needled through Trevor's legs as he stood. His feet were sliced up pretty badly too, he realized; he had been grinding them into the broken glass, trying to obliterate some image he could not piece together. The mirror fragments were opaque with his blood now, reflecting nothing.

Trevor climbed out of the tub and helped Zach up with his good hand, grabbed him with the other arm and buried his face in Zach's stiff hair.

“What can I do? ” he asked. The question seemed terribly inadequate, but he could think of no other.

“Leave with me. Now. ”

Trevor expected to feel the house clenching like a muscle around him, trying to hold him in. But he felt nothing coming up through the floorboards to mingle with the blood from his feet, nothing in the walls around him. He looked over Zach's shoulder at the buckled shower curtain rod and felt only an echo of the old sorrow tinged with dread. That was where Bobby had ended up, where he had chosen to end up. Trevor could choose to go anywhere he wanted to.

The realization was like seeing infinity suddenly unfold before his eyes. A million mirrors, and none of them broken. A million possibilities, and more branching out from each of those. He could leave this house and never see it again, and he would still be alive. And it was by his own hand: he had chosen to be with Zach, had chosen to eat mushrooms and go to Birdland, had sought out the house and turned the knob and walked in on Bobby's eternity. They were all choices he had made. It was up to him.

Zach opened the bathroom door and pulled him into the hall. The house was full of a clear, still blue light. The night was over.

Trevor looked down into Zach's ill-used, blood-smeared, weary face. J choose you, he thought, but I can't believe you still want me.

They stumbled into the bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed. Zach found his glasses unharmed on the floor and put them back on. Trevor saw the gouge in the opposite wall where he had tried to hit Zach, saw the bloodied hammer in the corner. He stroked Zach's hair with his good hand, kissed his eyelids, his forehead. He hoped an electrical current would have run up his arm and shocked him to death if he had violated this wondrous brain.

Zach leaned against him. His head lay heavy on Trevor's shoulder. “I need to get out of here, ” he whispered.

“Okay. Where will we go? ”

“I don't know. ” Gingerly, Zach touched Trevor's right hand, which he was cradling in his lap trying to keep still. “This looks bad. You need to get it set. And I think I might have a concussion. ”

“Oh. . . Zach. . . ”

“You didn't do it. My dad did. ”

“Your dad? ”

“Yeah. Look, we have to talk, but I can't right now. I feel like I'm gonna pass out. We need a hospital. ”

“The closest one's twenty miles away. Can you call Kinsey on your cellular phone? ”

“His home phone's cut off. I heard him say so last night. . . ” Zach trailed off. His eyes were half-closed now, his breathing quick and shallow. His skin felt cool, slightly damp.

“Can you drive? ”

Zach shook his head.

“But your car has a stick shift. ”

“I know. I'll shift for you if I can stay awake. If I can't, it's gonna hurt you like hell, and I'm sorry. But I can't even see straight. I'd run us right off the road. ”

“All right, then. ” Trevor tried to flex his hand. Great bolts of pain shot up his arm. The two middle ringers were stiff, swollen shiny, suffused with blood. The skin felt as tight and uncomfortable as an ill-fitting glove. His knuckles were so badly abraded that he thought he could see a pale glimmer of bone beneath all the red, though he didn't look too closely.

I can't hold a pencil with that, he thought. But he was too worried about Zach to care much.

Zach helped Trevor dress, tugged his sneakers on and tied them for him. Trevor felt the linings tugging at the cuts on his feet, blood soaking into the soles. Then Zach dressed himself and helped gather their belongings. Trevor took nothing but his Walkman, his tapes, and his clothes. If his hand healed, he would get new pens and sketchbooks later. He couldn't imagine using the old ones again.

After some consideration, he held a match to the envelope containing his family's autopsy reports and burned them in the kitchen sink. It felt a little like smashing his hand had felt. But he thought they belonged here.

He helped Zach out through the living room, half holding him up as Zach carried both bags. The air was thick as syrup, sucking at Trevor's legs, pulling at his feet. You could stay, it whispered. There is a place for you forever, here in Birdland.

But Trevor would not listen. It was only one of a million possible places, and it wasn't the one he wanted anymore.

Zach clung to him until they were out of the house and off the porch. The sky was a deep watery blue streaked with rose. A few stars were still visible; they seemed too huge and bright, their glitter too intense. The whole world was silent.

Wet grass brushed their knees as they made their way to the back of the house where the car was parked. Trevor helped Zach into the passenger seat, then slid in behind the wheel. Zach fumbled with his seat belt. Trevor wanted to wear his too, but he didn't think he could fasten it himself, and he was afraid to ask Zach to lean across the seat and help him. Zach looked sick and sweaty, on the verge of blacking out.

Trevor fitted the key into the ignition with his left hand and turned it awkwardly. The engine roared into life. Pain flared in his foot as he stepped on the clutch. The Mustang began to roll through the yard and down the overgrown driveway.

“Zach? ”

”. . . yeah. . . ”

“Put it in second. ”

Zach groped for the shift stick and pulled it down into second gear. The car picked up speed. They were at the end of the long driveway now, turning onto Violin Road. Trevor steered with his left hand, braced his right forearm against the wheel. He glanced into the rearview mirror. The house was barely visible through the shroud of weeds and vines. It looked like an empty place. Trevor wondered if it ever would be.

He let the car coast down the rutted gravel road. “Okay, ” he said. “Put it in third. ”

No response. Trevor looked over at Zach. He was slumped back against the seat, eyes shut, glasses sliding down his nose, bruises blooming like dark flowers on his pallid face.

“Zach! ” he said. “ZACH! ”

”. . . mmm. . . ”

Trevor slowed the car to a crawl, made sure Zach was breathing, speeded back up to twenty or so. If he rolled through stop signs, he could drive all the way to Kinsey's house in second gear. It would be hell on the clutch, but he didn't care. If anything happened to Zach now, Trevor might as well go right back into that house and nail the door shut behind him.

“Stay awake, ” he told Zach. “I don't want you slipping. ”

”. . . mmmmmm. . . ”

“Zach! Sing with me! ” Trevor tried to think of a song whose words he knew. The only thing that came to mind was one he had been made to learn at the Boys' Home. It would have to do. “YIPPIE KI YI YO-O, ” he sang loudly. “GIT ALONG, LITTLE DOGIES! Come on, Zach. Please... IT'S YOURRRR MISFORTUNE, AND NONE OF MY OWWWWN... ”

“Yippie. . . ki yi yo, ” sang Zach in a ghostly voice, barely a whisper.

“GIT ALONG, LITTLE DOGIES. . . c'mon, louder. . . ”

“YOU KNOW THAT WY-OMING WILL BE YOUR NEW HOOOOOME, ” they finished in unison.

Trevor glanced over at Zach. His eyes were open, and there was a tired smile on his face. “Trevor? ” he said.

“What? ”

“You're a lousy singer. ”

“Thanks. ”

“And, Trev? ”

“What? ”

“That song really sucks. ”

“So? ”

“So. . . you want this thing in third gear? ”

“Take it up to fourth, ” said Trevor, and pushed the pedals to the floor.