Silk

“I can’t do this,” she said, and Spyder only shrugged.

“Then go back to the house. I can carry him in alone.”

She almost did, almost left Spyder to do this crazy, awful thing herself, almost left her to deal with that face, the hollows where his eyes had been. Spyder squatted beside him, brushed black hair from his face.

“No,” Niki said. “I can’t let you do this by yourself. Let’s do it, now, before someone sees us up here.”

“Oh, Byron,” Spyder whispered. “I’m so sorry.”

When she was ready, they carried the dead boy across the plank bridge and down to the house.

Spyder laid him on the kitchen table, asked Niki to get a washcloth from the bathroom, please, something to clean his hands and face with, to scrub away the dirt, the gore on his gray cheeks. His legs hung off the end, deadweight pendulums, but Spyder carefully arranged his arms at his sides so they wouldn’t flop over the edge. Niki obediently brought her a washcloth, glad for something so simple to do, for those few moments filled with the imperfect illusion of sanity; Spyder soaked the cloth with warm water from the kitchen sink, wrung it out and started to clean his face.

“We have to call the police now,” and Niki was standing right by the phone, only had to lift the receiver and dial 911, but Spyder shook her head and wiped at a rust-colored stain on the side of his nose.

“No police, Niki. Didn’t I already say no police?”

Niki looked at the phone, sick of the flat, helpless feeling, sick of walking on eggshells for Spyder, crazy Spyder, and this was going too far, humoring her this time. This was where she had to do something.

“I’m not asking your permission,” she said as she reached for the telephone, “I’m just telling you what I have to do. You’re not thinking straight right now.”

And for an answer, Spyder set the washcloth down and picked up the big carving knife still lying on the counter where she’d sliced the onion the night before, stepped past Niki and made a loop of the bandaged phone cord, slipped the knife inside, electrical tape pulled tight around the blade.

“Put it down,” she said, no malice in her voice, nothing but promise, and Niki understood the rest, put it down or there won’t be a goddamned telephone to discuss, and the knife aimed straight at her heart.

“Spyder,” and the cord pulled tighter, then, only a little more pressure and the blade would cut them off from the world again.

“When do I ever ‘think straight,’ huh? I’m taking my meds, and aren’t they supposed to make me ‘think straight’?”

“That’s not what I meant, and you know it,” but she hung the phone up, stepped back, more distance between her and the knife, and Spyder glanced down at it. “Jesus, Niki, is that what you think? That I would ever hurt you?”

“Sometimes I don’t know what to think anymore.”

“If that’s what you think of me, you don’t understand any of this. If that’s what you think, you should just get the hell out of here now,” words pushed out hard and fast, indifferent cold melting away, and she dropped the cord, hurled the knife at the sink, and plates, dirty glasses and coffee cups shattered there.

“Everything got messed up, Niki. You weren’t here so I don’t expect you to know what I’m talking about. I tried to make it right again, but I couldn’t. This is all I can do for him. It’s the last thing left, and I have to do it.”

“How am I supposed to understand when you won’t tell me anything, Spyder? Am I just supposed to stand around and watch you mess your life up worse? Screw mine up with it? I do know that none of this is your fault.”

“You don’t know,” Spyder said, like a sentence handed down, final judgment, you don’t know, and she picked up the washcloth again, went to the sink, steaming water over glass and china shards, the window over the sink fogged opaque, and then she went back to Byron.

“I don’t know how to help you,” and Niki was crying now, hating herself for it, but she could not be this tired and scared, scared for her and Spyder, for them both separate and together, and not cry. Spyder began rubbing at the stubborn stain again, and already the kitchen was begi

“You can’t help me. This isn’t about you. Everything isn’t about you, Niki,” and Niki turned and ran, through the house and back to their bedroom, threw herself down on the bed and gave in to the tears, the exhaustion and rage. Her own madness inside and the certainty that Spyder was right; nothing she could do but intrude, act more like Spyder’s nursemaid than her lover, or sit back and watch, wait for this shit to play itself out. She found Spyder’s Klonopin on the floor by her side of the bed, pastel blue tablets inside amber plastic, had to wrestle a moment with the childproof cap: she swallowed one of the pills and put them back, wrapped her arms tight around Spyder’s pillow, heavy feather pillow and its dingy lemon-yellow pillowcase, as if cotton and the musky stink of old feathers could be Spyder. And she closed her eyes and cried herself to sleep.

4.

A long dream of candlelight on earthen walls and Jackson Square, the girl with her tarot deck again, but still Niki didn’t see the whole spread, that card, dream within a dream toward the end, that night on the beach in North Carolina, the strange girl named Je

Someone had undressed her-no, not someone, Spyder-had gotten her out of the bulky army coat, and it hung on a bedpost now, and there was quiet music playing on the portable CD player, Dead Can Dance, cellos and violins, Lisa Gerrard’s calming, ethereal vocals; the covers had been pulled up around her.

She could hear the television playing, too, a game show filtered through the walls. She stood up, cautious, distrusting her throbbing head, her rubbery arms and legs. No wonder Spyder hated taking this shit so much.

She turned off the music, set on repeat and no telling how many times the album had played through, getting into her sleep, coloring her dreams. The house was freezing, and she guessed Spyder had turned off the heat. Niki slipped the coat on, zipped it closed, and went to find Spyder.

Spyder had not put on warmer clothes, too hot from the hours of work and finally she had stripped off the T-shirt and jeans, sat on the kitchen floor now wearing nothing but her boxers, sweat drying on her pale skin. Watching Byron on the table, the package he had become, wrapped up tight. She’d started with plain white thread, four big spools she’d found in an old sewing box that had been her mother’s, round and round his face after she’d stuffed the empty eye sockets with cotton wads from Tylenol bottles. And then she used the other colors, black and red and bright Kelly green, and she’d had to switch to yarn, orange and gold the color of grain around his narrow shoulders, and after that nylon fishing line and torn bed sheets and tape, whatever she could find, incorporated into the binding.

She’d been thorough, and no glimpse of skin showed through. His raggedy, filthy clothes were folded and placed together neatly by the body, ruined clothes and his shoes. She thought he might be safe this way, safe from her and the things the house remembered because of her. Safe from the sounds that had begun an hour ago, the things that made the sounds, bonemetal scrape and papery rustle from the basement below.