Ander - Part 4: Subchapter 17
17
- moonlight. What was that? A knife? Tim didn't know. It was still dark, so that meant he must be asleep, which meant that this must be a dream. There was no other explanation for why a big black shadow would be standing over him, watching him sleep, holding a great big knife like that. He'd just squirm a little deeper into his blankets and drift right off back to slee and oh by the gods he was awake and there was somebody standing over him with a knife!!
He opened his mouth to scream and the shadow clamped a hand over his muzzle, damp and sweaty. Tim thrashed, his warm cocoon of blankets suddenly turned into a prison.
"Relax, doofus! It's just me, sheesh!"
Tim froze, his heart beating so hard he thought it might actually pop right out of his chest. He squinted into the dark, and suddenly the big scary shadow turned into his giant jerk of a brother.
"Godsdammit, Luke!" Tim whispered angrily, swatting his hand away. "What are you trying to do, kill me!? For a second there I thought it was that Banno guy standing over me, by my Living Soul! Haaah... Good gods."
"That's why I'm here."
Tim sat up, rubbed his eyes, and looked again. Luke really did have a knife in his hands, that wasn't just a trick of his sleep-addled brain. Not Dad's whittling knife though, but a kitchen knife, one of the long ones.
"Luke? What's going on?"
"Get up. And be quiet about it."
Tim got out of bed and the sudden difference between the toasty warm confines of his blankets and the chilly air hit his body like ghost's breath. This wasn't right. This wasn't right at all. "Luke, what are we doing?" he asked, rubbing his elbows. "And what's with the knife? Seriously."
"Seriously?" Luke said, holding it up so that the moonlight glinted off the blade in a single, straight line of silver. "I'm going to finish what I started, and you're going to help me do it. Dad's too nice to see what's going on right in front of him, and Val's too sweet, so it's up to us."
"Up to...? Luke, you don't mean you're actually going to...?"
"Oh yes, Tim," he said, catching the reflected light off the blade's edge with his eyes. Tim didn't like that look one bit. It was like the knife was actually inside his brother's eye. "We are going to go downstairs, quiet like a pair of mice, and we are going to end that Wolf before he has a chance to end us. You with me?"
If somebody had held a mirror up to Tim's face in that moment, he wouldn't have been surprised at all if his eyes had taken up the entire view. He was that shocked.
"Luke! Dad said no! And you said okay! And Val was crying! And you! He! I don't even know what!" There were so many things he wanted to say he could barely get them out, like a bunch of chickens stuck in a henhouse door.
Luke suddenly reached out and grabbed a fistful of Tim's night shirt, effectively shutting him up with a hard jerk, bringing them so close their noses were almost touching.
"You and I were the only ones by the river when that thing woke up! You saw what it did! It was half dead! No, way past half dead, and it still went on going like it was nothing! It lifted me right off the ground, Tim! What do you think would have happened if it didn't faint right then, huh!? It would have killed me! I know it! I saw the way it looked at me! I saw the way it opened its mouth, like it wanted to bite into my throat! I saw it all up close! Real close! Much closer than I ever want to be to that thing again! But I have to, because Dad won't listen! Not even after what happened to Val! Did you see the way that thing looked at her? The way it squeezed her hand? Val said it was nothing, but she lied! I think it really hurt her. She's just too proper to admit it. Please, Tim! Don't make me do this by myself! Be the little twin you're always yammering on about. Please? I... I tried, but... It was dark... and..."
He sniffled. Was... was Luke actually crying? His big brother, crying twice in one night? This was unheard of.
"But, Luke..." Tim whispered, wondering if he ever planned to let go. "Dad will know. Even if we... do it. He'll know what happened."
"So?" Luke hissed in the dark. "What do you think is the worst he'd do? Give us a hiding? Hell, at least he'll still be alive to do it, and we'll still be alive to get it."
Tim shifted his gaze to the window, frosty around the corners. He couldn't stand to look at his big twin when his eyes were being so crazy. "Val would know, too." Luke froze, but his grip slowly slackened until Tim was able to pull away. "I don't want anything to do with this. It's cold and I'm tired and I just want to go back to bed. You should, too."
Luke shook his head. "Can't do that. And neither can you."
"Why not?"
"Because you're already a part of this, Tim. We all are. I'm going down those stairs, with or without you. Now you've got two choices, and ignoring all this and going back to sleep isn't one of them. You can either come with me, or you can go wake Dad. Don't think that just because your hand's not the one driving the knife makes it any less blood-stained. If you think that Wolf can be trusted, then going back to sleep would be like murdering him right by my side. So go ahead. Go wake Dad. I won't try to stop you."
Luke stepped aside, opening the way to his bedroom door, slightly ajar. The hallway beyond it was pitch black, with not even a single ray of moonlight to light the way.
Tim didn't move.
"You scared, Tim? If you want, you can just shout from here. Dad's just down the hallway. He'll be sure to hear you. He'll come running. So go ahead. If you really think that Wolf is going to leave us alone, then scream your head off. Stop me."
Tim opened his mouth to do just that, but could go no further. It wasn't a shadowy hand stopping him this time, but something inside, something he couldn't quite understand. Or didn't want to.
"You can't do it, can you?" Luke said, sounding almost smug in his triumph. "Wanna know why?" Tim shook his head, but Luke went on anyway. "It's because you were there. You know exactly what I'm talking about. Just like me, you wish that Wolf would just disappear, because it's freaking terrifying. You didn't scream because you want me to take care of it. You want me to take care of you, just like I always take care of you, isn't that right?"
"Luke, this isn't like you. You're scaring me."
"You're right to be scared. I'm scared, too. Now have you made up your mind yet? Are you going to come help me out?"
Tim's gaze switched between the kitchen knife and the crazy look in his brother's eyes, unable to believe this was really happening. It felt like some kind of bizarre nightmare. "What do you want me to do?"
"I dunno, just..." he ran his hand through his hair, the same hand holding the knife, and for just a second Tim was afraid he would stab himself in the face with it. "You don't have to do anything. Just... I just don't want to do it alone, okay? Don't make me do it alone."
Alone. Ever since Mom died, they've all felt alone at some point. He and Luke were able to keep it together by being brothers, by always being there for each other. It's a special kind of bond that only they could forge. But Dad and Val... they were hit the hardest. Dad lost his wife, and now he's the only grownup. Val lost her Mom, and now she's the only girl. It's always there, like a dead crow lying by the side of the road. You tell yourself you don't want to look at it, but then your eye darts toward the black clump of feathers against your will and you see it, bubbling with maggots. That's what it was like. He'd tell himself everything was fine with them, and usually he could believe it. They laughed, they teased, they worked hard, they goofed off, all of the normal things. But then his eye would misbehave and he'd see Dad staring at one of Mom's old sketches, just standing there, not doing anything, hardly even blinking, dead to the world. Sometimes he'd see Val picking flowers all by herself and weave them into those little circlets, just like she and Mom used to do when all the chores were done and the menfolk of the family were off on their own little adventures, catching fish or building something in the workshop.
Seeing these things didn't make Tim feel sadness or pity. He felt relieved. He felt relieved because he didn't have to feel Mom's absence as badly as they did, because he had Luke. He would feel terribly guilty for thinking that way, so guilty he sometimes expected a hole to open up beneath his feet and suck him straight to hell for his wickedness, but the relief wouldn't go away. It was always there. Like that dead crow by the side of the road, boiling with maggots.
And now Luke was asking for his help. His big brother, his big twin, the one who saves him from feeling Mom's loss too badly each and every single day was reaching out to him, practically begging him to help keep their family from getting torn apart any worse than it already was, and what was he doing? Standing here in his night clothes, his knees shaking and his tail tucked between his legs like a pup.
"Okay..." he whispered. He swallowed the lump in his throat and said it again, with more conviction this time. "Okay."
Luke stared at his little twin and he fidgeted with the knife in his hand, tightening and loosening his grip, then tightening it again. His eyes were still wet and shiny from a while ago.
"Luke?"
Luke blinked, nodded, and started for the door without a word, and Tim followed close behind.
It wasn't until he was standing on the landing, inside the pale sanctuary of moonlight shining through his open bedroom door that a terrible thought occurred to him. What possible use could he be down there? What could he possibly do if things went horribly, horribly wrong? What if Luke hadn't come to him because he was scared, and he didn't want to face the monster alone, but because he wanted the opposite? What if Luke really had wanted him to scream? What if he really did want Dad to come out and stop him from doing this? What if... he only wanted to be rid of this responsibility he felt in his heart?
What if...?
"Luke...?" Tim whispered, but his big twin was already going down the stairs, carefully avoiding the ones that creaked.
It's not too late. I can still stop this. I can still...
In the end, Tim followed his big brother.
Just like always.
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