Penny Dreadful Read online

  How are you, Moon said.

  That’s a good question. I’m a little confused.

  Moon grunted and shifted the car into gear. I examined him. The same clothes, the same meaty face. The eyes vague and expressionless behind glasses but the mouth was vivid, quick. His mouth could be apologetic and menacing at once.

  You look healthier, said Moon.

  Yeah, well. It’s been a year.

  Is that all?

  I’m broke. I need a place to sleep.

  Oh, boy.

  What did you expect?

  I expected you to be dead by now.

  We were driving directly into the sun. It lingered on the horizon, a sullen yellow eye. The sun refused to blink. Every tree and car and lonely pedestrian was skeletal and black, shadows come to life. A wheelchair rolled abruptly across the road, slow and wobbling, as if its passenger were unconscious. I blinked, waiting for Moon to touch the brakes. If anything, he sped up and we narrowly missed crushing the thing. I turned violently in my seat and saw that the wheelchair was in fact empty, drifting safely to the other side. There was no one on the sidewalk who might have pushed it.

  What the fuck was what?

  What was what, said Moon.

  Moon pulled a cell phone from his jacket pocket and smiled sheepishly. He called the station and told someone to take his name off the board. He was taking a mental health day.

  I was amused. Are you feeling unstable? I said.

  Yeah. I was thinking of you, actually.

  I appreciate it. Where are we going?

  My place. You can sleep at the foot of my bed, with Shame.

  Who the hell is Shame?

  My cat.

  Curious name, I said.

  It was supposed to be Shane, okay. Like the gunslinger.

  Oh, yeah. Steve McQueen.

  Jesus. It was Lee Marvin.

  Whatever.

  Steve McQueen was a fine actor, said Moon. But he couldn’t have handled Shane. The character was too rich, too complex. McQueen didn’t have a true dark side. He was too good-looking, you know. He was a prettyboy. Lee Marvin, though. That motherfucker could act.

  I sighed. How did the cat become Shame?

  When he was a kitten, I had this girlfriend. And she had a speech defect.

  Beautiful.

  Chrome:

  Mingus had a remarkable nose. Chrome was proud of him, truly. He adored the boy. In less than half an hour they had come upon a Fred wandering stupidly down an alley. A thin, starved-looking figure in dirty clothing who meandered along, chewing his thumb and peering into sewer grates and stopping now and again to ponder the contents of a garbage pail.

  Chrome rubbed his palms together now, gloating. The alley was narrow and smelled of rot. The shadows were a dark, sinewy green. The shadows were lively. The Fred was perhaps fifty meters ahead of them but Chrome was unconcerned. He happened to know that the alley led to a dead end. And the Fred looked particularly weak, as if his brain had softened well beyond mush. A Mariner’s nervous apprentice could bring him down with two fingers.

  It was dreary, is what this was.

  The best sport was of course a Fred who was self-aware, his nerves jangling with fear and his own new tonguelust. The self-aware would come at you with a piece of pipe, with teeth and boots. The self-aware were dangerous. And much more fun. In a pure hunt, thought Chrome, the hunter and the hunted must be properly entwined. They must be inseparable, of one heart and breath. They must be shadows joined, they must be lovers.

  Chrome still twirled the garrote and bit at the air. He glanced at Mingus, who was walking so slowly he might have been asleep. Mingus wasn’t happy about this, he knew. It was a violation of the code of tongues to hunt by day. But it was a notion Chrome had been toying with for some time. Hunting in the light and among Citizens would surely increase the danger and thrill, the difficulty. He was bored silly with the stiff parameters of the game, the pious rules. And he was curious to see if anything would come of breaking the code. Besides. He was hungry.

  Chrome was always hungry, always.

  Mingus was a Breather, and therefore controlled his own tonguelust with the rigor of a celibate, which infuriated Chrome to no end. He spat with disgust as the Fred stumbled ahead and actually walked into a wall and bounced backward with all the grace of a rubber donkey. Fuck it anyway. The wetbrain would be a fast kill.

  Mingus now leapt to grab at a fire escape, pulling himself up like a spider.

  It will be a boring kill, he said.

  Be quiet, said Chrome.

  Mingus pulled a brightly colored yo-yo from his pocket, a Duncan. He flicked it down and back with hypnotic ease.

  Walk the dog, said Chrome.

  You know I can’t do any tricks.

  I will teach you, said Chrome. After I kill this poor Fred.

  Moon’s apartment was dark and relatively damp. He had very little furniture. I found I was not so uncomfortable at all. I had been a little worried that I might be. That we would be two unfamiliar men in a confined space, the smell of one overpowering the other and that any physical contact, skin touching actual skin, would be rare and awkward and tenuous. That we would suffer the crush of ordinary silence.

  But I let myself fall easily onto a dusty sofa that was covered in equal parts with brown leather and fuzzy orange stripes. It was a hideous couch and I immediately liked it. I would sleep here, if I would sleep at all. I relaxed for a minute while Moon rattled around in the kitchen, cursing.

  What are you doing in there?

  I’m cooking, said Moon.

  Oh, really.

  Well. I’m heating a few cans of soup.

  I nodded, gazing at a giant television that was so covered in dust I wondered if anything could ever be seen flickering on its screen. Other than the ghosts of dead baseball players and long unemployed actors. I wondered if Moon was in there mixing together several different and opposing flavors of soup: split pea and clam chowder and beef with barley, for instance. I hoped not. Moon came into the living room and tossed a narrow white box at me. It was a toothbrush, unopened.

  Are my teeth green?

  Moon shrugged. I went to the dentist the other day. It was free.

  Thanks, then.

  You shouldn’t neglect your gums.

  I won’t.

  Moon stared at me, apparently expecting me to run along and brush my teeth now, rather than later. As if I had a mouthful of dirt. I laughed and got up, thinking I might need to pee anyway. I repaired to Moon’s little bathroom, brushed my teeth with Moon’s generic toothpaste and poked aimlessly through Moon’s medicine cabinet. Foot powder and witch hazel. Razor blades. A variety of pills and fluids that purported to deal with gastrointestinal distress. Generic aspirin. I spat gloomily into the sink, ever watchful for blood. I had a bizarre craving for a tall glass of cherry-red cough syrup with ice and soda water. The toothpaste left my mouth raw and I rinsed it repeatedly.

  When I came out of the bathroom Moon was pacing, apparently agitated. I sat on the ugly couch and forced myself to swallow the unidentifiable soup Moon had given me. I wished Moon would sit down. He had taken off his jacket to reveal a blue denim shirt that was torn under one armpit. The sleeves flapped around his wrists, as if the cuffs had no buttons. He violently loosened his tie, his face red and puffing as he did so. He pulled a tiny Swiss army knife from his watch pocket and used the scissors to rapidly clip his nails. A skinny orange cat slinked into the room and came over to inspect me, the new human.

  That would be Shame, said Moon.

  Poor thing, I said. His name was ruined by a woman and now he looks like you never feed him.

  He’s just high-strung, said Moon.

  I lowered my bowl of soup to the floor and the cat crouched over it, growling.

  Moon, I said. You want to sit down, maybe? Relax.

  I’m thinking about something. I think on my feet.

  Okay. Do you have anything to drink?

  Yeah. Next to the si
nk is a bottle of whiskey.

  I went into the kitchen, glad for something to do. There was a mostly full jug of Canadian Mist on the counter. It was covered in dust and I wasn’t surprised. The stuff was worse than poison. But I was a beggar, now. I was a jackal. I rinsed two glasses and poured several fat fingers of Mist into each. There were three empty ice trays in the freezer. I cursed and muttered and told myself the stuff would be equally putrid with or without ice. But I compulsively filled the ice trays at the sink.

  I came back and gave one glass to Moon, who gulped the Mist in one swallow. Then choked.

  Oh, he said. That shit is bad.

  Christmas gift? I said.

  Yeah. From a guy in Homicide named Tom Gunn.

  What did you give him?

  Tickets to a Nuggets game.

  I guess you’re even.

  But these were good seats, man.

  The fucking Nuggets, though.

  Moon laughed. He sat down on a corduroy ottoman with a lurid floral pattern.

  What’s on your mind? I said.

  Save it for later, said Moon. Let’s get drunk.

  Goo:

  Adore smoked a clove cigarette, her eyes glowing red in the mirror like a cat’s eyes in the flash of a camera. Goo felt weary, she felt ill and she hated it when Adore sat behind her like that because it was like she was surrounded by her. Adore was behind her and Adore was staring at her in the glass. There were two of them and one of these days she would smash this mirror.

  Four walls were enough. In a mirror you had six walls, eight walls.

  Goo was bleeding in a dozen places.

  A young, nearly invisible girl knelt beside her, silently cleaning her wounds with a cloth diaper that she dipped into a pail of water and alcohol. The cuts were not deep, at least. She would not need stitches, and painful or not she was proud of the work. Goo watched herself smile in the mirror. She was in awe of Adore sometimes, and marked herself fortunate to be her apprentice.

  It had been a beautiful piece, The Bird.

  The crowd had been tortured into a state of distraction. They had paid good money to see her stripped naked and violated by Adore. But they were undone by their own fascination for blood and couldn’t take their eyes off the bird eating from her foot. Then the lights had gone out and they could only sit and listen to the grunts and whispers of what may or may not have been two women sweatily fucking on a dark stage. In fact, Adore had noisily eaten a sandwich while Goo had lain in a blissful stupor. The victims were always shifting in the landscape of the game and now Adore was staring at her.

  What? said Goo.

  You spoke to a Redeemer, earlier.

  She shrugged. Yes, so what?

  What did you tell him?

  Nothing. I told him that I was having boyfriend troubles.

  Be careful, said Adore. You can’t trust them.

  Who can I trust?

  Adore smiled. Are you still seeing that young man, that Mariner?

  I suppose. Why?

  Adore stubbed out her cigarette, deliberately.

  You don’t like him, said Goo.

  No, said Adore.

  The girl had finished with Goo’s wounds and now moved silently to brush Adore’s hair. Goo leaned back in her chair, still naked. Her clothes had been cut to ribbons, destroyed. It looked like she had been attacked by wolves and emerged remarkably unscathed. She would have to wear something of Adore’s if she wanted to go home. That green dress with the gold thread, perhaps.

  That’s okay, said Goo. I don’t always like him, either.

  I think it’s time for you to design your own piece, said Adore. I will be your victim, of course.

  Goo was surprised. Are you sure I’m ready for that?

  Adore didn’t hear her because Goo’s voice had fallen to a whisper. It didn’t matter. Because she knew she was ready. She felt a thin, seeping wave of nausea but she was ready. It was Adore who might not be ready to exchange roles. Adore laughed and said don’t worry, girl. I’m ready.

  My first victim, said Goo.

  That is, unless you have another victim in mind, said Adore. A young man, for instance.

  Goo stretched her arms and winced at the ribbon of pain across her ribs.

  I close my eyes and all I see is you, Jude.

  Your hair is long and wet and you twist it in your hands like a piece of rope. You sleep topless on the balcony with those strange shadows falling across your belly. You have more money than you know what to do with and still you steal fruit from the market. You spend hours shooting green bottles in the desert with your back to the sun.

  You ruined me for sex, by the way. I just can’t be bothered anymore. I can’t be fucked.

  I remember something you said about serial killers and how the interesting ones are always very good kissers. I stared at you, stupidly I’m sure. I asked how many serial killers had you kissed and you laughed like the ghost of Lady Macbeth. You kissed me.

  Moon was drunk, crashing around his apartment. He breathed wetly. His eyes rolled around, loose from their moorings. He was looking for something to punish, it seemed. He clumsily put his foot through a coffee table, panting. His foot became stuck and he fell heavily to the floor. I scrambled to move lamps and stereo equipment from harm’s way. I remember, vaguely, that Moon was not really supposed to drink. There had been incidents in the past, nasty incidents involving borrowed motorcycles and flooded toilets and gouged eyeballs. There had been a rather notorious sword fight maybe ten years ago. But I was never my brother’s keeper. The opposite, if anything. I could remember more than one night when Moon had prevented me from doing something stupid or fatal.

  Moon now lay sideways on the floor, his foot wedged among the splintered remains of his table. He coughed for several minutes, then demanded angrily to know where Mary had gone.

  I was patient. I promised him that I knew no one named Mary and Moon growled, then dropped the subject. I crouched next to him, patting his damp belly as if he were a wounded bear. Moon sighed sleepily and I quickly disarmed him. Moon carried only one weapon, and was known to disapprove of ankle holsters. But this Colt that he had carried at his hip for eleven years and had rarely fired was a regular monster. I hefted it, thinking I could easily kill a car with the fucker. I unloaded it, then slid the big gun under the couch. I currently had no gun, myself. I carried only the knife, and if it came to a knife fight I reckoned I was quicker on my feet than the poor coffee table, which had fared pretty well against Moon.

  What happened, said Moon. What happened in Texas goddamn you.

  Nothing much, I said. I watched a kid die.

  And the woman, said Moon. The fuck happened to that crazy bitch.

  I sat cross-legged on the floor. The carpet was dusty, hairy. It was pretty sticky in places. I stared at Moon’s heaving chest and belly, at the stains on his white shirt and the limp, smeared tie. The white, hairy stomach flesh that gathered at his waistband. The green canvas military belt with unpolished buckle. The filthy white pants, the white socks. The black shoes with flattened rubber heels. Moon needed a woman in the worst way.

  I leaned over and began to extricate Moon’s foot from the shards of wood.

  Jude, you mean. She’s living in Mexico City, last I heard. Married to a nice banker and two months pregnant. She’s happy as a clam.

  Liar, said Moon. Fuck happened.

  Ask me tomorrow.

  You shit me.

  Sleep, I said. Go to sleep.

  Not tired. Let’s go up on the roof.

  I don’t think so.

  Fresh air. I can’t breathe.

  You can’t even walk.

  Okay. Lemme tell you a story. Moon abruptly began to frisk himself, grabbing at his pockets and crotch. Where the fuck is my gun? My gun, my gun.

  I eyed the couch warily, hoping that Moon was too fat and soggy to wiggle over there. It’s in the freezer, I said. With your life savings.

  Okay. Shut up. Lemme tell you a story.

 
Yeah. Tell me.

  Moon was a lump on the floor. His voice was thick, droning. I lit a cigarette and listened, my own eyes closed.

  Thirteen, said Moon. Total of thirteen cops gone missing. But it’s gradual. They fade. Not dead exactly. No bodies to speak of. They go undercover for a while and sometimes they come back but when they do they’re not right. They’re different.

  Different how?

  Like pod people. And then one day they don’t come back at all. These are guys from Narcotics and Vice, mostly. Fuck them, right. But then two guys from Homicide. You remember Jimmy Sky?

  Yeah. I never liked him.

  Come on. The fucking Skywalker. You never met a cop so cool as him and he slides in dry as ice after a month undercover with a basket full of oatmeal raisin cookies he baked himself. Then he’s gone for good. And nobody wants to talk about it.

  Who’s your chief?

  Moon spat violently. Captain Honey, he said.

  I laughed.

  Moon muttered, the poor bastard is ninety days from retirement and doped up on painkillers. His teeth are no good. He tells me not to worry. Don’t worry, he says. Meanwhile he’s busy cutting shit out of the newspapers all day: comic strips and “Dear Abby” and coupons for cat food and his horoscope. You walk into his office and Captain Honey says hey, private. What’s your sign? He reads you your horoscope and smiles at you like some kind of drunk priest. Then he slips you a coupon for forty-nine cents off Fancy Feast. He says you got a fucking cat, don’t you? And the watch commander says there’s nothing he can do about it. These guys aren’t officially missing. Nobody knows shit. And nobody wants to go undercover, nobody.

  A minute or two rattled past. I waited but Moon said nothing else. His voice had disappeared into the powdery air of sleep.