Poppy Z. Brite - 1992 - Lost Souls (31 page)

 
          
Nothing
crouched astride Zillah, still gasping for breath. “I’m sorry,” he sobbed. “You
made me kill Laine and I did it. But not Ghost. Not Ghost.”

 
          
Molochai
and Twig were so surprised by the whole spectacle that they let go of Steve and
Ghost. Steve scrambled up, expecting them to go for him at once. Instead they
bounded across the room to Zillah.

 
          
Twig
grabbed Nothing and pulled him up by the front of his coat. Molochai raised his
hand to his face. After a moment Steve saw that he was biting through the skin
of his own wrist.

 
          
When
Molochai’s blood began flowing freely, he pressed his wrist to Zillah’s mouth.

 
          
Steve’s
hands ached. He supposed it was an aftereffect of the adrenaline rush.

 
          
Later
he would realize he had been gripping the bat so tightly that his fingers were
still curled in the shape of its handle.

 
          
Nothing’s
teeth clacked together when Twig hauled him up, and he tasted blood again.

 
          
The
taste reminded him of the potion in the wine bottle, the feast of Laine’s blood
they had shared. More than anything he wanted to be back in the van, singing,
drinking, on his way to New Orleans. Going away from here. Something had gone
terribly wrong.

 
          
At
least Zillah wasn’t dead, though he looked as if he ought to be. He had taken a
baseball bat in the face without going down, and Nothing thought he could have
taken the blow against the wall too, though it had been hard enough to break
someone’s neck.

 
          
But
the two blows so close upon each other had stunned him. Maybe Molochai’s blood
would bring him around. If it did, Nothing didn’t know what Zillah would do to
him, or to Steve and Ghost. He had to get them out of here before Zillah came
all the way back.

 
          
He
reached up, grasped Twig’s hands, and removed them from the lapels of his coat.

 
          
“You
want to waste time fucking with me?” he asked. “Zillah didn’t tell you to fuck
with me. And he’s hurt bad.”

 
          
“Because
of you,” Twig growled.

 
          
Nothing
could feel Twig’s hands trembling in his grasp, aching to go for his throat. He
knew Twig could kill him in a heartbeat. ‘Then save me for him. Let him punish
me for getting him hurt. He’ll be pissed if he comes round and you’ve already
sucked me dry, won’t he?”

 
          
Now
Nothing was sure Twig wanted to rip his throat open. Molochai would do it if
Twig did. They would kill him and then tear into Steve and Ghost. Nothing met
Twig’s eyes and held them. Twig was wilder and meaner, oh yes; Twig was the
badass here.

 
          
But
Nothing was smarter.

 
          
“Zillah’s
lying there bleeding,” he said. “If you won’t help me, I’ll carry him out
myself.

 
          
But
he’ll know what happened.”

 
          
He
jerked away from Twig and tensed, ready to fight if Twig lunged at him.

 
          
Twig’s
eyes blazed feral light.

 
          
Nothing
blazed right back at him.

 
          
And
Twig’s eyes dropped.

 
          
Later,
Steve would be unable to find the right words to tell Ghost how he had felt in
the next few moments. Ghost got it anyway, of course, but not because of
Steve’s attempt to describe it.

 
          
The
atmosphere in the room changed subtly. It had been electric, dangerous, full of
blood and the possibility of murder. But then something happened.

 
          
Steve
considered himself much less perceptive than he really was. What he would say
to Ghost later was “If even I could feel it, it must have been there.” It was
as if the kid were putting out pheromones or something. Something that felt (he
would shake his head and laugh a little, saying these words) like the essence
of childhood lost. This was baby powder and cigarette smoke, forgotten toys and
eyeliner and torn black lace, nursery rhymes and clank nightclub restrooms
haunted by a breath of vomit. This was the distilled essence of all that was
lost forever and all that came to replace it.

 
          
I’m
twenty-three years old, thought Steve, though he didn’t know why. I’m supposed
to be a grown-up. This game is for keeps. No one is ever going to come along
and make everything all right for me again, because no one can.

 
          
Then
all at once the strangeness was gone from the room, and there was only the
electric tension again. But it did not feel quite so murderous now.

 
          
“You
help me carry him,” Nothing told Molochai. Then he glanced back at Twig.

 
          
“You
go on out and start the van.”

 
          
Twig’s
eyes flared again, and for a moment Steve thought the kid had pushed it too
far.

 
          
But
Twig just exhaled noisily—Steve smelled rotten blood—and left the room.

 
          
Nothing
and Molochai got Zillah’s arms around their necks and helped him up.

 
          
Nothing
looked at Steve with wide brimming eyes, trying to smile. Sadness and pride
warred in his face. “I didn’t let them hurt you,” he said. “Now maybe you’ll
believe me.

 
          
I
never meant for any of this to happen.”

 
          
Now
that the fight was ebbing out of him, Steve felt weaker by the minute. “I just
want you out of here,” he said. “All of you.”

 
          
“We’re
going. Don’t worry.” Nothing glanced at Ghost, and his carefully composed
expression seemed to crumble a little, but he caught it quickly.

 
          
Steve’s
anger lessened as he looked at the kid. Scruffy and none too clean, in ragged
clothes and that damn phony-looking black dye job, looking as if he hadn’t had
a good night’s sleep or a decent meal in weeks, there was nonetheless a
strange, innocent dignity to him. His features were clear and heartbreakingly young,
and when he’d stood up with Zillah leaning against him, a kind of holiness had
broken over his face. A sense of rightness, of arriving at a place he had been
seeking for a long time.

 
          
Next
to him, the creeps looked worse than ever.

 
          
Ghost
stared at Nothing. As he had come awake, he had known something about Nothing,
about his past. A baby—a jumble of bright festive streets–a spreading pool of
blood on a hardwood floor. He had known that somehow Nothing was connected to
the bad times that were coming, maybe already here. Most of it was gone now,
though he knew he could get it back if he tried.

 
          
Instead
Ghost did something he could not remember doing before, not ever. He tried to
block Nothing out. He tried to keep his mind from touching Nothing’s, from
sharing Nothing’s secrets. He did not want to know who Nothing really was, or
where he had come from, or where he was going. He did not want to feel this
boy’s pain because he could not lessen it. Nothing was lost. He might not know
it yet but, what frightened Ghost still more, he might know it. He might know
it very well. He might have chosen it.

 
          
Zillah
swayed against his two supporters, nearly unconscious. Beneath the blood and
the swelling his face was androgynous and achingly beautiful in the way that a
statue or a mask might be beautiful—smooth and symmetrical, but cold.
Bloomless. His lips, purple with lipstick and gore, stretched tight across his
broken teeth. His
slitted
eyes burned bitter, the
color of poison.

 
          
“Is
he okay?” asked Ghost. “Is he–” He stopped, his eyes widening. A low sexless
voice had begun to speak within his head.

 
          
No,
I’m not okay, it said. I am in terrible pain because your idiot friend
surprised me with his baseball bat and my own lover betrayed me for the sake of
your worthless songs. So what? I can take pain. It will pass. And if I choose
to return and take my pain out of your hide, I will, my pretty seer. Or, if you
like, I’ll shove my tongue down your throat and corrupt you with my spit.

 
          
Or,
if you prefer, I’ll unzip your skin and kiss you with your own heart-blood on
my lips. Are you tempted yet?

 
          
“No,”
said Ghost. “Get out of my head.” He was not sure if he had spoken aloud; it
didn’t matter. He knew Zillah could hear him. The voice crested into laughter,
lewd and savage. Ghost thought of a blank soul, a being with no morals and no
passions except those that could be gratified at a moment’s notice, a mad child
allowed to rage out of control. Now Ghost could only see Zillah and the others
through a veil of tears. Tears not for the awful feeling of having his thoughts
raped by such a being, but for Nothing. For that quiet little boy with the thin
haunted face, with the dyed black hair. For that boy who loved Zillah with all
his soul.

 
          
“Stop
it,” said Nothing. “Please. Everyone just stop it. We’re leaving right now.” He
pulled Molochai and Zillah toward the door.

 
          
He
hadn’t meant to cause all this pain. How could he have known what would happen?

 
          
No
one had told him much of anything yet. They had taught him how to rip through
resisting flesh, how to coax the last drop of blood from a limp cold body that
had once been warm and alive. But no one had sat him down and told him how
quickly and inexorably the other world the day world, he supposed—would begin
to slip away. Zillah hadn’t said to him, We are your whole world now; we and
others of our kind. We are the only friends you can have now. Or as Molochai
and Twig might have put it, Everyone else is just cocktails.

 
          
He
glanced back at Ghost one last time. He wished he could crawl into bed with
Ghost, pull the pile of patchwork quilts and scruffy blankets around him, and
sleep in Ghost’s arms.

 
          
Ghost
would be a friend, not a wild and predatory master like Zillah. If Ghost would
love him, he might still have some choice as to what his life would be.

 
          
But
Ghost did not want him. And why think such thoughts anyway? He had made his
choice. Not even a choice, really. He had simply come home.

 
          
Steve
got up to make sure the creeps were leaving. The kid’s big dark eyes were smeared
with makeup and tears. Steve felt a touch of pity for him. He couldn’t be much
older than thirteen; right about now he ought to be cadging his first joint or
his first feel, not breaking into people’s houses with assholes like these. But
that was the kid’s choice. Pity wouldn’t help him.

 
          
Steve
looked back at Ghost on the bed, but Ghost was facing the window, avoiding
everyone’s eyes.

 
          
Steve
followed them down the hall into the living room. “Don’t go out the way you
came in, huh?” he said. “Use the door this time.”

 
          
The
kid—Nothing, what a weird name, what a shitty name when you thought about
it–turned as he went through the door and looked at Steve. In those dark eyes
Steve saw again the essence of childhood lost. The dark innocence, the doomed
sadness. And the shame.

 
          
“I’m
sorry,” Nothing said again.

 
          
Inanely,
Steve wanted to tell him it was okay. But just then Zillah lifted his head and
looked at Steve. His eyes were dull, and the wreckage of his nose and mouth
still oozed thick blood. Steve hoped he was fucked up for good. Brain-damaged,
maybe. But he managed to unglue his swollen lips and shape his mouth around
four bitter words.