The New Weird - Ann VanderMeer [95]
Comes a knock at the bedroom door. He rolls off the palette, club in hand. The knock comes again, high on the door. He stands on tiptoe, presses his ear to the door. The knock comes again, slightly above his head.
"Father?" he calls.
There is no answer.
His father would respond to his call. His mother is shut in her room, her door wedged closed. That leaves only the rats. The rats have returned. They are leaping high, throwing their bodies against his door. He knows better than to answer.
The deadfall collapses. He hears muffled sounds, fading. He swings open the door, brandishing the table leg, baring his teeth.
Peach preserves have spurted over the floor. He lifts the tabletop off the ground. He peers under it. Nothing but squashed peaches. The rats have escaped.
He travels through the dust, unspooling the fishline. Dust billows up. He stops, listens for rats. He hears nothing. He continues on.
He squints his eyes, breathing through the cloth over his mouth. He drops to his knees, pushing his hands into the dust. He takes up the keys, stands. He gropes his way to the wall.
He returns. His mother's door is ajar, splinters of wood scattering the floor.
He raises the table leg. He kicks the door open.
His mother lies where he left her, unharmed. Beside her, leaning against the edge of her bed, is his father. "Come here, Brey," his father says. Brey hesitates in the doorway, club half-raised. "This is not a game, dear Brey," says his father. "Am I understood?" Brey nods. His father rises, takes the table leg from Brey's hand, throws it out into the hall. He raps his knuckles hard against Brey's plaster forehead.
"Brey?" he says. "Brey?"
He turns the tabletop upside down. He sops up the peaches, flushing them down the toilet. He unravels a strip of cloth from his mother while she sleeps. Dipping the cloth into the toilet, he uses it to swab the floor.
Perhaps he can strike a bargain with the rats. Perhaps a truce might not be impossible.
He screws the legs back into the table, but leaves the tabletop upside down on the floor. He ties the strip of cloth to a table leg as a white flag. He leaves three jars of peaches next to the flag, proof of his goodwill.
He is willing to offer the rats something in exchange for a little peace. He is willing to exchange something valuable for the right to collect keys. Even something of great value. His father, for instance.
Limit.
Days pass. The jars of peaches remain. The rats do not come.
He tips the tabletop onto its side. He drags it over to block the bathroom door. The flag drags across the floor, turning gray. He unties the flag from the table leg, carries it to his mother, draping it across her calves.
There are keys to be collected. He has been told that he should collect keys. He will collect keys.
He is at the outer edge of the intersection, near the spool, holding a ring of keys. He follows the fishline back, trying the keys at each door, without avail.
He listens to his own footsteps. He stops abruptly. Behind him footsteps continue an instant, stop. Whirling around, he sees nothing.
He continues forward. Behind him, a light sputters out. He turns his head, peering backward into the fresh darkness. He feels the fishline vibrate. He starts to run.
He lumbers forward, crossing dusty intersections. He reaches the spool of fishline, stops long enough to heave it up and struggle on. The fishline plays out through his legs, shuttling to and fro across the spool. On one side of the spool appears a strip of exposed wood, growing wider as the fishline plays out. He crosses three dust-filled intersections and enters clean halls. He stoops to pick up a set of keys, hurries to the next intersection. He plucks up another set of keys and lumbers forward, the keys hooked awkwardly over two fingers. He stumbles, breathing hard, shifting the spool's weight to one side, to the hand without keys in