Stellar Thompson was a junkie and a drunk, at least when he was prosperous. Given that he was one of the town’s few long-standing homeless, that wasn’t often. No one hassled him much—the old man was amiably pathetic, tragic without seeming dangerous or making you too uncomfortable. Most days you’d find him watching squirrels as they jumped and played in the park, though whether his steady gaze signified deep thought or a mindless stupor was open for debate.
If you passed him on the street, he’d smile and nod, and only every other time would he ask for a bit of spare change. He asked in an easy, casual way that made it easier to refuse, but also made him asking less of an intrusion, less of a bother. And that was what he wanted. To blend in and go unseen. Living in the background meant no one noticed you or bothered you.
When we walked up to Stellar, he looked genuinely surprised. He was at the back of the hardware store, pitching a pair of pennies at the wall in some strange game of his own device, chuckling occasionally to himself. He smiled when he saw us, but he was wary underneath, wondering why we were there and why we were coming towards him. Sara spoke first.
“Hey, Stellar. Whatcha up to?”
He smiled again, ducking his head and stuffing the pennies and his hands in the pockets of his ratty brown overcoat. “Aw, nothin’ too much. Just pitchin’. Playin’ around. Nothing wrong with me bein’ here, is it? I can go…I’ll just go.” He was already shuffling away, and I panicked as I realized he might really leave before we could convince him.
“Whoa, Stellar. We don’t want you to go. We were just coming to ask you about something. See if you could do us a favor.”
When he turned back to us, he looked uncertain and curious. Then he broke into a brown grin. “Well sure, if I can help you kids.”
Sara nodded, giving him her most charming smile. “You can.” She pushed her hair behind her ear and leaned in conspiratorially, “You see, Dylan and I were wanting to get some liquor, but we’re still underage. We drink all the time at college, but it’s hard getting it when we’re home. You understand, don’t you?”
Stellar was already nodding, his eyes bright. He’d had this conversation dozens if not hundreds of times before. Kids would use him to buy booze, giving him money or a drink in return. I had friends in high school that recommended Stellar the way you would recommend a dependable accountant or mechanic. He was discreet, didn’t ask questions, and didn’t attract undue attention. He was perfect.
After he had gotten back into the car with the liquor, we drove north to the woods. Sara had thought up our stipulation that we would buy him a bottle of his own, but he had to go and drink with us afterwards. Stellar was only too happy to agree, licking his lips excitedly as his head bobbed up and down like a dashboard doll. His smell had not been noticeable in the chilly afternoon air, but after a few minutes in the car with the heat on, the garbage-stench that rolled off of him in waves was almost overpowering. I could tell that Sara was as grateful as I was when we were able to leave the car behind.
The entire walk to the cave, Stellar never questioned where we were going. One look at his face would tell anyone that he was desperate to snatch the brown paper sack from my hand, but he was old and patient. He kept his craving at bay and waited. When we reached the clearing he smiled, looking at me expectantly. Nodding, I took out a bottle of whisky and handed to him. He had spun the top off expertly and taken a long pull before I took out beers for myself and Sara.
For the next thirty minutes Sara and I nursed our beers while Stellar drank steadily, his back to the cave, happy and oblivious.
In my mind, I had pictured a long argument with Sara over my plan. I had prepared speeches and justifications, reasonable explanations and unassailable points. In the end, when I told her that we would use the cave…that we would use Mystery to save her, there was no surprise or outrage. Her first question was not how or why. It was who.
The choice had been obvious, though it had still taken me several hours of contemplation to arrive at Stellar Thompson. Someone who wouldn’t be missed. Who’s life was an utter waste. A man who had squandered any chances and talents he had ever had to live life as a homeless drunken druggie who would slit his own mother’s throat for a drink or a tweak. Compare that to Sara. Sara, who was still young and had her whole life ahead of her—a life full of promise. She had decided she wanted to become a doctor and help people. This, she said, was how she would make up for what we were doing. This is how she would make Stellar’s sacrifice worthwhile. She had cried as she said it, and I had known it to be true.
Stellar was a seasoned alcoholic, and I had honestly expected it to take longer to get him drunk. But after reaching the clearing, something made the old man nervous. Out of a nearly instinctive reaction to this sense of unease, he drank fast and hard, as though he feared we might take the bottle from him any moment.
The three of us spoke, but only occasionally, the sound of our forced laughter and idle chatter falling false on my ear. Once I decided that Stellar was “drunk enough”, but before he moved into the swiftly approaching area of “too drunk”, I stood up and nodded for Sara to do the same. I looked down at the old man, a smile hanging large on my face.
“Hey, man. Want to see something cool?”
Stellar looked up like a physicist interrupted during a complex equation. “Hmm? No, nah, I’m okay. Thanks though, man. This is good shit.”
I nodded, keeping the smile in place. “Sure. No problem. But seriously, I want you to tell me what you think of this. It’s right over here.” I paused and then added, “There’s another drink in it for you.”
He hesitated at that. Then he smiled widely. “You know, that sure sounds cool. But I just remembered, man. I’ve got a friend I’m supposed to be meeting. I got to go.”
I shook my head. “No worries. We’ll drive you back. Just come over here and see this thing and then we’ll go. Honest injun.”
He smiled again, nodding as he got shakily to his feet. “Sounds cool and all, but I’ll walk back. I could use the exercise. The fresh air, know what I mean? Be seeing…”
He had been so focused on me that he hadn’t noticed Sara behind him, a large rock held over her head. When she struck him in the back of the head, he tumbled forward without a sound, and I felt sure that he was dead, thinking fearfully that the thing in the cave wouldn’t take someone who was already dead as a tribute. Why I thought the last, I couldn’t say, but it seemed true as I thought it.
Sara must have thought the same thing, because she dropped the rock and rushed forward to check for a pulse. After a moment of groping around, trying to avoid the blood that was trickling freely from the back of Stellar’s head, she looked at me and nodded.
“He’s alive. It’s weak though.”
Without another word we began pulling him towards the drop-off. When we reached the edge, we looked at one another for the space of a second and then shoved him over. He rolled a long distance, thumping and bumping himself to the edge of the cave’s dark entrance. Then there was only silence.
After several minutes of hearing nothing, I called out in a loud voice, working to keep tremors out of it. “Tribute! We bring you a tribute!”
Before the final word was out of my mouth, Stellar Thompson had been drug away into the black. Afterward, we didn’t discuss whether or not we had done the right thing. We didn’t question the coincidence or bad luck behind both Roberta’s and Sara’s brushes with death so close together. We just waited. Two weeks later, Sara was given a clean bill of health.
She broke up with dear, sweet Chad during winter finals, and while she didn’t give me any details, I knew the reasons. One reason—at least I hoped—was me. But the real reason, I think, was that she saw herself differently now than she had before.
The following summer Sara and I were inseparable. The guilt that had pushed us apart before now bound us tightly together. We shared a secret that no one else knew, that no one else could ever know, and that made us unique as snowflakes—bright and shining and alone together. It might seem that this would make our relationship morbid or destructive, but it was neither. As the days grew longer and then shorter again, we spent hours talking and taking rides, going to movies and being bored together. I loved her so much.
Strangely, during all of this we did nothing that was overtly romantic. I was more than willing, but I knew enough to wait until the time was right. The moment would come, and I was patient enough to wait for it. I had been waiting for years, after all.
Sara kissed me for the first time on August 19th of the summer before our sophomore year, less than three days before she left to go back to school. We were sitting in the dugout at the old ballfield, the same place we had pondered the message that predicted Autumn Lester's death, the same place we had played and roamed for years before that. I was lost in that kiss, my body tingling and my mind racing as we finally pulled away from each other several minutes later.
I looked down at the ground, afraid my voice would betray too much if I spoke before clearing my head. When I finally did look at Sara, I saw tears glistening on her cheeks.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
She shook her head--two quick jerks in alternating directions as she wiped at her eyes. "Nothing. Nothing. Just...Thank you, Dylan. Thank you. You've always been there for me. Always helped me." She turned away, staring out into space. "And this last..." She fell silent, shaking her head again as she held her face in her hands.
I reached out and touched her arm lightly. "What we did was what was necessary. It was the only way."
She looked up at me, her eyes red and shining. "Was it? I...I don't know. We took his life so I could have mine."
"No. No, we didn't. That thing in the cave did. And even if we helped, so what? Is it better that some old bum that has wasted his life and will never do anything should live a few more years, or hell, maybe months, rather than you? You, who are young and beautiful, and have so much ahead of you?" When she sat silent, I went on. "No, it'd be a tragedy. That's what it'd be. A goddamned travesty. And if I had to do it over, I wouldn't hesitate. We made the right choice."
Nearly a minute passed before she nodded, turning to look at me one last time before standing up. "Well, I just wanted you to know. Thank you."
Unable to think of the right response, I just nodded and followed her off of the field. We only saw each other once more before she headed off for school, and then we only met for a quick goodbye lunch before she left. I wanted to kiss her again, to tell her that she should come back here to go to school now that things were over with Chad. Yet something kept me from it, telling me that it wasn't the right time. So instead I carried the last of her stuff to her car and gave her a hug, making her promise to give me a call when she got a chance.
She nodded and smiled, waving to Roberta and me as she drove away. When she had passed out of sight, Roberta turned to me, a solemn look on her face.
"You love that girl, don't you, Dylan?"
I was stunned, blurting out the truth before I could fabricate a lie. "Yes, ma'am. I do....I mean..."
Roberta smiled and gave a small laugh then. "No need to backpeddle with me. I've known that for a long time. And that's more than fine with me. Just..." She trailed off, several seconds passing before she began again. "My girl is going through alot of changes lately. The last year, well, she's just different. Have you noticed it?"
I shrugged and nodded. "I guess so. She's got alot going on, I guess."
"Well, I'm sure you're right." She studied my face, having to look up at me slightly since my last growth spurt. She put her hand on my shoulder. "Just be careful. Both for her sake and for yours. I don't know what I'd do if anything ever happened to either of you."
I smiled and gave her a hug, hanging around for a few more minutes before making up an excuse for why I needed to get back home. Weeks went by without a call from Sara, and I fought to maintain my resolve to not call her first. I knew from Roberta that she was safely back at school, but beyond that Sara's mother would volunteer little, a strange expression often passing across her face as she assured me that Sara was likely just very busy with school at the moment.
It was the middle of October when Sara's letter came. It was only two sentences, written in Sara's flowing cursive. My heart pounded as I opened the letter, full of hope and dread for what it might say. Then I read it. The world faded away and my breath stopped. It said:
Chad and I are engaged. I'm so sorry, Dylan.
I threw it away from me with fear and disgust, folding in on myself until I was sitting on the floor, too numb to yell or cry. What was I supposed to do?
Roberta watched the credits for The Thin Man, thinking not for the first time how much shorter movie credits used to be. She wondered if that meant that movies were more complex now, or that people just used to not get as much credit. Either way, it was hard to beat William Powell and Myrna Loy together, and her willingness to stay up so late was a testament to that. Since her miracle recovery, Roberta had gotten her real estate license and had been doing pretty well at it the last few months. Sighing, she stood up in the dark living room, wishing again that she hadn't scheduled a showing for eight in the morning. Still, she thought, it could mean a big sale, so I shouldn't bitch too much.
She felt around on the sofa until she found her cell phone, hitting a button to briefly turn on the phone's luminescent screen. She nearly always used this phone instead of her home telephone, and it was rare that it wasn't close by. The light flickered out after two seconds, so she hit it again and began moving out of the room.
Old movie or not, Roberta had always been a night owl. Sara, on the other hand, had always been almost annoyingly chirpy in the morning and went to bed early at night. Back during the bad times, Roberta had slept little. She would lie awake for hours, staring into darkness as she gritted her teeth in pain. Later, when she was better, she would still sit up late, enjoying time to herself without the pain and the fear that had been her world for so many years. Sara would usually be several hours asleep before Roberta went to bed, her daughter’s bedroom door always opened wide and on the way down the hallway to Roberta's own room. Not wanting to turn on a hallway light and risk disturbing Sara, and refusing to lug around a flashlight like some kind of lunatic, Roberta had taken to using her cell phone to light her way.
Even now, with Sara back at school for nearly two months, she still went to bed with the house dark and a soft blue glow to guide her. She moved into the front foyer as the light went out again. Light. Move to the bottom of the stairs. Light. Halfway up. Light. On the way to the top.
It was during this last stretch up the stairs that she thought she heard something. A tap, tap-tap sound so faint it seemed dreamlike in her sleepy state. She paused, listening for other noise. It had sounded as if it came from one of the rooms upstairs, but she couldn't say for sure. Noises sounded strange in the dark, and though it didn't sound like a noise she recalled commonly hearing, it was probably just the house creaking or settling or passing gas. She grinned to herself at this last thought, imagining the house turning on the air conditioner to try to mask its embarrassing flatulence. Satisfied with no repeat of the sounds, she started up the stairs again.
Light. Top of the stairs. Light. Past Sara's room and the bathroom. Light. Staring into the face of a monster, the icy pinpricks of light that served it for eyes outshining the phone's illumination. Its hands, cold and terrible, shot out to dig into the meat of her and pull her inside her bedroom, a tiny, gasping squeal escaping from between its impossibly long and sharp teeth. The door slammed shut behind her, and she had a final moment to stare at the glistening death's head drawing closer before the phone's light went out one last time, leaving her in the dark to scream.
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Credits
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