Impulse

It’s about to snow. Roy can hear it. He collects himself under his old hoodie, inhaling its familiar scent of cigarettes and coffee— coffee and cigarettes. The comfort this brings him is slight to nonexistent.

He comes to the conclusion that most everything around him— most everything— is in check. His eyes are squeezed shut for he is afraid. Nearly noiselessly, only nearly, buried behind the whistling of the snow, there is a padding of feet. A padding of feet so reminiscent of the padding of feet he’d heard in his nightmares. Or was he awake? He could hardly tell anymore.

Behind him stalks the predator, he’s certain. His teeth are like icicles that drip with humiliated blood. His cheeks are flushed red. Roy knows the predator is angry. He’s always so, so angry— so angry.
Roy picks up his pace, mumbled numbers dropping from his tongue and dancing with the sporadic snowflakes.

The predator falls behind, but still the prey is afraid to open his eyes. When he finally does, he does it slowly. Cautiously. The right one first because his hair hides it. If it turns out that he doesn’t want to see what’s in front of him, he can force himself to pretend he never saw it at all. But only if it’s behind the shield of his right— right— eye.

All he sees is the occasional snow, fleshy red skies, and the street he grew up on.

He passes a black and white mailbox, listening as his breath bounces from its metal exterior.

He recalls gloved hands pulling out a stack of envelopes— not from this mailbox, no, from another, and not his gloved hands, either, they were another’s— and shielding them from the warm breeze. He recalls the gloved hands pausing to rearrange the envelopes before shutting the mailbox and pushing back a loose lock of dark hair. He recalls the gloved hands disappearing inside of the Ice-Cream House.

Roy only calls it the “Ice-Cream House” because the first time he saw the gloved hands they were struggling to carry a tub of chocolate ice-cream in through the front door. The owner of the gloved hands was much younger then. Manhattan. He died that year.

Both of Roy’s eyes are now open and focused on his home. It draws nearer and steadily his breath quickens until he reaches the driveway. His feet squish with each step— seven steps— to the door. He’s about to go inside, but something stirs him to look down the street he’d just walked on. There are no dripping icicle teeth, nor flushed cheeks. There is no predator, nor any figure at all.

Roy wonders where the footsteps came from, his lips parted, eyes unblinking. The snow tastes sickly sweet on the roof of his mouth. Its whistle strangles away to screams as it begins to fall in thicker flurries. The air gets cooler, yet beneath his comfortable-but-not-comforting hoodie his blood races.

He goes inside. His father is not home from work yet. Roy takes off his hoodie and appreciates the flecks of white that have not yet melted in the house’s warmth. His father is not home from work yet. Roy goes to his room, mumbling, mumbling incoherent things, mostly incoherent things. After so much time has passed, he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it anymore. He slumps down the stairs, taking the last two steps an extra time out of habit. Kids and teachers at Roy’s school don’t like his habits. His algebra teacher has sent him to the counselor three times this year in an attempt to help him. Roy doesn’t find it helpful at all.

He sits on the floor in the center of his closet, leaving the heavy, reinforced door wide open to let light in. When his father comes home from work— home from work— it will be shut. Roy uses the time he has with the light to take off his backpack and do as much homework as he possibly can.

When he hears his father’s car pull up in the driveway, Roy twitches and the pencil he’d been using falls from his fingers. The back of his hand itches and he stares at it. The bug is practically visible beneath his skin, crawling about. It itches more. With the nubs of the nails he has on his other hand, he digs at the flesh until a bead of blood wells. The bug is in the blood. He wipes it on his jeans.

There’s a padding of feet— his father’s padding of feet— down the stairs. It’s very familiar. The feet only pad twelve times, not fourteen like Roy’s do when he takes the last two steps an extra time.

Roy sighs and pushes his homework outside the closet just as his father appears in his bedroom.

“Roy.”

“Hi, Dad.”

“How was school?”

“Fine.” Roy’s voice is gentle and meek. “How was work?”

“Fine.”

His father shuts the heavy, reinforced closet door.

*

Roy’s eyes are closed. Not relying on sight allows him to separate and magnify his other senses. At first, when he focuses on listening, nothing comes from it. He expands himself, though, taking a deep breath and silencing the sourceless static. Upstairs, his father is watching television. Roy tries to listen harder, to figure out what show his father is watching, only to get a headache. Or rather the headache he developed when the closet door closed worsens.

Next, he drops his lower jaw and tries to taste the air. All he gets from this is the closet he’s in is musty and unused— apart from his nightly stays— which he already knew. He finds taste to be a pretty useless sense.

On the other end of the spectrum, which isn’t truly a spectrum at all, the sense of touch is entirely important. He prefers to think of it as the sense of “feel,” though. There’s more to it than knowing that the wall he’s pressed against is plaster because he can feel the tiny beads of texture rubbing against his fingers. He knows that as a mammal he was given the instinctual ability to feel the space around him. He can feel the room is small and has no obstacles. The weighted door is a few feet in front of him and the knob protrudes towards him. He insists this knowledge is not knowledge created from memory. When he allows himself to expand past the barriers his body naturally sets, he becomes one with the space.

He feels confident about this space and opens his eyes, forgetting momentarily that there is no reason to do so. Momentarily. Momentarily he panics. He doesn’t know where he is. He doesn’t know what he did wrong. He worries his father is angry. Still angry— so angry. Roy’s scalp still burns from where his father had grabbed his hair and dragged him down the steps. This closet has always frightened him. He has nightmares about something being in there.

He thinks there’s something in there.

His scalp doesn’t still burn from where his father had grabbed his hair and dragged him down the steps.

A gloved finger finds his lips and he hears a gentle “Shhh.”

When Roy speaks, he’s shocked by the loudness of his voice. “Manhattan.”

The static in his ears comes back, exponentially growing in volume until he covers his ears and wonders if he’d spoken at all. Right now, there is nothing but sound and feelings and memories, but this is only the beginning.

His brain moves too quickly. He can’t keep up with his thoughts. They’re too jumbled to even attempt to follow. He wants Manhattan— he wants to go to Manhattan— he wants ice-cream— he wants the Ice-Cream House— he wants the gloved hands— he wants the boy with the gloved hands. They aren’t his gloved hands, though, they’re another’s. Right— right—?

He silences his head when a small light appears directly in the center of his line of sight. He watches as it grows, twists, and pulsates, expanding across his vision before receding again, over and over. It mesmerizes him for quite a while, as it always does. Its evolution is fascinating and beautiful. From the small white bead it morphs into tiny purple explosions that occasionally make him jump. He smiles into the darkness.

After some time he tries to close his eyes and rest, but the light doesn’t go away. It’s too distracting to try to sleep through, he knows.

He takes a deep, harsh breath and tries to become one with the space again, only this time he cannot feel the room’s limits. Besides the wall behind him, the black is endless. It stretches far out past him and the little purple explosions, and the door and door knob are nowhere to be felt.

Wetness slides down his face and it takes him a moment to process the tears.

His father would be disappointed.

Daddy would be upset.

The room erupts. The static gives into an agonizing shriek. The room closes in, tight against Roy’s body. He can taste blood in his mouth. The explosions tap out and leave him in the horrific darkness once again.

He should know by now not to think of disappointing his father.

This time, in his tiny, cramped space, he’s not alone. He can definitely feel another presence. The shrieking ends and Roy realizes he’d been making the horrific sound. His father won’t be happy. His stomach drops but he ignores the feeling, trying to focus on whatever the hell is in the room with him.

“You know this, Roy. You remember.” Roy can’t tell if the voice is his own or his father’s. He shakes his head in response. His hair tickles his face, greasier than he remembers it feeling earlier. He showered this morning, right— right? His feet are numb so he shifts positions, wrapping his arms around his torso.

There’s a low growl that follows his movement. He freezes and searches for its creator.

“Daddy?” He asks, his voice shattered. “Daddy, is that you?”

A face appears from the shadows, but it isn’t his fathers. Or is it? His father has come home from work.
It moves towards him, low to the ground. Or at least what Roy suspects is low to the ground. It has icicle teeth that drip with humiliated blood. Actual icicle teeth. Actual blood. It’s not Roy’s blood, or at least he doesn’t think it is. He think’s it’s blood from the gloved hands. Blood from Manhattan.

He’s never seen the predator look so real.

Roy thinks a little about how he misses his mother. About how he should have gone with her. He should have gone with her. He thinks a little about the way she regarded his incessant cleaning. “What’s wrong with you? Go play outside or something. Take those silly things off of your hands and have some fun for a change. Jeez. Kids these days. I swear. In my day we weren’t afraid of getting our hands dirty.”

Roy has always been afraid of getting his hands dirty. Not for any particular reason, though. Just because he didn’t like the way dirt would always get under his fingernails, even if he didn’t touch any dirt. It always just mysteriously ended up there. Little black crescent moons beneath his little white crescent nails. He knows there’s probably dirt under his nails right now. The thought makes the back of his hand itch. He can practically feel the bug crawling beneath his skin. It itches more. With his dirty-dirty fingernails he digs at the flesh until a bead of blood wells. The bug is in the blood. He wipes it on his jeans.

He’s never seen the predator look so real.

It creeps closer and he cries again. Any moment now it’ll kill him, just the way it killed Manhattan.

Manhattan. He could be there right now if only he’d gone with her. He should have gone with her. She may have joked but she would have never taken his gloves away. They could have had ice-cream together every night. Every night, in the Ice-Cream House in Manhattan. Manhattan.

It’s been seven years.

Poor Manhattan.

Light floods the room and Roy is blinded. The predator disappears instantaneously.

“Time’s up. Come on. Make me dinner.”

Roy feels incredibly ill as he tries to regain control of his senses and stand. “Hi, Dad…”

“Make me dinner.”

“Okay.”

*

Roy goes up the stairs the moment he feels physically able, his father following closely behind. Roy takes the last two steps an extra time for fourteen. His father sighs behind him, the sound overpowering his padding of feet. A padding of feet so reminiscent of the padding of feet he’d heard in his nightmares. Or was he awake? He could hardly tell anymore.

At the top of the stairs, Roy thinks a little about his father.

He’s never seen the predator look so real.