“Humor me for a moment,” Father Gareth said. “Can I ask that brilliant mind of yours a question?”
Gabriel nodded.
Gareth chuckled feebly. “Let’s pretend that there is a God, just for a moment. It doesn’t have to be the Christian God. Any version of God will do, any grand creator, any omniscient being that adequately fits the role. If there is a God, and if you had the chance for a one-on-one conversation with him, what would you tell him? What would you ask him?”
Gabriel pondered his answer, mentally spreading out the concept like cookie batter under a rolling pin. He listened to the droning hum of the oxygen concentrator and Gareth’s rattling breaths. “I’d ask him: why me? That’s what I’d ask. I’d ask why he picked me. I’d tell him ‘Hey, God, how dare you curse me with this supposedly brilliant mind?’ And then, I’d spit in the asshole’s face. Seriously, this brilliant mind that I’m so lucky to have? It’s a goddamn punishment is what it is. And if God exists, then it’s his fault. So after I spit in his face, I’d tell him to take that brilliant mind back and shove it up his ass. I’d tell him to carve some holes in my grey matter and make me a bit stupider.” Gabriel stood up, shaking his head. “That’s what I’d tell God, if God existed. And I’d mean every damn word of it.”
Gabriel’s skin was sticky with dried sweat. He wanted to run away from himself. That was impossible, but he could run away from Gareth. “I have to go. I’ll come back soon, okay? Stay safe until then. Don’t die. I’ll come back in a few days, I swear it. A few days.”
Gareth laughed and raised his blue-veined hand in a cheerful salute. “God bless you, Gabriel Schist!”
Fresh tears ran from Gabriel’s eyes. He wiped them away then tentatively stepped backward, slowly initiating his cowardly escape. Looking at Old Gareth’s smile, hearing that wonderful, merry laugh, he felt a stabbing pain in his heart. He wanted to voice his affection, but the words couldn’t escape his lips. He didn’t deserve Gareth’s love.
“A few days,” Gabriel repeated and walked out of the bedroom.
When he reached the front door, he paused. He didn’t want to leave. He shook his head. He’d be coming back in a few days. He’d see Gareth again. There was no reason to get sentimental.
He headed back to his car, and as much as he hated himself for it, the first thing he did was beeline it to the nearest bar. He drank until his blood was thinner than water then, too drunk to drive, crashed in a sleazy motel next to the bar. As he curled up under the cheap, sticky comforters, he promised himself that he would go back to see Gareth. And on his next visit, he would finally express how much the old priest meant to him, how much he loved him.
The following day, Gabriel woke up sometime in the afternoon. He downed some complimentary coffee from the motel lobby, which kick-started his nervous system just enough so that he could drive home. He pulled into the driveway at a cockeyed angle, decided it wasn’t worth fixing it, and climbed out of the car. Yvonne wasn’t home, though his mind was too foggy to figure out where she might be.
He quickly started the coffee machine and popped some pain pills to take care of his headache. When the telephone rang, he was so startled that he nearly fell.
“Hello?”
“Hello, am I speaking to Gabriel Schist?” The voice was mechanical and unfamiliar.
“This is he.” Gabriel rubbed his eyes.
“Mr. Schist, I’m calling from the hospital. I’m sorry to inform you that—”
“Fuck.” His stomach lurched. Not now, please, not like this. “Please tell me this isn’t about Father Gareth. The priest. Please.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Schist. Father Gareth passed away this morning.”
Chapter 34:
Infestation
Summer 2018
Matthew Lecroix, the Crooner, passed away in the middle of the night. There was no last song, no fond farewells, nothing but a black bag being whisked away to the funeral home.
Eighty-two of the one hundred forty-five residents living in Bright New Day were infected with the Black Virus. That was a high percentage, since they were all crowded together, but the infection rate across New England was also rising, with new cases reported every few days. Despite all efforts to contain the virus, the Schistlings were spreading their slimy tendrils across the East Coast like a torrential hurricane.
Gabriel stood in the shadows of the communal kitchen, staring at the television. The leopard-printed slug lay on his shoulder.
TOXIC PLAGUE INFECTS 5 MORE IN SPRINGFIELD, MASS
DEATH COUNT RISES TO 24 IN R.I.
WHAT CAUSES THE PLAGUE? RESEARCH IS INCONCLUSIVE
POSSIBLE LINK FOUND BETWEEN NEW EPIDEMIC AND SMALLPOX
Doctors, medical researchers, and scientists of all kinds were scrambling like chickens with their heads cut off, but none of the news implied that the scientific community had recognized the Schistlings’ sentience. The outbreak was still being painted as the spread of a new virus, and a government researcher was quoted as believing that it was probably an evolved strain of the norovirus. Other reports linked it to mad cow disease and bird flu. One family member of a victim had witnessed a Schistling emesis birth, but the story was laughed off as a conspiracy theory.
“Perhaps I can report my findings to one of the official research teams,” Gabriel muttered. “Send them all of my evidence.”
“That won’t be enough, Gabriel,” Leopard Print said. “They won’t believe in the idea of a rogue immune system. And even if someone does listen, your findings will get lost in mountains of paperwork. Years will pass before they look into it, and the Schistlings are moving too fast for that. The human race doesn’t have that much time. Don’t you realize that unless you do something, this Schistling epidemic will continue to spread?”
“There’s nothing I can do on my own. I’m a senior citizen with Alzheimer’s who wanders naked in the hallway. What can I possibly—hey, what’s that?” He jabbed a finger at the screen.
“Toxic waste,” the slug replied. “Or so they say.”
The news had finally switched to a different subject. Evidently, a helicopter pilot had captured blurry cellphone camera footage of a giant maelstrom of toxic waste moving along the coast of New Hampshire. The video showed what looked like an enormous black hole carved deep into the ocean’s blue flesh. The image reminded Gabriel of an oil spill. The experts were clueless as to its cause or what kind of waste it held. They were issuing warnings to potential beachgoers.
“That’s them,” Gabriel said. “Isn’t it? That’s why they always escape to the ocean, to join the crowd, to join their friends. Forming a new society, perhaps?”
The grainy, pixilated footage continued rolling. The black hole spun like a power drill into the ocean’s belly, reaching oily tentacles across the surface. But Gabriel noticed something even more stomach-turning than the toxic pool itself: a face, right in the center of the maelstrom. He rubbed his eyes and looked again; it was still there.
He thought it might be an optical illusion. Pareidolia was the name of the common psychological compulsion to see faces in everything, from a man in the moon to smiley faces in wood grain. But once he’d seen that face—with its contemptuous, leering expression and barracuda mouth—he couldn’t un-see it.
The video switched to footage from a morning press conference. “There’s no reason to panic,” a government official said. “Our top experts are on the case, and they’ve made it clear that there’s no reason to worry. This is simply a unique condition created by local pollution, but it will certainly dissipate within a month at most. We ask that you don’t leave any trash in the ocean, and everyone should be careful on the beach for the next few weeks.”
