Shadow Language

Shadow Language

by

JP Bloch

SMASHWORDS EDITION

* * * * *

PUBLISHED BY:

Pegasus Books/JP Bloch on Amazon

Shadow Language

Copyright © 2015 by JP Bloch

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

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ISBN - [TBA]

Comments about Shadow Language and requests for additional copies, book club rates and author speaking appearances may be addressed to JP Bloch or Pegasus Books, c/o [email protected], or you can send your comments and requests via e-mail to [email protected] or to contact us at www.pegasusbooks.net.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

For Tristan and his shadow

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

I always dreamt about the Sun People.

They stood fifty feet tall, and hundreds of them frolicked on the beach, like a nightmare soft drink commercial. Their bright bikinis and bathing trunks assaulted my eyes, as if staring into the sun. They played with volleyballs the size of houses and never stopped laughing. Their opaque dark glasses and big white smiles somehow made them impossible to know.

Beach Boys music came out of nowhere, and everyone danced. Everyone, of course, except me. I moved out of the way to avoid getting stepped on, but it made no difference. They passed right through me, as if I didn’t exist. I just stood there and watched, unable to speak.

I was not one of the Sun People.

When I woke in the morning, it took a moment to decide which world to believe in, especially in summer, when other kids played outside. I wanted to say to the sun, No, I am not ape-shit happy all the time. Please leave me alone.

I got older and stopped having the dream. But not really.

The worst thunderstorm in years happened on the day I got married. Everyone joked about it, and a snippet of the wedding appeared on one of those ha-ha video TV shows. But privately, I understood what the thunder told me. I sensed my own shadow nodding in agreement about something dark and without falsehood.

Thank you, friends, I whispered to my shadow and the thunder, when the moment came to kiss the bride.

1

I remember being happy. I mean, really happy.

It happened in winter, my favorite time of year. I walked alone in a wild, overgrown park my ghost town of a city had long abandoned. In the gray weather, trash didn’t look ugly, as it did on sunny days. Broken glass and the occasional discarded shoe blended in with weeds growing up through the cobblestones. I whistled an oldie, like I always do when I walk alone—or maybe I pretended to confront someone who scared me.

On impulse, I stepped across a knocked-down street lamp and climbed some rotting wooden steps to a boulder above the tree line. Standing near the edge, I saw the enormous gray sky turn black and powerful. And then it started to blizzard, as far as I could see. The whole world became a massive, drifting silence of black and white and brown. I couldn’t imagine anything more incredible. The trees were bare, but I thought of them as resting, as if winter were vacation time for trees. Everything felt still, yet so full of power. Dumb as it sounds, I wanted to be one of those trees, just standing there—just being.

Sometimes, when I wanted to die in my sleep or wished that the world blew up, I remembered the happy feeling I had for those few seconds. And sometimes—even though the moment came and went while my life and the world went on and on—the memory convinced me that if I had one good moment, maybe there’d be at least one more.

Of course, if I explained to anyone why standing in the freezing snow in a derelict park made me happy, they wouldn’t understand. But then, nobody had to understand because I learned long ago to tell people as little as possible. It’s supposed to feel good to open up to your fellow humans, but I had no idea what felt good about it.

Sometimes even saying hello exhausted me. Years ago at some party, I stood there on the outskirts of a conversation, and this weird guy looked at me and he looked at me and then he tapped me on the shoulder and said, Dude, social anxiety disorder? He said it just like that, as if playing charades or something.

Excuse me? I said.

Social anxiety disorder. SAD. Fear of. . . well, this. He gestured about the room of puppet-like drunks in suits and cocktail dresses. I noticed your hand shaking. You’re perspiring. You sound like you’re out of breath. You look at your watch every few seconds, like you can’t wait to leave. I bet you feel less lonely when you’re alone, am I right? I recognize the symptoms. I have them myself, but now I take my meds like a good boy, so I’m as friendly as can be.

He raised his glass in a sarcastic toast.

It drove me crazy when people assumed they knew more about me than they did. I wanted to say that his meds—not to mention the drink in his hand, which probably didn’t mix well with the meds—gave him the opposite problem. Now he came up to total strangers at parties and forgot to mind his own business. But, of course, I didn’t say this. I didn’t want things to go from bad to worse.

I’m fine, I said with a smile.

What do you do for a living? Does it add to your stress? I design video games, so I work alone. Or pretty much. Ever hear of the Alternate Universe Combat series? That’s my baby. You know, I once thought people had parties to make fun of me. To point out how nobody liked me. But now I realize—

Look, buddy, I have to go. Best of luck.

As I walked away to leave, I heard him go on about how social anxiety disorder also included not accepting friendliness from others, and how ignoring a problem becomes the biggest problem of all. He sounded like one of those arrogant guys who got even more annoying when he tried to be touchy-feely. I thought the whole thing ridiculous. I didn’t have some psychobabble disorder. Most of the time I coped quite well, considering. I’d like to see other people try being me and see how they do.

Here’s a scene from the horror movie of my life: I had to address a gaggle of reporters, though I wanted more than anything to lie in bed with a familiar book. I don’t think anything makes me more at peace than lying under the covers and reading a book I already know.

Instead, however, I walked to the podium outside the imposing, Romanesque building. I let everyone film me and take my picture, as if I were an inanimate object. The bright sun gave me a headache, though people chattered like chipmunks about the gorgeous weather.

Thank you for being here on this beautiful spring day, I said into the mic. I only wish it were for a different occasion.

Chief Hilario, said the first reporter, the public wants to know if police are doing everything possible to catch the Blind Date Butcher.

Talk about a ridiculous question. In the first place, what did everything mean, not to mention with a total police budget of fifty cents? And anyway, what did he expect me to say? No, we’re sitting around jerking off?

Glancing at the crowd, I saw behind the thick cluster of reporters maybe a dozen protestors carrying signs like Cops Don’t Care, or We Demand Our Right to Date. Several people had sheets over their heads to look like ghosts. They held a banner that read: Gone but Not Forgotten.

We’re absolutely doing all we can, I replied to the reporter. But we request that you cease to refer to this perpetrator by a catchy nickname. Whoever’s doing this is a coward and doesn’t deserve notoriety. Also, the families of the four victims surely do not appreciate seeing this worthless individual glorified in the media.

The profile signaled that this newest serial killer hated belittlement from authority figures. Or at least according to Myra, the FBI know-it-all who invited herself to take over the case, and stepped over my metaphorical dead body.

Chief, said the next reporter, do you have any persons of interest in the Blind Date Butcher murders?

I winced for the tiny wound to my soul; I never took it in stride when people ignored what I said, as if I didn’t exist. You might say I picked the wrong line of work in becoming a cop given this character defect, let alone chief of police in a rundown cesspool of a city. And by far the youngest chief in the city’s history, which made people disinclined to respect me. A popular choice when first appointed, I became scapegoat for everything wrong with the city.

Again, please do not refer to the case that way, I replied. But yes, there is a person of interest. In fact, we remained clueless as ever but I couldn’t say that.

Does it bother you to be called ‘Chief Hilarious’? asked a third reporter. A titter passed over the crowd, like hens in a henhouse.

Completely immaterial and in bad taste, given the matter at hand. The important thing is for people to be careful. Do not, I repeat do not, agree to meet even for a cup of coffee with someone you do not know.

In truth, people called me Joe Hilarious, Mr. Hilarious, Officer Hilarious, and now Chief Hilarious through the various stages my life. By the age of three, I rebelled against being called hilarious by never being hilarious. When people weren’t telling me to be more open, they told me to lighten up.

Do you think the Blind Date Butcher is a man or a woman?

Once again, we do not refer to the case by that name. We have reason to believe the perpetrator is a woman. That’s all I’m going to say.

The killing method—axing young bachelors into little pieces and keeping their cocks and balls as trophies—suggested a man at work, since the crimes were so violent. As anyone who watches TV knows, most serial killers are men, and women murderers tend to poison or smother their victims. But three of the four young men mentioned going on a blind date with a woman, and ended up chaotic piles of bloodied guts and bone. The FBI smarty-pants decreed the killer a woman, one who suffered some horrible trauma, probably on a blind date.

Still, I pictured the killer as a man. Not only because of the violence, but because. . . because my cop instinct told me. I also thought it had nothing to do with blind dates. But as often happened, I had no evidence to back up my claim—or at least not yet—and I knew better than to come off sounding like some flaky TV psychic.

Also, I figured declaring the killer a woman increased the likelihood of pushing the unknown subject’s psychological buttons. (Or as we experts called it, the unsub.) For not the first time in my life, I supported the dominant opinion when I believed it wrong. Though I had no idea why, it hurt my feelings when I pretended to know less than I did.

If the murders happened through an Internet dating service, tracking the killer could’ve been a piece of cake. But the unsub profiled as a clever online hunter who found personal web pages of guys in town, and then called them (never texting) from disposable phones to set up a meeting.

This suggested an eagerness to date on the part of all four victims. I had to admit that in their before photos—before being hacked to bits, that is—they looked pretty nerdy. As a woman detective said to a bunch of us pulling an all-nighter, The great irony here is that none of these guys could’ve had big dicks, and in spite of ourselves we all laughed.

Instead of trophies, she collects mini-trophies, offered a lieutenant.

She stores them in Tic-Tac dispensers, added another detective.

Charms for her charm bracelet, said someone else. Then, since there were three victims at the time, a bunch of people burst into a rousing chorus of Three Blind Mice. I didn’t join in, but when you’re a cop, you laugh at such things at 4:00 a.m. to keep from going crazy.

Crime itself never bothered me. Hell, if crime didn’t exist, cops wouldn’t exist. I saw no reason to take offense when someone dealt drugs for big bucks instead of flipping burgers. And I comprehended that people lost their cool and shot their spouse.

Crime scenes never grossed me out; I gleaned a strange satisfaction from gory sights and smells that confirmed my hunch that life stank. The stupid crimes bugged me: children murdered in drive-by shootings or sex offenders and murderers who thought their problems more important than someone else’s life.

I may not think much of life myself, but I don’t go out of my way to make it everyone else’s problem. I remember this one model of motherhood too busy fucking for crack to raise her daughter, so she had her own father raise the kid. Then, after getting busted for six or seven felonies, she said, You have to understand, my father molested me.

I said to her, So, let me get this straight. You gave your daughter away to the man who molested you?

She grew quiet, until she said, Gee, I never thought of it that way.

This kind of stupidity drove me up a wall. Over time, it broke my spirit. But I didn’t like admitting it.

I can answer one more question. From the podium, I looked at my wristwatch, as if piles of evidence demanded my attention that second. Public relations bullshit came with the territory. It didn’t matter how much I cared but how much I appeared to care. If I let myself care, I’d lose my mind.

Yes, Chief Hilario, said a reporter, emphasizing her usage of my correct surname. I think the people of this city deserve to know why the crime rate has remained the same since you took office two years ago.

Well, first let me say there’s been a ten percent reduction in crime, and that shortages—

‘Ten percent?’ Do you call that good enough?

I felt the anger build inside me. With a thirty percent budget cut and thirty mandatory layoffs, actually yes, I would. I’m not here to trip over your nasty little word game. I’m not here to—

I saw the FBI woman cut across her neck with her finger, meaning I shouldn’t hang myself out to dry. Through an intense act of will, I regained control of myself. These are hard times. I put in sixty to eighty hours a week, and I don’t get paid for overtime. That’s all I’ll say.

Though I said I’d take no more questions, another reporter shouted out, What would you say to the ghosts in the audience? She pointed to the idiotic people with sheets over their heads.

I’ve always believed it’s the living we have to fear. It offended me when some people laughed, but I didn’t say so. I wanted the press conference to be over.

You didn’t mention your family, Joe, said Myra, the FBI agent, as we walked back to my office. We entered the building through the swivel door, and the security guards waved us in. She pushed the up button for the elevator. Then she pushed it again, as if it would make the car arrive sooner.

What do you mean, Myra? Like a little kid, I enjoyed watching the lights above the elevator go from one floor to another. It let people in or out on the fifth floor, and next came the fourth . . .

You should’ve said working so much meant you never saw your family. You could’ve wiped your eye or put a crack in your voice.

Yeah. Okay.

You know what I mean, she replied. Joe, you’re sweating. Wipe your brow.

I hated it when people told me what to do as they would a child. I never knew how to respond, besides doing as they said. I took out my handkerchief and mopped my brow.

Are you feeling all right? Do you have a fever?

I’m fine, Myra.

The elevator doors opened; the people getting off looked either apologetic or resentful toward us for getting on. We stepped inside with a few other people, who exited on the third floor. I re-pressed the button for the sixth floor, even though it remained lit, to help the doors close sooner. For some reason it bothered me when a few people exited, but then more people entered, as if a game went on called Empty the Elevator.

You never talk about your family, Myra said. I find that fascinating. You don’t even have their pictures in your office, which speaking of PR is just plain dumb.

Look, you stole my case. You won. Are you also my publicist?

Joe, we’re working together. I didn’t steal anything. Not everything is about winning, you know.

Fine. Whatever you say. And as for my family, maybe if someone tried to kill your wife and kids, you’d be a wee bit inclined to keep them out of the public eye.

I could tell I made a small crack in her cheery countenance.

I’m sorry. I had no idea.

I’m a walking giant-sized folder of classified information.

We got off at the sixth floor, and I led her down the dirty hallway that the city cleaned maybe once a month. Myra’s high heels clunked behind me on the grimy fake marble tiles. We entered the outer office, and through force of habit, I scooped up my mail from the receptionist’s inbox.

I shuffled through the envelopes, several of which I recognized and handed back to the receptionist. Someone kept writing that the Blind Date Butcher belonged to an unground zombie cult, while another poor soul said his dead wife did it—stuff like that.

The usual nut jobs. Send a form letter. Tell them to go to hell.

Yes, Chief, said the receptionist, who now also doubled as office bookkeeper.

I held the door open to my inner sanctum, and Myra smiled as she entered. I’m not fussy about furniture, but my office would’ve depressed anyone. It consisted of a banged-up metal desk and file cabinet plus a couple of chairs with cracked plastic upholstery. The desk had a sticky substance on it that wouldn’t come off, and one of the file cabinet drawers didn’t open.

Overhead, the cracked fluorescent fixture made an annoying hum that, when I had a headache, made the headache worse. The one window, painted shut from years of soot, featured a cheap plastic window shade. Yet I permitted no clutter; I hated clutter. Sometimes I threw away letters or e-mails that would’ve come in handy later, but I am the opposite of a hoarder. I hate saving anything.

Various imitation bronze plaques and certificates in plain black frames covered the walls. Some were for my police work; I received commendations for solving some heinous crimes. Others came from local booster organizations and charities. When not at work, I could be