Better Eyes

By Travis Barr

After 32 years of marriage, famous entertainment figure, Bill Kirby and renowned photographer, Edna Kirby are getting divorced. An amicable decision, no petty fights, no court battles, no problems--except that both Bill and Edna harbor terrible secrets. Secrets that could undo all that they have worked so hard to build...and tear their family apart for all time...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Travis Barr
• Release date: Sep 2, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301185313

Travis Barr

Travis Barr grew up in Southern California and went to CalState University of Long Beach. He graduated with a BA in film then furthered his education with a teaching credential. Travis has always held a fascination with the fantastical and suspenseful in storytelling. With his second novel and first part of The Chosen Trilogy, "The Spider Agenda," he has taken that wonderment to new levels of gripping tension and spellbinding adventure. "Agenda" sets the scene for what is to come in the second installment, "The Wasp Initiative" and is the seeds for which will come to full climactic fruition in the third tale, "The Hornet Operative." Travis still lives in the California area with his family and good friends, and enjoys the beaches of his youth. His favorite TV programs include "The Walking Dead," "Falling Skies," and "The Strain." His most cherished novels of all time include Peter Straub's classic tale, "Ghost Story," Bill Blatty's "The Exorcist," and Stephen King's "'Salem's Lot." His favorite film will always be George Lucas' "Star Wars."

Book preview

Prologue

Can you see right now? said a man named Jerry.

No—well…sort of, said his bed-ridden wife, Sandy.

Sort of, what do you see?

I see black, but…also bright colors exploding over and over again…

Weird…

Last night was better, though.

Tutting in frustration, Jerry said "I wasn’t here for that. Man…"

Actually, you kind of were. In a way, you were. I mean I could see you…standing in a field of extremely bright green grass, almost glowing. But that’s not the weird part…

What was? he asked with growing interest.

…I felt like…I was seeing you not as myself…but like with the eyes of a whole bunch of people…you know, like I was all of them…

…Wow, he said and hissed a breath of brief, nervous laughter.

But that’s still not the part that was the freakiest.

Uh oh, tell me.

…You were standing there in that grass field, so serious like a statue…and you were the age you are now…but you had white hair.

Chapter One

What a killer night, twenty-one-year-old Russian immigrant Anton Karapov reflected as he sleeved an arm with his coat. And he did so with an ample measure of haste—clearly he was late for something pressing. Yet this did not rip him away from his mental replaying of last night’s ass-first, head first (hell, one and the same in this case) plunge into substance abuse excess.

With the Stone brothers, Paul and Patrick. Stone, thought Anton. What a totally fitting name for those two ultimate highflyers. For the Stone’s, as Anton and many in their circle well knew, were almost always stoned.

They were certainly lit last night, he noted to himself with a lecherous grin. Anton hadn’t even shown up to their place until one in the morning. And upon arrival, was hit with the slow coagulate nebula of Brazilian hashish—a contact high to kick things off. He had fallen into the pillowy couch beside them and the night’s glory truly began.

Screw the bar with the imported beer he had just ejected himself from twenty minutes earlier. This was the place for the real brain carnival to commence. Hey carney man, spin that carousel and rev up those spark-spitting bumper cars. Time to take that leathery mallet and slam it down with every thing you’ve got aaaaaannnd ding! We have a winner.

And while we’re at it, screw the day time, the morning after!—Anton howled with fervent conviction in his mind’s echoing halls. What good ever came of it? The daylight was muck, the sun hours nothing but long needles shoved deep into the brain straight through the eyes! Why did there have to be, you know, hours of it? Hours of how things really are, rather than how we would like them to be.

Oh well, peckerhead, it’s morning now and there’s no use in moaning like some St. Petersburg whore. Pick up the damn phone and do your act.

Heeding his older brother’s phantom voice in his head, he jabbed a hand out to grip the phone, pressed speed dial number four, and pasted it to his ear and cheek. He waited. …Edna? Hey, it’s me. Sorry I’m running a little late here, I can’t seem to locate my keys. That was a lie. They’re in here somewhere, I know it. Once I got ‘em, I’m gone…Okay, see you there. He pressed end and shoved his phone in his jacket pocket. Yet as he reached forth to snatch up his keys from the dining room table, his phone rang in its lyrical loop. And back out came the device. Hello?

And out of the thing’s sliver of a speaker came a tiny, mousy voice of a girl. Anton’s girl. Anton!

Natalie! he mocked, Listen, I’m late—

Where were you?!

When?

Last night!

I was with the Stone brothers. Getting stoned. And pissed, why?

I tried to call you four hundred fucking times last night—

Nat, I’m so past late here, what is it?

…Are you ready? came her elated tone.

"Whaaaat?"

…I won the lottery!

Instinctively, Anton swung around and trotted a few steps, as if Natalie was standing in that direction and his movement was allowing her more of his attention. The lot—what—how much?!

You won’t believe how much—

"Try me."

Twenty-five thousand dollars!

Are you kidding me?!

I am not!

He then became frozen. A dimensional snapshot in time of a frazzled, tousled-haired youth whose mind had possibly forgotten the simple task of mobility. But no, his being had only hit the pause button for a second before his mouth spat quite audibly, We never have to work again!

I know!

Get dressed, baby, I-am-on-my-way-over!

"See you soon, sweeetie."

Anton hung up, jammed the phone back in his coat while plowing towards the front door. He slammed it shut and was gone.

And the room was left to itself, a claustrophobic cube degraded by decades of disrepair and general laziness on the part of its current inhabitant. The dresser rested on it a multitude of various things—clothes, cologne, condoms, etc.—that seemed to have fallen on each other; like the remnants of some child’s imaginary war. Two things, however, towered up from the carnaged battlefield like risen victors—one was a three-year-old, twenty-two inch, flat-screen TV (which Anton accepted in lieu of payment for a bag of cocaine), and the other was a black, leather, rectangular case. Had the lid been opened, one would clearly be able to see four professional photo lenses fitted inside, all snugly held in place by wells of felt lining.

And had Anton not received the call from Natalie a moment ago, he would have grabbed the case by its flip-up handle and carried it with him to his only legitimate gig: a part-time photographer’s assistant to one Edna Kirby. This Edna would have, with Anton’s silent aid, employed these lenses to guide her in creating photographic mastery, two-dimensional sheets of scenic nirvana. She would then proceed to sell the prints or negatives to whoever had the good sense to commission her talents: travel magazines, science journals, etc. Edna would conclude the transaction by taking in a sizeable chunk of change to supplement her family’s income and, of course, siphon off an agreed amount to Anton for his efforts. And life, in its supposed smoothness of flow, would have circled on.

But, there again, Anton had received the call from his girl changing the game for everything, interrupting the often grating, repetitive loop of things. And now he was vigorously plodding down the apartment building hallways to obsessively find the front exit. Forgetting with abandon the pressing appointment he had with his employer. Filling to the brim in his mind the new reality that thousands of dollars would soon be his for the asking.

Granted, in his drug-addled consciousness, twenty-five thousand was interpreted as more like two hundred and fifty thousand—which he also looked at as a quarter of a million dollars. And thus rushed to his early nineties two-door thinking that he and his Natalia were rich and carefree. Certainly careless of now meeting up with Edna to carry out their latest assignment.

And the case of lenses he would have brought with him to act as focal windows for one of California’s most gifted photographers to work her magic would now just be a case of lenses. Sitting on a cluttered dresser. Useless.

Chapter Two

Nestor Beach dazzled its spectators with a tantalizing molasses-dipping of the orange-soaked sun. The wind was chilled yet it refrained from whipping the scattered patrons who currently inhabited Nestor’s scenic land and waterscapes. If asked, most of the varied souls would likely admit to having a fairly pleasant evening absorbing the beach’s aural and visual delights. After all, this locale was designed to deliver much needed doses of enjoyment prescribed by the mind’s consults to unwind and release tensions. One did not typically come here to wallow in the disparities of life’s darker and more oppressive drudgeries. And certainly not on a night such as this, with the sun putting on an eyeful of a show, rippling its way into the sparkling slumber of the ocean.

Yet wallowing was exactly what two particular individuals were doing here on Nestor’s wooden-built, quarter-mile stretch of pier. A couple, a man and a wife who were, sadly enough, nine-years-long bound to each other in legal name only.

The man was a celebrity talk show host by the name, William Dyson Kirby. His wife of thirty-two years was Edna Riley Kirby. She was, of course, the much revered photographer mentioned earlier. But neither of their professions mattered to them right now. Only that they had come here to talk over what both knew simply had to happen.

You know, Bill started from their silence, you look at all of this… and he peered across the darkening array of sand and sea, …and when you’re deep into each other like we used to be, it all seems like…I don’t know, like mystical and…meant to inspire magic in people’s lives, their ambitions and all that. My grandmother used to say it was fuel for the soul…but now…

But now that we’re talking about certain divorce, there’s no mystery or magic to any of it, Edna concluded for him, It’s just a bunch of earth and water. It looks pretty but it’s still just things. She shrugged as if to emphasize their point—a beautiful (yet cluttered) beach, a pretty ocean, what of it?

You know what this place really is? Proof that things never stay as good as they used to be. Can’t believe how dingy it’s gotten. And he shook his head but continued to stare out at the scenery. Though the night’s majesty was lost on them, they continued to look forward avoiding direct addressing of one another. It was not so much in an attempt to avoid gazing upon each other; more in hopes of trying to eke out a small scrap of comfort from the evening’s artistry. Though both of them knew it was virtually impossible.

So, Edna soldiered on, this is really it.

Bill breathed. Don’t see any way around it. Counseling proved that.

A small flat laugh escaped Edna. Counseling. Never again.

Bill rotated his head slightly. Ain’t gonna argue with that.

Edna turned to eye the layout of the beach itself, with its almost infinite, snaking walkway, the plant-encrusted cliffs that were lined with strips of steep stairs or diagonal ramps. And, of course, the people who made use of them. A weird nostalgia hit her mind. It really is tragically funny us coming here of all places to talk about ending our marriage…so many fun, romantic times on the beach…walking along this same pier…

Finally, he faced her. We’ll go somewhere else, then. I didn’t want to make this harder—

Grimacing, Edna said, Nooo…whatever, were here already.

…All right.

The grimace remained as she asked, Do you think we…failed each other?

"No. Hell, thirty-two years for God’s sake, name one of our friends’ marriages who lasted even half that."

We are the record holders in our circle, aren’t we?

And I’m not going to stand here and blame you for this—

"Oh, whose to blame, it’s just over, that’s all. At least we’re being adults about it. Which is more than I can say for any of the other divorces we witnessed over the years."

And Janine’s out on her own now, so maybe this won’t hit her too hard.

A sense of pride now soothed her mind serving to dampen the sense of loss. And that’s one thing you and I surely didn’t fail on. You and I raised a hell of a daughter.

Bill nodded with a small but satisfied smile. "She is quite something, isn’t she? I mean our child is now a graphic artist working for a big company…just amazing…"

Edna turned back to look at the sunset, actually taking some pleasure in the act. I even like her guy now, believe it or not.

Well, that’s a surprising one-eighty.

"Wellll…he does genuinely seem to care about her."

Bill cocked an eyebrow at her. We are still talking about forty-five-year-old Charlie Baker dating our twenty-six-year-old daughter, right?

We are.

Okay. Just checking.

All right, I’m still a little freaked out by the age gap. But I guess, who are we to question a slightly unusual relationship?

True. Hey, they’re still coming to the thing tomorrow night, right?

"Far as I know. Damn, Bill, three hundredth show…"

I know. I didn’t even think I’d last a season…speaking of our daughter…how are we planning on breaking this to her? Should I tell her, should you, both of us?

"I say both—but, we should wait until after the celebration tomorrow. There’s no point in spoiling her fun."

Nodding slowly, Bill said, I agree.

And both of them were silent for a moment, watching the last of the shimmering slivers of the drowsy sun succumb to the vast unconsciousness of the ocean.

Well… Edna began with a flat tone and a blank expression, …it’s down. Let’s go.

****

Bill drove their four-door sedan with Edna in the passenger seat. He had received the plush vehicle as a birthday gift for his fiftieth birthday from the producers of his talk show. It was a pitch black-colored car—which Bill had good-naturedly ribbed his staff about at the time of receiving: Oh I see now, I’m a black man so I should automatically get a black car, is that how it is here? To which Edna, still a year away from fifty herself at the time, retorted above the laughter, Well, you married a white women, you might as well have a black car and not piss off the racists too much. After a few more chuckles were issued, Bill ended the particular subject with, But hey! Where’s the leopard skin interior? Aren’t I worth the full nine here? And once the laughter from that comment died down, Bill, being the ultra polite man that he’d always been, thanked everyone profusely for the generous gift and promised not to get too soused and wreck it.

That was three years ago. And the car, naturally, was yet a smooth running machine, doing exactly what it was expertly designed to do. Provide a comfortable driving experience for its owners. With decent gas mileage no less.

Bill wished he could say the same for his corpse of a marriage. A jarring loop of a horrid thought raced around in his mind: when did it all sputter and give out so completely to have brought them to this point. As he drove wordlessly through the night’s traffic towards home (Edna as silent as he beside him), the thought played on him in its repetitiveness. Of course, he knew it was roughly nine years ago, that was clear. But the better phrasing of the question would have been what not when. What had effectively closed the door on their love for each other. Time? A million tedious frustrations? Their emerging revelations about themselves? Some evolution of their individual characters that diverged their passions to paths too far apart? Perhaps all of these, he mused morosely. Perhaps none. Truthfully, he didn’t know for certain what had happened. Maybe things just have a way of dying for no real reason, he sobered his mind with.

Then another stark thought pushed its way to the forefront of his conscious thoughts. One he’d been considering for quite some time. He broke the silence with, After tomorrow night, I’m going to go ahead and get a hotel room for myself.

Edna immediately faced him. What? Are you sure? That’s been your house too. You know I can find a place, I can stay with someone—

Listen, I want you to stay there. At least until we can get things sorted out on the legal end.

Edna made a breath of unease. …Are you sure?

I’m sure.

…All right…we don’t have to get separate lawyers, do we?

Instantly, he replied, "No, no, no."

Okay.

Then silence returned to the two.

****

It was time for bed. The Kirby bedroom was bathed in darkness save for the illuminate of the bedside table’s night lamp. Bill lay in their bed, a few blankets covering his lower half, and stared pensively at the ceiling. Frustratingly, an obsessive part of his mind couldn’t face the things just die sometimes concept and forced him to keep wheedling away at the cause (or causes) of the breakdown. At this point, however, Bill wished that he could just close off thinking altogether.

After a moment, Edna came from the adjoining bathroom and climbed into bed next to Bill. She mirrored his nervous gaze to the ceiling.

Well… he started, I suppose being cursed with impotency won’t make much of a difference now.

You don’t plan on getting back out there?

Me? Date at fifty-three? You can’t be serious.

Well…it’s not unheard of.

Most certainly not for you, you shady little sneak, Edna’s grandmother, Christine’s reproachful and accusatory voice rang through her mind. You used to tease those boys in your carefree teen years—the evil years as I like to called them—keeping at least two or three of those desperate manchildren on the hook. All for the satisfaction of your selfish, adolescent whims. Dirty child. It will come back on you one day.

Of course, that’s all it was, really—a voice that existed only within Edna’s burrowing conscience. Gammy Christine had been dead for thirty-eight years last October. Brain aneurism while she slept. But that didn’t mean the old self-righteous prig’s words were any less effective in bludgeoning Edna with a hammer of guilt and shame.

Eight years ago, Edna had met Pang Choi while arranging the funeral for her old high school friend, Patricia Dodd. She and Pat had been the tightest of best pals back in those hazy days of grade school. Yet as soon as both them got married, moved to different states, and had children, their busy lives afforded them few chances to meet, shop, and dish. Though they had grown apart, they always kept a certain love for each other. So when Patty died of a sudden and tragic heart attack (at only forty-three!), Edna felt compelled to be the one to arrange the funeral, as well as the after party.

Pang was the owner of the With Honor funeral home and burial services establishment. And had been for most of his adult life. An unwritten policy of his was to never mix business with personal interests, but when he met Edna for the initial arrangements, it was clear to his mind that the policy, in reality, was more of a guideline.

I don’t really work here, he said to her as she approached his desk. I’m just filling in for another Pang Choi who’s away.

She had laughed, not because the joke was particularly side-splitting in and of itself, but because Pang had delivered it with such comic pinash. A few weeks after the funeral, Edna made a fairly innocent lunch date with the middle-aged Hanoi native. And Mr. Choi was like a diabetic kid in a candy shop—knowing that it was bad for his health to potentially involve himself with a married woman—one whose husband was publicly famous. But he simply had to have her sweetness, that undeniable honey that dripped from her eyes and her smile.

And besides, all throughout the lunch he continued to make her laugh in all the right ways.

Three weeks later they went to bed together in a cabin loaned to Pang by his old college roommate. The passion was abrupt and intense, bordering on violent. Pang hadn’t dated in two years. And Edna hadn’t been to bed with Bill since his arousal issues surfaced a year earlier. The two were hungry. And by the end of the cabin visit, their proverbial libidinous bellies were full.

And so it became a regular thing—as regular as it could be with two lives as busied as Edna’s and Pang’s. She was a mother and still a wife with all the financial and familial obligations heaped upon those societal roles. And Pang had a dying father to attend to (as well as oversee the probate details after being named executor of the will).

For the last eight years, the two shady sneaks, as Gammy Chris liked to say, saw their get-togethers as balms for their wounds of reality, the things that ate at their minds and souls but had no control over changing. The secret getaways were what they looked forward to the most in life. And not just for the predominantly amazing sexual releases, but in the soothing realization that they had no real responsibility to one another. There was friendship and genuine affection, but no deep and unabiding love that spoke of a new future together. With marriage, kids, and the mortgage whole nine yards. It was an