Sleepwalker: The Last Sandman

By Brad Marlowe

A dark force is born from the imaginations of two young brothers, casting a shadow over Nod, the mercurial land of dreams. When the malevolent entity abducts the Sandman, and then snatches its own creators from their cozy beds in an Iowa farmhouse, the boys’ cynical father must rescue his sons and save the Sandman before the sleep-deprived citizens of the world burn everything to the ground.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brad Marlowe
• Release date: Jan 13, 2010
• ISBN: 9781452402321

Brad Marlowe

Brad Marlowe is the writer/director of five independent feature films you’ve never heard of, the writer of several technology columns you’ve never read, and has been making a living with his words for fifteen years. SLEEPWALKER: THE LAST SANDMAN is Mr. Marlowe’s first published novel. He lives near Los Angeles with his wife, a pair of dogs, and two beautiful sons who inspired this tale – even before they were born.* Please visit the Sleepwalker book listing page at Amazon.com to read current user reviews (4.5 stars across 18 reviews). The URL is:http://www.amazon.com/Sleepwalker-Last-Sandman-Kindle-ebook/dp/B002RHP4N2/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=digital-text&qid=1254873284&sr=1-2

Book preview

Chapter 1

No Place like Home

The churning tires of an aging BMW spat back a serpentine cloud of dust, shrouding the rural Iowan landscape in an eerie yellow haze and trailing the vehicle like a lit fuse. The narrow dirt road ended abruptly at a ramshackle clapboard farmhouse that was to be the Golden family’s new home. It was their Aunt Sissy’s house, which she had left to Cole Golden and his older brother, Sean, in her will. Just as a dog’s owner can come to resemble its canine companion over time, the farmhouse mirrored Sissy’s no frills facade and unimaginative, sensible construction.

Cole’s wife, Elizabeth, had lost her job at an A-list advertising agency back in New York City, and had been unable to find another position that paid even half of her former salary. Cole was a stay-at-home dad who had been educating Charlene and Zane (the couple’s precocious 11-year-old twins) from home for the last five years. So the cash-strapped family had reluctantly accepted Cole’s aunt’s posthumous gift, and had moved to Iowa to start a new life amidst the towering pecan trees and bittersweet memories of Cole’s childhood.

The mud-splattered vehicle stopped in front of the old farmhouse that had been a cheerful shade of blue many years ago, but now stood ghostly gray in the twilight. One of the car’s rear windows was lowered, and Charly peered out at the run-down structure in disgust. Her iPod’s ear buds were still lodged firmly in place and she spoke too loudly. Was it always this ugly?

Zane said, It looks like the creepy house in that lame old movie you like, Dad. The boy’s eager face appeared beside his sister’s in the open window. You think Aunt Sissy’s ghost still haunts the halls at night, carrying her severed head?

"She died of old age, Z, she wasn’t beheaded, Cole climbed out of the passenger’s side of the car, groaning and stretching his aching legs, adding: And that’s not a very nice thing to say."

Zane and Charly got out of the car to stand beside their father. Cole nudged his square eyeglasses up the bridge of his nose with a forefinger, and looked at the farmhouse warily. Zane said, Sorry, Dad. Aunt Sissy was cool. Cranky, but cool. Cole didn’t respond. He was staring at the house with a look of trepidation and childlike wonder that Zane had never seen on his father’s face. The gangly preteen said, Dad? You okay?

Huh? Cole shook himself from his secret thoughts and slung an arm around his son’s narrow shoulders. Yeah. You know, Sissy raised me in this house.

When Grandpa Jake was gone, right?

Right. Cole smiled and kissed the top of his son’s head, inhaling the familiar scent of his hair, thinking that Zane would be too tall for that familiar gesture of affection in another six months and was, perhaps, too old already. It was just one more vestigial connection between a father and his kids, assigned to the memory drawer along with all the kissed boo-boos and sweet Santa lies of early childhood.

Charly removed her ear buds and carefully wound their cords around her iPod. Dad, next time you write Grandpa Jake tell him I want to come explore the world with him. I mean we probably can’t even get DSL out here. Not to mention a decent slice. And look at the house...

"That’s enough, Charly. Cole added, with a note of finality: It is what it is and we’re all going to make the best of it."

Zane said, You think Grandpa Jake would come visit us here?

Cole was touched by the hopeful expression on his son’s face. He rumpled Zane’s hair and answered, He would if he could.

Charly said, Yeah, right. I know he’s supposedly out exploring the world and all, but he can’t show up in person every now and then? Or even call?

Zane said, I’ve never heard you ask to return one of his presents.

Charly answered, How could I, even if I wanted to? They just show up on our doorstep.

So?

"So no return address, doofus. How weird is that?"

A little, I guess.

"You guess? You know, Z. And it’s a lot more than a little weird. I mean, how many kids do you know that’ve never even met their own grandfather? Unless he already croaked before they were born."

Zane looked down at the dirt, offering an unhappy shrug in response. The abrupt change in the boy’s mood was not lost on his father, but before Cole could offer consolation Elizabeth Avila-Golden emerged from the car with her jacket in-hand, talking loudly into her sleek, black cell phone. She was a short, feisty Latina whose dusky skin tones were mirrored in her daughter’s exotic beauty, though Zane was as white and Anglo-looking as his father. In fact, Zane’s natural coloring was so pallid that his sister had started calling him Casper several years earlier. The nickname had stuck, much to Zane’s chagrin.

Elizabeth’s expensive, canary-yellow business suit stood in stark contrast to the jeans and short-sleeved T-shirts worn by the rest of the family. She tossed her long, curly, black hair and laughed. Well, you tell him if he wants the best it’s gonna cost him. My campaign for Happy Dog netted a 25 percent sales increase in the first quarter alone. Jason Boggs can’t even come close to those numbers. He’s a nice guy, but... Elizabeth stopped to listen for a moment. When she spoke again her voice had lost some of its sparkle. She said, No problem. Call me back when they’ve made a decision, but don’t let them wait too long. Make sure they know that I have other offers. Thanks, Vicky. Elizabeth snapped the phone closed and looked at the house. She let out a sigh of disgust and turned to Cole. Did I tell you that the movers left a voice mail? They unloaded our things yesterday.

Charly asked, Do you really have other offers, Mom?

Elizabeth brushed a lock of auburn hair away from her daughter’s probing brown eyes and said, "I will. Don’t worry. We won’t be here long. Elizabeth shivered and put on her jacket. We’d better go in. It’s freezing out here." She huddled down into her coat and made a run for the house, as if rushing for shelter from an arctic snowstorm. The rest of the family was amused by her theatrics as a warm breeze rustled the branches of the pecan trees overhead. Elizabeth considered anything below eighty degrees to be sweater weather and anything below seventy downright intolerable.

Chapter 2

The Promise

Later that night, Cole stood in the middle of a dark, empty room on the second floor. Two large windows looked out onto the endless rows of neglected pecan trees that surrounded the house. This was the bedroom that Cole and his brother Sean had shared as boys. A patch of stars sparkled in the sky like diamonds on deep blue velvet. But the night’s beauty was wasted on Cole, who was transfixed by an incongruous patch of crumbling brickwork that jutted from the interior wall, directly between the two windows. The structure looked like an oversized fireplace mantel, without the fireplace, and was six feet wide, rising from floor to ceiling.

Cole approached the odd addition, transferred the old book that he was carrying to one hand, and reached out with the other to touch the bricks. His movements were so tentative that you’d think the rust-colored bricks might spring to life at any moment and take a bite out of him. He spoke to himself in a hoarse whisper. How about it, Cole? Do you still believe?

Believe what, Dad? Zane stood in the doorway, carrying a moving carton that had been labeled ‘Z’s Room - Top Secret’ with a fat black marker.

"Probably can’t believe we have to live in this dump. I know I can’t. Charly joined her brother in the doorway. She’d been coming down the hallway from the other direction, lugging a bulging, fuchsia suitcase. Charly peered into the darkened room with distaste, and spoke in a sarcastic tone. Nice."

Cole took a quick step back from the bricked section of the wall and held the book behind his back. He said, C’mon, it’s not all bad. Your rooms are a lot bigger than the ones back in our old apartment in the city.

Charly narrowed her eyes and dropped the suitcase to the dusty hardwood floor with a thud. What’s up, Dad? You’ve got the same look Zane gets when Mom busts him.

Zane said, Like you’re such an angel.

Shut up, Casper.

You shut up.

Cole said, Hey. That’s enough.

Charly gave her brother a hard look before returning her attention to Cole. She asked, What’s with the book?

Cole’s cheeks reddened. Shouldn’t you two be in bed by now?

Zane and Charly stepped into the room, curiosity piqued by their father’s odd behavior. Zane said, "Yeah, Dad, what is with the book?"

Cole feigned innocence and said, Book? Charly switched on the overhead light, causing her father to squint against its sudden intensity, his eyes having become accustomed to the darkness. But the light reminded Cole of something, and he seemed relieved. Cole brought the book around to show his children. Its scuffed green suede cover had seen better days. "Oh, this book?"

Charly took the worn volume from her father’s hands and thumbed through it. The cover and pages appeared to be blank. What is it? Some kind of journal?

Zane said, It’s just a blank book. Why are you hiding a blank book, Dad?

Cole averted his eyes and shrugged. Charly and Zane exchanged a puzzled look. Something was definitely afoot. Charly said, "Dad, when we were little you told us that you had never lied to us and that you never would. Not about anything. Big or small."

Zane said, "Yeah, you promised, Dad."

Cole remained silent.

Charly said, So, why were you in a dark room, staring at a brick wall, hiding a blank book?

Cole’s shoulders slumped beneath the weight of the sacred promise that he had made to his children. A promise that he had, so far, never broken. He said, Okay, and reached for the book. "But it’s not a short answer, and I’m not sure you really want to know. I guess what I mean is... I’ve never been able to decide whether or not you should know, and I doubt that you’ll believe me if I tell you. And even if I tell you and you believe me, you might regret ever asking."

Zane was intrigued. He asked, Why?

"Because if I tell you, and if you believe, your lives will never be the same again."

Charly narrowed her eyes and waggled her fingers in front of her face while making spooky ghost sounds. Ooooh, creepy. She laughed. Our lives will never be the same again? As if an old blank book is gonna rip a hole in the fabric of the universe, like some retarded episode of Star Trek.

Cole had to smile, but he met his daughter’s eyes and answered seriously. "It can, Charly. And if you believe what I tell you, it will. "

Zane was incredulous. He asked, "And that’s a promise?"

"Yes, Z. That’s a promise."

Chapter 3

One Last Story

Cole knocked twice, entered Charly’s new room, and closed the door behind him without a word. Zane and his sister stopped talking abruptly and turned their attention to the book in their father’s hand. The twins sat Indian-style, facing each other on Charly’s frilly canopy bed, which looked out of place amidst the Rock N’ Roll band posters taped to the bedroom walls. Cole paused by the door. He looked over at his kids with and expression of dopey parental nostalgia.

Zane said, What?

You two, sitting together on the bed like that. When you were little, you’d huddle together every night to hear me read bedtime stories. Cole used his foot to nudge an unopened moving carton close to the window and he sat down upon it.

Charly said, That was a long time ago.

Zane said, Yeah, back before we couldn’t stand each other, and both he and Charly laughed in good-natured agreement.

Cole smiled, knowing how much his kids loved each other, despite the requisite sibling antagonism that they dished out on a daily basis. I guess this’ll probably be the last story I ever read aloud to you guys. Cole looked down at the book in his lap and ran his fingertips across the cover, which was still blank beneath the warm yellow lamplight. I guess that’s appropriate. But I wonder... Cole fell silent, lost in thought.

A look of concern passed between the twins. Charly said, Dad?

Zane added, You wonder what?

Cole looked up from the book and met his kids’ probing eyes. I wonder if it’s too late for you to believe.

Zane said seriously, I don’t know about Charly, Dad, but if you tell me something and you say it’s true, I’m gonna believe you. Zane looked over at his sister and she nodded in agreement.

Cole made his decision. All right, then, let’s get started. He reached for the lamp and switched it off, leaving the room in darkness. We’ll have to wait a moment for our eyes to adjust.

Gradually, the room seemed to brighten as the light from the star-filled sky shone through the bedroom window and fell across the book in Cole’s lap. The twins were about to ask what their father was up to when Zane noticed that the cover of the book now showed a luminous illustration of a teenage boy fighting off a shadowy creature while two smaller boys cowered behind their protector. The youngest was depicted with square eyeglasses.

Zane said, What the... and reached for the book. Cole allowed his son to take it from him.

Cole explained, It can only be read by starlight. Zane looked up with a question in his eyes and his father held up his hand in a stalling gesture. We’ll get to that.

Charly moved closer to her brother in order to read the book’s title aloud. The Book of Dreams. Zane and his sister flipped through the pages, which were now filled with handwritten text and painted illustrations that glowed beneath the starlight. Charly switched on the bedside lamp and the text disappeared, but now the kids could see that the book’s lavender pages were thick and leathery with what looked like fine golden filaments woven into the paper. Charly switched the light off again, and the handwritten words shimmered back into view.

Zane looked up at the stars and back down to the book, trying to make sense of the strange phenomenon. He said, It’s like those secret codes in cereal boxes you can only read through red plastic.

Charly handed the book back to Cole. Okay, very weird, Dad. But why all the drama? Why not just leave the book, and let us read it ourselves?

You could never make sense of my father’s handwriting. I can barely read it myself.

Zane’s eyes lit up. He asked, Grandpa Jake wrote that?

Cole nodded. It’s his story, and mine. And your Uncle Sean’s. The kids hung on their father’s every word. Cole continued, It explains everything you’ve ever asked me about your grandfather that I couldn’t answer, and a lot about me and my brother that I’ve never told you. And it has something to do with this house, too. I guess that’s partly why I decided to tell you now, on our first night here. That, and my promise.

Charly said, Not to ever lie to us.

"Yes. It was that more than anything. Besides, you’re both old enough to hear the story and mature enough to decide for yourselves whether or not to believe it. So... Cole cleared his throat and took a deep breath before turning to the first page. The kids got comfortable and waited, wide-eyed in the starlight, for the story that would change their lives forever. Cole exhaled, adjusted his square eyeglasses, and opened the book to the first page. He said, Grandpa Jake starts his story with a prologue."

Chapter 4

Jake’s Dream Girl

On the cusp of thirty years old, I had forgotten how to dream. Since childhood, I had dreamt of becoming a professional storyteller; a writer or a filmmaker maybe. And from my earliest childhood memories I had also dreamt of a princess. She was beautiful, of course, as are all princesses born of imagination, but my princess was also hilarious. By the age of ten I had awakened myself from a dead sleep with laughter so often, chuckling, snorting, and guffawing at her witticisms and practical jokes, that my mother took me to a psychologist, fearing that her only son was losing his marbles. But once I had awakened, I never remembered what was so funny, just as wakefulness had erased all of the other details of my vivid dream world. All details except those of my princess’s face.

She had smiling eyes and curly hair the color of rubies encased in amber with the sunlight sparkling through. I suppose my princess wasn’t really beautiful in the traditional sense, though I knew that first night in my dream that I could spend the rest of my life gazing upon her slightly crooked nose, with its fourteen freckles sprinkled across the bridge, and the turquoise eyes and ready smile that were a little too large for her adorably elfin face. My princess was also as clumsy as a cow in clown shoes. If she were walking alone in the sky on a cloudless day she would still find something to trip over. Then she would giggle at her own lack of grace, without an ounce of self-consciousness, and say, Hey! Stop pushing back there. She was kind and good, she snorted like a donkey when she laughed at my dumb jokes, and when my princess’s eyes met mine I knew True Love long before I was old enough to name it. She was my first best friend, my ever-present tour guide through the world of dreams, and the only girl for me.

Throughout my high-school years I dated lots of girls, but never fell for any of them, as my mother had always hoped I might. I tried, but never found the same easy familiarity, or that inescapable magnetic pull. But most of all, when I looked at these perfectly nice girls, I never felt the spreading warmth and rightness which I’d always thought of as my heart smiling; a sensation that flooded through me at the very thought of my princess. She simply made my heart smile. What more could you ask for? And, once you’d felt it, how could you settle for anything less?

In my senior year of college I grew so frustrated with dating, and so guilty for rejecting nice girls for no reason that I could verbalize, that I stopped the exercise in futility entirely. What could I tell these bright and pretty young women, except that they couldn’t measure up to the girl of my dreams? They would’ve dismissed me as a nut job. And if I went on to explain that I’d been involved in this nocturnal love affair since I was ten years old and that my princess had grown up in my dreams, along with me in the waking world, someone would surely have had me committed.

So, one day late in the semester, when I sat scribbling notes in philosophy class, the last thing I expected to hear was the familiar snorting laugh that I had loved for so long. I looked up to find a mass of curly red hair huddled over an overturned purse on the floor at the far end of the first row. I couldn’t make out the new girl’s face, but I could hear her offering an amused mutter about her own clumsiness. Despite my poor angle of view, the young woman was instantly familiar. My heartbeat jumped into triple-time. Oblivious to the lecturing professor’s droning monologue, I stood and hurried to help the girl, who was still laughing and wrestling with the spill. I stooped beside her and tried to speak, but my mouth had gone dry and my mind had blown a fuse. She didn’t look up from her mess right away, but I could see that her turquoise eyes were a little too large for her elfin face.

My lips moved for a while before I found my voice. I finally said, Can I help you? She pushed a handful of stuff into her overfilled purse, and an equal amount spilled back out onto the scuffed linoleum from the other side of the bloated satchel. The girl suppressed a laugh and a snort, and looked up with a beaming smile that could have restarted a dead man’s heart. She answered, I don’t know. Can you?

Our eyes found each other, and that was that.

I married Janie three months later. She had no memory of her parents or her childhood prior the age of twelve, due to a freak virus that had caused a fever high enough to burn those memories from her mind forever. Janie supposed that she had been an orphan because no one had told her otherwise and no one had ever come forward to claim her. Her earliest memory was of being introduced to the Cox family, who became the first in a long succession of foster families over the next six years. But despite her odd, and many would say tragic, origins, Janie remembered her childhood as happy.

My mother had died a few months before I met Janie, and I would have given anything to have seen her face when she finally met my dream girl. I think my mother would have wept with relief that her son wasn’t crazy after all, and then she would have hugged Janie hard enough to shatter every bone in her body. My sister, Sissy, and I weren’t very close back then, but I introduced her to Janie and they seemed to get along fine. So, without other family members to meet and seek approval from, or a big wedding to plan, there was no reason to forestall the inevitable. I had no doubt that we were meant to be together and Janie was soon seduced by my certainty.

Of course you’re wondering whether or not Janie was literally the girl of my dreams. It wasn’t until the night before our wedding that I mustered the courage to tell Janie about my princess and come right out and ask if she really was that girl. Part of me expected Janie to laugh in my face. The other, greater, part of me hoped she would confess that she had in fact been the girl who had kept me company in the world of dreams since childhood; she just hadn’t mentioned it because she thought I wouldn’t remember. Janie listened quietly to my confession, and then to my question. She remained silent for a long time afterward. At first, I thought she was taken aback by her fiancé’s mental instability, but then I realized that her hesitance stemmed from a heartfelt desire not to disappoint me.

After what seemed like an endless silence, Janie reluctantly admitted that she never remembered her dreams—not their locations, events, or inhabitants. As far as she knew, we had never met before that day at school, but my revelation made sense of something about which she’d always wondered. I had clearly loved her at first sight, and she had quickly fallen in love with me, too, after first becoming enamored of the version of herself that she saw reflected in my adoring eyes. Now she understood why.

Janie kissed me and told me that she loved my romantic fantasy, but she worried that I was marrying her for the wrong reason. What if she wasn’t the girl of my dreams? I told her that she had to be the one, because my princess hadn’t made a nocturnal appearance since the day that Janie and I met. That couldn’t be a coincidence; it had to be fate.

So we married, and I worked at a series of part-time jobs to pay the bills while Janie and I pursued our passions (mine: writing, and hers: painting) in our free time. And we loved each other. Sean was born less than a year later—five weeks premature and as wrinkled and red as a dried tomato. His head was covered in downy black hair that poked out from beneath the little knit cap he wore for the first few months to help preserve his body heat. I called him my Monkey Boy, because of all that black hair and the way he clung to me when I held him.

Our need for money led to my first real job working as a short-haul trucker, making deliveries to bookstores within a hundred-mile radius of the big bindery in our little town. It was ironic that I wanted so desperately to write and here I was delivering other authors’ stories. But I didn’t mind. I would come home exhausted, take one look at our wondrous little Monkey Boy, and become instantly rejuvenated enough to write another page or two of my own tales before turning out the lights. This went on for two years until my precious Janie died while giving birth to Cole, and she took my dreams with her.

Six years after Cole’s birth and Janie’s death, I was more lost, alone, and dreamless than ever. My boys lived with my sister, Sissy, in a rambling farmhouse in Iowa, ostensibly because I had taken on several cross-country routes, soon after Janie died, that kept me on the road for weeks at a time. But the truth was that the crushing loss had hollowed me out. I was an empty shell with nothing to offer my children except pain and bitterness. I know this now, but then all I knew was that I woke up every morning disappointed, worked my way to angry by midday, and closed my eyes each night feeling as though I was lying in a cold, dark grave with five hundred pounds of dirt piled atop my chest. Sadness is a drug, and I was hopelessly addicted.

That isn’t to say that I didn’t love my sons, because I did, fiercely and painfully. But they both had so much of Janie in them. Every time I saw their beautiful, hopeful faces my heart soared, even as it broke all over again. So, when I pulled my rig up to my sister’s farmhouse on the warm summer afternoon that proved to be the beginning of our odyssey, all I knew was that I had been driving for twenty hours straight, I hadn’t had a good night’s sleep in weeks, and I was going to see my boys. My weary heart was soaring—and breaking.

Chapter 5

Once Upon a Time

Sissy was standing at the kitchen sink spreading lime-green frosting onto a three-layer cake when she caught a flash of movement out of the corner of her eye. She suppressed a smile and addressed the skulking figure without turning her head. You’re gonna have to do a lot better than that, Sean Golden. I was sneaking past my momma thirty years before you were even a glimmer in your daddy’s eye.

Eight-year-old Sean wore the scowl that had become his trademark since coming to the farm. There had been many times when Sissy had asked Sean, who was already strikingly handsome despite his dour demeanor, who he was so all-fired mad at. He never had an answer, but it was me, of course.

Sean, who was carrying a dusty cardboard box, let out a sigh and his shoulders sagged. He said, "Aw, man. You’re good, Aunt Sis," and headed for the back door.

Sissy called after him: You been up in that attic again?

Sean answered, Yes, Ma’am, as he hurried down the back steps and toward the grove of pecan trees, struggling with the large box in his arms.

Sissy called out the window after her nephew, "You know, you didn’t have to sneak."

He glanced back and flashed a lopsided smile, rarely seen on the troubled boy’s face (the smile that never failed to break Sissy’s heart), and said, But sneaking’s more fun.

Sissy watched the boy she loved so dearly disappear into the trees, her bemused expression giving way to concern. Sean and Cole had come to live with Sissy and her husband Kyle six years ago, when Cole was just a newborn. Cole had no memory of life before the farm and he grew up loving Sissy and Kyle as if they were his birth parents, though he also looked forward to my monthly visits and knew that I was his real father. Cole was a quiet and sensitive child with a sharp mind, an open heart, and a stubborn streak a mile wide once he’d set his mind on something. He saw everything and perceived far more than the average six-year-old. And, knowing no other circumstance, Cole embraced this life with gentle grace and boundless joy.

Sean was also very smart, but he relied too heavily on the easy charm he could summon at will and his uncanny powers of persuasion. Sean had a good heart and a kind soul but despite his casual demeanor Sissy sensed a profound sadness in the boy. Even though the now-eight-year-old was barely walking when I brought him and his brother to Sissy’s door, Sean had begun to romanticize what he referred to as his First Family. And, Sissy thought, Sean secretly harbored an irrational resentment toward his little brother for destroying the idyllic life with his mother and father that only existed in hazy, rose-tinted memories.

Sissy glanced at the clock and called out the window, "Dinner’s at five-thirty. That’s one hour. Don’t make me come lookin’ for you. And you two be careful up there, you hear?"

Sean was already out of earshot. He trundled through the trees and toward the pond, panting beneath the weight of the cardboard carton. Once he had reached the tree nearest the water, Sean sighed with relief and lowered the box with the intention of placing it onto a crude platform at the foot of the massive trunk. But something caught Sean’s eye, and he cried out as he dropped the box to the leaf-covered ground. Sean jumped back, eyes bulging, and stumbled over his own feet. Cripes! He scrambled away from the platform, digging the seat of his jeans and his thrashing limbs into the leaves and dark, damp soil. He called out, Cole!

Cole’s cherubic face peered down from the tree house window. He adjusted his squared eyeglasses and said, Seanie—what is it?

Sean’s eyes remained locked on the fat, black spider with the red hourglass markings that had scurried from the middle of the wooden platform to the edge. He stammered, "One of them, and then repeated, louder, It’s one of them."

Just squish it and come on.

Yeah, right. Sean stood up and began to whack the dirt off of his clothes with angry swipes, never taking his eyes off of the black widow spider. Sean said, "Why don’t you just stop being afraid of the dark, huh?"

"Would you just squish it already? Or just let it go. Kyle says they won’t bother us if we don’t bother them."

Let it go? Sean narrowed his eyes and took a stealthy step forward, as if to sneak up on the spider that was looking right at him. Then it tells its disgusting little spider buddies that Sean Golden is too afraid of them to do what’s gotta be done. He took another step toward the platform and lowered his voice. And they wait until our backs are turned and then five hundred hairy, poison widows sneak into our beds one night and eat us.

Cole spoke from the tree house window, his chin resting on the bottom edge of the opening. "They don’t eat people. Cole began to look worried. Do they, Seanie?"

Sean took another step closer, gathering his courage. This one does. She’s the leader of a cannibal spider tribe from Botswana that hitched a ride here in a buncha bananas they sold at the A&P.

Cole said, Bots-what? That’s not even a real place.

Sean ignored his brother and continued, "The deadly, man-eating, Botswanian banana spider. It looks like a regular black widow, but it’s a thousand times deadlier. Ask Miss Piper tomorrow at school and you’ll see. Sean crept a step closer—within stomping distance, now. And it sings. Just before it strikes."

Cole looked nervous, now. "Seanie..."

If you listen very carefully... you can hear it. It’s like a mermaid’s song, but less... wet. Sean raised his foot slowly, but the deadly Botswanian banana spider held its ground. Sean whispered, There. Can you hear it?"

Cole swallowed hard and nodded his head, eyes wide with terror. Sean gritted his teeth, closed his eyes and began to bring his foot down—No! Cole cried, Don’t kill it, Seanie! Sean hesitated for a fraction of a second and the spider skittered off the platform to safety an instant before the size-three sneaker stomped the plank where the arachnid had stood, hard enough to crack the rotted wood.

Cole!

What if its tribe is watching us? Cole’s eyes showed his genuine fear and concern. This was no longer a game to him; he believed. He said, If you kill their leader they’re gonna get their revenge for sure.

Sean sighed and his shoulders sagged. "It was just a story, dummy."

"Don’t call me a dummy—scaredy cat."

Sean scanned the area for the spider, but could see no sign of it. He put the cardboard box on the platform, where ropes rose from each of the four corners of the wooden surface and led to an iron o-ring which connected a longer rope that ascended to a sturdy tree house, forty feet above the ground. Sean continued to look around nervously as he called out: Okay! Pull it up!

Cole answered, Okay! Sean began to climb the ladder of small boards that Kyle had nailed to the tree trunk as Cole grabbed the other end of the rope, which ran through a pulley. A moment later, Sean saw the box begin to move slowly upward in jerking increments. Cole grunted, It’s too heavy.

Sean was halfway up the tree. He taunted, Baby.

Cole called back as he continued to pull, I know you are, but what am I?

Sean mocked, in return, "I know you are, but what am I?" He reached the top rung of the ladder and clambered into the tree house. Cole continued to struggle with the rope, and Sean tried to nudge him aside but the younger boy wouldn’t budge.

Cole grunted through gritted teeth: I’m no baby. Sean grabbed the rope and the brothers pulled the box up together.

After they had wrestled the carton inside, the boys fell back, catching their breath. The interior of the tree house had been furnished with odds and ends retrieved from Sissy’s attic, most of which were stored there by me after Janie died. Several of Janie’s old paintings, abstract and hauntingly beautiful, had been propped against the walls of the irregular ten by ten space. Four embroidered pillows had been positioned around a frilly tablecloth that Sean had spread out on the floor of the tree house. Discarded dishware and mismatched cutlery, scrounged from cartons meant for charitable donation, had been laid out with care. A recent Polaroid photograph of me sat on the cushion at the head of the table. My eyes looked haunted and sad. Sean opened the box and began to rummage through it.

Cole asked, You find anything good?

"Did I ever. Sean pulled a small picture with an ornate silver frame from the dusty old box. Cole watched as his brother brought the photograph of Janie to the place setting beside mine. Sean carefully wiped the glass clean with the tail of his T-shirt before placing it at the table."

Cole asked, Is that her?

Sean answered, "Of course it’s her. Who you think it is?"

Cole said, She looks different in the other picture. The one in the house.

That one’s blurry and this one’s not.

She looks nice.

"She was nice. She was the best mom a kid could have."

Cole turned his attention to the other contents of the box. "How do you know?"

Sean’s face flushed with anger. "’Cause I remember her, that’s how."

Do not. Cole lifted a bundle of handwritten pages from the box that had been tied together with twine.

"Do too! I remember everything, you little snotrag!"

Cole shrugged indifferently. What’s this?

I tried to read ’em, but I’m still not very good at cursive. I think they’re stories.

Aunt Sis says our father told the best stories ever. I’m gonna read these after I finish first grade. I’ll read ’em to you, if you want.

Sean said, "I’ll read ’em to you before you read ’em to me."

Make a bet?

My Batman for your Captain Marvel.

Cole wrinkled his nose in distaste and asked, With the black costume?

Gray.

Cole’s eyes lit up and he said, Deal. He furrowed his brow while running his fingertips across the scrawling handwriting, as if attempting to break an ancient code. Cole muttered, "But I’m gonna read ’em first. Cole put the papers aside and removed a bag of half-eaten jelly beans and a wax-paper-wrapped peanut butter and jelly sandwich from the box. He said, Hey, you brought snacks?"

"They’re not to eat. Sean snatched the items from his little brother’s grasp. You think I wanna puke all over? It’s all I could sneak out of the kitchen." Sean tore the sandwich into four pieces and placed one quarter on each plate.

"I love peanut butter, said Cole, You should try it again. Maybe you stopped being allergict."

Sean counted out an equal number of candies for each plate. "You don’t stop being allergic. Only this time maybe I’ll eat peanut butter and die, not just puke. That what you want? Cole shook his head solemnly. Okay then—shut up about it. Dinner’s almost ready." Sean had lost count of the jelly beans, so he started over with an exasperated sigh.

Cole found something at the bottom of the box. It was a flat package, wrapped in wrinkled brown paper and tied with dirty twine. Cole unwrapped the package and said, "Cool. A book. I bet you could read this."

Don’t talk to me. I’m trying to count.

Cole took his discovery into the corner to examine it. The slim volume was filled with thick, blank, lavender pages, and Cole could see traces of gold glimmering in the paper. "Seanie, look at this. Sean made a threatening sound as he continued to count, so Cole clammed up and continued to flip through the blank book. A moment later the boys looked up at the sound of an approaching truck, which was followed by the whooshing squeal of pneumatic brakes. Cole cried, It’s him! and rushed to the ladder. He didn’t forget, Seanie! I told you he wouldn’t." Cole flashed his brother a smile, and scurried down to the ground.

Sean muttered, Whatever, and followed Cole down the ladder.

Chapter 6

Birthday Presence

Cole threw open the front door and raced across the lawn, sending the screen door banging against the clapboard. I stepped away from the truck, greeting my son with a melancholy smile. He seemed three inches taller than he had on my last visit, and looked more like