What Comes Echoing Back by Leo McKay Jr

Author:Leo McKay Jr.
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781774711675
Publisher: Nimbus
Published: 2023-05-05T17:18:41+00:00

9

October

Late summer stretched unseasonably into fall and Robot left his bedroom window open at night right into October. On the weekends, the few blocks at the bottom of Lemon Street could be an auditory trauma centre. Drunk people who’d forgot their keys yelling in through windows at their brother, their mother, their roommate, to come and unlock the door. Drug-ravaged people, purposely locked out by the folks in their lives who’d had enough of them, pounding, swearing. Fed-up girlfriends screaming “fuck off” or “go away” at boyfriends they’d deadbolted from their lives for the night. Occasionally he himself was the target of the yelling. The first time he’d been woken up by some drink-emboldened asshole on the street outside the house, calling out for him, he’d lain awake, heart thumping in his chest, waiting for what seemed like the inevitable escalation: the pounding at the door of the flat. The sound of stumbling at the side of the building, by his bedroom window.

“Murderer!” He heard the drunken voice again.

“Shut up, just shut up!” came the voices of the screamer’s concerned friends, trying to keep him out of trouble.

“He killed Gink! Get out here, murderer! I’ll kick your ass!”

“Shut up. You’re not kicking anyone’s ass.”

“Come on!”

Robot had his cellphone in hand, ready to dial 911 if needed. But one of his neighbours beat him to it. He saw the strobing red and blue against the window pane, heard the quick, single whoop! of the siren as the cops announced their arrival. It had happened that way several times since. Robot never left the house on any of those occasions. He’d never even gone to the window to see who the police were talking to.

But the chill of night eventually settled in. The windows in the apartment were closed up. If anyone was yelling in the street, he could not hear it.

His mother’s condition had fluctuated slightly over the past few weeks, from near death to not-quite-near-death as far as he could see, and then back again. She had been to the walk-in clinic a few times. He had no idea what for. It was hard for an addict to go to the hospital. The only thing that was keeping you alive was also the thing killing you. And in the hospital they would not give you that thing.

He tried to stay out of the house as much as he could during daylight hours. He lingered at school, hiding by himself in the back stairwell, playing his ukulele and singing into the reverb. Reverb had a spooky power, and if he could land on the right song in the right key, he could play and sing back into the sound of himself until a deep calm came over him. He remembered the dreamy, sort of stoned look on Sam’s face when he’d stood up from the landing where they’d been harmonizing. He’d had that pleasantly mixed-up feeling that playing and singing could leave you with, that feeling you’d disappeared into something bigger than yourself.

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