Part 1, Chapter 6

 

VI: Soda

 

It wasn’t long before Ray had set his heart on another session of shopping in the open dumpster, his mind flashing with all the wonderful, strange items he would find discarded inside (wonderful only, in all honesty, to Ray, as it was as standard a collection of garbage as what would be found in any other dumpster). This time, Paula could see; and when they arrived at the scene she beheld the garish sofa that had managed to stay in the exact same location it was in since the last time they visited the dumpster, leaned against the outside of the metal bin.

She gasped as they approached, and had her eyes been uncovered Ray was sure they’d be shining with infatuation. Her hands were laced together, and a smile had broken onto her face. The sofa was a tint of pink so saturated it stung to look at. He cast his eyes to the gravel, which in the area surrounding the sofa seemed to be tinted pink as well, so aggressive was the light bouncing from the furniture.

“Yeah, it’s no surprise you like it,” he said, “It burns my vision as much as your eyes do.”

She tilted her head admiringly at the sofa. She wouldn’t take her gaze off it.

“You’re not trying to suggest we bring it back, right?” he asked.

Paula pouted and rubbed her hands possessively on the matted fabric. “How could we not? We’re in desperate need of seating furniture, Ray—you sleep on a pile of towels.”

“I like the towels! Anyway, I thought you hated getting things from the dumpster.”

“It’s not in the dumpster, it’s beside the dumpster.”

He squinted at it through the harsh sunlight, sighed, and lifted one side.

 

It felt like hours before they reached the entrance to the chamber with the forsaken pink sofa, fending off hordes of mosquitoes and the sharp points of saw palmettos that adored piercing through their clothes. At first, Ray had held one side and Paula the other, but soon their arms grew weary, and they opted for the slightly more comfortable but far less efficient approach of dragging the sofa through the underbrush (with Paula wincing every time a spot of mud launched itself onto the fabric).

And though Ray had already been annoyed at having to expend so much of his fleeting daytime energy on lugging the unsightly furniture, he became even more annoyed when he looked at the diameter of the manhole cover, sweat rolling down the back of his neck, and saw that it was certainly too narrow to fit the sofa. Now that he gazed at the entrance to the chamber—how had they not considered this before? It was what, thirty feet to the bottom? Even if it would fit, what would they have done? Thrown it down the ditch?

Paula insisted that they would find a way and began tearing off the cushions. The underlying frame was smaller, and reluctantly Ray prepared to push the cushionless sofa down the hole while Paula held the lid open. But it wasn’t long until Paula, horrified at Ray’s carelessness with the sofa and exclaiming that he’d ruin it (had it not been long since ruined?!), demanded that they switch roles—so Paula now was tilting the sofa into the entrance, and Ray had just gripped the handle of the lid when—

“OW! SHIT!”

Ray jumped back from the lid, letting it clamp down forcefully onto the sofa while it was half-way in, and Paula scowled. “What?”

“It’s hot!”

“What, the lid?”

“Yeah, it—,” cautiously, he tapped a finger to the metal. “It’s burning.”

Paula cocked her head inquisitively. “No, I don’t think it was.”

“No, look, touch it.”

Paula gripped the handle with her hand and pulled the lid open. “Are you serious? You’re so dramatic. It’s a little warm, but that’s it.”

Ray was dumbfounded. His hand stung and pulsed from the burn. Still, his curiosity led his hand to touch the handle again, just to see:

He winced and pulled his hand back immediately. “It’s hotter! What—?”

He thought for a moment. “Lemme see your hand.”

“Why?”

“Just—lemme see something.”

Paula held out her hand, palm-up. He brushed his fingertips lightly against it. It was scorching.

Ray lifted his eyes to look at Paula. “Do you feel okay?”

“I did, but now you’re worrying me.”

“No, it just—I’m wondering if you have a fever or something. Your hand’s really hot.”

“You think I’m sick?”

“I don’t know, maybe. A fever’s when you get really hot when you’re sick, right?”

“I don’t feel sick.”

Ray drummed his fingers against his side. “Well, maybe you should take it easy for a little, just in case.”

Ray promised he’d do his best to care for the precious sofa, and was able to press it against the walls of the ditch as he descended the ladder, reducing the blow to a fall of only a few feet when he neared the bottom. Paula brought the cushions down as she descended after him, and soon they’d arranged the sofa neatly in the main room of the chamber.

“Oh, hey, you don’t have to sleep on the floor anymore!” Paula beamed. “You can sleep on the couch!”

Ray would have almost preferred to continue curling up on his pile of towels, but he had begun waking up with a sore neck and back, and conceded.

 

 

By the time Paula had fallen asleep, Ray’s energy was renewed. Now it was time for the second half of his day, during which he would bask in the quiet of night and go wherever he pleased.

He lifted Hitchcock onto his shoulder, then climbed the ladder and left. The sky was a bright pink, but grew duller and darker with every gust of wind, taking on the deep blue cape it would wear for the duration of the night. He broke through the dense woods, out onto the beach where they’d spent the first night, as the last of the sun’s color faded from the sky, and once again receded into his thoughts.

By the time he became aware of his surroundings again, he saw that he had ended up wandering far to one end of the island. Here, there was a compact roofed structure, perhaps a public restroom, one of whose walls boasted a vending machine. 

The bright colors and varied shapes of the snacks and drinks encased within the glass captivated him, and instantly he felt like a small child. He was drawn to the front of the machine and pressed his palms against the glass, eyes widened.

But he had, of course, no money with which to purchase anything, and quietly he mourned what could have been.

Then he had an idea.

“Hey, Hitchcock,” he whispered to the bird, “you wanna do something really cool?”

He offered a hand to the bird, which he stepped onto to perch. Ray moved his hand so that he looked Hitchcock straight in the eye. “I will give you so much sand/pencils if you do this for me.”

The bird cocked his head expectantly.

Ray pointed at a green bottle of soda with a colorful pink label reading “Dragon’s Dew”. There was only one left. “Get this for me,” he said, tapping at the glass.

“Oh, my God,” Ray chuckled in gleeful disbelief as the bird jumped up and flapped awkwardly through the flap of the vending machine. He watched through the glass as the bird swiveled itself up through the obstacle course of metal coils and packaged snacks. With his beak Hitchcock gripped the top of the bottle and tipped it forward until it fell, clattering onto the bottom of the machine and rolling to the exit flap, where Ray fished it out, beaming.

“You know what? Get all of it. All of it,” Ray said, gesturing to the other snacks.

In fluttering crashes, the bird swarmed around the inside of the machine, knocking plastic packages of candy and chips and things Ray couldn’t really identify as any real food down to the bottom, where Ray snatched them and stuffed as many as he could into his pockets.

By the time of his return, Paula was still asleep, curled up on the mattress. He stashed away the snacks in the kitchenette’s cupboard for later.

 

 

“Oh, look at this,” Paula exclaimed from the other room. “This is weird.”

Ray rubbed his eyes and stumbled over sleepily. She was standing before one of the walls in the bedroom, where there hung a thin board of wood. “Come look over here,” she said. “It’s a mirror.”

              She was prying off one of the edges of the wood board, and Ray saw that the wood was in fact fastened (poorly) with nails to something behind it on the wall. He followed where Paula was pointed and peeked behind the wood to see the reflective surface.

              “Why would someone board up a mirror…?” Ray muttered.

              “It’s strange, right?” she said, and stared at the mirror scrutinizingly. “I actually can’t think of a single logical reason.”

              With his hands, Ray pried off the three nails holding the wood board to the frame of the mirror, and then leaned it against the wall. The mirror was a bit dull in the corners and layered with dust, but otherwise looked perfectly normal.

              They stood together before the mirror and gazed at their reflections.

              This was the first time Ray had seen himself.

              His eyes were piercingly dark, and the skin under them a bluish hue as if he’d gotten no sleep. His hair was just as dark, and long and shabby so that it nearly covered his eyes. The bridge of his nose was high and long, and his eyebrows thick and expressive.

              Paula was gazing at herself, too. Her face was only a few inches from the glass, as if she were debating trying to enter the mirror. The soft warm glow radiating from her glasses bounced off the mirror and illuminated her cheeks.

              “Is that really what I look like?” she whispered.

              She touched a hand to her forehead.

              Ray turned his gaze to her. He didn’t see anything wrong.

              Gently, she moved a hand through her hair, and brushed out the more tangled areas. She touched a spot of acne on her forehead and rubbed a smudge of dirt off her chin.

              “Nothing wrong with looking a little rough,” he laughed half-heartedly. “Hey, maybe that’s why the guy covered up the mirror—so he wouldn’t have to look at himself.”

Her lips were quivering. She turned away from the mirror and sat on the edge of the bed. Ray wasn’t quite sure how to react. He sat down next to her. She was gripping the sheets so tightly her hands shook. Then beneath him Ray felt a warmth. He touched his hand to the sheets, and realized the heat was coming from Paula.

“You okay?”

Her grip on the sheets loosened, and the warmth dissipated.

“I’m fine,” she said flatly. She wore a blank expression. “I’m gonna go read through the journal again.”