Sea Creature Read online

  Patrick rose and walked down to the beach and sat in the sand. He watched the waves roll into shore and the moon lit the sky a soft blue. But the water appeared black and unwelcoming. He had always enjoyed the ocean and had been taught sailing by his father since he was a youth, but the sight of it right now sickened him and he stood up and started back to the hotel.

  Andrew had left a void in him. He was the only person Patrick ever cared for. His father was cold and distant and after their mother’s death they had no other relatives. On top of that, their father discouraged friends. He had told them that friends had the potential to make them weak and would yell at them whenever other boys came over to play. The only people they really had in their lives were their parents and each other.

  There was a small café on the walk home and Patrick stopped and ordered warm milk with sugar. He sat on the veranda and drank down the glass one slow sip at a time as he listened to the conversations around him.

  A man next to him asked him for a smoke and he told him he didn’t have any. The waitress struck up a conversation with him and he knew she was interested but he didn’t pursue it. He finished his milk and left some money on the table before walking back to the hotel.

  The bar near the lobby was a good one; they didn’t water down their booze like most of the places in the city. Patrick swallowed two shots of rum and then bought the bottle and took it up to his room.

  Sitting on the balcony, overlooking the city and the small bands of tourists that were out enjoying the nightlife, he saw a couple who were snapping photos and laughing and staring at the old buildings. It wasn’t difficult to tell it was their first time here and Patrick thought of the first time he had brought his wife here three years ago.

  It was before the bad times began; when they were still in the honeymoon phase after his return from Iraq. They had made love in a hotel and drank good red wine all night. They lay in the dark nude and she kissed his neck and ran her fingers along his chest.

  “Tell me about the war,” she had whispered for the first time.

  He began to speak and he wasn’t there in the warm bed next to the woman he loved any longer. He was under the burning desert sun with a scarf wrapped around his face to try and keep the sand out of his mouth for a few hours.

  “There’s telephone poles everywhere. It’s actually a pretty modern city and there’s parts that you are in and you can forget where you are. We were guarding this truck, I think there were three of us. I figured it was fuel or something but one of the others told me it was KBR—Halliburton—trucks and they were transporting paper plates and salads. Fucking salads.

  “We were standing around smoking and guarding these salads and I wondered how many poor bastards lost their lives over salad and why a sniper was on guard duty. We were griping and talking shit and then we heard gunfire across the street. We ran over there and two of our boys were pinned down behind a truck and there was at least ten Iraqis firing at them.

  “We dove in and I stood my ground. The bullets were flying by my face but I didn’t care. I was sick of this fucking war and if I was going to die it mind as well have been today. The ten dropped to five almost instantly and then I fired a few rounds and there was two or three of them. I saw a guy with a rocket launcher up on the roof of the building next to us and I got off two rounds. One hit him in the eye and the other hit the guy behind him loading the launcher through the throat. Everybody else ran after that.

  “When it was over, we heard crying. We walked down the street a little, right over where the firefight had taken place, and saw a man crying over his young son who’d been killed. I sat down with him and we cried together.”

  After that, she didn’t ask about the war again. She didn’t know what to say or do or how to react and he stopped talking about it with her. He withdrew into himself and soon there was no marriage left to save. They divorced only five months after their trip here.

  But he still had Chile and he still had that night in the warm bed with the moon’s cooling light over him. He thought of her now and hoped she was happy.

  Patrick picked up the bottle of rum and guzzled it until there was only a little left on the bottom. Then he went and lay in bed, staring at the ceiling until the rum did its job and he passed out.

  * * *

  7

  Christopher Woodruff stepped out of the hotel at nearly midnight. The air was warm and he was wearing shorts and his bed slippers. He walked half a block north and turned past a restaurant before pulling out his cell phone and dialing a long distance number.

  “Hello?” a male voice said on the other end, groggy from sleep.

  “Mr. Russell?”

  “Christopher? What the hell do you want?”

  “Sorry to wake you, sir.” He hesitated, waiting for a pedestrian on the sidewalk to pass him. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Then don’t say anything. What do you want?”

  “I’m calling about Patrick.”

  “What about him?”

  “He’s taking this thing with Andrew hard. I think we need to stay down here until he works through it.”

  “This thing with Andrew? My son is dead you little fuck.”

  “I didn’t mean it that way. But I still think we should stay down here.”

  “Fine. Why are you bothering me with it?”

  “Um, our credit card was recently declined. I’m sure it was just an error, right?”

  “Oh that. No that wasn’t an error.”

  “So, what exactly do you expect us to do, sir?”

  “I expect you to be men and make it on your own. You already have the tickets to fly back here. You want to stay down there stay down there. But don’t expect me to pay for it you little shit.”

  Christopher felt anger bubbling inside him. Of all the people in Damien Russell’s life, Christopher was the last one that should be treated this way. He was the one that knew all the bank accounts, all the offshore investments to avoid taxes, all the shell companies to swindle the government. He was the one that lined up the prostitutes in Washington D.C. and New York and Milan and Paris and London; and he was the one that would drive them to the hospital afterward and pay them to keep quiet. He was the one that had all the secrets.

  “To be perfectly frank with you, sir,” he said, “you’ve already lost one son. Do you want to lose the second too because you’re too stubborn to send him a few bucks?”

  “You bas—”

  “Mr. Russell, I’m being honest with you. Patrick needs this. Reactivate our credit card so we can stay down here a few more weeks. He should have it out of his system by then.”

  “Go fuck yourself, Christopher! And you’re fired.”

  There was a click and then the cell phone ended the call. Christopher took a deep breath and pretended that he was pushing all the negative energy out of himself with the breath. He walked back to the hotel and went to Patrick’s room.

  Patrick was lying in bed, a bottle of beer in his hand, listening to a Mozart concerto on the radio. His shirt was off and sweat glistened on his chest. Christopher sat in a chair near the bed and waited until the piece was over before speaking.

  “Where were you at dinner?” Christopher said.

  “Didn’t feel like coming.”

  “Patty, I set up that dinner so you could meet Maria.”

  “I didn’t really want to meet her.”

  “You need to find somebody. You’re bouncing from one chick to the next and I see it taking a toll on you. Don’t you want the white picket fence and the kids and the dog and all that shit?”

  “Kids? What if I turned out like my father, Chris? They say you become the parent your parents were.”

  “You’re nothing like him. Believe me.” Christopher went and got a beer out of the mini-fridge and sat back down. He popped it open, guzzled half of it, and let out a wet burp. “Speaking of his highness, I just spoke to him.”

  “What for?”

  “Our credit card was declined
at dinner. I can’t tell you how fucking embarrassing it was to have Maria and her friend have to pay for their own meals cause I didn’t have enough cash.”

  “That’s terrible. What’d he do, cancel it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s his power over me and . . .” They glanced to each other and Patrick looked down, absently tearing at the label on his beer. “That was his power over me and Andrew. His money. I think without it he wouldn’t be able to survive.”

  “Well we can relate cause without it we’re not going to survive. They’ve been running the card here every week and when it declines this week they’re gonna throw us out. Unless there’s more fights in you we can bet on, we need to go home.”

  “I’m not going anywhere, Chris. But you should get back before he gets pissed and thinks I’m stealing you away.”

  “A little late; he already fired me.”

  “He’s fired you before.”

  “I know and I’m sick of it.” He walked over and lay down on the bed next to him. “This is our chance, Patty. More important, this is my chance. I’ve been researching this the past couple days. Everybody I’ve talked to thinks this thing in the ocean is a giant squid. There wasn’t a single fisherman that even suggested anything else.”

  “I know.”

  “No one’s even seen a giant squid before. There’s some like blurry National Geographic photos and that’s it. They don’t even know how big they can get. Some people think they can get as big as two to three hundred feet near the bottom of the ocean. That’d be the biggest animal on earth.”

  “So what?”

  “So wh . . . are you kidding? Could you imagine if we caught or killed this thing?”

  “No one would care. It would be all over the internet for a while and then disappear.”

  “Maybe, but that’s why I made some calls.”

  “To who?”

  “Hear me out before you say no,” Christopher said.

  “Whenever you say that I’ve learned to say no.”

  “There’s this guy whose blog I found. Taylor Hamilton. You ever heard of him?”

  “No.”

  “He’s like some oil billionaire. Obsessed with these things. I emailed him and then we talked yesterday.”

  “And?”

  “And he wants in.”

  “In on what, Chris? We’re not doing anything.”

  “I was really vague about where we were and all that. He says if we bring him in and share the credit, he’ll fund everything. And we’ll get just as much press. He says if we can capture one it’s a guaranteed book deal, maybe even a movie.”

  “Not interested.”

  Christopher mumbled something about pigheadedness and then got up to leave. He turned before leaving and said, “You and I both know your father controls you through his money. You’re going to need a lot of money for your life and you got no way to get it. This is your chance to get out from under him. Or you can fly back and beg his forgiveness and hope he gives you a job at the company. Your choice.”

  * * *

  8

  Vanessa Kolkowski sat in a deck chair on the yacht and sipped a martini. The party had been going for over three hours and everyone was getting trashed. Her mother—who had forced her to come to this company retreat—was taking tequila shots with her boss, Anderson.

  Anderson had a belly and was balding with fat white forearms that made Vanessa sick. He was nothing compared to her father and she didn’t understand how her mother could go from a man like him to Anderson. The divorce only went through two months ago; maybe she was on the rebound?

  “Hi,” a man said as he came and sat next to her. He was older by at least twenty years and Vanessa had seen him with his wife earlier; before she grew sea-sick and went to lie down in a cabin.

  “Hi,” she said, looking in the opposite direction.

  “So I haven’t seen you before. Don’t tell me; you’re with accounting? Cause I know everybody and I don’t know you. I never get down to accounting.”

  “No, my mom works for the company.”

  “Oh yeah? Who’s your mom?”

  “Pam Kolkowski.”

  “Pam’s your mom?” The man looked over to Pam. “Oh.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “She your boss or something?”

  “Well, not exactly. She’s . . . I mean. Yeah, yeah she’s my boss.”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t tell her you were hitting on me. I won’t tell your wife either.”

  The man thought for a while and then stood up without a word and walked away. It put a smile on Vanessa’s face. Men had been paying attention to her from an early age, far younger than she could remember. Her mother had gotten her into modeling and she was used to having all eyes on her. But sometimes it depressed her. Men that barely knew her would tell her they would leave wives and children they had been with for years for her. She didn’t intend on getting married for that reason; men just couldn’t be trusted.

  She finished her drink and stood up. Looking around the deck at the employees mingling with management and kissing their asses made her nauseated. That was one thing her mother did give her through her modeling: freedom from a boss. Photographers could sometimes be just as demanding but her agent could deal with them if they got out of hand.

  Vanessa walked over to her mother. Her face was flushed from the alcohol and Vanessa could tell she would be too drunk to drive back to the hotel when they got to shore.

  “I’m going to bed,” Vanessa said.

  “Already? Stay and have some fun.”

  “I’m really tired. I’m just going to go to sleep.”

  Anderson, after staring at her boobs the whole time, said, “My cabin’s below deck and there shouldn’t be anyone there. You could use that.”

  “Thanks.”

  She walked off and glanced back once to see her mom running her tongue along Anderson’s fat lips.

  Vanessa found some steps leading below deck. She was in high heels and had to grip the railing on either side to keep her balance but she made it down and walked through a narrow corridor. She passed a bathroom, a closet, a small office, and then came to a door at the end marked, “ANDERSON J. ORRO: CAPTAIN AND FIRST MATE.”

  What a douchebag.

  Inside was as plush as any yacht she had ever been on. There were nice rugs on the floor and all the wood was a dark antique-looking brown. There were spirits in nice glass bottles at a bar and the couch was black leather and circled the room, a flat-screen taking up most of one of the walls.

  The bed had leopard print sheets and there was a package of unused condoms laid on the nightstand.

  She went to the bar and smelled what was in the various bottles. She found a bottle of vodka and a can of orange juice in a fridge and made a screwdriver with ice. She sat on the bed and drank and tried to see if her cell phone was picking up reception yet.

  It wasn’t and she put it in her pocket and lay down on the bed. A tiny window was open above her and she listened to the party for a while before dozing, and going to sleep.

  *****

  Vanessa felt tickling on her leg. Still half-asleep, she moved her legs, thinking it was some of the hundreds of bugs that were always around in Chile. The tickling didn’t stop and it began to move up her leg to her thigh and then her hips.

  She awoke to see Anderson’s fat face above her. His hands were caressing her hips and trying to get her shorts off. He stunk of liquor and sweat.

  “Get off of me, now.”

  “Oh come on, don’t be such a prude. I saw you looking at me earlier.”

  “Anderson, get off me or I’ll scream.”

  He grabbed her hands and pinned them above her head, kissing her neck. She struggled and brought her legs up enough that his body wasn’t pressed against hers and she tried to bite his face which only made him laugh.

  “You like it rough?” he said. “I can do rough.”

  She screamed.

/>   It wasn’t from Anderson or his stinking body or the fact that if he did rape her her mother would probably take his side. Out of the periphery of her vision, she saw something coming through the window.

  It was white and slick with what looked like circles on it. It was as thick as a tree trunk but seemed to shrink to get through the window. The tip slithered down to the floor, running over the rugs and up a table.

  “Just relax,” he said, “and you might enjoy it. Like I told your mom; I get what I want.”

  The thing seemed to hear his voice and crawled along the floor and up the bed. She screamed and fought and yelled and tried to pull away but he held her there as the thing climbed up onto the bed. It went over Anderson’s back and he smiled, thinking it to be her.

  The thing clamped down onto the fatty flesh of his back, sending a massive spatter of blood over the bed, the walls, and the ceiling. Anderson screamed as he was lifted into the air. The flesh ripped and he fell hard to the floor. He tried to get up and run out of the room but the thing moved as quickly as a snake and wrapped around his waist. It began to drag him near the window and the more he fought the tighter it wrapped itself around him.

  The thing crushed his midsection to the size of a watermelon. Blood was spewing from his eyes and ears and mouth and nose. He was pounding at it with his fist as Vanessa crawled underneath the bed.

  The thing brought him to the window. It was an undersized window, no more than a foot high, and it pulled Anderson through screaming, his bones crunching and his ligaments and tendons tearing as his legs folded behind his head and flesh scraped from his body as he was hauled through the miniature opening.

  Vanessa was shaking so badly she couldn’t stop. She put her hands underneath her to try and stop them and looked up to the window, praying that it wouldn’t come back as tears streamed down her face. She looked to the door. It wasn’t more than ten feet away. Slowly, she made her way out from underneath the bed.