the other Son

Chapter 4

The island was veiled in late autumn fog and the streets and alleys were quiet. Eanverness held its breath, anxiously awaiting the coroner's verdict whether it was one of them who'd been taken by the waters.

Every morning there was an appeal in the Island News to come forward with any information, whether to report someone missing - neighbour, odd tourist, estranged cousin - or put strange occurrences to paper.

The town didn't utter a single word though. Naturally, there was plenty of gossip but no one would come forward and tell it to the officials. People took care of their own business and the police involvement was barely tolerated. McParrish struggled to establish ties between the haughty island residents and the 'mainland people'.

The rumours only reached Tristan's ears because he happened to work at the right place, and people liked Griffin and Griffin liked him thus they reluctantly accepted his existence.

The evening after the body was found, everyone was pretty much sure it had been the crab fishers - maybe one of them had taken more than his share and they had gotten rid of him, a drunken fight gone wrong or straight up pure lust to kill. Fucking superstition at its finest.

Surely people would point their fingers elsewhere if they knew what was directly in front of their noses. Therefore, Tristan was glad about them jumping to assumptions so quickly, oblivious to the real danger, the thing with fangs and claws.

"They're still looking for the cause of death," Griffin took a guess on Saturday night after they'd kicked out any lingering guests and cleaned up. Some dimwit had spilled beer all over the floor and Tristan scrubbed at it with dark hair casting shadows on his face.

Griffin carried a box of empty bottles to the back.

Tristan stared out into the foggy night when he returned, slightly tilting his head in the direction of his thumping footsteps.

"Was it suicide?"

Griffin paused at one of the tables, sighing deeply as he replied, "It could have been anything. Suicide, murder, an accident. There won't be an open casket, that much I can tell you."

Tristan huffed out a sharp laugh. "Isn't that the thing we aspire to; an open casket at our funeral?"

Griffin chuckled. "Yeah, it's the least we can try to do."

At half past one Tristan left and Griffin locked the door behind him, switching off the lights as he prepared to go upstairs to the apartment he shared with Brenda.

Tristan stood on the empty, dark street and listened to the waves in the distance. Drowning had to be one of the worst deaths - so much time to struggle, to regret, to hope, to remember. There were better ways to commit suicide.

Hands shoved deep into his coat pockets he walked along the deserted streets, his own steps echoing all around him, creating an illusion of a whole legion striding through the night. His reflection was ghostly and alien in the glass of a shop window and he paused, inspecting the stranger.

Pale, spidery. A binary image. Deep-set eyes playing tricks on his mind, making him believe he was confronted with death, a skeletal distortion or even a foretelling. He tilted his head back and let the street lamp cast light onto his face, reviving him as it revealed wet and glistening eyeballs. He blinked, alive.

Back home he undressed and washed off the stench of booze and people underneath the hot spray of the shower. The water cascaded down his back and brought a pink flush to his skin.

He dried off, ruffled wet strands of hair in front of the mirror and reached for the toothpaste to brush his teeth.

At two in the morning, he was still wide awake and acutely aware of any noise. The building was old and quite vocal, resembling an elderly going about their day with achy joints and tired limbs.

Most likely he had been lucky by nabbing up this apartment before any rich snob could buy it to spend exactly one weekend per year on the island. He had great views over the roofs of Eanverness - a cluster of buildings and crooked alleys which called themselves town - and saw a smidgen of water from his West facing window.

It had taken him about two months to stop bumping his head since the apartment was located directly under the roof and the sloping ceilings weren't meant to accommodate someone of his height - the realtor had called it cozy. Tristan had gagged a little nevertheless had signed the contract shortly after. It wasn't moldy or as small as a fucking shoe carton and first and foremost remote. No big cities nearby, a crappy cellphone reception, a manageable amount of neighbours.

This night he couldn't help stare out of the window, keeping an eye on the street leading up the hill. It had been hours since the last ferry returned - the vessel presumably close to empty - and no one, neither friend nor foe, had any reason to stumble up that street only now.

Not to mention he would've been much easier to ambush earlier on his own way home.

Tristan switched off all the lights and settled in the armchair in front of the window, suddenly feeling as old and weathered as the building itself, tired.

The fog was creeping in through all the crevices and settled on his shoulders, weighing him down. He closed his eyes, let his head fall back, saw the fog invade his lungs. Cold and thorney, ripping him open from the inside. His lips fell open to suck in clean air but there was only more fog, more edges shredding his throat to bits and pieces.

He gasped as his hands curled around the armrest, gripped it tightly, leverage for his torso to rear up. Hot blood was dripping onto his chest by now, sticky and metallic and the fog around it turned bright red as it sucked it up greedily.

Drowning, he was drowning in his own blood, the thing that should keep him alive was drowning him and he threw his head back, gasping, wretching around the thick liquid. Drowning, drowning, drowning while the fog swirled and danced around him.

Drowning and drowning and drowning and-