‘Oh yeah. That’s why you’re starving to death in the snow under a bridge.’
‘Baby girl.’ Derek lifted his eyes to Susie, and crept slowly towards her, his voice suddenly dreamy, his tongue moving back and forth across his lower lip. ‘Remember when you were bitten by the snake? I saved your life. I sucked the poison from your blood.’
Susie made a small noise, and Alex put his hand back on her shoulder.
‘You were lying dead on the ground. You were so pale. You had no heartbeat. I picked you up in my arms and sucked the poison from your blood. Don’t you remember?’
‘That isn’t what happened,’ said Susie. She reached up to her shoulder and held on to Alex’s hand with her own.
‘I saved your life a hundred times. It was so hard. They kept trying to kill us, but I protected you. I will always protect you if you let me.’ He touched her knee with his hand. ‘Mom and Dad put the snake in your bedroom.’
Alex felt Susie’s nails through the back of his glove. ‘You know that it didn’t happen like that,’ she said weakly.
‘They tried to kill you so many times. Then they realized they’d have to kill me first. But I won’t let them, baby girl.’
Susie shook her head, exhaling hard.
‘The snake was five feet long and golden, and it sank its teeth into your little thin arm, your poor little arm, while you were sleeping in your innocent bed. The poison went straight to your heart and you died. You died in my arms.’
‘Derek.’ Susie pushed herself backwards decisively, and her voice was sharp and businesslike. ‘Forget the damn snake. I never died of snakebite. Let’s talk about your medication.’
Derek sat up, his legs going into a nearly convulsive twitch. ‘Susie-Paul, I don’t want to hear any more of these dangerous ideas. You know that I regulate my own fluid patterns. I had a buildup of semen this week and I dealt with it by my own measures.’
‘Oh God. Not this again.’
‘It was semen of a particularly thick and corrosive nature. Building up and expressing itself into my penis and interfering with the release of urine. It was quite urgent to find a means to discharge it.’ His hands were twining and untwining, his voice getting higher, more anxious.
‘Cut it out, Derek. Drop the subject now.’ She looked up at Alex. I’m sorry, she mouthed.
It’s okay, he mouthed back.
‘It was building up from my penis and testicles and entering my kidneys. It could have been very very hazardous. There was a leakage of semen from my penis on a regular basis.’
‘Jesus Christ, would you please shut up about this? I have a friend here.’
Derek rolled his head slowly from side to side. ‘Oh. Oh dear. It’s a problem. It’s a serious problem.’
‘Shit,’ murmured Susie, and motioned Alex away; he backed off a couple of feet, still within the circle of pale light. Derek was rocking and wringing his hands, his tongue working at one side of his mouth.
‘And they say, and they say, we can’t tolerate this, no no, we can’t tolerate this, but I never did the crime. I never did.’
‘Derek. Derek. Listen to my voice. Calm down.’
‘And you say, oh God, and oh God, but what kind of God is that? When they do these things? This is what kind of God. And why did they want to hurt you? I don’t understand, and I say, I don’t understand, but why would you hurt her, and I tried to protect you, baby, I tried and tried.’
‘Oh, please,’ said Susie. ‘Please don’t do this. Just calm down, can’t you calm down?’
‘Fucking hate, fucking hate, fucking hate this, but I never did the crime, did I, so why do I, why do I, why the hell, oh God, why do I have to live like this?’
Susie stretched out her hand and tried to touch him, but he was a dystonic scatter of movements, unpredictable. His own hands flew up and began to claw around his eyes, saliva trailing from his lips, and she seized his wrists and pulled them fiercely down. He crashed into her lap in something like a spasm and threw his arms around her, wailing, ‘Why don’t you stay with me? Why don’t you ever stay?’
‘Derek, please.’ Susie fell backwards under his weight, thrusting one arm into the mud to support herself, as Derek pressed his head against her chest, sobbing, his hands grasping up to her face.
‘Oh God, oh Jesus, what did I ever do to deserve this? They say I did the crime and they have to kill me, but I never did it, baby, I never did.’ Susie was almost flat on the ground now, dangerously close to the edge of the hill, Derek’s mouth on her neck, his body covering hers, and for a moment her arms seemed to go limp, helpless. Alex started forward.
But then she was moving again, she struggled free, and Derek slid down in a heap, his hands in his hair, a high hollow wail pouring out of his throat. Susie scrambled in the mud and pulled herself up, pressing her fists against her eyes.
‘I know, Derek. I know you didn’t,’ she said, fighting for breath. ‘It’s all right. Just please. Try to calm down.’
‘They poison me and fuck me up the ass until I bleed.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘They want control of my mind so they can make me do the evil thing.’
Her face tense with effort, Susie leaned back towards him and rested her hands on his head, pulling his fingers out of his hair. ‘Oh, Derek. It’s okay. It’s okay.’
‘I’m not the bad garbage,’ he said, his voice a thin whine.
‘No. No, you’re not. Sit up now, please. Sit up, Derek.’
He lifted his head, pulling his shoulders up until he could look in her eyes, wiping mud from his face.
‘Will you talk to me, Derek, about coming inside?’
‘No. No no. It’s not a good choice. I’m sorry.’
‘Then I have to leave now. I’ll come back another day. I could bring you, I don’t know, a warm blanket or something?’
‘I have my resources. I’m not in need.’
‘Well, I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Will you give me a kiss before you go?’
Susie frowned, a deep furrow between her eyes, and bit at her thumbnail.
‘Please, little sister?’
She leaned towards Derek, and briefly, softly, touched his wet lips with her own.
‘I won’t let them hurt you,’ he whispered.
‘Yes, Derek. Thanks. I appreciate that.’
She came back to Alex, and they scrambled up the short slope and crossed the railway track. Susie didn’t hurry across, he noticed; she saw that there were no lights, there was no sound of an approaching train, and walked over it at a normal speed, unafraid. She put her hands in her coat pockets and stood at the top of the hill, her jeans dark with mud and melted snow, staring across the ravine.
He remembered that night in the bar, all that time ago, when he had watched her crying, and he thought now that it had never been because of Chris at all, not Chris and not him, none of the things that had seemed so important.
‘I’ve been the lucky one, Alex,’ she said softly. ‘Just lucky. That’s all.’
The door of the Donut Wheel’s smoking room opened and then shut nearby, and the smell of cigarettes drifted around them at their table.
‘I don’t know what options I have. He hasn’t done anything that could be grounds for involuntary hospitalization.’ Susie ran her finger over a bead of moisture on her beer bottle. ‘I don’t think I’d want to do that even if I had grounds. There’s – there’s trust issues here. It’s just I’m really worried… I don’t think it’s an accident he’s living so close to the railway tracks. He’s tried to hurt himself before.’