the things we do in the dark (+18)

6

What a fucking idiot, August thinks.

He turns off his snowmobile and walks towards Iverem. He crouches over her limp body and waits for her to wake. When he grows impatient, he lightly taps her helmet. Her hazel eyes flutter open. Dazed, her lips part, and she takes a breath. Her breathing is erratic. She looks everywhere, confused.

"You've had an accident," August says. The words come out more ominous than he intends them to. But still, he relishes in the fear that begins to emit from Iverem. Pushing aside this morbid fascination, he removes her helmet to get a better look at her injuries, gingerly inspecting the back of her head, then moving on to the rest of her body until he's ensured she's all in one piece.

She groans, and her eyes begin to close again. August cups her cheek affectionately, in a way he didn't know he was capable of. "You gotta stay awake," he says.

"No, I'm tired," she groans, jerking her head away from his grasp.

She's still stubborn, even when she's concussed.

August runs his hands through her hair. He jerks her head upwards by twisting the braids through his fingers like rope. "Can you just trust me on this one?" he says.

She tries to shake her head, but his grip prevents Iverem from doing this. So instead, she says, "get off," pushing him away with her hands.

Iverem's body becomes tense, her breathing ragged. Her chest brushes against his as she squirms. The smell of flowers wafting from her hair seeps into his pores and quickens his heart rate. Her pink tongue darts out, wetting her lips. The movement hypnotizes him. She looks so vulnerable... so helpless underneath him. She's ready for the taking. But he doesn't do that. August prides himself on not being a by-product of his upbringing, so he hauls Iverem to her feet and onto his snowmobile.

"Stay awake," he says. Despite his pleas, Iverem's eyes shut close.

~

Edgar and his mother were upstairs whispering, but not really whispering, because August could hear them arguing from the den. Edgar, the Mexican real estate broker who took their family out of abject poverty, was angry again. He was always angry. August couldn't remember a time when Edgar wasn't angry.

His mother walked to the other side of the house, and his stepfather followed. Then, listless footsteps pivoted back to their bedroom. Cussing each other the whole way, after two intervals of wandering from the bathroom to their bedroom and back to the bathroom, they finally settled back into their bedroom.

They were yelling now. Drawers were opening and closing, doors slamming shut. A slap echoed off the walls and travelled down into the den. That's when August vaulted his eleven-year-old body up the stairs to his mother as fast as he could.

He started banging on their bedroom door. Something shattered on the doorframe. Still, August kept pounding on the door.

His mother screamed. "Mijo, not right now!"

August didn't listen. "Mom, what's going on?"

He couldn't feel his fists anymore; still, he kept pounding on the door, the frame trying to jump from the hinges.

August could hear her sobs now. "Don't touch her. Don't touch her. Don't touch her," he kept repeating.

This chant became a prayer, and his prayers were soon answered when the door was finally yanked open. Instead of falling onto his mother's favourite Kashan rug, he descended into a black abyss. The intensity of the fall caused his heart to almost lurch out of his mouth.

And then... he's in a dark room, lying in bed with Devon, who is already at the chorus of her nightly snoring routine. But tonight, August can't hear his wife. He can't feel his heart or the duvet at his fingertips. He can barely breathe. Let alone form a coherent thought or feeling. He's nothing. Maybe he's always been nothing, just like Edgar used to tell him. Maybe now the truth is finally catching up to him. Poor fatherless Augustine, who doesn't have a friend in the world, is finally coming into his own.

He slips on a sweater and goes to his cabin porch to have a cigarette – well, as much as a herbal cigarette can be a substitute for the real thing. August switched from clove to green tea cigarettes just a little over a year ago. It was hell overcoming a habit he had since he was fifteen. But Devon wouldn't shut up about this baby thing and actually thought that August quitting smoking would magically cause his sperm to sprint to her ovaries.

When his fingers begin to go numb, he considers heading back to bed. He stops in his tracks once he catches sight of his father bounding to the resort.

He waves at him, and this causes August's father to detour toward his cabin. Stopping right at his porch steps like he knows he has no right to step any further. "Can't sleep either?"

August nods before he takes a long drag of his cigarette.

"C'mon," his father says to August as if he's ushering him from a hiding place. "Walk with me."

They walk in silence until they reach the gazebo. August's fingers polish the gazebo's rosewood top rail to pass by the time. Underneath the frost and patches of snow are etchings of cherubs with bows and doves flying around them.

"We haven't talked in a while," his father says.

"You haven't bothered to try," August says, and he's shocked at the amount of vulnerability that's seeped into his words. Fuck, what is wrong with me? August thinks.

His father 'tsks' him. "It's not like I don't care. I've just been busy with work."

"Ok." Luckily, August manages to get this statement out calmly.

"No, I really mean it," his father says. "I've been meaning to talk to you about it."

August's father runs an advertising company, a company handed down to him by his own father. August always thought he would be next in line to run the company. Maybe not be the CEO, but at least be a major player. That dream went to shit three years ago when his father started mentoring Jonah for a position in the company instead of him. He didn't even think twice about August before taking Jonah under his helm.

"Can't you talk to Jonah about this?"

"He's not good at numbers like you."

I'm an accountant, of course I'm good at numbers, August thinks. "You don't have an accountant that can look into it?"

A dark look overtakes his father's usually sunny Nordic features. "Someone's been skimming money from the company; not a big deal, but I'd like to nip it in the bud before it gets any worse."

August skims his fingers against a cherub's wing to keep himself from laughing. "And you think I'm the person to figure this out?"

His father gives August a smile that once made him believe he truly loved him. "You're my son. Why wouldn't I trust you?"