Free The New Dead by John Connolly, Various Page A

dark, except for what light came in through the skylight.
     
    The Baker basement is dark. I like it fine.
     
    I miss the LED lights I used to strap to my head, but otherwise it’s the same.
     
    No electricity. Dark. Sleep all day.
     
    Try to remember.
     
    Back in the day.
     
    I remember when Trapper and I signed up.
     
    I remember Trapper - T - I remember T.
     
    I remember T when they took his brother away.
     
    I remember T after that. T said the cops took him and his and all he ever was and never was, all he ever had and all he ever might have been but wasn’t and will never be. I remember T says that.
     
    I remember.
     
    I remember T when he grinned at me, after signing up, and I remember the look on the recruiter’s face.
     
    Word is T never went over to the shit.
     
    Word is T was shipped right back here.
     
    Word is T got into some shit, and was kept from the shit.
     
    That’s before they were taking anyone, anytime, with any record. Miller tells me that’s how it is now. Two legs, two arms, two eyes, you in.
     
    Word is T got into some shit, they booted him before he saw sand.
     
    So T made like the Shia did over there - stripped and hauled anything worth anything away.
     
    Makes the neighborhood look like Baghdad East.
     
    Word is T has made a killing on the neighborhood.
     
    Word is T gutted the neighborhood.
     
    Shell by shell, T took all it was and sold it.
     
    That’s before I got back, before Fetus came back.
     
    Fetus took three AK-47 rounds three hundred meters from the Alamo; he shouldn’t have made it.
     
    He made it.
     
    Came back home.
     
    I remember Fetus before the shit.
     
    Fetus smoked those fucking French Gauloises, cheap tobacco the locals smoked over there.
     
    I remember Fetus before the war took his and him and all he ever was and never was, all he ever had and all he ever might have been but wasn’t and will never be.
     
    I don’t remember me before.
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    I remember T.
     
    I get up.
     
    I look out the basement window, across the street, across the way.
     
    Copper is sitting in his rocker on his porch.
     
    Copper is looking my way.
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    Before the shit.
     
    I don’t remember much.
     
    I remember T.
     

     
    One good thing is Copper has no sense of smell.
     
    Miller says he lit fire to a bag of catshit on Copper’s door one Halloween and it was the neighbor who called it in: the old lady was away and Copper didn’t smell a thing.
     
    The old man can’t smell a damned thing, and that makes a difference.
     
    Meant we can, if we are careful, pick and choose our approach pattern.
     
    I went point, and took it a day at a time.
     
    Copper is watching me now.
     
    Copper’s right hand is over his left wrist, and he watches me.
     
    ‘Your first car was a beat-up Chevy Impala.’
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    ‘You rolled it out on Route Four.’
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    Copper moves his left hand over his right wrist, cupping it.
     
    ‘Your mother cried all night.’
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    ‘I remember you, kid.’
     
    I don’t remember.
     
     
    Another good thing is Copper knows this burb like nobody else.
     
    He knows it all, including the backstory of every empty house.
     
    Copper remembers.
     
    I don’t remember.
     
    Word is Copper knows the trials and tribs of every occupied house and when who was where and went where and lived it and snuffed it.
     
    I don’t remember. Once, I knew some of it, but no more.
     
    Stout remembers.
     
    Fetus remembers.
     
    Word is that Copper and Becca settled here after Korea.
     
    Word is that young Copper had been in just about every one of these houses, those left standing.
     
    Word is that Copper and Becca had been in and out of these doors, on and off these front and back porches, and grilled and drank and spat in these backyards for longer than I’ve been on this mudball, before or after the day.
     
    Word is that middle-aged Copper