The Silences of Engledale

Art by KidVicious

My neighbors and I lived in the same suburb but two different realities. Why? I have no idea, and yet still I wonder and will forever in Engledale’s new silence.  

Engledale, a suburb where I haunt. 

Engledale, a sea of single family homes edged by apartments for the “others”.

North of Engledale—the city. Cluttered and chaotic. Angry jawed. 

South—fields, desiccated and dry. 

East—the vast lake, a stillbirth of green ooze. 

West—hills, sickly rivers, forests of famished trees, hanging on. 

My house, lair, Confusion Island—as I call it, rests in Engledale’s old subdivision. Here, I escape the chatter of screens to my backyard. There, a silver oak rises fifty feet, its husky limbs sprawling out thirty. Big, beautiful, and named—Reginald. In Reginald’s bushy arms, I built a tree stand, with permission. How did I get permission? Know the tree’s name? Simple. I asked. Purchased, for my birthday, a Tree CommX9, direct from Dublin far across the rising ocean. 

On that rare bright blue day, I asked if I might climb up and sit. Upon conferring with the robin, who nested a few feet above my perch, Reginald creaked,“Sure!”  

Day before, the wind had blown itself out and was on R&R but whispered sufficiently to tinkle Reginald’s wide green leaves, glittering with light. I settled on the planks, back snug against Reginald’s rough grooves. Aaaaaahhhhh, sighed my insides. And then, I witnessed.

I never knew any of my neighbors. Thirty years I’ve lived here, and yet. 

Across the street, tired woman mowed her lawn. Growwwwwl, said the mower’s gas engine. 

Abutting my backyard, divorced man sagged in his rusted lawn chair, pecked at a screen with bulbous fingers, and hollered at his dog, “Stop barking, dammit!” A constancy. 

Along the street walked drama woman plugged into earphones, shouting and flailing, eyes big with disbelief. “I mean, shouldn’t he know what I like by now?” 

Nearby, the vestiges of old man with snippers (old like me but beyond that, nothing like me), parked on his porch, scowling over his lawn, scissors in hand ready to snippety snip any single green blade that dare grow beyond his allowance. A habit drilled into him by his long dead father, I imagined. 

Typically, that was the height of activity percolating through our placid pocket of single family homes. But on that rare bright blue day, the thirty-somethings had convened a block party, just beyond the crossing of the gray streets—Imperial Drive and Brunn Ave. A white barricade blocked off Imperial from cars and the uninvited. 

There, children shrilled, ran. 

Teens bartered in illusions. 

Adults roamed, pinching red solo cups, pretending to laugh, trying to dance. 

Music beat out in a booming blare. 

At this moment, on that rare bright blue day, far beneath the transom of Imperial and Brunn, the earth grumble grumble grumbled and shook. Reginald trembled, and me along with them. The robin beeped tiny alarums. I gripped my raft set in Reginald’s limbs. And then, at the center of the gray transom of Imperial and Brunn, a bulge bloomed like a bubbling blister. 

Again, robin beeped. 

I gawked and squeaked, but none of my neighbors—

—mowing woman, 

—man barking at dog, 

—woman walking her drama, 

—snipper the elder, 

—nor did the reveling throng, beyond the white barricade, ceased their doings. 

None twitched their heads toward the heaving bulge of gray street. But I did twitch and witness.

The bulge grew and grew until it burst. CRRRRRACK-BOOM!!! The transom of Imperial and Brunn exploded in a billowing arc of gray. Chunks of asphalt and soil clattered back to earth, plonks of hailstones on a camper roof. A fog of dust swam. None of my neighbors bent an eye. But I did. I witnessed. My insides screamed, Ho! Eek! WTF?! I jumped to my feet on my little slab of boards twenty feet up in Reginald’s sturdy embrace. Robin, again, beeped and Reginald creaked, “Whoa.” 

The dust cloud thinned as unabated, my neighbor’s cacophonic symphony continued.

Growwwwwl of mower, 

blare of music,

“I mean, I always buy him something thoughtful.”

Snippity snip,

and, “Ugh! Stop barking, dammit.”

I stiffened, squeezing Reginald in a death clutch, urging myself to breathe. And there, at the crossing of Imperial and Brunn, Engledale, USA, thing emerged from its sinkhole, rising like a spring weed into the clean sky of that rare bright blue day.

thing—a fat wealth of orange, like a gigantic June popsicle, double-wide, topped in shags of stiff blonde hair sufficient to thatch a mansion’s roof. Its face, round and broad, the height of a two story barn, well jowled with sloughing ebbs of orange skin, undulating like rough seas. Lips meat-market red, puckered in persistent suspicion. Shaggy, chaotic eyebrows stretched tall as dogwoods over cold blue eyes threaded with disgust and connivance. 

Next, thing’s round orange chin sprouted. Followed hard upon by the sagging orange skin of its blubbery neck, throttled by a sterile white Oxford collar and yellow silk tie. A blue blazer wrapped tight around thing’s barrel chest. The whole of thing rose from its sinkhole, straight as a thistle. Black slacks emerged, followed by pointed derby shoes, so shined an ambling puff of white cloud floated in their mirror finish. thing spired so high it could’ve wrestled Engledale’s sole water tower. But thing wasn’t there to wrestle.

thing’s eyes roamed over the populace of my neighborhood. But not me. Hidden, as I was, by Reginald’s many flittering leaves.

thing scanned, settling upon elder grass-snipper. thing’s shadow cast long over the nearby houses as it marched toward snipper’s porch and glowered down upon snipper. But snipper did not twitch. Did not notice. Did not see thing. But I did. I witnessed.

thing huffed in a tiny bit of that rare bright blue day’s air, chest blooming, and spooled forth a thin white haze upon snipper who perked, rose on rickety legs, rail thin arms thrust out like a spear, leathery fists gripping shears, and marched toward thing.

Turning on a heel, thing spied its next morsel—divorced man shouting at dog. The dog did see thing, did cower, and did whimper in contrast to his meaty heft. Dammit, as I’d come to call him, was typically not to be mucked with. Again, thing’s shadow cast, again thing’s white haze flumed down, and divorced man ceased his barking, peeled his eyes from the screen, snatched up a poker from his rusted fire pit, raised it above his head, a scowl squeezing his face tight and hard, bent his head toward thing and sallied forth.

thing’s white haze flumed down on drama woman, tired mowing woman and, not to be missed, the revelers of Imperial Drive.

Stomping, tired woman pushed the growwwwwling lawn mower toward thing. 

Drama woman pulled out keys, settled the longest between her fingers as though she’d grown a claw, and strode toward thing. 

The faces of the block party twisted into scowls as they brandished rakes, bats, and various other mob accoutrements and, with angry huffs through gritted teeth, marched toward thing. 

And I, with terrified huffs through chattering teeth, witnessed.

Once all gathered round, thing pointed north and let loose an ugly and mighty RARRRRRRRGH and all my neighbors spun and ran, yowling hateful RARRRRRRRGHs, eyes wild. Their target, NorthPointe Apartments, dilapidated, musty, stained, scorched, grounds littered with debris, and confining the disposable others, refugees displaced by rising seas, years of drought, fires, wars, and on.

My once neighbors, like an army of bullet ants amped up on speed, transformed into a spitting horde and smashed through the apartment’s front doors, flooding the complex with all their newly anointed ire. And then, the screaming of the others commenced. 

Elders, mothers, fathers, teens, tweens, children and babes—screaming screaming screaming for pity, for help. But no help came. No siren sang. No bubblegum lights flashed. Only thing came, stomping, denting the gray street in car sized divots, orange skin swimming and slushing like seawater over a doomed dinghy.

Once arrived, bleached white teeth grinding, thing gurgled in delight at the wails of the others. “Hehe. Hehe. Hehe.” With a quick strike, thing shot out a beefy orange hand, snatched one of the captive others and flung them into the air of that rare bright blue day. The others’ sustained screams scratched across the sky until silenced by their back breaking KERSPLOSH into the stiff green hide of the lake. 

My gut cramped. I winced. I witnessed.

Then, both thing’s hands reached down and gathered up groups of others and flung all to the lake till there were no others to fling. For a time, it seemed as though the sky was a traffic jam of terrified condors. 

thing turned on the hoard, my former neighbors, christened them new others and flung these new others, their yowls of hate ascending into shrieks of betrayed woe. Until—diminuendo, al niente and Engledale’s silence was born.

Un-sated, thing stomped off toward the city, gurgling with psychotic glee. “Hehe. Hehe. Hehe.”

Heart banging, my lungs bounced as though I, too, were broken and drowning with my neighbors. But I wasn’t. I was pinned to Reginald. Safe. And when thing’s pounding footfalls fell off into the distance, through the entirety of our little suburb the only sounds extant—robin’s beep beep, Reginald’s creak, “So unnecessary.” And my … silence.