Duck thinks of the fires. Moving closer to the houses in the valley moving closer and closer still. All the trees, animals, underbrush, no food or shelter. The news says to watch for things needing a drink. Do not approach. Do not try to rescue. Do not touch. Mal is peeling an orange in one go, he will nail the skins to the wall in a row and call it art. Dried husks of fruits on all the walls with nails. Mal hands the peel to Lenny, but Lenny doesn’t know. What to do. Looks at the wall of fruit skins, and blanks. The faint cry of early internet. Daisy is bored, endless scrolling and when her eyes realign to the kitchen the scrolling continues in her eyes of every reel and video and picture and comment. The comments! Everyone talking all at once about everything in all of time. The internet! It’s too haunted of a place. The housekeepers to and fro. Everyone all crowded in the kitchen, isn’t that always the case at every party.
Are the goths dead? Duck demands. The next orange peel drops to the floor. Lots of eyes everywhere but on Duck’s. Who could live through these fires, lost in the forest?
Mal rips the orange flesh in half, quarter, and shoves it into his mouth. He feeds the other quarter to Lenny in the gayest way possible. Daisy laughs, but only because she is thinking of something otherworldly. No one is in the room but Duck, metaphorically speaking. Mal spits orange pulp: We saw their footprints coming out of the thicket. Word on the street is no one survived. But I will miss them, such royalty of darknesses. Such, Marys of silence. Such, Bela Lugosis about town. They already knew how to die, I’m sure they died in the most gothiest ways, as if they majored in death in school. Versed, shall we say? He swallows without chewing more. Lenny opens their mouth, sticks their large tongue way out and Mal throws another piece of orange to the target, misses, but Lenny catches it with their hand.
Duck says, I trust that’s true. That they are dead I mean.
In barges through the kitchen Mayks, Q, Rilly, and Angelix, all nails and low-sling jeans, dark rimmed glasses, and curly hair. They have been walking, evidenced by the wetness of the bottoms of their pants, the snow trapped on the tops of their shoulders.
Duck continues, I should thank the fire, after all. Thank the forest for engulfing them, for leading you all here tonight.
Mayks tugs at his imaginative beard. At your service, after all, he says, mocking. But also sincere. You can’t ever tell these days with him. He says, we are here to be of service to you. We need to cover the pool, the animals! Everyone is here to batten. He pats Q on the head. Q scowls.
Duck leans his body weight into the center tiled island, fingers the tops of the kitchen knives safely in their blocks. Everyone starts laughing, shouting, ruckus. Come closer, Mayks and Q, Ducks says, stopping all conversation mid-thought, mid-poetry, mid-song. Honey Q, don’t you deserve it all. You have done nothing less than all these assholes. Let me hug you. Let me keep you in my heart. He slides a knife from the block. No one moves.
Q says, if you want me in your heart, that’s your problem, not mine. No hugs. Stay away with that knife, Duck.
Duck stands tall, throws the knife from hand to hand in a nonchalant fashion. Hand to hand hand to hand his hands only. They watch, waiting for it to fall. Sharp as tongue. My happiness tries to escape in my sadness, he says. Slams the knife down on the top of the island. Everyone jumps at the noise. Mal is the king of the goths, he says. We will relocate to the harbor house, away from the fires for now. Mal will take over everything for me. Handle all business. Handle their business. All business, all the time.
Mayks grabs the knife. Points it at Duck. I’m exhausted, he says. I need to find Big Mayks, and tell him all of this. I’m leaving. He throws the knife across the room, into a space where no one is standing.
Duck laughs, my dearest boy! My sweet, sweet boy. No need to for such antics. Underneath Duck a crumbled lot of Dot Matrix paper seeps from his feet.
Outside, Mayks is seeing the blood stain on the carpet in the library where Cate bled. He’s seeing blood in the swimming pool. Blood trails in the snow. He is seeing blood in the smoke that doesn’t end in the sky. He coughs. Thinks to himself: I have to kill Mal. Thinks to himself: The only way to be king. May all the planets have mercy on me. If there is a god, he thinks, let her turn her head the other way. He walks off into the night.
Inside, no one has said a word. No one has moved an inch. Duck slams both fists into the island. Q, he says, you gorgeous minx. You do live in my heart. Mal, he says, the time for succession is now. Everyone, let’s eat!