I was inspired by Steinbeck’s East of Eden to write this flash fiction.
Caleb waits in the shadows. Murder is on his heart. Aaron won’t go as far as premeditated murder but he has no problem beating up an old man and taking back the money he lost in tonight’s poker game. The old man, Adam, gets roughed up, knocked unconscious and left with a debilitating concussion. Caleb lunges out of the darkness and kills him. Not the man he came to rub out but Aaron.
If you ask him why he didn’t bury the old man or allow someone else to do it for him, he couldn’t answer you one way or another. Compunction seems to have seized him at the last minute. And if that didn’t shock him, he stayed to nurse the old man back to health. Caleb became Adam’s caretaker. Why? Well, I’ve learned not to ask these questions. Nothing good comes from them.
Nearly 14 months later, Adam is ambulatory, again. But not like before the beating.
A deep bond materializes from this most unusual circumstance. The old man hires Caleb to manage his estate. He even goes as far as putting Caleb into his will. But the young man’s dark thoughts return like locusts determined to destroy everything in their path.
Can his reformed life atone for his past sins? He’s hurt innocent people. He doesn’t deserve mercy or kindness he thinks to himself. For a second time, he resolves to murder the old man. I’ll smother him with his own pillow at midnight.
As planned, he quietly enters his bedroom until he clumsily stubs his toe on the nightstand. He stops moving and holds his breath clenching his jaw to hold the pain in place. Caleb then exhales a soundless sigh of relief. Luckily his stupidity didn’t give him away.
He wonders though why the old man didn’t awake. He senses something is amiss. Looking down at Adam, the moonlight holds him still with an ashen hue. For the second time, the same question arises: Has death itself prevented him from staining his moral ledger? But instead of allowing death to draw him away, he cuts the strings tied to the Reaper’s finger by shaking him. He went as far as procuring and placing a cold washcloth on his forehead. Adam gasps for air.
Caleb’s conscience feels heavier than the stale air in the room. He confesses to his evil intentions and foiled plans. The old man confesses to him that he knew it all along.
“I read in the obituary that your mother had passed away. I knew you would exact your revenge for leaving you when you were just an infant. I doubt your mother told you why I did it. But I will… I owed a large sum of money gambling at the racetrack. More than I could ever pay off. They were going to take everything from us—the house, the farm, our livestock. I figured it would be best if I left you both so they would come after me. It broke my heart to do it… I never remarried or had more children. You are my first and only child. Your mother was the only woman for me. I left hoping one day you’d come and end my suffering. But I never expected you to end our family curse by tending to my wounds.”
“Mother told me why you did it. She hated the fact that I reminded her of you every time she looked at me. So she pushed me away.” He pauses, wondering out loud, “I should’ve killed you but something came over me. I don’t know if it was fear or love or both. But I’m glad I didn’t. I missed out on knowing love by the very people meant to give it. These last couple of years have been the happiest of my—”
He’s interrupted, “Your mother loved you. Never doubt that, Son. Sadly, her hate for me overshadowed that love. It was me. I robbed you of receiving unconditional love.”
“No. You showed me love is strongest when we’re tempted to live without it.”
Adam flares his nostrils to breathe. “Yes,” he adds, “when we’re at our lowest, love has the greatest potential.”
Caleb falls on his father with great affection. He can hear his last breath leaving his chest.
He prays, “Receive my father, Lord, onto your bosom. Reunite my parents in paradise without the complications of pride and prejudice.”