Veniss Underground by Jeff VanderMeer Read Free Book Online

the protective railing as he watches the red water below gush through cracks in the seawall. Your body becomes rigid, each step forward a trial. You are poised on the brink of something new, something that might destroy you. Underlying this, an even stranger sensation: even just looking at his back—straight, unyielding, clothed in the muted purples and grays that are his trademark—you have a sense of doubling—that, as once you could look at Nicholas and see yourself, now you see yourself in Shadrach.
    You slide in beside Shadrach and say, simply, “Hello.”
    Startled, he looks over at you, then the familiar mask slips over his features. The quickness of his recognition astonishes you, makes you think he expected your arrival, if not today then tomorrow.
    He says nothing. You smile and look out across the water. What does he see in it that he should come here day after day, year after year? It is oily, the residue of freighters from five years past still polluting it, but every year the waters are cleaner—ribbons of blue seep in between the overwhelming red. You suspect Shadrach watches more to see the change from red to blue than because the water holds beauty now.
    â€œHello, Nicola,” he says finally, and you smile again—at his casual delivery, and at his familiar habit of looking out to sea, at the shops behind him, his feet—anywhere but at you. How does it feel to be worshipped? Uncomfortable. You are aware of the heat of his body next to yours, somehow intensified by the wall in front of you, which rises to block out the world beyond the cool-down canals.
    â€œI'm not here on a whim,” you say as you draw your legs up and wrap your arms around them. Except that now it does seem like a whim. Your crazy brother is in trouble again.
    An uncomfortable silence, which you break with, “I didn't come here to upset you.”
    â€œYou're not,” he says. Looking into his face, trying to gauge the truth of him, you find an unfamiliar gauntness. The eyes are deep in the orbits, as if trying to escape their own testimony, and devoid of spark. Sad eyes. Were they sad before you sat down beside him? You smell an odor on him like drugs or aftershave.
    â€œHow is your work?” you ask.
    The torpid canal waters reflect your faces in shades of green and orange. Shadrach looks at you, and you hold your breath. His eyes are so old, his movements slow, careful, watchful. But anger smolders behind those eyes.
    â€œWhat do you want?” he asks. “I haven't spoken to you in what, five years? And, then, I'm sitting here and without warning, like a mistimed miracle, suddenly you appear. There must be something you want from me. Not that I am ungrateful for the surprise.”
    You look away—at the zynagill hovering like leathery seagulls, at the solar-sailed ships entering the canal.
    â€œI wondered,” you say. “I wondered if you had seen Nick recently. He was supposed to meet me for lunch two weeks ago. He didn't make it. No call, no message. His apartment is empty—except for this.”
    You hand him the poem; he takes it from you gingerly, tenderly. Your fingers touch, his skin abrasive.
    He looks at the paper for a moment, reads a line under his breath, thrusts it back at you, his mood unreadable.
    â€œSo?”
    â€œSo, where and when did you see him last? Did you speak to him recently? Did he say anything to you—about Quin, about anything?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œNo to which question?”
    â€œNo, he said nothing about Quin. I saw him three weeks ago.”
    â€œWas he in good health? What did he say to you?”
    â€œA new job. He'd gotten a new job.”
    â€œOn the tenth level below ground?”
    Startled, Shadrach turns to you. “What?”
    â€œHe bought some food with the last credits on a bank card on the tenth level a week ago. What would he be doing there? I didn't even know there was a tenth