McCallister's Gift

McCallister’s Gift

By

Derrick L.

The touchtone keypad at the front door chimed behind Alistair’s ears as the sound of the electronic lock disengaged. The scrape of metal on metal echoed as the door latch slid across the strike plate. The thump of polyurethane boots clunked against the linoleum floor; someone was standing in the threshold of his home.

A young woman called out to Alistair from the doorway and patiently waited for his response, “Alright old man, I’ll be back in the morning with your meds. You best sleep now, ya hear?”

It’s that rotten nurse again, feedin’ me them damn pills. He thought to himself.

Alistair grumbled and muttered obscenities under his breath. The young woman let out a sigh. The sound of her earrings and necklaces rattled against her skin as she shook her head.

“Night, gramps.” She said to him quietly as the door slid back across the plate and locked shut.

Alistair Fox was a curious old man that spent most of his days and nights by the balcony window of his five hundred square foot apartment. It was a modest abode that served a purpose befitting of an eighty-year-old pensioner. Some would consider the apartment luxurious, especially given that this retiree’s home was situated near the core of New Chiba City. Living high above on the fiftieth floor, the altitude provided him a view of the rambunctious energy of New Chibanites that rollicked in the city below, and high above. To most, the neon, glitz, and glam would have captivated its patrons in a hypnotic daze, an allure that could throb the tendrils behind your eyes, coupled with the nonstop vibration of surrounding clubs that stirred your soul and tugged at your heartstrings with a sense of yearning that makes you want to scream.

Alistair, however, was not like most people. Besides the clear divide in his age to the surrounding youth and night life, our petulant pensioner held quite an egregious disdain towards younger generations, and even more so toward every generation after the next. The disdain was akin to a compound equation except in place of growing interest, it was growing disgust. As of the year 2020, Alistair Fox’s new “flavour-of-the-day generation” were the Millennials. Of whom were most unfortunate if they ever had the chance of actually meeting Alistair. Fortunately for the youngest generation, Alistair hadn’t even known they existed yet.

Alistair yelled at his reflection in the balcony window, “Fucking Millennials! Those pill popping, hopping, and bopping, beer sucking, punks! They should be called, Pill-ennials! Look at them, constantly partying, day and night, and when the party is over, they wake up and cry! Boo hoo! ‘I’m so tired of everything!’ Poor me oh my! And what about me? I could use some goddamn sleep over here!”

He stood from his wheelchair, stomped, and pounded the plexiglass of his balcony window that was stained and scratched from previous attempts to coerce the night into turning the music down, or to put it in his own words, “to turn down that fucking badger-bop-beat”. Despite his efforts, it was as if the night itself rebelled against the old man every time and the vibrations grew louder.

“Damn rotten kids! Back in my day, we had some discipline and respect! These days, they just keep getting worse! And their smell is no better! Maybe if they stopped drinking that cheap swill, they wouldn’t be runnin’ around with that sour stink! Hah! They should be called, Dill-ennials!”

Alistair burst into laughter at what he thought was the height of comedy and glanced around to see if anyone heard his joke, having forgotten for a split second that he lived alone. Our petulant pensioner let out a defeated sigh, and leaned against the battered, acid rain-stained window. His moment of solitude was disturbed by having glimpsed another old man through the window of an apartment complex situated about fifty meters across the way. He instantly recognized the man, and Alistair’s blood began to boil at the mere sight of him. His gigantic metallic smile, bushy eyebrows, and the way he threw his head back when he laughed, it all irritated Alistair to the umpteenth degree. This was his former friend and battle brother, and for the past decade, he was his archnemesis whom he called, ‘that nasty Asher McCallister’.

“That fucking McCallister!”

Alistair Fox at the image of Asher McCallister, pounded the plexiglass window with his regular hand and then his titanium one, leaving small indentations almost invisible to the naked eye. The flurry of blows he inflicted winded Alistair to the point of fainting. He coughed a mucus rhythm that echoed a history of excessive smoking, it was severe enough to collapse the old man on his wheelchair. If there was anything he hated more than those rotten “Pill-ennials”, it was that “damned-decrepit old man, Asher Mc-fucking-Callister”. The combination of intense hatred and exhaustion from the five second boxing bout with the window tired him enough to fall into a deep slumber, but not before he caught one last glimpse of Asher chortling in the distance.

The heated rivalry between the two octogenarians began as a candid friendship, a brotherly love that extended past several tours of military duty for their own country and a couple private, lesser-known tours for sordid means. The two men were professionally trained as explosive experts and had claimed they were responsible for toppling tyrannical governments and were the spark of fringe group rebellions. Of course, to those who were audience to their stories often met them with a series of disbelieving scoffs and various iterations of, “Whatever, gramps,” that were seemingly more irritable than the last. Moreover, in attempts to regain the listener’s attention, the two old men could often be heard saying the following, “But it’s true, I was the one who helped assassinate – [Insert dictator’s name here]”. But at this point of the conversation, most have already up and left. It is unknown as to what caused their falling out as friends, but those closest to the two men speculated that it began as nothing more than a simple prank out of boredom, that quickly escalated to violent means.

“THUMP!” the sound of a blunt object smacked the balcony concrete. It was followed by the buzz of tiny propellor blades that woke Alistair out of his rage induced coma. He dove from his wheelchair and covered his head.

“GET DOWN!” he barked at no one.

After a moment, the old man sighed in relief that the sound was not from a dropped bomb or the roar of an artillery cannon. He winced as his joints ached and popped as he propped himself up to investigate the ruckus. He peered through the balcony door window and discovered that the cause of the scare was a nondescript package dropped on his balcony. The sound of the propellor blades were sourced from a floating delivery drone that blinked in yellow and red - the colours of its delivery company, hovering just above the box. He looked past the drone towards Asher’s window and was surprised to see his archnemesis’ own wheelchair, empty. Perhaps Asher must have gone to bed.

“Ariiigatoo…” hummed the drone, as a tiny printer clicked and whirred. It printed out an invoice that floated down to the package, before a gust of wind knocked both the drone and the invoice off the fiftieth-floor balcony.

“Fer chrissake! Now I gotta- damnit, all!” groaned Alistair. “Blasted machines are supposed to make your life easier!”

The disgruntled Alistair managed to open the balcony door and peered over the package to see who had sent it. On the face of the box was a postage label that read Alistair’s name and address. The return address read Asher McCallister’s. Upon reading his nemesis’ name, he collapsed onto his behind and shuffled backwards in panic, fearful of what the enemy sent him, and rightfully so. The last package he received from Asher contained a box of ‘Yummy Wummy Chocolates’ which were Alistair’s favourite. Inside was a detonator set on a wire trap connected to cherry bombs in place of the delectable treats. In retaliation for his now titanium hand, Alistair had sent McCallister a candied apple - his enemy’s favourite. However, Alistair cleverly hid a pressure detonated cherry bomb inside the apple, a much more ‘creative’ design as Alistair would have put it, compared to the more ‘boring’ designs of his enemy. The question now of what could be inside this package shook Alistair to the core.

Maybe it was a timed bomb? Thought Alistair.

The likelihood that it could indeed be a time bomb seemed to fit the ‘simple’ methods of his former friend’s. Simple, yet effective. Or maybe it could be something much worse, but the notion was quickly brushed off as being too creative. Whatever was in the box, however, was undoubtedly revenge for blowing up his jaw with the rigged, candied apple. Alistair quickly crawled away from the ominous package and hopped on a couch with its back facing towards the balcony. Even with his miliary training with explosives, he knew that his brown leather couch would be worthless against an explosive device placed merely three meters away. But he laid there anyway. He laid there on the couch for the rest of the night, staring at the stucco ceiling and the dangling lamp fixture that gyrated to the vibrations of the night. The anticipation was killing him.

Alistair Fox did not get a wink of sleep. His mind raced at what dangerous design McCallister could have sent him and wondered how he was still alive.

Perhaps it was a proximity bomb? Or a remote detonator? He thought.

The possibilities were running rampant in his head, he was not going to underestimate his enemy again. In the morning, Alistair peered around the couch and looked for what he could throw at the box from a distance. On the end table was a bowl of stale ‘Yummy Wummies’ that he threw at Asher’s box. He missed. The bowl shattered and his collection of delectables rattled across the floor like marbles. A banging rumble shook the floor as an annoyed voice echoed through the floorboards below.

“HEY OLD MAN! SOME OF US ARE TRYING TO SLEEP HERE!”

Alistair grumbled under his breath and searched for something else to throw. He grabbed a small picture frame from the end table and for a time, stared deeply into the photo of himself at a younger age. In the photo he held a little girl in his arms, about nine years old at the time and the two of them looked at each other with a laugh in their smiles.

A candid photo of a happier time.

The girl had two knotted cocoa-coloured braids that ran down the back of her head, each tied with a sky-blue bow at the ends. Her smile was surrounded by olive skinned cherub-like cheeks that beckoned any grandparent to pinch in between their thumb and forefinger, which he did back in the day. He held the picture frame like he did his granddaughter and slid the photo out from the back. He felt the resin treated photo grip between his fingers as he flipped it over. On the back of the picture was an inscription that read “Grandpa Alistair and Josie, 1999.” Alistair felt a stray tear trail down the creases of his face as he had forgotten the name of his granddaughter.

“Josie.” He whispered, “Josie.” He repeated again.

He tried to recall the day the photo was taken but could only grasp certain aspects, like the colour of the sky and the smell of the ocean. But he could not remember anything else of that day, except that it was a happy one. That was enough for him to hold onto the photo and keep it in the breast pocket of his lounge robe. Alistair Fox couldn’t remember the last time he saw Josie, or when his family even visited him. It must have been at least twenty years.

Our old man grunted and regained focus to the matter at hand, the box on the balcony. With his titanium hand, he popped up from the couch and threw the empty picture frame with a wrist snap at Asher’s box. The corner of the picture frame stabbed the box gently before ricocheting off the top and flying over the balcony ledge. Alistair cupped his mouth as he heard a car alarm go off, ten seconds after the picture frame left the building.

At least the box is not pressure activated. Alistair thought to himself.

When he deemed it safe enough, he decided to get closer to the box to investigate further. As he walked onto the balcony our plucky senior glanced across the way, wondering if the enemy was watching his every move. When he found his foe’s viewing window, it remained empty. McCallister wasn’t there. Before he could grab the box, the door latch clicked open, and the familiar sound of combat boots entered the apartment and the same young woman’s voice called out to Alistair.

“Hey old man, I got your pills.”

The sound of capsules rattled as the pill bottle was tossed onto a table in the apartment.

“I’ll be back for lunch, and I’ll get you something – hey, quit standing around out there you old fart, you’ll catch a cold! Anyway, I have to run to work, I’ll see you later!”

The front door slammed shut and just like that, Alistair was left alone again to his own devices.

“Good riddance,” muttered Alistair Fox, “I couldn’t stand that nurse anyway, the company couldn’t have hired someone that was not a goddamn Millennial? Pah, everyone is useless!”

He grabbed the box and placed it on the kitchen table next to the pile of empty pill bottles and the single full one. Before he began investigating Asher McCallister’s box, he took a pill and held it in his hand. Alistair grimaced at the sight of the plastic sheen on the capsule. He hated taking pills as he believed that medicine was a crutch that people over relied on to make it through their everyday lives. But he knew he had to take it anyway, as he realized that he didn’t have much of a choice, his doctor told him that it was good for his heart and Alistair didn’t feel like tampering with something he didn’t understand, something that he felt was quite out of the realm of his expertise. He swallowed the pill and for the next several hours, Alistair Fox sat in his wheelchair and stared at the box and restrained from opening it as he feared what Asher hid inside.

At around noon, Alistair had scratched off every possibility in his mind and determined that there were over an infinite number of potential combinations of things that could be placed inside to kill him. He had entertained the idea of calling in a bomb threat, but that would have gone against his pride and reputation of an explosive expert. The mere notion of being rescued by a bunch of youngins’ was, frankly, an embarrassment not worth living for. What about throwing it over the ledge? To put it simply, that would also be too cowardly. This was a matter between himself and that bastard Asher McCallister, and he was not going to let anyone get in the way of that. So, Alistair was left with only one choice, to open the box and face the consequences.

The door chimed once more, and the young woman burst open the door with her hands full of takeout food.

“Hey, I’m back, I brought some Chinese. I know it’s not quite your favourite, but it was along the way and Mr. Chang’s had a takeout special – hey what do you have there?”

The young woman placed the bags of food on the table near Alistair and his box and leaned over to read the postage label.

“Asher McCallister?” her eyes widened as she read the name and her tone grew softer as if she were about to tell Alistair something difficult.

“Hey gramps, I know this is something that may be hard to hear and well - I know the two of you had your falling out,” she took a deep breath before she continued, “well, Mr. McCallister passed away in his sleep a few days ago. Seemed like it was his time, his family called me and told me to invite you to his funeral.”

The sudden news stabbed a sharp pain in his chest. The realization that his enemy had now transcended and the idea that his archnemesis was no longer around for him to defeat struck him in a way that he didn’t expect. It was the end of a rivalry with no victory, he felt lost and didn’t know what to do.

“If it’s one last gift from your former friend, maybe you should open it. Here, I’ll do it for you.”

As the young lady peeled open the lid of the box, Alistair yelped and tackled her away, knocking the table along with all the food and pill bottles on the floor. The box bounced as the lid flew open revealing what was inside. Alistair covered the young lady with his body, shielding her from the box. No explosion ever came. Confused, he looked over to see that the box was empty except a half-scribbled note that said, “Alistair, I am sorry for everything.”

The young woman laughed to tears as she laid there on the floor and gently slapped Alistair’s face. “Hah, what’s gotten into you gramps?”

Alistair Fox felt relieved as if an immense weight was lifted off his shoulders, but a sinking feeling reverberated in his chest as if he yearned to cry out in joy and out of sadness for his former friend. He wiped a tear from his cheek and looked eye to eye at the young woman laying on the floor as if it was the first time. The characteristics of her face seemed so familiar, her olive skin, the way she smiled, those familiar cheeks. Alistair held the young lady like he held her all those years ago and pinched her cheek between his thumb and forefinger.

“Josie,” he muttered as tears rolled down his face, “it is so good to see you.”