Succubi

Her gaze rose. The moon hung low on the horizon. An egg moon, her mother would say—it was lopsided, not quite full.

Look at the moon tonight.

All right, I’m looking. It did look funny, its inordinate size and the queer pinkish hue. She’d been hearing about it on the news the last few days, some rare astronomical occurrence. The first day of spring was just days away; apparently, the moon’s position in conjunction with this caused an atmospheric anomaly that pinkened its light at certain times.

Big deal, she thought.

But the more steadily she stared…

It’s pink, she thought. It’s bloated.

Like her belly in the dream. Pink. Bloated.

But that was stupid. She was letting too much get to her. Everything reminded her of the dream. Her own belly felt bloated as she backed away from the window and padded to the bathroom.

She closed the door and turned on the lights. The mirror’s brightness shocked her, and the sharp clarity of her nakedness. She still looked good—for thirty seven. Her skin was tight, bereft of stretch marks. Could use some sun, though, she realized. When was the last time she’d actually lain out in the sun? Years. Her skin was very white, creamy, which contrasted intensely with her very dark brown eyes and ashen brown hair. Her nipples, too, were more brownish than pink, and large. She’d had little to compare herself to. There’d been occasions in college—phys ed electives—when she’d showered with other girls. Her body had always seemed more robust, her nipples larger and darker, her skin tighter and white. It pleased her to see how little her body had changed. At the firm there was a junior partner named Louise who was the same age as Ann. Once they’d shared a hotel room in Detroit during prelim litigation for an air wreck, and they’d changed together. Louise’s thighs looked like bags of cottage cheese. Her breasts depended, and her belly sagged. “I’ll loan you my best dress if you loan me your body,” she’d said with a sullen laugh.

Ann pinched her thighs. No signs of dreaded cellulite. She pinched her tummy and came up with almost nothing in the way of excess. Maybe it was her hair that made her look younger, too. It hung thick and plainly straight to her shoulders, the way she’d always worn it. The full plot of pubic hair, the same color as her hair, seemed to shine.

But suddenly, she felt adrift before the bright mirror. Mirror, she thought. The sensation of portent returned for no reason. Her nakedness. Her brown nipples and white skin. She closed her eyes and saw the spraddled, sweating body, the spread legs, the tight bloated belly pushing…

She thought of the emblem, the bizarre double circle engraved upon the dream’s chalice and suspended upon the wall.

When the phone rang in the bedroom, she nearly shrieked. For a moment she could only stand there staring at the vivid image of herself in the mirror, as the phone shrilled on. Not him again, she pleaded. Not the caller

Martin was answering it just as she opened the door. The bright bathroom light threw a block into the bedroom.

“It’s…it’s for you,” Martin said. Sleep roughened his voice. “It’s your mother.”

Ann sat down on the bed’s edge and took the phone.

“Mom?”

Her mother’s voice sounded curt, businesslike. It sounded…stoic. “Ann, there’s been a…”

“What, Mom?”

“Your father,” the voice hesitated.

Oh, no. Please, no, Ann’s thoughts dripped.

“Your father’s had a stroke. It’s bad. Dr. Heyd says he might not last the week.”

As the words sank in, Ann could only stare. Through the minute slats in the window blinds, she could see the pinkened, pregnant moon.

«« — »»

In another place, two girls sat side by side in the grove. They were young. They were naked and holding hands. Wistfully, they peered up into crystal black sky.

“Heofan,” one whispered.

“Give lof,” whispered the other.

They had. They could taste it in their mouths, salty sweet blood.

“The wifmunuc will be happy.”

“I’m happy too!”

The old pickup truck sat in darkness down the grove. So stupid the helots were. Like animals. The girls had only had to hang around the parking lot for a few minutes before they’d been approached. “Whatchoo two purdy thangs doin’ standin’ round here all by yerselfs?” the fat one had asked. “Our boyfriends left us,” one of the girls had replied. “Can you guys give us a ride home?” “Why, shore!” offered the tall one. “Cain’t have two purdy thangs like yawl hitchhikin’ these dark roads all by yerselfs.”

The two girls had grinned.

All four squeezed into the big bench seat. The tall one drove. He was nice looking, long black hair, nice boots, nice smile. He cranked up Led Zeppelin. The fat one looked…fat. Long hair too, sideburns, flannel shirt. He looked like a redneck Meat Loaf. “We alls from Crick City,” he said. “Where yawl from?”

“Lockwood,” answered the young dohtor.

“This here’s Gary, I’m Lee,” the fat one said.

Then Gary said, “Still a bit early, though. And Lee an’ me was fixin’ on partyin’ a little more.”

Lee’s chubby face grinned. “Yawl like ta join us awhile?”

“Sure,” said the younger.

“The night is young,” said the older.

They both grinned again in the darkness.

“We know a place we can go. Nice and quiet.”

“Just lead me the way, sweetheart,” Gary enthused, and cranked the Led Zep up a little more, “Houses of the Holy.” Lee cracked open beers for all of them, Iron City. “Best brew ya can buy, an’ only a buck ninety nine a six!”

It had been a glorious fulluht; the girls had learned well. The younger had reveled in the look on Lee’s face in the moonlight. She’d had to push his tremendous beer belly up to get on him right, though. It hadn’t been easy.

“We give lof,” said the younger.

“Through hüsl,” finished the older.

The younger drooled, straining over the fat one’s thrusting hips. The older was moaning, riding the tall one in the dirt. They were powerless now; the dohtors had taken them quick. They’d seeped into the peows’ gasts like balm. The tall one hadn’t even screamed when the elder dohtor sank the æsc into his heart. The younger one had plunged her own æsc delightfully in and out of the fat one’s belly in time with his fervid spurts. Blood flew, painting her. She shrieked in bliss as the big, dumb body twitched between her legs.

Sated, they rose and went to work. The blood on their young flesh looked black in the beautiful moonlight. They worked hard and happily.

The older dragged their bodies back into the truck as the younger siphoned gasoline into a paegel, which she then splashed into the cab.

They sat for a time first, they always did. They liked to stretch naked beneath the moon and dream of red heofan, of the godspellere, and the coming blissful nihtloc.

Later, they dressed and collected their things. The older carried the laden bags. “See ya ’round, Gary,” she said, laughing.

“Nice partyin’ with ya, Lee,” called the younger. She lit a pack of matches and tossed it into the cab.

The cab burst into beautiful flames, like a fek oven. Within the fire, the meat hissed and sizzled.

—

Chapter 8

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Ann, it’s not your fault.” Martin poured coffee for her in the kitchen. He drew the curtains and let the morning sun beam in.

“I want you two to go. I’ll go home by myself.”

“That’s ridiculous,” he said. “This is an emergency, and we’re a family. We’ll go together.”

“Melanie will be crushed,” Ann said.

“Ann, Melanie will understand. This is your father we’re talking about, and her grandfather.”

Sometimes Martin was too understanding. Ann knew he would do everything he could to help her, to make things work, in spite of the fact that her parents never really approved of him. “A poet?” her mother had objected. “Poets don’t make any money, Ann. Why do you insist on getting involved with these deadbeats?” Yes, Martin knew all about that, and still he would do everything he could to smooth things out.

“We’ll go to Paris next time,” he said.

Next time. When would that be? A year? Two?

Suddenly, she was crying.

Martin put his arm around her, stroked her hair.

“Every time something good happens, something bad happens,” she sobbed.

“It’ll be all right. There was nothing you could do.”

“He’s dying.”

“Ann, just because he had a stroke doesn’t mean he’s dying.”

“But the doctor said—”

“Come on, Ann, that old guy? He doesn’t know a stethoscope from a periscope. The best thing we could do is get your father out of that town and into a real hospital.”

It would never happen, Ann knew. Her parents believed in fate, not CAT scanners and ICUs.

“We better start getting ready,” Martin said.

As Ann rose, Melanie traipsed into the kitchen. “What time are we—” She stopped, looked at them, hesitated. “What’s wrong?”

Ann and Martin hesitated in return. Ann looked up at Martin in panic. The look said, Please tell her, Martin. I can’t. I just can’t.

Martin understood at once. “Melanie, we’re not going to be able to go to Paris this time,” he began. “Something bad happened yesterday…”

«« — »»

“Tharp’s escaped. Erik Tharp—remember him?”

Sergeant Tom Byron just stood there, mouth open.

Chief Bard sipped coffee from a spider cracked NRA mug. “Fucker busted out of the Rubber Ramada yesterday. Can you believe it?”

“Erik Tharp,” Byron said. “Escaped.”

“That’s right, boy. State’s saturated the whole area with their units, and they want all municipal departments on watch. He busted out with a rapist, killed four people already, two hospital people, old Farley from the Qwik Stop out on 154, and some redneck broad from Luntville. Raped the stuffing out of the broad before they killed her. And they got a piece. State M.E. says he pulled a .455 out of the girl’s ass, Farley’s Webley.”

“Erik…Tharp,” Byron repeated. The name put him in a daze. He remembered, all right. The pit full of tiny charred skeletons, and Tharp himself poised in moonlight with the shovel.

At last Sergeant Byron regained his ability to speak polysyllabically. “You figure he’s comin’ back here, Chief?”

“State says there’s no way in hell. Probably headed north, they said.”

“Tharp ain’t got a set brass enough to come back here.”

Bard frowned. What could he say to Byron? He was pretty much just a kid.

“I should’ve killed him five years ago,” Byron muttered.

Yeah, you should have, Bard thought. Instead, he said, “Don’t wanna hear no talk like that, boy. We’re professionals.”

With that, Bard scratched his belly and spat in the waste can.

“Lemme go lookin’, Chief. I’ll drive my own car. Just lemme—”

“Forget it. You mind your manners unless you wanna take old Farley’s place for five bucks an hour at the Qwik Stop, ya hear?”

Byron, reluctantly, nodded.

“LW One,” squawked the base station. “Citizen report of signal 5F two miles south of junction 154 and Old Dunwich. M.E. en route. Check for possible relation to state signal fifty five slash twelve in progress.”

“LW One, ten four,” Bard groaned into the mike.

Byron stared.

“Get on it, boy”, Bard said, and stood up exertedly. “Maybe Tharp’s closer than the state thinks.”

«« — »»

We look like idiots, Erik thought, glaring at the mirror.

“Jesus,” Duke murmured, standing aside.

They’d cut their hair short, in efforts to get with the times. Instead, they looked like they’d stuck their heads in blenders. The hair bleach hadn’t worked very well either. Erik had followed the instructions, or at least he thought he had. It turned their hair almost snow white.

Duke slapped the back of Erik’s head. “Ya a hole, look whatcha done.”

“It’s not that bad,” Erik tried to commiserate.

“Not that bad? Man, we can’t walk the street like this. We look like a couple of rejects from some California homo farm.” Duke glared at Erik, then stomped out of the bathroom.

At least we don’t look like our file pictures, Erik thought. That much was correct. The hospital updated their ward residence photos every year. The police probably wouldn’t be looking for two guys with white hair.

Duke slouched on the bed. He was watching the Three Stooges: Shemp was pumping Larry up with a fireplace bellows stuck in his mouth. Erik changed the channel.

“Hey, man! Whatdaya think you’re doin? It’s a Shemp!”

Shemp, Erik thought. We’re two killers trying to outrun the entire state, and all he cares about is Shemp. “We have to monitor the news as much as we can,” his voice creaked. He flipped through late morning cartoons, then—froze. Suddenly, he was looking at himself on the TV screen, and a newscaster was saying, “…have killed four in less than twenty four hours. Erik Tharp and Richard ‘Duke’ Belluxi escaped the state mental facility near Luntville yesterday morning at eleven thirty, overpowering two employees and murdering two more. They fled the grounds in a lawn contractor’s vehicle which was later found abandoned at a nearby convenience store, where they murdered a clerk and abducted a twenty year old Luntville woman only minutes after their escape. The woman, whose name is being withheld, was found dead later that afternoon in a ditch off State Route 154. She’d been shot, beaten, and raped, police say.”

Duke chortled laughter, pointing. “Looky! It’s us!”

Indeed it was. Both their faces filled the screen. Duke was grinning in his picture. Erik stared.

“Yeah, my mama, I’ll bet she’s proud!” Duke laughed. “Can tell all her friends her son’s a TV star!”

“Come on!” Erik shouted. “We gotta get out of—”

“What are you shittin’ a brick about?”

“They found the girl’s body, Duke. That means they know what kind of car we’re driving!”

The station wagon was parked right out in front of the motel, in full view from the main road. The first cop car that drove by would see it and then…

“Get our stuff together,” Erik commanded. “I’m gonna move the car around back so no one can see it from the road. We’ll have to leave on foot, get a new car somewhere else.”

“Right,” Duke said.

Erik slipped out the front door and got in the station wagon. How long had the police known what they were driving? It was incredible that the car hadn’t been seen yet.

Too incredible.

Something clicked behind his ear.

“Right there, fella,” a voice whispered.

Erik’s whole body seized.

The female cop had sneaked up alongside the car. She leaned over, pressing the barrel of a Ruger .357 to his temple. “You blink and your brains go out the other side of your head. Understand?’

“Uh, yes,” Erik croaked. His eyes darted right. A police cruiser was parked on the side of the last room. “Luntville Police Department,” a seal read.

The woman had dark red hair tied in a bun behind her hat. She wore mirrored sunglasses in which Erik could see twins of his own face. “You and me,” she whispered, “we’re gonna walk over to that squad car nice and quiet, right?”

“Uh, yes,” Erik croaked.

“You get out real slow and keep your hands up.”

The woman opened the station wagon door. She kept her gun trained on him. It was a big gun, but then Erik thought of Duke’s, which was even bigger. Right now, Duke was doing one of two things. He’d either crawled out the bathroom window and was heading for the hills, or he was standing behind that tacky louvered motel room door and lining up the sights of the gun he’d taken off the old man at the Qwik Stop.

Erik stood straight, his hands in the air. He whispered, “Lady, the other guy’s in the room right in front of us and he’s got a—”

It was a strange collision of sounds and sights crammed into a single second. The woman’s police hat shot up in the air, and suddenly she was standing before Erik with no head. It simply…disappeared. Only then did Erik hear the loud bang! The woman, headless now, seemed to stand for a moment, her pistol still thrust out. Then the body collapsed.

Erik’s expression collapsed as well. He lowered his arms. More blood on my hands, he thought.

“Ooooo eee!” Duke celebrated. He’d fired through the louvers. “Perfect head shot, man, fifteen, maybe twenty feet!”

Duke loped out, the Webley still smoking. He picked up the policewoman’s hat and put it on, laughing.

My God, Erik thought.

“Get the stuff,” he said, “and move the cop’s body into the room. I’m moving the car.”

Duke whistled gaily, dragging the body toward the room. “S’shame, though, you know? Wasted a perfectly good set of tits. Could’ve had me a good ol’ time with this girl-fuzz.”

Erik parked the station wagon behind the motel. Then he jogged back around to see what was keeping Duke.

Duke was sitting in the passenger side of the woman’s patrol car. He adjusted the hat on his head and looked up, grinning.

“Come on, buddy. We might as well ride in style, right? I’ll ride shotgun.”

By now Erik had resigned to Duke’s sociopathy. He had no choice. He started the car and tromped the accelerator. Duke wailed.

Luntville was just north. Erik sped south. The cop had probably radioed in her location when she’d spotted the station wagon. When she didn’t answer up, her friends would come looking.

Duke looked like a kid in a candy shop, surveying the car’s interior. Erik’s mind raced. “We’ve probably got five minutes before they’re onto us. When they find the cop you killed, there’ll be a hundred cars after us.” Erik turned off the main road, fishtailing. The further off the main roads they got, the more time they’d have to change cars. He remembered the area well. The back roads were a maze. “We have to ditch this car and get a new one real fast.”

“Why? I like this car,” Duke complained. He tore open a pack of Twinkies. “How come we gotta change cars all the time?”

“Don’t you understand anything? As long as they know what we’re driving, we don’t stand a chance. We need a car that nobody knows we’re in.”

And that prospect worried him. Taking a car meant taking (or killing) the owner. Erik didn’t want any more people dead, but he knew Duke had other ideas in that regard. How can I control an uncontrollable person? he grimly asked himself.

The mobile radio, a plug in Motorola, began jabbering. Then, much more clearly, a woman’s voice broke: “Two zero eight?”

Erik stuck his head out the window. The front fender bore the stencil: 208. “That’s us,” he croaked.

“Two zero eight, do you copy?”

Duke gaped at him, cheeks stuffed.

“Two zero eight, acknowledge.”

“Give it a shot,” Erik advised. “We’ve got nothing to lose except our lives, and we’ll probably lose those anyway.”

“Think positive, buddy.” Duke pointed to his own head. “Positive, that’s the way. How do you work this thing?”

“Just pick it up and push the button when you want to talk.”

Duke keyed the mike. “This is two zero eight. Go ahead.”

“Two zero eight, what’s your status?”

“A okay. Everything’s just fine.”

Erik was shaking his head.

The radio fizzed through a pause. “Two zero eight, are you ten eight?”

“That’s a roger. I’m the big ten eight.” He released the button and chuckled. “What the fuck’s ten eight?”

“I don’t know,” Erik said. “What do I look like? Adam 12?”

Duke laughed.

“Two zero eight, do you want a disregard on that possible fifty five?”

“Yeah, sure, gimme a disregard. Why not?”

Another fizzy pause. Then: “Two zero eight, state your ID number.”

Duke looked at Erik. They both shrugged.

“Two zero eight, identify yourself by name and ID.”

“This is bad boy Duke Belluxi, baby!” Duke wailed into the mike. “I am your friendly neighborhood walkin’ and talkin’ schizoaffective paranoid schizophrenic. And sittin’ right by my side is Captain Erik Tharp of the Starship Psychopath. We boldly go where no escaped mental patients have gone before, oooooo doggie!”

“Jesus,” the dispatcher muttered. “Two zero eight, please put the unit’s officer on the line.”

“Oh, you mean that pretty redheaded girl-fuzz? Well, she can’t talk right now on account of she seems to have misplaced her mouth. Oh, and do me a favor, okay? Shag my balls.”

Suddenly, a wave of voices panicked over the transmission. “Thirteen, thirteen! Officer down at Gein’s Motel!” Others shouted in the background. “She’s dead! The motherfuckers killed her!” “Check the back!” “Harley, get the gas gun!” “Holy fucking—” “The car, the motherfuckers took her car!” “Jesus Christ, they blew off her—”

“Head,” Duke finished into the mike.

“This is two one two to dispatch. Officer is shot and killed. No sign of unit two zero eight. Repeat, unit two zero eight is missing.”

Duke made pig noises in the microphone. Then he stuck the mike between his legs and farted. “How about all you pigs out there go fuck each other, and lick my crack too, while you’re at it, just like all your mamas do to me every night. Catch me if you can, piggies! Oink oink oink!”

The dispatcher was yelling over the air: “Ten three! All units ten three! Ten three, ten three, ten three!”

A crystal clear silence filled the void, which seemed anticipatory and vivid. Then: “Duke Belluxi, Erik Tharp, this is Chief Lawrence Mulligan of the Luntville Police Department.” The slight drawl sounded easy, almost chummy. “I want you boys to come to your senses. Give it up. Give us your location.”

“We’re at your mama’s house, Chief. Where’d you think?” Duke said, then made some more pig noises. “Looks like we’re going to have to wait, though. See, there’s a big line going all the way around the house, starting at the bedroom. Course, good poon like your mama’s is always worth waitin’ for, don’t ya think?”

“I want you fellas to know that every available state and local police car in this county is heading your way from every direction. You got a world of hurt bearin’ down on your asses, boys.”

Duke bubbled laughter. “Say, Chief, your wife’s the one with the really big titties who blows every guy in town for free, ain’t she? Think maybe she’d tongue my balls if I asked her nice?”

All this time during Duke’s profane fun, Erik had been fishtailing deeper and deeper into the back roads.

“You’re askin’ for serious trouble, boys,” Mulligan was saying. “You don’t want my men to catch ya on the run. Now be reasonable.”

“Shag my balls, Chief,” Duke answered. “How’s that for reasonable? Say, I heard your daughters do the football team. That true?”

“Listen to me, son. It’s goddamn impossible for you all to get away. Pull that car over right now, give us your location, and give yourselves up. You all have my personal guarantee that you won’t be harmed.”

“I got a better idea, Chief.” Duke chuckled. “You give me your mama’s location, and I’ll give you my personal guarantee that I’ll diddle her poon like your daddy never dreamed.”

Duke then repeated his rendition of pig noises into the microphone.

Erik turned off the radio.

“Say, buddy, you’re whippin’ this car around these turns like a regular Mariano Mandretti.” Duke dug into some more Twinkies, and burped. “And how do you like that no dick chief? Thinks we’re just gonna give up, just like that. Fucker would kill us in less time than it takes me to shake the piss off my pecker.”

Duke had that right, however uneloquently. Most cops down here thought the U.S. Constitution was a ship from the War of 1812. They’d shoot first and ask questions next month.

The network of back roads would hide them for a while but not forever. Unless they got an inconspicuous car, it was only a matter of time before somebody spotted them.

“We need a new car,” he said. “Now.”

“Way out here in the sticks, there ain’t nothing,” Duke observed. “We need a shopping center, grocery store, something like that.”

“I don’t think there are any this far in.”

Abruptly, Duke peered forward. “Well, looky there.”

Erik saw it.

“Tell me God ain’t on our side,” Duke said.

The road wound down through the woods. Up ahead was a one lane truss bridge which crossed a deep creek.

Parked off the side was a white van.

It was one of those custom jobs, cursive pinstriping, multiple coats of lacquer, Keystone mags. And lower, a guy and a girl sat at the creekside with fishing rods.

“We’re taking them with us, Duke, right? You’re not going to kill them, right?”

“No sweat, buddy. I swear on my daddy’s grave. From here on I don’t kill nobody.”

Erik pulled over. The two kids looked up the crest. Duke fiddled with some switches until the flashing red and blues popped on. “This is the police,” he barked out the window. “You two get on up here.”

The girl looked questioningly to her boyfriend. She wore white shorts, flip flops, and a maroon bikini top. The guy wore overalls. They both looked in their late teens.

“Come on, come on, I ain’t got all day.”

They rose and began to move forward. Duke fiddled with the LECCO on the console, which secured a Remington 870P. The lock was designed to prevent unauthorized removal of the weapon when the officer was out of the car and the keys weren’t in the ignition. Unfortunately, now the keys were in the ignition, and all it took was the press of a little button to remove the shotgun. Duke promptly racked a round of 12 gauge into the chamber.

“Duke—”

“Don’t worry, buddy. I ain’t gonna kill ’em. But we sure as shit ain’t gonna get their van by pointing our fingers at ’em.”

The two kids loped up the hill, approached the passenger side.

“Whuh what seems to be th the problem, sir?” the guy asked.

“The problem is this, son,” Duke explained. “We’re not really cops, we’re escaped mental patients. And we need a new set of wheels real bad.” He stuck the shotgun out the window, aiming at the kid’s head. “Now, that van there, it looks mighty nice.”

The girl’s face paled instantly. A light yellow wet spot appeared at the crotch of her pretty white shorts.

“Please don’t kill us,” the boy pleaded.

“Relax, kid. Just throw me the keys.”

“The keys are in it, sir.”

“Why, that’s just daaaaaandy, son,” Duke falsettoed, then squeezed the Remington’s trigger.

The boy’s head blew to pulpy bits. A plop of brains splashed in the creek.

“Goddamn it, Duke!” Erik shouted, and pounded the dash. “You promised you wouldn’t!”

Duke grinned. “That’s right, buddy. I swore on my daddy’s grave. Thing is, my daddy ain’t dead.”

The girl had fainted right away. The boy lay splayed on his back, his arms extended. He looked like a headless referee signaling a touchdown.

“Get them both in the van,” Erik said, now weary with disgust.

Duke stuffed the last Twinkie in his face and got out. He threw their things in the van as Erik pulled the patrol car as deeply into the woods as he could. Then he checked the trunk. A box contained shotgun and pistol cartridges, a Second Chance bulletproof vest, several flashlights, and some flares. Erik took the whole box and put it in the van.

“Hurry up!” he shouted.

Duke scratched his head over the fallen boy, whose own head was gone from the jaw up. A few cerebral arteries hung like scraps from what was left of the ruptured cranial vault. “Can’t we leave the dude?” Duke asked. “Seems silly to drive around with a dead fella.”

Erik jumped in the van and started it up. “Duke, how many times do I have to tell you? When we leave bodies, we leave clues. If the cops find a body, they’ll ID it, run the name through MVA, and then they’ll know what we’re driving. Drag ’em both in here and let’s get going!”

Duke complied, hauling the kid to the van by overall straps. He paused to chuckle. “That’s the third head I blowed off since we been out. Think that’s some sort of record? Three blowed off heads in a day?”

“Come on!”

Duke dumped the boy in back, then dragged over the unconscious girl and did the same. He slammed the rear doors closed.

Erik backed the van up, shifted, and took off down the road. He headed south.

«« — »»

Eleven minutes later, two Luntville units and a state police pursuit car, heading south on Governor Bridge road, slammed on their brakes in succession, just past the old truss bridge by the fishing dell. They’d all seen it at once, the rear end of a patrol car sticking out of the woods. The car bore the stencil along the back fender: 208.

At first it looked like it might’ve crashed. This prospect pleased one of the officers very much. His name was Lawrence Mulligan, chief of the Luntville Police Department. Yes, it looked like they’d been driving too fast over the bridge, lost control, and plowed into the woods. Aw, please, God, let it be so. Let ’em be sittin’ in front with their heads busted open.

But God, today, would not be so obliging to Chief Lawrence Mulligan.

The three cops approached the still vehicle with their weapons drawn. The state cop had an AR 15A2, which he kept trained on unit 208’s back window. A Luntville PFC edged in toward the passenger side, while Chief Mulligan squeezed through trees toward the driver’s side.

“Careful, Chief,” warned the PFC. “They might still be in there.”

Please still be in there, Chief Mulligan fairly prayed. It was a misguided prayer to begin with. One does not generally pray with a 10mm Colt automatic in one’s hand. Nevertheless, Chief Mulligan prayed again, aloud this time: “Aw, please, please still be in there.”

The eloped mental patients were not in there.

All that remained to reward Chief Mulligan for his efforts was a quick note scribbled on the back of a standard traffic complaint and citation form.

The note read: Shag my balls, Chief.

—

Chapter 9

The vast forest belt rose toward the county’s northern line.

They cruised down long, straight two lane hardtops, passing endless tracts of newly tilled soil. The air was filled with fecund scents, which seemed alien to Ann. She was used to smog. The hour and a half drive seemed to transpose worlds. Ann had almost forgotten what the country was like.

Some vacation, she thought.

Melanie sat quietly in the back, reading Kafka. Martin drove. Ann could imagine his reservations. It was never easy for him. He would always be a city person to her parents, a cosmopolite. Strangers in a strange land, she mused. But wasn’t the same true of her? She’d been born and raised out here, a product of the same sensibilities, but she’d turned her back on those sensibilities without thinking twice. It was a transposition of worlds, one of which she felt no part.

“Is Grandpa going to die?” Melanie asked.

Ann couldn’t fathom a response. Melanie was old enough now that she needed to be leveled with. It had been easy when she was younger; the innocence of children could be taken advantage of when life turned grim. Where’s Daddy? she’d asked when Mark had left. He had to go away for a while, was all Ann needed to say. He’ll be back sometime. As Melanie grew older, she put the pieces together herself. But this?

“He had a stroke,” Martin said. “Sometimes strokes can be very serious, and sometimes they’re not. We’ll have to wait and see.”

Martin always had answers for the unanswerable.

The last neck of the drive took them down State Route 154, the county’s only main line to the web of tiny townships which rimmed the northern belt. Oddly, there seemed to be a lot of police out today, when ordinarily she wouldn’t see any. She saw cars from Luntville, Crick City, Tylersville, Waynesville. She couldn’t figure what all these cars would be doing so far out of their jurisdictions. Lockwood had its own department too, one of the smallest. They only had two full time cops, Chief Bard and some kid named Byron, and one car, which was another oddity. Lockwood’s small population did not generate much in the way of municipal funds, yet the town council insisted on a police department, and no one objected. It was Ann’s mother who headed the town council, an elected post. No one had ever run against her, and that, too, seemed strange. “Lockwood is crime free,” Ann had once observed. “That’s why we must have a police department,” her mother had replied. “To keep it that way. You’ll find out all about crime once you get to the big city.”

Everything her mother said seemed to possess some level of insult. Ann couldn’t remember her ever being different.

“What’s this?” Martin queried, slowing down.

“Prepare to stop,” read signs propped up on the shoulder. Stubs of road flares had burned down. Roadblock, Ann instinctively thought. But it wasn’t a drunk trap. State police pursuit cars sat facing each way at the point, their motors running. Cops of various townships stood alertly along the shoulder and examined each vehicle which slowed before the point. Many had the thumb snaps of their holsters open, others openly grasped shotguns.

Melanie leaned between them as Martin pulled up to the point. The vehicle ahead of them was being searched.

“This doesn’t look right,” Martin said, and lit a cigarette.

Police to either side stared into their car as they waited. One’s gun hand hovered over his holster.

“Today must be National Terrorize Citizens Day,” Ann said. “I hope they don’t think they’re going to search our car.”

“Don’t start a fuss,” Martin advised. “We’ll just cooperate and be on our way that much sooner.”

Cooperate, my ass, Ann thought. This isn’t Iran.

They waved the pickup through. Martin pulled up.

“Is there a problem?” he asked.

A short, portly cop leaned over their window, his hand on the butt of his service pistol. “Sorry about the inconvenience. We need to look things over real quick.”

“What you need to took at first,” Ann suggested, “is the state annotated code. Check Chapter VII, paragraph 7:1, ‘Predispositions Pursuant to Unlawful Vehicular Search.’ You also might want to take a look at the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Ever heard of it?”

The cop squinted. He was bald, with a short mustache that looked like a brush in a gun cleaning kit. “I know you, don’t I?” he questioned. “Yeah, you’re Josh Slavik’s daughter, right? The lawyer?”

Great, she thought. She recognized him now—Chief Bard. What the hell is Bard doing running roadblocks ten miles out of Lockwood? “Hello, Chief Bard,” she said.

“Well, I’ll be,” he replied, smiling.

“We’ve just come up from the city,” Martin offered.

“Oh, yeah, I guess on account of Josh,” Bard realized.

“Have you seen him?” Ann asked.

“Well, no, but your mom told me it was a stroke, they think. Happened real sudden. I see your mom quite a bit.”

Of course he did; she ran the town council, which ran the police. “What’s with the roadblock?” she asked next.

Bard’s frown seemed to shrivel his face. “Couple of crazies escaped the state hospital yesterday. Bastards moved so fast they got through our net. We’re checking everybody coming in and out just to be on the safe side. One of them’s from Lockwood, but you probably don’t remember him; he came along several years after you moved. Erik Tharp.”

Erik. Tharp. It was a name she slightly recalled. She remembered her mother telling her about it years ago. A drifter, a substance abuser. Something about him burying bodies off the town limits. Several of the bodies had been children, babies.

“Trouble is, like I said,” Bard went on, “they moved real quick and changed cars a couple of times before we could get a fix on them. We just missed nailing them earlier today. Damn shame too. They killed a cop.”

Christ, Ann thought. No wonder every cop in the area is out.

“Well, you all go on now,” Bard bid. “Give your mom my regards. I’ll be stopping by later to see how Josh is doing.”

“Thanks, Chief.” Ann waved.

Martin pulled through the point. “How do you know him?” he asked.

“I don’t, really. My mom hired him when the old chief died. That was years after I moved out of Lockwood. I talked to him a few times in the past when I’d come home to visit my parents. He keeps a low profile. Not much use for a police department in Lockwood.”

“Until today,” Melanie suggested. “Escaped lunatics!”

«« — »»

Ann thought of a lot of things when they entered town. None of them were good. Lockwood was a splotch, a bad meld of memory: her frustrated childhood, social isolation, her mother’s dominance and her father’s passivity. Her past felt like a shadow she was about to reenter. She felt suddenly sullen.

The town looked equally sullen. It looked deserted. Martin idled the Mustang down Pickman Avenue, Lockwood’s main drag. Almost everything here had been built a hundred years ago, refurbished since. A little brick fire station, the police station alongside. A general store, a diner called Joe’s. Most of the economy here was agricultural; the men either worked the vast corn and soybean fields to the south, marketed farm supplies, or serviced tractors. Lockwood had always seemed to do better than the surrounding townships. There was no poverty and, hence, no drugs and no crime. It was almost idyllic.

Almost, Ann thought. Lockwood was isolated, remote. At times it seemed untouched by the modem world, and that’s the way everyone wanted it. There was a curfew for minors, and town ordinances against package liquor sales. The only place a person could get a drink in this town was a dusty little tavern called the Crossroads. Kids had a dress code for school. More ordinances prohibited late night convenience stores, bowling alleys, arcades, and the like. “As a community, we must strive to resist debilitating attractions for our youth,” her mother had proposed before the town council years and years ago. Motels were prohibited too. Outsiders were not encouraged to visit.

“What’s the matter?” Martin asked.

Ann’s thoughts had been adrift. “Just…thinking,” she answered. Did she blame her parents for her constrained childhood, or the town itself? Lockwood seemed to emanate repression. Here it was, early afternoon, and the town looked dead. Kids should be out playing, housewives should be out shopping. There should be traffic, activity, etc., typical things of any small town. But there was none of that here.

“Where is everybody?” Melanie asked. “Aren’t the kids here on spring break too?”

“In Lockwood?” Martin chuckled. “Who knows? They probably have a town ordinance now against children.”

“It’s not that bad,” Ann said. “Just different.”

“Yeah, different. I’m surprised we haven’t passed a horse and buggy.”

The end of Pickman Avenue formed the large town square. Here was the old, steepled white church that Ann had never attended, and the town hall. Beyond that, all that could be seen was the vast rise of the forest belt, which kept the town dark till mid-afternoon.

“Oh, yeah, and there’s probably an ordinance against sunlight too,” Martin said. “This place has always been creepy, but never like this.”

Martin was right. They hadn’t seen a single person yet.

He turned left onto Lockhaven Road. The residential section extended from here past the old middle school. The town possessed fewer than five hundred people; dark, narrow streets led past modest homes, mostly one floor, which all seemed to be white with dark trim, and big trees in the yards. More trees lined the streets, adding to the queer darkness. The entire town seemed to brood.

“Which one is it?” Martin asked.

“Turn here,” she instructed. It had been so long even Ann wasn’t sure. The narrow road seemed to rise. “Ah, here,” Martin said. He turned onto Blake Court and stopped.

“Jesus.”

The long cul de sac was filled with cars.

“Looks like half the town’s here,” Melanie said.

They’re all at the house, Ann thought without knowing why. But what would bring so many people here?

A long driveway led to the Slavik house. It was the largest house in town, large and gabled on a big lot full of trees. Very little of the house’s original brick could be seen, covered by sheets of crawling ivy.

Martin pulled up next to her parents’ old Fleetwood and parked. He sat a minute, peering out, and stubbed his cigarette in the ashtray.

“This is bizarre,” he said.

Melanie leaned forward. “Mom, how come—”

“I don’t know, honey,” she said, but she was thinking, Maybe Dad’s already died. What else could explain the crowd of vehicles?

The cast of Martin’s face indicated he had similar thoughts. Instead, he just said, “Let’s go.”

Walking up, Ann thought the rest of the town must be jealous. The house was old but well kept. The spacious yard and topiary were meticulously maintained. Ann knew her father had never made lots of money working farmland, and her mother accepted no pay for running the town council. The town had incorporated itself years ago; the farmland to the south was not privately but collectively owned, which was common in these parts. The profits were shared, yet Ann couldn’t imagine that they were significant. How did this town maintain itself? Moreover, how did her parents? All towns had their share of poor and wealthy. Everybody here seemed to be the same, save for the Slaviks.

The silence weighed her down. They approached the house, saying nothing, and ludicrously paused at the porticoed front door. Nothing could be heard within, yet she saw subtle movements past the narrow windows. Like people standing around.

Like a funeral reception, she had to think.

Her hand locked in midair. That door knocker always rasped her eye—a small oval of dull, old brass in the shape of a face. But the face was bereft of features, save for two, wide empty eyes. There was no mouth, no nose, no jawline really—just the eyes.

That’s what bothered her—it always had. The eyes, though ominous, seemed somehow to welcome her.

«« — »»

“I’m sure you’ve all heard about it by now,” Dr. Greene supposed. He sat at his big ugly gray metal desk, eating a Chunky. He had very short blond hair and was built like a fireplug, which never quite helped him look the part. He was chief of Psychiatric Services at the state mental hospital. A welter of psychiatric paraphernalia filled his office: Smith, Klein, and French calendars, Stelazine paperweights, a desk set advertising Lily pharmaceuticals. He drank juice out of a Haldol coffee cup and wrote with a pen that read “Xanax (alprazolam) 0.5mg tabs. Use it first!” He got all the stuff free from drug reps. These guys were like car salesmen, hyping themselves over the competition. Large orders often promised paid vacations. Dr. Greene didn’t want vacations in return for providing drugs that frequently turned human beings into docile dayroom potatoes. But he did like the pens and coffee cups. “Serious elopement yesterday,” he said.

Dr. Harold sat down. “How many?”

“Two.”

“Not bad.”

“Not good,” Greene countered. “They killed two people before they even got off the grounds. Today they killed a municipal cop.”

“What are their profiles?”

Dr. Harold, though a successful private practitioner, did free consulting and in patient profile evaluation on the side. Many private doctors did this as a gesture of professional goodwill. The state hospitals were overcrowded and understaffed, some to the breaking point. Dr. Harold offered his services a few hours per week to allow state staff to tend to more essential duties.

Greene took another bite of his Chunky. “First we got Richard ‘Duke’ Belluxi. Thirty five years old, I.Q. 113. Stage sociopath. They got him on a rapo fifteen years ago, but we know he did a lot more. We Amytaled the son of a bitch and figure he killed at least half a dozen people in his late teens, all sexually motivated. LH levels out the roof, this guy would fuck a brick wall if there was a hole in it. He did about ten years here before we gave him a roam status.”

“Why isn’t he in prison?”

Greene laughed without smiling. “He Gansered his way in. Made up a detailed delusion and stuck to it, then started doing the word salad for the court. You know how the judges are in this state. The guy raped a sixteen year old girl and cut off her arms for kicks, and the judge makes Belluxi look like the victim. Tell that to the girl—she lived. Anyway, we were stuck with him. A decade went by and he never caused much trouble, just mouthing off, a few confrontations with some techs. ACLU lawyer said he was going to sue the hospital if we didn’t give Belluxi some GB status. Said we were violating the guy’s rights. The way I see it his rights went out the window when he chopped off that girl’s arms, but you know how that is. Bet those grapeheads would sing a different tune if it was their daughters that Belluxi was cutting up.”

“Like Kojak says: ‘The system stinks, baby, but there ain’t a better one.’”

“Sure.”

“Who’s the second elopement?”

“Tharp, Erik, twenty nine, I.Q. 137, but he doesn’t do much on the diagnostics. A drug burnout. Never a problem. Been in almost five years. We gave him Class II last week. We figure he’s calling the shots, and Belluxi’s the muscle.”

“What did he do?”

Greene put his feet up on the desk, sighed. “We’re not sure. He got caught burying bodies, but there was never any evidence that he killed anyone. He’s no killer, you can see that. But there was a big to do because a lot of the bodies were kids and babies. So they sent him to us.”

“Diagnosis?”

“Unipolar depression. We put him on Elavil and he evened out. He was delusional and probably hallucinotic when we first got him. Read his story, it’s wild.” Dr. Greene pointed to a big leather bag on the floor. “It’s all there.”

“What can I do to help?” Dr. Harold inquired.

“Update the evaluations, augment them. Look for anything we might’ve missed; it would help if we could figure out where these guys are going. After twenty four hours the stats for reapprehension go into the ground. Try to have something for me soon; I need something to show the state mental hygiene board, and right now I’m too busy with the cops and the press.”

Dr. Harold nodded and rose.

This should be some very interesting reading, he thought.

The bag was very heavy.

«« — »»

“Why…is it—Ann?” asked the astonished face at the door.

“Hello, Mrs. Gargan,” Ann greeted.

“Come in, come in,” the woman hurried. “I almost didn’t recognize you at first. It’s been so long.”

“Yes, it has.”

Ann, Martin, and Melanie entered the dark half paneled foyer. At once, familiarity struck home, and memory. This was the house she grew up in. It never changed. The same old paintings were on the walls, the same carpets on the floor. The same grandfather clock she remembered tolling in the wee hours as a child. The moment seemed surreal. She was not merely stepping into her parents’ house, she was stepping back into her past. Ann felt instantly morose.

“Melanie! How are you, child?” Mrs. Gargan leaned over and gave Melanie a big kiss. “Look how big you’ve gotten, and how beautiful!”

“Melanie, you remember Mrs. Gargan.”

“Hi,” Melanie said, a bit stunned by the sudden gush of affection.

“And this is Martin White,” Ann introduced.

Mrs. Gargan had been a close friend of the family’s for as long as Ann could remember. She was in her fifties but didn’t look it; she beamed good health and didn’t have a single gray hair. Her husband, Sam, ran the farm supply store on Pickman, which served the entire town. They were nice people, if not a bit weird—Sam, like a lot of the men in town, seemed withdrawn against his wife’s popularity and outgoing demeanor.

Just like my father Ann thought.

Though Mrs. Gargan tried not to show it, her enthusiasm hitched down a bit upon introduction to Martin. “Oh, yes, you must be the poet,” she said. “We’ve heard lots about you.”

“Very nice to meet you,” Martin said.

Ann lowered her voice. “How’s Dad?” she asked.

But Mrs. Gargan turned. Had she ignored the question deliberately? “Everybody, Ann Slavik and her daughter are here.”

Dim lights glowed in the large colonial dining room. Cold cuts, cheese, and the like had been spread out on the table, around which at least a dozen people stood quietly conversing. The room went dead silent when she entered. Suddenly, she saw them all as they looked when she was younger. Mrs. Heyd, the town doctor’s wife. The Crolls and the Trotters. Mrs. Virasak, whose husband had been Lockwood’s police chief until he’d died several years back. In fact, there were many widows here, whose now dead husbands Ann ghostily remembered. These were staunch, robust women, conservative, and polite with an edge, and who looked good for their ages. Several younger women—Ann’s age, she guessed—stood in the background, with what seemed attendant daughters. Ann had indeed lost touch; the more she looked around, the more she took note of people she didn’t know at all. No, she didn’t know many of them. So why did she have the gut feeling that they knew her?

They went through the round of grueling introductions. The elders constantly fussed over her and Melanie, yet all but ignored Martin. All the while Ann felt like wilting. These people. This place. Her father sick upstairs. Perhaps he had already died—that would explain this bizarre scene, but certainly someone would’ve told her by now.

“Your mother’s upstairs, dear, with Josh,” Mrs. Croll said.

“She’ll be down presently,” added Mrs. Virasak.

This was frustrating, cryptic. Ann still didn’t quite know what was going on. She took Mrs. Gargan aside. “How’s my father? How bad is it?”

The woman stalled but maintained her cordial smile. “He’s resting,” she said. “He’s—”

“Is he even conscious?”

“Well, sometimes. We’ll go up when you’re ready.”

But that was it: Ann didn’t know if she was ready. She felt threatened by images. The image of her father as she’d always known him, and the image of what he must look like now: bedridden, sallow.

Abruptly, then, Mrs. Gargan hugged her. “Oh, Ann, it’s so good to see you. I’m just so sorry it has to be under these circumstances.”

Ann stiffened in the embrace. For her whole life she’d felt distanced by the townspeople, and now it seemed like a homecoming. More images crashed.

Again, the room fell silent. Ann turned.

A figure stood in the entry—a solid figure, unflinching as a chess piece. She was sixty but looked forty five, well bosomed, shining dark hair pinned in a bun. Fine lines embellished rather than depreciated her face. That face, like this house, the town, like everything here—hadn’t seemed to have changed at all. Stoic touched with kindness. Hard and compassionate at the same time.

The figure stepped into the dining room.

“Hello, Mother,” Ann said.

—

Chapter 10

“Women sure are noisy sons of guns, ain’t they?” Duke chuckled.

Erik remained numb in the driver’s seat. They’d parked on an old abandoned logging road, figuring they’d wait out the heat; the police probably didn’t even know this road existed. This, however, left them with time on their hands, and Duke Belluxi was never one to waste time.

The girl screamed and screamed.

She’d fainted after Duke had blown her boyfriend’s head off, but she’d come to real fast when Duke had pried off one of her long, shiny painted fingernails with a pair of Craftsman pliers he found in the toolbox. She’d lurched awake, screaming. “Sleep tight?” Duke asked, and began tearing off her scant clothes. Little as she was, though, she put up a formidable objection to Duke’s plans, clawing, slapping, trying to bite, so Duke clunked her in the head a couple of times with an empty Corona bottle to take some of the zing out of her. By now Erik knew the futility of trying to intervene—the guns were all in back with Duke. Now all the girl could do was moan and churn a little. Duke spraddled her out right on top of her dead boyfriend and began raping her at once. “Some bed, huh, honey?” he said, chuckling. Erik had no desire to watch this, yet every so often something—guilt perhaps—forced him to take a glance. “Oh yeah, oh yeah,” Duke was going. When the missionary position lost its thrill, he flipped her over and began to sodomize her. She jerked into full consciousness again and vomited. “Aw, shit, girl!” Duke objected, thrusting. “Look what you done! Puked all over our nice van!” Soon the girl started screaming again, in gusts, so Duke gave her another clunk with the Corona. “Simmer down, sweetheart,” he advised, then laughed.

He pushed her face down into her dead boyfriend’s crotch. “Give your honey a nice big kiss from Duke!” Then he yanked her head back by her hair, stepping up his thrusts. Erik stared blankly out the windshield.

This cannot go on, the thought hammered in his mind. Once Duke got going, he was beyond reason, beyond control. He was on a killing spree, and it was Erik’s fault. He had to do…something.

He glanced in back again. The Remington and the Webley lay beside the rear wheel hump. No way I can get to them, Erik realized. The box of stuff they’d taken out of the Luntville car was reachable but useless. All it contained were a few boxes of shotgun shells, some road flares, and the bulletproof vest—nothing he could use to fight Duke. I’m going to have to kill him, he reasoned. But I’ve got to get to those guns.

“Aw, come on, Duke!” he yelled when he saw what his associate was doing.

Duke chortled like a farm hog, grunting. His orgasm was obvious, spurting into the air and onto the girl’s back as he slowly strangled her with a battery cable. Duke wiped himself off with her panties, laughing. “Thanks, baby. Hope it was as good for you as it was for me.”

Erik just stared—at this monster he’d helped escape.

Again, he thought: Yeah, I’m going to have to kill him.

“Hey, partner, we got any more of them Twinkies?” Duke asked.

«« — »»

The Lockwood police station was a small brick extension of the fire station on Pickman Avenue. It had two holding cells, an office for Chief Bard, whose only window offered a resplendent view of the garbage dumpster in back, and an anteroom where they kept their files and supplies.

Sergeant Byron trudged into the office. He was a young big brawny kid, and a good cop. Now, though, he looked pale, disgusted.

“Where the hell have you been?” Bard asked. “I could’ve used some help out on the state roadblock.”

“I was on that 5F, remember?” Byron sat down, sighed. “You sent me on it.”

“That was hours ago.”

“Took the damn M.E. that long to get out there. I had to secure the scene and wait. Unless you want me to leave two cooked bodies sittin’ in a pickup truck.”

Bard set down his coffee. “What do you mean…cooked?”

“They was burned up, Chief. Somebody iced these two fellas, doused ’em with gas, and lit ’em up. Right on the town line, past Croll’s fields.”

“Lockwood residents?”

“Naw, two guys from the other side of the line. Gary Lexington and Lee More, both twenty five. No rap sheets, no trouble.”

“How were they killed?”

“M.E. don’t know yet. It was hard to tell anything by lookin’ at ’em, burned as they were. They was naked, though, clothes throwed in after. Ready for the best part?”

Bard gazed at him.

“M.E. said some of their organs were gone. Someone gutted these fellas, then torched ’em. Ready for more?”

Bard nodded, though he thought he already had a good idea.

“Fellas’ heads were busted open. Brains were gone.”

Bard opened his proverbial small town police chief desk drawer. He removed two glasses and a bottle of Maker’s Mark. He poured them each a shot.

“I know you’re thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’, Chief. Heads busted open. Brains gone. Shee it.”

Bard tossed back his shot, smirked, and nodded. But what could he say? What could he tell him?

“Just like some of the bodies we caught Tharp buryin’ five years ago,” Byron finished. He threw back his Maker’s and put his glass back up for another.

«« — »»

“How have you been, Mom?” Ann asked.

She followed her mother up the heavily banistered staircase. On the landing wall hung a mirror which had always scared her as a child—at night she’d come up the stairs to find herself waiting for her.

“Thoughtful of you to ask,” her mother replied.

Here we go, Ann thought.

“It’s absolutely disgraceful that you’ve seen fit to completely ig—”

“Mom, please. I didn’t come here to fight.”

“I’m surprised you came at all. We haven’t heard from you in six months—we thought you’d written us off altogether.”

“Damn it, Mom. Just stop it, would you?”

The headache was already flaring. This happened every time; they’d tear at each other until there was nothing left. Almost twenty years now, and the only bind that remained constant between them was bitterness, scorn.

“I came here to see Dad, not to argue with you.”

“Fine,” her mother said. “Fine.”

Down the hall, another lane of memory.

“I suppose you’ll stick your head in, look at him, and then be off again, back to your ever important job in the city.”

Ann felt her nails dig into her palm. “I’m off all next week.”

“Oh, a week, a whole entire week. I suppose we should feel privileged here in lowly Lockwood, that the prodigal daughter has graced us with a full week of her cherished time in order to spend it with her family, one member of whom is dying.”

Ann’s teeth ground together. Her jaw clenched. No, she thought. I will not fight with her I…will…not.

They’d set up a convalescent bed in the end spare room. The shades were drawn; pale yellow lamplight cut wedges in the room. From a corner chair, a stout man rose in a baggy suit. He was bald on top, with tufts of salt and pepper hair jutting from the sides like wings, and a bushy goatee. This was the man who’d delivered Melanie on that stormy night, and the same man who’d brought Ann into the world through her mother’s womb. Dr. Ashby Heyd.

He smiled warmly and offered his hand. “Ann. I’m so glad you could come.”

“Hello, Dr. Heyd.” But Ann’s attention was already being pricked at, dragged toward the high bed. Antiseptic scents blended with the musk of the old house. The room seemed stiflingly warm. Inverted bottles on a stand depended IV lines to the still form on the bed.

Ann looked down at her father.

It scarcely looked like him. The vision crushed her, as expected. Joshua Slavik’s face had thinned, leaving his mouth open to a slit. His eyes were closed, and one forearm had been secured to a board, needles taped into blue veins large as earthworms.

“He’s borderline comatose, I’m afraid. A massive cerebral hemorrhage.”

Ann felt desolate looking down. Her father barely seemed to be breathing; Ann had to fight back tears. Even in her worst moment, or during her mother’s worst tirades, Joshua Slavik had always had a smile for her, a simple encouragement, the slightest note of hope to help her feel better. He’d given her his love, but what had she given him in return?

Abandonment, she answered.

“He looks so peaceful,” her mother remarked.

Ann snapped. “Jesus Christ, Mom! You’re talking like he’s already dead! He’s not dead! You’ve even got this whole goddamn house full of people like it’s some kind of goddamn funeral home!”

Dr. Heyd took a step back. Her mother’s face went dark.

“We’ve got to get him to a hospital,” Ann went on. “He should be in an ICU, not lying in this stuffy crypt. What kind of care can he get here?”

“Dr. Heyd is perfectly capable of—”

Ann rolled her eyes. “Dr. Heyd’s just a small town general practitioner. He delivers babies and treats sore throats, for God’s sake. We need a neurologist, we need a CAT scan and an intensive care facility. We’re taking him to a hospital right now.”

“I forbid it,” her mother said.

Dr. Heyd stepped in, “Ann, what you don’t understand is—”

“All I understand is my father’s dying and nobody’s doing shit about it!” Ann yelled at both of them. “And if you think you can forbid me from taking my own father to a proper hospital facility, then you better think again. You may run this ridiculous little backward town but you’re not the law. I’ll go straight to the state probate judge and file a petition for guardianship. The court will appoint me guardian ad litem, and there’ll be nothing you can do about it. I might even—”

“Why not sue me while you’re at it, Ann?” her mother suggested. “Sue me for mental anguish. That’s what lawyers do, isn’t it? Sue people? And you’d do it too, I know you would, Ann. You’d sue your own mother.”

Ann caught herself. Her mother and Dr. Heyd exchanged silent glances. Ann stared, more at herself than them. What am I saying? she thought.

Her father groaned once, lurched and twitched a few times.

“Are you happy now?” her mother asked. “Look what you’ve done, you’ve upset him. Haven’t you upset him enough in your life? You’ll even upset him on his deathbed.”

Ann wished she could melt into the wall. For that moment she’d felt completely out of control of herself.

“This is a disgrace,” her mother said, and left the room.

Dr. Heyd followed her. He quietly closed the door behind him.

Ann sat down. Her outburst left her limp, jointless. Her gaze returned to her father. She seemed to be looking at him from miles away, or through a fish eye lens.

“I’m sorry, Dad,” she muttered.

He lay still. The flesh on his thin face seemed translucent, sagging into the crags of his skull. Then he moved.

Ann leaned forward, held her breath.

Very slowly, her father’s right arm lifted. His hand turned, and his index finger extended feebly.

Shakily, and only for a second, the finger pointed directly at her.

«« — »»

The house was emptying when she came back down. Visitors smiled curtly, bid subtle goodbyes, and left. A few teenage girls were picking up in the dining room, putting things away. Martin stood alone in the corner, his arms crossed.

“We could hear you yelling all the way down here,” he said.

Ann sulked.

“I know it’s not easy for you, Ann. But it’s not easy for your mother either. It’s not exactly sincere to threaten your own mother with legal action when her husband’s dying in the same room. You’re going to have to get a grip on yourself.”

“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t tell me.” Martin lit a cigarette and frowned at his cup of punch. “She went out back with Melanie. Dr. Heyd’s in the kitchen, I think.”

Ann nodded. She shuffled into the kitchen. Dr. Heyd was hanging up the phone.

“Dr. Heyd… I’m very sorry about the things I said to you. I don’t know what came over me. I didn’t mean—”

“No apology necessary, Ann,” he said. “This is a difficult time for everyone; I know what you must be going through. But you must realize the facts. The symptoms are undeniable. Your father suffered a massive orbital hemorrhage. Regrettably, no medical technology in the world can help him. There’s little anyone can do except try to make him as comfortable as possible. Your mother thinks it best that he stay here, closest to the ones he loves, in familiar surroundings.”

Dr. Heyd’s politeness, and his reason, made Ann feel even worse. What a shitheel I am, she thought. “How much time does he have? Do you think he’ll linger on like that for very long?”

“Highly unlikely. A stroke of this magnitude generally produces the same result. It’s a large hemorrhage. The hemorrhage will systematically clot, dispersing particles of coagulation into the major cerebral blood vessels. I’d say a week at the very most, though he could go at any time.”

Ann looked down at the floor. “Is there anything I can do?”

“Simply being here is the best thing you can do for him. And for your mother.”

Ann sighed quietly. Shitheel, shitheel, shitheel.

“He’ll be under constant supervision. I’ll be checking on him several times a day, and there’ll be a nurse ’round the clock. Do you remember Millicent Godwin? She’s several years younger than you, I believe.”

The name seemed familiar. High school, she thought.

“She’s a registered nurse now,” Dr. Heyd explained. “She’ll be staying at the house, to look after Josh when I’m not here. You needn’t worry. She’s quite qualified.”

“I can’t thank you enough for all you’ve done, Dr. Heyd. And, again, I’m very sorry about—”

“Think nothing of it, Ann.” He smiled and grabbed his bag. “I’ve got a house call to make right now, but I’ll see you soon.”

The doctor left. Ann craved a drink after all this, but then she remembered liquor was not kept in the house. She looked out the kitchen window. Large, gnarled trees kept the spacious backyard in shadow. Beyond the kiosk, Melanie could be seen walking through the grass with Ann’s mother.

—

Chapter 11

The top line read:

THARP, ERIK.

The second line read:

ADMITTANCE STATUS: NGRI.

And the third line:

DIAGNOSIS: Acute Schizoaffective Schizophrenia.

The standard form, Statement of Clinical Status, was dated five years ago.

PHYSICAL STATUS: The ad-mittee is a 25 year old white male. Build within ectomorphic range, 69 inches, 121 pounds.

BOARD EVALUATION, INITIAL: The patient was oriented, alert, and coherent. His motor behavior was unremarkable, his speech deliberate and monotone. His facial expression showed sadness, and he described his mood as “tired, but I’m relieved to finally be away from them.” His thought processes seemed clear though there were clear paranoid ideations. Somatic complaints included difficulty in getting to sleep and morbid dreams. The patient appeared to have a high I.Q., though his recent, past, and immediate recall were clearly impaired.

NARRATIVE SYNOPSIS: Admittee is subject to bizarre delusions highly sexual and subservient in nature. Admits to extensive CDS use during late teens and early twenties, though denies any such use within the past two years. Board concludes likelihood of PCP related receptor damage, which could explain delusion fixe and hallucinotic inferences. MMPI results indicate overly concrete abstract association and reduced multimodal creative assembly. No paranoiac or delusional tendencies, however, via MMPI results, which is curious. Patient demonstrated above average scores on Muller Urban diagnostic, which is puzzling given the nature and detail of delusions. TAT recommended prior to med therapy. Narcosynthesis is advised.

For the next hour, Dr. Harold read the narrative summation of Erik Tharp’s madness. The hospital board had evaluated him yearly. The last three narratives were fairly dull; Tharp denied the delusion outright, claimed to no longer be bothered by his nightmares, and dismissed all that had happened to him as “Craziness, I must have been crazy,” he told Dr. Greene. “I can’t believe that I believed those things, if you know what I mean.” Lying, Greene had written in the comments section of the evaluation form. Still believes delusion, just not admitting it anymore. But why would Tharp do that?

To qualify for roam status? Dr. Harold thought.

Of course, and to eventually…

“Escape,” he muttered.

It was obvious. Tharp had been planning his escape for some time.

Dr. Harold ruminated. Five years ago Erik Tharp had believed a disturbing delusion. So thereafter he lied, hoping Greene would think he was no longer possessed by the delusion and hence give him roam status.

His premeditation, even though it hadn’t fooled Greene, proved something very clear. Tharp had a preconceived motive for his elopement. He wasn’t escaping just to escape. He wanted to escape in order to do something specific. But what?

Why had Erik Tharp denied his own delusion after one year? The problem was, delusional people weren’t able to do that unless they weren’t delusional in the first place.

There’s something on the outside that he feels he needs to do. Whatever it is, it involves the original delusion, and the original delusion involves the place of his original crime.

At once, he dialed Dr. Greene. “I have some impressions for you,” he said. “I don’t think Tharp and Belluxi have fled the state, nor do I believe they plan to. I think they’re heading for the immediate area surrounding Tharp’s crime scene.”

“Because Tharp’s not cured of the demon thing even though he pretended to be?” Greene postulated.

“Yes.”

“You think the delusion is still important to him?”

“Very important. It’s the sole motive for the elopement.”

“Okay, I’ll go along with that. What else?”

“Tharp will abandon Belluxi as soon as possible.”

“Because he doesn’t need Belluxi anymore, right?”

“Right. Tharp only needed Belluxi to get off the ward, and he’s probably regretting it right now. Tharp isn’t homicidal—my guess is Belluxi’s the one doing all the killing, and Tharp doesn’t want any part of that. Tharp’s MMPIs indicate a high order of morality.”

“We’re talking about a guy who buried babies. Morality?”

“Sure. Tharp didn’t kill anyone, he just buried the bodies. But he may kill Belluxi in order to prevent more murders. That’s my guess anyway. However crude, Tharp’s TATs reveal highly focused guilt assemblies and even ethics. Plus, now Belluxi is baggage to Tharp. For every minute that Belluxi is with him, Tharp’s goals are jeopardized.”

“What do you think his goals are?” Dr. Greene asked.

“That’s anybody’s guess. Tharp believes in demons, so who knows? But you know what bothers me more than anything else?”

Dr. Greene laughed. “Tharp’s pathologically obsessed with a delusion but he’s not pathological.”

“Exactly. And that makes me wonder.”

Dr. Greene maintained his laughter. “Let me guess. You consider the existence of demons as a possible reality?”

“No but maybe the base of Tharp’s belief is real.”

“The cult, you mean?”

“Why not? I just read in Time that there are over a hundred fifty incorporated devil worship cults in the United States. I for one don’t believe in the devil but I can’t deny the reality that there are cults that worship him.”

“That’s an interesting point,” Greene remarked. “Maybe Tharp really did belong to some crackpot cult.”

“And if that’s the case, you just answered your own question. Tharp is motivated by a delusion. The delusion is motivated by a cult. Therefore—”

“That’s what he’s returning to,” Greene considered. “A cult. There was never an investigation because the state NGRI’d him almost immediately. The state attorney’s office was satisfied that Tharp perpetrated the murders.”

“At least it’s something for the police to go on,” Dr. Harold pointed out.

“I’m going to give them a call right now. Maybe you’re right, and even if you’re not, so what?”

“That’s the fun of clinical psychiatry, isn’t it?”

“Actually, I’m only in it for the free pens and coffee cups… Yeah, I think I’ll tell the cops to keep a real close eye on Tharp’s hometown.”

“Where is Tharp from, by the way?”

“A little town about twenty miles north of the hospital. Lockwood.”

Lockwood, Dr. Harold pondered. What a coincidence. Hadn’t Ann Slavik said she was from a town called Lockwood?

«« — »»

“I don’t know,” Ann said. “It’s just that your grandmother and I don’t always get along. We don’t always see things the same way.”

“Like you and me?” Melanie responded.

What a comeback, Ann thought. But it was proof of her innocence—the simple way in which she perceived the truth and how she associated it to herself. “Everybody has disagreements, honey. We’ll work it out, we always do.”

How honest a reply was that? In a sense, she knew she had never worked anything out with her mother. Adversity was their only common denominator. Ann Slavik had become everything in life that her mother opposed.

You’re afraid of becoming your mother, Dr. Harold’s voice haunted her again. Had she really been repressing Melanie’s perceptions all these years, by condemning her alternativism, by objecting to her friends? It was times like this that Ann wondered if she had any business being a mother at all. She would have to try harder, she knew, much harder, to give her daughter the conceptual freedom that she herself had never been allowed to have.

Melanie would be staying in the last bedroom on the east wing. It had been Ann’s room as a child. When she’d left home after high school, her mother had changed it as much as she could, “To turn it into a guest room,” she’d said, but Ann knew better. Back then her mother had felt so betrayed she’d gone out of her way to remove all reminders of Ann—a subconscious punishment. She’d gotten rid of all the furniture, and all of her things she’d left behind. She’d even changed the carpet and the wallpaper.

Ann looked out the same window she’d ruminated through so many times as a child. The backyard dimmed in early dusk. How many times had she peered through this same glass in complete misery, contemplating a future that did not include this place at all?

“Can I see Grandpa now?” Melanie asked.

“Let’s wait. He’s not conscious very often, and he’s probably very tired.” The truth was Ann was afraid. She didn’t know how to prepare Melanie for the still figure in the room at the other end of the house. Sometimes the facts of life included the facts of death. “Tomorrow, maybe,” she said.

Melanie seemed sullen. She loved her grandparents. She didn’t understand, but maybe that was the problem. Ann had never taken the time to explain the real world to her daughter. Melanie had been left to interpret it herself.

“I’m going for a walk,” Melanie said. When Ann turned, her daughter was stripped down to her underwear and was pulling on jeans.

“I don’t know, Melanie. It’s getting late.”

“This isn’t exactly New York, Mom,” Melanie observed. “I doubt if there are any drug dealers or rapists around. You think?”

Ann frowned. She couldn’t very well blame Melanie for her sarcasm. She’s had a great teacher, she thought. “Just don’t stay out too late, all right?”

“I’m only going for a walk, Mom. I’m not going to join the circus.” Melanie pulled on a T shirt that read “Cherry Red Records,” then she grabbed her Walkman. “Why don’t you come with me?”

Ann hesitated. “No, you go, honey. I’m going to straighten up our room.”

“Okay. Bye.”

Ann went down the hall to the room she and Martin had. It was on the other side of the house, across from her father’s room. Again, it was little things that bothered her, insignificant things. She didn’t want Melanie out by herself. She didn’t want Melanie to see her father in his present condition. She didn’t even like the idea of Melanie’s room being so far from her and Martin’s.

Now she felt isolated. Martin had gone out earlier. “I need some air,” he’d said. “I’m going for a drive.” Ann wished he and Melanie had gone to Paris without her; this scene was a dice of strained proximities and discomfort. It was a family matter surrounding a family that had never accepted Martin and had never been sufficiently exposed to Melanie by Ann’s own devices.

There was no sign of her mother at all. Where could she be at this hour? Perhaps Ann and her father were the only ones in the house. Down the carpeted hall, a slice of light glimmered. Dr. Heyd said that her father would have a nurse. But no one could be found when Ann stuck her head into the cramped, warmly lit room.

Only her father lay there, swaddled in covers.

He shouldn’t be here alone, she thought, but then she heard something downstairs.

In the kitchen, a figure leaned over the refrigerator, a plainly attractive woman about Ann’s height and build dressed in traditional nurse’s garb, a trim starchy white dress, white stockings, white shoes. Light brown hair had been cut short, and she looked up with very dark brown eyes.

“Hello, Ann,” she said. She removed a little bottle from the refrigerator. “You probably don’t remember me, but we went to high school together.”

“Milly Godwin,” Ann said. “Of course I remember.”

“You’re sort of a legend around here. You know, Local Girl Makes Good. Dr. Heyd probably told you, I’m the only RN in town. I’ll be looking after your dad. Your mother put me up in the room next to his.”

“I can’t thank you enough for that,” Ann said. “Just let me know your rates and I’ll write you a check.”

Milly Godwin looked slighted. She closed the refrigerator. “That won’t be necessary,” she said.

The offer probably offended her, Ann realized. She’d have to remember that this wasn’t the city; here time was not redefined in terms of money.

“We thought it best that I stay at the house, and if there are any complications I can’t handle, Dr. Heyd can be here in minutes. He has a beeper.”

“Well, again, we’re very grateful for your time.”

“I could never even begin to repay your parents for all they’ve done for me. They’re the most wonderful people, the whole town’s in debt to them. I would never have been able to go to nursing school without their help.”

What did that mean? Had her mother helped her financially? Ann thought it best not to ask.

“We’re feeding him intravenously,” Milly Godwin said, shaking the little bottle. “Most of the meds have to be refrigerated.”

Ann followed the nurse back upstairs. In the room she proficiently injected the bottle’s contents into one of the IV connections. When she looked down at Joshua Slavik, her expression remained flat.

Ann deliberately averted her eyes. It was hard for her, too, to see her father this way. Hopeless, she thought now.

“He comes to every now and then,” Milly enthusiastically remarked. “You should try to be around as much as you can.”

Ann knew what the woman was saying. The next time he comes to may be his last.

Milly could see Ann’s restrained despair. “Let’s let him rest now,” she said, and went out. “Even though he’s comatose, he shouldn’t be disturbed at night. The brain continues the normal sleep cycles. Unnecessary noise and movement can disturb him.”

“Is that what this is considered? A coma?”

“I realize it’s a scary word, but, yes, unfortunately. I’m sure Dr. Heyd has explained…” The rest fell off. Ann didn’t need to be retold that her father was dying.

They went back downstairs. Milly poured two iced teas and took Ann out back. Potted plants hung off the enclosure over the slate patio. Peepers thrilled heavily from the woods beyond. “This is the most beautiful house in town,” Milly remarked, “and such a lovely yard. Your mother does a terrific job keeping it up.”

“Where is she, by the way?”

“Board meeting. They have several per week. The town wouldn’t run without your mother. It’d be like any other town.”

Would that be so bad? Ann wondered. “Where do you live, Milly?”

“I have a house two blocks up from the town square. It’s small but very nice.”

Ann couldn’t imagine that Milly made much money, not as an RN in Lockwood. How could she afford her own house? “What are mortgages like around here?” she strategically asked.

Milly looked at her as if shocked. “There are no mortgages. Lockwood is a collective incorporate. Didn’t you know that? Anyone who lives in the town contributes to the town. The town gave me the house, and my car too. For as long as I live here.”

Ann winced. Whatever happened to private enterprise?

“Plus, the town pays me. Fifteen thousand a year.” Milly Godwin beamed.

Ann’s firm paid more than that in overtime for their three paralegals. “Couldn’t you do a lot better somewhere else, like at a hospital. RNs start at several times that where I live.”

“Yeah, and they also pay rent, car payments, auto insurance, health insurance, and thirty percent in taxes. Lockwood pays all that for me. It’s part of the community employment plan. Besides, I wouldn’t dream of leaving Lockwood.”

“Why?”

“No crime, no drugs, no corruption and sleazy politics. No gangs and no half assed education. I’d never want my daughter growing up in all that.”

“Oh, you have a daughter?”

“Her name’s Rena, she’s fifteen.”

“I have a seventeen year old myself,” Ann said.

“I know. Melanie. She’s lovely. Oh, and I didn’t mean to imply that you’re wrong to raise her in the city. I only meant—”

“I know,” Ann said.

“We’re happy here, and that’s the important thing.”

“Sure.”

They sat down on a stone bench past the slate. “What’s your husband do?” Ann asked, sipping her iced tea.

Milly Godwin laughed abruptly. “He ran out years ago.”

“I hear that,” Ann said. “Same thing happened to me.”

“I’m not even sorry he left. Rena and I are much better off without him. The bastard left when I was eight months pregnant. This was when your mother started the community assistance program. The town took care of me, then sent me to nursing school. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I was on my own.”

Again, her mother’s shadow reared. This town ran itself among itself. It bred what it needed to exist. It perpetuated from within.

“Lockwood’s New Mothers Program is really good too. If a woman gets pregnant, she doesn’t work for two years but she retains her pay. After that there’s free day care. There’s also a retirement program, an accident program, and an education program. Lockwood takes care of it all. The town has a multimillion dollar investment fund. Jake and Ellie Wynn are trained brokers. Lockwood’s been in the black for decades.”

But how could that be? How could Lockwood, with a population of five hundred, generate such a level of prosperity? The vast farmland to the south was valuable, but it must have taken some risky investments with produce profits to make all this work. Maybe Ann’s mother was smarter than she thought. Nobody was really rich, yet nobody seemed to want for anything.

“I saw your man earlier,” Milly said. “He seems very nice.”

Your man, the words echoed. What an antiquated way to put it, yet it sounded nice. My man, she thought. “He’s a teacher, and a published author.”

“Not bad looking either.” Milly grinned. “But don’t worry, I won’t go gunning for him.”

You fucking better not, Ann thought. “You date anyone regular?”

“Oh, no. Pretty slim pickings in Lockwood as far as single men are concerned. All the good ones get taken right away, and what’s left just hang around, drink beer at the Crossroads. Your mother figured she’d let them have a watering hole at least. Every animal needs a trough.”

Ann nearly spat out her iced tea. “And I thought I was a cynical feminist.”

“It’s not feminism,” Milly said, and sat back. “I see it more as realism. What’s the one thing that all the world’s problems have in common? Men. Not good for much of anything except filling potholes and fixing cars when they break.”

Ann couldn’t help but laugh.

“Why get involved with something that’s going to turn rotten anyway? After they have you, they take you for granted. Pretty soon you find out that you’re married to a couch that drinks beer, watches football, and farts.”

Now Ann was really laughing.

“I can live quite nicely without that,” Milly went on. “And I don’t need a man in my life to feel complete… Oh, but I didn’t mean to imply that your man—”

“I know, Milly, you’re just generalizing, right?”

“Right. And when I need to get laid, I get laid.”

The promptitude of this comment almost stunned her.

“I mean, why mince words, you know?” Milly stood up and traipsed into the dark yard. “It’s like fruit on a tree; it’s out there when you want it. Doesn’t mean you have to marry the tree every time you want an apple.”

Ann laughed again. “That’s some metaphor.”

But Millicent Godwin drifted into a sudden, sentient silence, facing the woods. Suddenly, she seemed reflective.

What was it?

Crickets and peepers echoed back their chorus.

“It’s a beautiful night, isn’t it?” Milly whispered.

“Yes, it is,” Ann replied. She looked up into the dark. The moon seemed sidled over the horizon, tiny in its ascent, and pinkish.

Milly turned slowly, surreally. In the moonlight her face looked wanton, her eyes large and clear. “Beautiful things are born on nights like these,” she whispered.

Ann stared at her.

“Yes, the most lovely things.”

—

Chapter 12

“I ain’t burying ’em. You’re the expert on that, ain’t you?” Duke chuckled. “How many babies did you bury anyway?”

I’ve got to get rid of this guy, Erik thought. His throat hurt, and he was hungry. Duke lay back in the van’s seat, chugging the last beer. “Dead man’s beer sure tastes better than regular,” he commented. “Something neat about it, you know?”

Erik winced at the two bodies. They’d start stinking soon. There was nothing he could use for a shovel, so he dragged each of them out of the back and into the woods. Their flesh felt clammy, cool. He covered them best he could with leaves. Rest in peace, he thought.

“Say, buddy, I’m like really hungry, you know, like I could eat a horse,” Duke despaired. “How much longer are we gonna sit here anyway? Let’s go get some food, huh?”

Erik went to close the van doors. Duke had the Webley on him, and the shotgun was too far up to reach.

They’d been here all day; they’d have to move sometime. The van would only remain inconspicuous for so long; eventually, the guy and his girlfriend would be reported missing, and the police would put two and two together.

“We’re moving now,” Erik said, his ragged throat throbbing with each word. “I want you to ride in back so you can’t be seen through the windshield.”

Duke looked offended. “What’s the matter? How come I can’t ride up front with you?”

“Because one guy with ridiculous white hair is less conspicuous than two guys with ridiculous white hair. The cops are looking for two guys. Come on, we’ll stop along the way and pick up some food.”

Duke perked up. “Yeah, man! Food! Twinkies!”

Erik shook his head and started the van up. Duke climbed in back. They drove several miles without seeing a single car. Getting into Lockwood would be tough; Pickman Avenue was the only access, and it would take them straight past the police station. Either Bard or Byron—one of them—would probably be on the road. Erik would have to bypass the town and take one of the dirt roads through the woods. Then he could go in on foot.

“Here we go,” Duke said. “Open twenty four hours. Ain’t that somethin’?”

The big sign glowed eerily in the night. Great, Erik thought. Another Qwik Stop. But they were in luck; the parking lot was empty.

Erik pulled in. He wondered if Duke would take his bait. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

“Bullshit, partner. I’m going too.”

“Only one of us can go, Duke. Someone’s got to wait in the van in case we have to get out fast.”

“You wait in the fuckin’ van. I’ll go. What if the guy at the counter asks you something? You can’t talk with that fucked up voice of yours.”

“You’re right, Duke,” Erik went along. “You go. Make it quick, this isn’t a shopping spree. Pick up some food and some batteries for the flashlight, D size. Get the stuff, pay for it, and leave. Don’t talk to anyone, and don’t start any trouble, okay?”

“Gotcha, buddy.”

“I’m serious, Duke. No trouble. We can’t risk it.”

“Don’t worry, man.”

“And don’t kill anybody, right?”

“Right.”

“Come on, Duke. Say it. Say ‘I won’t kill anybody.’”

Duke’s big teeth showed through his grin. “I won’t kill anybody, man.”

“Good. Now make it quick.”

Duke got out and loped into the store. That was easy, Erik considered. He’d gotten Duke out of the van without so much as a hint. There was only one option. Simply driving off and abandoning Duke wouldn’t be any good. For one thing, Duke would call the police immediately and notify them of Erik’s destination. For another, he’d rape and kill at least a dozen more people before the police caught him. No more innocents, Erik promised himself. He’d never killed anyone in his life, but killing Duke would be the same as killing a rabid dog. You have to kill it, before it gets into the playground.

As predicted, Duke had left the shotgun in back. Erik picked it up and racked a round.

Aw, no, he suddenly thought. Headlights plowed across the lot. A big old Chevy pickup pulled in. Rebel flag in the back window. ZZ Top pumping out. Two guys in jeans and T shirts got out, whooping it up and chewing tobacco. And they were big guys, really big. One’s shirt emblazoned a Confederate flag and read “Try burning this flag, fucker.” The other’s shirt showed a Smurf giving the world the finger. Next, a skinny, pock faced blonde slid out—cutoff jeans, flip flops, tattoos. The three of them were rucking it up real loud, heading for the store. Drunk rednecks, Erik fretted. The only thing worse than rednecks are loud, rowdy, drunk rednecks. Like them.

And Duke didn’t like rednecks.

Duke loped out just as they were about to enter the store.

“Nice hair,” Smurf shirt snickered, though he’d pronounced the word nice as nass.

Buddy, you just made the biggest mistake of your life, Erik thought.

“What was that, pal?” Duke demanded.

The three rednecks laughed. Duke stared. Erik had to admit, though, Duke did look ludicrous: an overweight chronic sociopath with cropped white hair and mismatched bargain rack clothes standing in a Qwik Stop parking lot with one arm around a grocery bag full of Twinkies and Hostess Ho Ho’s.

“Whatchoo starin’ at, fat boy?” inquired Flag shirt.

“Two redneck faggots and a titless chick with a face that looks like it got run over by an aerator. That’s what I’m staring at,” Duke answered.

The three rednecks could not believe this response. It was purely social common sense: talking back to big, drunk, uncultured rednecks was bad enough, but implying that they were of an alternative sexual orientation was exponentially worse.

Finally the stasis broke. Flag shirt spat a stream of tobacco juice onto Duke’s shoe.

“Doesn’t bother me,” Duke replied to the gesture. “It’s not even my shoe. It’s your daddy’s. I took it out of his closet last night when I was fucking your ma. And what’s that you got in your mouth? Dogshit?” Then, to the blonde: “Grow some tits, craterface.”

“You cain’t talk to me like that!” the blonde wailed.

“Shit, honey, I’ve seen sheets of plywood with more chest than you,” Duke then ingratiated her. “And that face—ooo eee! Got more nooks and crannies than a Thomas’ English muffin.”

“Fuck you, you fat pud! Eat shit and die!”

“Your daddy eats shit every night. When he goes down on you.” Duke blurted a coarse laugh. “Know what he told me? He told me you got the biggest pussy this side of the Mississippi. Says you blow farm animals too. That true?”

“Jory! Jim Bob!” the blonde wailed louder. “You gonna let him talk to me like that?”

Ory eyed, Smurf shirt stepped forward. Duke said: “Know what your mama told me last night, I mean, last night when she was shagging my balls? She says you two fellas fuck each other. That true?”

Then Flag shirt stepped up, clenching his fist, which was about the size of a croquet ball and probably as hard.

Duke grinned. “Is it true you blow your dad? That’s what I hear. When your no tit Swiss cheese for a face girlfriend’s not blowing him, that is.”

By now all Erik could do was shake his head.

Duke railed on. “You fudge packing flower sniffing redneck queers just gonna stand there, or are you gonna do something?”

“That’s it, fat boy,” said Flag shirt.

“We’se kickin’ yore fat ass,” promised Smurf shirt.

“Bust his fuckin’ haid!” the blonde screamed.

Duke laughed out loud. “These two pansies? They couldn’t fight their way out of kindergarten class. During naptime.”

Flag shirt rushed.

Duke was pretty good with his technique—it was almost magic. In a split second the bag of Twinkies and Ho Ho’s fell, and Duke’s hand was filled with the big Webley revolver.

The three rednecks froze.

“Wah wah we don’t want no trouble, man,” Smurf shirt stammered.

“Yeah, man,” offered Flag shirt. “We was just funnin’.”

No no no no no, Erik thought.

“Funnin’,” Duke iterated. “Well, I’m just funnin’ too. How’s this for some fun?”

Duke shot Flag shirt square in the head, which instantaneously burst. The report concussed like a cannon shot. Brain pulp slopped on the Qwik Stop window, besmirching a sign: “Briardale Cola! Six for $1.69!”

The girl broke. She’d managed to flee all of about a yard and a half when the second round went off. The Webley’s rudely large .455 slug caught her at the base of the spine, picked her up, and dropped her. Without the support of intact vertebrae, she lay on the pavement, folded in half.

Duke seemed pleased by the effect. “Poor sweet thang,” he mocked in southern drawl. “Looks lak she done blowed her last egg suck dog, shore ’nough, huh, Jim Bob buddy ol’ boy?”

Smurf shirt shivered, splaying his hands. “Look, man, I got money an’ all. Nice truck there too. Take it. Just don’t kill me.”

“Well, that’s mighty generous of you,” Duke responded. “Answer me a question first, okay?”

“Sure, man.”

“Do you have balls?”

Smurf shirt looked cruxed. “Huh?”

“Do you have balls?” Duke repeated more slowly.

“Well, yeah…shore.”

Duke fired the Webley into the guy’s crotch. “Not anymore!” he celebrated. Smurf-shirt collapsed, bellowing and clutching his groin, which now gushed blood quite liberally. Duke laughed all the way back into the store. The clerk was picking up the phone. “Shag my balls!” came the familiar prefix. Another round went off. The clerk’s head exploded.

“Damn if I ain’t good!” he railed when he came back outside. “You see that shot!” he said to Erik. But Erik lowered his head to the wheel, lamenting. Duke fired another round into Smurf-shirt’s head, to finish him off. Then he did the moon walk, guffawing, over to the blonde, who still twitched folded in half. He shot her in the face.

“Goddamn it, Duke!” Erik yelled out the window. “You said you wouldn’t kill anybody this time!”

“I didn’t,” Duke defended himself. “I didn’t kill anybody. I killed everybody!” Then he threw back his head and laughed.

Erik’s hands felt clammy on the shotgun. It felt hot in his lap. Duke took his time extracting the wallets from the pockets of jeans which now clothed dead men. Then he picked up the bag and came back to the van.

“Relax,” he said. “No one left to tell the tale.” But then he opened the passenger door. His gaze locked down on the shotgun, which Erik raised to chest level.

“Why, you cocksucking fairy faggot turncoat motherf—”

Ba BAM!

The 12 gauge spray socked into Duke’s chest. The massive muzzle flash lit the van like lightning. Duke flew back and landed flat on his back. Erik racked another round and fired again into Duke’s torso. Then again, and again.

“Sorry, Duke,” he muttered.

Then he drove off and headed down the dark road.

Erik was a fairly intelligent person. He was also more observant than most. Tonight, though, his vigilance slipped. Earlier he’d noted that the box they’d taken from the Luntville police car contained road flares, ammunition, and sundry supplies. It had also contained a Second Chance brand bulletproof vest.

Erik didn’t notice that the vest was now missing.

—

Chapter 13

The sign blazed tackily in blue neon: Crossroads. The writer in Martin mused over the name’s allegorical possibilities. Dust eddied up from the wood floor’s seams; the door creaked closed behind him. Yes, here was a real “slice of life” sort of bar: a dump. Its frowziness—its rough wood slat walls, old linoleum floor, and wear worn pool table—its overall vacuus spiritum—piqued him. This was not exactly the bar at the Hyatt Regency.

But a beer would go good now, as long as it was a decent beer.

Martin walked up. Only three other patrons graced these eloquent confines, roughened working class types, dusty from a day in the fields. No women could be found. An ancient black-and white TV sported a ball game with the sound low. Martin was glad to see that the Yankees were showing the Orioles it was a long way back to Baltimore.

He waited at the bar. No one seemed to notice him. An inveterate beer snob, he doubted that the Crossroads stocked anything more refined than Carling. The giant barkeep was ignoring him, sipping a mug of draft as he watched the game.

“Excuse me,” Martin interjected.

The keep frowned, and without taking his eyes off the game, said, “You want somethin’?”

An odd reply. “Well, yeah. I’d like a beer.”

“No beer tonight,” the keep replied. “Just blew the last keg.”

Talk about the bum’s rush, Martin thought. “What’s that you and those guys are drinking? Kickapoo Joy Juice?”

“Yeah, home. That’s what it is.”

“Fine. I’ll take one.”

“Sorry. Just ran out of that too.”

Just leave, Martin thought. That would be the wise thing to do. But when he wanted a beer, he wanted a beer. Why were these guys giving him the business? “What is this? I gotta dress black tie to get served in this pit?”

Now the keep looked at him. He set down his beer and came over.

The three other guys at the bar stood up.

“Listen, home, and listen good. You want trouble, you’ll get more’n you can handle.”

“I don’t want trouble,” Martin groaned. “I just want a beer.”

“We don’t serve to outsiders here. If ya don’t live in Lockwood, ya don’t drink at the ’Roads.”

“This has been one pleasant visit,” Martin said. “You guys want to kick my ass because I walk into a bar and order a beer. If I want to fill my car at the gas station, they gonna kick my ass too?”

The keep gave him a high look. “You’re visiting Lockwood, huh? And just who might you be visiting?”

“The Slaviks,” Martin began, but then he thought, To hell with it. He got up to leave.

“Hold up there, buddy,” one of the guys at the bar said.

And the keep: “You’re that writer fella. Gonna marry Ann, Josh and Kath Slavik’s girl.”

“That’s right,” Martin told him. “How the hell do you know—”

“Come on back, home,” the keep invited. “Just that we’ve had some trouble with outsiders. This here’s Wally Bitner, Bill Eberhart, and Dave Kromer.”

Martin didn’t quite know how to gauge this sudden change of attitude. What the hell’s going on? “I’m Martin—”

“Martin White, that right?” Dave Kromer said.

“You’re some kind of writer, huh?” Bill Whateverhisnamewas added.

First they’re practically booting me out the door now they know my name, Martin pondered.

“Yeah, we’ve heard about ya,” the keep said. “From Kath and Josh. You kind of help Ann out with Melanie, on account of Ann’s lawyer job, right?”

“Uh, yeah,” Martin said. He wondered what else Ann’s mother had said about him. Probably nothing good. “We came up from the city today, to see Ann’s dad.”

They all nodded glumly. “Damn shame, it is,” Wally Whoever bid. “Josh is a great guy.”

“And Doc Heyd,” added the keep, “he says there’s not much hope. Poor guy. We’ll all sure miss the hell out of him.”

This was not cheerful talk. Before Martin could shift subjects, they did it for him. “Name’s Andre, by the way. Any friend of the Slaviks’ is a friend of ours. You drinking beer or hard stuff?’

“Uh, beer,” Martin faltered. Now came the dreaded question of any beer snob in a place like this. “Do you have any imports?”

“Nope. No imports. No domestics either.”

What else is there? Martin thought.

“We got LL,” the keep said.

“That’s one even I’ve never heard of.”

“Lockwood Lager. Can’t get any fresher—I make it right here, right in back.”

A local microbrew, Martin thought. This was unique. In a place like this he’d have expected the cheapest, and worst. “Pour me one,” he said.

“No bullshit here either,” Andre said. “I grow my own hops and barley. Age each keg about sixty days. And I won’t sell to the other towns—let ’em have their piss. I make our own vodka, scotch, and gin too.”

Andre set the mug down. Martin reached for his wallet, but Andre put his big hand up. “No way, friend. That there’s a tin roof.”

“A tin roof?”

“Yeah, man. It’s on the house.”

Andre and his three locals broke out laughing.

Martin took a sniff and a sip. A full, robust taste, very malty without being sweet or overpowering. “My compliments to the brewmaster. This is great. You ought to bottle it, you’d make a killing.”

“Not my speed,” Andre said. “Ann’s mom, Kath, you probably know she’s kinda like the mayor here, and none too keen on alcohol. That’s why there’s no package store in town. I been brewin’ fifteen kegs a month for the last fifteen years. That does us just fine.”

This beer really was good; Martin was amazed. A brewmaster of Andre’s skill could become a millionaire in today’s U.S. microbrew market. In the back, Martin noticed wooden, not aluminum, kegs, and an ice line instead of a keg cooler. When it came to authenticity, Andre didn’t fool around.

“Yeah, Ann, she’s a great gal,” Andre went on. “I knowed her kind of when she was growing up. Real smart.”

Wally Whatever offered, “She’s a real legend around here. Most Lockwood gals, they stick home. We’re all rootin’ for Ann out there in the big city.”

“We truly hope that things work out for yawl,” added Bill Whateverhisfuckingnamewas.

“Thanks,” Martin said. He continued to survey the bar as he drank. There was no falseness here: this was a place where the working class came to drink when they were done in the fields. There were no Bud Light clocks, no Beefeater coasters, and none of the phony bar eclecticism found in the city. The Crossroads was real. Just a roof, some stools, and a bar. Martin didn’t even notice a cash register in the place.

Andre looked about fifty but in good shape; in fact, all of them did—physicalities and demeanors honed by lifetimes of hard, honest work. Andre wore jeans, a black T shirt, and a buck on his belt. He had wiry hair and a big friendly face, but a hardness about him too, like you could sock a 20 sledge right into his barrel chest, and all it would do was piss him off. Martin set aside his first impression. He liked this place, and he liked these people.

“You guys all from around here?” he asked.

“Aw, no,” Andre answered. “We all just kind of found our ways here, and Kath, she gave us a break. Me, I had a little trouble down South”—he chuckled—”so Kath, bless her, she gives me the job right off, and a place to live to boot. Same story for all of us pretty much. Bill here, he does engine work, and Wally runs a thresher.”

This was odd, though. Martin couldn’t figure it. If they’d been local, that would be different—localities were adhesive. But why would men like this, with serviceable skills, come to a town like Lockwood? The farmland was small, and Martin doubted that Bill Whateverhisnamewas was fixing more tractors here than he could in a big farm belt.

“I work for Micah Crimm,” the guy named Dave said. He laughed. “He’s the fire chief, and I’m the fire department. Hang around awhile, the rest of the boys’ll be in shortly. We’ve all been wantin’ to meet ya.”

“I will,” Martin accepted. He finished his LL, and Andre poured him another. “I haven’t even been here a day, and already I’m starting to really like this town of yours.”

«« — »»

Melanie strolled the outer residential streets. This was so different from the city. Quiet, peaceful. The woods ran opposite Hastings Street; she could hear crickets, a sound like waves. Small, neat houses stood off the road; a few even sat up in the woods. There was no traffic, no commotion, just tranquil twilight.

Melanie couldn’t picture herself ever living here; it was too far away from things. But she liked visiting, she liked the change. Melanie never really understood why her mother didn’t like to bring her here. Lockwood was almost like a different world.

“Hi. You’re Melanie, right?”

Melanie stopped. At first she didn’t even see who’d said it. What were they doing there, standing in the dark?

“Yeah. How did you know?”

“We’ve heard all about you,” came another, younger voice. “You’re the Slaviks’ granddaughter.”

The darkness at the edge of the woods seemed misty. The two girls looked like slowly forming ghosts. “My name’s Wendlyn,” one of the shapes said. “And this is Rena.”

Melanie squinted.

Rena looked younger. She was willowy, slim, and nearly breastless, while Wendlyn had a bosom that made Melanie slightly jealous. They wore plain pastel-ish sundresses and sandals. Both had hair the same light brown as Melanie’s, but Wendlyn’s was short, and Rena’s hung perfectly straight down past her waist.

“Your mom’s a lawyer, right?”

“Yeah, she just made partner,” Melanie responded, though she still didn’t quite understand that. It sounded to her that partners made more money but did less work.

“Rena’s mom’s a nurse. She’s staying at your house to look after your grandpop,” Wendlyn informed. “My mom runs the general store on Pickman Avenue.”

“What do your dads do?” Melanie asked.

“Mine died,” Wendlyn said.

“Mine ran off,” Rena said.

“So did mine, but my mom’s going to marry—”

“Martin,” Wendlyn cut in. “He’s a novelist or something, isn’t he?”

“Poet,” Melanie replied. But who were these girls? She’d never met them before—yet they knew all about her. They seemed nice, though. In the city, people never went out of their way to be nice.

They began walking down the street. “What grades are you in?” Melanie inquired.

“I’m in eleventh, like you. Rena’s in ninth. There aren’t many girls our age in Lockwood.”

“What about boys?” Melanie asked.

Both girls laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“Come on,” Wendlyn cut in. She took Melanie by the hand and led her into an opening in the trees. Melanie was too startled to object. The darkness cloaked her yet somehow she could see the path’s outline quite well in the starlight. Soon they led her into a cramped, moonlit grove.

“This is our place,” Rena said.

“No one knows about it,” Wendlyn added.

Melanie still didn’t know what was going on. The two girls sat down on a log.

“Sit down. We don’t bite.”

Again, both girls laughed.

Melanie sat down on a log opposite them. “How come you laughed when I asked about guys?”

“There really aren’t any,” Wendlyn said. Rena bent over, digging at something. “Most of the men are old, married, or they just work their jobs. No one our age.”

“Except Zack,” Rena said.

For the third time, both girls, inexplicably, laughed.

“Come on, what’s so funny?”

“Zack’s nineteen. He’s the janitor for the church.”

“He lives there,” Rena added.

What was she digging at?

“He lives at the church?” Melanie questioned. “What about his parents?”

“He doesn’t have any. He’s, like, an orphan or something. Your grandmother sort of adopted him, took him in. She’s done that with a lot of the guys in Lockwood. Likes to help people in need.”

“You’ll meet Zack.” Rena giggled. “You’ll like him. He’s hung like a horse.”

“Rena!” Wendlyn objected.

Melanie blushed slightly. If she knows that, she must’ve… She couldn’t help but put two and two together. She felt odd. She’d only just met these girls, yet for some reason she did not feel too inhibited to ask the next question. “Have you ever done it with him?”

“Bunch of times,” Rena admitted. “We both have. Zack’s our toy.”

Toy? Melanie thought.

Rena had lifted up a big flat rock. There was a hole underneath, and from the hole she had extracted a cigar box. Next, her face glowed orange for a moment—she was lighting a cigarette, or a joint.

Wendlyn passed it over. “Try some. It’s leahroot.”

Melanie’d never heard of it. Leahroot? “What, is it like pot or something?”

“No, it’s an herb. It gives you a good buzz, but it doesn’t make you stupid like pot. My mom grows it behind the store.”

It looked like pot to Melanie, which she’d only done twice, and didn’t like. Pot gave her tunnel vision and made her eat like a pig. But when the smoke wafted over, it smelled nice. It smelled sort of like cinnamon.

She took a light drag. In a moment she felt woozy, relaxed.

“See?” Wendlyn said.

“Have you ever done it?” Rena asked.

“What, this stuff? I’ve never even heard of it.”

“No, I mean have you ever gotten laid?”

“Rena! That’s none of your business,” Wendlyn scolded.

“I say she hasn’t.”

“Rena, shut up!”

“That’s all right,” Melanie said, and it was. She felt good now, and she liked Wendlyn and Rena. “And to answer your question, no, I haven’t.”

“That’s good,” Rena said. “You shouldn’t.”

“Why?”

“ ’Cause you’re special,” Wendlyn said.

Special? Melanie thought. What did that mean? Their comments were so odd, but just as odd, Melanie didn’t care. “I could have a couple times, but I was afraid. You know, AIDS and herpes and all that.”

“We don’t worry about stuff like that here,” Wendlyn said.

What a crazy thing to say. Were these girls stupid? She must mean they use condoms.

Melanie took another drag. Now she felt really good. The buzz titillated her. What had they called the stuff? A pleasant heat seemed to caress her chest.

“Feel it?” Rena asked.

“Yeah,” Melanie said.

The moon felt cool on her face. She could not account for the beat of thoughts that next filled her mind, nor the feelings. She looked at the two girls sitting across from her. They were looking back, grinning at her in the moonlight.

“I have to go,” Melanie said.

“We know,” Wendlyn replied.

“My mom’ll get pissed if I m late.”

“See you tomorrow, okay?”

“Sure.” Melanie rushed off. She could not define her feelings. As she wended down the path, she could hear Wendlyn and Rena laughing.

—

Chapter 14

“Dooer, dooer,” croaked the voice.

Wet lips sipped from the cup. The cup looked full of blood.

Shadows hovered. Firelight flickered on the earthen walls and she sensed a great heat.

“Dooer,” she heard, and then distant, soft singing.

Women…singing.

The emblem, same as that upon the cup, seemed huge behind the shadows, as if suspended in the air.

The flurry of hands roved over sweating skin, stroking the tight, distended belly. Hot mouths licked off rivulets of perspiration; she felt milk being sucked from the painfully swollen breasts. Then voracious tongues trailed up her legs, up her thighs to the radiating, wet inlet to her womb.

Her orgasm jolted her, followed by a string of smaller yet longer ones. It felt as though every inch of exposed flesh was either being caressed, licked, kneaded, or sucked. Beyond she noticed other shadows, which seemed to be men. Men, watching before a stoked fire. Forms of other figures seemed to squirm on the dirt floor, naked, coupling legs wrapped around backs, faces buried between legs.

“Dooer, dooer,” she heard again as her own orgasms pulsed down and the contractions began to throb.

“Join us.”

Two hands formed a basket between her legs. Squeals rose, in joy, in awe. The great, gravid belly shuddered, pulsed, shuddered, then collapsed very quickly. She felt something leaving, pushed from the womb into open air. Wet and stirring, the baby was held aloft. It began to cry at once.

The hands and mouths came away. Dozens of eyes looked up at the newborn.

The eyes were wide, glittering.

Staring up as if in reverence.

«« — »»

Ann churned awake. The bedroom’s dark felt like a crushing weight, a blanket of hot, wet cement. She lurched up.

The clock read 4:12 a.m.

The nightmare, she thought. Again.

Martin snored faintly beside her. He’d come home late, enthusing about his excursion to Lockwood’s only bar. “What a great bunch of guys,” he’d said. “You’ll never meet people like that in the city. Real people, you know? They have their lives and they live them in their own honest way.”

He rambled on happily, not drunk, just feeling good. It pleased Ann to see him so happy. It was hard for him here, she knew, in a place so different from the world he was used to, especially with the shadow of her mother’s cynicism constantly over his head. “It’s strange,” he’d gone on. “I’ve been here a few times in the past, but for some reason it’s different now. I wouldn’t even mind living here, to be honest. I feel at peace here.”

He’d made love to her when they’d gone to bed. She’d straddled him, touching herself between their hips. She’d wanted so badly to come with him, but as usual it hadn’t happened. She’d had to pretend again. Thank God he didn’t know.

The nightmare haunted her now. Its crisp images and vivid heat seemed to linger in the dark. When she got up, her sex tingled—the giveaway that she’d come in her sleep. How could she know so little about herself? She felt desperate without Dr. Harold. The dream’s scenario always roved like a camera lens, escalating to perversion. Why? What had Melanie’s birth proposed to Ann’s subconscious? Rampant lesbianism. Orgies beneath the birth table. Occult undertones, and that cryptic warped double circle.

She crept out of the room and closed the door. A faint beeping unbalanced the dead silence of the house. She peeked in on her father. Milly Godwin, the nurse, had dozed off in a chair with a book in her lap. A Lifepak heart monitor blipped green, rather slowly. Her father lay still beneath the sheets.

Next, she peeked into Melanie’s room at the other end of the house. Melanie’s bed was empty, but a quick glance up showed her daughter standing before the high, narrow window, gazing out.

“Melanie? Are you okay?”

At first her daughter didn’t respond.

“Melanie?”

She turned very slowly. Like Ann, her nightgown stuck to her from sweat. Her eyes looked glazed.

“Mother,” she said.

“What, honey?”

“The moon is pink.”

«« — »»

What had she been dreaming?

She’d been smoking that weird stuff with Wendlyn and Rena. Yeah, they’d been smoking that stuff—Leahroot—and they’d been looking at her, and there was something about that, wasn’t there? Something about the looks on their faces. Something…knowing.

Melanie knew too, but she didn’t admit it to herself. How could she imagine such a thing? So she’d left abruptly, hadn’t she? Yes, she left Wendlyn and Rena in their little hidden moonlit grove, and she’d gone home. She’d gone home and gone to bed.

And in bed she dreamed.

She dreamed of the little grove again. In the dream she was still there, with Wendlyn and Rena, smoking that stuff. But it hadn’t been like before.

“Yeah, Zack’s cock is almost ten inches,” Rena was saying.

“We made him measure it once,” Wendlyn came in.

Rena giggled. “Yeah, we made him play with himself till it got hard and told him to measure it. You should’ve seen him, Melanie, Zack standing there with his pants down, jerking himself and then holding a ruler to it. We laughed our asses off.”

“Zack does anything we say,” Wendlyn added. “He’s such a weak idiot.”

“All guys are.”

“One time we came back here and there was this old droopy dog snuffling around—”

Rena was slapping her knee, laughing. “And we told Zack to do it to the dog!”

“And he did!” Wendlyn finished.

And in the dream Melanie just looked back at them. She felt neutral, observant. She was just sitting there watching them, listening to them, and riding the buzz of the stuff they smoked.

Rena was grinning. “Hot out, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, it’s hot,” Wendlyn agreed. She was grinning too.

Melanie knew. She was not the least bit shocked when both girls skimmed their pale sundresses off. They leaned on one another and, without qualm, began touching themselves. Melanie watched them, equally without qualm. Their skin looked pure white, like a summer cloud. They both had dark brown nipples, like Melanie’s. Rena’s stuck out more on her tiny breasts. Wendlyn’s breasts looked much bigger, and firm.

“It feels better when someone else does it,” Rena said, then both girls switched hands, touching each other.

“Yeah, it feels a lot better,” Wendlyn agreed. “We do it to each other a lot.”

Melanie continued to watch. She felt hot herself.

Rena’s long slim legs began to tense, her heels digging in the dirt, while Wendlyn sat poised with her legs spread. Moonlight bathed Rena’s face. She was looking up with her eyes closed, squirming. She began to moan, and soon the moans were so loud Melanie feared the sound might carry out of the woods to the street.

When they were done, they lay back in each other’s arms. Their grins subsided to soft, sated smiles.

Melanie noticed now that her own hand had found its way to her crotch. Rubbing against the tight denim. Her mouth felt dry, her heart was thrumming. She did not resist the impulse; she stood up and took off her clothes.

The moonlight was pink in her eyes. She felt out of breath, desperate for something. Now Wendlyn and Rena were sitting on either side of her. Rena grabbed Melanie’s hand and placed it between her own legs. Wendlyn was kissing her nipples. They were giggling softly, stroking her, running their smooth white hands over her entire body. Between glances, Melanie noticed that they wore pendants of some kind, not chain necklaces, but thin white cords each with a thing like a little stone on the end. Rena’s pendant lay flat against her little breasts. Wendlyn’s swayed as she leaned over further and began to suck Melanie’s large dark nipples. All the while Melanie’s breath thinned as her fingers massaged the wet button of her sex.

“It feels better when someone else does it,” Rena said.

“Yeah,” Wendlyn said.

Rena’s hand pushed Melanie’s away. It did feel better, it felt a lot better. Melanie had masturbated a few times before, but it never felt like this. Rena’s fingers began to rub harder, faster. Wendlyn was kneading her breasts and slipping her tongue in her mouth. It didn’t take long; Rena’s fingers seemed to know exactly the best way to touch her. Melanie gasped against Wendlyn’s lips, and she came quite abruptly, a throbbing gust from her loins.

She lay back, slaked. “You’re very special,” Wendlyn whispered, her pendant swaying. All Melanie could see now was the strange pink light of the moon.

“Melanie? Are you okay?”

The dream was over.

“Melanie?” Her mother’s voice.

Had she actually been standing in her sleep? When she came awake, she was standing at the window, looking out. The dream lapsed, yet the pink phosphorescence remained. She was awake now. In her room. Staring at the moon.

“Mother, the moon is pink,” she said groggily.

“I know, honey,” her mother was saying, urging her over to the bed. “It’s a special equinox or something. It’s nothing.”

Melanie sat down on the bed. “God, I feel—”

“You’re soaked!” her mother exclaimed.

She was. Sweat dampened her nightgown to the skin.

“Are you sure you’re all right? You’re not sick?”

“I’m…fine. It was just a nightmare.”

Ann sat down next to her, pushed her damp hair off her brow. “Join the club. I had a nightmare too, as usual,” she said. “Why don’t you tell me about yours. Sometimes when you tell someone else your nightmare, it’s not scary anymore.”

God! Melanie thought. Sure, Mom, I dreamed I made out with two girls. And I liked it. “It was stupid,” she dismissed.

“You look pale. Do you want me to get you something?”

“No thanks. I’m fine, Mom, really.”

“Okay.” Ann kissed her on the cheek. “Get some sleep.”

“Good night, Mom.”

“Good night.”

Her mother left.

Melanie lay atop the covers, still perplexed by the dream. The pink moon beamed in on her. A special equinox or something. That’s right, it was almost spring. The moonlight looked pretty, but she shivered. It reminded her of the dream. That shimmering, faint pinkness. You’re very special, Wendlyn had said in the dream. They’d said that, too, for real, hadn’t they? That she was special? The more she tried to forget the dream, the more vividly she remembered it. It seemed enticingly forbidden, not repulsive. She closed her eyes and saw it more lewdly. They were pretty girls, with pretty faces. She saw their breasts again, from the dream, and those odd pendants. Then she gasped.

She lay still for a moment, until she realized what must’ve happened. It was that stuff they’d smoked, that was it. It clouded her memory, mixed some of the dream with reality. The pendants—the little gray stones on white strings. Her hand lay between her breasts. She was awake now—the dream was over.

Yet an identical pendant hung about her own neck this very moment.

—

Chapter 15

Sergeant Tom Byron loaded his left cheek with Skoal, then spat into a paper cup.

Chief Bard, fat behind his desk, wasn’t sure about how to make the revelation. “Tharp and Belluxi shot up another Qwik Stop last night. Killed the clerk and three stoners.”

“Where?” Byron asked.

“North of Waynesville.”

Byron’s lips puckered. “But that’s—”

“I know, it’s thirty miles away from us. And those two guys burned up in their pickup were found right on our town line.”

Sergeant Byron was no mental giant, but he didn’t need to be told of this particular inexplicability. “That don’t make no sense, Chief. The bodies we caught Tharp buryin’ were burned up just like the two Crick City guys yesterday.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, and their brains were missing, and some of their organs, just like five years ago. So why would Tharp risk driving all the way back here just to go thirty miles backward last night to do the Qwik Stop?”

Byron chewed and spat again. “Maybe Tharp didn’t do the Qwik Stop. Maybe it was a fluke, someone else done it.”

“No way. The state just called me with the ballistics. They pulled Webley .455 slugs out of those kids last night. And that’s what they ripped off of old Farley at the first Qwik Stop.”

“Ain’t never heard of a Webley.”