The Other Side
Page 19
“The building. It’s about to collapse. I can tell.”
“Right.”
Your altered mind, your brain in the reversion, calculates the options. There is only time for you to toss the boy from the window before the roof collapses. It is his life or yours.
“I don’t know what to do.”
“You do. You’ve already done it.”
You hesitate for a moment, allowing the reversion to pull you along in the swift, burning current.
Noe is crying.
You toss the ax to the side. You grab the boy beneath the arms and hurl him through the open window where, below, the men from your company wait to catch him. You stick your head out of the window and you see him land in the arms of a fireman. They both tumble to the ground, injured but alive. You pull back as you hear the burning timbers in their death throes.
“I’m going to die.”
The thought in the reversion echoes past your lips as you speak the same words. The flames flare up and blind you with their brilliance and then you’re back in the driver’s seat of the Corvette.
“The reversion. Is it over?”
“It is over, yes. And it never gets easier.”
It’s an odd comment from Noe and something you tell yourself you’ll need to think about when you get to wherever it is you’re supposed to be. But you don’t know where that is, or when that’ll happen, or why you can’t remember the reversion in the way that Noe does.
“So, now what?”
“Now that we’re through the reversion, we come to your choice.”
“What choice?”
“The fork. You need to decide which road to take.”
You shake your head, pounding your fists on the steering wheel.
“But I don’t understand. This isn’t fair. You’re asking me to do things and I have no clue what’s going on.”
“I’m not asking you to do anything. You are driving. Not me.”
You decide not to say anything else to Noe until you reach the fork. What else is there to say? She knows what to expect and you don’t. So, you drive. Hands on the wheel, pedal to the floor. You drive.
“Left or right.”
“Why do I have to choose?”
“Because this is how it works. It’s how it’s always been and how it’ll always be.”
You see the fork coming up fast. The Corvette shimmies and you downshift before you realize what you’re doing. The chrome side pipes breathe fire and the air has turned into nothing but an orange haze underlit by the flickering headlights.
“Where do the roads go?”
“Left loops you back around. Right takes you through to Canal.”
“Canal Street? I don’t even know what city that’s in.”
“It’s irrelevant.” Noe pinches the top of her nose, the words coming with a practiced staccato. “Just pick.”
“Right.”
“Are you sure?”
“No. You won’t tell me what will happen when I choose or where we’re headed. How could I possibly be sure? I’m going with my gut.”
Noe straightens up in her seat. She turns and faces you, leaning forward and leveling a solid gaze at you.
“You are?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s unusual.” She sighs and then continues, “Not something I recall.”
The fork is now less than 20 feet away and you start turning the wheel to the right. You’ve made your decision and, even if Noe protests, it’s too late to turn left now.
“Here we go.”
The Corvette fishtails and you can feel the tires spinning on the gravel. The engine coughs but doesn’t stall. The rear end of the car comes back around and you’re now through the turn. The firestorm that’s been chasing you from behind has disappeared. The night sky returns but, on the horizon, you can see the bleeding edge of day where purple ink is spilling up into the black canvas.
“You did it.”
Noe says it as if she never thought you would.
You smile, raising an eyebrow at her like a proud child. “Yep.”
She sits up straight, a small grin upon her face. “Punch it.”
You slam the pedal down and feel the horsepower pinning your shoulders to the back of the seat. The sun must be rising on the eastern horizon as the night sky begins to fade. The Corvette accelerates, only now it feels as though the tires have come off the ground, the suspension holding you like an egg in a carton.
“We’re going faster. Why is that happening?”
“It’s because we’re getting closer. That’s how it always works. The closer you get, the faster you go.”
You see the light on the horizon as it seeps up into what’s left of the night. Almost instantly, the smoke dissipates, revealing the crystal-clear zenith you saw earlier.
“Do I keep going?”
“You’ve made the choice already. There’s no decision left to make.” Noe smiles at you and it lights up your chest like a shot of whisky.
You smile back. Something has shifted in her. You sense a different dynamic now. Kinder, more open.
“Look.”
You turn away from Noe and stare through the windshield to see the tip of the sun cresting the eastern horizon. The first beams warm your face. Tears stream from your eyes. You don’t wipe them away.
“This is emotional for everyone involved.”
Things may have shifted between you and Noe, but you don’t understand what she means. You’re getting tired despite getting closer and so you decide you’re done asking her questions. Whatever happens now will happen.
“The road will widen and then it will constrict to a single lane. Drive through the tunnel.”
You sense a renewed spirit in Noe, a nostalgic wave as if she hasn’t been here in a long time. You forget the name of the street. You don’t bother asking about the name of the city. When you come out the other side of the tunnel, you’ll be there. Somewhere. A place she thinks you belong and that will have to satisfy you.
“We’re almost there.”
The sun is now hovering over the horizon, illuminating the entrance to a single-lane tunnel. It’s built of rock with a single traffic light hanging over the entrance. The light is green.
“Get ready.”
You take one more look at Noe before realizing your hands are no longer on the wheel. Your feet are no longer pushing the pedals. The Corvette is driving you.
“Thank you,” you say to Noe as the tears continue to flow.
“You’re welcome.” She’s crying, too, both of you laughing at each other.
At the moment the front end of the Corvette enters the tunnel, you feel a weightlessness. The car fades away as does the feeling of Noe’s presence. Everything is black inside of the tunnel. You hear muffled sounds and feel warm water surrounding your body.
And then, a faint light appears at the end of the tunnel. You can tell because you’re going in that direction, headfirst. You bring your hands up to wipe your eyes, but you miss. They won’t do what you’re telling them to do.
The light grows and now you must close your eyes because it hurts them. There are voices, ones you recognize but cannot understand. Your body pauses for a moment and, for the briefest of seconds, you think you might be stuck in the tunnel, until a force propels you forward.
The world explodes. You scream, you cry, you squeeze your eyes tight from the blinding light. You don’t understand where the sounds are coming from or what they mean.
More words reach your ears, but they’re impossible to decipher. But you can feel the love inside them all the same.
“Oh, Mary. It’s a boy. I love you so much.”
The Bus
By M.B.Vujacic
Alright, so this is the situation:
My name is Steve Capstone, and today is… Damn, I actually have no idea. My watch and my phone are gone, and there’s no sun here, so I can’t even figure out what time it is. The sky hasn’t changed in the past… twenty-four hours? God, w
hy am I even wasting time writing in this notebook? Might as well use it as toilet paper.
Fuck it.
Okay, sorry, let me try again.
My name is Steve, and it’s Friday. Yeah, sure, why not? Friday’s good. Anyway, I’m trapped on a bus. It’s one of those ugly public-transportation six-wheelers with metal handholds and plastic seats that make your ass itch. And, man, has it seen better days. The paint is chipped and crumbling, the doors and the handholds brown with rust. The seats cracked and many of them missing, and the windows are nearly opaque with grime. There’s dust and dirt everywhere, as if the bus has been dragged out of a junkyard.
I woke up on its floor with no clue how I got there. The last thing I remember is stopping by some chick’s place on our way downtown. Jordan lowered the passenger-side window and gave her pizza, and then I put the car in gear and drove on. Next thing I know, I’m here and my pockets are empty.
Jordan’s here, too. He’s my best friend. I’ve known him since high school. We played basketball, went to parties, picked up chicks, all that good stuff. The first thing I saw after waking up was him on his knees, his head in his hands, his eyes shut tight. Like me, he’s been robbed of everything he had in his pockets. I’m glad he’s here. I mean, I’m not glad, I’m just relieved I don’t have to go through this alone.
Not that I could be alone here if I tried. There are fourteen other passengers on the bus. They’re the most diverse group ever seen outside of a Hollywood blockbuster. We have a skinhead, a hillbilly, a stewardess, a tattooed housewife, a Latino gangsta type, a young nurse, a black yuppie, a Mexican construction worker, a hulkish bouncer, an effeminate teenager, a woman in orange prison overalls, and two Indian guys who look like brothers. There’s also a twelve-year-old kid. He just sits there, watching people with this curious expression on his face, like we’re all actors in a movie. I keep expecting him to start crying, but he’s pretty chill. Jordan thinks maybe the kid’s retarded.
The bus is moving. We can hear the engine grinding and feel the wheels turning, but… but that’s crazy because there’s no ground here. We’re sailing—yes, the bus is sailing, like a ship—on a sea of tar. Of course, I can’t confirm it’s really tar, but it’s viscous and smelly and it bubbles, just like hot tar. It’s all around us, reaching to the horizon and beyond. Sometimes I glimpse giant shapes in the distance, but there’s no land and the air is too murky to see clearly. I can’t find the sun but I guess it has to be there somewhere, because the sky is as bright as, say, on a stormy day. Speaking of the sky, it’s blood-red and strewn with brown clouds that Jordan says look like giant turds. Or scabs.
The bus doesn’t have a driver, but that’s okay because it doesn’t have gas pedals, or a dashboard, or even a goddamn steering wheel, either. Jordan thinks it’s controlled remotely via satellite. My theory is the wheels are just for show—the bus is actually attached to a track, like a monorail. We just can’t see it because it’s under the tar.
I lied when I said I don’t know why I’m writing this. The truth is, I hate being around people. Don’t take me wrong, I’m not a loner or a jerk or anything, I got lots of friends. I just need my space. A few hours alone, so I can lean back and watch TV, or whatever. But I can’t do that here, because I’m stuck with all these people, and we have no TV, no internet, no video games, not even a John where I could be alone for a minute.
I found this notebook, the pen already tucked in it, under one of the seats. Its front cover is blackened as if by fire and someone has burned out the first thirty pages or so, but the rest are fine. It really helps. Puts me in my own little bubble. I used to keep a diary as a kid, so it reminds me of that. Now, if only all these people could stop bawling and panicking and fucking talking for one second, I’d be golden.
Jesus Christ, I have to get out of here.
The Latino smashed the skinhead’s nose.
Jordan and I were breaking off one of the rusted handhold poles to use as a dipstick to test the tar’s depth, when the Latino roared at the skinhead to get the hell out of his face. The skinhead told him to take it easy, and the Latino clocked him. I’ve no idea what happened. I think the skinhead stepped on his foot while they were trying to pry the doors open, or something.
Later, his nose still gushing, the skinhead approached us and asked if we needed help with the pole. Jordan called him Nazi scum and told him to step away if he didn’t want us to use him as a dipstick. The housewife then told us we should all treat each other well because we were being watched and judged and bickering among ourselves would only make our cases harder to defend. She spoke quietly, like we were conspiring, and she had these facial tics that made her nose and mouth twitch every time she finished a thought. Her tattoos all depicted saints and crucifixes, pale and blue. Jordan told her to hit the road, too.
At the time, I thought he’d done the right thing. Why would we hang out with racists and weirdos, right? But now, the Latino, the yuppie, the construction worker, and the woman in prison overalls are all sitting together, talking quietly. Makes me wonder if we might have a little crew forming here.
Anyway, we broke off the pole and forced open the middle doors. Holding onto the doorway, Jordan leaned out and stuck the pole into the tar. It made no ripples and left no trail in the blackness. It merely stretched it a little. Like a needle puncturing skin.
Jordan howled and lurched forward; the pole ripped from his hand. I grabbed his shoulder and yanked him back at the last moment. We fell on the floor and watched the pole get sucked into the tar. He looked at me then, his face chalky, and screamed: “Something grabbed it, man! Something grabbed the pole!”
Something in the tar.
Jordan thinks we’ve been abducted by aliens.
He says they must’ve shot us with tranquilizer darts, thrown us in the bus, and beamed us into space with a big-ass magnet. We’re on another planet, one made entirely of liquid—a gross giant, he calls it, claiming he saw a documentary about it on TV—and the aliens are experimenting on us. When I asked him why the bus doesn’t just sink, what with it being on a water planet and all, he shrugged and told me the aliens must’ve outfitted it with propellers.
Alien or not, I hope whoever put us here will shake things up soon because this place is getting toxic. Ever since the pole fiasco, I’ve felt this tension in the air, with people almost coming to blows over dumb stuff like accidentally brushing one another’s shoulder or looking at someone for too long. It’s like watching a bunch of dogs sniffing each other, tails taut, just itching for an opportunity to go for the throat. Even the yuppie and the girly teenager, neither of whom I’d bet have ever actually thrown a punch, remind me of angry little rats eager to snap at someone’s ankle.
It doesn’t help that Juan, the Latino, has indeed formed his own crew. The yuppie, the construction worker, and the prisoner woman are at his side at all times now, and they seem to be well on their way to convincing the Indian brothers to join them. The hillbilly, the skinhead, and the bouncer have joined forces too. The rest of the passengers keep to themselves, staring into the distance like those creepy ‘realistic’ mannequins every clothing store has in its window nowadays. Only the twelve year old, Kevin, gets along with everyone.
Also, there’s another, bigger problem. I’ve been on this bus for three days now, but I haven’t taken a single piss, or felt the need to. I don’t sleep, either. Or eat. Or drink. Nobody else does, yet we aren’t getting any thinner. Jordan thinks the aliens feed us and flush our bowels every day, then wipe our memories. It’s the only explanation that makes sense, he says.
He wishes they washed our clothes too, while they were at it.
We were wrong. Jesus Christ, we were so wrong.
Jordan and I assumed there was some animal in the tar, an alien octopus or something. But it’s the tar itself. It’s alive. It’s fucking alive. Christ Almighty. My hands are shaking. I’ve been sitting on them for half an hour, but they still won’t keep steady. Shit. This is what happened.
Lakisha, the woman in prison overalls, has regular sex with Juan and gives him massages. They do it right there, in front of everyone. The housewife complains to no end, ranting how this kind of sin will doom us all. Others complain as well, but nobody dares actually confront Juan about it, no matter how often Lakisha goes down on him or how loud she moans.
The shit finally hit the fan today. Lakisha was on her knees, her head bobbing up and down between Juan’s legs, when Kevin, the kid, walked up to them. Normally, Juan and his cronies didn’t let him near, or one of the other women kept the boy occupied, while Juan was getting it on with Lakisha. This must’ve sparked Kevin’s curiosity because, this time, he sneaked in for a closer look. Juan saw him standing next to them, watching the proceedings with the same empty expression he always wore, and Juan laughed.
The skinhead exploded. He stomped to the front of the bus, calling Juan a “degenerate spik” and threatening to break his skull. Richie shouted at him to back down, but the skinhead didn’t give a damn. He barreled through the Indian brothers and slammed his fist into Juan’s face. Somehow, despite his pants being crumpled around his ankles, Juan sprung up. He roared incoherently and grabbed the skinhead by the neck. The Indian brothers tried to separate them, but then Richie charged in and punched one of the brothers in the back of the head. All hell broke loose.
I don’t know if it was an accident, or if Juan did it on purpose. One moment fists were flying left and right, the next the skinhead was flung, arms flailing, through the open doors. At the last instant, he clamped his hand on the rusted doorway and I saw his goddamn fingernails break, baring red flesh, and then he splashed into the tar.