Martin edged his way toward the back of the store. If nothing else, maybe he could make a run for it. Sloshing through the swamp for a mile might get him around the roadblocks and police patrols. He didn’t see any other way out of this.
The deputy, a woman with her hair back in a bun, stepped out of the vehicle. She had one hand on the butt of her pistol. “What seems to be the problem here?”
The clerk gesticulated wildly. “There’s something wrong with this guy. He was eating roadkill off the ground.”
David was starting to look worse by the second. One side of his face sagged a bit, almost like he’d had a stroke. The collagen and cartilage under his skin must have started breaking down as his body temperature continued to rise. At some point, his organs would start to cook and shut down one-by-one. More of that viscous, yellowed sweat poured down David’s face. It looked like his pores were spitting out melted butter.
“Sir, what’s wrong?” The deputy pulled her pistol all the way out of its holster, but she apparently hadn’t yet made the connection between David and the jailbreak. If she had David’s old description, she’d be looking for a man with a lot of meat on his bones. Right now, David looked more like a scarecrow made out of old rawhide.
“I . . . need . . . help,” David managed to wheeze out. His breath came in fast little gasps. One of his teeth fell out of his gums and clattered to the asphalt. There was crusted seagull blood around his mouth.
Martin glanced at Joe, who was still standing near the car. In that moment, Martin had an insight into Joe’s little rat terrier brain and realized what he was thinking. Catching Joe’s gaze, Martin shook his head.
Suddenly, a lightbulb went off behind the deputy’s eyes. She must have connected the dots. She raised her pistol, moving it from David to Martin.
“You two, down on the ground. You,” she jerked her head in Joe’s direction. He was standing off to the side and trying to slink out of her direct line of sight. “Stay where I can see you.”
It was over. Martin could run, but there was a decent chance he’d get shot. Even if he made it to the swampland behind the gas station, he’d have every cop in the state after him. If he gave up now, a good lawyer might convince the judge he was only the driver on this escapade. Maybe he’d get a relatively light sentence.
Martin licked his lips and tasted sweat. He slunk back to the deputy, got to his knees, and raised his hands over his head. Best to play this smart. Beside him, David sort of crumpled down to his knees as well.
The deputy spoke into her radio for a moment, then nodded to herself. Pulling out a set of handcuffs, she stepped over and slapped one end around Martin’s right wrist. The metal was tight and cold.
Clearly nervous, the deputy moved over to David. She reached out and grabbed David’s left arm only to pull her hands back in surprise. Just sitting near him, Martin could feel the warmth emanating off David’s body.
“Please . . . ” David managed. He reached out to grab a little morsel of bird intestine still on the ground.
The deputy snatched his arm before David could pick up the fly-covered glob. She slapped the other end of the cuffs onto David’s left wrist, chaining him to Martin.
“On your feet,” she said.
Martin stood up. David joined him with obvious effort. It was like being chained to a hunk of irradiated slag during a nuclear meltdown. And Martin was pretty sure David was starting to do exactly that. The yellowish sweat erupting out his body was taking on an increasingly orange hue. Trace amounts of blood oozed out of David’s pores as his body sucked itself dry. A coppery, salty scent wafted away from him. If he didn’t get something in his system now, he was probably going to die.
“Ma’am, we have to get this man some food,” Martin said.
The deputy ignored them, talking into her radio unit. A tinny voice crackled back at her, and she opened the back door of her sheriff’s vehicle before frisking them.
“Get in.” She gestured to the seats.
“Ma’am, if you’d just listen to me for a minute. We need to get this man some food.”
“Get in now!”
David sat down on the seats and effectively dragged Martin in after him. The deputy slammed the door shut behind them but kept talking to them through the window.
“I’m temporarily detaining you until my backup arrives. Until then, I’m just going to have a quick chat with your friend.” She locked the car door and looked over at the spot where Joe had been standing.
A gunshot made Martin jump. The deputy thumped against the side of the car and jerked spasmodically as another shot rang out. She slid down to the ground, collapsing out of sight.
Joe stood behind her. He’d used the gun he’d had in the back of his waistband and was staring at the gun as if he couldn’t believe what he’d just done. In the distance, the store clerk was running away into the bayou. But Joe didn’t seem to see him, stepping up to the side of the car instead.
“Joe, I can’t believe you shot her, man.” Martin moaned. “We’re so screwed.”
There wouldn’t be any getting away from this. And he’d end up on death row right there next to Joe no matter where they fled.
“I couldn’t just let her take David. They’ll drag him right back to the same people who did this to him in the first place.”
“You’re going to get all three of us killed,” Martin shouted. His stomach was tying itself into various balloon animal shapes.
“Martin,” David said. The droop on one side of his face was even more pronounced now. His words came out slurred. Either his body temperature had turned some of the muscle structure in his face into shapeless gristle, or it was starting to heat up his brain.
Finally, Joe shook out of it and pulled on the door handle. It jiggled, but nothing happened. In the distance, Martin could hear the first wail of police sirens approaching.
“Keys. Needs keys,” Joe muttered. He was clearly trying to stave off panic. He looked down, ready to filch the keys off the dead deputy. Then he said the last words to ever come out of his mouth. “Oh shit.”
Another pistol blast erupted from right beside the sheriff vehicle, and a neat little hole appeared in Joe’s face directly below his right eye. The back of his head burst like some cheap confetti popper, and he fell backwards with a thud.
“No. Not Joe,” David said, his voice like a puff of wind from a dry gulch.
Directly next to them, the deputy hobbled to her feet. She stood hunched and crooked, like a doll that had been run over with a lawnmower. Dragging herself to her feet pulled a scream of effort and pain from her lips. Opening the driver’s door, she reached for the radio, but collapsed onto the seat before she could say anything. Blood welled out of the two holes in her uniform. She didn’t move again.
“Oh shit,” Martin said, accidentally echoing Joe’s last words. He stared at the collapsed deputy through the partition between the front and back of the car.
“Martin . . . ” David said.
Martin turned to look at David. The man’s face was actually starting to slip off his skull. It looked like an ill-fitting mask someone had salvaged out of a fire, dribbling and melting in places. He was crying, but the tears were mostly blood. The connective tissue anchoring his skin to the rest of his body was starting to give way. He looked like a melting wax sculpture.
A thick, humid, meaty warmth, like being trapped in the armpit of some enormous creature, filled the vehicle.
In the distance, the sirens were still growing louder, their urgent wails drawing closer by the second. Maybe they’d be able to save the deputy. There was nothing they could do for Joe, though.
For that matter, there was probably nothing they could do for David, either. The only thing that could help him right now would be a massive influx of calories.
Martin tested the cuff chaining him to David. He tried the door, but it could only be opened from the outside.
David was staring at Martin.
“Martin, I’m sorry.�
� David’s voice wasn’t much more than a hollow moan. And then he was upon Martin with a flash of teeth and a wave of heat.
VOICES LIKE BARBED WIRE
TIM WAGGONER
I’ve lived in Ash Creek most of my adult life, so when I pull into the parking lot of a fast food restaurant that doesn’t exist, I am–as you might imagine–more than a little surprised. I’m scared, too, but at the same time hopeful. Maybe I’ll finally find what I’ve been searching for here–some small measure of peace.
I park my Prius between two vehicles that I can’t identify. One is a monstrously large sedan that looks like it belongs in the 1950’s, its body shimmering in the sunlight as if it’s made from mother of pearl. The other vehicle has seven wheels and looks like it’s been constructed from odds and ends of silvery wire soldered together. The other cars in the lot are equally strange, but I find them comforting rather than upsetting. They’re an indication that I’ve come to the right place.
When I get out of my car and take a breath, I find the air has a chemical tang to it, as if an industrial factory is close by. There isn’t one to my knowledge, but up until a few moments ago, I didn’t believe there was a restaurant here, so what do I know? The asphalt of the parking lot is dry and cracked, and there are no lines painted on it to indicate parking spaces. Vegetation grows upward from the cracks, some of it ordinary grass, but there are also weeds of a kind I can’t identify. Sickly yellow-green things that are covered with thistles terminate in round crimson bulbs that glisten wetly. These bulbs sway slowly back and forth despite the absence of a breeze. I ran over several of these plants while driving into the lot, and I flattened them, the bulbs bursting open like tumors, squirting reddish-brown goo. The substance reminds me of how my daughters used to mix paints when they were little, adding more and more colors until they created a muddy brown soup.
It hits me then as it often does, so strong and unexpected that I’m unable to prepare myself.
An image of two girls sitting on a couch, one twelve, one seven. My daughters, Nancy and Lauren. Nancy’s eyes are wet, but she’s smiling, desperately trying to hold back her tears. Lauren is crying openly, tears streaming down her cheeks like tiny waterfalls. The girls are holding hands, fingers interlaced, gripping tightly. It’s this detail that hurts my heart the most, I think.
I wish this wasn’t happening! Lauren wails. I wish this was a dream!
Nancy’s response to what her father and I have just told them is more restrained, and all the more awful for it.
That’s okay, she says, lips trembling with the effort of maintaining her smile. It’s okay.
The memory of their voices—of their shock and pain—nearly drives me to my knees. I can’t breathe, and I wonder if the grief and guilt will finally kill me, and I’ll fall dead in the parking lot of a place that shouldn’t be real. But the memory retreats and I begin breathing once more. My heart is racing, but I don’t think it’s going to give out on me this time. I feel as much disappointment as relief from this knowledge.
Pandora’s is the name of the restaurant, and it’s spelled out in large red plastic letters on the front of the building, which—despite the oddities of the parking lot and the vehicles within it—looks pretty much like any fast food joint. Beneath the name is a cartoonish depiction of a wooden box, the lid partway open, inside black shadows which almost seem to be swirling, like eddies of dark water.
How appetizing, I think, and although I’m still unsteady on my feet, I feel a little better. False bravado is better than none, right?
I go inside.
The weird chemical tang is stronger in here, as if the restaurant itself is producing it. My throat starts to hurt immediately and my eyes sting. I try not to think about what that odor is or what it might be doing to my body. At first glance, the interior looks the same as any other fast food place: tiled floor, counter staffed by dull-eyed uniformed workers, menu above them displaying options and prices, along with photos of what’s meant to be tempting food selections. Sandwiches, fries, and shakes, but not the normal offerings. The sandwich meat is greenish and covered with what looks like scales, and the seeds on the bun aren’t seeds at all, but rather tiny eyes. The fries look more like small sections of bone sprinkled with salt, and the shake cups are filled with a purple-gray substance that looks like something that’s been squeezed out of an infected wound. My stomach lurches, and I almost turn around and get the hell out of there, but the girls’ voices come to me again.
I wish this wasn’t happening! I wish this was a dream!
That’s okay. It’s okay.
I take a deep breath through my mouth so I don’t have to smell the chemical stink, and then I approach the counter. The woman at the register is in her twenties, bald with a tattoo of a large purple eye on her forehead. Her left eye remains closed while her right blinks rapidly and continuously. Her short-sleeved uniform is blue, and she wears a square brown hat shaped like a wooden box. Her nametag reads OND. When she speaks, her voice is bright and chipper, but she doesn’t smile.
“Welcome to Pandora’s, where you won’t believe what’s in the box. Will this be cash, credit, or etheric transfer?”
I try to speak, but my throat’s so raw—thanks to the chemicals in the air—that it takes me a couple tries to produce sound.
“I’m, uh, actually here to meet someone. Mr. Lim?”
Ond’s right eye stops fluttering, just for a couple seconds, before starting back up again. She doesn’t answer with words but instead raises her arm and points toward the dining area. Her hands are twisted and lumpy, as if she suffers from severe arthritis, but her face doesn’t change expression as she points.
I turn my head to look where she’s pointing, and I see a dozen people scattered around the dining area, some sitting alone, some with companions. They all look like the sort of people that would drive the strange vehicles outside, but only one captures my full attention. An older man sitting alone and eating a sandwich, a pile of fast food wrappers on the table before him.
Mr. Lim, I presume.
I thank Ond, who gives no indication that she hears me—or maybe she simply doesn’t care—and I walk over to Mr. Lim’s table. The man’s body odor hits me when I’m within five feet of him, a feral smell, like the scent of big cats in a zoo enclosure. His stink leavens the chemical odor and actually comes as something of a relief. He’s a thin man in his fifties—about a decade older than me—and he’s wearing an army jacket, jeans, and sneakers. His clothes are worn, colors faded, but overall clean enough. He’s several days overdue for a shave, and his bristles are as white as the tangled thatch of hair on his head. There’s a TV screen hanging from a ceiling mount. The sound is muted, but instead of news, it’s playing a series of black-and-white images that look like clips from snuff films. Mr. Lim keeps his gaze focused on the screen as he eats. Although eating is too nice a word for what he’s doing. He’s devouring his sandwiches, tearing into them with the speed and ferocity of a starving dog. He has three other sandwiches waiting for him on the table, all wrapped in yellow paper. I do a quick count of the crumpled wrappers piled in front of him, and I get ten. Assuming he hasn’t been sitting here all day and pacing himself, he’s evidently ordered fourteen of Pandora’s sandwiches for his meal, and while he’s eaten the majority of them, it appears his appetite is nowhere near satisfied. I wonder if he’s eating the sandwiches with the green-scaled patties, but I decide I don’t want to know.
He doesn’t look away from the TV to acknowledge my presence, so I stand there, unsure what to do. On the screen, a naked fat man holding an electric drill approaches an equally naked teenage girl duct-taped to a wooden chair. The terror in her eyes is so strong it’s almost a living thing in and of itself, and I cast my gaze downward, unable to bear witness to what happens next. I try to tell myself that it’s not real, just some slasher flick, but I know better.
I almost leave then, but I hear my daughter’s voices once more—maybe because the woman in the video is
so young—and my gut cramps with pain. As bizarre and frightening as this place is, it’s nothing compared to what that memory does to me and I stay right where I am.
“Sit down,” Mr. Lim says through a mouthful of food. He still doesn’t look at me.
I hesitate for a moment, then I sit down opposite him, my back is to the TV. He continues eating, one sandwich after the other, until he’s finished. It doesn’t take long. When he’s done, he wipes a bit of ketchup from the corner of his mouth and licks it off his fingers. At least, I hope it’s ketchup. He lowers his gaze to mine then, and I see he has the most beautiful pair of sky-blue eyes that I’ve ever seen. The eyes of an angel.
I’m about to introduce myself when he asks, “Who referred you?”
His voice sounds normal, but my ears hurt when he speaks, as if his vocal cords transmit an ultrasonic signal that I can’t consciously detect. I find my voice faster than I did with Ord.
“Marsha McLean. A friend from high school. She said you helped her and could help me. Maybe.”
“Said?”
“Uh, yeah. I posted about my problem on social media—just venting, you know?—and she sent me a private message about what you did for her and how I could find you.”
Marsha gave me Pandora’s address, but no result came up when I entered it into my GPS app on my phone. I figured it was just a glitch of some kind, and I set out searching for the restaurant. I drove up and down the street five times before I finally found it. A gas station was on this corner the first four times I drove by, but on the fifth, Pandora’s sat where the station had been.
Mr. Lim raises and lowers his chin, as if to indicate my answer is satisfactory.
“I remember her.”
He turns halfway in his chair and waves to get Ond’s attention. She looks at him blankly, then she nods and shuffles toward the kitchen. He then turns back to me.
“What’s your problem?”
Tales from The Lake 5 Page 16
