by S. D. Perry
“You suggested it,” she mumbled, and took a breath, and willed her legs to be legs again. The mental command worked well enough for her to be able to step away from him a second later, as soon as she could. “I’m OK, thanks.”
“What happened? Did he attack you?” He tucked the gun into his belt.
Amanda shook her head. “No, he was confused. I tried to talk to him, but he was—he’s already down…”
In Crazy-town, she’d been about to say, one of Devon’s quips, but the thought ran deeper. The feeling. She chased it, suddenly sure that it was important. From the beginning, she’d felt a sense of inevitability about the things she saw, like they were supposed to happen. She felt that now, stronger than ever.
What if they really are? What if no matter what they tried or did, all of it was supposed to happen, so it would happen anyway, like Devon had once proposed about a billion years ago? She’d run from Eric in the first place to avoid the scenario she’d created by running. Even thinking it hurt her brain a little, it was like one of those Escher drawings, but did that mean anything?
No, no, it can be changed. She’d seen Devon dead, and he wasn’t, he wasn’t going to be, that image was gone because he’d left town, he’d put himself out of the picture.
Does it have to be an all or nothing deal? Isn’t it possible that only some things are fated to be?
She blinked and felt that flutter of chaos she’d been picking up for the last few days, of numbers, lines, mirrors, grow stronger, become like a color she could almost see, shadow, balance, shell sea…
“For every darkness, there is light,” she said.
“Right,” Bob said, looking at her with some concern. “We should go inside.”
Amanda blinked again and felt some concern herself as the weird intensity faded. She was getting a headache, and she was suddenly quite sure that she was fated to see Eric again, that there was nothing she could do to avoid another confrontation…and she’d just made things way worse with him.
“Yeah, OK.”
Whatever limbo she’d been in, she felt like things were going to start happening, fast, and she’d better wake the fuck up if she wanted to make any difference. She followed Bob inside feeling scared and alone.
He ran through the woods until his hurting lungs finally slowed him down, his heart torn in two, his throat stuffed with horrible hard stones that he couldn’t swallow. He finally doubled over, hands on his knees, regretting every cigarette he’d ever smoked. He felt like shit, like dog shit scraped on a curb, and what the fuck game was she playing, anyway? He’d known she was a freak, but she was his freak; he loved her, he took care of her; what was she trying to do? She’d been touchy all day before the piss fiasco at that theater, she’d avoided him on the way home—then she’d climbed out a fucking window to get away from him. And fucking moved, and sent that shrink to talk to his father, for fuck’s sake. He’d had to play it all wounded-teen-runs-to-father-for-advice or risk being sent back to Boston to stay with his batty Aunt Marla until his mother came home, and what the fuck had happened?
He drew in great painful gasps of air, seeing her on the deck, her skin glowing white in the sun. She was so beautiful, so amazing and beautiful, there was no way she was going to leave him, no way in hell. She couldn’t just fuck him and make him love her and then tell him it was over; that was bullshit, fucking bullshit, and she didn’t even mean it. She loved him. She couldn’t have done the things they’d done together if she didn’t.
He needed to get her alone so they could talk. If he could just talk to her, show her how he felt, he’d make her see. He would talk to her. He told himself that they’d laugh about this someday, but there was a very hurt, very angry part of him that would never, ever laugh about what she’d done, how she’d run away from him like he was that fuckhole who was doing her mother, like he was dog shit. What the fuck, she was scared, what did that mean?
“Fucking bitch,” he panted, and he didn’t mean that, not really; she was his soul mate, and she had freaked out because she was a freak, but that was just part of her. He could accept that, he would, and they’d get past this. He just needed to talk to her, alone, that was all, a measly fucking few minutes without having a fucking gun shoved in his face, and everything would be fine.
There was still almost three weeks of his “family” vacation left, before he went home, but his father had been making noise about going back to California early; the new missus was getting bored. Eric had already planned to have Amanda come with him, at least long enough for him to pack up his shit and move wherever she wanted to go—Seattle, California, Africa, he didn’t care. He hadn’t been prepared to take no for an answer, let alone fuck off.
She doesn’t mean it.
His breath caught for just a second. He thought about the way her face had changed when she’d been trying to convince him that he wasn’t totally in love with her. He’d seen the compassion, the pain in her face, for him. And when he’d touched her, the hesitation, the heat of her skin against his…she still loved him, and wanted him. Maybe those two numbfuck grown men she was playing detective with, maybe they’d been filling her head with shit. She didn’t know them, didn’t know what their motivations were. They were probably hot for her ass too, even the oldster, Mr. Lone Ranger.
He stood up, still breathing deeply, the idea catching hold, confirming what he suddenly firmly believed—she was being brainwashed; those fuckers were brainwashing her. It was like that Stockhold syndrome or whatever it was called, where the hostage identified with the kidnapper or terrorist or whatever. That was why she was scared; that was why she’d screamed.
They’re probably with her all the time, working on her, fucking with her mind…watching her. He felt a physical revulsion, thinking of either of those old men touching her, putting their hands on her smooth, soft skin…
He saw a tree he could lean against and did so, closing his eyes, thinking of her little sounds and sighs when he had his hands on her, in her, that first time on the floor, when she’d parted her legs for him. He remembered the tremble of her creamy white thighs, the crimp of hair against his lips, the smell of her sex against his mouth…
Eric’s poor, thrashed dick stirred to life. He’d jerked it for better than an hour last night and then again this morning, tortured by these sudden memories, only days old. He’d kept losing his erection, wondering where she was, why she wasn’t with him, but then kept pressing and pulling anyway, kind of liking the unpleasant, electric feel of fraying nerves, and now he felt like he’d fucked a pinecone. He couldn’t help himself, thinking of her. The magic of the two of them, flesh to flesh, that was way too good to give up on so easily. He could remind her…and maybe break whatever spell the reporter and the doctor had cast over her. She was psychic, he believed that, and he’d let her look inside him, see how pure his love for her was. He didn’t like the psychic thing; he’d felt that she was too distracted from him, which made him feel so desperately unhappy that he could only think to pick a fight with her to get her focus back to what was important. He’d use it, though, to convince her of his feelings. He just had to get past her self-appointed guardians…
Dad had a gun. He kept it on the boat, wrapped in a piece of oily leather, under the back bench. A .22 semiautomatic.
Eric straightened his shoulders and started to walk, his breathing finally calming. The shade of the trees was cool, the path speckled with floating shafts of bright sunlight, like some cheesy postcard. It smelled like summer camp to him—the only time as a kid that he’d ever bothered with nature, when he’d been stuck there by his parents for two months every year—like green things and mold and dirt, a smell he associated with loneliness. He felt ravaged; running away, believing that she really wanted him to never see her again, that had been like running through hell, but the devastation was slipping away, becoming a call to action. He got it now. She put up a hard front, but she was a damaged little thing, hiding behind the armor of shit childhood, trying to survive. Kicked out, d
esperate, her future uncertain…how hard would it be for a couple of unscrupulous fuckers to start convincing her of things?
It wasn’t over. He hadn’t lost her, only parted from her for a moment, and realistically, all the great lovers went through turmoil; their dynamic was too powerful, the forces around them too great even to be overcome in some cases. The sophomore English final had been on Romeo and Juliet; he’d written an essay about how they’d had to die so that their love would remain perfect…
No one was going to die; he didn’t even know why he’d thought that. No one was going to die because if he was holding the gun, he’d be in control. He’d make them promise him an hour with her, that was all, away from their influence, and then he’d make her fucking listen to him, and he would listen to her, and she’d see that there was nothing to be scared of, that he would take care of her. He’d give her the gun; he could see him handing it over to her, see her drop it on the floor so she could lean in to kiss him. They could make love and then decide where they would go, start dreaming the life they wanted together, and maybe John and Bob would come back with the cops or whatever, but once she was with him again, once they’d reconnected, none of that shit would matter. He would be happy.
Still, better to avoid confrontation…he’d hang around, wait for an opportunity. He’d finally convinced the old man that he’d needed some alone time, and his father had been only too happy to comply, letting up on the let’s-pal-around scenario after Eric had tearfully, angrily confessed that his girlfriend was breaking his heart, could they please stay, he had to talk to her. Dad had hugged him in a stiff, movie-like way and promised to give him his space. As though he wanted to do anything else; he and Jeannie didn’t even leave a note most days anymore, they were just gone, shopping down the coast or out on the boat or just locked in their bedroom, humping. Being rich, bored assholes, pretending that he didn’t exist. He could wait for a long time. And she’d go out, eventually, or both of them would leave, and maybe the gun didn’t have to come out at all.
He smiled, thinking of their reunion, of watching her doubts fall away, of being trusted again, and was still smiling when he passed an elderly couple a few moments later, and he heard one of them say something about young love.
His smile widened. That would be them, someday. They would be together for as long as they both lived.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The police came and took a statement about Eric coming to the house, though Bob left out the part about pointing a gun at the kid. A flinty-eyed, round-faced officer, Kyle Leary—Bob remembered not liking him at some point in the past, and the feeling was confirmed as reasonable—with a semiautomatic and a condescending attitude asked a few questions and then bothered John with a few more when he came home, asking if John was Amanda’s doctor, asking if her mother knew where she was spending her nights. Grace Young did, actually. John had called her and explained that Eric might be a danger, assured her that Amanda was all right—and Grace had asked bluntly, drunkenly, if he was fucking her daughter yet, and then said she’d call the cops if he did, and then hung up on him. He’d told Bob about it the day before, while Amanda had been watching a movie in the other room; just hearing it made Bob want to go over there and give that barfly a piece of his mind and a boot in the ass. In spite of his denial, John felt pretty much the same. Bob could hear it in his voice, see it in the way he cut his eyes toward the living room, toward their persecuted, smart-ass little friend. Except for her taste in boyfriends, Amanda had turned out awfully decent, considering her life up until lately. Grace Young was a vampire.
“You had lunch?” Bob asked, still rummaging as John walked into the kitchen. He found a box of biscuit mix in the pantry. Biscuits and eggs, coffee…he had some vague idea of getting them all fed and clear-headed to talk about what Mo had told him.
“No, I was just going out when you called,” John said. “You cook?”
“Only when necessary,” he said, and found he couldn’t wait another second. “Listen, I think I found something. I talked to a friend of mine, and he gave me a name. A place, actually. Where, four years ago, they had a run of very bad luck. Big increase in impulse crimes, basically, including murder. There was some serious shit, in the same neighborhood of weird as what’s been going on here.”
John leaned against the counter. “You’re kidding.”
“Jenkin’s Creek, in California,” Bob said. “My friend got into it because he used to write a column for one of those supermarket alien conspiracy–type rags. He kept the post office box when the paper sank, and says he still gets these random letters from people about strange goings-on. Government conspiracies, UFOs, like that.
“He said he got several letters from a woman in northern California, an ex-hippie fan of his, documenting a ‘change’ in the air that she believed lasted from June until early in September in 2008. He said the letters seemed paranoid at first, and the woman had suggested that while she didn’t believe in aliens, she wasn’t ready to disbelieve in them, either, considering what was happening. Standard crank, right? Thing was, her letters were accompanied by articles. Not photocopies or printouts; they were cut from real newspapers. My friend, Mo, he checked. Articles about violent crime. There was some occult-influenced thrill murder…and a guy wiped out his entire family and disappeared.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah, but here’s the thing. Mo dropped her a line, asked him to keep her updated, and she wrote a few more times. Her initial fears, that perhaps there were aliens involved, disappeared; in the last letter, she talked about how good she was feeling, and how her close friends had become closer, and she was really feeling connected to her family, to her husband and children…Mo said that the letters were about everything changing, relationships, sense of self, sense of community…”
John was nodding. “Right, not just violence. Impulse control, sure, but that doesn’t necessarily lead to total chaos, not for everyone. Not even for most people.”
He rubbed at his eyes and looked at Bob. “So what happened?”
“Ah, Mo said she wrote a short letter sometime later that fall, to tell him that she believed the event, or series of events, was over. The tragedies of the summer were still being mourned, but the town was putting itself back together. She called it a summer of evolution and said that she hoped he’d file it with his ‘serious’ casework, because she—and several of her dear friends, according to her—firmly believed that something paranormal had been at play. He hasn’t heard from her since.”
John frowned and folded his arms. He seemed to forget that Bob was in the room, his gaze looking inward. Bob let him think a moment, found a bowl, and preheated the oven.
“What are you thinking?”
John blinked at him, still frowning. “She thought that some people gave in to positive influences, some to negative, is that the idea?”
“Obviously,” Bob said. “Maybe she was a kook about why, but it seems to me—”
“No, wait,” John said. “I don’t want to lose my way here. Before you consider the details, consider the whole. The same thing that’s happening in Port Isley, it happened somewhere else. Four years ago, in California. Also in the summer.”
“OK.”
“There’s a precedent,” John said. “I’d say our own activity started up in June, wouldn’t you? We can base the next search on clusters of events within the last five summers. Maybe it won’t mean anything, but it’s a starting point.”
“It’s a man,” Amanda said.
Both of them looked toward the open arch of the kitchen. Amanda stood there, her expression thunderstruck.
“That’s what I’ve been hearing and picking up,” she said, and looked at John, at Bob. Her short hair was still wet, slicked back from her face. She looked about twelve. “It’s him, the guy, the he’s here guy. He’s causing this. That’s totally it.”
“Since when?” Bob asked. “What are you picking up? How do you know?”
“Last couple
of days,” she said. “I’ve been getting this…like, a different channel. I don’t know, but the way he thinks, what I’m thinking…I don’t know how to explain.”
“You’re sure about this?” John asked.
“Fuck no,” she said. “Are you making coffee?”
John did so, while Bob filled Amanda in on what she’d missed…and Amanda filled them in on her new feeling from this person, this man who she insisted was responsible for the changes in Port Isley, only able to describe him in single words. Words about him, or from him, or because of him. Prisoners. Mirrors. Lines of numbers, maybe. Shadow, movement, something about seashells…Bob listened, trying to let the information become part of his understanding, realizing how much he trusted Amanda’s psychic perceptions—he didn’t question her assertion. A man, a human being, was responsible for those people dying. For people changing.
“Why do you think you’re picking it up now?” John asked. Bob had the biscuits in and was cracking eggs into a bowl. Hope you like ’em scrambled…
“Yeah, that’s fine,” Amanda said, as though he’d said something aloud. She didn’t seem to notice, though Bob and John exchanged a look, Bob raising his eyebrows.
“I dunno,” she continued, back to John’s question. “Maybe…maybe he’s getting stronger? His influence, I mean?” She shrugged. “Or maybe he’s closer.”
“Is he doing it on purpose?” Bob asked.
“No. I don’t think so.”
“A man,” John said. “You’re certain.”
“I keep saying I’m not, don’t I? I’m pretty sure.” Amanda accepted a cup of black coffee. “It’s got to be a tourist, right? He was in Jenkin’s Creek four years ago, and now he’s here for the summer.”
Bob and John looked at one another. “That makes sense,” Bob said.
“If it is a man,” John said. “And there are thousands of them here for the season, or some part of it.”
“Yeah, but we can track down a man.” Bob grinned. “If she can read his mind—”
