Pop the Clutch

by Eric J. Guignard

  When we arrived at Nick’s house, I said, “Mind if I use your bathroom?”

  “Sure thing,” he said.

  I followed him into the house. It was cramped, messy, smelled like mildew.

  “Bathroom’s straight ahead to the left,” he said.

  After I peed, I washed up and looked at myself in the blotchy mirror. Was I imagining it, or did my eyes look different? They were the same pale blue, but there was something emptier about them. Deader. They looked, well, exactly like Nick’s eyes.

  I left the bathroom and met Nick in the kitchen. He’d poured himself a glass of lemonade.

  “Want some?” he asked.

  “No, thanks,” I said.

  I was staring at his arm, at the snake tattoo. I flashed back to the times when he had assaulted me with a broomstick, calling me “homo” and “faggot” and “Gay Ray.”

  “You okay?” Nick asked. “You look funny.”

  A voice, a new voice, inside me said, Kill him.

  A moment later I grabbed a large knife and started jamming it into Nick’s throat. I felt excited watching the blood spurt from his neck and mouth as he tried to talk. The sounds he was making even sounded funny to me, and I might’ve laughed.

  I removed the knife and backed away as his body fell onto the kitchen floor. He was bleeding out, definitely dead.

  Making sure nobody saw me, I left the house and drove away.

  ***

  BACK IN JOHNSON CITY, I went about my life. I did some food shopping and chores around my apartment. Before bed, I took off the bandage and checked out the tattoo. Nick had been right—the old man knew what he was doing; it had come out swell.

  At work the next day people noticed a change in me. A few people asked me if I’d lost weight, another asked me if I’d gotten a haircut. I think they were reacting to my new confidence, though. I noticed other changes in my personality. I was nicer to people, more charming, but I also felt superior to them. In all honesty, I felt like the people I worked with were a bunch of morons, and I knew if I could do everyone’s job for them the company would’ve been run much more efficiently.

  Another new thing I noticed about myself: when I was on lunch break at work I passed a playground near my office and saw a kid getting pushed around by two bigger kids. Old Me would’ve felt sorry for the little kid, and might’ve even told the bullies to stop. New Me watched for a while and thought the whole scene was kind of funny.

  I wasn’t surprised when the cops showed up that evening to question me about Nick’s death. Nick had probably told people at “the plant” where he worked that he was going to his dad’s funeral, and maybe even that I was giving him a lift.

  Old Me might’ve been nervous about the questioning, especially if I knew I was guilty, but New Me was a good actor. New Me acted shocked when he heard the news and even squeezed out some tears. New Me was also a much better liar than Old Me. New Me wasn’t even aware that he was lying. New Me believed his lies were the truth.

  The police left, seeming satisfied that I had no involvement in the murder. Luckily Nick had lots of enemies and there were many people who could’ve wanted him dead.

  I continued my routine, feeling bored. I had a kid from the University over one night, but I really just wanted to kill again.

  Then, one night, I had a great idea. It was so great I wished I’d thought of it sooner.

  I took some time off work and began stalking the guy who had assaulted me outside of the bar on Clinton Street. The detective had told me his name, so he was easy to track down in the phone book. I followed him to work, to the grocery store, the hardware store, church, and everywhere else he went, waiting for the perfect time. On the third night, I had my chance.

  He was in a liquor store parking lot late at night and there was no one else around. Approaching him from behind, I said, “Hey.”

  When he turned, he seemed confused, like he knew that he knew me from somewhere, but he wasn’t sure where.

  “It’s me,” I said. “The faggot, remember?”

  Now he knew who I was. I also saw the fear in his eyes because he knew there was something different about me, something he needed to fear.

  “Don’t feel so big and strong without your roll of nickels, huh?” I said.

  “The hell’re you doing here?” he asked.

  I loved hearing the terror in his voice. It was also great not having a conscience to hold me back from doing whatever I felt like doing. If someone hurt me, I didn’t have to waste my life feeling bad about it, cowering in fear. Instead I could fight back.

  Kill him, the voice said.

  As I bashed his head against the concrete again and again, for the first time in my life I felt truly free.

  * * *

  JASON STARR is the international best-selling author of many crime novels and thrillers. He also writes original graphic novels and superhero comics for Marvel and DC and has contributed to numerous short story anthologies. He has won the Barry Award and is a two-time winner of the Anthony Award. Several of his books are in development for TV, film, and theater. His work has been translated into over a dozen languages. His latest novel is the psychological thriller, Fugitive Red. Starr was born and raised in Brooklyn and now lives in Manhattan

  * * *

  WE MIGHT BE GIANTS

  by Nancy Holder

  “We are in a life-or-death crisis. Your girlfriends seek revenge on you.”

  * * *

  ONE O’CLOCK, TWO O’CLOCK, THREE O’CLOCK . . . lookin’ good.

  Using the shiny grillwork on Mr. Fairfield’s Buick Skylark as a mirror, Johnny Morris slicked back his ducktail and gave himself a once-over. White shirt with his name embroidered in red on the pocket, tight black jeans, the cuffs rolled up, socks just a little grease-stained from work, but he figured he needed the sweet scent of motor oil to cover up any lingering traces of Amalia Rodriguez’s spitfire perfume. The Buick had been the scene for a little back seat Bingo.

  He was a teenager in love, oh yes he was, as hot-blooded as they came.

  Amalia rearranged her beehive hairdo and knelt on the ground with her curvy little bottom in the air. Johnny stayed loose as he stood behind her, taking in the scene. She had on black-and-white polka dot capris and a black sleeveless top, bright red kitten heels, and an ankle bracelet that said Berto—her boyfriend—but there was no trace of Berto in that hot-cha-cha smile she threw at Johnny over her shoulder. She was blindingly beautiful.

  “You see? So we fill up five tubs of water. They try to grab an apple with their teeth and if they do, they get a prize!” She gestured to the four other aluminum tubs, just like the one she was kneeling in front of. She bobbed her head up and down. He gulped.

  “That’s swell,” he said. “A prize like what?”

  She dimpled. “A homemade cake. We made cakes. All the girls in my family.” She pushed against the rim of the tub and got to her feet. “I’ll show you mine.” She bent her finger in a come-hither gesture and he followed like a puppy.

  About a dozen layer cakes were arranged on a picnic table covered with a Halloween cloth. Some were decorated like pumpkins or spiders; there was lots of black frosting and candy corn. “Here it is,” she said, proudly indicating a chocolate sheet cake. Little gravestones made from graham crackers sat among tufts of green frosting grass. “Here.” She swiped up a glob of green grass with her finger and held it out to him.

  Oh, Amalia, sweet Latin mystery train from down Mexico way, daughter of his boss Mr. Rodriguez, who owned Tusker’s Garage and Auto Parts. At seventeen, Amalia was his oldest daughter.

  I am out of my gourd.

  Mr. Rodriguez kept a baseball bat underneath the counter. And speaking of bats, tonight was the powder-puff baseball game, Sidewinders against the Cactus Flowers.

  “That is muy delicioso.”

  “Tonight you could win it,” she replied.

  “Fingers crossed.” Behind his back.

  “You’re coming to the game, sí? We a
re going to crush the Sidewinders.”

  A jolt of anxiety zapped through him. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  “I’ll save you a seat behind home plate.” She kissed him on the lips. He’d have to be sure to wipe all that bright red lipstick off.

  “Right.”

  He turned and walked away without looking back at her, because that was what cool cats did. But he was worried about that saved seat. Peggy Sue would be saving him a seat, too. Bet on it.

  He kicked an empty Schlitz can through the rain gutter. Along the scattered storefronts, scarecrows and painted skeletons dangled in clusters from posts pounded into the sand. Orange light bulbs were draped around the cacti flanking the adobe post office. For such a dinky little dead-end town, Sonrisa threw one hell of a Halloween carnival. It had always been that way, but as of six months ago, some homesick eggheads at some secret nameless upwind government lab had begun to make a habit of spending their paychecks at the Flight Test Bar, the Rocket Drive-In, Keebler’s Diner, and Roberto’s Taco Shop. There hadn’t been much of an increase in business at Fashion Fair—so far all the eggheads were men and none of them seemed interested in wearing those big frilly petticoats that crinkled when the girls sashayed by. So many petticoats.

  So little time.

  I gotta put on the brakes.

  Mildly cursing his all-American red blood, he ambled across the hardscrabble street beneath Sonrisa’s only traffic light, kicking up sand in the sizzling afternoon. Sonrisa was a few dusty buildings and the silver cigar of Keebler’s Diner. The sun bounced off it like bullets off Superman’s chest.

  Inside that diner Peggy Sue was zipping around serving burgers and milkshakes on her roller skates. Zip-zip, unzip—

  “Hey, Johnny,” she chirped as she burst through the door in her loafers and bobby socks. She greeted him with a kiss on the cheek. She was still wearing her pink-and-white striped apron over a light pink poodle skirt, and a matching pink scarf was tied around her blonde ponytail pulled up tight on her head.

  He managed a pang of guilt over his two-timing with Amalia as Peggy Sue took his hand and started chattering innocently about the dunking booth, which was the diner’s contribution to the carnival. You paid for three baseballs and aimed each one in succession at this lever, and if you hit it, the person sitting in the booth fell off their perch into the water. Peggy Sue’s boss Peter, the mayor, and the police chief had volunteered to be dunked. And so had all the members of the Sidewinders, rivals of the Cactus Flowers. Amalia was the captain of the Cactus Flowers and guess who was the captain of the Sidewinders?

  It’s just that they’re both so pretty, he thought. And so different. Amalia is red, black, white, and Peggy Sue is like a tasty little cone of cotton candy. Fire and sugar.

  He realized she’d said something to him that required a response when she stopped talking and looked at him expectantly as they reached the perimeter of the Dunkin’ Well. The tank had been assembled, and a water hose running from the spigot in the You-Wash-It was in the tank, filling it up.

  “So you can be our water boy tonight,” she cooed.

  “Uh,” he said, and just then, a man in a black suit, thick black glasses, and crew cut—had to be an egghead—stopped on the other side of the dunk tank and looked through its plastic sides at Johnny. The man—Flat-top—kept looking. Staring, even, like a big weirdo.

  Johnny lifted a brow and stuck a pose. “Yeah?” he challenged.

  Flat-top moved on. Johnny watched him go. There was something strange about that guy.

  “He look okay to you?” Johnny murmured.

  Peggy Sue smiled up at him. “Who?”

  “That cat in the suit. I think he’s keeping tabs on me.”

  Her lashes actually fluttered. “I only have eyes for you, Johnny. I’ll see you later. I have to warm up for tonight.” She moved her shoulders in an exaggerated shiver. “I have to be on my game. Amalia Rodriguez is so aggressive.”

  Oh, baby. Baby, baby, baby.

  “Later, gator,” he said, tugging on her ponytail.

  ***

  HOW HAD HE EVER DREAMED he could make time with the two most beautiful girls in a tiny town like Sonrisa? Same way he had run through the others, he supposed—by being cagey. Mainly he didn’t get why he didn’t have a terrible reputation. If a girl acted like him, she’d be labeled faster than a drag race down by the power plant. Gina, Doreen, Thomasina, Louanne, Amalia, Peggy Sue. Long, long list.

  I am cruisin’ for a bruisin’.

  He combed his hair for the walk home, using the Fashion Fair window as a mirror. His pompadour was a thing of beauty. Guys around here were stupid not to work on their looks. The ladies appreciated it when you made efforts.

  As he slipped his comb back in his pocket, a figure blurred behind him, reflected in the glass. Two round discs caught the still-brilliant sunlight. Glasses. Was it that egghead again? By the time he turned, there was no one there.

  He shrugged and ambled on home, turning over his predicament in his mind: the Halloween carnival, the baseball game, the two beautiful captains. Halloween was only three days away; could he wear some kind of costume or a mask tonight, hire someone to dress up just like him, be in two places at once . . . that might work on a TV show like I Love Lucy or Buck Rogers, but no one was going to buy that in real life. Besides, who was he going to ask? When it came to guys, Johnny was a lone wolf. Why hang out with your competition?

  Home sweet home was little and dusty but it was just his ma, him, his kid brother Stan, and his little sister Jackie. His dad’s picture was on the mantle. Young Richard Morris was all dolled up in his sailor suit, with the white hat and all. His ma said it was the sailor uniform that did it, that if she’d met Richard in his civvies, she would never have eloped. A weakness for good-lookers ran in their family.

  He continued to consider his predicament as he helped Jackie cut and paste her alphabet letters in her first grade workbook and then put away the dishes for his ma. He figured his best choice was not to go to the game or the carnival. He could say he’d gotten sick. That was smart; he might get cut some slack that way. Unless the two girls talked to each other. But they wouldn’t, would they? They came from different sides of town.

  He went out back to have a smoke and think things over. He kept returning to the costume idea. He could be Ro-Man the Robot Monster. Yeah, if he had two gorilla suits, two skull masks, two goldfish bowls, and an accomplice. Which he didn’t. Besides, would other nineteen-year-old guys be wearing costumes to a girls’ baseball game? Not on your life.

  He sighed and tamped out his cigarette. Maybe it was time to beat feet. Peel out of this tiny pueblo and go to Albuquerque.

  There was a rustling in the scrubby bushes by the laundry line. He walked over to investigate, parting the gray-green leaves.

  Crouched down was the same egghead who had wandered past the dunk tank about an hour ago. The man’s glasses slipped off and he pushed them back on his face as he straightened up, dusting the sand from the knees of his black suit.

  “Hey, kid,” he said, as if there was nothing unusual about hiding in somebody’s bushes.

  “Hey, yourself,” Johnny retorted, balling up his fists. “What the heck, man?”

  “I mean no harm. Really.” The guy put his hands in his pockets. He gave the sky a glance and blew air out of his cheeks. “Here’s the thing. There’s going to be a bomb test in a little while.”

  Johnny shrugged. “You guys have had a million of those things.”

  “Yeah, but this one’s . . . ”

  The guy’s eyes ticked past Johnny and widened. Huge. As if he’d seen Ro-Man. “Damn it,” he muttered. He plopped down in the bushes.

  Johnny turned around to see what had scared him. The horizon was the horizon—fence, a saguaro cactus, more scrub, the power plant in the distance, the blazing sun. But no, there was some kind of shimmer in the air—like a big soap bubble or something, and—

  A sharp clang rang out behind him. Johnny whirled
back around.

  Flat-top was gone. As in vanished.

  He beat the bushes looking for the man. There, at the base of the scrub, gleamed a metal panel. He touched it. There was a fwooomm and then the thing slid open with the exact same clang. In the sunlight Johnny saw what appeared to be a metal playground slide canted at an angle. He reached down to touch it, and the dang thing slid open right under him.

  He fell downward like a rocket as the panel banged shut above. He managed to cover his face with his hands as he flew along like he was in some race going for pinks. Then smacked wham! into something soft and bouncy.

  Hands grabbed him and hoisted him to his feet. And what he saw—

  Great balls of fire!

  Men with heads as big as jack-o’-lanterns, all big eyes and grins, except their skin was green. They were wearing silvery suits like long johns, and one of them shouted at another one, “Agent XYX! See what you’ve done!”

  Johnny was so stunned he fell backward, only one of the—what, spacemen? Spacemen?—caught him and kept him upright.

  “Superior Agent QQ2, I apologize, deeply,” said one of the spacemen. Had to be Agent XYX. He looked at Johnny and then pressed a button on a big bulbous metal bracelet on his wrist. The button glowed with an eerie blue light that bathed the spaceman. Then his appearance transformed into the egghead Johnny had seen squatting in the bushes.

  “Greetings, Earthman Johnny,” Flat-top said. “Please don’t be alarmed. You are safe here.” He cleared his throat. “Safer than any of those poor other Earthlings above us.”

  “What? What are you talking about? What the heck is going on?” Johnny whirled in a circle. “You’re Russians, right? Stay back, you damn Commies!”

  Flat-top shook his head. “We come from the planet Altara-Z. We landed here many of your Earth years ago, when your civilization began experimenting with dangerous weapons.”

  “What? What? Under my house?” Johnny doubled up his fists and started swinging at the spacemen. At the aliens. The aliens from another world. They winked in and out of existence, as if to dodge Johnny’s blows. Exhausted, he stopped and stood surrounded, panting.