Seams in Reality

by Alex Siegel

  Andrew took a close look at the sorcerer. He was wearing green camouflage pants with holes in the knees and torn seams. His blue tennis shoes also looked ready to fall apart. He had an orange parka with ugly brown stains. A black cap sat on top of long, greasy hair. He walked forward slowly into the light with his shotgun pointed at Charley's head.

  "Is he the sorcerer?" Dan said.

  "Yes," Charley peeped.

  Andrew nodded. The energy signature made it obvious.

  The sorcerer waved his shotgun menacingly. "Here's the plan. We're all going down to that nice, big, fat, juicy seam together. Nobody is going to cause any trouble."

  "What will that accomplish?" Dan said.

  "I'm going to have some fun. I waited a long time for this chance. I couldn't get close with that bitch Tonya hanging around."

  Dan glanced at the other two agents. They nodded slightly.

  "Hey!" the sorcerer said. "Don't try anything funny!"

  "I assure you," Dan said, "it won't be the least bit funny."

  He made a sudden gesture with his hand. It caught the sorcerer's attention, and the shotgun wavered. The other two BPI agents fired from the hip and hit the sorcerer in the head. The gunshots sounded like thunderclaps to Andrew. Twin sprays of blood created clouds of red mist. The dead body fell backwards into the snow. When the shotgun hit the ground, it went off, but it fired harmlessly into the air.

  Charley screamed in fright. Andrew put his arms around her and pulled her head against his chest, but he was just as scared. He had never seen anybody die before. He wanted it to be another delusion, but he knew it was real.

  "Go back inside," Dan said, "both of you. The police will be here in a minute, and we have to talk to them. It's going to be a long night of interviews and reports."

  Andrew and Charley didn't move. They were still too stunned.

  "He could've killed me," she said softly.

  "Which is why we killed him first. Thank us later. Now get out of here!" Dan pointed at the door.

  Andrew and Charley went back inside the warm building.

  The memory of the sorcerer being shot played in Andrew's mind like a film loop. It was still hard to believe it had actually happened.

  He heard approaching footsteps. Andrew's parents came running up.

  "We heard a noise," Percival said. "What happened? Are you OK?"

  "We're fine," Andrew replied.

  He tried to put on a confident and relaxed expression, but his acting skills weren't functioning at the moment. The best he could manage was a grimace.

  His father went to the door.

  Andrew jumped in front of him. "No! Don't go out there!"

  "Why not? What's out there?"

  Sirens wailed in the distance, and they were growing louder.

  Percival pushed Andrew aside and opened the door. "My God! Is he dead?"

  Beth joined her husband at the door. She gasped and covered her mouth.

  "Get back inside!" Dan yelled. "Close the door! Get out of here before the police show up! Go to your damn restaurant."

  Andrew grabbed his mother's hand. "Come on."

  "Are you and Charley alright?" she said.

  "Yes. We're fine. We have to go!"

  "Were you out there when that man got shot?"

  "Can we please have this conversation in the car?" Andrew said.

  He, his parents, and Charley walked quickly through the Fine Arts Building. They left through another door and crossed a parking lot to reach a big, brown Cadillac Escalade. Andrew had grown up with that car. The paint was scratched, and one of the doors had been replaced, but the SUV was still reliable transport. His father had taken very good care of it.

  Andrew and Charley got into the back, and his parents sat in front.

  His father started driving. "We're safely on the road now. Tell me what the hell happened! Who was that dead man? Who were those other guys?"

  Andrew looked at Charley. She shook her head. He kept his mouth shut.

  "I'm your father, damn it. Talk to me."

  "The restaurant is on North Avenue. Take a right."

  His father turned the steering wheel. "Were those Chicago mobsters? Are you a criminal now?"

  "No!" Andrew said. "I would never break the law. You know that."

  "I only know I just saw a fresh corpse and three guys with guns."

  Andrew had to tell Percival something, and it couldn't be a lie. Andrew would never lie to his parents.

  "The men in suits were federal agents," he said softly. "The dead guy was a criminal. He threatened Charley, and the feds shot him."

  Charley gave Andrew a very sharp look.

  There was silence in the car for a moment.

  Finally, his father said, "And why did a criminal threaten Charley? Why are federal agents on your campus?"

  "That's the part I can't explain," Andrew said, "but I didn't do anything wrong. Don't worry about me or Charley. We're fine. Let's talk about something else."

  His mother came to his rescue. "Good idea," Beth said. "Do we still want to eat out for dinner? I can't speak for you, but I may have lost my appetite."

  He raised his eyebrows in surprise. She usually didn't concede so quickly.

  "We have to eat, and the restaurant is supposed to be very good. Let's just stick with the plan."

  Andrew gave directions to the Chinese restaurant, and they arrived a few minutes later. It was in a strip mall made of red and brown bricks. All the other stores were dark. Andrew expected to find the place deserted on Thanksgiving, but there was a big crowd inside the restaurant. Many cars were in the snowy parking lot in front.

  "I guess we're not the only losers who couldn't make a traditional Thanksgiving dinner," Charley said.

  Everybody got out of the car. Andrew almost slipped on the icy pavement, and he grabbed the door handle to catch himself.

  They went into the restaurant. The hostess told them they had to wait twenty minutes for a table, but at least it was warm inside.

  The interior had a red-gold color scheme, and the furniture was made of wood. Spherical paper lanterns provided soft lighting. Bamboo screens divided the large space into small sections which allowed the patrons to have some privacy.

  Andrew looked at his mother. Normally, she was a very inquisitive woman, and he was still surprised she had backed down in the car. She knows something, he thought. She looked back at him with a sad and distant expression.

  Eventually, the group was seated at a table in the corner. Andrew looked at the menu. He quickly found his favorite Chinese dish: beef with broccoli.

  After they ordered, Beth seemed to come to a decision.

  "Your grandfather had a lot of secrets, too," she said softly to Andrew.

  He leaned forward. "You never talk about him. I don't even know what he did for a living."

  "He was a Methodist minister. He owned a small church in Mount Vernon, and he had a congregation of a few hundred."

  Andrew was shocked. A sorcerer can be a minister? he thought.

  "He also had a secret life," Beth said. "Strangers would visit him. Some of them wore blue suits and carried guns like those men back at the campus. Dad never shared his secrets with his family."

  Andrew's father was staring at her like she had grown a third arm. Apparently, this information was news to him, too.

  "I do know he did strange things in his church at night," she added. "Nobody was ever allowed to go into the attic. It was always locked up, and he had the only key. There was a story about that place."

  "Let me guess," Andrew said. "A mass murder."

  Beth nodded. "The kids used to say, if you went into the church at midnight, you could still hear the screaming. I tried it. It wasn't true." She looked down at the table.

  "How did my grandfather die?"

  "All I know is where it happened: in that attic. Nobody would tell me anything else, and I asked everybody. I was never allowed back into the church. It was condemned after the death. Now it lo
oks like you're caught up in the same business. Am I right?"

  "Yeah," Andrew admitted.

  Charley frowned at him.

  "You too?" his mother asked Charley.

  "I'm sorry," Charley said, "but we're really not allowed to talk about it. Andrew has already said too much. We'll all get into big trouble if this conversation continues, and I mean the kind of trouble that lands people in prison. Let's change topics. OK?"

  Andrew looked around the table. His mother nodded in agreement but appeared sad. His father was clearly angry, but nothing could be done about that. Andrew didn't like the situation either.

  "I want to hear stories about when Andrew was a little kid," Charley said.

  Beth smiled a little. "OK. He used to have a blanket he called his 'binkie.' One day, it got left out in the rain."

  "No!" Andrew groaned. "Not this one."

  She patted him on the arm. "Just be quiet, dear. Everybody loves this story."

  He put his face in his hands.

  * * *

  Andrew shuffled into the storeroom in the basement of the Fine Arts Building. It was early in the morning, and he would've liked more sleep, but his shift was starting now. He had to guard the seam. The mess with the sorcerer the other day had reinforced how important the job was.

  It was the last day of Thanksgiving break. His parents had stayed for just one night before going home. Without the other students around, the campus was quiet and lonely. He was actually looking forward to resuming his regular class schedule.

  Dan Easton was in the storeroom along with one other BPI agent. The others came and went, but it seemed Dan was a permanent resident. Andrew wondered whether he had volunteered for that duty or it had been assigned to him. Dan was the youngest agent in the crowd, and perhaps he was trying to impress his superiors.

  He and the other agent were sitting at a table and eating breakfast. The campus cafeteria was closed, and the food had come from McDonald's. The aroma made Andrew's stomach rumble.

  "Sit," Dan said. "We have some for you."

  Andrew eagerly sat at the table and opened a paper bag offered to him. He found a muffin with egg, cheese, and sausage. He took a big bite and washed it down with orange juice.

  "This hits the spot," he said. "Thanks."

  "My superiors have decided this situation is unacceptable," Dan said.

  Andrew looked over at him. Dan was wearing just a white T-shirt and plaid boxer shorts. It appeared he had slept in the clothes.

  "What do you mean?" Andrew said cautiously. He braced himself for bad news.

  "Tonya has to come home. Whether she likes it or not, her vacation is over. We want you and Charley to talk to her."

  "What if she doesn't want to come home?"

  "Convince her," Dan said. "The BPI doesn't like having a couple of kids responsible for one of the biggest, most dangerous seams in the United States."

  Andrew frowned. Tonya was an extremely stubborn woman who didn't take orders from anybody. He didn't see how he could change her mind about anything.

  "Where is she now?"

  "On a farm near Rockford," Dan said. "Agents have been keeping an eye on her, but they haven't approached her. That's your job."

  "Great," Andrew said with a sigh.

  "But I have some good news, too. To save time, the BPI will fly you and Charley out there in a helicopter. It will be fun."

  Andrew cracked a smile. "Really?" He had never ridden in a helicopter.

  "Yeah. Eat your breakfast. You're leaving in an hour."

  * * *

  Andrew and Charley got out of a car driven by Dan Easton. A big, blue helicopter was parked on a square patch of asphalt. It had space for two pilots up front and several passengers in back. It looked like the kind of aircraft an important executive might own. The engine was running, but the blades weren't spinning. Andrew and Charley grinned at each other.

  The rarely seen logo of the BPI decorated the side of the helicopter. It was a black gear with a white ruler and an electrical bolt drawn on top. It had little to do with the real purpose of the agency.

  Andrew and Charley climbed inside. The passenger compartment had eight seats arranged in four pairs. A carpeted aisle ran down the center of the narrow space. The two apprentices sat in the front seats.

  Andrew ran his hand along the supple leather upholstery. The armrests were padded, and there was plenty of legroom. First class accommodations, he thought. I could get used to this.

  Dan Easton sat behind him. The agent was wearing an official blue business suit now. Dark sunglasses and a radio earpiece completed the costume. A large gun was in a holster under his jacket.

  Andrew still hadn't quite recovered from witnessing the sorcerer die the other night. Hearing about his grandfather's mysterious death had also rattled him. Sorcery was dangerous in many different ways. Andrew wondered if he could get some practice time on a gun range. It couldn't hurt.

  The helicopter took off. He was used to the relative quiet of commercial jets, and the loud engine noise inside the helicopter surprised him. The roar made him want to cover his ears. He noticed yellow plastic earmuffs hanging by his seat, and he slipped them over his head. The ear protection helped a lot.

  Andrew looked out the window excitedly. The helicopter was flying over the western suburbs of Chicago. Streets formed neat grids, and the larger avenues marked off neighborhoods. He knew the area was actually many towns jammed together, but from the air, it was a continuous cityscape. There were a lot of trees, but they had lost their leaves and looked dead.

  As the helicopter flew west, Andrew saw more open spaces between the homes. Bits of the native landscape remained undeveloped. Still, it took a surprisingly long time to reach farm country. The Chicago metropolitan area was shockingly large.

  The farms of the Midwest formed a patchwork which stretched to the horizon in all directions. The farms were just bare dirt now, but Andrew could still see plow lines. Some of the fields occupied hundreds of acres.

  The helicopter flew in a straight line across the landscape at an altitude of a few thousand feet. He guessed it was cruising at the speed of a fast race car. It took less than an hour to reach their destination, but it was enough time for him to get anxious. He had no idea what he would say to Tonya.

  The helicopter landed in a field that didn't look much different than the others in the area. There was a cluster of buildings at the edge which included a large farmhouse. A green tractor was pulling a single plow across the field.

  That tractor immediately struck Andrew as very odd. He had grown up around farms, and he knew nobody plowed fields in November. Also, modern farmers used giant machines capable of plowing many rows at once. Andrew couldn't remember seeing a single-blade plow in actual use.

  He and Charley got out of the helicopter. Dust kicked up by the rotor wash irritated his eyes. Chilly air made him zip up his coat all the way.

  Tonya was driving the tractor. She was wearing a puffy white parka, mittens, and a ski cap pulled down over her ears, but her face was recognizable. Some of her blonde hair poked out from beneath her cap.

  Andrew and Charley ran across the frozen ground towards their instructor.

  Tonya turned off the tractor. "I was wondering when they would send you guys to talk to me."

  "Then you can guess why we're here," Charley said.

  "The BPI is cracking the whip. They want me back on duty, but they didn't have the guts to tell me to my face. They sent kids to do their dirty work."

  Andrew furrowed his brow. Tonya's ugly description of the situation was entirely accurate. He suddenly felt exploited.

  He looked over at the helicopter. Dan was standing at the door with his arms crossed and an impatient expression on his face.

  "Be that as it may," Charley said, "we do need you to come back. A sorcerer got killed trying to get into the building. He threatened me with a shotgun, and it probably won't be the last time something like that happens. Andrew and I also need to contin
ue our training."

  Tonya looked out across the field from her seat on the tractor. "But I need to get the plowing done."

  "That's crazy," Andrew said. "The seeds don't go in until spring. Who owns this farm anyway?"

  "I do. It's been in my family for generations. I leased the land to professional farmers so it would be put to good use, but it's still mine." She nodded towards the farmhouse. "They're home now. They told me I could plow."

  The farmhouse was made of wide boards painted white. Andrew imagined the conversation between Tonya and the farmers. They had probably thought she was insane, and they had been right.

  Andrew looked at the straight lines in the dirt. She was doing an impressive job considering the antiquated methods she was employing. The spacing was perfectly regular.

  He had an insight. "You're trying to create order in the world to balance out the chaos in your mind."

  "I guess that's true," Tonya said. "Living so close to a seam for so long tends to scramble one's brain. After a while, you forget what's real, and you don't care."

  He remembered the nightmare he had experienced while sleeping in the storage room, and that had been just one night. She had guarded the seam for decades. It was amazing she could still think straight at all.

  "You're the strongest person I know," Charley said. "You can handle the side effects."

  Tonya stared at her. "How do you know? You have no idea what I'm dealing with."

  "You seemed OK until the day you left."

  "Watching over two apprentices at once is turning out to be harder than I expected. It's very stressful. Blake's surprise appearance may have pushed me over the edge. I found a skeleton in my closet, and it talked to me in the voice of a dead lover. Tell me that's healthy. I had to get away for a little while at least."

  Charley grimaced.

  "And you're being very selfish," Tonya added. "Your training can wait until I feel better."

  Andrew glanced at Agent Dan again. "I don't think the BPI will accept that answer."

  She looked in the same direction. "Bastards. They have no idea what sorcery is really about. All they see are threats and risks. They try to control what they don't understand. They destroy what they fear. It wasn't always like this. In ancient times, people accepted mysteries as part of the natural world. There wasn't an obsessive need to attach scientific explanations to every last thing."