by Leah Cutter
Steve sat down on the chair next to the hospital bed. “How you doing?” Steve asked.
“You would not believe the food they serve me here,” Gary complained.
Steve grinned. It was Gary’s usual whine. “I promise that when you get out, the first thing we do is go for pizza,” he said. Then he paused. “But I did hear they have good Jello here.”
Gary nodded emphatically. “They do have great Jello.” He paused.
Steve braced himself.
“Say,” Gary said, trying to sound casual but missing by a mile. “Do you think, once I get out, that we can get the gang together? Finish off the campaign?”
“I don’t know. dude. Last game was pretty much a killjoy,” Steve said dryly. “Had been thinking about committing total party kill—TPK.”
Gary went on as if Steve hadn’t said anything. “You know. See if we can find Pat. Maybe Mary.”
Pat hadn’t fared much better than Gary. He’d only tried to kill himself twice since that night. Steve wasn’t allowed to go see him anymore. Doctors claimed his old friends made Pat too excitable.
“Or maybe Erik,” Gary continued.
Erik had been found on the river road around dawn. The news reports had said he’d been “mangled.” There had been some worries about wild dogs.
Steve could have told them it hadn’t been dogs, but probably the wrath of the Great Old Ones.
Plus, when Erik’s apartment had been searched, they’d found the makings for more bombs.
“Say, do you think you could bring that old lamp of mine in here sometime? Brighten up the place?” Gary asked.
“I don’t think so, buddy,” Steve said. He sighed. Every time he came to see Gary they had the exact same conversation, with Gary asking for the exact same things.
Steve didn’t want to admit it, but Gary wasn’t getting any better.
Gary’s mom had been happy to let Steve into the basement to gather together some of the gaming equipment. He’d taken the lamp and had had the greatest satisfaction busting it into bits.
But Gary never remembered that, no matter how many times Steve told him.
“Do you think the Old Ones will come back?” Gary asked plaintively after a few moments of silence.
“No, I don’t,” Steve said firmly.
Gary’s mom had also let Steve go through Gary’s room. He’d found evidence there that Gary had been under Erik’s influence for a lot longer than Steve had known. He’d destroyed the altar he found there—wouldn’t do for Gary’s mom to find such a thing, with its misshapen carvings and odd–smelling candles. Steve had washed the floors himself, removing all the old chalk and wax and whatever the hell that other shit had been..
“That’s too bad,” Gary said morosely.
Gary had only tried to kill himself once. He’d opened up a window, and the nurse had found him crouched before it.
Gary had claimed he’d just wanted some fresh air, but he’d been on a watch ever since.
Steve had never heard of Gary wanting fresh air, not once in his life.
“Tell you what. The next time I come, I’ll bring some dice. Just you and me. We’ll start a new campaign,” Steve promised.
“Another Old Ones campaign?” Gary asked eagerly.
“No,” Steve said firmly. “Starships. You like space pirates, right?”
“I suppose,” Gary said with a sigh.
Steve would bring dice with him next time. And maybe Gary would remember that they’d had this conversation many times before.
After all, wasn’t that what friends did? Looked after their buddies, even if their buddies were never coming back?
About the Author
Leah Cutter currently lives in Seattle—the land of coffee and fog. However, she’s also lived all over the world and held the requisite odd writer jobs, such as doing archeology in England, teaching English in Taiwan, and bartending in Thailand.
She writes fantasy set in exotic times and locations such as Tang dynasty China, WWII Budapest, rural Louisiana, and the Oregon coast.
Her short fiction includes literary, fantasy, mystery, science fiction, and horror, and has been published in magazines as well as anthologies and on the web.
Read more stories by Leah Cutter at Knotted Road Press.
Follow her blog at LeahCutter.com
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Working at a sex and toy shop like Chinaman Joe’s Good Luck Parlor keeps Cassie in smokes and off the streets. It isn’t glamorous. But it’s a life.
Then again, Cassie is just normal, not one of the blessed. No paranormal abilities, no telepathy, no pre–cognition. Normal.
But when someone kills Cassie’s best friend in the alley behind the store, the police start looking at her. Hard. Particularly when the Post–Cog on the case swears she’s involved, somehow.
Then someone strangles a prostitute right there in the store.
Cassie knows the cops are wrong about everything. She didn’t do it, and the deaths aren’t about drugs.
But to prove them wrong Cassie has to stop gods she didn’t know were real and prevent Ragnarok.
Her life will never be the same.
Available from Book View Café or your favorite retailers.
