The Argus Deceit

by Chuck Grossart

  Brody couldn’t describe what he felt, other than an overwhelming sense that he was seeing someone—some thing—that didn’t belong here.

  He felt confusion. Dread. And for the first time in a long time, fear.

  “Hello?” Brody yelled, his words echoing down the shadowy street.

  He received no response. The figure remained planted in place, motionless.

  “Hey, I said hello!” Brody shouted, immediately regretting how loud he was. The last thing he wanted to do was wake someone who would peek out their windows, call the cops, and ensure he’d have another brush with the police. Brody decided to confront the man and started walking toward him. Then he stopped in his tracks when the person raised his arm. Brody crouched, then took a few quick steps toward a building, immediately wanting to find some sort of shelter. To Brody, the man had appeared to be raising a weapon. But that wasn’t the case.

  He was pointing. Arm raised, index finger pointing beyond Brody, as if gesturing him to look.

  Brody did. And saw nothing. He turned back toward the figure quickly, not liking the feeling of taking his eyes off him, and gasped.

  The figure was much closer now. Too close to have walked the distance, or run it, as if he’d simply moved in a flash of time, from one point to another. He was directly under a streetlight, bathed in its glow, but still the figure remained dark as night. Just a shadow.

  “What do you want?” Brody asked.

  The figure gestured more forcefully this time, then blinked out of existence.

  Seconds later, Brody spied the figure again, much farther away down the street, appearing out of nowhere. Then in a flash, it was gone once again.

  Brody’s heart thudded away. He waited for the figure to return, but there was only the silent street before him, buildings bathed in the spotty glow of streetlamps, disappearing into shadows. Nothing more.

  The feeling of being watched was gone. He was truly alone.

  He started to walk back toward his apartment building, then stopped.

  The figure had wanted him to go the other way, to continue down the street. He didn’t know why, but Brody felt the need to do just that. He turned, took three steps, and then ran, feeling a sudden urge to get past his apartment building, and go up the street to—

  To where?

  He couldn’t remember ever going in that direction, but he needed to run, to go where he’d never been before.

  And then he saw her. Standing in the street.

  At that moment, the night came to a close for twenty-six-year-old Brody Quail.

  Chapter 12

  BRODY16

  West Glenn, Colorado

  Monday, March 30, 1981

  The president had been shot.

  “Dude, are you listening?” Jason asked, slapping Brody’s arm.

  Brody realized he’d been staring at Joan again. It was tough not to. God, she’s pretty. “Yeah, I was listening,” he said.

  “Bullshit. I saw who you were looking at,” Jason said. “What did I say, then?”

  “You were talking about Reagan.” Safe bet, because that’s all anyone was talking about.

  “Okay, so do you think the Russkies did it?”

  “I don’t think they’d be stupid enough to do something like that.”

  “No shit,” Kyle agreed. “If we found out they tried to kill him, we’d nuke the living shit out of that place. So if it wasn’t them, who?”

  “Your dad said it was some guy named Hinckley.” Brody glanced in Joan’s direction. She was looking right at him. He looked away quickly. “From Evergreen.” He began to sweat a little. Every time he was around her, even just in the same room, Brody couldn’t help but feel all hot and bothered, a saying his mom used, which Brody wished she wouldn’t.

  “I know that’s what he said,” Kyle continued, “but do you think he was working for somebody? Like Oswald was working for the CIA or Castro or some shit like that?”

  “I don’t know,” Brody said. He shifted his glance to Joan’s table and noticed she wasn’t sitting there anymore. Before he could look around the room for her, though, he felt Jason scoot over, making room on the bench for someone else.

  Joan. Jesus, she’s going to sit right here. And she did.

  Joan straddled the bench, facing Jason. All Brody could see was the back of her head, but she was only inches away. It was a strange feeling, and hard to describe, but it felt like a low-voltage current flashed through his body, as if every nerve ending screamed, Whoa! She’s right there! Only for a second, but long enough to cause him to catch his breath. He tried to keep his eyes from wandering, but they had a mind of their own. She was so small, almost delicate in a way. She was wearing a concert T-shirt, probably the Journey one he’d seen her wear before, which ended at her button-ups, which hugged her hips like—

  Jesus, Brody. Control yourself.

  When she abruptly turned around toward him, though, he nearly fell off the bench.

  “Hey, you’ve got Krichek for third period, right?” she asked, pulling her left leg up and over the bench so she could turn and face him more directly. Just that little movement caused a wave of her perfume to slap him right in the nose. It wasn’t that strong or anything, but it was all he could smell at that moment.

  “Yeah,” Brody answered, amazed that he was able to get the word out of his mouth. “Why?”

  “He said something about a test next Friday, but I didn’t catch what chapters it was covering.”

  “Um, seven and eight. I think.”

  She grabbed one of her spiral notebooks and flipped it open. Brody watched her write the chapters down, and then he saw it.

  His name.

  At first, he didn’t believe what he was seeing, but it was there. Drawn in balloon letters, at the top of the page, sandwiched between doodles.

  B R O D Y

  His name, not that other guy, the wrestler, Todd something-or-other. Brody felt his heart leap into his throat.

  Joan slammed the notebook closed when she saw him staring at the page. Brody wasn’t sure, but he could almost swear she was blushing a little. I wasn’t supposed to see that, was I?

  “Okay,” Joan said, “thanks, Brody.” She gathered her books and started to go back to her own table, but stopped and leaned over toward him. “Hey, can you give me a ride home?”

  “Uh . . .” Holy Mother of God she wants me to drive her home holy shit “Sure.”

  “Great,” Joan said, her smile nearly melting the sixteen-year-old boy sitting in front of her. “Maybe after we get out of here?” She whispered the last part.

  Brody was planning on ditching his last class anyway. “Sure.” Sure? Sure? Is that all you can say?

  “Okay, I’ll meet you in the parking lot.”

  “You know which car is mine?” Brody asked, suddenly wishing he had a better-looking car than his—

  “1963 Impala, right? Light blue?”

  Holy crap, she knows my car. “That’s the one.”

  “I’ve never ridden in one of those. It’ll be fun.” With that, she turned and went back to her table.

  “Jesus, Quail,” Jason said. “You know she has a boyfriend, right?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Have you ever seen him? He’ll kick your ass.”

  Brody didn’t care. Joan obviously liked him (B R O D Y) and that’s all that mattered.

  “It doesn’t work from the outside,” Brody yelled, leaning over and popping the door lever. There was a crumpled ball of paper on the seat, which he tossed into the back. If he was going to start giving Joan rides home (still a big if at this point, but a hopeful if), he’d have to make sure his trash was at least picked up next time.

  “Thanks,” Joan said, placing her books between them on the bench seat and slamming her door shut. “Cool car.”

  “Thanks.” Brody fastened his lap belt and cinched it tight.

  seat belt

  He pumped the gas pedal and turned the key.

  With a cough
, the Impala’s engine turned over. Brody winced at the cloud of blue smoke in his rearview mirror but was glad his old heap had decided to cooperate. He backed out of the parking space, then realized he had no idea where Joan lived. “Um, where do—”

  Joan giggled. “My house is on Lincoln, a couple of blocks away,” she said. “Take the first left from Michigan, and I’m the third house on the left.”

  “Got it.” Brody pulled out of the parking lot and headed down Central toward Michigan, suddenly self-conscious about missing a shift or grinding the gears, which would be very uncool.

  “I really like your car,” she said. “How fast have you had it?” She grabbed the metal dash with one hand and pulled one leg up underneath her, turning her body to face him.

  “Not very fast, maybe 80, 85.” He glanced over at her, took in her bright eyes, her smile. “It really starts shaking at 75, so I’m kinda nervous about going any faster.” He cringed as soon as the words spilled out of his mouth. God, I sound like an old man!

  She laughed. “My dad had an old car when he was a kid, and one of the tie rods snapped. He swerved into a ditch and rolled a few times.”

  “Holy crap.”

  “I know, right? He was lucky to get out alive.”

  get out alive

  For a second, Brody’s gut twisted, and he gasped out loud.

  fire there’s fire she’s in it in the fire

  “Are you okay?”

  Brody was breathing fast. “Yeah, I’m fine, I think I—”

  “Hey, you just passed Michigan.”

  “What?” He’d driven right by. “Sorry. I’ll take Washington. It goes through, right?”

  “Yeah. That’ll work.”

  seat belt

  Brody glanced at Joan and saw she wasn’t wearing her seat belt. “Hey, I don’t want to sound like an old man (hurry hurry before it’s) but could you maybe (too late) put your belt on?” She looked at him funny. He didn’t care, though. “Please?”

  “Brody’s rule?” she asked.

  “Yeah, Brody’s rule. Stupid, I know,” he said, patting the steel dashboard, “but I wouldn’t want you to ding your head on the—”

  Suddenly, Joan’s smile disappeared. “Brody! Red light!”

  Brody whipped his head forward and instinctively smashed the brake pedal to the floor. The car didn’t stop. The pedal was slack, no pressure whatsoever. He pressed it again and again, no response.

  Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the truck entering the intersection from the right, barreling right toward them.

  Tick. She lives.

  Joan put her hands up, as if she could stop the truck from hitting them. She screamed.

  Tick-tock. She dies.

  Brody opened his eyes.

  The air was still, thick. And it was quiet, unnaturally so. Brody moved his head, expecting a bolt of pain, but there was nothing. He was lying on his back in the intersection. The asphalt was rough against his hands as he pushed himself up to a sitting position and looked around.

  What he expected to see, he didn’t.

  There were no fire trucks, no ambulance. No debris from the wreck.

  My car.

  The Impala sat about ten yards away, right about where the truck (where is the truck?) had hit them. But there was no truck. There was no anything.

  Brody stood and brushed the gravel from his hands. Joan. He could see her there, in the front seat of his car.

  “Joan?” he yelled, running over to the car. “Are you okay?”

  burning, twisted and broken, engulfed in flames

  He peered through the driver’s side window. She was alive, sitting with her hands

  lips pulled back, revealing white teeth, grinning

  in her lap.

  “Joan?”

  She turned and smiled. “I like your car, Brody,” she said. “Impala, right? ’62?”

  Brody couldn’t believe what he was hearing, or what he said next. “Close, it’s a ’63. It was my dad’s.”

  There was a noise behind him, feet on pavement. Before he could turn around, he saw Joan’s eyes focus on a point beyond.

  “Who is she?” Joan asked, her eyes narrowing. “She shouldn’t be here.”

  Brody turned and saw her. A girl, roughly his age, dressed in strange clothes, like what a factory worker would wear. A lock of red hair covered one eye, and in the other Brody saw his reflection. And fear.

  She was terrified.

  “Get out,” Joan said. “You don’t belong here.”

  The girl turned and began to run away.

  “Wait!” Brody yelled after her. “Don’t go!”

  He watched a dark figure appear out of nowhere, directly in her path. Watched the girl drop to her knees. Heard her scream.

  At that moment, the day ended for sixteen-year-old Brody Quail.

  And the walls began to crack.

  Chapter 13

  BRODY52

  Joshua, Maine

  Friday, October 25, 1974

  The sun was setting, right on schedule.

  Brody stood by his desk, staring at the orange glow coming though his office curtains, the closest he’d come to actually watching a sunset since . . .

  Reba.

  Since before his wife had died.

  Since you let her die.

  He glanced at the pictures on the wall, snapshots of the two of them, of her, so vibrant once. That was all gone now.

  “Excuse me, sir.”

  Brody turned abruptly, startled at the sound of Felix’s voice. A quick look at the clock told him Felix was a little early, but no, that wasn’t strange. He had no dinner tray in his hands.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt, sir, but there’s someone downstairs who wishes to speak to you.”

  “Who, Felix?”

  “He didn’t give me his name, sir, but he says it’s imperative that he speak with you immediately.”

  “Regarding?” Brody asked.

  “He wouldn’t say.”

  Brody stepped around his desk, and as he passed Felix, he felt the man place his hand on his shoulder. Brody turned to look his old employee and friend in the face.

  “I believe it may be something serious, sir.”

  one shall pass

  Brody nodded and smiled at Felix’s concern for his well-being. “How could it get any worse?” Brody said. Felix smiled back, but there was no joy in the expression. Only a sense of shared sorrow.

  Brody left his office and turned to head downstairs but caught something out of place in the corner of his eye. He looked down the hallway toward his old bedroom, where Reba had been murdered, and saw that the door was open.

  It was never open. Never.

  “Felix, were you in the bedroom earlier?” he asked, trying hard to hide the anger that had risen so quickly in his breast. He’d ordered the door to remain shut. No one, even though only he and Felix shared the mansion now, was to enter that room. He hadn’t opened that door since the police had finished their investigation and Felix had returned it to its previous appearance. The room, for all intents and purposes, appeared as it did prior to that terrible night. The bed was made, the shades were open, and one of Reba’s favorite books was even sitting on her bedside table. If Reba’s spirit roamed the house, she would find her room to be in order, with everything exactly as she would have wanted it.

  When Brody didn’t get an answer, he turned back toward the office. “Felix, I said, ‘Have you been in the bedroom?’” Felix was standing behind the desk, looking at something in his hands.

  But it wasn’t just something. It was a gun. Brody’s Smith & Wesson Model 27.

  “Felix, are you all right?”

  Felix looked up at him, his gray eyes uncharacteristically dull and lifeless. “A fine weapon, sir,” he said, testing the heft of the gun in his right hand.

  Brody wasn’t sure what to think. This sort of behavior was completely out of character for Felix, and it instantly made him nervous. He switched his glance from Felix’s
eyes to the gun, and then back again. “It’s loaded, Felix” was all he could think to say.

  Felix popped out the cylinder, then snapped it back into place. “Why, yes, it is, sir.” Brody had never seen Felix handle a weapon before and was surprised the man knew how to open the revolver. Felix then grabbed the gun by the barrel, moving it toward Brody, grip first. “Will you require your weapon this evening, sir?”

  Will I require my weapon? “No, Felix,” Brody said, immediately stepping forward and gently removing the gun from Felix’s hand. His heart slowed a bit as soon as he had the gun back in his own hand, and he breathed a sigh of relief. “Are you feeling okay, Felix?”

  “Of course, sir,” Felix replied, his eyes less dull than they had been just moments before, as if he’d checked out for a minute, then returned. Brody was concerned for his old friend. Many a time he himself had sat behind that desk, holding the gun in his hand, contemplating how easy it would be to make all the pain go away. But he’d never taken his thoughts any further.

  Or had he? There was a strange feeling, a momentary flash of a memory he couldn’t recall clearly. There, then gone. Brody might’ve given the matter more thought, but he was worried about Felix.

  Both he and Felix had suffered after Reba’s death, of that Brody was certain. They had both loved her dearly, in their own way, but maybe Felix was having a more difficult time with this grief than Brody had realized.

  “Let’s keep this little gem in its proper place,” Brody said, placing the revolver back in the drawer. He wondered if he should find another place for the gun, maybe lock it up. “Felix, the door to the bedroom is open. Were you in there today?”

  Felix’s eyes went wide, shocked that Brody would assume he’d violated the trust the closed door represented. “No, sir, I was not,” Felix said, immediately stepping out into the hall and turning to face the bedroom. Brody followed.

  The door was closed. Just as it should be.

  Felix said nothing as he turned toward his employer, a curious look in his eyes.

  “I could’ve sworn the door was open, Felix.”

  “The gentleman at the door,” Felix said, apparently willing to let the moment pass without further discussion.

  “Yes,” Brody replied. “My mysterious caller. I’m sorry, Felix, I truly thought the door was open.”