“So . . . what do you say?” hissed Gash, thin strings of pinkish slobber dribbling from his lower lip.
Martin said nothing.
“So you’re gonna let us down again?” said his father, his voice taking on that same cold anger that had been so present in his speech the last few weeks of his life. “I thought you’d at least make us proud this one time, this one goddamn lousy time.”
“Please, honey,” Mom pleaded. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but you were always such a good boy. Please do this one thing for us, Marty. Please?”
And just like that, the brief moment of uncertainty that had nearly cracked his resolve became a cold ball of anger.
“Nice try,” he said to Gash. “But she never once called me ‘Marty.’ Her nickname for me was ‘Zeke.’
“You’re not only ugly, you’re obvious and sloppy.”
And with that, Martin made three quick movements that were so fast they might as well have been a single motion: he let go of the vein, spun around and downward to grab the crowbar, and threw it toward Gash; it shot straight out, a steel arrow, and buried three-quarters of its length in the center of the tumor cluster.
Gash threw back his head and screamed, dropping the lifeless and now-featureless figures, his hands fumbling down to find and remove the crowbar, and that was all the opening Martin needed; grabbing the end of the vein again and tightening his hold on As-Was, he ran straight out, right underneath Gash’s parted legs, reaching the hole a full ten seconds before Gash yanked out the crowbar and turned, still slobbering in pain, and started toward him, half-stomping, half-limping.
Martin threw the end of the vein upward with all the force he could muster; the shepherd caught it on the first try, and within seconds most of the people from the painting had lined up above, each grabbing a section.
Below, Martin tightened the other end around his wrist and arm, gripping the slack with his fist. “Pull!”
They did, and it worked, but it was slow going; they slipped once, almost dropping him back down, but caught it in time.
Meanwhile, Gash was rallying, gaining strength and speed, closing the distance.
Martin shouted: “C’mon, c’mon, c’mon!”
Gash saw that Martin was almost to the surface, let out a massive roar—
—and unfurled his hideous wings, taking flight, demolishing the walls, the bookshelves, and most of the displays as he soared forward, talon-hands thrust out, barreling toward Martin and making a final push—
—as the people from the painting gave one last, massive, powerful yank, pulling Martin through the hole and to the surface.
“Thank you,” he said, and that was all the time he was going to have, because now the first of Gash’s hands shot up through the hole, talons impaling the shepherd through his chest and face.
Martin ran.
Just ahead, dim and ruined and depressing, he saw the room where his six-year-old self still held open the doorway, and damn if that decrepit room wasn’t the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his life.
Behind him, the people screamed. Something ripped. Something else was pulled apart with moist, shredding sounds.
And then Gash’s scream filled the air.
Doubling his speed, Martin chanced one look behind him and saw something that would haunt his dreams off and on for the rest of his life: Gash’s torso, arms, and wings were free of the hole, and he was slaughtering everyone within reach.
Oh, God, please forgive me, all of you, please forgive me . . .
. . . and just before he reached the doorway, Golden Dress appeared from behind a tree and had just enough time to shout “This is not your doing!” before Martin released a scream of his own and leapt into the air, passing through the doorway, tossing As-Was forward, and slamming to the floor beyond—but remembering to tuck-and-roll, which is probably the only thing that prevented him from snapping his neck.
He saw Gash rise high in the background of the painting.
Martin looked around for something with which to destroy As-Was, found nothing, but then the little boy who’d once been him shouted, “Here!” and tossed the flashlight to him, the wonderful, big, long, heavy flashlight, and Martin raised it above his head, readying to swing down—
—except As-Was had changed; no longer a ghostly white deformed monstrosity, but a soft, pink-skinned, chubby newborn with perfect hands, feet, face, head . . . and the loveliest blue eyes.
It looked up at Martin and gave a gurgling giggle.
“What the . . . ?”
The baby squealed with delight, shaking its arms and kicking its legs, its smile wide, toothless, radiant.
Martin looked from the baby to the painting.
Gash was free of the hole, crouching down, unfurling his wings once again, readying to take flight.
Below Martin, the baby’s face changed into an expression of perfect newborn love.
He felt his arm slowly start to drop, then just as quickly remembered Jerry’s warning: don’t let your heart or hand be swayed by its appearance, that’s what Gash wants.
Martin closed his eyes, turned the baby’s head to the side, and smashed its skull into pulp with three powerful strikes. His ears filled with the sound of a melon hitting the pavement after being dropped from a great height, and he almost threw up, but then a great jolt like an electric shock shot up his arm, throwing him back against the wall and flipping the flashlight through one of the shattered windows.
The baby jerked and spasmed, thrashing against an ugly light engulfing its body, causing it to flicker and sizzle and—very quickly, at the end—fold in on itself like a film negative set on fire and implode into nothing.
At the same moment, the painting on the wall rippled and bulged, pushing outward like a bas-relief work before deflating, flattening out . . . and returning to the way it had been: a field of faces, looking out at something only they could see.
Martin sat up, pulling his knees to his chest and folding his arm around them.
“You did it,” said the little boy.
Martin lifted a hand and waved him away: not yet, please, just . . . not yet.
“You’re not finished.”
“I know . . .”
“You gotta—”
“I know!” And as much as seeing the false images of his parents had nearly shattered him for good, what he had to do next was worse.
Burn the painting, the letter had said.
Burn it right away and get the hell out.
Martin staggered to his feet and grabbed the box of magazines and newspapers and painting supplies, scattering the papers and opening the jar of kerosene that had been used to clean the paint brushes. He poured the liquid over the papers, onto the floor, and splashed the remainder onto the wall and the painting.
Pulling his lighter from his pocket and flicking open the lid, Martin looked at the little boy and said, “You need to leave.”
“I know. I’ll be going with you. If you want me to.”
“That would be nice, yes.”
The little boy smiled. “Cool.”
Martin took a deep breath, struck up the flame, took one last look at the painting that no one else but him had ever seen or would remember, then tossed the lighter into the papers and, per Jerry’s instructions, ran like hell.
It took less than three minutes before the rooms were engulfed in flames.
Five minutes later, the entire second floor was ablaze.
In the end, it became a four-alarm fire that razed the entire building. Firefighters fought for nearly six hours to get it under control, finally extinguishing the last remnants of the conflagration around 6:45 a.m.
By then Martin had made an anonymous 911 phone call about the body in room 401 of the Taft, hightailed it back to his apartment, taken a shower, put on clean clothes, and applied fresh peroxide and bandages to his various wounds.
Then he sat on his couch and waited.
8
They came for him at 7:30.
The officer pounded on the door twice, then shouted: “Martin Tyler, this is the police. Open up now.”
Martin complied.
The officer pushed him back into the room, was joined by his partner, and they were joined by Barbara Hayes.
“What the hell did you think you’d accomplish by running out like that?”
“You wouldn’t believe me,” said Martin as the officers cuffed his hands behind his back.
Dr. Hayes looked at him and shook her head. “I’m sorry it has to be this way, Martin, but there are rules.”
“I know.” He was alive.
He had done it.
Damn had he done it!
“How irked is Ethel?” he asked as they led him out to the police cruiser.
“Oh, you’ll be finding out soon enough, I think,” said Dr. Hayes.
After the officers had gotten Martin safely into the back seat, Dr. Hayes leaned down and said, “There are consequences for certain actions, Martin. You’re not being charged with any crime, but you just bought yourself the entire ten days at The Center.”
“I figured.”
She looked as if she were going to chew him out some more, but then her eyes softened, her face filling with something . . . something . . . not her.
“There will be other circuses for you, Dipshit,” she said in a voice that could only have been Bob’s—because it wasn’t Jerry’s, and it sure as hell wasn’t hers. “There will be cotton candy and funnel cakes and calliope music. There are always tomorrows, soldier, and other battles done; music in the square, women under flowered trees, as summer slides into soft decay, leaf unto leaf . . .”
Then she stopped, blinked, and gave her head a little shake before looking at Martin again. “You screw up, you deal with the consequences. That’s life.”
“Yeah,” said Martin, barely able to contain himself. “It sure is, isn’t it?”
The cruiser pulled away, taking him back to Buzzland.
Martin looked out the window at the morning world. The sun broke through the heavy thick clouds still lingering from the downtown fire, shining directly into Martin’s eyes.
And larks into falcons rise
from the yellow sleeves of eternal day.
He wished peace to Bob, bade the Substruo much luck, and sent his parents his love.
A new day, a new world. Yet again.
And again.
And again.
The yellow sleeves of eternal day, he thought.
Bring it on.
The Ballad
of Road Mama and Daddy Bliss
“Well it’s a winding highway that never seems to end…”
—Rory Gallagher, “Lonesome Highway”
“…Abe said, ‘Where you want this killin’ done?’
God said, ‘Out on Highway 61…’”
—Bob Dylan, “Highway 61 Revisited”
It could have been a scene from any drive-in B-feature from the 1950s or early 60s featuring juvenile delinquents as Everyman and drag racing as heavy-handed social metaphor:
FADE IN: a seemingly endless stretch of smooth two-lane blacktop emptying into shadows. Crowds of people line both sides of the road, the men looking tough while clutching at their bottles of beer, the women looking anxious while clutching at the filtered tips of their cigarettes, and the kids—especially the really young ones—looking like they aren’t sure how they should be feeling while they clutch at the hands or coats of the tough beer drinkers and anxious cigarette smokers.
There are dozens of cars parked at haphazard angles off to the side, their headlights illuminating two vehicles that crouch rumbling in the center of the strip, rabid animals straining at the leash. A YOUNG GIRL, early twenties (if that), dressed in a skirt and tight short-sleeved sweater, blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail, a scarf tied around her neck, stands a few dozen feet from the front of the cars, raising her arms above her head with a slow dramatic relish, a bright red kerchief clutched in each of her hands…
I was trying very hard to imagine all of this as being a scene from a movie that I was watching, half-expecting one of the SUPPORTING CHARACTERS to scream something profound like, “Burn rubber, Daddy-O!” so I could smile at all the clichés being firmly in place. If I could achieve some kind of half-assed Zen state, if I could convince myself that I wasn’t really a part of all this, if I could delude myself into believing that I was just viewing it from a safe distance, then I might be able to survive the next two minutes with mind and body in one piece—providing I could force myself to overlook the physical appearance of most of the spectators, or the thing that was driving the car I was about to race against. I could try focusing on the blonde girl who was about to signal the start of the race, but that would mean looking at her arms, both of which were easily a foot longer than a normal arm is supposed to be, her elbows having been replaced by the type of steel hinges used to fasten car hoods to their vehicles; what sinew, veins, and muscle remained to connect her forearms to her biceps wound through and around the hinges like vines, all of it kept functional with a combination of machine grease and petroleum jelly.
And she was one of the more normal-looking spectators here tonight. Those who were still alive and mobile, anyway.
“On your marks,” she shouted, her arms now raised to their full height, the crowd silent, wide-eyed, leaning forward.
The other vehicle gunned its engine, its driver letting fly with a phlegm-clogged laugh from a throat equal parts metal and meat.
Tightening my grip on the steering wheel, I wondered if I squeezed hard enough, would my knuckles just rip through my skin. Maybe they’d postpone the race if I were injured.
One quick look at my opponent answered that question in short order.
The blonde girl was smiling a smile that might have been radiant in any other place, under any other circumstances. “Get set…”
Her grip tightened on the kerchiefs in her hands. In a moment, she’d swing down those impossible arms in a swift, decisive arc, and off we’d go.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, wondering how long I’d be missing and dead before anyone took serious notice of my absence. It was quite the revelation, it was, to realize that out of all my friends…I didn’t really have any.
Have to move that to the top of your “To Do” list right away, I thought. Numero uno: make some friends…and try to keep them this time. Abso-freakin-lutely.
Oh, yeah—I was so boned.
The other vehicle gunned its engine once more, snapping me out of my maudlin reverie with an earsplitting glasspac reminder that very likely I would be dead one-hundred-and-thirty seconds from now.
The blonde-haired girl stood frozen, ready to snap down her arms.
The spectators leaned farther forward, still and silent.
I took a deep breath and without consciously trying achieved the elusive faux-Zen state I’d been hoping for, only I wasn’t watching this scene from a distance, no; I was watching the me of roughly forty hours ago, the me who’d been safe and sound in the world he knew well enough to take for granted, the me who was about to learn that
1
“…sometimes the bodies leak.”
I looked over at the man driving the meat wagon in which I was currently a court-required passenger and said, ever the fellow armed with a witty retort: “Huh?”
The driver—a fifty-something guy named Fred Dobbs (I’m not kidding; just like the character Bogart played in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, swear to God), a man built like a walk-in freezer who was also a twenty-two-year veteran driver for the County Coroner’s Office—nodded his head and sighed as if empathizing, though he was trying hard to conceal a grin. “Yeah, whenever we get a call like this one—y’know, when the folks have been dead a day or two—sometimes you’re gonna find that the bodies have been laying in the bed or on the floor, and if the weather’s all hot and humid like it’s been and they ain’t got air-conditioning, the internal gasses build up a whole lot faster and then
things start to strain and tear and rupture and the bodies, well…sometimes they leak when you move ‘em.” He cleared his throat, and when he spoke again his tone was much lighter, as if telling a joke: “I once had so much trouble trying to get this one old gal out of her bed—her bedsores were so bad that I thought her skin was gonna peel off and dump her guts right on my shoes—I finally just had to wrap her up in the sheets she’d died in before transferring her to the bag. If it’s bad, then we let the wizards in the doc’s office do the peeling. Our job is to just get in there and remove the bodies.”
“Which sometimes leak.”
Another nod: the teacher pleased that the student wasn’t as dim as he’d feared. “I’m not trying to make you sick or nothing, understand, but I figured maybe you ought to prepare yourself for the possibility.” He shrugged, honked the horn for reasons I‘d never know at someone or something I couldn’t see, then removed one of his hands from the steering wheel and flexed his fingers, the bones crackling like dry twigs on a campfire.
I reached out to turn down the radio; the news had been talking about a massive (what they called “…spectacular”) eight-car accident in Columbus on the I-71 loop last night that so far had left five people dead. The radio station had someone broadcasting live from the scene which still hadn’t been cleared. It appeared the accident had been caused when someone driving a Hummer cut across all four lanes without signaling and slammed into a Ford Gargantua or some other four-wheeled yuppie tank that in turn hit a semi...and I didn’t want to hear about it. There’s only so much death and destruction I can take when the sun is shining and there’s still the possibility of having a nice day.
“‘Course, now,” said Dobbs, “if the bodies’re on a rug or carpeting, that makes it a bit easier in some ways. If they’re leaking all over a rug, we just roll ‘em up in it and save the county the cost of a bag.”
“And if they’ve leaked onto the carpeting?” Pause for a moment and consider: how many people get to start their workday with conversations like this? Was I the luckiest guy on the planet, or what?
Cages & Those Who Hold the Keys Page 12
