Pyrophobia

by Jack Lance

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  The Man in Black

  Kayla arrived home early Friday evening, sad and depressed. Jason had called her one time. She had been angry when she spoke to him, but she no longer felt mad. When would she hear from him again?

  Restless, she roamed around Canyon View, turned on the electric kettle, and made herself a cup of tea, taking it with her into the study. Leaning against the window sill, one hand holding the mug of tea, she leafed through the album containing his childhood pictures that he had left out on his desk. Little Jason on the baseball field. A somewhat older Jason during his high school years. Jason with a few friends she vaguely recognized but whose names she couldn’t remember. Jason as a boy again, standing between Donna and Edward.

  Kayla had seen these pictures before. Photographs from the first years of his life. The one on the cover page was the first one ever taken of him. He had been photographed together with his parents, and underneath it his mother had added his birth certificate. Another photo depicted Jason as a baby being bottle-fed; still another featured a smiling infant crawling around on all fours. And so it continued.

  She went back to the first picture in the album. Donna was in bed, and Jason’s father sat in a chair at her bedside and held their little boy in the crook of his arm, proudly showing him off to the world. Both parents were beaming into the camera lens. Donna’s handwritten title with the photo was: WELCOME, MY DEAR JASON.

  Then Kayla looked at the birth certificate. At the top of the sheet it said STATE OF CALIFORNIA, and underneath CERTIFICATION OF VITAL RECORD. A list of numbers followed, the name of the newborn, JASON, and the date of his birth: SEPTEMBER 2, 1977. The names of his parents had been penned in by his mother and father.

  Kayla closed the album, wondering what was going through Jason’s mind at this moment. Could it really be that he thought his previous incarnation was somehow reaching out to him?

  She did not like being alone, so she called Simone. When Kayla asked her friend if she could stay with them, Simone said it would be no problem at all.

  In Simone and her husband Cliff’s living room, Kayla waited for his phone call – in vain. She told them that Jason was out of town. She did not mention that they had had a fight, nor did she divulge what he was doing in Arizona. Simone was convinced there was more to this story than met the eye and probed a little deeper. Kayla answered all her questions, but she barely heard herself talking. She could not concentrate. She kept glancing at her silent telephone.

  At ten thirty she was in bed in the guest room, and that was the start of the second worst night of her life. The worst had been the night Ralph died.

  The next morning, Saturday, August first, she went out for a walk because she had nothing better to do. She didn’t call Jason; her pride was holding her back. For the entire day she was a nervous wreck, feeling as though she were walking a tightrope over an abyss, and her doubts and anxieties kept trying to push her off.

  Had she done the right thing?

  Had she abandoned him?

  She kept her cell phone within easy reach at all times, but he didn’t call. She could call him herself. She repeatedly considered doing that, but each time she held herself in check. God, she hated her pride.

  How could she have left him there on his own? But then she thought of how stubborn he had been. He had let her down just as badly, if not worse.

  It doesn’t matter. This wasn’t necessary. There is no need for us to be apart now. We could have prevented it. Together we could have prevented it.

  Then Jason did call, around eight o’clock that evening. He said he was no longer in Mount Peytha. He had driven to Las Vegas that morning and had taken an afternoon flight to San Francisco. He would tell her all about it later.

  She was too stunned to question him. He asked how she was doing. She said she felt like crap and he said he was sorry. She ended the conversation quickly, her way of saying ‘come home’, but after she had hung up, she thought of all the other things she had wanted to say and hadn’t.

  Late that night she was in her own bed. She was determined to wait for Jason at home. He had told her that their house might not be safe, but even if the secret photographer were watching Canyon View, she no longer cared. What else could he destroy that he hadn’t already?

  Her mind kept on churning, but finally she fell asleep.

  When she awoke during the night, she saw a towering figure in a black robe at the foot of her bed. His face was hidden by a black hood, and his bony, skeletal hand held a razor-sharp scythe.

  She screamed, fumbled for the light switch, and flicked it on. In the light her enemy, the Grim Reaper, had disappeared.

  For the rest of the night she sat up in bed, fully awake.

  A new day dawned and the phone rang. It turned out to be Simone, worried that Kayla had not been feeling herself on Friday. Kayla told her friend she had spoken with Jason and Simone proposed having lunch together. She was a wonderful friend, very sympathetic, and Kayla readily accepted.

  ‘Great!’ Simone enthused. ‘Where do we meet?’

  ‘How about the Milano? Isn’t that one of your favorite places in Mulligan Square?’

  Kayla was well aware that Simone liked the small, cozy Italian restaurant. They served fresh food and its location was on a pretty square between Hollywood Boulevard and the Loews Hotel. It was quite a drive for them both, but in their opinion, well worth it.

  ‘What a wonderful idea!’ Simone said.

  After the phone call, Kayla made herself another promise.

  This silence on the telephone had gone on long enough. Today she would call Jason and talk things over. She couldn’t take it any more. She wanted to find out what had been happening. If only things had gone well, if only he weren’t in trouble, if only …

  If only he’s coming back.

  That was her most devout prayer.

  Kayla found a parking spot for her Chrysler and followed the Walk of Fame toward Mulligan Square. The sun felt hot on the back of her neck. She adjusted her Ray-Bans and glanced in passing at the street show in front of Mann’s Chinese Theater. Today featured a performance by a man in Spiderman garb. Beside him stood Darth Vader accompanied by Star Wars soldiers in white uniforms. A group of tourists clicked away with their cameras.

  She passed the statue of Charlie Chaplin, looking back at her from beneath his bowler hat with his famous grin, and thought: Life was simpler in your day. Had the Polaroid camera even been invented yet?

  As Kayla ascended the steps to Mulligan Square, music blared from across the square. She had to think a moment before she recognized the singer. Sheryl Crow. She passed an ice cream vendor and yet another stall selling hotdogs. From there she crossed beneath an arcade and walked up some stone steps toward the Milano. Once inside she scanned the tables. Simone hadn’t arrived yet. She found a table, ordered a glass of wine, and waited.

  Simone bounced up the steps fifteen minutes later, beaming. Kayla rose, they hugged, and soon were chatting away as close friends are wont to do. Simone’s chatter and buoyancy cheered Kayla up. She could put her troubles on the back burner and lose track of time.

  But questions continued to nag at her. What was going to happen after this afternoon? What was Jason doing in San Francisco? More importantly, how much damage had their relationship sustained, and could that damage be repaired?

  Later. Not now. Right now I’m here with Simone.

  A waitress brought Simone’s pasta dish and Kayla’s Mediterranean salad. They touched glasses.

  ‘How’s Cliff doing?’ Kayla asked as she dug into her salad. ‘I hardly talked to him while I was staying at your place. Or to you, for that matter.’

  ‘Oh, Cliff is doing fine,’ Simone said. ‘Latest news, hot from the press: he’s been promoted again. He’s a senior salesman now.’

  ‘Congratulations.’

  ‘There’s a downside, though. It means he’ll be away from home even more than before.’

  Cliff worked a
t AT&T and put in long hours, Kayla knew. She also knew that Simone wouldn’t mind Cliff taking on a less demanding job, one that would allow him to spend more time at home. But Cliff loved his job and was ambitious. More so than Jason, Kayla speculated, although he had often wondered out loud what it would be like to be his own boss and manage his own business. She had advised against it, worried about long nights, back-breaking work and poverty. The latter she could live with, maybe, because money wasn’t nearly as important to her as her marriage. But if some day he decided to take the plunge, well, she would be there for him.

  She would cross that bridge if and when she came to it.

  Although Simone had never taken another job after waitressing at The Duchess, she did volunteer three mornings and two nights a week at a telephone helpline for abused or battered children.

  Children. It crossed her mind that she hadn’t told Simone about Jason’s and her decision to try and have children. Should she mention it? No, she decided. Simone and Cliff had been trying for a long time to have children themselves. The latest medical exams had suggested that the problem lay with Cliff and not Simone. He had a low sperm count, Simone had confided to her recently.

  But the crisis in her own marriage was really why she refrained from broaching the subject. It was as if a black cloud had descended on her, and it was one that Simone noticed.

  ‘What wrong, Kayla?’ she asked her friend with concern. ‘You seem distracted.’

  Kayla managed a smile. ‘Oh, just some small issues. But I’ll iron them out.’

  ‘Is something wrong between you and Jason?’

  Kayla had said nothing to her, but Simone’s intuition had pieced together the puzzle while Kayla was staying at her house. And now she had asked the question that she had been dying to ask.

  ‘Some other time, Simone, please,’ Kayla begged off.

  ‘You can trust me. I’m your best friend.’

  ‘I know. I know that all too well. But I’m not done with this. I have to find out for myself how this will end and then I have to deal with whatever it is I find. If you understand what I’m talking about.’

  ‘Of course. I understand. Mum’s the word.’

  Simone didn’t mention it again, as was her nature. She could be patient, no matter how curious she might be.

  They enjoyed a delightful lunch that ended with a cup of tea, after which they paid the check and left the restaurant. The two women didn’t hurry when they walked back toward Hollywood Boulevard and past the shops on Mulligan Square. Simone talked about a trip to New York she and Cliff would be taking the following week to visit his family. She was looking forward to it, she said, although she wasn’t as thrilled about the stifling August humidity in the Big Apple. She chatted at length about Maura and Claudia, Cliff’s cousins, with whom she got along and was looking forward to seeing. Claudia had been dieting and had lost forty pounds, apparently, and Simone wanted to see the result with her own eyes.

  Kayla paused to peer into the window of a souvenir shop. A necklace made of silver, prettily decorated, had caught her eye. It was delicate, shaped like a flower, and it had much to commend it.

  But the necklace also touched her on a deeper level, and seemed to cast a spell on her. Suddenly she felt a wave of fatigue wash over her. Surely, she thought, it could not be from the two glasses of wine she had consumed at the restaurant. It had to be caused by the strain she’d been under lately. It had exhausted her; she needed some rest, some quiet in her life. When would that blessed feeling of peace and contentment finally return?

  She returned home late in the afternoon. Her cell phone had remained silent that entire day, but as she sat down on the couch it started playing her ringtone. It was Jason. He asked her how she was doing. She said she missed him and asked when he was coming home from San Francisco.

  ‘We have to talk about things. I want to talk about things.’

  ‘Me, too,’ he said with a sigh. ‘Me too, Kayla.’

  ‘What are you doing out there?’

  ‘I’m looking for something,’ he said. ‘But it’s not going so well. I’m stuck.’

  ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘I’ll tell you later. I think I can wrap it up here pretty soon. After that, I don’t know.’

  His voice had an edge of desperation in it, she got the distinct impression that he was desperate. She didn’t ask him what the trouble was. She didn’t care. For her, there was only one thing that mattered.

  ‘Promise me you’ll be back soon?’

  ‘I promise,’ he said quietly.

  The hours crawled by. She clicked through a number of channels on television without paying much attention to anything that was on.

  At ten o’clock, he called again and sounded radically different. He was excited, enthusiastic, as though possessed by something. Even his voice sounded different. His words came out in staccato fashion like rounds from a machine gun, but nothing stuck in her head. She did hear that he wanted her to return to Simone’s house. He didn’t want her to be home alone. He had discovered something, was on to someone, and he would take the six o’clock flight from SFO back to LAX the next morning.

  Then he hung up, and she sat gazing mutedly at her phone. It was much too late to call Simone and ask her if she could spend the night at her house. And besides, she didn’t feel like going over there. So she decided to stay at Canyon View.

  Although that night was free of the Grim Reaper, Kayla dreamed of being inside the tent with Ralph. Only this time it wasn’t Ralph beside her; it was Jason. He screamed – he was on fire. Flames leapt furiously around his face, his arms, his entire body. His skin was bleeding and blackening. He shrieked in horror.

  He turned and threw himself at her in his panic, and she felt him, really felt him. She started awake to feel a hand pressing down on her mouth.

  A figure draped in ebony black clothing towered over her. A man of flesh and blood. He was inside her bedroom and his hand was at her mouth, making it hard for her to breathe. He was large, wide-shouldered and strong as iron. In a flash he removed his hand and struck her a searing whiplash across the face. Kayla screamed.

  Another slap. And another … And another. He did not stop. He seemed possessed. She tasted her own blood. Her cries of pain grew louder.

  On the bed stand, within reach, her cell phone played its ringtone. But she could not reach it. Now the man in black was holding a knife in his fist. The weapon glittered in the moonlight shimmering in through the window. Her screams faltered.

  The man stabbed her with the knife, plunging it deep into her stomach.

  Pain exploded. He was killing her.

  Roughly, he turned her over on to her stomach.

  One hand slipped beneath her panties and squeezed her buttocks. With his other hand, he drove the steel blade deep into her back.

  The stabbing pain undid her and she blacked out.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  San Francisco

  After saying goodbye to Joe Bresnahan at his ranch, Jason made arrangements for his next trip. In Frank’s Cafe on Palm Square, he used the Internet to buy a plane ticket from Las Vegas to San Francisco, paid an extra fee to drive the Yukon one way to Vegas, and left Mount Peytha City at the break of dawn the next morning.

  Two and a half hours later he arrived in Las Vegas. The glitter and glam of the gambling capital of the United States remained oblivious to him; he didn’t want to risk missing his 2:40 p.m. flight to San Francisco.

  Ninety minutes later Jason was renting another car at San Francisco International Airport. He left the airport in a Ford sedan and soon arrived in the suburb of San Francisco that was his destination. Jason steered the sedan toward a detached bungalow and parked in the driveway. He got out, surveyed the area, and then walked past nicely tended flower beds to the front stoop protruding from the front of the nondescript off-white house.

  As Jason approached the front door of the bungalow, a balding, fifty-year-old man opened it and stepped outside. He wa
s wearing a baggy Hawaiian shirt that did more to emphasize his prominent stomach than to hide it, and a pair of khaki shorts and sandals. His name, Jason knew, was Phil Wallace.

  During Chris’s funeral Jason had briefly spoken with the man who had been his uncle’s next-door neighbor for three decades. As it turned out, Jason’s telephone conversation with him last evening from the Mount Peytha Inn had been about as brief as their conversation at the funeral.

  ‘Good evening, Jason,’ Phil said. ‘I saw you drive up.’

  Jason walked up to him and shook his hand. ‘Hello, Phil.’

  ‘Did you have a good trip?’

  ‘It was an uneventful one.’

  Phil nodded. ‘The best kind. Do you want to come in? Can I offer you something?’

  He gestured with his arm to the open front door of his bungalow.

  ‘Thanks,’ Jason said. ‘Could I come back tomorrow? I’d like to stop at that motel you suggested, and I’m meeting Hugo Shaver tonight. He couldn’t make time for me tomorrow or the day after.’

  ‘So you got hold of him, did you? The number I gave you must have been the right one.’

  ‘It was. And the one for Felipe as well. I’m meeting him tomorrow. I just wanted to stop by to tell you I’m here and to thank you.’

  Phil dismissed that with a wave of his hand, as if he was chasing away a fly. ‘Take your time. I’ll be here tomorrow after work, around five. Would that work for you?’

  ‘Completely.’

  Jason thought a moment, then: ‘Maybe I could ask you something, now that I’m here. Did Chris ever mention business he did in Mount Peytha City?’

  Phil frowned. ‘Mount Peytha City? Isn’t that in Utah somewhere?’

  ‘No. Arizona.’

  ‘Arizona, yeah, you’re right. What about it?’

  Jason sighed. ‘I was hoping you could tell me. Did Chris ever mention that town to you?’

  Phil shook his head. ‘No, it doesn’t ring a bell. What’s this about?’

  ‘I’ll tell you tomorrow,’ Jason said, reluctant to delve back into the entire story. ‘One more thing, if you don’t mind. Does the name Chawkins mean anything to you?’