Stealing Night
Page 11
My one good thing.
My throat fills with blood. I’m drowning.
And here I am, Jack Lewis, finally leaving Sunfall.
Only now, I don’t want to go. I don’t want to go. I don’t…
Chapter Twenty-Five
In a white room, I wake from darkness. Dull pain throbs, my head swimming, and someone holds my hand. No strength to move my head, I flick my eyes to the angel at my side.
“You’re awake,” Lily says.
“Where’s Nora?” I wheeze, my throat sandpaper dry.
“She’s with Dad and Paige. She’s…” Tears cloud Lily’s eyes. “Nora’s shaken, but…she’s going to be fine, thanks to you.”
“I…”
“She told us how you saved her. Told the police, too. They’ll want to talk to you, but everything’s going to be fine, Jack. I promise.”
“Lee?”
“Dead. Where he belongs.”
“I…I fucked up, Lil.”
“I know,” she whispers. “Let’s let that be our little secret, okay?”
“But I fucked up so bad.”
“It won’t happen again. I know it won’t happen again. Besides, you’ve given me more than my share of second chances. Now I’m clean, Jack. Really clean, and I’m going to stay this way.”
“I put Nora in danger.”
“Let it go. You didn’t mean to—”
“I have money, Lil,” I gasp, senses fading, darkness creeping in. “You and Nora can run…run away. Get her away from me. I…I’m cursed.”
Sobbing, Lily shakes her head. Then she kisses my cheek and whispers something in my ear.
“Sometimes,” she whispers, “sometimes it’s better not to run.”
Four
Years
Later
Epilogue
There was a time when I had nothing to live for, nothing worth dying for, no one to love, nothing to lose.
That’s all changed.
Occasionally I wake from a distant dream, my old wound screaming as I gasp—no more cigarettes for One-Lung Lewis—with Jenny Snowdon’s ghost haunting the cellar of my mind. But night terrors visit less and less as the world keeps turning, and Paige is always beside me for comfort. Kissing away pain.
Dad died last year. Brain cancer. Inoperable. We were all by his side when he went. I’ve heard it said that there’s never any dignity in death. To those who buy that shit, I say, you didn’t watch Charles Lewis go. The speech center of his brain was so torn up that he couldn’t say goodbye with words, but his eyes did a fine job. All of us took turns letting him go, letting him know how much we loved him, and how sorry we were for wasted time.
Lily and Nora moved to Omaha last year. I still see them once or twice a month when they come to my famous customer appreciation barbecues with Lily’s husband, Kyle Conrad. Kyle owns the clearinghouse that supplies much of my inventory. Paige and I—though I have to give her most of the credit—set them up on their first date. He’s a good man. A good husband. And a good father. Nora’s crazy about him, but me and Bear, we still have a connection.
Always will.
Paige and I have been trying to have a child. So far, no dice, but the “practicing,” as she calls it, sure is fun. Anyway, the kid we already have, Cody, is handful enough. He eats us out of house and home and is starting to look like he might have a future in pro football. I take him fishing on the weekends, and we play catch in the backyard every evening. Cody Lewis. He took my name, calls me “Daddy,” and I call him son, because he is.
We live in the house where I grew up. At first I thought of selling the place, but Paige had another idea. She said that a new generation of Lewis’s should be given a chance to get it right in this house, to exorcise the past, to make it a home. I’ll say this about my Strawberry Girl: she’s smarter than anyone I know.
Every day the place feels a little warmer.
With Dad’s help, using part of my old college fund, I bought the lot from Bud Sweeny two years ago. Business is pretty solid, people coming in from all over the county to buy my cars. I’ve even had customers from out of state. All right, one, and he came from northern Kansas, which isn’t exactly that far away. Still, Bud swears he never had an out of state sale in all his years.
Bud and I have grown close. He enjoys retirement, but fills his empty time by working for the Sunfall Chamber of Commerce, of which I’m president and founder. According to our records, the town actually grew by one hundred and forty-three souls last year. That number will seem paltry to city folks, but it means a hell of a lot here. A new factory went in a year and a half ago, and a new school is currently under construction.
The future sure looks brighter than the past.
Speaking of the past, the Snowdon money, even after all the talk of hiding it, was found in the trunk of Lee’s car, and the case was closed. I never told anyone that I witnessed her murder, and I don’t know if I ever will. In the end, I guess, we all have a dark secret, something that would extinguish all light if revealed. Guilt will always linger, judge me in the darkness, threaten me with its ugliness, and remind me…remind me that when the gun came out, I took a step back.
A step away from conflict. Me, ready to run.
Then I remind myself, I was only a child. A newborn. Since that time, I’ve learned so very much. I’ve learned to be an anchor in the storm for others. To be sturdy. And so I swallow my guilt, because it’s my burden, not theirs, and I don’t have time for the paradoxes of morality. I’m happy enough just being on the side of the angels.
When the Snowdons offered me the two hundred-fifty large, essentially for killing their daughter’s murderer, I turned it down. They used the money instead to found an organization committed to improving the lives of mentally ill children.
Jennifer Snowdon, it turns out, was bipolar, and in love with a boy her rich parents didn’t approve of, Jason Shapiro. The money that ultimately drove Lee to kill her was stolen from the family. Money for a new life.
Crazy?
Maybe.
But when her voice haunts me, when I hear her call Jason’s name, I hear love, not insanity. Some will argue that love’s its own form of insanity. Fuck them. I hope Jason loved her, too. I hope they’re somewhere nice.
Meanwhile, the world keeps turning, and here I am, awake to feel her.
If I have my way, I’ll never sleep again.
Peter Giglio
October 1, 2012
Lincoln, Nebraska
From Sunfall
with Love
A special debt of gratitude is owed to my talented beta-readers for Stealing Night.
Eric Shaprio, one of my brothers from another mother—you always cut to the quick. Your notes on the outline and the first draft made me bleed in necessary and invaluable ways. Much love, brother.
Shannon Michaels and Bryan Walker—much gratitude from the bottom of my heart. Friendship is rare. Insightful and honest friendship is golden. Thanks for setting the gold standard so high by helping push this work to the next level.
(Note: Shortly after Stealing Night was accepted for publication by Nightscape Press, Bryan Walker passed away unexpectedly. A good man taken too soon. He will be missed.)
And to those who have been supportive in one way or another over the last year: Scott Bradley (my brilliant writing partner and another brother from another mother), Joe McKinney, Robert Shane Wilson, Mark Scioneaux, Jennifer Wilson, Annie Melton, John Skipp, Karen Giglio, Frank Hall, Gwen Perkins, Rhoda Jordan, Ava Gerard, Gregory L. Norris, Trent Zelazny, Peter N. Dudar, Geoff Kruse, Gene O’Neill, Rick Hautala, Holly Newstein, Eric J. Guignard, Hank and Holly Snider, David Bernstein, Sandy Shelonchik, Mark Allan Gunnells, Jeremy C. Shipp, Ivana Lovric, and Charles Day. If I forgot your name, I’m sorry. The last year has brought me an embarrassment of riches and it’s regrettably all-too-easy to forget every kind gesture and moment of grace.
There have been many.
Thank you.
Love,
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