“Are you done?” Hank sighed. “I’m really very busy. Places to go, people to see, worlds to destroy. Oh, wait, “ he snapped two twig fingers, “that’s right. Destroying the world is your job, isn’t it?”
Corey’s shoulders shook, like tremors in the earth, as he turned the chair slowly back to the old man. “Please go away. I’m sorry for whatever is wrong with you, but I’ve done nothing. I don’t even know you. You need to leave me and my family alone. You’ve been spying on us, maybe even looking through our windows. Stalkers get arrested. You don’t want to spend the next few years in jail, do you?” He’d been able to maintain a steady, calm voice, never yelling but not sounding soft either. Never show fear. “You need to leave me, now, or I will have Andrew call security. If I even see you walking down my street, I’ll call the police. Do you understand me, Mister Cowles? I need to know if you understand me.”
Hank’s bottom lip began to quiver. Oh, this is great, Corey thought. The guy’s going to start crying in my cubical. He’s nuttier than a peanut and you’re telling him he’s going to jail!
But the old man did not start crying. He nodded, said, “Yes, yes I suppose you’re right.” Then, as if remembering something, he looked up, face bright, no sign of fear. He snapped his fingers again and said, “I know, why don’t you,” he pointed at Corey’s face, “go home, right now, and wind that fucking clock before I kill every member of your pretty little family.” He leaned forward suddenly and grabbed Corey’s shirt in two thin fists, moving so quickly Corey didn’t know how to react except crane his head back and stare, chin tucked in, recoiling as if from a punch.
Hank continued, “You wound the clock. You set this damned thing going, set everything in motion. You wonder what everyone’s so upset about around here because all of a sudden pretending the world is soup spoons and monkey shit isn’t working anymore. It’s not. It’s not. You wound it and began the End of the Ages. Now you’re the only one who can see it to its conclusion.”
…wound the clock and began the end of what? What the hell was he talking about? Cowles’ words were jumbled and confusing, so much so that Corey only now realized the guy had just threatened to kill Samantha and Abby.
No, he thought. You won’t touch them. “Not this time,” he hissed, and leaned forward, or tried to. Overpowering the man should have been easy; grab his shirt and push him back, scream at him to go to hell, touch my family and I’ll kill you first.
He couldn’t move. Cowles’ grip was iron-hard. The old man leaned further towards him, half raised from his seat, pressing his knuckles into Corey’s collarbone. Where was Andrew? He must be hearing all of this! The knuckles were hurting, pressing into muscle, maybe even cutting him.
“Yes, yes,” Hank hissed. “I’ll cut, and do worse.” His breath was sour, as if he hadn’t brushed his teeth in weeks. “You’re afraid of the world crashing around you, think you can control it by ignoring it. Now, Boy, I’ll tell you a secret. Ducking for cover in your little hidey-hole of a home is the very reason for what is going on out there,” he nodded towards the window. “It’s your fault. The clock is ticking, but now it’s winding down. It’s winding down and so is the world. You need to go home, wind it, get the world ticking again. If you don’t, if the clock stops, the world goes boom!” He shook him for effect, bony knuckles pressing harder. “Do you understand me, Corey Union? I need to know you understand me. You have what you wanted. Control, over everything and everyone. Wind the clock and save the world. Let it die and so does everything else.”
Cowles shoved him once, let go and leaned back in the guest chair. He resumed sliding his hands across his pant legs, sailing them up, up, down. “Pretty straight forward if you think about it.” Eyes cast down, already elsewhere in his thoughts.
Corey curled up, lifting his feet from the floor. He tried to straighten, tried to say something defiant, but his brain was spinning, catching and dropping the contradictions in what Hank Cowles just said. He couldn’t believe that nonsense, could he?
Of course not. Of course not. It was B-movie fodder— fantasy.
Hank stopped mid-flight, turned to him. “Fantasy?” He laughed, yellow teeth, a few missing. “You’re one to talk about fantasy, Corey. I’m the one who’s here this time, but Charlie is waiting back in Hillcrest. Charlie and my little army.”
“Army?” His voice was so weak, wanting to be left alone. Where the hell was Andrew?
Hank got up, lips opening and closing, “buzz, buzz, buzz…” and giggled.
Wanting to cry, wanting to lash out if there wasn’t a chance of falling under such inhuman strength again, Corey merely watched him wander into the aisle beside the windows. Hank looked out over Main Street, hands on hips.
“Go home, my sad little friend, and do your duty.” He twisted around, turning his body while the brown shoes still faced the wall. His face twisted into a smile. “Unless, of course,” giggle, “you need a ride, Mister?”
Corey’s heart melted like plastic, then hardened into a painful new shape. Before he could leap to his feet and throw himself at him, Hank had turned around and walked away.
Corey was suddenly standing, without remembering doing so, understanding that if he had leapt towards the old man he’d have sailed through the window. He stumbled into the aisle, but Hank Cowles was gone. Andrew was gone, too. The floor was quiet. A few steps at a time, checking every workstation, every chair, up his aisle and down the next.
Need a ride, Mister? Playing over and over in his head. Why were those words gutting him hollow like this?
He stopped after the third aisle. Everyone was gone. Home? Corey wandered back to his desk, tapped the mouse and reentered his password to get into the network. Clicked on email. A message from Jacob to the team,
In light of what is happening, everyone, except for service-critical personnel is authorized to leave. Head out whenever you want, and go home. Be with your families. You’re all in my prayers, especially that we’ll see each other on Monday. Don’t enter the time as vacation - personal time is fine. Go home soon.
Jacob.
Corey read the email over and over, knowing if he stopped, he’d be tempted to look for other emails or go online and check out what everyone was so upset about. It was bad, really, really bad. Breathing fast, he closed his eyes, tried to calm down. Hank Cowles hadn’t really been here. He couldn’t have disappeared that quickly.
Corey got up, wandered over to the bank of windows. Traffic must be bad outside if everyone was being let go. Four flights down, the street was deserted. A couple of empty cups rolled along the sidewalk. A single section of newspaper fluttered against the traffic light a block south.
Where were the cars? Cowles’ visit hadn’t been more than a few minutes. A cloud passed overhead. Corey looked up, blue sky, occasional weak tuft of cloud, but nothing—then they came into view, dropping in front of him and curling like smoke before dashing north, pulled along by a vacuum left in the wake of all the missing people. Bees, some long-bodied yellow, others sleek black wasps, fat bumble bees, swirling and mixing like a tornado past his window. All migrated north, towards Hillcrest. Towards home.
So many. Impossible. The smoke of their mass thinned until the last few stragglers passed between the buildings; then Corey was alone again, fingertips pressing on the glass, heat outside trying to squeeze through.
Home. He turned back towards his desk, picked up the phone and hit the speed-dial, got the bleep-bleep of a broken connection. No lines out. He pressed flash, tried again. Same alert. Phone lines were either too crowded, or non-existent.
The clock is ticking, but it’s winding down, like the world.
He’d said something like that. Corey stared at his monitor, at the open email. Go home to die, it may as well have said. Corey couldn’t stop it. Didn’t matter if a crazy person said he could. A clock. Nothing but a stupid, ugly clock.
The screen saver flashed on, WG Industries logo, bouncing around a field of black. Beautiful summer day refl
ecting on the glass from the window behind him.
He tried the phone again, slammed the receiver down as soon as the alert bleated in his ear. Corey grabbed his briefcase, checked his pocket for the keys, the usual end of the day routine. Barely two o’clock in the afternoon and the building, the whole city, was empty. He walked towards the elevators, slowly, calmly, waiting for people to reappear, for this mad hallucination to end. All the way down to the Parking Garage Level 2, doors opened to an empty span of concrete, save one lone car. His car. Waiting to take him home to die with his family.
VII
The house was too quiet without Abby puttering around. No television, no small voice asking what she was doing, if she wanted to play a game. No singing songs or moments of startled warmth as her daughter hugged her legs in a sudden urge to show how much she loved her Mommy.
Peaceful, as well, a breath of quiet to be Samantha. Answering to no one. Sam tapped the open notebook with the pen, scrawled random lines around the page. She’d written two short verses, on the paradox of wanting time and missing the lack of it, missing her daughter. Worrying. Two small moments of thought in words and lines and stanzas.
At the moment, however, she felt no inclination to do anything but run the pen across the freshly turned page, draw random shapes and find hidden pictures in her mind. Something moved at the edge of her vision. She looked up, expecting to see a rabbit or squirrel across the yard. Vanessa emerged from the wooded path. Even without the usual summer humidity it was hot, near ninety but Vanessa wore the same black dress. It swayed with her motion. Perhaps as a small acknowledgement to the weather, she had the top button of the dress undone, exposing a long, slender throat. The dress had no sleeves this time. Sam was surprised Vanessa would simply wander onto her property like this, uninvited, but acknowledged a thrill at seeing her. She was lonely, and bored, not knowing what else to do with her time but write, even as laundry and yard work needed her attention. Today was a respite from the mundane. A new, wonderful excuse to do nothing practical was now walking towards the porch, waving.
Samantha laid the notebook on the table and dropped the pen on top of it, rose to meet her neighbor as she stepped onto the porch. Vanessa didn’t slow in her approach, simply closed the distance and wrapped Sam in a long, soft embrace. Leaves and cut grass, cool nights overhead as their bodies pressed together. One day Sam would ask about that, how such a wonderful scent flowed around this woman, but did not get the chance. Everything happened too suddenly.
Vanessa pulled back, laid a gentle hand on Samantha’s cheek. Sam waited, expectant, unsure what it was she expected and pretended she did not know. The woman’s free right hand reached back, pulled something loose from around her waist. Sam’s breath caught as her imagination traveled faster than the reality of what was happening. Vanessa’s arm swung back.
The long knife glinted in the sun, then was lost from view. A sudden sharp prick under Sam’s chin, in the soft place between jaw and throat. She took in a quick breath but did not move, her brain focusing only on the steady, feather-light pressure of the blade.
Vanessa smiled, a warm, caring expression. The point of the knife pressed harder. Sam tilted her head back, hoping to forestall the inevitable breaking of skin, the knife pushing into her brain.
The woman’s other hand lingered on her cheek then touched her own face, as if transferring the feel of one to the other. She said, “I’m sorry, Samantha, but it has to be done. You’ll understand later. Right now, you have to do exactly what I say or I’ll have no choice but to kill you. Nothing personal, I promise. Corey’s coming back and I need to be with him, alone, for a little while. “
“Please,” Sam said, but stopped speaking when the point pressed though her skin, just a little. No pain, but something wet ran down her throat. Please, she thought, hoping to convey the word with her eyes.
Vanessa leaned forward, kissed her cheek on the very spot her fingertips had brushed. “I’m sorry,” she said, “we have to go.”
She shifted, moved out of sight behind her. The blade swiveled and curved across her neck but never lost contact. Sam whimpered, closed her eyes, waited for the slash, the cutting open of her throat. “Open your eyes, Samantha,” she said, “and begin walking towards the stairs, then down, back the way I came. The path.”
Was she taking her to her own house? Why, why, why? She wanted to scream, but every step down, across the grass, was a new chance for the blade to slice her open, spill her life down her t-shirt. Abby needed to be picked up. She would do whatever Vanessa wanted, so she could be free to bring Abby home. Pick up her daughter then run, run, run.
The pressure of the blade lessened, had turned so the sharp edge was aimed away from her when she moved into the trees. Still, the contact was there, never broken. “Watch where you’re going. Look down.” Samantha did, slowly stepped around the roots and shallow impressions in the path, moving her head only enough to scan the terrain a few feet ahead of them. She didn’t dare trip, end up sliding along the blade.
She couldn’t die. Abby needed her. Corey needed her.
Vanessa said Corey was coming home. How could she know that? He would have called. Sam walked and thought, Stay away, Corey. Go get Abby and go far away from here.
Thunder rumbled again in the distance. The sound was out of place. No rain was in the forecast; the air was dry with no taste of a storm. Another rumble, still far off. A plane, only a plane.
Why was Corey coming home?
In unison, the tops of the trees bent in a wind she did not feel here, sheltered by their presence.
“Here,” Vanessa said. Her left hand pressed on Sam’s shoulder, directing her off the path, towards a tall, collapsing structure half-buried in a copse of trees. Corey’s hidden shack, Sam guessed, where he’d found the key.
“Watch your step. Please don’t try to run.” Vanessa pressed the dull side of the knife harder against her jugular to emphasize the request, moved it around until it rested against her right collarbone. “We’re almost there. But we have to hurry, before your husband gets home.”
Sam risked, “Why? Why do you care if he comes home?”
They stopped in front of the cockeyed door, open and leaning on one hinge. Inside was dark. Trapped heat drifted out from this darkness like settling steam.
Thunder again.
“He’s going to wind the clock, and I have to stop him. As you can hear, the world is coming apart. If he winds it, it’s over. The clock must continue until the end. He has to let it wind down. It has to stop.”
She spoke these words matter-of-factly, but what she actually said tore apart any hope that Vanessa could be reasoned with. She was insane. Her new friend was crazy and was going to kill Corey over a clock. “Inside, quick.”
Sam hesitated, understanding now that doing what she said was only going to hurt Corey, not help him. One more time, try and talk to her. “Please, take me back. I’ll move the clock. You can take it with you, even. I promise. Take it, smash it, just leave us alone.”
The fingers of Vanessa’s hand squeezed around her left shoulder, pulling a bit of Sam’s tee shirt and skin. Samantha moaned but was too focused on which way to break free, where to hit Vanessa first to avoid getting cut too badly. “I don’t have time to explain, Samantha. I wish I could. He’s the only one. I can’t touch it and you can’t do anything, either. He’s the one who wound it.” She pushed Sam towards the door.
Now, do something now!
As soon as Sam thought this, a sharp pain ripped into her right shoulder, heavy pressure following, harder, insistent. She cried out. The pain worsened. The blade was inside her. She screamed, “Stop!” when it twisted, tearing her muscles. Out, then in again, an inch from the first spot, so deep! Sam screamed again, losing focus on her thoughts, fell forward. All sense of time and place were jumbled in the jagged pain racing through her body, washing down from her shoulder. How badly was her shirt ruined? Were any fibers inside her body? Sam was barely aware how bizarre thes
e questions were, but held them close as she stumbled into the shed, trying to get away from the knife and the pain.
A foot kicked her behind the knees. Sam fell, her right arm ineffectual when she landed and rolled over onto it, wondering if dirt was getting into the cuts. When she was on her back, Vanessa pressed her knee into Sam’s stomach. The blade drifted between them when she said, “I’m so sorry, Samantha, but you were going to do something stupid and I don’t have time to fight you. Please do what I say or I’ll find Abby and kill her. I’m sorry, I really like her, but I’m out of time and you have to do what I say. Please just do what I say.”
Staring past the knife, coated with blood that also dripped down the handle and over Vanessa’s fingers, focusing on her face at last, Sam forgot the pain. Abby’s name filled her with cold, killed whatever fight was left.
Vanessa continued, ”I will, not that I want to, but you need roll over right now and put your hands behind your back. If you do what I say, you’ll be fine and so will Abby. I’ll come back and set you free. I promise. That’s a bad cut on your shoulder and you’ll bleed out if I don’t come back soon. But I have to go now or you will die. So will Abby and everyone else. Do you understand? I have to know you understand.”
Outside the shed, the trees bent under another boom of thunder. It’s not thunder, Sam thought, then could think no more as she was rolled onto her stomach. Her arms were pulled back, the right tingling into numbness. Vanessa pulled her wrists together. Samantha dropped her face into the dirt floor, crying against the dust. She coughed, choking, turned her head and spit. The pressure on her back lessened but her arms remained behind her, locked in the vice of Vanessa’s hands.
“I promise,” Vanessa said again, moving but always keeping contact, picking something up beside her the same color as the floor. An old rope. A long coil of it pulled out of sight then wound around her wrists so quickly Sam fought only in reflex, forced herself to calm, wait, wait for Vanessa to leave. There were other things in the shed, further back, small lumps of shadow. Sam was pushed sideways again and screamed at the jagged twist in her shoulders. Clouds of dry earth rose up but settled again over everything, her shirt and face, Vanessa’s black hair. Sam coughed, closed her mouth and eyes, breathed shallowly through her nose. Her ankles were bound. Again she was rolled over and did not fight, felt no pain. A moment later, her legs were bent back and she was hog-tied with her face turned away from the dirt and the dark unmoving shapes in the far corner of the room, lost in a shed in the middle of the woods and she was going to die and who was going to pick up Abby? Who was going to save her daughter?
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