by Rick Hautala
“Yes, damnit!“ Hellboy said.
When he clenched his fist and pounded the table in anger, his hand grazed the cooler and knocked it over. The impact snapped the latch, and it opened up, spilling its contents onto the table. Lorraine let out a piercing scream when she saw a large, wrinkled object that looked like a gigantic dried prune until she realized that she was looking at a face. The lips were dried and cracked, pulled back into a terrible grimace that exposed the top row of yellowed, rotting teeth. The nose had caved in, leaving a dark V-shaped divot, and the eyes were closed and sunken in, the lids looking like thin layers of moldy onionskin.
Lorraine pushed herself violently away from the table and tried to stand up, but her legs felt unstrung and nowhere near strong enough to support her. She sagged back in her chair, gasping for breath, but she was afraid to breathe the sour, sickening smell that exuded from the severed head.
“Jesus! Is that him? Is that Red Shirt?“ she managed to say between gasps for breath. Her stomach clenched furiously, and a thick, sour taste flooded the back of her throat.
“Oh, no...no,“ Hellboy said, scrambling awkwardly to get the severed head back into the cooler and close it. “That’s something else entirely.“
“Jesus God!“ Lorraine said. “It...that didn’t even look human.“
“Oh, it was,“ Hellboy said as he slid the closed travel across the table to the Finn. “About two thousand years ago, anyway.“
The Finn stared at the cooler. “You found it,“ he said, almost in a whisper. “Where the hell did you find it?“
“Don’t ask,“ Hellboy replied grimly. “Just be glad you got it back. It was worth the bruises just to get you off my back.“
The Finn didn’t even acknowledge Hellboy’s gruff comments. He looked closely at the cooler a moment, then put it on the floor next to his chair.
“Well, then,“ Lorraine said, struggling to regain her composure now that the terrible object was out of sight. “It’s getting way late. I...my sister must be wondering where I am. I’d best be getting along.“
She got up shakily from the table. Her first and strongest impulse was to turn and run out of there, but she stood there for a moment, making sure her legs weren’t going to give out on her when she started walking.
“Hey, wait a minute,“ Hellboy said. “Where you going?“
He was looking at her, sort of, but his gaze was shifting and unfocused.
“Now that The Finn’s here, and you know the whole story, aren’t you going to toast to Red Shirt’s memory with us?“ he asked.
Lorraine licked her lips, all too aware of the sour churning deep down in her stomach. She didn’t know if she wanted to run away or pass out or what, but now that the head was, mercifully, out of sight, she didn’t quite feel so bad.
Finally, she shrugged and said, “Ahh...oh, sure. What the hell?“ and slid back into her seat.
For the first time that evening, Hellboy smiled as he raised the empty pitcher above his head to signal Kyle that they were ready for another round. Outside, the cold, autumn rain lashed against the window as the late October storm blew toward the distant Maine coast.
