Six Dead Spots

by Gregor Xane

  "You in some kind of hurry, kid?" the customer asked.

  Cliff stopped and looked at the bum, not answering, waiting to be given the OK to resume filling up the man's car with Apple Crisps, Handiwipes, and cans of NoodleZoni.

  "What's your name, son?" The man squinted to read Cliff's name tag. He turned away, then sharply back again, and reread the badge. "Cliff?"

  Cliff didn't answer.

  "Nice to meet you, Cliff," the bum said. "I'm Frank."

  Cliff stared, taking in the man's smell, and let his disgust feed his growing hatred.

  "Now, Cliff," Frank said. "You're not a valet and I'm not a woman." He looked at Charley, read his name tag twice, and asked, "Charley, I don't look like a woman?"

  "Not at all," said Charley.

  Cliff snorted. You don't even look human. I could choke you out, right now.

  "How old are you, Charley?" Frank said. He was still smiling at Cliff.

  "Fifteen,"

  "You have a car?"

  "I get my license next week,"

  Frank winked at Cliff, turned to Charley, looked at his name tag twice, and said, "That's not what I asked you. Charley."

  Charley was staring. He caught himself, and turned his head. "I'm saving up."

  "How much you got saved?"

  Charley shuffled his feet. "About three hundred."

  Cliff couldn't help but laugh. "Jeez, Charley. You'll get your first car just in time to drive yourself to college."

  "Do you have a bike?" Frank asked, ignoring Cliff.

  Charley turned red and bit his lower lip.

  "Yeah, he's got a bike," Cliff said, "with a basket on it."

  "Really?" Frank said. "I like baskets. Is it attached to the handlebars, or to the back of the seat?"

  Charley straightened up to defend himself. "To the back of the seat," he said proudly.

  "That's certainly much less girly," Cliff said.

  "Hey, it's functional. I don't like backpacks," Charley said.

  "It's got tassels hanging from the handlebars, too," Cliff said.

  "No, it doesn't."

  "Pink and yellow."

  "Shut up, Cliff."

  "Yes, be quiet," Frank said. "Me and Charley are talking business here."

  Don't you tell me to be quiet! Cliff wanted to say something, but he just stood there, not believing that he'd let this human filth tell him to be quiet. He struggled with this for a while, paralyzed with indecision, but finally he had to admit that this man scared him. The bum's eyes shone from beneath the filth, a reflection of a deep and dangerous inner world. His eyes projected this torment and sadness outward, covering everything, imbuing the outer world with false proofs and confirmations for his madness.

  This guy is seeing things right now, things Charley and me can't.

  "I want to make a deal with you, Charley," Frank said, wiping his nose on his coat sleeve. "I sell you my car for your three hundred."

  "Really?" Charley said, excited. Then he looked at the car's rusted body and sagging tires. "I don't know."

  "You'll have to throw in your bike, too."

  "You don't want this piece of shit," Cliff said.

  "The engine's fine," Frank said. "It will run for awhile."

  "I might think about it." Charley walked around to the other side of the car and counted bumps and scars, scratches and rusted holes. "I have to give you my bike?"

  "What are you going to do with it?" Frank patted the car. "You'll be driving this baby."

  Cliff laughed. "And what exactly is it?" he asked. "Come on, Charley. You can't even tell what kind of car it is."

  "I don't care what it looks like," Charley said. "As long as it runs."

  "It runs," Frank said. "Are you interested?"

  "I might be." Charley ran his hand over the hood and then brushed off the dirt onto his jeans. "Three hundred isn't bad."

  "No, it's not." Frank reached into his coat pocket. He removed a stack of business cards bound in a lint-covered rubberband. "Here's my card, kid. It's got my address and phone number on it. You give me a call, ride your bike over, and I'll sign over the title. You can drive away with it tonight, if you want."

  Business card? Cliff couldn't believe what he was seeing. What the hell kind of business can this guy be in?

  Charley was obviously thinking the same thing, he was studying the card closely, his face twisted up with confusion. "You're a graphic designer?" he asked.

  "Oh, yeah, the best in town," Frank said, with just a hint of sarcasm. He read and reread the top card in his stack before stuffing them back into his pocket. "So, do we have a deal, Charley?"

  "Probably. I'll think about it." Charley read the address from the card. "Weirmont. That's not too far from Wild Oaks, is it?"

  "Nope."

  "That's not too far to ride. I think I might do it."

  "Good," Frank said. "Just give me a call."

  Charley nodded his head and walked away, the groceries forgotten. He clutched the business card as if it were a winning lottery ticket, and made his way up the parking lot and through the sliding electric doors of the Old Grocer.

  "Where the hell is he going?" Cliff asked.

  "Guess it's just me and you, buddy," Frank said.

  "Yeah, I guess so." Cliff looked after his cousin. He picked up two bags filled with sugary cereal and sandwich cookies and threw them in the back seat of the car, not caring as their contents scattered onto the floor mats.

  "Be careful, kid," Frank said.

  Cliff ignored him. He knew he wasn't getting a tip.

  Chapter 14

  Frank, dressed in black, mounted his new bike, which he'd spray-painted black for the express purpose of making stealthy night missions. He turned around and patted the duffel bag of supplies in the basket behind his seat, making sure that he hadn't forgotten it, and then pedaled off down his dark suburban street, avoiding the bright circles thrown by the street lights.

  Frank had spent the last two months sleeping, dreaming, and facing his recurring nightmare head on. He'd now spent countless lucid hours at Steve's party, investigating, interviewing the party-goers, searching the back rooms for any clue to the truth of his dream. The more he lived in this dream, the more control he was able to exercise over it. Details changed with his will. He stayed longer each night, laughing and dancing, or sneaking off to look for hidden panels in the garage, depending on his mood. He'd taken guests to the back bedrooms on more than one occasion.

  The dream had stopped frightening him after he'd learned how to recognize that he was dreaming. It hadn't taken him long to overcome his fear of the magician. It only took him a week of lucid dreams before he was able to stay in the dream past the piercing trick. And he found that he came out unscathed. The magician simply removed the pipes and the wounds disappeared. He even held the magician's hand one evening and they bowed together as if they both had worked in tandem to produce this amazing feat. Frank had even spent long nights talking to the magician, one-on-one. Frank, knowing he was dreaming, asked probing questions, but the magician, provided predictably nonsensical answers.

  It was this persistent illogic of dreams that frustrated Frank. No matter how cognizant he was in the dream world, its fluid fantasies still confounded him. Being aware of the dream, able to see it clearly, didn't allow him to make sense of any of its strangeness. It only made the bizarre more vivid, the twisted more deeply felt.

  Finally, he decided that the answers to his dream didn't lie in the dream world at all, that the dream had been telling him all along exactly where the answers were to be found: Steve's house. In Steve's living room.

  Something had happened there, or something would. A secret was hidden in the walls. And Frank was headed there now to find out exactly what. His duffel bag was full with his makeshift burglary kit, amongst other things. He would have to sneak inside. He couldn't possibly ask for permission to investigate, because Jill and Steve would never grant their permission. Frank was certain that whatever was hidden
there, they didn't want him to see.

  Frank stopped in front of a familiar house to catch his breath. He'd been pedaling wildly for some time and hadn't even noticed. His mind had been too busy searching Steve's living room. But now he was starkly aware of his surroundings. He knew exactly where he was. He'd stopped in front of the house which belonged to the faceless girl from his dream. Frank didn't know who it really belonged to. But as he stared at it now, he made a mental note to find out.

  Frank watched the darkened front windows of the house, almost hoping a featureless face would reveal itself from behind a curtain. But he lost his courage in the end and quickly pedaled away when an upstairs light flipped on.

  He rode slowly the rest of the way to Steve's, avoiding street lights, careful not to show himself or make a sound. He stopped in front of a dark row of bushes across from Steve's driveway and listened. The front of the house was lit by a single bulb over the front porch. None of the windows were illuminated. Frank knew they wouldn't be. He knew that Steve and Jill went to bed early. They slept soundly and awoke well-rested every morning. It was something they bragged about. Yes. Steve and Jill would be first to say that they are both happy and healthy people.

  Frank dismounted and walked his bike up the driveway, around the back of the house, and leaned it against the steps leading up to Jill's prized screened-in porch. It was her masterpiece of wicker and hanging plants.

  Frank crouched by the basement window and peered through at a computer table and swivel chair. They seemed abandoned and useless in shadow. Frank imagined two robots, powered down for the night, retired to their storage cabinet, heads bowed in the darkness. He opened his duffel bag very slowly so that the zipper made no audible zip. He reached inside, retrieved a screwdriver and a hammer and wondered exactly what he intended to do with them. He studied the window and discovered that it was unlocked. He wedged the screwdriver under the bottom panel and pried it open. Frank then tucked away his tools and slid down into the basement, snatching his bag down after him as soon as his feet were firmly planted on the water-resistant carpeting.

  Frank held the bag close to his chest as he climbed the basement steps. He opened the door onto a quiet kitchen, dark except for a light flickering over the range. The kitchen was the middle of the house. Steve and Jill's master bedroom was located down the hall to his right. He squinted through the darkness and found their bedroom door firmly shut and no light spilling out from beneath it. Then Frank stepped softly over the plush carpet to the darkened party room on the opposite side of the house. The room smelled of stale smoke, air freshener sprayed over spilt beer. Moonlight poured through the windows leading out to Jill's porch, filtering through plants, throwing jagged shadows on the walls. The television set was a black, hulking box, a darker, brooding robot cousin to the chair and computer desk residing in the basement. The mouth of the fireplace was a tunnel leading to a lair of evil dwarfs. The glass covering the erotic art pieces glared, their silver frames shined.

  Frank lowered his duffel bag onto the couch and walked slowly across the living room and touched the wall between two pictures. It was perfect, clean, cool against his fingertips. He pressed fingers into it, and it was solid. It hadn't been recently repaired to conceal a crack. He turned his back to the wall and took a quick look around the room. Nobody was there. He sensed nothing out of the ordinary.

  He took a seat next to his duffel bag to think. Maybe if he sat in this room for a while, just sat there letting its presence wash over him, something would come to him, something might be understood. He unzipped his bag again and removed a can of NoodleZoni and a can opener. He twisted the lid off and reached inside his bag. His hand came out with a spoon and he spent the next ten minutes leisurely eating his cold noodles in spicy tomato sauce, staring at the wall, ready for it to open its mouth and taunt him with its silver-gray tongue. He scraped the last few noodles from the bottom of the can. He pushed himself from the couch in four separate motions in an effort not to rattle his bag of tools. He returned to the wall of erotic art and scratched with his over-long fingernails. He couldn't remember the last time he'd tended to them. Their tips were almost blackened now, shiny and jagged. The paint came away easily as he chipped and scratched. Flakes fell to the carpet and the vibrations, the friction of this activity, gave him the jitters. But Frank continued. He'd suddenly decided there was something hidden there. He persisted until he'd removed a ragged patch in the paint. Dull plaster shown through. He pressed his fingers through the plaster with ease and the wall broke away, leaving a hole exactly the same shape and size as the crack in his dream, and the emptiness beyond was just as stark, just as deep. Frank felt the same sense of vertigo he felt in his dreams as he peered into the hole, a feeling like leaning over a bottomless chasm, teetering on the brink with only the flimsiness of a single coat of dried paint between him and endless free fall.

  Frank took a step back. He stared at the crack in the wall, barely able to believe it was real. He wondered if his brother knew, and quickly decided that he didn't, he couldn't. Steve had never been able to keep a secret. But Jill on the other hand…

  Frank bent over and peered through the crack again. He saw a faint shimmer in the blackness. About three feet in, but it was impossible to tell for certain. The hole could be a foot deep or could go on forever. Frank retrieved a screwdriver from his duffel bag, twirled it through his fingers, and thrust its pointed end into the wall with a vicious stab.

  A triangle of plaster chipped off and tumbled into the darkness. It was preternaturally bright. Frank watched the simple flashing triangle tumble, twinkling, becoming smaller and smaller, as it fell into the void.

  He brought the screwdriver down again. And again.

  Two more cracked triangles winked out of existence.

  A slick silver wash of light swam up from the depths a moment after the triangles disappeared. It grew larger and more solid as it neared the crack in the wall. The baby doll arm's metallic gray flesh rotated in the darkness, a thing of magic, reflecting its own phantom light. Its chubby, cupped hand stopped a few inches from Frank's nose and remained perfectly still. He blinked and the arm spun in a hundred directions at once, but became still again as soon as Frank regained his focus on the piece of plastic he'd come to call the incubus.

  "What are you doing here?" Frank whispered at the detached baby-doll's arm.

  The broken toy didn't speak. It struck out at Frank, lashed him on the forehead, instantly drawing blood.

  Frank leapt back from the hole, fell onto the couch, rattling his bag of burglary tools. Then he crawled to the floor and kept perfectly still, belly and palms pressed firmly to the carpet, as if he were preparing to do a push-up. He listened for footsteps, tired voices. He stared at the hole in the wall as he listened. The gray baby doll arm twisted and twirled, making its way around the edge of the hole. It taunted him, compelled him.

  Frank crawled across the carpet, dragging his pelvis and legs like a maimed lizard. He then found himself laying his palms on the wall in a manner that he found worshipful and disturbing. He climbed to one knee and attempted to peek through the wall once again. But the doll hand swatted him away, digging out a swatch of Frank's hair from the scalp.

  He tumbled back and knocked into a flimsy floor lamp that had suddenly grown in the center of the room. Frank looked up at its lampshade that shook near the ceiling, blaring, rocking back and forth, ringing like an ancient church's bell. It cast a sort of sick truth over the bleak furniture. The couch blurred into a huddled mass of nude figures, uncomfortably intertwined to mimic the shape of a couch in darkness. They wore masks, but their faces betrayed a type of concentration and strain which contradicted their erotic arrangements.

  The bobbling lamp continued to sway, revealing easy chairs comprised of two pairs of writhing couples. The television became an aquarium filled with a perfect cube of flesh.

  Frank struggled to stop the lamp from moving. It fought him, bucked him several times before growing tired.
Frank brought it down and snapped off the light. And then he found two wing nuts at the base of the lamp's head and twisted them off. He suddenly realized that he'd disassembled this type of floor lamp before. He wasn't sure where. But he found himself unsnapping its parts and concentrically snapping it back together again in one neat compact package. When Frank was finished, the lamp was reduced to the size of an easy-to-use handheld flashlight. And it was turned off, extinguished. That was the most important thing. Frank imagined what it would have looked like from the street, the windows suddenly ablaze with the crazed flashlight beams of a mad dancing burglar.

  He held tight to the contracted floor lamp for a few minutes and waited, listened.

  A dog barked in the distance.

  Crickets carried on, chirping undisturbed. No footsteps, no raised, groggy voices.

  Frank returned to the crack in the wall. The doll's arm was gone. He reached both hands into the crack and hoisted himself up. He looked into the hole and saw the silvery wave return, joined by a dozen glowing eyes. The eyes blinked and reproduced. A dozen more eyes came into being with every blink.

  Frank saw the night sky. The eyes were stars stabbing through fog, worms of light sprouting up through thick purple mud. Frank was looking through a hole that looked onto Steve's backyard. A line of trees separated Steve's property from his neighbor's. Frank narrowed his eyes at the tree rooted directly across from the crack in the wall and found an identical crack in the tree's bark. He pressed his face deeper into the hole to get a better look. His nose and his eyes bulged through the other side of the wall. And the doll's arm returned, poking out of the tree, waving an excited parade wave.

  Frank tore himself from the wall, feeling as if he were really onto something. He soft-stepped it down the basement stairs as stealthily and as quickly as he could. He slithered out of the cracked basement window and onto the cement back patio with a grace and ease for which he felt oddly proud. He made his way around to the side of the house without disturbing too many leaves. Only a few twigs cracked under his weight. When he reached the living room's outside wall, it didn't take him long to find the tree he'd spotted from inside. He marched over to it, crushing dried leaves and not caring; the master bedroom was on the opposite side of the house.