I took a seat on the hill next to the Walrus. My spine was still healing, so I lay flat on my back and let my body do its thing.
I couldn’t see the driveway from behind the house, but it wasn’t long before I heard no less than four squad cars roar in. After that I heard the slamming of car doors, and then there was nothing.
I imagined Pat and her boys standing on the porch looking at the space where my front door used to be.
“This is the Eudora Police Department,” Pat’s amplified voice sounded from over the top of the house. She must’ve brought a bullhorn with her. “Come out with your hands in the air!”
I sighed and shook my head. I wanted to shout out to them, but I just couldn’t find it in me. After the morning I’d had, I was exhausted and yearned for sleep. I thought about my bed and sighed again.
Eventually, after hearing no response from within the house, Pat and the boys would have to enter. They would go in, guns drawn, and search room to room. Someone would shout “Clear” each time a room was checked and found empty. They would move methodically through the house, and as my room was in the back, they would reach it last. But, sooner or later, they would get to my room and find what I can only assume would be a hole in the wall where the window used to be, and surmise by the fact that since all the glass and drywall lay scattered about on the grass and not in the room, that we’d taken our fight outside.
I started to drift off there among the leaves, the breeze blowing over me like a cool blanket. Then something landed lightly on my chest. I opened my eyes and raised my head just enough to find a squirrel—yeah, that squirrel—watching me.
“Hey there, little guy,” I said. I had begun to feel like I’d just swallowed an entire bottle of whiskey in one go. The healing will do that to me.
The squirrel cocked its head.
“Look, I’m sorry about earlier,” I said. “I was frustrated and I’m afraid I took it out on you, and that’s not fair.”
The squirrel just continued to sit on my chest and look at me, its nose twitching so rapidly that it was practically vibrating.
“So what do you say, pal?” I held my hand out. “Forgiven?”
It approached my proffered hand with a caution one often sees in small animals. It took a quick sniff at my fingers, looked up at me one last time, and then sank its teeth into the flesh of my hand; breaking skin and drawing blood.
I shouted a curse—I mean, why wouldn’t I—and swung a fist at the dirty rodent. I missed, of course, and it hopped away unharmed into the woods.
“Next time I see you I’m just gonna start shooting!” I called out after the thing. “You hear my you son of a—”
“Norman?” a voice interrupted.
I turned and found Pat standing over me, a perplexed look upon her face.
She looked beautiful.
“Oh, hey, Pat.” I rose up on an elbow, shielding my eyes at the sun which had made another appearance.
“You okay, Norman? Your house—” she glanced over at the Walrus who lay in a lump beside me. “He alive?
“He is,” I said as I sat up.
“Tell me what happened?”
I did. Of course I left the part out about my chat just now with the squirrel. I figured that was best left between me, myself, and I.
“You’ve had quite the taxing day, my friend,” Pat said, offering me a hand up.
“That I have,” I said, brushing the leaves off of my rear end. “How’d he get loose in the first place?” I said, nodding toward the Walrus.
“Well,” Pat said, her face going flush. “He kinda snapped his cuffs and tore the doors off the back of the van we had him in. Then he just sorta jumped.”
“I tried to warn you, Pat. The Walrus ain’t someone you want to play around with.”
We stood in silence for a bit. I noticed the squirrel in the tree above me. I gave it a hard glare.
“I guess you know I’m gonna have to take you in,” Pat said in her typical casual style.
“I wasn’t talking to no squirrel, he was bothering me—wait,” I blinked. “What?”
“You shot up the Pub, Norman,” Pat said. “There were seven witnesses.”
“I didn’t shoot up no pub,” I said. “And there certainly weren’t no seven witnesses. Abner’s lying.”
Pat gave me that look. The one that tells me she knows I ain’t telling the whole truth.
“Okay, yeah, I shot a couple of vampires a few times, but that’s it.”
“Vampires, Norman? In Kansas? Who in the world is gonna believe that?”
“You,” I said.
“Of course I believe you, Norman. But I’m about it.”
“Ask Lemonzeo,” I said.
“We did, Norman. He tells us you stormed into the Pub and started shouting and shooting up the place. I’ve seen the damage.”
“Well he’s a dern liar,” I said. “He musta done all that after I left. You check the ballistics on them bullet holes? They .45 caliber? What about the slugs? Were there any slugs? Not all of them will match my guns.”
“Come on, Norman. What do you think this is? CSI Miami? We’re just one small town in the middle of Kansas. We’d have to send off to Topeka or Kansas City for a crime scene investigator and frankly, I just don’t think this case warrants such expenditure,” she smiled.
“All I did was shoot a vampire, Patty. I didn’t even kill it cuz I ain’t packing silver.”
“I still gotta take you in, Norman. It’s just a formality. Just answer our questions and we can let you go. I don’t think Lemonzeo wants to officially press charges.”
“Okay, fine. I’ll come quietly,” I said, raising my hands in the air.
“Put your hands down, Norman. It’s not like that. Just go get in the car and I’ll drive you down to the station.”
“You gonna bring me back home too?”
“Your Scout’s still at the office, right?”
“It is.”
“Then you have a ride home. Let’s go.” She took me by the arm and we walked around the house.
Pat took the Winchester and bundled me up in the back of her car as the rest of her boys loaded the Walrus into a paddy wagon. I’d noticed that they had no less than four pairs of cuffs on him—they weren’t taking any chances this time. That was good.
As I sat in the back of Pat’s car, watching the lights of the other squad cars rotate and bounce off the house, I thought back on my day. Nearly killed by a walrus, gnawed on by a troglodyte, lost in a goblin warren, nearly killed by a walrus once again, bitten by a squirrel, and then arrested for shooting a vampire.
Some days it just doesn’t pay to get out of bed.
21
THEY CAME FROM THE EARTH
ANTHONY HAD GROWN TO detest small town life. Unfortunately, he found himself living in Eudora, Kansas, where they wrote the book on the subject.
What he disliked the most about living in Eudora was the total lack of anything to do. Well, anything other than watching corn grow. If you wanted to do something even remotely fun you’d have to drive into Lawrence, or maybe even Kansas City. But, to do that, you’d need money. And a car. Anthony had neither.
What he did have was a fiancé who adored small towns, most especially the one she grew up in. Which, you guessed it, was Eudora, Kansas.
Anthony was from New York City. That’s where he and Maggie had met.
He’d been sitting alone in one of those out of the way coffee houses. They type of place that was cool simply because no one knew it was there. No one other than those that mattered.
Maggie had come to New York for the first time to visit an old friend. The old friend, as old friends do, had taken her out to do a little sightseeing.
The sightseeing had taken Maggie past the coffee shop in which Anthony had been sitting. He’d been gazing out the window, people watching, when Maggie had walked by. He’d sat in awe as she had walked along the sidewalk and then right into the coffee house.
Until that moment
Anthony had never believed in love at first sight, he’d thought of it as a myth that people made up just to romanticize their own relationships. But then Maggie had come along and shattered all of that.
He could still picture her out there on the sidewalk. And yes, though it had been over two years ago, he could still remember what she’d been wearing. She’d looked every inch the tourist in her I HEART NY t-shirt and her tote bag with the Statue of Liberty silk screened on the side. But what really made her stand out, at least in his mind, what really threw up that neon sign proclaiming this unique beauty as a visitor to the city that never sleeps was the fact that as she walked along the sidewalk, she had been doing what most native New Yorkers never did. She had been looking up in wide-eyed wonder.
Anthony smiled as he thought about it now, sitting in Eudora’s only coffee shop—The Coffee Bean, and wasn’t that just the most clever name ever—and sipping at what passed for coffee in middle America. He checked his watch, the second time he’d done so in the last two minutes. The shop would be closing soon and Maggie was late.
He shook his head, still smiling. Maggie was forever late, it was her one basic modus operandi, and it did nothing but endear her to him more, if that was even possible. Regardless, he found himself worrying. He glanced at his watch again and then looked out at Main Street through the glass that made up The Coffee Bean’s storefront. Darkness had fallen and the street lights had come on.
Anthony recalled the blackout that had taken out the entire town the month after he’d followed Maggie to Kansas. He’d never been in such darkness in an urban environment before, if you could call downtown Eudora an urban environment. Still, it had unnerved him like nothing ever had and he still shuddered to think about it. The bright lights of New York had always seemed to shine, they were eternal. Sure, the city had had its share of rolling black outs in the twenty years he’d lived there, but even when one area went out, you could still see the lights from other neighborhoods out in the distance.
When Eudora went dark it had been absolute.
He checked his watch for the third time.
“Sir,” a voice said at his shoulder. “We’ll be closing in two minutes.”
It was the waitress, some high school kid looking forward to getting out there and taking a few Mains before going home for the night.
“Yes, I’m sorry,” he said, looking up at her. “I’m just waiting on someone, she should be along in a minute.”
“Well, it’s going to take me at least twenty minutes to clean everything up,” she said, looking back toward the counter. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to let you wait.”
“Thanks,” he said, “It shouldn’t take that long, but I appreciate it.”
“No problem,” she said, glancing out at Main.
He followed her gaze as a carload of boys drove by, bass pumping from the car stereo, and he smiled. She wanted to be out there.
Maggie had once explained to him what it meant to take a Main, a favorite past time for local high-schoolers. It meant driving up Main, north, pulling a U-turn on Seventh, heading back down Main, south, turning left on Tenth, turning right onto Church, then use the horseshoe lot of the Happy Hamburger Drive In to turn around and head back up Church, north. Then left on Tenth and right back onto Main where you do it all over again.
Once in a while the kids would park in the lot at the top of Seventh and Main and sit to socialize with the kids in other cars. Or they would stop in at a stall at the Happy Hamburger and order soda or food. But mostly they just drove. It had all sounded more than dull to Anthony, but he couldn’t see what else a teenager with nothing but a tank of gas was supposed to do in a place like this.
He finished his coffee, took a last look at his watch, and decided that he could wait no more. Maggie was now officially thirty-two minutes late, which, regardless of her M.O., was unusual for her.
So, he left a twenty on the table—more than enough to pay for the coffee—and left the shop heading south.
Maggie worked evenings at the aforementioned Happy Hamburger Drive In. It was three minutes away by car. By foot it was almost three miles. The Happy Hamburger had closed almost an hour ago and as Anthony arrived he could see that most of the interior lights were out.
Her car still sat in the one of the four employee parking spaces behind the Happy Hamburger and he breathed a little easier. Maggie’s car was alone, meaning she’d closed down the restaurant by herself. That made him angry. Sure, she was the Manager, but she shouldn’t be left alone out here like this.
Anthony checked the front door and found it locked, which wasn’t unusual. Maggie was required to lock up the moment the restaurant closed so that no one could come in while she was counting the register. He couldn’t see anyone inside through the glass of the door, which would only mean that Maggie was in the back. Maybe she was going to the bathroom. He rapped lightly on the glass and waited.
Nothing. No movement inside.
He knocked again, only louder this time.
Again, nothing.
Anthony turned as a carload of teenagers drove through the lot. They were laughing as they sped by and he could hear the distinct sound of 80’s hair metal coming from within the vehicle.
He pulled his phone from a pocket and dialed in Maggie’s number. As the electronic ring sounded in his ear, he thought he could hear the muffled sound of her actual phone ringing. Her ring tone was rather distinct, it was the sound of R2D2 screaming. A sound he heard now, but distant. It wasn’t coming from within the restaurant, but from around back.
As he moved around to the rear of the building Anthony could hear that it was coming from her car.
He tried her car door. Unlocked. Only in a small town would someone think it’s okay to leave their door open to thieves and malcontents. He sat in Maggie’s car and looked around, finding her phone in the console between the front seats. He sighed.
Then he heard her scream.
Maggie.
It was faint, but it was her. His heart turned cold and he scrambled from the car.
The scream had come from the restaurant.
He was at the back door in five quick strides.
“Maggie!” He shouted, banging on the door.
The back door to the Happy Hamburger was solid and metal. No window. So he couldn’t see inside. He was about to run to the front and look in through the glass when she screamed again.
It had definitely come from inside. In fact it sounded like it had come from the other side of the back door.
“Maggie!” He pounded on the door then grasped the handle in both hands, shaking it so violently that it might fall off of its hinges. But it did not.
Then he remembered the key. Maggie had broken the rules by giving him a spare key to the restaurant, but she’d felt he’d need one in case of emergency, and this certainly qualified.
He fumbled for the ring of keys in his pocket and nearly dropped them. Cars continued to pull through the lot, music blaring through open windows: rap, country, and rock-n-roll. He paid them no mind as he slid the key into the lock and twisted.
The lock didn’t move.
Anthony cursed and ran a hand over his face, pulling it away dripping with sweat. He beat on the door in frustration. Why didn’t the key work?
He twisted the key again and felt more resistance.
“No! Work dammit!” He twisted and twisted, but nothing happened.
He heard a thump from within the restaurant, like something falling against a wall. Following the thump was a sound he couldn’t quite place. It was like a lion’s roar, but more high pitched. It was an animal noise, but not. It was uncomfortable and alien to his ears.
Maggie screamed again.
“Maggie! God, Maggie, I’ll get to you!” He kicked and pounded on the door, twisting the key as his heart raced.
“You okay, man?”
Anthony turned to find another carload of teenagers. A blond kid that was more acne than face looked at him through the open dri
ver’s side window.
“I need help,” Anthony said, shaking. “My fiancé is in there, something—” he wasn’t quite sure how to say it. “I heard her scream.”
He ran to the car and gripped the window sill, crouching to make eye contact with the kid.
“I have a key, but it won’t work. It won’t work!”
“Okay, man, chill,” the kid said. He was alone in the car. “I’ll call the cops, okay, just back up a little, alright?”
“Yeah,” Anthony said, standing. “Thanks. The police, yeah.” He ran his hand over his face again, the other hanging at his side, shaking like an addict looking for a fix. “The key won’t work. It won’t work.”
“Okay, man, okay,” the kid said, tapping at the screen of his phone. “They key won’t work, I get it.”
Anthony turned back to the store. The key wouldn’t work. It never worked, that’s what Maggie had told him. It didn’t just work when you twisted it, you had to—he ran to the door, lifted up on the handle, lifting the door itself a fraction of an inch, and twisted the key. There was a scrape of metal and the lock slid open.
Anthony laughed, threw open the door, and stepped into the restaurant.
Nothing seemed amiss; the restaurant looked as it should after the closers had finished sweeping, mopping, and completing the other various closing activities. He stepped fully inside and let the door close behind him. He stood in a short hallway. A few feet up to his right was a storage area. To his left were the doors to the bathrooms. Ahead was the cook aisle and more storage.
Now that he was in, he stepped cautiously. All he could hear was the pounding of his own heart. He stepped up to the opening to the right and gazed into the darkness of the store room. Maggie had shown him around once. Here was where they kept the vegetables that didn’t require refrigeration, along with cleaners and the boxes of solid grease that went into the fryers. He couldn’t see much but darkness at the moment. So he pulled his phone from his pocket, thinking to shine its light into the room.
The Adventures of Norman Oklahoma Volume One Page 11
