SORCERER
Greg F. Gifune
First Digital Edition
September 2010
Darkside Digital
A Horror Mall Company
P.O. Box 338
North Webster, IN 46555
www.horror-mall.com/darksidedigital
Sorcerer © 2010 by Greg F. Gifune
Cover Artwork © 2010 by Zach McCain
All Rights Reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
“Evil is obvious only in retrospect.”
—Gloria Steinem
Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions
-1-
“He’s still out there.”
As he sat up, Jeff’s perspiration-soaked back peeled away from the bed sheet. He squinted drowsily at the clock on the nightstand. The numbers were a jumbled blur. “What are you doing up?”
“I couldn’t sleep.” Perhaps carelessly, Eden stood nude at the apartment window. “I needed something cold to drink.” She held up a bottle of water in evidence. “It’s after midnight and he’s still out there.”
“Of course he is.” Jeff swung his feet to the floor. “That’s where he lives.”
“It’s ridiculous. No one should be living on the streets in this day and age.”
“I’d call the cops,” he said through a yawn, “but they won’t do anything.”
“Why would calling the police be your first reaction? He’s not doing anything wrong. He’s not a criminal, Jeff, he’s homeless.”
“Let him be homeless someplace else.”
“Don’t be so cruel.” Eden ran the cool plastic bottle across her brow and down along her flushed cheek. “He’s harmless.”
“How would you know?”
“He seems harmless, OK?”
“The guy’s probably a drunk or a drug addict—maybe both—and there’s a good chance he’s mentally ill. Most of them are, you know.”
“Well I feel sorry for him,” she muttered.
“Bums are bums for a reason. They’re usually bad news, these guys. For all we know he could have a criminal record a mile long.”
“And he could just as easily be someone who caught a couple bad breaks and found himself out on the street.”
Jeff searched the nightstand, located his eyeglasses and slipped them on. “Jesus, get out of the window.”
“It’s dark, he can’t see in.”
“No wonder he’s been trying to talk to you lately.”
Eden pushed a wisp of short brown hair from her eyes. “If you don’t get a job soon we’ll be out there with him. And then people like you can say horrible things about us too.”
“People like me?”
“You used to be a lot more compassionate.”
“That’s when I could afford to be. I don’t see anybody helping us, do you? We’re all on our own in this life.”
“And here I thought we had each other.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Not sure I do, actually.”
“Don’t turn this into an argument, OK?”
Eden delicately placed her free hand flat against the screen, as if to touch the night itself, or perhaps escape into it. “The bills are piling up.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
She faced him, pale breasts cutting the darkness. “If something doesn’t break soon—”
“I said I’d take care of it.” Jeff stood, peeled his boxers from his thighs and headed out of the room. “I need some aspirin.”
Eden looked back at the street two stories below. The man huddled at the base of their steps was watching her. He could see her, and they both knew it. For reasons unknown even to her, Eden felt inexplicably drawn to him ever since he’d first appeared on their street a few days before. Ignoring the rapid beat of her heart and the tingling in her nipples as they slowly stiffened, she wiped a trickle of sweat from between her breasts but made no move to cover them. The man gazed up at her, a crippling sorrow filling his eyes as he slid one hand down the front of his soiled pants.
She held his stare with an impassive version of her own. The man’s hand moved slowly at first and then more quickly. He nodded at her, encouraging her to take it farther, his hand jerking furiously now. She could see his lips moving but couldn’t hear what he was saying, just vague whispers in the night.
The man took a quick look up then down the avenue. No traffic, no one else on the street. As his stare returned to her, he unzipped his pants and pulled his erection free, stroking himself in plain view.
She stared at what he’d exposed, knowing it turned him on.
A throaty moan escaped him, echoed along the otherwise empty street.
Eden closed her eyes. A shiver breached the stifling heat and coursed through her. Absently, she dropped a hand to her upper thigh, fingertips just inches from the soft mound of pubic hair and the beginnings of wetness between her legs.
“I’ve got a splitting headache.” Jeff’s voice snapped her back as he returned to the bedroom. “Not sure if it’s allergies or what.”
She casually slid her hand up onto her waist. “It’s probably stress,” she managed, clearing her throat.
Jeff sat on the edge of the bed and watched shadows slink along the smooth contours of his wife’s bare back. Glistening with perspiration, her flesh looked like it had been sprayed down with a fine mist. “I was having a dream,” he told her. “Just now, before I woke up.”
“What was it about?”
“I was here, in the city, but I was lost and I couldn’t find you. It was like I had no memory of the city at all. I just kept aimlessly wandering the streets looking for you. I looked everywhere, but I couldn’t find you.”
“It’s OK,” she said softly. “I’m right here.”
Eden opened her eyes. The homeless man was gone.
-2-
Jeff left the apartment earlier than usual. As he exited through the main doors at the end of a small lobby, he saw the man sitting on the front steps. His clothes were filthy and ragged, his thinning dark hair snarled and matted, and the scraps of material covering his feet just barely qualified as shoes.
“Excuse me,” Jeff said firmly, “but I’ve asked you not to hang around here. If you keep it up I’ll have to call the police, understand?”
The man looked at him through bloodshot eyes and scratched at the heavy growth of stubble along his chin. “Why do you hate me?” he asked in a raspy voice.
Eden’s face came to him just then, her words from the night before ringing in his ears. You used to be a lot more compassionate. Jeff continued to the bottom step. “Look,” he said, attempting a considerate tone, “I don’t hate you, all right? But you make a lot of people in the building uncomfortable.”
“Then how come you’re the only one who gives me a hard time? I’ve never done anything to you.”
“Don’t you have anywhere else to go?”
“If I had anywhere but the street, don’t you think I’d be there?”
Jeff found himself studying the man closely for the first time. They were roughly the same age, middle thirties, and he couldn’t help but wonder how things might’ve been different had their lives taken even slightly altered courses. Maybe they’d have been friends or colleagues, or maybe their roles would’ve been reversed. “Isn’t there anyone who can help you get on your feet?”
“I wasn’t born like this you know.” The man did his best to smooth his hair into place with his grimy hands. “I used to have everything you’ve got, things just went bad. It happens.”
Jeff reached for his wallet.
“Listen, I just lost my job recently so I’m not in a position to do much, but let me give you a few bucks. Go get a bite to eat and clean up a little.”
The man stared at the twenty in Jeff’s hand. “I don’t want your money.”
“Just take it and go, all right?” Jeff thrust it at him a second time.
The man struggled to his feet and slowly walked away.
Whatever, Jeff thought. I tried. He returned the money to his wallet and started off in the opposite direction along Massachusetts Avenue. Their apartment, located in Boston’s Back Bay, was only a few blocks from the Boston Commons public park. Their neighborhood consisted largely of residential three-story walkups sandwiched one against the next that catered mostly to long-term tenants or college kids renting apartments from local college-owned buildings. But for the nearly constant traffic along the avenue, it was a nice area, though one Jeff couldn’t be sure how much longer they’d be able to afford.
He turned at the corner and continued on until he’d reached Boylston Street. There he stopped at a newsstand, bought a Boston Globe then crossed the busy intersection leading to Copley Square, a large cement park between the Hancock Tower, a shopping complex and several enormous old churches. He sat on a bench, watched the intricate water fountain at the center of the square. It was still early, but the commuters and businesspeople were already hurrying about on their way to jobs, juggling briefcases and coffees, babbling into cell phones and furiously texting on their BlackBerries. Not so long ago he’d been just like them, and now here he sat on a park bench like some loser. With a weary sigh, Jeff opened his newspaper to the “ Classified” section.
He’d not been scanning the ads long when he noticed a strikingly attractive young woman scoping out the square. Dressed in a pinstripe skirt-suit and black heels, she stood out from the crowd and looked like an up-and-coming business executive, her raven-black hair styled perfectly, her makeup flawless. Sexy but professional, she held a leather briefcase in one hand and a cell phone to her ear with the other. She caught Jeff looking at her, smiled, then after saying something into the phone, slipped it into the side pocket of her briefcase and started toward him with a confident and purposeful stride.
Holy shit, she’s coming over here. Heart racing, he quickly pretended to return his attention to the newspaper, but she’d already closed the gap between them.
“Hey there,” she said, her smoky voice laced with a slight raspy quality. “How are you?”
Jeff looked up over the paper as if he’d just noticed her. “Oh hi,” he said, nervously clearing his throat. “I’m fine thanks. And you?”
“Outstanding.” She bent her knees and placed the briefcase on the ground next to her, then reached inside the main compartment and removed a flyer of some sort.
Christ, he thought, she’s selling something. Yet the woman looked far too well-dressed and successful to have a job peddling wares or handing out flyers to strangers on the street.
“I hope you won’t think I’m being too forward, but may I ask a question?”
Jeff’s cynical instincts kicked in but he still couldn’t seem to get beyond how gorgeous the woman was. “Sure,” he said, setting the newspaper aside, “ask away.”
“Are you looking for work by any chance?”
“It’s that obvious, huh?”
“Well, let’s see. It’s a little before nine in the morning on a weekday, you’re sitting on a park bench rather than on your way to work, you’re dressed casually—which means it’s either your day off or you’re unemployed—and you’re reading...” With a mischievous glint in her eyes she looked to the bench and zeroed in on the newspaper, “…the classified section. Call me crazy, but I bet you’re looking for a job.”
“Impressive.” Did I just wink at her? I did. Jesus. “Are you a detective?”
“Hardly.”
“So I’m not under arrest then?”
This time she did the winking. “Not yet.”
Gushing like a schoolboy, Jeff laughed longer and louder than seemed necessary. Why am I so nervous? You’d think a beautiful woman had never spoken to me before. Eden’s gorgeous, she—EDEN—shit, right, Eden. Ratchet it down a few million pegs before you get yourself in trouble, dipshit.
“Check it out.” She thrust the flyer at him, her bright smile still in place and her dark, exotic and catlike eyes studying him. “It could change your life.”
Jeff took the flyer. It advertised interviews being conducted later that same day but gave no indication what the jobs were and no specific information about the company itself. IF YOU’RE SERIOUS ABOUT CHANGING YOUR LIFE WE MAY HAVE THE EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITY YOU’VE BEEN SEARCHING FOR. FOR ONE DAY AND ONE DAY ONLY, INTERNATIONAL FACILITATOR, INC. AND ITS CEO AND FOUNDER, WORLD-RENOWNED ENTREPENUER F. HOPE, WILL BE CONDUCTING EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEWS IN YOUR CITY. IF YOU’RE RIGHT FOR US THIS COULD BE THE FIRST STEP TOWARD MAKING YOUR DREAMS COME TRUE.
He’d never heard of International Facilitator, Inc. or F. Hope, but whoever they were it was obviously some sort of con. Legitimate companies didn’t recruit employees with street flyers. Probably a sales seminar conducted by some douche bag with a middle-of-the-night infomercial, Jeff thought. A self-appointed expert sharing his ‘secret’ of success if you’ll buy his insanely overpriced videos and books. Get in on it now and I’ll make you rich. Uh-huh, sure you will.
“It’s not what you think,” the woman assured him.
He looked up at her questioningly.
“The expression on your face gave you away.”
He attempted to hand the flyer back. “Thanks, I think I’m all set.”
“I don’t want to be a bother,” she said, sliding onto the bench next to him. “But do you mind if I ask your name?”
Up close she was even more beautiful, and smelled intoxicating. He felt himself blush. “Jeff.”
She extended her hand. It was dainty, with small, thin fingers, nails manicured, tapered and painted power red. “Jessica Bell.”
He shook her hand. It was warm and soft and he felt a tingle that began in his lower back spread out across his entire body the moment they made contact. “Jeff,” he said again, head spinning. “Jeff McGrath.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Jeff.”
“The pleasure’s mine.” He hoped to come off suave but knew he was more than likely making a fool of himself. He hadn’t seriously flirted with anyone other than Eden in years and it showed.
“Frankly, Jeff,” Jessica said in a conspiratorial tone, “I’d no longer have any interest in setting up an interview for you if you weren’t skeptical. I know this whole thing seems suspect, but trust me, it’s no scam. This is one of those instances in your life when you can either walk away or seize the moment, you know? A few years back, when one of his other recruiters approached me and handed me a flyer, I thought it was all a crock too. I was in New York, and I’d been working as a secretary at an accounting firm and taking acting classes at night. I wanted to be an actress back then, before Mr. Hope showed me my full potential. Anyway, I’d just been let go from the firm due to budget cuts and I was in trouble, a small town girl not long out of junior college and all alone in the big city, right? But I figured I had nothing to lose, so I went to the interview just for the hell of it. It changed my life, Jeff. It changed my life.” Jessica crossed her legs then smoothed the skirt down over her knees. “You see, what I didn’t know then was that the recruiters are trained to spot potential, to look for certain signs in individuals that indicate they might be right for our company. Back in New York the recruiter saw those signs in me. Just now, Jeff, I saw them in you.”
Even though he knew it was probably all part of some carefully calculated pitch, he couldn’t help but feel a bit flattered. Losing his job had damaged his self-esteem and confidence, and there were worse things than having a beautiful woman sit so close and say nice things about him. “I’m curious,” he said, “what exactly are those signs?”
“We’re talking intangib
les here.”
“Can’t even give me one example?”
She thought a moment before answering. “What I do involves instinct, utilizing a highly-developed ability to spot that special something in people that sets them apart. Strength, confidence—”
“And need?”
She relaxed her smile into something a bit more genuine. “And need,” she confessed softly. “But if you’ll notice, Jeff, this area is mobbed with people. The only person I’ve given a flyer to is you.”
“Well, so far anyway.”
“No. I was just about to leave when I spotted you sitting here.” She drew a deep breath and let it out slowly, turning away from him and gazing out over the square. “Did you lose your job recently?”
“A few months back.”
“Sales?”
“You’re good.”
“I’m well-trained. Were you in management?”
“Right again. Twelve years with the company, nine in management.”
“What line?”
He arched an eyebrow.
“I’m good, not psychic.”
Jeff chuckled. “It was a high-end car audio business. We did sales and installation, but unfortunately the giant discount stores have wiped out most of the specialty chains.”
“I noticed a wedding band. Do you have children too?”
Jeff relaxed a bit and decided to enjoy the game. “You tell me.”
She turned back to him, looked deep into his eyes. “No kids.”
“No.” Jesus, he thought, I’m actually swooning. “Not yet anyway. Hopefully at some point soon but right now we’re not in a position to—”
“Your wife works but doesn’t make a whole lot, right? It’s not enough, is it, Jeff? You’re in financial trouble.”
“It’s getting tough, yes.”
“Then tell me, what in the world do you have to lose at this point? There are a very limited number of slots, and I’ll be honest, I only get paid if one of my finds actually gets hired. So if you’re really not interested just tell me now, OK?”
“I thought I already had.”
“OK,” she said, hopping back to her feet, “it was nice to meet you then.”
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