by Rob Heinze
She’ll be mine again, he thought happily.
He got to the backyard and found no one there. He hoped—prayed—that he found Charley alone. Not that he really cared, but he didn’t want Eve to actually see him kill Charley: he didn’t think that would be good for their relationship. He went up the deck steps to the sliding back doors and slowly opened them.
Silence and dimness greeted him. He listened, his heart palpitating in his chest. He heard nothing, no movement, no hint as to where they might be. He stepped into the kitchen, the knife a cool silver glare in the darkness. He stalked the downstairs and found it empty. Confused, but not totally catching on, he walked up the stairs slowly, one or two wincing, but it didn’t matter: no one was there to hear them.
The house was empty.
He stood for a long time at the top of the steps, the knife held limply at his side. They had gone. They had tricked him.
For how long John stood on the top of the steps, he did not know. But when it finally dawned on him that Charley had taken his girl away, left him alone in this no-world, he took the stairs down two at a time. At the bottom, he hooked a hard right and ran back outside.
Their bikes were gone. How could he not have noticed that before? They always left them right in the driveway. His bike was still there, and he suspected that was how he had overlooked it. His mind had been too focused on the task ahead that it had overlooked the inconsistency.
Panicked now, he ran towards his bike and jumped on it. He didn’t get more than two feet before realizing that something was wrong. The tires were popped, slashed deep and long, and the bike was now utterly useless. He got off, jerked the bike into the air, and tossed it as far as his shoulders would allow. The bike clattered to the ground and was still...still like the rest of the world in which John was now alone. He screamed. He yelled. Spittle flew from his lips.
He couldn’t believe it. He just couldn’t believe it.
He had to catch them.
I’ll follow them, he thought. I’ll find them.
He ran down the driveway and stood in the dead quiet. He listened. He could hear nothing. There was no way for him to know which way they had gone, but there was suddenly a sense, a thought, a clear perfect image of Eve and Charley—holding hands—walking down the helix road towards their brook—that brook at which he had seen Eve’s hand on Charley’s back. They had gone that way. He was sure of it. John, knife in hand, sprinted away from the house.
Breeze in his face, he knew he would catch them.
4
Charley and Eve had planned to leave John, but they had to make sure that they did it smartly and secretly. They could leave no trace.
From their vantage point in Charley’s neighbor’s house, they watched the driveway as John walked up it, knife drawn, moving slowly and secretly. He looked like someone who had awakened into a nightmare.
“I hope it works,” Eve whispered.
They were deep in the house next door, but they still felt that the no-world was too quiet and John might hear.
And there was a moment when the man paused near the end of the driveway. That moment happened immediately after Eve had spoken. She glanced frantically to Charley, who shook his head in negation. The man couldn’t have heard her faint whisper; they were in another house! Still, he couldn’t help feel that restrained fear and panic.
But John kept moving into the house, his pause only a pause and not a discovery.
Their bikes were in the living room of this house, on their kick-stands, waiting to be used for a mad escape. They had no hard and fast destination, but both of them agreed that they had to head west. West was ancient. It was the way home, the way to freedom. If you went West, you were reborn.
John was in the house for a long time, and when he came out, he came out in a mad panic. He discovered his bike’s tires and tossed it. Then he sprinted down the driveway. He stood at the end of the driveway for a long time. They watched in tense silence. They were going in whatever direction he didn’t go in. This plan—Charley’s idea—would insure that John would not follow them simply by chance. They didn’t speak to each other; they were too afraid to speak. God forbid he somehow heard their voices…
John began to move down the winding road away from the house. They waited until he was out of sight before they looked to each other and nodded. They ran down the stairs to the living room and got their bikes. They went right out the front door into the warm sunlight and got on their bikes. They started to peddle. Soon John would be only a memory for Charley and an old nightmare for Eve.
As they peddled off, Charley couldn’t help but think that this was just too easy.
5
Something stopped John in his tracks as Eve and Charley were just leaving their position at the window. John did not know they were just leaving the window in the neighboring house, could he? No, he couldn’t have known this. But he did! Goddamnit! He knew it! It made perfect sense! They wanted to watch him, and then they were going to go the opposite way!
He turned around and began to sprint back up the hill. He imagined those two fuck-buddies upstairs in the bedroom, Eve down with her lips around Charley’s penis, Charley’s fingers splayed through Eve’s hair. Oh, God, that image! And more, there were so many more! Too many images, like some self-inflicted torture that never ended! See the slideshow, kiddies! Look how Eve fucks, how she sucks, how she blows Charley into the wind!
Hi, Ho, look at them go! Charley bangs Eve, don’t you know?
John didn’t want these images in his mind, but suddenly every image that he didn’t want was in his mind—sharp, blinking, like neon advertisements. Charley’s hand on the back of her head, urgently coaxing it faster and faster, back and forth, her hands gripping his ass cheeks tightly as he reached his climax…
John ran hard, grunting, a light mesh of bubbles on his lips. He might have bitten his lip or tongue, for there was pinkish blood in that froth. He crested the hill and spotted the tail-end of their bikes. Rage bloomed like warm spring in his mind.
“EVE!!!!!!” He screamed. “YOU’RE MINE!”
He took off after them, feeling nothing but that sweet rage.
6
The sound of his voice made their hearts skip beats, and both of them stopped to look back. They saw him running up the hill, and for a long time they just stood in bewilderment watching him come.
How’d he know?
There was still a good distance between them.
Charley suddenly came to his senses. “Let’s go!”
Eve didn’t appear to hear him. All of her mind was bent on the man coming up the hill, the man who had treated her as nothing more than an object—a man that she had once (stupidly) thought she could love.
Charley’s arm shot out and grabbed her shoulder. She looked at him, her face contorted in terror, perhaps thinking that John had magically closed the distance between them.
“Let’s go!” Charley persisted.
She nodded and they both began to peddle. Those initial few feet were slow, but soon they were moving. John fell behind. Bikeless, John would never be able to catch them.
Eve’s bike caught a pot-hole, one that she hadn’t seen (she had been glancing over her shoulder at John). The wheel didn’t pop, but it jerked the bike to a stop and sent Eve tumbling over the handle bars. Her palms and wrists took the brunt of the impact. A vicious, burning scrape, and then she was lying stunned on the ground.
The monster’s coming! She thought absurdly.
Charley heard Eve’s yelp and skidded to a halt. He saw her lying motionless on the ground, saw John closing the distance, and for a moment he considered just leaving. He’d have to fight John, and he didn’t want to fight John. John had a knife. John was tough. John beat on his women, John was a real man, and what was Charley? What was he?
A sudden, surreal burst of anger flooded his mind. He had no idea from where this rage had come, but it was there like a burning bolt in his head. He peddled hard, fast, grunting, and h
e aimed the bike at John. John stopped, as if sensing Charley’s intention, and the confused look that came into his mind almost made Charley laugh. The knife at his side dangled limply. Charley stood on the bike and peddled hard. Their eyes locked across the shortening distance like two gunslingers in a show-down.
At the last moment, Charley jumped off the bike. It was a smooth motion, smoother than he could have expected, him landing on his feet, and then he was charging the lunatic with the knife. Confused, surprised, John slashed out. Charley was too fast, though, and had come within John’s swing, so that only John’s forearm hit him. Charley whipped his forehead down towards John’s nose. There was a sharp, thick crunch. John’s nose was flattened under the vicious blow. Blood exploded out each nostril as if tiny foil packets had been popped.
Adrenalin was a great thing. Charley felt it like a sweet drug in his blood, humming religiously inside of him. John staggered back, and Charley fell on him. He whipped his arm in an uppercut. His fist caught John on the chin. There was a clunk as John’s teeth collided. He staggered back further, his arms flailing for balance.
I’m not a man!!! I’m not a man!!!
“You’re not a man!” Charley screamed, his face burning red.
He charged the man, arm drawn back into a piston, and when he reached John, the spring released. His arm soared through the air and mashed John’s lips into pulp.
In his berserk state, Charley had not noticed Eve rising. Her palms were red and raw, and her wrists hurt, but she barely felt the pain. The energy which imbued Charley must have eddied to her, for she was rushing up behind John, dragging her bike like a child pulling an oversized bat.
She grunted and swung it. The bike hit John in the back. He staggered forward as the pedal struck his spinal column. The knife slipped from his grip. Charley saw the man coming and closed his fist. The blood, so much, ran down John’s face like diluted raspberry jam. Charley brought his fist back and then slammed it forward with as much force as he could muster.
The blow caught John under his left eye. He staggered back, his head jerking to the left, and his feet tangled up in each other. He yelped and tumbled backwards. During his fall, his head whipped back and collided with the asphalt road. There was a white explosion in his mind, like a strong camera flash, and John knew that he was in trouble. He tried to move but found that he couldn’t. He lay in agony on the ground, writhing.
The last thing John saw before darkness took him were Eve’s eyes, looking down on him with hot hate burning in them.
Forgive me Father, for I have sinned, John thought.
Then darkness came and consumed him.
Eve looked at Charley, her lower lip trembling violently. Charley staggered towards her and they embraced. Both of them broke down. Horrified by what they had done, they cried and shook. They stood that way for a long time. They might have stayed that way forever, except that a sudden low chill filled the air, the sort of cold breeze that came during the onset of a fall storm. Charley opened his eyes and turned his head.
He saw them. They stood around the empty properties, ancient shadows, their lightless figures radiating nauseating no-color. It was as if they had been there all along, knowing this would happen, and simply waiting—
“What’s wrong?” Eve asked, looking at his face.
He motioned with his head. She turned around and almost screamed.
Charley glanced to John’s body and then up to the Those of the Dark.
“Waiting,” Charley whispered. “They’re waiting for us to leave.”
Eve didn’t understand. Then she saw Charley looking at John’s body. It dawned on her. She looked at Charley and nodded. They got on their bikes slowly and carefully. They didn’t speak; they didn’t remove their eyes from Those of the Dark.
“What are they?” Eve whispered.
Charley had no answer. He found himself thinking about a bird, and how a bird looked all big and puffy, but how most of their bodies were empty and hollow and mostly feathers.
They began to peddle, not looking over their shoulders. Maybe they’d turn around and see Those of the Dark and John gone; maybe they’d turned around and see Those of the Dark descending on the man, tearing him limb from limb like in their nightmares; maybe they’d turn around and see Those of the Dark chasing them.
There were too many maybes, and so Charley and Eve peddled away without turning around.
7
John never came awake. He was on the stone bridge and he saw that rock structure across it. Shades of red and pink seemed to be physically entwined around each other in the fissures of the place, like threads around threads, and the whole place had a holy sacred glow which hummed and pulsed and was sanctified.
The place where Those of the Light and Dark go to battle, he thought randomly.
The glow impossibly far below the bridge was red and mysterious and it made him nervous. He groped for his knife, but the knife was gone. He glanced up and saw the structure carved into the wall beyond the bridge, and in the spaces he saw the glowing red light. It was the way home, the way to freedom, and he only had to cross the bridge and enter it.
There was a cold wind on his shoulder, and John spun.
Those of the Dark stood behind him, towering over him. They had come from the shadows secretly and crept up on him.
Look into their mouths!
I don’t want to; I don’t want to look!
The shapes moved, appearing to reach out what only could have been an arm, and then hot pain seared up and down his body, seared and charred the hairs on his flesh. He screamed and coiled back, but the grip was strong, so strong, and soon the monstrosity was pulling him towards it, and no longer did he see the red/pink glow of the ancient place, the place where Those of the Light and Dark came to do battle. Now he saw a faint, cold blue glow deep in One of the Dark. That light grew closer, brighter.
And when the blue light was all that John saw, his mind went startlingly clear.
In the next instant, the blue light cleared.
He saw what had been waiting for him at the end of his path.
John began to scream.
8
“Did we do that?” Eve asked.
They were on a highway, heading west. Charley thought it might have been 78, but it didn’t look familiar to him. The sun had highlighted the sky in a myriad of colors, all of which mixed like some alcoholic drink from a tropical island.
“Did we kill him, Charley?”
Charley thought about it for a while. His legs were tired, and he knew that they’d stop soon. The highway was flat and featureless. Fleeing had been good; it had allowed them little time to think about what they had done. Looking around, thinking about where they were going to camp, Charley began to sweat. He would have all night to think about what he had done.
They had killed him.
No, he thought. We didn’t. Hurt him bad, yes, but not kill him. And do you think John wouldn’t have killed us if he had the chance?
“I don’t know,” Charley finally said.
“Those of the Dark killed him. That’s what I think,” Eve said. She allowed a short time of silence to elapse. She must have been thinking. Then she said: “We just got him started.”
There was no denying that. They didn’t speak anymore about it. A short time later, they made their camp along the side of the highway, off in the shade of some trees. The eastern sky was blue dark, and the light in the west was retreating faster then they had expected. They got to work setting a fire.
When they finally got it blazing, darkness had come down heavily around them. The fire filled the night with light, crackling and flaring. Eve was sitting close to Charley. She glanced down at his hands. There were bruises on the knuckles. She asked him to flex them; he did, and winced. He had never thought he could hit someone so hard.
He deserved it, he told himself.
Eve thought about the things John had done to her. She tried to tell herself that he deserved it, same excuse as C
harley, but somehow it wasn’t enough. So got to thinking about something else. She thought about what might have happened had John killed Charley? She would no doubt be with him, stuck in this place, him using her whenever he felt the urge. No love, no trust from that man: she would have been nothing more than an object, a blow-up doll with a Proper Name.
“Charley?” She said, coming out of her thoughts. She looked over at him. His face was pale red in the firelight. He looked as if he had come out of a deep thought too.
“Yeah?”
“Can I…”
He looked at her, waiting, his brown eyes shimmering in the light. She needed someone; he could see that. And here was a truth: Charley Allen needed someone too.
“Can I come closer?” She whispered.
Charley nodded. Eve slid over on their blanket, one of the things that they had managed to pack and stow away in the neighbor’s house. Their hips touched. Her shoulder leaned into his.
So long as we’re not joined any further, he thought.
He thought about Sarah. Her face was fading, somehow, and he didn’t like it.
I haven’t seen her in so long, he thought.
Eve felt better now. She rested her head on Charley’s shoulder. She respected Charley, and Charley respected her. She understood his feelings for Sarah; she wouldn’t try to persuade him again. Right now it felt good just being close to someone.
They slept sometime later.
Charley dreamed again of his home, all dark save for that single light upstairs. He was on the stair’s landing, except he was naked and aroused. He could smell a scent that reminded him of Sarah, yet his mind was unable to remember what that scent was. He crept up the rest of the stairs, afraid and excited. The light in the bedroom grew brighter. It was suddenly hard to breathe, and he was afraid that, if he stepped through—God, if he stepped through and saw Sarah—he was afraid he’d awake. He tried to breathe, couldn’t, then shrugged it off and went quickly towards the room. He stepped inside and saw the nude body on the bed. It was Sarah. She was lying on her side in the classical depiction of the Seductive Female, the curves her body formed mesmerizing.
