Shadows Burned In

by Chris Pourteau

  Stu nodded. “I’m wit ya, boss.”

  “Let’s go, then.”

  They inched out into the main yard from the infirmary. No one around except the tower guards that manned the spotlights and machine guns, and only two of them to worry about. The spotlights scanned the grounds regularly, like clockwork in fact, and Kitts caught their rhythm.

  “Now,” he said in a low voice, and they shuffle-ran, bent over as much as their old backs would allow. The spotlights raked the concrete of the basketball courts. Stu nearly yelped as one touched his back leg, but he held his tongue. Kitts hunched down at the base of a basketball goal, pulling Stu, who was huffing and puffing already, down with him. They were in a blind spot from which they could reconnoiter the rest of the ground.

  There was no alarm.

  All was quiet.

  “Okay, Stu. Fifty feet to the hurricane fence, up and over that and the razor wire, then over the outer fence, and we’re home free.”

  Catching his breath, Stu said, “You want I should go first?”

  Kitts rolled his eyes out of Stu’s sight. Jesus, you fucking retard . . .

  “No, Stu, I have to go first.” He patted the cardboard armor. “The razor wire, remember?”

  Stu rolled his own eyes at his own stupidity. “Oh yeah, boss. Sorreh.”

  “Don’t sweat it. Ready? Here we go. Now remember . . . I have to lead the way. Understand? You don’t go first. I have to lead the way.”

  “Yeah, boss, I don forget dis time.”

  Kitts nodded, feeling absolutely no confidence in that, and gauged the lights. One – two – three.

  “Now.”

  Kitts led the way and Stu let him. Before they knew it, they were through the sweeping minefield of spotlights and at the hurricane fence. Kitts looked up. It looked like the Empire State Building to him, it was so high. But he’d have to climb it.

  “Okay, Stu, help me up. Help me get a foothold.”

  “Yeah, boss,” said the other, cupping his hands and firming his back, worried that Kitts’s weight might cut his own escape plans short. But Kitts quickly caught his arthritic fingers in the chain links of the hurricane fence. Thank God they ain’t electrified anymore, he thought. The system had come to trust the tattlers and a series of crisscrossing electronic eyebeams between the first and second fences to hold the prisoners in.

  Kitts reached the top and carefully lay across the slimmest, skinniest, dullest portion of the wire he could find. They had forty-five seconds to be down the other side of the fence before the lights passed this way again. “Now, Stu!” he yelled quietly down. “Hurry, buddy!”

  Stu started up the fence. His own arthritis was more progressed than Kitts’s and made it hard as hell to keep a grip without screaming out loud. The bone-grating stiffness shot up his arms and into his heart, which beat faster than it had in years. But thoughts of failure, of failing Kitts, spurred him on, and then he was straddling Kitts’s back, ready to go over.

  “Go on,” gasped Kitts under Stu’s weight. “Twenty seconds to the lights!”

  Stu did his best to hurry over his friend lying beneath him across the wire, cursing with Stu’s every movement. Before he realized it, Stu was slung over the other side, his hands screeching their agony at him as he got his toeholds on the other side of the hurricane fence. Kitts was already struggling to release himself from the razor wire, which had dug its claws into the cardboard armor around his torso.

  Shit!

  Time ticked by as Kitts struggled to pull himself off the razored talons. He figured he had less than ten seconds before the lights hit him. Stu hit the ground on the other side. Kitts wondered if his brilliant plan was going to work, if Ramirez might not have the last laugh after all. That old faggot died humped over, just like he lived, he heard Ramirez cackling to the guards over a beer. Fitting end, don’t you think, boys? So to speak, that is, haw-haw-haw.

  Five seconds.

  Kitts decided to hell with it, he had no choice, and tried to swing his legs up and over his head like a gymnast, hoping his weight and the momentum would tumble him off the wire and down the other side. And if he was lucky, he’d catch himself on the fence, and if he weren’t . . .

  “Come on,” said Stu, “I catch you!”

  Kitts was lucky. The cardboard armor ripped open on the razors’ talons. His weight carried him over, but he missed his grip on the fence, tumbling fifteen feet to land atop Stu. Overhead the lights raked the fence.

  Catching his breath, Kitts asked, “You okay?” and Stu said, “Yeah.” But lucky was the word for it all right, thought Kitts. If I’d caught myself on that fence, I’d have broken fingers right now. “Come on,” he said. “We got one more fence to go.”

  But Stu held his arm. “But what about the electronic eyes? We gon trip ev’ry alarm dey got here.”

  “Too late for that now. We go now or we get shot. Your choice.”

  “But boss, de eyes, dey gon see us—”

  “You comin?”

  Stu looked Kitts in the eye, saw thirty years of planning, patience, and perseverance that promised them that, one day, they’d be free. “Yeah, okay, boss,” he said.

  “All right, then. Now remember . . . me first.”

  They were up and loping across the no-man’s-land as quickly as their old legs would carry them. Kitts imagined the invisible laser beams being broken, and sure enough barely five seconds had passed when a wailing alarm erupted inside the prison.

  “Stay behind me, Stu, stay behind me!” yelled Kitts, trying to be heard over the screaming siren without giving away his location to the tower guards.

  Searchlights scanned the area near both fences as the two prisoners pulled up short at the second one. Kitts pulled Stu down beside him, allowing the current sweep of the lights to pass overhead. The next pass would be at ground level. He said, “Remember, Stu, me first, okay? Then you go over, just like last time, right?”

  “Right, boss,” puffed Stu.

  The lights were gone for the moment, and up the fence Kitts went. He ignored the arthritis now. Too much adrenaline pumping. Guards were yelling at one another, trying to find the reason for the alarm. About once a month, rabbits or possums would get under the fence and trip it. There hadn’t been an escape from Huntsville in almost thirty years. Since as far as Kitts knew the tattlers still hadn’t set off the main board, he hoped the guards were looking for a possum instead of a prisoner.

  He had crawled over the razor wire and begun descending the other side before Stu realized what was happening.

  “Boss, what you doin? I need to crawl over you—de wire!”

  Kitts looked him in the eyes. Thirty years of friendship was worth something, after all.

  “Boss? What’s goan on? You gon throw me de cardboard, so I can go over m’self? I don’t haveta crawl over ya, that’s okay.”

  “Stu, you dumb bastard.” Kitts turned and ran as the searchlights traveled toward the second fence.

  Stu stood for a moment watching Kitts run away. Then he began to panic. He couldn’t make it without Kitts. Kitts did it all. He was Stu’s friend. Kitts looked out for him. Had done so for thirty years.

  “Boss?” The sound squeaked out, barely breathed. “Boss?” The scream brought the lights to him then as Stu tried to scramble up the hurricane fence.

  “Hey, Charlie’s in the wire!” whooped a guard, glad to find something besides a possum to shoot at. “Charlie’s in the wire!”

  Stu’s fingers screamed at him and he screamed at Kitts as he went up the fence. The razors were slicing through his dyed jumpsuit as he desperately tried to get over the other side to freedom, and to Kitts. He hadn’t been without Kitts for longer than he could remember.

  “Hey, you!” The voice blared at him from a bullhorn. “This is the only warning you get! Come back down or you ain’t never comin back anywhere!”

  Stu was almost through the wire, struggling through it, ignoring it as it sliced flesh, tearing at the patch he’d so carefu
lly sewn on like he’d once painted Ben Franklin’s face on the hundred-dollar bill. He struggled through with blood leaking from him. Tears streaked the shoe polish on his face.

  burrrrrp burrrrrrrrp burrp burrrp

  The tracer bullets made a line from one tower, then another as they converged on the spotlight and the contorted prisoner struggling through the wire at the top of the fence. At first Stu hardly noticed the bullets as they thumped into him, but then they ripped open his lungs and sliced through his muscles. The arthritis in his fingers didn’t hurt anymore and he had a moment to wonder at that, to feel relief, before the hollow points shredded his heart inside his chest. He had a thought of disbelief, then his hands betrayed him and he slipped, hanging loose in the razor wire.

  Tough to breathe now, and hot fire inside him—inside his lungs, inside his chest—made the old arthritis feel like a pleasant memory. All he could think of was how glad he was that it was thanks to him that Kitts was free after thirty years, The Man hadn’t got ’im, and that if he had to die, at least Kitts was free and The Man hadn’t got ’im.

  As the bright light overwhelmed his eyes, Stu Metzger’s last thoughts were that he’d made it after all, and that he was freer than even Kitts was now, and how happy that made him feel, how lucky he was to be rid of the pain now and how nothing else really mattered anymore.

  Chapter 5

  Last night was a real pisser, thought David Jackson as he got in the car to leave his new one-lawyer practice. All Susan can do is complain about coming here because she lost her big-city life. What was that show in reruns when I was a kid? Green Acres? “You are my wife . . . good-bye, city life!”

  Well, that about sums it up, he thought. Sitting in his car, he stared at the outside of his new office. The brick exterior was only that, a cheap veneer meant to look like more than it was. I think, thought David, if the big, bad wolf paid a visit to my office, he could blow it down, bricks and all. The paint was peeling a bit along the trim, and the newest thing about the entire edifice—David Jackson, Attorney at Law, stenciled in gold on the glass door—looked oddly out of place. It was one story (one boring story, David japed to himself as he looked at the worn exterior), but it was cheap, and despite the fact it looked cheap as well, he’d done some decent business for a local lawyer in a town this small. Will probates, mostly, with the occasional divorce or insurance settlement thrown in for good measure. It was October, which meant heavy rains anytime now, and if he was lucky, a hailstorm might spark some enmity between the odd homeowner or two and their insurance companies. He could make a little off that. Not that he wished anyone ill fortune. At least he didn’t chase ambulances.

  The law practice in Houston had been profitable enough. He had to agree with Susan there. But the big-city life

  (the cars)

  had finally gotten to him

  (the smog)

  and he’d decided one day that it was a small-town practice he wanted after all, and the life there

  (fresh air)

  was bound to be safer for Elizabeth. So, he and Susan would lose their weekly dine-out at La Vie en Parmesan. So what? Susan had taken the news rather well, he thought, even enthusiastically; or at least that’s how he remembered it. But now that they were here—and had been here for nearly six weeks—she had begun backbiting him about the move. She missed this and she missed that. She missed shopping with her girlfriends. She missed her nurse’s job at the medical center. She missed her city. Despite the fact that the Web gave her daily (and sometimes expensive) access to her old girlfriends. They were less than an hour away should they want to get together. The local hospital, small as it was, had been delighted to get a nurse with Susan’s experience on its staff. From all indications she would be head of nursing when the old biddy currently in charge retired.

  And as for the shopping, hardly anyone shopped at malls anymore. The Web had finally provided a viable alternative to department stores about a decade earlier. Congress had passed the Internet Commerce Act of 2021, providing real incentives to virtual shopping. Mortar-and-brick stores were already going the way of the dinosaur. Almost everything was Web based now—from virtual stores to virtual schools, where online monitors managed real-time discussions of five to ten students, each of whom accessed the teacher and subject from the comfort and safety of their own homes. The term homeschooling had taken on a whole new meaning.

  Just as physical exercise had become a leisure pastime in the late 20th century—something people a hundred years earlier would never have believed—so now engaging in activities outside the home had become, in the 21st, a choice, not a necessity. Street parties, neighborly barbecues, jaunts to the 3V monsterplex, and yes, even outings to what few specialty department stores remained were all things people did for entertainment now. The necessary day-to-day tasks of life were almost all done virtually.

  Even preliminary diagnoses by the family doctor could be done by the patient’s describing symptoms, the doctor’s doing a cursory visual inspection over the Web, and the upload of the patient’s vitals via data transfer from personal monitors. The doctor then made whatever recommendations for further inspection and diagnosis that might be necessary. This made the insurance industry happy because it was so efficient, it made doctors happy because the pressure to spend no more than fifteen minutes with a patient was gone, and it made patients happy because they felt a lot more comfortable showing their symptoms in the privacy of their own home and over a secured Web line.

  Why am I thinking about this stuff? David wondered as he stared at the old office with his name and title stenciled in gold. Maybe it was because he didn’t really need this office. With technology such as it was, he could do all his client interactions from home, when he thought about it. Well, he thought, maybe that’s why I need it. To get out of the house for a while. It was certainly cheap enough to maintain the space. Office real estate was inexpensive as hell nowadays, particularly in little towns like Hampshire.

  So his office was a luxurious expression of the norm these days, eh? To get out of the house and enjoy himself a bit. Somehow, catching himself as such an obvious expression of the current culture put a bad taste in his mouth. He’d always considered himself so independent. But the simple fact was he had this office because he could afford to have it. Because I want it, he thought.

  David put the car in reverse. Gravel and shale popped under the tires as he backed out of the parking lot. A mile and a half from now and I’ll be in the comfort of my own home. The thought came laced with sarcasm.

  Stopped at a light on Main Street, he tapped his fingers on the steering wheel and thought about the evening to come. Maybe Susan would be in a good mood. Maybe he wouldn’t come home to find another message from Elizabeth’s monitor saying she was falling behind and holding up the rest of the class to boot. Maybe the stock report would be up for a change. Maybe this evening would actually be peaceful. What a pleasant thought that was . . .

  Something off to the right caught his eye. An old man in a Columbo raincoat walking slowly along the side of the road. It’s the Walking Man, thought David. He and Susan had named him that when they occasionally saw him walking around town. The old man bent over the carcass of an animal, probably an armadillo, and used the flat shovel he had to pry it from the pavement. David winced his disgust. Surely he won’t eat that. I mean . . . come on. Surely not. The Walking Man struggled to free the flattened animal from the glue its blood and bile had made with the road’s surface. At last the animal was free. The Walking Man put him in the gunnysack he dragged around with him.

  beep beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep

  The impatient driver behind him pulled David’s eyes off the grotesque scene, and he mechanically put the car into drive. With some effort he pushed away the picture of the old man roasting a flat armadillo over an open fire.

  As he drove with muscle memory the short distance to his home, David reviewed his decision-making process for moving back here. He’d thought getting out of Houston
would reduce the whole family’s stress level. Susan had been happier in Houston, that was true, but he’d been sorely worried about Elizabeth. Nowhere seemed safe to have a house anymore. Real crime, the kind where someone got hurt, had shot up in recent years. White collar crime had gone almost entirely cyber.

  He hadn’t counted on the new stresses caused by moving back here. Susan’s disappointment. Elizabeth’s distractions. Maybe the big city wasn’t so bad after all. David grimaced at the thought, because it was giving in, giving up, admitting defeat. Couldn’t do that. Certainly couldn’t admit that Susan was right. Besides, Houston wasn’t better. It was just bigger. And the bigger the town, the more opportunity for people to take advantage of you. Here, at least, life was quiet. Home life, such as it was, was at least secure.

  He turned onto Elm Street, now only a few blocks from that security. And before he even knew what he was doing, he had pulled over near the high-grassed ditch where the street began.

  What?

  Had someone spoken? He surveyed the street around him but found no kids playing, no movement at all. He felt the sun on his neck as the day began to surrender to early evening. When he looked again, he barely noticed the house. And then it hit him exactly what he’d barely noticed.

  The house.

  A smile came across his face as he realized the sound he’d heard. The kids playing had been the whisper of memory. He put the car in park and stepped out and up on the driver’s side doorframe to peer across the slightly stirring tall grass. Needs mowing, he thought. The Spanish moss around the cracking, gray porch swayed lightly in the breeze. He squinted, trying to look through the windows but saw only darkness.

  Someone’s probably boarded up the old place from the inside as a hazard to children, thought David.

  And that made the smile fade from his face. He thought back to when he and Theron Taylor had come to the house on Halloween on a mutual dare to see if they could spook Old Suzie. She was a big woman then, and somewhere in the back of his mind David recalled she’d later died of something that makes other people just shrug and say, “Well, she was old,” before going on with their day.