by Carver Pike
She smiled lazily.
“Heather, I ain’t playin, baby. Keep your innocent ass over here on this side of the mirror.”
An hour later, Heather was passed out on the car seat. Haylay blew into the top of the bottle, making a hollow whistle sound. He’d stopped drinking because of a strange aching in his gut. In the last thirty minutes or so it had climbed its way up to his chest, making his heart thud, slow, but strong, like it wanted to smash its way out of his flesh and bone.
He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, trying to calm his nerves, but flashes of red lit up the back of his eyelids. A pinch of lightning coursed through his veins, over and over again. It was anger, no, not anger, but rage. He felt like he wanted to rip someone’s head off with his bare hands.
He stood up and surveyed the yard around him, where the remains of old furniture and beat up jalopies were thrown about. Heather looked innocent, snoring lightly, her arms crossed in front of her chest. He considered waking her, but knew that she’d insist on following him, and he needed to be alone for what he knew he was about to do.
Whether he wanted to wake her or not was beside the point, as he only made it a few steps across the yard when he accidentally kicked an empty spray paint can. It clattered across the ground.
“Where you goin’?” Heather’s voice sounded off behind him.
Haylay turned to see the girl standing with her hands on her hips.
“I know you were not just gonna leave me here all by myself,” she insisted.
Haylay only shrugged his shoulders. The shocked look on her face was almost hilarious, with her upper lip pulled up over her teeth.
“Hollis…Haylay! Seriously? You were just gonna leave me here? Where you go, I go. You don’t even know where the hell you’re goin’ anyway.”
“I need a gun,” Haylay announced. “Where can I get a gun?”
She stared at him, dumbfounded.
“A gun?”
“Yes, like bang bang. A gun.”
“Do I look like I know where a person could get a gun? And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you. Why do you need a gun?”
Haylay shooed her away and turned to leave the yard. He didn’t really care whether she followed or not. He had something he needed to do. That much was clear to him now. Seconds later she was right by his side.
“Really? Why do you need a gun?”
“I don’t know how to explain this to you, Heather, but I’m here for a reason. Your brother couldn’t do what needs to be done, so I was brought here to take care of it. Now, I need to find me some mean ass white boys who like to go pickin’ on little gay black men like your brother.”
“And you’re just gonna kill them?”
Heather hurried up and stepped in front of him, blocking his path. Haylay stepped to the right and she followed, but a quick step to the left again and he’d passed her.
“I don’t got time for these games, baby girl. Get the fuck out of my way before you end up hurt too.”
“You wouldn’t hurt me!”
“I ain’t all that sure I can control what’s boilin’ up inside of me right now. It’s in my gut, aching, like a hunger. I need to do this”
Heather tugged on his arm.
“You can control it. Nobody is in control of that body but you, Miss Haylay. I know I haven’t known you long, but from what I’ve seen, you’re the toughest bitch on the planet. I fail to believe that you’re gonna let some stomach cramp tell you what to do. Guess what, I get those fucking stomach cramps once a month, and do I ever wanna kill somebody? Oh hell yes, but do I do it? No! Why? Because killin’ is wrong!”
Haylay eyeballed the girl. She held the gaze for a moment, but then backed down and dropped her eyes to her feet. She let go of his wrist.
“Fine,” she said. “If you really think this is something you have to do, you go ahead and do it. But I’m comin’ with you.”
“Okay,” Haylay said as he turned and walked away.
He could hear her rushing to catch up.
“Wait, really? You’re just gonna let me be an accessory to murder? That’s messed up!”
An hour later, Haylay was behind the wheel again, driving aimlessly around the city. Heather was complaining in the passenger seat about drinking too much and he had to remind her she’d only had two wine coolers. He was growing more and more frustrated by the minute.
Why couldn’t he figure out where to get a gun? Guns were everywhere on the dark side. If he needed one, he’d probably just take one from some dead fool on the street who obviously hadn’t known how to use it well enough anyway. On the dark side, finding a gun was easier than finding toilet paper. Who would have a gun in this pretty world? Law enforcement, sure, but he wasn’t crazy enough to try and rob a cop. Who else?
“Where’s the nastiest part of town?” he asked Heather.
“Nasty, how?” Heather asked.
“What the fuck do you mean nasty, how? Nasty like you wouldn’t wanna go walkin’ through it at night nasty. Or nasty like there’s a gun store on every corner nasty. Nasty like Miss Haylay can easily acquire a motherfuckin’ gun nasty!”
“Benson,” she replied. “Two blocks back in that direction.”
Before he could make the turn towards Benson, Heather slapped his leg.
“Wait,” she said. “I think I know an easier way.”
Thirty minutes later they were parked in front of a trailer, with trailers to either side.
“This is your uncle’s house?” he asked.
She nodded her head.
“He a white uncle?”
“We don’t have any white uncles. He’s as black as you and me.”
“I’m sorry, baby, but this place screams white trash. Anyhow, how you know your uncle got a gun?”
“He showed me once. He was drunk and he showed me and Hollis,” she replied.
“And you think this uncle…”
“…Hank.”
“You think this Uncle Hank is just gonna let us take his gun?”
“He’s not home. He never is. This is his address, but he lives at the bar down the street. He’s a drunk.”
It didn’t take long for Haylay and Heather to make their way into the trailer. The door was barely held closed by the deadbolt, which seemed to be just dangling in place. Heather shook the door softly twice, then yanked hard, and it burst open.
Haylay held his nose as the stench of dirty underwear, moldy dishes, and stale cigarette smoke came wafting through the doorway.
“Oh Lord,” he cried. “I done smelled some horrible, hideous smells in my life, but damn, this got ‘em all beat.”
Heather pinched her nose closed with two fingers and led the way into the trailer.
Once inside, it was obvisous why the place reaked. Clothes, many of which were stained with oil or possibly bodily fluids, were draped over the pleather sofa and tossed onto the floor. Cigarette burn marks pocked the arm of the sofa. A TV was parked in the corner of the living room, but had a gaping hole in the front of it. Each of the two broken nightstands in the room had an open pizza box with old crust resting on it. Haylay bumped into one of the tables and roaches scattered.
“I take it Uncle Hank ain’t married,” Haylay said.
“Divorced, twice,” Heather replied.
“Ain’t that a shame. So where’s this gun? I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”
“In the bedroom.”
She led the way and Haylay winced. He covered his mouth and nose with his closed hand.
“Oh no. Do we have to?”
The bedroom looked a lot like the living room. A mattress lay on the floor, no box spring and no frame. A porn magazine was opened up on the floor, with a picture of a girl spread eagle, her lover on his knees inching his way towards her. Haylay kicked the magazine with his foot.
“Who needs a TV when you’ve got this kind of action?”
Heather looked down at the magazine and kicked it closed. When she went into the closet to
fish out her uncle’s pistol, Haylay glanced around the room, remembering his own bathroom stall at the back of the hardware store, in the Slums of York. Things had changed so much when he moved to the Blue Capped Mountains with Gabe and Lisa. Life was better than he’d ever known prior to that. For the first time, he’d had a family.
Looking around the room, he sensed the depression this Uncle Hank must feel. The one mirror in the room was cracked and it dawned on him that Uncle Hank might not be the Uncle Hank Heather thought she knew.
“Hey, how long ago did Uncle Hank start his drinking binge?”
“Right around the time his wife died. Got it.” She exited the closet with the gun pointed at Haylay.
“Hey! Whoa. Damn girl, point that thang somewhere else!”
“Sorry,” she said as she aimed it at the floor. “I’ve never held a gun before. This isn’t how I usually take care of my problems.”
She handed it over to Haylay.
“How did your aunt die?”
“Car accident. She and her son died. Not his son, but hers, from her first marriage. It was really sad. A drunk driver plowed into them as they were exiting the highway.”
Haylay could feel Uncle Hank’s pain. He imagined the rage he felt might be a lot like what he was feeling now, with the urge to kill the one responsible.
“The driver got what he deserved, though. God’s wrath, I guess. Gas line ruptured in his house and there was a fire, right before the trial. Strange how stuff like that happens.”
Haylay looked at the broken mirror again.
“Yeah, really strange. Look, stay away from your uncle as much as possible. He might not be the uncle you think you know.”
“What do you mean?”
Haylay considered warning her that her uncle was an image from the other side of the mirror, but thought it might be too much. She might mention it to Uncle Hank if she knew the truth, and that could be a really bad thing.
“He’s a hurting man. Let God sort him out. Don’t try to take it upon yourself to help him out or anything. That’s all I mean.”
“Okay,” she said with a roll of her eyes as she made her way out of the living room and out of the house. “It’s not like I’m gonna become his drinkin’ buddy or anything.”
“Well, you are quite the lush, Mrs. Two Wine Coolers!” he called after her.
Back in the car, Heather wouldn’t shut up. Haylay was caught somewhere between seething with anger, wanting to hunt down those responsible for the beating of his twin, and brotherly frustration, wanting to kick Heather out the passenger side of the car. He knew he couldn’t take the girl along with him for what he was about to do. There was no way.
“I need something to drink,” he said as he pulled the car into a gas station parking lot. “You think you can run in real quick and get sodas or something? I don’t know what’s wrong with me. My mouth’s all cottony like.”
“You got money?” she asked.
“No.”
“What do I look like, a sugar mama or something? Geez.”
She got out of the car and made her way into the store. As soon as the door closed and she was out of sight, Haylay backed the car up and took off. He felt bad leaving the girl stranded, but she was a lot safer at the gas station than she would be if she accompanied him.
It wasn’t until he was a few miles down the road that he realized he had no idea where he was going. Heather’d mentioned the punks hanging out at a bar right next to the ballet studio, but he didn’t know where the bar or the ballet studio was.
He pulled alongside the shoulder of the road and rummaged through the car. Surely Hollis would have something from the studio. Just as he’d thought, he found some fliers in the glove compartment, probably left over from the last do-gooder event he had helped with.
“Being a dancer wasn’t enough?” Haylay said aloud to himself. “You had to be a part of their marketing campaign too? No wonder those guys kicked your ass.”
As soon as the words slipped from his lips, he felt the rage grow again. The mere thought of the beating made Haylay feel wild.
With the address on the pamphlet and a couple of stops for directions, which garnished odd stares as dressing in drag wasn’t as normal as it had been on the dark side, Haylay was finally able to find the studio.
He watched the front door of the crappy looking bar from his car across the street. A woman with frizzy hair and her T-shirt tied in a knot at her belly puffed from a cigarette and laughed into her cell phone, her flabby belly shaking with each giggle. A man came out a few second later and lit up a smoke right next to her. The woman bummed a cigarette from him and flirted as they smoked.
Haylay watched all of this with fascinated boredom. It was just all too simple. On the dark side, the two would’ve already gone somewhere to have sex, or would’ve just done the deed right there on the sidewalk.
What he was waiting for, he didn’t know. He sat in the shadows watching people enter and exit the bar, the pistol resting on his lap, fully loaded. He wasn’t sure how he’d identify the men who’d beaten Hollis to a pulp, but somehow he knew he’d be able to pick them out.
He considered just waltzing through the front door, but he doubted he’d receive a warm welcome, and drawing that much attention to himself might get Hollis in trouble after Haylay did the killing and disappeared through the mirror. Unlike most images he knew, Haylay actually gave a damn about what happened to Hollis in the aftermath.
Finally, after several hours of watching a bunch of boring people smoke and joke, two men stepped out of the bar, staggering as they hit the street. Goosebumps rose on Haylay’s flesh. He knew it was the two he’d been waiting for. Even from as far away as he was, he knew. Their faces flashed before his eyes, close ups, like bursts of images from a dream. He could see them standing over Hollis, yelling taunts and insults at him, hatred raining down on him.
“Faggot!” he heard one of the guys yell.
“Dudes don’t dance, ya queer!” the other called out as he stepped on Hollis’ face.
It was nearly overwhelming, and Haylay had to lean his head back, take a deep breath, and calm his nerves. It wasn’t until he felt the wet trail reach his earlobe that he realized he was crying. Tears flowed as he felt the pain and fear Hollis had experienced. Suddenly the rage overcame the sadness and he bit down hard. Blood seeped out of his bottom lip as he threw open the car door and followed the two men.
They turned down a dark side street, staggering and laughing, holding each other up as they rounded the corner into the shadows. Haylay took off his heels and stuffed them into his purse. With bare feet he’d be able to mask his approach. Even with a gun, sneaking up on two men the size of these two was dangerous.
As Haylay headed into the alley, he found seeing to be more of a challenge than he’d expected.
“Hold on a second, I gotta take a leak,” one of the men said.
“Hurry up, ya puss. Diva Dive’s gonna be closing soon and if I ain’t gonna get any ass tonight, I might as well get me a lap dance.”
So the men were interested in finding a lady. Haylay quietly reached into his purse, took out the high heels, and placed them back on his feet. He walked through the alley, making sure his heels clicked with each step. Sure enough, the men took the bait.
“Whoa, what we got here?” one of them asked. “Billy, you best zip it up, we got company.”
“If that’s the case, I might should keep it whipped out, don’tcha think?” Billy joked.
“Fellas,” Haylay said with the most feminine voice he could muster. “Mind walkin’ a lady to the Diva Dive?”
“Oh baby, we was headin’ in that direction ourselves,” the man next to Billy said, as dull light from overhead caught his face and displayed his gap-toothed grin.
“That’s a beautiful thing,” Haylay said in his manly voice as he moved far enough into the light for the guys to get a good look at him and the pistol pointed in their direction.
“The fuck!” Billy yel
led.
“You da faggot from the other night?” the dumbfounded second man asked, with his upper lip practically touching his nose in a goofy, open-mouthed expression.
“Baby,” Haylay said as he cocked the gun and pointed it at the man’s forehead. “You couldn’t have chosen a poorer choice of words.”
The man’s eyes grew wide as he realized the predicament he was in. Billy didn’t even zip up his pants. He just stared at Haylay with his shriveled dick peeking through the hole in his jeans.
