House of Slide Hybrid

by Juliann Whicker

  “Fine. I’m leaving.” Snowy spun around and left me alone in the men’s room with Grim and the body. I opened my mouth to say something, but she was gone, and the way Snowy was, she wasn’t coming back. I’d have to find a different ride home.

  Grim pursed his lips before he knelt beside the Hotblood and began checking his pulse, holding the body’s wrist between two clinical white fingers before dropping it to the floor. Grim rose, pulling the body with him, the Hotblood’s arm over Grim’s shoulder so that he looked supported by Grim, instead of comatose. Standing, the unconscious guy looked younger, leaner, not really Hotblooded in spite of the black leather. I got a paper towel wet and dabbed his face underneath the messy brown hair so it wasn’t as bloody, then put a friendly arm around the man’s waist.

  “Where are we taking him?” I asked as we left the room, Grim managing to prop the door open with his foot.

  “My house, I suppose,” he answered, sounding slightly put out but still very polite. “This is going to result in quite a few house calls from various persons. I should have tidied up more before I went out.”

  “Why did Snowy call you? I didn’t even know she had your number,” I said as I stepped around the ‘closed for cleaning’ sign. Snowy thought quickly, of course she also wouldn’t let me ever forget that I’d rushed into a restroom to challenge a Hotblood. It didn’t make very much sense to me either.

  “Satan, my dear brother, was kind enough to request my assistance. Apparently I’m included in House business where you’re concerned, probably having to do with my position as go between for your mother and father.”

  I nodded as I gritted my teeth as the fellow slipped slightly over, heavier on me than he looked. Where did he put all that weight? “That sounds fun. My parents don’t seem to talk very much. I thought you’d be working with my dad for Slide.”

  “I am not entirely aware of Slide’s business. He lets me know what is necessary, but I am not in line as Son.” he gave me a slight smile over the head of the Hotblood, the kind of smile that looked unnaturally forced.

  We didn’t go into the main mall, but continued down the corridor attached to the restrooms to a back door outside of which was the convenient hearse. He opened the rear door, and I was impressed to see a guerney slide out automatically. Grim deposited the body then slid him in, shutting the door with a click.

  “He’s not dead, is he?” I asked, wondering how often Grim loaded bodies into his hearse.

  “No, but that could always change.”

  In the hearse, I sat in the front beside Grim who hummed under his breath, a tune that I’d never heard but grew to know very well after the monotonous repeats.

  “What is that?” I asked, finally after I gave up on trying to ignore it.

  “It’s the theme from the good, the bad, and the ugly.”

  “You, my mother, and Satan?” I asked.

  He chuckled then turned the hearse into a narrow alley that came out on a street of small houses that had seen better days. It wasn’t a slum by any means, but there was nothing of the ostentatious wealth of Slide. He pulled up the driveway of a small house hidden from the street by a dense hedge. It was private enough that I imagined he had no problem dragging bodies in and out of the hearse without his neighbors noticing.

  Grim asked me to grab the keys from the hearse which I used to open the back door while Grim carried the Hotblood like a child up the steps to join me. It took some time, but Grim waited patiently while I found the right key. I wasn’t exactly used to locking and unlocking things, so it was a bit of a novelty, particularly with the Hotblood’s rough breathing directly behind me. At last the door was open, and Grim flipped on the light, flooding the kitchen in bright fluorescent sterility.

  I stared at the kitchen, immaculate white countertops, white cupboards, white floor, with a massive white table with an adjustable light above, as though it could double for a surgical table in a pinch.

  “Yeah, too bad you didn’t clean up,” I muttered, feeling like a slacker for having clothes and books on the floor of my room at home.

  “Immaculate comes naturally to most Wilds, of course, if you really want to overcome the propensity, you can, as proven by my big brother.”

  “He does it on purpose?” I asked following him through the kitchen, down a hall, and into a white room with a hospital bed and a bit of medical looking equipment surrounding it.

  “That’s right,” Grim said as he lowered the Hotblood to the bed and began running hands up and down the patient’s legs. “Broken,” Grim said conversationally, “Perhaps three, four fractures on the left leg, right leg is a little more decimated.” I winced as I rubbed my own leg, feeling a sympathy pain. He leaned down so that his head was right over the heart, listening intently. After that, he ripped open the shirt, then put his hands gently on the skin of the Hotblood’s chest. His face showed his intense concentration as he did whatever unseen magic he could.

  “Why don’t you go make yourself a sandwich,” he said as he stayed there, still intent on the patient. “I have some tests to run.”

  “What kind of tests?” I asked, for some reason reluctant to leave the Hotblood.

  “He’s a Hotblood, but there’s something not quite right about him. He should be moving by now. Hotbloods heal fast if they don’t die right away, but this one seems close to hibernation, a state common for Cools, but very strange for a Hotblood. I want to take some tests to see if I can increase his metabolism, triggering his healing. Hotbloods heal faster the hotter they burn, but this one’s temperature has been dropping steadily since we found him.”

  “Oh. That sounds exciting. Okay, do what you do then,” I said, before heading back to the kitchen. Even the fridge was immaculate with little hand labeled jars, like nothing had come from an actual grocery store or something, no, that would ruin his fridge’s gleaming all white interior. He was as bad as my mother, maybe worse even. She had metal in her kitchen to liven things up, this was all pure, stark, unadulterated white; even the sink was white ceramic. I grabbed some hummus and pitas, and realized that most of the food was in the white/creamish category.

  My uncle Grim was a serious case. I took off the hat Snowy had shoved on my head and threw it on the table, liking the punctuation of it, a splash of color in the white kitchen. I ran a hand over my damp hair and smiled as I imagined how I looked in that white room with my blue hair.

  I was almost finished with my pita when the knock on the front door, more like pounding actually, made me jump. I sat there, wondering what I was supposed to do when Grim walked in, taking off latex gloves as he went, with red fingertips on the gloves before he dropped them into the white garbage can.

  “There are Hotbloods at the front door,” he said, apparently untroubled by this outcome. “If you’d be so good as to remain where you are, it would be much appreciated.”

  I stared at the place where he’d been standing a moment before, then waited to the count of five before following him. I stopped as I heard voices, low, murmuring outside the house where Grim stood talking to the Hotbloods I couldn’t see or hear. I sighed, irritated then went into the room, the one where the patient lay beneath a white sheet, his eyes closed as he lay there, looking like a corpse.

  I stood in the doorway, staring at the still figure before I moved closer, wondering if he was actually breathing. What Grim had said about hibernation was interesting, particularly when my dad hadn’t seemed to ever sleep in the summer. Cools and their abilities were a puzzle to me, even though as a Hybrid half Cool, I should definitely know about things like hibernation and whatever else weird stuff.

  I leaned over the body, and could see the slight rise and fall of his narrow chest, proof that he was breathing. I stared at his face, at the blotchy skin over the bruising. It looked like acne. He had to be young, fifteen or sixteen, but he looked tired even unconscious, or maybe especially unconscious.

  When he sat up and grabbed me by the throat, I didn’t have time for more than a sli
ght gasp, before I hung, clawing at his hand as I kicked my feet, trying to get anything, to knock something over so that my uncle would hear me.

  The boy blinked spectacularly bright blue eyes at me slowly. Frowning he pulled me close to him before he covered my mouth with his hand, releasing my throat. I took as deep breaths as I could through my nose then opened my mouth to try and bite him, but he shook his head, staring at me with eyes that glowed even brighter blue. His eyes didn’t look young. His eyes burned with so much raw energy he made my father’s look dead.

  “I know you,” he said slowly, like he had a hard time forming the words. “You were at the art gallery, the slaughter.” His eyes narrowed at me like he had a hard time remembering what he was doing. “Do you know where it is?”

  I stared at him, eyes watering as I tried not to blink first. He shook his head, slightly disoriented before he continued speaking, faster this time. “You’re the one I compelled, the one I brought to stop the idiot Hotblood from killing me. Not exactly a warrior, are you? Oh well, you’ll do.”

  I glared at him, at least I hoped it was a glare, and he seemed to notice that he still had his hand over my mouth. He removed it, looking around with a scowl, like he was looking for the best exit. Without his eyes on me he looked pathetic and helpless, but my aching throat told a different story.

  “You compelled me?” I demanded, but my voice came out a quiet hiss that Grim would hardly notice. “You’re Cool and a Hotblood. You’re a Hybrid like me.”

  “Yes, like you,” he agreed, looking at me with those shocking blue eyes again that made me wish that I’d said something different, something that would intimidate him and make him stop staring at me. He had multiple broken bones; he had to be in pain. “You understand what it’s like, being torn apart by two extremes, the chilling cold and the blistering heat, how it feels to never be whole, one, a complete entity, always struggling to maintain sanity. I must have it. You must help me.”

  “I don’t have to…” I began, but his hand gripped my wrist painfully and it wasn’t only the pressure that made my bone feel like it was about to be crushed, it was the wave of heat that poured out of him, fire that physically burned me. I yelped. He let go, looking down at my wrist the same time I did, at the white skin with red weals shaped like his fingers.

  “You must help me,” he said, differently this time, cajoling me like Snowy would have done with her batting eyelashes.

  “Help you with what?” I backed away from him, hoping that the broken legs would keep him where he was. “I think you’re crazy. It’s only a matter of time before you’re taken out, and I’m sorry, sort of, but it’s nothing to do with me, except that you compelled me.” I had made up my mind to rush out of the room to find Grim, even if he was talking to Hotbloods. I could turn over this basically psycho Hybrid before he burned, me, choked me, or did something else even less pleasant.

  “You’re right, I am mad, but that’s why I must have it, so that I can finally have peace, finally stop the pain right here,” he said, gripping his chest with his hand like he was prepared to rip out his own heart with his fingertips.

  “What are you talking about? What could make you sane? You sound crazy just talking about it.”

  “The cane. The cane. You must remember the cane. It was at the warehouse, that’s what I broke in to find, not to steal something belonging to that over-starched Hotblood, nothing that truly belongs to him, except that he didn’t have it, and I lost my temper. I didn’t mean to, but I can’t remember sometimes what’s real and what’s only memories, someone else’s memories.” His eyes became more cloudy, less piercing as he seemed lost in thought. His thin face did have acne, and his shoulders were hunched while his narrow fingers picked at the blue blanket over his legs.

  “You’re talking about Old Peter’s cane?” I asked, quietly, hating that I had to remember that I’d killed him.

  “Yes. You must get it for me.” He looked at me eagerly, raptly, his eyes shining again with a brilliance that was completely unnerving.

  “I can’t get it for you; I don’t even have a car much less the kind of ability to sneak into Ace’s warehouse and steal something he may or may not consider his personal property.” I’d done it once, back when I had a Hotblood soul and did that kind of thing. Now I snuck off and dyed my hair.

  “It’s not there,” he said, angrily. “Haven’t you been listening?” He almost called me stupid, it was implied by his tone. “There’s another one who could have it. There are two places, a garage or a house. Either one of them would be easy enough for you to reach in a matter of minutes. This is the right part of town.”

  I stared at him, wondering if his insanity was giving him delusions. He couldn’t know where he was—I hardly knew that and I’d been sitting beside Grim the whole time he drove.

  “You can’t tell where we are? The earth pulls at me, the trees in the park, that way,” he nodded past me, like the walls of Grim’s home and every other little house were translucent to him. “You should learn that, to feel familiar landmarks, it should be part of your training.”

  I opened my mouth to ask how he knew that I was going to be training, then shut it again, not wanting to continue this conversation any longer than was absolutely necessary.

  “If Axel doesn’t have it…” His face became a mask of fury at the same time I stopped edging towards the door.

  “Axel?” I asked, images of Lewis and his auburn hair dancing through my mind with a vividness most of my memories lacked. I could practically smell him, the sunshine on grass scent, while his eyes, so warm, golden and lovely gazed back at me.

  “He must have it, kept in his garage as a trophy. He wouldn’t keep it in the house—not the place to keep something like that. Most of its potency would be bled there.”

  “You’re serious?” I asked, waiting for the madness to subside, or for him to explode into rage Grim would hear. “You know where his, um, garage is, and it’s close to here?”

  He stared at me levelly, making me extremely uncomfortable. “Come here.”

  I couldn’t help but move forward, one reluctant step at a time until he put his massive hand on my forehead, pushing me away from him at the same time as he flopped back on the bed. I stared at him, the pale, lifeless face where a moment ago it had been all potency and turned reeling to the doorway where Grim appeared, making me jump.

  I blinked several times, trying to clear my vision while he nodded thoughtfully. “You should get some rest. Follow me, please.” I followed him, opening my mouth several times to tell him what had just happened, then closed it, not sure if I was ready to explain about the Hybrid to my uncle. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell him that he was awake and crazy, but that I wanted to know about the other thing, the part where the crazy Hybrid had touched my face and filled my mind with an image, a multitude of images actually, of walking to a place, details standing out in my mind, not fading with time as I stood with Grim outside another white room, only this time with a regular bed and no medical equipment.

  I’d seen the way to the garage, and it was close, a few blocks away where I might be able to find answers to questions I’d never had time to ask. I didn’t for a moment think that Lewis would be there, no, I didn’t want him to be there. I certainly wouldn’t go running to him when the last time I’d seen him had been so unpleasant what with the blood loss and the exploding, and the fact that I’d told him I never wanted to see him again, right before he’d told me he loved me. I stood in the room alone remembering his words, wondering what was up with that. He shouldn’t have said that to me, not when he was nothing like the nice boy he’d pretended to be.

  I stood there, lost in thought while a clock ticked in the hallway. I heard new voices, the low growl of my uncle Satan making me feel strangely protected and at the same time excluded, like I was a child in an all adult conversation where Grim could bring in Satan and they could know what was going on while I stood on the chessboard to be moved wherever they wan
ted me.

  I went to the window to look out and saw the shadows stretched over the lawn, the darkness of the winter evening filling everything with shadows in spite of the piles of snow reflecting any light it could. I pushed hesitantly on the window, thinking that it would be stuck, but it opened with barely a sound. I shivered as the cold air swirled around me down the neck of my coat, making me zip it up. One leg over, then another, a three foot drop down to the snow and I was on my mad, impetuous, deeply misguided mission.

  I grinned as I moved from shadow to shadow, feeling like a secret spy, or a seriously stupid lost puppy as I tumbled through the hedge and onto the sidewalk trying to look like I hadn’t just about landed on my face for anyone who might be looking my way. I couldn’t see anyone, couldn’t feel anyone with my leaning.

  I shoved my hands deep in my pockets as I moved as quickly as I could without running down the block, across a dark street, then even faster down another block while I held my sparkling energy behind walls so I didn’t blow up the streetlights. The sounds of traffic were distant, like all the fervor of the city was far away in another world. After two more blocks the houses gave way to different buildings, old gas stations or brick structures covered in graffiti that may have been fast food at some point.

  I knew that the garage was down an unlit alley with garbage bins along the walls, but it seemed like a strange place to have a super-secret stash of cars while it smelled of fried chicken and stale French fries.

  I tripped on a bottle, sliding over it with a noise that made me suck in my breath and realize how nervous I really was. If I’d stopped to think about it, I would have brought a flashlight, a gun or an uncle—something anyone of average intelligence would have brought. As it was, I was so close, and the thought that I might find something on the other side of the wall to explain to me about Axel, to prove that the person I’d been obsessed with existed, that hope kept me walking. I kept walking even though I strained my ears to hear every sound, and stretched out all my internal senses to hopefully read if someone bad was in the vicinity.