Initially, he had been relieved. He spent the day reading comic books, checking intermittently to ensure the continued absence. By that evening, however, his relief had given way to the reality of the situation’s danger. He could still feel it. At first, it was just a distant tickle. But the tickle grew stronger. Somewhere—somewhat nearby—his shadow was still alive. And it was eating…a lot. Precisely how much, however, Martin would have no idea until he saw the evening’s news report.
The nasal-winded reporter prattled on while Martin watched, his eyes wide.
“And, this just in: four more reports of…ahem…ghost sightings…have been sent in from witnesses in the downtown Irving area, near City Park. Apparently, a growing number of citizens are being harassed both verbally and physically by invisible assailants…”
“Oh, no,” Martin said. His parents, equally enthralled by the mysterious telecast, did not notice the extent of his worry. Nor did they think twice to ask their son where he was going when he lifted himself from the couch and hurried toward the door.
The anchorwoman, still unable to believe the content of her prompts, kept reading as Martin exited. “Police Chief Dwindle is expected to make a statement on the matter sometime in the following hour. That is, of course, once he’s been located.”
The soft yellow glow of overhead streetlights guided Martin through the side streets of town. A mixture of sadness and fear twined through him when he first stopped beneath one to notice that he no longer had a shadow. The light seemed to pass right through him and, for a moment, he worried that he too might have been rendered invisible to the eye. But then he remembered that his parents had seen and acknowledged him just fine at the dinner table.
Martin paused at the edge of City Park. A brilliant display of crimson and azure strobe lights spun to illuminate the area from the tops of multiple police cruisers. His shadow was not there. He did not sense it. And he didn’t want to risk getting too close to the investigative scene, for fear that the police might pick him up for violating curfew.
Martin closed his eyes and let his senses dull as he focused only on the location of his shadow. He could feel it, stretched like a rubber band across town, still somehow connected to him. It was moving slowly…a few blocks to the east! His eyes shot open and he hurried off down the street, trying not to let his casted shoulder move too much in the process. It ached, but he had more important things to worry about.
The closer he got, the stronger the sensation of his other half became. And it was so much stronger now. The thing had eaten more than it ever had, and this had swollen its strength to a level that almost hurt Martin’s head.
When he rounded the corner, he discovered where it was that his shadow had holed itself up: his school. The two-story brick building stood ominously among the shadows of ancient oak trees surrounding it. It was inside, he knew. This was its home, in a way. Oakhill Elementary and Middle School was where it had done almost all of its feeding for the past three years.
A cold shudder went down Martin’s spine as he thought of his entire class suddenly disappearing. Sure, not many of his classmates even acknowledged his existence, but still, he could not be responsible for what awaited them at the beginning of school the following morning.
It did not take Martin long to figure out a way inside. He knew his way around the school well, being accustomed to moving through the paths less traveled in his daily attempts to remain unnoticed. He used the window in the art teacher’s personal office. Miss Lumley must have had a ventilation problem, as Martin had seen the window wide open on numerous recess breaks when he snuck around the back side of the school to read spy novels. He recalled the aromatic, smoky smell that often wafted out and wondered seriously if his teacher was secretly keeping a pet skunk in her office.
The hard part was hoisting enough of himself through the window with his good arm without bashing the other on the sill. Somehow, he managed to get through without any trouble, though he did crush a paperclip container when he stepped down onto the desk. To his surprise, the cluttered room wasn’t smelly at all.
“Where are you?” Martin whispered.
The presence of his shadow called out to him from down the hall. He unlatched the door and, trying to keep quiet as possible, trod slowly down the dark corridors of the school. In the middle of the night, it was like walking through the sleeping belly of a great stone-and-steel monster. Papers, projects, and pictures lined the walls, eerie reminders of the small children it swallowed every day.
Martin followed his internal signal like a homing beacon past numerous classroom doors.
Strangely, his only fear was of being caught. While he knew his shadow was now much stronger than it had been upon its departure, he knew it would not hurt him. At least, that was what he told himself for reassurance.
When he came to the kitchen doors, he put an ear to their polished steel surface. He heard nothing, but knew with certainty he had found his shadow’s hiding place. It whispered unrecognizable words of longing through the door and into his mind. Just as Martin was about to push the swinging door inward, a vise-like grip seized him by the shoulder.
Martin was yanked backward, almost off his feet, and was blinded by light.
“What do you think you’re doing?” a hoarse voice demanded. Its owner was engulfed in a haze of halogen, which stung Martin’s maladapted eyes.
“Answer me, kid. Answer me, or I’m calling the cops.”
Martin recognized the voice, but it took his pupils a moment to catch up. Soon, the lanky figure of the school’s janitor, a short-tempered man known only as Wendell, took shape before him. The kids had another name for him, pertaining to the fact that his bald head resembled a light bulb, but Martin had never adopted it himself.
“I-I’m sorry,” Martin said. “I just…” His mind raced for a way out of the situation, but he wasn’t much of a liar. “I lost something.”
Wendell clearly did not believe this nighttime intruder, regardless of his age or his physical impairment. “How’d you get in here, kid? Did you break in? Boy, if you broke a window, you’re surely as hell gonna…”
“I didn’t,” Martin insisted. “I’m really sorry, Mr. Wendell. It’s just that there’s something I really need to do. People could get hurt if I don’t.”
Wendell Malloy wore a dumbstruck look on his face. Martin was correct in guessing that the man’s silence was due to the fact that a child had actually addressed him by his name. For he, like Martin, stuck mainly to the outskirts of the school’s general population.
“Yeah,” Wendell said, peering down the length of his crooked nose. “I remember you. You’re the kid who broke his arm on the playground last week.”
“I promise I’m not here to steal or break anything.”
Wendell crossed his arms and considered this unusual situation.
“Listen, kid. There’s…something funny going on in this place tonight.”
“Like what?” Martin asked.
“Like lights going out. Electrical problems, I think. But the circuit breakers are all working fine. I was just about to head home for the night when I heard you sneaking around.” Suspicion returned to his gaze. “Are you sure you haven’t been in here fooling around?”
Martin shook his head. “No, sir. I promise.” He was about to press the janitor for further information, but noticed something wrong with the man. It was as if his skin was glowing. Not glowing exactly, no. But rather it seemed he had no contrast with the rest of the world, though he was clearly still standing before Martin.
Martin’s eyes dropped instinctively to the floor.
“You…where’s…you don’t have one.”
“Don’t have one what?”
“A shadow. But that’s not possible. How can I still see you?”
And then it dawned on Martin why his parents had been able to see him. They had all been invisible. His shadow had attacked them, as well, and they were none the wiser. Martin panicked.
“That me
ans…” He held up his own hands for inspection, again noticing what he’d seen in the light of the lamppost almost an hour prior. The light from overhead streamed down to the floor, unhindered by his presence. It went right through him.
And Martin likely would have continued along the correct path of realization had something not stirred his attention from the corner of the lunchroom. There, just past the last row of bench-style lunch tables, a massive form of inky blackness stretched and drifted its way up the walls. It spread in all directions, moving like a blanket of weightless tar across every visible surface.
“Holy—”
Martin gaped at the size of the thing. Could it really be his shadow? Despite the presence of multiple bright halogen fixtures, it had nearly swallowed the room in a wave of night. Not knowing really what else to do, Martin followed his instincts and began to step toward the massive extension of his own self.
But he was caught quickly by his good arm, which was firmly in Wendell’s insistent grip. “Come on,” he said. His voice was barely above a whisper, but full of urgency. “Let’s go.” He tugged Martin from the room and out of the path of their oncoming attacker.
“Wait!” Martin tried to reach out with his bad arm. The pain brought tears to his eyes. “No, it needs me!”
He struggled against Wendell’s panicked grasp, but the janitor was much stronger than a ten-year-old boy. Martin was led along the darkened hallways, stumbling over his own sneakers, which squeaked on the freshly waxed tile.
Wendell was muttering his fears aloud. “Seen it in a movie once. That fog that ate the city. Ate the whole damn world. Not me…no sir. Not gonna eat me too.”
Martin feared that were he not able to turn around and go to his shadow, Wendell’s fearful film scenario of a devoured city was a likely probability. And he didn’t think his shadow could stand to feed anymore. The worst part was that he could feel it calling out to him. It sensed his presence and seemed to be in pain. The dark whispers cried for his return.
“Wendell…stop.” He could scarcely talk for being short of wind. Both his arms hurt, but just as the janitor brought them to the heavy set of double doors leading outside, a moment of opportunity presented itself. Wendell released Martin to find a key for the padlocked chains. In an instant, he turned and bolted back down the corridor to the lunchroom.
The room was now completely darkened, as if it had been coated with a thick layer of charcoal. Standing at the edge of the entrance, Martin stopped himself, frozen in awe at the beautiful, yet dangerous looking, absence of light as it roiled and recognized him.
“I’m here,” Martin said. “I’m sorry.”
The janitor skidded to a halt just behind Martin, caught in the same moment of reverie. He reached out for Martin once again, but stepped back with a whimper as the shadow crashed silently through the doorway.
It tumbled like an ebony tidal wave over Martin’s tiny, stock still body, swallowing him into the folds of its immensity.
Wendell fainted.
Martin could feel its fear as the shadow surrounded him. Unbelievably, it was still hungry, even though it had grown to a dangerously unmanageable size. He realized for the first time that it needed him far more than he’d ever thought. Despite its strength, it was fatally weak. It depended on him to protect it from itself—from its inability to know moderation, like a hound dog that would eat to the point of foundering.
“I’m sorry,” Martin said, feeling an overwhelming sadness for the shadow. Martin was needed. For the last three years, while he stayed quietly to himself, he’d actually had a friend all along. The shadow needed him, depended on him. “I’ll never let this happen again. I promise. Can you forgive me?”
In response, his vision returned and the world regained color. His surroundings, the paper-riddled walls of his school, returned. Soft light shone from the interior of the lunchroom and cast a reassuringly dark mirrored image of him across the pale linoleum.
He held his hand up to the light and let out a relieved sigh. “It’s good to have you back,” Martin said. He was whole again, even though he needed to shed some excess bulk from his darker self. When he stood over the unconscious form of Wendell, a large hunk of dark matter slipped back to its original owner.
“That’s a good start,” he told himself.
A week later, Martin returned to school. Everything was as it should have been. Over the course of the last few days, reports of ghastly encounters returned to standard nonexistence as a dozen missing persons suddenly began to turn up around the city. Nobody noticed the young boy hobbling his way away from each of the sites of reappearance.
“I said, give me your lunch money, runt.” Things were certainly back to normal. Paul Wingo wrinkled his puffy face as he demanded back-payment for two weeks’ worth of missing lunch money.
Martin sighed, and for the first time all year, smiled at his bully. “No.”
“What do you mean no? I’m gonna pound you into the ground, you little weirdo. You’d better—”
“I said no,” Martin said simply. And he was a bit surprised at the ease and confidence with which it came out. “You won’t pound anything, Paul. I’m not afraid of you anymore. And if you ever try to lay a hand on me again, you’re going to regret it.”
Perhaps Paul Wingo saw the flicker of darkness in Martin’s pupils. Or, maybe it was the shock at having his façade of strength challenged. Either way, he frowned and lowered his eyes to the ground as Martin turned and strode calmly away from him.
Walking away, Martin felt quite proud of himself. And his shadow was content, as well. It followed faithfully along beside him, dancing across the crunchy brown grass.
From somewhere behind Martin, there was a scream. It was Paul Wingo’s best friend, set shrieking by an invisible presence that demanded to join the game of football.
Martin smiled at his shadow and walked on. It looked a little plumper.
1st Appearance
Lane Donovan was a man of good taste (at least as far as he was concerned, anyhow). Lane lived for local and underground music, ate multicultural cuisine five nights a week, caught cult-classic reruns at the Dillinger Theater, and read the timeless literary works of the world’s best authors. But for all of his wide and varied interests, Lane placed one love above all others: comic books.
If ever there were an authority on comics and graphic novels, those magical vessels of visual transportation, Lane would consider himself to be it. He, like most comic book lovers, had begun collecting quarter books when just a youngster, eventually amassing mountains of stories concerning spandex-clad superheroes and science-fiction excursions into ether worlds.
It was probably a good thing that Lane had such an enthralled interest in comic books, since he owned Inaction Comics, one of the largest comic book stores in the state. The store was located on the corner of a very busy intersection, and had held its own through fifteen years of turbulent economic activity.
Lane was sitting at his perch, which was a desk atop a short platform that connected to the main length of glass that served as the showcase. Colorful book covers lined the walls of the lengthy shop from end to end, with the most expensive resting on the top tiers like the finest of liquors.
Without even a glance around, Lane farted. It was loud and nasty. After a moment, Lane found out precisely how nasty. He screwed his face up and made for the restroom that, for the casual customer at least, did not exist.
“Benny! Counter for me,” he yelled as he hustled for the can.
When he emerged again thirty minutes later (obviously short of no reading material), Lane saw Benny gently snoozing behind the counter. He had taken the kid on for two days a week the year prior, and he had just started showing up every day. Benny was a decent worker and a hell of a nice kid, so Lane had kept him around. One of these days he would even get around to paying him for the extra workdays.
“Looks like you’ve had your hands full,” Lane said. “Alright, move it or lose it, bub.”
&
nbsp; Benny jerked upright, pretending poorly that he had been awake the entire time. “Right, right. Hey, we actually had a guy in right after you, uh…”
“Left to take a shit,” Lane filled in.
“Yeah. Well, anyway, he was looking for some old rag I’d never heard of, and with you, um…”
“Shitting.”
“Right, I told him to come back later.” Lane nodded. People coming in off the street looking for offhand titles were not a rarity in this business. In fact, it was almost as common as folks bringing in the remnants of some worthless collection they had started years prior, usually in tatters or from a high print run, hoping it would have appreciated to something that would net them a fortune. It was actually rather annoying.
“That’s fine,” Lane said. “Hey Ben, why don’t you run down to Pizza Metro and pick us up a few slices, huh?”
Benny grinned. Any time dinner was on the house, Benny considered it a good night for business.
“Sure thing, Lane,” Benny said, “I’ll get the usual.” He took a twenty from the drawer and made for his bicycle parked out front.
Lane basked in the peaceful silence of the store and turned his attention to the daily crossword. He had worked nearly a quarter of the way through the puzzle when the ding of the doorbell told him that a customer had entered. Lane glanced up to see a man in an overcoat slowly examining the wall of new releases.
A three-letter word for which the clue was: ‘worn down’. What the hell could that be, Lane thought. The average American small business owner? While in the middle of working out this stumper, Lane looked up into the sad face of his new customer, who was standing only inches from where Lane sat. He instantly rolled backward in his chair with a hand to his chest.
“Jesus, Buddy. Kind of snuck up on me there.” He looked the man over a little more closely. Besides the suspiciously large overcoat, his face was long and angular, and his light hair was tied back into a perfect ponytail. The guy’s features were pencil-thin, and his color seemed unnaturally rich. “Can I help you with something?”
Chasing the Sandman Page 11
