I’m not quite sure I want to sleep again, anyway. Sleep brings dreams, and dreams—because they try to make sense out of a nonsensical world—bring nightmares.
I’ve had a great deal of time to think about what The Watcher was really up to, what was really going on in his sick mind. And after ten hours of driving, watching the white lines of the road bead off moments of transient time, I still can’t make sense of it. He had his own logic—a ceremony, of sorts—true, but his way of carrying out his insane scheme still doesn’t quite add up, no matter how I figure it. It’s too irrational—like time and space itself, I suppose—abstract and senseless. One could go crazy just thinking about it all. And that, no doubt, is exactly what The Watcher did, long before he ever met me.
But he did say one thing that makes a great deal of sense, one phrase that I keep repeating over and over in my mind.
Spring ahead, fall back.
He muttered it over and over, chanting it as I freed myself from the belts, cutting the leather with his knife. His voice had drowned down into a whisper by the time the cops arrived… but still I could see the words quivering on his lips, a silent prayer: spring ahead, fall back, spring ahead, fall back, spring ahead…
Over and over.
My back still stings, the salty sweat that pools there from so many hours of driving a sweet torture all its own. But I am thankful for the pain, the reminder.
And I am lucky… so lucky… that it was—still is—Autumn, Fall. The woman whose head was in that paper bag, his Spring victim, long lifeless and rotten, was not lucky at all.
Spring, a head. Fall, back.
I pull into Denver late, and the passengers complain, one by one as they exit the bus. But as far as I’m concerned, it’s perfect timing.
APOTHEOSIS
by Carrie Richerson
I paused with my hand on the door of the tavern and took a deep breath. It didn’t help; it just bypassed my lungs and settled in with the icy knot that used to be my gut. This night had been a long time coming and everything, everything rode on what waited for me inside. Don’t you dare screw up, I warned myself. I tugged the zipper on my jacket up tight under my chin and opened the door.
I spared the interior a quick glance as I sauntered toward the bar. The bartender/owner watched my approach with a blank face and alert eyes—and one hand out of sight under the counter. I’d staked the place out long enough to know that he liked to run a well-behaved establishment. In my leather jacket, dark jeans and sneaks I looked like some biker moll wannabe: trouble on the hoof. I disarmed him with a tired smile and put a bill of a respectable denomination on the bar as I asked for my draft. My politeness and my money did the trick. As he moved to the tap to pull my beer, I wondered what his protection-of-choice under the counter might be. A scattergun? Or perhaps something more intimate—a baseball bat? He looked like the no-nonsense type. Probably a riot gun. And you could be sure it was properly licensed.
He could have no idea just how dangerous I was. If he had known, he would have emptied the pump gun into me when I opened the door. But then again, he didn’t know the greater danger that was already inside. If his luck held, he’d never find out.
He set a foaming mug and my change down before me. I left the bills on the bar as I moved to a small booth by the front window. By the time I had settled into the seat the money had disappeared and the bartender was wiping glasses again.
I dawdled over the beer and pretended to watch the winter darkness outside the window. The neon advertising attached to the inside of the glass pulsed in a tasteful and reassuring pink/blue double beat, but none of the few passersby were seduced. They trudged heads down and collars up through the cold, dodging scattered slush piles. No doubt thinking of warmth, of home. Well, so would we all, if we could.
This tavern was warm enough, cozy and dimly lit, all dark wood and old, heavy furnishings. It had a muted, untrendy class. Only a handful of people were in residence this early on a weekday night. The background music was an eclectic mix of light classical, progressive jazz, and meditative electronics, not quite frothy enough to be libeled as New Age. There was no TV, praise the powers, and the place was too far off the beaten path to be a hangout of Homo singleus. Two couples carried on self-absorbed conversations in the other booths, and a loner hunched over something potent at a small table at the back. The loner was my guy.
Giddiness welled up in me, and my hand trembled as I set my beer down on its coaster. To have my quarry, the man I had been tracking for so very long, so close was far more intoxicating than any liquor could be.
He’d half turned his chair to put his back to the room, telegraphing inaccessibility. From my angle I could see a burly longshoreman’s body and the profile of a sullen face: bristling eyebrows, a pugnacious nose, and an in-your-face chin. Coarse salt-and-pepper hair curled from under the edges of a greasy dockworker’s cap. The same gray-touched hair matted the muscular forearms, but couldn’t completely conceal the traceries of faded blue tattoos. An old knife scar notched the back of one massive hand. His isolationist gesture seemed unnecessary; only a fool would approach a man like that uninvited.
I smiled, admiring the appearance he had chosen. The scar was an especially nice touch. He looked like an habitual drunk and an experienced brawler. I knew he was neither.
An antique mirror hung on the wall over his table. From time to time he glanced up and used it as I was using the glare-mirrored window beside me: to study the reflections of the other patrons in the bar. Once his eyes almost pinned mine as I stole a look around, but I let my gaze wander on. I wondered if he had guessed who I was, why I was there. It didn’t matter. Now that I had made it this far I knew he would let me make my play. He would be curious, if nothing else.
He lifted a finger to the bartender. I rose and drifted toward the bar with my empty mug. The barman was pouring a double Irish as I laid a hundred dollar bill on the polished wood. “Make it two.” My voice was pitched for his ears alone.
His gaze moved from the bill to my face and back to the bill as he thought it over. When he reached under the bar I braced myself for the riot gun, but he came up with another glass. I let go a silent breath and added another hundred atop the first. The bartender nodded imperceptibly and palmed the cash as I picked up the filled glasses. Whatever happened now, he would stay out of it.
My man didn’t bother to look surprised as I set a glass down in front of him and settled into the chair beside his. Perhaps my transactions at the bar had been reflected in the mirror. This time my hand was rock steady as I lifted my glass. I took a long swallow of the pale amber whiskey and felt Irish courage melt some of the ice in my belly. Careful.
He spoke as I lowered my glass. His tone was as flat and bored as his gray eyes. “I prefer to drink alone.” There was no menace in his voice. There was no need.
I shook my head. “I know who you are,” I said, watching for a reaction.
All I got was a raised eyebrow. The triteness of my words hung in the air between us like smoke. I flushed with anger as he reached for his whiskey.
I pinned his wrist to the table. He didn’t try to pull away. The knife I drew from the pocket of my jacket opened with an almost inaudible click. My back shielded us from view as I stroked the razor-sharp blade across his callused palm. The flesh parted widely, bloodlessly.
For a long moment we both stared at the cut, he as fascinated as I. A drop of clear fluid gathered in the deep furrow. I sighed and released his wrist, closed and pocketed the knife. He pursed his lips and considered me as he dabbed at his hand with a napkin. The cut was already closing. Exhaustion washed through me. It had taken so long…