by Sawyer Black
“Buddy, from the outside, all they’re gonna see is Penske yellow.”
Henry counted five liquor stores, two gun stores, two pay day lenders, and seven pawn shops before Francesco pulled into a parking lot surrounded by an eight-foot chain-link fence. Not a single grocery store or school.
Old vehicles in various states of disrepair lined a lot that slumped in front of a wide stubby building that looked like an ancient dealership where hustlers once unloaded lemons on wheels. The blacked-out front windows looked like rotting teeth. A rebel flag fluttered on one side of the front door. A Nazi banner beat in the breeze on the other.
“Jesus.” Henry sneered. “Is there anything fucking worse than a Burg City Nazi?”
“I dunno. Maybe Illinois Nazis?”
Henry chuckled. “How do you think I should do this?”
“I say kick the fucking door in and tear his dick off.”
“That works for me.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Henry threw the door open and sauntered up to the building. His reflection grew as he neared, and he was stricken by his appearance. Tall and wide. Muscles showed through his clothes. A stark relief to the fat balding dickhead from over forty years of hating the mirror.
It threw off his groove. He stumbled the last few steps, and when he planted his left foot for the kick, his balance was way off. Instead of blowing the door and the frame right out of the crumbling block wall, it exploded in with a WHANG of bent metal and a shower of glass.
A pasty shithead in a tight yellow leisure suit and a David Crosby mustache looked out from between his raised hands. Tinted glass covered his IKEA desk and glittered in his thinning hair. The only light was a small lamp on the corner of the fake wood top, and Henry's shadow stretched like an inverted triangle.
Henry marched up with a village idiot nod and said in his best redneck accent, “Hey, man! I’m looking for a late model Caddy with a cassette player. I know a feller who’s got a bunch o’ tapes still in the damn plastic.”
The shithead leaned back, blinking in confusion. He didn’t seem concerned that the person who had darkened his door was a red demon with a hayseed smile. He kept his eyes on Henry and turned his head toward a door at the end of a small hallway. “Gus!” He slid his chair back until it hit the wall behind him. “You and Bardo need to get in here right fucking now!”
“Who’s Gus?” Henry looked down the hallway, and his grin ramped up a notch.
A little greasy teenager with oily hair pulled back in a ponytail that exposed the angry acne on his forehead walked out like the world was his hourglass. He wiped grease from a rusty crescent wrench, and his jaw worked as he chewed a wad of gum with his mouth open. Gus in a script font sewn above his breast pocket.
The hallway darkened behind him, and Henry’s grin slipped into a hesitant smile. A giant demon crowded through with his shoulders drawn in and his head pushed down into his chest. His knees bent to keep his back clear of the ceiling, and when he stood and spread out in front of the desk, Henry’s smile fell into an open-mouthed frown.
Black eyes set deep in albino pockets of flesh. His nose was a pale button, and his underbite thrust jumbled fangs into the air, their crazy points all the way to his cheeks. As wide as Henry was tall, he was a foot over Henry’s horns, and his fists looked like warty boulders.
“Hi guys,” Henry said. “I’m here to talk to Mr. Letters. It’s kind of private, so if you don’t mind?”
Frenchy stood and looked at Henry from around the giant fucker’s elbow. “Keep this piece of shit busy while I go get my dog.” He pushed off Bardo and jogged up the hall.
“Hang on a minute,” Henry shouted. “I just want to talk!”
Bardo pushed his sleeves up, and his face broke into a hideous smile. “Too late for that, buddy.”
Gus pocketed the wrench and pulled out a shiny butterfly knife. He whipped it back and forth, clickety-clacking it into a blade, brandishing it with what he probably thought was a menacing expression.
Looks like the guy’s got gas.
Henry didn’t wait for the albino mountain to finish getting ready. He slammed forward with his best roar, and Bardo caught him against his chest with ten of Henry’s claws digging deep into his ribs.
Bardo howled and toppled over the desk. Henry pulled his claws out and slashed Bardo’s face as they tumbled. The lamp crashed to the floor, dying with a buzz. Papers scattered hither and yon.
Bardo closed his hands over Henry’s head and threw him to the side with a roar. Henry crashed into the wall, punching through Sheetrock, hanging up in the studs. He swiped at the dust in his eyes, and Gus crossed the floor in a dazzling flicker. He stabbed Henry a dozen times before Henry could heave himself out of the wall.
Gus danced away, and Bardo took his place. He hit Henry directly on the top of his head. The room blurred, and Henry’s knees ceased to exist. The carpet smelled like piss.
Gus dropped on top of him, stabbing and slashing as Henry dropped into the dark of his own mind with Bardo’s grinding laughter following him down.
Aw, fuck. The dark. The SHADOWS!
Henry stretched into the shadows fast, and Gus stabbed the floor instead of his back.
Bardo spun around, his confused eyes shining wide like compact discs.
Henry made a circuit of the room, wrapping himself in the shadows at the base of the walls. He gathered speed then launched into the dim light like a bloody missile, hitting Bardo right above his kidneys.
The giant’s hips popped forward, and his head whipped back.
Henry drove him into the corner where the hallway started, and a third of the wall collapsed.
The ceiling groaned, and Henry drove back into the shadows, grabbing it with both hands, throwing himself in a quickening arc. Gus stood in the center of the room, tracking Henry’s progress with Rain Man’s concentration.
When Henry burst back into the light, Gus’s knife met him under the belly button. His speed tore the knife from Gus’s hand, but not before the blade ripped through hoodie and flesh, blood flowing around his side and dripping down his ass crack.
He caught Bardo standing from the pile of splintered wood and vinyl paneling, right in the shoulder like a safety rocketing across the field for the tight end. Bardo left his feet, carried across the room on a slingshot of shadow, and he hit the outside block wall with his face to cushion the impact.
He’s gonna be in the concussion protocol for sure.
Henry released the shadow and bent over the hole in his belly. Gus retrieved his weapon and stood with the dripping knife held out in front of him. Henry’s legs quivered, and he dropped to one knee. Gus gave him that bilious smile then charged with a thrust at Henry’s face.
Henry rocked back and lifted his hand with his fingers spread wide. The blade stabbed into his palm and punched through his knuckles, showering his face with blood. He closed his fist over Gus’s knife hand then stood with a dark grin that reflected from the mechanic’s wide eyes. He fell into the shadows, pulling the screaming man with him. Swaddled in the dark, wrapped in its comfort and warmth, he opened his hand and rushed into the light like bursting through the surface of a frozen lake.
He fell to the floor in a gasping heap. Slashes on his back closed with a biting heat that made him grit his teeth. He held his hands over the flow of blood from his gut and drew deep breaths as Gus’s frantic screams faded to a whisper.
Bardo snored in a spreading puddle of black blood from his split forehead. Clear fluid leaked from his nose with every rasping breath.
A rumbling growl brought Henry’s head around, and a Pit Bull with a thyroid problem stood panting in front of Frenchy’s desk.
She was the size of a vending machine. Blocky and covered in jet black fuzz. Drool dripped from either side of her fanged mouth, and it steamed when it hit the carpet. Her eyes burned with a yellow fire. A glowing rope of blue fiber trailed from her barrel neck into Frenchy Letters’ white-knuckled grip. She jerked against the
rope, and Frenchy’s feet dragged across the carpet.
Henry threw himself back, and the bitch lunged, catching his raised forearm in a gaping maw that puked smoking heat into his face. She clamped down, her teeth meeting through bone, and she thrashed her head.
Henry thought his arm was going to tear from its shoulder, tendons and muscle stretching to the limits. His forearm snapped, sending electricity buzzing through his elbow. He gouged his claws into her eyes, bursting them under his fingertips, and she only shook her head harder.
She’s gonna tear it off!
Henry brought his fist down like a hammer on the tip of her nose, and she opened her mouth in a pitiful yelp. Henry readied himself to sacrifice his other forearm to her bite, when Frenchy shouted, “What the fuck?”
A shotgun pressed against the dog’s neck, and the blast tore through fur and bone, knocking her body on its side with its feet kicking. Lava sprayed from the wound, setting the carpet and wall ablaze. Sizzling holes in Bardo’s pant leg. The dog’s head hit the floor, her growl a wheezing cough, her teeth still gnashing.
Francesco pointed the shotgun at Frenchy’s face, and the shithead dropped the rope and lifted his hands.
Henry pushed his mangled forearm into the still bleeding cut in his stomach. He bent and picked up the dog’s head like a thirty-pound bowling ball, his fingers in the torn eye holes. He staggered over to Frenchy and thrust the head at his chest, where her questing bite got a hold of his sagging pec through his Rayon shirt. He screamed and beat at the head with flailing blows, but it chewed into his chest, blood flowing around her mouth in a red flower.
Henry looked at Francesco over the shotgun barrel. “The Hell was that?”
“You’re right about that. It was a Hell Hound. Just a baby one, though.”
“That was just a baby?”
“Yeah, that’s why the rock salt and iron shot did such a number on her. A bigger one would’a just laughed that shit off.”
Frenchy screamed again and dropped to his back.
A rib snapped, and Henry winced in sympathy. Then he squatted down and dug his fingers into the Hell Hound’s eyes.
Her jaw relaxed, and Frenchy gasped in relief, his face twisted in agony.
Henry leaned his knee onto the man’s thighs. “I still need that Caddy.”
“What?” Frenchy gasped.
“Where’s Petrov Obisev?”
“Who the fuck is that? I’m dying here!”
Henry let go.
Frenchy howled.
Henry grabbed harder.
“All right, all right! He’s at the cleaners on 33rd. Under the Burg City Credit Union.”
“What, like dry cleaners?”
“Not that kinda cleaner, you halfwit.”
“Hey, fuck you.” Henry looked up at Francesco. “You know where that is?”
“Of course.”
Henry let go of the smoking head and stood with popping knees. He danced aside as the fire licked at his calves.
Francesco grabbed his upper arm, guiding him to the front door and into the rainy East Side gloom.
Frenchy’s voice unraveled into a gurgling whine. The bitch must have made it through the ribs. Henry dropped into the back of the limo, barely able to get his foot inside. Francesco shut the door and walked around to the driver’s side, leaving Henry with a view of flames curling around the doorway and lighting the edge of the Nazi banner on fire.
That should make for pleasant dreams.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Henry woke in the back of Francesco’s car, snapping out of a dream about Amélie.
She had grown into a beautiful woman. Visiting Henry and Samantha at Christmas.
Standing at the kitchen counter with a green reindeer sweater, just like the one she wore in their family photo when she was five. She tipped a glass of white wine to her lips. A silver ring glinted on her finger.
Henry couldn’t see the details, but he knew it had the snake and frog. She was hiding her true self from her family. He raised his own glass to hide his disappointment.
Then he stretched, his feet hitting the inside of the back door, and pulled his claws in to protect the leather and sat up with a yawn. The rain had stopped, and the sun was behind a bright blue sky.
The limo took up two spots in front of the Mexican restaurant next to Mandyel’s thrift store. Francesco sat on the other side of the restaurant's glass near the front door, working through a mountain of nachos, a frosty margarita next to his plate.
Henry heard the pained voices of the city wash over him. He closed his eyes, and the cacophony of sorrow swelled. So many cries. Like overlapping radio stations. He imagined his mind was an AM dial, and he spun it. His mind filled with the static of wordless screaming, and he winced and spun the dial.
An old woman mourning the loss of her husband, taken by cancer. A father crying at the funeral of his little girl killed by a mugger. Henry spun the dial.
A man laughing with mad glee as he plunged a knife into his girlfriend’s lover. Murderous plans painting vivid fantasies across his mind. Henry spun the dial.
The voices died all at once. A silence heavy with its emptiness and Henry sagged with a gasp. He opened his eyes, and the blessed silence held him. Tension flowed from his shoulders. He could think again.
He turned the dial in his mind, and the voices flooded his brain in a cramping crescendo. Sent him hissing and spinning the knob back to the empty spot on the dial.
This is Hush-Hush Henry with all the sounds of silence here on 666 AM. We’ll take requests now. You’re on, caller.
Henry made a phone out of his thumb and pinkie. “Yeah, can I get some peace and quiet, please?”
You got it, caller. Thanks for listening.
Henry giggled as he hung up his “phone” on an imaginary hook in the air in front of him. He rocked in an awkward dance of victory, wiping the tears from his eyes.
This being a demon shit should have come with a manual.
He took a rib-cracking breath and settled back with an explosive sigh, closing his eyes again.
Now, for this fucked up face.
He pictured himself standing in an empty room. Without the distraction of the city’s constant murmur, the image sprang into his mind without effort. Two Henries. One balding and paunchy, a sheen of sweat on his broad forehead, his hoodie and jeans hung on his stooped shoulders as if he were hoping to melt within the folds. Fat Henry stood next to Demon Henry, but as Demon Henry collapsed into human form, Henry opened his eyes, shook his head, and banished the fantasy.
Mandyel, Boothe, and Henry’s own mind had betrayed him.
Demon Henry was his true form. The one his hate had chosen.
I can’t walk around in the body of a dead man.
I’m a monster, and I’ve always known it.
He dropped his head in his hands, and Demon Henry appeared with sardonic disapproval. Mike Serafino stood in front of him. Demon Henry winked at him over Mike’s head, then stepped forward into Mike Serafino as if stepping through a human-shaped door.
Good old Mike stood alone in an empty room.
The demon buzzed beneath the surface, bouncing around the confines of his new form like a pounding heart.
Henry stepped out of the limo, wearing Mike Serafino like a pair of sweatpants. Francesco stared at him through the restaurant window, holding a loaded nacho in front of his hanging jaw, his eyebrows practically up in his hairline.
Henry fired a finger gun at him and walked into Mandy’s Export Emporium.
A bell over the door dinged as his shadow spread across the floor, and Nadia looked up from her leather planner. A wreath of cigarette smoke floated around her hair, the silver stem clamped in her teeth.
“Hey,” Henry shouted, looking around like a seasoned shopper. “I’m looking for something in a summer pinstripe. Forty-three regular.”
“Henry!” A blond bullet shot out from under a circular rack of plus-size flower print dresses. He braced for impact,
and Adam launched the remaining six feet to land in his waiting arms. He took a steadying step back and hugged the kid to his chest.
“I found him, buddy.”
Adam looked up with shining eyes, and Henry fell into them, swimming in their weird beauty and thinking of Amélie. “You did?”
“Yup. Frenchy Letters told me where he is. Easier than I thought it would be, too.”
Nadia stopped in front of him, eying Henry from toes to head. “How are you doing that?”
“What? Old Mike here? Not really sure, but that’s pretty much the way I’ve done everything my whole life. I never stop to ask why a thing works, I just keep doing that thing and move on.”
“I always needed the ring. I could never figure it out, myself. So, whatever you’re doing, keep doing it.”
He nodded with a grin and looked at the boy in his arms. “I think things are starting to go my way.” The thought of Boothe dying in a Tracker’s net bubbled to the surface, but Henry drove it down with an annoyed shake of his head.
Adam grinned back. He wore jeans and a loud Hawaiian shirt with a surfboard on the pocket. Henry bent to set the boy on his feet, but he ran back under the rack of dresses. Henry peeked in. Adam had a pile of action figures arranged in battle.
He stood back up, and Nadia pinched the shoulder of his hoodie with distaste. “Henry, this is gross. Let’s get you out of those clothes, and into something a bit more … clean.”
Henry took her hand and held it between both of his, pulling it into his chest. “If I wasn’t still in love with my wife, I might have taken that a little differently.”
Her smile grew sad, and she pulled her hand free to reach up and lay it against his cheek. “And if you weren’t still in love with your wife, I may have meant it differently.”
She dropped her hand, sliding her first finger along his arm before turning toward a rack of suits along the wall. He followed and let her pick out his new outfit.
He knew better than to argue with a woman’s taste.
He inspected himself in the mirror and couldn’t help remember Charlie Mara walking into the cell as a naked demon, and returning as a fully clothed human. Maybe the secret is to always be naked. Just add the clothes in my mind later?