Swim Like Hell: A Visit to Superstition Bay

by Benjamin LaMore

  We both noticed the lights at the same time. Red, blue, white, beating on the windows. A lot of them, too. It looked at the lights, then back to me. Weighing its choices.

  Abruptly it stormed over to my prone body. It placed its claws on either side of my head and hauled me bodily off the floor, its empty eyes boring into mine. What was it doing? Was it sending me a message? Trying to communicate? Choosing where to bite? Before I could force a thought through the fog in my mind it dropped me on the floor in a pained heap and lunged.

  I knew what was coming an instant before it happened, and with the last of my strength I managed to cover my throat with my left arm. It lashed down and clamped its mouth on my forearm, those horrid teeth hacking and tearing, jaw chomping. I felt each individual tooth slashing and tearing through the cloth and the skin and into the muscle beneath, grating on the bone. I screamed a thin, plaintive wail. My arm was on fire, searing agony lashing through me like the wind outside lashed through the trees. Then it was gone, bounding over Becky’s body, across the room and through a side door.

  The last thing I saw before I faded out was my fellow officers storming through the Coachman’s door…

  One

  I’m staring down the swinging, Old West style double doors like I can convince them not to let me in.

  Tommy’s Hole in the Wall is exactly that. When the bar was built some years ago the contractors had forgotten to add the front door. Just forgotten it. A solid brick wall filled what was supposed to be an empty space and the workers, little smarter than the bricks themselves, just stared numbly at the blueprints and scratched their heads. Those are the risks of the low-bid system. Rather than pay for any further construction Tommy had simply picked up a sledgehammer and made the door himself, installing swinging doors on the inside of the big hole he’d punched through the wall. The name had followed naturally.

  It is three AM on Saturday. I’ve been standing outside of the Hole for a couple of minutes now, the summer Louisiana humidity so thick I’m beginning to fear for the safety of my watch and cell phone. The day had been the kind of Midsummer Day that brought the heat index to dangerous levels. A lot of it had worn off in the hours since nightfall, but a gradually thickening layer of clouds have sealed in the atmosphere like a zip code-sized pressure cooker. Sweat is running down the black tee shirt and loose-fitting jeans I threw on after getting Tommy’s phone call. I’m peering into the poorly lit opening, trying to get a measure of what’s waiting for me inside.

  The bar is packed. It’s always packed, even though if you’re looking for anything resembling charm there’s not much to the bar itself. It’s not the biggest bar in town, the dance floor is only slightly bigger than a postage stamp, and you have to be half in the bag before the stuff the kitchen churns out even begins to taste good. The reason he does such a good business is that Tommy has a reputation for being the fastest drink-slinger in town, putting glasses on the bar in half the time most bartenders can. Of course, being mildly telepathic gives Tommy a bit of an advantage over the others, but he’s not one to sweat details.

  I take a deep breath, stiffen my spine, square my shoulders, and do whatever else I can do to convince myself that I can pass through the doors and come back out in one happy piece. Like many times my presence is needed, coming out of it with my body intact is no sure thing. Before I can talk my way out of it I roughly push the double doors open like a desperado of old and stride into the bar.

  The crowd is entirely human, as far as I can tell. Most of the town’s supernatural citizens avoid the place. They have their own bars, of course, where they can let their hair down a little bit. That’s what makes a situation like this one all the trickier. I shoulder my way through the assembly, keeping my right hand protectively on the holster tucked inside my belt just to the right of the buckle, until I reach the bar. I signal to the balding man with the stained apron with a casual little salute.

  He has been watching me ever since I cross the threshold into the bar. He ambles over to me like a genial old bear, all but sidestepping to keep his bulk from wreaking havoc with the bottles behind the narrow bar.

  “Hey, Ian,” he says, relief uncreasing the deep furrows of his thick eyebrows.

  “Tommy,” I greet him.

  “Glad you could make it,” he says, as quietly as he could. We practically have to shout to make conversation, but he still tries to make himself sound secretive.

  “Give me a rum and Coke,” I say.

  “This would be so much easier if I could read your mind. You really spoil my rep.” He selects a bottle from beneath the bar top and begins to pour while I allow myself a small smile. Tommy is a minor telepath – even ordinary minds are usually safe from him – but when defenses have been lowered by alcohol he can glean minor thoughts (such as their drink order) from them. He finishes pouring, tops the glass with cola and hands it to me. The pudgy hand quivers minutely, the small tremors spilling a drop over the rim. I take a sip, wincing at the bite of alcohol.

  “Is he still here?” I ask.

  “I think he’s still getting warmed up,” Tommy says.

  “Where is he?”

  “Third booth in,” he says.

  “Get anything off him?”

  Tommy shakes his head. “Never could read him, no matter how much he drinks. Too many thoughts in that head, and I’m never sure how many are his.”

  I look around at the sweaty, shouting crowd, mostly kids who were barely old enough to drink. Way more people than I’d like to see here, given what’s waiting for me in the third booth. Then again, I can’t imagine a number that I would find acceptable. “Packed house tonight.”

  “Yeah.” He pours something clear in a shot glass and trades it to a man in a rumpled business suit for a pair of bills. He slips them into his apron, looking away from me. “Try not to let any of them get killed.”

  I drink off half of the rum and Coke and set the glass on the bar. “That’s my job,” I say, pushing myself away. “Watch that for me, I’ll be back in a minute.”

  “Good luck.” He watches me as I try to swim through the crowd. I correct myself as I glance back at him, before the crowd blocks him from view. He isn’t looking at me. He’s checking out the exits. Probably wondering how many patrons can get out in one piece when the panic starts. As a bar owner he’s seen his share of drunken brawls but compared to what he’s afraid might happen they’d been playground scuffles.

  I make it to the row of booths with a bit of effort. I count them as I pass, and slide into the empty half of the third one.

  “Evening, Arthur,” I say as I sit.

  “Good evening, Envoy,” Arthur says.

  “Don’t call me that. You know I’m not one of them anymore.” I should say more, but for a moment my mind is temporarily overwhelmed by the sheer wrongness of the man before me. A row of empty Jack Daniels bottles is lined up on the table in front of him, five in all with a sixth still showing about a quarter full. A staggering amount of alcohol, especially considering that Arthur had arrived less than half an hour ago.

  Weirder still is the chunk of asphalt on the table in front of him. It’s the size of an old, old dictionary, the edges rough and pitted. Arthur is part of the Superstition Bay Road Works department, and I’m certain the chunk had been part of the road earlier tonight. He is idly tearing off quarter sized chunks with the thumb and forefinger of his right hand and setting them on the seat next to him, not the best way to remain inconspicuous. But the strangest thing of all has to be Arthur himself.

  Good Lord, how can anyone mistake him for human? I’m average in size, a little under six feet and in good shape, but he dwarfs me. Hell, he dwarfs the booth. He’s six feet seven inches, with the curly blond hair of a child tumbling down the back of his neck over his shoulders. He’s as broad as a small car, seemingly sturdy enough to shoulder a telephone pole, dressed for work in huge overalls and a well-worn red T-shirt. The clothes and hair are part of his disguise.

  Arthur is a go
lem. A real-life Frankenstein’s monster, stitched together from the collected parts of exceedingly large corpses and magically reanimated. The clothes and hair serve to hide a horrific sea of scars from where the parts are stitched together – at the joints, down his torso, and one long one that ran the length of his spine all the way up to the back of his head. He’s as strong as an elephant, and that isn’t a metaphor. He can tear walls out with his bare hands. Once I personally saw him break a green pine tree trunk over his knee. He worked for decades in a South African diamond mine before deciding one day that he’d had enough and simply walking out. Nobody had tried to stop him.

  “How’s it going, Arthur?” I ask.

  “It’s been a rough day, Mr. DeLong,” he says, eyes downcast.

  “I can see that.” I pause as he pinches off another chunk of asphalt. “What’s the matter?”

  He shrugs. “I been feeling…off. All day now.”

  “What do you mean, off?”

  Another shrug. “Don’t know how to describe it. Just… off. My girl says it, well, affected me.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Well, Trudy… that’s my girlfriend… she said she don’t want me around no more.”

  Girlfriend? That’s news to me. I feel a sudden urge to meet the woman who enjoyed sharing time with something like him. I nod, trying to share a little camaraderie. “Too rough for her?” I guess.

  “No.” He drains the last of the sixth whiskey bottle in one seemingly never-ending pull and sets the empty bottle next to its brothers. “Since my mood’s been off she kinda said I wasn’t enough man for her.”

  I immediately lose any and all desire to meet Trudy.

  “Listen, you’re making Tommy nervous,” I say. “And you’re starting to stand out. You know his rule in here. No standing out. Any chance we could take this party somewhere else?”

  His stare falls on me like a weight. “Why?”

  “Look around you,” I say, gesturing towards the bottles and the ever-shrinking chunk of road. “You’re going to start attracting attention soon.”

  His scowl deepens. “Because I’m a freak.”

  “No, no,” I hasten to say. “Because you’ve already downed enough to flatten half a frat house. Someone’s going to start asking questions soon, and you know how we feel about questions.”

  “Questions about freaks,” he says.

  I can feel the hole around me getting deeper. Asking nicely wasn’t getting through to him, but then I hadn’t been convinced that it would. Arthur usually requires a firmer hand. I decide to take the risk and toughen up.

  “I’ve seen what happens when you get drunk, Arthur. There’s too many humans here. If one of them gets hurt…”

  “Hurt?” he says through a clenched jaw, teeth pulling back from his teeth like a snarling animal. “You think I’m going to hurt someone?”

  Okay, toughening up had evidently been a bad idea. He sets those mammoth hands on the edge of the table and squeezes. The polished wood groans as the fingertips sink a quarter of an inch deep. “I think you’d better leave,” he growls.

  Shit. Arthur is normally very receptive to reason, but under tonight’s circumstances he is starting off fuming and quickly working his way up to enraged. I wonder what it was that had started him on his downward spiral. I hold up my palms in a placating gesture.

  “Take it easy, Arthur,” I say. I feel the pressure of the holster at my waistband announcing itself, reminding me that the 40-caliber Springfield Armory inside it is ready for action. I hush it. Even if we weren’t surrounded by fifty people, I wasn’t sure that the subcompact would be enough to hold Arthur off. “Let’s work this out.”

  His breath is coming harder now, bull-like huffs blowing out his nostrils. I look around and am dismayed to find that, if anything, the bar is even more crowded than it was before. Arthur is now officially a ticking bomb.

  “How?” he seethes.

  I meet his eyes evenly, not yielding. “Let’s step outside.”

  He stands. No, that word doesn’t do him justice. He rises. He looms, his bulk blocking a quarter of the bar from my view.

  “Let’s go,” he growls.

  I stand, less impressively than he does but matching him glare for glare. Showing fear now might very well be fatal.

  “Back door,” I say firmly, then turn abruptly and begin to work my way to the rear of the bar. I know he’s going to follow me. His pride won’t allow anything else. I only hope he won’t step on anyone on the way.

  There are two people in the storeroom, a waitress I don’t know and Warren, Tommy’s spare bartender. They don’t try to stop me as I walk through. If they’re smart they’ll stay silent for another thirty seconds until Arthur passes through. I open the delivery door and walk out into the alley behind. I take up position against the far wall, reach deep into the pocket of my jeans for the only weapon I can use on the hulking golem and wait, but not for long.

  The door I’d just come through swings violently open, and the fact that it only comes free of its top hinge is testimony to Arthur’s self-restraint. He stomps out into the alley, eyes blazing, thick knots of iron-tough muscle straining the limits of his clothes. With the beginnings of a dinosaurian roar he lunges for me, arms outstretched.

  As he starts his charge I pull my hand out of my pocket, holding the bright orange package up so that it catches the light of the fading moon. When Arthur sees what I’m holding he freezes in mid lunge, the sudden change in momentum causing him to stumble awkwardly. His arms sink back to his sides, and he visibly deflates.

  “Damn it, Mr. DeLong,” he said, eyes fixated on the bag of Reese’s Pieces. “You know that’s not fair.”

  “Playing fair would have gotten me killed,” I said, letting out the breath I’d been holding. Not many people know about Arthur’s peanut butter addiction, but knowing things like that helps keep me alive. I hold the bag out to him. “Why don’t you go home, Arthur? Have a talk with Trudy. I’ll settle up your tab with Tommy.”

  He sighs, accepting the candy. “Been paying as I go,” he says. “But thanks. I’ll see you around.” He turns with a small wave and shambles towards the mouth of the alley, tearing open the bag and tipping it to his mouth. An alley cat screeches from the top of a garbage can as he walks past it, back arching and fur rising before it streaks away from him, past me and into the night.

  “Stay safe,” I call after him. When the mountain of flesh is gone I slump against the alley wall, unused adrenaline bringing small tremors to my limbs. I take a few deep breaths, slow and controlled, bringing myself down from the excited state that a near-fight always brings. That could have gone so wrong, I told myself. Not a potential fight with Arthur. I was reasonably sure I would have come out of that okay, mostly because no matter how much Jack Daniels he’d poured down his throat he’s still a decent person and would only hurt me in the blindest of rages. No, the danger had been to the humans in the bar. One unmeasured swing of one of those caveman arms could have killed more than one of them.

  My skin is drenched with a thick layer of sweat, not all of it from adrenaline or exertion. Though it was only in the middle eighties now the July humidity here, only a few blocks removed from the Gulf of Mexico, can be lethal. I need a shower. I run my hands over my hair and reach for the bar’s back door to let Tommy know the outcome of our discussion.

  That’s when I turn and see the woman coming down the alley in my direction.

  She’s about five and a half feet tall, soft brown hair tied back in a loose, shoulder length ponytail. She has the kind of skin that is naturally fair, but dedicated time in the sun with lots of high-powered sunscreen has given it a light bronzing that would fade without constant exposure. She’s wearing a sleeveless white linen dress, very sensible in the Louisiana heat. Pretty enough but smiling too brightly, showing too many perfect teeth. She has nice legs, short but shapely in sensible flats but she has an awkward gait, her steps too measured, feet wobbly. Not drunk, though, th
at much I can tell in the wan alley light. She doesn’t have the sloppy, unfocused expression of someone who is drunk or high, and under her sundress her breathing is steady, but as she draws closer she trips over her own toe. She stumbles, catching herself against the wall with practiced ease.

  That’s why I pull the gun on her.

  A possessed person is actually pretty easy to spot when you know what to look for. Their walk is the biggest giveaway. They always walk very deliberately, carefully planning their next footfall. It comes from the size difference – the person (or whatever) doing the possessing is rarely a perfect fit, size-wise. There’s always a difference in height, in weight, in the clarity of vision so their perceptions are thrown off, their center of gravity is changed, and so they tend to stumble if they’re not careful. Though this woman is certainly driving someone else’s car, but I’d seen a lot worse. Whoever was driving this body has had some practice.

  I pivot, quick-drawing the Springfield and level the sights on the center of her torso. She takes it well – it’s not everyone who can stare down the barrel of a cocked .45 and not lose bladder control. She stops her cautious stride, eyes narrowing.

  “Is this how you meet women, Mr. DeLong? At gunpoint?” Her voice, like her walk, is awkward, almost like a moderate drunk trying not to give himself away. Apart from that, though, it’s a great voice – a fine, sexy businesslike mezzo-soprano with just a trace of a Midwest accent. The accent comes from the mind so it’s probably genuine, but the voice belongs to the body.

  “Occasionally it’s helpful,” I say.

  “Your sex life must be unremarkable.” She sounds slightly amused. She does not, however, sound frightened.

  What has been caution up to this point is quickly turning into aversion on my part. “I’m not in the mood for games. State your business, witch.”

  She cocks a slender eyebrow. “How do you know I’m a witch? I could be a fiend.”