by J C Walsh
Many eyes stare at me from inside of my home. It’s not my home anymore. It belongs to the many versions of me, and the different variations of my memory. It’s their home now, a haunted fucking house. They can have it. Watchful eyes not only peer at me from my home, but from the houses around me. Across the street, a pale thing with long stringy hair stands in its doorway; it looks like it’s deciding if it is going to run out the door at me. In the yard one over, a small boy watches me from underneath the porch. He’s hunched over, most of the hair on his head is gone, the scalp revealed by patches of fallen hair. He hisses at me and then comes out of his hiding spot, black talons scurrying up the steps before disappearing into the house through the side door.
The sky is exploding. Like the beholder has said, this reality is merging with the Red Plane . Place of Chariots. I have to think quickly, and then it clicks. Of course, that’s where I must go next; it makes sense. I investigate the black maw of my garage. My car is not there; the emptiness is swirling, a churning tunnel of black mass.
“Don’t do it, Randy.”
I know that voice. I turn around and see Chris standing in my driveway. He wasn’t there before, and now, suddenly, appears out of nowhere. Just from the wasted look of him, I can tell he’s not here for a friendly chat and catch up. Not that I would want that with this son of a bitch.
“Chris.” I say to the nightmarish thing that was once a human being, once a friend. “What are you doing here?”
“Stopping you from making a big mistake,” he says, taking a few steps forward.
I raise the revolver and point it at him. He stops, raises his hands, a big smile on his face.
Seeing him closer is even more disturbing.
The man I used to know, the one who used to book our races, pick the spots, make sure they were good paying races and the spots weren’t widely popular with the police, the man who promised us we could take over the city of Providence in underground racing, make street racing big in Rhode Island. But then he had gotten involved with the wrong people, started owing those groups money, which, in turn, brought the heat onto us. The only way he could settle that debt was to give his soul to the Dead One. Unfortunately, he pretty much forged all our names and sold ours as well.
“I don’t think you’re going to stop anything, not with the way you look.”
He brings his hand to his cheek and looks at the blood. “Oh, that. That’s nothing. Just a little price I must pay to make full ascension, as you can see.” He raises his hands to the sky, always the showman, always had to exaggerate everything. “As you can see, it is about to happen; well, on this plane at least. I see you found a wormhole.”
“Yeah, and I’m going through it and ending this shit storm you started.”
He shakes his head back and forth slowly. “I didn’t start this, Randy. You’re the catalyst. You’re the one who opened the door; I just helped find the key.”
“Fuck you.” I should pull the trigger, but I don’t think he’s worth the bullet. I see shapes moving in closer, slowly surrounding me. How much more damage could Chris do in his state? He looks like he is slowly decomposing right before my eyes.
The wind is starting to pick up. In my backyard, a tree crashes down. Another one, much smaller, tumbles over weakly in the front; its trunk bends like rubber. The reality of this plane is turning elastic. The sky slowly starts to bleed.
“Isn’t this beautiful!” Chris yells.
Screw this, I’m shooting him. But, as I am about to pull the trigger, I swing my right hand in the direction of movement in the corner of my eye and quickly fire. The head of the creature that was about to attack explodes. Its dark and scaly body falls limply to the ground. There’s the sound of talons scurrying on my garage roof; I aim above me just as another creature leaps from the roof. It takes a bullet in the mouth; half its jaw is missing. It lands next to me; I stomp on it a few times until it doesn’t move. Two more creatures make their way toward me; they are so fast that, if I even dared to turn around and jump into the swirling darkness, they would succeed in injuring me. They go down, head shots as well. Then I aim at Chris and pull the trigger.
Click. The chamber’s empty.
He bellows out laughter. “You lost count, you stupid fuck!”
I take my chances and make a run into my garage. The black swallows me; I am running through a swirling tunnel instead of an actual garage. The other end opens slowly, showing another realm to enter. Before I enter, I hear Chris’s voice echo in the chamber.
“I’ll see you soon!”
I step out into another plane; the wormhole disappears behind me.
4.
There’s an opening on the end, a small circular opening. It expands as I move closer, revealing an entirely different neighborhood. Thankfully, it was not the opaque breathing red I had escaped moments ago.
I step through the opening. The wormhole starts to dissipate behind me as it continues its circular rotation, getting smaller until it winks out of existence.
Having to scan the area, it takes me a few minutes to fully recognize where I am. The wormhole dropped me right where I needed to be, imagined to be. It’s an amazing power to have, but I won’t lie and say that it doesn’t fill me with trepidation. I can do all these things, but still don’t have a full grasp of how or why. The only way I can explain any of this is once I get that feeling, that maddening itch deep inside my flesh, more so on the right side, I know what I need to do. So far, I have found I can punch through a human body, which, I’m not going to lie, was kind of fun. I have slight telekinesis and now I can open portals to what, another area of the same plane? A different plane?
What the fuck am I?
The one thing I do know is I am fucking exhausted. Every time I use this unknown power it drains me, causing a different type of pain, one brought on from fatigue and it hurts to move a part of the right side of my body.
On this long stretch of road, it’s mostly an industrial area. Along the right side sit numerous shops and warehouses. On the left side, a street leads up to another neighborhood, and a large playground. If I were to walk in that direction and turn onto that street, it would lead me to my Grandparents’ house. I am not in the mood for more talking walls and angry memories, but I can’t help wanting to see a younger me playing at that playground, like the days when I’d visit my grandparents and they’d take me there to play. When I started living with them, that playground became a forgotten place, one only a child would go to. I was not a child anymore, despite my age.
I turn to the building across the street from me. I have another ghost to visit.
From the outside, Blackmore Autobody and Repair looks the same as it did years ago. A large warehouse building, with a slanted roof. The rectangular fence surrounding it reaches all the way to the back. On the top, the fence is decorated with barbed wire; although, from the state of things around here, I doubt this place is need of any type of security any more. The gate is open. I wonder if anyone has been here in quite some time.
The empty lot is depressing. When I used to work here, this place was flourishing with work. There were so many cars they filled the lot from the front to the back, and then there were the ones inside the shop that were being worked on. Even though I know they are not real, the sounds of grinding metal, sanding, and air compressor guns bring me comfort, bring me back to the good old days, when I had enjoyed the hard work and hadn’t yet let street racing consume me.
At least the building isn’t shuddering and shaking madly like my house was doing earlier, but the ghost still hurt. I open the door; it releases a sigh as it pushes inward. Or was that sigh coming from me? I walk through.
The office is the first part of the shop I enter. It’s darker in here than outside, but I can make out the furniture just fine, with the grey light coming in from the outside. The furniture is not moldy with decay like the furniture in my house. It’s just abandoned, and, for some reason, that bothers me even more. Just like the lot void of
vehicles.
I am longing to see Karen Waterman behind that desk, looking at me as her small round glasses slip down her nose. A smile and then a big hug. And it would be a good hug, too. Not only was she the book keeper, and the person who handled the quotes on the type of work needed, she was kind of the den mother of all the boys at the shop. She kept them in line. She was a workout freak and was always trying to get everyone healthy. She always wore her workout clothes to work, that stretchy thermal type of material.
We would always talk about working out, Karen and me. Sometimes John would get in there, being the ball buster that he was. One time, we were sitting in the office during lunch and John chimed in while Karen and I were talking.
“Follow one of my routines, I bet neither one of you would come back, I’d work you so hard.”
Karen gave him that look with the glasses, her eyes pointing at his belly.
“The only thing you’re super setting right now is the beer bottles.”
I laughed.
John Slater pats his belly with a smile. Then he says, “I wouldn’t be like this if Randy and his grandfather weren’t slackers; we used to work out in the basement all the time.”
“Don’t blame his grandfather,” Karen scolded him, “And besides, most of the time, it’s what you put in your mouth. Here have some salad.” Karen held out her fork, some green leaves and a couple of strawberries attached to it.
He had waved it away with disgust. “Get the fuck out of here with that! Is that fruit in a salad? What kind of weird shit are you eating? What’s that brown crap on it?”
“Balsamic Vinaigrette?”
John takes a bite out of his burger. “No thank you,” He had said, as he was chewing at the same time.
Karen had shaken her head. “At least lose the fries.”
I smile at that memory; it’s less hurtful than the demons occupying my house. I must move forward though; I can feel the dying inside of me again. The Red Plane is gaining strength, moving into worlds like a tsunami.
I exit the office through a door and now I am inside the body shop itself. Surprisingly, the large open space isn’t completely void of cars. A few vehicles are scattered about, but they look like they were being worked on at one point and then all activity just ceased. Like whoever was working on them had left in a hurry.
I wonder what it would be like if everything was normal. I picture myself as just an ex street racer having done time for breaking the law. I still have my scars from the accident, and, even though I have had my challenges in the past, the programs had helped me. I do everything right before I finally come home. Would Laura greet me with a smile? Would Karen give me one of her strong hugs? At the car to my right, I could imagine John sanding it, his huge forearms tight as he moved the sander in circular motions along the surface of the car door. Would he greet me with one of his strong handshakes and make one of his jokes?
“Hey kid! How’s the outside world treating ya? You coming back to work or staying home on the couch watching shows all day?”
I don’t know how it would’ve played out if The Red Plane hadn’t happened. I move through the open space, dreamlike, head heavy again. I rip my mind from the memories, from what could’ve happened, and stay focused on what should happen. I make my way to the back of the shop; the garage door at the back is open. I see her sitting there, waiting for me.
My Midnight Beauty. But the 1972 Oldsmobile is not alone, other familiar muscle cars line up along the fence with her. The chariots. War beasts. Next to Midnight Beauty, Jack’s 1969 Dodge Charger. Then Alex’s 1970 Chevy Chevelle. Will’s Pontiac GTO, and finally, Laura’s 1970 Plymouth Barracuda. All here, all ready to race together. I walk over to her and run my hand along the dark blue surface. Oh how I have missed her. The dark blue reminds me of the deepest parts of the ocean, but, at night, she’s a shadow in the dark, moving so fast the eye won’t catch her, unless it’s under the moon’s brightest of light, or the illumination of street lights overhead.
“You deserve this, Randy.”
I spin around. I am no longer in the back lot of Blackmore Autobody. I am back home with my Grandparents.
“You’ve worked hard,” Grandpa says. He and Grandma are standing by the garage. He has his arm around grandma, and they are smiling. This is a proud moment for them, as it is for me.
“You kept your word, got your school grades high, stayed out of fights, so we kept our word.”
I remember the feeling of this day, the nervous excitement when I got home from school. The bus had dropped me off. I saw the large shape in the driveway immediately. Even though it was covered under a tarp, I knew a car when I saw one. I found it strange he had covered it. Maybe it was another car Grandpa planned to work on once he was finished with the previous one? Grandpa saw me immediately when the bus dropped me off. By the time I had walked up the driveway, he had excitedly called Grandma to come outside, and then I had known this was not a side job he was doing; this was for me.
I pulled off the tarp to reveal the 1972 Oldsmobile, just like the one he used to have. I had fallen in love with that car when I was young and was sad when he had sold it to help a friend, even though he had chalked it up getting too old for fast cars.
The car hadn’t been painted yet. Most of the original paint had been stripped so the car’s surface had been reduced to its original look, grayish chrome with some spots of its old paint still on in places. It had needed some sanding done and other work before it could be painted. That was not my area of work; I already knew where would send it to have it done.
“I’ll pay for the paint job when you graduate high school,” Grandpa said. “It’s drivable but will need work. I figure me and you can work on it together on the weekends, as long as you continue with your school work.”
“You got it,” I said, not able to hide the wide smile on my face. I walked over to them and wrapped my arms around my grandparents. My right arm just barely wrapped around Grandpa’s broad frame, while my left arm easily scooped up Grandma in my awkward, yet affectionate embrace.
The memory fades. I am back in the lot of the body shop.
“450 horse power. That baby right there is a 9 second car, just the way you left it.”
I almost pull my gun on the person speaking to me. Jack Slater is already ahead of me, pointing a .45 handgun. I slowly raise my hands.
“Hey, Jack,” I say.
“Randy, it’s been a while. I knew I would find you here sooner or later.”
“Memory is a little shaky but I seem to remember I gave Grandpa the rights to get my car out of the impound and get it here.”
“Yeah,” he says, still holding the gun. His hand is steady, he’s got my head in his sights. “Dad and I decided to keep it here until you were out, and ready to pick it up. Figured it would be safer.”
“That’s good,” I say. “You going to lower that now?”
“Is it really you, Randy?”
“Who else has this ugly mug?”
Jack laughs. It dies down quickly; his eyes look beyond me. “Friends of yours?”
I slowly turn my head, keeping my hands up, and survey the long stretch of grassless land beyond the fence. Standing on the train tracks are numerous figures, their flesh the color of soot. I must squint to fully focus on them; they are covered by the illusionary heat shimmer of the Red Plane. Soon, they’ll cross over and take over this plane.
I turn back to Jack. “No, but I think we need to get the others soon and come back for our cars.”
“Yeah, well, we are sticking to what you told us in the hospital.”
“What I told you?”
He nods his head slowly. I relax when he finally conceals the handgun in the back of his jeans.
“I figure I’ll fill you in on our way to get Alex. I don’t think he’s doing well.”
I give Jack a questionable look. How does he know what’s going on? It seems like he understands the mechanics of this world. I wonder if it’s because that’s how t
he merge affects people. Some go insane and change into horrid things, while others grasp a full understanding of the Red Plane’s madness. The only one I have seen so far that understands it is Jack, and, if what he says is true about the things I said while in the hospital, I wonder if that’s when it slowly began its merge and whoever was in the room with me was saved from the infection early on.
When he walks over to me, I embrace him with a big hug. I am extremely happy to see him, his is a familiar face amongst the insanity, and one that isn’t out to get me. His looks have changed a little bit; he still wears his leather jacket, and engineer boots, but he has grown a beard. A couple years ago it was just a small beard that traced along his jaw line and into a small goatee, but this beard is a longer than that. I grab a fist full of it and give it a tug.
“Ow,” he says, “What are you twelve?”
“I wanted to see if you are real,” I laugh. “You didn’t have that last time I saw you.”
“Well, spending a lot of days in New Hampshire will do that to you.”
“Oh really, yeah I can’t wait to hear this,” I say.
“What’s in the bag?” he asks, nodding to the big duffel bag at my feet.
I unzip it, and then pull the bag open to reveal its contents. Jack whistles.
“We really are doing this, huh?” he asks.
“Yeah.” I open the trunk and stick the bag in, then close it. My hands start to feel clammy. I don’t know why but I am starting the onset of an anxiety attack. I fight against it and open the driver side door. The keys are already in the ignition. I sit in the leather bucket seats.