by Stephen King
They were on the outskirts of Derry again. Ralph could see the Civic Center on the horizon.
Now it was Old Dor Lois turned to. 'Where is she? Do you know? It doesn't matter how many security people she's got around her; Ralph and I can be invisible when we want to be . . . and we're very good at changing people's minds.'
'Oh, changing Susan Day's mind wouldn't change anything,' Dor said. He still wore that broad, maddening smile. 'They'll come to the Civic Center tonight no matter what. If they come and find the doors locked, they'll break them open and go inside and have their rally just the same. To show they're not afraid.'
'Done-bun-can't-be-undone,' Ralph said dully.
'Right, Ralph!' Dor said cheerily, and patted Ralph's arm.
3
Five minutes later, Joe drove his Ford past the hideous plastic statue of Paul Bunyan which stood in front of the Civic Center and turned in at a sign which read THERE'S ALWAYS FREE PARKING AT YOUR CIVIC CENTER!
The acre of parking lot lay between the Civic Center building itself and the Bassey Park racetrack. If the event that evening had been a rock concert or a boat-show or a wrestling card, they would have had the parking lot entirely to themselves this early, but tonight's event was clearly going to be light-years from an exhibition basketball game or a monster truck-pull. There were already sixty or seventy cars in the lot, and little groups of people standing around, looking at the building. Most of them were women. Some had picnic hampers, several were crying, and almost all wore black armbands. Ralph saw a middle-aged woman with a weary, intelligent face and a great mass of gray hair passing these out from a carrybag. She was wearing a tee-shirt with Susan Day's face on it and the words WE SHALL VERCME.
The drive-through area in front of the Civic Center's bank of entrance doors was even busier than the parking lot. No fewer than six TV newsvans were parked there, and various tech crews stood under the triangular cement canopy in little clusters, discussing how they were going to handle tonight's event. And according to the bedsheet banner which hung down from the canopy, flapping lazily in the breeze, there was going to be an event. RALLY IS ON, it read in large, blurry spray-paint letters. 8 P.M. COME SHOW YOUR SOLIDARITY EXPRESS YOUR OUTRAGE COMFORT YOUR SISTERS.
Joe put the Ford in Park, then turned to Old Dor, eyebrows raised. Dor nodded, and Joe looked at Ralph. 'I guess this is where you and Lois get out, Ralph. Good luck. I'd come with you if I could - I even asked him - but he says I'm not equipped.'
'That's all right,' Ralph said. 'We appreciate everything you've done, don't we, Lois?'
'We certainly do,' Lois said.
Ralph reached for the doorhandle, then let it go again. He turned to face Dorrance. 'What's this about? Really, I mean. It's not about saving the two thousand or so people Clotho and Lachesis said are going to be here tonight, that's for sure. To the kind of All-Time forces they talked about, two thousand lives are probably just a little more grease on the bearings. So what's it all about, Alfie? Why are we here?'
Dorrance's grin had faded at last; with it gone he looked younger and strangely formidable. 'Job asked God the same question,' he said, 'and got no answer. You're not going to get one either, but I'll tell you this much: you've become the pivot-point of great events and vast forces. The work of the higher universe has almost completely come to a stop as those of both the Random and the Purpose turn to mark your progress.'
'That's great, but I don't get it,' Ralph said, more in resignation than in anger.
'Neither do I, but those two thousand lives are enough for me,' Lois said quietly. 'I could never live with myself if I didn't at least try to stop what's going to happen. I'd dream of the deathbag around that building for the rest of my life. Even if I only got an hour's sleep a night I'd dream of it.'
Ralph considered this, then nodded. He opened his door and swung one foot out. 'That's a good point. And Helen'll be there. She might even bring Nat. Maybe, for little Short-Time farts like us, that's enough.'
And maybe, he thought, I want a rematch with Doc #3.
Oh, Ralph, Carolyn mourned. Clint Eastwood? Again?
No, not Clint Eastwood. Not Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger, either. Not even John Wayne. He was no big action-hero or movie-star; he was just plain old Ralph Roberts from Harris Avenue. That didn't make the grudge he bore the doc with the rusty scalpel any less real, however. And now that grudge was a lot bigger than just a stray dog and the retired history teacher who had lived downstairs for the last ten years or so. Ralph kept thinking of the parlor at High Ridge, and the women propped against the wall below the poster of Susan Day. It wasn't upon Merrilee's pregnant belly which the eye in his mind kept focusing but Gretchen Tillbury's hair - her beautiful blonde hair that had been mostly burned off by the close-range rifle-shot that had taken her life. Charlie Pickering had pulled the trigger, and maybe Ed Deepneau had put the gun in his hands, but it was Atropos Ralph blamed, Atropos the jump-rope-thief, Atropos the hat-thief, Atropos the comb-thief.
Atropos the earring-thief.
'Come on, Lois,' he said. 'Let's--'
But she put her hand on his arm and shook her head. 'Not just yet - get back in here and shut the door.'
He looked at her carefully, then did what she said. She paused, gathering her thoughts, and when she spoke, she looked directly at Old Dor.
'I still don't understand why we were sent out to High Ridge,' she said. 'They never even came right out and said that was what we were supposed to do, but we know - don't we, Ralph? - that that was what they wanted from us. And I want to understand. If we're supposed to be here, why did we have to go out there? I mean, we saved some lives, and I'm glad, but I think Ralph's right - a few lives don't mean much to the people running this show.'
Silence for a moment, and then Dorrance said, 'Did Clotho and Lachesis really strike you as all-wise and all-knowing, Lois?'
'Well . . . they were smart, but I guess they weren't exactly geniuses,' she said after a moment's thought. 'At one point they called themselves working joes who were a long way down the ladder from the boardroom executives who actually made the decisions.'
Old Dor was nodding and smiling. 'Clotho and Lachesis are almost Short-Timers themselves, in the big scheme of things. They have their own fears and mental blindspots. They are also capable of making bad decisions . . . but in the end, that doesn't matter, because they also serve the Purpose. And ka-tet.'
'They thought we'd lose if we went head-to-head with Atropos, didn't they?' Ralph asked. 'That's why they talked themselves into believing we could accomplish what they wanted to using the back door . . . the back door being High Ridge.'
'Yes,' Dor said. 'That's it.'
'Great,' Ralph said. 'I love a vote of confidence. Especially when--'
'No,' Dor said. 'That's not it.'
Ralph and Lois exchanged a bewildered glance.
'What are you talking about?'
'It's both things at the same time. That's very often the way things are within the Purpose. You see . . . well . . .' He sighed. 'I hate all these questions. I hardly ever answer questions, did I tell you that?'
'Yes,' Lois said. 'You did.'
'Yes. And now, bingo! All these questions. Nasty! And useless!'
Ralph looked at Lois, and she looked back at him. Neither of them made any move to get out.
Dor heaved a sigh. 'All right . . . but this is the last thing I'm going to say, so pay attention. Clotho and Lachesis may have sent you to High Ridge for the wrong reasons, but the Purpose sent you there for the right ones. You fulfilled your task there.'
'By saving the women,' Lois said.
But Dorrance was shaking his head.
'Then what did we do?' she nearly shouted. 'What? Don't we have a right to know what part of the gosh-damned Purpose we fulfilled?'
'No,' Dorrance said. 'At least not yet. Because you have to do it again.'
'This is crazy,' Ralph said.
'It isn't, though,' Dorrance replied. He was holding F
or Love tightly against his chest now, bending it back and forth and looking at Ralph earnestly. 'Random is crazy. Purpose is sane.'
All right, Ralph thought, what did we do at High Ridge besides save the people in the cellar? And John Leydecker, of course - I think Pickering might have killed him as well as Chris Nell if I hadn't intervened. Could it be something to do with Leydecker?
He supposed it could, but it didn't feel right.
'Dorrance,' he said, 'can't you please give us a little more information? I mean--'
'No,' Old Dor said, not unkindly. 'No more questions, no more time. We'll have a good meal together after this is over . . . if we're still around, that is.'
'You really know how to cheer a fellow up, Dor.' Ralph opened his door. Lois did the same, and they both stepped out into the parking lot. He bent down and looked at Joe Wyzer. 'Is there anything else? Anything you can think of?'
'No, I don't think--'
Dor leaned forward and whispered in his ear. Joe listened, frowning.
'Well?' Ralph asked when Dorrance sat back. 'What did he say?'
'He said not to forget my comb,' Joe said. 'I don't have the slightest idea what he's talking about, but what else is new?'
'That's okay,' Ralph said, and smiled a little. 'It's one of the few things I do understand. Come on, Lois - let's check out the crowd. Mingle a little.'
4
Halfway across the parking lot, she elbowed him so hard in the side that Ralph staggered. 'Look!' she whispered. 'Right over there! Isn't that Connie Chung?'
Ralph looked. Yes; the woman in the beige coat standing between two techs with the CBS logo on their jackets was almost certainly Connie Chung. He had admired her pretty, intelligent face and pleasant smile over too many evening meals to have much doubt about it.
'Either her or her twin sister,' he said.
Lois seemed to have forgotten all about Old Dor and High Ridge and the bald docs; in that moment she was once more the woman Bill McGovern had liked to call 'our Lois'. 'I'll be darned! What's she doing here?'
'Well,' Ralph began, and then covered his mouth to hide a jaw-cracking yawn, 'I guess what's going on in Derry is national news now. She must be here to do a live segment in front of the Civic Center for tonight's news. In any case--'
Suddenly, with no warning at all, the auras swam back. Ralph gasped.
'Jesus! Lois, are you seeing this?'
But he didn't think she was. If she had been, Ralph didn't think Connie Chung would have rated even an honorable mention on Lois's attention-roster. This was horrible almost beyond conceiving, and for the first time Ralph fully realized that even the bright world of auras had its dark side, one that would make an ordinary person fall on his knees and thank God for his reduced perceptions.
And this isn't even stepping up the ladder, he thought. At least, I don't think it is. I'm only looking at that wider world, like a man looking through a window. I'm not actually in it.
Nor did he want to be in it. Just looking at something like this was almost enough to make you wish you were blind.
Lois was frowning at him. 'What, the colors? No. Should I try to? Is there something wrong with them?'
He tried to answer and couldn't. A moment later he felt her hand seize his arm in a painful pincers grip above the elbow and knew that no explanation was necessary. For better or worse, Lois was now seeing for herself.
'Oh dear,' she whimpered in a breathless little voice that teetered on the edge of tears. 'Oh dear, oh dear, oh jeez Louise.'
From the roof of Derry Home, the aura hanging over the Civic Center had looked like a vast, saggy umbrella - the Travelers' Insurance Company logo colored black by a child's crayon, perhaps. Standing here in the parking lot, it was like being inside a large and indescribably nasty mosquito net, one so old and badly cared-for that its gauzy walls had silted up with blackish-green mildew. The bright October sun shrank to a bleary circle of tarnished silver. The air took on a gloomy, foggy cast that made Ralph think of pictures of London at the end of the nineteenth century. They were not just looking at the Civic Center deathbag, not anymore; they were buried alive in it. Ralph could feel it pressing hungrily in on him, trying to overwhelm him with feelings of loss and despair and dismay.
Why bother? he asked himself, watching apathetically as Joe Wyzer's Ford drove back down toward Main Street with Old Dor still sitting in the back seat. I mean hey, really, what the hell is the use? We can't change this thing, no way we can. Maybe we did something out at High Ridge, but the difference between what was going on out there and what's happening here is like the difference between a smudge and a black hole. If we try to mess in with this business, we're going to get flattened.
He heard moaning from beside him and realized Lois was crying. Mustering his flagging energy, he slid an arm around her shoulders. 'Hold on, Lois,' he said. 'We can stand up to this.' But he wondered.
'We're breathing it in!' she wept. 'It's like we're sucking up death! Oh, Ralph, let's get away from here! Please let's just get away from here!'
The idea sounded as good to him as the idea of water must sound to a man dying of thirst in the desert, but he shook his head. 'Two thousand people are going to die here tonight if we don't do something. I'm pretty confused about the rest of this business but that much I can grasp with no trouble at all.'
'Okay,' she whispered. 'Just keep your arm around me so I don't crack my head open if I faint.'
It was ironic, Ralph thought. They now had the faces and bodies of people in the early years of a vigorous middle age, but they shuffled across the parking lot like a pair of old-timers whose muscles have turned to string and whose bones have turned to glass. He could hear Lois's breathing, rapid and labored, like the breathing of a woman who has just sustained some serious injury.
'I'll take you back if you want,' Ralph said, and he meant it. He would take her back to the parking lot, he would take her to the orange bus-stop bench he could see from here. And when the bus came, getting on and going back to Harris Avenue would be the simplest thing in the world.
He could feel the killer aura which surrounded this place pressing in on him, trying to smother him like a plastic dry-cleaning bag, and he found himself remembering something McGovern had said about May Locher's emphysema that it was one of those diseases that keep on giving. And now he supposed he had a pretty good idea of how May Locher had felt during her last few years. It didn't matter how hard he sucked at the black air or how deep he dragged it down; it did not satisfy. His heart and head went on pounding, making him feel as if he were suffering the worst hangover of his life.
He was opening his mouth to repeat that he'd take her back when she spoke up, talking in little out-of-breath gasps. 'I guess I can make it . . . but I hope . . . it won't take long. Ralph, how come we can feel something this bad even without being able to see the colors? Why can't they?' She pointed at the media people milling around the Civic Center. 'Are we Short-Timers that insensitive? I hate to think that.'
He shook his head, indicating that he didn't know, but he thought that perhaps the news crews, video technicians, and security guards clustered around the doors and beneath the spray-painted banner hanging from the canopy did feel something. He saw lots of hands holding styrofoam cups of coffee, but he didn't see anyone actually drinking the stuff. There was a box of doughnuts sitting on the hood of a station wagon, but the only one which had been taken out had been laid aside on a napkin with just a single bite gone. Ralph ran his eye over two dozen faces without seeing a single smile. The newspeople were going about their work - setting camera angles, marking locations from which the talking heads would do their stand-ups, laying down coaxial cable and duct-taping it to the cement - but they were doing it without the sort of excitement which Ralph would have expected to accompany a story as big as this one was turning out to be.
Connie Chung walked out from beneath the canopy with a bearded, handsome cameraman - MICHAEL ROSENBERG, the tag on his CBS jacket said - and then raise
d her small hands in a framing gesture, showing him how she wanted him to shoot the bedsheet banner hanging down from the canopy. Rosenberg nodded. Chung's face was pale and solemn, and at one point during her conversation with the bearded cameraman, Ralph saw her pause and raise a hand uncertainly to her temple, as if she had lost her train of thought or perhaps felt faint.
There seemed to be an underlying similarity to all the expressions he saw - a common chord - and he thought he knew what it was: they were all suffering from what had been called melancholia when he was a kid, and melancholia was just a fancy word for the blues.
Ralph found himself remembering times in his life when he'd hit the emotional equivalent of a cold spot while swimming or clear air turbulence while flying. You'd be cruising along through your day, sometimes feeling great, sometimes just feeling okay, but getting along and getting it done . . . and then, for no apparent reason at all, you'd go down in flames and crash. A sense of What the hell's the use would slide over you - unconnected to any real event in your life at that moment but incredibly powerful all the same - and you felt like simply creeping back to bed and pulling the covers up over your head.
Maybe this is what causes feelings like that, he thought. Maybe it's running into something like this - some big mess of death or sorrow waiting to happen, spread out like a banquet tent made of cobwebs and tears instead of canvas and rope. We don't see it, not down on our Short-Time level, but we feel it. Oh yes, we feel it. And now . . .
Now it was trying to suck them dry. Maybe they weren't vampires, as they both had feared, but this thing was. The deathbag had a sluggish, half-sentient life, and it would suck them dry if it could. If they let it.
Lois stumbled against him and Ralph had all he could do to keep them both from sprawling to the pavement. Then she lifted her head (slowly, as if her hair had been dipped in cement), curled a hand around her mouth, and inhaled sharply. At the same time she flickered a little. Under other circumstances, Ralph might have dismissed that flicker as a momentary glitch in his own eyes, but not now. She had slid up. Just a little. Just enough to feed.
He hadn't seen Lois dip into the waitress's aura, but this time everything happened in front of him. The auras of the newspeople were like small but brightly colored Japanese lanterns glowing bravely in a vast, gloomy cavern. Now a tight beam of violet light speared out from one of them - from Michael Rosenberg, Connie Chung's bearded cameraman, in fact. It divided in two an inch or so in front of Lois's face. The upper branch divided in two again and slipped into her nostrils; the lower branch went between her parted lips and into her mouth. He could see it glowing faintly behind her cheeks, lighting her from the inside as a candle lights a jack-o'-lantern.