by bret Wellman
"It's ... It's ah miracle!" Barns cheered. "There be enough flippy flop to get us through da rest of our lives." And with that he dove in, going straight for an expensive bottle of whiskey.
Dan walked over and took a beer out of a small fridge. He popped the cap and soon felt the bliss of sweet release rushing down his throat.
"Ooh! They got pool, Dan," Barns said, rushing over to a pool table at the far end of the room.
Dan followed him, noting that there was also a pinball machine and dartboard at that end of the room. As soon as he got over there, Barns shoved a pool stick into his hands.
"I rack, you get first."
Dan eyed the table, he hadn’t played pool since he was a kid in his uncle’s basement. Even so, it was probably like riding a bicycle, you never really forgot. He pulled an expensive-looking stick off a rack on the wall and used a small blue square to chalk the tip.
Barns lined up the balls using a triangular piece of plastic. He stepped back when he was finished with his work, taking a swig of vodka out of the bottle and looking excited.
Dan lined up the shot; when the cue ball hit at the other end, a stripe went in. Dan made his next shot, but missed the one after that. As it turned out, stripes weren't working out well for Dan, because the next time it was his turn there was nothing but stripes left on the table. He made only one more shot before Barns sank the eight ball and won.
Dan had the sudden feeling that he had just been hustled.
“Da boys bought one oh dese tables fo’ da whole fire department, back in the day,” said Barns.
Before Dan could turn away he was already setting up for another game. This was a challenge that Dan accepted.
Twelve hours, thirty games and twenty beers later, they were both sprawled out on the couches in a drunken daze. Music blared from speakers wired throughout the apartment and an action movie played on the TV.
Dan rolled his head to the side, there was a small jar sitting on the glass coffee table. He reached out, it took two tries before he could successfully grab it. He brought it close and lifted the lid, there was a bunch of white powder inside. A shock ran through Dan's body as he realized it was cocaine...
The surprise had knocked him slightly out of his stupor, he sat up straight. Looking over at Barns he could see the man lying there, drawing invisible pictures with his finger in the air.
Ever so carefully, Dan poured a small line out onto the table, brought his head down and took a large sniff.
The sensation that shot up his nose and through his body, made him feel like a live wire. He fell backwards onto the couch and stretched out, extending his arms and legs as far as they would go. The colors flashing by on the TV, the sound waves bumping through the air, it was all a part of him now.
Dan jumped up and grabbed the darts from the dartboard, he threw one and then turned to the pinball machine. Looking back and forth rapidly, he did his best to play them both at the same time; a few darts ended up in the pool table.
He sat down at the pinball machine when all the darts were gone, watching the ball bounce back and forth, back and forth, and swirling, and swirling.
Everything started to swim together, the spinning clock meant nothing. The sound mixed with the smells, the smells with what he was seeing. He had never done coke before, and it was a pleasure to make coke’s acquaintance.
When Dan opened his eyes it felt like they were made of sandpaper, his mouth was so dry, it was as if he had never touched water in his life.
He was on the couch and looking outside, the storm had passed. The TV was black, except for a few bits of fuzz where the leg of a chair stuck out from the screen. The couch Barns was on the night before had been flipped and Barns was nowhere in sight. There were feathers on everything, it looked as though somebody had ripped apart a pillow.
"Barns," he called. When he sat up on the couch the room started to spin.
Dan couldn't hold it, he leaned over and threw up on the carpet.
"What we do?" Barns said, emerging from a back room. "I don't think that drug was a good idea."
"You did it too?"
"I did it too? Why, you da one who made me do it! I got all happy wid da flip flop and den we do dat and everythang got all crazy like."
"I did more?" Dan asked.
This made Barns whistle. "Do more? Hell, I thought you gone die!" He walked over and grabbed a bottle from the bar, which was now in a shambles.
Dan sat there with his head on the couch and closed his eyes, he needed food and beer, that would make him feel better.
"Whew! What id that nasty smell? I think you took a poo in da sink," Barns said.
When Dan finally got up, he realized he was now in a business suit. It was something expensive too. Without much of a second thought, he loosened his tie and went over to the fridge that was already wide open from the night before.
He pulled out some eggs, cracked a beer and began to cook the best breakfast either of them had had in a long time. Not that it was a great breakfast, anything is better than fishing through a garbage can.
"What we gone do now?" Barns asked as he finished up the last of his plate.
Dan thought for a moment, "Well, we can't stay here. The storm is over, people will be coming back."
"You think the water be gone from the subway?"
Dan doubted they could clear all that water so fast. "Not yet, maybe we should go check on the community."
Barns perked up, "The commune? Yeah, we could go share some dis flippy flop with da others!"
There was a box of garbage bags lying in a pile of bottles that had been ripped out from under the sink. Dan picked them up and tossed them to Barns. "Fill one up and we will bring it with us."
Barns began gathering bottles but not before taking a swig from each to make sure they tasted right.
Dan cracked another beer and went over to the window while he waited. The city looked uncharacteristically calm, it seemed like people had yet to come out from hiding. There was a heavy fog eclipsing the streets. It felt as though the city itself were asleep.
As Dan sipped his beer he wondered where his place was. Right now he was homeless, a vagabond, but it wouldn't be like that forever. He needed to find his niche, something that could earn an income that he wouldn't completely despise. He would either find it or die, he thought as he downed the rest of the beer.
By the time Barns was ready to go, the entire garbage bag was jam-packed with booze. Dan watched in amazement as the man slung it over his shoulder like some kind of homeless Santa Claus. He fit the part well.
"Okay, I be ready to go."
Dan was the first to spot it as they started to leave; there was a briefcase propped up against the door. It was your average, everyday working man’s briefcase, made from leather and completed with gold clips. He slid it out of the way with his foot.
"I wouldn't do dat if I was you," said Barns.
"And why is that?"
Barns shrugged, "Because you said last night, dat dat was da key to all your troubles goin’ away."
Dan was intrigued. He bent down and unclipped the gold hatch, slamming it back shut once he saw what was inside. When he opened it back up it was all still there, stacks and stacks of hundred dollar bills, all lined up neatly to fill the entire space.
"There has to be over a million dollars in here, where did this come from?"
"Well," Barns said, "you was doin’ some snoopin’ and came out from a room wid it. You was so happy dat you broke da TV wid a chair."
"Oh," Dan said, snapping the briefcase shut and standing up. "Right, well what say we haul ass out of here before anybody can stop us?”
"On to da commune!"
Dan felt a sudden sense of urgency creeping in. That briefcase held everything he could ever dream of and he wasn't about to let it get taken away.
Barns lagged behind him as he hurried down the hall and called the elevator. He couldn’t help but wonder how long it would take the city to awaken from the
storm. Not yet, he thought, please not yet.
It felt like it took hours for the elevator to get to their floor, though in total it was just over a minute.
Staring at his reflection in the mirror on the way down, he noted how well he resembled a businessman. The pin-striped suit and shiny shoes, sure his tie was a little loose, it still worked.
What would he do with all that money? The government would surely ask how he got it. Maybe he could keep it under a mattress and only pull it out when he needed it. Small doses, that's what he would do.
The doors parted to reveal four cops standing around the broken lobby window. They all turned their heads and Dan knew exactly what they saw. A businessman and his homeless friend, holding a briefcase and a garbage bag full of stolen liquor.
Chapter 6
"Move out of the elevator and lay on the ground with your hands behind your head!" one of the cops demanded.
Dan and Barns stepped out together, went to their knees and placed their hands behind their heads. Dan placed the briefcase under his chest in an attempt to keep it guarded.
One thought kept running repeatedly through his mind: fuck fuck fuck fuck!
The cops were soon on top of them, kneeling on their backs and putting on handcuffs.
"That sure is tight, boy!" Barns said.
Dan watched helplessly as he was picked up and walked farther and farther from the briefcase. He barely heard his Miranda Rights being read to him, all thoughts were on the police officer picking it up. So far it was safe, the cop carried it along without a second thought.
There were bystanders in the street, taking videos with their phones. Dan tried to keep his head down, to avoid being caught on video. He was partly relieved when the police escorted him into the back of a squad car, he didn’t want to wind up on the news.
He had to keep his head down and shimmy in order to slide in next to Barns. Behind them, the cop with the briefcase popped the trunk and put the briefcase in. Dan was mildly comforted knowing it would be riding along in the same car.
“Put it in there,” he murmured, not realizing he had said it out loud.
With Barns and Dan locked in the back, the cops took their time. They stood on the glass and roped off the area with yellow tape. They looked tired, as if they had been running all morning. Maybe the storm had kept them from sleeping.
Eventually two cops got in the squad car. The car’s radio had been going crazy the whole time they sat there. Men and women shouted numbers back and forth at each other, Dan didn’t know what any of it meant, he assumed there was a fire somewhere.
"Hey, I have to go to the bathroom," Dan said as they started to pull away from the curb.
The cop in the passenger seat turned his head sideways so he had one eye on them. "The station is five minutes away, you will be able to go to the bathroom there."
"Thanks." Dan expected the cop to turn forward, instead he kept staring.
"Did you two think you could get away with this? I mean I have seen a lot of stupid crimes in my day but this one takes the cake."
Dan felt blood rush to his face, "We were stuck out in the storm. Why should I have any respect for the people who would just as soon let me die?"
This made the cop laugh. "What do you think the shelter is for?"
"We couldn't get there!"
"That's why you go before the storm hits, son."
"Easy to say that now, we thought we would be safe down in a subway station," Dan said.
"You were down in the subway?" the cop asked. "Then you are lucky to be alive, the entire system ended up under water."
"That's the whole reason we ended up in the storm," Dan said.
He was about to suggest that they hadn't really done anything wrong when the driver slammed on the brakes. "Dispatch, we got a four two four down on the corner of Thirty-third and Ninth. Requesting immediate back-up." His gun was already out of its holster as he got out of the car.
"Hell of a morning so far," said the passenger cop, before following his partner.
Dan stretched out as far as he could, trying to get a look over the hood. From his perspective it looked like a woman was getting a piggyback by a man in the street. Dan didn't know what a four two four was, but it looked to him like it must be impeding the flow of traffic. That was when the man spun, revealing the other side of his body. There was a huge chunk missing from his neck, blood squirted from the wound and drenched that side of his body. The woman was white as a ghost, blood ringed her lips and seeped from her mouth. She was fighting like a wild animal to get another bite.
The first cop tackled the lady to the ground and wrestled to hold her down. The second cop spoke into a small black object on his shoulder. Dan thought it looked like a Nextel. “We need an ambulance down here!” His voice came jumping through the radio.
The man with the wound staggered, dragging his feet for a moment before collapsing to the ground. The second cop jumped on him and began an attempt to stop the bleeding with his hands. It wasn't working very well and he was soon up to his elbows in blood.
"Oh, that lady sure is mad," said Barns.
Dan's adrenaline was flowing like crazy; sitting still was making him feel itchy. "I wish we could help, I think that guy could die if he doesn't get to a hospital soon."
The first cop lost his grip for a second, that was all it took for the lady to sink her teeth into his hand. He cursed as he struggled to keep the woman down and ignore the wound that was now gushing blood.
Both cops were giving their all to keep control of the situation. It didn't look good, the lady was slowly tiring the first cop out and the injured man had stopped moving.
When the ambulance came whipping around the corner it was like the cavalry in an old war movie. The EMTs poured out of the ambulance, taking over for the second cop so he could help the first.
With two cops, they could get the lady into handcuffs. The second cop had no trouble holding the cuffed lady down allowing the first cop to get his hand wrapped by one of the EMTs.
A second and third police cruiser showed up less than a minute later to help take control of the situation. With the new reinforcements, cop one was able to climb into the ambulance and be whisked away with the injured man.
Even with the handcuffs on, it took two cops to haul the lady into one of the other cruisers. She thrashed, kicked, and chomped at the air like a rabid dog. Dan was thankful they had shoved her in a separate cruiser from his. He didn’t think he could keep from being bitten, being in handcuffs himself.
By the time the cops got back to their cruisers, a good ten minutes had passed. Their cop sat in the driver’s seat, his hands shaking on the steering wheel. The original victim's blood had been wiped off for the most part, though Dan could still see a red tint in the webbing between his fingers.
Neither Barns nor Dan could think of anything to say so they kept quiet. The cop didn't acknowledge them as he started the car and began to drive. All the while, cops yelled back and forth at each other on the radio.
Dan kept shooting glances to Barns, who kept lifting his eyebrows in response. They were both not used to seeing such violence and it looked like the cop wasn't either.
The entire drive was disheartening, before it had seemed more lighthearted, now it seemed sullen. When they finally reached their destination, Dan was surprised to see that they were in front of a hospital and not the police station.
The hospital blended in with the rest of the towering buildings that lined the roads. If it weren't for the giant awning with the words "Emergency" Dan wouldn't have known it was a hospital at all.
"I'm going to let you two go," the cop said in a flat voice. "That was not the first attack today, in fact it was only one of many in the past few hours. We have so many of these crazies in custody that the chief wants me to cut you two loose."
Dan couldn't believe his luck, he was about to receive a get out of jail free card.
"How many attacks was there?" Barns asked.
&n
bsp; The cop sighed, "There was a few here and there all morning. It has gotten worse since people have begun to come out of hiding from the storm, way worse. There have been two hundred recorded attacks since we picked you two up."
"Two hundred!" Dan said, completely taken back. "It’s that bad?"
"Yeah, these kinds of attacks are usually not seen, and not so brutal. Every attack has involved some form of cannibalism." He rubbed his eyes and shut off the car. "It sounds like there are more and more attacks being reported every minute, Riot Patrol is going to have to take control of the situation. You guys watch yourselves today." He got out of the car and shut the door behind him.
It was then that the window exploded next to Dan. Two bloody hands reached in and grabbed him by the hair, yanking, trying to pull him out. He could feel Barns take hold of his feet, trying to keep him in the car. Dan was in the middle of a vicious tug of war; it felt like his ribs were going to split apart.
For a moment Dan saw what was pulling on him, a corpse. Its skin was pale white and there was a hole in its stomach that you could see clear through. Its eyes, they were the eyes of the drugged, toothless man at the homeless community.
It was coming in, about to take a chunk out of Dan, like had been done to all those other people.
That drug, Dan thought, this is all because of that drug! The thought only had a moment to sink in before the side of the man’s head exploded.
Its hands fell away with the body and Barns successfully yanked him to the far side of the car. Dan looked at the cop in time to see him holstering his pistol.