The Boys Are Back in Town

by Christopher Golden

  He pointed at Brian, saw Caitlyn helping him to sit up, and could look at them no more. Will felt the bile rise in the back of his throat, his stomach clenching, but he forced himself to stay calm as he focused on Danny again.

  “That guy, if you knew what he's done . . . and I'm not talking about Caitlyn here . . . if you knew . . .” Will shook his head. “Just call me tomorrow. If fucking Schnell wants to press charges, you all know where I live. Tell the cops they can find me there.”

  Later he would realize it was pure astonishment that caused them to let him go. Not a few mouths were gaping, not one of them knowing what to say as he turned and strode across the dance floor. A path cleared before him. He saw Martina, a look of sympathy etched on her face, but most of them looked vaguely embarrassed, as though just knowing him was something they felt ashamed of in that moment.

  The manager blocked his way. “You can't leave. The police are on the way. You can't just—”

  Disbelief erupted out of him as a burst of laughter. Will stared at the man. “You're kidding, right? I broke a few plates. Send me a bill. You're not the guy who got a beating.” Unbidden, a sneer came to his lips. “Course, if you want a real reason to have me arrested—”

  The manager stepped instantly from his path. “Crazy bastard,” he whispered, but he did nothing more to prevent Will from leaving.

  It was all so very unlike him, but Will knew that was a false assumption. The foundation of who he was had been altered. His life and his past were changing. It stood to reason that he himself might well be changing too.

  Just before he walked out of the banquet hall he glanced toward the bar where he had seen Stacy before. She wasn't at the bar, however. Other than Will himself, she was about the only one in the entire room who was in motion. She was walking across the room toward him, moving swiftly to get to him before he could leave.

  Will flinched, paused a moment with his head turned away from her. He swallowed, his throat tight, trying not to imagine what could happen to her, what had already happened to Ashleigh and the others.

  “You all right?” she asked.

  He turned. Somehow she had crossed the distance between them in just a few seconds. She gazed up at him with an expression that seemed equal parts sadness and bewilderment.

  Will's left hand fluttered up as though he were trying to erase something from the space between them. “Don't,” he said. Then he met her eyes. “No. I'm not. Never been worse.”

  Her face changed then, but not in the horrid way that Ashleigh's had. This was natural, organic. Into her features crept dark resignation and hard-won wisdom. There was no doubt in Will's mind that Stacy had lived through difficult times and he saw them now, etched in the crow's feet around her eyes, the tiny lines at the corners of her mouth.

  “Anything I can do?”

  Will shook his head. “I don't think so.”

  She took this in, then nodded sagely. “You'll tell me about it sometime.”

  It wasn't a question, but he nodded in agreement nevertheless. Then he pushed out through the double doors and into the foyer of Papillon, brightly colored butterflies all around him, tangles of white lights illuminating the path of his exodus. He went out the door and into the night, feeling in his pocket for the keys to his Toyota. The chill night air cleared his head, trying to wash away the old memories, all the images that didn't jibe with the world around him, with this new reality.

  But Will was not going to let them go.

  The lot was lined with the dark, silent hulks of a hundred cars. Nothing moved but the wind. Will strode amongst those cars, keys jangling in his hand. He reached the Toyota and unlocked it, but as he opened the door a wave of nausea and despair rose up in him. He steadied himself against the car, one hand on the roof.

  I can't do this, he thought. But even as the words went through his mind he knew they were bullshit. Who else, Will? You're the only one.

  The question was where to begin. He hadn't allowed himself even to think of magic as real and tangible power in more than a decade. Where to begin?

  “Hey.”

  Will grunted in surprise and spun around, heart hammering in his chest, mind flashing back to the empty parking lot. He was alone in the dark in the lot. Just empty, darkened cars. Alone.

  Or not.

  The kid was there with him, just a few feet away. In the moonlight his orange hair was dark brown, with hints of red. What the hell was his . . . Kyle. His name was Kyle Brody.

  “Jesus, kid. Gonna give me a heart attack.” Then Will's eyes narrowed. “What are you doing out . . .”

  He never finished the sentence. Possibilities, probabilities, bits of logic snapped into place in his head. For the first time he noticed the dark, heavy shape in the kid's hands. Kyle walked over to the Toyota and dropped the book onto the hood with a thump.

  In the distance, police sirens began to wail.

  Kyle Brody gave Will a hard look, but he was hesitant and even a little scared, and his voice cracked when he spoke.

  “I'm tired of being your errand boy.”

  Will barely heard him. He stared at the book where it lay, loath to pick it up, even to touch it. The cover was weathered and dark and there was no title. But he did not need a title to know that book.

  Dark Gifts.

  The wind died. For a moment Will felt as though the world had sped up its rotation, that it might slip out from under him and he would begin to fall, not knowing where he would land. As he stared at the aged face of that terrible book he felt as though it tugged at him with hooks through his eyes and his mind, his heart and his balls. The fluttering in his stomach and the tingle that danced up his spine were equal parts dread and elation, terror and arousal; it was almost like falling in love.

  “Fuck,” he whispered, the word not a curse but an oath of surrender. A veil had been lifted from his mind and a shroud laid down upon his heart. He had just been about to set out in search of this book, or a copy of it. But somehow he knew that this wasn't just any copy. This was the very same one, the one he and Brian had pored over, on whose pages they had spilled their own blood.

  Paper and leather and ink. And our blood.

  How he could be terrified of such a thing he did not know, but he was. The book had not even given him time to look for it; instead, it had found him.

  “I didn't bring it so you could just stare at it,” the kid said. “Tell me, Will. I want to know how it got under my stairs.”

  Seeing the book again had entranced him somehow. Just the grain of the leather was enough to captivate him, to fill him with trepidation. Kyle's voice broke that trance. Will shook his head, catching only the echo of the kid's words in his mind. Under the stairs, he thought, a tiny smile playing at the corners of his mouth. Of course. That's where I would have hidden it.

  The wind kicked up again, carrying with it the peal of police sirens. Will glanced up in alarm, ears and eyes tracking. They were coming from the west, and not far off now. He had heard them before, but his mind had been occupied with other things. There was no way to be certain they were coming for him, but the manager of Papillon had told him the police had been called, so Will couldn't take any chances.

  His fingers hesitated one moment longer, almost of their own accord, then he reached out and grabbed the book off the hood of the car. It was strangely light despite its thickness, as though it did not want to be a burden to its owner. Deceit, Will thought. But, then, most magic was powered by deceit.

  “Are you fucking deaf?” Kyle snapped, almost stamping his feet as if he might throw a genuine tantrum in a moment. His tough-guy posturing—always slightly undermined by his orange hair—was shattered.

  Will shot him a hard look, heart trip-hammering in his chest. “Get in the car,” he said as he slipped behind the wheel, placing the book on the seat beside him.

  The door hung open. Kyle stood half a dozen feet away. The police sirens were growing louder. Will glanced in the direction of that wailing noise.


  “They coming for you?” the kid asked, suddenly frowning, his head tilted in doubt.

  “Yes. Get in the car.”

  Kyle threw up his hands and blew out a dismissive breath. “I don't think so. Have fun. I'm out.”

  “Fine.” Will shut the door, jammed the key into the ignition and turned it. The engine roared to life. He had no idea what the police would do, but knew he might be arrested. His whole body was prickling with the rush of blood through his veins, his heart pumping wildly. Time to get the hell out of there.

  There was a rap at the window. Will snapped his head around to see Kyle standing there. His expression was torn. He wanted to take off, but not just yet. Will, though, was out of time. He rolled the window down even as he threw the car into gear.

  “Tell me one thing,” Kyle said.

  Will looked up at the highway. Blue lights splashed off the trees next to the main road and the entrance sign to Papillon.

  “Is it magic?” the kid asked.

  Will stared at him. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

  He hit the gas, pulling out of the parking space much too quickly. Tires spun on gravel. He kept his headlights off as he drove along between two rows of cars, then turned left, headed for the side of the building. Route 9 was the easiest access to Papillon, but Will James had grown up around here. There was a curb cut at the back of the parking lot that led through a small office park and then onto Chestnut Street. It was the wrong direction to get back to Eastborough, but that was the least of his concerns at the moment.

  As he drove behind Papillon he glanced once in the rearview mirror. Kyle Brody was lost in the dark, hulking shadows of the cars in the parking lot. A police car, blue lights spinning but siren now silenced, was just beginning to turn into the lot from Route 9.

  Will drove quickly, but as calmly as possible, through the small office park and out into the neighborhoods of Westborough. He remembered the panel at the rear of the closet under the stairs, and the times he had used it as a hiding place. Odd, he thought now, that it took becoming an adult to realize how much of his teenage years had been spent hiding things . . . hiding beer and pot and love letters and smut magazines. Hiding how badly he had wanted to grow up, to be an adult and make his own decisions. All that time spent rushing headlong toward adulthood, only to spend the rest of his life wishing he could go back.

  Go back. The words echoed in his mind, shattering things. Will couldn't breathe for a moment. His chest hurt and he pulled the car over, having taken so many turns that he barely knew where he was now. Some suburban street like any other, lots of trees and pretty houses and flower gardens wilted by the October wind. He laid his head upon the steering wheel and let the numbness come.

  Oh, Jesus, Brian, what have you done?

  For long minutes he sat there. At length he sat up and glanced around, then began to drive again, watching the street signs he passed, attempting to figure out precisely where he had gotten himself. A few hasty turns had brought him to unfamiliar streets. When he realized he was lost, Will laughed softly to himself in the car and then proceeded to drive on, trying to find his way, that dark book his only company. Though he kept his eyes on the road, he could feel its presence almost as though, stained as it was with his blood, the book remembered him.

  July, the summer before Junior Year . . .

  The thermometer at the bank across the street revealed the temperature every ten seconds as though it were an accusation. It was ninety-five degrees, not a cloud in the sky, and the sun gleamed upon the windows of Herbie's Ice Cream in a solar assault that kept the two tables closest to the plateglass windows empty. Customers would rather stand than sit in those normally coveted window seats.

  Outside, the rare skateboarder might flash by, or a cluster of kids unconcerned with heatstroke would wander past, headed for one cool destination or another.

  Inside Herbie's Ice Cream it was a blissful paradise. Will was actually glad to be working. The air-conditioning was pumped up as high as it would go, and though he was in constant motion, he spent his hours at work bent over massive tubs of ice cream. This was the place to be today, no matter which side of the counter you were on. Over the winter the owner had brought in a guy to paint murals on the walls, all of which involved ice cream, the beach, surfing, and penguins, of all things. Penguins were associated with staying cool, Will figured. But he liked them because they were so silly-looking.

  The murals were colorful, at least, which matched the decor of the place. The chairs were an array of bright pastel plastics and the tables were decorated with rainbows and stars. Music pumped from the sound system, loud enough that one couldn't ignore it, but not so loud that the customers couldn't have a conversation. The owner, Jack Herbert—aka “Herbie”—ran tapes of nothing but tunes from the sixties and seventies, but most of the kids liked the oldies just as much as their parents did.

  Will finished packing a mint chocolate chip cone, dipped it in sprinkles, and then handed it over to the attractive mom-type who'd ordered it. The woman paid him, told him to keep the change, and Will smiled at her as he punched at the cash register and did the math. The woman strode away, headed for a table of three other women, two with small babies. He counted out the customer's change and dropped it into the tip jar, which he and Nick would split at the end of their shift.

  Behind him the milk shake machine whirred. He glanced back to see Nick pouring milk into the tall, silver metal cup attached to the machine.

  “Hey! Make me one of those, will ya?” he called.

  Nick wore dirty Reeboks that had once been white, black shorts, and a crimson Harvard jersey. He smiled up at Will. “Make it yourself, you lazy bum.”

  Will hid his hand behind his back so he could nonchalantly give Nick the finger without any of the customers noticing. He knew he would probably be surreptitiously pelted with an empty cone at some later point. That was the best part of the two of them being on duty together.

  “Maybe you two should just grow up.”

  Startled, Will glanced up quickly and was relieved to see Brian on the other side of the counter. He laughed softly. “Don't sneak up on people like that, man.”

  Brian grinned. “Well, if you two jokers were actually working instead of just screwing around, you wouldn't be caught by surprise by the arrival of an actual customer.”

  “Hey. It's been friggin' busy in here today. This place, the movie theater, and the mall . . . people escape here on days like this. July in New England, buddy. Nick and I are performing a public service.”

  “Oh, is that what you call it?” Brian raised an eyebrow.

  Will narrowed his eyes. “Can I take your order, smart-ass?”

  “An orange float, please.”

  At a corner table, Mike Lebo and Danny Plumer ate sundaes and laughed uproariously at some private joke, probably something filthy. Will wished he could have been privy to it, but he was on the wrong side of the counter. Danny and Lebo called to Brian, but he only waved to them, waiting at the counter while Will created his orange float. Though Nick finished with the customer he had been making the milk shake for, he did not come over to say hello to Brian. The two got along fine when the group was together, but otherwise simply chose to ignore one another.

  The conversation across the counter was weightless, mainly concerning films they wanted to see and what was going on with Will and Caitlyn these days. But he and Brian carefully avoided discussing the subject that most fascinated them, the topic that had occupied so many of their days and nights in recent months.

  Will loved to make orange floats. The smell of the vanilla combined with the orange soda was wonderfully sweet. The biggest problem with working at Herbie's wasn't eating too much ice cream; it was deciding what he wanted. The owner had made it clear he did not mind if the employees sampled the wares, as long as they were reasonable about it.

  Once there was a nice vanilla froth on the top of the float, ice cream dripping down into the soda, he brought it to the counter. Brian p
aid him, and they made plans to go out after Will's shift was over. Caitlyn was going to the movies with her girlfriends, so Will figured he could drag Brian over to Liam's for buffalo wings.

  A wicked expression clouded Brian's features. He smiled. “Thanks for the float.”

  He turned to walk away and Will frowned, wondering about the significance of the strange look Brian had given him. He did not have to wonder for very long. As he watched Brian carefully walk his float over to the table where Danny and Lebo were sitting, he understood.

  Brian Schnell's feet did not touch the ground. The soles of his shoes were a little more than an inch from the linoleum floor. Floating in that way, he strode to the corner table and sat down across from the other guys, who had not seemed to notice this little bit of magic at all. Will's heart fluttered in his chest and he felt his face flush, incapable of stopping the smile that split his face at that moment.

  Thanks for the float. Yeah, right, he thought. Smart-ass.

  Anxiety raced through him. Certain that everyone in the place must have noticed this feat of subtle magic, Will looked quickly around. The air conditioners kept humming and music pumped from the sound system, a Led Zeppelin tune, in keeping with the other oldies on the tape. “Fool in the Rain,” he thought it was, but he'd never paid much attention to the Zeppelin stuff.

  No one was staring at Brian. In fact, the only person in Herbie's who was even glancing toward that table was Nick. When he felt Will looking at him he turned and shook his head. “Tell me why we have to work again?”

  “Money, my friend,” Will said, feeling numb and removed from his own words. “Capital. Spending power.”

  The bell jangled above the door and he forced himself to glance in that direction. A couple of twentyish guys in paint-spattered clothes and work boots came in, their sunburned faces streaked with sweat. They were semiregulars, and any other day Will would have shot the breeze with them, offered his sympathy that they had to work outside in this weather. Today he tried to wish them away. The painters did not disappear, but to his surprise and relief, they sidled up to the counter where Nick waited to serve them.