Static!

by Michael R Collings

  A final step, and he could see the opening into the living room.

  He screamed.

  To hell with embarrassment.

  He screamed and didn’t care that the kid spun around to stare at him.

  “Shit, man...,” the kid began.

  “Shut up,” Nick hissed. He had not moved an inch but now he let his eyes flick from the hall to where the kid stood battle-ready, shoulders hunched forward, legs bent, one hand closed into a fist, the other clenched around a thin Phillips-head screwdriver like it was a foot-long switchblade. Street punk ready to rumble. Maybe the image should have reassured Nick but it didn’t.

  He looked back down the hallway into the living room.

  There was nothing there.

  By now the kid was next to him, screwdriver still up. This close, he smelled musky; his arm grazed Nick’s and Nick could sense the tautness of muscle in the thick wrist.

  “What is it?” Ric asked softly.

  “There...it was...it’s gone now,” Nick said, his voice dropping off limply at the end. He felt shaky and his temples throbbed. The fever seemed to be setting in again. At least there was no nausea. Not yet.

  Ric stepped into the hall, still wary and alert. He stalked down the length of the darkness, opening doors as he went, letting in floods of brightness. He got to the living room opening and flattened against one wall. Without making a sound, he spun around, ready to slice and gouge. He twisted to where he could see the rest of the room. He straightened and disgustedly slipped the screwdriver into a small leather pouch on his belt.

  When he stomped back down the hall, he did not look happy.

  “What’s that all about?” he yelled, “screaming like some freakin’ fairy at a gang-bang! Your idea of a helluva good time?”

  He pushed past Nick, not trying particularly hard to miss him, and returned to the console.

  “But it....” Nick stopped. He couldn’t describe what he had seen. It would sound stupid, crazy, insane. There was this figure, see, and it was round-shouldered and stooped and stood like it had hurt its hip and when it walked it would limp, and its hand was gnarled with arthritis when it pointed to me and it was her it was The Greer, it was a dead woman only she was alive again and twisted and blue and gray and sparkling like she was all made of electricity and then I turned away and she was gone and when you went out there there was nothing at all.

  “It what,” Ric said, hostility oozing from his voice.

  “I thought one of the screens in the other rooms might have shorted out. I...I thought I saw, like, static or something.”

  “Shit,” Ric said again.

  He thrust the screwdriver behind the machine one more time.

  This time there was more than just a shock. Even Nick saw the flurry of violent purple sparks that exploded from behind the cabinet the same instant that the house exhaled a loud crackle and the living room went dark and the overhead light in the control room flicked off with a loud pop!

  “Blew the whole circuit,” the kid said, disgusted now that he was over his original startlement. “Shit.”

  He obviously had a wide vocabulary and believed in building it, Nick decided, not sure whether to be frightened or relieved.

  “Where’s the fuse box?” the kid demanded.

  “I...outside, probably, on the back porch, I think. That’s where mine is,” he added irrelevantly.

  The kid pushed past him again and disappeared into the kitchen. A moment later, there was another staticky click and the lights were on again. Nick glanced over to the console. A shadow of red sparks still played behind it, but they disappeared before Ric returned.

  The kid glanced behind the DVD and swore again.

  “Whole thing’s blown. Have to take it to the shop now. Nothing I can do here.”

  “What do you mean!” Nick yelped. “Payne didn’t give me any authorization to let you take it anywhere. I can’t believe it. You come in here and muck around with the circuits until you blow the thing than then tell me with a straight face that it’s got to be repaired. Well, I won’t let Payne pay for this one, you’ll fix what you wrecked or you haven’t heard the last of this....”

  Ric was right in front of Nick now, looking down at the shorter man.

  For the first time Nick really paid attention the play of muscle in the kid’s arms, the strength in his shoulders, the tightness of cloth across his chest.

  “Listen, you creep,” Ric said tightly. “I told you that it has to go into the shop. I got a slip from Gunnison giving Tasco’s permission to do whatever is necessary, that’s his words, whatever is necessary, to get this set working. It’s been on file with his signature since the old lady died. So don’t give me any shit about what I can and can’t do.”

  He turned away before Nick could say anything and pulled the set from the cabinet. The empty space was a litter of charred cords. The wall was scorched in three places. Nick could smell it from where he stood. The gap looked like some insane dentist had gone at someone’s front teeth, ripping one out just for the hell of it.

  “But...,” Nick tried again.

  Ric glared. Before Nick could finish speaking, the kid was in the hall, the console tucked under one arm, its burned cables trailing by his legs like figments of tails. Nick followed, remembering to flick off the lights in the control room, remembering to close the doors into the other rooms. The hall was dark again.

  By the time Nick got to the front door the kid was halfway across the lawn, heading toward a battered truck with Tasco’s scrawled across the side.

  “Hey,” Nick said in a last-ditch attempt at salvaging his self-respect. “You gotta give me a receipt for that.”

  “Sure,” the kid said. He slid the console into the rear of the truck and slammed the doors, checking to make sure they locked. He walked around to the passenger door—Nick noted again the arrogance of his movements, the almost sexual shifting of weight from hip to hip. He disliked the kid even more. And distrusted him.

  The kid pulled out a clipboard and scribbled something on it. He ripped off a sheet of paper and held it out to Nick. Nick took it and examined it closely. Everything was correct. The kid had even written in the serial number—or at least a serial number. Nick started to ask to compare the paper with what was actually incised in the casing of the DVD player then thought better of it.

  “Okay,” he said finally. “I’ll have to let Mr. Gunnison know when it’s going to be done.”

  “Tasco’ll call. Let’s say at least a week.” The kid grinned insolently, Nick thought, as if he knew he had won a critical battle. But then why not? He had won. The kid sauntered around the truck and pulled open the door on the driver’s side. He slid onto the seat and slammed the door.

  From inside, he stared out at Nick, who was still standing on the sidewalk, his hand outstretched, the slip of paper that was supposed to be a receipt fluttering in the breeze. Nick felt like a grade-A, class-one, honest-to-God idiot, and he knew that he looked like one, too. What went wrong? he wondered, trying to figure out just where he had lost control and the kid had taken over.

  “Shit,” he said under his breath, then looked up to see if the kid had noticed.

  The kid was writing something, probably entering the visit into the log.

  Nick went across the yard to his own place and, not without a little relief, went inside. His face burned. He didn’t know whether to call Tasco and complain—but maybe the kid is the old man’s nephew or something and he won’t believe me and the kid will just get madder and come back some time and….or just forget the whole thing and get something cold to drink.

  It wasn’t like him, he decided finally, after two and a half cold beers had disappeared from his refrigerator, to let some snot-faced asshole get him so uptight that he imagined things. He was usually more under control than that. Maybe the whole thing was just a final reminder of his siege of flu on Saturday. After all, there really couldn’t have been anything in the house except himself and the kid. And the kid
hadn’t seen anything.

  After the third beer, Nick was sure that he had only imagined whatever it was that he thought he had seen. After the fourth, he couldn’t quite remember what it was that he had imagined.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Ric watched Wheeler out of the rear-view mirror.

  “Freakin’ queer,” he muttered the guy disappeared into the house next door. “Scared of his own shadow. Shit.”

  He grinned a distinctly distasteful grin.

  He glanced down at the sheet he had just filled out. Everything on it was correct, he had made sure of that. Even the serial number. Tasco had a record of every piece of equipment in this house, along with detailed repair and maintenance records going back at least fifteen years. The old man wouldn’t say much about old lady Greer. He probably wouldn’t even have let Ric make this run if he hadn’t been doubled over with the shits this morning and was afraid to go back on his promise to this Gunnison guy. But there was too much money in continuing business at stake to let this house call slide.

  Anyway, Ric had come, he had done his best, and he had filled out the form correctly and completely. He slipped his copy into a manila folder with Gunnison written in capital letters on the tab. It wasn’t worth trying to pull something on Tasco. The old man was probably shitting nails right now—along with everything else in his gut—waiting for Ric to get back. Hell, this one address accounted for a good hunk of Tasco’s total business. Ric couldn’t figure out why the old lady had insisted on doing business in a rat hole like Tasco’s.

  He dug into his jeans pocket and pulled out a keychain. Not the one for the truck. No, that one hung limply from the ignition. He held up the keychain to the light, twisting it so that a shaft of sunlight struck a glistening new brass key. A door key. The key to this house.

  But he would wait to use it. Now that he had been inside, now that he had seen for himself what the stuff looked like and where it was and how hard it would be—how simple it would be, freakin’ child’s play—to strip the place, he would be back again. Late some night. Long after Tasco’s delivery truck had come and gone and no one would ever suspect. He might be a thief, but he wasn’t a fool.

  He glanced into the rearview mirror again, twisting it until he could see the front door of the house next door.

  He might even bring along some friends and they would have a party. Mr. Fairy next door could be the guest of honor.

  Then again, maybe Ric would take care of that little job by himself.

  He laughed and wrenched the ignition key and pulled away from the curb, interrupting his laughter long enough to curse the ancient truck for its lack of pick-up.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  When Nick heard the crunch of tires on Payne’s driveway late Tuesday afternoon he wasted little time in getting outside. He was standing by the car door when Payne switched off the engine and climbed out.

  “Nick”, Payne said, his voice sounding almost surprised. “How ya doin’?”

  “Okay, I guess. Look, there’s been....”

  “No more tossing your cookies or anything?”

  “No, not since Saturday, but….”

  Payne opened the back door and pulled out a suitcase out of the car and began carrying it toward the house. “Great trip. But it’s good to be back.” He started to slip his key into the back door lock when Nick placed his hand on Payne’s and stopped him. Nick pulled Payne’s hand back, and with it the key.

  “What’s the matter?” Payne asked.

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. There was an…an accident while you were gone.”

  Payne’s face went white—Nick noticed that it was easier to tell than it would have been a few weeks, even a few days before. Payne’s tan, so even and deep not so long ago, seemed paler now. The skin stretched tautly over his cheekbones was suddenly parchment white and ancient-looking.

  “It wasn’t that bad,” Nick hurried on. “The repairman must have touched the wrong wires when he was removing the DVD….”

  “Removing?” It was less a question than a muted cry.

  “Well, he wasn’t going to at first, but after the fire….”

  Payne thrust the key back into the lock and twisted it so hard that Nick was afraid the key would either bend or shatter. Neither happened. Payne slammed the door open and dropped the suitcase onto the back porch. The beat-up Samsonite hard-side wobbled for a couple of moments before toppling over. By then Payne was already on his way to the control room.

  The inside of the house was dark and stale-smelling, but Nick couldn’t catch even the faintest hint of the acrid smell of an electrical fire. The kitchen seemed undisturbed as Payne rushed through without even bothering to flick on the overhead light. He pushed open the door to the control room.

  Nick hung behind, anticipating the barrage of Payne’s fury.

  It didn’t come. There was only heavy silence in the control room.

  Shit, he’s probably so mad he can’t speak. There goes everything. If I’m lucky he won’t toss me out on my ear when my lease is up.

  Nick shuffled through the kitchen and across the hall, his shoulders slumped. He was ready to take his medicine.

  Payne stood just inside the door, hands on his hips, staring around the room. Nick couldn’t tell from the set of his arms whether his anger was red-hot or white-cold—either way, he wished he was in Topeka right at that moment.

  Payne must have heard him because he turned suddenly and faced his renter.

  “What burned? You said there was a fire.”

  “Not a big one, Payne,” Nick said, more apologetically than he liked. The words came out as almost a whine and Nick immediately felt foolish and childish.

  “What burned?” Payne repeated.

  Nick slipped through the door, brushing against Payne’s shoulder as he did so. The other man did not move.

  “There,” Nick said, pointing to the gap where the DVD console had been. It was deeply shadowed, no doubt hiding the scorch marks in darkness.

  Payne reached behind him and turned on the light. Nick squinted against the sudden brightness—he hadn’t realized how close to dark it was, or how dim the inside of the house was. The day had died away so gradually that his eyes had adjusted without his knowing. The sudden flush of light from the three 100-watt bulbs in the overhead fixture was blinding by comparison.

  Still blinking and wiping a tear from one eye, Nick turned toward the shelf.

  “Look, Payne,” he began, “that guy Tasco sent was pretty weird. I’m not sure he really knew what he was….”

  He stopped.

  There was the empty space on the shelf, still looking like an empty socket where a tooth had been removed, a front tooth maybe, or incisor, but whichever it was one of the most noticeable, whose removal made the resulting smile lopsided, distorted, and eerily wrong.

  There was the tangle of wires, looking like exposed nerves jutting from the tooth socket. Nick winced inwardly at the image. He had a deep personal aversion to dentists and wondered why in the hell he had let himself think about the machinery in such painful images. His teeth ached and his ears buzzed, the shrilly insistent buzz of a dentist’s drill set on high. They had found him, after all, found him crouched beneath the heavy coats in the cloak room—a six-year-old kid with a mortal fear of dentists curled beneath the other patients’ dripping parkas and fake-fur coats. Flecks of Montana snow, not yet melted in the coolness of the coat room, filtered down on him as he waited, then again as his mother pulled the coats aside and took him from his hiding place and dragged him through the halls and set him in the chair and tilted it back until he thought he would fall out onto his head and crush his skull and his brains would leak out the cracks and dribble all over the dusty green carpeting like lumpy pancake batter. But nobody seemed to care and his mother left the room even when he called for her again and again and again. His eyes tingled through closed lids as translucently red as a stained-glass window in a church. The brightness hurt even more whe
n Dr. Sutro adjusted the lamp and focused its intensity right at him. He smelled the medicinal air, smelled Dr. Sutro’s sweat and heavy breath, felt a rough finger tugging at the tender corner of his mouth. Any second now he would feel the shattering vibrations of steel against enamel, the jolt of liquid pain when the tip touched one of those exposed nerves. The scream he knew had to come eventually scraped insistently at the back of his throat as it built force, ready to burst through....

  “Nick, you all right?” Payne’s voice cut through the shadow of Nick’s remembered terror.

  “Yeah, I’m okay I guess,” Nick said, shaking his head to clear his mind of the painful images and staring at the empty...at the empty place on the shelf, he thought, choosing the most neutral word he could.

  The wall behind it was dead white. The wires were covered with plastic protective sheathing, blue and red and white and black. Where the metal was exposed, it glistened in the light with the bright red-gold glow of new copper.

  “Where was the fire?” Payne repeated.

  “It was there.” Nick pointed at the empty space.

  Payne went toward the shelf and stooped and ran his finger over the shelf and sniffed the air. “I don’t see anything. Did you fix it up?”

  Nick shook his head. In the back of his mind he saw the black streaks disfiguring the white wall, saw the wires charred and coiled like dead snakes. He could still smell the acrid-ozone smell of an electrical burst.

  Suddenly Payne was standing at his side, holding on to him.

  “Look, you don’t look good,” Payne said. “How have you been since you were...since Saturday. Any repeats?”

  Nick shook his head again.

  “Dizziness? Headache? Anything like that.”

  Nick started to shake his head again, then stopped. “A little. Some dizziness on Monday, just before….”

  “Before you came over with the repairman.” Payne finished the thought for him.

  Nick nodded mutely. “Hey, don’t worry. The way you were feeling Saturday, I’m surprised you didn’t end up in the hospital. I’m sure you saw something. Some sparks, maybe. Only your mind interpreted it as more dangerous than it really was. You can see that there’s no problem here.”