The Dead Have A Thousand Dreams

by Richard Sanders

  Gotta stop that thinking. Gotta clear through it. Try to meditate, try to concentrate. Try to breathe, try to pray. Please God fucking help me. A song came into my head. A gospel song, Turn The Light From Heaven On My Soul. The Dixie Hummingbirds. That’s what I need—please that’s exactly what I need. Turn the light on my soul.

  Braxton Road. Wooly’s block. A car was parked by the side of the woods, maybe 300 feet from the front yard, left where it couldn’t be seen from the house. I pulled in behind it, didn’t recognize it. The nurse’s stolen wheels?

  I switched my cell to vibrate, got out and started running. The light was just blue ooze, everything reduced to flat outlines. I felt like—no, not like I was dreaming. Like I was being dreamed. I felt like someone was dreaming me.

  There were only a few lights on in the living room, but I could make out some dim movement inside. I ducked behind the fake furniture, Glock out, and focused on one of the wide windows.

  It was like looking at a stage setting. I could see them all in the living room as my eyes adjusted. Wooly, Genevieve, Nickie—and a guy with a ski mask, trying to take control of the situation. He was Bogash’s height and weight and he was wearing not just a ski mask but clothes that were all B&E black. Bogash wouldn’t have had time to dress like that. Unless he got help from somebody.

  They were all standing except for Nickie. She was slumped on a chair. Something was wrong with her. Her leg was soaked with blood. Like she’d tried to make a sudden turn and the wound in her thigh had opened up.

  I could see something stuck in the back of the guy’s pants—Nickie’s Smith & Wesson. The piece in his hand was something else. A great big honkin’ 9 mm. A 9 mm Browning, the same gun Alex and the Hidden Lake cops used. I’d seen enough of them holstered over the past few hours to know.

  He was trying to herd everybody closer together but he seemed shaky on his feet, like a guy with a concussion and a face full of broken bones. He was waving the gun and shouting while Wooly and Genevieve—especially Genevieve—were giving him shit and shouting back at him.

  Things weren’t going all that well for anybody.

  Staying crouched, I ran for the shadows on the other side of the front lawn. Once I got to the side of the house, I called Jen, whispering.

  “You still there?”

  What’s going on? Her voice was pure nightmare.

  “I’m here.”

  Okay, I can see you now.

  “He went in the kitchen door, right?”

  Yes.

  I worked my way along the back of the house until I could see where he’d smashed the window of the kitchen door—a desperate, sloppy method—then reached in and opened the lock. I also saw the shattered glass sprawled on the kitchen floor.

  I stepped away. “I can’t get in here.”

  Why not?

  “It’s a mess of glass. I’ll make too much noise.”

  I moved back along the length of the house, looking for another way in. Every second was taking about an hour to pass.

  There’s a window. It’s too dark to see now, but it’s open a little.

  “Where?”

  Keep going. About another 20 feet.

  The powder room. She was right.

  “How did this get open? All the windows are supposed to be closed.”

  The woman? The black lady? I saw her open it a while or so ago.

  I remembered Genevieve complaining about being cold. Is that what she’d done, crack the window to lower the a.c.?

  “You stay where you are, okay?”

  You gonna be all right?

  “Just stay there.”

  Normally, wedging in through a window wouldn’t present much of a problem. The gashed shoulder, however, sent pain into my head like an instant mushroom. By the time I managed to hoist my ass inside, I was seeing in triple exposure. The walls of the dark room were shadows on shadows on shadows.

  I was taking breaths, trying to get my vision back, when the scream shot through the door. A woman’s scream. Nickie? No time to think about it. I went for the door and nudged it open, hoping to slip into the living room. What I got back, though, was a tremendous, clattering, world-shattering crash.

  The chair. The fucking chair, the one Genevieve had put against the door to keep it from swinging open. She must’ve put it back.

  Too late to stop now.

  >>>>>>

  I took the plunge. Maybe it was the weak light but the living room seemed to be doing 360s around me. As a grand entrance, this wasn’t the best of all moves. In the two seconds it took for me to get at least some bearings everyone else had time to jerk around and stare at the source of the commotion. That included the guy in the ski mask, who had his gun aimed dead-shot at my head and who was shouting at me. “Why?” he kept saying. “Why?”

  “Careful with that!” yelled Genevieve. “Don’t start shooting my house up!”

  He ignored her. “Why couldn’t you leave it alone?” he said, taking a step toward me, gun still at cranium level. “I think you should put that down. Just lay it down there.”

  He was talking about the Glock, and since I had the thing uselessly aimed at the floor, I couldn’t mount much of an argument. I gave it up.

  “Now kick it away. Kick it over there.”

  I couldn’t tell if this was Bogash’s voice. Maybe he was being muffled some by the mask’s mouth hole.

  I slid the Glock across the floor.

  “Why’re you taking hostages?” I asked. I could ask questions—I’d officially joined the party. “What’re you doing?”

  “What did you do?” he said. “It was a secret. Why couldn’t you keep it that way?”

  “Keep what what way?”

  “It was my life. It was my whole life and look what you’ve done to it. I hate you for what you’ve done.”

  “Me? It’s about me?” I pointed to Wooly. “What about him?”

  “He’s not here for me,” Wooly said flatly. “He’s been waiting for you. He’s only here for you.” He made no effort to hide the disappointment in his voice.

  Only me? I looked around for some kind of answer. Nickie, her face the color of salt, was trying to get off the chair but she couldn’t move.

  “I love her,” said Ski Mask. “I’d do anything for her. Why do I have to know?”

  “I don’t know what-all it is you know.”

  “It never should’ve happened. You never should’ve stepped in the middle.”

  “In the middle of what?”

  “Don’t tell me you don’t understand.”

  “Well it’s not coming easy to me.”

  He brought the gun inches away from my head. “This is bullshit.”

  “Get out of this house!” said Genevieve, marching a few steps in his direction. “You prick bastard, get out of here now!” She swiveled to Wooly. “Tell him to get out of here.”

  “Don’t yell at me!” said Wooly. “The fuck’re you yelling at me for?”

  “Just tell him!”

  Wooly stepped away, hands over his ears. “Just shut the fuck up!”

  “Stop moving!” said Ski Mask. “All of you! Will you please fucking stand still?”

  Genevieve shouted at him and he shouted at Wooly and Wooly shouted at her all about the same time. It was perfect hysteria for a good five seconds until Ski Mask broke it off.

  “Enough,” he said, giving me his full attention again. “This is over. Outside.”

  “Outside?”

  He gestured to the front door with his gun. “What else can I do? Outside.”

  “I’m not sure if my insurance covers that.”

  He brought the Browning not six inches away from the side of my head. He wasn’t fucking around. I started slowly for the door—like he put it, what else can I do?—and he side-stepped in tandem with me.

  We were making nice progress until Wooly blocked our path.

  “This isn’t right,” he protested. “It can’t be right. It’s supposed to be me.”

 
; “What’re you talking about?” said Ski Mask. “What’s he talking about?”

  “I’m telling you,” said Wooly, “it’s supposed to be me.”

  “Do we have to hear this now?” said Genevieve.

  “How could it not be me?” said Wooly “This whole fucking day, how it could it not be me?”

  “Shut up,” said Ski Mask, “and get out of the way.”

  “Yeah, shut the hell up,” seconded Genevieve. “Stop saying that stuff.”

  “Well, I’m saying it,” said Wooly. “You’re hearing me—I’m saying it.”

  “And I’m tired of it! All goddamn day long, I don’t wanna hear that shit anymore!”

  “Will you calm the fuck down?” said Wooly.

  “Will you both shut up!” said Ski Mask.

  “I can’t take this shit,” said Wooly. “I’ve had it.”

  It all happened so fast—Wooly suddenly bolting across the living room, heading I don’t know where, I just saw him move, Ski Mask yelling “don’t move! Stand still!” and whipping around to get an aim on him.

  And there it was, the doomsday moment.

  I jumped at him, crashing into him with my good shoulder, knocking him off balance and chopping down on his gun hand until I heard the Browning fall somewhere on the floor.

  He came back at me with a couple of hard punches to my head that made me think I was getting hit with a hammer. I clamped my arms around him and tried to wrestle him down, but I had nothing left in my shoulder, no strength. He spun out of my hold and hit me with a shot that staggered me back and left me wobbling on my legs like a giraffe on morphine.

  I kept moving backward best I could, getting the fuck away. He stepped after me, face to face.

  Had we been here before? Only hours ago, had we faced off just like this?

  I tried the same thing I did then, the same maneuver as before. I threw a right and as he started to counter with his own punch, I suddenly stopped and went to kick him in the knee. But it didn’t work. Not this time. Either my footwork was too slow or he knew it was coming, but his fist landed long before my leg even got halfway to where it was supposed to go.

  He got me in the shoulder. He caught me solid in the wounded shoulder. One single channel of burning pain ran in a steady flow from my arm to my brain. I saw snow falling, a soft-slow blizzard covering the street where I grew up as a kid.

  I was on the floor. I was face up and flat on the floor. I saw Ski Mask far away from me. He was looking for something that also seemed to be on the floor. I saw him pick the Browning up, I heard him say something that sounded like fuck, I saw him quick-point the gun at me and I saw his finger curling around the trigger.

  It sounded like an electrical storm was rushing through the house and the dead center of its thunder core had exploded right in the middle of the living room.

  My first question was, am I dead? Am I really dead? Does it happen this fast? How come I didn’t feel the pain of the bullet?

  And how come my shoulder is still killing me?

  Somebody was screaming. The same scream, over and over. Genevieve, definitely Genevieve, was screaming, “What did you do? What the fuck did you do?”

  I looked up. She was standing over Ski Mask, staring down at him. I didn’t understand what was going on until my eyes went across the room. Wooly was there, back from wherever he’d gone. He was holding his Berretta, the one he’d had custom finished in cartoon purple. It always looked like a toy, only now it still had smoke drifting out of its bore.

  “I told you it works,” he was saying, though he didn’t seem to be talking to anybody in particular.

  I got to my feet. Blood was seeping out of the wool mask and puddling on the floor.

  “Look at this mess!” said Genevieve. “Will you look at this mess!”

  I peeled the mask off, folding the wet wool up layer by layer, first seeing the bullet hole that had gone through the jawline. Then the face, not tanned flesh but pale white condom-colored skin. Then the dark bags under the eyes and the hair. Not spiked blond. Thick black hair that had been matted down by the mask.

  “Who’s he?” Genevieve demanded. “What’s he doing here?”

  At the moment, Marco Sung was being dead. Blood was bubbling from the wound and trickling through his closed lips.

  “He’s Georgiana’s assistant,” said Nickie.

  “Well look at the goop he’s leaving.” Genevieve whirled to Wooly. “Get me some towels! Get me some paper towels!”

  Wooly didn’t move. He was still holding the Berretta, still saying, “I told you it works, I told you it works,” saying it to nobody and to everybody.

  >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

  CHAPTER 9

  THERE’S A LOT OF DEATH GOING AROUND

  BLINDSIDED

  We were back at the village hall, in the same conference room where I’d first seen Wooly, saw him smash a water pitcher and two glasses with a flying chair and get tackled by the Hidden Lake cops, heard him screaming to the world that “the glass is half full, motherfucker!”

  Memories.

  Today we were here with Alex Tarkashian, watching him set his laptop up. Man was having a day for himself. He’d taken Georgiana Copely’s statement a few hours before and was doing the courtesy of letting us see it. Meanwhile, Gary Bogash had been apprehended in the wee hours by Suffolk County police, still trying to flee in the stolen nurse’s car.

  “He was always too blond for me,” said Alex. “Way too blond for my taste.”

  Bogash had just been charged and sent off to Riverhead—a good thing of course—but the business had left Alex’s office a mess. A real sight, he said. Since police headquarters was located in the village hall building, he’d walked us over here for the screening.

  “Hell of a day,” he said as Wooly, Genevieve, Nickie and I got settled around the table. “Though yesterday, Jesus, nothing compares to yesterday. Remember the Bush administration? Yesterday was like that. Who’d guess that eight years could last so long?”

  He’d had some good news for Wooly—in addition to Wooly still being alive. No charges would be filed in the shooting of Marco Sung. Wooly’s house had clearly been invaded, the threat of violence was slap-in-the-face real and he’d fought it off with a licensed weapon. He was in the clear.

  But that didn’t seem to bring Wooly much comfort. He sat there looking bristly and somber, even a little defeated.

  Alex was ready. He hit play. We all peered in at the screen

  Georgiana was sitting in a nondescript room, looking like absolute shit. She was drained and gray, staring into the camera with the turned-in eyes of the blind. Or the dead.

  She was sharing a microphone on the table in front of her with a man. Her attorney, a senior-partner type who looked like a highly paid professor of mortuary science—if such affluent academics exist—and he was decidedly not happy to be here,

  A puffy young woman sat on Georgiana’s other side. She wore goggle-like Elton John glasses and a head of black hair in a beyond-caring mishmash. She was Georgiana’s new assistant, recruited early in the morning, according to Alex. Marco had already been replaced.

  On the tape we heard Alex run through the formalities: date and time, location, those present. The attorney, Eric Rivers, leaned into the mic.

  Rivers: On behalf on my client, I feel duty bound to note that she came in of her own volition.

  Alex: Appreciate it.

  Rivers: And that her interpretation of recent events is being given on a voluntary basis.

  Alex: It’s just for the record. We’re just trying to get a full picture of what happened.

  Rivers: As long as we all understand.

  Alex: Ms. Copely, are you ready?

  Georgiana: I won’t cry. Please don’t expect me to cry.

  Her voice was spacey and shaky and barely formed. It was like she hadn’t spoken to anyone in eight months.

  Georgiana: I have full cause to cry, but I won’t. I simply won’t.

  Alex: T
hat’s okay. Two days ago, Ms. Copely, on June 20, you had a conversation with Marco Sung, correct? A particularly…difficult conversation?

  Georgiana: He wanted to know why someone would want to talk to me about my health. Mr. McShane, Quinn McShane, had called and said he needed to see me about my health. Marco came to me, he said I’m sorry, I don’t understand, why would someone suddenly want to talk to you about that?

  Alex: And you told him.

  Georgiana: I told him the truth. I told him the tumor in my brain had entered a phase of rapid growth. I told him I had months to live, less than a year.

  Alex: He didn’t k now that before?

  Georgiana: I didn’t want anyone to know.

  Alex: How did he take it?

  Georgiana: Badly. He wept. He became very upset. I went to…comfort him, but he kept punching at himself, hugging himself and punching his arms with his fists. He was, excuse the expression, he was blindsided.

  “Excuse this,” said Wooly. “Ya fucking scooch.”

  Alex: He went out that night?

  Georgiana: We had a number of talks that day. He kept saying he felt cheated, he felt angry—though he didn’t know who or what he was angry at. Then, yes, he went out that night.

  Alex: We know he fired shots at McShane that night. The gun he used, the Browning, it’s yours?

  Rivers: Legally registered to Ms. Copely.

  Georgiana: Everyone has a gun.

  “Too many idiots,” said Wooly, “spoil the broth.”

  Genevieve shushed him.

  Georgiana: I knew something was going on when he came back. He was shaking very hard. I didn’t have to touch him to know. I could hear him shaking all over. But he wouldn’t tell me what was wrong.

  We could hear paper rustling on the tape. Alex taking notes, despite the camera.

  Alex: How was he yesterday?

  Georgiana: I couldn’t talk to him. I couldn’t say a thing to him. Every time I tried, all he’d say was thank you—thank you for telling me. His voice all squeezed and raspy. Then, obviously, he went out last night. I asked where he was going. He said he wanted to find Mr. McShane and thank him for bringing everything into the light.