Mind Trap

by J. R. Brule

  “Racing who?” Jud asked.

  “Cooper Frank.”

  Jake laughed. “You picked a hell of a first target.”

  Jud said, “Don’t you know Cooper’s like . . . the fastest kid in school?”

  “He’s not,” Sam said. “John Handley is.”

  “Not too filled up on dust to have lunch, are you?” Jake asked, and Sam and Jud burst with laughter.

  “Actually, I beat him.”

  Abrupt silence.

  “What?” Sam asked.

  “Who knew?” Jake said. “Our Rudy’s a regular cheetah-man.”

  “Are you joking with us?” Jud asked, coming in front of them, walking backwards. The halls were packed with students. “I mean, if you really did beat him, people would know.”

  “Some do.”

  “Like who?” Sam asked.

  “Why’s it such a big deal?”

  “I’m calling bullshit,” Sam said. “When a champion gets dethroned, it doesn’t stay quiet.”

  “Let’s have a little faith in our boy,” Jake said.

  They sat down with today’s special: a rubbery burger patty between two soggy halves of bun. Their conversation covered the normal grounds—bullshit, bullshit, more bullshit, and of course the topic of Mandy Miller not wearing a bra today.

  “Did you see her nipples by the drink cooler?” Jake asked. “Seriously, it was like she was smuggling M&Ms.” The whole table broke out in laughter. Zach choked on his water. Jake didn’t let up, and kept on with the jokes. “A pirate with a steering wheel in his pants walks into a milk room.”

  “A milk room?” Kevin asked between laughs. “Seriously?”

  Jake held up his hand, trying to keep himself composed. “The girl behind the counter asks why he’s got a steering wheel in his pants, and he says, ‘ARGH! They be drivin me nuts!’ ”

  The table exploded with laughter. Sam banged his fist on the table and Zach held his bouncing stomach.

  When the laughter died, Jud asked, “So, did you guys hear?”

  “Hear what?” Zach asked, still recovering.

  “Rudy beat Cooper Frank in a race today.”

  “Should try out John Handley next,” Zach said.

  “Can we please just stop?”

  “Just sayin,” Zach went on. “Why settle for second place?”

  “Or how about the fact that he is in second place,” Jud said, and pushed up his glasses. “One of us, can you believe it? We could make a sigil for our group, sew it into a flag, and wave it around during track meets.”

  “Oh yeah?” Jake asked. “Are you going to do the sewing, Jud?”

  Everyone but Jud snickered.

  Rudy looked up to see John Handley glaring at him from another table, ignoring a tableful of chattering girls, and his heart dropped.

  ---

  Mr. Kloom popped the trunk open, tossed his suitcase inside, and laid his cherry wood box flat before slamming the trunk shut. He twirled the keys around his finger. “You didn’t listen to me,” he said.

  “Huh?”

  “You went to school, when I’ve told you it’s dangerous. Worse,” he said, sticking the key into the ignition, “you didn’t come out when I said.”

  “Sorry,” Rudy said. “I guess I don’t really know how.”

  “Don’t go back,” Mr. Kloom said, looking Rudy in the eyes. “The next time you do, you’re in for a hell of a confrontation.”

  “Okay.”

  Mr. Kloom brought out a black leather wallet, thumbed through bills, and handed Rudy $100 in twenties. “That’s good pay for an associate and you’d be well off to remember it. Soon enough, we’ll split the profit fifty-fifty. Fair?”

  “Fair,” Rudy said.

  He thought that maybe he’d have to get a second job. Of course, he couldn’t say that to Mr. Kloom.

  “Don’t go getting a second job,” Mr. Kloom said, reclining in his seat with a cigarette. “And get some sleep, kid. There’s more sales tomorrow morning. If we do half as well as we did today, we’re set for the month.”

  Rudy nodded, watched Mr. Kloom doze off with the lit cigarette still smoking in his lips, and found himself leaving once more and going back to school, back to where he felt needed.

  ---

  There you are, Julia thought. This time, she wouldn’t wait to grab him, wouldn’t wait to feel him disappear. Her Gift coursed through her, throbbing inside her veins, and she didn’t try to muffle its ping. Others would surely feel her presence, but it didn’t matter anymore—the game was over.

  She allowed her power to reach its full potential, allowed it to bare its fangs as she rushed out of the library, to the cafeteria. All she had to do was pluck Rudy up and out, while she clouded the other students’ heads. No one would even know she was there.

  No one but Rudy.

  23:

  ONE MOMENT THE CAFETERIA was normal—filled with Rudy’s laughing friends, a mass of indecipherable student chatter, and John Handley’s glaring eyes.

  The next moment everyone went POOF, and Rudy was alone in the cafeteria, engulfed in silence. The trays, book bags, forks and spoons were all gone—any indication that people had been there. It was just him and his food, his own belongings, and—

  Something crashed in the kitchen—a boxful of silverware—and Rudy looked that way, his pulse revved up and his eyes wide.

  A woman he recognized as their new librarian came around the corner, strolling past the registers, wearing a white silk dress. At first, her hair was red, but as he watched her, it shimmered, truly appearing to dance like fire before fading into brown.

  Rudy wondered why she needed to keep her hair color a secret.

  “W-who are you?” Rudy asked, suddenly wishing he’d tried harder to listen to Mr. Kloom, to avoid coming back to school. Though not in his total control, he could have resisted the transference.

  The woman stopped mid-cafeteria, with a smile on her face. And all at once, without being touched, the trashcans in the middle of the room slid away from her. They slammed against the tables, tipped over, and rolled on the floor, spilling discarded slop.

  “I’m Julia Frond,” she said. Rudy thought her voice was beautiful.

  “What do you want?”

  She cocked her head and smiled. “Rudy . . . I want you.”

  (just you)

  “Tell me,” she said. “Have you ever fucked a girl? I know you think about it. Wouldn’t it be nice?”

  No . . . it wouldn’t be nice . . . not with her. He got up from the table and backed away, toward the exit, abandoning his back pack.

  “You don’t think I’m pretty?” she asked, and by her smile, Rudy knew that was her last concern. “Oh, the humanity! My poor, weak female heart!” and she cackled insanely.

  Rudy took his chance and ran out the cafeteria, past the library door, turned the corner and . . . STOP! Julia was there waiting for him, standing so still and sure of herself.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t try to run,” she said. “You’ll force me to hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you, Rudy. Just come fuck me. Become a man. Wouldn’t that be nicer?”

  Rudy ran back, into the cafeteria, and didn’t stop. He jumped over a fallen trashcan, and rushed out the other side, into the ha—

  Not into the hall—back into the cafeteria, from the same side he’d come in from, as impossible as it was. He ran out that exit, expecting a hallway, and again he was back inside the cafeteria. Julia stood in the middle of the room, grinning.

  It’s all about illusion.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” she repeated, her expression betraying the truth. “Stand still, would you?”

  That same crashing from before came again, and Rudy caught a glint of light behind her. Knives—dozens of kitchen knives—flew to her side and floated around her as if magnetized. They twirled lackadaisically, like cat’s tails, awaiting her further instruction.

  “But I feel I must hurt you,” she said, “because you’ve been a very hard boy to catch.” One o
f the knives jetted forward, its point twisting in the air like an arrow. The blade clipped his right arm, shredding his sleeve, drawing blood, and removed a dime-sized chunk of flesh. Then the knife thunked into the wall behind him, sticking there.

  Another knife came flying.

  The windows.

  Rudy ran to the windows, heard a second knife stick into the wall, and glimpsed more rocketing his way. Without slowing, he jumped through the glass with his shoulder out, shattering the window. He dropped one story and landed on his right arm. Vaguely aware that his arm was numb, he got up and hobbled across the playground, to the parked cars. He didn’t look back, thinking more knives would come from the windows, but around the brick corner of the building, he saw her waiting for him once more, floating knives at the ready. He picked up his pace and kept on running to the cars.

  The knives came flying—too many to count.

  One clipped him in the leg. One gouged his arm. One sliced between his ribs. Another drove into the small of his back. Then he felt a paper cut-slice on his ear, and knew he’d just barely avoided a knife to the head.

  All the pain slowed Rudy down. Caused him to lurch and shudder like a junker car switching gears. But he kept on going until his hand grasped the metal of a parked car, and he felt his way around to the driver’s door. He flung it open and plopped down, closing the door, a knife now sticking inside its leather finish.

  Much to his amazement, a key was in the ignition, as if left there by

  Kloom?

  an angelic friend. He went to turn it, but found empty air. He checked again, and the key was gone. In fact, now that he really looked, he wasn’t in a car at all—he was at his seat in the cafeteria. Julia again stood in the center of the room, the knives dancing around her, fully loaded, as if she’d never fired one off.

  Rudy started to cry. He sagged in his seat and stared at the woman in white silk, finding terror in her smile.

  “Look at the bright side,” she said. “How many people get laid before they die?”

  He shook his head. It would be rape, and he didn’t want to die.

  “Get undressed,” she said, moving forward.

  Rudy stared, watery-eyed. He got up slowly and began taking off his shirt.

  “Hold on one minute,” said another voice, from behind.

  Both Julia and Rudy stared as a boy with a blond bowl cut strode into the cafeteria. He had his hands in his jeans pockets, and he grinned like he’d just pulled the greatest prank ever conceived.

  “How’d you get in h—” Julia began, before her eyes bugged out, and the knives all clattered onto the floor at once.

  “That’s right, sweetheart,” the blond kid said. “Chad Stevenson, at your service.” He bowed. “Well, in this case, I’ll be servicing you.”

  But Julia wasn’t about to give in so easily. Suddenly, the knives all rose back up, and she flung her hands forward, shooting them all at once at Chad. Chad stood there, hands still in his pockets, not looking concerned at all. Rudy now saw he had a thin stalk of wheat in his mouth.

  The knives got within a foot of Chad’s body before transforming into flakes of snow. They went from darting blades to drifting powder, and Chad hadn’t even taken his hands from his pockets.

  “My dear,” he said, “I think you ought to save your energy.”

  24:

  IT’S SO COLD . . . IS it snowing? Am I on a slab of ice?

  No, I’m in bed.

  Too cold to sleep, I’ll just brush my teeth, maybe get tired on my way back. Scrub, rinse, spit. How routine, how familiar.

  (don’t look in the mirror)

  Swaying there, two nooses appear on the ceiling behind me, moving like pendulums on a grandfather clock, a lush brown hue against colorless walls. Someone had to have put them there. But who?

  The bathroom door is opening. Oh my God, someone’s coming inside, coming to wring my neck. I should run, I should hide, I should

  (please wake up, please wake up)

  (WAKE UP)

  see who this person is.

  Rudy shot awake, still inside the Subaru. Mr. Kloom was fixing his hair in the rearview mirror. The sun was not up yet—the sky was a violet-black.

  Rudy checked where the knives hit him, and he found only smooth, unblemished skin.

  “I told you not to go back,” Mr. Kloom said.

  Rudy wiped his forehead, feeling cold sweat. “You put me there.”

  “Not this time. You went all by yourself. And just because you aren’t hurt doesn’t mean you can’t be hurt. The two people you saw . . . do you know them?”

  “One was named Julia . . . I’ve seen her in the library. But I think . . . I think she was wearing a wig.”

  “She’s not the one you’ve got to worry about.”

  “The boy? The boy! He saved me!”

  Mr. Kloom paused, his hands in his hair, and laughed. “Oh, Bill Cosby. Kids really do say the darndest things.”

  “Huh?”

  “Chad’s not a boy, and he certainly didn’t save your life. He’s a full-blown man.”

  “Huh?” Rudy said again.

  “He’s real old, and he wants to kill you.” Mr. Kloom lit up a cigarette and blew out smoke.

  “So why didn’t he?”

  “He’s using you, first.”

  “For what?”

  “To get to me.”

  “You?”

  “Oh yes. I’m afraid he’s found me out, kid. It sure has been a good time, taunting the poor fellow. But he’s got me, now.”

  “So . . . he wants to kill you, too?”

  “He’d like to do a whole lot more than that, but yes, essentially.”

  “What do we do?”

  “We sell.”

  “What? He’ll find us! We have to prepare!”

  “Selling is preparing. And he’s already found us, no point in hiding.”

  “You know what, you don’t seem too worried, and it’s worrying me. He’s trying to kill us.”

  “Our confrontation is a while off, don’t you worry.”

  “How could you possibly know that?”

  Mr. Kloom shook his head. “We’re further behind than I thought.” Then he got out, walked around the car and opened Rudy’s door. “Get out.”

  Rudy hesitated, but he did get out. Mr. Kloom led him across the dock, toward an outdoor food joint that served through a sliding window. He pointed. “Look.”

  Rudy looked.

  “You asked how I know.”

  “All I see is a window, sir.”

  “Then you’re not applying your lessons.”

  Rudy sighed and squinted, trying harder to focus.

  And it came, a sensational warm fluid that oozed from his mind, tingling his neck and shoulders, traveling down his arms and spine. From far away, he heard Mr. Kloom tell him, That’s it.

  The normal colors of the world drained away, sucked like the blood from a victim, turning everything into a black-and-white photograph. The skies, the shops, the pavement, the boats were now all separate shades of grey. The normal movements of life were still as paintings. All the sounds were gone.

  A vision was coming. The sun paused in its rising, casting a great ray over the scene Rudy witnessed.

  Then, a girl about his age appeared in the now open window, her hands planted firmly on the counter. She was not in black-and-white.

  On one side of her face, the flesh was stripped away as if she’d dragged her fingernails down her cheek. From each wound, a little spout of steam snaked out, like she was roasting alive. Her left arm had no hand and

  (just like brian)

  leaked goop with the consistency of churned cement. The fluid dribbled down the counter and pooled on the sidewalk below. She stared into Rudy’s eyes, her shoulders rising with each breath. Half her shirt had been ripped from her, exposing a scarred breast; the nipple was burned down flat, and beads of blood leaked from the pores.

  But her expression wasn’t one of anger or pain. Rather, it was of
surprise.

  She reached out her dripping stump toward Rudy. Her lips pulled apart as she tried to speak, the skin so hot that it stretched like melted gum pulled up from the pavement by a shoe.

  And then Rudy felt a hand on his shoulder that brought the real world crashing back around him. He regained muscle control and the world exploded with clarity. He drew a huge breath and turned to face Mr. Kloom.

  Mr. Kloom stood there, and the docks clunked peacefully in the waves.

  Rudy whipped back to look at the window. The sliding glass was closed, and the bloody counter was now spotlessly white. No girl was there, and it was still halfway ‘til morning.

  “Now you know something, too,” Mr. Kloom said. He put a hand on Rudy’s shoulder. “Lovely, isn’t it?”

  25:

  “HOW’D YOU DO THAT?” Rudy asked, staring at the empty window. Just a moment ago, a girl with half her face boiled away had occupied it.

  Mr. Kloom smiled. “Use the bathroom. We can talk on the way.”

  Rudy went into the men’s room, which connected to the docks, and stepped up to a urinal. When he finished, he turned on the faucet. The sound of the water triggered his memory of the bathroom at home. He felt each individual thud of his heartbeat. He was terrified to look in the mirror, knowing he’d see those nooses once more . . .

  (don’t look, don’t look)

  But he did look.

  And in its reflection he saw the bathroom door open.

  His heart nearly exploded.

  In strolled a very normal looking man, in khaki pants and a polo shirt, whistling, not even looking over. Rudy twisted off the faucet and left the restroom, drying his hands on his pants.

  Mr. Kloom was waving him down from inside the car, yelling “LET’S GO!”

  Rudy hurried into the car, and they didn’t talk at all about his vision.

  ---

  Mr. Kloom pulled to the curb inside a new neighborhood and parked. He leaned into the rearview mirror and gave both palms a quick lick before slicking back his hair.

  “Got to get serious, now,” he said. “Not many people come back this way cause there’s nothing here at all. Nothing but money, that is, and I mean it. These guys are a little rough around the edges, mostly keep to themselves; probably why they’re way out here. People with green in their pockets don’t associate themselves with the poor.