by Aaron Crash
His mom downright giggled, and it was adorable, this sixty-plus woman giggling and blushing.
Aunt Sue waved her hand. “That’s perverted. I’d steal money, lots of money, from rich pricks. There’s a shit-ton of rich pricks in this world, Jackie. And I say fuck ’em all! Fuck ’em right up their rich prick asses. Like those Malcolms. We won’t ever forget what they did to you, Jack. Not ever.”
His mom sighed at her sister. “Please, Sue, don’t curse.” Even mentioning the Malcolms made his mom sad.
“It’s okay, Moms,” Jack said quietly. He couldn’t disagree with his aunt, but he also didn’t point out her own son was basically a prick, rich or not. Sometimes, with family, you kept such things to yourself because you had to play the long game.
Moms grew serious. A little too serious. “It’s funny, Jack. Time is the real money of the world. And if you could stop time? You’d get more time, to do any number of things. To enjoy things. To learn things. Maybe to stop bad things from happening. Like a car accident. Stopping time would help you save people.”
Aunt Sue tapped her beer on the table. “That’s all very well and good, but I’m rethinking things. Sure, it’s perverted, but I’d go into that men’s locker room at the YMCA. Just to see a handsome man naked. It’s been a decade or more. Then? I’d go right to that bank you look after, Jack. Go right up and steal the money out of the drawers. They’re insured.”
“But if you took money out of a teller’s drawer, she’d get in trouble.” Jack shook his head, thinking of Annie. Where was she? It was all too convenient. Hugo, Hugo’s mom, Horns, the bank robbery, and the lady in red smelling like spice and sex. If Annie had been kidnapped, it had to be one of them that had done the kidnapping.
Moms didn’t have an opinion on the bank. She did have an opinion on the showers. “You know, Jackie, if you went into the lady’s room at your gym, you’d be a creep. It’s different for women...your aunt and me, for example.”
“That doesn’t seem very fair.” He stood up. “It’s all just pretend, you know? People can’t stop time.”
Jack helped them clean up the papers and the beer and again had to tell them he couldn’t stay for dinner. He’d get some orange chicken from the Señor Chang’s south on Plum Creek Boulevard from the bank and then continue to work on finding Annie.
Though a part of him knew that the most important thing he could do was stop time and test the limits of his powers. The lady in red might be watching, and if he gave her a good show, maybe she’d answer some questions about what happened to Annie.
But at the top of Jack’s list was finding Hugo Mundi. The crazy guy had given him the toy soldier and seemed to be up to his greasy hair in this business. To top it off? Hugo was crazy, and his mental illness might mean any number of things.
So Jack had a to-do list. Find Hugo. Find Annie. Practice his power and keep an eye out for the bitch with the two different-colored eyes. And he had to juggle his various jobs. But now he had more time. Literally.
First, Señor Chang’s. They had some good orange chicken, but their taco waffles—which were really just Navajo tacos—were also really good. At some point, Navajo tacos would take over the world of cuisine and maybe beat out pizza for the most delicious food ever.
He drove over, the headache gone, and he was feeling good.
It was time to test out his powers and see what he could do. He parked and went into the restaurant, which was crowded. Saturday night, people wanted their Mexican Asian fusion cooking. He noticed a foursome of women in the corner booth, eight margaritas on their table, four empty and four halfway gone. They were all cute, with various shades of blond hair.
Jack had the windup soldier in his pocket. Weird, but the lady in red had said something about him not needing it. Well, what the fuck did she know? She said what he could do was impossible, and she hadn’t stuck around to help him.
What was she anyway? Some kind of demon? That brought up bad memories of Tuesday nights and Catholic catechism. His old man insisted that you didn’t need to be Catholic to be a cop, but it certainly helped. His old man had gone to work every day with his St. Christopher medal around his neck and the policeman’s prayer to St. Michael in his wallet. Neither had stopped the bullet that had ended him.
That had been the first death, back when Charlie, David, and Eli had all been alive, all policemen in either Plum Creek or Denver.
Jack shook all those bad thoughts away.
At the counter, some rich asshole in a suit, no tie, shook his watch in the face of the chubby girl running the register. She was young, probably under twenty, and flustered. “See that?” the rich douche spat. “It’s a fucking Rolex. I could buy and sell you and your shitty little restaurant. I want my kung-pao shrimp burrito. I ordered before them.” He pointed vaguely at a goth couple who had piercings and tattoos and were looking really uncomfortable. They’d be posting to Instagram later about rich assholes and how their spinach enchiladas had been hard to swallow after the confrontation. The goth couple’s order was ready. Mr. Rolex just had to step aside to let them get it.
“Hey, pal,” Jack called out. “Leave her alone. Your fucking kung-pao shrimp burrito will be ready when it’s ready.”
The rich asshole, who had a little smudge of coke under one nostril, smiled like a shark eyeing chum. Some people liked to fight. This fuck was one of them. “Excuse me?”
“Let them get their food.” Jack nodded at the goths. Or emos. Or whatever their deal was. He lost track of all that online culture shit because he was just trying to stay afloat and didn’t have the time to follow trends.
“And if I don’t?” The rich asshole came forward.
And Jack took out the soldier. He turned the windup key to the left. Everything came to a stop, and Jack had a minute to take a look around and ponder the situation.
Freezing all of creation had a variety of benefits.
Chapter Five
JACK STOOD IN THE RESTAURANT surrounded by frozen patrons amid brightly colored tropical bird decorations and fake plastic palm trees. In front of him, the rich douche in the suit, sans tie, stood like an asshole statue. His face was a mask of hate.
Jack grinned. “Oh, so much better. I’ll deal with you, asshole, in a minute. Or are you more of a prick?” He recalled what Aunt Sue had said about stealing from rich pricks. It was something to consider. He thought the headache would hit him right away. Nope, he felt fine. Yes, there was a tickle behind his left eye, but at this point, it was only a tickle.
It was eerily quiet. No sounds of grease frying. No people murmuring, or in the case of the four blondes in the booth, no laughing and yelling. He turned his back on the Rolex-wearing douchebag and took a closer look at the girls.
The short one in the corner, laughing, was obviously the jokester in the group. Then there was the taller one, who was laughing but was still a little standoffish. The one at the corner had a bit too much makeup on and a bit too much cleavage showing. She was trying too hard, which was fine. Jack didn’t mind that. Lastly, the one at the corner was hometown pretty, and she was thicker and had a belly but obviously didn’t care. That was his type. He liked women who were comfortable with themselves. Confidence was fucking sexy. She had hazel eyes and freckles.
Normally, when Jack wanted to check out a woman, he had to be subtle because he knew most women didn’t want to be gawked at. The prettier a woman was, the more she had to deal with men always checking out her tits and ass. Being pretty was a burden. He’d learned that from his friend in the cadet program. Jennifer. He would’ve liked to talk with her. That wouldn’t be possible...not after what had happened.
Jack turned away from the four women. He checked himself. Did he feel sleazy for staring? He didn’t. If he’d groped them? No, that wouldn’t be right. So that was good. He still had a moral compass. He walked back behind the counter, noticed the taco shells being slid into the grease, the bubbles frozen. He went through the ranks of the workers and into the back office. The m
anager was there, a Hispanic guy in a dirty shirt, sweating. He was counting receipts and money, and, yes, Jack could’ve taken that money out of his hand and walked away.
No one would ever be the wiser. But Jack would know. The owner of the restaurant would just assume the manager had stolen the money because the manager would say it had simply disappeared.
No, Jack didn’t want to do that to the manager. It wasn’t right, and Jack wasn’t a complete fucking idiot. If you thought out the consequences of your actions, and how they fucked other people over, then doing the right thing became fairly easy ninety-nine percent of the time. When that morally gray one percent showed up? You did what you had to do and moved on.
Jack did grab a paper cup, which was like ten cents, and poured himself a Coke, with ice, which was about another ten cents. He’d throw the restaurant an extra couple of bucks for the drink.
So he could interact with the world without fucking things up, or so it seemed. He sipped the Coke and crunched on the good restaurant ice. All tasted good.
Well, now, this was interesting. He pushed through the doors and stepped outside, just to check to make sure the world was stopped. It was. He saw Boy Rolex’s car parked out there. That would be the BMW M6 convertible with personalized plates. “R1CHB0Y.”
That would be easy to fucking remember. This guy must’ve driven down from Cherry Creek or some other rich suburb of Denver. Plum Creek people, even the rich ones, were generally not that flashy or douchey.
Jack didn’t want to hate rich people, but what had happened with the Malcolm family, the richest family in Plum Creek, had put a bad taste in his mouth for such folks, and Boy Rolex had gone ahead and confirmed his bias, so thank you fucking much.
Jack pulled out his phone. No internet. No phone calls. Everything was stuck in place. He wondered if the entire universe had come to a halt. The timestamp was there on his phone, though.
October 8th at 7:17 pm.
He waited. The time didn’t change. It seemed his phone was like the soda machine inside. It worked, but again, it must be about his aura. He was outside of time, and so what he touched was as well.
The little pain behind his eyes had grown into pinpricks. The pain wasn’t bad at all, so he could get stronger, or maybe it was getting used to not being in the flow of time. The Tempus Influunt or whatever.
He put away his phone and went back inside the restaurant. He wanted to get the home address of Boy Rolex, or at least his name. He wanted to see how deep his pockets were. The Rolex and Beamer might all be a show, and he might not have a pot to piss in. If he did, however, then Jack had found one of Aunt Sue’s rich pricks he might want to rob later on.
Jack put his soda down and approached the guy, figuring his driver’s license would be in his phone case, in the inside pocket of his suit coat.
Or Jack could simply take his Rolex. He’d have to be careful how he sold it, but Pinetree could help with that. It wasn’t that Pinetree was a criminal, but he knew criminals, and served them booze before they went to do their criminal things. Pinetree had a certain moral flexibility, though, and for a long time, as the son of a cop, Jack hadn’t understood that.
Then the shit went down in the cadet program. It all changed, including how Jack saw life.
Jack didn’t go for Boy Rolex’s watch. He did reach into the douchebag’s inside jacket pocket. The minute Jack’s hands touched the fabric of the guy’s jacket, the tin soldier slammed his drumsticks down on the drum. And in a splash of noise, time lurched forward. Boy Rolex shoved Jack away.
“What the shit, guy?” the rich prick snarled. “Get off me! You have a fucking problem?”
Jack didn’t want to have to fill out an incident report on this asshole, and he didn’t want to get bogged down in a fight. Lastly, Jack didn’t want to wash the guy’s blood out of his clothes. Fucking bloodstains were hard to remove.
“No, sorry,” Jack said. “I tripped, is all. I didn’t mean to touch you.”
“But you fucking did!” Boy Rolex shouted. He charged forward.
In normal circumstances, the confrontation would devolve into a shoving match, or a yelling match, because in the end, normal people didn’t want to fight. In the end, it was why in the animal kingdom males feinted attacks to intimidate their opponent rather than lock horns.
Not Boy Rolex. He’d had some training. And he was a prick. Put them together, and the guy tried to clock him. Jack saw where his weight was, and he shifted, avoiding the first punch, and the second, and the third.
“Do you really want to do this?” Jack asked.
Boy Rolex replied with the very astute, “Fuck you, cocksucker motherfucker.”
“Don’t know what that means,” Jack said, “but I’ll take that as a yes.”
The best way to avoid blood was to avoid bashing in this prick’s face. So Jack let him come close. Then he grabbed the guy’s arm thrown forward in a punch. It was an Aikido move, using your opponent’s energy against them.
Jack pulled Boy Rolex forward. At the same time, Jack rammed his knee up into the guy’s diaphragm. The rich prick wouldn’t be breathing for the next few seconds, maybe a minute, as his diaphragm spasmed. It was a good, solid hit.
Boy Rolex was on his knees, gasping like a carp looking for a lake to crap in.
Jack tweaked the guy’s nose. “That’s why you don’t throw punches at people you don’t know. Always somebody better. Always somebody tougher.”
The entire Señor Chang’s had been silent. But after he’d taken care of the problem guy, the restaurant started clapping, whistling, hooting, and hollering.
The chubby girl behind the counter lifted up a paper bag. “Uh, his kung-pao shrimp burrito is ready.”
Jack took the burrito and the guy out the door.
Boy Rolex took another swing at him, but it was weak, and he was a joke. Jack shoved him down onto the pavement. He then walked by him and set the kung-pao shrimp burrito on the roof of his car. “There you go, R1CHB0Y.” He motioned to the license plate.
He would be following up on the name of this joker. Boy Rolex had too much money, obviously, and Jack was going to help him with that little problem. The guy had also solved one little mystery for Jack—he could touch and manipulate things, but he couldn’t touch people.
The douchebag was tired of Jack besting him, so Boy Rolex said some shit, got in his Beamer, and took off in a scream of rubber.
Jack inhaled the air. “Damn, that got me hungry. Now, what did I want again?”
He smelled a very distinctive perfume—a little spice, a little musk—and he whirled around.
He heard throaty laughter. Was it from one of the blondes inside the restaurant?
No, it was the lady in red. Well, she had said she’d be watching him, and it seemed she was making good on her word.
Chapter Six
THAT NIGHT, JACK WENT into the NCIC and the CBI databases. So far, there was no sign of Annie Blackburn. From the reports, she’d not come home from work. She lived with her father and a roommate in a little ranch in a nice, old Plum Creek neighborhood on the west side.
The roommate was also a friend, and both the friend and Annie’s father got worried when Annie didn’t come home. Well, yeah, she didn’t, because Annie had never left the bank. Most of the time, Jack wouldn’t have trusted Kyle with anything, but this time, he believed Mr. Turkey Neck. Kyle and Annie had gone into the bank, and suddenly, Annie was gone.
Disappeared without a trace. No calls to the father nor the friend. Her phone never left the bank, at least not in your typical out-the-front-door kind of way.
Could Hugo Mundi have grabbed her?
No, Kyle would’ve seen Sweaty. Besides, Hugo didn’t seem like the kidnapping type. Finding his address was easy. It was in an eastern neighborhood, one of Plum Creek’s original streets, back when it had mostly been a farming community. It wasn’t one of the better parts of the city—actually, if Plum Creek had a bad part of town, that was it.
Jac
k would swing by there and do a little interview.
But really, Annie was the priority. And Jack was pretty sure that it was either Horns or the lady in red that had grabbed her. So, how to get in touch with either of them?
He’d gone to bed pondering that question.
Jack woke up Sunday morning, said fuck the world, and turned off time. He woke up, on his own, an hour later with only a slight headache. He turned the soldier’s switch to the right and time started again. He had a job watching over a construction zone at noon, but he still had plenty of time to get over there.
And he’d gotten another hour of sleep. He felt good. He popped two aspirin and chased it with water from the tap. Normally, he’d have to get on with the boring, everyday stuff from there, but not this time. Out came the soldier. He turned the key to the left.
He couldn’t believe the freedom. He could do what he wanted, and with every time stop, his head was hurting less. His bedroom didn’t really have decorations. It was a mattress and his homemade end table and a secondhand six-string guitar. He’d wanted to learn to play guitar ever since he was in high school, listening to his dad’s classic rock. But learning guitar took both time and discipline. When he’d had the time, he hadn’t had the discipline, and when he had the discipline, he hadn’t had the time. Life was cruel like that.
Not anymore. With time stopped, he could practice. He picked up the guitar and went into the main living room. He sat in his desk chair in front of the window and played some scales, played some chords, and played one of his dad’s favorite songs, “Wish You Were Here” by Pink Floyd.
While he practiced, he kept his eyes open to see if either Horns or the demoness came calling. Or if he saw any other kind of creature. No such luck.
The lady in red might be watching him, but she didn’t comment on his shitty guitar playing. “Hey,” he said to the air. “Maybe you can cover my security work today. I really don’t want to spend eight hours watching over a pit.”