by Marc Laidlaw
“Who?”
“You just met your anima. It was your self, Mike. Like, your female side. You know, in psychology?”
Mike shook his head, uncertain why he felt so frightened all of a sudden. Was it because she had been so real? Because he had known her so intimately, loved her so intensely? Or was it because he had been planning and hoping to see her again, and now had lost her more completely than if she had never been. Which, Edgar seemed to be saying, she never had.
“This is unreal,” Edgar said. “My mom would flip if she heard this.”
“She was a hallucination?”
“No, man, she was as real as you. She was, is, like your ally. Your twin. I can’t explain it, but my mom could. It’s in books.”
“No . . . a hallucination . . . ?”
Edgar sighed and shook his head. “I am so jealous. You met your anima, and she was a fox.”
This judgment was so crass that he could neither agree nor argue with Edgar. Instead he fell silent, wishing he could call her back again, summon her out of some deep place in himself. But she had come unexpectedly. What made him think she would return just because he wished it? How many times had he woken from dreams of a perfect lover to find himself alone in the narrow bed, the empty room, staring at the rolling minutes on his Glantz Appliances clock radio? A desperate pang always followed such awakenings, haunting him all day sometimes, until he went to sleep praying he would dream of her again. At least then he could console himself with the truth: that his ideal lover was only a dream. But this girl—he had seen her with his eyes. He’d been drugged, true, but wide awake. He couldn’t bring himself to believe she didn’t exist, and therefore he grasped even at the purely psychological existence Edgar offered. Maybe . . . maybe if he did more acid he would see her again. Yes—if he stayed close to Edgar, he would meet her eventually. Again. She had seemed as real as the tank full of mannequins—as real as the spiders, the wolves, the burning key . . . She’s real, he thought, because I am real.
Edgar saw him straighten, must have seen the new look of strength and resolve in his eyes.
“Your power is definitely cracking tonight, Mike. I think you’re ready for what I’ve got in mind.”
Edgar’s envy and exhilaration were infectious. Even with the sense of loss that filled him, Mike felt ready for anything.
“Come on. This is gonna blow your mind.”
18
At the back of the house, Edgar unlocked the sliding glass door and went into his room. “Wait here,” he said. A moment later, without having turned on a light, he returned smelling strongly of patchouli and carrying a crowbar.
“While the psychic link is strong, this is the perfect time.”
“For what?” Mike asked, though he was starting to get an idea. Edgar’s laugh confirmed it. There was some sort of unspoken communication going on.
“Craig and me . . .” He shrugged. “We were partners at this sometimes. Not Howard, he’s too clumsy. But usually I work alone.”
“Work,” Mike repeated.
“You said you want to be a master thief. It’s time you start learning the trade.”
Mike had no reply.
“It’s easy, really. All you have to do is stay quiet, calm, and alert. And use a crowbar.”
The last few minutes had been a breathing space, a lull in the night’s strangeness, but that interval of peace was coming to an end. After the compressed insanity of the van, his mind had found room to stretch and expand beneath the open sky. But Edgar’s words, his hinted schemes, quickly brought all Mike’s fears reeling in again, cinching nightmares tight around him.
The acid effects had never gone away. Now, with the renewal of adrenaline, they began to ooze out again. He grew preternaturally aware of the slightest scrabbling sounds in the scrub around them; the wind in the sage sounded like a rough voice, whispering. Nature spirits lived out in the wilderness, their domains threatened by encroaching houses and streets. He thought he could see them lurking just beyond the reach of streetlights, warning him off. Edgar, also silent, listened with a similar intensity. He caught Mike’s eye and nodded.
“Yeah,” he whispered. “This is righteous. You’re the best partner I’ve had yet. I mean, you’re really tuned in.”
But if Edgar was tuned in to Mike’s dread, he didn’t show it. He pulled on a pair of leather motorcycle gloves and rapped his padded knuckles on the sliding glass door.
“In every house around here, there’s sliding glass doors, right? The ones that back up on the Greenbelt, like mine, have total privacy. Now these things are baby-simple to pop. We’ll practice on my door, since we can make all the noise we want back here.”
Edgar bent to point out the tracks in which the door slid. “This works almost like a window screen. You want to pry the whole thing up so it tilts in the frame.” He demonstrated by slipping one end of the crowbar into the track, edging it under the door, and levering down on the other end. As the door tipped up, it slipped free of the simple latch and slid open at a touch. “You’re in. If they’ve been burglarized before, they’ll probably have stop-bolts built into the tracks. But I never hit the same house twice. Now it’s your turn.”
Mike declined without making a sound. The ESP was surely working.
“Well, then, come on.”
Edgar led him along the crest of an eroded dirt embankment, a mound that had been piled behind the houses by bulldozers when the foundations were dug. Most of the houses dated from the first wave of development in Shangri-La. All were occupied, though tonight the lights were off in many. Looking between them as they walked, he caught a glimpse of his own house, one of a row running up the edge of the canyon. The lights were off there, too; Ryan must have turned them all off when he’d left for Dirk’s. He suddenly remembered his vision of standing in the canyon behind his home, looking up at it. A wordless panic reached for him. Before he could say anything about it, Edgar beckoned him into the bushes, beyond the mound.
“From back here you can watch all the houses and no one will even know you exist.”
From where they stood, well hid in the weeds, he could see straight into half a dozen houses, through the glass-paneled rears they had turned to the night—and to him. Like his own house, most had decks and sliding glass doors on every level. In many, drapes were drawn; but in a fair number the curtains were wide, showing dark interiors or vivid domestic displays. Kitchen scenes, people watching TV, talking on the phone, eating dinner, arguing. He watched in fascination, feeling his mind creep in among them, inserting itself into their lives. Ignorant, unsuspecting, all of them; as if simply because they saw nothing beyond their windows, nothing could possibly exist out there. Nothing could be stalking or spying on them. Not a one of them suspected his presence. It was as Edgar said: He might not even have existed.
The sagebrush whispered that this might be truer than he knew.
How often had Edgar sat here, spying? What a strange temptation—especially when the lives he glimpsed seemed, if anything, duller than his own uneventful life. Perhaps the strangeness of distance, the edge of paranoia, lent it all some slight curiosity. How would his own life appear to someone peering in at him? He couldn’t imagine that it would look any more interesting than these.
“There’s a girl down there—the window’s dark now—I’ve seen her stripping. And there’s a couple Craig and I saw fucking in their kitchen . . . right on the counter! Couple of geezers. We didn’t watch that too long.”
But nothing was happening now. It was all common and obvious. Only the incredible detail made it interesting. He might have been looking at an incredibly sharp film or photograph.
“Okay, so from here we figure out what everyone’s up to. Now that house over there—they’re out late tonight. Heard ’em telling my mom all about it.”
Edgar pointed out one of the dark houses. Beyond the blackness of the rear glass doors, Mike saw dark rooms and dim shapes of furniture. Remembering the tank of mannequins, his uneasiness
doubled. He was afraid of seeing Edgar’s face go blank again, and this time no soulmate would remind him that his eyes were shut. The impersonal night offered no comfort. He felt as if the weeds were pushing him forward, expelling him into plain sight. The dark house drew him like a magnet, but the pull was terrifying. Why hadn’t those people stayed home tonight? He had to find some way to get out of this.
“You’re on lookout,” Edgar said. “Try to keep our psychic connection. You know, think of that movie screen if it helps you. Imagine we’re still together. Picture, like, a two-way radio between us. If you see anyone coming, I’ll pick up your warnings and get out.”
“What if that doesn’t work?”
“Then hammer on the wall and run like hell. Don’t wait for me, either. We’ll have a better chance if we split up. If there’s trouble?—I mean, if the cops come? You might not see me for a day or two. I’ve got a hideout back in the Greenbelt. That’s my fallback, though I haven’t had to use it yet. I’ll hang around and test the water. You know, the cops might be onto me. It’s always a possibility.”
“Have you ever been caught?”
“Not at this. They’ve got fingerprints from some other things, though. Oh, yeah, take the crowbar. You’ll have longer to get away and hide it. Okay?”
Mike shrugged. Cops, he thought. They seemed more unreal, more terrifying, than any of this.
“The main thing, like I said, is to stay cool. Just . . . feel it. Stay tuned to me, partner.”
Edgar put out his hand, palm out, and Mike took it for a brief squeeze.
“No more talking. Let’s go.”
They crept over the embankment and darted to the back of the house. The house next door was all lit up, and patches of indirect light scattered on the dark house’s patio. They kept to the shadows. An amber floodlight whose model number he almost remembered was mounted above the sliding glass door, but it wasn’t on. Mike stared up at the bulb while Edgar worked the prybar into the track. He was remembering the day he first met Edgar—remembering Scott’s shadow blocking out the hot light from the alley, Edgar coming in, the fall of lightbulbs, Mr. Glantz’s anger and suspicion turning to slack, drooling blankness.
The door popped with a dull thump. Before Mike fully recalled where he was, Edgar handed him the bar and stepped into the dark house, heading down the hall toward a staircase.
He knew he ought to get back to the safety of the underbrush, but it was hard to leave Edgar alone inside. The more he strained to see into the black interior, the more he saw to frighten him. He had no desire to go in; the vast empty night, no matter how hostile, seemed preferable. He could not get in trouble with the law for simply hiding in the hills.
He moved off slowly. Dishes rattled in the house next door, making him jump. The sound had seemed to come from the dark house. A voice rose in anger. Was it aimed at him?
Looking down, he saw his foot was glowing. He had blundered into a patch of light. He jerked back, then sprinted around the side of the house where the shadows were deep and reassuring. Crouching against the stucco wall, he waited for his heart to slow.
Relax.
He crept to the front of the house and found a clump of bushes where he could sit and watch the street. It made more sense than going back into the hills, much as he might have liked to.
A pair of headlights swooped over the rise, heading east on Shoreview, coming his way. He tensed to escape. How long would it take Edgar to get down and out once he warned him?
But the car pulled over before it had gone half a block, dousing its headlights. He took a deep breath.
Why was Edgar taking so long?
He looked the other way, since it was just as likely that the residents would drive home by the back road from South Bohemia. His eyes roamed across the canyon, coming to rest on the row of houses there. He counted them until he found his own.
A light flickered on in his mother’s room. Jack had said not to expect them before two in the morning, but they must have come home early from L.A. He realized he didn’t know what time it was. It might have been later than two. He thought he saw his mother moving past the bamboo shades; then the inner Levolors closed. He was guiltily grateful to see her taking precautions for privacy, knowing now—from firsthand experience—that anyone might be watching.
Who had Ryan seen that afternoon? Someone actually spying?
Then this was fair-play, skulking and spying. But what about stealing?
Well, Edgar was the one doing that . . .
Light bloomed on the street, another pair of headlights sliding forward. This time it was easier not to panic. A hundred cars must use this street each night; only one would come here. The odds were in his favor. The headlights went out, relaxing him further.
He tried to reach out with his mind and feel Edgar inside the house, to reassure him if that were possible. But whatever communion they had shared earlier, in the flood of acid images, it was gone. He felt nothing now but drained. His eyes wanted to close.
The crowbar dropping from his hand alerted him; he jerked himself awake with a gasp. No time at all had passed, for the car was still approaching, very slowly, its headlights still dark. There might be a party somewhere around here; the driver could be looking for addresses in the dark. He huddled tighter into himself.
Just then, he saw that it was a different car. Metallic brown. As it passed under a streetlamp, he saw the shine of a chrome spotlight mounted on the driver’s door. It swiveled toward him like a silver eye, its lid of light about to open. It looked like an ordinary car except for that: unmarked.
He stumbled backward, tripping in the bushes; scrambled to his feet and rushed to the back of the house. He banged his fist against the glass, unable to draw a sound from his throat, hoping Edgar heard it.
Inside the house, Edgar made no sound. He wouldn’t, if he was smart.
Split up, Edgar had said.
Get out of there, Edgar! Mike prayed fiercely, sending the message as urgently as he could. Get away from that house!
He didn’t dare wait to see the result of his warnings. He was already running, lost in the bushes, trying to steer a course into the safety of the Greenbelt. He looked back only once, as light exploded around the house, surrounding it in a halo of glare. The powerful spotlight went roving down the path he’d followed a moment earlier. He thought the sliding glass door gaped wider than before, and hoped this meant that Edgar had come out already. But the glimpse of light redoubled his terror. He wanted only darkness now. So he ran.
He saw no trails. The ground kept folding into gulleys or ridges, deceiving him when he most needed trustworthy footing. Several times he fell and sprawled flat, taking advantage of the momentary stillness to listen. No sirens howled, no cop radios blared, but he might have run too far to hear anything. He thought not, though. His hearing was acutely sensitive tonight. It seemed as though he could hear crickets in the grass, waiting silently for him to move on. The infinite mindless patience of the insects inspired him.
He moved in a kind of overdrive for a time, a trance state that kept him from harm. In the moonlight, everything became very clear and obvious, even luminous. The individual plants had distinct personalities; they whispered to him of shelter, or cried out harsh warnings. He had not stepped into any cactus, though it grew everywhere here; it and the poison oak had voices unlike those of the other plants. He heard them long before he stumbled into them.
But that alien easiness passed eventually. He began to feel more himself again. Too much so, maybe. Every muscle ached.
It seemed that hours had passed before he came in sight of houses again, but it might have been only minutes. He had circled around Shangri-La to approach it from the southern corner. Squinting at streetlights, he blundered into barbed wire and backed off, gasping, with a gashed hand. Thoughts of tetanus coursed through him; his jaws were tight already, his teeth grinding so loudly that he feared they would draw his pursuers. He went crashing through brambles and came out in a clear
ing, sensing a faint trail in the dust at his feet. A spark of light glinted beyond a tumble of rocks. He moved toward it, following the trail to a high clump of bushes where it ended in a cavelike clearing among the brush. Interlaced branches closed over his head; the moon appeared broken between them, but there was enough light to show that the place had been hollowed out and trampled down. It was large enough to let him stand. His eyes were level with a small opening in the thicket, where branches had been bent and woven to make a frame, like a wicker porthole. The shelter was a hunter’s blind, from which one could await the coming of deer, but it should have been facing the Greenbelt. Instead, when he looked through the hole, he saw only a lamppost and the thin strands of barbed wire cutting him off from the street.
Under that light was a house. Parked in the driveway of the house was a black van. Not the one he had driven in tonight, though. Sal’s van.
He was still holding the crowbar, after all this time. He flung it deep into the bushes, as if it were poisonous. What if they caught him with it? Then he thought, what if this was a police blind, built for watching Sal’s house? They must know what he was up to, dealing drugs and molesting boys. If they came here tomorrow to resume their vigil, and found the crowbar with his fingerprints on it—the same crowbar used in the burglary—what then?
Jesus, he had to get it back.
He crouched and looked after the crowbar, but everything was tangled and murky among the broken sticks. Something pale lay flattened on the ground below the branches. He touched it, and heard paper crinkle. It was a magazine. Seeking clues, he dragged it out where the mingled lights of street and moon could fall upon it.
The pages were stiff and brittle as a stale tortilla, glued together from nights of dew, grittily gummed by the elements. A musky, moldy smell rose from the pictures. It was hard to see clearly here, but he knew what he was looking at. Bodies. Besides being crinkled and so horrible to touch that he could barely bring himself to leaf through it, the pages were selectively mutilated. Photographs of penises, gleaming wet, going into cunts that were equally glistening; and women with their mouths open, taking in other cocks; or gripping them, more than one woman, more than one man. Little of this was entirely new to him—he had Scott to thank for that. But wherever men appeared, the pages had been scratched and torn. Their testicles were missing, ripped away, nothing but holes there. On the opposite sides of those pages, the same holes found awful correspondence in the models’ faces; whole parts of their limbs and abdomens had been eaten away. By teeth or nails or acid.