Falter

by V. J. Chambers

  I crawled over to my laptop again, looking down at the list of redheaded escorts. My favorite was named Ginger. It wasn’t her real name, of course. I’d get her to tell me what her real name was. Later. She’d tell me anything I wanted.

  I reached for the phone.

  I’d just see if she was available. If she was, it was a sign. Then I was meant to have her.

  I dialed, my hands shaking in excitement.

  CHAPTER SIX

  ~azazel~

  “So, you’re thinking of tracking him?” said Boone. He was sitting at the table in the main meeting room.

  “Yeah,” said Jude, “maybe then we’ll see where he picks up the product.”

  The door swung open, and Grace came in. “Hi Azazel. Hi Jude.” She smiled at us. She pointedly didn’t say anything to Boone.

  Boone furrowed his brow. “Why is Grace even here?”

  “I called her when I called you,” I said. “She’s part of the team. She deserves to know what’s going on. Besides, you can’t tell me that you think a tracking mission is too dangerous for her.”

  Boone looked at Grace. “You’re young enough that you could forget about all of this, you know. Have a normal life.”

  Grace looked around, a confused look on her face. “Did you hear something, Azazel? I thought I heard something.” She settled down in a chair across the table from me.

  “Nice,” said Boone. “That’s really mature, Grace. Boy, you’re really showing me how much you aren’t a little kid.”

  Grace’s fingers dug into the armrests on her chair, but she didn’t say anything.

  “You guys want to fight some more, or can we get back to work?” said Jude.

  “Sorry,” said Boone. He got up and went over to Jude, looking over his shoulder at the computer screen. “That’s the dealer, huh?”

  “Yeah, the thing is, we don’t know who he is,” I said. “We were hoping that you might be able to do your computer magic and come up with an identity for us.”

  Boone considered. “I can, but it’s going to take me some time. Maybe a few days, even. It might make just as much sense for us to keep an eye on this location and see if he shows up again. Then we can make a jump on him right away.”

  “We’d never make it in time,” I said. “Unless you think we should go camp out in Maryland near that mall.”

  “Oh, it’s that far away, huh?” said Boone.

  “I’m up for camping out near a mall,” said Grace, grinning.

  I shot her a look. “You just want to get out of school.”

  She spread her hands. “All in service of the greater good.”

  “No, I’ll figure out who he is,” said Boone.

  “Oh, because it’s okay for you to skip school, but not me,” said Grace.

  “You’re talking to me now?” he said.

  She glared at him. “I shouldn’t. You’re a cockrag, and you don’t deserve my scorn.”

  “Whatever, Grace, I didn’t do anything to you. I don’t know why you’re pissed. If it’s because I let you go to school that day when Jude and Azazel—”

  “You don’t know anything.” She folded her arms over her chest. “I don’t care about that.”

  “So, then what?” he said.

  “If you can’t figure it out, then I’m not telling you,” she said.

  “Um,” I interjected, “I guess I thought that you’d be able to figure out who that guy was quicker, Boone. Is it really going to take days?”

  “It could be shorter,” said Boone, “but probably not. I’m only going off of a face here, and that’s not much. I’ll do my best. Why?”

  “Well, I thought you’d need me here, and I told Jason I wouldn’t be home tonight. But if there’s nothing for me to do...”

  “You should stay,” said Jude.

  I turned to him. “Yeah?”

  “We could stuff bullets with herbs,” he said. “We always need more bullets.”

  “That’s true,” said Boone.

  “I’ll help,” said Grace.

  Boone turned to her. “Look, why don’t you go home and do homework or something?”

  “I’m not going to have a normal life, Boone,” she said. “I’m stuck in a thirteen-year-old body, in case you hadn’t noticed. I’m like fucking Kirsten Dunst in Interview With the Vampire, and it sucks. But I’m not thirteen. So... fuck you.”

  “What’s Interview With the Vampire?” said Boone.

  “It’s a movie with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise. It came out when I was a little kid. It’s kind of old, but it’s cool,” I said. “Anyway, the little girl they make into a vampire can never grow up, and she’s trapped in this child’s body, even though she has the desires of a woman. Then she dies. It’s really tragic.”

  Grace got up from the table. “Fuck all of you.” She stalked out of the room.

  The door slammed after her.

  Boone sat down heavily. “Grace isn’t aging?”

  “No,” I said. “You guys haven’t noticed? It’s because she technically died.”

  Jude touched his face. “I technically died. I’m still aging.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “I don’t know. I don’t think you look that much different.”

  “Well, Jason is,” said Jude. “He’s taller than when he died.”

  “I know,” I said. “I meant to ask him about that, but I keep getting distracted by getting mad at him. I swear, that boy. Some days, I think I’m going to kill him.”

  “No one would mind if you did,” said Jude.

  “Jude, please,” I said. I turned to Boone. “You should go after Grace.”

  “Me?” said Boone. “She hates me.”

  “Only because you went on a date with another girl,” I said. “Why’d you do that, anyway? Everyone can see that you and Grace are meant for each other.”

  “You don’t know anything, Azazel,” Boone muttered. He got up and left the room too.

  The door slammed after him too. I winced.

  “You know,” said Jude, “has it occurred to you that you’re maybe not very good at matchmaking?”

  I glared at him. “Let’s find the bullets. We don’t need Grace’s help to stuff them full of leaves.”

  * * *

  ~jason~

  She got nervous when we’d been driving for about twenty minutes, when we broke out of the heavily populated area and got to the point on the interstate where there was nothing but farmland. Bergen County, New Jersey is pretty much wall-to-wall people, but I didn’t have to drive very far to get out of that. There are stretches of land, places in New Jersey, where there really aren’t very many people at all. It’s even more true since the solar flare. A lot of people died during the blackout and afterward. There’s a lot more open space than there used to be.

  Ginger didn’t betray her nervousness in the most obvious way. She didn’t shake or stutter. But I could tell, because she started to fidget. She toyed with her seatbelt and asked me where we were going.

  I didn’t tell her, of course. Afterward, I wouldn’t want her to be able to get back to this spot. I’d probably leave some kind of evidence behind. And what I was planning to do to Ginger, well, it wasn’t strictly legal.

  So I just told her to sit tight. She’d see where we were heading soon enough.

  I’d scouted out the location a while ago. The basement of an abandoned farmhouse. It hadn’t been hard to break in. The space was large and secluded. Perfect. There was no one else around. Except possibly a black snake. I’d found one of his old skins when I’d scouted the place out.

  Ginger didn’t like it.

  She didn’t like being tied up to a chair in the middle of the room either.

  But that was kind of the point.

  She was sitting there now, crying and struggling against the ropes that held her fast. Her mascara was running. She looked like a raccoon.

  “You really don’t need to wear that much makeup, you know, Ginger?”

  She sobbed.

  “
I’m going to clean that junk off your face.” I went to the opposite side of the basement, where I’d stashed about twenty gallon jugs of water. I brought one back with me, and a roll of paper towels. I sat down in front of her in another chair so that we faced each other. “Why do you wear makeup, anyway, hmm?”

  She just shook her head. She was crying too hard to speak.

  I poured a little bit of water onto a paper towel. “Is it because you think men like it?” I began to rub the wet paper towel over her face.

  She cringed away from me.

  “Hold still,” I said. “I’m sorry if it’s a little cold.” I worked quickly, scrubbing her face clean. “Maybe you wear it because it’s a little bit of armor? Something between you and the men who pay you?”

  She started to hiccup.

  “I don’t want you to wear any armor, Ginger. I want you to open yourself to me. Completely. Okay?”

  More tears squeezed out of her eyes. “Are you going to—hic—kill me?”

  “What’s your real name, Ginger?”

  “You’re letting me see your—hic—face. And that means you don’t care if I can identify you. Which means you’re—hic—going to kill me.”

  “Tell me your real name,” I said. “And I won’t kill you.”

  She burst into fresh sobs. “Oh my god, you’re—hic—lying.”

  I got out of the chair. “You look much better without all that makeup. But you’re crying so much that it’s hard to see how pretty you are.” I went back to the other side of the basement. I came back with a case of tools. I opened it up, so that she could see all of the things inside. Gleaming knives, blunt instruments like hammers, even a small saw.

  She whimpered.

  I sat back down. “What’s your real name?”

  She looked up at me, suddenly defiant. “It’s Patience, and I’m a college student, and I’m studying veterinary medicine, and I own three cats and a turtle and a bird named Maggie. And if you kill me, no one’s going to feed them. And they’re going to be so confused because they won’t know where I am. And my mom—my mom is going to blame herself because she never wanted me to live on my own, and she doesn’t even know that this is my job, and she’s going to be devastated.”

  I settled back in the chair. “Thank you, Patience.” Her hiccups were gone, I mused.

  She shook her head. “You’re some kind of monster, aren’t you? Everything I just said to you, it didn’t even phase you. You’re sick.”

  I nodded. “That’s true, Patience. I am very sick.” I leaned forward. Whispered, like it was a secret. “I’m not going to kill you.”

  “Then... what do you want me to do?”

  I picked up a knife. “I told you what I wanted, Patience. I want you to open yourself to me.” I smiled. “I might need to do a little opening of my own.”

  She shuddered. “Why?”

  I stretched my neck. “Why?” I surveyed the knife. And the words felt right, like putting on a pair of worn-in jeans. “Because you’ve disrespected your body. You’ve disrespected the hallowed interaction between men and women.” I looked at her. “You’ve whored yourself.”

  She cowered, fear all over her face. And for a second, I could see all the other girls, rounded up in the kitchen of the sorority house, that same fear written on their expressions.

  I stood up. Gently, I traced the knife over the curves of her waist. I pressed my lips against her forehead, and my voice was a whisper. “The All-Father sees what you have done, and he has decreed you must be punished.”

  * * *

  ~azazel~

  I folded up a leaf and tucked it inside the bullet casing. Jude and I were in my apartment at headquarters. The coffee table was covered in bullets and herbs. We’d been at it for a few hours now.

  “Did you hear that?” said Jude. “My stomach just growled.”

  I laughed. “Look, I don’t feel like going out, and we all agreed it wasn’t a good idea for delivery companies to have this address. So, if you want food, then I’ll give you money, and you go get it.”

  “Actually,” said Jude, “we could get stuff from the freezer.”

  “What?” I said. “What stuff?”

  “Well, you know that they fed us when we were here, right? They’d send the meals down every day.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “There are leftover meals,” said Jude. “They’re in the big walk-in freezer upstairs. I eat them when I’m hungry. The food isn’t bad.”

  “The walk-in freezer where we put Dwayne’s body?” I made a face.

  “No!” He looked at me like I was nuts. “Of course not. The other one.”

  I considered. The food really hadn’t been that bad. And I was hungry. “I kind of liked the lasagna,” I said.

  “I know there’s some of that up there,” said Jude. “Want me to go grab a couple? They microwave up pretty well.”

  “Sure,” I said. “I mean, I guess so. Why not?”

  He grinned and got up. “Be right back.” He left the room.

  While he was gone, I continued to stuff leaves into bullet casings, wondering if it would be easier if we dried the leaves out first. It probably wouldn’t, because dried leaves always fell apart whenever anyone tried to handle them. I guessed it was okay the way we were doing it.

  Finally, Jude came back and popped the meals in the microwave for us.

  He leaned against the counter in the kitchen area. I came over and scrounged around for utensils in one of the drawers.

  “So, why are you and Jason arguing?” said Jude. “Is it really about me?”

  “No, it’s not about you,” I said. I considered. “Well, it was this morning, I guess.”

  “Really?”

  I got two forks and two knives out and set them on the counter. “He thinks I spend too much time with you. But it’s always been easy to talk to you, Jude.” I turned. “I mean, even after you tried to kill Jason, I still missed you sometimes.”

  “You know, there’s no love lost between Jason and me, but if I could go back in time, I never would have shot him like that. You know that, right?”

  “I do,” I said. “I don’t know if Jason does.”

  “Well, I’m always here to talk,” he said. The microwave beeped. “That’ll be the lasagna.” He opened the door. “For you.” He handed me a tray.

  “Thanks.” I set it on the other side of the counter, where there were two stools. I moved around to sit down while Jude put his tray in the microwave.

  He started the microwave. “So, if you aren’t arguing about me, then what are you arguing about?”

  I cut off a bite of lasagna and speared it with my fork. “It’s stupid.”

  “Fights usually are.” He grinned.

  I popped the lasagna in my mouth and chewed. I was reminded of the way things had been between Jude and me when I first met him. Then, I thought he was gay, and he was my best friend. I confided everything in him. When I’d found out the truth of his identity, I’d felt so betrayed. But that had been years ago. None of it seemed important anymore. And I still wanted to confide in him. “I think Jason is in denial about who he is.”

  The microwave beeped. “What do you mean?” Jude got out his tray and joined me on the other stool.

  “He’s Jason Wodden,” I said. “He’s a badass. He’s good at killing stuff. He doesn’t want to admit that to himself. Or if he does, he’s all in a snit about it, like it’s a bad thing.”

  Jude stirred his corn. “It is a bad thing.”

  “It’s not. It’s a skill, and it’s neither good nor bad. It’s all in how he uses it. If he kills innocent people, then it’s a bad thing.” I picked up my knife and began cutting my lasagna into bite-sized pieces. “Of course, Jason says that we don’t have the right to judge who’s innocent and who isn’t.”

  “Really? He says that? Huh. I never expected him to be so reasonable.”

  “He’s not into killing anymore, Jude,” I said. “I don’t think he ever was.”
r />   Jude shrugged. “You watched those interviews same as I did.”

  He was talking about the videoed interviews of people who’d watched Jason kill people that my brothers Noah and Gordan had showed me. Before I killed them, that is. “I don’t even know if those were real.”

  “Come on, Azazel,” said Jude. “You don’t really think they faked them.”

  He was right. After everything I’d seen Jason do, I couldn’t deny what he was capable of. “Okay, fine. He probably did do all that stuff.”

  Jude set down his fork. “So, how do you ignore that? How can you still want him, knowing what he is?”

  “That’s the thing. I think that’s part of the reason why I want him. He’s... exciting and scary like a roller coaster or a horror movie. He gives me this... charge.” I ate more food. I was starting to feel warm all over, just thinking about it.

  Jude was quiet.

  “Sorry, was that too much information?”

  “No, just a resounding confirmation that all chicks get wet for douchebags.”

  “Jason’s not a douchebag,” I said. Then I looked at him. “Did you just say ‘get wet’?”

  “No,” said Jude. “I mean, did I?”

  I giggled. “Yes. You totally did.”

  He blushed. “I meant... you know, something else.”

  I laughed harder. “Maybe we should drop this conversation and just eat our food.”

  “You’re almost done,” he said. “You weren’t kidding when you said you liked the lasagna.”

  I ate the last bite. “It’s not bad. It’s actually pretty good.”

  Jude ate more food.

  We were quiet for a little while. I attacked the square of cake that was our dessert.

  “I know we’re supposed to drop it,” said Jude, “but I don’t understand. How is that something you and Jason fight over?”

  I looked sidelong at him. “Um, well, something happened between us. He did... something to me while we were... together.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “What you’re saying is that I probably don’t want to know.”