Out of the Shadows

by Timothy Boyd

  “Colt,”

  He looked at her.

  “I’d rather be dead than a frozen freak in her winter wax museum.”

  “Definitely.”

  “I’m being serious,” she glanced at him, making sure he saw her eyes. “If it comes down to it, you better put a bullet in my brain.”

  This was never a conversation they had had to have before, and he felt uneasy, but he knew that it was his duty to comply. He nodded, wondering if he really felt the same.

  “There it is,” she said, looking down the street.

  Downtown Camden was coming into view, a few buildings illuminating the night. Ahead, they would turn onto Main Street, a view of Penobscot Bay and the Camden Harbor just to the east.

  A car came barreling out from the church parking lot to their left, colliding forcefully into the side of the police cruiser, sending it sliding off the road. When Jonathan and Christine recovered from the violent accident, they saw the offender – Jessica – peel off down the road toward downtown.

  Having no time to assess the damage, Christine drove back onto the road and pursued, her adrenaline pumping viciously through her veins now, her hands shaking. Jessica had foolishly closed the distance between them by waiting in the parking lot for her surprise attack, and Christine didn’t intend to allow her to escape again.

  They passed the post office and a restaurant on their right, following Jessica’s hard turn toward Main Street, the heart of downtown. Jonathan opened the passenger’s window and leaned out, firing his gun at the car ahead. One shot, two, three! He fired again and again, denting the car, shattering the back windshield but still not slowing her down.

  They entered the massive five-way intersection that gave passage to many shops, restaurants, and the harbor. Jonathan was ready to end this awful day, so he aimed one final shot at the car in front of them and fired, blowing out one of the back tires.

  Her car wobbled back and forth, and then it suddenly spun around in a full circle, finding no traction on the icy road with which to stop. Christine had no time to react, and despite trying to swerve around the car, they collided, tipping Jessica’s car up onto its side and sending the police cruiser into a vicious roll. They toppled around repeatedly before the car landed on its hood and skidded down the road, metal crying out in agony, echoing through the night and screeching to a halt.

  Christine felt the blood rushing to her head, hanging upside in the cruiser. She dabbed at the side of her face and felt the sticky warmth of blood. She coughed, “You ok, Colt?” She turned to help him, but he wasn’t in the car. “Colt?!” she yelled a little louder now as she struggled to free herself from her seatbelt. “Colt!” She finally released the locking mechanism within her safety belt and awkwardly fell to the ground, crawling out from her broken window.

  As she stood, she felt the world spin, and she took a few deep breaths to stabilize herself. “Colt!” she called out again. And then she saw him, fifty feet away, lying in a mound of snow off to the side of the road.

  She took one step and howled in anguish, falling back to the ground. Examining her leg revealed that she had a broken bone, the end of which was poking through the side of her calf. She felt nauseous from the pain and the gas fumes filling the air around them. “Colt!” she yelled for him, desperately trying to get his attention while holding back the urge to vomit.

  Jonathan stirred awake, slowly sitting up and looking around, his hand placed on the side of his head. He felt around on his body, making sure everything was where it was supposed to be, and then he noticed his empty holster. He looked around, digging through the snow but coming up with empty hands.

  “Colt!” Christine shouted. “My leg is broken!”

  “I can’t find my gun!” was his answer.

  She began looking around as best she could without moving, but her search wasn’t successful.

  A deep cough from the other car startled them. On its side, the driver’s door opened toward the sky, and Jessica pulled herself from within, falling off and landing with a horrendous cry of pain as she grasped her shoulder’s bullet wound. Biting her bottom lip, she forced herself to stand, wobbling to and fro but finally coming to rest on both feet.

  Jonathan spun around to face her, wishing he had a weapon of some kind with which to defend himself.

  “Just leave me alone!” she screamed at them, tears filling her eyes.

  “Jessica, it’s over. Just stop this,” he tried to reason with her.

  Christine chimed in. “Please! You know that I understand what you’re—.”

  “You don’t understand!” she hollered, shredding her voice. She grasped her throat with one hand, wishing she had not screamed. “If you understood, you would be standing at my side right now!”

  “Jessica,” Jonathan made another attempt at calming her down. “We can help you.”

  While he served as a distraction, Christine searched frantically for a nearby weapon. Her heartbeat raced, feeling like they couldn’t catch a single break. Just when she thought she might have to make do with throwing snowballs at the crazed woman, she spotted it.

  About twenty feet away from her, half-buried in the snow, was Jonathan’s gun!

  “You can’t help me,” Jessica spat back at Jonathan, disgusted that he would say something so ridiculous. “I don’t need help! I’m right where I belong!”

  Christine slowly dragged herself toward the gun, cringing from excruciating agony as Jessica raised both arms into the air beside her, looking toward the sky.

  The ground beneath them began to rumble, and deafening cracks assaulted their ears. The crazed woman smiled as her skin went pale, and the air around her wisped in ivory plumes. “If you come near me, you’re dead!”

  Jonathan was deciding whether to call her bluff as Christine continued crawling, ever closer to the gun.

  The cops watched as walls of ice crystals rose up from the ground, snaking their way across the surfaces of the surrounding buildings, as if it were a form of sparkling, supernatural ivy. The buildings glittered brightly as Jonathan noticed a dome rising up around them one hundred feet in the air. For a brief moment, the new crystalline beauty of downtown Camden took his breath away, but as the thick icy dome continued to form over their heads, he knew something had to be done.

  He charged at Jessica.

  After taking no more than three steps, she thrust her hand toward him, and he was blasted backward by a vicious gust of bitter wind. Struggling to rise to his feet, he tried to step forward, but he couldn’t move.

  The frozen crystals from the ground had begun to snake around one of his feet.

  “Brody!” he called out to her, filled with terrified panic as he felt the frigid ice permeate his skin and invade his body. He suffered a horrific stinging sensation as his foot died, completely giving way to its new icy form. Like a swarm of insects, the frost continued to crawl up his leg, devouring his calf down to the bone. It seeped through his skin and along his muscles, leaving nothing alive in its wake. “Brody!”

  She finally snatched the gun from the ground and pointed it at Jessica, but then she halted when she saw the ice overtaking her partner. She permitted only a moment of irrational panic, and then she pushed it away, allowing herself to be filled with logical calmness, understanding what must be done.

  “Brody…” he pleaded, less panicked now, knowing what she was thinking. In the stillness that enveloped them, their eyes locked, and a thousand silent words passed between them, a love story of friendship stronger than many would ever come to understand in their lives. She knew he was sorry for the things he’d said to her today. He knew that she regretted running off on her own. She knew that he would want her to look after Leslie. He knew that she would do a better job of it than he ever could.

  And they both knew how much they cared for one another.

  Jonathan slowly nodded to her; she nodded back. Her hands steady now, she pointed the gun at him, and she fired.

  The shot echoed off the growi
ng icy dome overhead, startling Jessica out of her focused channel of power.

  Jonathan fell backward into the snow, his eyes wide, staring above at the glittering crystals surrounding them. He was at peace, calmly waiting to die. His breathing was relaxed, and he felt no pain. Christine still aimed the gun at him, the barrel smoking in the frigid air, but after a moment, his brow furrowed, as he was unable to figure out where he’d been shot. He sat up, checking his body for wounds.

  And then he saw it. He looked down to find that his leg was gone below the knee. She had shot and shattered the icy stump.

  Christine looked at Jessica with sadness in her eyes. “I’m sorry that things turned out this way.”

  “What are you talking about?” she asked.

  Christine understood the woman, whether Jessica was willing to see it or not. “You really are something special,” she said. And she meant it.

  Jessica’s lip quivered, and a crystal tear ran down her face.

  Christine fired the gun at the car behind Jessica, forcing the fuel tank to ignite. The vehicle exploded, engulfing the ice queen with searing fire that illuminated the night sky of Camden.

  The two cops stared at the molten blaze, reveling in the heat that they hadn’t felt all day. Christine collapsed into a snowdrift and sighed, exhaustion overtaking her.

  They both relished the relaxing silence, feeling relief that everything was finally over.

  A horrid scream pierced the night, forcing Jonathan and Christine to sit up, sending tingles of unease down their spines.

  “What was that?!” he asked.

  Emerging from within the fire, Jessica lumbered toward them, completely sheathed in thick ice. It was as if there was nothing human remaining within her at all. The frozen beast meant to kill.

  With a chilling screech, the monster charged. Christine aimed the gun one last time and fired.

  Jessica’s body shattered into hundreds of crystal chunks, clattering to the ground in a gigantic, icy mess. The two partners watched as the fire slowly melted the remains of the girl who just wanted to be understood.

  Jonathan crawled over to his partner and collapsed on her shoulder, letting out a giant sigh. Silence passed between the two of them for a long moment before he finally said, “You shot off my leg.”

  “It was either your leg or your head. I think your wife will agree with my choice.”

  “Probably right.”

  Their eyes rested on the blazing fire, confident now that Jessica was gone.

  “Ya know,” he began. “That last time you pointed the gun at her, I was really hopin’ you would a’ said somethin’ witty before ya fired. Like, ‘chill out!’”

  She rolled her eyes. “That was terrible.”

  “I suppose tellin’ her to freeze would a’ been pointless, too.”

  She sighed and said, “Is this going to be your thing now?”

  He put on an expression of faux offense. “No need to get frosty!”

  She closed her eyes and shook her head, gritting her teeth as she carefully attempted to reposition her fractured limb.

  He stared down at the stump where his leg used to be. “You should just cut off your broken leg so we match.”

  She laughed, the unexpected sound surprising her. “I’ll think about it.” She had forgotten how good it felt to laugh, and the thought made her smile.

  “I know ya did it on purpose just to pull me out of active duty. You’ve been wantin’ a new partner for years,” he joked.

  They both fell silent at the realization that Jonathan’s career as a patrol officer was over, and Christine would need to find a new partner. She wondered if she would ever be able to trust someone the way she trusted Jonathan.

  “I’m sure Leslie will be happy,” he said, trying to put a positive spin on things.

  “But will you be?”

  A minute passed as Jonathan thought about the life he almost never got to have with his beautiful wife, and he smiled. “Yeah. I will be.”

  The two of them looked up at the unfinished icy dome overhead.

  He pointed to it and said, “That’s gonna be a fallin’ ice hazard when the weather warms up.”

  When Christine didn’t acknowledge his joke, he turned to look at her and noticed that she was deep in thought.

  “Hey, what’s wrong?”

  “Colt…” she started, unsure she wanted to voice the thought on her mind. “How am I so different from Jessica?”

  “Come off it, Brody!”

  “I actually thought for a minute about joining her when she offered it to me.”

  He sighed. “But ya didn’t, right?”

  Christine felt emotionally overwhelmed from the day, and she could no longer hold it back. Tears suddenly burst forth from her eyes, and she cried, openly sobbing into Jonathan’s shoulder.

  He placed his arm around her and, holding her tightly, said, “You’re a good person, Brody. That’s what makes you different from her. We all have shitty things happen to us, but how we choose to deal with them is what defines us. It’s why you’re still sittin’ here, and she’s not.”

  After a moment, she pulled away from him, wiping her face on her sleeve. Frustrated, she threw her arms into the air. “Jesus, this day really sucks!”

  “Hey, at least the universe is bein’ consistent, lettin’ all the bad stuff happen on the same day so the other days don’t get ruined for ya,” he mused.

  She allowed herself to laugh, feeling much better after releasing the day’s pent up emotions. They both sat back and admired the gracefully falling snow flurries, marveling at the distinct beauty of every single one.

  As a soft wind gust blew through the streets of downtown Camden, those unique, crystalline flakes twirled and danced, euphoric from the freedom that the breeze brought with it. And when they finally gave themselves over to the frosty air current, accepting their new path with open arms, they peacefully fluttered away to a better place.

  The End.

  Perdition’s Path

  Perdition’s Path

  I

  One year ago, I died.

  A minute later, the doctors had been able to revive me. But for that handful of seconds where my life had slipped through the fingers of fate, I had crossed over into the land of the dead. I had seen flashes of my deceased grandparents, an uncle that had passed from cancer, friends from college that had died too young…

  And then I had felt the surge of electricity from the hospital’s defibrillator course through my muscles, shocking me back into the unconscious darkness where I anticipated my awakening.

  When my eyes had finally fluttered open, the pain from my grievous wounds slowly trickled through my tortured limbs, making me wish I still had been unconscious. The rhythmic beeps from the surrounding life machines had exacerbated the throbbing pain throughout my body. My long blonde hair had felt stringy, my skin greasy. I remember wondering how long I had been lying in that hospital bed, battered yet bandaged after my car had veered into oncoming traffic, colliding with another and sending me barreling through the air. A nurse had said a guy from the other car had died, but I didn’t want to know any more.

  Since then, I’ve spent over three hundred fifty days thinking about the crash. Over three hundred fifty days thinking about my “death.” Over three hundred fifty days thinking about the man I killed and what his family might think of me. Over three hundred fifty days…

  That much thinking can wear a girl down.

  So, I recently decided that every week, I ought to recline on overpriced leather furniture and talk to someone. The problem with my plan is that I’m a much better thinker than I am a talker. As a result, I now reclined on the aforementioned couch, my blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail, and I stared at the ceiling fan above me, watching it spin hypnotically.

  The room was dim, the blinds drawn to shade the den from the gray light of winter. Across from the couch rested a large mahogany desk that held a small lamp warmly illuminating the space. Seated behin
d the desk was Dr. Abner, his sweater vest covering a buttoned shirt with the sleeves rolled up and his thinning hair a curly mess on top of his head. He leaned forward in his leather office chair, his arms crossed on the desktop in front of him. I don’t usually look at him much, because he doesn’t blink nearly as often as a normal person should, but I could tell that he was currently staring.

  And so was his wife. Mrs. Abner sat in a chair at the far corner of the room with her hands folded in her lap, her flowered sundress a stark contrast to the sad expression on her face, framed by a short bob hairdo.

  The ceiling fan twirled, lulling me into a daydream of a light snowfall over the midnight sky of Chicago. I remembered driving my coupe down the road, reveling in the classical concerto pouring from the speakers. I remembered smiling – god, it’s been so long since I’ve smiled. I remembered the semi-truck in front of me start to skid on the icy freeway. I remembered swerving…

  I didn’t feel like remembering anymore, so I spoke instead:

  “With a name like ‘Melissa Perdition,’ I’ve had my fair share of struggles in life,” I said.

  Dr. Abner looked on with keen interest, taking a moment before replying, “What’s wrong with the name ‘Melissa?’”

  I rolled my eyes. “I didn’t realize you guys told jokes.”

  “I have to fill the hour with something.”

  Touché, Mr. Therapist, I thought. “‘Perdition.’ It means—. You know what it means.”

  “I do. But what does it have to do with you?”

  As if an alarm had gone off in my brain, informing me that an intruder was trying to break in to steal my thoughts, I deflected the question. “Never mind.”

  I glanced over at his silent wife as he scribbled something on his notepad. “Tomorrow’s a big day,” he said.

  “I guess.”

  “One year anniversary,” he clarified, like I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.

  “Maybe you should throw me a party,” I said dryly.