MirrorWorld

by Jeremy Robinson

  4.

  The crowd outside shouts at us. There are so many commingling voices that understanding the individual messages would require a supercomputer. And yet I clearly understand the communal meaning of their words: hate. But why? Who hates an ice cream truck, other than protective, corn-syrup-fearing parents?

  “What are they so afraid of?” I ask, not because I’m concerned for their well-being, but because I know there could be a subtle danger that I’m not seeing simply because I wouldn’t fear it.

  “How do you know they’re afraid?” Allenby asks.

  “People only act like this when they’re afraid.” It’s not a memory. It’s simple knowledge. “I don’t feel what they’re feeling, but I’ve learned to recognize it in other people and understand the kinds of things it can lead to. There is no short supply of fear in a mental institution.”

  “Things … are not good,” Allenby says. “Anywhere. People are afraid. And angry. Because they’re afraid. It’s boiling over into the streets. Major cities—New York, Los Angeles, Boston—are a mess. Rural areas, like most of New Hampshire, have been calm, but that appears to be changing. At first, they take to the streets, like this, latching on to whatever hot-button issue affects a certain area. Here it’s all about money. Wages. Taxes. The working-class money struggle. But things eventually take a turn for the worse. Violence. Looting. Vast destruction. People are dying.”

  The driver turns off the ice cream truck music and rolls down the window a crack. “Sorry! Sorry! It was an accident.”

  “Asshole!” someone shouts back. “You think what we’re doing is funny? That this is some kind of joke?”

  Others join in, shaking their fists at one of America’s most beloved summertime-fun icons. The images of Bomb Pops, orange Dream Bars, and ice cream sandwiches no doubt plastered to the side of this ambulance in disguise somehow appear as a threat to these people. Something to be dealt with harshly.

  The driver rolls up the window and turns to me and Allenby. “I think we should force our way through. This isn’t going to end well.”

  “We can’t just run them over,” Allenby says.

  “I could,” I say.

  The driver shakes his head. “Of all the people to be stuck in this mess with…”

  Allenby silences him with a gentle touch to his arm.

  He looks back at me. “Sorry.”

  Hands slap against the truck’s hood. And the sides. There’s a click all around us as the driver locks the doors. The vehicle’s interior rumbles as the people outside start pounding, venting their fear.

  “Shit,” the driver says. “Shit!” The fear outside the vehicle seeps inside, taking hold of him.

  I take hold of his prickly chin and turn his face toward mine. “What’s your name?” My voice is as calm as always. My pulse is rock-solid, like a metronome. Luckily, calm can be as infectious as fear.

  “Blair,” he says. “Ed Blair.”

  “Does whoever you work for have a helicopter?” I ask.

  He nods.

  “Are they far?”

  “A few minutes to prep and a five-minute flight.”

  I look up through the windshield. The buildings lining the downtown street are six stories tall, tops. “Call them,” I say. “Tell them where we are and to pick us up on a rooftop.”

  “I’m not getting out of this truck,” he says.

  I pat his arm. “Just call them.” Then, to Allenby, who is watching the crowd swarm toward the truck, “Finish your job.”

  “W—What?” She seems dazed. There were times at SafeHaven when my lack of fear put me in physical danger, causing me to later wonder about a cure for my condition. But in situations like this, where fear cripples people, I’m happy to be who I am.

  “My stitches,” I say. “You said you weren’t done.”

  “But the crowd. We have—”

  “Time.”

  With Blair now dialing his cell phone, I move back into the ice creambulance’s rear and take a seat on the gurney I’d been lying on. The vehicle shakes back and forth. Feels like we’re on a boat. Have I been on a boat? Muffled voices and slamming fists reverberate, thunderlike, through the small space.

  Allenby, focused on her task, opens a medical kit. She removes a tube of antibiotic, some gauze and a roll of medical tape.

  The vehicle rocks harder, knocking her off-balance. I catch her by the arms. “Just focus. Ignore them.”

  “Easy for you to say,” she grumbles. “Lean back.”

  I lie down on the gurney while she quickly smears the ointment over the wound and tapes down the gauze. Just as she finishes, the door to the front opens. Rather than just looking back, Blair slides out of his seat and joins us in the rear. “Helicopter is on its way. ETA seven minutes. But we’re not going to make it out of here.”

  I look around Blair’s head as something red and rectangular spirals through the air. A brick slams into the windshield, creating a spiderweb break in the laminated—and oddly tinted—safety glass.

  Allenby moves toward the back door. “We should go. Now.”

  “Not yet,” I say. “Can I have a shirt?”

  She points to a hook behind Blair, where my torn and blood-soaked olive-drab T-shirt hangs. The shirt, along with my blue jeans, have pretty much been my uniform for the past year. While many of the patients at SafeHaven wear hospital gowns, the higher-functioning patients were allowed the dignity of real clothing. The brown shoes on my feet are new, though. We wore slippers back at SafeHaven. I slip into the shirt, knowing the gory appearance will help back people away, and look back out through the windshield.

  “What are we waiting for?” Blair asks. He follows my eyes, looking ahead. “The longer we wait, the—oh, no!”

  I watch the green bottle’s arc through the air. It was a good throw from about forty feet away. The bright orange flame trailing the improvised weapon helps it stand out from the throng. The Molotov cocktail strikes the windshield. Flames burst in all directions, obscuring our view, but I don’t need to see.

  The pounding stops.

  The vehicle settles.

  The crowd has been repulsed by a splash of mankind’s original tool of mass destruction. In minutes, the truck will be an inferno, the crowd pushed back fifty feet by the heat. But we don’t need to wait that long.

  “Do either of you have a weapon?”

  “We’re a medical team,” Allenby says while Blair shakes his head, nervously eyeing the rear door.

  I take the bloody ceramic blade from the metal tray. “Okay, just—”

  A thump and the sound of shattering glass against the rear of our vehicle interrupts me. Flames cover the two small windows.

  “Oh, God,” Allenby says.

  “We’re going to jump through,” I tell them. “It’s just like running your finger through a candle. Move fast enough, and the heat won’t touch you.”

  “I—I can’t,” Blair says.

  I shrug, indifferent. “You can risk a minor burn, and the crowd, or you can cook alive in your very own ice creambulance turned urn.”

  He looks at me like I’m insane while he debates possible death against certain death. Without another word, I unlock the door and leap through the flames.

  5.

  “You’re on fire,” someone says, explaining why I wasn’t immediately greeted with violence upon flinging myself from the back of the ice creambulance.

  I don’t need to ask where. I can feel the heat upon my head. During my time at SafeHaven, I let my hair get a little out of control. As the stench of burnt hair wafts around me, I reach up and calmly pat the top of my head until the smoldering brown mane is extinguished.

  While playing fireman with my scalp, I take in the crowd surrounding us. A circle of humanity stands twenty feet away, pushed back by the flames behind me. Some look a little stunned by my emergence from the blaze, but most still look angry and capable of violence. They’re just waiting for a new trigger to push them past the fear of this fire and the bl
oodied man that emerged.

  One man, a particularly burly specimen, is the first to break ranks and step toward me, menace in his eyes. And for what? Because I was in a vehicle that had the audacity to play a plucky tune during a protest? While I was in an asylum, the world seems to have gone nuts. I relax my body, prepared to deal with the man in a way that will keep others from making the same mistake. But he stops short and looks a bit surprised.

  Allenby emerges from the inferno with a shout of fear. Her explosive hair, like mine, smolders. I shake my hand through her hair, cutting the stands of bright orange away before her head looks like a fiery troll doll.

  Blair exits next, falling to the ground and rolling. “Shit, shit, shit!” But he’s not on fire.

  “Get up,” Allenby says, and kicks Blair’s foot. She understands that of the two dangers surrounding us, the crowd surrounding us is worse. To them, we’ve become the antagonizers. They don’t want their pound of flesh from the government or the man, they want it from the ice cream truck. And now that it’s on fire—judgment meted out—they’re weighing the fates of the people who exited the offending vehicle. I consider pretending to be one of them, shaking my fist against injustice, but I can see it’s too late for that. These people might not be thinking straight, pumped full of fear, but they’re not stupid, either.

  With a subtle movement of my hand, I tap Allenby’s hip. She glances up at me. Makes eye contact, until I glance away, looking at the shop door to our left. Only three people stand on the sidewalk between us and the door, which will hopefully provide access to a staircase.

  I pull Blair to his feet. “Follow her.” Then to Allenby. “Slowly.”

  Allenby does her best to ignore the cold stares of the people surrounding us and steps up onto the sidewalk. Blair, far more shaken up, manages to stay silent and follow her. But his hands are shaking. Watching the crowd, without making eye contact, I bring up the rear. The people in front of the store—two twentysomething women and a young man—instinctively part for their elders. They’re either not worked up enough to be violent or have correctly assessed my capabilities: afraid, not stupid afraid. Not yet, anyway.

  The door remains shut when Allenby tugs on the handle. A man appears in the window, his thinning gray hair combed back tight, his light blue eyes wide with fear. I see Allenby’s lips moving, mouthing the words, “Help us,” without letting the crowd hear. She’s smart. Understands people.

  I pause on the edge of the sidewalk, unsure if we’re going to make it off the street or if I’m going to reenact the battle of Thermopylae, by myself, while Allenby and Blair make a futile run for it.

  For a moment, the old man doesn’t move, but the way Allenby is able to plead for her life, just with her eyes, is impressive. The man nods and unlocks the door.

  The heavy, painted green door opens, its well-oiled hinges slipping silently, until—jing jing. A bell at the top of the door clangs loudly. The crowd starts, bouncing back like someone has just fired a gun.

  The old man pushes the door open wide, allowing Allenby and Blair to hurry inside. I make a step to follow, but am stopped by movement at the fringe of my vision. The large man, whose build, crooked nose, and response to the ringing bell suggests a pugilistic history, strides toward me. I could get inside without facing him, but a man of his bulk would make short work of the door.

  “You the jackass who switched on the music?” the pugilist asks as he wipes his nose with both thumbs, makes twin sledgehammer fists, and starts bobbing.

  “Yes,” I tell him.

  The crowd around us buzzes with excitement, eager for the violence to begin.

  “I thought it was an ambulance,” I add. The statement makes the man pause for a moment, long enough for him to notice that I’m not backing away, nor have I taken up a fighting stance.

  “Ain’t you afraid?” he asks.

  I jab. The fast strike slips past his defenses, crushes his nose, and staggers him back. Before he has a chance to realize I’ve broken his nose, I kick him square in the nuts. The great thing about having no social fear is that I can fight dirty and not feel bad about it later. The pugilist howls and drops to his knees. I finish him off with a roundhouse kick that knocks him unconscious and spills him into the road. He’ll live, but he might not be able to reproduce, which is my little gift to the world today.

  I glance at the crowd, which is stunned by the sudden and extreme violence. It’s more than they bargained for and didn’t go the way they expected. But it won’t hold them back forever, and now that I’ve hurt one of their own, they’ll be out for blood.

  Moving casually, I step toward the shop and slip through the door, carefully closing and locking it behind me.

  The shop is full of eclectic antiques. There’s a tall 1950s radio, glowing with power. A stained-glass lamp. A medieval helmet opened to reveal a secret decanter and shot glasses. I feel like there is someone I would like to tell about all this, but there isn’t anyone. My only friends are Shotgun Jones and Seymour, and their tastes run a little closer to the crap given away on The Price Is Right.

  “Crazy,” Allenby says. She takes my wrist and pulls me away from the door. “This is Matt Williams.”

  The old man nods at me.

  “How can we get to the roof?” I ask.

  He points up. “I live on the second floor. Fire escape goes to the roof. Stairs are around back.” He starts leading the way but isn’t going anywhere fast.

  I snap my fingers at Blair. “Get to the roof. Make sure the chopper knows where we are.”

  Blair runs for the back of the store. I hear his feet thundering up the staircase a moment later.

  “Help Mr. Williams to the roof,” I say to Allenby. “I’ll try to slow them down.”

  When Allenby reaches out to take Williams’s arm, he shrugs away. “I’m not going anywhere. This is my store, and I’ll be damned if I let them hooligans make a mess of things.” He hobbles behind the counter and retrieves a shotgun. He struggles with the pump action for a moment but manages to chamber a shell. “I’ve seen war before.”

  War?

  “And I’m not afraid to shoot the first of those bastards to come through my door.”

  I pat his shoulder, say, “Thank you,” and head for the back of the store.

  Allenby rushes up behind me and says, “We can’t just leave him! They’ll kill him.”

  “Do you want to stay because you think it will change his fate? Or is it because you fear being ridiculed later on for leaving an old man to die? If it’s the latter, I won’t say a word. If it’s the former, you’re a fool. He chose his path. Respect it.” I start up the rugged stairs without looking back.

  One of the shopwindows shatters. Allenby starts up the stairs, revealing her personal truth—her life is worth more than her honor. There is no help we can provide for Williams that will avoid his death. But ours … we still have some control over how our lives come to a close. At least for a few more minutes.

  The apartment above the store smells like history—dust and mold hidden within the folds of countless overfull bookshelves. If the fire outside reaches this building, the apartment will all but explode. This much brittle, dry paper will ignite like gasoline.

  “Here!” Blair shouts from the back.

  We hurry through the living room to the kitchen, which is equally packed with old books. A pile of them has been spilled on the floor, apparently shoved away by Blair, who is peering back in through an open window above the spilled books. He waves us on. “This way!”

  Blair’s feet clang on the fire escape as he runs toward the roof.

  A second window breaks beneath us. It’s followed by a shotgun blast, a scream, and then the sound of thunder as countless people stream into the shop. If Williams screamed, the sound was blocked out by the rumbling, which I can now feel in the floorboards beneath my feet.

  Allenby crawls through the window, but not nearly fast enough. My hand hits her ass and shoves. She spills forward with a shout o
f surprise. I dive through, spin around, and close the window. As Allenby starts to protest about her rough treatment, I lie down on top of her, which fills her with enough fear to close her mouth.

  “If you stand, they’ll see you,” I whisper. “Crawl away before standing, but quickly. It won’t take long for them to figure out why the books have spilled.”

  She nods and slides forward. I hold my weight off of her and follow, but our stealth is a wasted effort. The window behind us shatters as a book—an old leather-bound Bible—careens through, strikes the black metal railing, and explodes into a flurry of ancient pages. A baseball bat begins clearing away the remaining glass shards.

  “Go!” I shout as the distant chop of a helicopter reaches my ears. “I’ll hold them here.”

  “But…” she says, clearly confused about why I would stand my ground here but not downstairs.

  “They can’t overwhelm me here,” I say.

  She understands, and runs up the stairs to the second story. I glance up and see Blair climbing a ladder to the roof. The helicopter sounds about a minute out. It will take nearly that long for Allenby to reach the roof. One minute, I tell myself and then turn to face the first person through the window, which is actually a pair of people, one holding a knife, the other a Louisville Slugger.

  6.

  The pair pauses for a moment. That I’m standing my ground has them wary, no doubt recalling the pugilist’s crumpled form.

  “You’re going to have to get close to use those,” I say, pointing at their weapons.

  For a brief moment, my logic seems to seep through. Both men look unsure, confused, and ready for a beer. But then the hairs on their arms rise up. The man with the knife shivers. With the suddenness of a fired bullet, they’re both back on task, refueled by fear of something greater than me, and ready to kill.