It’s my fault. I killed the tiny child growing inside of me, starved it, doused it with cocaine. But maybe it’s better this way . . . I’m not fit to be a mother, nor is this world fit to nurture a child. How could I bring a baby into this world, just to have it snatched away from me and devoured? This is the better way. The way it should’ve happened with me. Another mercy killing.
I cramp and bleed for over an hour, soaking through another towel and a T-shirt. I sip water and graze on nibbles from crackers here and there, because I know I need my strength to help me get through this. At one point, the cramping grows so severe that I double over, and a tiny lump passes through my birth canal onto the blood-soaked T-shirt.
I remove the black cotton shirt from my pants, careful not to spill the tiny soul, and I bring him or her up into the light. Nothing more than a raw, shriveled jelly bean with tiny nubs for arms and legs, and black circles for eyes. But he or she had a life, however short. And though evil brought that life into being, and it was just a breath in time, I feel a connection that goes beyond words with this little cherub. I love her, or him, all the same.
“I’m so sorry, Angel.” And I cry as I transfer her or him to a clean washrag and fold it up delicately. It’s better off without this world, and this mother, sure, but that doesn’t mend the soul-crushing sadness of holding my tiny, still child in the palm of my hand.
I change clothes, chain smoke cigarettes for a couple of hours, and try to hold my flailing pieces together while wondering what to do next. Go look for Gideon? Alone probably isn’t the best way. I should go back for Missy and Logan first . . . If our Lincoln is still out front, that would be a good start.
My period of calm rationality ends, and I plummet once again, heaving sobs until my eyes are swollen and I’m too drained to do it anymore. I sit there, dazed, staring into the corner of the room through the blur in my mind. When my eyes adjust, they zoom in on an ornate glass cabinet, glimmering in the afternoon sun. On the other side of the glass is a row of wine bottles, then rows and rows and rows of tiny little clear cups. Communion wine. Lord have mercy.
I sit up and light another cigarette. When the dizziness subsides, I jump up from the stage, where I’ve laid for the past few hours, and tighten the AR strap over my shoulder. The cabinet hides in a corner, so until the afternoon sun lit it up from the narrow windows, it lay in the shadows. There’s some kind of metaphor for my life here, but I’m jonesing for this booze too bad to try to figure it out.
The cabinet is locked, so I bash it with the butt of my AR, then remove the first, sealed bottle. Next to it on the shelf is a fancy, gold corkscrew with a red jewel on top. How nice. I cork the bottle in seconds and guzzle. The bitter, sour tang of red wine makes my insides clamor with warmth, gratitude. I drink until the bottle is half empty, then I collect the other four in my arms and head back over to the stage. Sure, they’ll make travel difficult, especially if I’m without a vehicle. But there’s no damned way I’m leaving this place without them.
I finish off the first bottle of wine as I pack what I’m taking into my bag. My tiny Angel wrapped in cloth is packed safely into the outside zipper pocket. There’s only room for three bottles in the bag, so I’m left with no choice but to cork bottle number two.
Swigging from the bottle in my left hand, rifle strapped to my back, along with my stuffed-full backpack, I start my trek, katana ready in my right hand. With one glance back, fighting tears and great fear, I gulp more wine and brace myself at the lobby door. I know I should wait until dark to move, but I can’t stay in this goddamned place another second.
Another dizzy spell hits me, but I breathe through it, gripping the handle, and when it passes, I crack open the door and scope out the lobby. Black dots sweep across my vision and I close the door again, and slide down it to the ground.
Once again, my body betrays me. I want to go, to push, to fight, to run . . . but it’s looking more like sitting the fuck down until my body gives me the go-ahead.
I drift off in a daze, mesmerized by the rainbow-colored fractured light spilling in through the stained glass window; the way it bathes its landscape without bias, and how some objects hold the light better, wishing I could hold light better, too. The chestnut wood of the pews shines like butter on toast, and my stomach growls in response. Must be dinnertime. With the coke almost out of my system, and my body repairing its damage, my appetite has returned, and it brought friends.
I dig through my backpack until I locate a six-pack of PB&J crackers and scarf them down in minutes. The sun dips deeper behind the stained glass, and I chug more wine until darkness shines down upon me. Nightfall—time to go. And I will, after five more minutes of rest. Five more minutes can’t hurt.
Twenty-One
Someone shakes me. “Grace, wake up.”
I sit up with a gasp and grip my rifle, looking to my left, but no one’s there.
“Over here.”
I recognize that voice. I turn to find Murray sitting beside me.
“Murray . . . Am I dreaming?”
“No.”
“But you’re not real.”
He doesn’t answer me, he just puts a half-smoked, lit cigar to his lips and puffs. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way, Grace. Your call.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“You let me help you, or you don’t. That simple.”
I scan the area around me, looking for proof that I’m in a dream. But everything is the way I left it, down to the cigarette that was in my hand when I drifted off to sleep. It fell, still lit, and burned a long, black divot in the carpet. I sit up and pull my bag closer, unzip the outside pocket. The cloth is still there with Angel baby wrapped safely inside. The half-empty bottle of wine is still arm’s length away.
“How did you get in here?” I ask.
“Door was unlocked.”
“How did you know I was here?”
“The drones.”
“What?”
“Same way they found your friend. The Suits have drones they fly around at night, searching for survivors and other things of interest. I tapped into their radio signal, so I heard them talking about sending a group back out to Zion after the girl.”
“Who?”
“I told you—the Suits. And we don’t have long. They’ll be back here some time tonight to apprehend you. Could be five minutes, or five hours, so I suggest we get moving ASAP.”
“And go where?”
“You got me, girl.” He adjusts his snow cap over his ears. “Ain’t no rhyme or reason in my life anymore, I might be dead tomorrow. You tell me where you want to go, and I’ll help you get there. Gives me purpose.”
With trembling fingertips, I reach out and touch his arm. It’s hairy, warm, human, real.
How?
“I don’t understand how this is possible, Murray. I hallucinated you. You can’t be here, now, like this. You’re not real.”
He crosses his arms over his chest and sighs. “Grace, listen. There are things people in your life have been too afraid to talk to you honestly about.”
“Things? Like what? And how would you kn—?”
“Your mind doesn’t allow you to see certain things the way they actually are. It’s a coping mechanism due to severe childhood trauma. Sometimes, what you perceive is not always the reality. Sometimes, it’s a false reality.”
“How do you know that?”
“I told you, they diagnosed me when I was in the pen. Same things they told me. It’s the same thing that happened when I shot the man at the ice cream shop.”
“I went there. To the ice cream shop. There was a shotgun under the counter. Was it the same one?”
“Who knows. Maybe. I couldn’t tell you exactly where it is now, or if it even still exists, it was so long ago.”
“But that didn’t really happen, Murray. Did it?”
He stares at me but doesn’t answer.
“Because you’re not real.”
“I am rea
l.”
“No, you—”
“I’ve always been here, Grace. You just don’t remember. I’ve always been here, even when I didn’t know your name, and you didn’t know mine.”
“See, I know when you get all philosophical and shit that you aren’t fucking real. Who talks like that? What does that even fucking mean?”
He shakes his head in disapproval, then stands and straightens his black suspenders. “We have to move, and quick. I’ve got a plan—a diversion—and I think you’re going to like it.”
Once Murray and I have our load evenly distributed, we start out into the foyer. Murray charges a corpse head-on, piercing him through the middle of the forehead with the katana. Relief comes, because fighting these things alone seemed impossible. With Murray by my side, though—no matter how false or impossible—I can do this. He’s a skilled fighter, brave, and strong for his age. Whatever twist of realms and realities brought him to me is nothing short of Magick. Maybe I was wrong about Zalaa after all. Or maybe all of this goes deeper than my understanding of things. Of true reality. Of my own mind.
“So, what’s your diversion?” I ask him.
We cut down the hallway Gideon and I had traveled at night, not noticing the thick, red gathered cloth hanging down at intervals, a sheer layer of fabric at every one.
Murray stops, digs into his pocket and pulls out a worn, bronze Zippo, a devilish grin on his face that makes the ends of his mustache twitch. He flips it open, and with one flick, the fabric ignites, flames crawling up toward the ceiling.
“Holy fuck, you’re nuts!” I dig my Bic from my pocket to join him, taking the other side of the hallway, until every curtain is up in flames. When we get to the main room, the walls are draped with more of the dusty, gathered fabric, dotted with giant, maroon bows. With heat building behind us, we circle the main lobby, littered with the remains of the dead, and bless it all with our fiery baptism. Watching Murray commit arson, seeing that boyish, rebel mischievousness, makes me love him in a whole new way. This is one badass grandpa, real or not.
By the time we get out to the front porch, the whole inside of the building is in flames. Without the indoor sprinkler system, it’s minutes before the flames shatter windows, lapping at the outside walls and the roof above them.
To my surprise, the maroon Lincoln Continental is still where Gideon and I parked it. Murray and I hop in, him driving and me in the passenger side, like last time. We pull into a Dairy Mary’s covered drive-thru about a block down the street and watch the House of Zion Praise and Worship Center burn to the ground.
“You hungry?” Murray asks me.
“A little. Kind of nauseous. I . . . had a miscarriage today.”
His eyes fall sad, like he’s been there before, and he places a hand onto my shoulder. “I’m so sorry. Are you okay? Medically, I mean.”
“I think so. I just feel weak.”
“You’re probably a bit anemic. We need to find you some iron. But just a little nourishment to start with wouldn’t be bad. As soon as nightfall comes, we’ll have the drones to worry about, but there’s less of them than there are of the dead, so I’ll take my chances. We can jimmy this drive-thru window first and see if there’s anything inside, then we’ll head somewhere else. A supermarket, or Costco, maybe, if we can find one that’s safe. It’d be a good place to find ya some vitamins, and other supplies.”
At the mention of Costco, I think of Missy. I need to go to her—and I will. But first, I need to take my Angel to his or her final resting place, the only home that tiny soul ever knew in its short time on this Earth. The place where Gideon and I fell in love . . .
But there’s more than one reason I want to go back to Wipeouts. I feel lost. I have Murray, but it doesn’t mend the destitution of my being, now that my safety blanket has been stolen away from me. I’m naked now, vulnerable without him. I hate that it’s that way, but I don’t know how to make it any different. That’s the way it is, and I don’t have the strength to fight it.
As the fire in the distance dies off, and the sun moves closer to the horizon, I drift off to sleep, unable to resist its call.
“I’m gonna rest for just a bit,” I tell Murray. “Will you wake me up after nightfall?”
“Sure thing, I’ll keep watch. Mind if I smoke?” He removes a stub of a cigar from the breast pocket of his vest.
“Go right ahead. In fact, I’ll smoke with you.”
I take a few drags from my cigarette, then put it out when my eyes begin to droop closed against my will.
“Rest, girl. Rest while you can.”
And I do.
Adjacent to my curled-up body, huddled against the slight chill of night, the driver’s side seat where Murray sat as I fell asleep sits empty. The door is closed, but he’s nowhere in sight. To my right, the drive-thru window of Dairy Mary’s sits ajar a few inches. I swear it was closed when I went to sleep. Maybe he’s in there. After a glance around to make sure no runners are in sight, I check the sky for drones. None of those, either.
It makes sense that the Suits would use them now. They’d been outlawed for the last ten years, since a barrage of them orchestrated a string of terrorist attacks. But all that’s left now is the crooked law, so they can do whatever the hell they want, with whatever the hell they want to do it with.
I open the car door and step out onto the pavement by the drive-thru window. The metal is dry, but after some jostling, the door screeches open. I hoist myself up onto the granite ledge, and hop through the window to the dusty linoleum floor. Realizing too late that I came unarmed, I decide not to go back for a weapon. Murray has to be in here, and he has to be armed. Maybe he’s scavenging for food in the kitchen.
A rummaging noise from an open doorway makes my breath catch in my lungs. I almost call out for him, but decide maybe that wouldn’t be the best idea in case it isn’t him. In which case, I’m screwed. Half of me screams to turn around and go back for a weapon, while the other half—the half responsible for my feet, apparently—takes me through a dark doorway.
When I enter, the noise stops, and I do, too. I back against the wall and brace myself for the attack. And when it leaps from the shadows, I scream and stumble back, tripping over something. A rat scurries off, leaving me lying there, amazed that I’m not being eaten alive.
I lie there for at least a minute. Silence. If Murray was in here, he would’ve heard me. He would’ve helped me. I sit up, stricken with a sense of dis-ease when I examine the situation further. Deep inside I know—I’ve known since the start—that Murray isn’t real. Even as I touched his skin, and as he helped carry my load; even as he drove our getaway car after burning the church down . . . even then, I knew he was a mirage.
A collapse of sanity, like a wrench in my wheel of being, and I’m suffocating, too distraught to cry, even. More of an extreme state of shock and bewilderment. If he’s not real—which he isn’t—then how do you explain what I’m experiencing?
I know how. I’m a goddamned lunatic. I’ve created an imaginary friend out of thin air. He even drives cars. But real or not, I like it much better when Murray’s around. It’s easier to face this hell with someone like him by my side. Maybe that’s why I conjured him up. And as much as I hate the psychosis responsible for his creation, I have the urge to hone in on the skill, so I can have him with me whenever I want. Like now.
After a few more minutes of wading in silent hope of his return, I forfeit my life to the grim reality of being alone. Perpetually alone. There have been brief encounters with others who’ve been mine for a short time, a break in the clouds where blinding light shone through, but just as quickly, the clouds came again, like they always do.
I don’t even check the kitchen for food or other supplies. Rage and indifference collide to create a volatile cocktail that could blow at any moment. My hands shake at the wheel as I drive away from Dairy Mary’s against the urge to call for Murray one last time. Something inside me tells me I’ll see him again. And though I
know it’s insane . . . I’m looking forward to it.
Burning down that church, seeing the fire in his eyes, the ignition in my own soul, makes me realize I’m more powerful than I thought I was. If I can burn down a billion-dollar mega church with nothing but an imaginary friend and a Bic lighter, what other things am I capable of?
I can’t do this alone, though. I need to find Gideon, and to do so, I need to get back to Logan, after I take my child home. And as much as it will absolutely fucking kill me to go back without him, my Angel isn’t the only one who needs a home right now. The fresh loss of Gideon makes me want to go back to the home we shared, because that’s the closest, it seems, I can be to him now.
As I drive, I remember the drive from Eve’s to my house to bury my sweet baby brother. It was important then, as it is now, to take him home. Home has always been so elusive to me, so knowing his final resting place was “home” eased the pain some. What hurts now is knowing that when I die, chances are there won’t be anyone around to deliver me the same gracious fate. The thought of sharing the backyard with Eileen, Henry, and Corbin—grim as it is—it’s comforting.
A part of me wishes I could just cut to the chase and bury myself today, too, but it’s a fleeting thought. Gideon’s still out there, alive, and I made a promise to him, and to myself, that I would do whatever it took to keep him alive. I can’t do that if I’m dead. Nor do I wish to entertain the idea of ever again letting down another person I love.
Despite all things, there’s still an ember of survival instinct glowing inside of me. It would be easier if there wasn’t, but it’s there, so I’ll use it to do good while I can, I guess. This is my curse . . . and my blessing. To survive, no matter how small or how sad, and to carry that torch, no matter how dim or how wavering. I’ll cup my hand around the flame to shield it as best I can, because that’s all I can do besides lie down and die. And it’s not my time to go yet.
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