"Because he pays me so fucking much money."
Bryan considered. "Not a bad reason."
They stared at one another.
Don't say it aloud. I need the girl, Bryan. I don't understand it myself, but I do. Nothing personal, but just let it be.
"When's Dee due in for her vocals?" Friedheim asked, casually. He fiddled with a pencil and eyed the clock. His face betrayed nothing.
Rourke glanced at his platinum Rolex. "Right about now. Why don't you go set up? Then maybe we'll have time for a break."
"Sure."
"Leave me another."
Disapproval?
Bryan slipped Peter the rainbow, then split to adjust the mikes for Dee Jennings. Alone, Rourke took another long hit up each nostril, closed the vial and leaned back. Rainbow always made him feel dizzy.
He felt tired, so very tired. It had been a long project, and the stress of carrying on an affair right under Gordie's nose was draining as well. Rourke wondered what Gordon might have up his sleeve to retaliate.
[... he was a little girl taking a long, scary walk home through the desert carrying a basket full of eggs; something was circling in the darkness, snuffling and drooling and edging closer…]
Damn it, what's wrong with me tonight?
Peter gasped as a hand clutched his shoulder. He sat up in the chair and spun around. Dee Jennings kissed him and laughed. "Wow, you're jumpy. How much you been doing, cowboy? Long lines?"
"Yards," Rourke said. This is just the rainbow, he thought desperately. It can't be coming back, not after all this time. This has to be the drug. I've got to stop, get back to normal.
The drug could be triggering something dangerous. I don't want to be like I was before; open that way.
But then he lost himself in Dee. Quick peek down the hall; a tug on the door handle, the sound-proofing popping his ears. He kissed her long and deep, massaged her full breasts. Dee rubbed his crotch. "I think Bryan's watching us," she whispered with a shameless leer.
"Let him," Peter said. "He's gay."
"So?"
"We're probably boring as hell."
"Fat chance."
Footsteps. Gordie?
They pulled apart, Dee smoothing down her Sour Candy sweatshirt. It was the kind sold during the band's most recent tour; ash grey, with a mushroom cloud design and "The Devil's Reign" spelled in blood-red letters across the front. The title seemed to shimmer and gnaw at Peter's subconscious. People were taking the band, and the tune, so seriously. He'd only been screwing around when he wrote it. They weren't Satanists for Chrissakes. Harmless fun, right?
His skin began to hump and writhe. He looked away, swallowing bile. It's the rainbow. Friedheim is right, I'm doing way too much of this shit.
[please, god, don't let it come back]
When Gordie Easton returned to the booth, Dee Jennings embraced him. Rourke, flushed with helpless jealousy, managed to remain calm. His career was at stake. Besides, Dee had made no promises. Gordie left, and Rourke ran Dee through her lead vocals. The short brunette was her usual professional self. Four or five warm-ups, six great takes; enough for Friedheim and Rourke to finish the record over the weekend.
By that time the entire complex was empty. Music Works was located in a large, twenty-story office building that towered over a dark and foreboding parking center. Friedheim was uncomfortable walking out to his car alone, so Rourke left Dee waiting in his office and rode down in the elevator with his engineer.
Bryan unlocked the door to his garish pink 2003 VW. He gave Peter a quick hug. "Nice job, man," he said. His reedy voice echoed through the deserted underground garage like a jazz clarinet. "You done good."
"You too."
Bryan started his car: Thunder in Carlsbad Caverns. He rolled down the window, just as Peter began to walk away, and whistled sharply.
"Pete?"
"Yo?"
"You got to stop it, man."
Rourke tried to keep things nice and light. He spread his hands innocently. Grinned. "Stop which?"
"Both, sweetie," Bryan said. "She'll bust your nuts, sure as the dope. You know that. And Gordie Easton is not generally considered to be a tolerant man."
"Yeah. I hear you."
Bryan sighed. "Then you may as well hear this, too. You don't fit here, Peter."
"Why is that?"
"Really want to know? You're too nice a guy to be doing this shit. This business will eat you alive if you don't have a pretty healthy ego and some emotional walls to keep the bullshit out. Go home, man. You've made good money. Go home and get your shit together and start another life."
"I'll think about it. Honest."
"Good."
"Good night, Bryan." A pause. "Thanks."
The little engineer drove away. Peter started back toward the glass doors encompassing the elevators. His reflection was distorted; elongated and shimmering. That eerie feeling of disorientation began to return, and the paranoia with it. Reality took a hike, and Rourke found his imagination running wild.
He fancied that someone was following him. He could almost hear an extra set of footsteps bouncing off the walls. As if they remained only a fraction of a second behind, nearly matched him step for step. Then there would be breathing, too; harsh and ragged.
Hunhhh. Hunhhh
. It could be some demented fan, maybe; some maniac stalking Dee Jennings.
Or perhaps he was "remembering" some future time and place.
Rourke walked faster, his heart thudding in his chest. Okay, life is good. Look, nothing is out there. This is just me. Too much partying. Got to cool it. It is not the talent returning. That's never going to happen. Never. I don't have to go home to know that, do I?
No, but I want to go home. I really do.
He was relieved when the doors closed safely. The elevator rose with a whoosh and took him to the seventh floor.
When he got back to his office, Dee Jennings was spread like a nude centerfold across the papers on his desk. Soft jazz whispered from the stereo, and the lights were turned down low. She was stroking herself with two fingers.
"Gordie?" he asked, slipping out of his shirt.
"He went home," Dee purred. "I said we'd be working late. He believed me. Gordie always believes me."
Rourke skulled something
(warning
) from very far away. A glimmer of his old gift, twitching. But Dee was right there, warm and inviting. The sinister voice disappeared the moment he was inside her. They rolled like the ocean, and after an impossibly long time exploded into a nova. Rourke passed out.
He woke up alone, in blinding sunlight, sprawled on the plaid couch in his office. The hangover was bone-crunching. Two enormous, yellowing potted plants seemed to be leaning down as if to claw at his face. This is suicide, he thought. I'm killing myself. He made a pot of strong coffee, booted up his laptop and checked his huge stack of emails for anything of real importance. It took a while.
Tinkling harmonies, discordant whines. The band was already in the studio, preparing for the next recording session. I've got to get back to work, Rourke thought. Feel jagged, strung out. Shit. He washed up in the rest room, patted his muscular frame with paper toweling and dressed in the same old clothes.
I need to get some real sleep. I need to see the sunshine.
A little grass took the edge off, and Friedheim had brought a fresh supply of rainbow, so the day went pretty well. Much like the day before, and all the days before that. Except for this droning, persistent voice. Peter Rourke couldn't seem to drown it out; no matter how loud the music, how strong the dope.
You're dying
, it whispered
, dying and you don't care. You can't control yourself. Why is that?Do you even know what you're running from any more? Maybe Bryan is right. Maybe it's time to go home.
2
JASON
When Jake Lewis noticed the ugly little man in the faded jeans, he was sitting on his battered brown suitcase, staring at the remains of a dead dog. How he'd ended up here in Two Trees, Nevada was anybody's guess.
Jake wouldn't have paid him no mind, but strangers were rare as hens' teeth these days, what with the new highway and all. Besides, the man was on foot. Must have hitched his way to the turnpike, then walked a tad under six miles through the scorching heat. Had to be half blind from the sun and thirsty as hell, and yet he was just parked there, only a few hundred yards from Jake's battered old gas station, studying that stinking pile of bleached bones and stretched skin like some kind of Pygmy witch doctor.
Takes all kinds,
Jake thought
. He'll come beg a drink when he's ready.
And with that, he went back to work.
Meanwhile, the ugly little stranger fiddled with the twine that held his suitcase together and stared down at the desiccated animal. His name was Jason Smith, and he was remembering; travelling back in time to recall the dog who had brought him Karen. The scruffy little brown mongrel, who had brightened his miserable days at Saint Augustine and connected him to another human being for the first and only time in his life. Dog had limped past the gates of the orphanage, whining, while Jason was hiding from some bullies near a stack of rusty garbage cans.
A little girl crossed the playground, and both spotted the mutt at the same moment. Jason had seen Karen around, but he'd never found the courage to talk to her. After all, he knew he was unattractive and small; the mirror reminded him every morning. His long, ragged red birthmark taunted him far more effectively than the bigger kids ever could.
"He's hungry," Karen said softly. "Hello, boy."
Dog lowered drooping jowls to his bleeding front paws and managed a feeble bark. The children giggled. When Karen faced him with a frank stare, Jason felt his stomach tie itself in knots. But she didn't flinch at his disfigurement. In fact, she smiled.
"He looks a lot like you," she said.
Jason surprised himself. "Heck, he's a lot prettier."
Laughter. Karen flashed a clean, slanted grin that dimpled her chin and wrinkled her freckles. Jason Smith thought
: She don't care I'm ugly
. He went all warm inside. Adults were full of crap. Kids could fall in love, just like anybody else.
Jason fumbled through the garbage cans and found a bone with a few shreds of meat still attached. He tossed the offering through the gate. The mangy puppy fell on it with a ravenous growl. Karen moved closer to take his hand, and Jason's heart skipped and twirled.
"We oughta keep him," she whispered.
"Can't. Sister Jane don't allow no pets."
"We could sneak him in, maybe hide him somewhere. Oh, come on Jason. Chicken?"
He puffed up his little chest. "I ain't chicken."A blink."Hey, you know my name!"
Karen looked shy and scuffed her heel in the gravel. "I've kinda noticed you places. My name is..."
"Karen," he finished. "I seen you too."
It was love. Had to be.
The adventure that ensued lasted nearly a week. The children hid Dog everywhere; in closets and cardboard boxes, behind dumpsters and under beds. There were chases down the long, booming corridors and through crowded schoolrooms. The other kids seemed amused, but they were impressed enough by the pair's daring to cooperate and keep silent.
Near misses: Sister Jane peeking out through tall, foggy windows with gnarled brass handles and icy panes of thick glass; knowing something was up, but not what. Doors opening, slamming shut. Much laughter in the night.
And then it all ended...
Dog squealing in a pet carrier, saliva running down his matted muzzle. Wet brown eyes filled with terror, hopelessness and longing saying: Keep me! Please, keep me!
Whaaaaaaaack.
"Oww!"
Karen crying, her pretty face all distorted, desperately trying to pull her hand away. The ruler coming down on her reddened knuckles, again and again. Jason, hatred scalding his rolling guts, helpless to intervene.
Whaaaaaaack.
"Sister Jane," Jason shrieked. "It was all my fault, not hers. Don't hit Karen!"
"You'll get yours too, mister."
Whaaack!
"Don't think I don't know the devil in a boy when I see him!"
Whaaack
! And Karen, just crying and crying.
Later, forced to pray silently in the chapel, he and Karen had rubbed their bloody fingers together in an oath. They'd sworn to be the best of friends, forever and forever. Never before, or since, had Jason Smith felt such warmth…
The
heat
, the sunshine, the thirst: He was back in Two Trees, Nevada.
Dog wasn't dead, Jason Smith thought with a grin. They believed they'd killed him when they sent him off to the pound to be destroyed, but they were wrong.
The desert sun was hammering down now, nearly blinding him.
Jason wiped his filthy brow and idly kicked at the white stack of bones. Oh, no, you're alive, Dog, he whispered in his mind. You can still bite, and so can I. We're together, forever and ever.
So hot
.
"Jason Smith, you settle down!" Chaos: Jason snarling and spitting and tripping over furniture in Sister Jane's Spartan office, while snow gathered on the frosty windowpanes and his blood ran wicked.
"No! They can't take Karen away from me!"
His birthmark was dark as spoiled strawberries, pulsating like an over-ripe blister. He could feel his entire forehead throbbing. Sister Jane caught up to him. She twisted his ear viciously and bent low, hissing like an alley cat.
"Now you hush, boy. I'm going to talk to the Nelsons."
None of it was fair. Bassad grown-ups. But Jason was curious, and in pain. He nodded.