Trigger Finger (25 page)

40.

“I never saw her
again,” I told Dr. Koenig.
 
“I wasn’t
going back after something like that.
 
I
told myself, she’s crazy.
 
Like Bobby
said: crazy-ass, Yoda-ass, fucked-up-ass bitch.
 
But she freaked me out.”

I shuddered at the
memory.

“Four years later,
I met Allie.
 
Within…I don’t know, our
first few encounters, I said, this is the one.
 
I didn’t think about Ruby at all.
 
Not for one second.”

“Kevin,” he said,
“I need you to concentrate.”

“I am concentrating.
 
What are you talking about?”

“You’re not
answering the question.
 
What
happened?
 
Tell me what happened.
 
I need to know what you saw.”

He had rolled his
shirtsleeves almost to the elbows and loosened his tie.
 
He looked like he’d been working forever,
like he hadn’t taken so much as an hour’s break since completing his doctoral
thesis on stone tablets and turning it in to a faculty who could only read
cuneiform.
 
The bags under his eyes spoke
of nights awake and gave the windows to his soul a sunken quality.
 
I blinked at him, and I thought,
he looks like I feel.

“I am telling you
what happened,” I said.
 
“This is all
part of it.”

What is he talking about?
 
I asked inside.
 
My inner voice had taken on a shrill quality
that made me feel like it belonged to someone else.
 
My stomach lurched.
 
My hands, clutching
Southern Rifleman
like a child might have clutched a beloved toy in
a moment of high anxiety, shook.

“Kevin, we need to
cut the baloney, okay?
 
We need to cut it
right now.
 
I need you to open up that head of yours and
I need you to tell me
what happened
.”

My stomach lurched
again.
 
I tried to stand, but my legs
felt like rubber bands and so I abandoned the effort before they could dump me
on the coffee table.
 
I didn’t want that,
because I hated the coffee table; I hated it every time I came in here, I hated
to look at it, hated setting things on it.
 
I hated it because that thing was bullshit on four legs.
 
Sheets of what was essentially plastic
painted to look like wood stretched over slabs of solidified fiberboard—the
vomit of sawmills.
 
Chinese factory
workers shaking their heads and laughing as they packaged it.
 
Stupid
Americans.
 
They think this is wood.
 
Such a shallow people.
 
Such a stupid people.

I looked at Dr.
Koenig.
 
His briefcase sat open beside
him

briefcase, briefcase, briefcase why does he
always get stuff out of a briefcase in his own office

with an array of
papers poking out of it in a disheveled mess.
 
Like their owner.
 
His trouser leg
had caught on the top of his black polyester sock, revealing a swatch of white
flesh.

“I don’t feel
good,” I said.
 
“Something’s wrong.
 
I need to go home.”

“Do you feel like
you’re going to be sick?”

I nodded.
 
He grabbed a wastebasket and plopped it in
front of me.
 
Then he sat down again,
leaning forward across the coffee table with that vulpine intensity.

“Tell me,” he
said.

“This is so fucked
up,” I said.
 
My stomach flip-flopped
again and then did nothing more.
 
But I
still couldn’t stand up.
 
“What’s wrong
with me?
 
Did you slip me something?
 
What the hell did you give me?”

“Tell me about the
Bald Man.”
 
If he leaned in any farther,
we’d be kissing.
 
“Tell me what he
did.”
 

41.

“When you first
discovered this whole idea of sliding,” I asked Brandon Cross, “what was it
like the first time?”

We’d had this
conversation a month ago, maybe two.
 
I’d
gone to see him so many times, all of our meetings blended together even though
they’d taken place across the course of both winter and spring.
 
On this occasion, we sat in the lounge again,
alone.

“Scary,” he said.

“Scary why?”
 
I asked.

“Just scary.”

“Because you
didn’t understand what was going on?”

He nodded.

“It was a surprise
to you.”

He nodded again.

“Was it in a
dream?
 
Were you in bed when it
happened?”

“No,” he
replied.
 
“I was awake.”

I woke up on the
couch in my basement man-cave.
 
How I’d
ever managed to fall asleep with all the doors and windows unlocked upstairs I
didn’t know; at some point, I’d learned sheer exhaustion overpowers the mind
and just shuts a man down.
 
But I woke up
now to a dormant television—it must have overheated and cut itself off—and the
soft glow of the lights over my bar.

And the creaking
of floorboards upstairs.
 
My eyes rose to
the ceiling.

There’s somebody here,
I thought.

Game on, motherfucker!
 
Bobby said.
 
He sounded almost gleeful.
 
It’s on!
 
Here he comes!

I took the AK-47
by the pistol grip and thumbed off the safety.
 
The enemy had penetrated my perimeter.
 
This time, though, no problem.
 
I’d unlocked the doors.
 
I’d let
him in.
 
This wasn’t a home invasion, not
tonight.
 
This was an ambush.

I got up off the
couch and crept over to the stairs leading up to the kitchen, covering the door
with my rifle.
 
By the sounds of it, he
stood in my living room.
 
Probably heading
for the stairs, thinking he’d find Allie and Abby up there.
 
In just a moment, he’d reach the staircase to
the second floor and begin climbing it.

Get into position in the living room,
Bobby said.
 
He’s going to have to come back downstairs to leave the house.
 
When he reaches the foyer, engage.

“Good to go,” I
whispered.
 
Above me, the floorboards
creaked beneath his weight
and
suddenly dissipated, becoming almost imperceptible above the rush of blood in
my ears.
 
He had reached the
staircase.
 
Going upstairs now.

I grinned.
 
I couldn’t see my own face, but I felt it,
and what I felt scared me.
 
And thrilled
me.
 
This right here felt good.
 
Game on
felt good.

Okay,
Bobby said,
slowly.
 
Get into position.

I reached one foot
out for the bottom step and

Suddenly I was
somewhere else.

The light coming
through the window of Dr. Koenig’s office spoke of mid-afternoon.
 
Shadows of the dogwoods, flowerless now,
reached across the hardwood floor for my feet.
 
I wore work shoes, the brown pair of Eccos.
 
I stared at the shoes, I stared at the
shadows and I felt the ice crystals slicing the insides of my veins and
arteries as my blood began to freeze.

What the fuck?

I looked up at Dr.
Koenig.
 
The last thought to run through
my mind displayed in bright confusion on his face.
 
His eyebrows had raised in surprise so
profound it looked almost like fear.
 
I
had succeeded in blowing his mind.

How did I get here?

Of course I blew
his mind.
 
I had suddenly appeared out of
nowhere.
 
I
slid.

My slack jaw
dangled from the rest of my face.
 
My
index finger curled around an invisible trigger guard; my hands were confused,
too, wanting to know where the AK-47 had gone.

My next words
emerged in a choked squeak, but I got them out.
 
“What in God’s name just happened?”

He stared at
me.
 
This must have been how Kenny stared
at Brandon Cross when the latter left every night to go back to his wife and
his kid and his Navy.
 
He turned his head
to one side and then the other in the slowest of shakes.

“How did I get
here?”

He swallowed.

“Where are you
supposed to be?”

“In my
basement!
 
There’s somebody…that son of a
bitch is in my house, and I was on my way up the stairs to hose his ass and put
a lid on this once and for all!
 
What the
fuck, Doc, why am I in your office?”

“Go back,” he
said.
 
“Tell me what happens.”

I closed my
eyes.
 

42.

I stood on my
basement stairs, the muzzle of the AK-47 covering the door.
 
Slender bars of light around the edges glowed
from the lamp over the stove.
 
My trigger
finger ached with the desire to open fire on something.

Easy,
Bobby said.
 
Make
every round count.
 
Make sure it hits
home.
 
You need to take a head shot first
thing, and it needs to be a home run.

I took a
step.
 
Then another.
 
The door grew larger in my field of vision.

What about the Mozambique drill?
 
I asked.
 
Chest-chest-head?

We don’t know what we’re dealing with,
here.
 
Bullets might not even work.
 
But if they do, only a head shot’s going to
do it; most of the bad shit in this world exists in the head.
 
So blow his off
.

I reached the
door.
 
I couldn’t see on the other side
of it, and I couldn’t hear the bald man anymore.
 
For all I knew, he stood right in the middle
of my kitchen, waiting for me.
 
With his
leering face.

I thought of that
face, and that did it for me.
 
I took a
deep
ki
breath and

Found myself at Magnolia
Plantation.

Brandon stared at me from across the coffee
table.
 
Every muscle in my body jerked in
a sudden spasm that made the boy jump back, like I’d tried to hit him.

I glanced all
around.
 
The posters in the conference
room didn’t look familiar, but on second glance, yes they did.
 
These were the ones hanging in here this
winter, when I first started coming.

I patted my chest
and looked down.
 
Trench coat.
 
Black gloves shoved in the pockets.
 
Yes.
 
Winter time.

Brandon spoke, but I couldn’t understand
him.
 
I looked back and found him staring
at me intensely.

“What did you just
say?”
 
I asked.

“Other world
real,” he said, pronouncing that last word
wheel.
 
“This a nightmare.”

My jaw
trembled.
 
“I need you to help me, man,”
I pleaded with him.
 
“I’m in the shit
right now, I can’t be doing this, I need to stay there and
handle this
!”

He opened his
mouth to speak and

“Keep going,” Dr.
Koenig said.
 
“Go back.
 
You can do it.”

“I was just on my
basement stairs,” I said.
 
“About to open
the door to the kitchen.
 
Then, all of a
sudden I’m at Magnolia Plantation.
 
What’s happening?”

He leaned
forward.
 
“Go back.
 
It’s almost over.
 
Go there and come back to me.
 
I’m not going anywhere.
 
Go!
”

“How?”

“Just do it!”

So I closed my
eyes and I did it.
 

I pushed the
basement door open carefully, knowing it would squeal on its hinges if I moved
it too quickly—it squealed anyway, and I winced.
 
I had meant to oil that.
 
I had meant to oil all the interior doors in
the house once upon a time, but this hadn’t ranked highly on my list of
priorities as of late, so I’d let it go.
 
The mundane, I had learned, were slippery things.
 
They tended to escape a man.

The door squealed
and I stepped into the kitchen.
 
A
faceful of cool air struck me with enough force to turn my skin to gooseflesh,
which only tightened more when I got a look at the sliding glass door just off
the breakfast nook.

Broken.
 
Not opened; shattered.

A pile of glass
lay scattered on the floor around the table, the remains of the door that led
from the nook to the deck outside.
 
The
light from over the stove puddled in it, manifold sharp edges of broken glass
catching the light and reflecting it to irregular twinkles.
 
I looked to either side, stopped and
listened.
 
Nothing.
 
I shuffled forward, moving past the little
hooks where we hung our car keys, and I froze.

A set of Ford keys
dangled from the hook.
 
Allie’s Explorer;
her keys hung right there, where they always did.
 
And that was fucked up, because those keys
were supposed to be in Pennsylvania.

What are they doing there those keys aren’t
supposed to be there did she drive home did she drive all the way home tonight
why didn’t she call me WHAT ARE THOSE KEYS DOING THERE

And what about my
rifle?
 
I looked down in my hands and I
wasn’t holding it anymore.
 
I looked all
around and didn’t see it anywhere.

I was unarmed.

My brain jammed
then, overloaded with too much conflicted information.
 
It froze, and the rest of me froze, and in
that instant I felt the huge arm wrap itself around my neck, I felt the tip of
a blade poking into my side and I knew who it belonged to—the Bald Man.
 
He’d gotten the drop on me.
 

Dr. Koenig slung
his legal pad down on the coffee table and shook his head.
 
He leapt up from his seat and reached across
to grab me by the lapels.

“Don’t do this
now!
 
You can handle this!”

“Where’s my
gun?”
 
I asked weakly, not
understanding.
 
“It disappeared.
 
Why are Allie’s keys…”

“Don’t think!
 
Just go!”

Back in my
kitchen.

The forearm
crushed my windpipe, wiry hair abrading my chin.
 
The knife dug into my side.
 
I felt where the tip had actually pierced my
skin, but I was so hopped up on adrenaline that it didn’t hurt, not yet.

Bobby?
 
Cried my panicked mind.
 
Bobby, what do I do here?
 
Come on, man, help me!

No answer from the
Bobby in my head.
 
The man with his arm
around my neck said, “Be cool, man.
 
Chill.
 
I ain’t gonna hurt you.”

A deep, gravelly
voice.
 
A calm voice.

A familiar voice,
one I had heard before.
 
On the
radio.
 
And on the telephone.

“I ain’t gonna
hurt nobody.
 
You stay cool, you’ll be
alright.”

My struggles
weakened, not so much because of what he said but because my muscles suffered
from lack of oxygen.
 
I didn’t understand
where my rifle had gone, not then, but my empty hands twitched at the air as if
trying to grab it.
 
I wanted them to
reach up for the hairy arm, but they didn’t listen to me.
 
I wanted them to drive elbows into the chest
of this person pulling me into him, but they wouldn’t do that, either.
 
I wanted to fight and nothing would cooperate
with me.

My body had
mutinied; I’d just come along for the ride.

“You fight me, I’m
gonna have to cut you.
 
So be cool,
man.
 
Just do what I say.”

I stopped
struggling then.
 
My hands fell to my
sides.
 
Obeying him, not me.

I had never felt
so terrified in my life.
 
I screamed
orders that no part of me obeyed.
 
A
man—a bald man.
 
He was white and he was
bald and I knew this without looking at him

How how how do you know this Kevin how do
you know what he looks like when you’ve never seen him before

My mind upended
then.
 
Cannons and capstans and lifeboats
ripped away from my listing decks and splashed into a black, frozen ocean.
 
And just when I thought I had sailed over the
edge of mindless terror, I heard a sound that told me know, I hadn’t; I didn’t
know what mindless terror was.
 
Not yet.

“Kevin?
 
Is everything okay?”

Allie.
 
Calling up to me from the basement.

What what what the fuck

“Tell her yes,”
the man hissed.
 
“Tell her everything’s
cool.”

Call 911, run, run, run, grab Abby and go
out the back get out NOW

But my mouth had
deserted me, too.
 
I understood then that
the mutiny was total.
 
I commanded
nothing.

“Everything’s
cool,” I called back.

I understood what
was happening now.
 
Oh yes I did.