The Book of Paul -- A Paranormal Thriller (52 page)

Strange. So strange. When Bean entered the hallway and the last feeble flickers of candlelight faded behind him, he didn’t think about how he was moving. He just did, one foot in front of the other. It wasn’t like he could see with his eyes, exactly. He simply
knew
where he was. Something in his gut, right below his navel, was pulling him like a leash, like it had when he was holding the Book. He walked and walked, never bumping into a wall or even brushing against one. Walking, turning, until he felt the sudden urge to stop and sit, which he accomplished with just as much mindless efficiency.

Black. So black. He’d never felt so safe before. So calm. So cruel. He held the Beretta serenely in his hand, his finger on the trigger, his back against the wall, his feet pressed against the opposite side of the narrow corridor. The gun felt good in his grip. His thoughts were nearly absent. He stared directly ahead, wondering if his eyelids were open or closed. He couldn’t be sure. He couldn’t feel them. Yet somehow he was
seeing
. Not the grimy floor or the cruddy wallpaper—they were as numbly nonexistent as his outstretched feet. He began to wonder if he were really here at all. Was he a ghost? A puff of smoke? Black on black? He didn’t know, but whatever he felt, whatever he
was
…he liked it. He liked it just as much as this new form of perception. If he could have put it into words, he might have described his altered vision as a cross between a daydream and a particularly vivid night dream. It resembled those vague mental images you get when you stare out the window, yet was combined with the crisper clarity and total immersion of an ordinary dream.

It was nice. The best of both worlds…his vision shifting from sleepy, cloudy pictures of people and places, always moving…busy, busy, busy…punctuated by sudden bursts of hyper-real (and unreal) panoramas he was witnessing from the inside, as if he were there. The pictures came and went, nothing so recognizable or compelling to distract him from the novelty of the experience. But when he thought about Martin, everything changed and he got the shock of his life. It wasn’t what he saw that jolted him so entirely. It was what he heard:

“Never alive…and never dead…” the voice whispered. The voice was Paul’s. The ear he whispered into…Martin’s. Michael saw them together, like they were standing in front of him, not in this hallway darkness. In the chapel. He knew they weren’t there now. But he didn’t know how he knew that. He was seeing Martin’s memories.

“Never alive…and never dead…” Paul repeated, his arms wrapped around Martin in an unbreakable bear hug, their hearts pressed so tightly against each other that they could feel every muffled thump.

“Never alive…and never dead…” Paul whispered again, his voice soothing as a hypnotist. “The angel knows everything…feel his tortured wings…see the hole in his heart…guide yourself there…to the absence…to the crack.…”

Martin was hugging Paul just as fiercely, his face pressed against those blister-red cheeks, staring unblinking at the angel only ten feet before him. They were standing together on top of the altar, their feet placed like sunken anchors, carefully positioned on top of the crude carvings that were almost obscured by the many layers of dried, caked-on blood.

“Never alive…and never dead…” Paul whispered more softly. “Feel our hearts beat together…slower…yes…slower and slower…”

Martin nodded, his eyes glazing over, his lids drooping, the angel smiling at him like an angry threat…his heart thumping softer, less frequently…right in time with Paul’s.

“Never alive…and never dead…” Paul seemed to say. But no air escaped his lungs. “There! The crack is opening! Can you see it? Hold me even tighter…like I showed you!
Now
…
jump, boy…jump!
”

Michael’s eyes snapped open. Or did they? He couldn’t tell. But he wasn’t in the chapel anymore, witnessing the inconceivable tableau of two men standing on an ancient altar, squeezing the last breath from each other. His eyes were traveling to the other end of the hallway. There was only one man standing there and it wasn’t Paul. Michael could see him just as clearly as he had before. Even clearer. It was Martin, and he was indeed jumping, into the darkness of the hallway. Running, no, loping directly toward him.

Like a werewolf chasing a rabbit.

Black. Everything was black again. Not that calm, soft, velvety darkness where all was well and fear was just a memory. No, this was the same blackness that had swallowed him up like Jonah’s whale only an hour earlier. He was scared shitless. The change came over him as soon as he
saw
Martin charge into the hallway, all his newfound bravado erased in the wake of his silent footsteps. Martin was coming for him! He was coming to kill him!

His ears pricked up for any sound. Nothing. Was he really coming? Was this all just another insane hallucination…like the burned-up closet? Was he going nuts? He couldn’t see a fucking thing! But that’s why he came in here, wasn’t it? So no one could see him either. Yeah, that’s right. That fuckhead would probably trip over his legs. Then he could shoot him! Wait, what was that? Muffled movement. Where was it coming from? He couldn’t tell! Was Martin in front of him? Behind him? In the other hallway? He wondered how many bullets were in his gun. He hoped he had enough. Because if he heard even one more sound anywhere near him he was going to start firing.

Then he heard it.
Whoooosh.
It seemed like it was almost on top of him.

He clenched his jaw and squeezed the trigger. The trigger wouldn’t squeeze.
Fuckity fuck!
The safety was on! But Michael Bean, who knew as much about firearms as he did about cold-blooded murder, didn’t have a clue where to look for it. And even if he did, it wouldn’t have mattered.

Because it was too fucking dark!

“You’re it!” Martin wanted to yell as he smacked Michael’s head on his whooshing way past. He leapt over him like a sleek panther, his eyes dilated to their maximum aperture, enough to see Michael’s comically horrified face while he fumbled to find the safety.

What an idiot,
he thought, galloping silently away. When Martin leapt over him, slapping his head on the way, Michael gasped with relief. Then he heard more footsteps shuffling from the other end of the hall. Fuck! Who was it this time? As soon as he asked himself the question, his visionary ability momentarily returned and he
saw
the answer. It was The Striker. He was coming for him too!

WhatamIgunnado?
screamed his fear-clogged brain. If he ran toward Martin, he was sure to deliver more than a playful punch next time. But he couldn’t wait here either. The Striker’s nearly silent feet were creeping closer. Could he shoot him? Could he…kill him? “Yes,” said a creepy whisper in the back of his mind. “You can and you will.”

Michael fumbled for the safety again and felt a tab of metal above his thumb. He flipped the tab, pointed the pistol, closed his eyes…and squeezed.
Bang! Bang! Bang!

Yes!
It worked!
He wanted to scream with joy. But it wasn’t time to celebrate yet. The shots were so loud he couldn’t tell if the footsteps were still approaching. He listened. Nothing.
Maybe I got him.

No such luck. Martin was standing in front of the chapel when he heard Bean’s shots. He didn’t hear the sound of any impact. Better yet, he didn’t feel any. “Wow,” he whispered, peering into the candlelit room. Everything he remembered was true. It was exactly like he pictured it…the altar…the angel. The only thing missing was the two of them standing on top of that blood-soaked wood, caught in that suffocating embrace…squeezing and squeezing until…No. He couldn’t think about that now. He looked down the nightmare-black hallway and raised his pistol. He didn’t want to kill the kid. Just clip him. The rest could wait until Paul followed him in here. Until Paul could watch him die.

Blam! Blam! Blam!

“
Ow!”
Michael yelled as a bullet tore through his shirt and bit off a slice of his armpit.
“SHEEEEIT!”
he screamed as the pain increased with every step, the idea never occurring to him that making more noise might not be in his best interests.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Thud. Thud. Thud.

Was he hit again? No. The next three slugs from Martin’s pistol slammed into the plasterboard behind him. He stopped running and started listening. Everything was quiet.

What should he do? The Striker was behind him. Was he shot? Silently waiting? And in the other direction, toward the chapel, Martin was waiting too.

He felt another wave of panic. Then he was
seeing
again. As soon as he pictured Martin waiting for him in front of the chapel, he
saw
him there. Awesome! Every muscle in Michael’s body relaxed. Even the bullet wound didn’t hurt so much.

His feet started moving. He saw flickers of candlelight painting the hallway up ahead. And with the cool-headed courage only the doomed can feel, he recognized that if his time had truly come, then he was going to do his very best to take Martin with him.

It’s time to go back there,
he decided.

Back to the room with the angel.

When Paul was on his way out the door last night, I asked him one last question: “What’s the story with the crucified angel?”

“Now you’re on the right track!” he yelled, clapping loudly. Then he left.

What a prick. I was so exhausted at that point that I flopped down on the couch. I closed my eyes for a second, trying to peer inside the chapel, hoping if I gazed upon the angel one more time, I would
see
all his secrets. I didn’t
see
shit. I thought about getting up to look at the tarot cards, something I felt more excited about than a kid waiting for Christmas before I hit the sofa, but I couldn’t get up.

Ten hours later, I opened my eyes again, waking from the strangest dreams I’ve ever had. They were all about Paul’s tarot and the story it told, which I completely understood while I was dreaming. I immediately wrote down as much as I could remember in my dream journal. But even though I scribbled as fast as I could, my insights faded with each second, until I got so frustrated that I quit and went over to the table to look at the cards, hoping I’d be able to recapture my lost treasures.

Last night, Paul had left the deck in a nice, neat stack on top of my cards. They weren’t in a stack anymore. They were laid out on the table in the same pattern Paul had arranged my own cards—which were gone. My first reaction was rage. I hadn’t touched the new cards, even looked at them! Yet there they were, in all their glory. I was certain Paul had snuck back into my apartment after I fell asleep so he could scare the shit out of me with the tarot switch. I was equally sure he had invaded my mind so he could fuck with my dreams. But as I bent over the table and gazed at those amazing cards, I knew it Paul hadn’t done it.

How was this possible? How did I get from the point of seriously doubting Paul’s sanity to even more seriously questioning my own? A sleepwalking tarot card reader? What’s next—multiple personalities?