Strange Tales From South Philly: An Anthology by Pete Bertino - HTML preview

PERMISSION FROM THE AUTHOR.

DEDICATION: TO YOU, WHOEVER YOU ARE!

107

‘The aliens have landed!’

Benjamin sat up in his bed awake just as the sun rose, though it could no longer be seen since the crisis began. Not aliens, he smiled weakly though perhaps that would be better for the human race if that had happened. No, it wasn’t aliens but ourselves that were the cause of this.

The incompetent leadership in the White House doubled down on the story that there was no atmospheric catastrophe caused by the crash of a CIA satellite carrying a bioweapon. That was ten days ago, all of the channels on TV went to either static or test patterns a week ago and the internet and cell phones had gone down four days ago. Radio miraculously was up for ten to twelve hours a day just a few days ago, though things didn’t sound good nation wide.

Trump was still blaming China for the satellite though it was already admitted by the Pentagon to be ours and most cities including here in Philly were rioting. Though it was in spurts, as it was easier to breath the air during the evening hours for some reason. Ben stood up trying to ignore the dread of what this day might bring.

He walked to the dresser and turned on the tiny Sony transistor radio, but only the unearthly sound of static greeted him. He turned it off but remained hopeful they’d broadcast again soon, 610 WIP had only a nervous and exhausted sounding disc jockey read snippets from the Inquirer and then back to static for the rest of the time. He nor Barb or Cooper his neighbors had seen anybody in two days.

He went to his bedroom window, framed with yellowing lace curtains, which was on the first floor and though a brick wall blocked his direct view it wasn’t too high up to see the sky above if he pressed his face to the glass. The sky during the day was like a washed out red velvet color, there were no clouds just a reddish-pink sky. At night it would turn the color of an over ripe strawberry, a wet poisoned fruit that was turning the air in their lungs into sludge as the gases of our atmosphere were literally turning out microscopic puffs of deadly pollen.

Though the sun was hardly seen but it was still warm, and the water and electricity were still running. Benjamin walked away from the red sky to bathroom and faced the mirror as his hand

rasped loudly against his beard, he normally shaved everyday but hadn’t felt like it recently. At least Barb told him he looked good with one, he remembered smiling at his reflection. Suddenly he recoiled in horror as the face staring back at him was not his own.

It was like his face, but different in a way that was not right. It was different in way that escaped him in words but had frightened him deeply enough to jump back with a near girlish scream. He 108

saw the reflection for a second, and his face was turned away for maybe three seconds before he looked back and felt the horror leave.

His face was fine, white maybe from the scare and the fact he had hardly slept last night but normal. He took a breath and approached the sink and turned the cold water on hoping it turned on and expected it to clank dryly. His heart stopped thundering in his chest by the time he splashed a second handful of water on his face.

He had to be careful not to breath too deeply or he’d double the risk of exposure. He closed his eyes and splashed another handful of water and held his breath as he opened his eyes to his reflection. It was the same as it ever was, he wondered what he thought he saw making him forget briefly about the horror ravishing the entire world.

He went out to the spacious living room that was mostly bare and had only a sectional couch and a flat screen on the wall, there were two doors, one led down to the basement and the other led to the hallway and stairs going up to the other apartments. A panorama window, also framed with yellowing lace curtains that were pulled aside to allow more light, showed the row homes sitting directly on the other side of Chadwick street, the apartment building was in the middle of the other homes standing one story higher than the rest of the houses on this block in South Philly.

On the north end of the block was Shunk street a narrow one way street that ran east to west, at the south end of the block was Oregon avenue which was three lanes and usually thick with heavy traffic but was as quiet as it was unseen from his view as was Shunk street.

The neighbors houses were all he could see, their curtains were drawn and showed no signs of anyone dwelling within. This part of South Philly had gone as quiet as a small town on a Sunday afternoon. Everything outside had reddish tint to it because of what was coming out of the atmosphere.

They could survive, the last CDC broadcast said survival was fifty fifty as long as proper precautions were being taken. Nobody in the building had N95 masks but that was OK, they had filters on all the vents and double panned glass, food, water and other supplies in the basement which his apartment had direct access too. Hopefully they wouldn’t have to defend it, especially

among themselves if one of them decided dividing the food by one would be better. He didn’t think Barb would be that two faced, Cooper from the apartment on top though...

A knock on his door brought him out of his dreadful thoughts.

“Hey Ben, you up?” Barb asked who lived on the second floor.

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Benjamin smiled and wondered how such a sweet girl survived growing up in South Philly, he didn’t know her growing up but they knew some of the same people in the neighborhood. He reached the door and opened it as she knocked again, Barb smiled looking as meek and vulnerable as a child. She was always nice but she was definitely in shock from everything, hell everyone was at this point Benjamin believed.

“I didn’t wake you did I? I know it’s early and I thought I heard someone yell.” her eyes were brown and wide with fear as she squeezed the tip of her pony tail in her hand.

“Yeah that was me yelling,” Benjamin said inviting her in as he explained.

They sat in the kitchen both of them cradling a mug of coffee while the coffee maker percolated making more, Benjamin had told Barb why he’d scream.

“It offended you? Is that what you mean?” Barb asked dumping extra sugar in her mug since there was no more milk and cream.

“I don’t know what I mean, I thought for a second that the mirror was broke but then I realized it wasn’t, it was my reflection that was broken. I don’t know, I woke up this morning thinking the aliens had landed so I must be losing my shit right?”

“Ya know I read in Scientific American that just after waking up some people can hallucinate.”

“Uh...are you serious?” Benjamin said feeling instant relief.

“Yeah.”

He was about to ask if she was teasing but before he could utter a word she placed a comforting hand on his arm.

“I’m serious. I’d tell you what they called it but I forget the name I promise you the article said it was normal. Do you want me to go get it? I think I still have it lying around somewhere.”

“No, if you were Copper I’d think you were messing with me.” Benjamin said smiling as Barb smiled back.

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A loud repetitive pounding on the door broke the silence like an explosion. It was a knock meant to annoy and get whoever was behind it to open up or I’ll try to put my fist through it. It sounded ominous but both of them knew it was Cooper. He didn’t know Cooper before he moved in upstairs and Benjamin was at least glad for that.

He was a short balding divorced middle aged MAGA guy who everyday since this had begun, hell since Trump was elected, insisted that Trump would win the day for America and save us all.

Last night Barb asked him simply how and Cooper ranted for an hour in a diatribe that was two parts self righteous and one part anger. Benjamin had asked Cooper to maybe settle down and he did, eventually.

“Speak of the devil.” Barb whispered as Benjamin called for him to come inside.

“Da fuck youse guys doin?” Cooper asked though it was rhetorical.

Benjamin was taller and heavier than Cooper, but that wouldn’t matter if he went crazy. He marched in he was cock of the walk and helped himself to coffee, spilling a half a cup of sugar on the floor as he prepared the mug.

“Easy, Coop.” said Benjamin.

“Hey suck a dick.”

“We want some sugar too.” Barb said with a firm voice catching them both off guard.

“Whatever.” Cooper said but was more careful as he poured out the sugar.

With his cup full he leaned back on the counter and he took a sizable gulp and grimaced as he watched them at the table with narrow eyes. He watched Barb for a few moments with beads of sweat on his lips from the hot coffee, he licked the moisture off his upper lip while eying her chest Ben noticed but she didn’t.

Cooper turned his gaze from her to Benjamin after fixing up another mug and not spilling quiet so much sugar. His gaze was a challenge, Cooper was trying to be the alpha.

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“So why haven’t you left the radio on?” Cooper asked with another gulp followed by a grimace as if he had taken a shot of whiskey.

He watched them both, closely. Benjamin looked at her, she looked back shyly at him. He turned to face Cooper more fully before answering.

“It’s static. There’s mostly nonsense...”

“We need to listen for the president.” Cooper said simply.

Benjamin took a quick glimpse of Barb who was looking down, and swallowed hard.

“Coop, no one outside the city has been broadcasting...”

“Aw, you’re fuckin full of it, ya know? You really think Trump would abandon us. He’s the mother fucker that’s gonna fix this and then bomb them fuckin gooks for this.”

“Cooper," Barb said easily.

Benjamin held his hand up and spoke instead.

“Coop,” he said trying to sound like he agreed. “I promise to leave it on, OK? So does Barb.

Right, Barb?”

Barb looked from him to Cooper and nodded with a smile that stretched across her face like taffy. Cooper finished his coffee with a sneer and put the mug down roughly.

“Well, that’s fuckin good then,” Cooper said and walked towards the living room window. “I can’t see over the fuckin roofs from my place all I could see was sky and smoke. I didn’t see any smoke this morning though. Maybe the cops finally got it all under control.”

Benjamin thought Coop’s confidence was misplaced but didn’t want to work him up.

“Can’t you go up on the roof?” Benjamin asked.

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“Nah, I ain’t got the fuckin key to go up there.”

“The landlord didn’t give you one?” asked Ben.

“No and I’m guessing he did give you one either. Fuck!” he shouted making Barb squeak though no one heard her.

Benjamin and Barb sipped the coffee while Cooper scowled at both of them. They both avoided eye contact with Cooper whose seawater colored eyes boiled with anger making them look bloodshot as if he were drunk.

“You still got the keys to the fuckin basement right, Benny?” Cooper asked quickly.

“Yeah, Coop.”

“Gimme them.” he said with his hand out.

“Why?” asked Benjamin.

“Because I want them.” Cooper said as if talking to an moron.

“They’re Ben’s keys.” Barb said.

“Did anyone ask you?” Cooper asked flipping her the bird.

“Here,” Benjamin said knowing it was pointless to fight.

Besides if he stole any of the supplies, he’d get exposed leaving the apartment without a mask.

Even his excellency President Trump said not to go outside, words Cooper was least likely to disobey. Cooper took the key quickly as Barb looked at Ben with sympathy, he gave a smile and shrugged at her showing he wasn’t fazed by Cooper.

“Fuckin bitch.” Cooper muttered as he jammed the key inside.

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He turned left then right, but there was no give. He pulled the key out and saw it was labeled clearly as basement and tried the key again but there still was no give. He flipped the door the bird and tried again.

“Fuck,” he said loudly. “Ben this ain’t the fuckin key.”

They got up from the table and stood on either side of Cooper as he sniveled and snarled trying to turn the key. Both of them could hear his teeth grind as he tried to force it.

“Coop,” said Benjamin easily. “you’re gonna break...”

Copper growled as the key snapped of with a metallic snap which sent him into a rage. He punched the door loudly screaming and swearing between punches. Ben and Barb just stepped back until he wore himself down. After a moment Coopers head rested against the door as he began to cough.

The sound in his chest was like a loud gravely bark from a dog that smoked two packs a day for twenty years. Just as quickly the coughing stopped and the redness began to leave his face. Once he was breathing normally again he spoke, sounding calmer than Benjamin had ever heard him and was suddenly very scared. Barb stood close to Ben her hand was gripping his arm though her face looked serene.

“Benny, my tools got lifted by some fuckin niggers from my truck a few days ago, you got any tools laying around?”

“No,” he said.

“I got my hand gun upstairs maybe I can blow the cocksucker open.”

“I got a hammer somewhere at my place.” Barb said excitedly. “Will that help?”

“Maybe. Benny, go help her look and keep an eye out for a screw driver or pliers, anything.

We’ll get this rusty twat opened one way or another.”

114

They left Cooper and went up to Barb’s, whose apartment was only a little more populated with furniture than his, but was much neater and cleaner than his downstairs.

“I know it’s somewhere in the living room because I was gonna put up some pictures today. I’m so tired of looking out the window.”

“Yeah everything has a sorta pink look, ya know.”

“Yeah talk about looking through rose colored glasses. Like Cooper and his boy friend Trump, I knew a girl in college like that. This guy she was going with was always lying to her and messing around with other girls, and no matter what he did she always forgave him.”

They only had to search for only a few minutes before Barb found the hammer in an entertainment stand sitting on top of a DVD case of a movie called ‘The Killer Shrews.’

“I don’t know how the hell it got inside there. I must be getting old.” she said with a nod.

Benjamin wanted to disagree, he thought Barb was pretty, but the situation felt inappropriate to say such a thing. He knew she was at least in her late thirties but believed she could pass for being in her early twenties easily in his opinion. Yet he saw that sadness on her face and he could see clearly in his mind he should tell her that.

“Barb I think you’re very pretty...”

She looked up at him and her eyes seemed to glow as a smile formed on her lips.

“...and I’m not just saying that because the worlds kind of...gone crazy...I felt that way before all this too.”

She quickly hugged him with a grip that was firm and tinged with fear, he was happy to bring Barb comfort. She gave him a peck on the cheek before they separated, smiling shyly as did Benjamin who gestured for her to lead the way. When they were half way down the steps Barb stopped and turned suddenly to face him.

For just a very brief moment Benjamin though her face was like how his had been in the mirror he closed his eyes as if to rub them and then opened them again. He looked into her eyes and saw that glow again and dismissed his fears.

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“Should we be scared of Cooper?” Barb asked.

She was shorter than him, her being a few steps down made her look nearly miniature in his eyes. She wanted the truth, he could have lied and maybe that would be best. The whole situation was well beyond the norm. He felt something stir inside himself for her, and though that was mostly because the world might be ending Benjamin was sure he would have fallen for her even under normal circumstances.

“Maybe but if we just keep our heads cool and nod every time Coop mentions President Trump coming to rescue us he’ll be alright.”

Barb nodded but she still looked worried, the glow in her eyes had been replaced with terror and confusion.

“OK, but what about after that? I mean we know Trump’s not gonna save us, even if Cooper believes it I don’t. You don’t really believe that do you?” she asked with a tone that was half humor half panic, her voice broke slightly on the last word.

“Hey now, of course not,” he said placing a hand under her chin and raising it so their eyes could meet. “I mean me, at a MAGA rally, Christ I didn’t even leave the house the night the Eagles won the Super Bowl.”

A smile rose from her face as some of that glow returned. Apprehension lingered in her eyes.

The smile faded again though she still was looking into Ben’s eyes.

“Is this really the end? I mean like the whole world do you think?”

He was stuck for a moment, as to how he could respond. It was a question with an obvious answer but should he be angry for such a question? The situation was obviously getting worse and this was certainly the end of something. But the usefulness telling her that seemed minimal at best, he wanted to spend whatever time was left comforting her rather than assure her fear that their deaths were imminent.

“Nah,” he said easily. “I mean things like Netflix and chill might be done for a while but you have a DVD player and some movies and I got a lot of books in my closet. And I bet Cooper has a real crazy DVD collection. I even got popcorn in the basement for you and me.”

116

“So it’ll be like a date?” she asked.

“Totally.” Ben said smiling.

She looked at him and smiled so brightly, he thought his heart would explode, the light in her eyes was greater than the sun. She went up a step and kissed him on the lips before embracing him again. He felt the warmth of her body and felt his heart begin to race.

“I’ll keep you safe.” he whispered and felt the her embrace redouble.

“Thank you.”

They walked down and entered the apartment expecting to see Cooper slugging down another coffee between swears. When they entered though he wasn’t there, and the mess of sugar on the floor was gone. Even the ants that were drawn out by the mess were gone, his mug as well as their own were missing but they hardly noticed.

“Cooper!” Benjamin called out.

“Cooper?” Barb called.

Benjamin went back out into the hall and shouted up the steps with his hands cupped around his mouth.

“Coop!”

He listened but there was only the white noise in his ears. Barb stood at the doorway with her arms folded and as she looked up the stairs, her face was a frown as her body shook just the slightest.

“Ben, this is creepy. Why’d he just go, he was waiting on us.”

“I’m gonna go upstairs maybe he’s at his place taking a crap or something.”

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He felt sure that had to be it,though Cooper was the type of asshole that would probably have told them about his intentions before doing so. Still some people could surprise you with the opposite.

“OK.” Barb said in a thin voice.

She went back inside as Benjamin ascended the steps to the third floor. Barb left the door open as she wandered around the living room, trying to see everywhere at once. Cooper could be scary sometimes, she found herself near the basement door and as she got closer she saw with amazement that the key was no longer broken off in the lock. She tried the door but it did not budge.

Benjamin was at Coopers door and knocked but there was no answer, he tried the knob but it was locked, he heard Barb call for him, it wasn’t out right panic but it was close. He was in his apartment in less than fifteen seconds with his arms poised to fight. But he saw only Barb leaning on the window trying to look down the block.

“What is it?” Ben asked with his heart in his chest.

Barb looked to him as her fingers fiddled with her pony tail. The glow was gone from her eyes, just a look of more confusion and outright fear.

“It’s Cooper he’s standing outside. Look.” she said stepping back.

He didn’t have to lean so much to see him, he stood on the sidewalk to the left a dozen feet or so facing away from them towards Shunk street, just a few inches before the angular view was gone. They could see only the back of him, he stood still with his arms at his sides. Benjamin knocked on the glass, and called out to him.”

“Cooper. Are you god damn crazy, get your ass in here!”

He knocked harder, hard enough to make the glass wobble. He felt his whole body freeze as he waited for the glass to shatter but got his breath back when it didn’t.

“Cooper, get in here you don’t have a mask.” Ben shouted.

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Barb gave a slight whimper.

“It’ll be OK, Barb. It’s not windy so he’ll be fine.”

He wasn’t sure if the wind made a difference but the sound she made broke his heart. She didn’t like Cooper but she didn’t want to see him hurt, nor did he. He turned to look at her and she nodded though a tear fell down her cheek.

“There’s something else, Ben. I don’t know how but Cooper got the key out before he bugged out. I tried to open it but it’s still locked.”

Benjamin went to basement door but it was just as she said. They still had the hammer, it hung low in Barbs hoodie pouch pocket. They’d get down in that basement one way or the other. Ben put out his hand and she gave him the hammer which had a wood handle that was worn and a heavy steel head that was a faded blue color. The door was thick and the knob felt solid as if it and the door were both cast in concrete.

“Should I try to put a whole in the door or try and break the knob off the thing.”

“I dunno. I’m not good with tools.”

“Me either.”

With only those two options he weighed them carefully. The door he knew was as solid as they come, it’s why he had all the extra water, canned goods and meds and stuff put down there. The knob however was of the cheap variety and perhaps he could pry it off instead of just mindlessly beating on the thing hoping it would break apart.

“I’ll try get the knob to come off.”

Barb stood back as Ben examined the knob trying to find a spot to slide the claw end underneath, but it was flush to the door. He could also see no screws holding the knob to the door, it confounded him but he hadn’t given up yet. He decided to hit it a few times in hopes of making a space to pry open.

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Barb flinched with each hit and even moaned in fear of the loud noises and Benjamin’s suddenly hectic breathing. The knob had a few dents but was still solid and flush with the door. Ben took a few hits that were erratic and angry.

“Don’t,” Barb said quickly. “you’ll overexert your self and breath in too much.”

He ignored her though and began to ram the door with his shoulder.

“We need the supplies in there.”

“What about the gun? Cooper said he had a hand gun.”

He thought for a moment feeling hope, but no that wouldn’t work. It’s locked and Cooper has the key, and Cooper had a dead bolt on his door, and that gun was probably locked away in safe hidden in some nook. Nothing short of a sledgehammer would get him in Coopers apartment and through a safe.

“I’ll try to and get his attention.” Barb said.

When she reached the window she yelped. Benjamin ran over dropping the hammer to the floor, and saw why Barb yelped. Cooper had moved but hadn’t at the same time. He stood where he was facing away from them towards Shunk street, but he was standing on his head, it was not a handstand he was balanced perfectly on his round pie plate bald head with his feet in the air straight up and flat as if he were standing on solid ground. He was stock still, not even his pant legs or his t-shirt were pulled down by gravity.

The sight of Cooper in such a position made Barb feel dizzy and faint, she was about to fall over when Benjamin caught her. She shook like a branch during a tornado but she didn’t cry and allowed her self to be stood up again. She couldn’t fight the urge not to look when she did she didn’t cry or scream but let out a wet sounding huh. Ben turned to the window and felt his stomach fill with toxic moths.

Benjamin pressed his face against the glass close enough to mush his nose, he cast long glances down both ends of Chadwick but Cooper was gone. Benjamin could taste his heart which felt like it was trying to jump out of his chest and up his throat. He put a hand on his chest hoping to calm his heart as suddenly the day went from a rose colored haze to a stark crimson. Perhaps night fall was coming faster, or days were shorter now?

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Barb yelped at the sudden change in light, her breathing was getting hectic and fast. Benjamin turned to her and saw she was quietly crying holding her pale shaking hands to her cheeks.

Benjamin approached her with arms out and she took his embrace readily.

“Is this it? Is this the end?”

He didn’t speak, he held her and rocked her gently hoping it would soothe her. Her shaking slowed some but her breathing was still wet and fast.

“Relax. We’ll be OK.” he said holding her at arms length.

Her face was teary but clean, a smile was trying to break the surface. It had almost showed until her eyes fell back to the window and her clean face went the color of porcelain and her lips turned purple in color. She squeaked but no words came out, she gave a slight nod of negation and stepped back from Ben and the window.

He followed her gaze and saw Barb’s twin standing just beyond the window, directly in front of the apartment window. She faced the same direction but was close enough to see just the side of her face, her clothes and everything were identical to her, even the scuff marks on her Nikes were equal in every way. The sight filled him with doubts about his sanity, he had believed for a moment they were dead already and were in hell.

“Ben...Ben...is that...is that...” she said between a series of loud hiccups.

“No.” Benjamin said staring out the window.

“Yes it is,” she said meekly. “I’m in a dream. I’m sleep walking.”

Benjamin looked back from the stock still profile of her twin and looked back to Barb whose eyes had a new glow to them that was wide with terror stricken panic. He told himself that wasn’t her double out there, though they both had brown hair that was long and tied in a limp ponytail and a hoodie that was identical in color and size.

“I’m sleep walking, Ben. My mom told me I did it when I was a kid.” she said with her voice picking up speed. “I’m asleep and I walked outside...I’m outside...without a mask.”

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She screamed and charged for the door. Her movements were so quick that she was a blur in his eyes. Benjamin caught her just as she reached the door in the vestibule that led outside, her whole body was vibrating from the adrenaline. Benjamin guessed she probably could have run to Citizens Bank park and back in a few minutes on fear alone.

“Barb!”

She still fought to get to the door, her face was wet and her cheeks were red like apples. She was breathing deeper and deeper, the sound of a cough stopped her flailing.

“Barb, stop!” he said forcefully quieting her completely.

“You go out that door, carrying on, breathing that heavy with no mask you’ll die for sure.”

She looked at him as if she’d never met him before, her eyes had a cautious look upon them as if he were dangerous. Benjamin led her back into the apartment as gently as he could, she eyed him warily for a second but let herself be led away. When they were back inside, he softly closed the door behind them.

Her eyes went to the window where her double stood facing Shunk street like a sentry. Her eyes searched the room and settled on Benjamin, she looked at him but was silent. The silence spun out like a void that stuck in the room like a foul fishy stink, Benjamin had to speak or the silence would have made him vomit.

“I’ll make some tea, I don’t think we need any more caffeine and sugar.” he said with a hollow laugh and a beating heart.

He took the kettle already on the stove and began to fill it with water. He kept trying to understand what was going on, he kept wanting to blame Cooper but didn’t know why or how that was even fair. As the kettle filled, Barb slowly walked to the middle of the floor unnoticed by him. He wanted to comfort her, but the guilt of yelling at her gnawed at him so deeply he didn’t notice her picking up the hammer.

“I don’t know what’s going on, Barb. I think were both hallucinating, we don’t know what the long term affects of this will be.”

“I have to wake myself up.” Barb said.

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Her voice was so calm, clear and sure that Ben turned to her just as she swung the hammer on the glass. There was a loud bong sound that was drowned out by Ben’s scream. When he was just within arms reach of her another blow from the hammer fell upon the glass. The sound of its shattering was so loud and grating on his ears he screamed, believing not even hell could be this loud.

Everything looked frozen as jagged lines raced across the window in crooked and sharp patterns.

The lungs in his breath contracting then ceasing movement, the sound in his ears was the only constant moving thing and it drove him mad as all went dark.

‘The aliens have landed!’

Benjamin sat up in his bed awake just as the sun rose, though it could no longer be seen since the crisis began. Not aliens, he smiled weakly though perhaps that would be better for the human race if that had happened. No, it wasn’t aliens but ourselves that were partly to cause.

He sat still feeling unsure, why he thought aliens had landed. It was a government fuck up, with the orange king of fuck ups and the government agency he ran disagreeing about it. Then a week ago no TV, and then the internet and cell service was down, only radio was still up, sort of.

He got out of bed and turned on the radio on his dresser which emitted only scratchy banshee like screams of static. Oh well, he thought not really caring about the radio anymore. All News Radio had was some wet behind ears sounding kid reading snippets of local news for fifteen minutes or so focusing on the number of deaths from the pandemic and virus hot spots.

Ben got a quick glimpse of outside and saw the blood clot colored sky, according to the last credible news report the sky was turning into a cloud that would suck up moisture and squeeze out poison instead of rain, a microscopic pollen that was red and sticking to the atmosphere like

glue. He headed for the bathroom brushing his fingers through his beard then stopped suddenly at the doorway.

He had a sudden fear come over him as he stood just outside the room, his heart felt like for a moment it had been caught in a vise. But why had he been stuck with a fear of entering the bathroom? It was just a white tiled room that smelled mostly like bleach and Pine Sol.

The chrome of the tub faucet gleamed spottily under the soft buzz of an incandescent bulb. He looked towards the mirror sitting above the sink which was clean and spotless and felt his stomach twist just slightly. He could see a part of the tub and the white shower curtain in the 123

reflection but nothing else. He didn’t go in and went to the kitchen instead to splash water on his face.

He went through the living room passing the door to the basement that always smelled like mold and the air was always dank and unpleasant thanks to flooding ever year. It wasn’t an ideal place to put all the supplies but that door was the only way to get in and was safe from looters as there were no windows down there. He had the coffee percolating when there was a timid knock at the door.

“Hey Ben, you up?” Barb asked with another soft knock.

He opened the door with an easy smile to her shy one. He was glad he had Barb for a neighbor, she was a great alternative to Cooper on the third floor.

“I know it’s early and I thought I heard your pipes.” her eyes were brown and wide as she squeezed the tip of her pony tail in her hand.

“It’s cool, I was just getting the coffee going. Come in.”

Benjamin smiled and wonder how such a sweet girl survived the neighborhood, he didn’t know her growing up but they knew the same people in the neighborhood. She lived on the second floor between him and Cooper, the Trumper on three Barb said once about him not long ago.

They sat at the table comfortably drinking coffee in the morning silence. There were no birds any more and neither one had ever seen a summer so free of flying insects. He tried to remember if they’d seen any moths last night. He wanted to ask Barb but the question sounded too ominous for an answer so he said something else instead.

“Ya know, I woke up this morning thinking we had been invaded by aliens. It was crazy but I was so sure that was what was going on.”

“That would be better than this.” she said with a weak sigh.

“Then I was too scared to go in the bathroom, the thought of looking in the mirror felt like the worst idea in the world. Like it might kill me if I look. So I must be losing my shit right?”

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“Why because you were afraid to see your reflection, or because you really thought the aliens were here?”

“I don’t know. Both? Shit, Barb do you think I’m crazy or losing it?”

“No I don’t think you’re losing it. We’re in a bad situation, we have to be calm while breathing too deeply can kill us. And I don’t know about you but I haven’t been getting much sleep, that’s for sure. There’s an article I read in Scientific American that just after waking up some people can hallucinate or psyche themselves into a waking nightmare.”

“Uh...are you serious?” Benjamin said feeling instant relief.

“Yeah.”

He was about to ask if she was teasing but before he could utter a word she placed a comforting hand on his arm.

“I’m serious. I’d tell you what they called it but I forget the name I promise you the article said it was normal. Do you want me to go get it? I still have it lying around somewhere.”

“No, if you were Copper I’d think you were messing with me.” Benjamin said smiling as Barb smiled back.

A loud repetitive pounding on the door broke the silence like an explosion. It was a knock meant to annoy and get whoever was behind it to open up or I may or may not break it down. It sounded foreboding but both of them knew it was Cooper.

“Speak of the devil.” Barb whispered as Benjamin called for him to come inside.

“Da fuck youse guys doin?” he asked though it was rhetorical.

Cooper helped himself to coffee and spilled a half a cup of sugar on the floor. Ben was about to speak when Barb scolded him.

“We want some sugar too.”

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“Whatever.” Cooper said but was more careful as he spooned more sugar into his coffee.

With his cup full he leaned back on the counter as he took a sizable gulp and grimaced as he watched them at the table with beady eyes. He watched Barb for a few moments with beads of sweat on his lips from the hot coffee, he wiped the sweat from his upper lip with his hand while rolling his eyes in annoyance. Cooper turned his gaze from her to Benjamin after stirring in more sugar his gaze was a challenge, he was trying to be the alpha.

“So why haven’t youse left the radio on?” Cooper asked with another gulp followed by a grimace as if he had taken a shot of whiskey.

He watched them both, closely. Benjamin looked at her, she looked back shyly at him. He turned to face Cooper more fully before answering.

“It’s static. There’s mostly nonsense...”

“We need to listen for the president.” Cooper said simply.

Benjamin took a quick glimpse of Barb who was silent.

“Coop, no one outside the city has been broadcasting...”

“Aw, youse guys are a bunch a fuckin snowflakes? You really think Trump would abandon us.

That mother fucker that’s gonna fix this and nuke the ever loving fuck out of the gooks for this.”

“Cooper," Barb said easily.

Benjamin held his hand up and spoke instead.

“Coop,” he said trying to sound like he agreed. “We promise to leave our radios on, OK? Won’t we Barb?”

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Barb looked from him to Cooper and nodded with a smile that was forced and did not reach her eyes. Cooper finished his coffee with a sneer and put the mug down so hard the handle snapped off.

“Well, that’s fuckin great,” Cooper said with a sneer and walked towards the living room window. “I can’t see over the fuckin roofs from my place. I can’t see the smoke from down town anymore either. I bet the cops finally got it under control.”

“Did you go up on the roof?” Benjamin asked ignoring the comment.

“Nah, I ain’t got the fuckin key to go up there.”

“The landlord didn’t give you one?” he asked.

“No and neither do you I bet. Cock suckin dyke fucker!” he shouted making Barb’s brow furrow at his unusual swear.

Benjamin and Barb sipped the coffee while Cooper scowled at both of them. His seawater colored eyes brimmed with tears of anger, as his he made a fist and bit down on it with a zombie like grunt.

“You still got the keys to the fuckin basement right, Benny?” Cooper asked quickly taking his fist out of his mouth.

“Yeah, Coop.”

“Gimme them.” he said with his hand out.

“Promise not to bite it?” joked Benjamin.

“Yeah.” he said trying to smile.

Ben was about to hand the key over when he had a feeling that Cooper would break it off in there which filled him with a kind of dread, the landlord had even said the lock on the door was 127

rusty from dank air in the basement. He held on to the key a few seconds longer prompting Cooper to comment.

“Benny boy, come on.”

“Let me do it. The locks old and it could break the key.”

He just sighed heavily but stepped aside for him with an arm gesture. He looked closely and could see orange veins of rust emanating from inside the key slot, even Cooper was looking closely.

“Maybe not a bad call on you doin it, Benny old boy. I got a temper when it comes to rusty locks. If those niggers hadn’t lifted the tool box from my truck I’d get the big ass can of WD-40

I kept in it and soak that little snatch down for you first.”

Ben had to look back at him and see if Cooper was being serious, he simply nodded.

“The thoughts appreciated, Coop. I’ll just have to be extra gentle with it.”

Benjamin licked his lips that were dry and sticky, he felt his heart double in beats when the key was inside. No matter which way he turned it though it was immobile. And though he was gentle in his wrist and hand the key twisted off like cheap plastic.

“How the fuck...you broke it, Ben!” Cooper said more shocked than angry.

“Did you put too much weight on it?” Barb asked looking closer at the stub the was left.

“No. I barely turned it and it snapped off.”

“What the fuck!” Cooper shouted and punched the door making Barb gasp and Benjamin jump.

“I got my hand gun upstairs maybe I can blow the cocksucker open.”

“I got a hammer somewhere at my place.” Barb said excitedly. “Will that help?”

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“Nah, I’ll get my glock and blow the fuckin lock off. We’ll be here until Trumps next inauguration trying to get through that door with a hammer. Just stay here brew some more coffee and don’t skimp on the sugar.”

Cooper exited leaving the front door partly open, they could hear soft patter of his footsteps on the carpeted steps that became so much background noise as he ascended. They went to the couch as the coffee maker percolated away, sitting just a few feet apart from each other with only a large glossy black paperback copy of Poe’s collected works as a barrier between them.

Barb picked the book up and smiled at it with a far away look in her eyes. He wondered what she might have been thinking about. He couldn’t help notice how lovely she was today, he remembered the first time they’d met and he’d thought how pretty she was then.

“Last time I read Poe was in school, almost twenty years now. I must be getting old.” she said with a nod.

“Barb I think you’re very pretty...”

She looked up at him and her eyes seemed to glow as a smile formed on her lips.

“I felt that way before all this too.”

She quickly hugged him with a grip that was firm and tinged with fear, he was happy to bring Barb comfort. She gave him a peck on the cheek before they separated. For a moment when he looked at her, her face wasn’t her face.

Her eyes were just circles, cursive and inexact in their roundness looking more like the suggestion of eyes. Their color was just one neutral tone of an indeterminate shade that sent Benjamin’s brain into overdrive, which screamed words like: FAKE, IMPOSTER, IMITATION, FABRICATION!! He tumbled off the couch, falling on the wood coffee table in a shouting fit, pushing himself away from Barb.

She stood up holding her hands up in a defensive gesture, her face was as it always had been.

She was wide eyed with her arms across her chest holding herself tight as if she might blow away. Ben saw the fear he had caused her and began to weep openly, and sadly.

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“What’s the matter with me....” he said in a whisper broken by sobs.

Barb felt her compassion win over her caution and sat beside him on the floor to console him.

She realized they were all in shock right now and that some people needed more patience than others. She put a hand on his shoulder, he was crying and breathing heavily.

“Shh,” she said softly.

“I’m sorry.” he said in a gasp.

“It’s OK. Just take slow breaths or you’ll get sick. We’re all crazy right now. What made you angry?”

“No,” he said wiping his eyes. “I wasn’t angry. I got scared, when I saw your face it didn’t...”

He tried to say it without making it sound rude or crazy but found he was unable to as his vocabulary was saying one word: fake, over and over.

“It was like an imitation, but bad, like a good book being made into a bad movie I guess.”

“OK,” she said confused.

Seeing the look on her face he tried to elaborate.

“It was like your face was just a picture or a drawing of your face. It was supposed to be your face but it wasn’t.”

He wasn’t very good at describing it, and felt tongue tied and filled with brain farts as he tried to articulate what he saw. He felt the urge to cry but held it back this time, he didn’t want to freak Barb out again.

“Maybe it’s like that article you told me about. Or maybe it’s the red shit were sucking in that’s causing me to see shit, I could be a danger.”

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“We all could be, to ourselves and each other, but we need to stick together, and I still trust you more than I do Cooper.”

“Really?” Benjamin asked. “Even after how I acted.”

“Yes, really, this is real for all of us and we need to watch out for one another. Not be scared of each other and hide in our apartments. But I wanted to ask you should we be afraid of Cooper?”

“Maybe but if we just keep our heads cool and let him lead once in a while he’ll be alright.”

“OK, but what about after that? I mean we know Trump’s not gonna save us, even if Cooper believes it I don’t. I know the sky makes everything look pink now but talk about looking through rose colored glasses. I feel sorry for him.”

Benjamin stood up and helped Barb stand as well when he realized Cooper wasn’t back yet. Barb looked questioningly at him. They’d been sitting for at least fifteen minutes, the coffee pot was full and ready and the walk up to Cooper’s place was thirty seconds, forty five tops.

“How long has Cooper been gone?” he asked Barb.

They stood in the vestibule looking up the steps, the door to Coopers was at the very top but they could see it clearly and it was closed. Benjamin could feel the breath wheezing in and out of his lungs in a rattle. He could see Barb in his peripheral vision, probably twice as scared as him and thanks to his little freak out on the couch she had to of lost some confidence in him. Time to win some of it back.

“I’m going up you wait here.” Benjamin said sounding firm.

“No, we stick together. Remember?”

He looked at her and saw he didn’t need to win anything back. Her eyes glowed with hope and love.

“You don’t have to.” Benjamin said.

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“Just hold my hand as we go up.”

“Only if you hold mine.”

She laughed and they ascended to Cooper’s place. It was eighteen steps but each step felt miles long, on ever inclining hill with the air growing thinner with every step closer to the top. The area between the landing and the door was wide enough for both of them to stand.

The door was large and green and was very thick and heavy. Ben made a fist and gave the door a few swift pounds. Barb jumped a little from the noise but her face was still. Nothing from the other side of the door.

“Cooper. You takin a dump, whats the story?” Ben said trying to smile but it felt fake like the false face he saw on Barb.

He knocked again but it was not as hard or swift, he had already given up hope on Cooper answering. He tried the knob, hoping if it did open Cooper wouldn’t shoot him for it but the knob didn’t budge no matter which way it was turned.

Barb stood at the doorway with her arms folded, her body shook just the slightest.

“Ben, this is creepy. Why’d he just go, we were waiting on him.” she said as a finger fiddled with her pony tail.

“I don’t know.”

They went back to his place to drink coffee and wait thinking he had just gone to the bathroom but when the sky went nighttime dark they had gone up to Barb’s together and found her hammer. They didn’t speak of the fact that Cooper had simply vanished into thin air. But it was on their minds weighing down every decision with unimagined horror of where Cooper had gone.

They knew the world had ended and nothing could spare them from the horror of the unknown.

The fear they would not only become sickly and die but to altogether just vanish into mystery, gave them a new typer of terror to think about. Benjamin wondered if they hadn’t already died and were in purgatory.

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They stood in front of the basement door again, looking at it for a few minutes. Hating its yellowy wood and its slight varnish smell. Ben looked into its grainy surface feeling the handle of the hammer vibrate in his hand as he gripped it with murderous force.

He felt sure this door was fucking with him, them both, hell all three. Benjamin wasn’t sure why he knew that but he did. It knew Cooper was gonna blow the thing away so it...no stop it. Stop being crazy.

“Ben.”

The basement door isn’t trying to stop you, you gripped too hard on the key. But did I, he wondered. That was bullshit, he barely held the thing and it snapped right off. It was like the lock had teeth and just bit down on the key.

“Ben, what is it? What’s the matter?”

He suddenly remembered Barb and felt worried about having such lunatic thoughts, even if he did believe them to be true. He didn’t want to scare her but he didn’t want to lie to her either.

“I blame this door for taking Cooper. I know that’s fucked to be so worried about Cooper but if it took an asshole like him, then it could take you too. I know that sounds crazy but I believe that, and I don’t think I could bare losing you.”

She looked at him closely and her eyes glowed, and with a smile she said: “Then break the damn door down.”

He nodded and felt a surge of hope fill him like a balloon getting a huge shot of helium all at once. He felt so full he could burst and without a second thought he lifted the hammer high and with teeth gritted he swung on the knob. He struck it but it felt as if the knob bit back, a loud snap struck his ears followed by the sound of his own painful scream.

His hand hung twisted at an awkward angle, with a small lump protruding between his wrist and palm. His scream was louder then Barb’s who was white as a ghost as her hands flutter on his back like panicky birds as she tried to soothe him. He grinded his teeth as he gingerly held his injured hand upwards just below the wrist.

“You need to lay down.” Barb said while struggling to take short breaths.

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“What? Why?” he asked taking short breaths hoping he would start coughing if he had to take a deep breath.

“You’ll hyperventilate, you’ll breath too deep and get sick. If you’re a sleep you won’t be breathing so hard.” she said leading him to the couch.

“No,” he said woozily. “we have to wrap it.”

“I will. I had some oxycodone left over from my last dentist appointment. I grabbed them when I got the hammer. If you take one you’ll be calmer and take shallower breaths, it’s risky but I’ll watch you in case you fall asleep.”

He could have said no, and she might have understood though it would be painful and would cause him to breath deeply. If he said yes, he would be putting his whole life in her hands, he maybe couldn’t stand losing her but that didn’t mean likewise with her. He was in too much pain to think deeply on it and just took the pill that was offered to him and chased it with a sip of cold coffee.

At some point sleep took him, though he recalled sometime later thinking his hand had been cut off below the wrists with a flaming hot ax. Then he slumbered again, some time later the darkness in the room became awash with pink. He sat up afraid, immediately sure Barb had vanished. He got off the couch too quickly and fell immediately to the ground from the sudden movements and was suddenly very dizzy, from nowhere Barb was holding him up.

“Easy, you don’t want to mess up your wraps.” she said sitting him back down.

When she was seated beside him he removed the wrappings and looked at his wrist in awe. The skin was unblemished and showed no bruising, and there was no longer a bump from a protruding broken bone.

“I thought it was broke for sure.” he said rotating it and waiting to feel pain but didn’t.

“You were just panicked I think.” she said.

He looked into her eyes again and gave her a hug which she accepted gratefully. When they parted he remembered Cooper.

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“Did...”

She nodded and he didn’t mention it again. She handed him a fresh cup of coffee told him there had still been no broadcast. Mentioning that made her face go pale but Benjamin pretended not to notice. Her demeanor perked up when she mentioned finding two decks of playing cards and declared herself a champion rummy player asking if he wanted a game with the champ, and Ben felt excited to play cards with her.

They needed to enjoy whatever time was left and worry about opening the door when the supplies were low. And with only him and Barb they would last longer for sure, and they could always make masks out of their clothes if necessary. Barb said she would make them a steak she found in his freezer that was still in date amazingly and a few potatoes for a side and make a real dinner.

“Hey after cards we’ll watch a movie. I’ll go up and get my DVD player. I’ll grab some some comedies.”

“OK.” he said feeling safe and calm for once.

He actually felt like he might survive, he didn’t want to think about the basement and its god damn door. He wanted to close the curtains from that gross pink light, uncork that bottle of Shiraz he had in the back of his fridge and make love to Barb as slowly as possible so as not to overexert themselves of course, Ben thought devilishly.

He could spend his last days on Earth doing that, any man should be that lucky. He suddenly felt too lucky, like it had gotten used up. As if he’d been on hot streak with dice and then suddenly he

just crapped out bad, like rolling snake eyes with the house on the line. He stood up from the couch and felt the world and all the color drain from everything.

He ran out the vestibule but didn’t see Barb walking up the carpeted steps. Did I even hear her footsteps, he wondered.

“Barb!” he shouted.

His heart was doing double and triple flips in his chest. Sweat coated his hands and dripping off his finger tips in fast droplets, heavy and salty like blood. He was half way to her place when he saw her door was closed. For the last day Barb had been paranoid about locked doors so she had 135

both their apartment doors open and tied fast to whatever since they had plenty of good strong rope.

The door was closed, and the hole in the wall she made to tie the end of the rope to was gone as if it had never existed to begin with. Benjamin began to cry as he made his way back to his apartment in a sobbing mess taking huge breaths. As he felt to the floor of the living room, feeling the worst heartbreak a human can feel, he began coughing.

It was slow at first but built into a steadily growing whopping cough that sucked in more of the poisonous in the air. His coughing was harsh and rattled deep in his lungs, a hand found his lips which came away bloody. He stood up and looked to the basement door and he felt a rage come over him so quickly it made everything in his sight turn red.

He threw a kitchen chair at the door, and though the chairs were made of fine heavy oak two of the three shattered on impact. He kept his breath short and quick but he still fell into a bloody coughing fit. He wanted spit every curse he knew at that door but he could barely get a breath in without coughing.

He wept as much as his body allowed, he ripped off his blood soaked t-shirt that was a sodden mess and kneeled to the floor hiccuping clots of bloody matter. He looked away from the basement door which was unmarked completely from his attack feeling flaccid and weak.

Instead he looked to the panorama window and its candy light outside. The pink reminded him of all the blood he coughed up and gave him an idea.

He could go out now and take a few whopping breaths and that would be all she wrote in less then a day. He lost Barb and death was all that mattered. And the red death held sway over all, did it not? Before he could have second guessed himself, he found the hammer which sat on the living room floor.

He threw it, and realized the glass was some sort of Plexiglas, the hammer hit it but the glass bowed out and began to do waves like the ocean during a storm. Benjamin cried out as he failed a second and third time trying to break it. Finally after another painful blood soaked coughing fit he took a deep breath and grabbed the only undamaged kitchen chair and drug it into the living room and with all his strength he threw it. The chair hit and the sound of glass shattering was so loud and grating on his ears he coughed a bloody scream as he covered them.

Everything appeared frozen as jagged lines raced across the window in crooked and sharp patterns. His sludge soaked lungs already poorly contracting air ceased movement, the sound in his ears was the only constant moving thing and it drove him mad as all went dark.

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‘The aliens have landed!’

Benjamin sat up in his bed awake just as the sun rose, though it could no longer be seen since the crisis began. Not aliens, he felt terrified none the less though. No invaders from Mars, just a self inflicted wound that was choking everyone to death. He wanted to go to the bathroom but the idea felt terrible.

He thought about his neighbor Barb all of a sudden and felt his stomach twist with sadness. He wasn’t sure why, she was still upstairs now. He could just make out her footsteps above. He wanted to share a pot of coffee with her like they had for the last few days since the internet went down.

The idea of it though made him feel sick with worry for himself though he couldn’t understand why. The thought of her just vanishing sat heavily on him. Even the thought of Cooper just disappearing, who was an obnoxious Trump loyalist by the way, gave Benjamin discomfort.

Ben fell back into a thin sleep listening to the patter of Barbs feet over head. He awoke sometime later to her voice, apparently Cooper had stopped by her place for coffee since he stayed in bed, Ben surmised. He closed his eyes again for just a moment when he heard someone come rushing down the steps in a hurry.

He sat up as the feet thundered closer and closer to his place, and heard a scream that was something close to a war cry. Benjamin cringed at the coming storm of swears and fury.

“Eahhhhhh, you fuckin niggers ain’t looting in this neighborhood!!”

A sudden pop-pop sound struck his ears causing him to cower and cover his ears in terror. It was Cooper, he’d gone mad. He heard the front door close as he realized Barb was in danger, with out hesitation he was out of bed and at his front door in thirty seconds.

He didn’t know what to do if he ran into a gun toting Cooper but he didn’t care, his focus was on Barb. He planned to make a run for the second floor and just hope her door wasn’t locked. He counted to three and opened the door, and was almost knocked over by Barb who came in like a freight train, she collapsed into his arms weeping.

“What happened, Barb?”

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Ben gave her a few seconds to control her breathing. She was down to just sniffles after only two minutes and was clear enough to speak.

“I was waiting for you to get up so we could have coffee, but it was late and I figured you were catching up on sleep. So I got bored and went to Coopers and he was all paranoid as soon as I showed up and so I asked if he just wanted me to leave and he said no. And he was OK for a while and then he went to his window and he saw some guys standing at the end of the block.”

“Was it the cops or maybe soldiers?”

“No, he said it was a couple of black guys. I looked but I couldn’t tell if they were black or cops or what, and I told him that. He got all paranoid again and out of nowhere he pulls out a gun, and he just ran out the door screaming and firing it off. He said he had one but I thought he was just trying to brag.”

They had been sitting on Ben’s couch as she spoke, he got up and Barb suddenly grabbed his arm.

“I’m just gonna look out the window, maybe see if he’s on the porch.”

She let go of his arm reluctantly and said: “Maybe we should lock him out and barricade the door.”

“Let’s cross that bridge only if we have to, OK?”

He didn’t wait for her response, and looking out that window did not sit easy with him. The pink cotton candy light was nauseating to his eyes and made him want to puke, it was like the Earth had put on rose colored glasses to this crises and for some reason that metaphor pissed Benjamin off. He shook the useless thoughts away and stepped close enough to the pane for his breath to fog it up.

He looked to the right towards the Oregon avenue side and could see the bottom two steps that led to the sidewalk and to the left that was just as empty of people. The windows to the houses across the street were curtained and did not move. He pressed his face as far as he could and saw no one standing in either direction. He watched for a full minute on either side before giving up.

“I don’t see anybody out there.”

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Behind him Barb sat red eyed on the couch, he body shaking hard enough to hurt Ben’s heart. He sat down beside her and took her willing embrace.

“He’ll be dead in a couple of hours without a mask.” Barb said in a watery voice.

“It’ll be OK.”

He didn’t know what else to say to her, he felt somewhat to blame. Cooper wasn’t known for being neighborly and in this situation human contact was the only thing keeping them from giving up totally. He just held her for a little while and didn’t speak.

They laid on the couch together as morning gave way to afternoon. He woke up later with his arm still wrapped around Barb who slept peacefully. He didn’t know what woke him up, he was sleeping one minute and then the next he saw nothing but a door behind his eyelids.

He stood up from the couch and looked over to the door all the way across the room. It was an off yellow color made with heavy looking wood, the knob and lock were of the cheap variety.

The dank foul watery air from numerous floods rusted the lock, he could see veins of it coming from the key hole. As he got off the couch Barb woke up watching him carefully.

“What is it?” she asked sleepily.

“The door. I just remembered all the supplies are locked up behind that door.”

“Oh. Well you have the key don’t you?”

“Yes.” he said pulling it out of his pocket flashing it at her, the metal of the key was neither hot nor cold he realized.

“Then what’s wrong?”

“I don’t know, I was asleep and I think I was dreaming about the door. I dreamed we kept trying different ways to open it but the key kept breaking. Every time I look at that door I feel sick like someone I loved just died and...”

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He felt the weight off it all crash into him like a wave, sweeping his emotions out to sea. He collapsed to his knees and cried, while trying not to breath too deeply. Barb was suddenly beside him with her arms wrapped around him and he felt some of his tears and worry subside for the moment. She picked his face up with her hands and wiped his tears away then gave him a kiss firm but sweet on the lips.

He looked at her in wonder as she smiled shyly at him. He smiled back unsure of what to say, his heart was beating fast but he was breathing normal again. Ben started to look over to the basement door again but Barb stopped him.

“Don’t worry about the door. If the key breaks we can pry it open, it’s just one of those cheap K-Mart locks.” she said as they both stood up.

“Yeah, you’re right. I just I woke up and I thought I was still dreaming ya know until you woke up.”

“That’s wild. Ya know I read in Scientific American that just after waking up some people can hallucinate.”

“Uh...are you serious?” Benjamin said better than he had in days

“Yeah. I’d tell you what they called it but I forget the name but the article said it was normal. Do you want me to go get it? I still have it lying around somewhere.”

Before he could respond, a series of loud pops broke out, they both jumped into each others arms as the pop sounds drew closer. Then suddenly there was silence again, just the white noise of the

building and nothing more. They held each other for a full minute shaking so much from the sudden gun fire.

“Oh, god was that Cooper?” Barb said finally breaking the eerie silence.

“I’ll look out the window.”

Ben could feel Barb nod in negation against his chest, but he stood fast and pulled himself from her as gently as he could. Tears poured quietly down her face as she squeezed the tip of her pony tail in her hand. He stepped softly, ready to duck fast if more shots rang out as he lurched slowly ahead.

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The day was winding down, the world was going to its new night time maroon shade. He got only half as close as he did the last time and did not dare go further. He leaned slightly forward and looked but no one was in his view. He looked back at Barb who was wet faced but quiet.

He was about to speak to her when her eyes double in size and looked just past him in horror.

Benjamin turned and saw Cooper standing right there in front of him in the room with them, his gun drawn out like a gunslinger. It was Coopers face that struck the greatest fear in both their hearts.

His face was two dimensional thing with bleary white splotches for eyes, the rest of his face just a splash of unknown shade to give the illusion of a face. The mouth was just a scowl that was lazily drawn upon him. Cooper screamed but the sounds out of his false mouth was like feedback on a speaker turned to eleven.

The noise and the sight caused Ben to trip over his own feet and fall to the ground, as he did the thing that had Coopers face began to fire shots. He didn’t aim he just held the gun and pulled the trigger, the loud reports were silenced out by the inhuman shrieks.

Benjamin turned and saw Barb had fallen to the floor, a pool of blood spilled from her body.

Ben got up and raced to her ignoring Cooper. She had fallen to her side and was taking shallow breaths. He pulled her to his lap, her eyes fluttered open as a minuscule stream of blood dripped from her mouth.

Ben wept as her eyes tried to look everywhere at once. It was then that the screams finally stopped and Ben saw Coopers face was normal again. The look in his eyes though said he had no idea what happened.

Cooper saw the confused hurt in Ben’s eyes and realized what he’d done. With just a slight nod and tears coming from his eyes, Cooper raised the gun to his own temple and pulled the trigger.

Although he watched it all and knew it was coming, the loud pop of the gun made him jump causing Barb more pain. An explosion of blood and bits of brain matter erupted from his temple, his body his the floor like a sack of wet laundry.

“Oh god...glurt...” he tried to say god but the sight and sounds of Cooper’s demise caused him to puke.

He wiped his mouth as he refocused on Barb who had been shot at least twice and was bleeding bad, they had bandages but they were...He looked and saw that heavy wood door, he had this 141

lingering ugly thought that it was laughing at him. He could feel the mold tickle his nostrils and he hated himself for not just breaking the door down to begin with.

He gently moved Barb who gurgled bloody breath and tried to hold him.

“I need to get down there. There’s medicine and bandages, just hold on.”

He ran to the door and stopped for a second as he saw just for a moment a blue light flash from between the floor and the bottom of the door. He heard Barb cough and forgot about it as he rummaged the key out of his pocket. He stuck it in and before he could properly grip it, the key was a broken nub in his sweaty palm.

“Fuck!” he shouted to the red heavens wondering how he’d manged to break it, though he was now convinced the door was trying to stay locked.

He grabbed a kitchen chair and hit the door with as much force as he could, the chair simply bounced back hitting him in the nose directly causing it to bleed. He screamed again as Barb coughed out blood bubbles that were popping loudly.

Pop! He realized the gun was here, Coopers glock. Benjamin ran around the sectional and saw Cooper’s body had fallen with his dead eyes looking away from them. Ben fought the urge to vomit again by constantly swallowing and looking only at the gun held by his dead limp hands.

Thinking that though caused him to spew again, he was amazed how much he’d regurgitated despite only having coffee for the last day and a half. He wiped his mouth with his shirt and

finally freed the heavy steel weapon from Cooper. The gun felt as heavy as a bowling ball and smelled of oil making his stomach gurgle.

He walked far from Barb so he could focus on the door. He could still hear her breathing, it didn’t sound better but it didn’t sound worse either. He went to the edge of the kitchen and stared for a moment at the off yellow rectangle with deep grooves and smiled with lips dripping blood from his nose.

The gun felt light as a feather as he lifted it, the trigger was like string and he barely squeezed it before a shot rang out. He felt himself gladden in spirit at the sound which redoubled when he saw the black smoking hole he created just above the lock missing by a quarter inch. With great relish he shot six more times, though he’d hit the lock directly on his third shot. He had the sensation he was murdering the door and didn’t want to stop.

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“I got it, Barb.” he said in a broken voice.

He started to sob again, then remembered Barb was in trouble still. His sob became an angry grunt as he dropped the gun and charged the shot door with his shoulder out ready to knock it down or break an arm trying. When he hit the door he felt nothing, the door simply moved out of his way as if someone on the other side had decided to answer.

But there was no one answering, the door simply moved on its own. Ben felt his weight and the speed he traveled begin to slow down as he fell forward. He waited for the smell of dank air and the darkness and the sound of creaky wooden steps. But there was nothing, only a deep bright blue void and his own screams.

He fell faster now, into the great blue light as he plummeted his body turned and he saw his apartment building as just pictures built like a house of cards, even Chadwick street was just a scene built with flat two dimensional images. It was all surrounded by nothing except blue light.

He saw it all moving away from him as if he were still and the building and Chadwick street were being pulled away from him. He saw what it all really was and screamed for death.

“Fuck!” said Jeff as he dropped his head lightly on his desk in disgust.

“I’m guessing he wasn’t supposed to get in there?” asked his girlfriend, Gwen who sat beside him helping test his new game.

Jeff didn’t lift his head from his desk as he nodded in negation, his hair was long, straight as an arrow and was all over his desk in a pile covering his key board and mouse. She gathered his hair

in a ponytail and pulled his head up but it was a gentle pull. Gwen thought he was the smartest guy in the neighborhood but she believed he was way too hard on himself.

They were still fresh out of college and in love and anxious to create video games. They both had the knowledge and were still perfecting their craft.

“Bae,” she said looking into his face when he was upright again. “remember it’s not a bug...”

“...it’s a feature.” he said smiling at her.

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She caressed his face with her hand as she jumped on his lap, giving him a nice long kiss. She was the most beautiful woman in the world in his a opinion, he thought she looked like a young Regina King but she was as smart Steve Wozniak and the only person whose opinion mattered.

“I just want to make something other than a retro home brew or another Candy Crush clone that I can’t make money on. I’m done jockeying a register at a gas station, and acting like the god damn Shell Answer Man.”

“Who’s the Shell Answer Man?”

“Some asshole in a suit.”

“You look good in a suit.”

“Well if I ever become successful I’ll get a nice Italian one. Hopefully soon.”

“It will be soon. This game will be a smash, and it’ll be bigger and scarier then ‘Five Nights at Freddy’s. So it’s not 100 percent yet, I was scared.”

“Yeah, when it runs right it’s good. I can’t believe I got the values right for Ben to regenerate health when he goes to sleep, I thought that would take a couple of tries, shit I keep forgetting to remove the dialogue codes for the alien invasion story I was gonna use. You sure the red death story is better?”

“Yeah, in South Philly if aliens invaded you know the whole neighborhood would be out there with baseball bats. With a pandemic people are more likely to stay inside. I don’t care how tough the neighborhood is, you can’t curb stomp an illness.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Jeff said with a slight nod. “I wish I could get Cooper to stop despawning and respawning so often or at least not upside down and shit, too. It keeps fuckin up the flow of the game and throwing the AI off. Maybe I should let the players control the neighbors instead.

Nah, then it becomes a Sims game, fuck that.”

“Agreed. What are you gonna call it?”

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He tried to think of a title, something catchy. God Simulator? Nah, Apocalypse Simulator? He wracked his brain but was unable to come up with anything that he liked.

“How about ‘Neighbors’?” Gwen said.

Jeff looked at her, and suddenly he was nodding his head. It was simple but it was good, and it was about neighbors surviving the end of the world so the title was short and simple, easy for a customer to recommend to his buddies. Shit, maybe a big youtuber will make a let’s play video of it, he smiled.

“I love it. What else do you like about the game?” he said getting excited.

“I like how it looks like an old N64 game and it’s set in our old apartment. I forgot all about that sectional couch, remember that time we smoked all that kush and drank blueberry wine and pretended the floor was a river and the sections were rafts.”

“Yup,” he said smiling at her.

“Remember when I fell in and you had to save me from drowning and performed...CPR on me?”

she asked looking into his eyes.

“I remember the old guy that lived upstairs yelling to either save you or to keep it down.”

Gwen screamed in laughter and held him tight again. His heart beat was noticeable under her hand as she touched his chest briefly, she looked into his eyes and felt safe and alright with the world.

“I don’t care if you ever get rich making video games, as long as you can make me laugh like this until we’re old and gray, I’d marry you and love you for the rest of my life.”

“Really? You’d marry a silly white boy like me?”

Though her laughter was like music to his ears, he cut it short so he could steal a kiss from her.

THE LIST BY PETE BERTINO

THIS STORY IS COPYRIGHT PROTECTED 8/27/2019 PETER

JAMES

BERTINO AUTHOR; AND MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED WITH

OUT

PERMISSION FROM THE AUTHOR

DEDICATION: FOR DEBRA

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The pellets of ice falling from the bleak January sky bounced musically against the rectangular windows that were closed tight against the morning weather. Jane sat at her desk staring through the window with her head resting on her hand wishing she were anywhere but here.

“Ms Ramondi.” said Miss Regina looking annoyed and displeased as usual.

She was a tiny woman that put Jane in mind of a lizard because her lips were always chapped and she had beady eyes that darted around the room when she heard talking, she wore a black arm band with the letters TL which stood for the Temperance League,she was dressed like a nun minus those goofy things they wear on their heads. She started every class with a prayer standing in front of class clasping a silver crucifix she wore around her neck on a spider thin chain, at the end of the prayer she would kiss it and say amen.

Jane was just glad she was in a public school and not one of the catholic schools through out the neighborhood. The students there were always marching and praying before the school day started for them and if you got into bad trouble they’d beat your ass with a yard stick. Jane turned away from the window trying to remember what old lizard lips was talking about.

She looked down at her open notebook but all that was written there was Social Studies and the date 1/15/97, no help there. She looked to her right at Betty, a girl she had known for a few years and sort of considered a friend.

Jamie just looked back, her hands folded with a tiny frown looking both glum and innocent with wide saucer like eyes that said helping would be inappropriate, Jane could even hear Betty saying the words in her usual whiny tone. The classroom was quiet except for the ice spattering the windows outside.

“I’m sorry, Miss Regina, what was the question?”

Lizard lips inhaled sharply, she hated repeating questions.

“How did the President fix our government?”

“Oh uh...” she fumbled about in her short term memory. “he aborted the Judy branch...”

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A few titters and chuckles escaped from the back of the classroom.

“Silence.” Miss Regina said quickly.

Betty then raised her hand.

“Ms Giavani.”

“He abolished numerous courts and was given executive oversight over the Judicial branch.”

“Correct.” she gave Betty a thin smile before giving Jane a glare.

When the day was over Jane walked slowly with Betty at her side, she was talking but she hadn’t been paying close attention. The weather was warmer than usual though the cold of early winter was still stretching its legs. The sidewalks were as cold and indifferent and gray as the sky above, here and there other students walked down Broad street, either talking to a fellow student or looking down at a cellular, though not all students could afford them.

“Miss Regina said I’ll make the honor roll this year.” she said with a smile that was like nails on a chalkboard to Jane.

“She’s a dumb bitch.”

“You shouldn’t say that. What if she heard you?” she said with wide eyes and slightly pursed lips.

“Yeah, they’d probably put me on their list.” Jane said sarcastically.

“Who got put on the list?” asked Mario Silva who ran up from behind them.

His backpack bounced as he faked running to keep up with them, though he was handsome with his crew cut blond hair and blue eyes he looked buffoonish with a desperate smile on his face.

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“Nobody.” said Jane quickly as she felt a chill race down her spine.

“Aw come on tell me.” he asked in a childish whine walking beside them.

“Shh, you’ll get us in trouble,” said Betty.

“Mario shut up, I was just fucking around.”

“Yo that Miss Regina was fuckin with you bad today, Jane.”

“She’s just a fuckin lizard, she can go screw.” Jane said.

“Yeah, her lips are all chapped from suckin off some of the teachers.” he said following it up with an exaggerated slurping noise.

“That’s disgusting.” Betty said with a frowning grimace.

“Whatever,” he said with an eye roll. “youse coming around tonight?”

“If it don’t rain, maybe.” Jane said.

“Maybe.” said Betty as well.

“Aight, I’m outtie 5000.” Mario said walking away in a goofy shuck and stride.

A chirp sound filled the air as Betty began to rummage in her pants pocket and removed a cellular Tap Screen, her family could definitely afford them. Her pinched face looked to pinch even more as she looked at her screen.

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“It’s my mom.” she said before answering.

“I gotta go, I’m tired.” she said not wanting to wait but Betty was already walking in another direction.

It was a quick walk from school to Carlisle street, the smell of fried onions and hot dogs from Texas Wieners that sat at the corner of Carlisle always put her in mind of her grandmother that everyone called Bubbles, whom she was now living with. Her father was doing time for assault in Eastern State and her mother a drunk had gone out on a bender last year and had not returned.

Jane used the pay phone in front of the hot dog eatery almost daily for the first few weeks calling her moms cellular until a robotic voice told her the number was no longer in service.

After that the rent for their apartment had been due so she took some clothes and whatever else she could carry and brought it to her grandmothers, she and grandpa bought it after World War 2

and finished paying it off only a few years ago just before grand pa died, and Bubbles brain wasn’t going soft yet. The house was bigger than the apartment and she had her own room at the back of the house that had a window with a fire escape that she sometimes used when sneaking in late, though Bubbles was teetering slowly into senility and Jane could have easily convinced her of anything she wanted.

Jane found it useful but felt horrible about it at times because she would sometimes ask Jane where her mom was. The school didn’t even know she was living with her grandmother, no one

knew about her mother being gone, if the school needed something signed she just forged her mom’s signature and so far no teachers or staff had caught on.

They didn’t have a big family or close friends, the few people she hung with she had known for at least a few years but didn’t know if she could totally trust them. Certainly not Betty though she knew her the longest out of anyone who hung out at 15th and Porter, she was kind of a snob and brown nosed the teachers, she dressed like dweeb for school, usually wearing dress slacks and penny loafers or a pair of shiny Mary Jane's and a tweed skirt and white blouse. Jane went in through the front door and the smell of old lady hair chemicals and moth balls greeted her nose.

Bubbles sat on a love seat smiling at the TV as the president gave an address to begin his second term, she was a tiny, chubby woman wearing a heavy pink house dress and slip on shoes, her head was a cap of curly white hair that still had some gray. Her smile redoubled on her pudgy face when Jane entered the room.

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“Hi Janey, you done school for the day?”

She asked this question on weekends sometimes as well, Jane always said yes and tried not to think about it too long.

“Yes, Bubbles.”

“I’ll make some grilled cheese.”

“OK, gram.”

She stayed in the kitchen while Bubbles cooked and prattled on about the news, she said there was nearly a riot downtown because the city council voted unanimously to allow local businesses to interpret the Jim Crow laws as they saw fit. She watched Bubbles closely to make sure she didn’t burn the house down. After eating she went upstairs feigning to do homework, but instead turning on her radio player trying to maneuver it to catch some pirated signals from the FAR stations up north in the Republic of New England, but all she could get was the local news.

She had a cartridge console but she only had a few kid movies from the 40‘s. Supposedly in Southern California you could play video games on them and play with others at the same time as well using WiI. The idea seemed exiting, all the video games she had ever played were of the hand held type with a tiny screen playing by herself.

She day dreamed briefly about playing a video game like that on a TV or a wide Thin Screen, but that was in another country that was cut off by a wall. Jane sighed and felt the boredom creep in on her. Jane laid on her bed as the radio player droned on with the news, she gazed on the green walls of her room which had a few sporadic pictures placed on them.

A digachrome of her mom and dad and her when she was a baby. Another that was of her mom holding up an over sized novelty bottle of soda. A few were of her dad when he was still a kid, another showed her and her mom and dad at a park when she was seven or eight, seeing that brought a sudden hurt upon her that she hadn’t felt before, or not quiet so deeply. That had been a near perfect day, Jane though sadly.

She accepted her mom being gone just like her dad, but he was in jail for the next twenty years and he would send her a card twice a year, one for her birthday and the other for Christmas.

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Although it was the only correspondence inmates at Eastern State were allowed, it was still better than the total absence of her mom. She quietly wiped the tears away, remembering the few really good times she had with her before the booze and the good times took her over completely.

She thought about her dad beating some guy nearly to death for some obtuse reason when she was ten and felt the tears come again, but she pushed them down and reached over for a book she was reading that she found on bus stop bench a few weeks ago. It was missing the front cover and the title page and spine were covered in red ink meaning it was outlawed she assumed, it had to be considering the story involved a brother and sister having sex while locked away in an attic for years.

She began to read as the radio player droned on with more news about the presidents second inauguration and felt her eyes unfocus as she slowly drifted to sleep. She had a strange dream that felt brief. She was walking through a dense forest towards a large hill or mountain, she wasn’t sure if she was alone but she kept walking even though night was gathering quickly in the sky of her dream.

By six the sun was on the other side of the world and night laid over South Philly like a damp blanket. Jane woke from the forest to her bedroom on Carlisle street with the president giving an address on the radio player.

‘...bing bang boom! Just like that problem solved, just like that!’

In the back ground cheers could be heard, through the radio player it had an echoey quality that made it sound ominous. Jane turned off the player and changed clothes, the night was rainless so far but she didn’t feel like walking to 15th and Porter so she took her hoverboard but left the charge pack and went through the window down the fire escape and out the alley to Jackson street.

Although the ground was still wet she thought the bigger risk to her board was the police, since they were banned in the city a few years back. Tonight she couldn’t care less and rode her board on the street as often as on the side walk. She stopped at a 7-11 on the corner of Broad and Wolf and bought some sour green apple Bubblicious. She rode her board and took a quick hip shot to get on Porter and cut across a moving car whose driver began to honk and yell.

“You stupid little shit, get the fuck off that fuckin thing before you kill someone!”

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Jane without pause or looking away shot back a middle finger at the driver as she blew a bubble which popped loudly. She arrived at 15th and Porter which was a boarded up convenience mart that was diagonal from The Pizza Shack. They’d hang out in front of the pizza parlor if the cops were prowling, but if they saw you eating and not boozing or smoking or being otherwise rowdy they’d leave you alone. The TL patrols were a different matter all together, though they didn’t come around here too often.

Betty and Mario stood with his girlfriend Jen Deluca who was petite but tall though smaller than Mario, between the three of them was Matt Avalon who was tall and skinny and wore horn rimmed glassed and claimed to be related to the singer Frankie Avalon. They were talking quietly as Jane glided up and kicked her board up and grabbed it and put it under her arm deftly.

“Shit that thing’ll short out if it rains tonight.” said Matt.

“Fuck the rain, I’m gonna freeze to death first.” said Mario who had a clearly cold girlfriend whose arms were hidden under his coat.

“We can go to Marconi park.” said Matt though he smirked.

“Out in the open with the wind, you silly fuck.” Mario said with a laugh.

“What we’ll build a camp fire.”

“Fuckin a, well get some gasoline from the Time Kill station across from the park to light it up.”

Mario said with a devilish smile.

“You can’t do that Mario. This is the city.” said Betty sounding horrified by the idea.

“It’s a fuckin joke Betty, I know this is the city. Anything else you wanna fuckin inform us about? How to loosen a tight asshole, maybe?”

“Quit being a douche, Mario.” said Jen.

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“Aw whatever the fuck.”

From around the corner came Monica Downs, a girl that was around 16 or 17 though she never said how old she really was, and was as mysterious as you could get in this neighborhood.

She would sometimes show up with Frank Bucharelli, like she had tonight. Most of the stuff she heard about her though was from others in the neighborhood. She heard Frank mention once she had been to jail, and Monica didn’t agree or disagree with him when he said it while she stood there.

Another rumor she heard was that Monica had murdered her parents and had run away from home. Jen’s sister Betty said she was on the TL’s special list because she shaved her whole head while still in middle school and started worshiping Satan. She had started coming around a little more than a year ago, with a girl named Debra Raggio who lived on a block not far from here and who Jane had seen around the neighborhood sometimes since she was little.

She heard Debra had moved away when her dad died and then a few years later was around again, but different. She used to dress like a normal girl before, she wore blouses and nice dress shoes or clean white tennis shoes with jeans. But when she came back she was always wearing a leather bomber jacket that had Air Force patches sown on it and combat boots, her fathers stuff from when he was in the service Mario had said to Jane when she asked him about, feeling too silly to ask her directly.

She also had started smoking, and that was around the time Monica first started coming around.

They were usually hanging out together smoking Marlboro’s and drinking sometimes on the corner or at Marconi park. Debra had even gone back to her house on Mole street and on occasion threw parties though Jane had never been to one.

Then early last year Debra had gone again, and the house she was living in had been boarded up and had an official TL poster and a police notice put on the front door warning about trespassing on a crime scene. That was when Jane heard Betty say Debra and Monica were witches, which made Jane laugh. Monica was different than the rest of the girls in the neighborhood just like Debra, but if the cops or the TL were looking for you, you probably wouldn’t want to be noticed so easily.

Which was probably why she was only around at night, and she always went home by herself where ever that was. She had hair down to her shoulders, but underneath it was shaved to the 157

skin, which was were Jen’s sister probably got the idea she had shaved her whole head at some point. Her hair on top was pulled back into a short pony tail,sometimes she would wear make up, not a lot just a hint of dark eye shadow on her eyelids and a thin gloss of a dark plum colored lipstick on her lips.

And judging by her roots she was blond but dyed her hair black. She wore cargo pants and was always wearing a black hoody that she kept up all the time day or night. Some times she would hunch her shoulders when she walked, especially if a cop was nearby and would seem to try and hide under her hood, she was mysterious but that hardly made her a witch or a teenage murderess.

She didn’t usually hang out with guys but she had been hanging with Frank often over the last few weeks, which obviously bothered Betty who had a secret crush on him since she was nine or ten. Betty never said anything to Jane about it but she could see it in her eyes, especially since Monica didn’t seem to like him all that much. He would try and kiss her or rub her back and most of the time she pushed him off sometimes with a grimace, Jane would look over and see Betty biting the inside of her lips whenever it happened.

Monica was nice though and didn’t talk like she knew it all or acted like she was hot shit. Jane had talked with her on occasion, if it were just the two of them while getting a slice at The Pizza Shack or just talking while sitting on the corner.

“Hey Jane, cool hover board.” Monica asked.

“Thanks, my mom got it a while back for a hundred and fifty.” she said almost including the part about how she left for good just a few days later.

“Awesome, did it come with a charge pack?” Monica asked while Jane let her have a closer look.

“Yeah, it takes all day but that still gives you like four or five hours of solid hover time.”

“Here check out my new cellular.” Monica said pulling a Tap Screen from her back pocket and handing it to Jane.

“Is it the new NovaX?” Jane asked feeling amazed by the soft black screen and how it lit up when you touched it at all.

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“Nah, it’s an older TI model. But the guy I bought it from had it all modded it out.”

“Cool.” Jane said handing it back.

“You got a cellular?” asked Monica.

Though Jane didn’t prefer having a cellular, she felt bad at that moment for not having one. She honestly hated talking on the phone and texting felt weird to her but she wouldn’t have minded talking to Monica or even texting. She knew a lot of cool stuff and wasn’t all drama like Betty.

“No, my mom said I had too choose between that or the hover board.” Jane said.

Hoverboards were stupidly expensive like the new Tap Screens, the cheapest boards would go for five or six hundred easy. Hers was a Lionel brand that was mid range but her mom got it for cheap from a black guy who was hawking them on Broad and Snyder. It was black with a red trim on its sides, underneath between the pair of hover engines was a picture of the grim reaper in a ratty black robe wielding a scythe in one hand while holding out the other as if in welcome.

“Hey, Mon.” said Frank sheepishly.

“What?”

“Let’s go back to the house.”

“What house?” asked Mario who was walking over with Jen still wrapped around him.

“God damn it, you can’t keep your mouth shut?” Monica said with an eye roll.

“What,” he said defensively. “you said if it got real cold you said you’d take us?”

“I said if it rained and was cold.”

“You bought a house?” asked Matt.

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“Yeah ass head with a two car garage and a lawn to mow.” said Mario.

“I call dibs on the master bedroom.” said Matt.

“Fuck that, I’m the one with the girlfriend so we get the master bed room.” said Mario.

“Yeah to jerk yourself off.” Jen said

“It’s just an apartment in a duplex.” Monica said quietly.

“Yeah, we were messing around on the steps and I found a key under the welcome mat.” Frank said excitedly.

“Oh, come on let’s go see it.” Mario said.

“No, there’s some people living upstairs still.”

“Come on, we’ll be quiet.” Frank said rubbing her shoulders, though she bore it this time.

“Maybe we shouldn’t,” said Betty quietly while Mario and Frank as well sighed heavily in annoyance. “or maybe not all of us go. People might hear us and call the police.”

“Were not havin a fuckin orgy Betty, if we were you wouldn’t be invited anyway. Either come or go.” Mario said as Matt guffawed a horse like laugh.

“I didn’t say we were going.” Monica said when suddenly it began to spit rain down on them.

Although is was closer to a mist than an actual rainfall, Monica relented and they walked on 15th heading towards Wolf street. They crossed to the other side of Wolf and came to a stone white house with a front stoop leading to a heavy looking white door, next to it were two door bells.

The first floors panorama window was curtained, between that and the glass was a blue and white sign that said: Noah Real Estate, which hung to the glass with suction cups on the four corners.

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“OK, everybody shut up.” Monica said holding a smoldering cigarette in one hand and a key in the other.

The door opened to a short hallway. To the left was another door, just a few feet ahead was a set of a dozen steps going up to another door at the top. Monica flicked her cigarette out the door and unlocked the door to the left with the same key.

Everyone was holding their breaths, Betty kept looking up at the at the door at the top looking as pale as milk. Monica opened the door and everyone quickly ran in, Mario began laughing.

“Shh!”

“Sorry,” Mario said with his face red from holding in the laughter. “that was like a fuckin prison break. I thought I was gonna fart and blow our cover.”

The room was dark, a set of curtains blocked out the street lights keeping everything near pitch black. Suddenly a light from a table lamp sitting on the floor blazed on casting everything in yellow, Betty gasped from the sudden brightness in the room. They stood in a parlor that was bare from the walls to the floor.

In one of the corners was a back pack laying beside a laid out blanket not far from the lamp Monica turned on. The room was chilly but the windows looked nearly new and didn’t feel drafty. Off to the right was a kitchen that looked just as bare.

“You’ve been crashing here?” asked Mario.

Monica only gave a slight nod. Betty was besides Jane and rolled her eyes.

“Yuk, I can’t believe she lives like this.” she whispered.

Jane feeling angry at Betty’s words, turned away from her without responding. They sat on the short carpeted floor in a loose circle. Not really talking all that much and just enjoyed being inside with out adults around questioning everything they said or did.

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A haze of smoke from Monica’s cigarette hung in the room like a wispy fog. Every once and a while Frank would bug Monica into the kitchen, each time she seemed more exacerbated as each trip in there was longer and longer. It seemed to fill the air with tension each time they sat back down again. Jane looked at Frank and could see him clenching his jaw with a frustrated look in his eyes.

They retreated into the kitchen again, Jen was talking quietly about something when Jane could hear Monica and Frank whispering but it was it was getting a little louder. Jane looked back toward the kitchen but they were silhouettes in darkness. Monica spoke louder this time and she walked out of the dark kitchen.

After a few steps she turned and faced Frank, he stepped towards her and with his arms extended grabbed at her chest. What happened next was quick though Jane thought it lasted much longer.

Betty gasped as Monica grabbed Frank by the shoulders with both arms as if to embrace him.

Instead she tilted her head back and with lightening quick speed head butted him directly in the face.

A loud crack could be heard in the empty room, Frank guffawed a breath as he stumbled backwards putting a hand to his misshaped nose which was bleeding.

“I told you to keep your fucking hands off me.” she said in a savage whisper as Frank fell to his backside on the floor.

“You fucking witch! You dirty cunt bag!” Frank yelled with blackened teary eyes.

Betty had stood up and was about to go to Frank when they all heard loud foot steps above them.

“Who da fuck, down there? I’m callin da fuckin cops!” said a voice from the floor above.

“Hey, man. I’m outta here, come on babe.” Mario said quickly getting up and dragging Jen along.

“Right behind you guys.” Matt said quickly in a strained voice not looking back at the others.

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Betty had gone white again, whether it was from the blood or the threat of police Jane never found out. Betty squeaked like a mouse with each hurried breath she took as she looked at Monica with terror, her hands shaking like a small dog during a violent thunderstorm. Frank got up holding his hand to his nose as blood dribbled through his fingers. He made a wide loop of Monica.

“Fuckin witch.” he said in a clogged nasally voice.

He brushed passed Betty who frowned and looked at the point of tears. Monica didn’t move as Jane stood a few feet away, she was about to console her when she spoke instead.

“Youse guys better get outta here.” Monica said sounding calm.

“Come on, Jane.” said Betty quickly.

“Just go.” Monica said.

“I don’t want walk home alone, I’m scared.” Betty pleaded.

“Will you be OK?” Jane asked Monica ignoring Betty.

“Yeah, I just gotta find a place to crash. I’ll be around.”

Jane and Betty left heading towards Broad street quickly and quietly, they left with out looking back. Betty spoke only once or twice in hurried hushed tones which annoyed Jane to no end.

Once they were closer to their neighborhood, she spoke normally again though Jane still felt agitation at the sound of her voice.

“Poor Frank. I hope he’s not hurt.” Betty said in a high voice.

I hope his dick falls off, thought Jane viciously as a smile formed across her lips, though Betty did not notice. She continued talking.

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“Monica is such a bitch.” Betty said with a head shake.

Seeing her head wag like that made Jane think of Miss Regina and felt a deep pang of anger. The smile left her face as she rolled her eyes but kept silent. They turned down Broad street just a few blocks south from where they had left school this afternoon and every afternoon for the past few years.

“How could she do that to him?”

“Because he grabbed her tits, for Christ sake it was right in front of you!” Jane said roughly as she held her hoverboard tightly under her arm and clenched her teeth.

It was getting late, close to police curfew, a few cars drove up and down, but Broad street was close to empty. Jane had an urge to just jump on her hoverboard and ditch Betty gliding down the near empty street like a bullet. Not going home, just going, going until Betty’s irritating voice was replaced by the wind in her ears.

“So?” said Betty meekly but still sounding sure.

“What do you mean so?”

They stopped walking and Jane turned to look at Betty, whose lips were pursed.

“She shouldn’t have brought us there, she lead him on. What was he supposed to think bringing him to an empty house.” she said in a maddeningly puritanical voice that made Jane again think of Miss Regina.

Jane wanted to take her hoverboard and smash Betty’s pinched fucking face and then maybe punch her in the tit. Instead she stepped off the curb with a huff, threw her hoverboard down and pushed off wiggling her ankles to build up speed. Betty said something but she ignored her and glided of into the night towards home.

She wished she didn’t have to go home, she wanted to hover the rest of the night, consequences be damned. She didn’t care, she just wanted fly but she couldn’t fly, however hover boarding seemed close enough. Besides she’d see a cop car long before it would see her.

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They didn’t drive the ORV’s in the city. They stuck to the Packard Town Cruisers in Philly, the TL patrols sometimes used ORV’s that were black and had blue flashers on their roof. Jane had seen one or two TL cars that were dark blue station wagons with wooden panels on the sides, where a silver emblem or a black circle with the initials TL was painted on like a decal.

Jane saw neither type of patrol but decided to go home, the wind had picked up some and her cheeks felt cold and numb. She coasted down a sidewalk past a bar with a Thin Screen replaying the inauguration, it’s blue glow seemed to be the only life inside though she could smell the yeasty aroma of beer and hear the voices of the patrons laughing and shouting. Jane felt a chill race down her spine hearing the president speak again but quickly forgot about it when she hovered passed a wooden fence dividing the sidewalk from the bar’s back yard.

On the rickety wood fence that was peeling brown paint was a poster for the Temperance League, they were usually either gory with drawings of a bloody and beaten Jesus hanging on a cross. Or they were creepy with actual pictures of scantly clad women or girls selling their bodies on a corner or a drawing of a creepy face in a dark corner or from a window staring back at you from the murkiness of the shadows, which was generally followed by the phrase: ‘The TL

is watching.’

This picture was the latter and showed a man wearing a dark trench coat looking over his shoulder from a dark alleyway. Jane had hovered slowly by it, slow enough to feel those hollows eyes stare into her mind and caused her to shiver. She quickly spit on the ghastly face and went

home. She came in through the front door which was locked and fished out her key from her pocket to unlock it.

She had hoped Bubbles might still be awake, she was going soft in the head but the sound of her soft voice still made Jane feel better. But she had gone up to bed already, the night was depressing and walking into a dark parlor didn’t help. It was a lightly furnished room, obviously the place an old lady would call home. The TV was of the old bulky CRT variety which had gone out of style in the 80s. Though she did have a government sanctioned radio player that was fairly new but was good only for news and top 40 radio programs and music.

Though WiI intranet was free and filtered on every street corner for cellulars and personal computers, which were becoming more common, they were as expensive as hoverboards and Tap Screens. Some people built their own PC’s with spare parts though that was against both federal and state law to modify repair or rebuild electronics and or home media devices. Jane went upstairs, put her hover board on the charger and went straight to bed, the nights excitement had left her feeling sick and tired.

She didn’t turn the light on and simply kicked off her high tops and crawled into bed grateful for its warmth as the wind picked up again. Jane felt the worry gnaw at her thinking of Monica 165

being outside all night. Her window was closed and the curtain drawn, but Jane felt the cold dankness behind all that and frowned a little for Monica. Despite her deep and sincere worry, Jane drifted off to sleep after only a few minutes.

The next morning, Bubbles opened the door and turned on the light.

“Rise and shine, sleepy head. Time for school.” Bubbles said happily.

Jane was buried deep under a pink comforter and a pair of pillows, her head popped out sleepily as she squinted around the bright room.

“OK, Grammy. I’m up.” she said half awake.

“I’ll make some oatmeal. The weather man said it’s very cold today. You want some oatmeal?”

“No, I’m just gonna hop in the shower and go to school.”

“You shouldn’t go to school with out a complete breakfast.” Bubble said sounding eerily similar to the women selling all those cereals and shit on TV.

Jane heard her say it before and would sometimes laugh at how that sounded. But she was too tired to laugh this morning and just wanted to get through another school day as fast as possible.

She took a quick hot shower but used a blow dryer on her hair. She was brushing her teeth when she saw the frost that had built up on the bathroom window last night.

She could hear the TV down stairs playing the local Action 6 news. The days high was only going to be 33 and tonight there was expected to be record lows, though no precipitation. Jane thought of Monica again and cringed, god damn Frank. He couldn’t keep his hands to himself, if a guy tried that shit on her she’d punch him right in his dick.

Jane smiled at the thought of giving Franks’ jewels a solid uppercut. She grabbed her back pack in the living room where Bubbles sat watching the local news, sometimes talking to the people on the screen, as if the people on there were talking directly to her. Jane watched her grammy and wondered how long before the school found out mom had split for good, there was no way they would let Bubbles be her care taker.

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Jane went over and kissed her grammy on the cheek before heading to school, trying not to worry about her burning down the house and being sent to live in an orphanage like that one called the Barberry or something like that. Of course that place burned down years back, but she heard people in the neighborhood talk about it still like an evil legend, a place for unwanted kids.

Everyone knew that place, hell even her mom would use it as a threat if she didn’t listen or was being bad. Her mom telling her how to behave, that was a laugh.

She opened the front door to a short bluster of wind and a deep cold in the air that had teeth. It was a clear morning and the sun was making its way up by the time the first bell rang. She saw Betty at the corner of Carlisle who smiled and waved at Jane but she merely mouthed a hello.

Frank wasn’t around that day, she didn’t see Mario or Jen until lunch.

“Yo, man last night was crazy. She broke his nose.” Mario said picking at a sandwich.

“How do you know?” asked Betty looking pale again as she pushed away her neatly prepared lunch.

“I heard it from Matt,” said Jen. “his mom and Franks mom are on neighborhood watch alliance.”

“Did he say what happened?” asked Jane.

“He told his parents he got jumped by a bunch of Irish guys from 2nd street.” said Jen.

“Yeah he don’t want anybody knowin he got his ass kicked by a girl.” Mario said with a smirk.

“Language, Mr Silva.” said Miss Regina standing just a few feet away.

Jane felt her stomach lurch at seeing Miss Regina, whose eyes darted at each of their faces as they all sat silently feeling awkward, waiting for another rebuke. Had she heard everything or just Mario’s off hand swearing? After a moment of her silent glares she turned away, a sigh broke from them at the table. Jane felt her heart pounding in real fear, though no one knew she was technically an abandoned child, it wouldn’t be hard to find out.

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She would sometimes see her old neighbors from when her and mom were still living on Bancroft street. They’d ask about her mom and Jane would just say she’s fine and didn’t elaborate. Even when they asked why they moved all of a sudden she’d say I don’t know and get away quickly from the subject whether it was an adult or another kid asking.

They day went on slowly, by the time the final bell rung Jane felt like every period had doubled in length though the clocks moved with their usual slowness. Well, tomorrow was Friday and then she’d have the weekend, which lifted her spirits some. She came out of the schools front double doors into a cloudy and cold January afternoon.

She had only walked a few paces through the parking lot, her dark blue back pack slung over her shoulder with one strap walking among a throng of other students bundled up against the winter air, when Betty caught up to her. It was maddening how she always seemed to tag along with her everywhere.

She tried not to get too irritated with her, sure she was sort of snobby from the way she held her books to her narrow chest like a six year old and her wide eyed shock when anyone uttered a swear. But she never told anyone what had really happened last night so she had that at least in her favor. So they walked together though Jane didn’t speak much, Betty spoke only a little more.

When they reached the corner of Carlisle street the door to Texas Wiener's suddenly opened, an over weight middle aged bald man with a stained red apron held it open for whoever was coming out. All though it was a polite gesture, the man holding the door was red faced with nostrils flaring and lips pressed so tightly together they were barely visible. Through the door stepped Monica, she sneered at the bald man as she spoke.

“I got the money for the cheese dog.” she said holding up a plastic bag filled with what looked like only pennies.

“Hey I ain’t got time to count four hundred fuckin pennies,” he said in a heavy Italian accent.

“go get some fuckin real money, you mouthy bitch. I’ll call the fuckin TL hot line on your witchy lookin ass.”

Monica was silent and shoved the plastic sandwich baggie filled with pennies back into her hoody pocket as she walked down the steps and readjusted her black backpack which looked empty, the bald man closed the door without another word. Jane was startled by Monica’s 168

appearance, under her eyes were purple bags over flowing with exhaustion and fear. Her face was a mask of hunger and sleeplessness, her eyes were red and glassy as her lips quivered and her teeth chattered.

“Hey Jane,” Monica said looking away out of embarrassment. “I didn’t know you lived this way.”

“Oh Jane doesn’t. Her grammy lives on this block and she sleeps over there sometimes.” Betty said in her irritating I know it all tone.

“Oh,” Monica said with a nod. “can you help me for a minute,?”

“With what?” asked Betty in a bright manner with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.

Monica’s brow furrowed, whether it was annoyance or anger Jane didn’t know but answered before Monica spoke.

“Betty why don’t you split.” Jane said in what she hoped was an easy tone.

Betty’s small smile shrunk to nothing as she held her shoulder bag filled with text books closer to her as if it might fly away. Monica and Betty stared at each other but Betty looked away first.

Betty frowned a little before speaking.

“Don’t get in trouble, Jane.” Betty said in a pouty voice.

“Don’t get in trouble, Jane.” Monica said in a mock pouty voice when Betty was farther away.

Jane couldn’t help but laugh, though Monica seemed far away from good humor today.

“Can you help me?” Monica asked again.

Jane didn’t know what she could have wanted, in the year or so that she had known Monica she’d never asked her for help or anyone else in the neighborhood that she knew of. Jane wasn’t 169

one to trust most people and would feel guilty trying to avoid talking about her mom and living with a grandmother who sometimes thought Nixon was still president. Her trust in other people was nonexistent especially since the days her mother had still been around, but Monica was different in a way that made Jane feel more at ease.

Monica was on the run, and Jane realized then, she was on the run as well. They were the keepers of their own secrets and the masters of their own destiny. Jane thought back to dream she had of walking in a forest, that feeling that although there was danger near, she was not alone.

Maybe it was Monica with her in the dream?

“Sure,”

What she wanted was not that big of a deal. Late last night Monica went down the street from the apartment on Wolf, hoping who ever lived on the second floor was bluffing, but after fifteen minutes a police Packard pulled up and didn’t leave until late into the night. When the sun rose she waited on the steps of an empty house down the block for whoever was on the second floor to leave for whatever at some point so she could try to sneak back inside. The man living upstairs had finally left at around one o’clock that afternoon.

“I need you to be a look out for me while I try to get back inside.”

“The cops, you mean?”

“That or the old guy living upstairs, he has a cane and walks all hunched over, you can’t miss him and he walks slow.”

They walked quickly to Wolf street, Monica despite her being clearly exhausted was moving fast, Jane struggled to keep up at first. The house looked the same as it did the night before, Jane stood beside a parked car at the curb as Monica took a quick look around before going up the stoop. She removed the key from her pocket and opened the door to the short hallway.

Jane nonchalantly looked down both ends of Wolf street, but no one was walking this street nor were any cars. Jane could just make out Monica’s figure in the darkness, it only took her a few seconds last night to open the door. Nearly two minutes passed when she heard Monica say fuck loudly. She came down the stoop and threw the key across the street somewhere saying fuck again though not as loudly.

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“The fuckin hunchback changed the fuckin locks. Shit, it’s too cold to sleep in the park and those flop houses all want ID. I’m so fuckin tired.”

“You can crash with me.” Jane said suddenly.

Monica seemed surprised and a little reluctant. Jane felt sad, but was determined to help Monica.

She smiled and nodded.

“What about your parents? They’re not gonna ask me all kinds of shit are they?” she asked trying not to hold her breath on the possibility of a warm bed, and maybe food.

“No, it’s just me and my grammy. My parents aren’t around, and we can go in through the back so you wont have to talk to her.”

Monica smiled and looked ready to cry but her voice was straight and clear when she said thank you. They walked to the alley behind Carlisle street and went around back and climbed the fire

escape into Jane’s’ room. Monica followed Jane inside and let her back pack drop to the floor before flopping down on the queen sized mattress with a deep sigh.

“You got a big ass bed.” Monica said appreciatively as she stretched.

“This was my mom and dad’s room when they were living here. It’s all mine now. You hungry?”

Jane asked.

“Yeah, starving. Here for room and board.” she said digging out the heavy bag of pennies from her pocket.

“Nah, it’s cool.” Jane said sincerely.

“Please take it I can’t carry these things anymore. I never realized how heavy four dollars in change was.” she said with a laugh and dropping it on the floor.

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Jane went downstairs and made three bologna sandwiches with mayo on white bread. Bubbles was excited to see her granddaughter as she always was, and offered to make her grilled cheese though she had already made the sandwiches at this point. When she had Bubbles settled back down watching TV she went back upstairs into her room and found Monica snoring deeply using her hoody as a pillow and holding an actual pillow under her arm like a teddy bear.

She put the sandwiches on the dresser at the foot of the bed and let Monica sleep, she just sat on the floor trying to do homework but after twenty minutes of algebra she gave up and started reading her book about the kids locked in the attic. Monica woke up for a few minutes after sunset to use the bathroom, when she came back in the room she thanked Jane again in a muddy sleep talk and fell back to sleep in nearly the same position. She didn’t even move when Jane crawled into bed her self sometime around eleven.

The next morning Bubbles had come in with her customary brightness, she didn’t fully wake up until she realized Monica was gone. On the dresser was an empty plate where the sandwiches once sat, now there were just some crumbs and a note that said thank you. Jane smiled a little, feeling glad she helped Monica, before frowning wondering what Betty might say.

She wrinkled her nose and smirked realizing Betty doesn’t need to know shit, Monica was cool and Jane felt a closeness to her that was probably the same feeling you’d have for an older sister.

Someone who was still different from you but like you in all the right ways so you wouldn’t feel so scared and alone all the time. Sisters had to keep each others secrets, and Betty wasn’t her sister. She walked to school and went until lunch before seeing Betty, right away she asked what Monica wanted.

“She was hungry, that’s all.”

“Well you can’t expected to get food with bags of pennies. She looks like a crack head doing that.”

“Who’s a crack head?” asked Mario sitting down across from them carrying a tray of food with Jen beside him.

“I think Monica is.” Betty said.

“Why cause she’s got bigger tits than you?” Mario said with disdain before being elbowed by Jen.

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The day was as cold and moved as slowly if not slower than the day before. It was Friday but the school day drug on and on, the class she had every other day with Miss Regina felt worse than usual. Miss Regina kept calling on Jane though her hand hadn’t been raised in any class at all today. When the last bell of the week rang, Jane’s heart did a joyful flip.

Mario, Jen, Betty and Jane walked through the crowd of other adolescents looking forward to another weekend. Near the front of the school a large blue Cadillac drove by blasting hip hop from it’s trunk which was partly open and revealed a large speaker. The music was fast and the singing put Jane in mind of nursery rhymes. The exotic beats were followed by very graphic lyrics.

‘Pop that pussy! Hey! Pop that pussy, baby!

Pop that pussy! Pop, pop that pussy, baby!’

“Turn off that illegal nigger music!” shouted an old female school crossing guard with a TL

armband.

The car did a sudden burnout as the woman shouted. A large portion of the students cheered and hooted as the large vehicle sped away down Broad street.

“Stop cheering,” the crossing guard cried out. “I’ve got his license plate and I know some of your names!”

Students began to disperse even quicker, some looking scared, a few out of sight of the crossing guard laughed before leaving. Mario who usually always had something to joke about when crazy shit was going down was silent and looked a little sad. So did Jen, even Jane felt sad about that though she wasn’t exactly sure why. Betty however looked like she had been slapped in the face and pinched in her rear by the music pouring out of the cars trunk her face was blushing a deep red.

“Youse guys gonna be around tonight?” Jane asked trying to forget the sadness inside her.

“Nah,” said Mario his look of sadness now gone. “me and Matt are gonna go see Frank.”

“He’s still in the hospital?” Betty asked.

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“No he’s home now, but my mom told me to go over there and have dinner or some shit.

Probably spend the whole fucking weekend watching episodes of Gunsmoke and Son Of The Rifleman, sucks the Yellow Jackets missed the playoffs this year, his parents got a big ass Thin Screen.”

“Can I go too?” asked Betty.

“I don’t fuckin know, ask his mom.” said Mario clearly annoyed.

“I’m gonna see my cousins new born,” said Jen. “her and her husband bought this farm house in Porter just outside the city. She showed me a picture she took with her cellular of a bunch of deer on her front yard.”

“Are there forests around Porter?” asked Jane feeling excited for Jen.

“Oh yeah, there’s trees everywhere.”

Her answer made any sadness she felt disappear almost right away. The thought of woods and forest had begun to take on a magical aspect in her mind. She had heard of books outlawed by the government that spoke of such things like magic and their practitioners. Jane parted from everybody and walked the rest of the way home in solitude.

Other children crowded some corners as they came home from their respective schools. In the distance was the wail of rush hour traffic building to the sound of engines and children loitering on street corners that had a store or mini mart with a sign forbidding more than two school children entering at a time. Some wore regular school clothes, more were wearing uniforms of the catholic school type, a few of those children wore TL arm bands and were handing out leaflets with information on how to join the junior league version of the TL.

Jane ignored them all thinking magical thoughts about woodland creatures and the witches and wizards the might live among them. Jane kissed her grammy and went upstairs to her room to try catch some an FAR signal but again no luck. Jane sighed and laid down on her bed and removed her hand held from a dresser drawer while the radio player emitted a soft static sound. She played until the sky filled with purple light and was so caught up playing Mnemonic The Wretchhog 2

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that she didn’t hear the knock on her window at first.

She paused the game when she heard it again, she went to the door but Bubbles was downstairs talking to the TV. She heard the knock again and realized it was coming from the window. She walked over to it and pulled up the shade. On the other side was Monica crouched in front of the window with an shy smile and a wave, Jane smiled making Monica's’ smile redouble.

“Can I come in?” she asked, her voice muffled by the glass.

Jane nodded and opened it for her, a cold breeze blew in behind her before closing the window.

On her shoulder was the same back pack but this time it looked full.

“Hey, sorry I had to bail. I had to do some shit and I needed to go alone.” she said carefully removing her back pack as she sat on the bed.

“That’s cool. What’s in the bag?”

She smiled and opened its zipper and removed a pair of glass bottles with a small black label, one was filled with blue liquid the other orange.

“You want blueberry or orange?” she asked holding them up in one hand.

Jane was wide eyed, you couldn’t get liquor like this outside of a casino in this state. On the bottom of the bottle was another label which said: Property of Black Beard’s Cove Casino, NOT

FOR SALE or CONSUMPTION outside of this establishment!

“Holy shit, you got in a casino?” she asked handing it back.

“No,” she said with laugh that was not unkindly. “long story. Is it cool if I smoke?” she asked.

“Yeah, sure. “ she said taking out an old tin ashtray from a closet in the corner that still held some of her mom’s old butts and gave it to Monica. “So what’s up?”

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“ I’m splitting town in a few days, so I wanted to celebrate with a friend.” she said opening the bottle of blueberry and taking a big swig.

“Oh shit, I brought some chasers too.” Monica said removing a six pack of Cherry Royal Crown cola.

“You’re leaving the city?” Jane asked feeling that old sadness return.

Monica kept her head down as she popped open the can of soda and took a small swallow. She looked up and was frowning.

“Yeah, that’s why I came by here. Since Deb got put away, you’re like the only person I felt like I could trust. Everybody else is cool and all, except Betty, but I always liked talking to you cause you don’t act all offended by everything and you were always chill compared to the others. And none of them would have ever let me crash at their place.”

What she said made Jane want to cry, it was the one time she didn’t feel so lonely and it would only last a short while.

“Thanks,” Jane said trying not to let her hurt show too much as she sat on the floor across from her.

“Come on, have a drink. I’m with my only real friend in the world and she looks like she’s about to cry.” she said passing the bottle of blue alcohol with a smile that said please don’t be sad.

“Ew, lemme have the orange one.” she said with a smile.

“Bitchin.” she said handing Jane a bottle.

Jane had drank a few times before, usually bootleg malt liquor, and once a beer from New England in a large unlabeled glass bottle that was called a forty that Mario had found at Marconi park a while back. Jane opened the bottle and took a swig of the liquid. It was sweeter than orange juice and burned a little but tried to swallow making an odd looking grimace. Monica laughed as Jane then opened her mouth wide making a weird gurgling sound that made Monica laugh even harder.

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“It’s so sweet, oh my god.” she said smacking her lips trying to fight the giggles now herself.

“Here, here.” Monica said in a laugh handing over a can of soda.

Jane fumbled it a little as she laughed and when she popped the can in began to squirt out in numerous arcs causing them to scream in laughter trying to cover the eruption with their hands.

The laughter ended when the door to the bedroom opened suddenly and Bubbles walked in with a look of confused wonder on her face.

“Oh, I thought I heard somebody up here with you? I thought it was your mother.” Bubbles said looking at Monica closely.

Monica was nervous and tensed up until Jane gave her smile and mouthed, it’s cool at her. When Jane didn’t even make an attempt to hide the booze, Monica finally did relax and smiled at Bubbles.

“No, grammy, it’s just my friend from school. I spilled some soda but we cleaned it up. OK?”

“Oh, hello.” Bubbles said brightly.

“Hi.” Monica said feeling a little awkward by her jubilation

“Are you hungry? Would you like some grilled cheese?” she asked looking excited at the idea.

“No grammy we’re not hungry.”

“Well OK. You girls aren't smoking are you? I smell cigarette smoke I think.”

“No, gram nobody’s smoking.”

Monica’s eyes were wide as between the two of them on the floor sat an ashtray with a butt still smoldering despite getting hit with soda. The old lady had just nodded at Jane with a smile and 177

eyes filled with empty light. When Bubbles left the room was quiet, grammy had visitors but they were few and far between.

And the ones that did visit didn’t realize she was living there, because they all knew how her engine was still running but nobody was behind the wheel. They were usually the ones who asked how mom was and Jane would make up whatever. Monica was quiet as Jane felt the shame of the situation burn her face.

“My mom split a while back and my dads in jail. Bubbles, that’s my grandma, my dads mom, I don’t know why everybody calls her Bubbles I don’t think she even remembers why, I live here with her but nobody knows. Everybody thinks my mom’s on the graveyard shift and I’m just staying the night.”

“I won’t tell anyone.”

“Thanks. If anyone found out I’d wind up in a place like the Byberry.”

Monica’s heart went still at the mention of the word. And although it was currently a burned down husk being reclaimed by nature, Monica could still clearly see its barbed wire fences

surrounding it and the smell of turpentine in the hallway. But there were much worse things she experienced than that.

“You heard of that place?” Monica asked as she took a swallow of more liquor minus the soda.

“Yeah.” said Jane who took another swallow of orange followed by a sip of soda before noticing the change of her demeanor.

“What’s that noise?” asked Monica looking around the room.

“Oh, just this.” she said getting up and taking the radio player sitting on the dresser still playing static softly.

“I can’t ever catch any FAR broadcasts.”

“Here.” Monica said holding out her hand for it.

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Jane handed it to her as Monica dug in her back pack and removed her Tap Screen and a charging wire that was connected to a fat black plastic housing that was a wall plug on one end.

Monica took a pen knife from her pack and removed the plugs housing and removed the serial plug hiding inside and plugged that into the radio players serial port and plugged the other end into her cellular. Immediately a sharp clear sound of smashing drums and screaming guitars and deep angry vocals, known as English Metal, played through the tiny speaker. A smile crossed Monica’s lips though she still appeared grim.

The song ended and was followed by a station identification.

‘see far...listen far...First Amendment Radio.’

“After nine they play hip hop.” Monica said resting the radio and cellular back on the dresser.

“That’s black people music, right?”

Monica nodded as she held a cigarette stiffly between her lips, her face was forlorn and looked whiter than usual. Jane wanted to cheer her up. But she could see the sadness, and felt sad again herself.

“Are the cops after you? Is that why you’re leaving?”

“I’m on the TL’s list, I’ve been on it for years. Since I was twelve.”

Jane felt her stomach lurch, she expected it but never believed it. If you broke the law you went to jail, but if you broke any laws under the jurisdiction of the Temperance League you were in a whole different level of trouble. Just associating with someone on the list could get you put on it.

“I tried to always put on a happy face,” Monica said finally her lighting cigarette. “but since I was twelve I’ve been wearing a mask like it’s Halloween.”

“What’s Halloween?”

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“It was holiday they outlawed back in forties, kids would wear masks and adults would give them candy and treats.”

“Really, was it free candy?”

“I think so.”

“Wow.” said Jane feel excited about wearing a costume and getting free candy. It seemed like a harmless ritual to her, so she asked: “Why was it outlawed?”

“Because people were afraid, kids dressing up as ghosts and goblins and witches freaked the religious people out. The Jesus freaks still want to burn witches and shit. They talk about that stuff like magic being evil, meanwhile Jesus was performing all kinds of magic tricks with bread and fish. They’re scared of that kind of magic and shit because it’s better than their magic. They hate it cause they think demons and ghosts and witches are real.”

“Do you think they are?”

“Witches are, I’ve seen one.” Monica said staring off in the distance as she sat surrounded by cigarette smoke.

“You saw a witch?” Jane said holding her Mad Dog bottle tightly.

Monica nodded just the slightest before taking another slug of blueberry.

“When, where?” Jane said with a beating heart.

“Earlier you said you heard of the Byberry. What did people tell you about it?”

“That they put all the bad kids there, my mom said, but she would always fuck with me about that place whenever I was pissing her off. I remember on the news when it accidentally caught on fire and that some people died and the kids living there went missing.”

A shock of realization struck Jane like an ice pick in her heart. Monica was one of the missing children. Before Jane could say another word Monica continued.

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“I’m not from South Philly, I grew up on Frankford ave in the Northeast. I was being raised by my half sister until she got killed by her boyfriend for turning tricks at Mt Carmel Cemetery.

She was the only family I had so they sent me to the Byberry. I had a lot of friends that I was never gonna see again, when I got there I cried so hard I threw up.”

Her voice cracked a little but she took another swig of booze and continued.

“That fat twat Ms Harker, she was the adult that watched over us, she rubbed my face in my own puke. She would humiliate us, all of us. I think there was like a dozen of us, when I met Debbie there. We all hung out in this room that had white walls and windows gated over like the windows at that prison on Moyamensing avenue. You know the one I mean?”

“Yeah my dad was there for a year.”

“We hardly ever left that room, ever except to eat. But we never could go outside, not even when it was summer and the heat was making your face feel like it was on fire, and you knew it was a

lot cooler outside and that a soft cool breeze was waiting to greet you the second you’d open the door. In the winter it was drafty, there were a pair of big ass propane tanks that didn’t do shit to keep any of us warm. The room wasn’t the worst part, I wish that it had been.”

Monica looked up at Jane and smiled, but it was a smile that was broken and so horrible that Jane shuddered. With glassy eyes she took another swig from the bottle and lit another cigarette before continuing.

“The worst was this guy who was the security guard,” Monica said slowly eying the glowing ember of her cigarette. “he’d pay Ms Harker to fuck around with us. He was after Deb mostly cause she was the oldest I guess. We couldn’t do anything cause all of us that was there was put at that place cause they knew no one would claim us. That’s what Debbie always told me.”

She dragged on her cigarette still looking at the smoldering tip but her eyes were filled with anger now.

“I think she was right,but he would go after the really young ones when he was drunk and we couldn’t stop him cause that pig Ms Harker would start beating us if we even got off the bed or made a peep.” Monica said in a tight controlled fury.

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“One night, Buddy, that was the guards name ,drunker than fuck took a girl named Carol out of the room. She wasn’t even seven...”

Monica trailed off a little as Jane's’ heart shook with fear, she held her bottle so tight her knuckles were white. Monica took a big gulp from her bottle before continuing.

“We never saw Carol again. Me and Debbie had talked about running away, I wasn’t sure if we were being for real until after Carol disappeared. She said she was gonna pick the lock with a bobby pin, she said her dad taught her how, and she really did know how, her dad was a mechanic and was a soldier and had taught her all kinds of cool shit. She showed me how to do that trick with the Tap Screen and the radio player.”

Monica took a swig from her bottle and a sip from her soda. She was breathing fast like she’d run a race and was loathe to continue, but she quickly rubbed at her eyes and began talking again.

“ We were gonna take all the girls with us. She didn’t want to leave them there, I don’t know if I would have done that if Deb wasn’t around and I was trying to split, I even said something to her about it, but she said no way, she said it would make us no better than Ms Harker. We thought

once we were outside we’d maybe hitch a ride or hop a train or something, we had been planning it for a while but only me and her knew. It sounds stupid now but we thought it was a great idea at the time. Deb was doing a practice run one night when Buddy caught her.”

Monica looked at the bottle, thought about taking another gulp but opted for soda instead. She fiddled with a cigarette but didn’t light it.

“ He didn’t say anything at first, he just sorta smiled and grabbed her, said he caught a little birdy trying to fly away. Deb didn’t yell or cry or scream, she just let him take her. I didn’t think she’d come back. I cried for hours thinking I’d just hang myself in the shower.

“ A girl who was retarded and was always getting her ass kicked by Ms Harker, did it a few months ago with her bra. But after a couple of hours the door opened and Deb came back. Her eye was black and blue and she was walking funny but I didn’t say anything, I just helped her to bed and got in with her and held her while she cried.”

A tear dropped from Monica’s eye as she lit a cigarette and wiped it away. She took a drag and coughed a little. She took a small sip of soda before speaking again.

182

“I don’t believe in God, I think Deb did but I’m not sure. But I think we both prayed that night, I wasn’t sure what we were hoping for, immediate death or just one last breath of fresh air but our prayers were answered a few nights later.”

Monica was silent again, a cloud of gray smoke hung in the room like a patch of London fog.

Jane’s stomach felt like a washing machine filled with suds, she put her bottle down and took a tiny sip of soda.

“That’s when we saw her...the witch. But she wasn’t all old and ugly like the one in the ‘Wizard Of Oz’ or how the fairy tale books describe it, she was young and beautiful. We heard Ms Harker screaming from out in the hallway and then we saw a light coming from under the door and we thought it was a ghost, a couple of the younger ones were crying cause Ms Harker was always teasing them that the Holy Ghost was gonna come and take them away in a bright light.”

Monica grimaced and as she pushed her hair back from her forehead..

“I remember they all started to cry, I felt like crying too, I believed for just a minute it was the holy spirit coming for us. But Debra didn’t, she gathered us all up and we hid in the bathroom.

We were in there not even a minute when we heard the door unlock and footsteps approaching, it was dark in the dorm but a light was coming towards us, and Debbie stepped in front of us all with her arms held out.

“The light grew brighter as the steps drew closer and then she came through the doorway. At first I thought it was a white light, like from a flashlight, but it was kinda like a bright green, like a florescent light. The light was her eyes, her eyes...”

She shook her head as if recalling the event was still too unbelievable even to her who was a witness.

“Her green eyes, I’ll always remember them, they were glowing, the iris’ were moving like boiling water. So bright, but it didn’t hurt to look into them. She was wearing a striped pullover and her hood was up and I could see her hair flowing out from underneath, hair as black as night.

I could feel this energy around me like electricity before a really bad storm, ya know.

183

“I could barely think straight, even when she told Debra about the van out front. How she knew Deb could drive neither one of us ever figured out, I though maybe we were dreaming and none of it was really happening. I was thinking it and then Deb actually asked her if she was real. She just said to leave, when she said that I realized it didn’t matter what was real and what wasn’t and I had to drag her out of there.”

Monica was still breathing heavily, her face was white as goose bumps covered her arms. She looked down at her arms and began to rub them slowly.

“We were just a few minutes away when the explosion hit, the fire could have been an accident or maybe it was just yellow news, I don’t know, I just remember feeling good. I only prayed one more time after that. I prayed that Buddy and Ms Harker were stuck inside choking on the smoke while their bodies burned. I remember going down the highway pleading with God to make them suffer like we all did, and hoping it was slow and painful for them right to the very end. By the time the sun was up we were free.”

Janes’ mouth was dry and her lips felt leathery as she took another sip of soda.

“That’s why you’re on the list. They think youse guys did it.” Jane said.

“Maybe, they don’t tell you why you’re on it.”

Jane felt a deep panic fill her, not for herself but for Monica. She was desperate to put her friend at ease.

“Maybe you’re not on the list. Have you ever seen it?”

Monica frowned deeply and got up to get her cellular. She pulled the serial plug out, cutting off a man singing about digging through ditches and burning through witches, casting the room into silence. She tapped on the screen a few times and handed it to Jane.

On the screen were three long columns of names listed in alphabetical order. Between the names Nancy Darrow and William Dunwood was her name. Monica put her cellular on the bed and sat back down on the floor again.

“What happened after you got away?”

184

“It was hard keeping all of us together, a lot of the younger ones wound up in another place not much different than the Byberry. We weren’t ready to be mom’s as much as we thought.

For awhile it was me, Deb and another two girls, about our age who we broke out with, Nicole and Dana . They were some crazy bitches.” Monica said with a small smile.

“They had it rough before they ever got to the Byberry though, and I think Nicole was a little slow. They were the ones that kept saying the lady who broke us out was a witch, especially Nicole she was really into fairy tales and shit, she’d spend hours talking about this book about a magic ring with wizards and elf's and all kinds of cool shit. I never got into that stuff, Deb did though. I think that was why she went along with them when they wanted to start a coven.”

“What’s a coven?” asked Jane.

“It’s a club for witches. We decided we were witches, and that was why we had been rescued by one. We all dyed our hair black and started wearing hoodies. Dana and me shaved underneath each others scalp, just trying something different, ya know.” she said sounding a little shy about it.

“ We would run around all over South Philly, the Northeast, downtown, we’d even hide out in the subways, we’d graffiti, well Nicole mostly. She would tag whatever, a cop car a TL building, she didn’t care. After a while though things were starting to get scary with her.

“She kept talking about wantin to stab people or cutting their throats and crazy shit like that.

Towards the end she was carrying a straight razor everywhere and we would be walking and she’d sometimes start screaming at random people who were minding their own business and swing that thing around, she would always laugh afterwards and said she was fuckin around but I could see in her eyes she wasn’t fuckin around.”

Monica downed her soda after taking a small nip from her booze again.

“It wasn’t long after, her and Dana killed these two dudes they were partyin with, the cops and the TL, hell that whole neighborhood lost their shit about it.”

“Maybe something happened, like what happened with you and Frank the other night.”

185

“Maybe,” Monica said thoughtfully. “more than likely though they were just trying to rob them, pretend that they’re gonna party with them or whatever. They’d done it that way before, with out killin anybody of course. I don’t know, me and Debra weren’t there. Crazy bitches.” Monica said though not unkindly.

“What did you and Deb do?”

“I wanted to leave the state, but we didn’t have money, not the kind of money to get through the border wall. We didn’t know what they told the cops or the TL so we split up for a while. I went back to Frankford avenue for a while and hooked up with some people, I found work sellin dope and bootleg stuff for a lady who knew my half sister and used to watch me when I was a little kid.

“Deb said she was gonna try looking for friends in her old neighborhood. We stayed in touch with our cellulars but we didn’t see each other for a few years. I had gone down to visit her one weekend when she’d managed to break into her old house. No one had bought it so she said she was reclaiming it by birthright.”

Monica smiled and laughed before continuing.

“It was a good thing I did visit that weekend. That section of Frankford I sold on, that whole block was nothing but crack houses and brothels, and almost anything within reason you could buy was there. And everybody knew it, but nothing lasts forever and there was a vice raid and everybody on that block was put away.”

“Wow, that was lucky.”

“Yeah, I guess. There were cops and armed TL patrols all up and down the block, I remember seeing it on the news and feeling as scared as the night I saw the witch. I thought I was gonna pass out cause we both knew we were on the list by that time and how the TL could torture you if they wanted. How they got Debra I don’t know, I just got lucky again and missed those fuckers by a cunt’s hair.” Monica said with sneer.

“ I think it was cause she had that house, everyone in the neighborhood knew she was on the run and that she was squatting there. When I bailed out the other morning I went looking for a guy I knew from Frankford ave, he owns this boat and pays a guy to go to southern Cali and the Republic of New England, to get good liquor, serial drives filled with porn and music, crazy stuff like that. He said it costs just five hundred bucks to go to New England.”

186

Monica went into her back pack and took out a thick roll of money. Janes’ eyes were wide as she looked at the bulk of green. It was mostly twenties with the familiar chubby faced portrait of Grover Cleveland and an actual hundred dollar bill with Andrew Jackson’s portrait on one side and Smedley Butler on the other riding a tank in front of the US Capitol..

“Holy shit. He loaned it to you?”

Monica squirmed and didn’t answer so Jane let it go.

“In a few days I have to go to an underground club he runs called 2007 on Juniper street, he’ll give me the time and place to meet the boat. I wanted to go to California cause I heard it doesn’t ever snow or get cold there but fifteen hundred was too much. I was gonna wait at first, but I’m too scared though, I have this feeling my lucks gonna run out if I put it off.”

“I hope you get there safe.” said Jane.

“Me too.”

They talked into the night, but of subjects more in the province of teenage girls, as the night grew late, and a deep chill fell over the city, the wind scraped the pavement sharply. The windshields of cars parked up and down the neighborhoods covered with frost cast ghostly reflections of the orange arc sodium street lights through out the city. The utility poles on the corners that held electrical wires at their tops and enormous WiI intranet routers on their sides stood fast and strong against the arctic like winds. Jane and Monica laid in bed halfway to sleep as the wind hollered over the city, laying side by side under the warmth of a comforter.

“Are you scared, I mean about going to New England?”

“Well yeah...but I’m exited too. I hope it’s not as cold as everybody says.”

It was quiet for a few minutes, Jane’s eyes were fluttering closed when Monica spoke again.

“Thanks for being my friend, and not judging me.”

“Ditto, kiddo.”

187

“What?” Monica said with a soft chuckle.

“It was something my dad would say,” Jane said laughing back. “I mean, thank you for being my friend and not judging me too.”

“I’m sorry your dad’s in jail.”

“Thanks. Can you hang out tomorrow?”

“Can I try out your hover board?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Cool beans.”

The next morning was sunny and clear with a low of only 45, the girls greeted the day just after nine o’clock and felt more intoxicated from the fresh air than the Mad Dog they had drunk last night. After taking turns getting showered, Monica treated them both to Twinkies and a couple of RC mega gulps from the Time Kill gas station across the street from Marconi park where Jane showed Monica how to ride the hoverboard. It was huge park that was two city blocks long and wide with winter stunned grass and elms slowly dying from disease lining the concrete walkways that cut through the park.

During the summer months the park would be more populated by young women and their children during the day and the more rowdier element during the night, consisting of mostly teenagers getting high or drunk. Today the playground section for smaller children was empty, a lone page of newspaper blew between the swings and curly slide on a gentle breeze. After an hour or so of hover boarding on the walkways they decided to sit and chill as an impromptu tackle football game broke out between a large group of teenage boys in the part of the park that was for baseball during the summer months.

They got many appreciative glances and awkward hellos as they fumbled and ran and tackled each other. At the end of the game one of them, the biggest one, approached them as they sat on gray stone lined border dividing that side of the park from 15th street, his friends were already heading to some place else as he meandered his way over with a cocksure stride. Monica gave a smile that looked enticing but put Jane in mind of a shark.

188

“Hey baby, how about a date?”

“How about I cut off your balls and feed them to my cat?” she asked with the same lovely smile that radiated danger.

He went pale and walked away mumbling something.

“Do you even have a cat?” asked Jane who snorted with laughter.

“No but the way he looked at me makes think I should get one just in case.” she said sounding serious.

When the afternoon began to wane towards evening Monica re-shouldered her back pack as the sky became awash in pink. They walked slowly down 15th street with the park on their right and a Rite Aid on their left. They reached the corner where Moyamensing avenue cut diagonally across Oregon avenue, Jane felt a sadness fill her again as they stood there watching cars coming and going.

“Well I gotta split.” Monica said with long heavy sigh.

“Are you gonna come around again before you leave?”

“No, I’ve got a place to crash though,” she said with a slight grimace. “I still gotta do a few things yet before I can go.”

Jane nodded and felt empty like she had when her dad got put away. Without thinking she gave Monica a hug who hugged her back, Jane could feel her shaking from the fright of her coming journey. After the embrace Monica took a step back and looked like she wanted to say something, her face was a mask of sorrow.

“Be careful.” Jane said.

“Ditto, kiddo.” she said making Jane smile.

189

Monica looked east, towards Broad street behind them, where darkness was slowly overtaking the sky. She stared for a moment then looked back at Jane her eyes glassed over threatening tears, but she didn’t cry and took a deep watery breath before speaking.

“If you ever get to New England, look me up. OK.”

“Definitely.” Jane said though she believed she had a better chance of eating the cheese that made up the moon long before she’d ever be able to leave the country.

But she didn’t want to think about that. She just stood and watched Monica head for the Orange line subway station at the end of the block, which was a structure made of stone and Plexiglas that was opaque in some spots from years of filth and graffiti. Before Monica went down the steps into its maw, she turned backed and waved. And though Monica didn’t cry as she waved, Jane did as she waved back and watched her only real friend recede into the dark tunnel below.

Jane came home as the orange glare from the street lights bathed the neighborhood in a shade of apricot. Bubbles was watching the news and engaged in a lively discussion with the reporter on

the screen. And although she was getting softer and softer in the head, she noticed Janes sadness almost immediately.

“What’s the matter, Janey?” she said standing up from the couch quickly with a face that was ready to cry.

“Uh, nothing, grammy” she said caught off guard by Bubbles observation. “I’m just sorta tired.

I’m gonna lay down.”

Her hands held Jane’s arms gently her eyes were cloudy with senility but there was still worry for her grand daughter in them. Jane felt her sadness come down a little.

“OK...” Bubbles said looking confused for a moment.

“Here sit and finish watching the news. OK, Bubbles?”

“Oh OK. Do you want me to make you some pancakes? Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.”

190

“You did, Bubbles. It was good.” Jane said.

She replaced her gloomy face with a false smile that she hoped reached her eyes. She even rubbed her tummy a little to indicate how full she was. Jane went upstairs and spent the rest of the night in her room, playing her hand held halfheartedly and with an ear listening for a knock on the window but it never came.

She tried to stay awake late into the night, but by ten she was snoring away dreaming, again in the forest. The woods are thick with foliage and humidity, it’s nighttime and the forest creaks and moans with after dark sounds. She’s alone walking up a hill side so thick with trees she feels like she’s suffocating.

Just when she believes the forest is going to swallow her whole, there is a road or the remnants of one. It’s here she looks over head at the trees which were all bent unnaturally away from the old road, leaving open a section of sky directly above. She followed it for a long time, then she came to a high stone wall with a large iron gate at its center, Jane looked through the fence and up a hill where a massive home made of stone sat.

She felt her heart drop at the sight of it, as if she were about to take a deep plunge on a roller coaster. Jane could feel a dark evil wafting from that place like a scent and recoiled a little. She saw the windows of the mansion and thought they were they eyes of a mad man and their monsters of the night, its walls so big they touch the sky that has an upside down sickle moon frowning down on her, the sight of that made her stomach roil with bile. Then she heard footsteps coming from behind her, Jane turned an saw a pair of green iris’ staring at her from the darkness.

“Leave...” the witch said.

“Are you real?” Jane asked her.

“Leave Now!” the witch said as her eyes grew brighter.

Jane awoke to her room, her heart was beating unmercifully in her chest. The dream was so real she thought sitting up, she could even remember the sound of dead leaves crunching under her feet. She sat for a few minutes in bed replaying the dream again before it faded away, she had never had nightmares before.

191

The great house sitting in the forest like an evil creature was the worst part of the dream, though the witch scared her a little too. Hell maybe the witch was trying to scare her to keep her away from that huge ass mansion, maybe she could sense the evil in it too, unless she lived there. A sudden feeling of anger filled her as she dismissed it all, not just the dream but Monica’s story about the witch was well.

But as she showered and dressed she went through Monica’s story again. Someone broke them out, but a witch? What for, and wouldn’t those TL goons be burning them at the stakes on the local news if there really were witches flying around on broom sticks. So then it was just an ordinary lady that broke them out?

“Yeah. Could be.” she said to herself as she unplugged her hoverboard.

After a quick breakfast of cereal, she zipped up her hoody said bye to Bubbles and went out with her hoverboard. She seemed to think more clearly while gilding through the neighborhood. She felt bad doubting anything about Monica’s story. The whole thing made her stomach feel all twisted and rubbery.

She found herself back at Marconi park, it was colder today and no one was around. Although the trees were a diseased mess, at least the park was clean enough to hover. After a couple of hours or so of hip shooting around the elms and steel waste cans her cheeks were getting numb and she had a hunger for a slice of pepperoni pizza. She dug out some change from her pockets when she arrived and was given a thick and gooey slice of pizza on a paper plate.

She made quick work of the slice leaving only a sliver of crust and some crumbs. She went down the stoop outside just as Betty turned the corner at the same time bringing them face to face.

Betty looked embarrassed, in her hand she held her cellular and gulped.

“Hey, Jane.” she said meekly.

“Hey, what’s with you?”

“I, uh um I’m sorry.” she stuttered.

“What the hell are you talking about, Betty?” asked Jane not hiding her annoyance.

192

“I was waiting for you the other morning to walk to school. And I saw Monica leave your grammy’s house...” she blurted.

“What?”

“I told my mom cause I thought she was robbing her, so she called the police and she kept asking if it had anything to do with Frank getting hurt...I didn’t mean to tell... she went to Miss Regina, cause I told her she might be a witch...I was scared...” she sputtered trying to put herself in the best possible light.

“You ratted her out?!” Jane screamed.

“I didn’t mean...” Betty said teary eyed.

“You fucking bitch!”

Jane hit Betty right in the mouth swinging as hard as she could with a punch her dad taught her called a hook and relishing the sound of her yelp. Betty fell backwards into the The Pizza Shack’s rubber trash can saving her from cracking her skull on the pavement her brown hair all over her face. She bellowed out in a wailing cry that made her sound like a toddler. She held a hand to her cheek as blood coated her lips, Jane felt a surge of gladness at the sight.

“Hey, what are you kids doing?!” shouted someone nearby.

Without looking to see where the shouting came from, Jane jumped over a pair of cars parked bumper to bumper next to the sidewalk and tossed her hoverboard to the ground. She got on it pushing herself off one of the cars, though doing that could fuck up the engine, she didn’t have time to stick around. She went up the side streets as often as she could, avoiding Broad street altogether.

She ignored everything except the cars and people that were in her path. She didn’t come up Carlisle but instead on Rosewood which was one block over. She would go to Bubbles, but then what?

If the cops hadn’t been looking for her before they would be now, and the TL for sure. She was walking down Jackson street heading to Carlisle trying not to think about being caught when she was suddenly grabbed from behind and pulled into the alleyway she normally took to sneak into 193

her bedroom. Jane’s heart was in her throat and her eyes closed tight with terror until whoever grabbed her spoke.

“Shh, they’re at your grams house.”

“Monica,” Jane said feeling an almost instant relief. “what are...”

“You’re on the list.” Monica said with the same looked she had before leaving yesterday.

“I’m not surprised. Betty ratted you out to the police and the TL, she told them you robbed my grams house and about Frank.”

The thought of Bubbles brought alarm to her heart and she began to walkout of the alleyway.

Monica tried to hold her but it was useless.

“Don’t, they’ll see you.” Monica whispered fiercely.

“I just have to look.” she said with a quick desperate glimpse at her.

She came to the edge of the corner house and leaned over looking at the far end of the block were the house sat. Standing in the middle of the street was Miss Regina, glaring at the front of the house. The door to the house opened and two men wearing white coats were taking Bubbles out of the house, A police Packard was parked askew at the far corner with a cop standing beside it watching the exchange. She could hear her grammy crying and could see the tears soaking her cheeks that always put Jane in mind of bread dough.

Miss Regina walked forward and was speaking furiously and pointing at her like a student that was caught talking in class. Jane felt an icy dagger pierce her heart when she heard her grammy say: ‘No, no, my Janey is a good girl.’ The men with the white coats pulled her away towards an ambulance. Jane stepped back and turned to see Monica staring at her crying quietly.

“I’m sorry, please don’t hate me.” she said with a hitching breath.

“It’s not your fault. It’s like you said nothing lasts forever.” she said wiping her tears away.

194

A sudden whoop from a siren brought them out of their tears and they made their way quickly in the opposite direction of the house and the siren. They ran at first then Monica said: ‘Don’t run it’ll look suspicious.’ So they walked quickly heading south on Rosewood street.

“You came back.” said Jane.

“I checked the list, I don’t even know why I did. I had a bad feeling and… I don’t know, it’s my fault you’re on it. I had to warn you.”

They were quiet for a little while as they walked further and further south until Jane finally spoke.

“Where are we going?”

“The red monster.”

Jane looked confused, Monica smiled a little before explaining.

“There’s an old football field along Bigler street. On the top of the bleachers is an old broadcast booth with a busted door, we can wait there until dark.”

They skirted Marconi park walking down a small side street called Iseminger and came to a chain link fence separating Bigler from the football field, beyond the field was the Schuylkill expressway.

The grass was more than knee high in some areas and stunted to near bald patches in others, with a glittering blanket of broken glass strewn through out. The last football game to be played here might have been decades ago as far as either of them could tell. Monica led her to a section of link fence that was coming off and held it open for Jane after she stepped through.

They walked quickly through the abandoned field trying to walk among the taller weeds , the tiny shards breaking under their feet sounded as loud as gun shots to in their ears. They were looking everywhere at once as they reached the bleachers. They would be exposed to the houses lining Bigler briefly while they climbed up to the derelict broadcast booth.

195

Jane understood right away why they called it the red monster, the booth was made of metal siding that was corrugated and had been painted a deep crimson that still looked bright despite being exposed to elements for many years. The Plexiglas panoramic window was broken into pointy shards making it look like a mouth with big teeth, someone had even spray painted a pair of angry blood shot eyes above its plastic fangs. Once they were inside sitting out of view they felt more at ease.

Monica lit a cigarette looking close to tears again but didn’t let any fall. Jane felt her heart wince in pain when ever she thought of what might be happening to her grammy. Monica still had some blueberry Mad Dog and took a swig, she held it out to Jane but she declined.

“What do we, where do we go?” asked Jane who couldn’t keep the whine out of her voice.

Monica took a long drag on her cigarette before answering.

“You come with me, to New England. I gotta talk to somebody first though, tonight.

“You don’t have too do that.” Jane said though she was hopeful.

“We’re friends aren’t we? So yes I do have too, I know you’d do the same. So would Debra if she were still here.” she said in a watery breath.

When dark reclaimed the sky they walked north on 13th street, in the direction of Juniper street.

They felt naked walking across Snyder ave which was equal in size and traffic to Broad street which was semi busy despite the late hour on a Sunday. They came upon Juniper street which was lit with only one feeble street lamp at the opposite end of the block.

Monica led them to a building sitting in the middle of the other brick and mortar row homes looking like nothing more than a private garage. On the garage door written in black paint was the address; 2007 S. Juniper street. Just to the left of it was a regular door that looked heavy and impenetrable.

At eye level was a mail slot that was made of brass. Monica approached the door and gave a swift quick pound with a closed fist. After a few seconds that slot opened, behind it Jane could see a pair of eyes. The eyes glanced quickly on Jane before narrowing on Monica.

196

“What’s the word?” said a voice from behind the slot.

“Thunderbird.” Monica said.

“What’s the price?”

“Forty twice.”

The slot closed again, after a moment the garage door went up noisily with a rusty squeal and stopped so low they had to duck under it to get inside. They were in total darkness when the door went back down. Jane felt a blanket of fear creep over her when she heard movement somewhere.

Before she could react a light came on above their heads cast everything in bright yellow light. It was a small room made of concrete, it’s walls were covered with various posters of music

festivals from some long time ago as well as ads for pornographic films from California. There were also crates made of rough looking wood, some stack ceiling high along the walls as well.

At the far corner stood a hulking man with olive colored skin his black hair slicked back with a spicy smelling oil, giving him a sharp and shiny widows peak. He wore dark dress slacks and an open throat shirt, over his shoulder was rifle of some sort. Jane’s heart froze though the man held the fire arm in a non threatening manner and the look on his face was of boredom.

“Cover charge.” the man said holding out his hand.

Monica removed a few bills from her pack and handed it over. The man licked his thumb and swiftly counted. He nodded and put the bills into his pants pocket before walking to the opposite corner where a half dozen crates stood. Jane watched the man stick his hand back somewhere between the wall and the crates and heard the sound of metal clanking against metal.

Jane’s heart skipped a beat as the crates began to swing out revealing a hallway. In the distance music came out though it sounded muted. The large man nodded silently at them.

“Come on.” Monica said.

197

Monica led her down a dark hallway that was poorly lit by a hanging low watt bulb. They stepped through the hidden door, it slammed shut behind them loudly making Jane yelp.

“It’s OK, we’re safe here.”

“What is this place?” Jane asked as they walked closer to the music.

“It’s a rave.”

“A rave?”

“A speakeasy, a place to listen to music, drink, ya know whatever.”

They came to a door that was only wood, Monica opened it to a set of steps leading down. They were greeted by loud music and flashing colors of light. They walked down and came to wide dance floor where dozens of people were dancing drinking and laughing.

The room was filled with the smell of cigarettes and weed. Although Jane was shivering with fear, the sound of music and people just hanging around relaxed her. Even the lyrics of the music put her at ease.

‘When I hear music, it makes me dance,

you got the music, here’s my chance’

Jane even smiled a little as multi colored lights cascaded over everyone. At the end of the dance floor was a booth where the music was coming from. A man with a large head set stood in front of PC hooked up to a digital turntable, his head bounced up and down to the beat of the music.

The floor was made of wood and had a shine to it making the lights bounce everywhere at once.They skirted the dance floor and approached the door to the booth but were stopped by another hulking sharp dressed man though he didn’t carry any fire arms. He stood in front of the door with arms crossed.

“I need to talk with Darchimedes.”

198

The man was immobile and silent. Monica dug in back pack and removed money and shoved a sheaf of bills between the mans muscled forearms. He took the money and put it in his pocket without counting it and opened the booth door.

“D!” he shouted.

The man, although walled in by loud music, turned and looked at them. He turned back to his sleek turn table PC combo complete with tiny Thin Screen showing nothing but amber colored ones and zeros on a black background bouncing in sync with the music, and leaned out the booth missing it’s glass and tapped a black man standing in front of the booth.

“Take over for me.” he said as the black man quickly climbed into the booth through the window and put on the headset.

Darchimedes waved the two of them in before walking through a door at the back of the booth.The door and the room behind it were sound proofed with mattresses and egg cartons, though the set up looked useless, when the door closed the music was just a tiny din of noise.

The room was small and lined with posters similar to upstairs, though there was a fancy desk in the middle made of some bright fresh looking wood. There was only one chair sitting behind the desk, Darchimedes sat with heavy sigh eying the both of them closely.

He was short and dressed like a man in construction, a white t-shirt, jeans and work boots, he looked barely thirty though he came off as a man twice that age. His hair was short and on his face was just a hint of beard stubble giving him a handsome rugged look. He spoke before they could.

“Why are you here, Monica? I told you...”

“I need help...”

“We’ve had this discussion already. I gave you the money and you got the hell out if I remember correctly.”

“My friend, the TL is looking for her.”

199

Darchimedes laughed curtly as he leaned over on his desk, he removed a large bottle of red eye and a tumbler glass from a drawer and splashed some in, he took the shot and put them away again before speaking.

“Let me have the money I loaned you.”

It wasn’t a request, Monica looked back at Jane briefly. Darchimedes snapped his fingers quickly with impatience so she took the cash and handed it over to him. He quickly counted what was there as eyed them again and let the cash drop to the desk.

“There’s only four hundred and change here.”

“I needed to live while I...”

“Shut up!” he shouted making them both jump.

He leaned back in his chair with a nod and a look of disgust.

“You spend money I loaned you just to piss it away on some girl you can dike it out with.”

“It’s nothing like that she’s like my sister...”

He put his hand up and Monica was silent.

“Do you think I send a guy out on my fuckin boat just to save the freaks and the weirdos from the government?”

“It’s just one more person, can’t you just...”

“Hey, I’m doin you the favor not the other way around. You think that money just falls out of the fuckin sky?”

“Please, I’ll do anything.” she said weakly.

200

“Yeah, I know you would, problem is your fuckin attitude. You might be the queen of cool with those dumb ass kids you hang with, around here you annoy the fuck out of some of my people.”

He pushed the money away from him with a sneer.

“You bring the heat with you where ever you go. And you bring some little fuckin kid with her toy,” he said pointing at Jane making her feel about two inches tall. “ askin for free passage and have the balls to say it’s just one more person. I don’t know if you noticed I’m running a god damn business here not the fuckin underground railroad, that’s for the niggers trying to go west.

I’ve got competition from two legit casinos in this fuckin city on top of all the other assholes running their own operations.”

“Look, I know I’m not the fuck of the decade, D. But I’ve done my fuckin share of bringing you business and merch to peddle as your own. I’ve always done what you asked, whether it was robbing stores in Chinatown or hitting someone in some fuckin ghetto in West Philly. No matter how disgusting or vile the act I did it, maybe I didn’t have a fuckin smile on my face every god damn second, but I did it.”

Monica frowned but spoke with a confidence she’d had never felt inside her before. She dug in her back pack and pulled out a dagger with a shiny silver handle and held it up. Jane had never seen it before and felt her legs turn to water and threaten to spill her to the ground.

“You gave me this for protection, a god damn pig sticker to use in case some dirty fucker tried something. Of course they usually had a gun more often than not, but hey I guess my fuckin attitude kept you from giving me a gun. I’ve seen shit that would make you slit your wrists, so if I have an attitude too fuckin bad.”

She held the knife and with a quick stroke across an open palm she cut, Jane gasped at the blood.Monica squeezed her cut hand, drops of blood squirted between her fingers. Darchimedes grimaced but remained silent.

“I swear by my blood and the blood of all the fallen witches who died during the burning times, I will get my sister out of this country. If you don’t help me I’ll come over their cut off your cock and sacrifice it to a pagan goddess whose name you can’t even pronounce.”

201

Jane felt faint as her stomach was doing flip flops, surely he’d kill them both. Women didn’t talk that way to men ever, but Darchimedes only sighed and to Jane’s surprise followed it with laugh.

“Christ if you’d have been born a man and were ten years older you’d probably be running this place. Like I said before Monica you got balls. And you may be right, but only a little,” he said now pointing at Monica. “but witch or not you got a lot of heat on you and you can’t 50

put a spell on this place to protect me from the TL or the five oh. You can stay the night but you and your sister or whoever the fuck she is are gone in the morning.”

He went into his back pocket and from his wallet removed three one hundred dollar bills and placed them on his desk. He then wrote an address on the back underneath Butler’s tank, he also wrote Wednesday 11:15 PM and underlined it twice.

“Remember to say to him exactly what I told you.”

“Will this cover both of us?” asked Monica.

“I don’t know,” he shrugged. “that’s all I am giving you. If he wants more than that’s your problem not mine.”

Monica quickly grabbed the cash and put it in her pack. She gestured to Jane and they headed to the door.

“Monica,” said Darchimedes freezing them in place. “good luck getting out of here.”

Monica looked back at him but saw he was sincere, she nodded her head quickly and they went back to the dance floor. Jane helped Monica wrap her wounded hand in a bathroom that smelled of piss and bleach but was very clean otherwise. The cut looked brutal and bloody but the bleeding stopped after a few minutes of running cold water on it. Monica wrapped her hand in paper towels and produced a roll of duct tape from her pack to hold it in place.

“You got everything in that bag.” Jane said.

“Nah, not everything. Besides, duct tape, W-D 40, and Bic lighter are all you need sometimes.”

202

“Did you make that up?” asked Jane.

“No, that’s one of Howdy the Green’s philosophies.”

“Who’s Howdy the Green?”

“He’s a wizard, he has a whole bunch of names. You can only find him on the deep net, since he’s wanted by the government and the TL he has to stay in hiding. They say he can create video games and knows code and can talk to animals.”

Jane thought Monica was teasing her, but the look of reverence in her eyes when she spoke of the wizard was similar to the look she had talking about the witch.

“Do you believe in magic?” Jane asked.

“Absolutely,” she said with a smile. “do you?”

“Ditto, kiddo.”

“I need a drink.” Monica said with a laugh.

They came out of the bathroom and went to the bar on the opposite side of the dance floor and found a pair of stools side by side unoccupied. Monica ordered them both a tall glass of something called sangria. Jane was about to warn Monica about spending too much money for drinks, but the man tending the bar smiled and tipped Monica wink. Jane smiled shyly at Monica as she slid her hover board between them.

“He’s cool, he’s gay and I helped him get out of trouble with something having to do with it so I drink for free. Drink up, if you liked the Mad Dog you’ll love this stuff.”

Jane took a sniff and a tentative sip and was greeted with a taste of juice that was only half as sweet as Mad Dog but was very smooth and didn’t leave a sickening after taste. The music was too loud for talk, but Jane was grateful just to be with her friend and off the streets. The place was like a fortress against the world so she took a big gulp and belched loud enough for Monica to hear.

203

“Told you you’d like this stuff.” Monica said with a laugh.

Darchimedes was at the booth again creating music on the fly and mixing it with tunes you could only hear on First Amendment Radio. The song playing now had such a grooving beat Jane couldn’t help but weave her head to the rhythm.

‘tell me why,

I like the way you get me high,

so alive,

that you just make me wanna die’

The next song was fast and had furiously uplifting beats and lyrics.

‘welcome to the club now,

gonna pump it up now,

this is an emergency’

music is my galaxy’

After ten minutes Jane decided to get on the floor and start dancing though she had never danced before but the sangria made her not care in the least. Monica was dancing too after a few minutes as the lights washed everything in many shades of the rainbow. The music and adrenaline left a bright white noise in her ears so loud she didn’t realize the music had suddenly cut off.

Everyone was still and silent, looking confused, even Darchimedes looked a little lost. Then most of the colored lights went out leaving only the light from the bar and the DJ booth casting everything in shadows and indifferent yellow light. There was a sudden pounding followed by an explosion at the door leading back upstairs.Everyone screamed, Darchimedes ducked below the booth window and reappeared holding a large machine gun.

“Get down!” he shouted as a police SWAT team poured through the door carrying their own machine guns.

Darchimedes let loose a sweeping barrage of lead while he screamed, possibly killing of few of his own patrons as he took out some of the masked policemen. Jane was on the floor while screams and cordite filled the air as shots rang out overhead, she managed to crawl into the bar and bumped her head. In the swatches of light and shadow she saw her hoverboard and held it over her head as she frantically looked around for Monica.

204

Her mind was running so fast she didn’t realize she was vomiting up the sangria in a flood making her vision double from tears and sweat. She was hyperventilating when Monica suddenly was beside her pulling at her arm.

“ I had to get my back pack, come on, this way!” she shouted over the chaos of gunfire that gave the room a strobe light effect.

They crouched and ran towards the DJ booth when Jane was suddenly pulled back violently by her hair. She screamed from the pain as she fell backwards, a SWAT had her hair in a fist and was pulling her away. Monica with her dagger in hand charged with a scream and buried the blade into his stomach up to the hilt, he let go of her hair and collapsed shooting off a few rounds that whipped by Janes’ ear in a high ghostly shriek.

Monica had fallen herself but got up though she was very pale and slow in doing so. They crouched ran towards the foot of the DJ booth where Monica knew a false vent for an air

conditioner would lead them out, it was small they’d have to crawl but they would fit. Monica pulled it open and practically threw Jane in before following behind, she was breathing heavily as she replaced the vent cover, it was dark but far ahead was a faint blueish glow.

“Crawl towards the light, it’s one way.” Monica said giving her a light shove on her shoulder.

There was a smell of dust as they crawled, dust so thick Monica was coughing bad from it, as they went deeper the smell became rancid and dank. Jane was still sneezing as the air slowly filled with the taste and stench of long molded rot and awful. The vent widened out a little allowing them quicker passage.

As they drew closer the stench began to level off some and the blue light grew closer, making Jane think it was light from a TV. But that was silly, she knew just by the smell and the fact the speakeasy was below ground they were escaping to the sewers. The thought sent a chill racing down her spine as she thought back to an old story she heard from Mario (not a very reliable source, obviously) about a two headed monster living in the sewers and eating up homeless people and run away kids living in the subways.

He even made a fucked up joke about Megan Torelli getting eaten by one though no one really knew what ever happened to her even after four or five years since she’d gone missing. She was too young to recall knowing Megan though they lived in the same neighborhood, Jane shook the memory away remembering there were real monsters that were looking for them now. Jane double timed it though Monica sounded tired, coughing and out of breath from the smell no doubt.

205

“We made it.” Jane said sticking her through the opening.

Just a foot below was a cat walk hanging firmly like a bridge over many pipes of various sizes, over head were even more pipes though these were mammoth, every few feet a bare bulb hung by a chain casting blue light. The catwalk went both left and right of them, though they looked long and without end the left hand side had a exit sign chained to the railing with an arrow pointing to that end.

“The exit’s this way!” Jane said climbing out of the shaft feeling her leg cramps finally begin to subside.

Jane felt more of her fear drain as she looked towards end of the cat walking hoping they could still walk away unscathed. Jane turned back to hurry Monica up when she saw her arm hanging out of the shaft as if she were napping. Jane felt coated in ice and terror as she dropped her hoverboard and ran back to her friend, her sister.

The shaft was low so she had to kneel, Monica was still awake though she looked dead at first, her head sat awkwardly on her shoulder as she laid on her side . Her eyes were cloudy and the color was gone from her skin, her lips were a glossy red. Jane looked back into the shaft and saw a trail of blood which was coming from Monica’s body. Jane felt a knife of grief and sadness embed itself into her heart making it ache with each beat.

“How bad are you hurt?” she asked her face awash in tears.

Monica slowly lifted her hoody which revealed through the charred remains of her shirt a pair of holes in her upper chest oozing blood. Jane squeaked with anguish seeing the holes and realizing she was bleeding from the other side much, much worse. Monica talked but coughed spitting up blood, Jane tried to stop her but Monica needed to speak.

“I’m...sorry...didn’t mean for...you getting...dragged into...to my shit. It’s my fault...I bet Debra would be pissed…at me, ” she coughed a little harder a blood bubble formed and popped on her lips. “you gotta...take my pack...go meet the boat guy on Wednesday...he’ll be a young guy wearing a red hat...and he’ll ask about the weather...tell him it’s partly cloudy in Boston.”

“No, no,” Jane said holding Monica’s undamaged hand. “I can’t by myself.”

206

“Yeah you can,” she said fighting against another bloody cough. “when I told D you were my sister, I meant...it, you’re one of...the toughest girls I ever met...everybody in...the coven is...your sister and you would’ve...been in...our coven..for sure.”

“I’m glad I met you, Monica.” she said shaking so bad her teeth chattered.

“D-d-d-ditto, kiddo.” Monica said trying to smile as she gasped. “I’m cold t-t-t-oo, I’m so cold...I can’t stop sweating...”

Then she was silent, her head rolled back and her eyes were in shadows. Jane felt her heart shudder as she cried as quietly as she could, fearful again of being pursued. She hugged her body for a few minutes washing Monica’s cheeks in tears. She might have stayed longer, the thought of just leaving her to the rats filled her with a sick horror.

But the sounds of voices coming from the far end of the shaft brought her out her grief just enough to think. The exit was still ahead, and alone or not she had a ticket to freedom. She took Monica’s back pack and kissed her on the cheek.

“I love you, big sister.” she said and grabbed her board then hovered down the catwalk.

She had to pull her self along using the railing, her legs were too weak from drinking, dancing, and crawling through vents to wiggle her ankles properly. If it broke the engine, oh well, with out the charge pack the thing would become useless baggage once the battery died. Jane looked back every few seconds but she saw no one following.

Maybe the blood and Monica’s body stopped them from going any further. The thought brought fresh tears making her eye sight double, she quickly rubbed her eyes dry and buried her grief for later. Monica wouldn’t want her getting caught crying like a little girl.

Jane pulled herself along quicker and after ten minutes she came to a door that looked like the ones in her high school. It was too solid to hear through but they were behind her and hopefully they would stay behind. She turned the knob expecting it to be locked but it opened easily and she found herself facing a subway corridor that was empty.

At one end were steps leading down to the train tracks, at the other end was a set of wide tiled steps leading to the city above. The trains didn’t run in the middle of the night so she went for the steps leading out, she ran up them two at a time getting ready for the cold air to greet her.

They were push doors and she shoved one open wide not paying attention or looking through the door that was entirely made of glass.

207

The door swung and nudged the elbow of a uniformed police officer who was talking to a tall athletic looking young man wearing wearing a Pea coat with a TL armband sown on the sleeve.They both looked at her as Janes’ internal temperature went below zero, but with hardly missing a breath she said excuse me and walked on.

She calmly walked across the street passing a store with a large window that reflected the exit where the two men stood. The TL man watched her closely, and gestured towards her before walking in her direction. When she turned to look back the man went into a full out run after her, Jane jumped on her hoverboard and made her legs and ankles wiggle.

There were no parked cars between them and he had a straight shot but he tripped on the curb and fell to the ground. Jane flew down the sidewalk grateful for the lack of people at this late hour, she heard the TL man coming again and chanced a look back and saw that the cop he was speaking with joined in the chase and was gaining.

She saw a fire hydrant and grabbed it doing a perfect 45 degree hip shot and crossing the street into an open alleyway. It was too narrow and the ground was covered in trash and weeds so she kicked off it and ran to the end of the alley way before jumping back on again. As she hit the corner another cop appeared running full force at the same instant a Septa bus was making its night owl route, Jane muscled her her ankles and caught the bumper just as she started to hear the panting of the cop chasing her.

Jane smiled at her victory but it was short lived, as suddenly a TL ORV with its blue lights flashing and siren wailing began approaching the bus at a suicidal pace from behind. The bus driver in a panic hit the brakes as he tried to let the vehicle pass and did a wild turn sling shooting Jane down 15th street into the path if an on coming car. Luckily the car turned right into the parked cars as she turned left on the no parking side of the street and laughed.

She had slowed only the tiniest bit just to look back and see who was following when she was suddenly tackled to the ground by the athletic TL man. She tumbled to the pavement hitting her head on the curb and went into the darkness of unconsciousness. In the darkness though she could feel the pain ringing her head.

At some point in time her eyes opened, she was in the back of a vehicle laying on her back. Her left eye stung for some reason, she wanted to rub at it but lacked the strength. She then thought of Monica and the horrors she endured at Byberry. She panicked and tried to move, but suddenly a hand was around her neck.

“Be silent!” said a male voice.

208

She wept quietly and fell back into unconsciousness. Behind her eye lids was light trying to get through, she opened them an was in a room that was white and buzzed from above her. A white curtain attached to a rail on the ceiling was all she could see around her. Her head was felt like it was burning and itched unmercifully.

Her nostrils flared from the scent of cleaning chemicals. She struggled to move her head as it felt like she had been knocked in the skull with a sledgehammer. She had hardly made a noise when suddenly the curtain was pulled open, the rings holding it up clanged loudly along the metal track, Jane squinted in pain from the sound.

Miss Regina stood there with a pert smile and beady eyes, looking satisfied. She approached Jane and leaned over her so close Jane could see the peeling skin of her lips and felt her stomach turn at the sight. She was saying something, but it was gibberish in Jane’s ears, but Jane tried to speak. Instead she closed her eyes and fell away into blackness again.

When she opened her eyes again Miss Regina was gone, she saw the curtain again and realized she was in a hospital. Her head still felt like it was split in two and on fire but it was a little easier to move, she looked down and saw she wore a gown and was covered with a white thin blanket, to her left she saw an IV planted into her forearm. The tube was connected to a bag filled with blood hanging on a metal pole, though she wasn’t sure if they were taking her blood or was being given blood.

She closed her eyes from the burning and buzzing of the florescent bulbs trying to remember what had happened and slipped back beneath consciousness. She opened her eyes again, and the blood bag was gone but a bag with clear liquid was there now. She heard voices and lifted her head as much as she could in the direction of the voices. The curtain was mostly closed, there was a few inches of space showing the room, she could see an old man standing there. A man that looked so old he made Bubbles look young. He looked angry and was sneering at whoever spoke.

“I don’t care,” said Miss Regina. “you have no say.”

Jane heard a dusty creaky laugh and felt her body turn cold at its sound.

“But I do, fraulein.” the old man said in a heavy foreign accent.

“You dirty Hun, you can’t do this.”

209

“Ah but I can. See the lawyer here, he decides, you have friends, but mine are more powerful, fraulein.”

“Stop calling me that!” she shrieked which made the old man laugh.

She closed her eyes again and was washed over into darkness again. When she opened them again the curtain was closed but there were voices.

“Is this really that important, Dr Fischer?” said a male voice.

“Dah, she RH negative. Very rare, I’ll take as much as I need.”

“Will you hand her over to that woman after?”

“For what? They have plenty for their own amusement to torture. Nein, she has a better service she can perform.”

I’ll have to escape, she thought. She believed she could, that she would sneak out once the old man and whoever else was here left the room. Yes, she’d crawl out a window if she had too, even if she were a thousand feet in the air on top of a skyscraper downtown. They had fire escapes didn’t they?

She just needed to rest first, her head was still ringing and her eye lids still felt coated in concrete. Just a short rest and she’d be outie 5000 before anyone one knew. She fell back into darkness with relief that she had a plan, not worrying that the money and even her clothes were now gone.

She dreamed, even as some one came and got her out of bed and made her get dressed she dreamed of discovering magical places and creatures with her sister at her side. She sat on the bed wearing a black sweat suit in a soupy daze. A man dressed in a similar outfit came with a wheel chair and took her as she dozed in and out of sleep, as she rolled down a nondescript hallway her hand went up to the back of her head.

.A swath of hair had been shaved from her head, which began to burn again when her fingers caressed the stitches there, she cried while whoever pushed the chair remained silent. At some point she was in a vehicle with an engine that roared like a truck, she sat in the back alone as she opened her eyes. It was night, it felt warmer than it had been but she barely noticed. All she saw 210

was darkness surrounding her, she was silent as she tried to recall that happened and felt daggers of sadness pierce her body.

She wanted to cry but was filled with great terror, she had no desire to upset or anger whoever was driving, she was already in great pain. She lifted her head and saw through the windshield a dark road, and felt consumed with dread when she noticed the trees everywhere. She felt terror devour her when she looked through the passenger side window and saw the tops of the trees recoiling from the road as if offended. It wasn’t until she saw the iron gate and the great stone manor behind it, that she began to scream.

MY FRIEND BOB BY PETE BERTINO

THIS STORY IS COPYRIGHT PROTECTED 1/21/2020 PETER

JAMES BERTINO AUTHOR; AND MAY NOT BE REPRODUCED

WITHOUT PERMISSION FROM THE AUTHOR.

DEDICATION: TO BOB, WHEREVER YOU ARE, THANK YOU.

211

I was nervous about writing this, mostly because it sounds too outlandish to be real. I guess if I want to publish this story I’ll have to change some names and places. But for now I’ll just try to tell this story that I don’t totally believe myself and I went through it. I don’t know how to even write a story from my perspective.

Honestly, all of my novels and short stories have been in third person perspective. But that’s how I’ve always wrote stories since I was eight years old, I don’t know why but that’s the only way I can envision any story I tell. And I wish I could for this one, but it directly involves me and I felt like a I understood maybe half of what was going on. I’m getting ahead of myself though, let me just tell it as it happened. This is a story about my friend Bob.

My name is Seth Hooper by the way, you might be familiar with that name if you are a fan of the hit SyFy original movie Star Breaker which was based on my novel of the same name. But this story I am about to tell took place before all the success, when I was working in telemarketing.

I didn’t have a knack for journalism, I had been halfway through my first semester in Community College when I realized that. It’s not that I felt it was beneath me it was just not what I was into I didn’t enjoy it the way I did telling stories. After CC I was dating a woman named Heather and we got along well, or so I thought.

We didn’t get serious right away but we were living together within a year, I was usually cashiering in the neighborhood or going downtown to get temp work which was generally being a gopher for a construction site foreman or hauling furniture out of houses and apartments for moving companies to keep up with my half of the rent. I’m not very tall but my chest has always been bigger than my stomach I am proud to say and I could handle couches and cinder blocks with the brawniest of men. On the side I did write free lance articles, usually for new software for computers or video games. It was a pretty niche area at the time and this was before youtube so I wasn’t much more than a blogger that occasionally got paid to review stuff, and it wasn’t always money that I was paid.

So that doesn’t get you very far and it was something I did halfheartedly, it never matched the pure joy of story telling. I would spend an hour or so at least every day just writing. Heather was moving up in her line of work easily, she wasn’t the I want money type so don’t let me give you that idea first and foremost I was just...

“You’re so weird, you freak me out sometimes.” she said running a hand through her curly hair.

I cringed thinking she’d rip her hair out but she didn’t and just made a fist instead when she saw how confused I looked.

212

“What I look angry?”

“You don’t listen when I’m talking, you’re always daydreaming. You make these stupid faces whenever it happens”

“So what if I think my thoughts more than ordinary people. And besides you make faces all the time. When you get up in the morning and you pee you make a face like you’re having a stroke.”

Her brow furrowed as she tried to judge if I was being serious, she put her hands through her dark curls and clenched them into fists. I cringed again worrying she was gonna rip herself bald, I could feel my own scalp tingling with fright at the idea.

“Yeah,” I said feeling awkward. “so, I’m weird, you’re weird. We’re all weird...right?”

I had a dumb smile on my face, I could feel it stretch my cheeks like cheap rubber, as weak as my argument.

“Seth, I don’t want weird, OK? I need normal in my life, a normal partner. You keep going into your own world to make stories that are never going to get published. You don’t even have an agent.”

“Yeah, but...”

“Look you can’t spend time trying to create some make believe world no one is interested in reading, you need to get your head out of the clouds and stop this and focus on a real career.”

She was an Italian woman from South Philly, a lovely olive skinned girl from 9th and Ritner with short brown hair and brown eyes and she was a brutally honest woman, she was talking with her hands as well now and her eyes looked like they were on fire but threating tears at the same time. I knew right at that moment what she was saying was hurting her a lot, she saw she’d caught my eyes and continued.

“Seth,” she was pointing at her self and her accent was thickening which only ever happened when she was really angry or really upset. “I tried, I’ve been trying for a long time now. You have to give it up, it’s time to be normal now.” she stopped pointing and put her hands on her hips as her final word on the subject.

213

“Writing makes me happy.”