Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10|11

Part Eleven

Sitting in the surgery waiting room’s hard plastic chairs, Lori asked herself the question she knew her mother was thinking. Why did she care what happened to Doug? He barely had been a part of her life in the past, and after 10 years of forgetting him, suddenly she practically was forced into the strange world he inhabited. At least most of her friends who had given up their careers for men had fallen for relatively normal guys.

In a haze of determination she still did not understand, Lori had stood near the policeman who guarded Doug’s door, hoping to wear him down into letting her go inside. After her feet got sore without any hint of her plan working, she had given up the first round. Apparently her feminine wiles needed work, and she needed better shoes.

So, there she sat, waiting to see a man who it seemed needed more help than she could give.

A man with a slight, tight-lipped grin approached. He wore tan slacks, a brown and orange paisley tie with a burnt orange shirt, and stood more than six feet tall. He held a small spiral notepad in one hand and pushed dark brown hair from his forehead with the other.

The newcomer sat in the chair attached to the same end table as Lori’s. “Hello, I’m Detective Wallace Davies, Homicide. Is it okay if I ask you ladies a few questions?” He swept his dark brown hair off his forehead.

Nothing about him resembled the casually dressed detectives Lori sometimes assisted back in Ralston. That department didn’t have a separate homicide division, but she doubted that made a difference.

“You need to read us our rights,” said Lori’s mom.

Lori sighed. “Jesus H., Mom. He’s not arresting us.”

“Fine, then you do all the talking. This is your own deal, anyway. I’m not a part of it. And watch your language, young lady.”

“Excuse me, Mrs. Breden, but I believe the victim died in your vehicle,” the detective said.

Lori’s mom pursed her lips, turned her head away, and held out her hand, palm flat and fingers straight.

“That means she’s finished talking, Detective Wallace.”

“That’s Davies.”

“Davy’s what?”

“My name is Wallace Davies.”

“Oh, sorry. To answer your question, yes, it was Mom’s car, but she just came to pick me up at the DART station.”

“Why were you transporting one…” he referred to his notes. “Doug McGruder?”

“He had some kind of attack on the train.”

“So you two were traveling together?”

“No. We just happened to be on the same train. I used to know him back at UHD. I think he had passed out drunk or something.”

“UHD?”

“University of Houston Downtown.”

Wallace wrote in his notebook. His eyelids closed halfway and his mouth gaped open as he drew in two quick breaths. He turned his head quickly and sneezed into the fold of his arm.

“God Bless you,” Lori said.

“Don’t you mean, ‘Jesus H.?’” her mother said.

Lori growled and stood. Why didn’t her mother just leave if she was going to be so difficult? “Detective, can we please go somewhere else to talk?”

“Sure. You want to grab a coffee in the cafeteria?”

——-

Wallace “Wall” Davies sat in The Gourmet Bean, a coffee shop adjacent to the hospital’s cafeteria. A man wearing a blue hospital gown sat at a nearby table, a tube from his arm leading to an intravenous drug bag hanging from a wheeled stand.

“I guess some people just gotta have their coffee,” Wall said.

Across from Wall sat a young woman who looked equal parts frightened and uncertain. He had seen it before. A guy she’s interested in gets wrapped up in a possible murder charge and she’s torn between spilling what she knows or covering up to give him a second chance.

“Detective, I want to tell you everything I know about Doug, but without my mom around. Some of it’s kind of embarrassing.”

Sometimes his first guess was wrong.

“Oh. Okay, Lori. I’m here to hear you.” He almost cringed after he uttered the phrase that one of his superiors had used during interviews. Now that he was the lead, he was doing some of the things he had sworn he never would.

“He told me on the DART this morning that he didn’t have this sensitivity to sunlight when we knew each other, but now that I’ve had time to think about it, things are making sense. Really adding up, you know? I mean, I didn’t think anything about it back in school, and I hadn’t even seen him since then.” She stopped and took a slow sip from her latte, cradling the large mug in both hands.

“I was walking on the sidewalk in front of the student center one night and this guy pulls up in his car. Doug. Out of the blue he says, ‘You doing anything tonight?’ We had a night class together the semester before, and I always thought he was nice and funny, but he had a girlfriend.

“I got in the car with him. He drove us to his duplex and we made out. It was like all of this pent-up attraction came out at once. After we went as far as I would on a first date we just hung out and talked all night.

“Everything was going great, and then he looked at his watch and said it was time for him to take me back to my dorm. Said he didn’t do sunrise on a first date. Too special, or something. After that I didn’t see him again.” She looked down at her latte and swirled the mug, seemingly mesmerized by the taupe liquid’s movement. “I just figured he decided he didn’t like me.”

Wall took another sip of his plain, black coffee. “Did he ever show any signs of being violent? Like he’s capable of what happened this morning?” he said.

“No, not that I saw. But there’s something he said in the car that’s been bothering me. I laughed it off at first, but it’s like all these things I knew about him back then add up with what I know now.”

“What did he say?”

“That he’s a vampire.”

Wall gulped down the rest of his coffee and banged the mug back to the table.

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9|10

Part Ten

Cooper and Hunter ran between the few cars that had straggled into the intersection. Traffic sat still at all four lights. Some motorists honked their horns and yelled for others to get out of the way. “Haven’t you ever seen a wreck before, idiots?” a man shouted.

Not one quite like that, Cooper guessed. At least not the way he and his friend had seen it, anyway.

“That was totally messed up, Coop! That just ain’t right.” Hunter yelled, a frightened edge in his voice that Cooper didn’t recognize coming from him. He stopped in the corner convenience store’s parking lot and leaned over to vomit between his shoes.

Cooper, unsure whether he was short of breath from exertion or terror, took a moment to slow his breathing. “I know, man.”

“That guy is some kind of monster,” Hunter said and spit repeatedly to clear his mouth. “He ripped his neck apart with his teeth.”

“I’m never going joyriding again. This proves we shouldn’t have done it.”

“So, you think that was some kind of punishment?”

“First we have a crash, then a guy with a gun takes us hostage. But, and this is the kicker, we’re saved by a vampire or whatever the hell that was,” Cooper said.

The boys sat on a curb near a bright yellow, coin-operated machine. On it was a coiled black hose and large black letters spelling, “AIR.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s God’s retribution.”

“You know what that word means?”

“Shut up, Coop. This is no time to be a superior prick.”

“Fine.”

Cooper turned his head and took in the scene. The man who had killed the gunman still lay still under the afghan, but the ladies with him kept their distance. The family from the minivan sat on the sidewalk across the way, caddycorner, and watched what was happening. The hurt guy with them was talking, but he didn’t look so good. The kid wasn’t crying anymore. That helped a little.

A police cruiser pulled into the lot and screeched to a stop so close that Cooper felt the heat from its engine. The officer from the driver’s side bobbled a bullhorn and held it up to his mouth. Squealing feedback echoed off the surrounding buildings. He fiddled with a knob on the device and tried again. “Please, all those involved in the accident, stay where you are. Everybody else, please clear the area.”

His partner, the heavier of the two, lumbered from the passenger’s side and shot the boys a severe look. “Damn, Bennet, try not to hurt yourself with that thing. You already almost ran over these kids.” He then strode stiffly to the center of the intersection, where he directed traffic around the accident victims and damaged cars.

Sirens approached from the left and from behind. Fire trucks, ambulances. Cooper didn’t know. Things that rescue people.

——-

Doug was in pain, but he had felt worse. The storm clouds had moved in at just the right time, so he most likely would survive, but now that his secret was out he wasn’t sure how much of a life that would be. He opened his eyes.

He was in a stark white room without windows, tucked into crisp white sheets on a bed with metal rails. A television, turned off, hung from a hinged metallic arm on the wall. He smelled disinfectants and latex. “Hospital. Shit.”

Doug found and depressed the call button. A nurse skittered in moments later. With a professional yet warm demeanor she wrapped a blood pressure cuff around his left arm and pulled her stethoscope up to her ears. She placed the other end of the stethoscope against the inside of his arm just below the cuff and gave a black rubber bulb several quick squeezes. The cuff tightened.

“Could you please tell me what’s going on?” Doug said.

She held up her index finger indicating for him to wait. The cuff gradually loosened while she concentrated. When it went completely slack she noisily opened it and pulled it off his arm.

“I only know that you were brought here by EMT’s earlier today. We couldn’t make out your blood type so it’s a good thing you didn’t need any. Strangest thing, though. Usually that’s so easy to tell,” she said.

“I’m pretty much a universal recipient.”

Doug considered again her words. “I was injured?” he said. “In the crash?”

“I don’t think so. Turned out we didn’t find any open wounds, so that blood on you wasn’t yours. It’s amazing how fast your skin healed from the burns.”

“What else do you know?” What did any of them know?

“About what happened? Nothing. But, there’s a policeman standing watch outside your door. Probably on account of that blood not being yours. And, a young lady has been asking to see you, but he won’t let her.”

Doug suspected the nurse wasn’t telling him everything. The doctors probably found his blood very unusual and it would be only a matter of time before he was being poked and prodded in ways he preferred not to imagine. If not by doctors, then certainly by the inmates wherever he ended up after his inevitable murder conviction. He hoped maybe he could avoid the latter by claiming his actions were heroic. That would leave him battling only the doctors.

——-

Detective Wallace Davies sat on an orange plastic chair in the surgery waiting room, next to two frightened parents and their toddler son. It was his first homicide case as the lead investigator, and it had started out weird.

“So, Mr. and Mrs. Cody, you don’t know why the victim was allegedly chasing your friend, Blake Leftkowitz?”

“Neighbor,” Mrs. Cody said. “He was just our neighbor. And, please, call me Liz.” She pointed to her husband, who was pinching their son’s nose. “He’s Alex.”

They were sitting in a hospital waiting for him, but he wasn’t a friend? “Okay, your neighbor. Any ideas why someone might come after him?” Davies said.

Alex spoke up. “He demanded that we take him to Defensor. Said Blake could get him inside.”

“Were you aware of the sensitive nature of Mr. Leftkowitz’s job?”

“No. We knew where he worked, but last I heard from him he didn’t have any security clearance yet. Like Liz said, though, we barely knew him,” Alex said.

“But you opened his vehicle door and turned off the headlights and the ignition?”

“I’m a good neighbor and I didn’t want his battery to go dead.”

“But you left the keys in the vehicle?”

“I feel awful about that.”

“Well, if the stories I’ve heard are true, that was the best thing you did all day.”

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9

Part Nine

Sharp pain filled Blake’s head and everything on his left side. He hoped that they were out of danger now, after he had dragged them into his problem. The man who had carjacked them, flanked by two teenaged boys who had emerged from Blake’s Endeavor, stood with his back to Blake. He spoke to two women who assisted a figure enshrouded in a colorful, handmade blanket. The latter three had climbed out of the Toyota Matrix that had struck the minivan head-on.

Thunder provided an aural reminder of a storm’s impending arrival. Darker clouds rolled in and blotted out the sun.

Blake lay on the sidewalk next to little Reid, who still sat strapped into his car seat while his parents attended to him. His crying had stopped. Alex whispered something to Elizabeth and then sat down next to Blake.

“How are you?” Alex said.

“At least as bad as I look,” Blake said, pain shooting through his head with each word.

“No comment. Help should be on the way soon, man. Just keep talking to me.”

“‘Just keep talking?’ Damn, I must look worse than I feel.”

The man who had shot at him got more animated with each moment that he talked to the ladies and Blanket Mummy.

“Probably. So, what do you think they’re talking about? And why is that guy wrapped in an afghan?”

“No idea. I wish we could help them.”

“Well, you can’t, but I could,” Alex said.

“Don’t even think about it. I don’t want Reid losing his daddy because of me.”

“Where’s a damn ambulance?” Alex said to nobody in particular and stomped his heel on the sidewalk.

“Do we even know for sure that someone has called this in?” Elizabeth said.

“I’d be surprised if there’s a person at this intersection who hasn’t,” Blake said.

He lay there wondering if what he suspected could really be true. “You know, I think that’s my truck that hit us,” he said.

“What?” Alex said, then turned to look. “Oh, God, I feel terrible.”

“Why?” Blake said.

“Before we left I noticed that the keys were in it and I just left them there. I checked to see if you were home, though.” He looked at Blake, then at Reid. “This is all my fault.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Blake pointed at the odd group in the intersection. “He’s the reason my keys were still in the truck. I just finished cleaning it up and raising the windows when he took a gun to me.”

“That’s so scary. What did he want?” Elizabeth said.

Alex gently pinched Reid’s nose. The boy laughed. “If it’s none of our business, just say so,” he said.

“That’s fine. Actually, I –” Blake began.

“Hey, something’s happening,” Elizabeth said.

Blanket Mummy almost fell, but stayed on his feet thanks to his helpers. The gunman and the two teens walked quickly toward the Toyota Matrix.

——-

Lori and her mother tried to restrain Doug as he struggled to follow his attacker. He pulled free of them, afghan trailing on the street. He worked free of it as he walked, then ran toward her mom’s car. The yarn’s bright colors piled onto the asphalt just as the first raindrops fell.

“Doug, stop!” Lori called.

“If he wants to get himself killed, then let him. We did all we could,” Lori’s mother said.

In a weird moment, Lori wondered if her late grandmother, who had passed down her knitting skills, was looking down to see her legacy lying on the wet, dirty pavement. The rain poured now.

The Toyota’s starter turned over but the engine did not respond. Doug reached the car and entered through a back door. Lori could not see what happpened next, but she never would forget the screaming. Although the man cried out only once and very briefly, the teens shrieked in horrified shock as they escaped the car and splashed their way through traffic to the nearest corner.

Doug burst from the car and bolted toward the afghan, emitting a sustained primal yell all the way. Blood covered his chin and the front of his shirt. He put the soaked afghan over his head and collapsed on the glossy black street.

Although Lori’s instinct to run and help was strong, instead she and her mother stepped back several paces. Doug McGruder had changed a lot since college. Lori felt her socks getting squishy.

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8

Part Eight

“Oh, God. Mouse,” Blake said. His faithful canine companion of 10 years lay still on the minivan’s floor.

Pain ran up Blake’s left side, from his feet to his head. He couldn’t see out of his left eye, and the world was blurry. Two white blobs, presumably airbags, blocked his view out the front. He gingerly touched his ribs on his left side and, after nearly passing out from the pain, looked at his blood-smeared fingertips. To avoid hurting more, he ignored the urge to move his left leg or arm.

Two-year-old Reid wailed, “Mommy!” between tearful sobs.

“It’s okay, baby. Everything’s… gonna be all right,” Liz sang from the front passenger’s seat. She seemed to be working to free herself from her seatbelt.

Still not convinced, Reid kept crying.

Alex unbuckled his seatbelt and worked to open his door. “Hush little baby, don’t you cry. Daddy’s gonna sing you a lullaby,” he sang. He continued his struggle and the song as the child’s cries grew louder.

Doug turned enough to see whether he still was being held at gunpoint. The man who moments before had shot at him lay motionless and face-up against the back of Blake’s and Reid’s seats, cradled by a cushy bed of trash bags filled with clothing, stuffed animals, and toys. Blake slowly reached out his right hand and pushed on the man’s chest. Somewhere below a high-pitched, badly sampled voice enthusiastically called out, “I love you.” The man didn’t move.

Between Reid’s squalls came the sound of a grown man screaming, but it wasn’t anyone in the minivan. Somebody in one of the other involved vehicles was wide awake and suffering.

Liz finally escaped her seatbelt and crawled over the console to her son. She stroked his head and said, “There, there, sweetie,” in soothing tones.

Someone outside the van shoved the rear passenger door open along its track. It was Alex. “Leave him in his seat,” he said.

“But he needs us,” Liz said.

“He might be hurt. It’s best to just take his car seat out with him still in it.”

Liz released the belt holding the boy’s seat and Alex deftly lifted Reid out the door. She followed them.

“Here, take him. I’m going to see about Blake,” Alex said.

Elated that he was no longer a hostage, Blake lifted his right arm just enough to give a thumbs-up. Then everything went black.

——-

Just like in his nightmare in the church, Doug felt the flesh on his legs was on fire. He screamed at first, then ratcheted it down behind clenched teeth. His head and arms still were covered and he was slumped face-down over something hard. A dull ache started building behind his forehead.

“Mom? Doug?” Lori called, from Doug’s left.

Lori’s mother groaned from the right. “Is everybody okay?” she said.

“No, my legs,” Doug moaned. “Uncovered.”

He felt two hard objects dig into his back, and then the excruciating burning sensation on his legs gave way to the pain of after effects. The two objects (elbows?) lifted from his back.

“There. Better?” Lori said.

“Yes, thanks,” Doug said. “What did we hit? A Mac truck?”

“Minivan,” Lori said.

“My face hurts,” Lori’s mother said. “Better than hitting the windshield, I guess.”

“Let’s get out of the car,” Lori said.

Doug vowed never to risk getting caught in daylight again, and to avoid drunken nights with people who didn’t know his condition.

——-

“Come on, Coop, we gotta check on the people in the van,” said Hunter.

Cooper stood, leaning over with his hands on his thighs. He thought he was going to be sick. “I can’t believe you hit them. You weren’t even watching where you were going,” he said.

“I already saw some of them get out. They’re probably fine.”

The two teens waited for a clearing between passing cars and then ran over to the minivan. As they approached Coop saw the driver’s side had taken heavy damage, especially above and behind the rear wheel. The large window above the wheel was gone, but there was barely any glass on the road below. Confused, Cooper forgot about it when he saw the man seated inside.

He sat bloodied and in a daze while a man on the passenger’s side of the van urged him to get up.

“Blake, we have to go. He could wake up any minute. Come on.”

Bloody Blake moved slowly toward the door to take the other man’s outstretched hand.

Who could wake up? “Oh, shit, look,” Cooper said, pointing to an unconscious man sprawled out in the back. “That guy needs help.” The man opened his eyes and with great effort turned his head to look at him.

Cooper and Hunter dashed around the van and started to squeeze past the two men.

“Stay away from him. He’s dangerous,” said the man helping Bloody Blake.

“Bump that, man. I feel bad enough. I’m not about to let that guy die in there,” Hunter said.

Both his arms assisting his friend, the man had no way to stop them, and made no attempt. “Just, please, stay away and let the authorities handle him.”

“Whatever, dude,” Hunter said as he and Cooper ducked inside.

“You boys are my saviors,” said the man they had come to rescue. “Take me to your vehicle and drive me away from here.”

“Sorry, but our ride’s out of commission,” Hunter said. “Besides, don’t you need a hospital or something?”

“No, no doctors. No police.”

Cooper and Hunter kneeled to allow the man to throw an arm over each boy’s shoulders. They hauled him to the door and stood, then set him down on the floor with his legs dangling. He pulled out a gun, careful to keep it concealed between his legs.

“Easy, man. We just came to see if you’re okay. We don’t even know these people,” Hunter said. “Right, Coop?”

“Right.” Cooper said and looked back to find if somebody was watching.

“As I said before, you two will take me away from here. I don’t care which vehicle you use, but we can’t stay for the rest of this party.”

Cooper thought he must be having a nightmare. He was even more sure of it when from a smashed Toyota emerged a person wrapped in a brightly colored afghan, escorted by two women.

——-

“Mom, you’ve got to hold it shut or he’ll burn,” Lori said. Already angry at herself for following too closely while driving, she was taking her frustration out on her mother.

They pulled Doug from the car and guided him while trying to keep the afghan light-tight.

“Don’t scold me. I came to pick you up at the station and then all this happens. I’m beginning to hope I’m still at home in bed, dreaming all of this.”

“Sorry, ma’am. I didn’t mean to cause you trouble,” Doug said from behind his yarn veil.

“Vampires, men with guns. I think I’m losing it,” Lori’s mother said.

“He’s not a vampire, mother.”

“Umm — ” Doug began.

“Hey, lady, does your car run? This guy’s hurt real bad and we need to rush him to a hospital,” said one of two approaching teenagers with a man following close behind.

“The EMT’s should be here soon,” Lori’s mother said.

“He can’t wait.”

“You’re not taking her car,” Lori said. “You’ll have to wait like everybody else.”

“I don’t think you understand how important this is,” said the other boy.

“Kiss off,” said Lori’s mother. “My day’s already turned to shit and I’m not letting you take my car.”

Doug laughed.

The man with the boys flashed a gun and fired twice, with a sound not exactly like Hollywood’s guns with silencers, but similar enough that Lori knew what had happened. He tucked the gun away just as quickly.

Doug slouched. Lori and her mother caught him before he hit the ground. They strained to stand upright.

“Now ladies,” the man said. “Do we understand the urgency?”

“Oh my God. You just… oh my God. Doug!” Lori shrieked.

“Shut up now or someone else gets hurt,” the gunman said calmly.

Lori sobbed. Her mother stood still, apparently in shock, but held onto Doug.

“They keys are in it,” Lori said.

The man prodded the boys and made his way behind them to the Toyota. She tried not to think of what would happen if it didn’t start.

“Doug, can you hear me?” Lori said.

“Yes,” he whispered back.

“Help should be coming.”

“I’m fine. Well, except for these third-degree burns from the sun. Now, just point me toward that trigger-happy asshole and you and your mom will get your money’s worth. Be ready with the blanket, though.”

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6|7

Part Seven

Cooper sat in the passenger seat of the “borrowed” Mitsubishi Endeavor. His lifelong friend Hunter drove. This was the craziest thing they had done, but denying it was fun would be lying to himself.

“Donuts, here we come!” Hunter said.

“And then the Comic Con, right?” Cooper said.

“What?”

“Star Wars Fan Days Two. It’s free.”

“Coop, we’re not going to a sci-fi geek-out today. Going and parking this thing kind of defeats the purpose.”

Defeated was exactly how Cooper felt. Why had he gone along on this ride in the first place? “Wasn’t it kind of dumb to take a car from our own neighborhood? How are we going to get it back without anybody noticing?”

Hunter sighed. “Coop, Coop, Coop. How many times have you heard of joyriders taking the car back to where they found it?”

“None.”

“Exactly. Now relax and get out your cash for donuts.”

“I didn’t bring any cash,” Cooper said.

“Shit, man. I guess I have to handle everything.” Hunter opened the console between the front seats and looked inside. “Aha.”

“What?”

“He’s got one of those coin organizer things built in. Must be at least three dollars here.”

Cooper looked up in time to see a red light for their lane.

“Hunter! Stop!”

——-

Blake sat in the middle row of the minivan’s seats, his dog Mouse on his lap. Behind him sat a man he did not know, holding a gun and telling everyone what to do. His only idea for situations like this — running — was out, so although he had no relationship with God to speak of, he did what came naturally.

Blake prayed. He asked God to protect not only him but the family who had stopped to help. Although he had lived next door to them for nearly a year, he had not bothered to get to know them. After finishing he opened his eyes and looked over at Reid, Liz and Alex’s two-year-old son, strapped into the seat next to his. The toddler had stopped crying, but tears still streaked his face.

“You will drive me to Defensor,” said their captor.

“Just let them go, please,” Blake said. “They don’t work with me. They don’t know anything.”

The man in the back pulled a children’s toy from a trash bag and waved it in front of Reid, who happily squeezed it. The toy bleeped and blooped and blinked red lights. “If they cooperate, they will not be harmed. The actions of individuals today will be irrelevant once I have carried out my mission.”

“I don’t know why you think I can help you. I don’t even have level five clearance yet,” Blake said.

“No, but you can get me in the building, Leftkowitz. Once I am inside, I have other methods to get what I need.” Then, to Reid, “That’s a good boy.”

“Alex, Liz. I’m sorry for getting you involved,” Blake said.

“How sweet,” said the man. “Somebody’s bucking for the Neighbor of the Year award.”

Still aiming the gun at Blake with his left hand, the man continued playfully shaking the noisy toy near Reid’s outstretched hands. The little boy’s tiny fingers batted at it, just short of satisfaction.

Alex turned around in the driver’s seat. “Leave our son alone,” he said firmly.

Blake noticed movement out of the corner of his left eye and turned to look. He was dumbfounded to see his own SUV run the red light and head straight for his side of the van.

——-

Lori’s mother climbed out of her blue Toyota Matrix to greet them. She looked puzzled.

“I’ll tell you when we get in the car,” Lori said. “We have to keep him covered.”

The two women Lori believed were suburban prostitutes smiled at her mother as they approached the car holding up loose ends of the afghan. Her mother held open the back door while Lori and her newfound friends worked to tuck Doug safely into the backseat. Once the enshrouded Doug was seated, Lori closed the door.

“Thank you, ladies. You’ve been very kind,” Lori said.

The two women turned on their high heels and clopped their way to their respective vehicles. Lori wondered what their haul was from the night before.

“What’s going on, honey?” her mother asked. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, Mom. I’m fine. It’s Doug I’m worried about.”

“I’ll be fine,” Doug said, his voice muffled behind the tightly woven yarn.

Lori, who preferred not to have her mother behind the wheel, settled into the driver’s seat and smiled as she pulled out into downtown Plano traffic. “We’ll get you to whatever help you need for your… um…” she trailed off.

“I know you’re probably wondering,” Doug said. “So I’ll just come out and tell you. I am a vampire and if it weren’t day time you both would be my unwitting concubines by now.”

“Very funny, Doug. That is one thing I remember about you,” Lori said. “So, Count Dracula, how do you make a living?”

“I barely have to anymore. I have a free place to live by way of a dead uncle. At my job I work hours that don’t require me to go out while the sun’s up. Count Dracula’s a myth, by the way. We real vampires don’t take much to tales about him.”

“You still didn’t tell me what kind of work you do.”

“I’m a web designer,” Doug said.

“Which plays right into your need to work weird hours.”

“Precisely. You’re as smart as you were back in college. I look forward to biting your neck.”

Lori’s mom looked worried. “Don’t be scared of this guy, Mom. He always loved a good joke.”

“That’s not what’s bothering me,” her mom said. “Look.” She pointed to a minivan directly ahead as it approached an intersection.

Lori looked. She saw a man in the back of the van, apparently sitting atop full garbage bags, and in front of him were three more adults and a toddler. “Looks like a normal family ride to me,” she said.

“That man in the back. I think I saw him wave a gun,” her mom said.

A gray SUV plowed into the minivan’s back left corner, spinning it to face Lori, then struck another SUV and stopped.

Lori swerved to miss the wreckage, but caromed off a car in the adjacent lane and smashed head-on into the minivan’s grill.

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5|6

Part Six

“The wheels on the bus go ’round and ’round, ’round and ’round, ’round and ’round,” sang the woman on the children’s music CD. The minivan’s speakers blared her voice and those of her prepubescent backing vocalists.

“I don’t suppose that as the driver I could get you to move that music to the rear speakers, could I?” Alex said.

“Sure.” Liz pushed and then turned the audio control knob on the Odyssey’s CD player. The volume faded from the front speakers. She turned to look at the toddler strapped by five-point harness into the back seat. “Reid, sweetie, can you still hear it?”

“Yes, Mommy.”

“Oh, Christ!” Alex yelled.

The van swerved, jostling Liz hard enough that she hit her head on her window. They stopped, tires squealing. “Ow! What the hell?” Liz said.

“Some idiot just ran out into the road, and I think he’s carrying a dog,” Alex said, checking his side mirror. “Hey, don’t do that!”

A banging sound came from the back of the van. Despite the sharp pain spreading through her head, Liz turned to find the source.

Their neighbor, Blake Leftkowitz, ran up to the driver’s door carrying his little dog and looking like he had just been in a paper cut battle. Thin, shallow lacerations — some tiny, some several inches long — covered his face and his arms. Sweat mud covered his face and rivulets streaked his cheeks, as if he had been crying.

“It’s Blake,” Alex said and lowered his window glass.

“Please, you have to help me. A man is trying to kill me,” Blake said between labored breaths.

Liz’s mouth dropped open. “Why is he — ?”

The rear glass on the driver’s side shattered. The adults ducked. Little Reid started crying.

“What was that?” Alex said.

Blake glanced over his shoulder, then back at Alex. “He’s shooting at me. Please, let me in.”

Alex punched a button left of the steering wheel. The passenger’s side rear door clunked open and whined slowly along its track, obviously unaware of any urgency. Blake scrambled around the front of the minivan and dashed inside the open door.

The driver’s side mirror shattered.

“Don’t move or I will shoot someone instead of something.”

A man walked up to the van, his gun aimed through the broken window at Reid. “Do as I say.”

——-

“See, I told you, man, the keys are in it,” said Hunter Martin. He was a 17-year-old with little to do but spy on his neighbors, and today had been no exception.

“How did you know?” said Cooper Stahl, Hunter’s sidekick since second grade.

“I pay attention, Coop. I heard the guy next door telling his wife about it before they left. Nobody was home when he tried the front door. It’s perfect.”

“But when was that?”

“About 15 minutes ago, before we finished playing Fall of Man. Come on, let’s do this.”

Hunter shot his eyes at the surrounding houses. He opened the door to the SUV and climbed into the driver’s seat.

Cooper grabbed the door. “Dude, don’t do that. It’s one thing to move somebody’s patio table or unhook their grill from the gas. We’re not car thieves.”

“Car borrowers, Coop. Come on, you think I can afford to put gas in my dad’s truck?”

“We could just siphon the gas,” Cooper said.

Hunter turned the key and the ignition brought the engine to life. “No adventure in that. Now get in or get out of the way.”

Cooper let go the door and held up his hands. “Let the record show that I’m doing this under protest.” He walked around and climbed into the front passenger’s seat.

“Let the record show that you’re an ass-bite,” Hunter said.

——-

The DART train stopped.

Doug shook under the afghan. He couldn’t see anything and he was hot, but at least his skin wasn’t burning. He struggled to remember what happened after he and his friends arrived at the park the previous night.

“My mom said there’s room for both of us in her car,” Lori said.

He had not seen Lori Breden since college. If she harbored any romantic feelings for him this would go a long way toward helping her shed them.

“Okay, thanks,” he said.

“So, how can we move you?” Lori said.

“I have to keep all my skin out of the sun. You’ll have to guide me.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll keep the way clear for you,” said a man’s voice Doug didn’t recognize.

“Great. Thanks,” Lori said.

Doug squirmed out from under the seats and used one of the support poles to pull himself up. Wordlessly, Lori worked to keep the afghan wrapped around everything but his shoes. At some point as she led him, he felt more than one set of hands doing the work.

“Whoever’s out there, thank you,” he said.

“You’re welcome” came in various forms and voice ranges.

Following Lori’s lead, he stepped carefully down from the train and onto a sidewalk. The air seemed fresher than it did downtown. Birds chirped and a cicada or two still called out for a mate.

“You’re going to make it, Doug. You’ll be just fine,” Lori said.

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4|5

Part Five

A man sitting in the front seat of the train car shrieked. “It burns!” he yelled. The passengers sitting near him recoiled as if something might indeed be on fire.

The man tucked his arms inside his tee shirt and buried his face in his chest. “The sun! Help me!” he shouted.

Lori grabbed the afghan she had been knitting and shuffled and nudged her way through the standing riders, most of them gawking. “Excuse me!” she said.

The man writhed and slid down from his seat. Those sitting raised their feet as he worked to roll under them.

Bouncing her way past a wall of muscle that looked suspiciously like a man, Lori crouched and reached under the seats. She lay the afghan over the man, now in the fetal position on the dirty floor. One of her tightly-knit, full-length efforts, it was long enough to cover him from head to toe.

“Are you okay now?”

“I think so,” said a muffled voice from behind the rows of rich burgundy, blue, and white yarn. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. What happened?”

“I’m sensitive to sunlight. It’s like I’m on fire.”

“You better not be. I’ve spent a lot of time knitting this.”

A soft chuckle came from under the cover. “Lucky for me.”

Despite the blanket’s barrier, Lori thought she smelled alcohol on the man’s breath. During her assistance in the recent investigation of the county employee pervert, she had spent enough time as honorary cop. She ignored the booze.

The standing riders leaned as the trained slowed. Muscle Man looked down at Lori and shook his head, expressionless.

She turned back to look between the pantyhose-clad shins of the ladies seated directly above her new acquaintance. “Why are you on the DART in broad daylight?”

“I don’t know. Last thing I remember I was drinking with co-workers on a night off. Bar-hopping in the West End. Then we were in a park.”

The train stopped.

“Where are we?” the man said.

“Coming up on my stop. The end of the line.”

The man gasped. “End of the line? We’re in Plano?”

“Yes. Where do you live?”

“In the West End.”

“And that’s where you got so drunk you passed out? Don’t you know you’re not supposed to crap where you sleep?”

“Thanks. I’ll remember that next time. Ouch.” The man shifted under the blanket.

Lori looked up at the women whose legs blocked her view. She shot a glance at their legs and put on her best inquisitive look. Each woman smiled and crossed one leg over the other, their high-heel pumps nearly poking Lori’s eyes. She wondered whether they were prostitutes from the suburbs making their way back from a busy Friday night in the city.

Shaking away that thought, she again addressed the suffering stranger. “Why did you get on the train?”

“I told you I don’t even remember doing it. Will you help me get home?”

Lori sighed. “I just flew in and I’m visiting family. Look, you can keep the afghan. It wasn’t coming out right, anyway.”

“Your voice sounds familiar. What’s your name?”

She hesitated. “Lori.”

“Lori Breden?”

Her eyes opened wider. “Who wants to know?”

“Doug McGruder from University of Houston Downtown.”

“From zoology?”

“Yep.”

“You didn’t have this problem in college,” Lori said. “What happened?”

“It came on later in life. It can do that.”

Lori considered this a moment. She didn’t know anything about such diseases, but she remembered Doug as a nice enough guy. Still, she had not seen him in 10 years, and this wasn’t a good time to get involved. “Do you have a phone? If not, then I can call somebody for you,” she said.

“What time is it?”

She checked her watch. “About seven o’clock.”

“There’s nobody I can call right now.”

Lori turned and sat down, her shoulders bumping the prostitutes’ kneecaps. She pulled her mobile phone from its holster and dialed a number, then pressed Send.

“Hey, are you still out there?” Doug said.

“Mom?” Lori said to the receiver. “Is there room for two people in your car? I’m going to have someone with me when I get off the DART.”

(to be continued)

Parts: 1|2|3|4

Part Four

Sweat dripped from Blake Lefkowitz’s brow as he sat in the driver’s seat of his Mitsubishi Endeavor. The dashboard gleamed under its new protective coating and the windshield was bug-free. The breeze through the open windows was the only thing keeping him out there long enough to admire his handiwork.

He remembered the blinking high beams of an oncoming motorist on his way home from the airport the night before. Not written in any driver’s education materials, it was the universal symbol for any of several conditions. His headlights had been set to low beams and he had not seen any cops, so he figured it meant, “Hey, there’s something wrong with your lights.”

He turned the headlights on and observed their effect on the garage door. The left side shone brightly while the right remained dark, no matter the setting. Lone headlight still blazing, he turned the key to the “accessory on” position and worked the controls to slide up all the windows. The air conditioner roared to life.

The front passenger door swung open and a man Blake did not recognize leaped into the seat beside his. He brandished a large, black handgun. “Very slowly, get out of the vehicle and go with me inside the house. If you try to run, I will kill you.”

“What do you want with me?”

“No questions. Go now.”

“But I –”

The man smacked the gun against Blake’s head, just above his ear. “Stop talking and go inside the house.”

Reeling from the blow, Blake leaned over and opened the driver’s door. What usually was a simple hop from the seat to the driveway now took concentration. Hoping to avoid anything else from the gun, he carefully climbed down.

A quick peek back showed his attacker close behind, shoving the gun into his front jacket pocket. “Look straight ahead as if everything is fine, arms at your sides,” the stranger instructed. The air from the dashboard vents swept long, thick blond hair up over the man’s head, revealing closely shaved black hair underneath.

Although the company had told him this kind of thing could happen, his meager security training to that point had not prepared him for anything like this. Despite that, he was trying to notice anything that might help investigators. Blake detected no accent in the man’s speech. He could have been from Omaha, Oakland, or anywhere in between.

His annoying voice, however, would have kept him out of the news anchor’s chair.

Blake walked slowly along the sidewalk from the driveway to the front porch. He resisted the urge to feel the knot on his head.

“Now, stay very close. Go ahead. Open the door.”

Blake did and stepped inside. His dog, Mouse, bolted into the entryway barking loudly and heading straight for the doorway. Blake stood still and watched his tiny dog of three years, a Maltese with short bobbed hair, as it snarled and bared its teeth at the intruder.

The man backed up a step, still on the front porch. Blake turned and slammed the door and locked the bolt. He ran into the kitchen and ducked behind the island.

A new yellow note on the refrigerator, in his wife’s script, read, “Phone guy coming Tuesday.” Home phone not yet in service and his mobile phone sitting uselessly in the truck from which he had been forcibly removed, he was cut off from rescue.

Still squatting, he waddled to the back door and saw nobody through the dining nook bay window. He swept Mouse up, rushed out the door, and sprinted for the back fence.

“Stop!”

Blake didn’t and leaped head-first over the chest-high stone retaining wall into the dirt behind it, where the gap under the wooden fence looked big enough for an escape. The pickets splintered inches above his head, as if being shot, but he heard no gunfire. His attacker was using a silencer.

Growling, Mouse strained to break free from Blake’s arms. “Easy, boy,” Blake said.

The stone jutted just far enough above the high ground to provide cover as he rolled under the fence.

He was in a corn field. The neighborhood had been built on top of acres and acres of former farmland, but a few holdouts dotted the landscape. For this particular old-timer, he was glad.

Blake got to his feet and ran. The leaves lashed his arms as he tucked Mouse in like a running back with a football. Somehow his mind recalled a movie wherein the character repeatedly yelled, “Serpentine!” as he and his cohorts escaped on foot.

He laughed briefly, then cried as he zig-zagged his way through the corn. “This isn’t what I signed up for,” he whined.

(to be continued)

Herein are several people whose lives at first do not seem connected. Their paths converge unexpectedly. This is Part Three.

Parts: 1|2|3

Part Three

Doug sat in the end of a church pew, alone, ornate stained glass windows looming above from every stone wall. A raven smashed through the window behind the altar and lit on the offering table. Its black feathers shimmered in the sunlight pouring through the hole in the multi-colored glass.

“Consecrate me!” squawked the bird.

A window on the far wall shattered. A raven emerged and flapped away twinkling glass shards as it flew to the offering table.

The shaft of light brought up welts on Doug’s face. He covered his eyes and the backs of his hands started to boil. Shrieking, he struggled to tuck his face into his shirt.

Now all the windows seemed to be exploding at the same time, the oil-black birds bursting through them and joining their kind at the altar. “Consecrate me!” the birds squawked in a deafening chorus.

Sunlight filled the sanctuary. To escape it, Doug closed his eyes and sank to the floor to roll under the pew.

His shoulder smacked the floor hard. He opened his eyes. Room-darkening drapes, barely touching the tan carpet, swayed in the wake of his fall. Sunlight rolled like ocean waves over the baseboard, getting slower and smaller until finally the drapes hung still.

“Bad dream,” Doug said. His voice croaked, his throat dry from breathing through his mouth all night.

He pushed himself off the floor and climbed back into bed. The silk sheets still warm on his side, he slid his legs into a cool spot.

The drapes on the other bedroom window still were shut tight, too, with sunlight barely peeking out the tiny spaces between the drapes and the wall. The hallway seemed much brighter than usual.

He remembered the church, the smashing windows, and all that burning sunlight. “Better check the rest of them,” he mumbled.

Doug threw back the covers and grabbed a burgundy silk robe from the hook on the wall. The cool fabric enveloped him and quickly warmed up to his body temperature. He looked down at the robe and admired its glossy shine. “Thanks again, Uncle Curtis,” he said.

He got only a few steps into the bright hallway before retreating. Grumbling, he stormed over to his nightstand and picked up the phone. As he punched in a number on the cordless, he yanked open a drawer and pulled out a blue stress ball.

He took a few deep breaths. Three rings. “Come on, pick up, dammit.” Finally, after five rings, an answer.

“Hello?”

“Steve, it’s Doug. Can you come over here to my new place on your lunch hour?”

“What’s wrong? You sound pissed.”

“I am. One of the shades in the living room is up.”

“Your dead uncle’s cat again?” Steve asked.

“Yeah. Of all the things he left me, that damn cat was his favorite. I think I’m going to have to get rid of it.”

“Or get new skin.”

“As soon as you find that for sale, you let me know.”

Doug held the stress ball close for a better look. Blue silicone tubes of varying lengths were arranged in a spherical honeycomb pattern. He gave it a squeeze.

“What was that sound?” Steve said.

Doug read the white letters. “Jelly Smacker Stress Ball.”

“Sounds disgusting.”

Doug held it closer to the receiver and gave it a few more squeezes.

“Stop, man. Please,” Steve said.

“I figured it’s about the only way you’ll be hearing that sound.”

“You know what you need, Doug?”

“A girlfriend?”

“Besides that.”

Doug worked the stress ball rhythmically. “I got nothin’.”

“Come on, man. Remote control shades,” Steve said.

“That’s cheaper than new skin, but Uncle Curtis left me stuff, not money. You gonna pay?”

“Sure-sure, yeah-yeah. Look, I’ll be over after lunch. Just sit tight and keep squeezing your kooch.”

Doug kept at the gelatinous toy and, matching the rhythm, made three quick kiss noises. “Here, kitty-kitty.”

A large, black Persian cat flowed slowly around the corner into the short corridor.

“You’ve been messing with my shades again, haven’t you? Bring your black ass over here.”

The cat approached and purred loudly as it rubbed its face and body along his outstretched hand. Its tail lifted as it finished, revealing a tiny, puckered pink circle devoid of fur.

“Whatever you’re expecting when you do that, I’m not up to the call. Sorry.”

He turned on the viewer atop his armoire and pulled up the weather forecast.

“Shit.” He threw the stress ball, narrowly missing the cat. It made a wet smack as it hit the wall. “Sunny.”

——-

“Wow. You’re right. That was a weird dream,” Steve said.

“It isn’t the first time I’ve had it, but it’s the first time I’ve fallen out of bed,” Doug said.

“Silk sheets will do that to you.”

They sat at the kitchen table, fluourescent overhead light blazing, room-darkening shades pulled down tight.

“That’s a mighty fancy garment you’re wearing there, sir. Somehow I never pegged you as the silk robe type.”

“It belonged to Uncle Curtis.”

“Yeah, I know, just like everything else I’m looking at. Now, what’s this you’ve whipped up as the ‘perfect chaser’ to my meal?”

“Turkish coffee,” Doug said and picked up a small brass pot by its long handle.

Steve pointed at it. “What’s that?”

“An ibrik.”

Steve laughed. “Sure, you gotta have a good ibrik for your Turkish coffee. Everybody knows that.”

Doug carefully tilted the pot to fill a small porcelain cup decorated with blue and red flowers. He handed it to Steve on a matching saucer.

“Let that settle a minute before you drink it.”

“Why?”

“So the grounds can all go to the bottom.”

Steve peered into the cup, then looked at his friend. “So is it this condition of yours that’s turned you into such a freak, or is this inheritance going to your head?”

“It’s good coffee, ass face,” Doug said. “Trust me.”

They sat quietly, letting their grounds settle. The cat slinked into the kitchen and rubbed against Steve’s calves. Static electricity crackled as the long, black hairs clung to his tan slacks.

A car horn sounded from the street below. A woman screamed, “You coulda killed me, you meathead!”

Steve lifted his cup. “Here’s to the city.” He sipped cautiously, then swallowed. One corner of his mouth pulled up into a grin. “Not damn bad. Not damn bad at all.”

“You’ll start to notice the grounds as you go. Just stop when you can’t take them any more.”

“Okay, freak.”

(to be continued)

Related reading: Talk With a Killer, Wall

The End

“Are you sure this is the first place you want to go?” Shonda said.

Their eyes were locked onto a computer’s LCD monitor displaying various trips that had been booked and, for as many reasons, had been canceled last-minute. Shopping around that way, with neither of them tied to an office job, they could save money with spontaneity.

“Yes. No doubt in my mind,” Bernie said.

It had been an arduous three months, but with physical therapy and Shonda’s encouragement, Bernie had recovered physically. Breathing independently of the vent or any supplemental oxygen had come slowly, and because it used so much air, she spoke only for short periods at first.

Speaking up against Jeff Stivins had taken more than just rehabilitation. It had taken all of her courage, but because she had committed to not being the victim again, she held her head up and — for her brother, her dad, and her mom, chose life.

Her testimony had helped put Jeff Stivins away for more than one life sentence. Because he was an unpopular public figure, local judges and attorneys wasted no time getting him to trial. The defense had an appeal planned, but that would not stop Bernie.

“But it’s where your father died.”

“Yes, but he never finished seeing everything. I want to do it for him.”

Shonda clicked the mouse and leaned back in her Herman Miller Mirra chair. “Okay, I just booked it. The U.S. Virgin Islands. No turning back now.”

Bernie sipped Coke from a can and nibbled a Keebler Grasshopper cookie. “Have you already arranged the donation?”

“Just like you said, twenty-five percent of what we spend on every trip goes to the home for battered women and children. That has to be the strangest demand I’ve ever heard someone make before accepting a job,” Shonda said.

“I’m a strange woman.”

Shonda threw her head back and downed the last of a can of Diet RC. “It’s a good thing I’m a rich woman racked with guilt.”

“You know, there’s one more person I didn’t get to say ‘goodbye’ to yet,” Bernie said.

They drove to Pop’s One Stop.

Shonda wore a full, knee-length cotton skirt with a large flower print, a matching pink tank top and flip-flops. She grabbed Bernie’s hand and burst through the front doors, the bells above them announcing their arrival.

Bernie, clad in khaki capri pants and a bright blue, fitted tee shirt, liked the way her feet felt in the tan canvas slip-ons. Although she had not exactly moped around the previous spring, this time around she was much more upbeat.

She had good reason.

During her recovery, doctors had told her that only 15% of patients in a coma due to oxygen deprivation come away able to live independently. They attributed some of her remarkable recovery to the constant exercise and spare eating habits of her former lifestyle. A person less fit most likely would not have fared so well.

Finally, Bernie had overcome the odds and believed that not only did she have nowhere to go but up, but she actually had a good shot at getting there.

From behind the counter, Pop looked up from the quarter-folded Sun-Times and smiled at their arrival. He climbed slowly from his barstool and leaned down behind the counter, out of sight. He stood back up and set on the counter two plastic, gallon milk jugs full of water. “I saved these for you, Little Bernie.”

“Thanks, Pop, but you can just hang onto them,” Bernie said.

He looked back down at the newspaper’s crossword puzzle. “Four letters, means ‘liberated.’ Starts with ‘F.’”