For Jennifer Jason Leigh and Peter Coyote

Prolog

Drown Victim's Identity Unknown

by Jeffrey Chapman
Staff Writer

 

Mutilated Torso Found in Abandoned Vehicle

by Kevin Walsh
Staff Writer

Light

Michael remembered entering the dark bar and leaving the bright August sunlight behind.  He couldn't picture himself walking in, though.  One minute he was outside the bar, the next he was in, just sitting.  The contrast between the bright sunlight and the dark interior was like warm and cold air masses colliding.  The thought of them meeting triggered blinding flashes of lightning in his head.

He skipped over the mechanics of walking in and concentrated on the image of himself sitting and waiting for something to happen.  .  .

Michael sat quietly in the shadows at a table across the bar.  The light from a high-intensity lamp illuminated only his hands and arms as he stared at the blank yellow legal pad before him. The ice clinked in his glass.  He was working on his fifth double scotch-and-water, waiting for something to happen; perhaps for someone to arrive.  It was too early for anyone to be getting that drunk on a Monday afternoon without a reason.

He saw three other patrons sitting in the bar.  One of them got off his barstool and walked over to the jukebox to drop a couple of quarters in.  The music was piped through six large speakers that filled the bar with brilliant, clear sound.  Though Michael preferred the Blues, the loud country music didn't bother him.  He was preparing to write. 

Something else was on his mind.

He jotted something down on the yellow pad and put down his pen to reach into his pocket.  He pulled out a small, hand-painted tin and looked at it.  It was square in shape and was filled with a peculiar mix of herbs and spices.  He'd had the box since he was a boy.  It had remained shut since then.

Michael had been in Santa Cruz for a couple of days already.  The morning before he left San Jose he had a dream about someone he knew a long time ago.  The dream had left him feeling strange.  It seemed premonitory; almost like a warning about something he couldn't quite comprehend.  It had made him superstitious enough to bring the little tin along for protection.  As he sat at the table he opened it carefully.  The fragrant herbs and spices hadn't lost their potency; in fact, their scent seemed a hundred times stronger than before.  The smell flooded his head with memories.  He clamped the lid back down and placed the tin in his shirt pocket next to his heart.  He pulled out a cigarette and lit it.

It wasn't exactly the way he looked; it wasn't even his drinking.  It went beyond the physical appearance of his short spiky hair and glinting eyes.  There was an invisible aura about him that drew its energy from the atmosphere of the large, open room.  The problem was that it drew indiscriminately, attracting the bad along with the good.  The effect seemed to make him stand out from the shadows, as if the light from the hanging lamp above the table were shining full in his face, revealing the apprehension in his pale blue eyes and the anticipation in his somber features.

He picked up his pen again and wrote with long elegant strokes.  Whatever he was scribbling absorbed him in thought.  Between drinks he talked to himself and smirked, oblivious to the noise that shattered the quiet of the room.  The waiter came by with another drink for him.  Michael handed him a crisp five-dollar bill.  Money wasn't a concern.  He had three hundred bucks stashed in his wallet and he was determined to sit there and work all night if he had to, waiting for something to happen.

When the waiter stepped away from the table, Michael looked towards to the entrance on the left.  He saw a tall man in jeans and a black leather jacket walking into the room.  The bright light from outside cast the shadow of his body across the floor and kept his face hidden from view.  The man had a well-defined physique.  He carried himself with such confidence he seemed almost cocky.  The back of his hair was wet and he walked with a slight limp.

As the door closed slowly behind him, his shadow seemed to retreat into his boots.

In the dim light of the windowless bar, the stranger's face remained obscured.  As he moved across the bar, something in his confident gait made him seem familiar.  His presence charged the atmosphere with electricity.  It was an elemental disturbance, like the sound of a radio station that's not quite tuned in.

Michael picked up his glass and took a long drink.  Without taking his eyes off him, Michael put down his glass and picked up his pen.

The scene before him became dream-like; yet, it was underscored by the unusual clarity of Michael's five senses.  Michael became light-headed and inexplicably aroused by the alcohol in his blood.

The stranger turned and leaned against the bar.  His face remained in the shadows.  Michael pulled his head back to ensure that his own face remained hidden in the shadows.  He propped his arms against the edge of the table.  He was unconscious of his own actions.  He didn't know why, but he watched the stranger with a certain amount of trepidation.  Something was going on.  It made the hairs on the back of his neck bristle.

As the stranger leaned forward with the drink in his hand, an exposed metal button on his fly caught the light from a recessed ceiling fixture.  It glinted silver in the incandescent light.  The reflection caused a metallic taste in Michael's mouth.  He suddenly felt weak.  The alcohol seemed to rush to his head without warning.  He began to feel queasy.  He was apprehensive about trying to stand; he thought he might pass out.  Instead, he swallowed hard and looked down at his paper, trying to read what he had written.  He could see his hands starting to shake.  His apprehension was quickly turning into fear.  He heard footsteps approach his table, but he was afraid to look up.  When he finally did, the first thing he noticed was the penetrating look in the stranger's golden eyes.

The stranger placed his drink on Michael's table and stared.  "Thanks for the drink!" he shouted over the loud music in a booming voice.

Before Michael could respond, he turned his head and puked against the wall with such force, the liquid splattered under the table and onto the stranger's boots.  Michael stood quickly to keep from getting splashed.  He thought about running to the restroom, but before he could move, another wave of nausea overcame him.  He propped himself against the wall and puked out another quart of liquid.  When he was finished his knees gave out from under him.  With a painful groan, he sat back down in his chair hard.  He was so drunk, he ignored the vomit that dripped from the edge of the blue gingham oil cloth onto the floor.  The music was so loud, no one else in the bar noticed what Michael had done.

The stranger sat across from Michael as if nothing had happened.  He picked up his drink and held it up, "lookin' for trouble or cheap thrills?"

Michael looked at the stranger through blurry eyes.  His head was pounding, but his stomach felt better.  "Wha'd you say?"

"Kamikaze."

Michael grabbed the glass and downed the citrus sweet drink.  He slammed the glass on the table and grinned.  "Yep!" he said, "tha' was a kamikaze awright...nnnnn...I gotta take a piss."  His speech was slurred and he was having trouble getting up.

The stranger rose from his chair and walked over to help him to his feet.  Michael felt himself being lifted by the waist.  The stranger's enormous strength was surprising.  Michael looked up into his face and smiled, "I sure wouldn' wanna get you pissed off."  The stranger hoisted him to his feet without a word.  He picked up the yellow legal pad and tucked it under his arm while he helped Michael to the restroom.

Once inside the restroom, Michael felt he could stand on his own.  He stood over the stainless steel urinal and started to piss.  The stranger stood next to him and joined in.

"Didn't answer my question," the stranger said, watching Michael rock back and forth as he shot a steady stream of urine against the back of the urinal.

"Wha'd you wanna know?"

"What are you looking for?"

"What makes you so sure I'm lookin' for anything?"

"Everyone who comes in this fuckin' place is looking for something," the stranger responded nonchalantly.

"Like you?"  Michael grinned from ear to ear.  He was too drunk to resist.

"Yeah."  The stranger cocked his head and looked Michael in the eye as he shook himself off.

"Oh yeah?  Who you lookin' for?" he asked, shaking himself off in brisk mockery.

"You, junky."

Michael looked down and tucked himself in.  A shudder ran through his body.  "OK.  I'll go along with that," Michael heard himself respond.  His own voice sounded foreign to him now; it sounded distant.  The alcohol had severely altered his perception.  He felt trapped inside himself, as if his body were under the control of something alien. 

When they finished, they left the restroom together and sat in a corner booth.  The stranger slid the yellow legal pad over to Michael and walked over to the bar.  As he walked away, Michael felt a swell in his chest.  The air tingled with electricity and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up again.  He was anxious to get away, but his fascination kept him from leaving.  Perhaps this was the event he had been expecting.  He sat motionless, watching a badly disfigured busboy clean up the mess he had made across the room.  The look in the busboy's eye was vacant and his actions were mechanical.  Somehow he didn't seem real.

The stranger returned with two black coffees.  He sat down and took a sip.  Michael felt his eyes probing; scanning his interior and taking stock.  It made him feel naked and uncomfortable.

"What are you writing?" the stranger inquired.

"Nothin'...a poem."

"You a poet?"

"No," annoyed by the question.

"Lemme see."  He reached over and pulled the pad toward him brusquely.  Michael noticed the heavy musculature of his hands and wrists.  He felt he had no choice.

The stranger looked down at the pad and started to read.  As he did, Michael felt a chill.  He tried to keep himself from shaking.  He picked up his coffee and took small sips from the heavy ceramic mug.  The stranger ignored him.  He seemed interested only in what he read.  Michael stared until the stranger looked up at him threateningly.  Michael looked away and took another sip of his coffee, and the stranger began to read aloud:

Something had happened. I don't know what.  But from the moment he watched her running--running like a deer--like a man--down the dimly lighted sidewalk; running and running.

Running faster than a man; something had happened; the wires routinely strung from building's corner to sidewalk's intersection; he had imagined: the deer taking that unnecessary short-cut where memory smell and inevitable wires stretched across the darkness and the grass...

The stranger stopped reading and pushed the pad back over to Michael.  "Nothing is what is seems," he said disgustedly.

Michael felt the blood drain from his head.  The stranger's uncanny remark stabbed through his heart like a knife. 

"Wha'd you say?" he asked in a breathy voice, disoriented and confused.

"You heard me.  Nothing is what it seems."  The stranger's voice had changed tone.  He sounded old and feeble; almost familiar.  His eyes flashed golden in the artificial light.  Michael's fillings seemed to spark a bright metallic taste, as if he'd bitten into a piece of tin foil.

"Why'd you say that?" Michael asked without actually wanting to know.  His mouth had become cotton dry.

"You know why," the stranger answered in his normal voice.

"Fuck you!  I don't know anything!  Who are you!  What do you want!"

"You..."

A sharp tremor passed through the bar and distracted Michael from what the stranger was about to say.  Judging by the way it rattled the glasses above the bar and caused the hanging lamp to sway back and forth over the table, he figured it had to be a 5.0 on the Richter scale.

"What the fuck!"  Michael exclaimed.  If he hadn't been so drunk, he would have run out of the place and stood in the street until it passed.  The stranger sat staring at him, completely oblivious to Michael's reaction.

"...to help," he continued in a reverent tone.

"What?"

"To end it....What you started."  He sounded as if he were petitioning in a weak and helpless voice.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"  Michael asked, looking around the place desperately as if trying to find an escape route while the stranger continued to talk. 

Another tremor jolted the bar slightly.  This one was hardly noticeable.  Michael wasn't sure if he had imagined it this time.

"What you dragged me into."  The stranger sounded angry.

Michael pushed his coffee away slowly and tried to stand.  The stranger lunged across the table and grabbed his hand, squeezing it and grinding it into the tabletop.  Michael winced from the pain.  The loud music drowned out his groans.

"You're not going anywhere, you little weasel," he said maliciously.  The look in his eyes told Michael he was dead serious.  "You're gonna sit there and listen until I'm finished.  Understand?"  He squeezed Michael's hand harder and stood up, putting his face close to Michael's.  Michael nodded and gritted his teeth.  He couldn't bring himself to look into the stranger's eyes for more than a few seconds.  The metal button on his fly had caught the light again from the fixture above the booth.  Michael had to look away. His teeth were beginning to ache.

The stranger sat down and let go his hand.  He spoke in a clear, calm voice.  "You bought me a drink.  What does that tell you?  I was standing across the room minding my own business and bang.  You buy me a drink."  He looked at Michael disgustedly.  "You don't even know me."

"I didn't..." Michael heard himself try to reason with the guy. 

"Well, let's put it this way.  I accept the invitation.  And right  now I feel like a little conversation.  Can't say how I'll feel later.  Could be you get what you asked for."

The waiter came by to take their order.  Michael declined.  The stranger ordered him a kamikaze anyway.

"Fair's fair," he looked Michael in the eye.  "You buy me a drink.  I buy you one.  Wouldn't want to hurt my feelings, would you?"

When the waiter came back with the drinks, the stranger reached in his pocket and took out a black ball-point pen.  He stirred Michael's drink briskly.  "Gotta make sure there's no separation."

The stranger picked up his own drink and swirled the liquid in the glass.  He placed the pen back in his pocket and looked at Michael.  "Drink up."

Michael downed the drink and sat back.  He felt the alcohol instantly rush to his head.