Are You Afraid of the Dark?. Seth Adams C.

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СКАЧАТЬ gun was heavy and solid and cool.

      ‘Feel the weight of it,’ the killer said. ‘Become familiar with its contours, how your fingers feel around it.’

      Reggie did so, feeling the heft of the thing. It was heavier than he would have thought. It felt large in his small hands.

      ‘Always keep it pointed away from you,’ the killer said. ‘Never point it at anything you don’t intend to shoot.’

      Reggie lifted the gun and aimed at the bottles on the fallen tree several yards away. Ivan rose and stood behind him.

      ‘Keep your right arm locked,’ he said. ‘Now bend your left at the elbow a bit. Keep your legs apart and the left one forward.’

      Reggie did as he was told, and looked down the sight at the bottles. Ivan reached over him and towards the safety. Reggie looked up at him.

      ‘Won’t someone hear?’ he asked.

      Ivan smiled and reached in his jacket. From a pocket he pulled out a black metal tube and reached again over Reggie. Screwing the silencer on, he then flicked off the safety.

      ‘Go ahead,’ he said. ‘Give it a try.’

      Reggie sighted down the pistol at one of the bottles. His finger curled around the trigger, but he didn’t pull it. He thought of his dad in the church parking lot and the blood on the asphalt.

      ‘Pull, don’t squeeze,’ said the killer.

      Then he was thinking about the older boy at the drugstore. And his mom slapping him at the cemetery.

      He pulled the trigger smoothly and deliberately.

      There was a low whoosh and dirt kicked up about a foot in front of the tree. The recoil shook in his arms and made his muscles twitch.

      ‘Again,’ said the killer, soft but firm, and Reggie pulled the trigger again.

      A silver-dollar sized crater appeared in the bark just below the bottle on the left. The thunk of the bullet sounded like something heavy dropped on carpeted floor. The bottle did a little wiggle and twirl like a tired dancer, but came to rest still upright.

      ‘Again,’ the killer said, and Reggie pulled the trigger.

      The low whoosh again and the bottle disappeared, pulled out of sight like something yanked out of reality. It was there, and then it was gone.

      ‘Good,’ said the killer. ‘Now the other one.’

      He adjusted his stance and aimed. Pulled the trigger and the other bottle likewise was yanked away.

      ‘Very good,’ said the killer. ‘You’re a natural.’

      Ivan reached out and over him to take the gun. For a moment both their hands were over the weapon, and Reggie didn’t want to let go. When he did and it was out of his hands, Ivan considered him with a curious look.

      It felt good holding the gun, and when it was in his hands he wasn’t afraid of being hit by anyone.

      ‘Let’s head back,’ Ivan said, holding his side and starting to walk, each step placed gingerly and with care. He holstered the gun and Reggie watched it until it was out of sight beneath the flap of the jacket hem.

      He could still feel it in his hands, like a phantom sensation.

      Like it belonged there.

      ***

      ‘Was there ever someone you wished you hadn’t killed?’ Reggie asked when they were back in the tree house.

      The walk and climb back up had exhausted Ivan, and the man settled back down in his spot near the far window with a groan. Outside, a summer wind stirred the branches and made the structure moan likewise, as if returning Ivan’s grunt like a separated beast calling for its pack. The swinging branches brought the sun in fits and starts of bright light, casting alternating bars of sunlight and shadow across the floor and the walls of the tree house. This pattern fell over Ivan, making the man seem caged, behind bars.

      He thought of what the deputy had told his mom earlier.

       Yesterday morning a man escaped from a police escort taking him to the county jail in Tucson.

      ‘No,’ said the killer, the answer snapping Reggie back to the moment. ‘There were two people I wish I hadn’t killed.’

      ‘Who were they?’ Reggie asked.

      ‘Just a woman and her son,’ the killer said. ‘No one special.’

      ‘Is it the woman you raped and killed yesterday?’ Reggie asked.

      Ivan looked at him sternly.

      ‘What are you talking about?’ he said.

      ‘When I rode into town for the medicine,’ Reggie said, ‘there were police all over the highway. One of them stopped me and told me about the woman and kid you killed when you escaped.’

      ‘I didn’t kill anyone yesterday,’ he said.

      ‘But the cop said …’ Reggie began.

      ‘I don’t care what the cop said,’ the killer interrupted him. ‘A state trooper recognized the car I was driving as reported stolen. Pulled me over. A second highway patrol vehicle happened to be passing and pulled in behind me. They cuffed me, searched the vehicle.’

      ‘What were you doing here in Payne, then?’ Reggie asked. ‘Were you sent to kill someone?’

      ‘Only if necessary,’ the killer said. ‘I was sent to find something. Not my usual business, but the money was good.’

      ‘How’d you get away?’ Reggie asked, interested in what the killer was supposed to find, but deciding to save that question for another time.

      ‘There are a few ways to work yourself out of handcuffs if you know what you’re doing,’ Ivan said. ‘I waited until the two police cars were separated in traffic before I made my move. The trooper was young, inexperienced, and panicked when he saw me free of the cuffs. He crashed into the concrete divider, the window shattered, and I crawled out.’

      Reggie’s uncertainty must have shown on his face, because the killer elaborated a little more. That the man wanted Reggie to believe him seemed somehow important, and so he filed that away in his mind.

      Always mind the details, he thought, and was slightly disturbed by the killer’s voice replaying in his head.

      ‘I escaped yesterday from the police, beat them up pretty bad, got my stuff back, but I didn’t kill anyone. And I don’t do rape.’

      ‘So the woman and kid you’re talking about …’

      ‘Happened a long time ago,’ said the killer.

      ‘The officer СКАЧАТЬ