Dastardly Bastard(64)

“Now and forever.”

Now & Forever





49


JUSTINE’S EYES SNAPPED OPEN. TREVOR was holding her to his chest, crying.

Trevor!

“Baby?” he sobbed. “Please, baby, wake up.”

“I’m here, fool.”

“Oh, thank God!” Trevor pressed his mouth to hers. It tasted of morning breath, but she didn’t care. Justine kissed him back.

“Don’t have time for that!” Donald yelled. The little guy stood a few yards away. Donald wasn’t looking at them. His attention was focused above them, on a battle being waged above their heads. “It’s… it’s not working.”

“You all right now, baby girl?” Nana Penance, still wearing her purple sundress and pink bunny slippers, stood behind Trevor.

“I’m here. What do we do about him?”

“I took care of Papa. I think I can handle this bastard.” She floated up, heading toward the warring throng.

“Thank you.”

“No need to thank me, Just. You’re the one doing this.”

It occurred to Justine that Nana Penance was right. Even her grandmother’s voice was her own. Gone was the southern twang and broken, unformed words.

Justine got to her feet and backed away a few steps to get a better look at the chaos overhead. She willed Nana Penance through the mass of memories, homing in on the Bastard. Her grandmother’s form began to glow with an aura of brilliant light.

The Bastard didn’t see her coming. Nana Penance glided up behind him, wrapping her sparkling hands about the Bastard’s long neck. The Bastard wailed. Nana Penance bore into the creature, pushing up and in, melting into its form, becoming one with it.

The Bastard retched, heaved, and coughed up molten light. Its black skin crackled and blistered, popped and sizzled. Through the flesh came bursts of flame and smoke. Justine was reminded of a marshmallow that had been left over a campfire far too long. The smell was unbearable.

You gotta burn them off, mostly. You gotta get them to unlatch themselves. Shadows can be dastardly bastards. You just gotta know how to deal with them.

“I am… forever!”

“No,” Justine said. “You’re not.”

The Dastardly Bastard of Waverly Chasm exploded. Pieces of charred flesh rained down over the expanse of the padded cell, turning to ash long before ever touching the floor. Gray bits floated in the air. One landed on Justine’s arm. She blew it away without a second thought.





50


JUSTINE LED THE TREK OUT. Silence took over when they passed Jaleel’s body. No one seemed to want to talk about what had happened to the man. What could she say? She hadn’t known him for more than a couple hours.

Once out of the cave, the group let her cross the bridge first. Everyone else followed, traversing the chasm one at a time. When Flat Rock was, once again, under everyone’s feet, Justine watched the bridge slowly fade away. There were no shocked gasps, no questions. She knew why the cave’s entrance and bridge were gone. Because it had never truly been there. Just like the Bastard, the bridge had become a fading memory.

The moon spun languidly around the sun, quickening with every revolution. Night melded with day, purple lightening to blue, until time righted itself. The sun, back where it should be, sat in the middle of the sky. Justine had never been so glad to see a sunny day in all her life.

With all the terrors she had been privy to, finding the body of a different tour guide really didn’t stun her. The name badge on his green polo read “Clyde.” He’d been shot in the head. Lyle was the one who spotted him. The dead man had been stuffed into the bushes at the trail head. Justine thought she knew who’d done it, but if Jaleel had killed Clyde, she knew the man wasn’t to blame. He’d only been a puppet.

Mark used his cell phone to call the police. Two people were missing—or so he told them—and another had been shot.

Trevor held Justine while she cried into his chest, letting everything pour out. There had been so many tears that day, but these felt better, purer. Trevor had saved her from the Bastard. Just the memory of how they’d met, their online conversations, were stronger than anything else. The Bastard included. Nana Penance had gone back inside Justine’s mind, where her memories of her grandmother belonged.

Lyle sat forlorn on the trunk of his mother’s car. He didn’t cry. Justine felt he would come to grips with his loss in his own time. Tragedy had a way of becoming you, taking you over. She hoped Lyle would forget the bad. Remember the good.

The first responding officer was a middle-aged blond-haired woman. Her badge read, “Bay’s End Police Department Officer Jenna Wales.” The woman seemed to center on Lyle first. She wanted to know what he’d seen, what he’d been through. Justine figured she just liked kids. That was good. Lyle needed a friend.

Donald had come up with the story they would tell. He began with fragments of truth—Jaleel spinning around, spewing nonsense—then moved on to the fiction. The crazy guide had pulled a gun on them. Marsha Lake—a mother protecting her cub—tried to wrestle the weapon from Jaleel, and both had gone over the edge. Donald told it with flair, filling in grand details with intricate lies. Justine found his tale very satisfying. In Donald’s version, Marsha Lake had gone out a hero.