Vice(71)

It won’t be long before it begins.

Overhead, somewhere on the second floor, a window breaks, sending shattered glass raining down to the ground. I can hear the tinkling, smashing sound as people scream. Looking back over my shoulder, I finally see the source of the smoke in the air: flames rushing out of one of the bedroom windows, angry red and orange tongues of light licking up the fa?ade of the building. What remains of the curtain material billows out of the yawning window frame, being consumed by the roaring blaze.

“Fuck!” Harrison screams. “That’s my room.”

Fernando graces him with a disgusted look. “Just find Garrett. Do your job.”

Harrison runs out into the dark, gun raised, talking into his earpiece. Apart from the fact that his bedroom is on fire, he must be feeling pretty vindicated right now. If Fernando had listened to him in the first place, I’d already be dead. I wouldn’t be running around out here in the dark, ruining their party and generally making trouble for them.

Now that Fernando’s on his own, I’m in a prime position to make my move. I get ready, preparing to race around the front of the house, take the steps three at a time and grab the motherf*cker. But just as I’m about to go, I hear something that has me hugging the wall again, attempting to vanish into the darkness:

Jurassic 5.

I spin around, and there he is, Ocho, headphones blasting music louder than ever, and I don’t have time to react. I’ve been so focused on Harrison and Fernando’s whereabouts that I forgot about the weathered old mute man. He lifts his arm, and a jolt of ice-cold adrenalin slaps me hard. I’m expecting him to have a gun, for him to shoot me dead, but he doesn’t. The object he’s holding in his hand is much larger than that, and unmistakable in its shape—a garden shovel.

As he brings the flat blade if the shovel down, swinging it through the air, I kick myself. I should have really been more observant. I should have seen this coming.





******





I don’t know how long I’m out for. My head is throbbing as I crack my eyelids open, and the sound of people screaming fills my ears. The night sky overhead looks orange, great clouds of dirty gray smoke funnelling upwards, and I think I’m about to throw up. I am no longer by the side of the house. I’m laid out on a small patch of dirt, surrounded by trees, maybe only twenty feet away. I can see the grand white building in snatches through the forest, people running, the flash of fur and teeth as something lithe and limber runs by. God, my head is killing me. It hurts to f*cking blink.

“You didn’t need to hit him so hard,” a voice whispers in the dark. “He probably won’t be able to walk now.”

My stomach rolls. I’m having f*cking hallucinations. Ocho is looming over me like a paunchy, sour-faced statue, his face cast in highlight and shadow, making him look even sterner than normal. And next to him, my sister is pulling a knife out of a cracked leather sheath, turning the blade this way and that in the dim light. She looks down at me, shaking her head. There are dark circles under her eyes, and her blonde hair is dirty, knotted in a snarled tangle around her head. She looks like she’s just gone five rounds in a cage fight.

“Ha!” I laugh, then wincing at the sharp bolt of pain that needles me in the head. “I thought the dead would look a little more glamorous in the afterlife.”

Ocho makes a loud gurgling sound, stabbing a finger toward the forest, twisting his left hand around in a series of strange gestures that my dead sister seems to understand. “I know, I know,” she hisses. “But he’s completely out of it. Look at him.”

Ocho does look down at me, and he doesn’t seem too impressed. More gurgling, and more hand gestures follow. His headphones are looped around his neck, silenced, and I realize that this bizarre, out of body hallucination I’m having is the first time I’ve ever seen the man try to communicate with anyone. He makes a growling sound, pretending to gnash his teeth together. My sister shakes her head, sighing. “They’re not going to attack us,” she says. “Not when there are so many people out there to pick off.”

Ocho grimaces, rolling his eyes. He glances down at me again, nudging me with the toe of his boot, then makes a gesture that I do understand; he extends his index finger and stabs it repeatedly toward the sky.

Up.

And not just up.

Get the f*ck up. Now.

He digs his boot into my ribs again, and a blast of pain shoots through me, ricocheting around the inside of my head like a pinball. I try to sit up, but the ground beneath me pitches sideways, threatening to tip me right off the very surface of the earth.

“Wait, damn it. Give him a second to figure out what the f*ck is going on,” Laura whispers. She touches her hand to the side of my head, grimacing when her fingers come away bloody, and suddenly I’m not breathing. Not blinking. Not moving. Not able to make my brain function in any way whatsoever. My sister? My sister in front of me, dressed in a dirty black shirt and dirty black jeans, giving me the same look she always used to give me when we were fighting as children? What the f*ck?

My lungs are screaming. I need to take a breath, but I’m too goddamn scared. If I move a single muscle, take my eyes off her for even a second, I fear she’ll disappear. How is this happening? How the hell on earth can this possibly be real?

A weak, sad smile slowly spreads across Laura’s face. She looks older than I remember. Tired. Different, in so many ways, and yet still…her. She takes hold of my hand and squeezes tightly.