Nowhere (4 page)
“You bet Richard, I want you to know that we’ll figure it out. We have excellent personnel here and I’m willing to take the time you need in order to get this all straight. You’ll see, in a couple months this thing will all blow over and we’ll have you feeling good about yourself again. One last thing that I’d ask is if Steven does show up again before we meet, could you let me know what he says to you. And if he asks you to do anything for him, could you discuss it with me before you act on his requests. Ok?”
“Sure thing Doctor Hays.” Richard gave a smile and walked out.
The walk back from the clinic was a pleasant one. It was early afternoon, cool but not cold, and drearily overcast. It was strange but a day like this would make many people depressed. From Richard’s experience with people, he knew that most would expect that today would bring rain. In anticipation of the rain many would cancel various plans, people would change their daily routines and otherwise react as though weather had already ruined the day. Richard, perhaps due to his forgetfulness, lived very much in the here and now. Therefore, when he walked about, and saw the sky was overcast and the air felt humid with impending rain, he was not troubled.
In many ways Richard was a positive guy. He did not consider himself depressed or overly negative in any way, but there was something else that Richard carried as his burden. In his mind it was called nightmare mode. The problem for Richard was that nightmare mode would come without warning and suddenly Richard would be in terrifying places being chased by horrible creatures. The people with melting faces, these aliens, or at least that was the best way Richard could explain them to Dr. Hays. They always caught him at the end of the dream, and then Richard would suddenly awaken into the real world. Sometimes he would find himself safely in his bed, sometimes he would be on a park bench or even at the library. Most times he would not remember getting there.
He was walking briskly down the sidewalk that ran along tenth street which headed east toward the county road. The traffic moved quickly along the narrow lanes. It was the one hub of life that the town offered. In or out of town it was tenth street you would travel. Because of this the frontage was grown over with gas stations, fast food joints and struggling mom and pop places. Off the main drag the town dwindled like ripples in water. Richard stepped into an alley that crossed behind the James Brothers Law office building and provided a shortcut out toward the town’s only supermarket, H& H Food. Aparently, when the town was even more rural, the H & H was called the Feed Bag, but in an effort to modernize the name had been changed some years ago.
Richard entered through the automatic sliding glass doors, the smell of citrus wafting towards him as the pressure shifted. He wiped his feet on the large rubber mat that made up the first five feet of the entry area, and then grabbed one of the small red shopping baskets from the stack at the front of the store. He then set to the task of shopping for some fresh produce for the remainder of the week. The store seemed particularly crowded even though it was around three in the afternoon on a Wednesday.
The radio overhead blared out the familiar voice of the DJ from the area’s only radio station.
“Folks, this is the Wildman here, playing only the hits on K101 The Hits FM!” He said and then another song started up. Richard walked to the stands of fruit.
He was bagging up a few oranges, when he suddenly felt as though he was being watched. The hairs on his neck began to stand up on end and his cheeks flushed a little. He caught a glimpse of an old woman staring at him in the corner of his eye, as he hesitantly turned in her direction he could have sworn that her face was like a dark black pool, like the surface of a rippling lake at nighttime, yet when he faced her directly and made eye contact, her face had solidified and she appeared normal. Still old and ugly, but wholly human.
Even still, her features were troubling to Richard and he instantly wanted to turn away. She sneered at Richard with crooked yellow teeth and a raised lip like an angry dog. There were black halo shaped patches surrounding her eyes making her look like some sort of zombie. She stood there hunched over with osteoporosis, yet leaning forward on the balls of her feet as though she was ready to attack if Richard made the wrong move.
A manager came over and made brief conversation with her, Richard imagined him telling her to stand down, because her demeanor quickly changed and her posture shifted back to that of a casual shopper. The manager left and the woman returned her wretched gaze back toward Richard.
He turned not wanting to face her any longer, and walked quickly the opposite way down the aisle to the end where he tucked behind a large stack of soda boxes and listened. From here he could hear her shuffling quietly down the aisle toward him, and somewhere, under the sound of her old slippered feet sliding across the tile floor of the supermarket, an almost inaudible sound of bubbling water coming from what he could only imagine was the surface of her face.
Richard panicked and dropped his basket. He ran to the next aisle, but quickly decided to put several additional aisles between himself and the creature that had detected him.
He breathed a little easier knowing that he was now several aisles down from this danger. He briefly considered the possibility of darting back to get his oranges, but decided it would be too risky and thought a better plan might be to lure the alien sentry over to the meat market and then give her the slip so that he could race back and collect a new sack of oranges from the produce section.
He now found himself on the pet food aisle, an aisle he had never really ventured down since he did not own a pet. He walked cautiously toward the other end, pausing every couple of seconds to check over his shoulder to see if he was being followed.
“Hey!” A voice suddenly called out to him. “Hey you, get over here!”
Richard was about to run again, when he recognized the voice as that of Steven’s. It was coming from between two stacks of dog food. All of the pet food was stacked high on an industrial grade metal shelf. Behind the stacks, Richard could see that there was a dark space between the food and the wall, and now within that darkness, appeared the silhouette of a man.
“I said get over here!”
As he went toward the shadow, Richard peered in as if squinting might somehow cast more light on this mysterious figure.
“Don’t you pretend for a second that you don’t know who I am. You’d just be wasting time and risking both our lives in the process.”
Steven’s gruff, no nonsense voice was unmistakable. When Richard reached the dog food, he glanced around to see if he was being watched and then pretended to be inspecting the fine print of the bag. ‘Man’s Best Friend: select grade puppy chow’ the bag read. ‘Now with real beefy chunks’.
“What did you say to your new friend, the Doctor?”
“Excuse me?”
“Don’t play dumb Rich, I know that you talked to the doctor at the clinic today and I know that you told him about me. All I need to know is what exactly you told him and why you would expose me like that?”
“We… we were sharing information… It was confidential. No one knows.”
“I’m sure that’s what they told you. They’ll tell you anything to get you talking.”
“They?”
“Yea, the good doctor is one of them too. You don’t see it yet, but the more we press them, the more they’ll be exposed and we won’t be alone in this fight anymore. What information did they share with you? Maybe it will help us get at them.”
Richard felt in his jacket pocket , unbuttoned it, and pulled out the yellow sheet of paper. He unfolded it and pressed it against a bag of dog food to flatten it out as much as possible before handing it into the shadows to Steven.
There was the sound of paper in the darkness as Steven undoubtedly was inspecting the schedule.
“Is this what I think it is?” Steven asked, his disappointment could be felt through the darkness.
“Yes, it’s the unofficial version though,” Richard defended. “It could change without notice… It’s stamped too.”
“You traded information about me for a lunch calendar?”
“It’s unofficial, that’s why it’s yellow.”
“I don’t care why it’s yellow, Richard, it’s a dinky lunch schedule!” Steven shouted loudly. “They’ve got you figured out man! You’re an imbecile… They tricked you Rich. I can’t believe it, you let them trick you.”
Richard could hear the crumpling of the lunch schedule and then Steven threw it out at him in a yellow wad that bounced off Richard’s chest and onto the floor.
“You probably gave them everything they wanted too. What’d you tell them?”
“Nothing really, we just talked.”
“Yea, you must have said something, told them something Richard.” Steven yelled. “You told them something about me, because I’ve got eyes my way like I’ve never had Rich. You traded details about me, exposed me Richard! For a blasted lunch schedule!… And you don’t even eat there!”
Richard saw that the manager had heard the commotion and was now at the head of the aisle looking his way. He stepped to the side as if comparing prices of feed. He even looked up at the top shelf as if considering the value of purchasing his nonexistent K9 companion a “Toasty-Pup” igloo house.
“Shhh,” Richard spouted talking from the side of his mouth. “You’re making a scene.”
Suddenly the manager was advancing his way evidently suspicious of his shopping habits.
“Excuse me Sir,” The manager said in a professional yet stern sounding voice. “Is there anything that I can help you with?”
Richard gave his best attempt at an innocent, ‘who me?’ look.
“No, I’m just looking…” and if Richard had just stopped there, he may have been in the clear, because the manager began nodding, but he had to add, “I’m considering the ratios of beef content between these two brands.” The manager kept nodding, but Richard could tell that he was now trying to conceal the fact that he was considering the ratio of bull crap that Richard contained.
“Oh, ok…well then do let me know if you need any assistance Sir.” The manager said as he issued a thumbs up in Richards direction. “Oh and if you end up needing something from the top shelf, please come and get a store attendant. You enjoy your day Sir.”
“Yes, thank you,” Richard nodded as cordially as possible. “And you do the same…General Manager Brian.” Richard read from the manager’s name badge.
The manager walked away toward the other end of the aisle, gave Richard one last glance, and then disappeared down another aisle to attend to other shoppers.
“I have to lay low for awhile. They’ll be looking for me, you should do the same. We could leave town for a few days.” Steven said encouragingly.
“No, I can’t. If I don’t show up for work tomorrow, my boss will call Dr. Hays they’ll be looking for me.”
“You’re right, you should probably act normal to keep a low profile.”
Suddenly they heard the unmistakable shuffling noise of the old lady as she came around the corner. She stopped and stared at Richard who looked back at her with hate filled eyes. Her own eyes were barely visible within the dark outlines of their sockets. She began to sneer at Richard once more.
Richard turned back toward the darkened space where Steven was hiding.
“I’m sorry for doubting you Steven, I want you to know that I’m in this now and I’ll help you however I can.”
“It’s good to know I have an ally…” Steven said in his low voice, all anger had been erased. “She’s going to flip alien any second, Rich. You need to get out of here now, I’ll create a diversion and I’ll contact you again when I can.”
Richard nodded.
“Run!!” Steven yelled as he pushed over the stack of Man’s Best Friend Gravy Blend, two of the bags from the top split open explosively when they hit the tile floor. Richard stood there in the ankle deep tide of tiny dog food pebbles as the manager came back around the corner and stood at the old lady’s side. Her eyes now spiraled with the black liquid sending shivers down Richard's back. Then he bolted away in the opposite direction.
He sprinted quickly back to the produce dodging shopping carts and shoppers. He tore a plastic bag from the roll next to the citrus stand and frantically filled another bag of oranges. Then as he ran toward the entrance he fished a five dollar bill out of his front pocket and threw it at the cashier as he passed, the electronic doors chiming as he found freedom in the outside.
He ran back around the store and into the alley from which he had come. When he was a safe distance down the alley, he turned and looked back to see if he was being followed. He saw no one there and decided that he could slow to a jog.
He jogged all the way to his block and then stopped near some bushes to make sure his apartment building wasn’t being watched. Finally when he thought the coast was clear, he slipped into the front door of his apartment building. He peered out of the glass momentarily again to make sure that he had not been trailed. Then he scaled the three flights of stairs, two stairs at a time up to his apartment. He double checked the knob to make sure it was still locked, then he unlocked it and entered, shutting and locking it behind him.
