Pieces of Hate (2 page)

Margaret punched her cigarette into the ashtray, then, tired of hearing about the problems of the caller in Boulder City, Nevada, she began to wander up and down the AM dial in search of
 

another talk show that was more interesting and less provocative. When she found nothing, she slipped a CD into the player and listened to some jazz as her tires hummed over the surface of the Interstate, taking her toward the dark and sparkling sky that met with the desert floor far off in the distance . . .

Margaret gasped as her eyes snapped open, her back stiffened and her hands clutched the steering wheel tightly. Her heart trip-hammered in her chest as she stared wide-eyed through the windshield at the road ahead.

The quiet jazz on the stereo and the lulling hum of the tires beneath her had relaxed her so much that she’d begun to doze off at the wheel. Her knuckles turned white as she slowed the car a bit, her breasts heaving with each rapid breath.

“Sheez,” she muttered, “wake the hell up!”

She hadn’t even realized she was tired, but she wasn’t going to give herself the opportunity to fall asleep again. Margaret took a cigarette from the pack and lit it, then stopped the music and began searching the AM dial again for voices. She figured she would be much less likely to fall asleep to the sound of loud voices than she would to the sound of music.

There was a man rambling on and on about what a disgrace it was to have a president who had dodged the draft and had never served in the military, and a preacher raved about the horrors of abortion and homosexuality; she found a station that was all news all the time, and another that was all sports all the time.

She was still searching the dial when she saw the light up ahead.

When she first spotted it, it was high in the night sky, steadily making its way downward. She eased up on the accelerator as she ducked her head a bit to watch it through the windshield, frowning as her eyes followed its descent.

The light was white in the middle and very bright, but around the edges it became an electric blue. As Margaret looked at the glowing object carefully, she smirked when she realized it was shaped like one of the Xanax pills she sometimes took when she was feeling especially anxious. But her smirk fell away immediately when she realized something else.

She was seeing a UFO!

Her eyes widened beneath eyebrows lowered in a deep frown as she slowed the car even more. Her heart began to pound hard when it became obvious that the glowing object was getting bigger and bigger as it descended . . . and Margaret soon realized it was going to lower itself onto the interstate directly in front of her.

It grew larger rapidly, making her wonder, with a chill, exactly how big it really was. Margaret was so stunned by the sight of the object and so busy watching the thing that it never occurred to her to step on the brake.

Before she knew it — as if it had happened in the blink of an eye — the glowing object filled her entire windshield and she suddenly threw herself back in the seat with a little cry and, out of panic and fear, slammed her foot down on the brake pedal as hard she could.

The tires screamed as they slid over the pavement at an angle, and when Margaret realized she had lost control of the car, she began to fight with the steering wheel. It did no good, and she screamed as the car shot into the ditch beside the freeway, just a few yards from the glowing object that had come from the sky, which was now a monolith that towered over the car, so bright that she held a hand up before her eyes.

“Oh, God,” she muttered, “my God, my God.”

She was frozen, her whole body — her arms, legs, not even her lips — nothing would move. The only thing she could do was stare out at the enormous structure that was blocking the eastbound side of the Interstate and a good portion of the desert to her right. A cold wriggling worked its way down her spinal column, from neck to ass, and she couldn’t stop her frantic, staccato breathing.

It was like nothing she’d ever seen before . . . except in the movies. It was so big and had such a glow coming from it — a natural glow, not from lights, but a glow that seemed to come organically from the smooth, curved walls of the object — that she began to feel as if her mind had been injected with Novocain and was quickly becoming so numb that she couldn’t think, couldn’t even form a single word in her mind, not so much as a fuzzy concept.

As Margaret stared in awe at the object, a round section in the bottom half opened smoothly like a camera lens. She sucked in a sharp breath as she watched it, seeing nothing but blackness beyond the opening. Until she saw movement . . . the slight movement of shadowy figures in that blackness.

This time, she held her breath, unable to inhale or exhale as movement continued in that dark circle.

Then those shadowy figures came out of the black hole. Three of them. They floated gracefully down, feet first, as if they were being lowered on cables . . . but they weren’t.

Their bodies were incredibly slender and very pale. Their heads were large and their eyes were even darker than the hole from which they had emerged. They had no noses and no mouths that she could see. Their stick-like arms seemed far too long for their bodies, and their large hands had long, bony fingers that moved restlessly at their sides as they approached her car.

Suddenly, all feeling and movement came back to Margaret as she watched them float down toward the pavement of Interstate 10 and she felt a bit panicky.

Their large, almond-shaped eyes remained black, but glistened with moisture as they looked directly into Margaret’s eyes through the windshield, coming closer, in no hurry but moving with purpose, with determination.

“Shit!” she cried, throwing the car into reverse. “Oh God please help me, my God, please God!”

She tried to get the car out of the ditch, but she found it hard to take her eyes off the creatures approaching her. They were three or four feet from the car when her door snapped open by itself. She slammed her foot down on the accelerator . . .

. . . but the engine died.

Margaret felt sick with fear, so sick that she was unable to scream as they got closer and began to reach out their long, skinny arms.

When the first one wrapped his long fingers around her left arm, she let out a loud, high scream that echoed through the empty night, but it did no good.

The creature pulled her out of the car with surprising strength, then placed his other hand atop her head.

In seconds, the desert disappeared and her mind was filled with the utter blackness of the sky above it . . .

2

Thump — thump — thump . . . thump — thump — thump . . .

The sound came again and again, reaching her slowly through the deep, muddy waters of sleep. It seemed so muffled that, as she began to wake, Margaret was certain it was coming from some distance.

Before she even opened her eyes, she began to feel the stiffness in her body — in her back and shoulders and neck — and she realized she was sitting up, not lying in bed where she knew she should be if she were waking up. She winced as she leaned forward rigidly and opened her eyes.

“Ma’am?”

The voice made her jump and she jerked her head to the left, her eyes widening at the sight of a highway patrolman leaning down to peer at her through the window. He had hair the color of beach sand and skin darkened by the sun, in his late twenties, maybe early thirties.

She stared at him, shocked and mute.

“Would you mind rolling down the window, ma’ am?” he asked, voice raised to be heard through the glass.

She stammered as she hit the button a couple times, then realized the ignition had to be on. She turned the key, pressed the button, and the window hummed down.

“H-have I d-done something wrong. Off-Officer?” she asked, her voice hoarse.

“I don’t really know, ma’am. I saw you on the shoulder here, your car in the ditch, I just wanted to make sure you were okay. Are you okay?”

“Well, yes, I was . . . I-I was just sleeping.” It wasn’t until that moment that she realized it was just past dawn. “I was driving all night, see, and I . . .” She turned to look ahead on the interstate before continuing, suddenly feeling herself being clutched in the cold, razor-like talon of panic. It was gone. That colossal thing that had landed there in the dark of night was gone now, and from what she could see, there was absolutely no sign that it had ever been there. Forcing herself to calm down, she glanced at the officer as she continued, “. . . and I, um . . . well, I . . .” She glanced back at that place where the thing had been, just to make sure. What could she tell the highway patrolman when she wasn’t even sure what had happened? Had she dreamed the whole thing? Had she gotten so tired she’d pulled over to — yes, that was it. It would have to do for now.

“I got very tired,” she said, looking at him again. “There didn’t seem to be any rest stops or motels or restaurants ahead and I figured there wouldn’t be for miles, maybe hours . . . so I pulled over to take a nap. I guess I slept longer than intended.”

He nodded. “Have you been drinking?”

She flinched, offended by the suggestion. “No, of course I haven’t been drinking, I’ve been sleeping. I’m on my way from Los Angeles to Harlie to see my sister because she’s dy . . . she’s, um, sick. In the hospital. Very sick.”

He nodded again. “Sorry, ma’ am. I was just asking. That’s part of my job. You did the right thing, you know. Pulling over like that. You might’ve saved yourself and somebody else by doing that. But in the future, try to plan ahead so that won’t happen again. It’s a good idea to make sure you’re plenty rested up before you start on a long trip.”

She just nodded, not knowing what to say.

The patrolman stood. “You have a safe trip, now. And hope your sister gets better.”

He nodded with a rather tight smile, then walked away. She looked in her rearview mirror and saw him getting into his white patrol car, watched as he pulled the door closed with a muffled clump, and waited for him to start his engine. But he didn’t.

Margaret sucked in a deep breath and let it out sharply as she rubbed her eyes with the heels of her palms, then scrubbed her palms over her face vigorously. She lit a cigarette, took a deep drag as she started the Lexus, then backed out of the ditch. This time, it was easy . . . but she remembered it being impossible last night . . . if, indeed, that had happened at all.

Once she’d backed up, she heard the patrol car start. He pulled around the Lexus, waving as he got back on the interstate and drove away.

Margaret stared at the large section of ground that had — unless she’d dreamed it — been occupied by some gigantic, glowing craft the night before. She could still almost see it . . . a ghost-like memory of it, filling her windshield, swallowing her view of the desert.

She closed her eyes and leaned her forehead on the steering wheel, muttering. “What happened to me?”

After awhile, she took a deep breath, put the car in gear and pulled back onto the interstate . . .

3

Harlie was a small town about eighty miles east of Tucson. The biggest hotel in town was the Royal House, which was where the reunion was being held. She decided she wouldn’t be caught dead staying in the same hotel as some of her former classmates from out of town. As she drove around, she saw a Motel 6, the Cactus Flower Motor Inn, a ratty little joint called simply Desert Cottages, and a couple of bed and breakfast establishments that were probably overpriced. She finally settled on a Best Western Inn on the very edge of Harlie, near the freeway. It wasn’t exactly what she’d grown accustomed to on her frequent business trips as a successful woman in the high-pressure advertising biz, but it was a far cry from having to go outside in the middle of the night if she wanted ice.

The second her things were scattered over her bed, Margaret shed her clothes and took a long hot shower.

She took her time under the spray of water. Her body was stiff from sleeping all night in her car and she’d developed an industrial-strength headache during the remainder of her drive to Harlie. She’d spent that whole drive going over and over her memories of the night before. She assumed that was where the headache had come from.

She’d asked herself question after question, more often than not talking aloud to herself. Had she dreamed it? If so, why didn’t she remember getting tired and pulling into the ditch to take a nap? She knew she hadn’t done that — it had simply been a convincing lie for the benefit of the patrolman — so it was unlikely she would remember doing something she hadn’t done. She didn’t even remember going to sleep; one second, she’d been trying to get away from those creatures reaching for her in the car, and the next, she was waking up just after dawn to a cop peering into her window. So, if she hadn’t gone to sleep and dreamed it, what the hell had happened?

There was, of course, one glaringly obvious explanation, but she tried to resist even considering it. She had visions of sharing that particular explanation with someone in confidence, then going to the grocery store a few days later to see herself on the cover of the Weekly World News beneath the headline: ADVERTISING EXECUTIVE ATTACKED BY U.F.O. ALIENS! — Probed Rectally Then Impregnated By Elvis!