Second Chance (45 page)

“The virus."

"
Mmm
. My doing. It's becoming very popular, isn't it?" Keith coughed, then cleared his throat, swallowing what he had brought up. "I'm not really surprised to see you. Knowing what you did . . ." He tried to smile. ". . . what I
told
you, it didn't take the Hardy Boys to find me. And at this point, I don't really care. But why you? Why didn't you call the police?"

"The police wouldn't have done what we have to do.”

“And what's that—kill me?"

"No. Take you back." Woody smiled grimly. "Back to where you once belonged. You never should have been, Keith. And I think it can change. It can be what it was before—a world without you after 1969. A world without Pan."

Keith tried to lick his dry lips, but there was no moisture on his tongue. It was like rubbing leather with a dry sponge. "Afraid not," he said, and his words, coming on each breath, sounded to his dying ears like cornstalks brushing together in the wind. "It's too late. But I know . . . you're right in theory. I do have . . . you to thank. I still remember dying . . . in that building. I dream about it . . . But you brought me back . . . so I could do . . . what had to be done. From the first time . . . I knew what I would do." His eyes went down to his heaving chest. "Knew here." He looked back up, gave his head a little shake. "Wasn't a hoof print. Never meant that. Was. Omega."

"Omega," Woody said. "The end."

"Final warnings. What I gave. And now . . . final solution. Poor Woody. Even if . . . there was time . . . too late. Won't go back. Won't let you . . . take me . . ."

He turned his head to the right to make it easier, and focused all the strength remaining to him down his right arm, into his right hand that held the pistol. Even then, it came up so slowly that Woody had time to move, but not quickly enough, not before Keith took the barrel in his mouth like a weary child sucking at its mother's breast one last time before sleep, pulled the trigger, and died.

Part V

Chapter 45

"Oh
Christ
! Oh holy
hell
, Woody!" Curly said.

Woody stared, arrested halfway on his leap to the couch by the sound of the silenced gun merging with the wet sound of the bullet splitting flesh. He stared at Keith, slumped on his dead mother's lap, stared at the family portrait above the sofa splashed with blood and other things, things gray and pink and tan, stared at the end of the world.

"No," he said quietly.

"We'll never get him back now, oh hell, it's over, there's not a flicking chance . . ."

"
No!
" Woody said, and the single word dammed the verbal stream that flowed from Curly. "We'll get him. We will." He set the rifle on the floor. "Pick him up. We've got to carry him to the car.

Curly only stood, his jaw hanging. "Woody . . ."

"
Pick him up,
dammit
!
It's our only chance. For
any
of us.”

“But he's
dead!
"

Woody gave his head a furious shake. "He wasn't dead back then. He wasn't dead yesterday. Curly . . . Curly, what else can we do?"

Curly looked around wildly for a moment, at the bodies, at the shotgun he carried, at Woody. Then he nodded jerkily. "All right." He set down the shotgun. "All right."

They wrapped Keith's head in newspapers they found in the kitchen, and held the sheets together with masking tape. Then they put his legs in one large garbage bag and shoved a second over the top half of his body. They had to rest several times carrying the body up the slope, but didn't want to take the chance of having their car seen outside Mrs.
Aarons's
house.

Eighth Street was empty when they reached it, and as they lugged their burden across it toward their car, they heard a pounding from the trunk and a feeble voice inside.

"Jesus, what about him?" Curly said.

They set Keith's body down next to the car on the curb side, and Woody struck the trunk lid. "
Quiet
. I told you to keep quiet, damn you." He turned to Curly. "Don't let him out. Stay here. I've got to get the guns and close up the house."

Woody ran across the street, down the slope, and into the house through the kitchen door. He picked up the shotgun and the rifle, then looked at Keith's silenced pistol. After a long moment of thought, he took that too, jamming it into his belt. Then he turned out the lights and closed and locked the back door. He stopped at the house Keith had rented, and did the same there. He thought about taking the manuscript along, but left it, figuring that by the time it was found and read and understood, everything would be over, for better or worse.

Curly was waiting at the car, and Woody threw the rifle and shotgun into the back seat, then put an arm around Curly and drew him away, several yards down the street. "I've been thinking," Woody said softly. ""This is hard, but it's the way it is. We can't let the old man go."

"What!"

"
Listen
to me. He tells the police, they find Mrs. Aarons, they've got our description, the description of the car, and they get us before we get back to Iselin. We need a
day
, Curly. A day to get everyone back for tomorrow night. And he's dead anyway. He's got the virus just like we do."

"You mean . . . kill him?"

Woody nodded his head. "I don't know what else we can do.”

“Tie him
up
, take him
with
us,
Jesus
. . ."

"He could get loose, and what would we do with him? No. Don't you see, if we can do what we have to do, then he won't be dead, because none of it happened. None of this happened."

"Yeah, great—you gonna shoot him in the head and then tell him he's not dead?"

"We can't jeopardize this."

"And we can't
kill
a guy either!"

"It's like a dream, Curly. None of
it's
real. It's like killing somebody in a
dream
."

"And is Keith a dream?" Curly said, pointing to the wrapped corpse several yards away. "Is Tracy a dream too? Are your kids a dream? It's
reality
, Woody. And you'll really be
killing
someone!"

Woody looked at his friend for a long time, thinking about pulling the trigger, thinking about Tracy and Peter and Louisa. "It doesn't matter," he finally said. "It doesn't matter if it's a dream. And it doesn't matter if it's reality. Because if this is real, and this is the
only
reality, then we're all dead anyway."

"Dead but not damned," Curly said. "And that's what you are if you murder that old man."

"I already took a monster out of hell. I already set him loose on the world. One murder's nothing next to that. I can't be any more damned than I already am."

Woody pulled the pistol from his belt, walked to the car, shoved the key in the trunk, opened it. "Get out."

"Woody . . ." He heard Curly coming up behind him, and turned, pointing the gun at
Curly's
chest.

“Just wait here," Woody said. "Mr. Rooney and I are going to make a phone call. Come on, Rooney. Get out."

Rooney climbed out with difficulty. "I was only yelling because I thought you guys had forgot me. Who we
callin
'?"

"The police," said Woody, wondering if he could do what he had to do. His arguments had seemed sound when he had talked to Curly, but there was a difference between hypothesis and reality, however tenuous that reality might be. "We're going to call the police. From your house."

"Woody . . ." Curly said again. His voice was pleading, and in the dim glow of the streetlight Woody thought he saw tears in his eyes.

Woody shook his head, steeled himself. "Wait for me."

He gestured with the gun, and Rooney walked ahead of him toward the house. The dog started to bark again. As they passed it, Woody asked Rooney if there was some way to keep the dog quiet.

"Had him for ten years," Rooney said. "If I knew some way, I
woulda
done it by now."

Woody wanted to laugh at the comment, but did not allow himself to. This man is a dream, he told himself. And when things are right again, he'll be alive, and he'll never know that I killed him, not even in dreams. He's a dream, I'm a dream, this gun is a dream, and as they walked through the house, Woody told himself to believe it, over and over again, until he
did
believe, believed long enough to point a gun, and when Rooney reached for the phone, Woody put the pistol against the back of his head and pulled the trigger.

And nothing happened.

Woody had tensed for the now familiar sound, but the dry click was far more shocking. It froze him, as a dozen questions and options ran through his mind. But it didn't freeze Rooney.

The old man swung around and smashed the handset against Woody's left ear. A crashing sound exploded inside his head, and he staggered, and the next thing he knew the man was on him, legs wrapped around Woody's thighs, one arm choking him, the other hand battering the top of his head with a bony fist.

"
Try'n
shoot me,
y'sonabitch
!" Rooney howled, and the dog howled too, and Woody twisted around, dropped the empty pistol, buried his head in the man's reeking shoulder, shook him like a bull trying to shake off a terrier. But the old man held on, still hitting, hitting until weakness joined the dizziness, and Woody knew he was going to fall, and thought that if he did
more
than fall, that if he
threw
himself to the ground—

He did, and felt his chin smashed back by Rooney's collarbone when they landed, but the old man was underneath, and took the brunt of the impact, cushioning Woody's fall. The pinioning legs went limp, the arm stopped choking, the fist stopped beating, and the curses turned to a groan.

Woody ignored the hot pain in his jaw, and pushed himself away from Rooney, who was flailing his hands and starting to roll over. He looked about in panic, and saw a rack of rusty kitchen knives on the cluttered counter. He glanced from the knives to the man on the floor and sobbed, unable to imagine the sensation of pressing sharp metal into flesh, afraid to grasp the worn wooden handles.

But then Rooney had the handset of the phone, was pushing himself to his feet, and his other hand was reaching for the buttons of the wall phone's dial.

Woody dove at him, knocked him to the floor again, grabbed the cord and jerked it out of the wall. Rooney came at his face, his wiry fingers hooked into claws, and his long, yellow nails raked Woody's cheek.

There were no words or curses now. All energy had gone to the physical, and Rooney kicked out for Woody's groin. Woody turned just in time, taking the blow on his thigh. Then he grabbed the edge of the counter and got to his feet. His hands scrabbled on the countertop until he reached the knives, and he clutched a grease-covered handle. But just as he pulled it from the wooden rack, he felt Rooney grasp his buttocks, and suddenly the world was filled with a terrible, nauseating pain.

Rooney, holding Woody's hips like a lover, had slammed his head into Woody's crotch, and was doing it over and over, and with every blow the pain became sharper, dulling Woody's reason so that the only thing in the world that mattered was stopping the pain.

The blade of the knife he held was only three inches long, and he buried it in the back of Rooney's neck so deeply that most of the handle entered as well.

Rooney's head fell one last time, softly, against Woody's groin, and his hands dropped as he toppled over sideways, hitting the floor with his shoulder. He looked up at Woody as though he was suddenly confused, not knowing what to make of this carbon steel wild card sticking in his neck.

Then he coughed blood and lay back gently, the weight of his head pressing the base of the knife handle against the yellow linoleum so that the patchily shaven wattles of his neck stretched, and the skin parted, and the point of the knife peeked out like some shy, rusty parasite, tenderly severing the jugular as it passed. Blood pumped, and the old man's face twitched with every heartbeat, and Woody watched in horror as the puddle on the floor grew wider.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. "Oh God, I'm sorry . . ." But Rooney didn't answer.

Woody looked away for a long time. He told himself it had to be this way, and that he had to stay, to make sure Rooney was dead. His heart was sick at having killed this man, but what made him even sicker was not knowing why.

It had been the only thing to do, as he had told Curly. But had he stabbed him to save the world, or to stop the pain Rooney was causing? If the former, he could feel like a soldier. But if the latter, he thought, he was no more than a murderer. And with a knife, feeling the blade slip in, like cutting a piece of meat . . .

The knowledge of what he had done and the sickness the physical pain had caused brought up what little was in his stomach, and he vomited into the sink, then leaned on the counter, resting his head on his forearms, and breathed deeply until the spasms stopped threatening. By that time Rooney was dead.

Woody took the empty pistol, turned out the lights and went out the front door, locking it behind him. The dog barked at him savagely, but he didn't look at it as he walked toward the car.