The Dinosaur Four (2 page)

The floor
running along the now-missing wall cracked and dropped, as if on a hinge, leaving Lisa on a thirty-degree slope, a slide that led right down to the water. The ceiling above fell at the same time and a large chunk from upstairs slid past, landing with a splash. Water sprayed into the café and slickened the slanted floor.

Lisa slid down the slope, twisting and turning and reaching back for anything that could stop her. She felt like she was falling out of the world. Just as she opened her mouth to scream, she hit the water and went under.

Tim MacGregor watched as the woman washed away downstream.
A wide river flowed from left to right where Chestnut Street had been moments earlier. Warm, humid air flooded the room. He couldn’t understand how this was possible.

Another man who had been standing in line shouted “Lisa!” and fumbled off his black suit jacket.

How did he know her name?
Tim wondered. It was easier to ponder their relationship than whatever was happening. Someone else had shouted that downtown Denver disappeared. That didn’t seem right, though. The café had moved. It had
gone
somewhere. Tim had felt the shifting.
But how? Where?

The man threw
his jacket onto an empty table and backed up into the room, bumping the old woman who sat under the bookshelves. She whimpered and held her leg. Blood glistened between her fingers. Tim wondered what the man was doing and then realized that he was trying to get a running start.

The younger barista walked up to the crack in the floor and stared down at the river.

“Move it,” ordered the man. He sprinted forward, straight toward the missing wall. Tim grabbed the barista’s arm and pulled her clear. The man sprung off of the sloping floor and flew out over the water. He landed on his side and swam downstream.

Tim had never been in this café before. His new girlfriend, Julie, had told him to meet her here. He had just walked in, hoping to see her, when the ticking started. He felt paralyzed. He wanted someone to tell him what to do.

The man disappeared into the night as he swam off after Lisa.
What if that had been Julie?
Tim felt guilty, both for his inaction and for his inability to swim. Colorado was a thousand miles from the nearest ocean, he remembered defensively. If he jumped in after them, he would just be one more person in need of rescue.
That doesn’t mean you can’t do something. You aren’t injured. Do something.

“
This is nuts,” said another customer, a man wearing a UPS uniform. “Where did they go?” Tim shoved past him and hurried toward the entrance. Blinded by the emergency lights above the door, he stumbled over a fallen chair and kicked it out of his way without stopping.

“Hey!
Watch it, buddy,” barked an older guy wearing jogging shorts.

Tim ignored him and stepped through the now-empty windo
w frame by the door. He stood on a portion of sidewalk covered with broken glass. To the left, the concrete jutted out over the river. To the right, it stopped above a muddy bank. Straight ahead, the sidewalk simply came to an end.

He saw the man floating downstream. Tim took several steps out
over the river, but the man was too far away to reach. He looked around. Beyond the sidewalk, he saw no sign of Denver. The sky above held more stars than Tim had ever seen in his life, even camping in the mountains.

He hurried to his right
and stepped down onto the muddy ground. The café sat on the edge of a river in a wide clearing, surrounded by a wall of trees.

“Hey, wait
,” called someone behind him. It sounded like the UPS guy.

Tim did not look back. The two people in the water were
washing away. Tim caught sight of the swimming man, illuminated by starlight. Further downstream, he saw a frantic splash that must be the woman. She disappeared around a bend. Tim ran after them, slipping in the mud despite the thick tread on his work boots. He stopped watching the river and focused on his footing. As the woods closed in, he pulled out his mobile phone and shined the light ahead of him.

The
heavy humid air reminded him of summer vacations at his grandfather’s house in Minnesota. It felt nothing like Colorado. Thin stems slapped at his arms and legs. Tim paused, realizing that the café must be nearly out of sight. He turned to look back, wondering if it would still be there.

The Daily Edition Café had occupied the bottom corner of an old, eight-story building. A
ragged ruin two stories high now hung halfway out over a river. The café itself looked mostly intact, but the suite next door was nowhere to be seen. Half of the second floor remained, with uneven walls and no ceiling.

Denver
hadn’t disappeared, they had. The café had been scooped out of the building and deposited on this riverbank. Tim wondered briefly what had happened to the rest of the structure, back in Denver. Did it collapse? Had anything happened to Julie?

He pushed the thought aside
and pressed on. Tim lost sight of the river when he took a wide arc past a thicket of thorny brambles. He began to feel lost in the dark and wondered if he could find his way back to the café. He stopped and tried to slow his breathing so that he could listen for the sound of rushing water.

W
illiam Crockett stood on the sidewalk and peered into the dark woods, searching for the young man who had run off. His long-sleeved UPS uniform felt sticky in the warm, humid air. At three inches over six feet, William had a good vantage point, but after forty-two years, his eyesight was not so sharp. He saw no signs of life.
What in the hell is going on?
He worried about his sons. Had whatever happened here also happened at their school?

William walked to the
left end of the sidewalk, where it jutted out over the river. He squinted, searching for anything else that looked like a building, but he saw only dark shadows. He turned around and walked to the other end, where the sidewalk stopped above the muddy shore.

Holding on to the bricks, William leaned
around the corner and looked at the side of the building. More shadows. He studied the wall, which belonged to the suite next door to the café. A real estate office, he remembered. Little of that room remained. The wall was blank except for a light switch and a framed photo of the Rocky Mountains. William followed the wall upward. The ceiling of the realty office jutted out only a few inches. Above, the wall continued past the second floor, where it ended with a jagged edge. It looked like one of the buildings in the World War II video games his sons played. William wondered what was in the suite above the café.

He looked
down. Pieces of wall had fallen and stuck in the mud along the edge of the building. The ground looked solid enough, but the café was the only thing that remained of Denver. It was the only thing that felt real. He was afraid to step down. William returned to the center of the sidewalk and steadied himself on a parking meter, looking downstream again. The sky looked lighter over the tree tops.

So
meone took his arm. He jumped and turned to see the young woman who had been flirting with him while she made his latte. “What’s happening?” she whispered. She sounded close to tears.

“I don’t know.”
He looked at the girl, wishing he could think of something to say that might make her feel better.

“Where the hell are we? Are we even on Earth? Look at the stars. They don’t look right.”

William looked up. “They’re brighter, that’s for sure. All I know is the big dipper, and I can’t find it.” He put his arm around her. “But it still feels like Earth. It feels like the Florida panhandle to me. The humidity, the insect noises.”

“
What happened to Lisa?” she asked. “My boss.”

“Th
e guy who jumped in the water was catching up to her, right before they disappeared around that bend.” William pointed. “The other guy ran off in the woods, in the same direction. I think he went looking for them. I been kicking myself for not going after him, to help.”

The young woman
blew out a long, slow breath. “He has a crush on her. The one who jumped in the river, I mean. He comes in almost every day. He’ll save her.” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself.

“What about the other guy?”

She shook her head. “Never seen him before.” She paused. “I’m Beth, by the way.”

“William.”

William nodded toward the woods. “I think the sun is coming up. Once it gets a little brighter, we can go looking for them. If they aren’t back by then.”

“They’ll be back.”
Tears welled in Beth’s eyes. She walked along the sidewalk toward the shore. Like William, she stopped right at the edge.

They were joined by a
woman wearing a tailored blazer. Her boots crunched the broken glass on the sidewalk. “Have you figured out what happened to us?” It sounded more like a demand than a question.

Beth spun to look at the woman, who stood with her hands on her hip
s, as if she was posing for something. “Well,” Beth began, “While you were inside, a television crew planted a forest around us. It’s all a big prank.” She put a finger to her lips. “You can’t see them, but there are cameras watching right now. Don’t do anything embarrassing.”

The woman
gave Beth a curt smile and looked around. She bent over and picked up a piece of broken glass. “This must be how that young man’s face got cut up, when the window broke.”

Beth gasped.
“Are you a detective?” The woman did not respond.

“How
is everyone doing inside?” William asked.

The woman in the blazer
met him eye to eye. She had to look up, but she managed it without seeming small. “I think everyone will be okay. The redhead is patching up the old woman. She’s a bit of a bleeder.”

“What about the guy with the cuts on his face?”

“She tried to look at him too, but he wouldn’t have it. He’s pacing back and forth and freaking out. I think he’s okay, though. The cuts aren’t very deep.” She dropped the glass shard and stuck out her hand. “I’m Patricia Hayman.”

William
gripped her hand with a firm shake. “William Crockett. And this is Beth.” Beth kept her arms folded but offered a small smile.

Patricia
walked out to the end of the jutting sidewalk and crouched, looking down at something. “Come see what I found over here.”

Al Stevens
had been hoping the café might be quiet today, that he might spend a few extra minutes chatting with Lisa after she made his coffee. He kicked his feet and swam downstream in the dark, trying to catch up to her.

Ahead, Lisa flailed and flapped like an injured bird. Al kicked harder, closing in on her.
He couldn’t understand what was happening. His mind jumped to terrorism, but that didn’t explain why it was dark out. Or why he was swimming in a
fucking river
. A small voice whispered in the back of Al’s mind.
This is perfect.
He didn’t need to think of something clever to say. He didn’t need to worry about his hair or his teeth or his breath. He just needed to save Lisa.

The river swept them
along. Al caught up to Lisa and hooked an arm around her. She shrieked. He tried to tell her to calm down but sucked in a mouthful of river water instead.

Al coughed and paddled toward the shore. Lisa slapped at the water with both hands, hindering more than helping. As they moved from the center, the current slackened into small eddies. “It’s okay,” Al said. Lisa gripped his arm.

A voice came from the dark shore. “Over here! I gotcha.”

Al saw the dim shape of a man and swam toward him. When he felt the gritty bottom, he pushed Lisa out ahead of him and she stumbled to her feet.

The man held onto a sapling with one hand and lifted Lisa onto the peaty bank. He turned back to Al. “Hey, look! What is that?”

Al
spun around. “What? Where?” The river rushed by endlessly in the dark.

“Something slid down the bank on the other side.”

Al squinted but saw only frothy bubbles swirling in the starlight. “It’s pretty dark, buddy.” He coughed and spat as the young man helped him onto solid ground.

“It’s Tim.”

“I’m Al. How did you find us, Tim? We were in a coffee house. Where did you come from?” He pulled at his wet shirt, trying to stop it from clinging to his body.

“Same place. I was standing right behind you in line.

“Great.”

Al
moved over to Lisa, who leaned forward on both hands and spat on the ground. He knelt and patted her back as she coughed. “It’s okay. You’re okay now.”

Tim
held his phone overhead for light. Lisa’s dark hair hung down the sides of her face in sloppy wet strings. She wrapped her arms around her wet blouse and shivered, despite the muggy heat. “Why are we…? Where did we…? Wh- what’s happening?”