The Flashback Trilogy

Chapter 5

He stared at the bag, irritably, contemptuously. “Will it help me sleep?”

“Call Vicki with any questions.”

“Hmpf.” And he went back inside.

“You’re welcome,” I said; even as the wind blew and the screen door banged.

And then I looked across the street. At the long, open, swaying gate and the hideous, black, gothic-style arch. At Sandy Chain Community Cemetery with its towering cyclone fences and tombstones like ruined teeth; its brown, semi-frozen lawns; its crypts and sepulchers full of nothing.

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Bennet continued as I laid the roses (I’d parked next to her section with the engine running and the door hanging open): “Vacation? (laughter in the studio) No, no, not this Deputy. I mean, what would I do? Yeah, yeah; I know: Go to Bluebeard’s Cove, right? Or Devil’s Gorge. Go bet on the races at Checkered Flags. Well, that’s fine, I suppose—if you’re a civilian. If you’re not a lawman. But I am lawman, see, and—”

I stood, staring at the marker, staring at the inscription.

“—an oath of service, a promise to protect. And that promise comes before anything; even, I dare say, family—"

I watched as rain began to spot the granite; to stain the marker in ever-increasing blotches— darkening the ‘C’ in Cynthia, punctuating the still-fresh epigraph.

“—well, that’s true, I don’t. I don’t. I mean, unless you count Barney; that, he’s my dog. Norwegian Elkhound. (proud chuckling) That’s the national dog of Norway—”

I stared at the marker.

Were you really so unhappy—so lost? So alone? Was it really so hopeless—and did you hate me so much—that you would use a piece of me—a piece of my work—to at last finish what the pills and alcohol couldn’t? Had I abandoned you to that extent, my love? And did any of it—any of it—ever really happen?

I looked at the granite and the semi-frozen grass—the insufficient inscription, the red, wet roses in cellophane.

Where are you, my love, and just as importantly, where am I? Because I no longer care about what I cared about—and so fiercely! while you were here; by which I mean, what I took from you and gave to Sandy Chain, what I thought was my duty but was in fact only selfishness.

I looked up, the rain spotting my eyes, to find the clouds virtually racing.

Where are you, and just as importantly, where am I?

And then I turned toward the west, toward the sea—I’m still not sure why; and became, in that very instant, a kind of statue, a kind of oak. Then I saw the Anomaly for the very first time (that churning, boiling stormfront; that amorphous Man o’ War spreading, ink-like, across the sky), and, unable to comprehend what I was seeing, just stood there, frozen, like I’d looked on Medusa herself. Like I’d become Irit; the Lady of Gomorrah—and prideful spouse to Lot—after she’d been turned into a pillar of salt.

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“Looks like a mushroom cloud–only, like, horizontal.”

I confess I jumped, and that my hand dropped to my weapon—had I carried one. “Donovan. Now how many times have I told you not to cut through the cemetery?”

“Ah, Chief, but then I’ve got to go all the way around. And there’s a mean dog on Oberlin; you know that. Besides,” He stepped up next to me and gazed at the cloud. “You don’t really mean to tell me you care about that when there’s, well, that. Am I right?”

I peered at the cloud: at its curtains of rain and lightning—like the tendrils of a jellyfish—at its billowing cumulonimbus, which flickered and flashed.

“What is that?” I mumbled. “Is that, is that lightning up there, or something?”

I guess he must have followed my gaze. “Up there? Near the top? No—no, I don’t think so. More like—more like balloon beacons, or aircraft. Their wing lights, maybe—glowing in the gloom. Those colors, though. They don’t—they don’t look right. Almost like—”

“That’s because you’ve never seen them,” I said, and toggled my radio. “No one has. K-94, this is the Chief. Do you copy?”

But there was nothing—only static. Only white noise. I listened for the truck’s radio: nothing. Just dead air. Just silence as thunder rumbled and the rain fell and the wind gusted—powerfully. Alarmingly.

“K-94, this is the Chief—do you copy?”

More static, more noise. I looked at the fast-approaching cloud.

“Donovan,” I said.

“Yeah, Chief?”

“Don’t cut through the cemetery.”

And then I hustled for the truck and quickly climbed in—jammed it into gear, activated the light bar. Then I was driving out of the cemetery at a dizzying clip; reaching for my cellphone even as it started ringing and ringing; glancing at the shotgun as it lay—bleakly, funereally, like a coffin—between the seats.

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“What do you mean, gone?” The wipers went squirk, squirk, squirk. “She’s probably in the restroom, Hank.” I cradled the cellphone as I drove. “I mean, she is pregnant. Jesus. Give her a minute.”

“I’ve given her about 20 minutes—and I’m telling you, she’s not here. Now are you coming to check it out, or what?”

“Look, my phone’s been ringing since I left Mirabeau; okay? Just hold on. I’m turning onto Main now.”