Part 17 (1/2)

I paused for a moment, thinking. I didn't have an answer, and I didn't really want to venture a guess. ”Mama Ca.s.s thinks it's some type of hallucinogen, something in the environment that's making us all crazy.”

Cob Gilles nodded. ”Yeah. That sounds like her. We're all broken, hallucinating, and she's the only one taking it in stride. At least that's what she'd like to believe ... the only one strong enough to ride it all out-this strange and dangerous trip-and walk out the other side with money busting her every seam.”

”You don't agree?”

”No.” He smiled. ”No, we're not insane. It's deeper than that. It's the world that's gone insane, not us. It's the world.” He bolted a swallow of Scotch and leaned forward in his chair, swaying slightly before his hands found the edge of the desk. ”It's a tumor,” he continued in a confidential whisper. ”It's a cancer-brain cancer-somewhere deep in the core of the city. Growing, distorting the shape of reality. Spreading. Metastasized. Terminal. It's eating us hollow. We're eating ourselves hollow.”

I glanced down at my gla.s.s, focusing on the beautiful glowing liquid. It was easier to look at, easier to comprehend. When I glanced back up, I found him watching me, his eyes suddenly bright and jovial. Those eyes told me his entire story. He knew how crazy this all sounded, but he no longer cared.

He had his booze. He had his pills. He'd made himself ready for the end of the world.

”I saw it, Dean. I actually saw the tumor.”

For a moment, I thought he was kidding, or at last speaking in glib abstractions. But those eyes were not the eyes of a jokester; they were the eyes of a man who really didn't give a f.u.c.k what I believed or how I reacted. He was speaking in order to speak, in order to hear his own words. Nothing else mattered.

”It was in the hospital, I think, though I'm not quite sure. We started way out east, in the industrial district, but where we ended up ...” He smiled widely and shrugged. ”Jesus Christ, it was f.u.c.ked! We were underground for ... I don't know. A long time? And I don't remember most of it-moving in a drunken trance, like s.n.a.t.c.hes of memory from a weeklong bender. I remember it was cold at times. And sometimes we were in earthen tunnels, sometimes in bas.e.m.e.nts and corridors.

”There were six of us at the start, but only two of us made it to the room. I really don't know what happened to the others. I remember glancing around and seeing fewer and fewer people, but it didn't really register. It was like my higher brain functions had been shut off. I was dizzy, and I think I threw up a couple of times.”

He raised his gla.s.s back to his lips. His hand was shaking now, and I heard the gla.s.s clink against his teeth as he finished off his drink. He lowered the gla.s.s and refilled it quickly, spilling another tumbler's worth across the surface of the desk.

”We must have climbed back out of the underground at some point, but I don't remember any stairs. Just the room. It was halfway down a carpeted corridor-the entire expanse gray with predawn light, all the color stripped out of the world. And then there was this ... room-” As he said these words, Cob Gilles's voice swelled with awe. ”There was this room,” he continued, ”with golden light spilling out, onto the floor of the hallway. And we were there, at the threshold, looking inside. We must have been aboveground, because there was an entire wall of picture windows on the far side of the room, blinding us with the most beautiful golden light. We were at least ten floors up, and the city outside was gorgeous and new-I don't even think it was Spokane. And there was a big table stretching down the middle of the room, with people sitting all around. It was some type of boardroom, and everyone was dressed in business attire, sitting motionless, staring at us. Staring at us with unblinking eyes. At least twenty of them, both men and women.

”I don't know what they wanted, but their eyes were absolutely huge, expectant. Like they knew something was going to happen-and that something, whatever it might be, was going to be absolutely terrible. And then-” The photographer's eyes scrunched up as if he were trying to riddle out some complex problem or trying to remember something that desperately did not want to be remembered. ”-and then they stood up, all at once, in freakish unison. And then ...” Cob Gilles shrugged and once again raised his gla.s.s to his lips. Before drinking, he mumbled around the gla.s.s: ”And then ... I just don't remember.”

I joined him as he drank deeply. My head was swimming, and the sharp bite of Scotch did little to straighten things out.

What the photographer was saying was absolute insanity-boardrooms and businessmen! If anything, it supported Mama Ca.s.s's theory. What he was describing was a drug trip, a hallucinogenic break from reality.

The photographer let out a bracing hiss and set his gla.s.s back down. ”When we came to, we were sitting on a bench downtown, and it was just the two of us. The others were gone. And they stayed gone. We never saw them again.”

”And that's the tumor?” I asked. ”A boardroom filled with stuffed suits?”

The photographer shook his head. He didn't seem put off by my abrupt summation. He just seemed very, very tired. ”There was a sickness there, Dean; I could feel it. There's something horribly wrong with the very nature of the universe, and it was centered right there, in that room, at that meeting. Like suddenly physics had gone awry. Stars had collapsed, and atoms had split. And it was tearing everything apart. And this-” He gestured about the room, but it was clear he meant the city and not the chaos of his apartment. ”-this is a symptom. This place. This feeling.”

I shrugged and lifted my palms into the air, a gesture of pure frustration. ”It could have been a delusion, a chemical state that imbued your visions with a sense of importance, with spiritual clarity.” As I talked, memories of Psych 101 came flooding back in. ”That's what religion is: epiphanies and euphoria. Just neurons misfiring.”

Cob Gilles smiled and shook his head. ”I saw through the veil, Dean. During that trip, the scales-as they say-they fell from my eyes.”

He once again reached for the bottle of Scotch, this time almost knocking it over. Instead of refilling his gla.s.s-a task I don't think he could have managed-he drank straight from the bottle. ”And what I saw ... that was the reality. And this world-this whole f.u.c.king world-is the delusion, nothing but a fever dream spinning away inside a dying mind.”

He paused for a moment, then continued: ”And what happens, Dean? What happens when that mind dies? What happens when there's no one left to hold it all together?”

”Dean!”

Sabine's voice was shrill and frantic, and it sounded a long way away.

At the sound of her cry, Cob Gilles started in his chair. He'd been so focused on me-and his booze and his story-I think he'd forgotten all about Sabine, left to wander through his apartment as we talked, as he let the drugs and alcohol work their magic on his body and nerves.

I spun around and started toward the confusion of bookcases, then decided to bypa.s.s that maze altogether. Instead, I stayed near the wall, pa.s.sing a small, garbage-strewn kitchenette before finally reaching the front door and picking up Sabine's trail.

”Dean!” She was closer now, and her voice sounded more frantic, more desperate.

”Sabine!” I called back, but she didn't respond.

What will I find? I wondered. Her body, sunk into the floor? Her eyes, pleading for help?

I collided with a bookcase and sent a shelf of notebooks cascading to the floor. A binder popped open, and the air filled with photographs.

I turned a corner and found Sabine standing in the narrow s.p.a.ce between the wall and a row of bookcases. Her face was contorted with confusion and anxiety, but she looked healthy, unharmed.

After a moment of tense silence, she turned and faced me. ”It's the Poet,” she said, her voice congested, breaking into a breathless sob. ”It's the Poet ... and she won't speak to me!”

I followed her gaze back down the narrow s.p.a.ce. There was a woman sitting on a stool about a dozen feet away. She sat perfectly still, facing away from us. Her back was ramrod stiff, and her whole body looked tense, ready to spring.

She was wearing a hood. It was a black leather fetish hood, and it covered almost her entire head, leaving just her eyes, mouth, and jaw visible. A spill of dark brown hair cascaded out from beneath the back of the hood, falling over the collar of a gray, paint-spattered peacoat. I could see her face in profile. Her pale lips trembled with suppressed energy, and her bright blue eyes-framed in cut-out ovals-quivered as she looked pointedly away.

”Sharon said she wore a mask,” Sabine gasped, her voice harsh and breathy. ”That's why she sent me here-so I could find her! But she won't say a word!”

Unleas.h.i.+ng a sudden burst of anger, Sabine turned back toward the masked woman. ”f.u.c.king say something! f.u.c.king talk to me!”

The Poet remained still. I thought I could see her eyes widen at Sabine's outburst.

A hand grabbed my arm and jerked me back. My foot slipped on a loose photograph, and I almost fell to the floor. ”It's time for you to go,” Cob Gilles growled. He was drunk and unsteady, but that didn't diminish the force of his hand, or his words, as he pulled me toward the front door. He launched me in that direction with an abrupt shove, then went after Sabine.

”You better f.u.c.king leave her alone!” he yelled. ”She's my angel-my angel!-and she's been through enough s.h.i.+t without some crazy b.i.t.c.h yelling at her!”

He grabbed Sabine's coat and pulled her back, but unlike me, Sabine did fall. The photographer didn't wait for her to regain her feet. He just kept pulling, dragging her across the hardwood floor. Sabine kicked out, knocking stacks of books across the floor and setting one bookcase tottering precariously. Finally, one of her flailing arms struck Cob Gilles's s.h.i.+n, and he lost his grip on her coat.

”Get out!” he roared, falling back against the wall, overwhelmed with emotion. There were tears streaming down his cheeks. ”Get the f.u.c.k out of our home! You aren't welcome here. You aren't welcome!”

He collapsed to the ground and buried his face in his hands. ”You aren't welcome,” he continued to sob, losing energy and volume. ”You aren't welcome.”

Sabine jumped to her feet and started toward him. Her jaw was clenched, and there was dark venom in her eyes. I stopped her. I grabbed her in a tight bear hug and rotated her away from the photographer, putting my body in between the two of them. ”Shhhhh,” I said, trying to make a comforting noise in her ear. ”Shhhhh. He's done. It's all over.”

After a handful of seconds Sabine stopped struggling, and I let her go. She took a step back, then adjusted her jacket across her shoulders. ”f.u.c.k this s.h.i.+t,” she muttered, and fled the apartment, violently ripping the front door open and letting it bounce off the wall.

I turned back toward the photographer and gave him one last look before following her out. He was still sobbing in his hands.

And as I watched, he toppled over.