Dave Zeltserman - Bad Karma

I’m dreaming, he told himself, this is nothing but a dream .

The younger Russian, Dmitry, was staring intently at Susan. The older Russian had his.45 out and was polishing it with a handkerchief. When he noticed Shannon awake, he put his handkerchief away and showed a crooked smile.

“You think this is a dream?” he asked, amused.

“It has to be,” Shannon said. He pushed himself up into a sitting position. The cold sweat from his back had spread to his thighs. “That’s all this is. It’s what’s called a lucid dream.”

The older Russian smiled broadly. “Hoo boy, are you mistaken. How come we are in it then? And how come it’s so realistic? Lucid dream you control, right, smart guy?”

Shannon found himself nodding.

“You controlling this one?”

Shannon started to shake his head, stopped himself.

“Then you sure you didn’t wake up?” the Russian asked, laughing. “What if I let my young friend do what he wants to do? Will that prove this is no dream?”

Dmitry’s face was a hard white as he stared at Susan, his mouth small, his eyes tiny black holes. As he stood there, his breath came out in a harsh, almost obscene rhythm. Shannon shook his head. “This is only a dream,” he repeated. “Look at both your noses. They’re the way they were earlier today before I broke them.”

The older Russian touched his nose, shrugged, then sat on the edge of the bed next to Shannon. He touched Shannon’s knee in a conspiratorial type fashion. “Maybe this is something else,” he said, his breath stale and smelling a bit like rotting fish. “Maybe this is what you call prophecy , right? A look into your future?”

Shannon didn’t answer him. Just sat still as his heart pounded within his chest.

“You take us as idiot mudacks ?” the Russian asked, all amusement now gone. “Do you think we can not find you here?”

“Why should you be able to? I’m registered under Susan’s name.”

“And nothing in your apartment has her name? You don’t think we will call every hotel looking for her?”

Shannon looked from Dmitry back to the other Russian. He tried to tell himself this was only a dream. That he had full control over it and could make these two Russians leave anytime he wanted. But he wasn’t sure of that. He also didn’t want them to leave. At least not yet. He wanted to hear more of what this man had to say.

The Russian sensed what Shannon was thinking. A sly smile showed on his lips. “You know you were lying to her before,” he said. “About us not bothering you again if you keep sticking your nose in our business. You know we will come for you. Her too. And you know we will hurt her. Very much. You don’t even have a gun to protect her, do you?”

Shannon involuntarily shook his head.

“What type of detective don’t have gun,” the Russian mused. “ Pussy detective, that is what. What’s matter? Too afraid to upset her, that why you don’t have gun?”

There was some truth to that. Shannon had never gotten a gun permit as a way of showing Susan that he wasn’t going to take any dangerous cases. At least that was the plan. Now it was too late. Even if he applied for a permit tomorrow, it would take six months. How was he going to defend Susan against these Russians if they came after them? With a roll of quarters? A baseball bat? What good would that do against two stone cold killers armed with.45s?

The Russian smiled thinly. “So that is the answer,” he said. “You never got gun to prove your love. How romantic. But leaves you now, how you say, up shits creek. If you have any brains you keep nose out of our business!”

“How is that cult your business?”

“Not smart question to ask.” The Russian looked over at his partner and smiled sadly. “Never see my friend before want a woman as bad as yours. Look at him, he barely knows where he is now. I let him do what he wants, it will not be pretty sight.”

“Fuck you. How is that cult your business?”

“Then I answer this way,” the Russian said with a tired shrug. “A secret.”

“Who the fuck are the two of you? Ex-KGB?”

“Anything possible,” the Russian said, again shrugging.

Dmitry’s breathing had become more ragged as he stared at Susan. The older Russian glanced at him and told Shannon how it could be interesting anyway to let his friend do as he wants. “We can see how well you control your dreams,” he said, his laugh ugly and coarse.

Enough! Shannon shouted to himself. Leave! Both of you!

“Okay, okay,” the Russian said. “Don’t get your panties in uproar. You want us leave, we leave. Just ask yourself if you want us back for real.” He turned to his friend and pulled him by the arm. “Next time, Dimi,” he promised him. “We see her again and I will let you do what you want.” Dmitry reluctantly let himself be dragged to the door, all the while staring with a hot white intensity in Susan’s direction. Then, without the door opening, the two were gone. As if they’d faded into the air.

In the split second between semi-consciousness and waking, Shannon felt as if he were in freefall. Then he swung up in bed, his heart racing a mile a minute, his body damp with sweat. In a near panic he reached out and felt Susan next to him. The sheet had slipped off her and his hand touched her bare thigh. She was sound asleep. He let his hand linger there for a long moment as he tried to slow down his breathing.

The room was dark, shadowy. In his dream the room had been as bright as daylight. Slowly he regained his orientation. He squinted at the alarm clock and saw it was three-twenty-four in the morning.

He sat motionless for several minutes as he tried to make sense of his dream. It had seemed ultra realistic with none of the sloughing through molasses feel or lack of control that a normal dream has. But he never felt as if he had complete control over it, and at times, wasn’t even sure he was dreaming. This was something other than the lucid dreams he’d been experimenting with.

He left the bed and walked to the bathroom sink. There, he splashed cold water over his face, then risked a look at himself in the mirror. He shuddered involuntarily at what he saw. His face looked drawn, his eye and jaw still swollen badly, his skin the same whitish-gray color he’d seen on dozens of drug addicts he’d encountered over the years. Lowering his head he splashed more cold water over his face, this time avoiding any glance of himself in the mirror.

As he thought more about his dream, he wished he had a chance to discuss it with Eli. He knew that it was partly his subconscious warning him about things he’d overlooked, such as the Russians being able to locate him through Susan’s name. In the morning he’ll have the front desk change their registration to an alias. He also knew he had only been fooling himself before. If he kept digging into that cult, those two Russians would come after him again. There was no chance that they wouldn’t. Maybe his dream was simply a warning to him to drop the case. As he thought about it, he felt unsettled. He knew he couldn’t drop it. He couldn’t just leave Pauline Cousins and her daughter to fend for themselves. He was going to do what he had to and worry about the Russians later.

When he got back in bed, Susan turned over so that the side of her face pressed against his chest and her legs lay over his. Shannon put his arm around her thin shoulder. He lay like that for a long time just feeling the shallow, rhythmic rising and falling of her breathing. Eventually, he closed his eyes but didn’t sleep again that night.

Had the Gibson family home been in Aspen it would’ve made a nice ski lodge. As it was, sitting on a cul-de-sac with a lake view, it was impressive. A big stone Tudor styled to look as if it had been built in Europe during the nineteenth century. An attached four car garage did little to alter the illusion.