Brian Freeman - Marathon

“So what are you baking?” the man asked.

“My wife is making a dessert to bring to the office tomorrow.”

“That’s nice. Me, I love coconut dishes. Have you ever tried magic bars? Chocolate chips, butterscotch, sweetened condensed milk, and coconut on a graham-cracker crust. They’re so good. My wife makes them for the kids, but to tell you the truth, I eat more of them than they do.”

Khan checked his watch. “I’ll have to try them.”

“You won’t be sorry.” The man twisted his body and looked outside at the rain. “Whoo, it’s still coming down out there.”

“Yes.”

“Summer in Minnesota, huh?”

Khan’s brow wrinkled with mild confusion and annoyance. “Yes. How much for the coconut?”

“Oh, well, let me run it through.” He scanned the plastic bag and announced the price and then said again, “Anything else?”

“No.”

“Any coupons?”

“No.” Khan handed him the five-dollar bill.

The manager opened the cash register and counted out Khan’s change, but he stopped to open a new roll of nickels, even though it looked as if he had plenty of nickels in the drawer. He counted out the change slowly.

“There you go,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“Do you want a bag for that?”

Khan shook his head. “That’s not necessary.”

“Come back and see us again.”

“Yes, I will,” Khan said.

He headed for the automatic doors of the grocery store. The doors slid open, and Khan walked outside into the rain, but he stopped when he found the fat man in the leather jacket blocking his way. The man still had his hands in his jacket pockets.

“Excuse me,” Khan said, but when he tried to change direction, the man stepped in front of him.

“Excuse me,” Khan said again.

The man didn’t move. “Is that your cab over there?”

“It is, but I’m sorry, I’m not taking fares right now.”

Khan looked past the man into the store parking lot. Half the cars had vanished. Among those that remained, he spotted people inside, peering at the two of them through the windows. He could see others on the street corner, backing away. The mother he’d seen in the baking aisle was running across the street against the light with her baby clutched in her arms.

The rain poured down.

“Excuse me, I have to leave,” Khan said.

“No, I don’t think so,” the man replied.

“What?”

“You’re staying right here.”

Khan began to push past him, but the man grabbed his wrist.

“Let me go!” Khan called. “Get your hands off me!”

The man dug a phone out of his pocket. “I’ve got a question for you, buddy. Is this you?”

“What?”

He held the phone in front of Khan’s face. “I said, is this you? Because it sure looks like you.”

Khan squinted at the phone, but he couldn’t make out any details on the screen. “I have no idea what you’re showing me, but please get out of my way.”

“Until the police get here, you’re not going anywhere,” the man said.

“Police? What are you talking about? I’m going home now.”

Khan shook off the man’s grip and marched toward his cab, but before he got there, a heavy impact in the small of his back knocked him off his feet. The coconut bag flew from his hand. He hit the wet pavement, and the air burst from his lungs, leaving him gasping for breath. The fat man landed on top of him, pinning him to the ground.

Struggling, Khan elbowed the man above him and managed to squirm free, but the man hammered a fleshy fist down into Khan’s chin. Khan’s cheekbone struck the pavement, and the impact rattled around his head. He crawled away, but the man jumped on him again, and they grappled like wrestlers through the puddles of the parking lot.

He heard people nearby.

Someone shouted, “That’s him! That’s the guy!”

The two of them fought their way back to their feet beside Khan’s cab. Another thick fist landed in Khan’s face; his head snapped back. He lost his balance and grabbed for the man’s jacket to steady himself, and something spilled from the man’s pocket with a metallic clatter. He saw what it was, and he heard screams.

“A gun!”

“He’s got a gun!”

It’s not mine ! Khan wanted to shout.

The man punched him hard in the chest, and Khan staggered back, colliding with the door of his cab. He saw the man squatting to retrieve the gun, and Khan took a step and shoved the man with all his strength. The stranger fell flush on his back, where his skull cracked against the asphalt. Khan kicked the gun under his cab, and then he ripped open the door and turned on the engine. Around him, people yelled and pointed and shouted for help.

The cab jerked forward. All he could think of was to get away. To go home. To see Ahdia. To see Pak. To find out why this nightmare was happening and put a stop to it. But he was trapped. Above the thunder of the rain, he heard a siren, and a police vehicle screamed from the north, cutting off the road that led home. He couldn’t go that way. Instead, Khan turned left, away from his house, away from his wife and child. He glued his eyes to the mirror and watched the police car swerve into the parking lot of the grocery store behind him.

Then he sped around the curve, and he couldn’t see anything more.

He drove, but he didn’t know where to go.

Gayle Durkin spent an awkward hour with her parents at the home near Amity Park where she’d grown up. Some families grew closer after tragedy; some built walls. She loved her parents, but after her brother’s death in Paris, she didn’t know what to say to them. Being in the old house, which they’d kept as a shrine to Ron, made it worse. As soon as she got there, she wanted to leave.

She kept seeing things the way they used to be. She remembered the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room, where she and Ron had opened their gifts. The backyard swing set was still in the yard, where she’d pushed him as a toddler. Her matchbox bedroom was where she’d pounded on the wall to complain about Ron’s bad guitar-playing. Right now, the volume of her memories was even louder than that awful guitar.

The report about Khan Rashid gave her a reason to escape. She kissed her parents and said she’d see them soon, which was a lie. When she headed out on the lonely stretch of Jean Duluth Road, she found herself torn between emptiness and anger. The Islamist terrorists had taken away more than her brother. They’d moved into her family home like monsters hiding in the coat closet.

Pulses of rain surged across the highway. It was nearly dark. She didn’t see another vehicle ahead or behind. Birches and fir trees lined both sides of the road, with only an occasional house carved out of the woods. She drove fast; she always drove fast. Her tires skidded where the water pooled. She wanted to get back to work, because work was the only thing that made sense.

She remembered Khan Rashid’s face, which bore all the tells of a liar. The nervousness. The fear. She wasn’t surprised to learn that he’d been spotted in Canal Park moments before the explosion, even though he’d claimed he wasn’t there. He was a typical terrorist coward, planting the bomb and running away. At least the bomber who killed Ron in Paris had done the world by a favor by blowing himself up, too.

Gayle had barely driven a mile when the report reached her that Rashid had been spotted at the Woodland Market. Adrenaline made her fists tighten on the wheel. She knew exactly where that was; her parents shopped there. Just ahead of her, Jean Duluth Road became Snively Road, and if she turned right at Woodland Avenue, she’d reach the grocery store in five minutes. Police were incoming. She accelerated to join them. She wanted to be there when they took Rashid down.