Ryan Jahn - The Last Tomorrow

A few things yet.

4

He stops at a liquor store and buys himself a bottle of Old Grand-Dad. He knows there’s a good chance he’ll get sloppy if he works drunk, make mistakes that might kill him or put him in prison, but he doesn’t think he can remain sober and still do what needs to be done. He knows he can’t. Tomorrow will be a day filled with ugliness and he can’t face it straight. Every time he thinks about it he feels sick to his stomach. But it has to happen. If he’s going to walk away from this, it simply must happen, and that’s all there is to it. So he’ll do what he needs to do to make sure it does. He’ll try not to get drunk, he’ll try to consume only enough so he can face the day, but he needs his medicine.

With the bottle purchased he steps back into the daylight. As he does he throws Louis Lynch’s room key into a trash can by the door.

He won’t be needing it again and doesn’t want it on him.

5

He makes one last stop before heading back to the warehouse. He parks in front of a hamburger joint, steps inside, and walks to the cash register, behind which a pimple-faced young man in a white hat stands waiting. He orders six hamburgers for take-out. He pays and walks to a red vinyl stool. He sits down and leans forward with his arms on the counter and glances around the room, checking out the few other patrons. To his right a woman sips an ice-cream soda through a straw, and a teenage boy drags French fries through a smear of ketchup. Then he looks left. The detective he ran into at the Shenefield Hotel, the one who saw him drop the murder weapon, sits not twenty feet away in a booth in the corner. A greasy white take-out bag sits on the table to his left, presumably lunch for someone who couldn’t make it to the diner. Eugene turns quickly away, head snapping forward. He looks straight ahead at the wall behind the counter, at shelves of ketchup and mustard and various flavors of syrup for sodas and fresh fruit in baskets. He wants to glance over his shoulder again, to see if the detective noticed him, but doesn’t. He must simply sit here and look normal and wait for his food. He wants to leave immediately, but doesn’t do that either. If he leaves the counter boy might call after him, hey, mister, you forgot your food, and this would bring him attention he doesn’t want. No, he must sit and wait. He must not look around nervously. He must act normal. He closes his eyes and swallows. He opens his eyes and looks at the clock on the wall.

After what feels like an hour a white paper bag is set in front of him.

He says thanks, picks up the bag, turns around. He doesn’t glance toward the table at which the detective sits. Only an asshole would do that. He walks straight for the door. He feels stiff and awkward in his movements, as if he were drunk and trying not to reveal the fact. He pushes his way outside. He walks to his motorcycle.

No one tries to stop him. No one says a word.

6

He steps into the warehouse and walks to the tractor trailer parked at dock number three. He looks into it through a hole in one of the doors. Evelyn and Louis Lynch are sitting across from one another, silent and motionless. Evelyn’s arms and legs have been freed, the gag removed from her mouth. At this point it doesn’t matter. She’ll be locked in the trailer until it’s finished and it’ll be finished tomorrow afternoon.

Besides, she needs to eat.

‘I got you food.’

Neither Evelyn nor Louis Lynch says anything.

‘Stand up.’

They both get to their feet.

Louis Lynch glances toward him. ‘Do you really think you have any chance of walking away from this?’

‘Toss your gun toward the door.’

He removes a revolver from its holster and throws it toward Eugene. It thuds against the wood paneling and slides to the door, which brings it to a stop.

‘You’re already dead,’ Louis Lynch says, ‘you just don’t know it yet.’

‘Turn around and put your hands to the wall, both of you.’

They both turn their backs to him. They both walk to the opposite end of the trailer. They press their palms against the wall.

‘Don’t move.’

Eugene pulls up on the handle, the bolts retract, and the doors swing open. He removes two burgers wrapped in greasy white paper, then tosses the bag containing the four remaining hamburgers into the trailer. It lands with a heavy thud against the floor. He picks up Louis Lynch’s revolver and tucks it into the back of his pants. He shuts the trailer doors and brings the handle down, sliding the bolts back into their holds. He puts the padlock into place.

Then he walks to a stack of pallets in the middle of the floor and sits down. He takes off his gloves. He unwraps one of his burgers. The smell makes his stomach turn. He knows he should eat, but he isn’t at all hungry. He feels sick. He brings the burger to his mouth and takes a bite. It’s very salty. He chews slowly and forces himself to swallow.

This is it, then.

There’s nothing left to do until tomorrow — when it all happens.

THE CANNIBALS

At nine twenty, with the Lazarus sun drowned once more in the western sea, a heavy-set man in a gray suit with a blue silk tie wrapped around his neck and a matching handkerchief poking from his breast pocket steps from a DC-6, descends a set of rolling steps, and, trailed by three men, makes his way across the tarmac, through Los Angeles Airport, and out the front doors. Crowds, without realizing they’re doing it, part for him as he walks. People simply glance in his direction as he cuts through space with the ease of a sharp knife and step out of his way. They do it as a unit, a group of people suddenly moving as one, like a sheet of paper unfolding.

He carries in his right hand a black leather briefcase.

1

Next morning, the sixteenth of April, the sun breaks past the horizon at five twenty-one. The temperature is fifty-two degrees Fahrenheit, though it will increase to sixty-eight before the day is finished. The air is clear enough to see Mount Wilson to the north through the morning haze and to the northwest the Santa Monica Mountains. The wind speed is a little over five miles per hour. The sky is cloudless and when the sun rises fully will be a one-color canvas — solid blue. In other words, it’s a beautiful spring day, last weekend’s rainstorm nothing but a distant memory.

2

At seven thirty Carl steps into the cool spring morning.

He hopes they catch a break on this investigation today. They need to catch a break on this investigation. They have too many man-hours put into it to come up with nothing. And Carl feels they’re close.

He can sense it. They’re close.

To what, though, he doesn’t know.

3

Eugene opens his eyes at seven fourty-five to find himself looking at pin-dots of morning light shining through holes in the corrugated tin roof overhead like stars in a makeshift sky. His night was long and restless and cold, and what little sleep he had was unpleasant. His head aches and he feels sick to his stomach.

The best outcome today is still something to dread.

Today will be a day filled with ugliness and horror.

He wishes it were otherwise, but it isn’t.

He wishes he could take Evelyn out of that trailer and scrub her body clean and give her a fresh set of clothes. He wishes he could apologize and wrap her in his arms and forget any of this ever happened. But he can’t do any of that. He can’t even allow himself to feel any of that.

Much worse is yet to come.

4

They didn’t let Fingers leave last night. They led him instead to a hotel room with a bed and told him to get comfortable, we’re not letting you leave till you talk. He thinks they’re getting desperate, or else they sense something approaching. He certainly does.