Rob Thurman - All Seeing Eye

The tickets were ten bucks apiece. Ten bucks to see a muddy, frigid hole in the ground. Needless to say, I didn’t pay. There was a tour guide, potbellied in shorts, a Carlson Caverns T-shirt, and tube socks. With a booming voice that issued out of a gingery beard, he led the way into the cave. “Carlson Caverns was first discovered in 1771 by an expedition led by…”

I tuned him out. I wasn’t particularly interested in who had been the first unfortunate bastard to trip and fall through the cave entrance while screaming like a banshee. I was interested in lunch, sleep, a whole lot less of Hector, and that was it. And sun… sun would be good. Forget that I’d just been cursing the hot, sweaty grip of it. Standing in a nature-formed grave freezing my ass off made me appreciate a heat that baked you to the bones. Sighing, I shifted from foot to foot and folded my arms against the chill. A little boy standing at his mother’s side looked over at me. About seven, with a baseball cap and a backpack, he grinned cheerfully. An all-American boy, missing front tooth, freckles, skinned knee-and then he flipped me off.

All-American, all right.

Snorting, I looked over at Hector. “I’m starving. Let’s get this over with.”

I stripped off a glove, bent down, and picked up a rock. Freezing. Bored. Paid ten bucks for this? Tourist thoughts, and unsurprising ones at that. I dropped it, took a few steps, and picked up another one. Same thing. I wandered a little farther out toward a side tunnel off the main cavern. Mr. Carlson himself was finally getting to the legend as I walked.

“And in 1864, a Confederate Army deserter holed up here to hide from his unit. Hart Renfrow. Apparently, ole Hart wasn’t right in the head to begin with, because he lived in this Georgia tomb for seven years, just sure as can be that his fellow soldiers were still looking for him, waiting to string him up. And when winters got hard and game was scarce…” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the guide’s mock leer highlighted by a flashlight under the chin. Je- sus. I was glad the ten bucks hadn’t come out of my pocket.

“Yes, ladies and gentlemen, when game was scarce, he ate people. ” His voice sank to a horrified whisper. “Crept over to the outskirts of Carlson City and stole them. Women and children, mainly, but the occasional man. In those days, they thought bears or wolves had gotten the missing, but you and I and Hart Renfrow, we know better.”

He went on, but I’d heard more than enough. What a colossal waste of time. Hector had followed me, and I glared at him over my shoulder as I reached for the stone wall of the tunnel for the last check I was going to bother to make.

“Milk shake and fries, you got it? And I want a huge-ass hot fudge sund-”

The world went away. This world. But there were always other worlds, weren’t there? This one had the stench of boiling flesh hovering on a winter chill, half-skinned naked women hanging from racks lashed together from tree limbs, and bones littering the floor to crunch with every step. Yes, every slow and sure step you took as you prowled closer to the five-year-old girl hiding under her mother’s body. She was screaming for her daddy over and over and over. Screaming and screaming and-

The sun.

I blinked. Blue sky and sun and a warmth that could melt any chill, even that of Carlson Caverns, an atypically bitter Georgia winter, and Hart Renfrow.

“Hunhh,” I mumbled less than coherently. There was more heat under me, intense and so goddamn wonderful I could’ve lain on top of it for the rest of my damn life.

“You with me, Jackson?”

I turned my head slowly to take in Hector’s wary expression. Was I with him? Was I here? Good question.

“She wanted her daddy,” I said blankly as I looked away back to the sky. “Renfrow thought she tasted good. Tender. Went way too fast, though. The little ones always do… always did.” It was like a nightmare now that contact was broken, but not a fresh one-an old one from years and years past. Thank God, except I’d never thank anyone who’d made me see what I had seen.

I sat up to see that I’d been lying on the hood of Hector’s car, just your average overloaded psychic taking in the sun.

Hector wasn’t looking wary any longer, he was looking flat-out worried as hell. Worried about my mental health or about my ability to do the job-it didn’t matter which. In the end, they were one and the same.

“Get a T-shirt, Allgood.” I rubbed my mouth, hoping there was no drool. “What you’re looking for doesn’t get more righteous than this.” Not when you were trolling for massacres, serial killings, and explosions of violence.

“Yes, the eyes rolling back in your head and the Exorcist whispering before I dragged you out gave that away.” He held out a hand to help me down. My glove had been replaced, but I still ignored the offer and slid down on my own. My knees wobbled a bit as I hit the ground, but I locked them in place and managed to stay upright.

“Whispering?” I repeated cautiously. “Me? What was I saying?”

He pulled the car keys from his pocket and looked at them with far more focus than they required. “Little girl.” He shook his head and squared his shoulders. “You were saying, little girl. Come here, little girl. Come here, sugar and spice and everything nice. Come here. And you sounded… hungry.”

I looked back toward the entrance of the cave, past the curious stares of tourists waiting for the next tour, past cars, and beyond the modern world. “He was,” I said simply. “Always hungry. No matter how much he ate, how many he ate. He was always hungry.” I turned my back to it, physically and mentally, to grimace faintly. “Me, on the other hand, I think we can forget lunch.”

As it turned out, my body didn’t agree with that notion. I’d been working it steadily today, and psychic exertion was considerably more draining than the physical kind. By the time we reached the diner, I was sweating buckets, and it wasn’t from the heat. Clammy and soaked with cold sweat, I knew my blood sugar had taken a serious dive, and I ripped into the complimentary crackers the second we hit the table. Annie’s Big Fat Fannie was a barbecue joint, but there was enough in the way of side orders there for a vegetarian to get by. Potato salad, macaroni salad, cole slaw, a cheese sandwich, fried biscuits with apple butter, strawberry-rhubarb pie, and pint jars of sweet tea garnished with a frozen slice of peach. As for Annie’s generous fannie, the woman was damn proud of it. Good for her.

She was a whirlwind in the tiny restaurant, bustling from table to table in jeans and a sparkly halter top about thirty years too young for her. She treated the three waitresses like daughters, scolding and praising in one breath. Greeting regulars with hoots of joy and hugs and greeting strangers just the same, she was nothing but grins and sass and good heart. One regular in dirty clothes with a permanent alcohol glaze in his eye was given free food and a hug the same as everyone else. The world needed more Annies.

“You boys doing okay?” She beamed as she wrapped an arm around Hector’s shoulders and squeezed before leaning on the edge of the table. Waist-length platinum-blond hair was teased into a stiff, hairspray-coated, billowing cloud, turning her into a Rapunzel of the Bible Belt. As for her fannie, I wouldn’t say it was fat, but if you were an ass man, there was more than enough to catch your eye. Earlier, I’d seen her catch a few country boys gawking from the counter. She’d turned to slap it briskly in their direction. She’d laughed. “Double helpings, boys, and more than pups the likes of you can handle.”

“Doing good, Miss Annie,” I said politely, sliding a look toward Hector as I wondered how to insinuate that he was a fan of the fannie. From the stone-faced glare I received in return, it was plain to see that he was doing a little mind reading of his own. Letting the opportunity at humiliation go, I added, “Best fried biscuits in Georgia.”