Dean Koontz - The Voice of the Night

“Then why would I try to take credit for them?”

“To make your story about being a killer seem more realistic. To make me believe it. To set me up for some kind of joke.”

“You sure can be stubborn,” Roy said.

“So can you.”

“What will it take to make you face the truth?”

“I already know the truth,” Colin said. He finished the dishes and dried his hands on a red-and-white-checked dish towel.

Roy got up and went to the window. He stared at the sun-dappled swimming pool. “I guess the only way I’m ever going to convince you is to kill someone.”

“Yeah,” Colin said. “Why don’t you do that?”

“You think I won’t.”

“I know you won’t.”

Roy turned to him. Sunlight streamed through the window, painted one side of Roy’s face, left one side in shadow, and made one of his eyes even more fiercely blue than the other. “Are you daring me to kill someone?”

“Yeah.”

“Then if I do it,” Roy said, “half the responsibility will be yours.”

“Okay.”

“Just like that?”

“just like that.”

“Doesn’t it bother you that you might wind up in jail?” Roy asked.

“No. Because you won’t do it.”

“Is there anyone special you’d like me to take care of, anyone you’d like to see dead?”

Colin grinned because he was now certain that it was just a game. “Nobody particular. Anyone you want. Why don’t you pick a name out of the phone book?”

Roy turned to the window again.

Colin leaned against the counter and waited. After a while Roy looked at his watch and said, “I’ve got to be getting home. My parents are going to dinner at my Uncle Marlon’s place. He’s a genuine asshole. But I have to go with them.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute!” Colin said. “You can’t change the subject that easily. You can’t slip out of it. We were talking about who you’re going to kill.”

“I wasn’t trying to slip out of it.”

“Well?”

“I’ve got to think about it for a while.”

“Yeah,” Colin said. “Like for fifty years.”

“No. By tomorrow I’ll tell you who it’ll be.”

“I won’t let you forget.”

Roy nodded somberly. “And once I’m rolling, I won’t let you stop me.”

Weezy Jacobs had an important dinner engagement Sunday evening. She gave Colin money to eat at Charlie’s Cafe, and she also gave him a short lecture about the importance of ordering something more nutritious than a greasy cheeseburger and french fries.

On his way to dinner, Colin stopped at Rhine-hart‘s, a big drugstore one block from the cafe. Rhine-hart’s had a large paperback-book section. Colin browsed through the titles in the wire pockets, searching for interesting science fiction and novels about the supernatural.

After a while he realized that a pretty girl, about his own age, had walked up to the racks a few feet away. There were two shelves of books above the wire pockets, and those titles were shelved sideways instead of with their covers showing; she was looking at these, her head tilted to one side so that she could read the spines. She was wearing shorts, and for a moment he stared at her lovely slender legs. She had a graceful neck. Her hair was golden.

She became aware that he was staring at her, and she looked up, smiled. “Hi.”

He smiled, too. “Hi.”

“You’re a friend of Roy Borden‘s, aren’t you?”

“How’d you know that?”

She cocked her head to one side again, as if he were another book on the shelf and she were reading his title. She said, “The two of you are almost like Siamese twins. I hardly ever see one without the other.”

“You see me now,” he said.

“You’re new in town.”

“Yeah. Since the first of June.”

“What’s your name?”

“Colin Jacobs. What’s yours?”

“Heather.”

“That’s pretty.”

“Thank you.”

“Heather what?”

“Promise you won’t laugh.”

“Huh?”

“Promise you won’t laugh at my name.”

“Why would I laugh at your name?”

“It’s Heather Lipshitz.”

“No,” he said.

“Yes. It would be bad enough if it were Zelda Lipshitz. Or Sadie Lipshitz. But Heather Lipshitz is worse because the two don’t go together, and the first name just calls attention to the last. You didn’t laugh.”

“Of course not.”

“Most kids do.”

“Most kids are stupid.”

“You like to read?” Heather asked.

“Yeah.”

“What do you read?”

“Science fiction. You?”

“I’ll read almost anything. I’ve read some science fiction. Stranger in a Strange Land.”

“That’s a great book.”

“You see Star Wars?” she asked.

“Four times. And Close Encounters six times.”

“Have you seen Alien?”

“Yeah. You enjoy stuff like that?”

“Sure. When there’s an old Christopher Lee movie on TV, you can’t pull me away from the set,” she said.

He was amazed. “You actually like horror movies?”

“The scarier the better.” She looked at her wristwatch. “Well, I’ve got to get home for dinner. It’s been real nice talking to you, Colin.”

As she started to turn away, he said, “Uh … wait a sec.” She looked back at him, and he shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other. “Uh… there’s a new horror flick coming to the Baronet this week.”

“I saw the previews.”

“Did it look good to you?”

“Might be,” she said.

“Would you … well … I mean … do you think …”

She smiled. “I’d like to.”

“You would?”

“Sure.”

“Well … should I call you or what?”

“Call me.”

“What’s your number?”

“It’s in the book. Believe it or not, we’re the only Lipshitz family in town.”

He grinned. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Okay.”

“If that’s all right.”

“That’s fine.”

“Bye.”

“Good-bye, Colin.”

He watched her walk out of the store. His heart was racing.

Jeez.

Something strange was happening to him. For sure, for sure. He never before had been able to talk like that with a girl-or with a girl like that. He usually got tongue-tied right at the start, and the whole conversation went into the toilet. But not this time. He’d been smooth. For God’s sake, he’d even made a date with her! His first date. Something sure was happening to him.

But what?

And why?

Several hours later, as he lay in bed, listening to a Los Angeles radio station, unable to sleep, Colin thought about all of the wonderful new developments in his life. With a terrific friend like Roy, with an important position like team manager, and with a girl as pretty and nice as Heather-what more could he possibly ask?

He had never been so content.

Roy was the most important part of his new life, of course. Without Roy, he would never have been brought to the attention of Coach Molinoff and would never have gotten the job as junior-varsity team manager. And without Roy’s liberating influence, he would very likely never have had the nerve to ask Heather for a date. More than that-she probably wouldn’t even have said hello to him if he hadn’t been Roy’s friend. Wasn’t that the first thing she had said to him? You’re a friend of Roy Borden‘s, aren’t you? If he hadn’t been a friend of Roy’s, she probably wouldn’t even have looked at him twice.

But she had looked twice.

And she had agreed to date him.

Life was good.

He thought about Roy’s strange stories. The cat in the birdcage. The boy burned with lighter fluid. He knew those were just tall tales. Tests. Roy was testing him for something. He put the cat and the burned boy out of his mind. He wasn’t going to let those silly stories destroy his lovely mood.