Maggie Shayne - Wake to Darkness

“What was it like? Shooting that guy, I mean?”

He froze, didn’t look at her, just froze, and then the gunshot sound effects went off and the blood spatter on the screen told her someone had just offed him. Game Over.

He set the controller down and looked at her. “Not like shooting someone in the game.”

She smiled encouragingly and nodded at him to go on.

He shrugged. “He was just...he was. And then he wasn’t. I did that to him.”

“It bothers you.”

“Not really. I mean, he was gonna kill them. I didn’t have a choice. I’d do the same thing again. But it’s just...weird. How easy it happened.” He bit his lip, looking down. “Like how easy you go from being alive to being dead. Bam. Just like that. Like nothing happened, except you’re gone. You’re just...erased.”

She nodded. “This is creeping me out a little. Maybe a new topic?”

“Yeah, okay.”

He looked disappointed. Like he’d wanted to talk about it some more. “So...are you okay? I mean, you know, with your dad, and then that guy?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Mom made me go to therapy for a while after, but it’s all bull.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet.”

“I mean, if you pay someone to listen to you...”

“I hear you. And what do you say? You sit there trying to think up shit to take up the time, because you know it’s costing like a hundred-fifty an hour, and you wind up just making shit up.”

“Yeah.” He tilted his head to one side, looking her in the eyes finally. “You’ve been to therapy, huh?”

“Uh-huh. I lost like fifteen pounds during my first soccer season and Mom was just sure I was purging. You know.” She stuck her finger into her mouth and stuck her tongue out, the international symbol for gagging.

Jeremy smiled. It was very faint, just the slightest uptick at the corners of his mouth, but it was the first one she’d seen since they’d finished breakfast.

“Were you?” he asked.

“No. And gross. A halfback runs an average of eight miles in a game. I was just burning it off, that’s all.”

“Oh.”

“You play?”

“Not this year. Basketball, usually, but...not this year.”

“I wouldn’t, either, if it was my dad. I’m really sorry, Jeremy.”

“Thanks.”

She sighed and, not sure where to go from there, got up and paced to the double sliding glass doors facing the backyard. Looking out back, she grinned so wide it hurt, pulled her cell out of her pocket and started snapping pics. “Ohmygod, Jer, look at this!”

He twisted on the couch so he could see, then got up and came over to see better as Josh and her aunt Rachel came flying down the hill on a cheap plastic sled. The crazy dog was sitting right in the front, her ears flapping in the wind and her jowls pushed back so she looked like some kind of alien. “Aunt Rachel’s screaming her head off.”

“Look how big Josh is smiling,” Jeremy said. “He loves that dog.”

“I can tell. She looks like something out of Gremlins.”

He sent her a quizzical look. “Gremlins?”

The trio had reached the bottom and tumbled into the snow. They were already hiking back up for more.

“It’s an ancient movie my father insists on playing at least twice a year. Says it’s a classic.” She grinned. “I’ve got to get a few more pics. This is too good. I can blackmail Aunt Rache for the next six years with this.”

“Is it any good?” Jer asked.

“What?” She was holding up her iPhone, waiting for the right shot.

“The movie. Gremlins.”

“Oh. Yeah, it’s not bad. Actually, it’s pretty funny. We should see if we can stream it.”

“Right now?”

They were coming down the hill again. “Myrtle is so completely Mogwai.” Misty snapped and snapped. Then she put the phone in her pocket and looked at Jeremy. “Maybe tonight, if we hang that long. We can order Chinese and go pick it up.”

“Okay.” He stuffed his hands into his pockets and looked away. “What do you want to do right now, then?”

“See that other sled?”

His head came up. He wasn’t smiling, but he nodded. “You really want to do that?”

“Yeah, I really do.”

“Guess we’ll lose our asshole status. First, though, can I see your phone?”

“Sure.” She slid it from her pocket and handed it to him. He located the pics while she looked to see what he was doing, then he sent one to his uncle’s phone. She smiled. “Cool. He’s gonna love that.”

“I thought he was into your aunt before. But then we stopped seeing her and he didn’t mention her name at all.”

“I think she’s into him, too. Hell, we might end up cousins.”

“I hope not,” he said, and then a flush of red went right up his neck and into his face. He handed her phone back to her, turned and headed for the coat closet.

* * *

Mason was on his way home when he thought to check the phone while he was sitting at a red light. There was a text from a number he didn’t recognize that included a photo attachment, sent hours ago. He opened it and grinned. Rachel, Josh and Myrtle on a toboggan flying down the hill behind his house. Rachel’s eyes and mouth were wide open, and her hat—no, wait, his hat—was in the air behind her, so her hair was like a flag. Josh was smiling all the way to his ears—laughing out loud, Mason thought. The kid was going to be okay. And the dog... The dog was all flapping jowls and ears and gleaming teeth. She was wearing her goggles and her winter scarf, and looked like she belonged in a steampunk creature feature.

He felt something warm settle into his chest, and it pushed away the cold darkness that been squatting there before. He couldn’t wait to get home. And he thought what a great feeling that was.

As he stared at the photo, realizing it had come through several hours ago, a car blew its horn behind him and a new text message popped up, this one from Rachel’s phone. Ordered Chinese. What’s ur ETA?

He went through the light, then pulled off the road so he could reply. The other vehicle flew by him, and he secretly hoped for a speed trap up ahead.

20 min, he texted back. Want me 2 pickup?

Sent kids. C U soon.

On my way.

He looked at the phone for a long minute. Okay, there was some interesting stuff going on in his sappy regions at the moment. Stuff that bore further mulling.

He clicked the button to make the shot his background image. It made him feel good to look at it, and Rachel’s books were always saying when something feels good, pay attention to it. It was good advice, even if she didn’t always practice it herself and claimed to think it was complete bull.

He looked at her face, her full mouth wide open in a shout but somehow managing to smile at the same time. She’d relived a murder last night—lived it from the perspective of the victim. But today she was raising hell in the snow with her dog and his nephew. Yeah, maybe she didn’t think she practiced what she preached, but he was pretty sure he’d just been given photographic proof that she did.

He put the car back into gear, and headed onto the highway and back toward home.

* * *

I had more fun that day than I’d had since I got my eyesight back—not counting my one-nighter with Mason, which was the most fun I’d ever had. Ever. By the time the younger generation had been thoroughly exposed to the genius of Joe Dante through Gremlins and Gremlins 2, we had spent close to four hours in front of Mason’s gigantic TV. The sixty-inch HD was his country home’s one concession to modern design. Everything else looked rustic, even though he was wired for sound. He had the fastest internet connection I’d seen—essential, he said, for gaming. And his nephews loved their gaming.