Bentley Little - Dominion

What did Holbrook have against him?

He suddenly realized that the classroom door was closed.

"I ... got your summons." He held up the pink notice, aware that his voice was quavering, wishing he could stop it.

"Yes," Holbrook said.

"Is mis about the independent study thing? I already told you I don't want to do it."

"Why?" the teacher asked. "Afraid of being alone with me?" He grinned.

This was getting too damn weird. Dion started toward the door. "I'm sorry," he said. "I have to go."

"Afraid I'll attack you?"

Dion stopped, turned toward the teacher. The supplies on the desk, he saw now, were rolled-up scrolls of parchment. "Is there a reason you called me here?" he said coldly. He met the teacher's eyes.

Holbrook looked away, moving back a step. "Why do you think I asked you here?"

He wished Kevin was with him. If he'd had his friend's moral support, he would have replied, "Because you're a pervert, that's why." But Kevin wasn't here, and he wasn't brave enough to talk back to the teacher.

"I don't know," he said.

The teacher had pulled open the top drawer of his desk. Dion craned_his neck, trying to see what Holbrook's hands were fiddling with, caught sight of what looked like a long, shiny knife amidst the pencils and paper clips.

The door to the room opened, and Dion jumped, startled.

"Wait a minute!" Holbrook said.

Dion was not sure if the teacher was talking to him or to the group of men walking into the room, but he quickly pushed his way past the men, through the doorway, into the hall. He was sweating, his heart pounding, and the first thing he noticed was that the school seemed to be empty.

There were no faculty or students in sight.

He turned, caught the last of the men looking at him, and quickly sprinted down the hallway toward the exit. There'd been five men altogether, and each of them had been carrying scrolls and white cloth--just like Holbrook. Dion didn't know if he'd been invited to a Klan meeting or what, but there was something about the situation that didn't sit right with him, and he did not stop running until he was outside the building and on the sidewalk headed toward home.

Pastor Robens looked out over the half-empty church. He tried to smile, though smiling was the last thing he felt like doing at the moment. Three weeks ago, when church attendance had started to drop, he'd attributed it to a flu bug that was going around. Two weeks ago, he'd blamed the playoffs. But last week, as his flock continued to dwindle, as the number of people coming to the already poorly attended fellowship fell to single digits and as the spaces between people in the pews on Sunday became bigger, he'd had to admit that there was something seriously wrong.

He'd spent the last five days trying to nail down the problem, trying to determine what was happening. He'd gone over his notes for the past two months, looking for anything offensive he might have said in one of his sermons, something that might have driven people away, but he had found nothing. He'd even called some of the longtime parishioners who'd quit attending Sunday services and asked them if anything was the matter, if there was some reason why they had stopped coming to worship. To a person, they said everything was fine and promised to show up on Sunday.

None of them were before him now.

And six other churchgoers were missing.

Pastor Robens folded his hands and smiled at the people who had shown up as the organist finished playing. His smile was false, a mask. He did not feel happy today, he did not feel at peace.

He was worried.

The last notes of the hymn faded.

Pastor Robens bowed his head. "Let us pray."

* * *

Polly Thrall gobbled the wafer and enthusiastically gulped the wine.

Father Ibarra smiled at her, gave his blessing, and moved to the next person, Bill Bench. He looked over Bill's head at the empty pews, then down at the double row of kneeling men and women. Overall attendance was down, but participation in communion was up.

Way up.

He should have been happy about that. But he wasn't There was something about the eagerness with which his parishioners drank their small sip of wine which seemed to him sacriligious, almost defiantly so. They were performing the most holy of rituals, enthusiastically going through all of the proper motions, but there seemed something wrong about it, something blasphemous, and he found their enthusiasm both unhealthy and unchristian. They appeared to be more interested in the wine than the ritual, though that did not make any sense to him.

Bill ate the proffered wafer, greedily swallowed the wine.

Father Ibarra smiled, gave his blessing, and moved on.

He didn't like the way things were going.

He didn't like it at all.

The restaurant was nothing like he'd expected. From its name, and from its stately, rustic, vaguely European exterior, Dion had imagined the Foxfire Inn to be a tastefully elegant eating establishment, a dark dining room filled with Victorian table settings, expensive chandeliers, and dimly heard classical music. Inside it was dark, all right, but file booths were covered with red and rather shabby naugahyde, and the plain walls were decorated with sportsmen's memorabilia: moose heads, antlers, guns. Through the open doorway which led into the smoky bar, he could see neon beer signs and could hear the hyperactive jabbering of a sports announcer from a too-loud TV.

Things were not turning out the way he'd planned.

But Penelope was taking it all in stride. In his mind he had mapped out every moment of the evening, had practiced each intended topic of conversation, and so far nothing was occurring in the way he'd foreseen.

The perfect romantic evening he'd envisioned was turning out to be a series of barely avoided misadventures.

But it didn't seem to matter. Penelope had merely laughed when he'd left his wallet at the Shell station and had to turn back for it. She'd politely ignored the fact that when he'd come to the door to say hello to her mothers, his zipper had been down. She'd registered no disappointment when she saw the inferior interior of the "nice"

restaurant he'd promised to take her to and for which she had worn her best dress.

The logistics of the evening had turned out to be a nightmare, but Penelope had turned out to be better than he had dared dream.

The food, to be fair, was not bad, and they ate slowly, talking. He told her of his life, she told him of hers. Their rapport was immediate and instinctually trusting, and even though this was only their first date, Dion shared with her thoughts and feelings that he had never shared with anyone else, that he thought he would never share with anyone else. He felt he could tell her anything, and that both scared him and made him feel exhilarated.

Two hours flew, by.

After they'd finished eating, the busboy cleared everything but their water glasses, and their waitress returned. "Is there anything else I

can get you?" she asked.

Dion looked questioningly at Penelope, but she shook her head. "I guess not," he said.

"I'll be back in a minute with your check."

Dion nodded and smiled, but as he looked at Penelope across the table, he realized that he didn't know how much money to leave for a tip. The dinner had gone surprisingly well, much better than he had expected or had reason to hope, but he had another chance to blow it right here. If he left a tip that was too small, she would think him cheap and miserly.

On the other hand, if he left a tip that was too large, she would think him foolish, since she already knew he wasn't rich. But how much was too little in this instance? How much was too much?

"I'll get the tip," Penelope said.

He stared at her. It was as if she had read his mind. But he shook his head anyway. "No," he said.