Burning Man

Klein’s death. My gut told me differently. All the words Levitt had offered up were passive. In the note left at the tower he’d written “What goes around, comes around.” And the note he’d tried to post on the Klein memorial wall page wasn’t about retribution but fate: “Some say Paul Klein’s death was tragic. Those that knew him would say it’s karma.” If you cause someone to die, Levitt was saying, you should expect to die yourself. That wasn’t the voice of a killer.

I thought about the visions I’d had while working the Klein case. I’d paid the price for those insights; I should have listened to them more closely.

“That’s the problem with me being my own oracle,” I told Sirius. “It’s hard to interpret my own visions.”

My moment after had told me that this was a revenge killing: an eye for an eye. Maybe it had also somehow told me about the kid that had overdosed, although I didn’t know how that was possible. In one of my visions, Dinah had been lip-synching “A Little Help from My Friends.” Ringo hadn’t only gotten by with a little help from his friends, he’d gotten high.

There had been that other vision also, the one where I’d had to face up to my own suicidal thoughts. In law enforcement, one of the most dangerous situations an officer can encounter is when he’s up against someone that wants to die. When a suicidal individual is unwilling or unable to take his or her life, he or she often employs the services of the police. That’s why they call it suicide by cop. But just because you want to die doesn’t mean you’re not a danger to those responding to the situation.

There had been a part of me, I knew, that had wanted suicide by cop, me being the cop. I had wanted to die on the job. But was it possible my vision wasn’t only about me? I had inquired about suicides at Beverly but not drug overdoses. Sometimes it’s difficult to distinguish one from the other. The death of Jeremy Levitt’s friend had been labeled as a drug overdose, but what if it was a suicide guised in needles or pills?

I fought to stay awake. Some kind of answer felt as if it was within reach, but I had reached the point where even toothpicks would have had a hard time keeping my lids up. I didn’t have the strength or inclination to leave my easy chair and fell asleep sitting. I was in one of those deep REM sleeps when I awakened groggy and confused. This time I wasn’t having my fire dream, but it was something just as horrifying. Nearby I could hear Ellis Haines talking. He was in my house. My heart hammered in my chest.

“How you are sleeping? Do you hear the wind blowing outside? Is it keeping you up?”

My hand was still clenched around the half-filled beer bottle. I hadn’t yet gotten a replacement for my Glock, but there was a spare handgun in my bedroom. Get the gun, I thought. My body was shaking, which made it hard to get to my feet. And that’s when I noticed Sirius standing at my side. My partner was watching over me, but he wasn’t on alert. He knew the Weatherman wasn’t in the next room. The voice I was hearing was coming from my answering machine.

“The wind always invigorates me. It almost makes me feel like I’m flying. Isn’t it nice to be a leaf in the wind? Everything is out of control and direction means nothing. It is the ultimate freedom.”

My heart continued to pound, but now I wasn’t scared so much as I was angry. Out of my message machine Haines continued to talk.

“You looked so fragile when you visited me, Detective. I was concerned for your welfare. I didn’t like the idea of others trying to interfere in our unfinished business. I wouldn’t have others do my own work, Detective. That wouldn’t be right.

“Naturally, I’ve been concerned about the state of your health. You, Sirius, and I are secret sharers. If something should happen to you, I hope you have made provisions for Sirius. Is he watching over you now?”

My partner’s ears were up and his head was slightly tilted. He’d heard his name spoken, and he seemed to recognize the speaker’s voice.

“When you visited, you looked like someone at death’s door, Detective. I was afraid the right wind would push you over into the abyss. Are you looking into that darkness right now?”

My job forces me to deal with people experiencing times of crisis. When someone is attacked or has his property stolen, he invariably feels a sense of violation and helplessness. All of us have boundaries, and we suffer if they’re breached. Haines had violated both my person and my property. That son of a bitch had found a way into my house. He had invaded my world. And there wasn’t a goddamn thing I could do about it.

Sotto voce, Haines continued talking. “I love it when the Santa Ana winds begin to blow. Have you ever noticed how the wind feels like warm breath down your neck? When that happens I always feel compelled to return the favor and do my own heavy breathing over a special neck of my choosing. I become one with the wind. Take a moment to listen, Detective. Can you hear the wind calling for you?”

The asshole stopped talking long enough for the silence to fill the room. I didn’t want to listen, but I couldn’t help it. Outside, the wind was howling and its cries filled my house.

“It’s just warming up for an even bigger show this night, as am I. As I have been wont to say, never leave your audience hanging.”

I thought he was finished but he wasn’t. My home invasion became surreal when he started singing. What made it even worse was the bastard had a good voice, hitting every note. Maybe it was his audition tape for American Idol. I knew the song: “They Call the Wind Mariah.”

The last line of the lyrics was particularly plaintive, and he put everything into it. It felt as if he was singing it just for me, and that he knew how lost I had been for so long, and how “not even God may find me.”

The song came to a merciful end, but the intimacy of it shook me. It didn’t strike close to home. It was in my home and in my head.

“That’s our song,” Haines whispered. “Have a good night, Detective.”

In the silence I could still hear his voice. It felt as if Haines were stepping on my grave.

The easy chair no longer felt comfortable. For a moment I considered taking a shower to cleanse myself from the toxic ramblings of Haines, but instead I just decided to crawl into bed.

I didn’t replay the message. It could wait until the morning, when I would listen to it in the light of day. And maybe in that light I wouldn’t feel so lost, and maybe God would find me.

Unfortunately, that light never came. An hour later I was once again burning.

The Strangler screamed for help, but his words were swallowed by the fire. I watched his mouth moving and his face contort, but as close as I was to him, I couldn’t hear what he was saying. I had never heard the voice of fire-of inferno-until now. It was a terrible thing-a raging, roaring, deafening howl-and in it there was hunger and madness and worst of all, laughter. It was the sound of a demon unleashed.

The flames were whirling all around us. The wind kept blowing, the bellows kept churning, and we kept running.

The fire made us move to the rhythm of its churning jaws. It came at us from one direction and then another. And then the fire was everywhere, and our dance became wild and out of control.

I’d once seen footage of a male tarantula attempting to mate. As it performed for the female, all eight of its legs were moving. We-the Strangler, and me, and Sirius-were eight legs. My partner was grievously hurt, but sometimes his legs twitched and moved as if I was scratching him in his sweet spot.

In Italy, the tarantula inspired a dance known as the tarantella. Folklore says that when bitten by a tarantula, the only cure is doing the tarantella. It is believed that by frenziedly whirling about, you sweat the poison out.

The flames were making us dance the tarantella. There was madness in our steps; we were out-of-control dervishes. I was the one with the badge and gun. I was supposed to have answers, but I was as lost as lost could be. In the flaming wilderness, I went a little mad.

“We must sweat the poison out!” I shouted.

The Strangler still thought me sane. “What?”

“The poison,” I said.

We continued the dance of the dead.

The shrieking woke me up. It took me a second to realize I was the one doing the shrieking. Sirius was nudging me and whimpering.

“It’s all right,” I said.

But it wasn’t all right. My life was out of control. Every day I was dancing some version of the tarantella.

My racing heart began to slow, and my sweat started to cool. In the blessed relief, my after-fire moment came. It started with music, the strains of Scheherazade, and in my mind I saw a montage of familiar entertainers and sports figures.