John Dies at the End

me, then ran up, kneed me in the groin and wrenched the fork from my hand. She ran off with it, and when I looked up—

White walls.

Industrial sounds.

Machines.

I was in a large building, very clean, and a man stood in front of me wearing a blue uniform, watching a small computer screen on what had to be an assembly line. To my left I saw a massive red sign that said NO SMOKING OR OPEN FLAME ON THE PRODUCTION FLOOR, with a cartoon explosion underneath it.

I stepped forward, noticed the guy had one of those Far Side flip calendars next to him. It was badly out of date, the current page a couple of years old.

I had to stop this, somehow. I felt like I was a swimmer, getting tossed downstream by white-water rapids. I knew somehow that if I didn’t get ahold of myself, I would drift like this, forever.

Not expecting to get a response, I said, “Uh, hey.”

The guy stirred, turned. For just a moment I thought I saw his eyes meet mine, but then his gaze swept around the room, seeing nothing. The man apparently decided he had imagined it and turned back to his monitor.

The room was full of people at various machines. It was obvious no one could see me. I was here, but I was not here. I looked down and, sure enough, could not see my feet.

My feet, I knew, were still in a trailer in Undisclosed, on a Saturday afternoon. I focused all my concentration on getting back there, to that spot, to that time, to my body. And in a blink, I was back in the trailer, on the floor. Pain in my face, stench of shit on my pant legs.

I breathed a sigh of relief, tried to remember what I had been doing, when Morgan Freeman stepped through the door and stopped cold at the sight of me.

Damn. I suck at this.

I looked up, climbed awkwardly to my feet with my hand on my bloody face, my pants stinking of Robert Marley’s feces.

The detective looked me over.

He had two red plastic gasoline cans with him.

He’s gonna burn this place down, I realized with perfect clarity.

And he’s gonna burn me with it.

Morgan sat the gas cans at his feet, then lit a cigarette. He smoked in silence for a moment, looking off into space as if he had suddenly forgotten I was there.

“So,” I began, figuring I would remind him, “I suppose you’re wondering why I’m here.”

He shook his head slightly. “Same as everybody. You’re trying to figure out what in the name of Elvis is going on. Everybody ’cept me. Me, I don’t even wanna know no more. I bet you’re wondering what I’m doing with these here gas cans.”

“I think I know. And I don’t think Robert’s landlord would approve at all.”

He studied my bleeding face, then reached into his pocket and handed me a handkerchief. I pressed it to my cheek.

“Thank you. I, uh, fell. On a . . . drill.”

“You believe in Hell, Mr. Wong?”

Five seconds of confused silence, then, “Uh, yeah. I guess.”

“Why?” he asked. “Why do you believe in Hell?”

“Because it’s the opposite of what I want to believe.”

He nodded slowly, as if this answer seemed to satisfy him. He picked up one gas can, unscrewed the cap, and started splashing the orange liquid around the living room.

I watched him for a moment, then took a tentative step toward the door. In a blur of movement Morgan turned, whipped his hand out of his jacket. A revolver was now aimed right at my face.

“You leavin’ already?”

My mind was still buzzing and suddenly I saw a flash from Morgan’s memory, something too bizarre to grasp. It was a scene from this morning, here at this very trailer. Blood.

And screaming. All that screaming. What the hell did you see here, Morgan?

Then I had another vision, of walls erupting in flame around me. I put my hands up in surrender and he nodded down toward the other gas can.

He said, “Help me.”

“I’ll be glad to. But first I want you to tell me what happened to John. You know, the other guy you were interrogating?”

“I figured he was with you.”

“Me? Didn’t he, you know, die?”

“Sure did. He was in the interview room and Mike Dunlow was askin’ him the same questions I was askin’ you. And your guy was muttering responses like he’s half asleep. He keeps sayin’ we gotta let you and him go, that you got to get to Vegas, else it’s the end of the world—”

Las Vegas again. What the fuck is in Vegas?

“—So finally Dunlow says to him, ‘Look, we got dead or missing kids here and we’re gonna find out what we need to know, so you’re stayin’ in this room until I’m satisfied or you die of old age.’ Your boy, when he hears that, he falls over dead. Just like that.”

“Yeah, that sounds like John.”

“And now he’s gone. Got a call from the hospital, it’s just an empty bed where he was. They figured he skipped out on payin’ the bill.”

“That also sounds like John.”

I picked up the gas can and removed the cap. Morgan put his gun away. I soaked the couch.

“You know a kid named Justin White, Mr. Wong? High school kid?”

“No. You asked me that back at the police station. He’s one of the missing, right?”

No, you know him. Think.

Morgan said, “Drives a cherry-red ’65 Mustang?”

Ah. I didn’t know the man but I knew the car. This was the baby-faced blond kid I saw Jennifer making out with at the party.

“I know what he looks like, that’s it.”

“He’s the guy who called in the—the whatever happened here. Now, this is how my day started. Just so you understand me, so you understand my state of mind. Okay? Kid calls nine-one-one in a panic, hysterical, talkin’ about a dead body. This was about four in the morning. I happened to be two blocks away at the time. So I race over and I’m the first one there and from outside I hear screamin’. And there’s people runnin’ away, kids peelin’ out in their cars. Party that went bad and all that.”

He stopped splashing the gasoline and sat the can on the ground. He stared off into space for a moment. He sucked some inspiration from his cigarette butt and spoke again.

“I go up to the door, I tell ’em it’s the cops. I go inside and I see—

—I WAS THERE. Just like that.

I was still in the trailer, standing in the exact same spot. Only the pain in my cheek was gone, and horrible rap/reggae hammered my ears from a floor stereo across the room. The light was different and a glance toward a window told me it was night. I looked down and again couldn’t see my feet.

Here, but not here.

It was like somebody had hit rewind on the trailer, the playback from about twelve hours ago.

The room was full of people. I spotted the faces of Jennifer Lopez and Justin White in the crowd. I scanned the room for John, but there was no sign of him. But of course he would have been gone by now, back at his apartment having a rough night of his own.

The music thumped but nobody was moving, or talking. All were standing frozen, their eyes fixed on a spot to my right. Holy shit the song was bad. It was “Informer” by the white reggae rapper Snow. “Infooooormer,