The phone fell with a thump and a ring. An ashtray cartwheeled across the floor and broke in the corner. I leaned back; Ms. Redding followed. Her solid form pressed down on me.
'Don't come in, Elmo!' I shouted at the door. We froze for a moment-faces close and expectant. Then I kissed her. Our tongues met like hungry snakes. I felt Ms. Redding's hands like vices on my buttocks. As my hand took an enjoyable ride on a long zipper, I had the sense of being watched. Elmo would be down on one knee at the keyhole. Hell, who wouldn't?
Chapter 34
Ms. Redding left at around three-thirty. Apparently, she was unaccustomed to sleeping on desks. I saw her to the door then asked Elmo if he wouldn't mind reading in the office so I could use the couch. I had to give Tommy's body a rest. If I pushed too hard, I would end up wrestling his personality for control. Also, I had my own little hallucinogenic facsimile of sleep, and I thought better when disembodied. Mary Redding's Volkswagen exploded to life in the quiet street below. In minutes, Tommy was snoring beneath me on the couch.
As I had feared, the sex and orgasms had quite exhausted my intellect. I felt all shocked and spread out-kind of drippy-like egg yolk sliding down a wall. I floated near the ceiling, my mind a flickering cloud of sexual echoes. Ms. Redding had been willing and able, and she had never met someone like Tommy. That was one thing about him I could accept. He had a libido that could sink a ship. Ms. Redding had staggered away finally, flushed and musky. 'Save some, save some,' she had said. It was true. Tommy's body responded to each atom of sexuality as though it would be the last he would ever encounter. I let the buzzing, chafing images huddle and squat on my mind for a few panting moments, and then I gave it all up to my own strange dreams.
Transition.
I was in a confined space. A line of Authority Enforcers sat across from me. They held auto-shotguns in their gloved hands. A red light overhead made them look like demons. I heard a grumble of gears. An engine groaned before the sensation of motion.
Transition.
I was outside all of the sudden, walking down a street that glistened wet from a new rain. My shoes dragged on the asphalt, and made a slushy scuffing sound. I could taste whiskey, cigarettes and sleep. I rubbed sand from my eyes. Suddenly, a baby's cry echoed up the street, bouncing between the buildings and rattling off the fenders of parked cars. I shook my head. A cat, probably-or cats making kittens.
A form emerged from the mist beneath a streetlight. At the end of the block, at the corner, a clown in greasepaint swaggered through the puddles toward me. He wore tall hard boots of black, and red spotted coveralls. A. 9mm automatic pistol jumped like a rabbit in his hand.
I reached into my coat for my. 44, but found my shoulder holster missing. A brilliant star blossomed at the end of the clown's gun. My chest erupted in red. Another star burst forth, then another. I dropped to my knees as holes appeared across my chest in bloody plumes. These shooting stars came plummeting, impacting into my chest. I fell forward. My hands were wooden paddles. I couldn't feel the street. The world weighed a billion tons-I tried to hold it away, strained to keep it off of me. My arms quivered. Blood poured out of my sleeves-puddles formed. The streetlights lit the growing red mirror. I could see my reflection. A clown laughed back at me. My mind raced.
Transition.
I marched toward the noises ahead. To the left and right of me, Authority Enforcers moved shoulder to shoulder in a line. They held tall plastic shields and clubs. So did I. Our boots crunched on the broken asphalt. Ahead of us came shouts of rage. A huge mob of the dead approached. They had guns, and clubs and rocks. A scream, and the shields clattered as rocks were thrown. I heard an order shouted, and a long blinding arc of flame leapt over our heads and landed on the mob. Another order, and we charged the burning figures.
Transition.
I was back in the waiting room outside my office. A sucking dryness pulled at me. Below in Tommy's place a tall pale man in black and gray was stretched out. His lips were a sour pucker as though he held a skinned lemon between his teeth. His face was broad, his nose straight. A hat covered his head. From a closed eye, a tear trickled.
Transition. I was back on the street. A burning corpse grabbed me. I saw its flaming eyes. Transition.
Tommy was below me again. The waiting room was silent. The hallucination ceased. Moments passed silently. A fly's buzzing assault against the window was the only sound. A fly that carried eggs, that carried maggots, that carried rot. Rot that was the end for all animal, vegetable or mineral.
Tommy screamed. He leapt from the couch, hands clawing for his gun; the gun I had put away in the desk.
'Get away!' he shrieked, hands gripping the thick hair at his temples. 'Get it off me!'
He attacked the wall beside the door to the hallway with such fury and venom that he was dust-covered and through the slats in no time. I saw blood streaming from knuckles and forearms. Elmo entered the room. His eyes were wide with terror. His hands were outstretched. They worked an imaginary rope. 'Boss! Boss!' He yelled, terrified.
Tommy continued to pummel the wall in an effort to escape. He whirled around into a crouched position, and screamed into his hands like a man in quicksand. He bellowed mad, garbled words at Elmo-words that made no sense to the living or the dead, the words of the dream world. The dead man stood against the far wall bewildered. 'Whiskey, Boss?' he mumbled impotently, like a man with new teeth, lips and tongue. 'Just a dream, Boss. You want whiskey, that's all.'
Tommy was silent, thrashing his glance around the room. He laughed 'Whiskey!' and gripped his gut. He rolled on the floor. 'Yeah, and bring my gun, I want you to put a bullet between his eyes. Let's do it right this time!'
Eyes wide, Elmo hurried from the room. Tommy rolled onto his back and stared into the space I occupied. 'I hate him.' The dark words fell from a slack mouth. His expression was cold, his eyes black.
My mind still swam from my own experience. I was too disjointed and exposed to care. Below me the clown squinted, and smiled.
Chapter 35
I staggered against the desk, then lurched upright leaning heavily on my hands. They splayed across the wood like two dying squid. I looked at them, they were crusted with dried blood, and the skin was torn from the knuckles. I gagged, but managed to baby-walk my way around the desk. The floor surged. I kicked a boot at it. The boards tried to twist up again; I stamped them flat. The walls leaned in at me, they wavered, and the blinds vibrated like an eye-test. The horizontal rhythm, the blind, space, blind, space, blind, space-had my guts churning. The air was thick and sour, thick like water-it suffocated me. And it was hot. It was so hot. I was overboard. I thrashed forward-my hands, arms and legs a million miles away. I was working them by satellite. But I was attached. Each motion worked the fissures in my shattered skull against each other with terrifying painful screeches. Finally, exhausted, I dropped into the chair and fumbled for the phone. In a mechanical voice I ordered coffee-lots of it, then flailed out and picked up a cold cup that I had knocked on the floor. It came free of a sticky black puddle with a slight tug. I tore the plastic lid free. The coffee was bitter and icy, so it fit right into my state of mind.
I was drunk-ripped. Tommy had polished off a bottle of whiskey in an effort to find sleep. Not wishing to miss a day's work, I had taken over before he passed out. There had been no struggle for control that time. I could sense his relief when I entered. Of course, it meant I had to deal with a zero to ninety sensation of complete sobriety to rip-roaring drunkenness. My guts rumbled. I didn't want to throw up, but Tommy's body didn't want cold coffee. I felt bile rise; doubling over I painted the inside of the wastepaper basket. I stared at it, wondering who the idiot was that thought wicker was a suitable material to build them out of. I came to the conclusion that he had never been sick in one. I felt better, but I knew that feeling would pass. I was full of poison.
