"Define magic. That was spontaneous human combustion, well documented in scientific literature. Of course, the subject wasn't exactly human."
She staggered into a recessed doorway and squatted down, trying to clear her head. The apartment was at least a mile away. Maureen didn't think she could make it.
She needed coffee.
She needed warmth.
She needed explanations.
She stared up at the stranger. Silhouetted against the streetlights, he looked too damned similar to the man who had been following her. And he hadn't really answered her question. He had just killed . . . something. Something "not exactly human."
All the bone seemed to melt out of her legs and spine and she huddled back against the doorway. Maureen's memories ran off with her, fleeing the alley. Buddy Johnson had looked like that. Squat, strong, hairy, broad nose and powerful jaws like the Christmas Nutcracker and a forehead that looked like the business end of a battering ram. Java Man walked the streets of coastal Maine. He grew up to play pro football. Brutal aggression fit in there. Steroid rage. He'd bought off a couple of rape and assault charges with his earnings.
Maureen shivered and curled tighter into her ball. She was suddenly ten years old, cold and wet and frightened, hiding from the neighborhood bully who insisted on playing "doctor" with her when he came over and Jo wasn't home yet. It hurt. Every time she met a man, she had to fight down those memories. She kept wishing Buddy Johnson was dead and buried along with her teddy bear and tap shoes.
Something touched her shoulder, and she flinched back. Words flowed around her, gentle, barely louder than the sleet rattling against the storefront glass. She shrank back into the deepest corner but felt implacable hands lift her and guide her back out into the storm.
"You need a chance to dry off and something hot inside you. There's an all-night coffee shop a few blocks from here."
Those were her own thoughts, pulled out of her head and spoken. The man knew what she needed. He wanted to help her. He was concerned. And now that he was close, she smelled him again. He was the first man she'd ever gotten close to, who smelled right. He smelled safe.
"Prefer. B-b-b-booze. Need. D-d-d-drink." Her teeth were chattering too fast for coherent speech.
The apparition in the yellow ski cap shook his head. "The only bar close to here is no place for a lady. Let me buy you coffee."
"S-s-strip joint. Next b-b-block. Open. Serve booze. Walk by it every n-n-night. Seen naked women b-b-before. M-m-mirror."
Besides, she was much too cold to be affected by the atmosphere of sex. And she was used to aggressive, wanton women. She lived with one.
Author Bio
James A. Hetley is also known as James A. Burton. He lives in the Maine setting of his Hetley-authored contemporary fantasy novels The Summer Country, The Winter Oak, Dragon’s Eye, and Dragon’s Teeth. His residence is an 1850s house suitable for a horror movie, with an electrical system installed while Thomas A. Edison still walked the earth, peeling lead-based paint, questionable plumbing, a furnace dating back to Teddy Roosevelt’s presidency, a roof perpetually in need of shingling, and windows that rattle in the winter gales. He's an architect. Not just any architect, but he specializes in renovation and adaptive reuse of old buildings. Go figure.
Other diverse connections to his writing include black belt rank in Kempo karate, three years in the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War, a ham radio license, and such jobs as an electronics instructor, auto mechanic, trash collector, and operating engineer in a refrigeration plant. He continues a life-long fascination with antique crafts and the hand-tool skills of working wood and metal.
