Like last night, in the movie. He’d spotted the two shadowy figures hiding behind the old furniture in the basement, watching the A-Squad and April. He figured Shutterbug had never noticed them before because maybe the film had to be projected really big to see them. And Todd and those other morons hadn’t noticed last night because they were too busy watching themselves with April.
No one had noticed them the night the A-Squad did April, of course. But Bat had noticed last night. There they were, on Candid Camera. In 1976, Shutterbug’s primitive movie lights had cut the shadows for a second or maybe two…just long enough for Bat to spot the two of them up there on the big screen, peeking from behind that old furniture, in 1994.
Amy Peyton and Doug Douglas. Just a quick glimpse, but he’d caught it.
He wondered what he’d do about the two of them, and Shutterbug. He’d have to do something about them. He’d have to get hold of that film. For keeps. After he took care of The Six Million Dollar Robot, of course.
He wondered about the whole mess while he sipped a beer after work.
He wondered about it while he drove home.
He was still wondering when he pulled into his driveway.
And spotted Ozzy Austin standing on his front lawn.
THREE
Things said or done long years ago,
Or things I did not do or say
But thought that I might say or do,
Weigh me down, and not a day
But something is recalled,
My conscience or my vanity appalled.
7:28 P.M.
The Six Million Dollar Man sat behind the wheel of the car he had owned since high school, waiting for a red light to turn green.
He had done it all for April. He had covered up at the cemetery, masking his insane mistake as best he could, knowing all the while that the tilting house of cards he had constructed to protect the two of them couldn’t survive the mildest breeze. And then he had found April’s nightmare at the old drive-in, and that was a sheer stroke of luck. He had dived into the nightmare, hoping to set things right, because it was a real nightmare and he could hold it in his hands.
Success or failure couldn’t be measured. Not yet. Steve knew that Shutterbug had gotten the message, but he didn’t think Bat Bautista had seen the light. Things might get messy with Bat, and that kind of trouble could send the house of cards into a dizzy sway. Forget a mild breeze. An attack from Bat Bautista would be launched with the fury of a full-force hurricane.
Steve had to avoid trouble. If he could. Maybe he could leave town. Pack up, take April, and go.
No. Not with her screaming. Not with her trapped in the nightmare.
The light turned green and Steve hit the gas pedal. The old Dodge roared over the crest of Georgia Street, past closed department stores, past the post office, to the empty street that paralleled the cold channel which separated the shipyard from the city.
Steve pulled to a stop in the public park behind the main library. He stepped from the car, unblinking eyes behind his silver shades staring at the channel. Choppy black waves lapped against the concrete walls of the pier. The sunset arced above the metal buildings across the water. The salt wind was as steady as time. It pushed clouds across the copper sky. Copper to pink to purple and iron while he stood there. Shipyard steel painted by advancing shadows as the sun melted into the horizon.
No. He couldn’t leave. This was his home. Always had been, always would be. His home, and April’s home, too.
Home. That was where he should be now. Not driving around, a scared kid wearing a cop’s uniform.
But Steve was afraid. He was afraid to face April. He didn’t want to find her screaming her head off in his fortress of solitude, still trapped in her nightmare. Because if she wasn’t free after everything he had done, what more could he do?
He didn’t have an answer for that. He slipped behind the wheel and decided that it was time to find one. He came to a red light at the foot of Georgia, sat there waiting with a picture of himself locked in his house, listening to April’s tortured screams for years to come.
The Six Million Dollar Man watched the light. It was as red and dangerous as the cherry on his police cruiser. A warning. The streets were empty. Downtown was deserted. He didn’t move when the light turned green. The old engine idled, missing the occasional beat. April’s nightmare was real enough to hold in his hand, real enough to hide in the pocket of his uniform. But his dream was real, too, wasn’t it?
Parts of it were. The doves nesting in the dying pines that ringed the drive-in. April’s dog, Homer Price, racing through the eucalyptus grove near the cemetery. But he hadn’t found the meadow. It wasn’t real. Not yet.
Steve had wanted April to step into his dream, alive and young, just as she had wanted him to enter her nightmare as a living, breathing avenger. They had tried to make it happen with drugs and paperback wisdom. But neither thing had happened, not really.
Something else had happened, something that they hadn’t anticipated. April’s nightmare had slipped into Steve’s dream, and now one reality was tearing at the other. But the tempest was only beginning. The winds were rising, just now, and Steve felt that in the end only one of the two realities could survive.
The dream, or the nightmare.
Seagulls drifted on dirty wings over the empty streets, rooting for fast food scraps. Steve felt the house of cards tilting. Maybe he could save it. He didn’t know if he was up to the task. The way he was feeling today… everything was out of sync.
Behind him, a car horn sounded.
Steve jerked in his seat as if he’d been stabbed in the back. His brain kicked into gear. He made a right turn and drove to the hospital.
Emptiness burned a hole in his gut as he stepped into the elevator. The caretaker was still alive. Steve was certain of that, because the receptionist on the first floor had informed him that Royce Lewis was on the third floor in room 303.
Steve waited for the elevator doors to close. Maybe everything would end while he was in this small metal box. Royce Lewis would release his last breath as Steve drew his next, and when the elevator doors opened Steve would step into his basement and find April waiting there in the cool, screamless silence.
