It was a limbo trance. Until my spirit could get itself together again, heal itself, the rest of me was not real, and my ass was up for grabs.
‘And that’s when Death snagged me for his personal chauffeur, dressed me in a white satin suit and put me behind the wheel of his black, ultra-swank seventy Caddy limo.’ Kenny paused and glanced at Daniel again. ‘You following this shit?’
‘So far,’ Daniel said.
‘I don’t
‘At first, when I was still on the fire base, I knew some of the names, guys in my outfit. And there were some Vietnamese names, too. After a while I didn’t know any of the names. But I fucking always knew where to find them.
‘Then one night driving along there’s a huge flash of light behind us, like an ammo dump getting off, and when I glance back the light’s just right somehow so I can see through the partition into the backseat, see Death. He’s a skeleton all right, man, with this mad, hungry, lonely grin, but forget the Grim Reaper shit,’ cause he’s wearing a business suit, one of them sharp, pinstriped jobs, and his finger bones, every one of them, is crusted with diamond rings.
‘The next card comes through the slot, I don’t even have to look to know my name’s on it. When you see Death, Death looks back, and there’s millions of fucked-up people to chauffeur him around.
‘I didn’t think twice – if I was going down, I was gonna take that motherfucker with me. So I stood on the gas until we were howling through the dark and then I jerked the wheel hard right and hit the door rolling.
‘But I didn’t get him. He’s got some kind of dual controls in the backseat there, and I hear the brakes lock before I clear the car. Now feature this, man: I don’t hit the road, the bushes, nothing – I’m just falling through space. All I can concentrate on is the image of Ginnilee’s face. I look into it, into her eyes and her smile and her dreams and the life inside her, and I don’t know whether I’m imagining, remembering, or actually seeing her, because when I stop falling and open my eyes, I’m looking at this ugly old nurse who growls, “About time, soldier. There’s a war on.” But they sent me home to the VA.
‘Not many know what Death looks like, what kind of wheels he has. Those that do have a responsibility to ride patrol and waste the motherfucker on sight. No questions. No answers. I got my piece from ’Nam under the seat. When I see him, I’m gonna blast them diamonds off his fingers, blow him down to dust.’
Daniel said, ‘You think you can kill Death?’
‘I don’t know. But I sure as fuck can try.’
‘Almost have to,’ Daniel said softly. He leaned back in the seat and shut his eyes. He tried to imagine Ginnilee’s face but he was too weary. He opened his eyes only to be blinded by the high beams of an oncoming car. As it passed, Daniel, struggling to refocus, thought he caught a glimpse of a black limo. He wheeled to look out the rear window, telling Kenny, ‘I got an eyeful of headlight, but I think that might have been it, the black limousine.’
‘Fuck, man, are you on drugs? That was a red seventy-seven Toyota.’
Daniel watched the taillights move closer together as they faded in the distance. From what he’d seen, the car was long, low-slung, black. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Relax, man,’ Kenny reassured him. ‘It’s a crazy story to get behind, I know. Hard news. Cut the spook loose in ya is all. Remember, I
Daniel turned back around on the seat. ‘No problem,’ he said. ‘It’s your call, your patrol – only trying to help out.’
‘I roger that, bro’, and much obliged. Fuck, man, you were crying with me there during the war stories – think I don’t know you’re on my frequency? I pick up every hitchhiker I see on patrol, and I tell ’em all about Ginnilee’s face and that gone month driving Death around. Some of them say nothing, some tell me I’m full of shit, some humor me like I’m some sort of war-psychomoron, and almost all of them decide that they’d rather stand on the empty desert highway than ride another mile with me. Maybe one out of a hundred has even a little fucking tiny tear to shed, has the
The question, sudden and oblique, caught Daniel off balance. ‘What makes you ask that?’
Kenny shrugged. ‘A hunch. A feeling. I wasn’t meaning to get in your shit about it. You don’t have to tell me diddly.’
‘I almost died once,’ Daniel said. ‘From a bomb explosion. My heart stopped when they were loading me in the ambulance; they had to shock it to get it started. That’s what the doctor told me, anyway – I don’t remember. I was falling, that’s the last thing I remember, falling till it seemed I’d fall forever, then right in front of me, out of nowhere, was a mirror, and I remember lifting my hands to protect my face but I don’t know if I fell through it or it shattered or what. I guess the closest I’ve ever come to seeing Death was in that mirror, but I don’t remember what I saw there, if I saw anything at all.’
‘That’s Death, all right. He loves to fuck around with mirrors, mirrors and windows – two of his favorite toys.’
‘If you don’t mind a personal question, something you said has got me curious.’
Kenny glanced over at him. ‘Do it, man. Shoot.’
‘I’m not quite sure how to put it,’ Daniel replied. ‘You said when you looked at Ginnilee’s picture, you vanished inside yourself. Do you mean your body actually disappeared, turned into air?’
‘Negative. Just the fucking opposite. My body stayed and my mind vanished. You had the right track, though; just the wrong train.’
Daniel thought about this. It actually seemed to make better sense than the way he was going about it. He tried to imagine his mind vanished, smiling when he realized he’d gotten ahead of himself, that first he’d have to
