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Authors: Loren D. Estleman
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aimed at my face. This time I got hold of it, flailed my legs until I had a heel braced against its mate and shoved upward. There was a splitting sound and a hoarse scream of agony. Then steel flashed in the corner of my eye. I ducked and something swished shrilly past my ear. Not quite past. A large fat drop plopped to my shoulder. The lobe stung.
“No blades.” It was the first voice, though less deep, made shallow by range and pain and lost wind. “We’ll bust up this white motherfucker without help.”
There were more than two, maybe as many as six. A hundred wouldn’t have made much difference. I glimpsed faces in the stark locker-room light, shining black faces, distorted with fury. But mostly I just saw legs and boots. I kicked back and grabbed and tried to get up, but there were too many legs, too many flying boots. They got me in the stomach and groin and neck and head, in the elbows and knees, and all the time that deep black voice kept repeating, “White motherfucking son of a bitch white motherfucking son of a bitch white motherfucking son of a bitch,” until the litany merged with the roaring in my head and then the roaring stopped and then there was silence and then there wasn’t even that. There wasn’t anything, least of all me.
7
S OMEONE WAS STANDING on my eyelids.
He had spurs on and the rowels made my eyes ache. I decided to try to open them anyway. The effort squirted fresh pain into a hundred and one tender spots in my anatomy and gained me nothing beyond a dull headache. I lay there gathering strength for the next attempt while my stomach rocked itself still and sweat trickled down noisily from my forehead into my ears. Meanwhile I watched the pyrotechnics going on inside those stubborn lids. They were corpuscle red and spleen green and arterial blue, with here and there a dash of bile yellow to give the whole thing balance. There were tubas too, but I didn’t much like them because every toot reminded me of the pounding in my head.
Time for another try. No, it wasn’t. Yes, it was. I conjured up a crowbar and pried. I knew if I got one loose the other would break free on its own, as with stuck windshield wipers. Something gave. I cast the crowbar back to the limbo whence it came and grated open the lids.
I’d been cheating myself on fireworks. They were outside, not in, and with the veil gone they leaped into naked brilliance, whirling and plummeting and exploding into colors I couldn’t identify. My stomach lurched. I rolled hurriedly onto my throbbing right shoulder and said goodbye to the roast beef I’d eaten in the little place on Woodward.
I dry-heaved for a full minute after there was nothing left, then turned laboriously over onto my hands and knees and remained like that for a minute or an hour; my head hanging, body burning, and the cold clamminess in which I had lain seeping deeper into my bones. It was pitch dark, but I knew from the gritty wet feel of the surface under my hands that I was in some alley, a location in which my work had occasionally dropped me, not always standing up. It smelled of vomit and motor oil and damp and drunks’ urine and the dry musk of rats. So did the alley, but my work was worse. Traffic hummed in the distance. Except for Vietnam I had never been in a place where I couldn’t hear traffic humming.
I went through the routine. What’s your name? A fairly simple question, but there might be a trick to it. What the hell, take a chance. Walker? First name? Amos, but don’t spread it around. Height? Around six feet, or it was before tonight. Weight? One eighty-five. Eyes? Two. Brown, if you’re particular. Hair? Also brown. Some gray. Next of kin? None, unless you count my once-wife, living in California with an out-of-work artist on my alimony. Interests? Old movies, jazz and early rock, good Scotch, staying alive. Not necessarily in that order. Reason for present predicament? My mother’s fault. She dropped me on my head when I was
“No blades.” It was the first voice, though less deep, made shallow by range and pain and lost wind. “We’ll bust up this white motherfucker without help.”
There were more than two, maybe as many as six. A hundred wouldn’t have made much difference. I glimpsed faces in the stark locker-room light, shining black faces, distorted with fury. But mostly I just saw legs and boots. I kicked back and grabbed and tried to get up, but there were too many legs, too many flying boots. They got me in the stomach and groin and neck and head, in the elbows and knees, and all the time that deep black voice kept repeating, “White motherfucking son of a bitch white motherfucking son of a bitch white motherfucking son of a bitch,” until the litany merged with the roaring in my head and then the roaring stopped and then there was silence and then there wasn’t even that. There wasn’t anything, least of all me.
7
S OMEONE WAS STANDING on my eyelids.
He had spurs on and the rowels made my eyes ache. I decided to try to open them anyway. The effort squirted fresh pain into a hundred and one tender spots in my anatomy and gained me nothing beyond a dull headache. I lay there gathering strength for the next attempt while my stomach rocked itself still and sweat trickled down noisily from my forehead into my ears. Meanwhile I watched the pyrotechnics going on inside those stubborn lids. They were corpuscle red and spleen green and arterial blue, with here and there a dash of bile yellow to give the whole thing balance. There were tubas too, but I didn’t much like them because every toot reminded me of the pounding in my head.
Time for another try. No, it wasn’t. Yes, it was. I conjured up a crowbar and pried. I knew if I got one loose the other would break free on its own, as with stuck windshield wipers. Something gave. I cast the crowbar back to the limbo whence it came and grated open the lids.
I’d been cheating myself on fireworks. They were outside, not in, and with the veil gone they leaped into naked brilliance, whirling and plummeting and exploding into colors I couldn’t identify. My stomach lurched. I rolled hurriedly onto my throbbing right shoulder and said goodbye to the roast beef I’d eaten in the little place on Woodward.
I dry-heaved for a full minute after there was nothing left, then turned laboriously over onto my hands and knees and remained like that for a minute or an hour; my head hanging, body burning, and the cold clamminess in which I had lain seeping deeper into my bones. It was pitch dark, but I knew from the gritty wet feel of the surface under my hands that I was in some alley, a location in which my work had occasionally dropped me, not always standing up. It smelled of vomit and motor oil and damp and drunks’ urine and the dry musk of rats. So did the alley, but my work was worse. Traffic hummed in the distance. Except for Vietnam I had never been in a place where I couldn’t hear traffic humming.
I went through the routine. What’s your name? A fairly simple question, but there might be a trick to it. What the hell, take a chance. Walker? First name? Amos, but don’t spread it around. Height? Around six feet, or it was before tonight. Weight? One eighty-five. Eyes? Two. Brown, if you’re particular. Hair? Also brown. Some gray. Next of kin? None, unless you count my once-wife, living in California with an out-of-work artist on my alimony. Interests? Old movies, jazz and early rock, good Scotch, staying alive. Not necessarily in that order. Reason for present predicament? My mother’s fault. She dropped me on my head when I was
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