“HEY!”

I was faced with two wooden stalls, both wide open and empty, and an old porcelain sink.  A dark haired girl a few years younger than me was standing at the mirror with some kind of make-up thing in her hands.  The whole room smelled of perfume. 

Much nicer than the men’s room, I noted absently.

“Wrong door, jerk!”

I took a step back into the closing door and almost fell over myself.

“Sorry,” I stammered, “I thought my friend just came in here.  I think she’s sick or something...”

I was getting a completely unresponsive look from the girl. 

“Um... Blonde hair?  Long and curly, have you seen her...?  No...?” 

Shit.

“Do you fucking mind?”

The girl was getting pissed.  I figured it was best to avoid further chaos, so I backed out and leaned up against a huge golf arcade game where I could watch the door.

I waited.  Five, ten, and then almost fifteen minutes went by.  Three different women had entered and exited in that time, but no Blondie.  Just as I was starting to get some weird looks from people, baldy walked up to me with my check in his hand.

“You still need that table or what man?”

“Uh, no.  Sorry, we’re all set.  Here-” I handed him my bank card and resigned myself to moving the search out to the streets.  “Just put it all on that I guess...”

*  *  *

Fore Street was brimming with activity.  It was pretty close to the weekend, and people were wandering all over the place; on their way to Liquid Blue to go dance away to eighties hits under black-lights, headed to Bull Feeney’s for a pint of Guinness and some live acoustic music, or stumbling down to the treacherously cobble-stoned Wharf Street to antiquated old buildings where you could dance on top of the bar at the Iguana and find a bag of weed or a drunk hook-up as quickly as shot of whiskey or a beer.  Normally I loved it.  The energy, the drunken chaos, I would drink it in and embrace its comforting madness.  Secure in the knowledge that there was so much more going on in the world besides my life.  It was easy to blend in with the crowd on nights like that, and I loved the anonymity.

But at that moment there was only one thing on my mind.  Blondie had just threatened me and then disappeared out of the bar.  She obviously was connected to what was going on around me, not to mention she was my only link to the missing hour.  And I had to find her.  Plus I had to pick up a fifty dollar tab I didn’t even have the pleasure of remembering running up. 

If anything bitch, you’re at least splitting the fucking bill with me.

I bummed a cigarette from a tipsy, overweight girl in a shirt three sizes too small leaning on Gritty’s windowsill, lit it with her lighter and inhaled deeply.  The nicotine buzz hit me almost instantly.  It had been forever since I’d smoked, but I felt the shit I’d dealt with qualified me to have one while I pondered my next move.

“You see a curly haired blonde chick come running out here?”

I figured I’d ask the smoking drunk since I already had an open dialogue with her.

“Nope, but I’m sure you’re not the only one looking for one,” she slurred, and then started giggling to herself.

I thanked her halfheartedly then turned away to walk up the street, my eyes down in thought as I puffed away.  Seconds later, I ran headfirst into something that felt like a person and landed flat on my ass on the sidewalk, crushing the burning cigarette with my palm.

“Ah shit!  What the fuck, man!”

I squinted up into the streetlights at what I’d hit.  It was a tall, solid dude with broad shoulders and short black hair.  A flicker of recognition hit me.

No fucking way.

It was Dave, the missing roommate, standing on the sidewalk with a dumbfounded look on his face and wearing the same shirt I remembered last seeing him in a week ago.  For a second I was overjoyed.  My roomy, my compadré... the skeptical voice of reason, there was no doubt he’d be able to bring my life back from the screwed up edge it had been skirting along.  But as I looked at him I realized that something seemed... wrong.  He was staring blankly at me with glassy eyes that looked sunken too far into his skull.  And there was too much white showing and not really any pupil.

“Aiwass.” he said simply.  His voice was scratchy and raw sounding.

Maybe he’s just fucked up on drugs or something, I thought as I stood up.  Sure, ‘cause everything else has been easily explained lately.

“No, Dave... it’s me, man.  Jay, your roommate,” I started to move toward him so I could shake his shoulders and snap him out of whatever trance he was in, “are you-”

His arm shot up and he grabbed me square on the throat, strong and unyielding.  All I remember was being completely surprised and thinking I’d made yet another stupid mistake as I was forced roughly backwards into a dirty shop door.  I tried to yell out but only managed a raspy cry as my windpipe start constrict under a solid, icy grip.

Nine
Fore Street Massacre

"Hey!” I managed to cough out after a second, “what the fu-ack!”

I made a futile attempt to loosen Dave’s fingers, but he’d always had more strength behind him that I did.  He’d been in the military for a few years before college and had never really lost that solid muscle bulk they hammered into him during boot camp.

He moved his head in slightly closer at a slightly tilted angle, like a dog trying to comprehend something.  His white eyes had an odd combination of no emotion and focus to them.  I was vaguely aware of people moving around my peripheral and looking on curiously.  Somewhere in the back of my head I vowed never to turn my back on someone who looked like they might be getting their larynx crushed in the middle of the street.

“Aiwass seeks you... I... seek you...” he growled at me. 

His voice was strange, like someone had synthesized it and notched it down a few tones.

“Who?” I rasped out, “Dave, I don’t even listen to Imus!  Stern all the-”

His grip tightened.  I coughed then pushed his forearm away with both hands as hard as I could manage, just barely relieving the pressure on my throat. 

“You will open the rift.” 

It wasn’t a question, but a matter-of-fact statement.  His gaze seemed to falter for a second as he looked at me, almost like he was searching for something but didn’t know what.  I tried to illicit some trace of recognition from him.  We had known each other for years and I expected some glimmer of who he was to shine through as we locked eyes.  Some trace of the college drinking buddy I once knew.  But there was nothing... just a blank, white-eyed icy stare.

There was no doubt in my mind at that moment, the thing that had been following me – whatever it was – had gotten him.  The trashed bedroom, him missing for almost a week now, it all made sense.  Who knew how long he had been wandering around town searching for me.  Why he wouldn’t have just waited at the house I couldn’t imagine.  I briefly thought about how I would probably need to change the deadbolts on the house.

How the hell am I gonna pay rent?  And where the fuck are the cops?  So true what they say: they’re never around when you fucking need them...

I tried to lift my leg to push him away but couldn’t seem to get my balance right and instead ended up awkwardly sliding half-way down the door I had been backed into, one foot pointing uselessly up toward the night sky.  My throat tightened beyond where I thought possible, feeling almost like it was in serious danger of collapsing into the back of my neck.  I was gasping for air like a goldfish that had been dumped outside of its bowl.  Nothing came though. 

Dave was staring at me, his face betraying no more expression than it had when I plowed into him.  People were looking on from all around now, but from my half slumped vantage point all I saw were random legs and shoes facing in my direction and the chatter of the crowd getting louder.  I used my last ounce of energy to twist sideways and tried to knock his leg out from under him, but just managed to give myself a better view of the parking garage across the street in the process.  I couldn’t believe no one was helping me. 

What kind of fucking town do I live in?

As I looked up sideways at the gray concrete parking garage, sadly resigned to the fact that what I was seeing would be my last view before death, an unmistakable mane of wildly curling yellow hair came into focus.  Blondie was leaning against the waist high wall of the second floor, her chin in her hand, calmly watching me with the trace of a smile on her face.  The second I caught her eyes, her smile widened.

Then a young kid’s voice screamed someone else’s name off to my left.

“JAAAAAACK!!!”

Who the fuck...? 

A moment later Yankees came cruising out of the night on his bicycle, gears clicking wildly, and landed a square kick on Dave’s leg as he glided by at top speed.  He was followed immediately by his buddy, who had his foot lifted just high enough to catch my possessed roommate on his lowered shoulder.  The blows caught Dave completely off guard.  He lost his grip on me and was twisted around roughly, landing half on the sidewalk and half in the streets in a decidedly ungraceful pile of limbs.  People all around were yelling and gasping. 

“Woo-ho!  Yeah Jaaaaack!”  I heard the second one shout as he recovered his balance and sped off up Fore Street and into the night behind Yankees.