He enters through the back way and hits the locker room to change. All the while he waits for the sound of Agani coming in late, as he often is, or Banks' voice bellowing from the station, bitching about how his truck crapped out on him again and he's got half a mind to take it out back and shoot it like a rabid dog.
None of it comes, and Butcher finishes changing into his uniform in silence. He looks at the pictures taped to the inside of his locker. Six photos of his son and none of his wife- the standard divorcee configuration.
His first day on the job is still sharp as diamonds in his mind. He'd worked some long hours down at the mill while Elaine got her degree, before she turned around and returned the favor so he could attend the academy. It was what husbands and wives were supposed to do, or at least it appeared that way from the outside, because the truth was it also enabled them to spend most of their time apart while seeming like a functional couple. That day, though, the morning Butcher was told to report to his new station after graduating two weeks earlier, Elaine had uncharacteristically called out from work to see him off. She did more than that- first in the shower, then in the bedroom- and nine months later, almost to the day, Jake was born. A bi-product of law enforcement, they liked to joke.
Butcher shuts his locker a little too hard. The clang of its metal reverberates through his unhappy skull.
Everything seems normal on the station floor, a typical Monday morning full of yawning cops, some at the end of their shifts and some just starting. Up at the front desk, wearing a scowl, Monton hangs up the dispatch line.
"Problem," Butcher asks, grabbing the cleanest Styrofoam cup he can find.
"Banks didn't show for his shift. He's two hours late and he’s not answering his goddamn phone. My guess is he got loaded last night and over-slept. Again."
"Maybe he got lucky," Officer Smith offers, his boyish face looped into a grin.
"Maybe we all got lucky and he left town for good."
“No one in Shallow Creek has ever been that lucky.”
Butcher finishes preparing his coffee. "What about Agani, he no-showed, too?"
"Took the week off to visit family in Canada. He's been blabbing about it for weeks, don't you pay attention?” In that tone that says, What kind of cop are you?
“Guess I tuned it out.”
“Maybe you should cut down on the coffee.” Monton points to his cup. A few of the officers chuckle and exchange looks. They know exactly what the man means, and it has nothing to do with caffeine.
Butcher sits at his desk, cup in hand. He watches Banks' chair. In a small town everyone knows everyone, Butcher thinks to himself. That includes their demons.
**
"Peter Johnson?"
Mary peeks out into the waiting room, what the employees call The Most Boring Room on Earth: white walls, gray chairs, bland artwork, and the saddest play area this side of an abandoned amusement park. A man in the corner lifts his head, a man she's seen around town with his signature goatee and blue puffy vest, always hitting on the women at free concerts in the park or getting into arguments about parking tickets. Mary knows the type- a smooth talker and a high school sports star, he carved his niche at seventeen and stayed in it until it became a rut.
He smiles at Mary in a way no one smiles at the dentist's office, then stands and approaches her in the doorway. He's way too close to her when he says, "That's me."
"Hi, I'm Mary. Right this way."
“Yes, ma’am.”
She leads him down the hallway, past two booths, one empty and one with a woman recovering from surgery, before she brings him to the third chair and asks him to lie down.
He sits and says, "I always listen when a pretty girl asks me that." He smiles again and it makes Mary queasy. He talks exactly how she expects someone who's named for two words that mean ‘dick’.
"I was warned you were a ladies man."
"There’s nothing ‘were’ about me."
"Haven't lost your game, is that it?"
"That's it. Never have and never will." He pauses, looks her up and down. "You're new in town.”
“Subtle.” Mary opens up a new packet of sterilized tools. "Somewhat new, about two months. You know how it is in these towns, you know everyone in a month but it takes ten years before they stop thinking of you as an outsider." She spreads the tools out on the tray- the mouth mirror, the probes, the scaler.
"With a smile like yours, it won't take more than two," he grins. Mary turns on the light over his head, blinding him. He puts a hand up in front of his eyes. "Jeez, a little warning next time, huh?"
"Sorry, I must have gotten distracted."
He shifts on the leather seat and adjusts his crotch. "I do have that effect on women.”
She forces a giggle and hates herself for it.
“So,” he whispers, “what time do you get off?”
Before she can answer, Doctor Dion enters the room, white hair bobbing, wiping his freshly washed hands. He introduces himself as if he's never met Mister Johnson, even though he has, repeatedly, a habit that annoys Mary and more than a few patients. Mary moves around to the other side of the tray and pulls her surgical mask up over her mouth as the doctor explains what they'll be doing today.
Johnson says, “Anything is better than that cleaning woman.”
“You mean Doctor Palamara, the hygienist?”
“Whatever you call her. She’s got the bedside manner of a pit-bull on its period.”
As much as Mary finds the man disgusting, she can’t help but agree with him on that point.
The doctor clears his throat. “Yes, well, that aside she is a very capable doctor. Is there anything I can do to make you more comfortable before we start?"
"You can tell that pretty nurse to take her mask off."
The doctor looks to Mary, surprised by the man's words. She says, "I think Mister Johnson is comfortable enough." All three of them laugh, but inside Mary burns up.
"Alright then, let’s get started." The doctor moves to the surgical tray but stops, his hand hovered over it. "Is there no scalpel?"
Mary looks at the tools spread out on the strip of white paper. “That’s funny,” she says, “I thought I put it out.”
**
She checks the time: four minutes to go.
The indicator for two missed calls blinks on and off at the top of her phone’s screen. She doesn’t bother checking it, she knows who called and she doesn’t have time for that conversation at the moment. Instead, she slips the phone back into her bag and pulls her coat closed, hiding her body from the wind’s bite. If she hears his voice now, not just his voice but anyone familiar, she might lose her nerve.
Mary looks across the parking lot, lit by one lonely lamp-post, a green-hued beacon in the dark. As dead leaves blow across the pavement they make odd scraping sounds, their gnarled corners dragging and hopping along in random intervals. She thinks of The Self, of the way it borrows and steals organics from anyone and anything unfortunate enough to come close. A plagiarist of the body. The only thing to feel fortunate about is that it didn't appear in a desert or a jungle, some place more dangerous than the suburbs, where things eat and destroy for a living, where they sting and claw and drag victims down until they drown on water or their own blood. Then again, in a place like that, at least you would see it coming.
Mary looks to her car, along the side of the building where the employees are told to park. Her fingers brush the key in her pocket and she gets a flash of panic, a sudden urge to get behind the wheel, stick the key in the ignition and drive, get far away from here, leave everything behind and never come back, run away from The Self and its hungers, run from this town and its creeps both alive and otherwise.
She thinks of Kevin, at home with that thing, waiting for her to come back to him. Those missed calls mean he's alive. They also mean he's worried about her, checking on her.
Something like guilt makes her let go of the key.
An over-polished red pickup tr
uck turns left into the lot and drives up to the curb. It skids to a stop directly in front of her, and Peter Johnson leans out the driver's-side window. "Got your message."
She looks around the darkened patch of blacktop, makes sure they're alone. "What message would that be?"
He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the slip of paper stained with her handwriting. "Eight-thirty. Parking lot," he reads. "So here were are, in the parking lot." He checks the digital clock in his dashboard. "And would you look at that- eight-thirty on the dot."
"I have eight thirty-two."
"Then your watch is fast."
She holds up her arm, pulls her coat sleeve down to show her naked wrist. She fakes a flirting smile.
"Okay smart-ass, you getting in or what?"
"Does that line work on all the ladies?"
"Just the ones that slip notes into my pocket."
"Well in that case." She walks to the front of the red truck with her heart booming against her ribs, through the piercing headlights and around to the side where he’s leaned over to open the door. As she climbs up into the truck, she thinks how this must be the only situation in which Peter Johnson opens a door for a woman.
Immediately there’s the smell of leather polish. He's one of those, she notes. Obsessed with keeping his car immaculate but probably lives in a dirty hole.
"The heat feels good," she says.
"Heat always does."
She rubs her palms on her knees, trying to warm both. He watches her with watery eyes, watches her hands work over her legs, watches the place where her coat opens. "So," she says, looking him in the eye, "are you planning to sit here all night looking at me?"
"Can you blame me?”
She laughs a little too loud. “I’ve never done this before.”
“That’s not a problem, little lady.” He fingers the gear shifter. “Just say the word and we'll go wherever your little heart wants.”
She swallows hard, a picture of The Self in her mind. “I was thinking my place.”
“Yeah, right.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
He chuckles and scans the lot like he’s looking for someone to share the joke with. “With your house? I don’t know, your husband could be a small problem.” He reads her face. “What’s the matter, you thought I didn’t know you’re married? The ring was the first thing I saw. Though I see you’re not wearing it now.”
“I hope that’s not a problem.”
“For some guys it would be. Some guys see a wedding band, they see a red light. Not me- I see yellow.”
“You have an interesting philosophy on life.”
“It’s done me right so far, just like my policy on no houses.”
“My husband’s away on business. He'll be gone for a week.”
“Famous last words.”
He slams the truck into drive and pulls away from the curb, not bothering to tell Mary to put her seat-belt on, not really caring either way. At this moment getting into a car accident bad enough to be ejected through the windshield would be an improvement on her situation.
They pull out of the lot and onto the street, driving in silence through the night, dark trees slipping by, between them the occasional pair of glowing eyes. "So where should I go? Plenty of private spots in this town. There's the cornfield behind the church, or the supermarket that shut down over on Weebly, or the...you okay?"
"Fine," she lies.
"Hope you're not having second thoughts."
"No, I'm just not going to some abandoned building. I'm better than that."
"Bet you are. Alright, tell you what- we can go to my place, but you got to wait in the car while I take care of a few things."
"I'd much rather go to my place."
"And I'd much rather not, so it seems we have a problem." They pass three teens walking along the side of the road, two girls and one boy, drinking from paper bags that definitely don't hide soda bottles, and Mary wishes for that back- the innocence, the rebellion, the excitement- remembering the good times of those years ago and how much they weren't filled with shape-shifting creatures and sexual perverts. "What's at your house that's so important, anyway?"
She thinks for a moment. “I have some…toys, if you know what I mean.”
Peter Johnson laughs. “That’s pretty hot, I gotta admit, but I don’t play with that stuff. Now if-”
“I have a whole room. You should see my set-up. I really want you to see it, we could spend all night there.” At this point willing to say anything that might intrigue him.
“You are a wild one, aren’t you? I’m surprised you haven’t jumped me already.”
She rolls her eyes out the window and says, “I can barely wait.”
“In that case…” He turns down a side street with only a few lights blocked by the overgrowth of unkempt trees.
“What are you doing?”
He puts the truck into park, pulls up on the emergency break and takes off his seat-belt. “Getting this party started.”
“Uh uh. Not here.”
“Here, there, anywhere.” He leans forward to kiss her but she shrinks back in her seat, makes herself small.
“I said not here.”
“And what, because you’re the woman you get to make the rules?” He presses the red button on her seat-belt, letting it rewind with a snap. He pushes the hair off her shoulders so he can get a better look at her neck.
“I said no,” she shouts. The sound echoes in the small space. Johnson recoils back into his seat, a dejected look on his sweaty face. The porch light of a nearby house turns on- a concerned neighbor, disturbed from their television.
“Don’t forget you started this,” he growls. “You came onto me. You put the note in my pocket. And this is it now? This is how you’re treating me?”
“No.” Mary's eyes are wide. Scared. She pulls a scalpel from her coat pocket. “This is.”
**
Peter Johnson’s hands grip the wheel so tightly his fingernails are white. He glances down at the blade held an inch from his gut, and he thinks about making a move- knocking it out of the woman's hand, overpowering her, pulling her out of the truck and kicking the high holy shit out of her.
"Don't think about it," Mary says. She moves the scalpel in closer until it's pressed against his side.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Good, then keep driving, the turn's coming up."
"I know where you live. It's the house on the edge of town all the kids are scared of."
"What?"
"I'm telling everyone about this, you know, the cops, your boss, everyone. You're going to jail until you're old and gray, and the second you set foot outside I'm gonna shoot you in the head.”
"What did you mean about the house?"
"I wondered how they kept reselling it, but now I get it- there’s no shortage of idiots." He turns right onto Blackstone Drive, just two minutes from the house.
"What do they say about it?"
"Fucked if I know, I don't pay attention to that crap. All I know is no one lives there more than a few months, and then like clockwork some new sucker moves in all starry-faced and puppy-eyed and we all pretend like 'Oh, yeah, welcome to the neighborhood,' like we're ever gonna see them again."
"Alright shut up, we're here. Park close." She points to the top of the driveway. He turns in and pulls all the way up to the house, puts the truck in park and waits. Mary pushes the scalpel toward him. "I don't want trouble from you."
“You’re going about it the wrong way.” In the front window the curtains move and Kevin's face peers out at them. "Away on business, I see. You gonna tell me what this is about?"
"Stay there." She holds the blade up to his neck and climbs between the seats, making sure not to cut him as she awkwardly maneuvers into the back. "Okay, open your door slowly." As he unlocks and pushes it open, she fumbles for her own handle and opens her door without looking away from him. She jumps out and quickly moves around t
o aim the scalpel at him. "Get out-"
“Let me guess- slowly?” She nods, her eyes filled with fear. He swings out of the driver’s seat and jumps down, his movements exaggerated and sarcastic, not taking her seriously, this tiny woman with her tiny blade, clearly panicked, clearly married to a man who won’t do his own dirty work. He slams the door shut behind him and allows her to march him toward the front door.
Halfway there, he stops and turns.
“Keep moving,” she orders.
He gives it some serious thought, making a show of it. Finally he shakes his head and simply says, “No.”
“What do you mean no?”
“I don’t think you have the balls to use that pig-sticker. Not that it matters. I mean, maybe if you’d tied my hands or something, but as it is I could run across that field and there’s no chance you’d catch up.” He sees the color fall from her face and adds, “You’re not very good at this, are you?”
Mary looks at the tiny scalpel in her tiny hand, feeling exposed, foolish. “My husband has a gun,” she tries, but he only laughs at her.
“Why didn’t he give it to you? Have him come out here and show me. In fact, tell you what- if your husband can get out here and produce a gun, a real gun, I swear on my dead mother I’ll go inside that house with you, no struggle, no yelling, not even a word. What do you say to that?”
She glances at the living room window. The moment she lets her guard down, he rushes at her. He grabs her small wrist and crushes it in his thick paw while the other goes to her neck. She yelps. The scalpel falls to the grass.
“Now sit down.” He yanks her by the neck and pulls her to the ground. Before she's rolled to a stop the door is already open, Kevin in the doorway. He tries to run out and help her but he's pulled back violently at the ankle. He crashes to the floor on his belly.
“Leave her alone,” he screams.
Peter Johnson kneels down on Mary and pins her to the grass with his full weight, his knees and hands holding her down. “Why don't you use your gun,” he asks Kevin. “Seems to me like a good time to use it.”