Chasing the Moon

CHAPTER FIVE

Diana sold coats. Or, to be more honest, she stood around in the coat section of a department store and waited for people to come around and pick out coats. Buying coats was one of those shopping experiences in which a clerk served about the same purpose as a mannequin. Only instead of wearing the coat, she told people how good they looked in their potential new wardrobe additions.

She didn’t lie. If someone looked genuinely bad in a coat, she usually told them this (in a gentle, soft-sell fashion). But it was hard to look bad in a coat, and it really wasn’t hard to pick out one that you liked that looked fine on your body type. Although there was one dreadful red-and-orange eyesore that had been in the coat department since long before her and would probably still be there, waiting, long after she was gone.

As jobs went, it wasn’t horrible. She’d had worse. She’d had better. She wasn’t planning on making a career out of it, but it paid the bills for the time being. The only bad thing about it was that it could be dull and, when she was in the wrong frame of mind, a single shift could last thirty or forty hours.

Today felt like it would be one of those days.

After being trapped for four days and change in her apartment, she wasn’t ready to be trapped in a bigger room. She also didn’t feel like calling in sick because that would inevitably lead to questions. Where had she been? Why hadn’t she called in? And so on.

It would almost be easier to go in to work and pretend she hadn’t even missed. Except that even if she was willing to pretend, no one else would be. The same questions would still be waiting. Why is there a hairy green monster following you?

Oh, just something I picked up at the nexus of realities, she would reply. Can I help you with a coat?

She supposed she could have just skipped today and not called, but that wasn’t the way she was hardwired. It was against her character to miss work four days in a row without letting someone know.

A glance at the clock confirmed she had two minutes before having to get up and get ready. She lay in bed and wished there were a way to miss and not call in and avoid the various hassles awaiting her on each and every path before her.

The phone rang in the other room. She was slow to answer it because she had to move the dresser blocking her door. The door didn’t have a lock, and she didn’t trust Vom to stay in control of his appetites while she slept. By the time she moved the dresser out of the way he had already answered the phone.

“Hello. Yes, yes. Oh really?” He listened, making generic I’m listening sounds to confirm this to both her and the person on the other end of the phone. “Okay. I’ll tell her. No problem.”

He hung up.

“There was a fire at the store,” he said.

“Oh my… was anyone hurt?”

Vom shrugged. “Didn’t say. Just said you don’t have to bother coming in today.”

She leaned against the wall and absorbed the news. On the bright side, her work problem was solved.

“Wait. I just moved in, and I haven’t talked to anyone yet. How did they get this number? Even I don’t know it yet.”

Vom shrugged again, but she could tell he was holding out on her. Even though he didn’t have any eyes, his mouths pursed suspiciously. She could feel he was lying to her. Probably part of that psychic bond they shared.

He withered beneath her glare.

“You’d probably call it magic. Or sorcery. Or wizardry. Or majik with a j and a k. Though I’ve always found that pretentious and unnecessary.”

“Okay, so now you’re telling me I have magical powers.”

“It’s just a side effect of straddling multiple floors of reality. Any intelligent being can do it, provided they have the will and desire. Also, you need a conduit to gather the appropriate metaphysical charge and—”

“Stop.”

“What? Too technical again?”

“I’m sure you have a great metaphorical explanation you could give me, but it’ll just be more mumbo jumbo that I really don’t understand.”

“You wished not to go to work. Magic took care of that for you.”

“I didn’t wish for a fire.”

“You didn’t not wish for a fire.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Unguided reality manipulation will always take the path of least resistance. Since you didn’t specify the details, you can hardly be upset by the results.”

She hastily threw on some clothes, not bothering to shower.

“Where are you going?” asked Vom.

“To the store,” she said.

“I thought you didn’t want to go to the store.”

“I didn’t, but if I started a magic fire that killed somebody, I need to know.”

“Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why do you need to know?” asked Vom.

“Because it’s important.”

“It’s important to know if you killed someone?”

“Yes.”

“And why is that?”

“Because I couldn’t live with myself if I did.”

Vom nodded. “Then why would you want to know?”

Diana said, “You don’t understand.”

“Oh, I understand. You may have killed someone by accident and now you think it’ll make things better to torture yourself about it. Just because I don’t agree with it doesn’t mean I can’t understand it.”

“We can’t all be amoral monsters with a complete indifference to human life.”

“I’m not indifferent to human life as a whole,” he said. “Just individual ones.”

“My mistake. I’m going. You stay here.”

Vom snarled. “I’m a cosmic entity. Not a puppy.”

“Just do me a favor,” she said. “Try not to chew on the furniture.”

He grinned. “I promise nothing.”

Diana rushed to the store, stopping only for a coffee and a bagel. When she was almost there she realized that seeing the fire wouldn’t answer any questions. By then she was less concerned with the possible body count and just determined to see what the results of her careless wish might be. She envisioned the entire department store burned to the ground. Then, worrying that perhaps imagining something like that would make it happen, she did her best to wipe the image from her mind. But it was like asking herself not to think about a pink dinosaur. Once the idea was introduced it uldn’t be removed.

She should’ve taken the time to listen to Vom’s explanation. If she did have magical powers now, it was probably smart to understand them.

The department store had not been destroyed. closed for repairs read a sign on the door. She peered through the windows and, while the coat section wasn’t visible from outside, she could see that most of the visible smoke damage was in that general area. The store was still standing, and it didn’t look as if the fire department had had to soak the place down to stop the fire from spreading.

“Pretty bad, huh?” asked Wendall from behind her.

She turned toward him. He worked in housewares. Wendall was short, a little chubby, with curly hair and a perpetual smile. Always cheerful. Sometimes too much so. They hadn’t talked much, but she liked him in a pleasant, casualacquaintance way.

“Had to come and see for yourself, huh?” He joined her at the window. “Me too.”

“Do they know how it happened?” she asked.

“They think it was an electrical short. You know how old the wiring is in this place. Thank God, nobody was hurt.”

She breathed an inner sigh of relief.

“They say it’ll probably take a week or two to fix the damage,” he said. “Say, you want to go get a cup of coffee or something?”

“Actually, I just had some coffee,” she replied.

“There’s a great little bagel place just around the corner,” he said.

“Uh, I just…”

“My treat.”

Wendall grinned at her. He had a crush on her. Possibly. It wasn’t easy to tell because he was always so friendly, but he was that special brand of nice guy who was so used to being overlooked that any woman who acknowledged his existence became attractive by default. Or maybe she was just flattering herself. Maybe he was just being friendly again.

“Yeah, sure.”

She figured it couldn’t hurt to spend some time with a regular, non-world-devouring person, and Wendall was as ordinary as reality could get.

The “great little bagel place just around the corner” was actually the “adequate little bagel place just around the corner where she ate lunch two or three times a week,” but she found the familiarity comforting. Something like a half-cat, halfrabbit hopped around, unobserved by everyone else, under one of the tables, but she resolutely ignored it.

Wendall carried the bulk of most conversations. He wasn’t a blabbermouth, but if you weren’t feeling up to talking he didn’t mind filling the silence himself. He talked about nothing important. She didn’t hold it against him since most talk was about nothing important. She didn’t have anything worthwhile to discuss either, aside from herent induction into the world of the supernatural, and this was the last thing she wanted to talk about. But there were only so many variations of “Crazy weather we’ve been having lately,” so much shop talk, before she found herself zoning out.

“Anyway,” said Wendall, “how about it?”

“Hmmm.”

“About the movie?” he asked.

It took her a moment to realize that he’d asked her out at some point in the conversation. She was having trouble focusing. The air crackled with a weird electricity.

She forced herself to look into his eyes. Bright, eager eyes above a hopeful smile.

“Uh, Wendall,” she started, “I’m kind of in a bad place.”

All the hope vanished from his face, though he was quick to recover.

“I’m not trying to blow you off,” she said. “I’m not. It’s… just… I’m going through something kind of… complicated right now.”

She wanted to explain it to him, but it was too unbelievable.

A round purple monster waddled into view in the window. It stopped, pressed its face against the glass, and with its three eyes scanned the interior of the bagel place. In a world full of monsters, there was something different about this one. This one put her on edge. More on edge, anyway. And when its gaze settled on her, she was not surprised.

The creature jumped through the window, sending glass shattering in all directions. The other customers screamed. Some froze. Others jumped up in panic. But the monster lumbered with single-minded determination toward Diana. Lunging, the giant hedgehog-like beast prepared to pounce.

Suddenly Vom was there. He hoisted the purple creature into the air and threw it across the room.

“Are you okay?” asked Vom.

“I thought you said you weren’t a puppy.”

“Aren’t you glad I lied?”

Roaring, the hedgehog threw itself into Vom.

Diana, along with half the customers, found herself trapped by the grappling horrors cutting off the exit. She didn’t know what anyone else observed, but she saw a giant hedgehog with a thick, rubbery skin wrestling a fuzzy green puppet. The scene put Diana in mind of a Scooby-Doo episode. Except the villains were exactly what they appeared to be, and people were going to get hurt.

Vom took a bite out of his opponent, inflicting a gushing wound. A purple splotch jumped off the hedgehog’s back and enlarged into a duplicate of the original. The new creature turned and charged at Diana.

Yelping, she threw her hands up to defend herself. A chill ran down her arms, and invisible forces catapulted the monster through the ceiling. She felt a little woozy after te effort. She definitely needed to get the hang of these new superpowers.

The hedgehog spawned two more duplicates. All three piled on Vom.

Wendall took her by the hand and pulled her out the door. Outside the restaurant she stopped him from dragging her any farther. The roars and shrieks coming from within were terrifying and bizarre. The struggle shook the street and cracked the building.

“We have to get out of here,” said Wendall.

It was the smart thing to do, but it felt wrong. She’d left Vom to be mauled to death. Although she wasn’t certain that he could die. He was ancient, and it was hard to imagine that a savage beating could destroy him. But the hedgehog was also some kind of monster, so maybe that was an exception.

She couldn’t do anything about it. Her own magic powers were so new and unfamiliar that she didn’t have the faintest idea how to help Vom, even if she had been sure it was the right thing to do.

A terrific howl rocked the earth. She was knocked off her feet. Dust obscured her vision as Wendall’s shadowy figure offered her a hand. She took it, and a sharp pain ran down her spine.

It wasn’t Wendall. It was the hedgehog. She pulled away, but his grip was unbreakable. He seized her by the throat.

Wendall came out of the dust and threw a sloppy punch that connected with the monster’s shoulder. The monster didn’t move, but it was a noble effort. She’d written off Wendall too soon. At least he’d tried when he could’ve run away. Too bad she was going to die anyway.

Or not. She wasn’t able to breathe but didn’t seem to need to. The monster wasn’t hurting her. It didn’t really seem to want to, either. It threw her down to the ground, and a quizzical expression crossed its face. It was confused, frightened.

Thunder cracked from the restaurant as a hedgehog duplicate smashed through its façade, bounced off the street, and nearly struck Diana and her attacker. Another boom followed as a second hedgehog hurtled outward, digging a trench in the pavement and coming to a stop a few feet to their left.

Vom exited the building through its shattered front door. He made a show of wiping his hands with big grins.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. I think so.” She rubbed her throat. The skin was a little raw, but it wasn’t a serious injury.

The hedgehog tilted its head at a curious angle and stepped toward her.

“It’s okay,” she said in a soothing voice. “Everything will be fine now.”

The beast’s face contorted into a snarl, and it lunged at her. Instincts kicked in. Since flight had failed her, she resorted to fight. Diana unleashed a haymaker under the monster’s chin. Its head exploded in a burst of green and black. The body took several steps backward before collapsing.

“Holy crap,” she said. “I didn’t mean to… it was an accident. I wasn’t trying to—”

“He’s not dead,” said Vom.

Vom picked up the mushy purple body and started to eat it. It was a gruesome show as one unspeakable thing devoured another in the space of a half a minute.

He belched.

“Excuse me.”

The pedestrians stood in shock at what they’d just witnessed. They weren’t ready for a world gone mad filled with horrible monsters and exploding heads.

Several hedgehog beasts waddled beside Vom.

“You didn’t have to hit me so hard,” said one.

“Sorry about that,” replied Diana. Only a moment later she was unsure of why she was apologizing.

“Diana, you know these things?” asked Wendall.

“I can explain,” Diana lied. “It’s not as crazy as it looks.”

No, it was crazier. She couldn’t explain because she didn’t understand much of it herself.

He scrambled away as if she were every bit the horrible beasts beside her.

A whistling sound drew her attention skyward. The hedgehog she’d launched into the atmosphere plummeted downward. Before she could shout a warning it returned to Earth, landing right on Wendall, squashing him into a gooey mess. Or so she assumed. She turned away to avoid seeing all the gory details.

But she couldn’t turn away from the carnage and destruction surrounding her. It was only in comic books that a whole city block could be destroyed without casualties. The ten-story building that housed the bagel shop looked as if it might collapse at any moment.

She was going to be sick.

“What’s with her?” asked a hedgehog beast.

“She’s new to this,” replied Vom.

Vom and the hedgehogs faded away. Diana was still adjusting to this strange perspective on reality, so she wasn’t able to see what happened. She sensed the ripples as the cosmos readjusted itself, but was aware of it only after it was over. She sat in the restored bagel shop. Everything was back to normal, returned to the state just before the monster attack.

“Wendall,” she said. “You’re alive.”

He hesitated. She wondered if he remembered any of it. If anyone here did. There was an awkward quiet in the shop, and indeed the entire block, as the remnants of unacceptable memories faded.

Maybe it was all her imagination. Maybe Vom and the hedgehog were all just figments of her own deranged mind. It seemed more sensible to believe she was insane than that she was living in a universe filledwith monsters that no one else saw.

Diana considered Wendall sitting before her. She never would’ve thought it, but he’d proven himself to be a good guy. And even if it was only in her imagination, she still thought he deserved a chance to prove it.

“Wendall, I’d love to go to the movies with you,” she said.

“Yeah… about that,” he stammered. “I’m pretty busy the next few weeks, but I’ll check my schedule and get back to you.”

She reached for his hand, but he recoiled.

“I have to get going,” he said, “but I’ll see you later, I’m sure.”

He ran out the door without a backward glance. He was in such a hurry he steamrolled over an old lady.

He remembered, and he wasn’t the only one. Nobody was looking at her. More than that. They were deliberately not looking at her. She had become something else to be ignored. Like the crumbs of rubble littering the floor or the spiderweb of cracks running through the shop window or the miniature hedgehog clone skittering across the floor. Bits and pieces of a not-quite-undone reality.

Diana’s head hurt. The world was both too bright and not bright enough. Everything smelled funny. Her bagel tasted weird. The air blown by the ceiling fan scraped against her skin. She was aware of everything now, and everything seemed alien and unpleasant.

She threw away her bagel, dumped out her coffee, and walked out of the shop into a strange universe she could no longer call home.