Thicker Than Blood - The Complete Andrew Z. Thomas Trilogy

DESERT PLACES ALTERNATE ENDING

I've let it slip in a number of interviews that there were major alternate endings to both Desert Places and Locked Doors, and over the years, I've gotten quite a bit of email from fans wanting to read these original endings.

I completed my first draft of Desert Places in the winter of 2000, working with my writing professor at UNC Chapel-Hill, the great Bland Simpson. At the time, I thought I had just finished the best novel I'd written to date. The ending was a gutsy, surprise mindfuck if there ever was one. I got an agent with this draft, but when she tried to sell it, a number of editors had issues with how the book ended. Maybe it was a little too ambitious. After a lot of hand-wringing, I decided to rewrite the last hundred pages of the book (that rewrite went on to become my first published novel and the version of Desert Places with which all of my readers are familiar).

One of the beautiful things about ebooks is that I can now share the original, uncut ending of Desert Places.

This picks up at the moment when Andrew Thomas is hiding in Orson's house in Woodside, Vermont. He hears a Lexus pull up, and watches Orson get out of the car. In the original ending, Andy sees someone else, and it takes the book in a completely different, much darker direction (the last two chapters are stunners).

I'm still very proud of the original ending, and it's a substantial chunk of text, clocking in at 22,000 words, or roughly 100 printed pages. This alternate ending has never been edited, proofread, or copyedited. It is in the same raw, uncut, unpolished state from which I downloaded it off an 11-year-old, 3.5-inch floppy disk.

I hope you enjoy this exclusive look at a Desert Places of a different feather.

# # #

The alternate ending takes its turn into left field in the existing Chapter 24, following this paragraph:

The low shudder of a car engine pulled me to the window. I split the blinds with two fingers and watched a white Lexus sedan turn into Orson’s driveway. I waited, my stomach twisting into knots. If Orson came in through the back door, he’d see the broken glass...

ALTERNATE ENDING

The slim figure of a woman, between forty and fifty, with frosted hair that may have once been jet black, walked up the sidewalk towards the front porch. She wore a long, navy trench coat that dropped to her ankles and carried a brown briefcase in her right hand. The sky darkened fast behind her, and as she ascended the steps and disappeared from view, my mind turned to chaos.

When I heard the deadbolt turning, I ran from the study, through the living room, and past the staircase. I turned right into the dining room and stood by the open passageway which connected it to the kitchen. From here I could watch the sunroom where I'd made my entry, and make sure she never saw the broken glass.

I held the gun by my face, pressed my back up against the wall, and listened. The front door opened and slammed shut. High heels clicked against the floor, and I heard her drop her briefcase. I could tell that she walked through the living room, and I prayed she'd go down the hallway, but instead she stepped into the kitchen. My chest raced furiously up and down.

The answering machine came on, and as the messages played, she opened the fridge. Her back is turned, I thought. Go now. I didn't move. The refrigerator door shut, and she walked to the kitchen sink. She turned on the water, and I thought again, her back is turned. Go.

I stepped out of the dining room into the threshold and pointed the gun at her back. She was bent over the sink trying to scrub something off her hands.

"Don't move!" I shouted. She gasped. Slowly, she craned her neck, trying to see me.

"Turn back around!" I said. "You wanna die?"

"Oh God!" she cried. "Please, no."

"Shut up!" I screamed as she hunched over into the sink. "Turn off the water," I said.

She cut it off, and aside from her quiet sobbing, the house was silent again. My voice lowered, I said, "If you look at me, I'll kill you. You got towels in the kitchen?"

"Yes."

"Blindfold yourself."

She opened a cabinet beneath the sink and pulled out a large, white dishcloth. She opened it, rolled it up, and then tied it around the back of her head.

"Back slowly towards me," I said. When she was several feet away, I said, "Stop." I made sure the cloth covered her eyes and cinched the blindfold tighter.

"You can have whatever you want…"

"Walk to the study. I'll guide you."

She stumbled through the living room, and I pushed her through the narrow doorway. When we were inside, I shut the door and knocked her to the floor, at the foot of a tall bookshelf.

"On your stomach," I said.

Immediately she obeyed, remarkably calm, as if she'd done this before.

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Mary Parker."

"Do you work at the university?"

"No, just my husband. I'm a lawyer."

"You're married to David Parker?"

"Yes."

"How long?"

"Why?"

I leaned down and put the gun to her temple.

"Six years," she said.

"That's impossible."

"I swear."

"When does he get home? I'll know if you lie to me, Mary."

"After seven. He has a meeting tonight."

"You expecting company?"

"No."

"Why's the fucking table set?"

"It always is. I swear."

"I'll kill anyone who shows up besides your husband."

"No one else is coming," she said, her voice begging me to believe her. "I promise."

"You have children?" I asked.

"No."

"Does your husband expect you to be home?"

"Yes." I sat down on the floor, breathing easily again, resisting the exhilaration.

"What do you want?" Mary asked, her voice so calm it unnerved me.

I took the radio from my fanny pack and spoke into the receiver. "Fred Flintstone," I said. "Complications. Safe now. Bring it home."

"Roger that, Wilma," the radio squeaked.

"How well do you know your husband?" I asked.

"What do you mean?"

"You've heard of the Heart Surgeon?"

"You're not…"

"No. David Parker is."

"There's no way," she said. "Are you FBI?"

"I know a hell of a lot more than the FBI. You know the name Orson Thomas?" I asked, but she didn't answer. "Have you heard the name?" I asked again.

"Yes." She trembled. Her back heaved heavily up and down against the floor as she panted like a dog, nearly out of breath.

"How do you know him?" I asked.

"He taught at the university, but he left, he disappeared. I don't know where."

Rising to my feet, I walked towards her. "You're protecting your husband."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she whined.

"Quit fucking with me!" I shouted. I knelt down on the floor, grabbed her throat, and held the gun to her head. "You think this is a joke? You know I'll kill you if you lie to me, so why protect him? You know what your husband does to people? He takes them to a cabin. He tortures them. He cuts their fucking hearts out, you stupid bitch, and you want me to believe you don't know this? That you don't have a part in it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," she cried.

"Shut up!" I screamed, grabbing her hair and shaking her head. I rolled her over on her back and ripped the blindfold from her face. "Your husband doesn't look like this?!" I shouted.

"Orson." Her face turned white. "Why are you doing this to me? What are…"

"I'm not your husband, Mary. I'm his brother, and I'm gonna kill him, because he's a monster. You want to protect him, what does that make you?"

"I don't know what you're…"

"Turn over on your stomach."

"Why?"

"Do it or I'll kill you."

She turned over and lay flat on her belly. I held the gun by its short muzzle and crushed the back of her head with the hard, metallic handle. She let out a moaning gasp and was still.

My first thought was that she might bleed onto the floor, so I took the blindfold and pressed it into the back of her head. Only several drops of blood seeped through the white cloth, and I applied pressure until the bleeding stopped altogether.

A car pulled into the driveway, and I ran to the window. Walter's Cadillac backed in. He got out, opened the trunk, and returned to the driver's seat. I put the gun in my fanny pack and lifted Mary from the floor. Slinging her over my shoulder, I walked to the front door. By my watch, it was 5:15, and as I opened the door, I saw that the sky had deepened into a dark blue evening. Through the black-silhouetted trees, the first stars shined in the cold, night air.

I rushed down the steps, along the walkway, and stopped at the rear of the Cadillac. Setting Mary in the trunk, I slammed it shut and ran to Walter's lowered window.

"Who the hell is that?" he asked.

"His wife," I said. "I never thought he'd be married."

"Is she dead?"

"No. Get out of here. I'll call when he gets home. She said seven o'clock."

"I don't like this, Andy," he said. "We can't kill her. She might not know."

"She knows," I said. "Now's not the time. When the police come looking for them, the neighbors are gonna remember your car sitting in the driveway, so go. I'll call you."

Walter eased down onto the street, and I walked calmly back towards the house. Inside, I locked the front door and picked up the bloody dishtowel in the study. I'd clean up the glass before Orson came. I wanted there to be no trace of a struggle, no evidence that these people had been abducted save the simple fact they could not be found.

# # #

I tapped on the ivory keys and waited. The Steinway horribly out of tune, the notes hung awkwardly in the still air. I'd turned on three living room lamps so the house would look warm and inhabited, but that had been two and a half hours ago. Now it was several minutes past eight o'clock, dark outside, and still no sign of Orson.

I'd walked through the entire house--the upstairs, the first floor hallway and den, even the basement. Nothing here suggested Orson's taste for violence. I'd found no trophies, no hearts or photographs, not even a newspaper clipping concerning the Heart Surgeon. There weren't even indirect links such as horror novels, videos, or paintings. (In Orson's room in Wyoming, a William Blake print of The Simoniac Pope hung above his bed--a pen and watercolor of souls being tortured in hell). I couldn't understand it. I'd expected Orson to live alone, surrounded by the paraphernalia of his hobby. David Parker now seemed to be more than just a safe name. He was a different lifestyle, one separated, almost completely, from Orson Thomas.

A car came up the hill and pulled into the driveway. I took the walkie-talkie from my fanny pack and pressed the talk button.

"Go Papa," I said, but there was no response. "Go Papa," I said again as a silver Mercedes stopped behind the Lexus and its headlights went dark.

"Copy that," the radio squeaked. I laid the syringe and the vial of Meprobamate on top of the piano and took the Glock into my hands, now trembling. When the car door slammed, I grabbed the needle and tranquilizer and ran through the living room. Turning right, I walked several feet down the hallway and then left into a small den. A green, cloth sofa sat against the back wall, facing a big-screen television and a stereo, both held in a large, yellow pine cabinet at the far end of the room. I turned off the lights and sat down on the sofa.

A moment passed, the house silent. The doorbell rang, but I didn't move. Frozen in place, I prayed a neighbor or a friend of the Parker's hadn't just dropped by. It rang again, and I rose to my feet and walked quietly into the living room, stopping at the front door. Looking through the peephole, I saw him. His back was turned, but I recognized the wool suit and the gold, wire-framed glasses that rested neatly on his ears. He screamed pretentious intellectuality.

Orson turned towards the door, and I looked into his face for the first time since Wyoming. It took my breath away. He looked nothing like himself. He'd dyed his hair light gray, and it had grown out. In the orange porch light, his once blue eyes were brown. His face was the same, but the expression and intensity different. He could've passed for mid-forties, but the solid build beneath the wool suit reminded me of the man who'd taken me to the desert.

"Mary, it's me!" he shouted. "Come on, I'm freezing my ass off."

Turning the deadbolt, I stepped behind the door. It opened and Orson walked in.

"Honey?" He slammed the door behind him, leaving his back turned to me. "Mary?"

"Not exactly," I said. Orson spun around. He dropped his briefcase, and his eyes opened wide, a look of utter horror painted ghost white across his face.

"Orson?" he said breathlessly. "What the hell are you doing…"

"Mary tried that, too. Turn around."

"Where is she?"

"Turn around!" I yelled, and he did. "Walk slowly into the den," I said, and he walked across the living room floor.

"Did you hurt her?" he said, moving into the hallway. His voice shook.

"Where's that sadomasochistic edge?" I asked. "You going soft on me, brother?"

"What did you do to her?" he asked again.

"Mary's fine," I said. "She isn't here right now, but you'll be with her soon."

We walked into the den, and I cut the lights on.

"Sit on the floor," I said, and Orson obeyed, sitting beneath the pine cabinet. I sat down on the sofa, beside the needle and the vial, and stared at him. "You are a fucking genius," I said. "In all seriousness. I mean, I'm sitting here wondering if you even know what kind of a sick bastard you really are. You get a facelift or something? I can understand the hair and the colored contacts, but you don't even look…"

"I promise," Orson began, "that I don't know what the hell you're talking about."

"Damn. You are good," I said. "I have to keep reminding myself what you did to me and the others so I can even go through with this."

"Look, you need help. I can help you. Please, Orson, don't do this."

I raised the gun and pointed it at his head.

"Try that shit again," I said. "I dare you to call me Orson one more fucking time."

Orson looked down at the floor as if to cry. "Why are you doing this?" he asked, looking up at me, tears in his fake, brown eyes. "What the hell happened to you? You disappear for three years, and then you come back, for what? I can't help what the committee decided. You messed up." He was sobbing now. "There was no other way," he said.

"Lay on your stomach," I said, and Orson turned hesitantly over. I opened the vial of Meprobamate and dipped the needle into the concentrated solution, filling the syringe with the tranquilizer and then tapping it to remove air bubbles.

"Tell me something," I said, setting the needle on the floor. "Why'd you kill Mom? I have a theory, but I'd like to hear your reasoning."

"You're speaking Greek."

"It wasn't to make me come for you," I continued. "Because I think it never crossed your mind that I'd find you. I think you shit your pants tonight when you saw me standing behind your door. Though I'm sure it appealed to you that Mom's death would destroy me, I'm pretty confident there was another reason. As much as it goes against your nature, I think you were ashamed for your mother to see your accomplishment. And that's all I'm gonna say about Washington. I'm not even gonna dignify what you did there with the tiniest remark."

"You're out of your mind," Orson said, his voice controlled, his words stronger now.

"I'm sure it seems that way to you," I said, taking the syringe and rising to my feet. I walked towards my brother, the needle in my left hand, the Glock in my right. "So what was the plan?" I asked, standing over him as he lay flat against the hardwood floor.

"Once again, I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm sure. Maybe a secret trip down to my lake? How many bodies of those thirty-seven hearts are buried on my property? I'm surprised you haven't tipped the FBI yet. Or were we due for another jaunt in the desert next summer, where you upped my ante to torture? Maybe it's a good thing for your sake that you only taught me the killing part."

"What do you want me to say?" Orson pleaded. "I don't understand what you want."

"Where's the evidence. You got a safety deposit box? A storage locker?"

"No."

"Then where is it? Where are your trophies? Where are the pictures of us cutting up those rednecks? Or Shirley Tanner? Where are the newspaper clippings, the videotapes?"

"I don't have a fucking clue what you want, or why you think I have it," Orson wept.

"You're lying," I said. "Does Mary know?"

"About what!?" he screamed.

"About what," I said calmly. "What does it take?" I asked. "He's hidden in there somewhere. What'll bring you out, Orson? Torture? I can do that, you know. It might not be as effective as you could manage, but it'd be persuasive."

"My name is David Parker."

I kicked him in the side, and ribs cracked. He groaned, and I dug one knee into his spine.

"Don't you move," I said. "I'll put your brains on that cabinet if you breathe." I set the needle on his back and took the Glock into my left hand, pressing the barrel into his head. "I'm gonna give you a sedative now," I said. "You'll feel a sting in your neck. There's a hollow point with your name on it if you flinch. I know deep down you must be proud. I couldn't have done this a year ago. But you taught me, didn't you? Gave me one hell of an education."

As the needle slid into a bulging vein in his neck, Orson grunted but didn't flinch. I injected the contents of the syringe, pulled the needle out, and stepped back away from him. "Sit up," I said, and Orson sat up against the cabinet. I went back to the sofa and put the needle and the vial, now empty, back into the fanny pack.

"What was that?" Orson asked, his words dragging, his eyes beginning to tire.

"A tranquilizer. You got a staggering overdose. I might not have to shoot you."

"What about Mary?" he asked, his eyes now half-closed.

"What do you care, huh? Don't pretend with me."

"I'm not…" His words trailed away, and he exhaled deeply, painfully.

"I caught your lecture on Caligula," I said, taking the radio out. "You were a good teacher, Orson. Should've devoted your life to it."

His eyes closed.

"Remember that poem you recited for me at the cabin when I was going under? "The Road Not Taken" by Frost. Hell, I'd recite it for you if I could remember the words."

Orson slumped over onto the floor, and I pressed the talk button. "Bring it home," I said.

# # #

Orson was too heavy to carry, so I dragged him through the hallway, into the living room, across the smooth, hardwood floor. Through the front windows, I could see Walter's Cadillac at the end of the driveway, the trunk closed, Walter waiting inside. I left Orson lying in the foyer and ran out to the car. Crossing the lawn, it felt colder than it had been three hours ago. My breath was now a white vapor, vividly exposed, and the air tickled my throat when I inhaled.

I knelt down by Walter's window as it lowered. "You're gonna have to help me bring him out," I said. "He's too heavy, and it'll look funny, me staggering around out here."

We ran up to the house and went back inside. Orson was still unconscious, lying on his stomach on the floor, his skin now a stormy, yellow pallor.

"Don't touch anything," I said, closing the door behind us. The phone rang, and we both jumped. Walter looked at me, tangible fear dripping from his eyes. "Don't worry about it," I said, and the phone continued ringing until the answering machine cut on. I turned Orson over on his back and grabbed him underneath his armpits.

"Take his feet," I said, but Walter didn't move. "What? You wanna stay for dinner?"

"That's not your twin," he said. "Who the fuck is this, Andy?"

"This is Orson Thomas," I said. "The man we came to get. Don't pull this shit now, Walter. Pick up his feet so we can get the hell out of here."

"Tell me who this is right now," Walter said.

I let go of Orson and stepped up into Walter's face. "This is my twin," I said, my voice intentionally calm, "the Heart Surgeon. Every second that Cadillac sits in the driveway, we're risking getting caught. So, please, pick up his feet, so we can leave."

Walter grabbed Orson's feet up angrily and glared murderously into my eyes.

"I'll fucking kill you if this isn't Orson," he said as I lifted my brother again off the floor. "You had to lie to me?" he asked as we edged towards the doorway.

"I didn't lie to you…"

"Don't insult my intelligence by telling me this is your brother. He doesn't look a thing like you. I ought to fucking leave you here. Make me drive with a woman yelling in my trunk."

"She woke up?" I asked, turning the doorknob.

"That's why I didn't open the trunk. She's been screaming for the last hour."

"Shit."

"Yeah, shit's right, you prick…"

I kicked the door shut and dropped Orson. His head smacked onto the floor. I grabbed Walter by his shirt and flung him against the door, my right forearm digging into his soft neck.

"I'm not lying to you." I said. "That's my fucking brother whether he looks like it or not. How the hell do you think he's been able to kill for so long? And you want to walk out and leave him here. Suppose he lives? You just killed twenty or thirty more innocent people, because he won't ever stop. You've been tepid this whole trip, and even if you don't believe me, guess what? Too late. He's probably dead now, and you think that lady would forgive you if you opened the trunk and said you're sorry? Her husband's nearly dead. Her head's got a big fucking knot on it. You quit now, you go to jail, so do what you have to to finish this." I released him and he gasped for breath, clutching at his throat. Rage sizzled in his eyes but fear along with it.

We lifted Orson for the third time and walked back out into the night. I closed the door behind us, and we carried him carefully down the steps and across the grass. My eyes kept cutting back and forth from the icy blades beneath my feet to the surrounding houses with their warm, yellow lights and open curtains, the inhabitants moving carelessly about inside. It'd take one person glancing outside and seeing two strange men carrying something across the Parker's front lawn, to turn a mysterious disappearance into a murder investigation.

We set Orson down on the cold concrete, and Walter went to unlock the trunk. I could hear Mary crying inside, and her despair touched me in a very distant place.

"Don't open it yet," I whispered. "She's gonna scream bloody murder."

"No blood in my trunk," Walter whispered, as I took the Glock from my fanny pack.

"She's gonna wake the neighborhood when we throw Orson on top of her."

"I'll risk it," he said. "Nobody's blood is gonna stain that trunk."

"Then you lift that heavy bastard off the ground," I said, putting the Glock back into the fanny pack. I took the keys from Walter, and when he'd hoisted Orson up against the rear bumper, I turned the key and the trunk popped open. Mary didn't scream. Curled up in a corner with wild eyes like a caged animal, she looked at me and then Walter. She started to speak when her husband rolled on top of her and the trunk slammed shut, leaving her again in darkness.

# # #

"I wish it was misty again," Walter said as we sped along the highway. "Last night was perfect. That moon's worse than a fucking spotlight."

"You watching the mileage?" I asked, annoyed at Walter's apparent lack of attention to the most important detail of the night.

"3.7."

"The second it turns over to 4.8, you stop."

"Quit telling me the same…"

"I'll tell you as many times as I think it's necessary. You feel like digging another hole? It's a different ballgame when the dead people are with you."

4.8 miles north of the coffee shop in downtown Middlebury, Walter eased across the road, onto the wide shoulder of 116. He parked the car as close to the forest's edge as he could get, using the pine shadows to obscure the white Cadillac from moonlight. We stepped out and slammed the car doors, their echoes racing down the empty highway.

I buried my hands in the pockets of my suit before they could go numb. The air stung my cheeks, and I could only be thankful that the night was without wind or snow. The moon, rising now above the Green Mountains in the east, was as bright and full as I'd ever seen it. It turned the sky navy instead of black and kept the most luminous stars from showing.

"I see it!" Walter yelled, running through the stiff grass. He pointed to the large, flaking trunk of a pine, ten yards ahead, and I saw the shovel, too, it's head stabbed in the frozen earth.

"Get the flashlight," I said, running ahead of him.

The brilliance of the sky did not extend down into the trees. The stand of pines remained black and gloomy, and it was harder than hell finding our way back to the gravesite. I counted twenty-nine steps, walking straight back into the woods, before we began walking parallel to the highway again, in search of the hole.

Twenty yards beyond the car, we stumbled upon it. I smelled the organic, smoky scent of freshly turned dirt, and on my knees, I reached into the hole, unsure if it could hold two. I looked back over my shoulder at Walter and shook my head.

"I don't know if it's deep enough for both of them," I said. "In a few days, the animals will smell them if there isn't a foot of dirt between the surface and the bodies." I rose to my feet. "Make it deeper while I bring the woman," I said, motioning to the shovel in Walter's hand.

I took the flashlight and scrambled back through the woods towards the car. There wasn't much undergrowth to make foot travel especially difficult, so in no time, I'd emerged from the trees and was standing under the blinding light of the moon.

A car screamed by, heading towards Middlebury, and a sharp current of fear coursed through me. But the car continued on, becoming nothing more than a pair of red taillights as it faded from sight and sound.

When I was certain there were no cars in the distance, I took out the Glock and approached the trunk. I inserted the key, opened it, and stepped back, pointing the gun at Mary. She let out a short gasp and then a high, piercing scream that ended when I indicated the gun and stepped towards her. Slowly, she sat up, pushing an unconscious Orson off her body.

"Get out," I said aloud, not masking my voice in a whisper. "You scream, I shoot."

"What did you do to him?" She motioned to Orson.

"He's just unconscious," I lied. "Come on." She shoved her feet out first and slid over the bumper, her high heels touching the grass. Then she was standing, wobbling a little from the large knot on her head and the hours spent cramped in the small confines of the trunk. The moon shined on her face, swollen and teary. I hoped she was too emotionally spent now to fight me.

"Close the trunk," I said, and she slammed it. I pointed to the trees. "Start walking."

She looked nervously at the woods and then back at me. "Why?" she asked.

I aimed the gun at the ground near her feet and squeezed the trigger. The muffled blast tore through the dirt, and Mary jumped back, fear and respect aroused again in her eyes.

"Because I'll just shoot you and drag you back there if you don't," I said, and she began walking. A sob burst into the night air, but she fought it down into her throat.

As we walked towards her grave, surrounded by the pines, I heard a car approaching. Mary slowed and turned her head back towards the highway, a look of longing in her eyes.

"Don't even think about it," I said.

"Are you going to kill me?" she asked, her voice remarkably strong.

"Walk faster." We soon found the space between the trees. Walter was standing in the hole, throwing dirt onto the slowly growing pile that we'd use to fill the grave again.

"Go now, Walter, if you don't want to see this," I said.

Walter tossed the shovel onto the mound of dirt and scampered out of the hole and back into the forest. Mary stopped suddenly at the edge and turned around, tears rolling down her cheeks, lips trembling. She shook her head.

The gun touched her forehead, and I pulled the trigger. I didn't hear the shot. I only saw its fatal and instantaneous effect. The strength in her legs evaporated, and she collapsed, headfirst, into the hole. I dropped the gun to my side and stared down at her, remorse pulsing somewhere inside of me that I refused to acknowledge.

From her head to her waist, Mary was slumped over into the hole, but her legs still stretched out, flat against the ground. I pushed her all the way in with my boot as Walter came running up from the woods and stopped beside me. We looked down at her, and I felt relieved that dirt covered her face. Only her hair, her high heels, and her navy trench coat were visible, spread out across the black earth.

"You wanna throw some dirt in there?" I said.

"Shit, Andy."

"I know."

He reached down and felt her face with the back of his hand. "She's still warm," he said.

"Quit fucking around, Walter. She won't be warm long. Just throw some dirt on her."

He got up and walked over to the shovel.

"I'm gonna need your help with Orson," I said.

Walter threw several scoops of dirt on top of Mary. Then he tossed the shovel onto the pine straw forest floor, and we walked back towards the highway. As we neared the trunk, I dug for the cold keys in my pockets, wishing the latex gloves were warm in addition to their flexibility. I unlocked the trunk and opened it once more. Orson lay motionless in the same position his late wife had left him. We laid him out in the grass. As Walter closed the trunk, I knelt down and dug two fingers into Orson's neck and waited.

"He's got a pulse," I said. "He's probably in a coma. Take his legs."

There was an overwhelming sense of relief when we dropped Orson on top of his wife. Even as Walter reached for the shovel, I unloaded the eight remaining rounds into Orson's chest, thinking of the hell he'd created for me. There was no place for sadness as I ended my brother's life. He'd killed our mother; he'd tortured and killed others. How could I not feel a tinge of joy as his body shook at the impact of each hollow point tearing through him?

We packed the dirt, stomping on it and smacking it with the head of the shovel. When the ground was level again, we gathered handfuls of dry pine needles and covered the bare dirt.

As we walked away, back through the trees, I marveled at how we'd left no trace of the hole, or the people beginning to freeze just inches beneath the surface. We neared the highway, and I could no longer see that small space between the pines, the gravesite of my brother. It was all smooth, pine needle forest floor now, and even if someday I wanted to see this place again, I doubted if I could ever find it.

We loaded the shovel and flashlight into the trunk and had climbed back into the Cadillac when I noticed headlights in the distance. I sat in the driver's seat and had put the keys into the ignition when the car rushed by. My head turned, and aided by the enormous moon, I saw that the brown vehicle was a police car. It continued on for several hundred yards, but then brake lights exploded through the darkness, and the car turned around in the empty road.

"You gotta be kidding me," Walter said, as he looked back. "You don't think he saw us?"

My heart raced as the police car sped back towards us and then pulled slowly onto the shoulder. Its lights began blinking, and its siren rang out for a split second, then silence.

"I'll talk," I said. "We're lost--get the map out--trying to find a place to stop for the night." I turned on the interior lights as Walter fumbled around for the map. "Hurry up. He doesn't need to see you looking through the glove compartment." In the rearview mirror, I watched the police car come to a stop several yards behind the Cadillac. The officer remained inside for a moment, and I assumed he was running our license plate through a computer.

"Your gun," Walter said. "You should've put it in the trunk with mine."

As the officer stepped casually out of his car, I dug through my fanny pack for the second clip. I found it, released the empty magazine, and popped the new one into the Glock. I chambered the first round and shoved the gun between the seats.

"What are you doing?" Walter whispered.

I could hear the officer's footsteps in the grass, and in the mirror I watched him approaching cautiously, his hand on his holstered weapon.

"I'm not going to prison," I whispered. "Look at the map, he's here."

There was a soft tapping on the window. I took a deep breath and turned with a smile to face the officer. I pushed the button to lower the window but nothing happened.

"Just a moment," I said, chagrined. The officer's brow wrinkled as I turned the key back. Then I lowered the window and frigid air slipped into the car. "What can I do for you, officer?" I asked, looking into his chiseled, emotionless face. He couldn't have been over thirty. He wore a tight-fitting jacket over his uniform and a toboggan reached down and covered his ears.

"You folks having car trouble?" he asked. He lifted his flashlight and inspected the front and then the backseat, awaiting my reply. I was so thankful we'd put the shovel in the trunk.

"No, sir. Just a little map trouble." Walter made a rustling noise to draw attention to the large map of Vermont spread across his lap.

"Why you parked so far off the road? Trying to avoid being seen?"

"No, sir," I said. "Just trying to avoid getting hit."

The officer nodded but pursed his lips as if he believed otherwise. "I need to see your license and registration," he said.

"No problem. Walter, get your registration for the man," I said, reaching into a pocket for my wallet. "It's his car," I said with a nervous laugh. "I'm on driving duty now."

The man's face didn't even register that he'd heard me. I pulled out my wallet, and as I slid my driver's license from the clear, plastic panel, I realized I still wore the latex gloves. I pretended I was having trouble getting my license out and made a weak attempt to pull a glove off. It wouldn't budge. Sweat had cemented my skin to the rubber.

Walter laid the registration in my lap, and I took it and my driver's license and handed it to the officer, quickly withdrawing my hand the moment he had the papers within his grasp.

"Wait here," he said, and he walked back to his patrol car and climbed inside.

"He suspects something," Walter said. "He asked why we were parked so far off..."

"And I told him why we were parked here." I rolled up the window. "There's no way he suspects what we've actually done. No one would."

"What if he wants to search the car?"

"A very respectful, Bill of Rights-oriented, no fucking way."

"We'd get the chair for this," Walter said, after a moment.

"That really helps." I remembered my gloves again. The officer stepped out of his car and shut the door, so I pulled like hell and squeezed out of them. I put them under my seat and rolled the window back down.

"Your gloves were on?" Walter was incredulous.

The officer returned and handed back my license and registration. "Where you folks coming from?" he asked as I returned my license to my wallet.

"Bristol," I said. "Just up the road."

"I know where it is."

"We came up here for the week to see the countryside, and now we're trying to find Middlebury." I'm talking too much, I thought.

"Oh." The officer smiled. "Well, just get back on the highway and head that way." He pointed down the road. "It'll take you right through downtown. Not more than five miles away."

"Fantastic," I said. "You've been a great help."

"You folks have a safe night," he said. Then he turned and walked away.

We waited as the officer climbed into his patrol car and drove away, back towards Middlebury. It seemed his red taillights were visible for miles as they dwindled away down the lonely highway. The relief was indescribable. I could see it in Walter's face, too. But we said nothing. Tired, hungry, and tense, we were beyond verbal expression, the air between us so thick with reality, we didn't disturb it with words.

We sat in the dark for several minutes after the police car was gone, staring down the road, into the woods, into nothing. The moon continued to rise above the mountains, and it had just reached into our shadows when I started the car and drove back towards the inn.

# # #

The sun crept up over the Atlantic, its rays gliding gently across the water, into the coast, and over the Green Mountains. They warmed the window near my bed, brightened the room, and turned the morning sky from black into royal blue. I burrowed deeper beneath the quilts, shielding my eyes from the new, morning light. With the blankets over my head, I shut out the sun and slept until I woke from restfulness alone, not the piercing rays which showered in between the curtains.

I kicked the covers onto the floor and lay on the naked bed in boxer shorts. A cool draft tickled my chest and I shivered. On the bedside table, the clock read 10:29, and it pleased me to be waking at a reasonable hour. As I sat up, I felt the raging hunger in my stomach. In fifteen minutes, Walter and I would be sitting before the fireplace downstairs, drinking coffee, eating hot pastries. Last night would be a fading nightmare, nothing more.

I planted my feet on the floor and stared across the room at Walter's bed, neatly made. Slowly I came to my feet, glancing around the room, but he wasn't here. As I approached his bed, I saw a piece of white paper, folded in half, standing like a tent on the smoothed, plaid bedspread. I reached down and picked it up, and when I saw the words, my knees gave out.

You stupid fuck. I watched you sleep for an hour last night. I stood at the end of your bed and thought about cutting your throat so you couldn't scream while I disemboweled you. Why didn't I? Because I have plans for you. This is only the beginning.

Poor Walter. What are you gonna tell his wife, Andy? That he's rotting on a mountainside in Vermont? That I took all of my rage towards you out on him for several horrible hours? Maybe you shouldn't tell her anything. Maybe you should do her a favor, too.

Go back to North Carolina, Andy. I'll contact you before Christmas. And save yourself the trouble of wondering how I got out of that hole, how eight bullets at point-blank range couldn't kill me, because I got a little tidbit for you, brother: I was never in that fucking hole.

# # #

My mother was discovered eight days after Orson murdered her when a neighbor noticed newspapers collecting on her porch and phoned the police. They found her in bed, under the covers, stiff and cold, tucked in as lifeless and cozy as a Barbie Doll in her blue dress with yellow sunflowers. There was only one bruise on her entire body--a thin, purple ring encircling her neck. The pantyhose which Orson used had been balled up and thrown under the bed.

I arrived home from Vermont on Sunday evening, and at nine-thirty on a cold, rainy Monday morning, a police officer was banging on my front door. His grave eyes might have been unbearable had I not already known. Even when he told me, I couldn't muster tears, so I buried my face in my hands and asked him for a moment alone. Shutting the door and leaving him standing on the front porch, I rushed to the kitchen sink and dabbed water on my cheeks and rubbed my eyes so they’d look red and swollen. How could an innocent man explain not crying when he learns his mother has been murdered? Even the guilty manage tears.

Walter's Cadillac sat in my garage. I'd intended to sink it to the bottom of Lake Norman after dark, but that was impossible now. I’d have to go to Winston to handle my mother's affairs.

Most of Monday, I spent at a police station in Winston, identifying my mother's body for the police and the coroner before noon and answering questions for two detectives afterwards. From the outset of their questioning, it was obvious they were baffled as to why my mother had been murdered. Did I know of any reason someone would want to kill her? Did she have a boyfriend? Did she use drugs? To my knowledge, had she ever borrowed money from anyone?

Sitting in front of the two men in the interrogation room, I wondered if they suspected me. I sat comfortably in a chair, but the gray, windowless room felt intrusive. The detectives had been pleasant, but behind their smiles and professional sympathy for my loss, I sensed their predatory urge to begin the process of breaking me.

I’d been with my mother several hours before she died, but the detectives didn't know this. Certainly someone must have seen my jeep parked on the curb in front of her house. Hell, I’d waved to her neighbor across the street. The detectives needed to hear it from me that I'd been with her, before a neighbor tipped them off, making me look suspicious and evasive.

"Look," I began, twisting my glass of water on the tabletop. Exhausted, I'd been patiently answering their questions for the last hour. "I don't know why I didn’t mention it before, but I saw my mother on the 30^th."

"Where?" Detective Hadley asked, a young man, possibly under thirty, with a muscular build beneath his gray suit, a clean-shaven face, and short, neatly-trimmed, blond hair.

"At her house. I took her to dinner at K&W and got home around ten that evening."

The detectives sat across from me, staring at each other with poker faces. The older one of the two, a balding man with black hair and a bushy mustache, looked slowly back at me while his partner lowered his eyes, focusing intently on the surface of the table.

"Mr. Thomas," he began, pursing his lips for a moment before continuing. "Here's the thing. Nothing was stolen from your mother's house, and there was no sign of forced entry. Now this means one of two things. Either your mother slept with her doors unlocked, or whoever killed her had a key. You told us no one besides you has a key to that house. And now you're telling us you were with your mother, possibly on the day she was murdered. If you were on this side of the table, what would you think?"

"Maybe some psychopath convinced her to let him in," I said.

"Psychopaths torture their victims, Mr. Thomas," Detective Prosser said, as if I should've known. "Your mother wasn't tortured. She wasn't raped. She wasn't even beaten." He smiled warmly. "She was simply strangled."

I pushed my chair back and walked to the door. The detectives didn't move. "Look," I said, my hand squeezing the doorknob, "I got a bunch of shit to do. You wanna talk again, you know where to find me."

"Have a nice day," Hadley said, smiling.

I walked out and slammed the door behind me.

# # #

Despite ten days of decay, the mortician turned my mother's skin a glowing rose it had never held when she was alive, so on Tuesday evening, I held a wake for her at the Haverty Son's Funeral Home in downtown Winston. By seven-thirty, the formal, red-carpeted visiting room was packed with friends and family, most of whom I hadn't seen in more than ten years. They'd come from all over the country, for my mother and for me. Their sadness and love was more comforting than I'd expected, and through their tears, I allowed myself to grieve.

After two hours of standing in the receiving line with my mother's brother and two sisters, my mouth ached from smiling. With no visible end to the steady stream of mourners, I slipped away, into the crowd. As I searched for a chair or sofa to rest my legs, someone grabbed my arm from behind, and I spun around.

"Andy, I'm so sorry," Cynthia said, her eyes glistening. We embraced, and she squeezed me tightly, as if she could take my pain into herself and save me the tears.

"You didn't have to come down here," I said as we pulled away. "Thank you."

She took my arm, and we pushed through the crowd towards an empty sofa, collapsing onto the cushions. "When did you find out?" she asked, brushing graying hair out of her eyes.

"Yesterday morning. A police officer woke me up."

"Oh God. Do the police have any suspects or leads?"

I looked into Cynthia's eyes with a jaded scowl. "I think those fuckers suspect me."

"No."

"These two detectives were giving me shit yesterday. Since there was no forced entry or torture or rape."

"So that automatically means you did it?"

"That's what they seem to think. I don't know. They may've just been feeling me out."

Cynthia leaned back against the sofa and straightened her black suit, brushing particles of lent and strands of hair off her pants. "I tried to get a hold of you last week," she said. "I wanted to ask if you'd started anything. You go out of town?" I caught an edge of distrusting curiosity in her voice.

"I was in Barbuda. Didn't know I'd be coming back to this."

She placed her hand gently on my shoulder. "You'll get through it," she said. "You need anything, just call." She hugged me again and rose to her feet.

"Taking off?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm beat."

"You're welcome to stay at my place," I said. "It's just an hour from here."

"I appreciate that," she said, "but I'm staying at the Radison a few blocks away. I got an early flight out of Greensboro tomorrow morning. Gotta get back to New York."

I glanced past Cynthia and saw Beth Lancing making her way through the crowd towards me. She held the hand of her four-year-old son, John David. I couldn't face her.

"Take care, Andy," Cynthia said, taking my hands into hers. "Call me sometime this week, will you? Just to let me know how you're doing."

Beth now stood several feet away, waiting for me to finish. I stood and embraced Cynthia once more. Kissing her on the cheek, I said, "Thanks for coming. I'll call you soon."

As Cynthia walked away, blending into the pool of dark suits and dresses, I sat back down on the sofa. Before anyone else could get to me, Beth stepped forward with her son, and hesitantly, I looked up into her eyes. A stunning woman, tonight she wore a brown dress that dropped to her small ankles. Curly, blond hair bounced above her shoulders. As I looked into her face, I saw misery. The makeup couldn't hide the deep bags beneath her eyes. They were bloodshot, too, as if she hadn't slept in days. Weakly, I smiled at her and winked at John David, dressed like a man in his little, black suit. I stood and hugged Walter's wife, and she broke apart in my arms, her tears streaking the wool of my suit.

"Sit down, Beth," I said after a moment, and we both sat on the sofa as John David knelt on the floor and began crawling around on the dark red carpet.

"I'm sorry about your mother," she said, wiping tears from her eyes with a tissue.

"Thank you for coming," I said, but I knew why she'd really come. When I returned from Vermont, there were ten messages on my answering machine from her, wanting to know if I'd heard from Walter. "Anything from the police?" I asked, my voice soft and conciliatory. I touched her hand which rested on her knee.

"No, nothing." She shook her head. "They won't do anything, Andy. He'll have been gone a week tomorrow morning." Tears filled her eyes again. "The detectives think he left me. They won't come out and say it, but they keep asking if we had a good marriage. If he had ever cheated on me. But it makes me wonder after awhile, you know?"

John David jumped onto the sofa and snuggled up between me and Beth. His mother ran her fingers through his short, blond hair and he leaned back into her. "He asks about him constantly," she whispered, motioning to her son, and I felt tears coming from the iceberg of guilt that floated behind my eyes. "Jenna's a lot worse, though. She knows things aren't right."

"How are you?" I asked though I didn't want to know.

"If I didn't have to be strong for my kids, I might be dead. It's the nights that are especially hard." She looked down at her son, needing him in a way his innocent psyche could never comprehend. Kissing the top of his head, she smiled at him when he glanced up at her. "I know you're busy," she said, looking back at me. Then standing, she lifted John David into her arms, and he laid his head down on her delicate shoulder. "Can I call you tomorrow?" she asked.

"Sure," I said, rising to my feet. "I'll let you know if I hear anything. You do the same."

"Thank you, Andy. And I'm very sorry about your mother." She kissed my cheek and tried to smile, but it failed miserably. Then she turned and walked slowly away, towards the doors which would lead out of the funeral home, to an empty house.

# # #

When the visitors had gone, leaving only myself, family members, and the pale-faced funeral director, I walked towards the open casket. It had been crowded since I'd been here, so I had waited, wanting to see my mother for the last time, alone, in a quiet room, without the disturbances of a thousand acquaintances. The mortician had warned me that the bruise around her neck would be difficult to hide, and he was right. As I set my hands on the metallic shell of her casket and peered down at her vapid face, it was the first thing I saw.

To someone who didn't know what to look for, the bruise might never draw a glance. But I'd seen her in the cold morgue, and the blackish-purple ring around her neck had been strikingly obvious then. It had looked as if someone had scribbled with black and purple magic markers on her soft, white neck. But now, in this reverent visitation room, only a light periwinkle shown through the makeup on her throat, like dull violets poking through snow.

I cried, touching her face. Though stiff and unnatural, it was hers. Her hands had been folded on top of each other, and they rested on her chest as if she merely slept. When I leaned down to whisper in her ear, I felt a pair of cruel, penetrating eyes staring through my back. My heart froze, and a cold sweat beaded on my forehead. Quickly, I spun around, darting my head towards the two sets of double doors on either end of the long, rectangular room. Jim, Hannah, and Wendy stood in a small circle, chatting by the entrance, and there was no one at the other end. I took a slow, measured breath, and turned back towards my mother, waiting for the icy feeling in my heart to retreat, though it never did.

# # #

White lights sparkled on the opposite shores, and a biting wind swept across the cold water. I stood shivering atop the grassy bank, watching the white Cadillac glide into the murky water. As it filled and lowered into the depths of Lake Norman, the air inside rushed out, breaking into tiny bubbles like a boiling cauldron on the surface. Then it was gone, the black, glassy surface smooth and calm again, except for where the wind stirred it.

I walked back through the woods, towards my property, the ground muddy from the construction that had begun on a new subdivision. No houses were finished, but concrete foundations, gravel roads, and skeletal wood frames were already in place. A wide swath of forest had been gutted, giving the landscape a bruised, beaten demeanor. It would be another six months before anyone moved here, and though my house was nearly half a mile up the shore, I still hated that I would one day have neighbors so close. I might even move when the yuppies came, with their four-wheel-drives and bratty kids.

Rarely did I think of Walter. Only when his wife called, wondering if he'd contacted me, did his face cross my mind and torture me. But for the most part, I'd mastered the management of guilt, simply by disconnecting myself from his memory. I hadn't killed him. Though heartbroken for the loss, it was business, another casualty of Orson. He knew the risk when he went to Vermont. He made the choice. It was remarkable how numb I felt.

Walter hadn't told Beth where or with whom he was going. All she knew was that on Wednesday morning, November 2^nd, Walter had left before dawn with enough luggage for several days. He'd told her nothing, and she had trusted him. Now, for reasons unknown to me, Beth had chosen my shoulder to cry on. I'd been on the phone with her earlier tonight before I drove her husband's car from my garage to this muddy section of woods and sent it rolling into the lake. Though I hated myself for lying to her, there was no other way. No one could know that Walter and I had been to Vermont. As I walked in the dark, feeling my way between frozen trees, I thought, I'll help her come to terms with the possibility her husband might be dead. I'll help her through this, for Walter.

Leaves crunched beneath my footsteps, and occasionally I'd step on a stick that snapped the silence. These woods are so different from the pine forests of Vermont, I thought, picturing that dark, intimate gravesite, cloaked in pines. Here the trees were larger, spread farther apart, the forest floor soft and deep with the decades of dead leaves.

Orson was always with me, at the edge of thought, an omniscient quality to him now, like an evil god. As I passed through the woods, I saw him behind every tree, lurking in the shadows, hiding in my quiet house. I couldn't bring myself to question what had happened in Middlebury, how a man could climb out of a hole with eight bullets in his chest and an overdose of tranquilizer coursing through his veins. But the alternative was more terrifying. If not Orson, who had I buried in Vermont? Here, the retrospection ended. I had a keen ability to think myself up to the edge of madness and stop before plunging into the abyss. I had one purpose now. Utterly at Orson's mercy, I would wait for him to contact me. There was nothing else I could do. You can't sneak up on God.

In the distance, I saw my glowing house, shining like a beacon in the dark, surrounded by the sweet, bitter-smelling red junipers I'd planted last spring. I'd left the lights on, and I walked through the yard towards the back porch steps, peering through the windows into the lonely interior. For a moment, I wanted someone, anyone to be with me. A loneliness grasped me, so overpowering tears burned down the sides of my face. But angrily, I wiped them away and cursed the weakness that had struck me. It was the sort of thing he preyed upon.

Warm and silent inside my house, I turned on the television, went to the wet bar, and fixed myself a Jack and Coke. It was after eleven o'clock, so the local news was on, and as I poured the whiskey over cubes of ice, I heard an anchorwoman say, "Heart Surgeon." I turned and looked at the screen as the video cut to Agent Harold Trent standing before a dozen microphones inside the FBI headquarters in Washington. The soundbyte began halfway through his first official statement to the press since October 31^st.

"…testing, we have confirmed that at least seventeen of the hearts found on East Street belong to the corresponding names. We have several leads, but I can't discuss further…"

The telephone rang, destroying my concentration. I left my drink half-made and walked into the kitchen, grabbing it on the third ring.

"Hello?"

"You son of a bitch." Her voice was heartless.

"Beth?"

"Why are you doing this to me?" she asked.

"What are you talking…"

"I know you called me, Andy. I just dialed Star69 and you picked up the phone!"

"Beth, I don't understand…"

"Bullshit! Why didn't you call from a payphone this time?"

"I haven't called you, Beth."

"What'd you do to my husband?!" she screamed through tears. "Tell me where he is!"

"I don't know."

"You said insects were crawling in him. What does that mean?!"

"I didn't…" A chill descended my spine. "Wait," I whispered. I brought the phone to my chest and listened. The television blared through the house, so I set the phone on the counter, walked into the living room, and cut it off. Now I could hear nothing but my heart, pounding like a blacksmith's hammer. I returned to the phone. "Beth," I whispered.

"I'm calling the police."

"I didn't call you. I got home five minutes ago, and that means someone has been in my house. You said this person has called you before?"

"Yes." Her voice trembled.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"He said he'd kill me and my children if I told anyone. He said he'd know."

"You have to believe that wasn't me," I said. "I promise you, Beth. Do you believe me?"

"Yes," she said, though still hesitant.

"You're in danger," I said. "We both are. You have someplace you can take your kids?"

"Yes, I have an…"

"Don't tell me. Just go. Go right now and stay there till you hear from me. I'll leave a message on your answering machine. Don't tell anyone you're leaving. Not a soul."

"What about the police?"

"Not even them."

"This has to do with Walter, doesn't it?"

"We don't have much time," I said, glancing at the living room, then up the staircase towards the darker second floor. "I'll explain it to you later. You have to trust me now."

"I have to know about my husband," she said, crying again. "Please tell me."

"If you don't leave now, you and your children will die tonight. Now go." I hung up the phone and wiped my sweaty hands across my jeans. A gun, I thought. Shit, I don't have a gun. My Glock, Walter's 9mm, the silencers, and even the boxes of rounds sat on the bottom of the lake. So I grabbed a butcher knife from the cutting block and walked towards the staircase.

My footsteps echoed through the house as I ascended the steps. The second floor hallway was dark, along with the open guestroom. I moved from the hardwood steps into the carpeted hall and flipped on the ceiling lamp. The white walls became yellow under the orange light, and the sickening pulse of fear ran through me, making my stomach hurt, my legs weak. Turning right, I walked towards the end of the hallway to my bedroom. The door was closed, but I couldn't remember shutting it.

With the knife in my right hand, I turned the doorknob and cracked the door, then kicked it open and turned on the light. My bedroom seemed empty. The two windows on the left wall, which looked out on the meandering drive, were hidden behind their blinds. I walked quickly through the threshold to the walk-in closet on the right, and without giving consideration to my fear, opened the door and pulled the light switch. Empty. Moving to the bathroom beside it, I opened the door, and in the dim glow of the nightlight, ripped off the shower curtain. Empty.

Coming out of the bathroom, I noticed an impression on the bedspread. I ran my hand across the warm, ruffled blanket, sat down, and picked up the phone on the bedside table. Pressing redial, the numbers blitzed through silence, followed by two rings.

"Hello?"

"Beth, it's Andy. I wanted to make sure you're leaving."

"I'm packing now."

"Good girl. I'll call you soon." I hung up the phone and stood up. My hands shook, still holding the knife. As I walked towards the door, something on the dresser facing the bed caught my eye. An unmarked envelope, which hadn't been there before, lay on a stack of New Yorkers. Opening it, I expected to find a sheet of paper with that horrible black ink. But I only withdrew an airline ticket. Under the illumination of a stained-glass lamp standing on the dresser, I examined the ticket: November 21^st, 8:00 a.m., Billings, Montana. Two weeks away.

Setting the knife on the dresser, I closed my eyes for a moment. I was tired of this. Tired of the fear. When I opened my eyes again, I looked into the circular mirror above the dresser and gasped. In black magic marker, there was something written on the glass, and I couldn't imagine how I'd missed it:

RENT A CAR AND DRIVE TO THE C.M. RUSSELL

WILDLIFE REFUGE FIRST THING 11/22

WAIT FOR ME WHERE 19 CROSSES THE MISSOURI R.

I collapsed onto the bed. For a long time, I stared up at the bumpy ceiling, my eyes traversing the tiny clumps of paint that looked like a vast, snow-covered range of mountains.

# # #

Fifty miles north of Billings, Montana, in the midst of an empty, nothing land, I pulled off the road to piss. I left the car running on the flat shoulder and stepped out into swaying grass. It was bitter cold, and dry, sterile grassland extended in every direction, as far as I could see. The crystal sky had clouded, now a uniform gray, and a biting wind blew incessantly across the plain.

I climbed back into the warm rental, a red, four-door Buick, and continued north on 87. This time, I carried no gun. I’d packed only a small suitcase with provisions for several days. In a way, I was calmly putting my head to the chopping block, leaving my life in Orson's hands. He’d won. Invulnerable, he'd already set in motion the events that were destroying my world. Walking out of my lake house yesterday morning, I listened in the doorway as Detective Prosser left a message on my answering machine, all but ordering me to come to Winston that afternoon for more questioning. They suspected me, and it was only a matter of time before they indicted me. Then what? How hard would they have to look to find that I'd been to Vermont with Walter, now missing? It didn't surprise me that at my weakest hour, Orson had wanted to meet.

I entered the C.M. Russell Wildlife Refuge on highway 19 after five o'clock. The sun had nearly set, and on the horizon, above a distant range of mountains, it managed to peek through the clouds and set the prairie on fire. Yellow grasses turned gold, and miles ahead, I saw glittering radiance like sunbeams dancing on moving water. I hadn’t passed another car in the last hour, and I was beginning to understand why Orson had chosen this place. The vacancy was overwhelming. A distant migraine pounded in my head, and I knew it'd torture me in the coming hours. Only fear would overshadow it, and I felt it, too, deep in my gut. The river was close.

The prairie became a network of bare, rolling hills. There were gentle slopes and ridges now along which the highway ran and below, the valleys, cut by streams. Thickets of pines followed the water which meandered towards the Missouri, the first trees I'd seen since Billings.

As I crested the rounded peak of a low foothill, the Missouri opened up before me, like a river of crimson gold beneath the brilliance of the falling sun. More than a quarter mile wide in places, it flowed quickly eastward, out of the breaks, towards the flatlands of North Dakota. I wondered what remote mountain spring gave birth to such a mighty body of water.

The highway descended to the river, and approaching the water, I saw the bridge, barely noticeable in this oversized country. It crossed the Missouri in a narrow spot, traversing only fifty yards of water before ascending another treeless foothill on the other side and disappearing over a yellow ridge.

When the road straightened and widened as it prepared to cross the water, the sky turned purple and gray. The sun slipped behind the mountains, and the red and orange escaped from the clouds, leaving a dreary darkness upon the plain. I slowed down and veered off the road, into the tall grass. The ground felt soft beneath the tires, like after days of steady rain. I turned off the car and took my brown leather jacket from the passenger seat. A raw wind whipped my face as I slipped into the jacket, stepped outside, and slammed the door. With the loss of the sun it was much colder, and I dug my hands deep into my pockets. From where I stood, the hillside sloped down a hundred feet to the river. Pines and shrubs grew along the sandy bank. I looked into the trees but saw no movement, only branches swaying in the wind.

I reached the bridge. Thirty feet above the water, a stone wall, three feet high, served as a guardrail. Traversing the double yellow lines, I watched my feet, trying not to think about how cold I was as the fierce wind pressed into me head on. Walking became difficult, and I'd just thought to myself, "Fuck this," when I looked up and saw him.

Even in the blue dusk, I wasn't sure how I'd missed him before. On the left side of the road, near the end of the bridge, he sat on the stone wall. I squinted through the poor light. The dull throbbing of my heart pushed up into my throat, and I shuddered at his silhouette.

My first instinct was to run back to the car. I kept thinking, "He's gonna kill you. You've come out here to let him kill you." Twenty yards away, I knew for certain it was Orson. On the stone railing, facing west, his legs dangled over the river. I know he heard my footsteps, but he never turned his head. He just stared straight ahead at the magenta clouds in the sun's wake.

Cautiously, I climbed onto the wall. We sat four feet apart, and I let my legs hang out over the water, too. I eyed my brother, warily, for he had yet to acknowledge my presence. He wore dark jeans, a white fleece pullover, and worn hiking boots. His brown hair had grown out and was messy from the wind. I glanced down at the swift, silent current as it glided beneath the bridge, then spit and counted how long it took to reach the water.

"Where's your car?" I asked.

"Hitched a ride with a transfer truck this morning."

"You were pretty confident I was coming. You been out here all day?"

"Since noon."

We were quiet for some time. There was a somberness about him I'd rarely seen. He seemed deflated, like after a kill, when his victim could no longer suffer and the reality of his useless existence came crashing down on him.

"How are things back at the homestead?" he asked, smirking through his words.

"They think I murdered Mom," I said. "Beth Lancing wants to know where her husband is. That's the guy you killed in Vermont."

"Well, I'm glad you came, Andy. It was the right thing to do. There's been a bunch of shit between us."

"That surprises you after Mom?"

"It surprises me after last summer. I thought you knew me better. I tried to make you understand." He turned, and we locked eyes. "Did you come after me because of Mom?"

I gritted my teeth and nodded. The stinging of wind on my cheeks had vanished.

"Would you like to know about Vermont?" he asked. "Like who you murdered? Why you were so blindly convinced he was me?" He smiled, but I said nothing. I was used to his baiting. "You like it out here?" he asked.

"It's all right."

He laughed. "It's fucking better than all right. You ever seen a sky this big? I come out here all the time," he said. "You can lose yourself in that sky. But you wouldn't know anything about that, would you? You like hiding in the trees where no one can see you. You like the claustrophobic forests in the East. These wide open spaces scare the shit out…"

"Fuck off," I said. "You gonna mentally abuse me? Was that your plan? Guess what? I don't give a fuck anymore. I'm looking at prison, Orson. It's a lot scarier than you."

"You aren't going to prison," he said.

"Well unless you're planning on turning yourself in, I don't see any other…"

"I am."

I looked up from the dark river into his blue eyes. "Why? I'm not trying to talk you out of it. I just don't understand. It doesn't seem like something you'd ever do."

He sighed. "I don't know how to explain it without you hating me more. I'm proud of what I've done, Andy. It's on the news everyday, in the papers. I'm out there. The world just doesn't know me yet. I'm a nightmare, and I want the fear I bring to last. I don't wanna be caught, but because of the national attention that's inevitable. So I'm gonna act. I want people to wonder, 'What if he'd never turned himself in? How many more would he have taken?'"

"So kill yourself."

"I won't do that," he said, a flash of anger surfacing in his eyes before descending again, back to its infinite source. "That's what those cowards who shoot up fast-food restaurants and schools do after they've killed thirty people, because they weren't happy. Besides, you can't do interviews when you're dead. You can't have criminologists lining up to meet you. You can't watch movies about yourself, or read your own biography written by your famous brother."

"No," I said.

"Well, that's the price of your freedom, Andy. And I won't fucking argue with you about it. You'll spend the rest of your long life in prison or your short one on death row if I do anything but turn myself in. You see, killing me won't save you now. They already think you killed your own mother, and eventually Walter's blood'll find its way onto your hands, too."

I turned from my brother and looked across the plain. It grew darker each second. Moments ago, the river glittered. Now it moved, a stream of liquid black, as if flowing from a cold hell. The mountain range was indistinguishable now from the clumps of purple clouds hovering above the sunless horizon. The land had lost its texture to night.

"They'll execute you," I said. "You won't gloat long."

"Twelve years is the average from courtroom to death chamber. I can live with that."

The wind had begun to die down. "I had to come to Montana to hear this?" I asked.

"There's a town west of here. Choteau. I'm turning myself in there tomorrow, and I want you to be with me. It'd be a brotherly thing to do, and it might help you with your biography."

It made me sick on my stomach to think of writing a book about him. "Why Montana?"

"I'm in love with this state, Andy. I want to die at the prison in Deer Lodge."

"You've killed in too many states, Orson. Everybody's gonna want to prosecute you. You may end up on death row in Missouri or Kansas. It could be anywhere."

"But I can influence that decision before I turn myself in by making people think of me when they think of big sky country. I can do something so terrible here, everyone will want Montana to have the privilege of putting me to death."

I could feel my hands beginning to tremble. "How?" I asked, but he hopped off the wall.

Running towards the car, he shouted, "Let's go! I want a soft bed tonight!"

The pounding inside my head was excruciating. I needed a drink. As I climbed down and followed Orson back across the bridge, I searched myself for the hate towards him that had burned inside me, but it only felt like a vacuum in my chest. I just wanted it all to be over.

# # #

We hurtled west along the straight, lonely highway. Nothing existed outside the car save the pavement in the headlights. The landscape was draped in blackness, no moon or stars, and the drone of the engine had become imperceptible. Orson hadn't spoken since we left the wildlife refuge nearly two hours ago. He'd turned away from me, now leaning his head against the window as if he slept, but I couldn't tell for sure.

"You awake?" I whispered, but he didn't answer. "Orson, we're fifteen miles from Great Falls. Where are we stopping?"

"I'll let you know when. I'm not sleeping."

I glanced over to the passenger seat, hesitant, but then asked, "Who was David Parker?"

"If you just wait," he said, "you'll know everything. And I mean everything."

"When?"

"This time tomorrow," he said, becoming annoyed. "Every question you can possibly think of will be answered. But for now, please shut the fuck up."

I drove in silence for the next forty-five minutes, through the small town of Great Falls, with its truck stops, 24-hour gas stations, and dirty motels. I wanted to stay in town because of all the restaurants, but I didn't ask. Even though I was starving, I drove on through and watched the collection of lights grow dim again in the rearview mirror.

Twenty miles west of town, where 87 branched off into 89, there was a gas station, the New Atlas Bar, and the Blue Sky Motel. According to several signs, this spot was the last place to get gas, lodging, and a cold beer for the next seventy miles.

"This is it," Orson said.

A little after nine, I turned into the motel driveway and parked by the front office, beside a large sign with "Vacancy" and "BLUE SKY MOTEL" above it in cursive, neon blue letters. We both got out of the car and stretched. Though cold and windy, it felt good to breathe fresh air again and walk the stiffness out of my legs.

The motel was hardly spectacular. There was no pool or restaurant, only a two-story complex with twelve rooms on each floor. Across the street, live country music poured out of the New Atlas Bar, accompanied by rowdy laughter and yelling. Occasionally, a couple would stumble out the front doors and either cross the empty highway towards the motel or wander into the bar's dark parking lot. Farther up the road, the gas station glowed against the black prairie.

We walked into a single-wide trailer which served as the front office. To the right, a smooth-faced old man wearing a leather cowboy hat sat behind a desk. His feet propped up on the tabletop, he watched a small black and white television sitting on a rickety stool in the corner of the room. To the left stood a naked wall with a closed door in the center. I wondered if the old man lived in the trailer, too.

We walked to the desk, and he looked up, smiling comfortably. "How can I help you?"

"We need a room with two single beds," I said.

He muted the television, put his feet on the floor, and thumbed through the guest registry. "I've only got a double," he said. "Sign here please." He slid the registry towards me. "Write the names of anyone else staying in the room with you and your license plate number."

I entered my name and Orson's along with the plate number of the Buick. Orson stared over my shoulder while I wrote, looking down at the registry with peculiar concentration. When I'd finished, I closed the book and slid it back across the desk to the man.

"$39.50," he said, and I took out my wallet. While we waited for the charge to clear, I glanced at Orson. His eyes ran from the closed door on the opposite wall, to the old man, to the locked key cabinet behind the desk. He looked again at the registry and smiled strangely at me. The man handed my card back along with a receipt. Then he stood up, unlocked the key cabinet, and took out one key. He handed it to me.

"Check out's at eleven," he said. "Leave the key on the dresser."

We walked out of the bright trailer into the night, and I parked in front of our room. 218 was in the middle, on the lower level of the complex, and lights glowed from every first floor rooms except ours. I grabbed my suitcase from the backseat, and we got out and locked the car.

"I'm going to get a drink at that bar," I said to Orson as I forced the key into the lock.

"No. I want you to stay here," he said, and I didn't argue.

The room was warm and cozy, in a fake, cheap sort of way. The wood-paneled walls made it seem even smaller and kept it dark like the interior of a cabin. A double bed with a table on each side, rested flush against the left wall, across from which sat a dresser with a television on top of it. A tiny bathroom and a closet were located at the far end of the room, and the walls were adorned with a quilt, a Charles M. Russell print of a cowboy riding a horse into a bar, and a photograph of two bighorn sheep butting heads.

I set my suitcase on the brown-carpeted floor beside the dresser and turned on one of the bedside table lamps. It produced only a weak, orange light, giving the room a jaundice-like glow. My stomach ached with hunger, but I didn't complain. Sitting down on the bed, I kicked off my shoes and tossed my leather jacket onto the dresser.

"I'm taking a shower," Orson said. "Why don't you go to bed."

"I haven't eaten," I said.

Orson sighed heavily. "Can't you wait till morning?"

"What the fuck do you care whether I eat or not?"

"I don't want you to leave this room tonight," he said.

"Got a particular reason?"

"Just drop it, all right?" he said. He slid off the white fleece pullover, tossed it onto the bed, and began unbuttoning his black shirt. With his chest exposed, it amazed me again how cut he was. He laid the shirt carefully on the bed so it wouldn't wrinkle.

"You wanna read something good?" he asked. "Before you go to bed."

"No."

"Come on, Andy, it's a masterpiece. Open that bedside table," he said, pointing to the one nearest the door. I opened it and extracted a black hardback copy of a King James Bible.

"Get out of here," I said. "You said the Bible was soma for the weak-minded."

"One verse," he said. "It'll blow your fuckin' mind." He waited for me to ask.

"Which one?"

"First Corinthians 13:12."

I thumbed through the thin pages.

"Read it out loud," he said.

"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." I closed the book and returned it to the drawer. "So?"

"Just think about it," Orson said, unbuttoning his jeans and letting them fall to his ankles. Leaving them in a blue pile on the floor, he walked to the dark bathroom and stopped at the threshold. He turned around and stared. It scared me.

"I don't get that verse, Orson," I said. "Are you just fucking with me?"

"You will," he said, turning on a ceiling light in the bathroom. Though the tub was hidden behind the wall, I could see Orson's bare shoulders in the streaked mirror and the sink and toilet to his right. Laughter and moaning came suddenly through the walls.

"Go to sleep, Andy," he said lifelessly as he shut the door.

# # #

"Get your ass out of bed," Orson whispered, and the dusky room came slowly into focus. The lamps on each bedside table shed their orange light upon the walls, and though the curtains were drawn, I had the feeling it was still night. I couldn't remember falling asleep.

"What time is it?" I asked, rubbing my eyes and sitting up against the headboard.

"Four-thirty," Orson said. He stood at the foot of the bed, still wearing his clothes from yesterday, his face flushed, sprinkles of blood on his white fleece.

"What did you do?" I asked.

"Get dressed. We don't have much time. Move!" he shouted.

Climbing out of bed, I dug through my suitcase, lying open on the floor. I put on a pair of blue jeans, a close-fitting long-johns top, and a green sweater. Then I forced my slim, yet bulging suitcase to close and stepped into my hiking boots.

"You got the room key?" I asked, lifting my suitcase.

Orson smiled sickly. "It doesn't matter now," he said, laughing.

Though only an hour from daybreak, the clouded sky was dark as midnight. Snow flurries bumbled in the air, and a brisk wind blew out of the north, so the tiny feathers of ice stung my cheeks and eyes. As we moved towards the car, now lightly dusted with snow, Orson tossed me the keys. I walked to the trunk so I could pack my suitcase away, but he stopped me.

"Put it in the backseat," he said.

As we pulled out of the parking lot, I looked across the road to the New Atlas Bar. It was dark now, the drunken crowds gone, the parking lot empty save two pick-up trucks. I looked up the highway towards the gas station, and it still glowed, the snow flurries visible in its artificial light. The motel was enveloped in an eerie, lifeless silence now, and Orson's over-anxiousness to leave this place frightened me.

We headed west on highway 89, and in several moments, the small transit community was only a fading splotch of light on the immense prairie. In the rearview mirror, I saw the eastern horizon, tinged now with the faintest trace of purple. It will be light soon, I thought, but a foreboding sensation flooded me as I thought of the coming day.

We'd been on the road for a half-hour when I asked him, "Whose blood is on your shirt?"

"You'll find out," he said. "I told you you'd know everything by tonight."

I put my foot on the brake and brought the car to an abrupt halt on the grassy shoulder of the highway. Turning the ignition back, the car died.

"I don't trust you," I said, glaring to the passenger seat. I could barely see Orson in the predawn darkness. "I don't have to drive you to Choteau. What'd you do last night? Drug me?"

"No."

"I think you're lying," I said. "I think you're lying about everything. I could be driving myself straight to prison. Even if you do confess, you could finger me, and I know you got the evidence to do it, with all your little fuckin' pictures and videos. You're such a pussy, you know that? I hope they fry your fuckin' ass."

"You done?" he asked.

"Yeah, I think I'm done driving you across the country. I'm done being your chauffeur."

"Then I'll get out," he said, reaching for the door. "But it's gonna look bad when you get arrested alone at the roadblock."

"What roadblock?"

He smiled. "The one the police are gonna set up on every highway in Montana when someone figures out what happened at the Blue Sky Motel."

"What happened?"

He turned and stared calmly into my eyes. "For two hours this morning, a police officer knocked on the doors of the eleven occupied rooms at the Blue Sky Motel. When a guest opened the door, this cop flashed a badge, said he was looking into a reported robbery, and was let into each room with virtually no hesitation. Once inside, he told the guest or guests to have a seat on the bed while he asked them a few questions. When they sat down, this police officer pulled out a silenced 9mm and shot them in the head. Most never made more than a dying groan.

"So tell me, Andy. How long do you think it'll take for someone to find out that motel's a morgue? In actuality, it may be a day or two, cause Billy Joe Bob motel manager is sharing a bed with one of his guests. But if someone stumbles into one of those rooms and calls the police, they'll set up roadblocks in a millisecond, and we'd never get through one with our cargo. You see, I'm planning on surprising the Choteau police department with Officer Barry in case they don't take my confession to heart. Hell, I might even wear the uniform again."

My fist landed square against his jaw. It popped, and Orson grunted, "Fuck." He leaned over on the dashboard, holding his jaw in his hands. My knuckles throbbed pleasantly.

"I'll take you to Choteau, you motherfucker," I said, starting the car. "I'd kill you."

We were doing a hundred before I realized it, and I slowed down. Orson sat up now, still holding his jaw, and I hoped it hurt him. The sky lighter now, it still snowed a little, the clouds a purplish-blue. A crushing sadness pressed down on me. I couldn't even think about what he'd done, so I told myself it wasn't true. It all felt like a dream. I was a dream.

I wondered if I'd pissed Orson off so much he'd want to drag me down. It was a terrifying thought, and I almost apologized for hitting him, but I convinced myself that he wouldn't want to share the blame for his killings. He'd want all the attention for himself, including his biography. He thought I was the only one who understood him, and he knew while I was free, he had me by the balls. I'd do whatever he said. I'd write his fuckin' book.

As the sky brightened into morning we sped through the prairie, and in the distance, a range of snowy mountains rose up out of the horizon. The clouds had dissipated, and now the early rays of sunlight made the snowpack glitter. I tried to focus on the remote, isolated beauty of the land rather than the fear, growing minute by minute inside of me. Orson didn't speak. He just sat there, holding his jaw, watching dawn break across the sky.

# # #

At seven-thirty in the morning, we sat in a Waffle House in Choteau. We occupied a booth, and a large, glass window at the end of our table looked out towards a chain of mountains called the Lewis Range. For the first time in hundreds of miles, I could see trees. At the foot of the mountains, still five miles west of town, a forest of tall, elegant pines spread across the yellow prairie. They stretched halfway up the slopes until the timberline began, a brown, lifeless zone of rock and scraggly undergrowth, coated with snow the higher it climbed. A thousand feet below the summits, the snowpack was so deep most of the boulders were hidden, and the contrast between blinding white and vivid blue where the peaks met the sky was ethereal.

I stared down into my cup of steaming black coffee. Lifting the cup to my nose, I inhaled the scent of charred, smoky beans, and took a small sip.

"Will you talk to me?" I asked, looking up at Orson. "About Vermont."

He sighed.

"Who was David Parker?" I asked.

"A friend of mine," he said.

"A friend?"

"We were colleagues in the history department at Middlebury."

"You never told me you were a professor."

"I never told you a lot of things."

"Why'd you quit teaching?"

"I didn't quit. I was removed. They found out my credentials were fake. Dave did actually, and he had my position taken away."

"Do you know how I found him?" I asked.

"Of course I know," he said, "and I took care of that rancher and his bingo-loving wife." Orson smiled. "Don't look so surprised, Andy. It's not like you aren't used to it now."

I sipped my coffee. "Did David know about you?" I asked. "About your hobby?"

"No one did."

"He looked just like you, Orson. He sounded like you. Even walked like you. Part of me still thinks you're buried up there. I don't know what the fuck happened."

"Yes, that is strange," he said.

The waitress was standing by the table, staring down at me, dumbfounded.

"Pull up a chair, Marge," I said, reading her nametag. "Join our private conversation."

She looked at Orson and then strangely at me. "Would you like more coffee?" she asked.

"No," I said, and she walked away, her face reddened with embarrassment.

As I lifted my coffee, I glanced at the left side of his jaw, swollen so much it looked like he had a golf ball in the corner of his mouth. But it didn't seem to bother him much.

"You ready to go do it?" I asked, finishing the last sip, but he shook his head. "We're here, in Choteau. What do you wanna fuck around this town all day? Aren't you in a hurry to be infamous and all that other bullshit you told me yesterday?"

"Yes. But it's at the price of my freedom. That's a difficult thing to just hand away."

"I know," I said.

"You know…" Orson laughed spitefully. "You know shit."

My eyes narrowed. "Wasn't I held against my will in a fuckin' cabin all summer? You know what you made me do," I whispered. "That's worse than losing your freedom."

"I helped you," Orson said. "I did you the favor of your life, and you will thank me."

I pushed my cup towards the center of the table and looked again out the window. A car drove by on what I presumed to be the main drag through town. Further down, buildings threaded the street. I saw a homely feed store and a cinema showing movies two months after they'd premiered in real cities. The sidewalks were narrow and empty. My eyes moved again to the Lewis Range. Were it not for those towering, icy pinnacles, this dead town would be unbearable.

# # #

At a quarter to noon, I pulled into a visitor’s parking space at the Choteau Police Department. Orson opened the door and stepped out onto the pavement, a manila envelope under his left arm.

We walked quickly along the sidewalk, strewn with dead leaves from two aspens on the building’s front lawn. Across the street, a dirt road climbed into a thicket of pines, blanketing a modest hill. We were as close to those snowy mountains now as we'd been all day, but the surrounding foothills blocked them from view. I couldn’t even see the downtown, only the narrow country road running beneath the blue sky and this police station, isolated from the minimal bustle of Choteau. It seemed out of place here among the foothills of the Lewis Range.

The police department was a meager, brick building. It was small, resembling a miniature version of a decrepit public school, only in place of yellow buses, there were police cars. We ascended the concrete steps, and Orson stopped me in front of the glass double doors.

"I’m the only one who talks in there," he said. Then he grabbed me suddenly and pulled me into him, crushing my chest in an awkward embrace. He opened the door and I followed him inside, walking straight through the lobby, littered with cheap furniture on brown carpet. The walls inside were a darker brick, and they gave the interior the musty feel of a wine cellar.

There was a desk at the end of the room and behind it, a hallway, perpendicular to the lobby. On the brick between the two corridors, Choteau Police Department, was spelled out in bold, brass letters. A secretary was talking on the phone when Orson walked up to the desk. He snatched the phone from her hands and hung it up.

"I need to speak to a detective," he said as she stared incredulously into his eyes.

Clearing her throat, she glanced warily behind her at the corridor. She was pretty, I thought, plain but pretty in her long, plaid dress. "What is it regarding?" she asked.

"Are you a detective?"

"No, I’m a…"

"Then quit asking me fucking questions. Get me a detective right now."

"Just a moment," she said. She picked up the phone and dialed an extension. "Roger, are you busy?… Okay… There’s a man here who wants to speak with you… I don’t know… He’s being rude… I don’t know… I’m fine." She hung up the phone. "He’ll be right with you," she said. "You can wait over there." She spun around quickly in her swivel chair and began typing at a computer. Orson stood by the desk, tapping impatiently on the wood.

Less than a minute had passed when a tall, thin man in a dark blue suit emerged from the corridor. He stopped behind the desk and nodded to Orson and me.

"You asked for a detective?" he said, and Orson nodded. "Come with me," he said, and we walked past the desk down the hallway on the right. The brick walls were drab and undecorated. I followed behind Orson, watching his feet pound softly against the thin, hard carpet.

"I’m Detective Hartness," the man said without turning around. "Why were you rude to Jennifer?" He glanced at Orson, fire in his bleak, white face. His brown hair hung just above his eyebrows, and his ears were large and grotesque, like an old man’s.

"It doesn’t really matter," Orson said. "You’re about to become famous."

If Hartness heard him, he didn’t show it. He kept walking, into a large, bright room full of desks and computers, where several men typed furiously, filling the room with a nervous, staccato pattering like raindrops hitting a hot microphone. We proceeded through the dark corridor on the other side of the workroom, and I could see the end now. There were three vending machines for coffee, soft drinks, and snacks lined up against the brick at the terminus of the corridor. But we stopped long before the end when Hartness turned suddenly and opened a plain, black door on the left wall. He held it open for us while we filed inside.

A boring little room with bare brick walls, a table stood in the center with four chairs slid underneath it. I thought it strange that a single, unshielded light bulb burned brightly overhead. We pulled out the chairs and sat down, Orson and me on one side, facing Hartness. The detective was removing his jacket when Orson broke the tense silence.

"Get a tape recorder," he said. "I’m only doing this once."

Hartness hung his jacket on the back of a chair and began unbuttoning his cuffs. He was already sweating as he rolled up his shirt sleeves. "We’ll get to that," he said. “Why don’t…"

"Get the tape recorder or I say nothing," Orson said, rage buried in his voice.

Hartness sighed and slid back in his chair. He got up and left the room.

"Orson…"

"Not a word, Andy."

We sat in silence, and I drummed on the table until Orson glared at me. I wondered if there was really a dead police officer in the trunk of our car. After two minutes, the detective returned carrying a large tape recorder under his arm. He set it down on the table and plugged the long, black cord into a socket in the wall. Sitting down, he lit a cigarette and pressed a red button.

"Your name?" Hartness asked.

"Orson Thomas."

"Well, Mr. Thomas, what do you wanna tell me?"

Orson had been leaning forward with his elbows on the table. Now he leaned back and removed his blood-stained fleece jacket. He threw it into a corner and smiled at the detective. Then he tossed the manila envelope onto the table.

"Have a look," Orson said, his voice cold and emotionless.

The detective lifted the envelope and tore it open. Withdrawing a quarter-inch stack of photographs and newspaper clippings, he gazed down at the photographs, and his skeptical face turned immediately into shock. He laid a picture on the table and stared down at it, taking a long draw from his cigarette.

I managed to see the picture upside down--a five by seven, color photo of a woman lying naked on the ground, a gaping hole in her chest and a bloody mass in the palm of her hand. It could’ve been Shirley. It could’ve been any of them.

Hartness spread a dozen similar photographs across the table, and I could see him fighting to retain composure. He blinked more than usual and swallowed hard several times. I watched Orson watching the detective. There was a sick gleam in my brother’s eyes, as if he'd waited for this moment his entire life. The detective looked back up at Orson when he'd finished thumbing through the newspaper clippings.

"So," Hartness said. "What do you want me to do with this?"

"Are you a complete fucking idiot?"

Hartness said nothing. He just stared at my brother.

"You watch the news?" Orson asked, his voice more courteous.

"Yeah."

"And you don’t know who I am? Washington D.C. Thirty-seven boxes. Ring a bell?"

"Look, I know what a crank is. I know when I’m being lied to. The FBI sent out a memo to every police station in the country. They receive around 90 cranks a day relating to the Heart Surgeon case. We’ve had one over the phone already this week."

"That’s funny," Orson said, livid. "I had a feeling you wouldn’t take me seriously."

"Good instinct," Hartness said, rising to his feet. "You just committed a felony, and I’m gonna arrest…"

"Barry Johnson’s in the trunk of my car you prick."

The detective placed his hands on the table and leaned towards Orson. "I don’t think you wanna take the credit for kidnapping that police officer," Hartness said with a smug grin.

Orson reached into his jeans' pocket and tossed a shiny badge and a driver’s license onto the table. "I killed him, too."

The cocky, wise-ass smile vanished from the detective’s face. He looked down at the badge which rested face-up on the colorful photographs. Lifting the driver’s license, he stared at it a moment, then looked back down at the pictures. The burning cigarette fell from his lips, and he drew his gun. He pointed it at Orson, but my brother only laughed, nodding in approval.

"Stay right there," Hartness said, his voice low, filled with malice, his hands shaking. He edged to the door and opened it.

"Want the car keys?" Orson asked. "So you can get that smelly body out of my trunk. I waive my rights."

"Take them out slowly," Hartness said, and I reached carefully into my pocket and withdrew the keys. I tossed them to the detective and he caught them in his left hand as he pointed his 9mm at Orson. Then he slammed the door and locked it.

# # #

The detective had been gone two minutes when Orson straightened himself in his chair and turned towards me. He put his face into his hands and ran his fingers through his greasy hair.

"Andy," he said, lifting his head, his eyes alive again, a smile edging across his lips. "Now I've gotta let you in on something."

My head ripped apart. Involuntarily, my eyes closed and when I opened them again, I was walking towards a woman, chained to the pole in the desert shed. I held a hunting knife in my hand, blinked, and was on her. Her screams were strangely pleasing, like I'd acquired the taste of a long-despised food. I stared down at her face as she exhaled her last bloody breath. It contorted into another, and this face breathed its last, gurgling breath, too, replaced by another, and over and over again I watched the men and women die.

I stood on the desert in the dead of night. All around me, there were open holes in the sand. I walked beside each one, and peering down inside, saw the heartless bodies, their eyes open, staring at me with a hollow rage, though they were not alive. The horrible scream rang out, inhuman, eternal. It was always there, in the back of my mind, as loud as I'd let it be.

Like movie frames passing in slow motion, a surge of images engulfed me. Standing at a podium and lecturing to fifty students. Running through a city street at night towards a railroad car. Fire in a rusted oil drum. Pounding rock into skull. Driving a black prostitute out of south Charlotte towards my lake house. Burying her in my backyard. Waiting on the shoulder of a dark highway for someone to pull over and help me with my car. Leaving boxes in Washington before dawn. Strangling my crying mother in her bed, her wide, confused eyes as the pantyhose tightens. Walter begging for his life and screaming why in the cold woods. Dragging a police officer from his car across the road. Shoving him bleeding into the trunk. Writing letters to a man named Andrew Thomas, who had no idea what he'd done or what he was.

I opened my eyes. My heart pounded, but the screaming had stopped. In the interrogation room, the tape recorder still running, the light bulb burning quietly above my head, I sat alone.

# # #

I leaned against the cool, metal fence and stared across the prairie. It was late in the day, nearly six o'clock, and though it was early August, the sky remained flawlessly blue. I liked standing here looking through the fence, because I could've been in my own backyard, in my own clothes, deciding which restaurant I'd dine in tonight. I could almost forget the four guard-towers, the high-powered rifles, and the icy men who held them.

Sick of the prairie now, I’d memorized the contours of the land, how it gracefully descended for six, gentle miles into a valley of pines, and how those pines adorned the lower slopes of the sharp, brown mountains. From the prison yard, I could see the skylines of the three ranges that surrounded Montana State Prison--the Big Belt Mountains to the east, the snowier Swan Range in the north, and the jagged, wild-looking Bitter Roots, west and south.

Normally, on a summer evening, I’d take my hour of exercise around eight o’clock. I liked to come out late to see the sunset, though the guards would never let me stay for its entirety. Prisoners aren’t allowed out after dark, but it was worth it just to see the sky turn red and purple for a short time. It made me feel normal again to know that at that moment, when the sun had almost slipped away, everyone watching it fade felt the same sense of loss as me.

But it was not a normal evening. I turned away from the fence and walked back across the parched, yellow grass towards the prison. Two guards waited for me on the steps, smoking cigarettes and talking. When they saw me approach, they instinctively put their hands on their holstered pistols, watching me warily. Seven years of perfect behavior had taught them nothing. They treated me fairly, but beneath their professional exteriors, I had no doubt that every guard who'd ever watched me despised me. I sensed that loathing in everyone, even the doctors and psychologists who wanted so desperately to study me.

Near the steps which ascended back into the prison, I stopped several feet from the guards. I wasn't allowed to be within six feet of prison staff without handcuffs. I'd forgotten that rule once five years ago and surprised a guard coming in from the yard. He beat me unconscious with his nightstick, and I stayed in the hospital for two weeks. The warden determined the guard’s actions were justified. I had fucked up.

"Turn around," Haywood said, slowly descending the steps. He dropped his cigarette on the ground and stepped on it, twisting the toe of his shiny black shoe on the dying ember. A short, stout white man, he moved quickly. He stepped forward, holding a pair of handcuffs, and in an instant he'd cuffed me. Then he took my right arm and escorted me up the nine steps, through heavy, black double doors. Jerry, the other black guard, walked close on my left side.

As we headed through the dull, gray corridors towards the showers, I stared straight ahead, listening to our footsteps echo down the long, empty hallways, and the distant ruckus of other inmates. Muffled excitement pulsed inside of me, a rare emotion within these walls. I'd waited a long time for this night.

# # #

I sat in a hard chair, in a small room with white, windowless concrete walls, my feet chained together in leg irons, my hands cuffed behind my chair. Two guards stood behind the cameras, watching me. I could still smell the fragrant prison soap in my hair, and I wore a new, bright orange uniform. Across the large rectangular table sat Dr. Richard Goldston, a handsome, sharp-witted man. He may've been over fifty, but his face was smooth, without wrinkles, and his hair space black. He wore silver-framed glasses pushed down on the bridge of his nose, and when he looked at me, his smoky-brown eyes were penetrating but kind.

The woman who had wanted to do the interview stood beside the cameraman in a conservative yellow suit. She reeked of poignant questions, a zombie for her network. Though one of the top journalists in the nation, intelligent and savvy, she was utterly incapable. When I agreed to do an interview with the network, I had one condition. Dr. Goldston, a former FBI agent in the Behavioral Sciences Division, would conduct the interview. Regarded by his peers and colleagues as the sharpest, most qualified criminologist in the country, he'd dedicated his life to understanding and tracking serial killers, not to becoming a media whore. I respected that, and I respected his books. I wanted to meet him and feel his probing intellect.

Goldston laid a bulging, cream folder on the table and opened it. It was full of crime scene photographs, forensic reports, and several documents I'd never seen before.

He looked back at the woman and her cameraman. "You ready, Laura?" Goldston asked.

"Yes, we can start now," she said.

Goldston lifted a tape recorder off the floor and set it on the table. "I’m recording this for my file, too. Is that all right with you, Andy?"

"It’s fine," I said.

He pushed the record button and holding up one finger, spoke into the air: "August 17^th, 2003. Eight p.m. Montana State Prison. Deer Lodge, Montana. Subject: Andrew Thomas." He cleared his throat and withdrew a sheet of paper from the folder covered in indecipherable cursive. Goldston looked up from his notes and smiled. He didn’t fear me.

"I want to first thank you for doing this. I appreciate the opportunity to talk with you."

"Certainly," I said. I was nervous about the cameras and kept looking directly into them.

"When we spoke on the phone, I asked if anything was off limits, and you said there wasn’t. Is that still the way you feel?" he asked, and I nodded.

"This is the first interview you’ve agreed to do since your incarceration in 96'. You’ve remained silent, refusing to speak even at your own trial. Why have you waited until now?"

"I’ve been dealing with things. Privately."

"Are you responsible for the killings at the Blue Sky Motel?" he asked. There was no emotion in his voice. He was interested solely in obtaining information, not judging or condemning me. He put me at ease, and I could see why he was so well-respected.

"No."

"The Washington boxes?"

"No."

"Are you responsible for the bodies found at your cabin in the Wyoming desert or at your lake house north of Charlotte?"

"No."

In the thick silence, Goldston swallowed. "You consider yourself innocent?" he asked.

"I do."

Goldston reached into his briefcase and took out a small tape player. "I want to play something for you," he said, setting the tape player on the table. He pushed play and for several seconds the speakers crackled. Then, through the softer static, I heard his voice:

"Barry Johnson’s in the trunk of my car you prick… I don’t think you wanna take the credit for kidnapping that police officer… I killed him, too… … … You stay right there… Want the car keys? So you can get that smelly body out of my trunk. I waive my rights… Take them out slowly [Door Slams]… … … … Andy… What?… Now I’ve gotta let you in on something… Oh God… … … … [Door Slams] Where’s Officer Johnson’s car, Orson? Where is his car? Oh, you don’t want to talk to me now. Piece of shit… Where’d he go?… Where did who go?… My brother… What the fuck are you talking about?… Shit. Oh, shit… Where’s the car, Orson?… Oh God… Tough man doesn’t wanna talk now. Well, that’s okay, cause you’re fucked. Why are you crying, Orson? Huh?… That’s not my name. Where is he?… Who are you talking about?… The man I came in with. Where’d he go?… You’re out of your fuckin’ mind… Where’d he go?… Calm down… Where is my fucking brother?!!!"

Goldston stopped the tape. My hands shook, and I felt very cold. He could sense my discomfort, so he remained quiet for a moment, allowing me to regain my composure. I took deep breaths and closed my eyes. When I opened them again, I looked around the room, at the guards, the cameras in front and behind me, at Laura Webber, and then back to Goldston.

"Andy, I’ve literally spent hours going over what I just played for you. I’ve probably listened to that tape a hundred times, and for the life of me I can’t figure out what happened in that room. I even had several psychologists listen, and they were baffled. I interviewed the detective who questioned you. He said you were a different person when he came back into the interrogation room." Goldston removed his glasses. "What’d you feel hearing that tape?"

I stared at the table, my heart racing. "I don’t know. That was a really fucked-up day."

"How many people were in that room after the detective left?" Goldston asked.

I looked up from the table. "You won’t believe me," I said. "It’ll seem like I’m crazy, like I’m grasping to save my life, and I’m not. I know they won’t ever let me out of this place."

"How many?"

"Two."

"One physical person walked into that police station, Andy. There’s a videotape of it."

"I know."

"Who’s Orson?" he said, but I shook my head. "You don’t know?"

"I don’t know what he is anymore."

"Is he in your head?"

"No."

"Then you actually see him?"

"Not since Choteau."

"What does he look like?"

"Like me. He’s my twin."

I felt a cool breath on the back of my neck. "Hey, big boy," he whispered, and I shivered.

"What?" Goldston said. "What'd you say?"

Orson walked around the table behind the guards. He stepped over the mass of cords that linked the microphones and cameras to the outlets and leaned against the wall. He smiled, wearing jeans and a dirty tee-shirt. His hair was buzzed like mine, and he had a two-day beard.

"What’s wrong?" Goldston asked. "Andy, you’re trembling."

"I’m staring at Orson right now," I said, watching my brother walk to the table.

"Andy, you’re looking at me," Goldston said. "You’re looking directly into my eyes."

"No, I’m looking at you," Orson said, standing beside me, his dirty hands on the table.

"Orson," I said, "listen to me…"

"Dr. Goldston, I’m Orson Thomas."

"It’s nice to meet you, Orson," Goldston said hesitantly. "Where’s Andy?"

"Right here," I said. "Watching you talk to Orson. He's beside me. I'm looking at him."

"No," Goldston said, "you’re looking at me."

"Who the fuck cares?" Orson said. "You wanna talk? Talk."

Goldston gathered himself and cleared his throat. Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead, and he wiped them away on the sleeve of his black jacket.

"What makes you come out, Orson?" Goldston asked.

"What do you mean?"

"What makes your personality come out?"

"I’m not a fucking split personality, Doctor. I’m always here. I run the show, not Andy."

"You’re always aware of him?"

"Yes."

"Is he always aware of you?"

"When I want him to be. He’s in la-la land most of the time."

"La-la land?"

"I send him away when I have things to do. Europe, Aruba. That’s his La-la land."

"But sometimes he physically sees you…"

"Because I make him see me."

"Does he know we’re talking now?"

I was speechless, walls of false reality tumbling down. Everything I'd lived for became a transparent curtain behind which Orson had lived and murdered. He'd given me a glimpse of it in Choteau, but I'd tucked that hideous knowledge away. I'd denied and forgotten it, letting my brother remain an enigma as I'd done before.

"Yes," I said, tears trickling down my cheeks.

"Shut your fucking mouth," Orson said, wiping the tears away.

"So you sent him away when you went to kill?" Goldston said. "How?"

"I don’t know how I did it. It’s like he lived in a fantasy world when I used him. But it was strange, because sometimes he wrote books about what I did. It was like some part of him knew what was happening even though I sent him away."

"Can you read Andy’s mind?"

"He’s as much a person to me as you are."

"Oh, man," Goldston muttered. He glanced back at Laura, her face white. Everyone’s face had blanched, even the cameraman and the two guards. Goldston turned back to Orson. "Who was born into this body, Orson? You or Andy?"

"We both were," Orson said.

"Andy, I want to talk to Orson for..."

"You don’t have to ask his permission."

"Okay," Goldston said. "When did Andy became aware of you and you of him?"

I wanted to speak, but I didn’t. I let Orson talk, though I feared what he might say.

"I don’t know how old we were," Orson began. "I lived behind his eyes. I could hear him talk, I saw what he saw, but I had my own, separate consciousness. When we were seven, I started talking to him. I don’t know how, but when I spoke to him, he saw me. I told him I was his twin, that no one else could see me. I told him not to tell anyone or I’d go away.

"Well, he told his mother, and she went right along with it. Just like I was his fucking imaginary friend or something. She’d set a place for me at dinner. She’d buy presents for me at Christmas. Jeanette was always a little weird."

"But you still didn’t have control over Andy’s body?" Goldston asked.

"No. Not until he was twelve. I can’t explain to you how I did it, but he was sleeping one night, and I moved his arm. I just thought about doing it, and it happened. I realized that when he was unconscious or asleep I could use his body. So I started going out when he fell asleep, and he never knew it. I did this for several years.

"As Andy got older, through high school and college, I think he started to realize I shouldn’t be there. Started feeling weird about me. We were close, and then in college he tried to ignore me. Tried to pretend I didn’t exist."

"Did that make you mad?"

"Don’t fuck with me." Orson glared at Goldston. "Anyhow, you gotta remember I’m telling this from my point of view. I knew what the fuck was going on. I knew I was inside of him. He didn’t know that. I'm not sure how, but he saw me. He physically saw me. Only thing I can guess is his mind created these hallucinations to compensate for what it heard. I don’t know. I’ve looked at psychology texts and there isn’t a damn thing on this sort of condition."

"I’ve never heard of anything like it," Goldston said. "What happened in college?"

"I was twenty-one. I didn’t like the prospect of spending my life sharing someone else’s body, watching them live. So I turned Andy off."

"What do you mean?"

"How can I explain it to you? I had an edge on him. I just turned him off. I could suggest things to him, by thinking into him. It’s impossible to explain. I told him to sleep, to dream. Told him he was in paradise, and he slept for seven years. He vividly dreamed that part of his life so when he woke up, he had a past that wasn’t mine."

"What do you remember, Andy?" Goldston asked.

"Why do you wanna talk to him?" Orson said.

"I’d like to hear what he dreamed, what he remembers."

"I remember the Caribbean," I said. "A long time ago. It’s very vague, like childhood."

"You didn’t think that was strange?" Goldston asked. "That your memory was fuzzy?"

"What did I have to compare it to?" I said. I wanted to cry but I didn’t.

"What’d you do during that time, Orson?" Goldston asked. "While he was asleep."

"I left Appalachian. Went to New York and was homeless there for awhile. Practically lived in the library. I read constantly, gave myself the best education you could imagine. Then I went to a school in Vermont called Middlebury. I made up this flawless resume. It said I got my Ph.D. in history at this college in Arizona which didn’t even exist. I made up all the credentials. It was ingenious. I taught in Vermont for a year until this prick named David Parker, a professor in the history department, too, found out that Baxter College didn’t exist. I was fired."

"Is this when you started killing?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I could. And there were people who deserved it. But I'm not saying anything else about it. I won't sit here and let you put me in one of your categories. I killed. End of story."

"When did Andy come back?"

"When I started killing. I'd bought this cabin in Wyoming. I could feel Andy starting to move again, especially when I’d wake up in the morning. Sometimes he’d have control of his body. He didn’t know where the fuck he was. I told him he was in the Bahamas. I talked to him constantly without him knowing it was me. Still do. It's really just subtle suggestion. Sort of like hypnosis. That’s when I found out how much control I really had. He thinks he only killed once, but he killed whenever I told him to. He was pretty good at it. He thought it was a game."

"I don’t remember any of that," I said.

"Of course not. I told you what to remember. About this time, I bought the lake house. It was a safe place to let Andy write. He was good, too. Wrote about the things I did. You know, it's funny. He thought he was making it up. A lot of what’s in his stories really happened.

"When his books started getting published and making money, I realized it’d be smart to let him keep writing. So I did. And the money he made allowed me to travel."

"Travel as in hunt?" Goldston asked.

"Yeah. I just had to be careful and let Andy have a small piece of his life, too. He'd made a few friends in the publishing business, so part of the time, I’d sit back and let him go. Let him keep up his connections. It took a lot of patience, but it paid off. The only time Andy was actually conscious was when he was writing and doing his book tours. I did a few readings, but they were boring. I'd have faked more of his life, but I’m a different person. People would’ve known something was wrong. Besides, I hated trying to act like someone else.

"When he wasn’t writing or touring, I’d travel and send Andy away. If you asked his friends, they’d say he traveled quite frequently. Always going to the islands. Always alone."

"Orson," Goldston said, "I want to show you something." Goldston pulled several pieces of paper out of the folder and laid them across the table. They were the letters Orson had sent to me. "I could never understand why Andy wrote these to himself," Goldston said. "Especially since he never used them to prove his innocence." He looked up at Orson. "You wrote these."

"Yes."

"Why go to the trouble of kidnapping your brother and bringing him cross-country to the desert when you had mind control over him? From what you’re saying, you could've just suggested he go to the cabin, and he would."

"But not of his own free will. I did, I do have control over Andy, but that gets old. I wanted Andy to act on his own."

"To kill on his own?" Goldston asked.

"To kill on his own. I wanted him to kill for the pleasure of it. Not because I suggested it. I guess I wanted us to be more like brothers. Real brothers."

"Did he?"

"I didn’t!" I yelled. "Not one fucking time did I kill for the pleasure of it. Even when I thought I was killing Orson."

"You tried to kill Orson?" Goldston asked.

"When Andy was at the cabin with me," Orson said, "he learned about David Parker from this cowboy who I’d purchased the land from. I'd used Dave's name from time to time as my own. Andy thought David Parker was the name I assumed when I was away from him. So I let Andy chase him down. What did I care? This guy had gotten me fired from teaching. I also wanted to see if Andy could do it. If he'd kill me, given the chance. If he'd do it in cold blood."

"And did he?"

"Oh yeah," Orson said. "Just to give you an idea of how much control I have over Andy’s mind, I’ll tell you this. David Parker looks nothing like me. I told Andy he was me. I convinced him I was a professor named David Parker at Middlebury College, and he tracked David Parker down and murdered him and his wife. Andy did it of his own free will, too, and he did a damn good job of it. I still don’t think they’ve found their bodies, and I know they never suspected Andy. I was really proud of him for that. I knew he had it in him."

Goldston scribbled furiously on his notes.

"Orson, let me…"

"No, Andy. I’ve heard enough from you. I’ve heard forty years of shit from you. You’ve had the past seven to yourself. It’s my turn now."

Goldston removed a thick stack of black and white photographs from the folder. I saw pictures of the desert, Washington D.C., the excavated backyard at the lake house, and a woman lying heartless on her back in the sand.

"I’d like to discuss some photographs with you. Why you chose certain victims, when and why you started removing the hearts. Was Washington your ultimate goal?"

"This is what you've waited for isn’t it?" I said. "The glory and the fame."

"This is what I’ve waited for," Orson said. "This and you to finish your book. It’s good, Andy. I’ll make sure you get some credit for…"

"It's not finished," I interrupted.

"I know," he said. "I have to finish it."

"What are you talking…"

"You know what I’m talking about," Orson said. He looked me dead in the eyes and squatted down beside me. "I'll take it from here, Andy."

"Excuse me," Goldston said, "but what…"

"I’m talking to my brother," Orson said. "You can wait two fucking minutes."

"Orson, please listen," I begged.

"No. You’re just gonna fuck all this up. You know I earned this."

"Orson, no."

"What? You wanna do this hard time with me? You wanna get the needle with me? That’s five long years away. You know I could send you somewhere bad, Andy. I could send you to hell before you actually get there, so don’t piss me off."

"Don’t do this here, Orson. Please. Wait till we get back to the cell."

"Why not kill you on national television?"

I screamed as loud as my voice would carry and shook in the chair. The guards’ eyes widened as they rushed around the table towards me, knocking over the cameraman. Goldston yelled something over and over, but I couldn’t hear him. I couldn’t form words. Hands grabbed me. I saw Orson smiling, his voice whispering harshly into my ears to be still…

# # #

The waves are crashing gently onto the white beach. The sun beats down on my chest, slowly turning my skin into a deep golden bronze. I look out over the turquoise sea. The blue-green water stretches out to the horizon, blending indistinguishably into the cloudless sky.

Sitting up in my chair, I lift my Jack and Coke from the sand, take a long, cold sip, and set it back down. There’s faint music in the distance behind me. I turn and see my hut a hundred feet above me on the lush, green hillside, its white roof showing through the trees.

I have a strong buzz now. A warm, fuzzy peacefulness.

I lean back in the wooden recliner and close my eyes. The salty breeze caresses my face, urging me into sleep. It’s such a mild day for the tropics, one that invites you to sleep right through it, beneath the sun, in the presence of the whispering waves.