“D’ya think she’ll do it right?” Carl asked, sounding anxious. “She’s smart; she knows what to do,” Lewis replied. “I told her, not one crumb on the floor or the counter. She’ll do fine.” “But what if they come back?” Carl was knocking his knees together like he had to pee again. “They won’t,” Lewis said, making himself sound more confident than he actually felt. “It’s already been more than fifteen minutes.” He’d counted it down in his head: one Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi .... “But they never leave together, what if --” “Carl, chill. They used to go out together all the time. But that was before they brought you and Penny down here. If they were gone for more than fifteen minutes, they’d be gone for hours. They’re going to a secret club or something like that. Meeting people like them and doing stuff.” He tried to put enough emphasis on “stuff” to discourage Carl from asking more questions about where the Cold Ones went or what they did. Because Lewis didn’t actually know, and told himself he didn’t want to know, although his imagination got the better of him sometimes. Sometimes the Cold Ones videotaped what they did to him and Carl and Penny; maybe they sold the tapes, and that was how they got money. Or maybe they were the ones with the money, and today they were touring another basement in another isolated house. Lewis hoped they were selling the tapes they made, because then maybe the FBI or the sheriff would find one and figure out where they were. However, if there weren’t any tapes for the good guys to find, maybe Penny would find the black box … An excerpt from However … co-written with Gary A. Braunbeck in Soft Apocalypses: bit.ly/Apocalypses
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 19:17:55 +0000
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