I looked up and saw that we were in a suburban neighborhood with palm trees lining the side of the road. The houses were all one-story ranch styles and painted in pastel colors. When I pulled the car over in front of the house, I could hear crickets singing quickly in the night heat.
Before we got out, the Devil leaned toward the front seat and said to Christ, "I"ll make you a bet she doesn"t do a miracle while we"re here."
"Bulls.h.i.t," said Christ.
"What do you want to bet?" asked the Devil.
"How about him," said the savior and pointed that weird thumb at me.
"Quite the high roller," said the Devil.
As we were walking up the driveway to the front door, the Devil lagged a little behind us. I leaned over and, in a whisper, asked Christ if he thought she would perform.
He shrugged and rolled his eyes. "Have faith, man," he said. "Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose."
"I heard that," said the Devil. "I don"t like whispering."
We walked right through the front door and into the living room where a woman was sitting in front of the television. At first, I thought she was deaf, but it soon became clear that we were completely invisible to her.
The Devil walked up behind me and handed me a sixteen-ounce Rolling Rock. "There she is in all her splendor," he said, as he handed a beer to Christ. "Doesn"t look like much of an opportunity here unless she"s gonna get better looking."
We stood and stared at her. She was about sixty-five with short hair dyed brown and wearing a flowered bathrobe. On the coffee table in front of her set an ashtray with a lit cigarette in one of the holders. In her left hand she held a gla.s.s of dark wine. As the daily reports of mayhem and greed came through the box, she shook her head from time to time and sipped her drink.
"What"s she done?" I asked.
"She brought a kid back from the dead a few months ago," said the Devil. "A girl was. .h.i.t by a car outside a local grocery store. Mrs. Lumley, here, was present and just touched the girl"s hand. The kid got right up off the stretcher and walked away."
"Strange s.h.i.t," said Christ. "We don"t really know how it works."
"You mean," I said, "that you can"t make her do a miracle?"
"Not exactly," said Christ.
"That"s a b.i.t.c.h, isn"t it?" said the Devil. "Now drink your beer and calm down."
The Devil walked around behind Mrs. Lumley"s chair and used two fingers to make horns behind her head. Christ went to pieces over that one. I even had to laugh while we watched her pick her nose. She was at it for a good five minutes. Christ applauded her every strategy, and the Devil said, "The one that got away."
"We better sit down. This may take a few minutes," said Christ.
The Devil and I sat down on the couch and Christ took an old rocker across from us. The evil one rolled another huge joint and listened intently to the report on the television of a murder/suicide in California. Mrs. Lumley began singing "The Whispering Wind" to herself in between sips of wine while Christ hummed a duet with her.
"I"ve had more fun in church," said the Devil, as he pa.s.sed me the joint. Again, I tasted the cinnamon and fire, and I took big gulps of beer to soothe my throat.
Christ begged off and just rocked contentedly in his chair.
The news eventually ended and Jeopardy came on the television. "Wait till I get my hooks into this a.s.shole," the Devil said, nodding toward the host of the show.
"He"s yours," said Christ. "It"s on me." Then he pointed his finger at Mrs. Lumley and made her change the channel to a Star Trek rerun.
While we waited for something to happen, the Devil showed me a trick. He took a big draw of Carthage Red and then exhaled it in a perfect globe of smoke. The globe hovered in the air before my eyes and turned crystal clear. Then it was filled with an image of my wife and kids reading bedtime stories. When I reached for it, the globe popped like a soap bubble.
"Parlor tricks," said Christ.
Eventually, Mrs. Lumley got up, turned off the set and went into her bedroom. We followed her as far as the door, where we looked in at her. She was kneeling next to the bed, saying her prayers.
"I hope you like the heat," the Devil said to me.
Then Christ said, "Look."
Mrs. Lumley lay on the floor, her body twitching. A steady groan escaped through her clenched teeth. In seconds, her skin had become a metallic blue and her head had doubled in size. Fangs, claws, gills, audibly popped from her features. She turned her head to face us, and I could feel she was actually seeing us with her expanding eyes.
"s.h.i.t," said the Devil, and turned and ran toward the door.
"Let"s get out of here," said Christ, and he too turned and ran. I followed close behind.
By the time we got outside, the Devil was sticking his head out the back-seat window of the car. "Move your a.s.ses!" he yelled.
I ran around the front of the car and climbed in the driver"s seat as fast as I could. Mrs. Lumley, now some kind of rapidly changing blue creature, growled from the front lawn. I turned on the ignition and hit the gas.
"What the f.u.c.k was that supposed to be?" said Christ, catching his breath as he pa.s.sed us each a cigarette.
"Your old man is out of his mind," said the Devil. "It"s all getting just a little too strange."
"Tell me about it," said Christ. "Remember, I warned you back when they first walked on the moon."
"This is some really evil s.h.i.t, though," said the Devil.
"The whole ball of wax is falling apart," said Christ.
"I actually had a break-out in the ninth bole of h.e.l.l last week," said the Devil. "A big b.a.s.t.a.r.d-he smashed right through the ice. Killed one demon with his bare hands and broke another one"s back."
"Did you get him?" I asked.
"One of my people said she saw him in Chicago."
"Purgatory is spreading like the plague," said Christ.
The Devil leaned up close behind me and put his claw hand on my shoulder. I could feel his hot breath on the back of my neck. "His old man is reading Nietzsche," he whispered, his tongue grazing my earlobe.
"What"s he saying?" Christ asked me.
"Which way am I supposed to turn to get out of this development?" I asked.
Just then there was an abrupt b.u.mp on the top of the car. It startled me and I swerved, almost hitting a garbage can.
"You gotta check this out," said the Devil. "Saint Lumley of the Bad Trips is flying over us."
"Punch the gas," yelled Christ, and I floored it. I drove like a maniac, screeching around corners as the pastel ranches flew by.
"We"re starting to lose her," the Devil called out.
"What are you carrying?" Christ asked.
"I"ve got a full minute of fire," said the Devil. "What have you got?"
"I"ve got the Machine of Eden," said Christ.
"Uhh, not The f.u.c.king Machine of Eden," said the Devil, and slammed the back of my seat.
"What do you mean?" said Christ.
"When was the last time that thing worked?"
"It works," said Christ.
"Pull off and go through the gate up on your right," said the Devil. "We"ve got to take her out or she"ll dog us for eternity."
"I don"t like this at all," said Christ.
After pa.s.sing the gate, I drove on a winding gravel road that led to the local landfill. There were endless moonlit hills of junk and garbage. I parked the car and we got out.
"We"ve got to get to the top of that hill before she gets here," said Christ, pointing to a huge mound of garbage.
I scrabbled up the hill, clutching at old car seats and stepping on dead appliances. Startled rats scurried through the debris. When I reached the top I was sweating and panting. Christ beat me, but I had to reach back down and help the Devil up the last few steps.
"It"s the hooves," he said, "they"re worse than high heels."
"There"s some cool old stuff here," said Christ.
"I saw a whole carton of National Geographics I want to snag on the way out," said the Devil.
Off in the distance, I saw the shadow of something pa.s.sing in front of the stars. It was too big to be a bird. "Here she comes," I yelled and pointed. They both spun around to look. "What do I do?" I asked.
"Stay behind us," said Christ. "If she gets you, it"s going to hurt."
The next thing I knew, Mrs. Lumley had landed and we three were backed against the edge of the hill with a steep drop behind us. Her blue skin shone in the moonlight like armor, but there were tufts of hair growing from it. She had this amazing aqua body and an eight-foot wingspan, but with the exception of the gills and fangs, she still had the face of a sixty-five-year-old woman. She moved slowly toward us, burping out words that made no sense.
When she came within a few feet of us, Christ said, "Smoke "em if you got "em," and the Devil stepped forward. Tentacles began to grow from her body toward him. One managed to wrap itself around his left horn when he opened his mouth to a.s.sault her with a minute of fire. The flames discharged like a blowtorch and stopped her cold. When she was completely engulfed in the blaze, the tentacles retracted, but she would not melt.
As soon as the evil one finished, coughing out great clouds of gray smoke, Mrs. Lumley opened her eyes and the tentacles began again to grow from her sides. I looked over and saw that Christ was holding something in his right hand. It appeared to be a remote control, and he was furiously pushing its b.u.t.tons.
The Devil had jumped back beside me, his hand clutching my arm. He had real fear in his serpent eyes, yet he could not help but laugh at Christ messing around with the Machine of Eden.
"What"s with the cosmic garage door opener?" he shouted.
"It works," said Christ, as he continued to nervously press b.u.t.tons. Then I felt one of the tentacles wrap itself around my ankle. Mrs. Lumley opened her mouth and crowed like a rooster. Another of the blue snake appendages entwined itself around the Devil"s midsection. We both screamed as she pulled us toward her.
"Three," Christ yelled, and a beam of light shot out of the end of the Machine. I then heard the sound of celestial voices singing in unison. Mrs. Lumley took the blast full in the chest and began instantly to shrivel. Before my eyes, like the special effects in a c.r.a.ppy science fiction movie, she turned into a tree. Leaves sprouted, pink blossoms grew, and as the singing faded, pure white fruit appeared on the lower branches.
"Not fun," said the Devil.
"I thought she was going to suck your face off," said Christ.
"What exactly was she," I asked, "an alien?"
Christ shook his head. "Nah," he said, "just a f.u.c.ked-up old woman."
"Is she still a saint?" I asked.
"No, she"s a tree," he said.
"You and your saints," said the Devil and plucked a piece of fruit. "Take one of these," he said to me. "It"s called the Still Point of the Turning World. Only eat it when you need it."
I picked one of the white pears off the tree and put it in my pocket before we started down the junk hill. The Devil found the box of magazines and Christ came up with a lamp made out of seash.e.l.ls. We piled into the car and I started it up.
I heard Christ say, "Holy s.h.i.t, it"s 8:00!"
The next thing I knew I was on my usual road back in Jersey. The car was empty but for me, and I was just leaving New Egypt.
Julie"s Unicorn.
Peter S Beagle.
The note came with the entree, tucked neatly under the zucchini slices but carefully out of range of the seafood crepes. It said, in the unmistakable handwriting that any graphologist would have ascribed to a serial killer, "Tanikawa, ditch the dork and get in here." Julie took her time over the crepes and the spinach salad, finished her wine, sampled a second gla.s.s, and then excused herself to her dinner partner, who smiled and propped his chin on his fingertips, prepared to wait graciously, as a.s.sistant professors know how to do. She turned right at the telephones, instead of left, looked back once, and walked through a pair of swinging half-doors into the restaurant kitchen.
The heat thumped like a fist between her shoulder blades, and her gla.s.ses fogged up immediately. She took them off, put them in her purse and focused on a slender, graying man standing with his back to her as he instructed an earnest young woman about shiitake mushroom stew. Julie said loudly, "Make it quick, Farrell. The dork thinks I"m in the can."
The slender man said to the young woman, "Gracie, tell Luis the basil"s losing its marbles, he can put in more oregano if he wants. Tell him to use his own judgment about the lemongra.s.s-I like it myself." Then he turned, held out his arms and said, "Jewel. Think you strung it out long enough?"
"My dessert"s melting," Julie said into his ap.r.o.n. The arms around her felt as comfortably usual as an old sofa, and she lifted her head quickly to demand, "G.o.d d.a.m.n it, where have you been? I have had very strange phone conversations with some very strange people in the last five years, trying to track you down. What the h.e.l.l happened to you, Farrell?"
"What happened to me? Two addresses and a fax number I gave you, and nothing. Not a letter, not so much as a postcard from East Tarpit-on-the-Orinoco, hi, marrying tribal chieftain tomorrow, wish you were here. But just as glad you"re not. The story of this relationship."
Julie stepped back, her round, long-eyed face gone as pale as it ever got. Almost in a whisper, she asked, "How did you know? Farrell, how did you know?" The young cook was staring at them both in fascination bordering on religious rapture.
"What?" Farrell said, and now he was gaping like the cook, his own voice snagging in his throat. "You did? You got married?"
"It didn"t last. Eight months. He"s in Boston."
"That explains it." Farrell"s sudden bark of laughter made Gracie the cook jump slightly. "By G.o.d, that explains it."
"Boston? Boston explains what?"