Chapter Five: The Sun that Parts the Clouds
“Pigeons,” I mutter as I clean the last of the feathers out of my store, three days after it was vandalized. “Nothing good comes from pigeons.” The store was set to open again and I was excited. I had taken the opportunity to repaint and remodel a touch. The bleak maroon walls had been repainted a blue pastel, Adeline’s favorite color, and the old mahogany shelving was replaced with sleeker cedar shelves. The place was clean, but I still scrubbed away at the floor on my hands and knees as if haunted by the pests that had nearly destroyed my store. “I hate pigeons.”
It was pouring. Type #2 rain, unrelenting, pounding rain, one mf my favorites. It gets my blood pumping, my adrenaline flowing. The only time I get to feel the sheer power of type #2 rain is on kill days. I summon Driftwood and pull my Honda into traffic bound northwards from Arlington, VA. I’ll be in Connecticut soon.
100MPH…105MPH…110MPH, I gotta keep pace with the clouds. I swerve and honk my way through the cars; gripping the wheel tight as each time I make a tight pass. I promise myself that even if I don’t scratch the car she deserves new paint and tires after this is over. Its dark up ahead, looks like a big storm. My body is racked with pain, but I know I am close. The pain, the chase, they end today.
Jerry Marston flips the sign on the door from “Closed” to “Open” and settles in for the morning with his coffee and the paper. Instinctively he flips first to the weather section. “Damnit, 72 and sunny again. At least its good for business.” He sips the scalding coffee and swallows deep allowing it burn his trachea and stomach. He loves the burn. He does not look behind him; he does not see the clouds.
The Rainmaker nears South Haverbrook and consults the map she stole from the last gas station. She knows her victim owns a bookstore on Gavin Dr. and knows he is working today because she called to inquire whether the latest Dan Brown novel was in. She knew what she was going to do, she was just looking at the map to figure out the best way out of town.
Keep one-step ahead, you don’t want to arrive in time to see another corpse. She never kills in a house or an alley, always in public. She embraces death and wants others to as well. Jesus this looks familiar. That church with the slightly tilted spire, I was just here, I know it. I pull over and wrestle my laptop out of my bag. S-O-U-T-H H-A-V-E-R-B-R-O-O-K. Jesus, I knew this looked familiar. The pigeons. What the hell was that? I know it was her, but why the pigeons? No matter, the Rainmaker loved comfort. I’ll take my chances with the park.
I flip the sign from “Open” to “Closed,” its lunchtime and I forgot my lunch on the counter this morning. Guess I’ll go grab a quick sandwich and shake from Delia’s. As I close the door behind me I realize for the first time this morning that it its raining. I don’t have a coat or umbrella and I don’t care. I missed the rain and embrace each cooling drop.
I’ll let him get his final meal. I pet Driftwood and check my gun. The rain, type #22, is steady, but not overbearing, it is patient rain.
I pull out my flask and take a big gulp. This is it, I can’t do this much longer. It ends today, in this park, or I’m done. I screw a silencer onto my USP .45 and wait. Its going to hurt, but I need her alive. I hope I can still make the shot.
Maybe I should “forget” my lunch more often. Damn that raspberry shake was good. Its still raining, I’ve never been happier to see the rain. It helps wash away the deep pain of my loss. Wash away the blood in the grass at the park. Wash away the pigeon crap on the sidewalk in front of my store. “Get in,” I hear a woman in the red Honda that pulled up alongside me say. She is pointing a gun right between my eyes. I can’t run. My legs have betrayed me. The raspberry shake and BLT weighing down my stomach have betrayed me. I get in.
This one is often quiet I think to myself. Usually they are begging at this point. No matter. I hardly hear them now. The rain has intensified. It is type #2 again.
I drag myself up the jungle gym and perch myself next to the slide facing the shed. I lie down and get into shooters position. This is my chance. The pain is incredible, but I need to ignore it. She has one shot and I have one shot. For my sake and this poor soul’s sake I need to shoot first.
I’ve stopped thinking. I am about to be executed like my Adeline. I suppose it is fitting, but I can’t say I understand it. I didn’t know I had any enemies. Neither did she I suppose. I close my eyes and think of clouds, ducks and Milky Way.
“Get out and walk to shed,” said the Rainmaker to Jerry.
Jerry does, not even feigning interest in taking off.
“On your knees and look into my eyes. I want you to watch me kill you.”
I look up and see the Rainmaker draw the Anaconda and cock the hammer back slowly and deliberately. She was obviously enjoying this. I suppose if I am going to die I will at least get to die in same park as my Adeline. A wave of happiness overtakes me. “The pain will end and good will conquer evil. The rain will end and the sun will part the clouds. Adrift in a sea of apathy, I wait for rescue,” I mutter to myself as the gun is leveled between my eyes.
“What did you just say,” shrieks the Rainmaker.
Before he could repeat it the Rainmaker’s slender body crumpled over as a bullet tore through her right knee. The Anaconda and a Taser she had in her pocket went flying out. “TASE HER BEFORE SHE GETS UP,” I hear a voice yell from the jungle gym. Still shocked, I stumble for the Taser and deliver 40,000 volts of electricity into her back and watch as she crumples into a quivering heap.
“I am sorry about your loss,” said the older gentleman who had made his way down from the swing set. I watched, dumbfounded, as he tied up the bloody lady and gagged her with a weather beaten tennis ball he found. He pulled his pristine looking Mercury Zephyr and placed her bloody body in back seat that he had covered with a tarp and what looked like 20 towels. He collected her gun and Taser and threw them into the passenger seat of the car. Finally, he walked up to the Honda she was driving and removed the small travel bag she had in there.
“Forget you ever saw this,” he said to me as he sped off into the parting clouds.
I sat down next to the shed unable to move, staring at a pristine Mercury Zephyr race off. Besides me a grey cat did the same.
“What did you just say,” shrieks the Rainmaker.
Before he could repeat it the Rainmaker’s slender body crumpled over as a bullet tore through her right knee. The Anaconda and a Taser she had in her pocket went flying out. “TASE HER BEFORE SHE GETS UP,” I hear a voice yell from the jungle gym. Still shocked, I stumble for the Taser and deliver 40,000 volts of electricity into her back and watch as she crumples into a quivering heap.
“I am sorry about your loss,” said the older gentleman who had made his way down from the swing set. I watched, dumbfounded, as he tied up the bloody lady and gagged her with a weather beaten tennis ball he found. He pulled his pristine looking Mercury Zephyr and placed her bloody body in back seat that he had covered with a tarp and what looked like 20 towels. He collected her gun and Taser and threw them into the passenger seat of the car. Finally, he walked up to the Honda she was driving and removed the small travel bag she had in there.
“Forget you ever saw this,” he said to me as he sped off into the parting clouds.
I sat down next to the shed unable to move, staring at a pristine Mercury Zephyr race off. Besides me a grey cat did the same.
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