This is the first chapter of my novel, No Evil.
CHAPTER ONE
When it happened, nobody noticed.
Sheets of cold rain pelted the window of a dimly lit all-night bakery. Bursts of neon blue, red, and yellow advertised the place was open and that there were indeed baked goods inside.
It was early winter and had been swaying back and forth between freeze and thaw for the last week or so, but word on the street said it was due for a cold snap. For now, though, it looked as if the jagged, dirty mounds of snow at either side of the roadway were mountains slipping silently into the curb.
The only sign of life in the place was the silhouette of a hunched man with unkempt hair and loose-fitting sweat clothes.
The man sipped from a mug not with casual purpose as one normally might, but with a sense that it was choreographed and perfected over months or years. Each sip — each raise of the arm — was done in a specific way and always the same. On the countertop before him were a row of parallel stir sticks and when the barista — a dark-haired, bearded man in his mid-twenties — wiped the counter nearby, they skittered out of line. Moving again with practiced perfection the man arranged them in their parallel row. His knee bounced as he sat, an expression of everyday restlessness he’d adopted as a youth. A dangling lanyard swayed as he moved, the workplace ID card at the end reading MUNSON, SAM.
A gust of wind shifted the rain into a horizontal burst that collided against the window sounding cacophonous in the vacant silence of the bakery.
“Really coming down out there, eh?” the barista said as he emerged from the back room.
Sam gave a cursory look over his shoulder and nodded. He returned his hands to the side of his mug and took another measured sip.
Flinging a towel over his shoulder the barista said, “I see you in here quite a bit.”
“Just a night owl I guess.”
“Yeah, we get a lot of those in here, I guess. But you’re the only one that orders warm milk. Another?”
“No thanks, had my fill.”
Sam slid the now empty mug across the counter to the barista.
“Yeah, most guys want a hot cup of coffee when they come in here. Truckers, junkies sometimes. They usually want it black and strong,” the barista went on as he washed the mug, drying it on the towel slung over his shoulder.
“And?”
“I just thought it was funny, ordering warm milk at 4 a.m. that’s all.”
“Yeah, well, I work nights. It’s not easy to reset on a night off.”
“Ah, I see. Warm milk.”
“Warm milk.”
Sam threw some change on the counter and turned to walk out when he heard the tinkle of a bell and felt a rush of cold air from the front door.
A portly man with a red face and tattered clothes took a few clumsy steps inside the door. He was soaked from head to toe, water running in streams off him and collecting in puddles on the floor.
“Need…warm,” he said, his lips quivering unnaturally.
The barista didn’t hesitate. He poured a cup of coffee and started toward the door. On his way past he leaned over to Sam and whispered, “Likely homeless, we get these quite a bit.”
The barista didn’t seem concerned, but something about the man seemed off to Sam. He was obviously cold, but his shivers seemed almost put on. His ruddy face seemed frozen in an expression somewhere between confusion and rage.
“Need…warm.”
“No problem, I got you a nice hot cup right here,” the barista said, stretching out his arms to hand the cup over.
Ignoring the coffee, the man squealed as if he’d been sliced head to toe. The scream seemed to resonate on a frequency that recalled something akin to the tone of the old emergency broadcast system. The man pushed the mug back into the face of the startled barista, whose hands shot up, muffling his own pained cries.
The soaked man rounded on Sam, pulling back his clenched fist as he charged toward the counter. Sam stood frozen in shock but was forced to shake it off quickly and avoid a wild, uncoordinated punch, stumbling to the floor in the process. The soaked man’s hands clenched up into fists and he convulsed and jittered, slamming them against his ears. He hunched and darted erratically left to right.
“I can hear them!”
Sam looked away from his distracted attacker and to the barista who was still writhing on the floor a few steps away. Sam forced himself to his feet and charged with all the strength he could muster, tackling the man to the ground.
The man seemed not to notice. His balled-up fists still jittered and slammed against the side of his own head.
“They’re in me!”
Sam pinned the man to the ground as the barista raised himself up, one hand covering the side of his face. Even in the gloom of the dark bakery Sam could see a hint of deep red through the barista’s splayed fingers.
“Call the cops!”
The barista reached into his pocket for his cell phone and dialed 9-1-1.
*
The news had done a short piece on what happened, complete with some security video showing Sam’s (in his opinion) elite-level tackle. The man turned out to be a paranoid schizophrenic named Peter Pettingill who, without access to his medication, had been known to wander into downtown businesses to spout various warnings of impending doom.
Still, it was strange. The video was blurry, dark, pixelated. You could tell there was rain outside in one frame, but in the next it appeared to stop altogether, or at least changed direction again. Sam couldn’t be sure. When the door opened, the man appeared to shudder in the frame as if the video were being played on an old reel-to-reel projector. Static blurred the image around his head whenever his gaze turned in the direction of the camera. It was subtle and Sam was sure he was the only one thinking about it, but still unease panged.
Sam’s leg bounced furiously as he sat at his small desk, pondering. He glanced toward the antique mahogany cabinet with intricate ivy carvings and inlaid glass doors that contained simply a bottle of whiskey and some glasses. Picked up for surprisingly little at a yard sale, it was his prized possession. He wiped his palms on his pants, opened his laptop and pushed back from the table. He poured himself two fingers neat and sipped it once before sitting back down. The drink was all at once soothing and concerning as he looked back toward the row of empty bottles arranged neatly on the kitchen table. The leg bounced, but slower.
His attention returning to the open laptop, Sam navigated to his email and began to scroll down a list of various junk mail. Sam’s scrolling ceased when he came across the name CASE. It hadn’t been opened and the date showed it had been in his inbox for over a year. He turned to his dresser where a framed photo of his college graduation sat covered in dust. Sam stood with two women and a tall, stout man with short dark hair and caramel skin.
He clicked on the email, read quickly, and began to craft a response. As he paused to consider what to say, he rethought the whole thing and slammed the laptop closed again.
The rain over the last few days had given way to snow and the cold snap that had been predicted arrived. It was biting and harsh, but Sam needed to think. He got dressed, threw on a coat and headed out on foot downtown.
The area had really been neglected over the years. Piles of old newspapers soaked and frozen in place sat like sad, square snowmen; stoically smiling stacks of stories never read. Garbage bags were piled high next to a full trash bin in the alley which itself had an underlying griminess Sam thought could pass as derelict chic on a New York runway. It was that homey charm that made Sam turn left instead of right.
There was a distinct line in town, bisected by a highway overpass, where things became noticeably less dingy and caked in grime. The windows of the shops became less cluttered, the signs less aged, and storefronts took on a more glossy, modern feel. Sam found himself really noticing just how abrupt the transition was for the first time. On one block stood a payday lender with caged windows and just one street away there was a new hot yoga studio. Sam actually turned to look back as he questioned whether he’d been daydreaming so intensely that he’d walked a lot further than he thought.
As he looked to the payday lender, a familiar face appeared in Sam’s peripheral vision and he recoiled slightly.
“Sam?” It was Case. “Thought that was you.”
Sam had to physically shake off the feeling of shock at the coincidence and, dumbstruck, mouth agape, he said nothing.
“You okay?”
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. Hey, I’m just, I’m on way to a big interview, but we should maybe catch up some time,” Sam said, a twinge of guilt hitting him the gut.
“That’s, uh, that’s great man,” said Case, his eyes scanning Sam’s sweatpants and sneakers.
Sam half shrugged, pointed a thumb over his shoulder and turned to walk away.
“Hey Sam, wait a minute.”
He took out a small leather case containing business cards, pulled out a pen and, leaning against the window of the yoga studio, scribbled something. He handed the card to Sam.
“Give me a call, Sam.”
“Yeah, yeah I for sure will.”
“Seriously. Call.”
Sam, still half turned in the opposite direction, nodded in confirmation and shoved the card into his pocket without looking at it.
What had made Sam walk this way? Was his subconscious telling him it was time to reconcile with his former best friend? Was it just coincidence? Lately, it seemed like everything ordinary had been drained from the world. He’d been noticing things.
Over the past couple of months, the news had reported on at least three ordinary people — a school principal in Chilliwack, an electrician in Port Hope, an insurance broker in Joliette — who had had complete mental breakdowns. They had carved up their families and when they were finally found by the authorities, they had each self-mutilated to the point where they had to be identified with dental records. Those were extreme cases, but Sam had also experienced some unsettling interactions closer to home. Neighbours, usually friendly, seemed distant, even hostile in some cases. He himself had seen his drinking increase and his ticks become more pronounced.
Whether it was his subconscious that plagued him or some unknowable external force, he didn’t know. All he knew was that he was plagued.
Every night, as soon as the sun went down, a wary feeling would creep into every cell. Sam’s stomach would knot and turn and wrench. As far as he could tell nothing in his life had changed all that much in the last couple of months, but suddenly he was jumping at shadows and peeking in every dark corner expecting … What? He had no idea. Besides, it wasn’t the fear he felt when he was awake that was the real problem.
Sam’s feet were frozen. He’d walked ten blocks since bumping into Case. His hand traced the corners of the business card in his pocket. Did he intentionally walk in that direction because he knew Case worked nearby? He didn’t think so, yet somehow he also felt like he’d been nudged in that direction. At any rate, he felt like his feet would fall off if he didn’t get warm, so he hailed a cab and headed home.
*
A wrinkled hand compelled Sam forward; dry, cracked knuckles clawing within inches of his nose. They snapped as the hand flexed back and forth, beckoning him. The edges of his vision were blurred narrowing his focus, but he could see gold rings hanging loosely to the withered fingers. They were worn thin on the bottom and slightly oblong, seemingly deformed from a lifetime of love.
Intuition told Sam he was supposed to take the hand in his. He couldn't. Just the thought opened a fresh gash of anxiety in his gut. The voice called again in a terrifying, unintelligible rhythm — a hum, like a television on in another room. The hand sank low out of his eyeline and a bleat like a thousand trumpets in unison jarred him.
Sam's body went rigid as he attempted to stabilize himself against an overpowering sensation of falling. He awoke in bed. Beads of warm sweat poured down his neck and chest, soaking his sheets. They clung to his body uncomfortably and he pushed his comforter off as if it were a coiled asp. A glance at the alarm clock told him he'd been asleep just an hour. That made four hours. This week. Total.
No sleep. Again.
Sam ached for uninterrupted rest, but the dreams came for him nightly. The voice — a garbled wail of anguish and confusion —haunted him. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and shuffled to the bedroom window where he tore open the deep black curtains in one frustrated tug. On the horizon parallel strips of pink and slate marked morning in the city.
His truck sat where he’d left it. The rusted blue pickup was parked on an angle in the far corner space of his building's lot. He could see people scurrying to their cars and scraping frost from their windshields.
Sam moved across the room to his nightstand. A business card sat propped against his lamp. In blue ink the words CALL ANYTIME werescrawled and underlined several times; one extra under ANYTIME for emphasis. He picked up the card, running it between his thumb and index finger for a moment, then pulled on a pair of unwashed jeans, a sweater and stuffed the card into his pocket. He needed some fresh air.
The cold breeze was a pleasure. Sam didn't like the heat and kept it off in his top-floor apartment. The uprising air from his neighbours kept his place warm and not hot for the most part. But when he went to bed it always seemed to get stifling.
A block away from his apartment Sam settled into a booth at a diner. He pulled out his cellphone and the business card, checked the time again, then entered the digits. He stared at the call button.
“Coffee?” asked a middle-aged waitress who looked too cheery for 6:30 in the morning. She had looping brown curls piled on her head.
“No, thank you. Could I get an orange juice?” Sam did his best at cheery.
“You want pulp?”
“Sure.”
“Well good, 'cause that's all we have,” she laughed.
That made Sam chuckle. He felt a little better and, when the waitress turned, he hit the call button.
On the fourth ring a familiar voice echoed through the line.
“I'm sorry, I was getting the kids on the bus. Damned thing seems to come earlier every day. I'm glad you called Sam.”
“Thanks for answering Case, I know it's early.”
“Naw. Like I said, I was already up sending the munchkins off to Oz.”
“Oz?”
“Inside joke. Osborne Academy. Some private school that got a good Yelp rating or whatever. Marina's idea.”
“Wow, things must be going well Case. I'm happy for you.”
“Thanks. Yeah, they are going well. Anyway, you looked a little,” Case paused and drew a breath. “You were maybe a bit, uh,out of sorts the last time I saw you. What's up?”
“I know you're a busy guy, but you said call any time. I just had some free time. Coffee?”
“Free time? Come on Sam. It's six in the morning and last I heard you were working nights? You’re going to job interviews half clothed? Are you okay?”
“Can you meet?”
“Yeah, yeah, I can meet. Where are you?”
“It's a cafe not far from my place. Milly's, you know it?”
“For sure, I'll be there shortly.”
