Fire (73 page)

The three of them sat down at the kitchen table, in spite of the fact that it was empty, because it was a good place to talk.

“I wanted to stop by and see you,” Ron said, “before I went north. Starting graduate school next month, up near Boston. Don’t know when I’ll get a chance to get down in the direction again.”

Luke nodded, and smiled. Ron Hawkins in grad school. That was something, wasn’t it?

“How did you find us?” Christine asked him. “You’re welcome, of course. But I hadn’t realized we’d left a trail. And we haven’t seen anyone in the months we’ve been here.”

Ron shook his head. “No — you didn’t.” Shrugged. “Damned if I know. It’s spring and I’m here. I think the others will show up, too. Soon, now. Real soon.”

Luke found himself looking absently out the window, wondering if the creature was somewhere out there in the woods, watching them. It was a strange idea, a little unsettling and a little comforting both at once.

He thought of the days just after the scene at the edge of the Lake of Fire. How they’d all waited there, the Vice President and George Stein and Ron and Andy and himself and all the others, waited for Christine and the creature to be well enough to leave. It hadn’t taken that long — most of a day, maybe. And then they’d all traveled together for a while, but before they’d reached the first town George Stein had slipped away, and a while after that the creature and the dog had headed off in another direction while no one was looking. Bill and the dark-eyed woman did the same, as did the technician, Tim. By that time Tim had already taken the dead policeman under his wing. Looking in his eyes, just before they’d wandered off, Luke thought that he was helping the dead policeman to make some amends for the city of St. Louis, whose destruction Tim had largely caused.

In the town those of them still left had bought bus tickets to three different places. The Vice President, to Washington. Ron and Jerry Williams, back to Tennessee. And Luke and Christine and Andy had bought tickets to New York. Until Ron showed up, it’d been the last he’d seen of any of them.

“Has it changed much out there?” Luke asked. “Has the world changed?”

“Oof,” Ron said — as though the question were bigger than he knew how to lift. “Yeah. It’s changed a lot. An awful lot.” He frowned, thinking. “People aren’t dying any more. And they aren’t starving when they don’t eat. And when they’re broke, it doesn’t make a whole lot of difference. Hard to get anyone to do a job he doesn’t want to do.”

And they talked a long time after that, but nothing Ron said haunted Luke the way that idea did. Imagine that: a whole world where no one did anything against his will, or because he had to.

Would it even work? Ron wasn’t all that clear on whether it was working or not. It was a thing Luke had to see, he decided. Real soon.

Later in the day the others arrived. Bill Wallace and his strange, dark-eyed wife; the creature and the dog who followed him everywhere. The preacher, George Stein. Graham Perkins, the man who’d been President (in the eyes of the law, at least) for the four weeks it took him to get to Washington and sign resignation papers. Andy Harrison and young Jerry Williams, each escorted by their parents. Last to arrive was Tim, the technician who’d worked for Herman Bonner. The vacant-eyed policeman, Jorge Rodriguez, came with him. Neither of the two had much to say, though Rodriguez looked as though something had begun to regrow inside him.

All of them sat in the hearth room of the cabin, and they broke the bread that the Harrisons had brought. Later they went out into the woods and walked for a long while. None of them said much of anything.

That night they made room for bedrolls near the fireplace, and those who felt a need for sleep rested.

Late that night, Luke sat awake at the kitchen table, counting how little he’d accomplished in the last year and thinking about whether people ought to do things or not. Or whether they should just be. After a long time he decided that there wasn’t much point to life unless you did something with it.

Soon, he thought. Soon. Soon it’d be time to set himself back into the world and find things to accomplish — and accomplish them. And swore to himself that he’d set himself to the task in a day or three. Or a week. Or a month. Time wasn’t a thing that could press on him now; soon was soon enough.

I will, he thought.

It was a promise, in a way. A promise to himself. And though there wasn’t much urgency in it, it wasn’t an empty pledge.

About the Author

Bram Stoker Award-winning author and editor Alan Rodgers (1959-2014) was a horror writer, he loved sci-fi, and was an extraordinarily gifted editor and poet.

Alan is remembered by many for his work in the early eighties as Associate Editor for Rod Serling’s Twilight Zone Magazine(1984-1987). Soon after he initiated another project as the Editor of the spin-off horror digest Night Cry(1985-1987). His stories have been published in a number of venues including Weird Tales, Twilight Zone and a number of anthologies such as Darker Masques, Prom Night and Vengeance Fantastic.

He began publishing fantasy with Bram Stoker Award for Best Long Form Fiction winner and World Fantasy Award nominee the novelette “The Boy Who Came Back From the Dead”(1987). His debut horror novel “Blood of the Children”(1989) was a Bram Stoker Award nominee for Best First Horror Novel. Other novels to follow were “Fire”(1990), “Night”(1991), “Pandora”(1995), Stoker Award nominee “Bone Music”(1995), “The Bear Who Found Christmas”(2000) and “Her Misbegotten Son”(2000).

Alan spent the last ten years of his life working 12-14 hours a day, every day, bringing classic works of literature back to life as the publisher of Alan Rodgers Books. Today, there are over 4,000 titles in the Ingram Catalog which have been edited, typeset, and put out in lovingly-prepared legacy editions as trade paperbacks, jacketed hardcovers, and library hardcovers.

Alan’s family continues this tradition as part of Chameleon Publishing. Laurie DeGange, Alan’s sister, is Chameleon Vice President, and his brother Scott Rodgers is an editor and book designer with Chameleon. More Alan Rodgers Books, including new editions of his bestselling horror novels of the 90s, an expanded edition of “The Boy Who Came Back From the Dead,” children’s novels written before his death, and never-before published adult horror novels, including Smoke, are forthcoming.

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About the Publisher

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