Otherworld (27 page)

“I'd like to close with this quote. Many years ago, a preacher by the name of Dr. Arthur John Gossip lost his wife. In the sermon he preached the very next day, he said, ‘I don't think you need to be afraid of life. Our hearts are very frail, and there are places where the road is very steep and lonely, but we have a wonderful God. And as Paul puts it, “What can separate us from His love? Not death,” he says immediately.' If you know Jesus Christ, you have put on the imperishable and the immortal, and not even death can separate you from God's love. Let's pray.”

Steve prayed, and friends and family who had gathered to mourn the loss of Vickie Holland unanimously agreed that it was the most beautiful prayer they had ever heard. When he finished, he allowed for five minutes of quiet reflection. Although she had been touched by Steve's closing prayer, Sandra, one of Vickie's friends, leaned over to her neighbor during the quiet reflection and whispered, “Just like a preacher to bring Jesus into everything.”

The truth had been clearly proclaimed here, plainly before Mike for the grasping. It was punctuated by the boxed corpse of Vickie before him, a shining emblem of his ultimate fear. But just the notion of death now, even in the context of escape, prompted his tuning out. He had caught bits and pieces of the message almost subliminally, primarily the parts about “not fearing death,” but his mind had already drifted to other concerns. His attention, by choice, had been diverted, occupied wholly with thinking about Molly and what she planned to do. He wondered if she would come back to Houston. He hated to think that it took the death of her sister to drive her back home to her husband, but to him, that possibility was the bright light at the end of this dark, dark tunnel.

After they lowered Vickie Lorraine Holland's body to rest, her friends congregated around the hole in the earth, paid their respects, and thought their last thoughts. Then they each approached Molly, some hugging, some crying, and told her how much they loved her sister and how close they were to her and how such-and-such a time they went to the zoo or the park or the movies or out on a double date. Molly thanked them all and invited them to the house for snacks. All of them declined.

Thirty minutes later, the rest were sitting in two groups in Vickie's home on Poplar Drive. Mike, his parents, and Robbie and his wife, Teri, sat in the living room. Mr. and Mrs. Walsh watched CNN with the volume muted, and Robbie and Mike talked business.

“Sending you to Utah in January,” Robbie said.

“Oh, yeah?” Mike replied, his eyes glued to the floor.

“Yeah. Movies all day. Get a little skiing in. You might even see Redford out there. He runs the festival, you know.”

“You don't say,” Mike said.

“Yeah. But you need to come up with something in the meantime, okay? Take your time, but I'll need some ideas in a couple of weeks,” Robbie said.

“No problem.” Mike looked up at the TV. Soldiers were saluting a coffin draped with the American flag.

In the kitchen, Steve and Molly sat at the table and talked. Mike could see that Molly was crying. Every now and then, they both closed their eyes and prayed.

Mike got up to go to the bathroom, and his mother followed him down the hall.

“Mike,” she said in her tender, maternal voice.

“Uh-huh?”

“Are you all right?”

“Yeah. I'm fine.” He smiled, but he knew a mother could always tell when her son's smile was fake.

“Have you gotten a chance to talk to Molly at all?” she asked.

“A little bit,” he said uncomfortably.

“Do you know if she's …?”

What? Do I know if she's what? Decided she does or doesn't need me? Decided to stay here in her dead sister's house for the rest of her life, because she'd rather be anywhere than with her louse of a husband—her soon-to-be
ex
-husband? I really have no idea, and frankly, I really don't think I want to know.
“If she's what?” Mike asked.

“Well,” his mother said, “are you two all right?”

Mike shook his head. “I don't know, Mom.”

She put her hand on his arm. “Your father and I love you very much.”

“I know. I love you, too.” He began to turn around, but his mother said, “Mike?”

“Uh-huh?”

“Your father's missing one of his guns. You didn't, by chance, borrow it or anything, did you?”

Suddenly, Mike
really
had to use the restroom.
Oh, sure. I used it at the movie theater. I waved it at some lady who tried to run me over with her car.
“No,” he said. “I don't know what happened to it.” His lie burned in his mouth.

 

Graham Lattimer sat at his desk, popping aspirin like candy and watching Sam Petrie talk on the phone in the main office. Graham had spent the night at the station. He hadn't seen the throng that had gathered outside in the early hours of the morning to protest the department's handling of the evidence that Trumbull was being visited by UFOs. They held signs. They wore WHAT ARE YOU HIDING? T-shirts made especially for the protest. One man wore a mask of an alien, a replica of those Pops Dickey referred to as the grays.

Petrie hung up the phone and entered Graham's office without knocking.

“Well?” Graham said.

“Got a match, Cap. Prints pulled from Abby Diaz's closet doorknob match those found all over the Horn home. They belong to Jimmy Horn. Also, the medical examiner I spoke to said he couldn't be positive right now, but he thinks the same murder weapon—or at least, a very similar murder weapon—was used on both victims. We know who we're lookin' for.”

“Well, let's find him,” Graham said.

From “Houston and Trumbull Murders Linked, Officials Say” in
the
Houston Chronicle
:

Homicide investigators in the Houston Police Department and the Trumbull Police Department have verified early reports that the murder of a Houston woman discovered in her home yesterday is connected to the brutal attack and murder of a Houston businessman in his Trumbull home last night. John Dickerson, an HPD detective, announced this morning that fingerprints lifted from the Houston crime scene match those lifted from the scene in Trumbull. The suspect's name is Jimmy Horn, the son of the woman found slain in her kitchen. He is also wanted in connection with a convenience store robbery and the attempted kidnapping of a child.

Authorities say that the child is the daughter of the Trumbull man found murdered last night after the man's wife called 911 to report a break-in. Trumbull police say that Horn, 17, had probably been stalking the girl for a while. The reasons are unclear. Horn has been in previous trouble with the law and has served sentences in juvenile correction facilities. He is considered armed and dangerous. If you have any information concerning Jimmy Horn's whereabouts, please contact the Trumbull Police Department or the Houston Police Department, or call the CrimeStoppers hotline at 222-TIPS.

 

5:15 p.m. Mike and Steve stopped at a fast-food chicken place on their way to the airport. Steve's plane left at six fifty-five.

“Mike,” Steve said.

“Yeah?” Mike said, mumbling through an Original Recipe chicken leg held to his mouth like a harmonica.

“Do you mind if I ask you a question?”

“No, I guess not.”
This isn't gonna be about Jesus, is it?

“Yesterday. Back on the, uh, grassy knoll. What was going on?”

“Oh. Well, you know, like I said. I was just thinking.”

“Oh,” Steve replied, but his tone said,
That doesn't exactly answer my question.
“About what happened there?”

“Yeah,” Mike said. “About what happened there. And … well, other stuff, too.”

“About Molly?”

Mike looked at the minister.
Do I know you? Can I tell you things? Are you a friend?

Steve said, “Back on the knoll, you started to tell me something, but you stopped. Was it about Molly?”

“Yeah … Well, no. No, it wasn't about her. I don't want you to think I'm crazy or anything.”

“I don't think you're crazy.”

“Okay, but I don't want you to think I'm a sinner or a heathen or whatever,” Mike said.

“Okay. What's on your mind?”

“I've been having these dreams about … Well, it started when I was a kid. I was out fishing with a friend, and we found this dead body in the river. It just kinda floated toward me, you know. Like it knew exactly where it was going. Like it wanted to come to me. Like it wanted me to see it. And, well, I've been seeing it ever since. I just … I guess I feel like what you talked about at the funeral today. You know—fearing death. I guess I feel like death is haunting me.”

Mike scooped up a spoonful of mashed potatoes and placed it in his mouth, letting his words sink in. He didn't enjoy saying any of it but felt as though a heavy weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He swallowed the potatoes. “Forget it,” he said. “I know it sounds stupid. It's too hard to explain.”

“No. It doesn't sound stupid,” Steve said, and the pastor looked like he meant it.

On the way to the airport, the two men talked about the Texans' playoff chances. “Who knows?” Steve had said. “As long as they keep wanting it bad enough.”

They talked about their parents, about the Astros (sports are a staple of men's conversations, especially when two men don't know each other that well), and about other random news of note until Mike asked, “Do you believe in UFOs?”

Steve laughed. “UFOs? Hmm. I guess I never gave it much thought. You talking about the deal in Trumbull?”

“Well, yeah, but in general,” Mike said.

“Well, I guess people are seeing
something
. I mean, that's why they're unidentified, right? But as far as them being, like, flying saucers?”

“Yeah.”

“Nah.”

“You don't think so?” Mike asked.

“Nah,” Steve said. “I don't believe in 'em.” His eyebrow arched. “You?”

“No, I don't either. Still … like you said, they can't all be liars.”

“That's not what I said. I said they're seeing something. But that doesn't make those somethings flying saucers.”

“So what do you think they are?” Mike asked.

“I have no idea. Planes. Stars or planets. You can see Venus sometimes when the sky's real clear and it's the right time of year. They say it looks like it's flashing.”

“What about people who say they've been visited by aliens?”

“Hmm. I'll tell you what, I think that if those encounters actually occurred, they were hoaxes or …”

“Or what?” Mike asked.

“Or … well, I guess … encounters with demons.”

“Demons?” Mike chuckled.

The pastor seemed amused by his own statement. “Yeah,” he said.

“You actually believe in demons?”

“Well, yeah, I guess. I mean, the Bible talks a lot about angels and other spirits. They may not be as prevalent today, but I believe what's in the Bible, so if someone told me they had a visit from some creature in the middle of the night in their bedroom, I would think it was a trick, a dream or hallucination, or a demon,” Steve said.

Mike smiled. “I didn't know you guys still believed in that stuff.”

“Well, I've never actually seen one or met anyone who has, but yeah, I believe they exist. Somewhere.”

“What about parallel dimensions?” Mike asked.

“What?”

“Parallel dimensions. Another dimension here on earth that we can't see. A whole other world. With people like us living in it.”

“Sounds like science fiction to me,” Steve said.

“What if I told you there are scientific principles and theories to support a belief in it?”

“I'd say that any scientist who believes in something can come up with something that will support his belief and make it into a theory. Like starting your research with an already-drawn conclusion. Whoever came up with that theory knew where he wanted to go, and he made sure he got there when he was done.”