Strange City Read online

  "We own you lock, stock, and barrel." Twit breaks out in an obnoxious little chortle. "You know how it works."

  I nod. I realize that this was how I had lived my life. My skull aches with that realization, and a numbness fills my brain. People tike Praeger rule our lives and our deaths. I had always thought death was meaning­less, but death is worse than that. Death is when peo-p!e like Praeger triumph.

  Then Halperin reaches toward my eyes with ashen fingers. Before I can flinch, his fingers close, and he peels a foggy membrane from my face. For the first time, I look with clear vision upon the world of dead souls. This was a world I already understood. I had lived it for years. And now, as far as I knew, I was going to live it forever.

  The Scarlet Letters

  by Scott H. Urban

  The fog was just beginning to roll in as Corrinda found Cafe Prague. Thin, white wisps crept around corners like sentries for an invading army of oblivion. Emerging from the mouth of an alley, like something born of the mist, came a huge dog of uncertain breed. Surely he's too big to be someone's pet in the city? she wondered The canine ran across the road with an easy lope, not even giving a sniff in her direction, and was swallowed back up by the enveloping shadows of a narrow side-street.

  Over her head, a sputtering neon sign caused the fog to glow in a blue nimbus. She could still see where someone, many years ago, had painted the name of the coffee house on the tall front window, using varicolored daisies and asters to give shape to the letters. Only in Haight-Ashbury, thought Corrinda, where the flower is in power. A handwritten sign taped to the window's lower left corner read "Open Mike Poetry Reading—9 pm Until ???"

  Corrinda brought herself close to the glass. As she did, another face approached her. She gave a start, then realized it was her own reflection. The bruise under her right eye was only now beginning to lose some of its purplish bloom. She winced and wished she had learned to use makeup somewhere along the line.

  A plywood stage rose on the other side of the win­dow. Two interior spotlights mounted on the ceiling were aimed at the stage. Someone was onstage speaking, but the glare prevented her from determining whether the person was male or female. She took another step and pushed open the door.

  In all her fifteen years she had never been to San Francisco, but she immediately felt more at home here than she ever had in Homily, some five hundred miles to the north. The atmosphere was thick with smoke. It hung in spiraling coils like the thin ghosts of snakes. Her nose detected not only tobacco, but also cloves and pot. Ten circular tables, each with five or six chairs and most of them occupied, filled the center of the room. Ten additional chairs were lined up against the left-hand wall. The patrons seemed divided equally between gray-haired day-trippers who had somehow missed the word that the '60s were over, and khaki-shorted out-of-towners who wanted a safe brush with the counter-culture. The bar was to the right, and a chalkboard hanging behind it proclaimed, "The Perk of the Day." Irregularly spaced around the wails were vintage Peter Maxx posters and psychedeli-cally lettered broadsides announcing concerts by Jefferson Airplane and The Grateful Dead,

  A lanky man with hair to the small of his back was shouting onstage. In his left hand he held a sheaf of wrinkled, stained papers. His right hand fluttered as if trying to work itself free of the confining wrist. He was saying something about government atrocities in Central America, but it was somehow mixed up with what his older brother had done to him when they were young.

  She followed a roundabout course to the bar Behind it stood a woman with thick, curly red hair, fair skin, and freckles the color and size of pennies. Corrinda ordered coffee, black, and watched it poured, thick and steaming, from a waiting pot. She passed a five-dollar bill over the counter, wincing as she real­ized she was now down to ones She blew across the top of the mug while waiting for her change. She turned slightly, looking back at the stage, trying to get into the flow of the poet's declamations.

  "Are you going to read tonight?"

  The voice, right behind her ear, was unexpected-She gave a start, nearly slopping scalding coffee on her fingers. Cursing, she set down the mug and turned. She could have sworn there was no one behind her when she walked up to the bar, but a man now stood only inches away.

  He was swarthy, stocky, and of medium height He wore a black turtleneck sweater and loose-fitting black slacks. His hair, also black, was swept straight back from his forehead. She could see little of his eyes. They were set deep amidst his other features, whereas his nose was just a touch too prominent. He frowned with concern.

  "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to frighten you."

  "It's all right. E just didn't see you there." She began to ask him where he had come from when she caught a warning. Her palm was resting on the smooth, oak top of the bar, and she felt the message travel up her fingers, through her arms, and into her brain. Her pupils and nostrils flared wide.

  She looked up at the newcomer. "Brace yourself against something," she said breathlessly.

  His brows drew together in question, but before he could ask her what she meant, a rumble—at first distant—seemed to approach at supersonic speed. The floor beneath them rippled, as if they somehow stood on the surface of a wave. Glasses and plates beneath the bar shimmied against one another, trying to see how violently they could shake without shatter­ing, though many fell and burst. A couple of the cafe patrons screamed, but by the time their cries faded so had the tremor, the faultline agitation flowing back into the mantle to be absorbed. Most of the audience was laughing now, releasing nervous tension. The bar­tender was standing up toppled bottles.

  "It wasn't the Big One, folks," the lanky poet onstage announced, "so God must be telling me it's all right to finish my poem."

  The man in black focused his attention on Corrinda. "You knew that was coming. You knew it before it happened."

  She nodded, using a wad of napkins to mop up cof­fee that had spilled from her mug. "Sometimes I ... catch things. I think of it as catching because I know there are messages flying around us all the time, out here"—she used her finger to point in ten different directions—"and sometimes I just happen to be in a position to pick them up. it's like catching a baseball blindfolded- Most of the time you'll miss. But if you hold your mitt just right, you might catch one pitch out of a thousand. Sometimes I learn things about the past. Sometimes I learn about the future. Sometimes I know what another person is thinking right at that moment."

  "What a gift to possess." The stranger smiled, "You have been blessed."

  Suddenly she looked down and bit her lip. "You wouldn't think so, Not if you'd caught . some of the thoughts I have."

  He nodded, accepting that without question. "So. As I was asking you before San Andreas interrupted, are you going to read tonight?"

  She felt the blush rising on her cheeks "I wanted to. Is it so obvious7 It's the reason I came, I guess But now I'm not sure I don't know if my stuff is good enough. I don't know if it... sings."

  "Ah." His eyebrows rose slightly. "Are you the new Belle of Amherst?"

  She quickly shook her head- "No. Nothing like that. I write more about. . . the darker side of life."

  "Emily understood that as well She knew Death would stop for her and take her to the Narrow House. But that's beside the point- I would like to hear you read "

  "I'm afraid I'll make a fool of myself, . ."

  He nodded at the stage. "You couldn't do any worse than that one. You may get some applause. You may even feel like doing it again" He looked her up and down appraisingly, and she discovered, much to her surprise, she didn't mind. "What's your name?"

  She hesitated. She had no idea who he was—for alt she knew, he could have been a mugger, a psycho, a serial killer. She could lie, make up a name—but then she realized she would never see him again after tonight anyway.

  "Corrinda. What's yours?"

  He repeated her name in a low whisper. It had always seemed awkward before, but in his voice her name became something exotic a
nd glamorous.

  "That's different. Very beautiful." He glanced at the stage. "Co on up there. Before you can talk yourself out of It." The audience was clapping, seemingly with relief, as the lanky poet stepped from the stage.

  She made her way between the tables, feeling as if she were walking toward a sacrificial altar. She had to keep swallowing. Stepping onstage, she turned toward the audience. The spotlights in her eyes jarred her, but she felt relieved she didn't have to took into any faces.

  "Ummm." She brought her hands up nervously, brushed her hair back, then laced her fingers in front of her. "My name is Corrinda, and ... I write poetry" Someone over to the right coughed, "OK." She didn't put her poetry on paper. The twenty or so pieces she had composed that she was satisfied with she had committed to memory. Now she almost wished she had then written down so that her hands would have something to do while she recited.

  The words came, tremulous at first, Sweat dotted her forehead, prickled under her arms, but she gained confidence with each minute, her voice becoming increasingly stronger and firmer. She spoke of a mother's love turned into something venomous when the mother abandoned the family She was able to take a stepfather's abusive and incestuous advances and turn them into something tragic, while they yet remained repulsive. She sang of an anger frustrated because there was nothing at which to strike. She mourned for dreams that were bittersweet to begin with because they could never come true. The lights, the audience, Cafe Prague itself evaporated; she spoke in a void, a place white yet without illumina­tion, where words were the only things to console her She was surprised when she reached her last word; it brought her back to the mundane. She blinked, now seeing patrons hunched forward in their seats, silent—waiting for her to continue.

  "Ummm. That's it. Thank you."

  She stepped from the stage and was taken aback at the applause that erupted around her. She was certain it was a mistake; they must have been clapping for someone who just entered, She headed for the door Well, you did it, she told herself. You shared your poetry with the world- Now you have to figure out what to do with no money and no place to go home to.

  She was just about to slip outside when an arm shot across her path—not touching her, but barring her exit.

  "That was incredible!" It was the dark-haired man from the bar. "Please don't leave just yet." Flecks of purple and black swirled in his eyes, now revealed in better light.

  "I... I really have to go."

  "At least come finish your cup of coffee. I was sav­ing it for you." He removed his arm, ushering her back to the bar.

  She blinked several times, clearing her eyes, then nodded and preceded him to the back of the cafe. Now on the platform a woman sporting Marine-cropped hair, tattered T-shirt, and camouflage pants avowed she was a 'feminist-revolutionary-lesbian," and she began to stomp on the plywood in time with her poetry.

  'I could almost believe the Muse had descended and spoken through you," He picked up her mug and handed it to her.

  She shook her head. "Please. It wasn't that good." She accepted the coffee and took a long sip.

  "You underestimate yourself. Your poems are emotional and touching, but not maudlin. You can trust what I say. I've been . . condemned to follow beauty " He leaned forward, peering intently at her face. "Your poems. Some of them come from life, don't they?'

  She couldn't meet his unflinching gaze, "All of them." She dabbed at the hated tears with the already-soiled cuff of her military-surplus jacket "When no one would listen to me, hold me, I found poetry. For the first time I had a world that accepted me and made me feel safe. The Romantics, the Symbolists, the Beat poets. . . . They seemed to understand the hurt I felt. They had fought against the unfairness of the world, and although they may not have won any battles, they did leave some beauty behind."

  "It never ceases to amaze me, Humans' ability to hurt each other. . ." He brought his hand up near her cheek but refrained from actually touching her. "Monster J must be .. ,"'

  "Lest monster I become,'" Corrinda finished. For the first time, the man seemed rattled. "Where did you hear that?" he demanded.

  Corrinda's eyes darted left and right, as if she had done something wrong and now sought an exit. "It's a line from a poem," she said hastily. She reached into her jacket and pulled a thin book from an interior pocket. "In this book," It was smaller than a hardback, with an ash-gray cover and the title in a bold, red typeface:

  The Scarlet Letters by Virgil

  At the sight of it the man's eyes narrowed, almost as if it were a poisonous snake suddenly discovered too close. "By the blood!" His voice was nearly a hiss. "Where did you find this?"

  She didn't know whether to drop the book, put it back in her pocket, or give it to him. "I—I bought it in a used bookstore. They usually only carry trashy romance novels, but one time I found this. ... It was only iwo bucks, and I really liked the poetry, Have— have you read it, too?"

  He ignored her question, as he had all her others. "Would you consider selling this to me?" His voice, up until now calm and resonant, quivered, as if its pos­sessor were an alcoholic suddenly denied the bottle.

  "I—i don't know." She looked at the chapbook uncomprehendingly. "It's my favorite. They're poems in the form of letters from a vampire to a mortal. They talk about the horrible Embrace of darkness . , . the uncon­trollable thirst for blood . . . and the eternal longing for a final release. It depicts a world of night and shadows and death—more beautiful and more terrifying than our own world. It's a world I wanted to enter .. . I felt like the poet had read what was written in my soul.. ."

  The stranger was so focused on the chapbook it seemed he had forgotten her presence. "Damnation! I thought I had rounded up and destroyed all of these years ago . . ." As if the volume were a fragile find at an archaeological dig, he lightly stroked the cover. As he did so, his fingers, thin and cool, brushed against her.

  And she caught another of her messages.

  Her jaw dropped, causing her to appear more frightened than when the tremor had struck. "Oh, my God." Her voice was no more than a whisper. "How can you be standing here—when you're—"

  She couldn't complete her question. He gripped her wrist and cinched She gasped, cutting off her own words. His eyes bore into hers. "You've got to come with me." He was speaking—so softly she was certain no one else could hear him. 'To a place where we can talk in private. You mustn't make a sound, understand?"

  He began pulling her from the bar. She looked frantically around the cafe; no one seemed to be tak­ing notice of them. She considered making a sound— plenty of loud, shrill screaming sounds—but she had no idea what he would do to her wrist, let alone the rest of her form, if she didn't cooperate.

  He led her to a door in the rear wall. The red-haired bartender, who had gone into the back to load up on silverware, came through and almost walked into them. At the last moment he pulled Corrinda back out of the way. It was like she couldn't see us! Corrinda thought, nearly crying out. He squeezed her wrist sharply: Stay quiet.

  They pushed through the door and found them­selves in a small kitchen. The gleaming, stainless steel surfaces of an oven, refrigerator, sink, and preparation table ran along the walls. He led her to a second door in the far right corner. He looked back over his shoulder and was apparently satisfied with what he saw. or didn't see, "You caught something about me when we touched, didn't you?" He spoke quietly and earnestly, yet she could make out each of his words, He opened the door: wooden steps with peeiing paint made a right angle turn as they led to a basement below.

  As they made their descent, Corrinda spoke as if in a drug-induced stupor. "I saw—everything that is the opposite of light—shadows, darkness, night, the Void . , . And E saw blood—an ocean of blood—and you—floating on its surface—not breathing—not even alive."

  They stepped onto the floor of a stone-lined base­ment. The air was much cooler down here than it had been in the stuffy cafe upstairs. The chamber was illumi­nated by a single ba
re bulb of low wattage hanging from the middle of the ceiling. The center of the floor was taken up by tables and chairs, all in need of repair. Boxes with indeterminate contents were piled against one wall,

  Only now were connections falling together in Corrinda's mind to link words, messages, and omis­sions. It was not that she was naive or incapable of inductive reasoning. It was simply that, even with her unfocused prescience, the image she arrived at ran counter to all she had been taught to expect from a blind, heedless universe.

  He bent to the floor and found a fingerhold that had been undetectable to Corrinda. He pulled up what looked like a solid stone slab and held it while motioning her over. "Sit down and swing your feet inside. You'll feel rungs. Climb down carefully. You'll be all right. This used to be a rum-runner's storage room during Prohibition."

  She thought once more about bolting for the stairs but knew the time for that was long gone She sat on the trapdoor's lip. "You wrote those poems, didn't you?" She peered at him so intently her gaze might have seared the flesh from his skull, 'You're Virgil The one who led Dante into Hell." She looked down into the dimly lit opening. "Should I abandon all hope?"

  He wouldn't turn from her stare. "Haven't you already?"

  She had no answer for that, and began to climb down,

  At the bottom, she hugged her arms to her chest and waited for him to lower the trapdoor and descend, The chamber in which she stood was a mixture of the con­temporary and the archaic. It was slightly larger than the main room upstairs. There was soft track lighting around the perimeter of the ceiling, but the primary source of illumination came from a pair of elaborate candelabra on a heavy oaken trestle table perhaps ten feet long, Aside from the candles, the table supported teetering piles of books, scattered papers, and a bottle or two of wine. In a far corner stood a huge bed with Mediterranean-style headboard and footboard. There were four or five photographs to either side of the bed Corrinda stepped closer and examined them, her eyes growing wide with disbelief as she did so. The pho­tographs all depicted Virgil with other people, some of whom she thought she recognized- God! That's lack London! And that's you and Kerouac—outside City Lights bookshop!"