He shone the light back into the barn, and laughed. There was no man, just the hame of an old harness, nearly busted into two pieces.
Time to get out of here. Maybe stop at Gentlemen’s for one more drink, then home and straight to b—
There was someone behind him, and this was no illusion. He could see the shadow, long and thin. And . . . was that breathing?
In a second, he’s going to grab me. I need to drop and roll.
Only he couldn’t. He was frozen. Why hadn’t he turned around when he saw the scene was deserted? Why hadn’t he gotten his gun out of the safe? Why had he ever gotten out of the truck in the first place? Jack suddenly understood that he was going to die at the end of a dirt road in Canning Township.
That was when he was touched. Caressed on the back of his neck by a hand as hot as a hot water bottle. He tried to scream and couldn’t. His chest was locked up like the Glock in its safe. Now another hand would join the first and the choking would begin.
Only the hand pulled back. Not the fingers, though. They moved back and forth—lightly, just the tips—playing across his skin and leaving trails of heat.
Jack didn’t know how long he stood there, unable to move. It might have been twenty seconds; it might have been two minutes. The wind blew, tousling his hair and caressing his neck like those fingers. The shadows of the cottonwoods schooled across the dirt and weeds like fleeing fish. The person—or the thing—stood behind him, its shadow long and thin. Touching and caressing.
Then both the fingertips and the shadow were gone.
Jack wheeled around, and this time the scream came out, long and loud, when the tail of his sportcoat belled out behind him in the wind and made a flapping sound. He stared at—
Nothing.
Just a few abandoned buildings and an acre or so of dirt.
No one was there. No one had ever been there. No one in the barn; just a busted hame. No fingers on the back of his sweaty neck; just the wind. He returned to his truck in big strides, looking back over his shoulder once, twice, three times. He got in, cringing when a wind-driven shadow raced across the rearview mirror, and started the engine. He drove back down the ranch road at fifty miles an hour, past the old graveyard and the abandoned ranchhouse, not pausing at the yellow tape this time but simply driving through it. He swerved onto Highway 79, tires squalling, and headed back toward FC. By the time he passed the city limits, he had convinced himself nothing had happened out there at that abandoned barn. The throbbing at the nape of his neck also meant nothing.
Nothing at all.
YELLOW
July 21st–July 22nd
1
At ten o’clock on Saturday morning, O’Malley’s Irish Spoon was as close to deserted as it ever got. Two geezers sat near the front with mugs of coffee beside them and a chessboard between them. The only waitress was staring, transfixed, at a small TV over the counter, where an infomercial was playing. The item on sale appeared to be some sort of golf club.
Yunel Sablo was sitting at a table toward the rear, dressed in faded jeans and a tee-shirt tight enough to show off his admirable musculature （Ralph had not had admirable musculature since 2007 or so）。 He was also watching the TV, but when he saw Ralph, he raised a hand and beckoned.
As he sat down, Yune said: “I don’t know why the waitress is so interested in that particular club.”
“Women don’t golf? What kind of male chauvinist world are you living in, amigo?”
“I know women golf, but that particular club is hollow. The idea is if you get caught short on the fourteenth hole, you can piss in it. There’s even a little apron included that you can flip over your junk. Thing like that wouldn’t work for a woman.”
The waitress came over to take their order. Ralph asked for scrambled eggs and rye toast, looking at the menu rather than her, lest he burst into laughter. That was one urge he hadn’t expected to struggle against this morning, and a small, strained giggle escaped him, anyway. It was the thought of the apron that did it.
The waitress didn’t need to be a mind reader. “Yeah, it might have its funny side,” she said. “Unless, that is, your husband’s a golf nut with a prostate the size of a grapefruit and you don’t know what to get him for his birthday.”
Ralph met Yune’s eyes, and that tipped them both over. They burst into hearty roars of hilarity that made the chess players look around disapprovingly.
“You going to order anything, honey,” the waitress asked Yune, “or just drink coffee and laugh about the Comfort Nine Iron?”
Yune ordered huevos rancheros. When she was gone, he said, “It’s a strange world, ese, full of strange things. Don’t you think so?”