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.A corkscrew.She kisses her son’s cheek and strokes his face and then hides the weapons between the mattress and the box spring.Today, she is not hiding weapons.She is reclaiming them.Or one, at least.She reaches under the mattress and pulls out the revolver.Psyche is still sobbing softly.Then: the squeak of faucets.Splash of water.A sign that today’s time of sorrow draws to a close.Have to move fast.Alison kisses Barney on the forehead.Whispers to him that she loves him, that Mommy will be back in just a moment.She quietly slides along the margins of the hallway.Toward the bathroom door.Hand on the knob.Gently turning.When it opens, Psyche is startled.Face puffy and red from crying.She’s doing like she does every night—leaning forward on the sink, staring into the mirror.She jerks her head toward Alison.Her face is a conflicted mess of rage and confusion.The leash snakes out, winds around Alison’s mind.A python, swiftly tightening.“What are you doing?” Psyche asks.Only.One.Shot.Alison cries out, muscling past the psychic lockdown, and raises the gun and fires.Psyche’s head snaps back and she staggers.Alison keeps firing.One, two, three—the gunshots are everything, noise and wrath and stink.The hammer suddenly falls dry as the cylinder empties—click click click click.The madwoman lays over the toilet, back arched like a bridge, hands scrabbling on the linoleum but finding no purchase.The psychic leash unspools—a thread pulled from a sweater until it unravels.Alison is free.She knows she doesn’t have long.Move fast, then.Gun on the floor with a clatter.Into Barney’s room.Scoop up his comatose frame—he’s still not waking, she hoped he would wake, damnit—and hurry down the hall, down the steps.Psyche makes a sound from the bathroom, a kind of “Gggggh!”—a garbled, pissed-off gargle that precedes her screaming Alison’s name.But by the time Alison hears it, she’s snatching the car keys off the hook by the front door and then she’s outside.Air.And the sound of birds.And traffic, somewhere.Everything feels crisp, like hotel linens.Hyper-alert like she’s just had a whole pot of coffee.She smells herself: a whiff of sweat.Has she showered? She doesn’t even know.People are coming out of their houses, now—a gunshot in Philly means everyone turtles, ducking into their homes and turning up their televisions, but here in Doylestown it’s a different affair.Faces poke out of windows.Doors open.Half a dozen people will already be on the phone.Good.Fine.It doesn’t matter.To the car.The red Toyota.Its inside scrawled with symbols like those in the house.Inked on the windows, carved into the dash.Psyche put them there.For protection against her ‘enemies.’Alison fumbles with the keys.Psyche screams.She’s at the front door.Unbloodied.Untouched by bullets.She’s out.Running across the lawn.Alison feels her fingers sinking deep into her mind like jagged spears—but then she slips into the car, falling forward over Barney, and it’s like a big iron door slams down, cutting off Psyche’s invisible fingers.The symbols.It has to be the symbols.No time to think about that now.Psyche slams up against the glass as Alison locks the door.The madwoman begins punching the glass.First hit: nothing.Second hit: the glass of the driver side window spider-webs with a crunch.Alison turns the key, and the engine starts.She guns it forward.Clips another car’s bumper—whatever.She sobs and screams as she leaves Psyche in a cloud of exhaust.NO NO NO no you stupid woman no no no—Psyche stands in the middle of the street.The car speeds away, tires shrieking as it rounds a tight corner and then is gone.She reaches out with everything she has to find Alison’s mind, but the very sigils of protection she placed inside the car to keep the Driver from finding them work on her, too, when she’s out of the car.Her body is electric with anger, and with a deep and vibrant channel of potent self-loathing.Faces peer out of windows and doors open; Psyche plants her feet on the earth and screams to the heavens, and the faces snap backward, noses squirting blood.Doors slam on bodies and fingers.She needs her.Needs Alison.She’s a channel to her husband’s killer.And better—she’s the perfect instrument of revenge.To have the man murdered by his own wife would be exquisite—such an eloquent orchestration of justice.It must happen that way.It must.But now—sirens.Not that kind, but the human kind.The ‘authorities’ will be here, soon.And now that she’s outside of the house, one of the inhuman authorities will be here, soon, too.Psyche’s done so well at staying hidden, and now here she is—ripping off scabs and letting her mindsblood flow.The shark will have her scent.She’s lost everything.She hates herself.She goes inside the house to wait.And weep.And break mirrors.She could run.But what’s the point?Eventually they come.The police.In their crisp blue uniforms [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.A corkscrew.She kisses her son’s cheek and strokes his face and then hides the weapons between the mattress and the box spring.Today, she is not hiding weapons.She is reclaiming them.Or one, at least.She reaches under the mattress and pulls out the revolver.Psyche is still sobbing softly.Then: the squeak of faucets.Splash of water.A sign that today’s time of sorrow draws to a close.Have to move fast.Alison kisses Barney on the forehead.Whispers to him that she loves him, that Mommy will be back in just a moment.She quietly slides along the margins of the hallway.Toward the bathroom door.Hand on the knob.Gently turning.When it opens, Psyche is startled.Face puffy and red from crying.She’s doing like she does every night—leaning forward on the sink, staring into the mirror.She jerks her head toward Alison.Her face is a conflicted mess of rage and confusion.The leash snakes out, winds around Alison’s mind.A python, swiftly tightening.“What are you doing?” Psyche asks.Only.One.Shot.Alison cries out, muscling past the psychic lockdown, and raises the gun and fires.Psyche’s head snaps back and she staggers.Alison keeps firing.One, two, three—the gunshots are everything, noise and wrath and stink.The hammer suddenly falls dry as the cylinder empties—click click click click.The madwoman lays over the toilet, back arched like a bridge, hands scrabbling on the linoleum but finding no purchase.The psychic leash unspools—a thread pulled from a sweater until it unravels.Alison is free.She knows she doesn’t have long.Move fast, then.Gun on the floor with a clatter.Into Barney’s room.Scoop up his comatose frame—he’s still not waking, she hoped he would wake, damnit—and hurry down the hall, down the steps.Psyche makes a sound from the bathroom, a kind of “Gggggh!”—a garbled, pissed-off gargle that precedes her screaming Alison’s name.But by the time Alison hears it, she’s snatching the car keys off the hook by the front door and then she’s outside.Air.And the sound of birds.And traffic, somewhere.Everything feels crisp, like hotel linens.Hyper-alert like she’s just had a whole pot of coffee.She smells herself: a whiff of sweat.Has she showered? She doesn’t even know.People are coming out of their houses, now—a gunshot in Philly means everyone turtles, ducking into their homes and turning up their televisions, but here in Doylestown it’s a different affair.Faces poke out of windows.Doors open.Half a dozen people will already be on the phone.Good.Fine.It doesn’t matter.To the car.The red Toyota.Its inside scrawled with symbols like those in the house.Inked on the windows, carved into the dash.Psyche put them there.For protection against her ‘enemies.’Alison fumbles with the keys.Psyche screams.She’s at the front door.Unbloodied.Untouched by bullets.She’s out.Running across the lawn.Alison feels her fingers sinking deep into her mind like jagged spears—but then she slips into the car, falling forward over Barney, and it’s like a big iron door slams down, cutting off Psyche’s invisible fingers.The symbols.It has to be the symbols.No time to think about that now.Psyche slams up against the glass as Alison locks the door.The madwoman begins punching the glass.First hit: nothing.Second hit: the glass of the driver side window spider-webs with a crunch.Alison turns the key, and the engine starts.She guns it forward.Clips another car’s bumper—whatever.She sobs and screams as she leaves Psyche in a cloud of exhaust.NO NO NO no you stupid woman no no no—Psyche stands in the middle of the street.The car speeds away, tires shrieking as it rounds a tight corner and then is gone.She reaches out with everything she has to find Alison’s mind, but the very sigils of protection she placed inside the car to keep the Driver from finding them work on her, too, when she’s out of the car.Her body is electric with anger, and with a deep and vibrant channel of potent self-loathing.Faces peer out of windows and doors open; Psyche plants her feet on the earth and screams to the heavens, and the faces snap backward, noses squirting blood.Doors slam on bodies and fingers.She needs her.Needs Alison.She’s a channel to her husband’s killer.And better—she’s the perfect instrument of revenge.To have the man murdered by his own wife would be exquisite—such an eloquent orchestration of justice.It must happen that way.It must.But now—sirens.Not that kind, but the human kind.The ‘authorities’ will be here, soon.And now that she’s outside of the house, one of the inhuman authorities will be here, soon, too.Psyche’s done so well at staying hidden, and now here she is—ripping off scabs and letting her mindsblood flow.The shark will have her scent.She’s lost everything.She hates herself.She goes inside the house to wait.And weep.And break mirrors.She could run.But what’s the point?Eventually they come.The police.In their crisp blue uniforms [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]