CHAPTER 35
Matt went up to his apartment the traditional way: through the lobby, up the elevator, down the hall, through the door. Rain dripped down the back of his neck, and he scowled as he pulled off his clothes and got into the shower.
He tried to let his mind wander. It worked after a fashion. The water beat across the bruises on his chest and side and made him catch his breath, but soon he began to grow numb under the near-scalding spray. He mentally ticked off everything that had happened in the last few days—finding Simon in the park, the chase, the fruitless search for him, the discovery of the little girl, Diedra’s discovery of him, the visit to Glory at the home. He couldn’t remember when so many things had happened to him so fast.
He dried off carefully and dabbed gingerly at the bruises, which were rapidly turning a sicker shade of yellow around the edges. Dressing in a loose T-shirt and running shorts, Matt padded into the kitchen on bare feet. His stomach growled. When had he last eaten?
His mind was still on automatic as he prepared a breakfast-type meal of scrambled eggs, meatless bacon, and toast with honey. Diedra knew who he was now. At this moment, in his apartment cooking breakfast, he could pretend that everything would continue as it had before—but he knew it couldn’t.
Well...maybe it could.
He could take Diedra out of the picture.
The thought came to him unwanted, dark and ugly. With her gone, he could clean up his act, take more precautions than before, make sure he never repeated his mistakes. All it would take was one bullet. Not even that. He knew countless different ways to kill with his hands, most of them precise and fast.
Suddenly dizzy, Matt braced himself against the counter with one hand, sick to his stomach. He washed his hands in the sink, and his face, and his hands again. “No way,” he said clearly. “Jesus. No way. She knows. And that’s fine.”
A few minutes later, after his stomach had settled down, Matt carried his loaded plate and a glass of orange juice to the couch, set them both down on the coffee table, and picked up the TV remote. Without cable he only received one station clearly, but he wasn’t really interested in watching the programs; he just wanted background noise. So he turned on Channel 46 and was rewarded with the opening credits of what appeared to be a special prime-time edition of the Good Morning Sheree show. He stared at the floor as he ate, the TV buzzing in the background. He’d read about Good Morning Sheree once or twice before. It sounded more or less brainless.
On the TV, applause from a studio audience gradually ended, and Matt glanced up just as a breathtaking redhead filled the screen. He chewed slowly and watched her with narrowed eyes, his mind elsewhere. On a lower corner of the screen was the word LIVE, flashing slowly.
“Few sensations have gripped America in quite the way the topic of tonight’s show has,” Sheree said perfectly.
Maybe the whole thing was a bad idea, Matt thought. He tapped his plate absently with a piece of fake bacon. Grown men don’t do what I’m doing. When they have problems they deal with them, either alone or with someone else’s help, but they deal with them. They don’t do what I’m doing.
But then, other people can’t do what I’m doing. I’m a special case. That’s why all this got started - because I can do this stuff.
He shook his head and closed his eyes...and then snapped them open again, all his attention on the TV and Sheree Baker’s voice.
“In just over one week, the mysterious character known as the Redeemer has captured the hearts and minds of people all across the nation. He appears from out of nowhere, dishes out a particularly brutal brand of justice, and vanishes again. More than a dozen people have come forward with stories of how the Redeemer has helped them, claiming that he’s come to their rescue as they were about to be victimized by criminals. But our guests today have a different take on what the Redeemer is all about.”
The cameras cut to focus on a couple in their late forties, seated uncomfortably in two chairs, on one of the set’s raised platforms. They both wore clothes appropriate for Sunday morning worship services, and both had tightly pinched faces. The man was fat, his belly spilling over the belt of his trousers, while the woman was reed-thin, approaching skeletal. Matt couldn’t picture either of them smiling. A caption appeared on the screen below them: TOM & AMANDA PITTMAN. Below the names, in smaller letters: Son was shot and hospitalized after imitating the Redeemer.
Matt’s throat turned dry as sand. He dropped his fork on the plate and forgot about it.
“Say hello to our guests, Tom and Amanda Pittman. In a widely publicized case, their son Nathan left the house a few nights ago, put on a mask, and tried to stop a robbery at a convenience store. In the process Nathan was shot, and is now in serious condition at Gavring Medical. Tom, Amanda, how are you doing?”
Matt thought his eggs would come back up, and he forced himself to drink a sip of orange juice. His entire world had narrowed to the TV screen.
Amanda Pittman nodded bravely. “We’re still here, Sheree. We’re holding on.”
Sheree nodded sympathetically, plastically. “And how is Nathan?”
“There’s been no improvement,” Tom Pittman said. His voice was gravelly and phlegm-filled. “The doctors haven’t said anything about him getting better anytime soon.”
“Tom, Amanda, I can only try to understand the pain you’re both going through, and I extend my deepest sympathies. Now, I understand you’ve decided to take action based on what happened to your son?”
“We have, yes,” Amanda Pittman said. “We’re going to do something about that worthless, spineless vigilante that made our Nathan go out and do what he did.”
“And you’re talking about the Redeemer?”
“Yes we are,” Tom Pittman growled. “Nathan wouldn’t ever’ve got those stupid ideas in his head if not for that low-life. So we’ve got a lawyer, and as soon as the police catch him, we’re going to make that Redeemer pay for what he’s done.” Pittman filled the name with venom.
“So, just so there’s no confusion here,” Sheree said, sounding as though she barely understood it herself, “what you’re going to do is file a lawsuit against the Redeemer. Someone whose identity is unknown.”
“It’ll be known soon enough,” Amanda Pittman chirped. She looked and sounded like an old, desiccated bird. “When the police catch that bastard and pull off his mask, we’ll have a lawsuit waiting for him so huge it’ll make sure he never causes any more harm to any other innocent young people.” She sounded coached; she said the words as if she were reciting them, but Matt didn’t notice.
He stood up from the couch, boiling inside. Captured the hearts and minds of the nation? He cursed himself for not keeping up with the news. And this kid, getting shot playing hero? How could he not have known about that?
Matt dumped his mostly uneaten meal down the garbage disposal as the Pittmans further described their hatred for him and their desire to see him brought to justice for the injury done to their son. His hands trembling, he stood behind the couch and watched as members of the audience voiced their own opinions about him and how he should be dealt with. Some disagreed with the Pittmans, but a lot of the audience were middle-class, morally upstanding parents, and they seemed to agree wholeheartedly.
Matt clicked off the TV and violently hurled the remote the length of the apartment. It sailed through the door to his bedroom and punched a small triangular dent in the wall over his work table. He hurriedly dressed in street clothes, grabbed his gray raincoat from his bedroom closet, and headed downstairs to buy a paper.
AUTHOR’S NOTES FOLLOW IN THE COMMENTS SECTION.
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1 comments:
The whole "my kid did a bad thing because some celebrity made him do it" idea never held an ounce of water with me...and I sort of wonder if that doesn't come through a little too pointedly in this scene, what with the Pittmans being a little cartoonish and over-the-top loathesome. I might end up re-working this in some fashion, since it bothers me a tiny little bit, but at present i have no idea what I'd do to change it.
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