adjectives. One of them opting instead for bluntness: FIREFLY
BROTHERS KILLED. The simplicity was an anvil dropping on her heart, pushing the
breath from her body, doubling her over.
She didn’t remember whether she had paid for her copies or justwalked off with them. She didn’t remember how
she’d made it back to her room, but here she was. The wind picked up and
rainwater darkened the pages. She lifted them to keep the ink from bleeding, to
keep it from seeping into whatever mundane nonsense was printed on the back, to
keep these worlds distinct. Even as the world was collapsing upon itself. Even
as she was having trouble breathing. Another drink will help. Who needs a
glass. Who needs something to mix it with. It’s supposed to hurt on the
way down.
On the running boards, it had occurred to her that she was the only one
smiling.
What a beautiful day! Red and yellow leaves danced in the air before her,
cartwheeling on their descent, some of them even brushing against her face as
the Buick careened through the woods east of that small Indiana town. Early
autumn and calm, no wind that morning, but as the car sped along, her hair was
horizontal, the tips snapping at the face of the poor sap behind her. She
reveled in the way the day felt against her face, the way life felt against her
face, as she rushed past it, looking for what lay beyond.
This had all been very unplanned, of course. One does not plan to be a hostage
in a bank robbery. It would have felt like a dream, but in a dream you
can’t feel pain, and her fingers did hurt; it was hardly easy to
hold on to the side of the Buick like this, as it sped along at God only knew
how many miles per hour. But my word this was fun.
The man across from her vomited on the roof of the Buick. That was unfortunate.
There were four of them, a man and a woman on each side, positioned there by
the bank robbers as a human shield. And they did their job well—the
police hadn’t fired a single shot. Darcy was in front on the passenger
side, and she wished she could have bent down to peer inside. She wanted
another glimpse of the gang leader, the man in that fabulous suit, the man who
had winked at her so absurdly that she had laughed. Laughed out loud, her voice
echoing off the marble walls of the very, very silent bank. She had been
sitting with one of the clerks, arranging to pick up some money she’d
wired from her hometown bank inChicago to sustain an
extended visit at the home of her cousins here in the country, when the gang
leader had entered with his suit and his large gun. After informing everyone of
the rules and procedures, he had passed the teller stalls and was maneuvering
through the various desks and chairs in search of the bank president, who was
cowering behind a desk.
After she’d laughed at the leader’s wink, he had smiled a bit,
bemused. He hadn’t expected that response. But then he had walked past
her, toward the bank president. As she watched him move, she caught sight of
the clerk sitting opposite her, who silently moved his mouth to ask her, quite
accusingly, if she was crazy.
Yes, she wanted to answer, minutes later, as October recklessly flew through
her hair. Clearly. The faces of the other three hostages were all white, their
jaws as clenched as their knuckles on the roof rails, and one woman prayed, not
loudly enough for Darcy to hear distinct words over the engines and the sirens
and the dirt road crunching beneath the tires, but the pleading tone was still
recognizable.
She had never been one to scare easily. Though her twenty years on this earth
had been financially comfortable, her life story had contained enough ominous
chapters and dangerous cliffhangers for her to be rather unfazed by the
introduction of new threats. She had learned about the suddenness of death at a
tender age, and had learned that she could survive great
damage—self-inflicted and otherwise—with her sense of humor intact,
though it was a bit darker than it used to be.
BROTHERS KILLED. The simplicity was an anvil dropping on her heart, pushing the
breath from her body, doubling her over.
She didn’t remember whether she had paid for her copies or justwalked off with them. She didn’t remember how
she’d made it back to her room, but here she was. The wind picked up and
rainwater darkened the pages. She lifted them to keep the ink from bleeding, to
keep it from seeping into whatever mundane nonsense was printed on the back, to
keep these worlds distinct. Even as the world was collapsing upon itself. Even
as she was having trouble breathing. Another drink will help. Who needs a
glass. Who needs something to mix it with. It’s supposed to hurt on the
way down.
On the running boards, it had occurred to her that she was the only one
smiling.
What a beautiful day! Red and yellow leaves danced in the air before her,
cartwheeling on their descent, some of them even brushing against her face as
the Buick careened through the woods east of that small Indiana town. Early
autumn and calm, no wind that morning, but as the car sped along, her hair was
horizontal, the tips snapping at the face of the poor sap behind her. She
reveled in the way the day felt against her face, the way life felt against her
face, as she rushed past it, looking for what lay beyond.
This had all been very unplanned, of course. One does not plan to be a hostage
in a bank robbery. It would have felt like a dream, but in a dream you
can’t feel pain, and her fingers did hurt; it was hardly easy to
hold on to the side of the Buick like this, as it sped along at God only knew
how many miles per hour. But my word this was fun.
The man across from her vomited on the roof of the Buick. That was unfortunate.
There were four of them, a man and a woman on each side, positioned there by
the bank robbers as a human shield. And they did their job well—the
police hadn’t fired a single shot. Darcy was in front on the passenger
side, and she wished she could have bent down to peer inside. She wanted
another glimpse of the gang leader, the man in that fabulous suit, the man who
had winked at her so absurdly that she had laughed. Laughed out loud, her voice
echoing off the marble walls of the very, very silent bank. She had been
sitting with one of the clerks, arranging to pick up some money she’d
wired from her hometown bank inChicago to sustain an
extended visit at the home of her cousins here in the country, when the gang
leader had entered with his suit and his large gun. After informing everyone of
the rules and procedures, he had passed the teller stalls and was maneuvering
through the various desks and chairs in search of the bank president, who was
cowering behind a desk.
After she’d laughed at the leader’s wink, he had smiled a bit,
bemused. He hadn’t expected that response. But then he had walked past
her, toward the bank president. As she watched him move, she caught sight of
the clerk sitting opposite her, who silently moved his mouth to ask her, quite
accusingly, if she was crazy.
Yes, she wanted to answer, minutes later, as October recklessly flew through
her hair. Clearly. The faces of the other three hostages were all white, their
jaws as clenched as their knuckles on the roof rails, and one woman prayed, not
loudly enough for Darcy to hear distinct words over the engines and the sirens
and the dirt road crunching beneath the tires, but the pleading tone was still
recognizable.
She had never been one to scare easily. Though her twenty years on this earth
had been financially comfortable, her life story had contained enough ominous
chapters and dangerous cliffhangers for her to be rather unfazed by the
introduction of new threats. She had learned about the suddenness of death at a
tender age, and had learned that she could survive great
damage—self-inflicted and otherwise—with her sense of humor intact,
though it was a bit darker than it used to be.
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