Down Time

Arc Patenaude's eyes opened and he stared hard into the light. The cold, black silhouettes of buildings on his left and right spun before him, seeming to move a few inches, only to suddenly return to their starting point and begin again. Rain glimmered down, the light broken into rainbow shards as it passed through the droplets - descending diamonds of water and light.

Had he made it?

Arc blinked. The light did not abate. It was a bright grey, like looking at clouds at midday, an unforgiving kind of glare that was uncomfortable, forced Arc to squint. He started remembering.

The Israeli woman in the blue satin robes certainly felt real. Arc remembered her warm body pressed against him, squirming, the sounds of shredding cloth, rip and rip. She was thin and young, with a tenderness that, to an evil man, would cry out for violation. That much was real.

So were the drugs, and the bulldozer of a migraine reminded Arc that he'd taken some. Bodily functions took over. A warm fluid traced itself across Arc's hip. He was urinating. Arc lifted his right hand and made sure it was functioning. The hard light filtered between his fingers and broke away. Arc was suffused in wet darkness as the light tore apart and the helicopter shining it sped off - probably to shoot many, many bullets at a much more deserving target than Arc Patenaude.

No.

Arc rolled over to his left, and his face submerged in a pool of water and oil. Or maybe gasoline. There was the dry smell of unburnt matches; swirls of unctuous liquid oozed past his eyes. The water was clear, but the oil was cloudy, drifting through his line of sight, hazy, twisting, like smoke. The smoke came with sulphur, fire, and a darkness. He felt something hard against his body. There was the tarmac - he knew that - but there was something else. He kept peering into the swirling, smoky oil. The room was dimly lit, almost no light. Something was burning, like incense or candles. Whatever light source was in the room was well hidden, well shrouded. He had to practically push the darkness aside. Sheets of fine cloth caught his face and pulled at his black hair. Frustration tugged at the back of Arc's neck. It began yanking as he stumbled over a footstool piled high with tomes. The clatter of books sent vibrations through the walls and floors of the room. Somewhere in the place, a bird squa wked, aroused by the crash of books. Arc inhaled rapidly. The air was clearer down here by the floor. Smoke rises. There was a lot of smoke in this place. Arc pushed himself up.

Eye adjustment: Arc rolled over onto his right side. His arm was stretched before him, his hand grasping a phantasmal gun, his index finger caressing the hair trigger, his palm comfortable in the crosshatched grip, his thumb snugly placed in the curvature just below the hammer, his other fingers gently but securely molded into the ridges of the handle, their tips gingerly stroking the crosshatching. The barrel reflected a purple neon light from across the street. He tucked the gun into his jacket. No cops would be around there for another few hours. The buildings beckoned silently except for the buzz of the neon lights that set the street ablaze, blinking off and on, selling everything from pens to flesh. The surface was wet - with what he couldn’t tell. Rain, oil, blood; in this place it mattered not. A broker dressed in Gucci stepped out of a brothel and lit a cigarette. He looked extra white underneath the ice blue and silver glow of the brothel’s sign. The brothel employed black whores. Arc kept wait ing for Gucci Man to explode in a cloud of flame from all the pollutants there must be in the air. Arc shook his head.