"Mary Rosenblum - Afterimage" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rosenblum Mary)

MARY ROSENBLUM

AFTERIMAGE

I'm walking down the street, and I'm wet. Rain is running down my face, and my
T-shirt is sticking to me. Even my underwear is wet, and I think stupid-- you're
gonna get there looking like you drowned. And then I think...

. . .get where?

And I don't know. I don't know where I'm going and it's like a black hole inside
my skull. I stop -- forget the rain -- because I'm scared. Because it's like the
old days, only then I used to let the blackness in with a needle.

I didn't do a shot. I mean, I think about it sometimes, you know? Like when you
wake up and you figure there's got to be a reason you're alive, but no matter
how hard you try, you can't come up with one? Nothing that really matters
anyway. I think about it then. Yeah. But I didn't do one.

Daniel would kill me.

I recognize the sub shop on the corner, and I know where I am anyway. I'm either
on my way to Daniel's place, or to see Hammer and Keri. At the corner, my feet
take me left, away from the river, toward Hammer's. And that tells you right
there that I'm not really sure I didn't do something. When I climb up the stairs
to Hammer's loft I have to pound on the door, because his bass is shaking the
whole building. Which doesn't matter because the building is empty, and Hammer's
only there because the owner likes the band and lets him live rent-free as the
official caretaker.

Dicey finally yanks the door open. "Hey, Ian," he says and backs off giggling.
He's got a half empty bottle of tequila in his hand, and he's making faces at
me. Which is normal for Dicey. He's nuts. Hammer only puts up with him 'cause he
does the drums like a slumming angel. Or the devil. "Hey, Hammer," I say.

Hammer's stroking these dark chords out of his bass, and he doesn't look up. The
notes make me shiver. There's an old lantern burning on the coffee table --
something Keri found in a junk store-- and that's all the light there is. Which
means the place is full of shadows and I think they're kind of moving with the
music. Hey, you can't not move when Hammer plays.

"So it's all a joke, huh?" Dicey flops down on the cushions that are about the
only furniture in the place. "Heaven, hell, all that stuff. It's all shit, huh?
You just keep on keepin' on." He sucks at his bottle again. "Jeeze, what a
joke."

"What's up?" I say to Hammer, ignoring him. Something's wrong. Weirdness is
crawling up and down my spine and I wonder what happened that I don't remember.
"Where's Keri?"