Free Heretics by Greg F. Gifune Page A

bend in the road.
          “I wonder sometimes,” Harry said.  “I wonder if it’s all real.”
          “Let me tell you something.”  Rip laid back, stretched his legs out.  “Sometimes people go off in their minds, you know what I mean?  It’s like…like when my old man’s on the fucking rampage.  I learned a long time ago to just go someplace else in my mind.  So when he’s screaming and pounding on me it’s like—like I ain’t even there while he’s doing it.  I’m gone.  Just gone to a place in my head where nobody can find me.  But it’s just my imagination, dude.  It ain’t for real.  It’s all in my head.  Just a thing your mind does to help you out, like a kind of escape.  It’s the same with Madeline, it’s just dreaming.”  His dark eyes reflected moonlight.  “But I know this much: like you said, some fucked up shit must be going on, ‘cause you don’t escape that deep unless the real world is so harsh you can’t deal with it no more.”
          “What if it’s only innocent daydreams, Rip?  What if nothing that bad is happening to her but she’s just an eccentric girl who needs to dream about other places that aren’t really there?  What if that’s all it is?”
          “Is that what you think?  You just got through telling me bad things were going on in that house.”  He shook his head as if hoping to dislodge annoying thoughts.  “It’s in the air, dude.  I can feel it.  It’s like when I was in juvenile last time.  Some nights bad shit goes down.  Nobody says nothing but you know it’s coming, you feel it.  Something’s gonna happen.  Something bad.  It gets all quiet—the only time that happens in there—real still, like now.”
          “The calm before the storm.”
          “Yeah.  Well I got that same kind of feeling tonight.”
          “Me too,” Harry said.  “Maybe we should forget about it and just hang here.”
          “You afraid?”
          “Aren’t you?”
          “The Ripper Man’s not afraid of nothing.”
          “Jesus, man, swing by an English class now and then, will you?”
          They sat on the roof laughing quietly so as not to awaken the rest of the house, and for a few minutes all was right with the world.
          In time, the moment passed.  
          “Seriously,” Harry said, “maybe we shouldn’t go.”
          Without answering, Rip checked his watch then crept across the slope and onto a flat shelf of roof closer to the ground.  He swung his legs over the gutter and dropped away into darkness, a muffled thud breaking the silence a second later.  Harry sighed but followed, careful to move quietly along the shingles before rolling off the edge to the ground below.
          They pulled Rip’s motorcycle from where he had parked it behind the house and wheeled it along the driveway and across the street.  The night winds increased the closer they got to the water but they continued on without speaking until they had put enough distance between themselves and Harry’s house to start the engine without waking anyone.
          “Rip, maybe we—”
          “Hold on tight and keep your face low.”  Rip tossed him the only helmet.  “It’s gonna be cold as a bitch riding tonight.”
          “Rip,” Harry said again, “maybe we shouldn’t go.”
          “Fuck it.”  He straddled the bike and looked back over his shoulder at him, smiling his mischievous, shark-like grin.  “Let’s go see what we can see.”

9

    A single shaft of bright sunshine spilled through the only window, splitting the small room in two.  Harry watched dust motes dance in the beam, ignored a strong desire to smoke a cigarette and instead wiped a trickle of sweat from the corner of his eye.  The walls had begun to perspire too, but with blood.  It ran slowly to the baseboards, leaving behind streaks and stains of watery crimson, the only wall unaffected the one