Free I Kill in Peace by Hunter Shea Page A

have the flu. I plopped my briefcase over my lap just in case the cute librarian walked by. The last thing I needed her to see was my erection while I was surrounded by open pages filled with nightmares.
    The fever heat worked its way outward until I thought I was going to spontaneously combust. Oddly enough, I wasn’t sweating. I kept wiping my forehead, expecting my hand to come away dripping.
    Setting the newspapers aside, I opened up my Facebook account without thinking why I’d check something so nonsensical when all of this insane shit was going down.
    The little Facebook message box that blinked on the bottom right of the screen gave me my answer.
    Even though I had no friends with the initials AO, there was his message, waiting. I enlarged the message box. The text bubble sprouted from AO’s image, which was a picture of a roaring flame.
    AO: I see you’re starting to come around.
    I typed: What the hell are you?
    I pushed my chair back from the computer. My briefcase slipped off my lap. The sound was like a thunderclap in the silent library.
    I had asked AO what it was instead of who . Why had I done that? Did a part of me know better? A what could be a tumor, the perfect alibi. A who, now that would be trouble. The tried and true mother’s lament, would you jump off a bridge if Jimmy told you to? , could not excuse me from what I’d done.
    AO: Do you want to tamp out the fire?
    I typed: You know I do, so why ask?
    It felt as if my flesh was going to melt from my bones. In another minute, I’d start stripping and the cops would be called to haul me away. Not that they had time to waste with a nude man in a library. What other horrors were being committed behind closed doors right now?
    What horror could I be doing, right now? Just thinking about it dialed up the heat. I thought I smelled roasting pork and wondered if it was me.
    AO : This is bigger than the others. You have to want it .
    I typed: Just tell me what it is. I’ll do it.
    AO: There’s no return from this point on.
    I typed: How the hell can I go back from what I’ve already done?
    There was a long, uncomfortable pause. I wiped some saliva from my mouth with the back of my hand. It stung like acid.
    AO: The Mustang is parked behind the library. There are two cases in the backseat. You need to use what’s inside each case.
    I read on as AO dictated my marching orders.
    It was awful. Unthinkable. For a moment, I thought I was going to pass out.
    As the sun peeked through the windows behind me, I caught my reflection in the monitor’s glare.
    Despite everything I was feeling, I was smiling.
    Smiling like the devil on a feast day.
    * * * * *
    I didn’t go back home to Candy or try to call her at the town’s last remaining pay phone. The Mustang ate the road like a man whose hunger strike had just ended. My hands should have been shaking, but they were steady on the wheel.
    I had two destinations today. The first was in Portland. The second would be in New Hampshire. I figured the round trip would take me four to five hours. I could be home just in time for dinner.
    If I had an appetite.
    The agonizing heat had subsided the moment I sat in the car, but it was still there, a humming undercurrent like the thrum of a nuclear reactor.
    At a light in Raymond, I leaned back and opened the two cases. The first one had my trusty scimitar. It should have been stained with crusty blood, but the blade shone like it was newly minted.
    The other case contained an Uzi along with a half dozen magazines.
    If I were a real man, I would take that Uzi, press it to the side of my head, and pull the trigger.
    If I were a real man . I wasn’t even sure what I was anymore. After this day, I wouldn’t qualify as the worst speck of humanity’s garbage.
    So why was I so willing to go ahead with it?
    It had to be more than just a Pavlovian aversion to the pain AO could inflict on me, right?
    I made it to Portland, lost