“No, go right ahead. You’ve been sitting on your ass long enough. When are you going to give up the smokes, Billy? You know the doctor said they contributed to your little gut problem.”
“I’ve cut down to almost nothing,” Billy said, but with a telltale downward shift in his gaze. Dan could have found out just how much Billy had cut down—he probably wouldn’t even need to touch the guy in order to get that much info—but he didn’t. One day in the summer just past, he’d seen a kid wearing a t-shirt with an octagonal road sign printed on it. Instead of STOP, the sign said TMI. When Danny asked him what it meant, the kid had given him a sympathetic smile he probably reserved strictly for gentlemen of a fortyish persuasion. “Too much information,” he’d said. Dan thanked him, thinking: Story of my life, young fellow.
Everyone had secrets. This he had known from earliest childhood. Decent people deserved to keep theirs, and Billy Freeman was decency personified.
“Want to go for a coffee, Danno? You got time? Won’t take me ten minutes to put this bitch to bed.”
Dan touched the side of the engine lovingly. “Sure, but watch your mouth. This is no bitch, this is a la—”
That was when his head exploded.
2
When he came back to himself, he was sprawled on the bench where Billy had been smoking. Billy was sitting beside him, looking worried. Hell, looking scared half to death. He had his phone in one hand, with his finger poised over the buttons.
“Put it away,” Dan said. The words came out in a dusty croak. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I’m okay.”
“You sure? Jesus Christ, I thought you was havin a stroke. I thought it for sure.”
That’s what it felt like.
For the first time in years Dan thought of Dick Hallorann, the Overlook Hotel’s chef extraordinaire back in the day. Dick had known almost at once that Jack Torrance’s little boy shared his own talent. Dan wondered now if Dick might still be alive. Almost certainly not; he’d been pushing sixty back then.
“Who’s Tony?” Billy asked.
“Huh?”
“You said ‘Please, Tony, please.’ Who’s Tony?”
“A guy I used to know back in my drinking days.” As an improvisation it wasn’t much, but it was the first thing to come into his still-dazed mind. “A good friend.”
Billy looked at the lighted rectangle of his cell a few seconds longer, then slowly folded the phone and put it away. “You know, I don’t believe that for a minute. I think you had one of your flashes. Like on the day you found out about my . . .” He tapped his stomach.
“Well . . .”
Billy raised a hand. “Say nummore. As long as you’re okay, that is. And as long as it isn’t somethin bad about me. Because I’d want to know if it was. I don’t s’pose that’s true of everyone, but it is with me.”
“Nothing about you.” Dan stood up and was pleased to discover his legs held him just fine. “But I’m going to take a raincheck on that coffee, if you don’t mind.”
“Not a bit. You need to go back to your place and lie down. You’re still pale. Whatever it was, it hit you hard.” Billy glanced at the Riv. “Glad it didn’t happen while you were up there in the peak-seat, rolling along at forty.”
“Tell me about it,” Dan said.
3
He crossed Cranmore Avenue to the Rivington House side, meaning to take Billy’s advice and lie down, but instead of turning in at the gate giving on the big old Victorian’s flower-bordered walk, he decided to stroll a little while. He was getting his wind back now—getting himself back—and the night air was sweet. Besides, he needed to consider what had just happened, and very carefully.
Whatever it was, it hit you hard.
That made him think again of Dick Hallorann, and of all the things he had never told Casey Kingsley. Nor would he. The harm he had done to Deenie—and to her son, he supposed, simply by doing nothing—was lodged deep inside, like an impacted wisdom tooth, and there it would stay. But at five, Danny Torrance had been the one harmed—along with his mother, of course—and his father had not been the only culprit. About that Dick had done something. If not, Dan and his mother would have died in the Overlook. Those old things were still painful to think about, still bright with the childish primary colors of fear and horror. He would have preferred never to think of them again, but now he had to. Because . . . well . . .
Because everything that goes around comes around. Maybe it’s luck or maybe it’s fate, but either way, it comes back around. What was it Dick said that day he gave me the lockbox? When the pupil is ready, the teacher will appear. Not that I’m equipped to teach anyone anything, except maybe that if you don’t take a drink, you won’t get drunk.
He’d reached the end of the block; now he turned around and headed back. He had the sidewalk entirely to himself. It was eerie how fast Frazier emptied out once the summer was over, and that made him think of the way the Overlook had emptied out. How quickly the little Torrance family had had the place entirely to themselves.
Except for the ghosts, of course. They never left.