“Yes,” said X. “I will.”
Stan grabbed things from the counter and hurled them at X: spray cans, bottles, a brush, a hair dryer. X pushed him hard against the chair. He regarded Stan pityingly, as one would look at a child having a tantrum. When Stan had run out of projectiles, X pulled him out of the chair and dashed him to the floor.
Stan tried to scramble to his feet, but X raised his boot and brought it crashing down on his back. They remained motionless for a time. Then, breaking the silence, came a terrible new sound.
Stan was crying.
X had no pity.
“Has your courage fled so soon?” he said.
He took a step backward. Stan rolled onto his back, and cradled his enormous head in his hands, sobbing dismally. X loathed the man so much that the noise had no effect on him. It might have been the screeching of a scavenger bird.
Soon, Stan was listing the many reasons he did not deserve to die. X had heard such speeches from many men. (Banger was the only exception: he’d simply asked X if he’d be able to get cell service where they were going.) Stan moaned, lied, and made excuses for himself so vehemently that spittle flew from his lips. X only half-listened.
Finally, Stan quieted. X stood and removed both the purple shirt and the threadbare one beneath it.
“Oh, come on,” said Stan. “Again with the damn strip show?”
X stretched out his arms, and felt Stan’s sins gathering force within him. Images began to bloom on his back:
A car was stalled by the side of an unlit highway. An old man with a friendly, open face had pulled over to help, and was shuffling toward the car. He was wearing flip-flops, a pink Izod shirt, and khaki shorts. His legs were knobby and white as an uncooked chicken.
He rapped his knuckles on the driver’s window.
The driver was Stan.
He’d been lying in wait for a Good Samaritan. He thrust open his door, knocking the old man onto the road. The man looked up in confusion. He reached up a hand for help. Stan kicked him in the ribs.
The old man crawled into the highway to get away. Stan followed, laughing and kicking, until the man lay in the middle of the road, the double yellow lines under his back.
Cowering in the salon, Stan turned away from the images. He could not bear to watch.
X extended a palm toward a mirror, and the mirror jumped to life. The movie now played there, too. In an instant, it jumped to the next mirror and then the next and so on around the room, as if the mirrors were catching fire one by one.
X pulled Stan’s head up high and forced him to watch.
“I gave you your freedom on the lake,” he shouted. “I gave you your life! And this is what you squandered it on!”
In the movie, Stan was hooting with happiness as he slid into the old man’s car and peeled away.
His victim lay stranded in the middle of the highway. He tried crawling and rolling. He tried pulling himself across the blacktop with his fingernails. His flip-flops had fallen off and lay behind him in the road.
Now a truck could be heard coming around the curve. Its headlights were high. Its brakes were screaming.
Not even X could watch the rest.
He clenched his fist, and the movie vanished. Outside the salon, he heard police sirens, howling like cats. They were half a mile away and growing louder.
X looked at Stan with a glimmer of compassion. It was then that Stan knew he was truly about to die. He was so scared he could barely bleat out a word.
“Now?” he said.
“Now,” said X.
“Don’t you gotta take me back to that lake?” said Stan.
“No,” said X. “We can reach our destination from anywhere. We can reach it from here.”
X dressed slowly. When he had finished, he closed his eyes for a moment and the room instantly went dark.
“Why’d you turn out the lights?” said Stan.
He was stalling.
“Respect for the dead,” said X. When Stan gave him a puzzled look, he added simply, “You.”
He picked up Stan. He threw him over his shoulder.
He turned to the great round mirror at Marianna’s station.
“Will it—will it hurt?” said Stan.
“Only forever,” said X.
He leaped at the mirror. The glass exploded as he and Stan passed through it. The shards, rather than raining onto the floor, were pulled in after them. X left the shell of Stan’s body behind—a worn and ugly casing for the police to find—as he pulled his soul down into the dark.
ten