“Just paying the lady a compliment,” the guy replied. He looked confident, which Mal hated. Especially because Mal remembered being that confident once.
“I’m the lady’s husband,” Mal said. “Now go run off to your board meeting.”
The guy puffed his chest out. “Or what?”
“Or I’ll beat the shit out of you, then make you lick it up.”
Doubt flashed across the man’s face. He muttered, “Asshole,” then turned and walked off.
Deb looked irritated. “Where did all that testosterone come from?”
“The guy was hitting on you, Deb.”
“He said it was really brave of me to take my jogging pants off like I did.”
Mal rolled his eyes. “He said that because you have a nice ass. Think he would have said that to some fat guy with artificial legs?”
“Can’t I be brave and have a nice ass? You know, Mal, I feel like a freak often enough. Some guy innocently flirting makes me feel normal. He wasn’t a threat to you.”
Mal wanted to turn away. But if he did, it would prove she won and he was wrong. So he forced himself to maintain eye contact. “He saw you as an easy target, Deb.”
“I’m not easy. And I’m not a target.”
Mal switched tactics. “Deb, there are… guys… who have fetishes about…”
Deb’s eyes darkened. “So now he didn’t approach me because I had a nice ass. He came over because he’s an amputee pervert.”
“I’m just saying—”
“You’re acting like an asshole.”
Mal studied his shoes. He wanted to kneel down, help her put her snap-away pants back on, but he couldn’t align the snaps with one hand.
“Look,” he said, letting out a long breath. “I didn’t like that guy swaggering up to you.”
“Him? You swagger more than any guy I ever met.”
Maybe, once upon a time. But not lately.
He changed subjects. “Do you have the Xanax?”
“My purse.”
He sat next to her on the bench and pawed through her handbag. The medicine bottle had a child-proof cab on it, and after trying to pry it off with his teeth, he simply cradled it in his lap until Deb finished dressing. She reached over, held his hand.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I used to be fine flying. But now…”
“It’s okay to be afraid.”
He wanted to scream, to smash the pill bottle against the floor and stomp it to bits. Instead he clenched his teeth and whispered, “But I’m afraid of everything.”
“I know.”
“Including losing you.”
“I know.” Deb patted his hand. “And that’s not going to happen.”
“I’m sorry, Deb. You deserve better.”
“You’re all I need, Mal.”
She kissed his cheek. A kiss of pity, not love.
Mal felt his ears get hot. He endured the kiss without flinching away.
“Take a few, Mal. Zonk out on the plane.”
Mal nodded. But he wouldn’t. Deb couldn’t drive the rental car, which meant he had to, and alprazolam abuse and driving didn’t mix. So when Deb opened the bottle for him, Mal swallowed one, just to take the edge off, and then they shuffled into the terminal.
With an hour before boarding time, they stopped at the Burgh Sportz Bar in the Airmall. Deb had a chicken salad. Mal had a burger. When the food arrived it looked decent enough, but Mal’s stomach was sour and he picked at his French fries while watching Deb inhale her food. She’d talked him into coming to this stupid experiment, and even seemed optimistic about it. Bless her little heart, Deb considered this trip a hybrid of vacation and adventure.
Mal felt differently. He didn’t like confronting his fears in therapy, and he knew he’d abhor being purposely frightened. But the thing that bothered him most was being allowed to bring weapons.
What kind of government experiment allows the participants to be armed? What safeguards were in place to prevent someone from getting seriously hurt?
Mal had packed the gun in their check-in luggage, and both he and Deb had taken shooting lessons. But in fright’s grasp, Mal wouldn’t trust himself to hit a bus from a meter away. What if he fired wildly and hurt someone? What if he shot Deb? What kind of insane tests were going to be conducted on them that required firearms?
“Aren’t you hungry?”
He shook his head. Deb took that as an invitation to tear his burger in half and start munching. Mal stared at her, marveling at her resiliency. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her. How proud he was of her. She was two levels away from becoming a black belt. A double amputee, slowly becoming a karate master. Who could have ever guessed all she could accomplish? But instead of gushing his admiration, he thought of that CEO jerk hitting on her, and how she seemed to eat it up.
She’s going to figure out I’m a coward, and leave me.
Mal didn’t think he’d be able to handle that. But he was sure it was coming.
Someone bumped the back of Mal’s chair, and he turned to see a teenager standing next to the table. Chubby, almond-eyed, protruding tongue. Down Syndrome.
“What’s wrong with your hand?” the teen said, pointing at Mal’s prosthesis.
“I lost it. This one is made of rubber.”
“How did you lose it?”
A madman strapped me to a table and cut it off with a scalpel while I begged for him to stop.
“An accident,” Mal said. He looked at Deb, who was staring at the boy with wide eyes. While the teen was probably harmless, he was bringing up old memories. Bad memories.
“Where are your parents?” Mal asked, searching around for the child’s caretaker.
“You’re a freak,” the boy said.
Mal blinked. “What?”
“You’re a freak and you’re going to die.” He looked at Deb. “And so are you, lady.”
Mal began to stand up. “Look, kid—”
But the teenager stepped back and pointed, then began to yell, “FREAKS GONNA DIE! FREAKS GONNA DIE!”
Mal turned to his wife. Her face had lost all color, and she looked ready to throw up.
“FREAKS GONNA DIE!”
Again Mal looked for the boy’s father or mother, but instead he only saw people staring. Not only those in the restaurant, but passersby had also stopped to watch.
“FREAKS GONNA DIE!”
Finally an older woman came rushing over, tugging at the boy’s arm, saying “Calm down, Petey, calm down.” She offered Mal and Deb a quick, soulless I’m sorry, and then managed to pull her son away from their table as he continued to shout.
“FREAKS GONNA DIE!”
The woman tugged the child further into the terminal, until his voice melded in with the rest of the airport noise. In the restaurant, the clinking of silverware on plates resumed, and conversations picked up to levels prior to the interruption.
Mal, his whole body flushed and twitching, turned to his wife.
“You okay, babe?”
Deb’s face pinched, and then she vomited all over the table.
Solidarity, South Carolina
Forenzi
Dr. Emil Forenzi sat on the mattress—the one piece of furniture in his bedroom that wasn’t an antique—and squinted at the Bruno Magli loafers he’d just put on. There was a stain on the toe. He pulled it off and licked his thumb, rubbing off a reddish-brown streak.
Blood.
Forenzi couldn’t remember wearing the shoes in the lab area, and his mind wandered as to elsewhere he might have trod in bodily fluids. His revere was interrupted by a knock on the bedroom door.
“Enter,” he said, dropping the shoe next to the bed.
Sykes came in, holding a sheaf of papers. He silently presented them to Forenzi. It was reports on their guests.
Tom Mankowski, the cop, had just arrived at the airport. Excellent. He would make a sturdy test subject.