No Dominion The Walker Papers - By CE Murphy Page 0,73

folks wouldn’t reckon on being real, ain’t that right?”

Annie smiled like I was bringing up the good times. “I suppose we have, at that. I hadn’t thought about most of it in a long time. It seems like another life.” Her eyes got dark, like she was rememberin’ that pretty soon it would be another life.

I held her hands again, trying not to crush ‘em. “Your Pop wasn’t crazy, Annie. I was there the day that car almost hit you. Somebody did knock you outta the way. His name’s…well, I call him Horns, ‘cause his name’s a mouthful, but the way I see it, sweetheart, that’s where it all started.”

“You were there—” Annie wet her lips, then closed her eyes a minute. I could see her trying not to dismiss what I was saying outta hand, trying not to think I was crazy. After a bit, she said, “Let’s get my prescriptions and go home. We can discuss it there.”

She was quiet in the car, an’ I did my best to keep my mouth shut. Once we got home she had a look around like she’d never seen the place before. Committing it to memory, even if she was the one gonna leave. Then finally she came to sit, an’ said, real mild-like, “You were there. And you never thought to mentioned that before now?”

“Darlin, I didn’t…remember.” I sighed and sat too, rubbing my hands over my face. “You know how you an’ me, we remember different things happening at the same events? It’s like that’s happening inside my own head. There’re things it’s like I’m remembering twice, and one of those memories is seeing you by the roadside, an’ Horns comin’ down to tackle you outta the way.”

“Who is Horns?”

I recognized the voice she was using, and looked up with a little grin. “No going all Nurse Annie on me now, sweetheart. Will you trust me if I say it don’t matter who he is? That what matters is me knowing that day wasn’t an accident, an’ that your Pop wasn’t going crazy? He did see a guy on a silver horse come outta nowhere and knock you aside, an’ I can tell you that the reason it happened, the reason any of this is happening, is because of the girl in that painting he did there at the end. Joanne. Joanne Walker. She’s a friend of mine, darling, or she will be, and she’s got magic like you wouldn’t believe.”

“She will be?”

There wasn’t no Nurse Annie in her voice anymore. It was just my girl sounding strained and about to break. I shut myself up and hugged her against me, wishing I’d known to shut up earlier. “Some of the things your pop saw were flashes of the future, huh? I got something like that going on right now too.”

Her silence said more than words, but after a minute she filled it with the words, too, soft an’ scared: “Do you know what’s going to happen to me?”

“Yeah,” I said, and for the first time in my life, deliberately lied to the woman I loved. “You’re gonna be fine, sweetheart. This stupid thing is just gonna turn out to be another scare, like all the other crap that’s almost gotten us through the years. An’ that’s what it is, Annie.” I wasn’t lying, now, and that helped sell the part that was a lie. “It ain’t sickness, not the way the doctors can recognize. I guess we always knew there were monsters out there. This one’s just comin’ at you the best way it knows how.”

“We’ve met monsters,” Annie whispered. “They’re not subtle, Gary. Why is this one? Hiding itself in sickness instead of fighting red in tooth and claw?”

“Ain’t the first time it’s tried sickness against you, sweetheart.”

“Maybe not, but even the fever was carried by a monster. We saw it. We fought it. How can this have come from nowhere?”

I sat up straighter, still holding her but with my heart pickin’ up speed. “I reckon it couldn’t have. This things come on fast, sweetheart. Who’s new in your life the last couple months?”

“For Heaven’s sake, Garrison Muldoon,” she said, prim as a school teacher, “you sound like you’re asking if I’m having an affair. There was a new optometrist for my annual eye examination, two new booths at the farmers’ market, a new gardener for our yard and a new yoga teacher at the studio. And I’m sure I speak to a dozen or so strangers