The darkness of the night rests on my shoulders like an old blanket, comforting and welcomed. My mind is reeling with emotions and thoughts... cluttering my perceptions of the street I'm supposed to be watching. Thoughts of the lasts weeks research, thoughts of the girl who came to my office and tossed my world into a spinning process of change, thoughts of this man I'm hunting like a starving wolf scenting a wounded deer... But this man is no wounded deer, but the lion loose in my wolf's forest.
The sudden blast of a taxi's horn brings me back into this form of reality. I need to keep my mind from wondering into its own mazes and fantasies and keep my head in the deadly game I have willingly joined. To many people out tonight, its making me feel suffocated and trapped. The press of humanity around me starts my ohh-to conscious mind into doubting that I'll find this man, this "William Bethel" or "Billy B" to some.
It was about two weeks ago when I was drowning in vodka and tonic at my favorite dive bar... I was about at the end of my cathartic swimming experience when she walked into the bar. She was only five foot tall wearing heels, but her presence along filled many a mans vision. She moved across the floor, a shadow in motion and talked in low tones to the bartender.
And like the bastard of a patulous bitch he is, he points at me.
She come over to me booth gliding on confidence and sits, uninvited across from me. "I hear you can find people." she states with-out even the normality of introduction. "I used to, but now I just find the bottom of bottles and past due bills." She reaches into her clutch and pulls out a manila envelope which she passes over to me. "The information you need and a third of your pay is in there. You'll get the other third when we meet and the rest after you find my husband."
She stands and leaves the bar, like dream that follows you into your waking hours. I can feel the weight of her words pressing on my hands as I reach for what she left.
I wait a few days to call her. She says to meet her at a small Chinese place to get my directions. As almost a whispered thought I seem to pour through the day until our meeting time. I arrive early, but she is already there. Sitting in a corner booth eating noodles and drinking tea, this woman seems to still stand out like a blooming red rose in a snowy field.
I sit at her booth and her eyes fall on me. Her eyes put the jade statues to shame and cause my cold heart, and other things, to stir. She doesn't say a word. She pushes another envelope to me, stands and walks out of the restaurant. I order myself some Saki and rice before opening the sealed parcel.
Inside the folder was another third of the cash, a brief bio of "Billy B" and some photographs of this man I am to hunt. It all seems kosher until I read the words on the last grainy picture.
Dead or alive. I just want him found.
A week passes and I have tracked this lion through the streets of this dirty town. Billy is as illusive as shadow across dark water, but I know things about him that only a loving wife should know.
That brings me back to the street I stand on now... I wait for him this night... tonight it will be done. I light another cigarette and feel the acrid smoke fill my blackened lungs, just another vice for a sinner like me. My plans for Billy B are a greater sin than damaging my body, but it's a sin I have confessed before and it won't be my last before I am judged at the gates.
My unconscious mind reels as he passes through my peripheral vision. He walks across the street with the confidence of a man who owns the world. His clothing is immaculate and his long, dark hair is pulled back into a quay at the base of his neck. I start off to begin my pursuit, to walk the march of a black heart.
He stops at a street vender, buys a coffee and starts on his way further into the pulse of the city. Good I think, go deeper into town where the traffic grinds and the bar's rowdy music will cover over the sound of death that flies as lead from my hand.
I catch up to him and place my hand on the cold tool in my coat pocket, I am only inches from his mortality when, with a voice that could stop the rain, "I am not the easiest prey in the town 'eh detective?" He turns and judges me with eyes sharper than the steel in my grip. I start to shake and doubt my own being as he just winks and bolts down a side alley. As I run a thought looms in my head...
Who is the hunter and whom the prey.
I make chase after the lion and he leads me through the labyrinthine alley ways and back roads that I had never seen. He stops at the mouth of another dank alley and turns to look me in the eye. My heart stops and my mechanical body takes over. My pistol jumps to my hand and my finger is drawing the hammer as he steps out of view into a doorway in the backside of a brownstone.
Fuck, I hesitated and lost my chance. My first thought is to stop... take the money that demon woman gave me and move back to Indiana. But my heart wins over my mind. Billy b saw me and in his eyes I saw death. One of us must die tonight and unless I forge on, my judgment will come well before I am ready. I run to the building he went in and go to throw open this passage, but something is queer.
This door is perfectly clean and almost glowing. It has to be the only thing pure of filth and grim for a New York mile. I put my hand on the silver grip and as I swing the door open I hear Billy B... the lion... my hunter... laugh. The only thing I see is light, pure unfiltered light... It must be heaven. He has won.
I sit up in my bed, cotton filling my brain. It's about 6:45 and my alarm has been blaring for at least 20 minutes. Another fucked up dream makes me late to class. I am in such a rush that pulp dream is forgotten and I don't even notice the smell of smoke or the gun-oil on my hand.
null
The sudden blast of a taxi's horn brings me back into this form of reality. I need to keep my mind from wondering into its own mazes and fantasies and keep my head in the deadly game I have willingly joined. To many people out tonight, its making me feel suffocated and trapped. The press of humanity around me starts my ohh-to conscious mind into doubting that I'll find this man, this "William Bethel" or "Billy B" to some.
It was about two weeks ago when I was drowning in vodka and tonic at my favorite dive bar... I was about at the end of my cathartic swimming experience when she walked into the bar. She was only five foot tall wearing heels, but her presence along filled many a mans vision. She moved across the floor, a shadow in motion and talked in low tones to the bartender.
And like the bastard of a patulous bitch he is, he points at me.
She come over to me booth gliding on confidence and sits, uninvited across from me. "I hear you can find people." she states with-out even the normality of introduction. "I used to, but now I just find the bottom of bottles and past due bills." She reaches into her clutch and pulls out a manila envelope which she passes over to me. "The information you need and a third of your pay is in there. You'll get the other third when we meet and the rest after you find my husband."
She stands and leaves the bar, like dream that follows you into your waking hours. I can feel the weight of her words pressing on my hands as I reach for what she left.
I wait a few days to call her. She says to meet her at a small Chinese place to get my directions. As almost a whispered thought I seem to pour through the day until our meeting time. I arrive early, but she is already there. Sitting in a corner booth eating noodles and drinking tea, this woman seems to still stand out like a blooming red rose in a snowy field.
I sit at her booth and her eyes fall on me. Her eyes put the jade statues to shame and cause my cold heart, and other things, to stir. She doesn't say a word. She pushes another envelope to me, stands and walks out of the restaurant. I order myself some Saki and rice before opening the sealed parcel.
Inside the folder was another third of the cash, a brief bio of "Billy B" and some photographs of this man I am to hunt. It all seems kosher until I read the words on the last grainy picture.
Dead or alive. I just want him found.
A week passes and I have tracked this lion through the streets of this dirty town. Billy is as illusive as shadow across dark water, but I know things about him that only a loving wife should know.
That brings me back to the street I stand on now... I wait for him this night... tonight it will be done. I light another cigarette and feel the acrid smoke fill my blackened lungs, just another vice for a sinner like me. My plans for Billy B are a greater sin than damaging my body, but it's a sin I have confessed before and it won't be my last before I am judged at the gates.
My unconscious mind reels as he passes through my peripheral vision. He walks across the street with the confidence of a man who owns the world. His clothing is immaculate and his long, dark hair is pulled back into a quay at the base of his neck. I start off to begin my pursuit, to walk the march of a black heart.
He stops at a street vender, buys a coffee and starts on his way further into the pulse of the city. Good I think, go deeper into town where the traffic grinds and the bar's rowdy music will cover over the sound of death that flies as lead from my hand.
I catch up to him and place my hand on the cold tool in my coat pocket, I am only inches from his mortality when, with a voice that could stop the rain, "I am not the easiest prey in the town 'eh detective?" He turns and judges me with eyes sharper than the steel in my grip. I start to shake and doubt my own being as he just winks and bolts down a side alley. As I run a thought looms in my head...
Who is the hunter and whom the prey.
I make chase after the lion and he leads me through the labyrinthine alley ways and back roads that I had never seen. He stops at the mouth of another dank alley and turns to look me in the eye. My heart stops and my mechanical body takes over. My pistol jumps to my hand and my finger is drawing the hammer as he steps out of view into a doorway in the backside of a brownstone.
Fuck, I hesitated and lost my chance. My first thought is to stop... take the money that demon woman gave me and move back to Indiana. But my heart wins over my mind. Billy b saw me and in his eyes I saw death. One of us must die tonight and unless I forge on, my judgment will come well before I am ready. I run to the building he went in and go to throw open this passage, but something is queer.
This door is perfectly clean and almost glowing. It has to be the only thing pure of filth and grim for a New York mile. I put my hand on the silver grip and as I swing the door open I hear Billy B... the lion... my hunter... laugh. The only thing I see is light, pure unfiltered light... It must be heaven. He has won.
I sit up in my bed, cotton filling my brain. It's about 6:45 and my alarm has been blaring for at least 20 minutes. Another fucked up dream makes me late to class. I am in such a rush that pulp dream is forgotten and I don't even notice the smell of smoke or the gun-oil on my hand.
null