TOUCH | Part 3

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Sean studied the holes that the bullets had punctured into his chest. He guessed that one bullet had gone directly into his heart, and that the other two had lodged into the tissue just above his left ribcage. Whoever this woman Betty was, she was a good shot, and willing to kill without hesitation. It hadn’t made any difference.

The skin around the bullet holes pulsed and shuddered. Sean watched with curiosity as the muscles and organs strained against the bullets, pushing them back towards their entrance wounds. It took about fifteen seconds for the bullets to pop out of his chest and fall to the pavement. The wounds started to knit themselves together, leaving three round, baby-smooth patches of skin visible through the holes in his shirt.

Sean had never been shot before. He’d been stabbed, impaled, and partially crushed over the past few years. But this was a new experience.

The sound of ice crunching caused Sean to whip his head around, back to the semi-truck. Edwin stood there, leaning around the cab and staring. The flurries had died down enough for Sean to make out the trucker’s slack-jawed disbelief from thirty feet away.

“You okay?” Sean asked.

“Am I…” Edwin scratched his head. “I heard shots. I hid in the woods. I thought they…” Then he saw the bloodstained holes in Sean’s shirt.

“Yeah,” Sean said. “They shot me. Where’s your GPS?”

“My…” Edwin’s mouth struggled to form words, but he removed his phone from his pocket and tapped at the screen with shivering fingers.

“Go back to the truck,” Sean said. “I’ll tell the police – the real police – to come pick you up. I need to find that trailer. Give me your phone.”

Edwin shook his head. “I’m going with you.”

“The storm—”

“The storm is breaking,” Edwin interrupted. Sean couldn’t make out an accent in the man’s voice, Midwestern or otherwise. “I need to get to the trailer before they do.”

Sean considered it for a moment. “Fine,” he said. “Lead the way.”

Edwin trudged up the shallow slope back to the road, heading in the direction Sean’s attackers had gone. Sean followed, glancing in every direction as he went. They walked in silence for a few minutes. The only sound was the pavement crunching under their feet.

Edwin looked back over his shoulder. “Can I ask you a question?” he asked.

“Yes,” Sean said.

“Do you have, uh, superpowers?”

Sean didn’t respond.

“It’s cool if you do,” Edwin said quickly. “Where I’m from, a lot of people don’t like that. They think it’s unnatural. But to each his own, I guess. You can tell me.”

Sean scanned the trees on either side of the road. No sign of trouble, but no sign of the trailer yet either.

Edwin sighed. “I’ll keep your secret. But I gotta know if I’m gonna trust you.”

Sean mulled it over for several long seconds. “I do,” he said finally.

Edwin waited for Sean to say more. He didn’t. “So what can you do?” Edwin finally asked. “Are you an ice guy?”

“What?”

“Can you shoot ice out of your hands or something? Just wondering why the cold doesn’t bother you.”

Sean shook his head. “I’ve never been cold,” he said. “How close?”

Edwin held his phone up close to his eyes. The snowfall had calmed down to a steady, gentle wave of flakes. Clouds still obscured the sun overhead.

“A hundred yards,” Edwin said. “You’ve never been cold?”

“I’ve never been anything,” Sean replied. “Cold, heat, wet, dry, I can’t feel any of it. Pain either.”

Edwin whistled. “That’s pretty handy. Is that all?”

Sean stepped up beside Edwin to glance at the phone screen. He didn’t trust the man. Not yet. But the screen showed the pair closing in on a little green circle just off the road. And they hadn’t yet heard the engines of the stolen police vehicle. All good signs.

“I can heal,” Sean said.

“Heal what?”

“Everything.” Sean poked at the spots where the bullets had pierced his skin. His fingers sensed nothing. “When I was five, I got hit by a speeding car. Flew twenty feet and smashed into a brick wall. Stood up a minute later and went back to the playground. Freaked out the other kids with all of the blood on my clothes. That was the first time I realized I was different.”

Edwin nodded. “That’s gotta be a weird life.”

Sean shrugged. “I wouldn’t know. It’s the only one I’ve got.”

They reached the trailer. Sean didn’t see it at first, but after a few moments he could make out the faint shadow of the trailer on the hillside. It rested at the edge of the tree line, completely covered in snow that had fallen in the last two hours. A casual observer would never notice it. Paul and Betty must have driven right by. Their tire tracks, if they’d left any, were already obscured by ice and snow on the road.

Edwin clapped his hand to his chest. “At least it didn’t flip,” he said softly. He turned to Sean. “Thanks for walking me all this way, my friend.”

“No problem,” Sean said. “Let’s make sure the trailer’s okay.”

Edwin nodded and approached the trailer, walking more slowly now. The man’s smile was frozen, too casual, too relaxed. Something was still off, and if Sean’s instincts were right, Edwin hadn’t told him everything.

“Since I answered your question,” Sean said, “maybe you’ll answer mine.”

“Shoot,” Edwin said cheerfully. The emotion in his voice couldn’t mask the nervous expression on his face. They’d reached the back of the trailer. One of the rear corners had snapped a white cedar tree nearly in half. It must have been a hard impact.

“Why did you lie about hiding in the woods?” Sean asked.

Edwin stopped in his tracks. “I didn’t lie,” he said. “I hid in the woods. I was scared.”

Sean shook his head as he studied the lock on the trailer. “You said you heard shots, then hid in the woods. But they checked the cab before they shot me. You weren’t there.”

Edwin shook his head. “I guess I mixed up my timeline. I hid, then heard the shots.”

“Why?”

Edwin didn’t have an answer. He just stared at the trailer.

Sean dug through the snow at the base of the trees, then came back up with a rock about the size of his fist.

“Do you have the key?” Sean asked.

Edwin shook his head. “Must have dropped it in my confusion. It’s probably back in the snow. I forgot until now.” He seemed relieved that Sean had changed the subject.

“Maybe that woman found it,” Sean said. “What was her name? Bertha?”

“Betty,” Edwin replied.

Without warning, Sean smashed his rock into the trailer lock. It broke on his first try.

“You never heard her name,” he said, dropping the rock and turning back to Edwin. “They only said it once, and it was too soft for you to hear from your hiding place. And they knew who you were. What aren’t you telling me?”

Before Edwin could splutter a reply, Sean grabbed the door handle and wrenched it up. He pulled the trailer door open with a loud creak and peered into the darkness. A soft orange glow illuminated the empty space in the back half of the trailer. Beyond the light, a dozen pairs of eyes met Sean’s. Human eyes.

Edwin reached for the ground. Sean turned just as Edwin swung the rock, and his world faded to black.

~

Read PART 4.

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