SEVERAL WEEKS AGO There was no way that Smith could have missed at that distance. His brother–or at least his brother’s form, I still wasn’t sure on the details–was standing no more than a foot away, directly in front of the gun. Yet when my eyes readjusted to the gloom after the brilliant flash of the gun, he was still standing there, looking none the worse for the gunshot.
PRESENT DAY Since she wasn’t answering my question and I had no intention of answering hers, we were at somewhat of an impasse. Worse yet, she was standing in the only exit that I knew, so I couldn’t even consider running for it. Granted, there was almost surely a fire escape–was that mandated here in Italy as well?–but I couldn’t count on finding it before being kebobbed. So for long moment after long moment, we just stood there staring at each.
PRESENT DAY The apparent source of all the commotion just stood there in the hallway, so far as I could tell completely ignoring the havoc she’d wrought. She was an older woman, short, barely more than five feet tall if that. Lightly built, she looked as if she might have been a dancer in the youth, although that would have been many years ago indeed. Steely gray hair pulled back into a tight bum framed a severe looking face with features hinting at perhaps an Asian background.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO The lights sounded almost like popcorn, going one after another. First the smaller lights–a strand of Christmas lights here, a smaller lamb there–and then the main overhead light blew out, I squeezed my eyes shut and raised my hands to cover my face. My hope was that I could protect my fact and eyes from the worse of it.
SEVERAL YEARS AGO I felt lightheaded. I couldn’t have said if it was the strange goings on or the lack of blood, but either way the world seemed to be glowing around the edges. That couldn’t be natural.
“Did you see–” I started to say, but my words seemed to make the glowing even worse.
PRESENT DAY “You know Father,” I said, turning to Father Antonio. “I don’t think that’s a story to leave until another time. I think that’s a story for right now.”
I wasn’t quite sure what it was that pushed me to the sudden confrontation, but I was just getting tired of all of the being lied to. Of not remembering or not being told what I should know. So I was going to get some answers.
SEVERAL YEARS AGO According to the medic, Amira was bleeding internally. He thought that he could go in and fix her up, but the problem was that she was just losing too much blood. She was going to need a transfusion or nothing that he could do was going to be able to save her life. Unfortunately, he had no idea what her blood type was, so what they needed was someone with O negative blood–a universal donor.
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO
Staring down the barrel of the gun in Mrs. Claire’s hands, I let go of the man and slowly raised my hands. “Let’s not do anything hasty now, shall we?”
Her eyes flicked from the other man to me and back. “Why don’t you tell him that.”
PRESENT DAY
The tensions finally peaked once we’d all had a chance to sit down and–at Father Antonio’s insistence–have a cup of coffee. To her credit, Amira made an American variety, not the jet fuel that we’d had down at the cafe, but Father Antonio at least took it in stride.
Finally, he was the one to break the silence. “So, you said that the two of you were old friends? Where did you meet?”
SEVERAL WEEKS AGO
Mrs. Claire’s was everything that I expected it to be. A dimly lit front room with all manner of New Agey crystals and talismans on every available surface. A beaded curtain in lieu of a door, leading back into the shadows. The only thing missing was the eponymous shopkeeper herself.
“So?” I asked, turning to the man who’d brought me here.