The Immortals and Other Tales by Victor J. Banis

Author:Victor J. Banis [Banis, Victor J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Short Fiction Collections
Publisher: Untreed Reads
Published: 2017-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

In Passing

“You sure you don’t want to wait for a lift?” Chris was a fusser. “I’ll be glad to run you home. It won’t take me more than an hour to finish up here, maybe less.”

“Thanks. By that time I’ll be tucked in bed,” I told him, slipping into my windbreaker.

“You’re not worried about the bogey man?”

It took me a minute to sort that out. I hadn’t heard him called that. “You mean the Slasher?” I asked. “Nah. He’s after sweet young things, isn’t he?”

“You could pass for twenty. You’re not so old,” he said, and gave me the look. I knew why he wanted me to stick around, and it wasn’t out of concern for my safety, though I suppose you could say he was thinking of my skin.

It was flattering, but he wasn’t my type. Anyway, I worked for him, at least in a sense. He didn’t own the bar, but there was the hierarchy to these jobs: he was bartender, I was just the lowly bar-back. I have a standing policy: don’t shit where you eat. Or, a bit more elegantly, don’t get your meat where you get your bread.

“I’m not so sweet, either,” I said. I opened the front door and he came to lock it behind me. “Good night. See you Thursday.”

He looked longingly. Hoping, maybe, for a kiss. He got a smile instead. He was still looking as I started away, pulling the collar of the windbreaker up. The weather had been mild, but even in the summer, even in West Virginia, it can be cool at three in the morning.

It was not a long walk, anyway, and I liked the late-night hours. I wasn’t a daytime person. It had driven me to distraction when I lived in Los Angeles, all those sun-worshippers. My body couldn’t take it. Ten minutes of toasting and I could feel my skin start to shrivel, and all but hear the cancer grow.

Besides, moonlight was flattering. All the songsmiths knew that. In its silver glow, I probably could pass for twenty, the way Chris said. I lived a lifestyle conducive to staying young. In the bright light of day, however, if you looked long and hard, the years sang out. I didn’t like the tune.

I almost didn’t see him. He was waiting for the bus, not out in the open, at the stop, but in a doorway. He must have seen me approach, however. He cleared his throat as I neared, and I slowed my steps even more and glanced in his direction.

“You don’t know what time the bus comes, do you?” he asked. He moved a little out of the shadows, so I could get a look at him. I stopped altogether.

“I don’t think there is one till morning,” I said.

“Fuck.” He stepped then into the light and looked up and down the street, as if a bus might make a liar of me, and then looked back at me, a look that suggested there was more on his mind than bus schedules.

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