Halloween IV: The Ultimate Edition by Nicholas Read Free Book Online Page B

forgot what. Maybe it just tasted good.
    “Double scoops?”
    “Double scoops,” Rachel said, and smiled back. Thank God .
    Rachel gave her a big hug within the next instant, just as Sunday jumped up onto the bed. He was dying for a little love, too, and Rachel obliged him with a little scratch behind his ears. Then she stood up.
    “Come on, kiddo. Let’s get some breakfast.”
                  Chapter Six
    Norman Dale had popped a couple of ruby red pill capsules no later than five minutes into his lunch break, and here he was, thinking I’ll be goddamn if this shit’s kicking in and already it’s time to get back to rebuilding that busted tranny.
    Rebuilding transmissions was never in Norm’s adult life a problem. Right now, the problem was finding his way to it. Until after he’d found himself marrying into a family which transplanted him from Chicago to this shithole roadside service station in the middle of nowhere, he hadn’t been as nearly impressed with any sort of recreational drug. He was halfway into the forty-somethings, and he was afraid things were going to be just as predictable for him throughout the next half of his life as they’d been today and yesterday, and the day before that.
    He was better off single and home, than nowhere and stuck there.
    As he thought this, he decided to make a mental note of it and adopt it as a motto.
    A useless motto.
    Damn Glen for being out of weed today was his next thought, as he entered the service station’s glass EMPLOYEES ONLY side door and faced the mirror above the corner wash area. He took a shop rag from the top of the porcelain sink and thumbed it down a rear pants pocket so that it hung out halfway.
    If his coworker hadn’t been out of weed, he wouldn’t have had to resort to those “mystery pills” he took from him. Norm had no clue what those red pills were, nor what to expect from them. They were something new, something mysterious , as Glen put it.
    They were kicking in big time .
    He dared not gaze into his mirrored reflection for too long, lest the grey-brown hairs on his month’s growth of beard start spreading across the rest of his face.
    That was it; he was going to find Glen and march right over to him, tell him he’s having an extended lunch break, maybe extend it into tomorrow. He’ll apologize, and offer to bring Glen a Big Buster pastrami on rye from the other half of his father-inlaw’s desert wilderness empire: the café next door. After all, it was Glen who offered him this hallucinatory surprise, and it was Glen who therefore had to understand .
    He abandoned the wash area, determined to carry out the proposal. The rusty-white Plymouth Belvedere upon his right appeared to melt like warm vanilla ice cream as he stepped past it.
    I can do this , he insisted to himself and to the garage door he approached. The door was closed and chained down into latches cemented into the floor, and as he halted the small rectangular door windows fell within his line of sight.
    He peered out one of them.
    He spotted a figure outside, standing between the service pumps.
    He stared.
    The figure looked like a mummy. A mummy , dressed in a tattered white hospital gown, standing there, staring straight back at him.
    Goddamn Halloween crazies , he muttered aloud, scratching at his own wolf man bearded reflection in the glass.
    Another glance at the service pumps revealed the mummy-like figure was no longer there.
    Norm turned away.
    A sound distracted him. Something metallic clanked and echoed inside the garage like a tin can kicked purposely, and it was at that moment when Norm realized the garage had been silent the whole time after he’d returned.
    He focused his gaze on the employee’s side entrance door. It hung open, though Norm couldn’t remember if he’d shut it or left it that way.
    Another sound.
    “Hey Norm?” It was Glen’s voice, from the other half of the garage. “You there? How ‘bout a nine-sixteenths socket over