Velvet Rain - A Dark Thriller (64 page)

Vancouver
Sun,
November 8, 1962

SANTA CLARA DESTROYED IN NUCLEAR RESPONSE

U.S. Calls For Unconditional Cuban Surrender

Vancouver
Sun,
November 11, 1962

SOVIETS INVADE BERLIN

Russian Air Strikes Kill Hundreds, Tanks Roll In

~

There had been no eleventh-hour heroics; no happy ending.

Only death.

There were twenty-two clippings, each more chilling than the one before. She read in disbelief as a holocaust had escalated to America and Europe, and even to Asia. Havana had claimed it was only defending itself from overtly punishing American aggression, striking Cape Canaveral with a tactical nuclear weapon on the sixth of November. On the eighth, Washington responded by leveling Santa Clara—the provincial capital of Las Villas—calling for total and unconditional surrender. The Soviets, already engaged in heavy fighting with American warships over the naval blockade of Cuba, invaded Berlin as retribution. They took the city in hours, and within days, the Cold War had become the latest war to end all wars. In the end, it mattered little who bore the burden of blame; the madness had consumed the Northern Hemisphere, in one nuclear strike after another. New York and Washington had been reduced to cinders, along with scores of other U.S. cities. Europe had fallen to a new breed of Blitz, had become a graveyard of ashes. In a single week of war, the estimated dead topped one hundred and forty-two million.

~

Lynn was dumbstruck. She felt sick to her stomach and nearly doubled. She
had
known … hadn’t she. To be sure, in her mind there had been nothing concrete, nothing so sobering, for her nightmares had filled her with so much terror she had forgotten almost all of them upon waking. The real terrors had come in her day; a moment here, a sensation there. In the diner, she had overheard a conversation about a car accident where a young woman had been killed. For some reason, it had struck a chord in her, so much so she had dropped the three plates she’d been carrying. Gabe Milton had made a simple gesture with his hand (rather, his missing one), and that had been enough; she had fled the store in a panic. More than once a song on the radio had brought her to tears, and for the life of her, she had not known why. Still—what had struck her most dearly—was that long, thin scar on her left hand.

It was the twenty-eighth of October. She had been in the kitchen slicing an onion for the dinner salad, listening to the radio—listening so very closely, like the rest of America—when the dark news had come. The Russians weren’t backing down. The newsman had said it would likely mean war, possibly
nuclear
war, and she had been so distraught she had sliced right into her palm. She had bled so severely that Lee had had to bandage her hand for her.

But she had no scar.

Not in this timeline.

The
second
October the twenty-eighth had been vastly different. Just before the news came, she had remembered, the knife in her hand jarring her memory deeply. And at that moment, she had set the blade down.

That’s when she knew.
Really
knew. She just didn’t want to believe it.

She read the last clipping again. Just to be sure.

To be sure that it
was
real.

~

Vancouver
Sun,
October 29, 1962

KHRUSHCHEV BLINKS

Soviets To Dismantle Missile Bases In Cuba

She wept until dawn.

~

“Ma …
Ma.
”

Lynn sat up, groggy, her weary eyes half open. She drew her blanket around her. It took her a moment to realize where she was.

Ryan was kneeling beside her. Lee was sitting in her grandfather’s old chair with her feet up on the ottoman, stirring a bowl of oatmeal she had warmed up on the woodstove.

“You slept here all night?”

“… Looks that way. I—”

She checked the coffee table, then the sofa, and felt a gush of relief as she remembered. Just before she’d dozed off, she’d cradled the diary under her blanket. Thank God she’d gathered the clippings, and set them back in the envelope.

The clippings. There were no other copies, of course. All of the others had vanished, to wherever—rather,
whenever
—they had come from. During the Turn, Kain had kept them safe to preserve their existence; in his pocket, she supposed, just as he’d done with that article of his mother’s death. But now, in this here and now, they were no more than fiction. The world was new again.

She considered
how far.
It had been several weeks, she now understood, and despite her denial during that time, the reach—the
ripples
—had been felt round the world. She and her children had suffered the usual effects, of course, but had thought nothing of it; at least, they had silently agreed not to discuss it. Spencer and the surrounding area had not been spared, for there had been more than a few of the townsfolk complaining of a variety of conditions; minor aches and pains, sudden muted suntans, nausea, the occasional bout of vomiting and diarrhea … hints of
déjà vu.
Just three days ago in the diner, one of the locals had gone on about how two of his horses kept running in circles as if they were crazy, running themselves ragged until they collapsed; another had been forced to put down a bull with some buckshot, to stop it from trying to hump every cow in sight. These were all minor occurrences, certainly, and yes, some of them could bring a smile, but they were not isolated in the bigger scheme of things. They were indicative of a much larger issue—a larger danger—a danger she had simply chosen to ignore. Indeed, a Canadian woman had insisted she had been transported from Boston to Montreal; in fact, such an incredible event had been reported on at least four continents. She recalled the news of how a British tourist in Paris had leapt to his death from the Eiffel Tower … how the man’s wife and three children had been found poisoned in their hotel room, how the man had been carrying a placard declaring,
BEWARE THE END OF DAYS.
Curiously, there had been no reports of mass hysteria or suicide, and she reasoned that those who knew—or imagined they knew something—had, in the vast majority of cases, kept their mouths shut, their insanity to themselves. She had.

When she considered further, the relative global calm made perfect sense. There
were
no Newark, New Jerseys, out there, out of sync, out of
time,
with the rest of the world. Kain had Turned so far back that everything—
and everyone on the planet
—had turned back with him.

Still … why had there been no disastrous side effects? As far as she knew, there had been no earthquakes, no tornadoes or hurricanes, no natural disasters of any kind. No fields of dust … no sickly air or spoiled food … no dead roses. What she measured had to be right; there was no other explanation. Kain had been steadily—
decaying,
came to mind—for months before that night. Things had gone deeply awry, the world inside the bubble transforming into something ill. But the Turn itself had delivered a more profound effect. It had purged him in one massive cleansing, like a drug addict finally coming clean. In the subsequent months he had fully recovered, his abilities restored, possibly to the point of his days before the Project. His mind had been cleared.
Purified,
perhaps.

And yet, in the end, the
how far
had been …
too
far.

“Ma.” Ryan snapped his fingers again.

She slipped out of her haze. They looked at her oddly.

“Can you fix me a coffee, Lee?”

“Sure, Ma. Are you okay?”

“Can you bring in some more firewood?”

Ryan raised a brow as he regarded his sister, then simply nodded. Lee-Anne followed him out of the room.

Lynn made certain her daughter didn’t see her. She slipped off her blanket and went clear across the cold hardwood, to the tall bookshelf in the corner. She slid the diary between two books on the lowest shelf, far enough in, but not too far to draw attention.

She returned to the hearth and knelt before it. She opened the fire screen, and then, with some misgivings, regarded the envelope in her hand.

She wanted to tell them; wanted so badly to. Lee seemed completely oblivious, the lucky girl, but Ryan had been having as much trouble sleeping as she had. He hadn’t spoken a word about it, but more than once she had heard him rambling in his sleep. In his nightmares. In his own way, he probably knew.

She decided he didn’t
have
to know. Time would be his healer. Time.

She drew a match from the metal box her father kept beside the wood. And just as she struck it, she paused. She blew it out and tossed it into the hearth.

Take a good look.

That’s what Kain had written.

She drew out the clippings and fingered through them. Flipping them over and back, expecting to find something she had missed—something important—she had been disappointed in her search. She went to slip them back inside, and at that moment, she found it.

She
had
missed something.

Kain had folded a small piece of paper in half and had taped it inside the envelope at the bottom. She slit the tape with her nail and drew out the note; it had two tiny hearts coupled, drawn by his hand. She unfolded it, and when she saw what it was, cupped a gentle hand to her lips.

Now’s the moment,

Now’s the time …

Make Now count,

Every time.

I wrote it down so you didn’t have to. As time goes by, we tend to forget the simple things.

I love you.

Kain

She returned the papers, all but one; the last she slipped in the pocket of her robe.

She tossed all the wrappings into the hearth. The envelope burned quickly.

Big Al scampered into the room and snuggled up to her. She stroked her ears, then patted her on the side of her tummy.

“Thanks, Rye,” she said, as her son filled the log carrier with an armful of maple.

“You’re crying,” he said, and Lee-Anne, overhearing, joined them.

“Ma? What’s the matter?”

Lynn wiped her tears. She looked up at her beautiful children. She put her arms wide, and they fell in next to her in a hug. She would not let them go. Not ever.

She sniffled. And then she laughed.

Again they looked at her strangely.

Lynn looked to the window with a smile. It was snowing quite heavily again.

“You drive carefully,” Ryan told her. Rosa had been running the genny to keep things going at the diner. At least for another day, that was.

“Do you really have to work today, Ma? You barely made it back yesterday.”

The tears kept coming. She couldn’t begin to lose that grin; it was having its way with her, and it felt utterly wonderful. She was heartbroken, yes, in love with a ghost, but her heart was soaring.

As time goes by, we tend to forget the simple things.

“Let’s make a snowman instead.”

And they did.

~ a final word

Thank you. For being a reader. For coming this far.

Velvet Rain
has been a long journey for me—much like it was for Kain Richards, I suppose. Sometimes, I feel like I’ve walked every step with him in those tired leather boots. I hope you feel the same way, at least at some level, and I hope you come away from his story feeling a little brighter, a little hopeful that every one of us can make a difference. We can all be heroes to someone.

Until next time, my friend. Be well.

David

March, 2012

~ dedication

For Mom—I know you can see this.

For Dad—I know Mom can see
you.

~ acknowledgments

Cover design by David C. Cassidy

eBook prepared by David C. Cassidy

Author photograph courtesy Tina Forgét

Cover, Artwork, and Photography

Copyright © 2012

“Disgusting Behavior” font used with permission,

courtesy Eduardo Recife

Copyright © www.misprintedtype.com

~ about the author

David C. Cassidy—author, photographer, half-decent juggler—spends his writing life creating dark and touching stories where Bad Things Happen To Good People. Raised by wolves, he grew up with a love of nature, music, science, and history, with thrillers and horror novels feeding the dark side of his seriously disturbed imagination. He talks to his characters, talks often, and most times they listen. But the real fun starts when they tell him to take a hike, and they Open That Door anyway. Idiots.

David lives in Ontario, Canada. From Mozart to Vivaldi, classic jazz to classic rock, he feels naked without his iPod. Suffering from MAD—Multiple Activity Disorder—he divides his time between writing and blogging, photography and photoshop, reading and rollerblading. An avid amateur astronomer, he loves the night sky, chasing the stars with his telescope. Sometimes he eats.