Mad Dog and the Dream Ch. 01

Ron paled. "I can't do it. Please."

"You'd better find a way. Fast."

He looked at his new friend kneeling in the dust. A boy, really, just beginning to find his place in the world. Ron raised the gun. Adrenaline was flowing through him. He had three choices: one, he could kill Larry, as kind a soul as one could find in this business and barely more than a child. A person with whom he had no qualm with. Two, he could try and kill Andro...and die. The outcome of that option was certain. Three, he could refuse and be killed himself, forfeiting Maddy's body with his last act of cowardice.

Really, there wasn't a choice to be had.

"I'm so sorry, Larry," he said quietly. Larry began to cry harder.

Aiming carefully, Ron pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened.

Larry began screaming into his gag, muffled and useless.

"Well," Andro smiled. "I guess we've learned something else about you, Ron." He turned to the bound figure. "Sorry about all this, Larry. I hope it didn't upset you too much. I needed Ron to grow a little, and you have helped me with that greatly. No hard feelings, I hope." Larry was hyperventilating into his gag, rocking back and forth.

Ron gasped, dropping the gun in the dust and fighting the urge to throw up. "Why?" he asked.

Andro looked at him for a moment and sighed. "Life is like a woman you love, Ron. And this is important, so listen: both of them often require you to do things that you may not want to do...things that are very hard. And whenever they ask these things of you, you'd better give them what they want and do it with a smile. Because if you don't, well..." without taking his eyes of Ron, he lifted his gun. The sudden echoing retort made Ron jerk reflexively as the bullet that accompanied it ended Larry's life instantly.

And then Ron was sick.

Andro walked over, picking up the gun Ron had dropped and wiping some of the dust off of it. "Remember, Ron. Life and the woman you love. Whatever they want, you give it to them with a smile, because we can't all end like Larry. Some of us have to keep pulling this big blue world around."

Ron said nothing, crouched over his pool of vomit and letting his tears fall into it.

Andro sighed. "Get in the car. I have some guys coming to clean this mess up. Don't worry...they'll get the vomit, too."

He climbed into the car and started it. Ron knew the tall man wouldn't hesitate to leave him behind, so he rushed over and climbed in. As the car began to pull away he put his forehead to the window, fogging it with his breath. Larry's corpse slid past his line of sight as the car turned around.

"I'm so sorry, Larry," he said under his breath, and closed his eyes.

Andro looked over at him, and shook his head, but neither of them spoke. As the miles passed, Ron tried to think about the conversations he and Larry had shared in their short time together. He tried to remember the small man's face. He wondered if anybody else in this world would care to enough to do so.

They were nearing the outskirts of town when Andro spoke again. "To help you learn a lesson," he said.

"What?" Ron sat up, looking over at him.

"Didn't you just ask me why I killed Larry?"

"No."

"Oh." Andro squinted out at the road. "That's weird. I thought..." he trailed off.

Ron tilted his head. When nothing more was said, he asked, "What was I supposed to learn?"

"That's a strange question to ask."

He fought the urge to roll his scream. Andro's eccentricities were as frustrating as they were brutal. "Did he do something wrong?"

"Who?"

"Larry! Larry, goddamn it!"

"No. He did a job for me last night, actually. Did it real well."

"So why is he dead?"

Andro shook his head. "Why are we still talking about this?"

"Because I want to know. Because I think a man died for nothing back there. He respected you, maybe even liked you, and you shot him for nothing."

"So I guess I'm the bad guy."

"Goddamn right you're the fucking bad guy!"

Andro raised an eyebrow. "And Larry was a good guy."

"Yeah. Yeah, I believe he was."

"And yet you pulled the trigger on him, too. On Larry the good guy. You did that, Ron. Sure, I'm the one that ended him, but it would have been you. All that was missing was a loaded gun." He glanced over at the passenger side. "You would have shot him on his knees in the dirt. And yet, when I handed you my gun before, in the car...when you had the chance to pull the trigger on me, you couldn't do it. Not to save yourself, or Maddy. Somehow, deep down, you just couldn't kill Andro the bad guy. So, tell me Ron, what does that mean?"

Ron felt sick. "I...I didn't want to do it. You..."

"Oh, don't worry. Don't even feel bad about it. Good guys are easy to kill. Easier than anything." He scoffed. "They even think they deserve it."

Ron went back to looking out the window. After a while, he asked, "What am I?"

"It's not for me to say. That's the point. Or one of them, anyway. Just be patient. My guess is we'll find out eventually. And, to be honest, I'm as curious to know as you are. Maddy is too, although she doesn't realize it."

Ron turned to glare at him. "Look," he said, "I can deal with a lot of things, and maybe I do deserve some of it, but this game you're playing with my marriage...I love my wife very much. I don't want to see her suffer for my sins. I certainly don't like feeling like we're being played against each other."

"That's not what's happening."

He slammed his fist against the door. "Then what the fuck is? Tell me, Andro! Tell me what's happening!"

Andro just shrugged. "Larry died. That's what's happening."

Ron ignored the aside, refusing to be distracted from what he wanted to know. "Why are you spending time with my wife?" he demanded.

"One could argue that your wife is the one spending time with me."

"Why?!

The tall man took a deep breath. "Are we cutting down to basics? Okay. Human beings are social animals. They crave connection within their own species. They seek it for breeding, for community...other reasons, I'm sure. Still, I've always wondered why they do...they suffer for it more than they benefit, I think."

"Why is Maddy lying to me about spending time with you? Why is she hiding it from me?"

"I don't go visiting her intentions. That's not my place."

Ron pounded his fist on the door again, harder. "Goddamn it, Andro! Enough bullshit! Are you fucking my wife or aren't you?"

Andro ran his tongue over his teeth, wrinkling his face in a disgusted grimace. "That's crude," he said. "But at least you pulled the trigger this time."

Ron fought the urge to scream. "So are you?"

Andro nodded slowly, but what he said was, "Not yet." He shrugged. "I do intend it."

Ron groaned. The statement was bad enough, but the tone of Andro's voice had made the message all the more concussive. It wasn't a boast, or a threat. It was a casual acknowledgment of an inevitable event...like observing that it was about to rain when the first drops were already on the ground. He felt suddenly exhausted, and he deflated into his seat. "Please," he said, his mouth dry. "Don't."

"You don't seem to be placing a whole lot of faith in Maddy." Andro noted.

Ron shook his head. "No. It's you."

"No," the tall man pushed his foot to the pedal, and the car sped up. "It's you." He let the car pull above ninety miles per hour just as they crested a small hill. Across the divide, speeding the other way, three police cars appeared.

Ron watched them nervously. "Where do you think they're going?"

"Same place we're coming from."

"What?" Ron gasped. "The cops...they know?"

"Of course they know. Didn't I just say I had people coming to clean up the mess?" Andro glanced over at his terrified passenger. "Don't worry. They'll clean it up just fine. Real professional. They're paid well, anyway."

Ron looked back in the direction of Larry's murder, as if he could still see the body in the sand, and began to wonder just how alone he really was. He wondered if he would end up like Larry...murdered for nothing, as part of one of Andro's sick games.

Something at the back of his mind wondered if Maddy would care.

Andro laughed. Ron turned to look at him, and his fear deepened. The tall man's face was silhouetted by the dying sun, and Ron found nothing human there.

Just the wild joy of a mad dog.