Something More Than Night Read Online Free PDF Page A

gathered.
    Molly fingered the tape. Though he was well behind her now, cut off by the crowd, Bayliss’s voice came to her as though he spoke in her ear. The unwelcome intimacy caused her to shiver.
    “Keep going. The bulls won’t stop you.”
    She ducked under the cordon, expecting shouts and cries and threats that didn’t come. The policeman watching the cordon barely noticed the intrusion. He gave only the slightest nod of acknowledgment as his gaze slid past Molly. A dreamlike silence had fallen upon the world. Shrouded it, as though the world were holding its breath for she knew not what. And yet she could hear the crunch of snow underfoot and the electrical hum of the emergency lights. Even the faint hiss where dark puddles steamed on the tracks. The steam tasted like salted iron.
    Molly sidestepped the plastic barrier. She cast no shadow over the scene at her feet. Two men crouched on the tracks at the center of a patch of red-black snow. They wore purple latex gloves. The night smelled of cold metal and ozone and shit. A black rubber pouch roughly the size of a sleeping bag lay on the snow beside the two men. They fished meaty things from the discolored snow and plopped them in the bag. A dented taxicab rested on the platform where tram passengers normally waited and disembarked.
    Martin sat slumped on a broken bench, head in his hands. A policewoman sat next to him. She looked uncomfortable, or bored, clearly waiting for him to finish with whatever grieved him so. Why was Martin crying? He never cried. Not even at their mother’s funeral.
    Molly glanced again at the men in the bloody snow. They finished their task; they zipped the bag, stood, then stripped off the gloves.
    She remembered the taxi careering across the wet street. Remembered grabbing Martin. Remembered falling.
    Oh. No. No.
    “Martin!”
    She hopped onto the platform, crouched, and pulled his hands from his face. She tried to smile for him. “Hey, look! I’m okay!”
    God, he looked awful. He yanked his hands away, as though something tickled or stung or burned them.
    His teary eyes looked through her.
    She knelt on the concrete and planted her hands on either side of his head. “Look at me! I’m here!”
    Martin flinched again, shaking off her hands. He scratched vigorously at the spots where she’d touched him.
    The policewoman watched it all with the same bored expression on her face.
    Molly grabbed Martin by the back of the neck, pulled his head toward her and leaned forward until their foreheads bumped together. She found his eyes, pushed past the wall of confusion and despair, and forced eye contact.
    He slid off the bench, fell to hands and knees, and puked over the side of the platform. The policewoman sighed, but not unkindly. Molly smelled vodka and beer in his vomit. How long ago had they left the bar?
    “Martin!”
    “Careful, angel.” Bayliss stood beside her. “He’ll stroke out if you keep giving him both barrels.” He watched the police dismantling the scaffold and lights. “Yeah. It’ll take some practice before you can interact.”
    “Shit. Holy shit.” Molly clutched her forehead, ran her hands through her hair. She closed her eyes; counted ten long, slow breaths. “If you’re about to tell me that I’m stuck as a ghost, I swear to God I’ll kick your nuts out through the top of your head.”
    Bayliss coughed. “Kinda blue for a high-end swell, aren’t you? Anyway, ghosts are a fairy tale.”
    His hat, his coat, the cigarettes … She remembered the rest. She remembered everything. She remembered his ancient eyes watching her die.
    ”Motherfucker! You did this to me!”
    He backed away again, farther and more quickly than he had in Minneapolis. “Bygones. Bygones!”
    “Kick you? Screw that. I’m going to shoot you.” She reached for the policewoman’s belt. Did cops even wear guns in Australia? At the very least, Molly figured, they must carry pepper spray or a zap gun or stickyfoam. Something that