The Dead Zone Read Online Free PDF

I’m going without you.”
    â€œBe right out.”
    â€œSwell!”
    She ran a finger over the Jekyll-and-Hyde mask, kindly Dr. Jekyll the left half, ferocious, subhuman Hyde the right half. Where will we be by Thanksgiving? she wondered. Or by Christmas?
    The thought sent a funny, excited little thrill shooting through her.
    She liked him. He was a perfectly ordinary, sweet man.
    She looked down at the mask again, horrible Hyde growing out of Jekyll’s face like a lumpy carcinoma. It had been treated with fluorescent paint so it would glow in the dark.
    What’s ordinary? Nothing, nobody. Not really. If he was so ordinary, how could he be planning to wear something like that into his homeroom and still be confident of keepingorder? And how can the kids call him Frankenstein and still respect and like him? What’s ordinary?
    Johnny came out, brushing through the beaded curtain that divided the bedroom and bathroom off from the living room.
    If he wants me to go to bed with him tonight, I think I’m going to say okay.
    And it was a warm thought, like coming home.
    â€œWhat are you grinning about?”
    â€œNothing,” she said, tossing the mask back to the sofa.
    â€œNo, really. Was it something good?”
    â€œJohnny,” she said, putting a hand on his chest and standing on tiptoe to kiss him lightly, “some things will never be told. Come on, let’s go.”
♦ 2 ♦
    They paused downstairs in the foyer while he buttoned his denim jacket, and she found her eyes drawn again to the STRIKE! poster with its clenched fist and flaming background.
    â€œThere’ll be another student strike this year,” he said, following her eyes.
    â€œThe war?”
    â€œThat’s only going to be part of it this time. Vietnam and the fight over ROTC and Kent State have activated more students than ever before. I doubt if there’s ever been a time when there were so few grunts taking up space at the university.”
    â€œWhat do you mean, grunts?”
    â€œKids just studying to make grades, with no interest in the system except that it provides them with a ten-thousand-dollar-a-year job when they get out. A grunt is a student who gives a shit about nothing except his sheepskin. That’s over. Most of them are awake. There are going to be some big changes.”
    â€œIs that important to you? Even though you’re out?”
    He drew himself up. “Madam, I am an alumnus. Smith, class of ’70. Fill the steins to dear old Maine.”
    She smiled. “Come on, let’s go. I want a ride on the whip before they shut it down for the night.”
    â€œVery good,” he said, taking her arm. “I just happen to have your car parked around the corner.”
    â€œAnd eight dollars. The evening fairly glitters before us.”
    The night was overcast but not rainy, mild for late October. Overhead, a quarter moon was struggling to make it throughthe cloud cover. Johnny slipped an arm around her and she moved closer to him.
    â€œYou know, I think an awful lot of you, Sarah.” His tone was almost offhand, but only almost. Her heart slowed a little and then made speed for a dozen beats or so.
    â€œReally?”
    â€œI guess this Dan guy, he hurt you, didn’t he?”
    â€œI don’t know what he did to me,” she said truthfully. The yellow blinker, a block behind them now, made their shadows appear and disappear on the concrete in front of them.
    Johnny appeared to think this over. “I wouldn’t want to do that,” he said finally.
    â€œNo, I know that. But Johnny . . . give it time.”
    â€œYeah,” he said. “Time. We’ve got that, I guess.”
    And that would come back to her, awake and even more strongly in her dreams, in tones of inexpressible bitterness and loss.
    They went around the corner and Johnny opened the passenger door for her. He went around and got in behind the wheel.