A PERFECT RENDEZVOUS

A Perfect End For A Perfect Boy

The frightening scene he'd witnessed rolled around and around in Harry's head as he raced through the swirling snow to the garage and stumbled through the doorway at the side. His fingers fumbling in their haste, he changed into the snowmobile suit, yanked on the gloves and helmet, then he began dragging the snowmobile toward the door, afraid to turn the motor on for fear of whatever noise it was going to make. Outside, he swung his leg over the seat, fumbled with the chin strap on the helmet, and turned the ignition key. The motor sprang to life with much less noise than he expected it to make, and moments later, he was flying over the snow toward the woods at the far edge of the yard, struggling to keep his balance, praying that the snowmobile wasn't loud enough to be heard inside the house.

Shaking with a combination of exhilaration and fear, Harry careened through the trees, fighting for control of the machine beneath him, sideswiping pine branches and skirting boulders beneath the snow. When he was well out of sight of the house and certain Zayn wasn't following him, he'd turn the snowmobile toward the winding road and follow that down to the highway, but for now, he was glad of the need to keep in the woods. Beyond their shelter, the wind had risen to a howl and the snowstorm was working itself into a full-fledged blizzard.

Five minutes became ten, and a sense of success and freedom gave him courage, but its joy was unexpectedly diminished by the memory of the grief he'd witnessed in the man he'd left behind. The thought occurred to him that it seemed incongruous, in fact, almost impossible, that a cold-blooded murderer would feel such anguish at the death of his cellmate.

He glanced over his shoulder to make certain he wasn't being followed, then cried out in alarm as he nearly hit a tree, swung wildly to avoid it and almost overturned the snowmobile.

* * *

Shoving himself upright, Zayn looked listlessly about him at the mangled appliances and broken glass on the kitchen floor. "Shit," he said dully and reached for the brandy decanter. He poured some of the fiery liquid into a glass and tossed it down, trying to numb the ache in his chest. He kept hearing Dom's cheerful voice as he read that last letter from his mother, "Hey Zayn, Gina's getting married! I sure hate to miss that wedding." He remembered other things too, like Sandini's unorthodox advice and knowledge. "You want a fake passport, Zayn, you don't go to some guy named Rubin Schwartz that no one's ever heard of. You come to me and I put you in touch with Wally the Weasel. He's the best picture book man in the country. You gotta start letting me help you Zayn..."

Zayn had let him help, and now Dom was dead because of it.

"Hey Zayn, you want some more of Mama's salami? I got plenty of Rolaids."

Standing at the windows, drinking the brandy and staring blindly at the snowman Harry had been building, Zayn could almost feel Dom's cheerful presence beside him. Dom had found such delight in stupid little things. He'd probably have been out there with Harry, building the snowman...

Zayn froze, the brandy glass suspended partway to his mouth, his gaze searching the yard. Harry!

"Harry!" he shouted, stalking toward the back door and jerking it open. A blast of snow hit him in the face and he had to put his shoulder to the door to force it open in the rising wind. "Harry, get in here before you freeze your—" The wind hurtled his voice back in his face, but Zayn didn't notice. His gaze had riveted on the deep footprints already filling up with snow and he was running beside them toward the garage at the back of the house.

"Harry!" he thundered as he slammed the side door of the garage open. "What the hell do you think you're doing in here—"

Zayn drew up short, momentarily unable to believe the answer he saw with his own eyes as his gaze ricocheted from the snowmobile sticking out from beneath a tarpaulin to the doorway. There, a set of snowmobile tracks began and led straight into the woods.

A few minutes ago, he would have sworn that he was incapable of feeling any angrier or more desolate than he had at the news of Dom's death, but the explosion of fury and foreboding he felt at that moment eclipsed even that.

* * *

Cold. Minutes after he left the protection of the forest and pointed the snowmobile down the steep, tree-lined lane they'd taken in the Blazer, Harry felt a deep, bone-freezing cold that was nearly unbearable. Droplets of ice were clinging to the corners of his eyes; snow was driving into his face, blinding him, his lips and arms and legs were stiff. The snowmobile flew over a rut and slid sideways, but when he tried to slow the vehicle down, his limbs were so numb that it took precious moments before his body could obey him brain's frantic command to react.

The only thing that wasn't numb from cold was his sense of fear, fear that Zayn would catch him and prevent him from escaping and a new, debilitating fear that if Zayn didn't, he would likely die out here, lost in a blizzard, buried beneath the snow. In his mind, he conjured up a vision of a search party in the spring locating his perfectly preserved remains beneath a mound of thawing snow, his body and head still clad in this chic navy blue little snowmobile suit and matching helmet, which also coordinated—not by chance, he was sure—with the snowmobile he rode. A "perfect" ending, he thought with grim misery, for a boy from the Chicago slums who wanted to be perfect.