In White Robes

Chapter 17 - Answers on Ice

I had the answer to freedom now. I had the upper hand. All Larson could do now was wait for his death, staring into the barrel of the iron in my hand. I would not end up sparing him. He deserved to taste it, to relish its song; one gunshot, one flash of melody, and then he would drop dead.

"Killing me will solve none of your questions," Larson said, so calm and collected, folding his hands there on the desk like he was in an office meeting. "Read the book."

I reached down to the desk, taking the journal up in my hands and setting it at my side. If I was going to read it, it would not be now. Not now when I had him right where I wanted him.

"Tell me where Avery is," I insisted on finding him. Larson shook his head--a gesture I wanted to punish, but I held back.

"Read the first page, Kay," he urged me, "please, read it."

I concluded threatening him would not get me very far. He was hardheaded, wouldn't listen to anything I was saying. He clearly wasn't afraid of the gun I had now. But I wasn't going to test if it had bullets in it or not. The possibility of having none or only one left in the chamber was a solid one.

So instead, I catered to his pleads and held the journal up in front of me, flipping past the cover's label and into the first page. It was not what I was expecting. Taped to the original slip of paper belonging to the journal, a singular page from a newspaper article. For a second I looked over the edge of the journal and at Larson, to which he returned the look solemnly.

Then I read what I saw.

Young teen dies tragically in fire that erupts in local home; Father of teen beats officers to the scene to reunite with dying son.

Authorities say the child had his legs crushed beneath a fallen wooden beam, and was unable to escape from the home. The fire had surrounded him, trapping him and eventually killing him. The father stepped outside the home after a bittersweet goodbye, covered in bruises and burns and grieving his loss.

Cause of fire--reportedly a gas leak, ignited.

Dated five years before today's year.

In all honesty, I didn't know what I was reading. Or why he was showing me this. What it had to do with me or him or anyone, really. I stared at him, lowering the newspaper article, lowering the gun.

"Do you remember that day?" Larson asked as soon as we met eyes. "The day of the fire. How I held you in my arms, sang one final song about the angels with you, prayed in my head that this was not your last day to live. Do you remember our song, Kay?"

Completely flabbergasted, confused, I sat down in the chair at his desk. Trying to calm myself, rubbing the aching from my temples. I had come here first to lift the weight and pain from my heart, but this . . . confusion . . . only added more sizzling pain to me.

"I . . ." My voice was weak. My thoughts were fractured. "You're insane. You're crazy. I'm not your son. I'm alive. I'm . . ."

Larson leaned quickly across the desk, cupping my cheeks in his palms as his face rested just inches away from mine. He was smiling with tears in his eyes. "You deny it, but it is only the truth. I couldn't live with the guilt anymore. The pain of losing you. My sins!"

"What did you do?" I said.

"I met eyes with the Devil, Kay. I learned of the value of life, and yet still I was blinded."

"Who am I?"

"You're the Kay you've always been!"

"Then who died?"

"A piece of you that was able to be restored!"

No. Not anymore. I shot away from his hold, standing up and pointing the gun, not at him anymore but at the gasoline tank back behind his desk. A little container of fuel. Flammable.

Slowly I backed up toward the door, aim steady, eyes focused. Larson had figured out what I was planning to do, and so he had an expression of utter fear in his eyes. Glowing eternally just like mine. I liked how he feared me, how he knew that today was his last day to live.

"No, wait--" he began to stammer.

"I never died," I interrupted, "I'm right here. Haha--I'm real." I took a free hand, curling it and releasing it. Feeling myself. I was not dead, nor was I fake. I had eyes, I had skin, I wore flesh, I had a beating heart and dreams that spoke to me in my sleep. He was lying. "I don't know why that fire started. Don't know the poor child who lost his life in that house. But you're a liar--and I hate liars."

"KAY!"

I pulled the trigger, the pistol clicking in response, sending a bullet into the side of the gasoline tank. There was no hesitation for what happened next. The door behind me swung wildly open; I dove through it, leaving behind the red-hot explosion in his office and his bloodcurdling screams.

The facility was flashing red with its emergency lights, and Larson's room had its own red lighting. The blaze of fire and flames, beating against the air with burning determination.