Black Sky

Chapter Thirteen

First night shift.
Luc Collier had volunteered to do it, even if in retrospect he didn't know why. He had nothing to prove to anyone.

Neither Iris, nor the twins. It had always been that way - he didn't really feel obligated to any of them. It had taken Luc some time to admit this to himself. But eventually the thought came: does this make me a bad person? Maybe. But I'm still a good man. I do my best, and that's all anyone can ask of me.

Especially since neither Celine nor Mark were his biological children. And strictly speaking, Iris wasn't his wife either.
He had had a wife before, but that was a long time ago.
At that moment, while looking out at the deserted parking lot, Luc Collier was thinking something else: seven hours already.

More than seven hours, actually. Like everyone else, Luc Collier had begun to resign himself to the impossible. Perhaps this eclipse was an entirely new spectacle, a unique experience in the history of mankind; a hope Luc could cling to, at least until the badly injured man with his tattered winter clothes and gaping wounds had stumbled into the rest area, only to die under Luc's trembling, bloodied hands.

From that point on, something had drained out of Luc. It almost seemed to him that the second the man's eyes had gone blind, something else had also been torn from Luc's deepest center.
Perhaps it was what Iris would have called the soul. Maybe it was life itself. Luc was leaning more toward the second theory.

Now it seemed even more abstruse to him that he had volunteered for the first night shift. Like a joke at his expense or a silly skit.
Everything seems like a joke at one's expense when the sun suddenly goes black, Luc Collier thought.

"What time is it now?" whispered Luc.
He had a wristwatch himself, but he couldn't think of a better conversation starter. And he had to talk. Otherwise the thoughts would consume him.
"Just before midnight," growled the giant, Illya, who had also agreed to work the night shift. "At least, that's my guess. The hands on my watch have stopped."
"Well great," Luc said quietly. "How about you, Jonah?"

He turned to the other side.

"I don't have a wristwatch," the young man said. "I tried to look at my cell phone earlier, but the battery ran out."
"It's better that way," Illya said, and even with his voice lowered he sounded like a thunderstorm rolling in. "We can't afford any distractions."

And so they continued to stare out the window in silence.
Behind them, Luc could hear the unanimous snores of Celine and Mark, as they slept in a nest of blankets and chairs. The rest seemed to be just resting. The constant worry and tension had drained them, and yet few were able to sleep.

Perhaps that was why he had chosen the night shift, Luc reflected. To be able to distract himself with something - even if distraction in this case meant staring with tired eyes into the darkness, at the shadows of headlights and parked cars, including his leased family station wagon.
I wonder what happened to the people from the gas station? Why haven't any of them come over yet? And the others who fled - who are out there now? What about them?

In the darkened window, he saw a faint reflection of his own face, dimly outlined by the reddish glow of the tea lights. He thought he could make out rudiments of his long blond hair, gelled and parted, falling to his shoulders. The pale skin, the thick frames of his glasses. And perhaps the last point was an optical illusion, but he thought he could clearly make out his own eyes, looking back at him blank and exhausted. Like extinguished coal.
His face had turned into a death mask.

Then he squinted his eyes.
He thought he saw a movement, out there, among the parked cars.
A scrap of white cloth. Long, black hair that moved in the wind like seaweed in a current.
His mouth became dry as dust.

For a moment, the figure disappeared. Then his eyes focused again and he saw her again.
He wanted to speak, wanted to let the others know, but something squeezed his throat.
He recognized the figure.
That white dress brought back all the memories he had never been able to repress, no matter how many times he had tried.
Hannah's dress. The dress he had torn from her lanky white body on their wedding night.

That is impossible. Of course, he knew better. It's as impossible as a perpetual solar eclipse. Hannah's dead. I saw her, right there on the exam table.
I saw the stitches in her flesh. I saw her closed eyes.
Then he saw the black sun, surrounded by a glowing corona, floating directly over Hannah's head into a dark sky.
This was not real. This was all a dream.
The black sun. The shrill screeching in the darkness. The man who had died under his hands. Hannah.
Not real. For sure.

Luc.

It was her voice that spoke to him from his memories.

Do you see me, my darling?

He stared at the floor, clenching his fists until his manicured fingernails pressed painfully into the heels of his hands.

Please don't look away, Luc. It's hurting me. Look at me instead. Me.

He lifted his head. She was right. It was outrageous.
And there she stood. Out there, in the darkness.
She was maybe five meters away from the big glass wall. He could see her clearly: Her pale features, not necessarily beautiful, but sensual, thoughtful. Sadness oozed from her black, large eyes.

Luc. He could see her blue lips moving, cold and bloodless in death. I tried to make myself beautiful. I want to look beautiful for you, Luc. But it's getting harder and harder to be beautiful as time passes. I know I'm ugly, Luc.

That's not true, Luc thought. He almost said the thought out loud, but at the last moment he pulled himself together. This would have betrayed him. This would have destroyed everything.

I can hear you, Luc. She stepped a little closer to the glass. Her black eyes seemed to eat up her face. It almost seemed to Luc as if her eyes were growing. I can read your thoughts. My angel. My cavalier. This is what happens when you love each other, Luc. That's exactly what happens.

She stretched out her hand. And it was also as if her arm was growing. As if it had no joints and no bones. As if it would stretch out further and further.
But it didn't matter. Luc craved her closeness, and he knew she did, too.
Almost her white fingers touched the glass.

Luc... Something broke when he heard her voice. I'm cold.

Without thinking further about it, Luc stepped forward. Illya saw it, but by then it was too late.
Luc had released the latch from the door.