Instinct by Jason Hough (ebook reader web TXT) 📗

He lets me in and we kiss again.

“I was serious about sleep,” I say when we break, breathless. My voice is husky like his was, betraying my words, but I guess my eyes are serious because Kyle watches them, and he nods.

“Works for me.”

In bed I lay propped on an elbow, watching him brush his teeth in the bathroom just beyond.

“Hey,” I ask, “is Kenny okay?”

“Whaddya mean?”

“I don’t know. When I saw him at the gas station he looked… thin.”

Kyle leans out the door and studies me for a second. “I know he looks like a tweaker, but he’s clean. Swear.” His head vanishes again.

“Thinner than usual, I mean. And his lips were super dry.”

Kyle’s bedroom is simply furnished. The queen mattress is on the floor. There’s a low table on the adjacent wall with a flat-screen TV on it and a PlayStation. One of the games stacked beside it I recognize.

“Hey, you play Bug Out Bag?” I ask him.

“The game? Used to. It sucks. So unrealistic.”

Below the window on the adjacent wall is a cheap dresser, flanked on one side by a floor lamp and on the other by a tall gun safe, suitable for holding several hunting rifles.

“How many guns does one man need?” I ask, eyeing the metal box as he comes back into the room.

He glances that way, then at me, and gives a sheepish smile. “Actually,” he says, “it’s pretty much empty right now. Kenny’s cleaning them for me. It’s kind of a thing for him. He’s fine by the way. Kenny. Far as I know.”

“ ‘Pretty much’ empty? Care to elaborate, sir?”

“Just a single pistol, Officer. For self-defense.”

“You better have a permit for it.”

“I… uh… gee, Officer, not exactly.”

I assume he’s joking, because I was joking, but to my surprise he opens the safe. Makes a show of it, in fact, with no attempt to shield the combination from me. From inside he removes a holster and belt. Even in the dim light I can tell it’s old, the leather cracked in places, yet it still has an air of being lovingly maintained.

Inside the holster is a pistol I’ve seen in dozens of movies, but never in person. “Is that a Luger?”

“Yep,” he says, proudly. “Want to hold it?”

“It’s really unlicensed?”

He stares at me, and his face scrunches up in an almost comedic admission of guilt. “I mean, I think so. This old fogie gave it to me to cover his bar tab, few years back. He sort of implied I should keep it on the down low. Figured it would be best not to find out.”

“Yeah, of course. You wouldn’t want to find out it’s a Nazi murder weapon or something you’ve been slathering your fingerprints all over.”

Kyle shrugs, a little too amused at the sarcasm. He offers the weapon to me, grip-first.

I shake my head at him. “No, I don’t want to hold it. Pretend I never saw it, okay?”

He puts the old gun and its holster back in the safe, spins the lock, and crawls onto the bed.

Ten minutes later, with Kyle spooned against my back and his warm breaths tickling the hairs on my neck, I fall into the best sleep I’ve had in days.

The sound of rain against Kyle’s window stirs me awake. Soft gray light pushes in around the edges of the blinds. It’s just enough to see the crumpled sheets and discarded clothes. Funny, I think, how the aftermath of a night of sleep isn’t too different from that of lovemaking.

Careful not to wake him, I slip from under the covers and gather up my things. The idea of a warm shower is practically enough to make me salivate, but I decide against waking him. I want to cross the street and be inside the station before anyone notices I was here.

The clock on my phone reads 6:12 a.m. There’s no messages, and only one text: a note from Clara, thanking me for rescuing her from the silo and offering to buy breakfast as a show of gratitude. “We are still getting breakfast, yes?” the message concludes. She sent it only a few minutes before. I reply:

busy morning ahead. make it lynch and you’re on.

Followed by:

*lunch! ducking auto convict.

Her reply is two emojis: a face crying with laughter and a thumbs-up.

I leave Kyle’s place on the top floor of the narrow old four-story building. I always thought living so close to work would drive me nuts, but as I slip out the little side door next to the pub’s entrance and walk quickly across to the station, I can appreciate the benefits.

I go inside only long enough for a shower and a cup of coffee. Fifteen minutes later I’m in the car, feeling energized and ready to roll.

Last night as I fell asleep—which didn’t take long—a plan of sorts started to take shape in my muddled brain. More of a credo than a plan, I guess. A mantra that I repeated to myself several times before drifting off. “Look into everything, no matter how crazy.” And that’s exactly what I intend to do today. Before lunch if possible. I want to have something solid the next time Clara, Kyle, and I talk.

Because although I’m convinced now that at least some of Silvertown’s residents—myself included—are having behavioral issues, the question is how? Why?

I take my time driving through downtown. There are no cars around yet. Just a few people out for morning walks, either alone or with their dogs. None of the shops are open, at least not for business. The door to the kitschy crystal-healing and occult gifts shop, called The Dark Wheel, stands ajar. The sight of its open door gives me a little knot of dread, but as I drive by, the owner of the store, a soft middle-aged man with jet-black hair flowing to his shoulders, waddles out butt-first, sweeping a broom left to right