The Tall Man

“Teague, come on,” she said with measured patience.

                  Teague resisted, obstinate in the way that only little kids could be. He dragged his feet, drawing out every little step as much as he could until his aunt was forced to slow down and heave a heavy sigh. None of this was her fault, but she was the only one around for Teague to take his frustration out on. When she held out her hand to guide him across the street, however, Teague gripped it tightly. He wasn’t really mad at her.

                  “I dunno why I haveta buy something,” Teague whined and fell into step with Grace as she led him through the mid-town crowds. In only a few years he would be getting to school on his own, but until then he stayed close and held her hand tightly.

                  Teague looked down at his shoes and shuffled his feet against the dirty pavement as they waited for the next light. “I made something for Dad.”

                  “I know,” Grace sighed again. “But your mom thought it would be a good idea for you to buy him something for his birthday instead. Maybe a nice mug? You know your daddy loves coffee.”

                  “But…” His father had mugs. He had more mugs and nice little cups than they knew what to do with. Lida, their housekeeper, always complained, good naturedly, about how much space those mugs and cups took up in the dishwasher. Why did Teague need to buy another one?

“I made him something. It’ll make his job make a lot of money. I talked to the Dark Thing and…”

                  “Teague,” Grace said shortly with a slight edge of panic to her voice, and maneuvered him away from the traffic of people, back toward the side of a building. She spoke softly. “I told you, you should be careful doing anything with the Dark Thing.”

                  How many times had Grace and his father given the exact same warning? Teague didn’t understand why they kept acting like the Dark Thing was somehow bad or dangerous. They didn’t know it. They’d never heard it speak or seen how it could help. They had decided all on their own to tell Teague it was bad.

                  Teague didn’t agree. The Dark Thing was a part of him. How could anything about him be bad?

                  “I was careful,” he protested. “I did it all right. I…”

                  A sharp screech cut him off midsentence. There was a thump, a woman shouting, and then a beat of complete stillness and silence.

                  Grace looked away from him, her hands loosening on his shoulders, back toward the street and the man just now rolling down from the hood of a car that had turned into the intersection.

                  Teague frowned. He didn’t understand exactly what had happened, only knew it was bad. The crowd around him rushed forward and pulled back in equal measure, the energy rising above them in panic and fear and a hint of disgust. The Dark Thing around Teague felt it and fed the information back to him.

                  “Teague, Teague you stand right here,” Grace insisted. “Don’t move okay, don’t move.”

                  Grace gripped him by the shoulders again gently maneuvered him to stay against the wall, then pushed through the growing crowd that surrounded the man on the street. She yelled that she could help, that she knew first aid.

                  The man on the street was dying, the Dark Thing told Teague. The car had hit him, and it had done bad things to his body.

Teague watched, moving and angling his body to peer through the crowd. His Aunt Grace was hunched over the body, kneeling in the gutter and laying her hands on his chest. She didn’t know first aid, but the Dark Thing knew that she was healing him nevertheless. There were little dots of light glimmering above the man, unseen to the eyes of the bystanders, hovering above his tie and the twisted suit jacket around his middle. Grace was helping using her own version of the Dark Thing, but it wouldn’t be enough. The driver of the car got out and stood by the door, holding his head in disbelief and horror, too shaken to do anything to as they called for help, but it would all be too little, too late.

                  The man would die.

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                  Teague sighed and leaned against the rough wall as the Dark Thing pulled back and draped around him like a cloak. There was nothing he could do but sit and wait for Grace to be done so they could get back to their walk.

                  Movement to his side caught Teague’s eye, and he looked away from the chaos. A tall man, far taller than the crowd moving around him, was staring at Teague from beneath the rim of a tall hat. His face was skeletal, an odor of liquor like the kind Teague’s father drank, and old smoke drifting toward him. There was something different about him. The man seemed too solid for the world around him, the edges of his long black coat too sharp. Something was different, but Teague couldn’t figure out what.

                  The Dark Thing perked up. Whoever the man was, the Dark Thing was interested, and quietly it told Teague to be as respectful as a child his age could manage.

                  The man gestured to him, and Teague left his place on the wall to wind through the crowd and follow as the man left the chaos behind and found a quieter place a few stores down.

                  “Ya know who I am, little Through?”

                  Teague blinked. “I’m not supposed to talk to strangers.”

                  The man laughed like bugs crawling over stones. There was something about him that should have been unsettling, Teague knew that, but mostly he felt comfortable. It felt like this was someone he had been waiting to meet for a long time.

                  “Ya can talk to me. Ya know what’s happening with that man?”

                  Teague looked over his shoulder. Up close, the stranger smelled like dirt, and in fact there was dirt, scattered on his coat and caked on to his boots. He was so tall he needed to stoop to fit under the store’s awning.

                  “He’s dying. My Aunt is trayna help, but he’s dying.”

                  “Your Aunt ain’t all that good at healing the dying. Not when I’m already here. Ya want the man to die?”

                  Teague shrugged. It wasn’t that he wanted to see anything bad happen, it was just out of his control. It was hard to care about things like that, even when he knew he should. “I guess not.”

                  “Maybe he’s gotta son like you, little Through.”

                  Teague shrugged again. The Dark Thing hadn’t mentioned anything like that. It was too busy listening to what this tall man had to say.

                  “You wanna save him?” the tall man asked.

                  “I can’t. I dunno how to do that.”

                  The man grinned from beneath his hat. “I’ll teach ya. First time won’t cost ya much.” He turned and pointed with one bony hand through the window of the store. “Ya see those little bottles by the register? Take one and give it to me.”

                  Teague looked from the tall man to the man in the street and back. It seemed easy, and the Dark Thing certainly agreed with the idea. This was what he was supposed to do, the Dark Thing told him. They had figured it out, finally. Still, Teague had a few misgivings. He could practically hear Grace in the back of his mind.

                  “That’s stealing. Aunt Grace says it’s wrong to steal.”

                  The tall man laughed again. “Let me tell you something, little Through.” He leaned down to put his face closer to Teague’s. Up close, he looked even more unsettling, skeletal, but Teague didn’t feel the slightest bit of fear. In fact, he kind of liked this man. “Lots of rules ain’t gonna apply to you. Better get used to that now.”

                  Teague considered. If the man said it was alright, it was probably alright. And it would be nice to save the man in the street. People seemed to care about that. Grace seemed to care. They would forgive him for taking the bottle.

                  “Okay,” he agreed, and let the Dark Thing pull around him. He couldn’t ever be invisible, but the Dark Thing had taught him how to go places unnoticed. If they didn’t know to look, they wouldn’t see.

                  Inside the shop, he snuck to the counter and waited until the man standing there looked away before reaching up and fishing a bottle from the jar. It all took less than a minute for Teague to get what he wanted and return to where the tall man waited.

                  He held out the bottle. “Here you go.”

                  The tall man clicked his tongue. “Nah, little Through. Do it right.”                 

                  Teague frowned. He thought he was doing exactly what the tall man had asked of him but… the Dark Thing whispered an answer. He wasn’t doing it right, not yet.

                  “Okay. Um…I want to trade you this,” Teague held up the bottle. “In exchange for helping save that man’s life.” The Dark Thing prompted him to continue. “And that’s all I want to do.”

                  The tall man accepted the bottle with a wide grin and snapped it open. As he tipped it into his mouth, he laughed. “Ya gonna be good at this, little Through.”