Chapter 2
Jacob Hollow
April
He walked alone on the edge of the road. His tennis shoes crunched on icy gravel, and his breath danced in the air before him like a series of dying ghosts, writhing to nothing against the pale sky. He wore a dirty grey hoodie, and the hood hung unused at the nape of his neck despite the chill morning air. He squinted against the brightness. His long shadow lumbered across the road beside him. He kept his hands in his hoodie pocket, folded together as though in prayer, to protect them from the cold. His eyes watered in the bitter wind, and he could not feel his ears. But he smiled.
He walked in a desolate landscape. Barren fields stretched left and right, before and behind—long, low hills, yellow and white and brown, speckled occasionally with clumps of cattle. The road with its accompanying rows of fenceposts raced on ahead for miles before vanishing against a gradual rise. The sky, a dissipated haze, would by noon dissolve into a crisp piercing blue, marked by whispers of cloud. Far overhead, a hawk circled.
The man had never been in a place like this before. He thought to himself: how could it be so cold and bright and dusty and windy all at once?
He walked at a steady pace, unyielding.
The entire morning only three vehicles passed him. Two were going the other way. The one going his way, a battered green pickup truck, stopped to ask if he wanted a ride. He smiled and shook his head. The driver looked uncertain, because it was cold and the closest town was twenty miles out, but eventually he shrugged and continued on.
The walking man looked unremarkable. His pale face, narrow and framed by patchy stubble, would have excited no comment, but a manic energy lurked behind the eyes, a wildness. Something about this man’s gaze had made the driver of the green pickup truck uneasy.
Sometimes the walking man removed a hand from his sweater pocket and snapped his fingers a few times.
Sometimes he spoke. He spoke as though conversing with another, though he walked alone.
“This is the place, right?”
Fuck if I know. Didn’t you check the coordinates?
“I think this is the place. He’ll be there.”
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So we’re just trusting that sketchy message now, huh? Unbelievable.
“Got any better ideas?”
Yeah, in fact I do, but you didn’t want to listen. Seriously, all you had to do was murder like twenty humans. Now you’re walking into some kind of trap like a gods-damned idiot.
“It’ll be fine.”
Oh, really? Why didn’t you say so? Wow, that’s so convincing. Okay, then, great. Can you hear how convinced I am?
“I got this feeling, that’s all.”
Bullshit. You’re just following birds.
“Problem with that?”
Listen to this guy. I don’t know why I waste my time.
“Because you’re bored.”
No, I think it’s ‘cause you’re gonna die. And I want to watch.
“Hey, I’ll be fine.”
I think we both know you definitely will not be fine.
“Shut up.”
(Laughter.)
Bright streams of powdery snow crawled like luminous serpents across the cold, cracked asphalt. The hawk cried out overhead. The young man peered at the horizon and kept walking.