Chapter 11

PRESENT

2020

“How do we kill The Mist?”

Never in all the years Jenarius had been alive, through happy days and the horrid days, did he believe he’d ever get to say those words to somebody else.

He was watching the Latin American, name apparently Angel, pass her hand over his selection of guns. They were in a black bag he had purchased over the years, one he carried with him everywhere.

Harvey had been freed from under the bed, and after sharing an odd moment with Angel, in which they smiled slightly at each other, he had buried himself under the red covers of the motel bed and drifted off into a deep slumber.

Now, five minutes past midnight, he stood under the dim light of the mostly room watching the strange Angel gawk at his guns, asking her the one question he’s wished – for years- to be able to ask somebody else.

“A state from here,” Angel started, “there’s a Shaman I know. He’ll help us figure out what we’re meant to do.”

“You have no idea?” Jenarius mocked.

Angel glanced behind her shoulder and glared at him.

“I’m sorry," she said, deadpan. "I didn’t finish my PhD in paranormal activity. Forgive me.”

He could have laughed, would have laughed, if he were still the same dull and emotional Jen who had no sense of humour whatsoever.

He roamed his green eyes over her body as she turned to stare at his guns. She had hips, womanly hips, and a little bum. Her hair was boyish but it suited her and she was young but she moved like she owned the entire world.

“Angel,” he said, slowly, “how old are you?”

She snorted.

“Hell, no, rapist.”

He blanched, “It isn’t what you think.”

“I can feel your eyes on my ass from here, cabróne. Get in line.”

Jenarius smiled and Angel turned around and crossed her arms over her chest.

“I want to know why you’re wasting your life,” he said, “especially if The Mist isn’t coming back for you ever again.”

Angel smiled but it was sad.

“Don’t you get it, Jenarius?” she said. “The point is to hurt you for eternity. Whether or not I move on, he’ll come for whoever I marry, for whoever I love, through Julian. Blood ties. A connection. I tried to move on, I even graduated high school, but I couldn’t just sit back and forget. Everything felt…”

She trailed off and ran a hand through her hair and over her face. She leaned back against the wooden counter and her eyes started to water.

Jenarius ached to soothe her pain, remembering how he had faced it alone, but then he reminded himself of what would happen if he got close to her. This time, it was both ways.

Either she would be targeted by Phoebe or he would be targeted by Julian.

“It fucking sucks,” he said. “There is no point to moving on when you know it’s impossible to.”

She smiled, “Exactly.”

He decided it was too much to think of, for his and Harvey’s sake, and so he cleared his throat and changed the subject.

“I’m guessing your age then,” he said.

She laughed.

It was still not annoying him.

“Are you 25?”

She smirked, “You wish.”

“Jesus,” he frowned, “23?”

She shrugged but the answer was clearly a no.

He wouldn’t believe she was younger than 21.

“21?”

“Bingo.”

He shook his head.

“What?” she said.

“You should be at college parties, drinking people under the table, playing ping pong or something.”

“And you should be in a retirement home.”

Jenarius looked up and caught her eye. She was laughing at him.

“I’m not that old.”

Angel shrugged, “And I’m not that young.”

He ignored her.

“I’m only 42, if you must know,” he sighed. “Although I feel older.”

Angel ran her eyes over his face.

The beard made him appear older but you could see the youth in his green eyes. The long hair suited him more than it did any other person she had ever seen but she could see how much the pain of his past had aged him along with his fear of the future.

She had to admit it, though, Jenarius was handsome and from the photos she had collected of him for her revenge plotting, she noticed how much better he appeared the older he got.

“Stop staring, cabróne,” he mocked.

It was odd at how simple it had taken them to be comfortable enough to joke with each other.

It was the loneliness, Jenarius thought just as Angel blamed the loneliness.

She had been traveling on her own for three years. Stealing cars- until she found her perfect vehicle that was parked outside a n old dead man's farm in Alabama- hitch hiking and living in motels, for the sole purpose of finding an answer to the Wishing Well problem that the earth had.

For Jenarius, he had been the grown up he had to be. There was never anybody to joke with. Strangers would remember him from the news or the papers and would call the police faster than he could say ‘The Mist’, Harvey had been too young to pay attention to a word he said, and even though he was older now, he was still a little boy.

Angel was his first real adult company, because she had gone through what he did, and Jenarius was hers for the same reason.

There was understanding between them.

Two people in a room had suffered a great loss the very same way, even though Jenarius had almost experienced it twice. They were looking at each other, she- the girl he had almost killed and he- the man she was risking her life for to save, but that was all they could be for each other.

Not a person.

Not a lover.

Not even a friend.

BEFORE

2015

Two months left until October 12th. It had been so long, so fucking long, yet the month never seized to cause a sense of dread- so strong- he was surprised it hadn’t killed him yet.

Jenarius stood under the scorching heat of the faucet as hot droplets of water fell onto his body. He enjoyed the numb feeling it gave him, as sick as that was, and he placed his palms flat against the white tiles as he showered his nightmares away.

He dreamt of her sometimes. Leane. She was noisy and complained, even in his dreams, but the annoyance and anger he had felt towards her before was no longer present when he slept. Her beautiful brown eyes and her contagious laugh filled his ears, and that was the peaceful part. By the end of his dreams, she would be screaming, and then he would be drowning in a pool of her and Christopher’s blood.

He jerked when the hot water ran cold.

It was finished.

He stepped out of the shower and didn’t care to grab for a towel. This would be his last month in Orlando. He had been here for too long.

Jenarius dressed in a deep green jersey and black jeans. He put on a pair of black boots he had successfully stolen from a motel customer last year and he was good to go.

It was cold outside, chilly, and he rubbed his hands together as he headed across the street to a diner. He would have coffee for breakfast, only coffee, because he never had the stomach to eat a full meal- or anything, for that matter- after a death dream.

The diner was white and glass walled where there was no brick. It was open 24/7, like every other diner across a motel, and the door pinged loudly as he moved inside. He took a seat on a red high chair against the bar table. The floor was checked and the walls were a deep red; the colour of blood. When he was handed a very graphic menu, he almost wretched.

A woman in a pink uniform waltzed up to him and asked him for his order. He barely glanced up at her. He mumbled coffee and sighed heavily and when she didn’t move, or speak, he assumed he hadn’t spoken loud enough.

He looked up and opened his mouth to tell it out, ’co- fucking- ffee’, but when his mind registered the face he was looking at, he froze.

Katherine Wanders.

There she was, blond hair in a pony tail, blue eyes wide in surprise, lips slightly apart as she gaped at him; he was looking at her much the same.

They looked at each other in surprise. Not like long lost lovers, although that would have been the case if he hadn’t only been around for a day, but like two people who were really- truly- shocked they were seeing each other again.

Yet here she was, the sweet girl who had once forced him to dance when his heart was broken, standing in this shit hole diner, serving him again.

She leaned in for a hug and he instinctively flinched.

“Lord, Jen,” she laughed, “what is with you and contact?”

He didn’t know what it was about the women in his life and them calling him ‘Jen’.

Jenarius shrugged apologetically.

“It’s been a while.”

Katherine smiled, “Since what? You’ve been hugged?”

Jenarius nodded, shameful.

Katherine laughed, as though he was kidding, and leaned down. This time, she daringly kissed his cheek and he let her.

It happened fast, that time.

They sat for hours, from the early morning until the sun set and the evening came, talking about the simple things in life Jenarius had once experienced but could never remember enjoying.

He enjoyed the memory now, the girls and the drugs and the booze. He talked about his first love, Phoebe’s mother, her red hair and the way she was so trusting. He talked about his first car, a Mustang GT, and it was like a fog had lifted. He forgot. He actually forgot. At just the right time.

When it was over, they walked back to her apartment. He didn’t ask why she had moved for the last time he was in Orlando, in her bedroom, it had been in a nice and safe looking neighbourhood. Now she was stuck in the dumps in a place he wouldn’t have sent his worst enemy, except The Mist- of course.

Jenarius was looking forward to whatever was going to happen that night, whatever she wanted to do.

If she wanted to mess around and have some fun, he would enjoy it while his sorrowful heart allowed him to, and if she wanted to talk- he would enjoy it too.

When he walked into her gaping white doorway and bent low to pick up his shoes, he was rambling about the love for baseball he used to have.

When he rose to his full height, he was shocked at the sight before him.

A little boy was balancing on Katherine’s right hip. He looked to be a year old.

He had her beautiful face and her sun kissed blond hair, scattered freckles, bent button nose and bushy brows- even at his age- but it was his eyes, nothing but the colour and the shape of his eyes, that knocked the breath out of Jenarius.

They were green.

Tree green.

Just like his.