Hunting Season Read Free

broken and chipped teeth on pointing out at Elijah.  A long breath escaped his mouth.  Elijah watched Miguel's life sputtering out in the red brake lights.
    "This is how you die."  Miguel gurgled blood.
    Elijah blinked and found himself kneeling over the empty pavement.  Miguel had vanished.  He ran around and looked at the front end of the car.  It was undamaged.
    "What the Hell?"  He'd never experienced anything like it.  A vision followed by a vision?
    A semi raced by and honked.  Snapping out of his disbelief, Elijah climbed back aboard and drove on, determined more than ever to get to Mom.
     
    *  *  *  *  *
     
    The guards were expecting him and called for an escort from the infirmary when Elijah arrived.  A thin, gaunt man met him and took him to his mother.
    She was a sack of bones with sunken eyes and birdlikearms.  He walked over to her and kissed her on the forehead.  Her skin was clammy.  She smelled of wet-wipes and urine.
    "I'm here, Mom."  He leaned over her, and saw a glint of recognition in her milky eyes.
    "Knowing you were alone and unloved here in prison has been the only comfort in my life.  You murdered Dad, and left a broken kid to roam the broken world.  My only hope is that you don't die.  That you continue to rot away, alive and in misery, forever, and ever."
    A single monotone sound emanated from the heart monitor.  A flat line drifted across the screen.  A doctor and a nurse raced in and pushed Elijah aside and started CPR.  Rather than watch, he moved toward the door feeling empty and defeated.  Ten minutes later, a doctor found him in the hallway and told him she was gone.
    "I am Loneliness," he said when he was by himself.
    Elijah stood there a long time, thinking about her, and his life.  Thought about Miguel, the stranger of his dreams.  Thought about the people he'd killed before they could do bad things, the images of them replaying in his head all at once like a surreal movie.  And now the one thing he'd always had in his life, his focus of rage, the woman who had ruined him, was gone.
    His hands trembled as he rubbed the back of his neck, thinking, wishing he could make sense of everything and feeling more alone now than he ever had.
    Just get out of here, he thought.  Find a motel, sleep, and then bury Mom tomorrow.
    After signing out with the guard at the front, Elijah walked to his car and climbed in.  When he tried to start it, nothing happened.
    "Come on."
    He turned the key again.  Nothing.  Not even a click.
    Deal with it tomorrow, he thought and got out.
    Elijah grabbed his backpack from the backseat.  Looking at the solitary patch sewn on the front reminded him of when Mom had first given it to him.  His favorite band for her favorite son.
    Fuck her, he thought, shaking the memory off and slinging the pack over his shoulder.  He slammed the door and walked from the car down the road away from the prison.
    I am Loneliness, he thought as he pulled his jacket tighter against a chill wind.  I am Vision.
    The headlights of an approaching car rounded the bend up ahead.  As it neared, Elijah stuck out his fist and cocked his thumb up.
    The car slowed and pulled over just past him.  "Need a ride?" a woman said.
    Elijah stared at the car a moment before walking toward it.  "Yes, I do."
    "I can take you as far as town."
    "Sounds good."  Elijah climbed in the passenger seat and set his pack on the floor between his feet.  "I appreciate it."
    "Got a name?"  Her accent was soft, maybe Georgia.
    Elijah looked at her.  He couldn't make out much but could tell she was thin.  Her breasts were nice and round.  Her hair, auburn and long.  She looked like Mom when she had been younger.
    "Miguel," he said.
    I am Vision, he thought.  I am Death.
     

FUBAR
     
    The term for my situation: FUBAR.
    FUBAR, one of those handy-dandy acronyms used in the military to prevent one from speaking more words than necessary.  Meaning: Fucked Up Beyond All Repair.
    The