Jake’s breath steamed out into the
frigid December air, curling and spinning before dissipating. He
walked quickly down George Street, head down, his hands buried in his
pockets. Every so often a muttered curse escaped from between his
clenched teeth, and his already miserable face twisted into a brief
snarl. He was heading back to Rockoff from Scott Hall, where he had
just been mystified by yet another final. As he called down disease
and misfortune upon his professors, the department heads, and Rutgers
University in general, he contemplated how he could make a living
with half an English degree and no marketable skills.
The possibilities of life as a
third-rate stand-up comedian or a proofreader at some backwoods
newspaper in Oklahoma helped him ignore what little activity there
was on the streets that night, but the sound of a deep voice shouting
down a side-street made him look up. A tiny older lady was
struggling with someone over a purse. She didn’t look like she
lived around here; her clothes were much too fancy. Her assailant
was much bigger than her, but not that much bigger than Jake, and had
the strap of the bag wrapped around one of his arms, while his other
hand was half-inside the bag already. The man had his back to Jake,
and was dressed in a baggy grey hoodie and a beat-up Duke Blue Devils
cap.
Jake wondered for the rest of the life
what made him do what he did next. Maybe it was because he was
bullied as a kid, or because the lady reminded him of his
girlfriend’s grandmother, or maybe because he was just a generally
good guy. For whatever reason, he yelled “Hey!” and sprinted off
to the rescue. The man ripped the purse from the old lady’s grasp
and ran past her, bumping into her and knocking her to the ground.
Jake knelt down next to her when he
reached her. She was oddly calm for someone who was just assaulted.
She wore a mink stole over a very elaborate light green dress with a
high, stiff collar and tacky gold buttons. Her spike heels were a
matching green, and her grey hair was done up in tight curls. When
she looked up at Jake, she seemed surprised that he was there.
“Are you alright, ma’am?” The
lady blinked, and silently nodded. She must have been in shock.
“You stay here; I’ll be right back.” With that, he took off
after the man, who had darted inside the nearby parking garage.
Jake ducked under the yellow-and-black
striped arm and followed the mugger into the severe, grey structure.
Screams of pain echoed down the concrete stairwell as he chased the
fleeing figure up the stairs. The sounds were crazed and shrill.
Great, he thought as he leaped up the steps, panting from
exertion, this guy is on some freaky drug trip. He caught a
glimpse of a boot and the ragged leg of a pair of sweatpants as the
man ran through a doorway and into the rows of cars.
Emerging from the stairwell, Jake
paused for a moment after losing track of the man. His screams
bounced around the parking garage, coming from all directions at
once. Then there was a flash of movement, and it galvanized him into
action. He darted through and around cars, the hollow shrieks giving
him an eerie feeling that he tried hard to ignore.
Suddenly… silence. It came so
quickly and abruptly that Jake’s momentum left him along with his
determination. The incoherent screeching had been disturbing to say
the least, but this new silence hit him like a bucket of ice water.
There was a feeling of void to his surroundings now, an all-consuming
feeling of being completely and utterly alone… and yet…
There was something else. That
irrational feeling one gets when alone, quiet, and completely
vulnerable. The prickling on the back of your neck, the feeling of
the axe about to fall, the phantom sensation of something plunging
between your shoulder blades… Utter, fervent, primal fear.
Jake quickly checked the reflections
in the car windows, making sure no one was behind him. He didn’t
want to spin around and check, didn’t want to give anyone- if there
was anyone, which there might not be- a reason to act. He slowly
moved forward, senses intent, the focus darting around, first from
where he thought he heard the mugger last, to behind him, to every
niche and hiding space someone could leap from. This was a bad
idea, he thought. This guy could have a knife… Oh God, or a
gun! I should have called the cops and stayed with the old lady.
What the hell was I thinking! Rushing off like some kind of
super-hero… Oh God, I don’t want to die over some lady’s purse.
He forced himself to act calm, move
slowly, even though every nerve screamed for him to run, to scream,
to destroy everything that could hide someone, to do something,
anything¸ to eradicate this indefinable danger. No… no…
Air rushed into his lungs in great gasps as he took a moment of
stillness to calm himself. These are irrational fears, he
told himself. You are in a brightly lit, public space. You
are fine. Nothing will happen to you.
There was something on the ground up
ahead. Jake curved around so that he could see what it was while
being far away from it… just in case. He saw the purse, but no
mugger. The bag rested close to the edge of the level, only a few
inches from the cables that were pitiful excuses for safety
precautions.
Jackass must have run right out
into thin-air, he thought with relief as he approached the bag
and picked it up. It was a big, misshapen thing, made of some sort
of rough, reptile skin and with a sharp looking clasp that was
embellished by two big, ugly, red-orange jewels on either side. The
strap was long and thick, very ropy and with an awkward knot at the
top, as if it had broken long ago and was constantly being retied.
The whole thing was trimmed with tassels and fringe and it looked
ridiculous.
Relieved that he didn’t have to face
off against a purse-snatching maniac, Jake clasped the bag tightly in
his hand and turned to go, preferably someplace brightly-lit and full
of people. The clasp dug painfully into his palm. He winced and
shifted his grip on it. A few steps later he stumbled over the long,
snaky strap. Frustrated and afraid, he grabbed at the thing and
tried to get it under control. Somehow it had gotten tangled
insanely tight around his ankle. He hurriedly tried to loosen it and
again felt a sharp pain in his hand. The bag had fallen open and the
inside of the lip was jagged and sharp. Jake dropped the purse and
struggled with the strap. Although the bag was wide open and being
dragged all over the place, nothing was falling out. That was
strange. Did the old lady not have anything at all?
Wouldn’t that be ironic, he
thought as he reached for it. And then he froze. The bag had slid
across the cement floor, slowly, making a scratching noise. He
hadn’t touched, hadn’t pulled it by the strap. It moved again,
and Jake could see that the strap was slowly disappearing into the
bag.
Jake grabbed at the
knot keeping the strap together and tried to pry it loose. He
couldn’t; he could see- he could
feel the strands
tightening, retying themselves. He stood up and tried to shake it
loose and fell down almost immediately as the bag engulfed his foot
and he began to
scream. It felt like there were a thousand
razor sharp teeth tearing away his flesh, demolishing his bones to
pieces, and turning his body into puree. The straps of the bag
elongated to pin his arms against his body, and they contracted so
hard that his ribs cracked and his eyes bulged.
Jake’s screams
bounced around the parking garage, coming from all directions at
once, back at Jake. His own hollow shrieks covered up the sound of
his bones breaking as he was engulfed. For some reason, Jake was
conscious of the whole process, even after his heart and lungs were
ground into hamburger. He could feel the bag working its way up his
neck, and finally, he died as the bag closed on his head. For a few
moments, the bag shook and shuddered, its sides bulging and
compressing sporadically. Then its clasp opened and it let out a
resounding belch accompanied by a spout of flame.
Silence fell. It
was eventually broken by a slow, rhythmic clicking. The purse lay on
the ground, now still and motionless. The tapping echoed off the
concrete walls. It stopped as the little old lady reached the spot
where the purse lay. She slowly bent down to pick it up, no sign of
age in her posture or movements. She lifted the bag up, and held it
over her head, which she tilted back, mouth open. The purse
shuddered, and the scales popped and opened. From the slits trickled
thick, dark red liquid. The blood trailed down the channels between
the scales, and poured into the upturned mouth of the little old
lady. For a solid minute it flowed out of the purse and into her
mouth before the purse had given all it had received and its scales
closed again. Then the little old lady put the purse back over her
shoulder, wiped a crimson drop from the corner of her mouth, and
walked away, a satisfied smile on her lips. The even tapping of her
footsteps receded into silence.
-D.M.D.M. 6-1-2005