David Bowie’s Starman was playing on the radio while Sal was trying to navigate the bus through a twisting landscape and stormy weather. It was a task he found especially hard, given that Seth had insisted on taking off his shirt while they were driving. His upper-body was powerful-looking, and he had a chiseled chest, and Sal kept throwing surreptitious glances at Seth—he could be a fitness model, for heaven’s sake. They were on the outskirts of nowhere, and Sal found it hard to concentrate. It was an accident waiting to happen.
Sal had been in his room where he was enjoying a game of Hitman.
Carl was laying on Sal's bed, deeply engrossed in his cellphone. The rest of his family was out—his parents were at work, and Vickie had taken the twins to Giantsfair.
He'd entered the world of an assassin in the game in which he had the power and intelligence of Agent 47 at his fingertips. Sal was trying to figure out how he might assassinate Viktor Novikov in a most creative manner when Carl broke his concentration, Novikov slipped under his radar, and he had to restart the mission. "Goddamn, it,” he said bitterly.
Carl was stomping around the room, searching for a charger for his phone. "Have you seen my charger, by any chance?" Carl paused. “No, wait…I found it.”
Sal turned his attention back to the game—maybe he could assassinate Novikov from the balcony—but Carl's voice sounded again, annoying him. “What the fuck's that?”
“What?” Sal replied, throwing the PlayStation's controller away from him.
“On the outside of the window.” Carl's face was pressed against the window. “It looks like a piece of paper.”
Carl opened the window and took hold of the curious piece of paper. It was a laminated note with a small flower on it that had been taped to the window. Carl read it out loud:
"Dinner at 19.00. Be ready at 17.30. Seth”.
He stared at Sal in great anticipation, waiting for him to comment on the note.
“What time is it?” Sal asked, trying to dodge Carl’s well-founded curiosity.
Carl chuckled and looked at his phone. “It’s 17.00. Are you going on a date?"
“I guess so.” Sal could practically feel himself glowing.
He took a shower while Carl made his best attempt at ironing a pair of jeans and a black shirt for him.
Sal used a blow dryer to create a slicked-back look, brushed his teeth, got dressed, and asked Carl what he thought.
“You look like a million dollars." Carl gave Sal's shoulder a nudge. "If anyone asks, I'll say you’re on a date with a Greek god.”
Sal went outside. The note didn’t say where to meet, but he had the feeling that Seth would find him.
Seth was waiting for him by the bus. He was holding an umbrella, and wearing a tuxedo. Seth looked so elegant in the crisp, black, cotton sateen jacket. Hell, he could wear an old tracksuit and still be impressive.
He smiled at Sal. “You look good," he said. "Can we take your bus?”
“Sure.” Sal unlocked the doors, and Seth jumped in, taking cover from the rain.
“Why the note?” Sal asked while Seth was adjusting his seat. Sal wondered if he could raise the entire ceiling of the bus.
“I wanted to maintain my mysterious appeal. Plus, your phone was switched off.” His lips formed a delicious smile.
“So, where are we going?” Sal asked, turning the key in the ignition.
“We’re going where no man has gone before, Sal.”
They made a pit-stop before descending into the middle of nowhere. Sal filled the bus with gas while Seth went inside the small gas station to get coffee. There were a couple of women waiting in front of the small store. Seth greeted them as he passed with a charming smile and slight gesture of the hand as if he were tipping his hat, before going into the small shop.
The women giggled at him and gazed enthusiastically as they straightened their hair and adjusted their bras. Though he knew that Seth had that spellbinding effect on everyone, Sal couldn't help but feel a bit jealous, and he focused on pumping gas instead.
He felt stupid standing there like some belittled lover, but then he remembered something Jack had once said: "After she left me for another guy, I had to go back to pumping my own gas.
Pumping gas—we all do it at some point." They'd been on their way home from some godforsaken field trip to a potato factory with the rest of the class when the bus, which was their transport, was in desperate need of gasoline. The driver had cursed loudly and made a stop at the nearest gas station. Mr. Mayer, who had, unfortunately, been their escort for the trip, constantly reminding the students that they represented the entire school, spotted a blonde woman having trouble with one of the pumps. He'd smoothed his hair, straightened his clothes, and went—hopefully—in her direction.
Mayer ended up getting gasoline all over the woman’s shoes. He walked shamefacedly back to the bus, showered with threats that the woman would call the police. “Can you really blame the guy?" Jack had said with a big smirk. "He probably hasn’t pumped gas in a while.”
Jack had mimicked Mr. Mayer’s voice and said, "After she left me for another guy, I had to go back to pumping my own gas. Pumping gas—we all do it at some point." Sal and Jack had laughed until they were blue in the face.
Sal burst out laughing as he returned the pump to the handle, but his amusement came to an end when Seth came out of the shop, followed by a couple of big hillbillies with an obviously bad attitude, who joined the women outside the shop.
“Have a nice day, ladies,” Seth said with his silky smooth voice. He put two fingers on his lips and then pointed them out toward the women who giggled. Seth walked back to the bus, pleased as punch.
As expected, the guys weren’t amused by Seth’s gestures and launched a diatribe at him, containing a substantial amount of anger aimed at discrediting his manliness.
“Hey, you fucking queer, what the hell do you think you're doing?” one of the hillbillies shouted.
Seth stopped, made a sign to Sal not to get involved, and slowly turned around, his eyes anticipating a confrontation. “Are you talking to me?”
“I don’t see any other faggots in the area," the guy said with confidence. The remark made the other hillbilly laugh.
“Why do you assume I'm gay—is it because I dress better than you, or do you just find me irresistible?” Seth ran his fingers over his lips.
The guy closest to Seth spat on the ground. “Your kind makes me sick.”
“You have your entire life to be a jerk," Seth said, pushing all the right buttons, waiting for the inevitable to happen. "Why not take today off?” Seth seemed bored with the guys' tedious attempts at making up for their lack of confidence.
“Come on, Randy," one of the women said, trying to reason with him. "Let’s go—we're going to be late.”
“Not until I've taught this little worm a lesson,” Randy replied. If hatred were visible, the guy’s breath would have looked like fire.
The women stepped back as the other guy stepped forward until they'd surrounded Seth.
The first blow came from out of nowhere, steering straight at Seth’s abdomen. Seth blocked the blow effortlessly, throwing his coffee in the guy’s face, blinding him and leaving him howling in pain.
“Randy, are you okay?” the second guy asked dumbstruck.
"What the hell do you think, you moron? Get him!” Randy answered.
The moron attacked, trying to tackle Seth, but he didn't know how unmatched he was. Seth moved swiftly to the side, hooked the moron’s ankle with his foot, and pulled it toward him. The guy fell face forward down on the stony ground.
“Are we done playing?" Seth quickly squatted down to pin the second idiot, placing his right elbow on his throat.
The guy with the coffee on him hadn’t learned his lesson, it seemed, and he went in for another blow, moving quickly, thinking Seth would be more vulnerable crouching down. With the reflexes of a cat, Seth moved out of the way and delivered an uppercut that would have made Mike Tyson jealous, and the guy faltered back as blood spattered from his nose.
Seth turned to the two shocked women he'd greeted earlier and kissed each one on the hand. “I’m sorry you had to see this, ladies. Please, forgive me.”
The two women stared at Seth in disbelief and nodded.
“What a waste of coffee,” Seth said, rather vexed as he walked back to the bus. “And I got blood on my shirt.” He was greeted by a fascinated and a slightly shocked Sal.
"You did that on purpose,” Sal noted. “Why risk exposing yourself like that?”
Seth was low key. “The security cameras won’t show anything—they aren’t working.
“It's incredible what some people will share with you when you bat your eyelids.”
“The clerk flat-out shared that information with you?” What a stupid question, Sal thought to himself; Seth could persuade a dead person to talk.
He gave a Sal an overbearing glare. “Dear friend, I used to be a burglar, remember? I know my security cameras. Plus, their equipment dates back to the 1970s. Plus, I blend in very well.”
“You really dig confrontations with violent outcomes, don’t you?” Sal said electrified.
Seth turned his head and looked warmly at Sal. “It's you I dig—I simply tolerate violent confrontations.”
Sal levitated from his seat for a moment as the euphoria increased in his body.
They passed the city limits of a village called Wallowdale. Population: none.
A huge sign in red letters warned them to stay out. Wallowdale used to be a bustling town, but it died when the local industry had fizzled. Now, it was abandoned and consumed by the elements. The deserted town featured a big, steeple-shaped fish monument, a children’s playground, a sports hall of fame, and the ruins of a train station.
Sal had vaguely heard of Wallowdale, as the place no one dared enter. Maybe they'd heard the story of how it had been irradiated from toxic waste or how people claimed to see the ghost of a sadistic nurse who'd used her patients as guinea pigs, administering a lethal cocktail of morphine and atropine on her patients, and holding them down until they'd died.
The nurse had claimed her goal was to kill more helpless people than any other man or woman in history. She was later found not guilty by reason of insanity. On a silent, clear night, it was rumored the spirits of former residents showed themselves, screaming in agony. A TV crew who had later wanted to conduct a paranormal investigation at Wallowdale mysteriously disappeared, never to be heard from again.