By June Decker

Before I never saw my father again, there was football.

I was seven when he bought me my first football. He gave it to me with a story. He wasn’t a star quarterback in high school; he was a running back. He was the fastest on the track team, the cross-country team, and the football team. But he had torn his ACL in college – Michigan State University – and that was the end of football for him.

I knew him in a different way, then. My dad lived slowly. He talked quietly, walked with his hands in his pockets, drove his Cadillac slow down our neighborhood street. But once, he’d been fast. I imagined that he could have outrun anything. But the fast had left him back at Michigan State University.

The summer day that he gave me the football, he handed it to me and I saw that slow smile spread across his face. It was my seventh birthday, and we’d just had a party in the backyard. I was stuffed with chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream.

“Do you want to play some, son?” he asked. His voice was always slow and quiet, but it was powerful. I smiled a big smile and nodded. He tossed me the ball and we jogged together to the front lawn.

The first time he threw me that football, it was fast. I tried to run past him, but he moved so quick that I barely saw him move. He barely had to take a step to grab me. He spun me around and I laughed, hard.

I threw it back to him, and he was fast. It was like the ball was a key unlocking the door to the decade before, back from before when I was born. When he ran, I stopped and stared. I wondered if the fast had ever left him. I saw him like he was, then. He grabbed me again and put me on his shoulders, and we laughed.

My dad and I played every day until the night that he never came home. Mom wouldn’t tell me what happened right away, she just cried, gasping, until she couldn’t speak or see. She took the phone call, took in a breath that could have cut her throat open, grappled around the wall, and finally found my shoulders with her hands. She grabbed me and looked into my eyes. I was quiet as I looked back at her. The moment moved slowly, and I was too young to know why she cried, but somehow I did.

It was hours before she told me that dad had been in an accident. A driver had run a red light and had hit him. The driver had been going too fast, and dad wasn’t coming home.

My dad had been both cars in that moment, in that accident, in my mind. The Cadillac, the quiet, the smoothness. And the stench of alcohol in the Mustang, the red, the streak, the asphalt, crashing, dying. Going far, far too fast.

By Ryan Rahman

Lee Kerr sat on the porch with his evening coffee and pipe, watching the sun drop behind Dry Pines. He heard the horse approaching before he saw the rider. When the man finally came into view, Lee knew right away who it was.

It was Nate Brodie.

He fell off the saddle and hit the dirt as he dismounted. Lee didn’t get up to lend a hand. Just sipped his coffee and puffed away. Nate coughed as he pushed himself up and dusted off.

“This horse don’t let go of shit,” he muttered. “Still mad at me after all these years.”

“Not surprised. You’re drunk.”

Nate grinned and took a long pull from the bottle.

“Damn right I am. And it’s good to see you too, Lee.”

Lee puffed on his pipe.

“Something tells me you didn’t come all the way out here to catch up.”

Nate nodded. He reached into his coat and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He set the bottle down on the rail and slowly unfolded it.

“Remember Dickie Forsyth?”

Lee didn’t even look. “What about him?”

“Wanted. Dead or alive. Five hundred bucks.”

“Didn’t I kill him in Guthrie’s saloon?”

“You got him in the collarbone. He managed to stumble out of there,” Nate said, slurring slightly. “You were pretty drunk that night. Hell, we used to get wasted all the time in Guthrie’s. I’m surprised I even remember that night! Anyway, I heard he’s in the area. Lying low after some bank job over in Hope County.”

“Where’s he now?”

“Word is he’s holed up near Mackinnon Valley. His cousin’s got a ranch out there. Figured we could ride out. You and me, just like old times.”

Nate grabbed the bottle and took another swig. Lee gazed at the hills.

“I’m done with that kind of work.”

“Come on. What do you mean you’re done? This is an easy job. Remember Sleepy Newton and Lucky Irvine? You dropped them both without blinking. Sleepy couldn’t see for shit and Lucky wasn’t so lucky after all. People still talk about you. You know that? Even at our age, you still got a reputation.”

Lee looked down.

“Sleepy didn’t need to be killed. Lucky got married right before I ran into him. Made his wife a widow in only a week.”

Nate blinked. Kept quiet. Lee gestured toward the Colt 1873 Single Action Army holstered on Nate’s hip.

“You fire that thing lately?”

“Still works.”

“When’s the last time then?”

Nate shrugged.

“I dunno, twelve, thirteen years? Don’t matter. It never let me down before, it ain’t gonna let me down now. Besides, with you joining me, we can’t lose.”

Lee shook his head.

“I said I’m done with all that. Somehow, I managed to find peace here in Dry Pines. I’m not interested in reliving the old days. And if Dickie is still alive, you may wanna make sure your gun’s in good shape. He might be old as we are but he’s still an outlaw. If what you said is true, take him seriously. And his cousin. If it’s the one I’m thinking of, you should take him seriously as well.”

Nate rolled his eyes and laughed.

“Lee… you worry too much, you know that?”

Lee closed his eyes, pausing before he opened them again.

“I’ve sinned enough already. God already took Julia from me too soon. Punishment. For all the lives I took. I know I’m goin’ to Hell, but I don’t wanna make my stay any longer than it has to be. I’m sittin’ this one out. Just make sure your piece still fires.”

Nate narrowed his eyes.

“You’re really done, huh?”

Lee looked up at him.

“I am.”

A pause.

“Fine. You wanna see if this old thing still works? If I still have it in me?”

Lee didn’t say anything. Nate drew his Colt and turned toward the porch post where an old cast-iron horseshoe hung from one of the nails. He cocked the hammer and fired without taking the time to aim properly. The bullet struck the horseshoe, ricocheted, and slammed into Lee’s gut before he could even flinch. He dropped his cup and pipe and the remaining coffee splashed across the porch floor. The sound he made wasn’t pain. It was more like surprise. Disbelief. Annoyance. He pressed his hand to the blood seeping through his shirt. Nate stared as the gun still smoked in his hand. Lee looked at him, trying not to wince. Nate just stood there, eyes wide.

“You stupid fucking idiot.”

Nate slowly stepped back. Lee drew his Smith & Wesson Schofield before he could react in time. One shot. Nate fell back, tumbling down the steps. The bottle shattered against the boards. Lee leaned back. The pain was quickly setting in. Sharp. Hot. Relentless. He looked at the blood slipping past his hand and winced as he shifted on the bench. He stared upward and breathed out slow. Then turned his eyes to Nate’s crumpled body. Same stupid look on his face. The Schofield slipped out of Lee’s hand.

“See you in Hell, friend. Real soon.”

By Patrick Johnston

There’s something amiss with one of the chaps in the Bureau. At first we thought it was a simple case of Administrative Pneumonia. But it’s worse than that… He’s got late stage Merkanoonism… he is literally becoming a filing cabinet.

Chipped paint. Racing green. Keys that don’t fit the locks. Grubby cards labelling the drawers… everybody else in the office has been pretending not to notice… it seems impolite… after all it’s not like the poor chap did anything to deserve it… with a Mehrkanoon infestation that’s generally how it goes… wrong place wrong time. People just look at their feet and shuffle off in the other direction muttering vague inanities about the weather…

The top drawer, just below what was his face, bears the label Recondite Minutiae (G–Mo). I didn’t dare look any lower.

Some chaps from the Workshop heard about it and came to take a look. You could tell that they were grudgingly impressed even though they had a word or two to say about the paintwork and the rust spots. Having surveyed the situation thoroughly they set too like men who knew what they were doing. The rest of us gathered around and engaged in polite conversation with them studiously ignoring poor Maurice. One of the workshop chaps disappeared and came back with a step-trolley.

“He’ll be right as rain,” they assured us as they wheeled him out. Of course that was the last we ever saw of him. A new man appeared the very next day. Also called Maurice, as it happens. Just one of those funny coincidences, I suppose.

#########################

– well there you have it… the testimony of Jeremy HardNosed Johnson is utter balderdash…

– well, to be fair… it’s not utter balderdash – I witnessed Armitage myself when they took him to the warehouse and dismantled…

– yes. Of course. Of course. I’m simply saying that the man’s diagnosis was woefully incorrect. If that was Mehrkanoonism I’m a baboon’s ass. A baboon’s ass I tell you. I’ve worked out here for donkeys years and have seen more Mehrkanoon infestations than you have had Black Scallywaggs.

– well. In that case I defer to your experience.

– damn right you are, sir. Mehrkanoon. Balderdash. The man simply turned into a filing cabinet. Stranger things have happened. We are in the East remember….