Later, in bed, I think of Harry and the bird on the bluffs. The big creature rises out of its paint job and flies next to the river, casting its red eyes and deer horns over the earth. It follows me and Mitch and Harry and Jess like an officer, its uniform a skin of thick brown scales. A bird like that could swallow our car. It could swoop down and lift us with its talons and take us deep into its world.

Eileen got to the address. She lit up a cigarette and leaned against the side of the building and smoked. She stamped out the cigarette in the gutter, went into the building and told the security guard in the lobby, “I have an audition for a McDonald’s commercial.” 

The conversation carries on while Sue slips headphones over her ears and resumes typing Jim’s endless dictation. As crazy as Jim drives her, she’s half partial to him. Truth is, if Sue left, Jim would retire. She knows it. He does too, but won’t admit it. The man’s just shy of helpless. He’s a fine trial lawyer. Tried over a hundred cases in his time, but the world is changing, and old dogs don’t always follow smoothly.

Johnny canted his neck to the side, then flung his muscled shoulders back, his vertebrae crackling. A black bandana circled his mane of corn-silk hair. He turned to Daniel, a sly, lopsided grin tilting his thin lips. Daniel flinched, retreating a step. He couldn’t believe it. In thirty years, Johnny hadn’t changed, not a wrinkle creasing his boyish face, not a gray hair on his head.      

Your brain can only be Oxygen deprived for so long. I felt like those helpless victims in Jaws. What would be worse? Getting ripped apart by that giant sea monster or not being able to get to the surface for a breath? One time in high school a jock had cold-cocked me upside the head for calling his sister a tramp. Afterwards I couldn’t stand straight or stop the ringing in my ears. This was no different, although that was a smidge more enjoyable.