So, Be Gentle and Shit

I dabble in fiction from time to time. I wrote a series of short shorts a couple years back. thought I might post them here and see if you guys like to read. Heres the first one. Its called "The Diner."

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Sam stopped in front of the diner, glancing back over his shoulder at the fog. He could hear them, out past the light, slithering across the street, the wet, squishy noise reminding him of a Cronenberg film. One hand under his jacket, he didn’t realize he was caressing the handle of a Desert Eagle, tracing the grip with his trigger finger.

“Fuck you,” he whispered to the fog, then pulled open the diner door and slipped inside.

He let the door close against his back and held the bell, which was small, brass and had a clapper made of an old pair of black dice. No sense in telling the world he was there.

Thunder boomed behind him, which calmed him as he figured the rain would take care of the fog. He’d had enough fog. Enough of the fog, enough of the dark, and sure as hell enough of the goddamned squishy sounds.

He surveyed the diner, all chrome-edged counters and bluish white under the fluorescents. He wasn’t in the mood for a stool at the counter, so he walked to the back and slid into a blue-vinyl booth.

            Teeth clamped down on a toothpick, he shucked off his plain black ballcap, pitching it atop the table. He reached into his black canvas jacked and pulled out the twin Desert Eagles, popping the clips out into the dome of the cap.

            “Jesus Christ, Mister. I’ll give you the money if you want.”

            Sam glanced toward the waitress. He’d heard her enter from the back, the sharp, scared intake of breath at seeing the guns, but he needed to scare her, so he’d ignored her.

            “Coke, no ice, and a Red Bull if you have one.”

            “Anything else?”

            “You have any apple pie?”

            “No.”

“No.”

            He set one gun down, then jacked the slide on the other, checking the chamber. He shifted his eyes toward her without turning his head.

            “The Coke?”

            She vanished into the back again. Sam switched guns, checked out the other one, then popped the half-full clips back in both, chambered a round in each, then flipped on the safeties and slid them back into the holsters.

            He crossed his hands and waited, staring out the front of the diner, listening to the thunder and wondering why it still wasn’t raining. He glanced at his watch, thought better of something, pulled out the right-side Eagle and laid it on his thigh.

            The waitress came out from the back with a Coke in an old-fashioned glass bottle and a tall “Coke” glass full of ice pellets.

            “We’re all out of Red Bull,” she said.

            She turned and started away from the table. Sam checked her out thoroughly before saying, “Got any cherry syrup?” He wondered when skin-tight, low-cut jeans and cropped, sleeveless t-shirts became standard Diner waitress attire. Not that he had a problem with it.

            She stopped, spun on one foot. “Yeah, pretty sure we do.”

            Sam noticed then the sharp, feminine lines of her face, the small nose and high cheekbones, almost emerald green eyes, pale skin and spikey black hair. Something was odd about her. Something…

            “Can I have some?”

            “I dunno. Can you?”

            Sam grunted.

            She walked back to his table, picked up the Coke, the glass, carried it all back behind the counter and set about mixing in the Cherry syrup. Sam watched.

            “You like the Eagles?” she said, nodding toward the guns.

            Sam looked down at the piece on his thigh. “Yeah, they’ll do.”

            “You a pretty good shot?”

            “Good enough.” He shrugged.

            She nodded, he turned his attention back to the window. She finished mixing the soda then brought it back to his table. She paused, Sam looked up then she slid into the other side of the booth and settled her back against the wall.

            “So, what’s after you?”

            “What? You immediately assume it’s a what, not a who?”

            “You don’t look the type to be afraid of whos, and this isn’t the best part of town.”

            He looked away from the window, into her eyes, and suddenly found it hard to concentrate. He kept staring at a small silver ankh nestled into the hollow of her neck. He took a deep breath and focused.

            “True. I was surprised to find this diner at all. More surprised to find it open.”

            She nodded. “You don’t want the Coke now?”

            He crinkled his forehead, then reached for the soda. He had it halfway to his mouth before stopping. “You do anything to it?”

            She clicked black-painted nails on the blue tabletop. “What do you think?” she asked, smiling and leaning toward him enough for him to look down her shirt.

            “Dammit,” he said, under his breath. He scanned out the front windows, thought he saw the flash of red eyes, imagined he heard the squishy sounds.

            “Who the hell are you?”

            “I’m the owner,” she said, smiling and leaning back into the wall again.

            He checked his watch. He figured he had about ten minutes.

            She said, “How’d you get into this, anyway? This trouble you’re in?” She reached over, took the Coke from him, took a sip and then ran her tongue across her upper lip. Sam felt himself blink then made himself stop imagining the tongue running over other things.

            “Sam,” she said, “How’d you get into this?”

            “Some suit hired me to check out where his daughter was going on full moons. Been on it for a couple weeks. Not quite what I expected, and I’m not sure I’m getting paid.”

            “Lost her?”

            He snorted. “Lost her? Apart from following her into the District, I haven’t seen her in two weeks. I’m so damn tired, I wouldn’t know her if she walked up and bit me in the neck.”

            “What’s her name?”

            “Vivian.”

“Vivian… hmm,” she said, rolling the name on her tongue as if tasting it. “I might remember a Vivian around these parts. Everyone down here ends up at the Diner sooner or later. What’d she look like?”

Sam opened his mouth, started to explain, then stopped. He couldn’t remember. “Fuck,” he said, squeezing the grip of the pistol. “I can’t fucking remember.” Then a thing occurred to him. “Did you call me Sam?”

She smiled, pulled her knees to her chest, leaned forward and turned toward Sam. He caught himself staring down her shirt again and could see the pale outlines of her breasts and the top of a shiny black bra he assumed was leather.

            She put her hands on top of the table, then both knees, then moved into Sam, hands holding his head. He’d barely seen her move, or rather had seen her move but been unable to react. He stared into her green eyes and had the impulse to speak when she leaned in and kissed him, enveloped him. His sight, hearing, sense of place all vanished.

            Then it lessened and she was moving back, smiling, and Sam saw her as if through gauze. He blinked to clear his head and flipped the safety on the gun in his lap.

            She slid from the booth and moved away from him, untying the apron and tossing it on the counter. He couldn’t help but watch. He shook his head. He reached into his jacket and pulled the other Eagle.

            “The fuck did you just do to me?”

            “Nothing you didn’t want me to.”

            “Didn’t I?”

            She smiled, and he knew she knew something he didn’t, which pissed him off.

            “I don’t care how hot you are, no one just fucks with me like that, especially not like that.” He pointed the guns at her.

She smiled again, then winked. “Shouldn’t you be watching the windows?”

Sam felt the blood drain from his face. He felt like he was moving in slow motion as he turned first his head, then his body and guns toward the windows, windows now full of glistening black shapes and red eyes.

A part of his brain knew he only had ten shots and needed to aim carefully, but his fingers began squeezing the triggers, almost of their own accord, and Sam’s ears were filled with the booming echo of gun reports and shattering glass. He might’ve been screaming. And some part of his brain noted it had started raining.