Needful Things - Stephen King [327]
8
"Help me," Norris said to Seaton Thomas, and slung an arm around Seat's neck. He staggered to his feet.
"I think I winged him," Seaton said. He was puffing, but his color had come back.
"Good," Norris said. His shoulder hurt like fire and the as if pain seemed to be sinking deeper into his flesh all the time, seeking his heart. "Now just help me."
"You'll be all right," Seaton said. In his distress over Norris, Seat had forgotten his fear that he was, in his words, coming down with a heart attack. "Soon as I get you insid"No," Norris gasped.
"Cruiser."
"What?"
Norris turned his head and glared at Thomas with frantic, painfilled eyes. "Get me in my cruiser! I have to GO to Needful Things!"
Yes. The moment the words were out of his mouth, everything seemed to fall into place. Needful Things was where he had bought the Bazun fishing rod- It was the direction In which the man who had shot him had gone running. Needful Things was the place where everything had started; Needful Things was - where it all must end.
Gaeia blew up, flooding Main Street with fresh glare. A Double Dragon machine rose out of the ruins, turned over twice, and landed upside down in the street with a crunch.
"Norris, you been shot-" "Of course I've been shot!" Norris screamed. Bloody froth flew from his lips. "Now get me in the cruiser!"
"It's a bad idea, Norris-" "No It's not," Norris said grimly. He turned his head and spat blood. "It's the only idea. Now come on.
Help me."
Seat Thomas began to walk him toward Unit 2
9
If Alan hadn't glanced into his rearview mirror before backing out into the street, he would have run Polly down, completing the evening by crushing the woman he loved under the rear wheels of his old station wagon. He did not recognize her; she was only a shape behind his car, a woman-shape outlined against the cauldron of flames on the other side of the street. He jammed on the brakes, and a moment later she was hammering at his window.
Ignoring her, Alan began to back up again. He had no time for the town's problems tonight; he had his own. Let them slaughter each other like stupid animals, if that was what they wanted to do.
He was going to Mechanic Falls. He was going to get the man who had killed his wife and son in revenge for a piddling four years in the Shank.
Polly grabbed his doorhandle and was half-pulled, half-dragged, out into the debris-strewn street. She punched down on the button below the handle, her hand shrieking with pain, and the door flew open with her clinging desperately to it and her feet dragging as Alan made his reverse turn. The nose of the station wagon was pointing down Main Street. In his grief and fury, Alan had totally forgotten that there was no bridge to cross down that way anymore.
"Alan!" she screamed. "Alan, stop!"
It got through. Somehow it got through in spite of the rain, the thunder, the wind, and the heavy, hungry crackle of the fire. In spite of his compulsion.
He looked at her, and Polly's heart broke at the expression in his eyes. Alan wore the look of a man floating in the gut of a nightmare.
"Polly?" he asked distantly.
"Alan, you have to stop!"
She wanted to let go of the doorhandle-her hands were agony-but she was afraid that if she did, he would simply drive away and leave her there in the middle of Main Street.
No she knew he would.
"Polly, I have to go. I'm sorry you're mad at me that you think I did something-but we'll sort it out. Only I have to g-" "I'm not mad at you anymore, Alan. I know it wasn't you. it was him, playing us off against each other, like he has just about everyone else in Castle Rock. Because that's what he does. Do you understand, Alan? Are you hearing me? Because that is what he does!
Now stop! Turn off the goddamned engine and listen to me!"
"I have to go, Polly," he said. His own voice seemed to be coming to him from far away. On the radio, perhaps. "But I'll be ha-" "No you won't!" she cried. Suddenly she was furious with himfurious at all of them, all the greedy, frightened, angry, acquisitive people in this town,