StoneDust by Justin Scott Page B

county. Ted was watching. Still amazed, I tried to catch his eye, but he looked through me like I wasn’t there. The old barn blocked us from the busy Amish. Fred Gill was nowhere to be seen.
    ***
    I slipped off my Academy ring, which would make an awful cut, and punched Duane Fisk in the eye. There’s nothing quite so disorienting as a punch in the eye, particularly if a guy’s not accustomed to getting punched. He reeled back, clutching his face.
    Bill moved between us. “What the hell did you hit him for?” he asked, throwing a big arm around Duane’s shoulder.
    Sensing a rush, I went cold. Ted had picked up a two-by-four stud. Red with anger, he stepped into his swing like a long-ball hitter.

Chapter 9
    The prisoners waiting to become my friends and enemies at Leavenworth had organized a lively pool in anticipation of my arrival, betting on how long and in what manner the white-collar felon would survive. But all bets were off when they saw me go cold the first time my life was threatened. It took one to know one, and the sociopaths present recognized a fellow killing machine long before I did. It was sheer luck I didn’t spend the rest of my life there for murder committed behind bars.
    When I went cold, a survival genie slipped from his dark bottle. All thinking ceased and I made no conscious decisions. But while middle-class Benjamin Abbott III watched from a safe distance, the genie inventoried weapons at hand: another two-by-four; a jagged half cinderblock; the catspaw nailpuller Duane had dropped. My hand took the catspaw—twelve inches of steel rod with a claw at either end. My legs delivered me inside the arc of Ted’s swing.
    Ted had his own survival genie, a little more civilized than mine. He dropped the stud and backed away, muttering, “Jesus, what am I doing?” And then, when he realized that my survival genie was very reluctant to climb back into his bottle, Ted wisely turned and ran.
    I started after him, measuring the long target of his back, cocked my arm, and threw the nailpuller with all my strength. At the last second, I got ahold of myself long enough to hurl the catspaw down instead of through his shoulder blades. It penetrated six inches into the soil. I stood over it, gasping, trying to expel the electric surge of adrenaline through my lungs.
    As I became aware that my friends were staring at me in fear and disgust, I spread my hands wide. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”
    â€œSorry?” echoed Duane, still holding his eye. “You oughta be sorry, you son of a bitch.” Bill muttered indignantly that I was crazy. But I wasn’t talking to them.
    Ted knew. He shambled toward me—his face burning with that particular delight felt when you’re surprised to discover you’re still alive—his hand extended. “I’m sorry, Ben.”
    â€œMe too.” We started to shake hands but ended up in a clumsy World Series winners’ hug, less out of love than a desire to confirm we both still existed.
    ***
    It was very quiet. The carpenters had stopped hammering.
    The air, already rich from the grass and blossoms of a summer evening, and the sharp cow scents of the farm, suddenly shimmered with the delicious odor of chicken frying in the Amish camp. For a moment so vivid it seemed to ache, Ted and Bill and Duane and I—and even Reg—could have been heading home twenty years ago after seven innings in Old Man Hawley’s side yard.
    â€œSo what happened?” I asked. “Was Reg stoned when he left?”
    â€œI don’t know,” said Ted. “I saw his lights when he drove away. He wasn’t going particularly fast or slow. He didn’t seem to be weaving. His brakes flashed at the road.”
    â€œDid he signal his turn?”
    Ted thought a moment, while the others stared at us. “As a matter of fact, he signaled.”
    â€œLeft or