Read The Two Deaths of Daniel Hayes for Free Online

hand in his front pocket, yanked out the keys too fast and lost his grip. He could hear the cop yelling again, not at him, calling for backup, saying words from television shows, officer needs assistance , and all units , and suspect on foot , all muffled as Daniel bent to scrape his fingers across the gravel, come on, come on, the keys had to be —there. He snagged them, beeped the alarm, piled in, and was slamming the stick into reverse as the cop came around the corner of the building. Daniel floored it, spinning the wheel hard, then threw it into first without braking. The car jerked to a stop and then surged forward, ten cylinders screaming. There was the crack of a gunshot behind him, holy fuck , then another, and ahead a narrow strip of grass with two pine trees and the sad roadside sign for the motel, and he swung away from the trees and clipped the sign, sparks and plastic bursting, block letters flying into the night, a scraping sound and a momentary feeling the car was going to get stuck, and then the tires bit blacktop and lurched and squealed and caught. US-1, two lousy lanes, his heart on fire, running like every frightened thing, the quiet calm part of himself screaming, telling him to stop, asking him why, Jesus, why was he running?
Because he’s chasing.
The BMW shredded the highway, up to 80 in seconds, the road a black ribbon. The nerves in his fingers and feet seemed to connect through the car to the road itself, like he was surfing the blacktop, flying over it, topping 110 now, and behind, far in the rearview, red and blue lights. He had a head start, but the cop was coming fast, others no doubt bearing down from all directions.
Think, goddamnit, think!
He tore around a curve, houses and garages and bridges and trees all blurring into a smear of late-night evergreen, darkness pressing down. Half a mile ahead, a narrow lane pulled off.
Any animal can run. It takes a man to think.
He bit his lip, clenched his fists, and turned off the headlights. Took his hand off the stick long enough to reach the settings knob for the onboard computer system. Twist, press, Options, twist, press, Lighting, twist, press, Disabled. The running lights and headlight halos snapped off. Night swooped down. Gripping the steering wheel with one hand, Daniel worked the clutch and downshifted into third gear. The engine screamed and bucked, the car actually hopping, rear tires skidding. He almost hit the brakes by instinct, stopped himself just in time. The car swerved wildly, but he kept it on the road, forced it into second, the needle plummeting, down to twenty by the time he hit the lane. He spun hard right. The car slewed sideways, the tires leaving the ground.
The world ahead of him was geometries of darkness: triangles for trees, a rectangle that might be a barn. He desperately wanted to turn on the headlights, but didn’t, just forced it into first gear and took a chance, aiming at the maybe-barn. The side of the building was fifteen feet away when he jerked the parking brake. The BMW hopped and groaned and shuddered to a stop.
In the fallen silence his heartbeat was impossibly loud. His hands didn’t shake, they vibrated. He took them off the wheel, knit the fingers together as though he were praying. Holy fuck. Holy fuck. Holy fu—
The cop blew by on US-1, a frenzied fury of blue and red and Dopplering siren, big as the world and then gone.
Daniel’s breath came ragged. He clenched his fists together till the knuckles creaked. Jesus. Why had he run?
More important, why was he chasing you?
Who are you? Who were you before you woke up on that beach?
He sat for a moment, as long as he could make himself. Then he turned on his headlights, put the car in gear, and pulled back out onto the road. Outside the windows, the silhouettes of pines loomed, shaggy forms cut from a cloth of stars. Despite the punishment, the BMW seemed okay.
The cop hadn’t doubled back yet, but he would. Time to get off this road. Daniel turned