Chapter 14: You Should Have Killed Me

Meeks jolts awake in the boxcar. Beal sits at the partially cracked door and he’s soaking in the moonlight.

“Talkin' in your sleep again.”

Meeks rolls up and stretches his shoulder.

“Kept sayin' it's time for them all to die.”

“Shut up,” Meeks says.

“Kept sayin' Linda, Linda, don't leave, don't leave.”

“I don't talk in my sleep.”

“I'm just sayin'. You talk in your sleep.”

Meeks checks his gun.

“I won't leave you,” Beal says.

Meeks shakes his head. Beal turns to him.

“Heard those voices again, too. Whispering. Don't you hear anything?”

“Jesus, don't you ever sleep?”

Beal shrugs. “Not much. Sleep when I'm dead, I guess.”

Meeks rolls away from him and closes his eyes. In the distance the WHISPERS chatter softly. Meeks covers his ears and tightens his eyes.

And he remembers.

##

Twenty years ago.