One Hot Autumn

The gray-eyed cat had been perched up on top of a stack of boxes, next to the dolly that held the gas tanks, where the master’s old apron hung. They were standing in a well-kept workspace, tidy in a way where faded denims fit right in.  Nothing was new, but all the equipment was in good, working shape. Well used. Still.

“Yeah, it’s got the eyes. Kind of surprised…considering all the things we’d done to them.” A silent pause.  A breath. “But, it’s here….”  

Familiar…

The journeyman had heard stories about an old Luger, picked up by the one who went to Normandy to become a man at sixteen, the one who’d lied to get in. Journeyman had heard about that gun, how it had been loaned to Uncle Dead's older brother.  And how Uncle D’s older brother, Colorblind, had stood at the opening of a dead-end tunnel off one of the irrigation ditches. How the Luger had been fired into countless sets of glowing eyes until light had drained from every pair. 

But the journeyman did not question the master. 

No questions… none of those questions because he didn’t want to know what Uncle Dead had done exactly.  So he didn’t ask.  

Smoke... the vaporous hue of the feline’s fur made the eyes hard to see. The two men stood in the shop. They were quiet for a moment as the form slowly turned its head and looked past him, fuck…through him.  The journeyman figured the score had somehow been settled.  Or would be… just a matter of time.