Somewhere

I’ve lived in Missouri my entire life.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m a well-rounded world traveler, I’m not one of those pig-fed Pervises who’s never been out of their hometown and is proud of it for some reason.  But my point is that I know the Mother of the West like the back of my hand.  I used to tell Martialla that if you blindfolded me and dropped me anywhere in the world I could tell you if I was in Missouri or not.  She used to scoff at me when I said that.  She said that she been to tons of places around the world that look exactly like Missouri.  That was before a vampire tricked me into murdering her.  She doesn’t say that anymore because she’s dead.   

I looked around out the window “Where are we?” 

“Somewhere in Mexico.  I’ve never been able to figure it out on the map exactly.  We’re on the east side of the Gulf of California, south of Puerto Peñasco.” She looked around as well “Somewhere.” 

Normally I would be pretty freaked out by missing time but it didn’t bother me in that moment “Wow must have I passed out there for a day, it only seems like we’ve been driving for a couple of minutes.” 

She smiled slightly, which I have to say, was ghastly with her split lips “We have only been driving for a couple of minutes, it’s best not to think about it.” 

I nodded “So you’re one of them, this is your power? Car teleportation?  Are you some kind of car monster like in that movie where the guy fucks his car?” 

She shook her head back at me, well not at me since she was driving, but you know “Nah, I’m one of you.  Did you watch that show Buffy the Vampire Slayer?” 

I couldn’t help but scowl “No, you’re like the third person who’s mentioned that damn show in the past eight hours.” 

She half-shrugged an apology “I’ve never seen it either, I just said that because people always bring it up to me when talking about this kind of stuff.  I tried to watch it once but there were robots and aliens and shit and I couldn’t care about it.  How about that show Grimm?  We’re Buffy Grimms.  We can see the monsters.  What we have is worse than what was going on in those shows because Buffy and the dude from Grimm, I assume his name was Greg Grimm, had superpowers so they could rassle with robots, and vampires I assume but I never saw that, we’re just normal.” 

“Plus Buffy got to marry Freddie Prinze Junior.” 

She seemed a little confused “The wrestling promoter?” 

“What?” 

“Huh? 

I shook my head to clear out that exchange “You can make a car go hundreds of miles in a second, that doesn’t seem super normal to me.” 

“Yes, I can do that, and I have other amazing abilities as well, but that’s because I learned how to do those things, which has nothing to do with us being the most special more interesting girls in the world.  You won’t be able to do that unless you learn, which you probably can’t, all people like us can do is see them as they really are.  Which, I don’t want to sugar coat this, basically sucks a dick.” 

“Why are we like this?” 

She shrugged again “Don’t know.” 

“And we’re supposed to slay the monsters we see?” 

“Supposed to?  I don’t know about that.  Supposed to according to whom?  Or what?  Is a hawk supposed to eat a vole?  That’s like a question for fancy college people.” 

“I went to college.” 

She gestured “Well there you go then, you can explain that part to me.  What I can tell you is that once you see them you can’t unsee them.  It’s going to get worse, you’re going to see them all the time, all the time they’re around I mean.  Eventually you’re going to want to do something about it because you’re going to see some fucked up shit. Most of them are bad, or a lot of them anyway.  It’s hard to not want to step in when you see it going down.  Unless you’re an asshole.  Remember that episode of Law and Order where the woman gets sexually assaulted on the train with fifty people just standing there doing nothing?  You could be like those people.  I know some guys like us who do that.  Well, actually just one now, the others drank themselves to death.  One guy shot himself but he was drunk when he did it so I think that counts.” 

I slumped back in the seat “That doesn’t sound so bad right now.” 

“Yeah, I figured you were having a rough time, that’s why I brought you here.” 

“How did you find me?” 

“Uh, I didn’t really.  There’s the thing that happens where I just seem to be in places where weird paranormal shit is going down.  Fate or luck or destiny or magic, whatever you want to call it.  Maybe it’s not even thing, maybe it really is a coincidence.  It happens a lot.  I turned into that parking lot to take a shortcut around a red light and I saw you standing there covered with blood looking like you had just been tricked into murdering your best friend.  So I figured that’s why I was there.  It’s like that lady in Deadpool Two, I’m just where I need to be sometimes.  You ever see that movie?” 

“No, I don’t watch many movies or shows, that seems to be the only way people can explain things to me though so maybe I should start.”