Deviant by Adrian McKinty

Thirsty. He’d skated up Las Vegas Boulevard all the way to the 15.
    It was two years earlier. It wasn’t a dream then. It was real. It was June 20. A day before the wedding.
    Hot at six A.M . The Santa Ana blowing across the Mojave.
    His backpack on his shoulder. His thumb out.
    The heat haze making the road bend.
    A thousand vehicles passed by.
    A car slowed. An old car. A ’70s Chevy convertible. Red.
    â€œWhere you going, son?” a man asked, winding down the passenger-side window.
    â€œChicago.”
    â€œHow old are you?”
    â€œEighteen.”
    â€œTake you as far as Salt Lake.”
    â€œOK.”
    Danny got in. The man was in his forties, wearing a white shirt with short sleeves and a thin black tie. He had a graying flattop. He was smoking.
    Half an hour went by in highway and blue sky.
    â€œSo what’s in Chicago?”
    â€œMy father. My real father. I’ve never actually met him. My real dad, that is,” Danny confessed.
    The man nodded. Drove. Adjusted his aviator sunglasses, reached into the pocket next to his seat.
    This was the bad bit of the dream.
    â€œIf you could ask your real dad a question, one question, what would it be?” the man wondered.
    â€œI don’t know. I’d ask him stupid stuff, not like heavy stuff, you know.”
    â€œLike what?”
    â€œLike, I don’t know, stupid things, like I’d ask him if he thought magic really existed. I mean, what if all the magical objects on the earth were just alien technology, from some vast civilization that died out eons ago. I mean, Earth’s been habitable for a couple of hundred million years, aliens are bound to have visited at some point, don’t you think?”
    The man smiled, drove for a while, took his sunglasses off, looked at Danny, pulled the car over to the side of the road.
    â€œI liked your question,” he said.
    His eyes had narrowed. Danny noticed he was holding a small semiautomatic pistol. It was silver and Danny watched it glint in the sunlight.
    â€œDo you believe in evil, son?” the man asked.
    â€œI don’t know,” Danny said. He felt cold. Not afraid, but cold.
    â€œI wish there were evil,” the man said.
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause if there were evil, at least there would be something.”
    The man pointed at the desert.
    â€œYou know what’s out there?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œIndifference. Nothingness. When you die, boy, the world won’t hesitate on its ellipse. On it will fall toward the sun. No one will care. Your killer will never be found. You’ll be a story for a day or two, not much more.”
    â€œMister, I—”
    â€œGet out of the car. Go back to Vegas. It’s a dangerous world, son … a mighty dangerous world.”
    The man pointed the gun at Danny.
    Sometimes, in the dream, the man pulled the trigger.
    â€œDanny.”
    â€œUhhh.”
    â€œDanny.”
    Danny
.
    â€œDanny. Have you seen this?” Tony said.
    â€œWho? What?”
    â€œHave you seen this?” she repeated, handing him a blurry white object. Something big and noisy. Danny rubbed his eyes, sat up, checked to see that he wasn’t wearing his Lily Allen T-shirt.
    He wasn’t.
    What she was handing him turned out to be a newspaper.
    The
Cobalt Daily News
, a free paper that they threw on your front lawn. Juanita had quite a collection of them sitting there unwrapped in the recycle bin.
    â€œDo you ever knock?” Danny asked, surprised to see her in his bedroom.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWasn’t the door locked?”
    â€œNobody round here locks their door. My mom told your mom that, and she thought that was wonderful.”
    Danny didn’t think it was wonderful. He’d lived in East L.A. and several parts of Las Vegas where gunshots were much more common than backfires. He liked having bars on the window and a deadbolt on the door. It made him feel secure.
    â€œHow did you