Brandon went still as a statue, his eyes wide with fear. He swallowed and tried not to shake as Alan carefully shoved the end of his shelf between the two boards, pressing the edge of the book, pushing it back towards the middle of the shelves.
“There,” Alan whispered. “Let’s get it out of here, okay?”
The other two nodded and stood slowly, carefully, and began to walk the hallway to the incinerator. They were hit by the heat spilling from the open door of the huge metal furnace as they entered the room. The furnace’s body and piping writhed with blue-white arcs of static and twining snakes of light, the entire thing crackling and snapping at them.
“Okay,” Alan started. “Put your boards up across the incinerator’s opening, but don’t touch the furnace, and don’t let go until I can shove the book into the flames.” He looked at each of them in turn, they nodded. “I’m not sure if it will burn completely up if I can’t get it all the way into the flames. And I don’t think I’ll be able to do anything about it once it’s in there.” A large crackling arc jumped from one furnace pipe to another, emphasizing his point. “Don’t touch the furnace,” he said again quietly. “I’m not sure, but I think the book might be able to kill anything that touches the incinerator once it’s inside.”
“Yeah,” Brandon muttered and Angela nodded. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
They stepped up to the open door. Heat flowed out from the furnace in hideous waves, the interior a flickering orange and white hole of fire. All around them the furnace snarled and snapped, the static charges reaching out and biting their arms, their faces. Against pure instinct to run, they held the boards up to the door, the book sandwiched between like the dark, horizontal pupil of some demonic eye.
Alan set the end of his board against the spine of the book and shoved with every once of strength he could muster. The furnace gave off an incredible flash of light, electric charges flew from every surface to every piece of metal in the room - buttons, belts, necklaces, doorknobs, hinges, screw and nail heads, everything. The fire within flared, the heat climbed to an intensity that could not be withstood and Brandon, Angela, and Alan threw up their hands, dropping the wooden shelves to the floor and falling backward away from the inferno. The air filled with the smell of burning paper, glue, and leather; and then by the smell of burnt flesh, hair, and bone.
~ ~ ~
Jessica took the martini off the beach-side bar and placed it on her tray. She carried it out to the patio and set it on the small round table next to one of the deck chairs.
“Here you go, Mr. Porter,” she said, her voice light and pleasant. “I think John has finally figured out how to make them the way you like.”
She glanced at the older man. He was sitting with his eyes closed, his head resting on the back of the deck chair, his mouth slightly open.
“Mr. Porter,” she said quietly, a soft smile on her lips. “Your table will be ready in just a few minutes.”
He didn’t respond. She watched his chest for a second, felt a little silly for doing so, but he wasn’t a young man anymore.
“Mr. Porter?” she called again and took a step toward him.
“Mr. Porter?” she called louder and placed her hand on his arm.
The arm beneath her fingers crumbled away, leaving a large divot of empty air where skin, muscle and bone should have been. Jessica screamed, stepped back and caught her foot on the chair leg, jostling it. Mr. Porter disintegrated into a pile of ash and dust on the chair’s cushion and the cement patio. An evening breeze swirled around the screaming waitress, picked up the remnants of the old man, and spread him out over the beach in front of the Island Paradise Hotel, dispersing the subtle scent of brunt paper, glue, and leather with the old man's ashes as it passed through.
~ Peace and finality
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