Quicksilver

by Dean Koontz

“Weirder still, I get the feeling that someone or something is coming toward us along that cobblestone road, coming out of the stars. No, wait. That’s not right. It’s not just some feeling. I know for sure that something’s approaching along the cobblestones. Because, I can feel it coming, something powerful, the way you feel the air taking on weight when a thunderstorm is coming. And then I can almost see what it is. It’s invisible but I can see the space where it is, just inside the door in the day. It’s like how heat rising off a highway distorts the air, so the air ripples and quivers. The air is quivering in the shape of a man, a very tall man or something like a man, but I can’t see him, only this suggestion of him. I think I must be losing it, having a breakdown. But then somehow I know he’s real and that he’s there because of the baby, worried that the baby has been abandoned on a highway, and wants to be sure it’s safe. I don’t know what I said then, but I must have said something, because Caesar and Bailie turned to look. I expected maybe they wouldn’t see anything, but they did. They did.”