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Roland stood for a moment with his head lowered and his hand on the butt of his gun. When he looked up, he was wearing his own smile. It was handsome and tired and desperate and dangerous. He twirled his whole left hand twice in the air: Let’s go.
The gunslinger had seen this man die, gunshot and then eaten alive by the carnivorous lobstrosities which lived in the shallow waters of the Western Sea, but here he was again. Because infinite worlds spun on the axle which was the Dark Tower, and here was another of them.
He was aware of how funky it smelled back here—rotted meat and moldy produce, the yeasty scent of a thousand departed brewskis, the odors of don’t-care laziness—and the divinely sweet fir-perfume of the woods just beyond the perimeter of this dirty little roadside store. He could hear the drone of a plane in some distant quadrant of the sky. He knew he loved Mr. Flannel Shirt because Mr. Flannel Shirt was here, was with them, linked to Roland and Eddie by the strongest of bonds for these few minutes.
“Shut up.” He had never said such a thing to Roland in his life, but now the words came out on their own, and he felt no urge to call them back.
“What’s on your mind?” Cullum asked him. “A man named Stephen King. Do you know that name?”
When Eddie looked to the right, he saw that the gunslinger was sitting with his talented, long-fingered hands folded peaceably in his lap.
“Have another strawberry, Eddie,” Roland said, and handed him one. Eddie took it. Considered squashing it against Long, Tall, and Ugly’s beak, just for the hell of it, then dipped it first in a saucer of cream, then in the sugarbowl.
His temples were thudding with rage. Had he ever been so angry? Once, he supposed. When Roland had refused to let him go back to New York so he could score some horse.
or should I say your best friends, your family? Because that’s what they are to you, aren’t they? And Deepneau, who the fuck is he? Just some old guy full of cancer who ran north with you when you needed a running buddy. You’d leave him dying in a ditch if someone offered you a first edition of Shakespeare or some special Ernest Hemingway.”
Other worlds. Perhaps an infinite number of worlds, all of them spinning on the axle that was the Tower.
“Big talk from a man who’s seen the future,” he corrected. “And the future is computers, Cal. The future is Microsoft. Can you remember that?” “I can,” Aaron said. “Microsoft.” “Never heard of it,” Tower said.
Well, dis Freud—dis smart cigar-smoking Viennese honky muhfuh—he claim dat we got dis mind under our mind, he call it the unconscious or subconscious or some fuckin conscious. Now I ain’t claimin dere is such a thing, only dat he say dere was.
“That door beneath the castle—one of their mistakes, I have no doubt—goes to nowhere at all. Into the darkness between worlds. Todash-space. But not empty space.” Her voice lowered further. “That door is reserved for the Red King’s most bitter enemies. They’re thrown into a darkness where they may exist—blind, wandering, insane—for years. But in the end, something always finds them and devours them. Monsters beyond the ability of such minds as ours to bear thought of.”
“Man, I’m so scared,” he said. Roland reached out and briefly grasped his hand.
His Calla tan was thin paint over an immense pallor.
Then King said, “You started to scare me, so I stopped writing about you. Boxed you up and put you in a drawer and went on to a series of short stories I sold to various men’s magazines.” He considered, then nodded. “Things changed for me after I put you away, my friend, and for the better. I started to sell my stuff. Asked Tabby to marry me. Not long after that I started a book called Carrie. It wasn’t my first novel, but it was the first one I sold, and it put me over the top. All that after saying goodbye Roland, so long, happy trails to you.
Yes, Stephen King had created them. At least he’d created Roland, Jake, and Father Callahan. The rest he hadn’t gotten to yet. And he had moved Roland like a piece on a chessboard: go to Tull, Roland, sleep with Allie, Roland, chase Walter across the desert, Roland.
“The mudholes, do ya. On top, you’ll think you had a nap. A wonderful, refreshing nap. You’ll get your son and go to where you’re supposed to go. You’ll feel fine. You’ll go on with your life. You’ll write many stories, but every one will be to some greater or lesser degree about this story. Do you understand?”
“You’re done for now—close thy book, wordslinger.”
The Dark Tower is my uberstory, no question about that. When it’s done, I plan to ease back. Maybe retire completely.
As for you, Constant Reader . . . One more turn of the path, and then we reach the clearing. Come along with me, will ya not? Stephen King May 28, 2003 (Tell God thank ya.)
