He pushed the first number and then forced himself to continue. His hand shook. He could see the phone cord jittering. He pressed the last number, there was a silent moment, and then the ring. He held the phone to his ear and waited. Part of him hoped no one would answer. He closed his eyes, one ring, two rings, three rings, and then a noticeable click.
“Hello.”
John didn’t say anything.
“Hello?”
He recognized Dr. Taylor’s voice.
“Is there anyone there?”
“Dr. Taylor…” John didn’t recognize his own voice.
“Yes. Who is this?” Dr. Taylor sounded aggravated.
John couldn’t bring himself to say the words. He felt the phone shake against his ear. “…Dr. Taylor.”
John could here Angela screaming for him in the background.
“John, come here!”
“Dr. Taylor—” he said, trying to continue.
“John, John Mason, is that you?” Dr. Taylor’s tone took a serious turn. “Is everything all right?”
“John,” Angela said. “For the love of God, come here.” Her voice was more frantic than ever before.
“Dr. Taylor, we need you to come to the house,” John said.
“What’s the matter, John?” Dr. Taylor asked, obviously concerned. “Did something happen to Alex—”
John hung up the phone. In a daze, he ran down the hall to the rear of the house. He stood in Alex’s open doorway looking in. Angela gazed up at him from the edge of the boy’s bed. Her eyes bulged in the sockets, her stare wild and crazed as she spoke in a murmur.
“He’s moving.”
4
John wasn’t sure he’d heard his wife correctly. The words ran through his mind for a moment until he deciphered them clearly: he’s moving. He was sure his wife had lost her mind. He walked toward Alex’s bed with lead feet. Light from the window shined brightly in a square patch in the middle of the room. John had to remind himself to breathe with every other step.
Angela was sitting on the edge of the bed looking at the comforter squished up near the pillow. She turned her head slowly toward him. The look on her face was a maddening picture of bewilderment. John had a strong desire to go back out into the hall. He tried to clear his throat and found it sore and dry. The sound of his cough filled the small room like a blaring horn. Angela looked down at the comforter, and he followed her stare.
He was a few steps from the bed when he saw it for himself. Something moved. John froze; he felt his blood rush through his veins. Angela’s head shot toward him as if to say, “I told you.” Something moved again under the comforter, and John saw it for sure. His mind raced with possibilities as he searched the room for the dog. For a moment, he believed this was some cruel joke, but he found Rex sitting under the window. He was also fixated on the little bed. Angela moved first, reaching for the comforter with one shaking hand.
“No.”
With two short strides, John reached her. He grabbed her hand and pulled it away. He knew something wasn’t right. Angela’s mind was too far gone to make any rational connections. She snapped her hand away from his grasp.
John stood beside the bed and eyed the edge of the comforter. He reached out for it and took a firm hold. He felt it pull away from him, and he yanked it back with one pull. Alex’s body lay in the fetal position. His feet and hands were a dirty yellow, the rest of him covered in fireman pajamas. The boy’s face was toward the wall, and John could only see his cheek and neck. He watched his son’s chest long enough to see he wasn’t breathing. He turned his attention to the comforter, and then Alex’s head moved. John took a step back.
“I told you, I told you,” Angela said.
She got up on her knees and moved closer to Alex’s feet, as John moved back to the end of the bed. The only thing he could grasp was that Dr. Taylor was on the way. Angela moved again, this time faster than he could react. She grabbed Alex’s pajama bottoms and rolled him over. The boy’s body turned, and John looked at his son’s face. His deep yellow color was ghoulish.
Alex moved again; this time his head turned toward the door. John jumped back until he was sitting next to Angela at the end of the bed. He watched Alex’s chest for a long time and was sure it never once rose or fell.
“He’s not breathing,” he said.
“You saw him move,” Angela said.
Wild surprise filled her eyes. “If he’s not breathing, then he’s not…”
John stopped as a sound rose from the other end of the bed. Alex’s lips parted and a low guttural moan came from within him. The sound continued for several seconds but then died away. His mouth remained open. John didn’t continue trying to convince Angela that Alex couldn’t possibly be alive. He got up and moved around to the side of the bed where Alex’s head was facing. He got down on his knees and leveled his face with his son’s. John moved his face closer to the bed, studying Alex. Beneath the yellow skin, dark lines had formed like tiny rivers of blood running the length of his cheeks and forehead.
There was an awful smell coming from Alex’s opened mouth. It reeked of decay. The stench hit John in the face, and he nearly toppled backwards. He had to fight to hold down what little food he had in his stomach. John steadied himself with one hand on the floor and covered his nose and mouth with the other. He leaned in toward Alex, catching sight of the boy’s tongue and discovered it was black as night. Something dark covered the edges of his teeth, which looked to be eating away at the enamel.
“What the hell is that stuff?” John asked.
He was a nose length away, studying the boy’s face, and his heart stopped as Alex’s eyelids flickered once and then opened. John sprang to his feet. He could see Angela jumping up and down on the end of the bed, but his brain couldn’t register her mindless ranting. Alex hadn’t moved, but his eyes were open. John’s stare locked on the boy’s eyes. The dark spheres were void of color, empty of any signs of real life. John slowly backed away, still unable to speak. He reached the doorway before he found the courage to pull his hand away from his mouth.
“Get out,” he heard himself say. He didn’t know why he’d said it, but he never meant anything more in his life. “Get out now.”
Angela yelled at him, cursing in more ways than he ever believed she knew how. She was still jumping on the bed when Alex moved again. This time the boy sat up. The movement caused her to go silent. The boy reached for his mother, grabbing her around the leg. John ran for the bed as Angela reached down for Alex, her face consumed with a mother’s agony. In her blind love, she did not see Alex’s mouth opening wide as he pulled her leg closer. John threw one arm around her waist and pulled her from the bed.
He held his wife in the air and looked back at Alex. The boy slid to the foot of the bed as he tried to hold on to Angela’s limb. He reached out for his mother as she dangled in front of him. The black pit of his mouth was open, and the vile moan spewed out like a growl. His soulless eyes remained fixated on his mother as he grabbed her shirt. John pulled her farther away, and as he did, he got a slap across the face for his trouble.
“Put me down,” Angela said, screaming at the top of her lungs. “Alex needs me.”
She kicked and punched, hitting John several times on the face and the top of his head. John pulled at her until he was practically dragging her across the floor. By the time he reached the doorway, Alex had lunged forward and fallen off the bed. His face hit the wooden boards, and his hands flailed about trying to push up.
John let go of his wife with one hand in an attempt to grab the door. He found the knob and felt a painful scratch on his cheek. Angela dug her nails in his skin and pulled with all her strength. She got free, pushing herself back toward Alex on her hands and knees.
She was only a few feet away before John got to her again. He gave up on the niceties and grabbed a handful of hair. Once he got her on her back, he pulled her away. Alex lunged out for her and grabbed one of her feet. She continued to scream
at John even as the boy pulled up toward her and tried to bite her toes. John didn’t think; he reacted. He dropped Angela’s head onto the floor and stepped over her. He sent a solid kick to Alex’s face, the boy’s neck snapped back violently, and he lost his grip on his mother. John grabbed another handful of hair as Angela tried to get to her feet.
She reached for everything within her arm’s length. Toys flung across the room and the bookcase toppled over, but John didn’t stop. He reached the doorway, grabbed Angela with both hands, and flung her down the hall. He grabbed the door, and the last thing he saw before he slammed it shut was his son picking himself up off the floor.
♦
John kept Angela’s hands pinned to the floor. He’d pulled her out into the living room and gotten on top of her. She was rabid, screaming and thrashing with strength far beyond her thin frame. He struggled to keep her down.
“There’s something wrong with him,” he said.
Angela didn’t pay attention to what he was saying. She was hell-bent on getting back to her boy. Her mind was broken; John could see it in her eyes. He wasn’t sure she would ever come back from this.
“That’s not Alex in there,” he said.
He wasn’t sure he knew what he was saying either. John had looked into Alex’s eyes and saw the hollow void within the sunken darkness. There was no life within him. He didn’t know what it was, but he was sure it wasn’t his son.
He stayed on top of her for nearly an hour. She kicked and screamed the entire time until her strength finally gave out. Soaked in sweat, she collapsed beneath him as if she’d been possessed, and the demon finally left her body. Spit lined her cheeks and chin as a strip of fresh blood ran from her cracked lips.
“You have to listen to me,” John said. “That’s not our boy in there. Whatever that stuff was he got into, it did something to him.”
Angela turned her head and looked up at him, but she didn’t say anything. She looked weak as if her will to live was gone. She struggled to say something but froze with her eyes wide open. For a moment, John thought she had gone into shock, but then he heard it. There was a low whimper coming from the hall. It took a second for it to register, but then it hit him.
“Rex?”
The moment the name left his mouth, the whimpering stopped. There was a loud single yelp, followed by a terrible silence. John rolled off Angela and sat on the floor looking down the hall. The hallway was dark and foreboding with Alex’s door closed.
Angela sat up, her eyes focused with John’s. The silence continued for several minutes and then a new sound arose. Long, slow scratches came one after another from the inside of Alex’s door. John had no desire to see what was making the noise, but he wasn’t sure how long he could keep Angela away. Calling the police seemed like the wrong thing to do, but he wasn’t sure what other choice he had.
“Let’s just have a look,” Angela said in a calm voice.
John studied her face. She was, in fact, too calm. She’d pulled her hair back and wiped her face off. He had to be careful with her, he knew. When she was out of it, she was capable of terrible things.
“John, we can do this,” she said. “We’ll do it together. We have to check; he’s our baby.”
He recognized her manipulation. Angela always got her way. One way or another, he would do what she wanted. All he wanted was for her to be okay. He couldn’t lose both of them.
They crept down the hall on their hands and knees. The scratching grew louder. Two distinct shadows formed in the space beneath the bedroom door. Alex was standing there and both John and Angela knew it.
They reached the end of the hall and stopped. Angela looked over at him with pleading eyes. John’s mind screamed at him to back away, and he had to force himself to reach for the doorknob. He felt the cold metal with his fingers and paused. The scratching on the other side of the door stopped before he turned the knob.
John froze. He and Angela sat at the door for several agonizing minutes, listening for anything. John could hear his heart beating over everything else. The next sound they heard was something hitting the ground. It was far enough from the door not to break the light underneath. A moment later, something slid across the floor. John held his breath until it came to a stop.
Angela reached for the doorknob, wrapped her hand over John’s, and turned. Hesitantly, they pushed. A rush of stench engulfed them as the door opened. Angela turned away; John had to put his hand over his nose to keep from gagging. He kept his eyes on the room, waiting for anything to move. Both of them stepped through the doorway, and the sight of blood smeared on the hardwood floor struck them. Small handprints dotted the maroon colored mess.
Chunks of dark brown fur clung to the floorboards. A hacking gag from Angela pulled John’s eyes to the corner of the room directly across from the door. There on the floor lay the remains of Rex. There was little left to identify the animal. All that remained was a mix of blood and exposed organs dotted by patches of soaked fur.
“My God,” John said.
The smell intensified once he could see the remains of the dog. Nauseous, his head spun as the aroma of death filled his senses. He wanted to get back out into the hallway as quickly as he could. He couldn’t fathom what was happening to his son, and the only thing he knew for sure was that the thing that awoke on Alex’s bed wasn’t a boy, it was a monster. He felt his legs shaking beneath him, and he couldn’t make them stop.
His concentration was broken. A new sound crept across the bedroom floor and grabbed him. John recognized it at once. The low, guttural growl was the same as it had been when Alex lay on his bed. John felt Angela’s fingernails dig into his arm. He looked down at her hand and back up at her face. She wasn’t looking at him. Her face was pale and her eyes widened beyond their limits.
John found himself unwilling to look. He knew she’d found where Alex was, and John wasn’t sure he wanted to know. He was more willing to leave the room and never open the door again. Slowly, he forced himself to follow her stare. He turned on his heels and gazed back at the small bed. It took him a moment to see them. John was drawn down to the dark space underneath the bed. What he found there would haunt him every time he closed his eyes. Looking back at them, watching every move from within the darkness, were the soulless eyes of his son.
5
John realized he was holding his breath. Slowly, he let it out and took a step toward the door. He felt Angela grab his hand and pull. She was looking at him; he could see her from the corner of his eye.
“What?” he asked.
“We can’t leave,” she said.
“Like hell we can’t. Didn’t you see Rex?”
“That’s your son down there, damn you.”
John could argue the point, but hearing it made him think. It was the most inopportune time, but his mind was flooded with memories. He remembered holding Alex for the first time in the hospital. He remembered how small his hands were when he pushed his thumb into the center of his palm. In that moment, John remembered it all.
“Alex?” John said.
Angela’s grip tightened. “Alex,” she said.
John felt paralyzed. Tears formed in the corners of his eyes. He couldn’t find the strength to move. Nothing made sense. “Alex, please, it’s daddy…”
He went quiet as a sound came from underneath the bed. A hissing noise grew louder for several seconds but then died away. A sudden movement from underneath the bed caused John and Angela to jump. Alex’s hand reached out from the dark space and into the light. The skin was thin and grey. Dark lines crisscrossed over the top of his hand, running down each frail and boney finger. His nails were caked in something John couldn’t guess, but the stains on the tips of the fingers were clearly blood.
Alex’s other hand lurched from underneath the bed, clawing at the floorboards. The hissing noise returned as John saw his son’s face pull out into the light. The color of his cheeks was more blue than grey. The jaundice-like glow was gone, but the dark veins
were more prominent in his forehead and neck.
John felt Angela’s hand pushing against his back, but he held his ground. He gave her a shove in return with his elbow and then planted his feet firmly. He did not intend to move closer to the bed until he better understood what was going on. He was horrified by Alex’s appearance, but as far as he could tell, Angela wasn’t affected by it at all.
“Hey, baby,” she said as she got down on her hands and knees, looking into Alex’s eyes for some sign of her son. As she tried to move closer, she was crying. John put his hand on her back to stop her, and he was forced to step in front of her.
John got within a few feet of the bed before Alex lunged forward. He made it a foot away from his father and then collapsed on the floor with his hands outstretched. John didn’t react quickly enough, and if Alex would have had the strength, he would have had his legs. The boy lay motionless on the ground, and the hissing turned to a growl. His exposed arms looked battered and bruised. Angela reached out and stroked his hair before John could stop her. Alex didn’t move.
“He’s dying,” she said.
That’s an understatement, John thought.
“Do something,” she said.
John crept to his right so he could keep an eye on Alex’s face. He saw the outline of blood on the boy’s ear and the side of his head. There was a dark brown clump stuck to his hair. It took John a few seconds to realize it was Rex’s fur. Now, closer to the bed, John could see the rest of the dog’s remains underneath. He could also see Alex wasn’t breathing. Even so, the boy’s fingers moved every couple of seconds.
“I think he’s…” John thought about what he was saying. “I think he’s hungry?”
“So, I’ll go get him a sandwich,” Angela said, and then she jumped up.
“I don’t think so,” John said, and she stopped at the door. “I don’t think a sandwich will do it.”
“What does he need?” she asked.
The Decaying World Saga Box Set [Prequel #1-#2 & Books #1-#2] Page 3
