The Awakening

by Pierre C. Arseneault

She wiped them a bit with a cloth, drying off the bathwater, and dressed them in their light cotton sleeping gowns. She watched them as they both yawned and began to slip off into slumber; the warmth of the stove helping them to sleep. Thunder had rumbled prior to his bath, screaming and crying, while at the same time, Sunshine had lay quietly sucking her thumb as she often did during his rants. It was as if her brother’s cries soothed her. The twins slipped off to sleep in unison.

  Sparrow heard what she thought was her water boiling on the old wood stove but when she turned her attention to it, she saw the water was still, without a hint of steam yet, let alone boiling. The noise repeated itself, and seemed to come from outside. It had been a beautiful day when last she looked, but now she heard what had to be strong winds battering the cabin. Had the winds grown stronger? Is there some sort of storm brewing, thought Sparrow as she went to the door to see.

  Opening the door, she spotted dark clouds in the sky blocking out the sunshine she had seen not long ago. In the far off distance, she saw a dark figure lurking in the shadows near the brush that surrounded the cabin’s yard. She turned to check on the children and saw them peacefully sleeping on the bed. When Sparrow turned her attention outside again, the figure was no longer in the brush but standing twenty feet from the cabin. It stood in a wide pentagram made of flames that were as high as the figure’s waist. The flickering flames cast much light but somehow, the figure remained draped in shadows. It had to be Bessie thought Sparrow. But how was she doing this? It had to be dark magic of some sort. The figure raised its arms, palms up and the flames grew taller.

  “What do you want from us? Leave!” Sparrow cried out, tears welling up in her eyes. She couldn’t believe her eyes. She had been so sure Bessie had died that day just over a year ago.

  “Go away with your dark magic! We want none of it here! You are not welcome!”

  Sparrow looked back at the children who still seemed to sleep peacefully. Sunshine sucked her thumb while Thunder lay sleeping next to her.

  Sparrow picked up one of Henri’s smaller axes that sat near the door and charged at the figure in the flaming pentagram at full speed. She raised the axe overhead as she ran, hoping to scare off the figure, but it stood there, arms stretched overhead, flames growing high. Reaching the flames, she ran through them and brought the axe down on the figure. Down went the axe, through thin air, the figure gone, the flames and the pentagram also gone. The axe hit the dirt with a thud and sent a cloud of dust around the sharp slit mark it left in the ground. Picking it up in a swift movement, she clutched it as if waiting to be attacked. She looked around perplexed at what had just happened. As her breathing slowed, she felt confusion and fear set in. Had she imagined her? The dark figure whom she assumed was Bessie? Was it her spirit? Confused, she stood in front of the cabin a few moments until the sound of crackling coming from behind her made fear swell up inside her. Sparrow spun around to see the entire cabin engulfed in flames.

  “Nooooooo…” she screamed, her legs feeling weak as she dropped to her knees, the axe thudding onto the ground before her. “No!”

  “Sparrow!” she heard someone shout. “Sparrow… what’s wrong?”

  Sparrow buried her face in her hands and wept hard. She felt strong hands grasp her shoulders and shake her. Sparrow looked up at the bearded man who had driven the cart on the night the twins were born.

  “Sparrow, is it the children?” the bearded man demanded. “Tell me!”

  Sparrow looked at the bearded man in stunned silence as she saw the blue sky overhead.

  “Fire…” she began, but stopped. Glancing past the man she saw the cabin, perfectly fine and not a sign of any fire damage.

  “Have I gone mad?” Sparrow asked the large, bearded man, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  “What?” the bearded man asked. “Sparrow, where are the twins?”

  Sparrow, still kneeling on the ground, pointed towards the cabin.

  The large bearded man turned and ran to the open door expecting to find something horrible. Sparrow had been shrieking after all. Instead he found the twins, lying on their bed; the boy fast asleep but the girl sucking her thumb. She popped it out of her mouth and began cooing and smiling up at the man as he smiled back at her.

  Henri sat at the wooden table in his home with a near empty plate before him. He watched with disdain as the twins played in a makeshift play area Sparrow had fashioned using boards in a corner of the cabin. The boy had taken to crawling early and now was walking with unsteady steps at thirteen months. The girl seemed content to sit, often just staring off into the distance when she wasn’t her usually bright cheerful self. Sparrow had gone to fetch water, wash clothes and clean the cast iron skillet. She had insisted that Henri keep an eye on his children. Henri could tell that she had been hesitant to do so. He had been trying to keep his anger under control over the past week, or at the very least hidden from Sparrow. He did not want her to think that he was not able to father his own children. When she insisted that he look after them, he knew he had succeeded. Otherwise, she would never have left him with them alone.

  She had instructed Henri to simply keep an eye on the twins while she did her chores. She wouldn’t be too long. She explained to Henri how Thunder had gotten out of the makeshift pen a few times already, and Sparrow was afraid he’d burn himself on the stove if he got out unattended. Henri had grumbled his agreement to tend to them while Sparrow did chores. As he ate his meal, he watched them with disdain. Henri wasn’t done blaming the twins for their mother’s death. He couldn’t stand to look at them. He hated them still.

  Henri ate the last of his potato, as he poked his knife at the last morsel of boiled rabbit on his plate. He heard the twins cooing but couldn’t bear to look at them, instead focusing on the meat before him. He ate the last of the rabbit while wishing his wife still lived. He missed her greatly. She had always made him happy, even in difficult times. But he had lost her, and it was their fault.

  Henri heard a rustling noise coming from the pen area, but he couldn’t bring himself to look. He hated those children. He felt as if his blood boiled, his face flushed, and his stomach knotted as he listened to the twins coo. He didn’t think he had the patience to watch them grow after they took his Martha. He listened to them shuffle about but refused to look. He refused that is, until he heard one the children speak what sounded like a word.

  “Mama,” he heard the tiny voice say as a tear ran down his cheek as he thought of his Martha. She had wanted children, many children. He knew because she had told him often enough. Now her children would grow up never knowing who their mother was. He wiped away his tears as he turned to see the children but saw they were no longer in the pen. He heard a squeal of happiness coming from one of the twins. On the bed was a familiar looking fabric. Both twins sat on the bed, on his late wife’s blood-covered dress. The girl child smiled and laughed while the boy spoke.

  “Mmmm… mamma!”

  Sitting atop the blood smeared dress, the twins toyed with the fabric, getting blood on their hands as they smiled. They smiled and laughed. The boy child stuffed a bloody hand in his mouth, took it out and spoke.

  “Momma!” he said with a scowl as his twin sister laughed.

  Rage fueled Henri as he rose from the table, sending the chair he sat on tumbling backwards. It clattered and struck the wall behind him. He walked to the door of the cabin with the intention of going outside but stopped at the door.

  “MOMMA!!” he heard coming from behind him.

  Looking down to his left, Henri picked up his heaviest axe, marched to the bed and without hesitation began hacking at the twins. Blood spattered his face as he brought the axe down on the small bodies again and again, destroying the bed as well in the process. The maddening rage that had fueled the onslaught subsided as his head spun and he staggered, taking a step backwards. He looked at the carnage before him; the small bodies completely
hacked to pieces and gore splatter covering the dress, the bed and walls. Bewildered, Henri dropped the axe and looked at his trembling blood covered hands. What had he done? How could he explain this to Sparrow? He remembered his dead wife and her love of children. He had killed their children, her babies. Looking back up at the bloodied, decimated bodies of the two infant children, he knew what he had to do.

  Sparrow saw the cabin door was open as she approached and that worried her. Has Henri left the twins alone again, she wondered? She carried a skillet in one hand and a bucket containing freshly washed garments in the other. She wanted to run but was afraid of what she might find when she got there. Henri had seemed better recently, less angry. The sight of the open cabin door worried her. She set the bucket down before stepping inside but kept hold of the cast iron skillet. She stopped and stood in the doorway. The skillet fell from her hand, hitting the wooden floor with a clang. Sparrow’s scream echoed in every corner of the small cabin.

  Henri’s lifeless body dangled from a rope tied to a rafter, a chair toppled over at his feet. Sparrow hesitated, but then stepped into the cabin, her thoughts returning to the babies. When she saw the wood bed and straw mattress in the corner had been chopped to pieces, most likely with the axe that lay on the floor next to it, she gasped. Just as soon as panic began to well up in her abdomen, it was squashed when she saw Wallace, the large bearded man who had driven the cart to fetch her on the night the twins were born. Standing next to the children’s pen, he held Thunder in his arms, his face tear-stained as the little boy grabbed at the big man’s beard. Sunshine stood by the edge of the pen holding herself up, smiling at the large bearded man.

  The children were fine after all, but Henri was dead and by his own hand. As much as she loved the children she had cared for, she knew this was the end of her journey with them. Turning back towards the cabin’s door, she ran out, ignoring the tears that ran down her face. She knew she had to protect her own baby that grew bigger every day in her belly. She could not let what she now believed was a curse on these babies affect her own unborn child. Sparrow wondered if something was wrong with the children. Were they possessed by an evil that she could not see? They had been exposed to Bessie at birth and Sunshine had been used in a ritual that Bessie had tried to do on the night the girl twin was born. She had no clear idea of what this curse was, but she knew this was something she could never tell anyone if she was to be rid of the burden of caring for someone else’s children while expecting her own. With a man like Wallace and his family to care for them, they would be better off, so Sparrow ran.

  Wallace and his eldest son had already constructed a makeshift bed for the twins. They would sleep in the same bedroom as Wallace and his wife Hester. The Masterson twins needed caring for and there was no one else to do it. That decision would not come without their share of worries.

  Wallace had explained to his wife that Sparrow had run away after seeing the lifeless body of Henri dangling from a rope. She hadn’t said a word to Wallace when she saw he had the children in his care. She had just bolted outside and had been seen by Hester as she ran away from the cabin where Henri had taken his life.

  Hester and Wallace discussed at great lengths the situation before they agreed to take in the children and care for them, as there was nobody else for miles, and even if they did go look for help for the twins, they knew they would be likely locked away in an orphanage somewhere. This was not something the loving couple could let happen.

  Later that night in their home, in the warm glow of lanterns, their own children already sleeping away the tiredness of chores, the couple conversed.

  “I’m not sure I can raise these children with names like Thunder and Sunshine,” Hester said. “I know Sparrow said Henri never wanted to name the children, but Wallace, if they’re to be ours now,” she said, trailing off as she raised the little smiling girl into the air. Hester smiled wide at her, making the child giddy with laughter.

  “Jenkins children need names,” Wallace said to the boy he cradled on his lap. “We will call you Liam.” He had heard the name on the wharf. One of the boat captains had been named Liam and he thought it suited the boy.

  “Fannie,” Hester added with a smile. “We will call you Fannie,” she said to the little girl as she dressed her in warm clothes that used to belong to their own daughter when she had been little.

  “Welcome to the Jenkins family,” Hester said. She shed a single tear of happiness. Hester had wanted more children in recent years, but it hadn’t looked like it would happen. With two growing children of their own, she had not been able to bear any more. The twins had to be a gift from God, she thought. Finally, her prayers had been answered. She would think that way for a while still.

  It would take some time for the evil embedded in the little girl to show itself again. She would love the children fiercely even when it finally did.

  Chapter 9

  Grady

  Early July

  Grady stood behind the Old Mill Restaurant, gripping two smelly trash bags in his hands. The dumpster lid was propped open with a rotting piece of wood and he stared at it, then at the bag in his hand. Could he throw it into the dumpster from where he stood? The last time he tried that, it had hit the side of the dumpster and burst open, strewing trash all over the asphalt. All while Shelley had been watching him through her small office window. No matter how much he insisted he had seen a rat near the dumpster, Shelley angrily insisted he clean his mess, which Grady did reluctantly while cursing his own stupidity the entire time.

  Grady needed this job. He hadn’t needed it, that is, until he’d crashed his father’s car while doing donuts in the church parking lot. He needed this job to pay for the damages to the car and to replace the large metal donation bin he had crashed the car into. The bin was used to drop off used clothing and articles by community members trying to help out their fellow islanders. It had been smashed open, spreading its contents all over the asphalt. Clothing, lamps, and dishes had been sprawled out everywhere. The metal box had been bent out of shape, the door detached, and the paint scratched. There had been no way to repair it and so it needed to be replaced. This was why he needed this job, he remembered, as he arched his arm back, ready to throw the bag. The memories of his luck with spreading things all over parking lots and the stench of the garbage bag were the deciding factors against the idea.

  “Third time’s the charm, my posterior,” he muttered, thinking himself clever. He walked to the dumpster while dragging his feet. He tossed a bag into the dumpster and winced at the smell as he did. He gagged at the rancid stench as it washed over him.

  “What’s in that?” he muttered to himself as he cleverly tossed the second bag into the dumpster in a way that it struck the wood in the process, knocking it into the dumpster and slamming the lid shut in one fell swoop. Pinching his nostrils shut with his fingers, he looked around to see if anyone had seen his really cool toss and lid closing trick. Of course, nobody was around, he thought as he wished someone had seen him. He glanced at the window of Shelley’s office to see if she was watching and felt disappointed when she wasn’t.

  A scuffling sound behind him caught Grady’s attention. He turned his focus back to the dumpster. On top of the now closed lid sat the biggest rat he had ever seen. Spooked, he took a single step back as the rat raised itself on its hind legs and hissed at him like a cat. Before he could react, the rat’s neck jutted forward and with its mouth open it sprayed the teen’s face with a hot, sticky, and rancid liquid.

  “Fuck!” Grady exclaimed as he stumbled backwards a few steps before falling on his ass. He couldn’t see anything at first, the sticky substance blinding him. He wiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt trying to see. He panicked, thinking the rat was going to attack him. Struggling to see, he scurried away from the dumpster backwards. His vision began to clear, specks of light pricking the darkness, but everything was blurry; he couldn’t
see the rat anywhere. His eyes began to burn as he struggled to his feet. With one hand outstretched and the other wiping at his eyes, he stumbled to the back door of the restaurant. He made his way to the back room, found the eye wash station near the first aid kit and felt at it blindly, trying to understand how to use it.

  Shelley, hearing Grady stumble about came to check on him. She saw him feeling around the eye wash station with his eyes closed and slime on his face. She pulled the cap off the eye wash station and helped Grady place his face on it.

  “Keep your eyes open,” Shelley stated firmly at Grady while watching him struggle to flush his eyes. “What is that stuff?” she blurted, thinking this was so typical of Grady to do something stupid like this.

  Meanwhile, Grady uttered a series of curse words while he struggled to keep his eyes open to flush them out. The burning sensation still raged inside his lids, but it seemed to dissipate with each flush of the cool eye wash liquid.

  Once his eyes were cleaned and the slime seemed to be all gone, they went to the parking lot and got in Shelley’s car. On the drive to the ER, Grady eventually told her the tale of the large rat and how it had spit the slime all over him. Shelley assumed that Grady was lying, trying to cover up something stupid he had done. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time he had done that. Besides, who ever heard of a giant rat that spit at you? Grady was definitely lying.

  Later that night, with help from his mother, Grady had applied more eye drops prescribed that afternoon by Doctor Kingsley at the ER. His eyes stung still but it was mild now. The redness around his eyes hadn’t gone away. It actually had gotten worse with the constant rubbing. His vision had been fine most of the day; although he had spent most of his time laying in the dark with his eyes closed, listening to music from his cell phone, trying to alleviate the occasional itching without scratching.