He placed his hand upon the glass window pane again, and quickly turned his neck to look at the opposite window.
It was only a split second, but he saw dozens of shifts in the glass panes across the room. Before he could completely bring his eyes to focus on them, they had reset, still and black and motionless.
That’s what I’m feeling, he thought. Something in the glass.
He turned back, again detecting a response to his movement as the black covered panes behind him reacted to his turn, resetting themselves.
Then he glanced at the pane he’d placed his hand on. Appearing under his fingers was a face in the glass. It looked old and masculine. Wrinkles were etched in the skin, and a faint mustache grew above the lips. It seemed confused by his fingers upon the pane, and its eyes were centered on his hand, gazing at it intently.
My palm, Ron thought. The palm where the nazar entered me.
The face in the glass faded quickly, becoming a solid sheet of black film. Behind him, he felt the eyes of dozens of faces that must be present in the panes of the opposite wall. He knew that when he turned, they’d disappear too.
“What are you looking at?” Jake asked, coming up behind him.
“Faces,” Ron replied. “In the glass.”
“Faces?”
“Yeah.” He turned, feeling the windows now in front of him shift to hide, as the ones behind him engaged, watching. “There’s a face in each of those panes. Dozens of them. They shift when I’m not looking. They don’t want to be seen.”
“How do you know?” Jake asked.
“I can feel them,” Ron replied. “The nazar, I think it makes it so you can sense things…not just see, but feel. No, that’s not the right word, I can’t exactly feel them…it’s just…I’m not sure how to phrase it. I can sense them. And I caught one of them…” He placed his hand on one of the panes and turned quickly, repeating the steps he’d taken before. “The whole wall of them, they disappear when I’m not looking, but…” He turned back quickly. In the glass, under his hand, the same face appeared; old man, heavy wrinkles, mustache, concern upon his brow, looking at his palm. Then it swiftly faded. “But…I caught one of them, by touching the glass.”
“You’re telling me there’s a face in each of these panes,” Jake said, looking up at the giant window, “staring down at us right now?”
“Yeah,” Ron confirmed. “Both sides.” He pointed to the opposite wall.
“Fuck,” Jake mumbled.
“Are you sure you still want me to tell you this shit? I can keep it to myself.”
“No, I’d rather know.”
Ron repeated the steps again, catching another glimpse of the face. “It’s an old man. He’s looking at my palm. I get the feeling he’s confused too, like the one I saw back there, in the bedroom.”
“Great, so they’re confused,” Jake replied. “We should speed this up, take advantage of their confusion before they figure out why we’re here.”
Ron removed his hand from the glass. “I think you’re right.”
They moved out of the room and into a hallway that entered the west wing. Each of the rooms was quiet and unremarkable, and Ron didn’t sense or see anything odd, until they approached the last hall at the end of the wing. A set of closed double doors appeared twenty feet ahead, centered in the middle of the hallway. Unlike the doorways to the various rooms they’d searched, it was surrounded by ornate molding.
“Something special in that room, I guess,” Jake said.
Ron was about to reply when he heard a scream from inside the room, a high pitched wail that carried throughout the hall, reverberating and echoing. It held, sustained, continuing for what seemed like minutes. Ron placed his hands to his ears, trying to cut the sound.
Jake appeared confused. “You hear something?”
“You don’t?” Ron replied, wincing.
Jake paused, tilting his head a little like he was straining to listen. “No.”
“High pitched scream. It won’t…”
It suddenly ended, the wail quickly dropping in pitch and intensity. Ron lowered his hands.
“It stopped?” Jake asked.
Before Ron could reply, a ghostly figure emerged through the wood doors. It was a tall woman. Her hands were outstretched, reaching into the air as though she was trying to claw at something ahead of her. Her eyes were wild, rolling in their sockets, and the hair piled up on her head was disheveled, with strands hanging down.
Her mouth opened, twisting rapidly, forming words he couldn’t hear. She moved quickly, racing toward them.
“Step back!” Ron warned Jake, pulling him to the side and holding him against the wall as the crazed figure rushed past, not stopping to look or acknowledge them. The fingers on her hands grasped at the air in front of her, bending spasmodically; the look on her face was one of pure horror. As she passed, Ron heard the faint sound of odd words, a language he didn’t recognize.
“What?” Jake asked, as Ron realized the apparition was only for his eyes, something Jake couldn’t see or detect. Nevertheless, he kept Jake pinned against the wall as he watched the woman progress down the hall away from them, her words trailing, her legs carrying her quickly into the depths of the house. After she had disappeared from sight, he released Jake and then bent over, taking in a deep breath.
“What was it?” Jake asked again.
He stood back up. “I think that was Mrs. Coldwater.”
“Fuck!” Jake replied. “Did she look as creepy as Mrs. Hughes made her sound?”
Ron looked down the hallway. “Maybe more.”
Jake joined him, glancing back the way they’d come, trying to see whatever Ron was seeing. “Goddamn. So it’s all true, then.”
“It was just like she described. Her hands were out in front of her, clawing or grasping for something. She was saying weird words, almost like a chant.”
“Did she see us?”
“I don’t think so. She was out of her mind. She looked terrified.”
They turned to stare at the doors.
“Terrified by something in there?” Jake asked. “Well, fuck.”
Ron looked at his friend. Although he didn’t have the numb look of horror he’d seen on the woman’s face, Jake looked genuinely scared.
“I guess that means what we’re after is in there,” Jake said. “You wanna get that strobe out? One of us has to use it while the other does the cutting.”
Ron slipped the backpack off and opened the zipper, pulling out the strobe. It was square, made of plastic, and had a silver cone on one end with a plastic lens. He replaced the pack onto his back and fumbled with the device. “Is there a switch?” he asked, realizing Jake had been the one who tested it.
“Here,” Jake said, handing him the machete. “I’ll work that, you do the cutting. You’re all worried about me holding the blade anyway.”
Ron passed him the strobe, and Jake had it activated within seconds. The hallway suddenly lit up with flashes, making every movement appear to be slow motion.
“Save it for once we’re inside,” Ron said, and Jake shut it off. “I’m gonna open the doors, and you get ready to turn it on when I say.”
“Alright,” Jake replied, positioning the device, standing next to Ron. “Open both doors at the same time?”
“Right,” Ron agreed.
They reached for the handles, and pushed.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Corpse of a seal.
San Luis Obispo. As they spent most weekends while his family lived there, Ron was on the beach, running in the wet sand toward the blue waters of the Pacific.
He was very young, and he played all over the bay, within the watch of his parents and their spread blanket. It wasn’t unusual on some days to find something washed up, and today a new, mysterious lump was on the beach, partially covered by sand. He approached it and noticed a foul smell. Before he could poke at whatever it was, his father suddenly lifted him into the air and returned him to the blanket,
calling the lump a dead seal, and telling him to leave it alone.
He kept that sand-covered lump in his peripheral vision most of the day, wanting to examine it more, but knowing it wasn’t allowed. He had learned that disobeying his parents was a quick way to cut the time at the beach short, so he didn’t risk it. However, throughout the afternoon, the lump never lost its intrigue. If he could find a way to look at it more closely, he might try.
He decided to head for the water, his young brain completely misjudging the power of the ocean. The first wave he encountered was taller than his small, four-year-old frame, and it knocked him over, rolling him sideways, submerging him.
A moment before the wave hit, he had complete control; now, he had none. The wave had engulfed him. There was no defense against it; it was so overwhelming, his choices were suddenly gone, removed from him. He had no option but to submit to whatever the water had in store.
He attempted to recover by pushing himself up, but the sand under his hands eroded quickly as the wave began to recede, giving him little to push against. The tug of the retreating water pulled at his small body unexpectedly, making him twist in a direction he didn’t want to go.
Salt water tried to invade his lungs, but he didn’t let it. He’d spent many hours in his grandmother’s pool; he knew about holding his breath. It wasn’t the water covering him, or even how strong it had been, knocking him down. It was the feeling of not having control, of not being able to stand back up…and knowing another wave was coming. He’d watched the waves from the safety of his parents’ blanket, and he knew they were endless, they didn’t stop. He needed to move back, toward where his father and mother were lying on the beach, back where it was just sun and sandcastles and the bottled soda his mother always brought in a small, Styrofoam cooler. Getting back there was the issue. He had to find a way before the next wave hit, and the next, and the next. They’d keeping knocking him over until he had no strength left, and he’d die right there on the beach.
He’d be just another sand-covered lump, like the corpse of the seal.
The idea terrified him, so he fought.
He wasn’t sure what mental levers he managed to pull, but they seemed to be working; the wave that hit him and knocked his mind sideways when they opened the doors to the room was receding. Instead of finding himself twisting in the tug of the undercurrent, he was standing upright, his mind refocusing on what was in front of him, somehow reaching out mentally to brace against the floor, the walls, the ceiling, forcing his senses to orient and right themselves.
Jake wasn’t there. The room was dark, but not because of the black film covering the windows. Heavy drapes had been pulled. He couldn’t see what was at the other end, but the area around him was faint, shadowy. There was a sickening smell, something rancid and sweet; to his right was a table with a mirror, covered in small perfume bottles.
He was afraid another wave might come, like the beach. He felt the need to brace himself, so he checked the mental bulwarks he’d constructed: imaginary steel beams of rectitude, bolted to the scene in front of him, strong and able to keep him upright if another blast hit.
A scream in the distance pierced through the darkness, focusing his attention. Slowly, a dim light at the other end of the room grew, faintly illuminating a bed. Another scream was followed by deeper grunts, and Ron began to make out figures on the bed, twisting and interacting.
He turned, again looking for Jake, but aside from the scene at the other end of the room, he was alone.
Another scream made him turn back to face the bed. His eyes were wide, trying to take in the faint information the dim light revealed, but it was still too dark to make out more than shadows.
Yet another scream, bloodcurdling, long, and high-pitched; it caused him to take a step back. The door, he thought. I can turn and open the door, and leave. I don’t want to see whatever is down there.
Then his body began to move away from the door, against his will. He was sliding over the ground, closer and closer to the bed. He tried to stop his legs, but realized it wasn’t his legs that were forcing him forward. It felt like the receding wave on the beach, pulling him regardless of how much he wanted to control things. He was powerless to stop it.
Forward, across the dark floor, moving smoothly like a camera in a movie, he found himself positioned along one side of the large bed. A small light on a nightstand next to it had a frilly shade, more decorative than functional; its dim radiance provided just enough light to illuminate the bed’s surface.
A young girl was on it, wearing a darkly stained dress. She was face down, her arms tied to the bedposts with rope. She twisted against the bindings frantically.
Straddling the girl at her waist was an older man, also fully dressed. He was bulky and large, with a thick neck. Ron couldn’t make out his features; he was facing away.
The girl screamed once again, shuddering in pain and agony. She twisted her head toward him; he could see her eyes, rolled back. When they finally centered, they landed upon him. He saw tears. Then, they slowly focused upon him, widening with hope.
Ron felt terror race up his spine as he realized she could see him; she knew he was there. “Help me!” she screamed, her eyes pleading.
Ron felt frozen. His position by the bed wasn’t under his control; when he tried to move his legs, nothing happened. He raised an arm, wondering if he might be able to loosen the bindings, but his arm wouldn’t move, either. The only thing he could control was his vision.
She screamed again, pinching her eyes shut in pain, her mouth wide as another bloodcurdling yell reverberated throughout the room. Her mouth stayed open as the scream cut off, and her eyes suddenly opened wide with horror.
“Now, now,” came a low voice, from the man on top of her. At first he wondered if the man was sexually abusing her; his position over the girl’s waist made it appear that he might be performing intercourse. As the man shifted a little, Ron realized it wasn’t intercourse; at least, not of a sexual nature. He had her right foot in his hand, bent at the knee.
“You wanted that horsey,” the man said. He raised something in his other hand, placing it on the flat sole of the girl’s foot, and slowly slid it along the length of it.
The girl screamed again, a terrible, high-pitched wail that shook Ron to the core. Dark red lines of liquid ran down her leg.
“Ya gotta tend to it,” the man said as he positioned his hand again. Ron saw that he was holding a wood plane, gripping it by a large metal ball on top. He pressed it hard against the girl’s sole and slid it again, from her toes to the heel.
Another desperate scream erupted from her, followed by frantic wails. She twisted under the man, but the bindings were secure, and his large frame, pinning her waist down, kept her from escaping. He examined the results of his work, holding up long, thin pieces of flesh, and seemed satisfied. Slowly he swung his leg off the girl until he was standing on the side of the bed opposite Ron. “You gotta learn responsibility!”
Now, with the dim light hitting the man’s face, Ron recognized the wrinkles and the mustache. It was the face from the mirrors. As he made the connection, the man stood more upright, looking right at him.
“Did he send you?” the man asked.
Ron was dumbfounded by the horror he’d just witnessed. He tried to take a step back, but again his legs wouldn’t respond. When he opened his mouth, attempting to speak, nothing came out.
“I figured he’d send someone. Wouldn’t want to miss the show. Hope you liked it, you sick fuck.”
Clasping several pieces of thin flesh between his bloody fingers, the man let the plane fall to the ground. It hit the carpet and made a loud thump.
Ron recognized the sound immediately. Overhead…he heard it every night in his own home, before the sound of steps on the stairs.
It was the same thump.
It made him feel sick.
The man left the side of the bed and walked through the room. Ron tried to turn, worried that he might co
me up behind him, but he heard the door close and assumed the man had left. Below him, on the bed, the girl’s body heaved as she sobbed, her head pressed into the pillow, muffling her cries.
He wanted to reach out and help, to remove the bindings and lift her from the bed, carry her out of the house, but none of his limbs would respond. If he could speak he’d try to console her, to tell her everything was going to be alright, but the words would not come out. He was in no position to make any kind of promises or to offer any kind of comfort; the receding force of the wave still had control, could still make him move or not move.
The light on the nightstand began to flicker, creating short moments of darkness, not unlike a strobe. Ron felt the rumble of another wave building momentum, churning to create energy and form. As the intensity of the strobe gained strength, the wave hit him full force, and he felt as though he was spinning in the salt water, his hands flailing, his legs trying to locate the ground.
I’m a seal, he thought. A lump of dead seal, waiting to be covered by sand.
- - -
“Nothing,” Jake muttered to his left, turning off the strobe. Ron turned; his friend was walking toward a closet on the far side of the room. “Just like the rest of the house.”
Ron wandered farther in, feeling bewildered and confused. He stopped when he reached a spot where a deep indentation was still pressed into the carpet. Turning, he saw three more. The bed was here, he thought. To the side, the vestiges of a stain. He knelt next to it. The man was standing here. The flesh he cut from her was dripping. He ran his fingers over it. Someone tried to take the stain out…got most of it. But it was still there.
“So, this is a little weird,” Ron said.
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