Keep in a Cold, Dark Place

by Michael Stewart

The door jangled as Limpy entered the store. Cool air sent shivers through her. She resisted an urge to be home. But if Mr. José could help rein in the creatures then he was worth a stop. This had become bigger than her.

  Despite the years the family had lived in Flesherton, the Josés had never really connected with the community. Not that Limpy’s family had either. Sometimes farms were a refuge for the strange and the odd. Limpy shuffled past the counter, which was vacant. Again she heard the steady rocking of a chair upstairs.

  “Do you believe in chupacabra?” Limpy asked, suddenly self-conscious that maybe Emmanuel was poking fun at her.

  The rocking stopped.

  Emmanuel stared up at the ceiling. “My dad can’t even see anymore, and still he watches for them.”

  There came a sudden scraping, like chair legs peeling back the veneer of floorboards.

  “I don’t have much time,” she said, as booted feet crossed the ceiling to the stairs. She reached into her pocket and pulled free the article that mentioned the chupacabra in Flesherton. “Do you know anything about this?”

  Emmanuel flushed and nodded as slow creaking came from the stairs.

  “Hal Smith says they aren’t real.”

  “Well, I didn’t think they were either until the library, but—” Emmanuel began, and then Emmanuel José Sr. stepped into the glow of the little store’s fluorescent lights.

  His hands caressed the stack of canned meat before him. His eyes stared off into the distance beyond Limpy, their irises cloudy as if filled with milk.

  “Chupacabra,” he said, enunciating each syllable and speaking as if he feared he summoned them. “You know this thing.”

  Limpy bit her lip and then shook her head, but Mr. José couldn’t see. “Sorry, sorry, I have to go.”

  “If you have seen chupacabra, you don’t have time,” he replied, and his raspy tone urged Limpy to flee. “None of us do.”

  “Dad, you’re scaring her. I brought her so that you could help her. They’re causing problems.”

  Mr. José’s head swiveled to face his son and he said, “We all should be scared.”

  His glazed eyes made Limpy wonder where to look. Although unseeing, his glare seemed to burn into her.

  “They’re just fuzzy things. A type of bunny maybe.” But she didn’t believe it as she said it.

  “Los chupacabra are territorial—they stay near their nest, and protect it, until they ready to leave. Every generation has its chupacabra. You have chickens?”

  Limpy nodded. “Yes.”

  “Not for long. Cats?” Limpy whined as she thought about Spud and the Greek and Roman cats. “Your family. They must stand strong. Together.”

  Limpy shook her head. “No, I don’t think they would hurt my family.” But she was thinking about her father’s toe.

  “You don’t believe,” he said. “It’s time. Time you saw too, Emmanuel.” Then he strode toward them, both Limpy and Emmanuel looking one to the other. And then, blind or not, Mr. José’s fingers caught each by their wrist and hauled the children toward a door.

  “Dad,” Emmanuel said. “You’re hurting.”

  “I want to go home,” Limpy said.

  “With chupacabra there won’t be no more home. No more dreams. You must stop them before they grow too big. To stop them you must first believe. Truly believe.”

  Limpy had decided to run as soon as he let her go in order to open the door, but he kicked it open instead and never loosened his grip. The door swung inward, cracking against the stairwell wall. Steps led into a dank basement.

  When Limpy started to say something, Mr. José shushed her. So she whimpered and followed, the grip on her wrist like a vice. Emmanuel hit the light switch as he passed, but the thin light of the single, naked bulb failed to reach all the shadows of the cluttered basement.

  In one corner belched a furnace as it burned oil. It rattled and knocked as if it were alive. Stacks of boxes, inventory to replenish the store shelves, filled most the space, but many of the boxes were dusty with age, their contents surely spoiled. Mr. José dragged the children to the far end of an aisle and then skirted the stone basement wall to reach a humming freezer chest. Thick chains encircled it, secured by a heavy padlock.

  Finally he let go of their wrists. Even though Limpy wanted to run—knew she should—she couldn’t. The same curiosity that had opened the box in the first place, it shackled her here. She had to know what lay inside the freezer.

  From around his thick neck, Mr. José pulled a leather thong from which dangled silver and gold keys. One hand traced the chain to the padlock, and the other fitted the key inside and twisted it until the lock unhinged. The chains rattled to the ground. Limpy covered her ears at the roar and peeked through her fingers in the ensuing silence. Everyone drew a deep breath as the lid of the freezer opened with a hiss of stale air.

  Mr. José stepped forward into the fog of cold, reached inside, and heaved out a concrete block, followed by another. These he set one atop the other until sixteen blocks were stacked beside the freezer. So fluid and regular was the motion that Limpy was startled when he pulled an iron box from the bottom rather than another brick.

  Mr. José rubbed his palms together. Taking the smaller gold key from the thong, he fitted the key in the lockbox and turned it. Tumblers clicked and he kept a thumb on the lid to keep it from lifting. As if he could see, his gaze drifted from his son, and then to Limpy, who simply stared at the box perched on the blocks. Fear and excitement shot through her. Finally Mr. José whispered in Spanish something like a prayer, and the lid slowly creaked open.

  Inside lay an egg. A silver egg. A perfect match to the eggs she’d discovered in the box in the barn.

  “Another egg,” she said.

  “You know of others?” Mr. José asked quietly.

  “I do.”

  “And they . . . go . . . free?”

  “Yes,” she said, knowing what he meant. “They’ve all hatched.”

  “How many?” he asked.

  “Four.”

  “One for each of your family.” He clenched his sightless eyes. Limpy had watched a sheep being slaughtered once. Its last breath had rattled like Mr. José’s sigh.

  “You must not let them grow,” he said.

  But she knew they had. The creatures on the school roof had been bigger. Chup was twenty times the size of the puffball that had hatched. How long had it been? Five days! Suddenly Limpy had a terrible desire to leave, but not only to escape the store—to run away from everything, from the chupacabra, from her father and from the farm. And she began to back down the aisle.

  “You must stop them,” Mr. José said, his milky eyes following her retreat. “But you can’t kill them. You can’t kill a nightmare.”

  “How, then how?”

  “I cannot help you. It is something only you can know.” His face had gone deathly pale and sweat trickled down from a sideburn. “But take this.”

  From the box he drew a book, swiftly covered the distance between them, and pressed it into her hands. The spine burned with cold in her palm. Unthinking, she took it. Pasted newsprint bristled from the pages.

  “What do you mean, we can’t help her, Dad?” Emmanuel demanded.

  Mr. José’s face darkened. “Because I don’t know . . . I don’t know how to stop them. Only themselves can stop them.”

  “Dad, you have to,” Emmanuel said.

  “I am afraid, my son, so very, very afraid.” And then Mr. José began to ramble on at her, but now in Spanish, louder and louder. She clapped her palms over her ears, but she couldn’t keep the warning out. She understood. Somehow, she understood. She’d heard the words before. Keep in a cold, dark place.

  “Wait,” Emmanuel called after her, but she was already sprinting up the stairs.

  Chapter 25

  Limpy heard the store door slam, but continued biking down the road with the book in her grip.

  “Limphetta!” Emmanuel called. “Wait! What about your scholarship? Y
ou forgot your knapsack with your art!” But the blood pounding in Limpy’s ears muffled the shouts. She needed to reach the farm, to fix what she’d started. Somehow. Nothing else mattered. Not the scholarship. Not even potatoes. Nothing. Not while chupacabra roamed.

  The front tire waggled as she rode. The one hand with which she could grip the handlebars was slick with sweat. The other struggled with the book. She swerved back and forth as she concentrated, but tears from the wind and fear blurred her vision. The rear tire skidded in the gravel as she turned toward the Tater Hut.

  When she hit the rutted lane, the front tire ran headlong into the mud wall created by the tractor tire treads. The book spilled from her fingers. Although she hadn’t been riding fast, she toppled over the handlebars. Pain lanced through her shoulder as she landed. Breath whooshed from her chest and pages from the book swirled like litter.

  As her eyes cleared and the agony of her shoulder ebbed, she rolled to her knees and stared at the papers. Red ink circled a dozen headlines, some from the Herald, but others from newspapers across the world in various languages. She sifted through them, collating ones from her local paper.

  PRIZE HORSES VANISH. THIEVES FEARED.

  COYOTE SHOT WITH MANGE. CONTAGION FEARED.

  PIGS BLED TO SKIN AND BONES—TEENS BLAMED. VAMPIRES FEARED.

  METEOR SHOWER BREAKS WINDOWS. ASTEROID FEARED NEXT.

  STABLES EXPLODE—CASE OF SPONTANEOUS COMBUSTION FEARED.

  And they went on. Odd happenings, many of which were centered around her family’s potato farm. In almost every title the word fear was underlined except:

  CURSED FARM SELLS TO FOOLISH FOREIGNERS.

  The book was open to a drawing. An image of a creature unlike Chup, with a skin like dragons’ scales and with a great maw of teeth. Other pages held more images of chupacabra, seemingly at different stages of maturity.

  She turned back to the article about the fire. No, not “fire,” the explosion. Like in science class . . .

  “Over there, there!” her father hollered from the other side of the yard. She glanced up from the book, but her father and brothers were hidden by the farmhouse. She climbed to her feet, wobbled on legs unsteady from the fall, and staggered around to the back, leaving the articles and book to scatter in the rising wind. When she reached the corner, she froze.

  Her father swung a pitchfork this way and that as if hunting for something elusive. Dylan did the same with his rifle.

  “I’m out of ammo!” Dylan shouted.

  “Don’t just stand there, Limp—give the boy his bullets,” her father said. “You do have the bullets?”

  Limpy was about to say something when a can of beans shattered a window and landed at her father’s feet. He roared again.

  Limpy would have sworn she’d heard laughter coming from the barn, but when she peered toward it, she couldn’t see anything.

  “There’s something out there.” Dylan pointed into the potato fields. “It’s making fun, too.”

  “Bullets!” her father cried.

  Dylan narrowed his eyes at her. “Where’s Connor got off to?”

  Her father’s head jerked forward, struck by a flying potato. “I’m gonna teach the little monster not to throw taters at me . . .” He turned and charged into the house.

  “Left the bullets at the hut,” she said to her brother.

  “Why’d you go and do a thing like that? Go fetch ’em,” Dylan shouted, still hunting with an empty gun barrel.

  Limpy didn’t respond, just turned tail and jogged back to the front of the house and down the lane. Connor panted in the middle of it.

  “Where have you been?” she demanded. He said nothing, but there was something curious in the small smile that touched his lips as she rushed past.

  The bullets were where she’d left them. Gripping the box, she stepped on an article that read: “‘Keep in a cold, dark place.’ Last Words at the Trial of a Convicted Arsonist and Horse Killer.”

  She squinted at the headline, then collected as many articles she could find and folded them back into the book. At the sound of more glass shattering Limpy burst into a sprint.

  In the farmhouse, her father twitched at the table, glancing this way and then that. He started when Limpy stepped into the kitchen. Around him were scattered plates, broken cups and trays. A knife quivered in the wood paneling as if freshly thrown. The kitchen cabinets were empty, their doors askew on torn hinges. A bag of flour had exploded, dusting everything in white and turning her father into a wizened old man.

  She placed the bullets on the table.

  “It’s not natural, Limphetta,” he whispered, with eyes wide and pupils so dilated that he looked crazed. “With the potatoes I know I fight disease. With the weather I know I fight drought. But what is it? How can I fight it? It got all the chickens, every last one.”

  Limpy shuddered at that, knowing what the chupacabra would come after once the chickens were gone. Her family.

  “Why couldn’t the little buggers have come out after we’re off the farm, eh, Limpy? Just our luck.”

  She wondered too. Why now? Mr. José had said that every generation had its chupacabra; why now? “Lady Luck doesn’t favor quitters, Pops,” she whispered.

  Her father glanced up and waved her closer. Seldom had her father waved to her in any way other than the shake of a fist. She shuffled over to him. “You’re right, Limphetta. You’re right. Good, lass.”

  She spotted the tracks. In the flour were footprints left by the culprit.

  “There, Dad, in the flour,” she said, pointing. Each had five toes, with multiple joints and scratches left by claws. A short, fat footpad made up the rest of the print.

  “Good, Limphetta, that’s no fox, no coyote, no bear.” He shook his head. “You’re saying these are them chupacabra?”

  Limpy, despite everything, brightened further. Her father wanted her opinion. It hardly seemed possible.

  “Here.” She opened the book and pointed to one of Mr. José’s drawings.

  Dylan came in while her father inspected the paw marks and drawing.

  “Took you long enough,” Dylan said and punched her in the arm so hard it numbed before tingling back to life. He grabbed the bullets and thumbed a few into the rifle’s magazine.

  She remembered then what Mr. José had said. You can’t kill them. You can’t kill a nightmare.

  “You stay here while we take care of this,” her father said. “Too dangerous for you. Stay in the cellar until it’s over.” He jabbed a finger toward the farmhouse’s cold storage. Then, grabbing Dylan by the shoulder, he shoved him outside.

  Connor had been staring at her from the living room. “What, Connor?” Limpy asked, suddenly self-conscious.

  He grunted; it was more than she’d heard from him in years, and then he followed his brother. Limpy covered her face with her hands, not knowing what to do or to say, but knowing that they now fought for more than the farm—they were fighting for their lives. And she wasn’t going to hide in any cellar.

  Chapter 26

  Her brothers were armed with axes and a gun, so Limpy pulled the knife from the wall and drew a deep breath.

  Outside, she heard shouts and the pounding of boots on dry earth. Ghost roamed the night. But she didn’t really consider Chup, Podge or Tufts to be chupacabra. Not in the evil sense. If only she could find them, she might still be able to keep them safe from Ghost and her family.

  “Chup, chup,” she whispered and then cocked her head to listen. Nothing. “Chup?” she said louder.

  Something flashed out the door of her bedroom to slide beneath the couch. She smiled and started into the living room, crouching down to peer beneath the sofa. “Chup, chup, chup?” she asked and waved for it to come out.

  Chup, chup, came the reply, and she grinned.

  She sensed its fear, but soon the furry ears protruded from the edge of the cushions. “Come on out, little buddy, I’ll keep you safe.”

  And out it shuffled.
/>   When it stood on its hind legs, Limpy gasped and it shied backward. “No, no, it’s okay,” she said. “You’re just growing up, is all.”

  Chup had grown, standing about a foot and a half tall, the size of a racoon. The fur had shortened and thinned. Shiny, gold scales showed through. With the receding fur, its jaw protruded and the small teeth when it chirruped made her shudder. The eyes slitted backward at a downward angle. It spotted the knife in Limpy’s hand and loosed a low growl.

  She put the blade behind her back.

  “Oh, Chup, I wouldn’t hurt you. That wasn’t a real chupacabra that Arnie stabbed. It was a stuffed animal.”

  Its eyes flicked over her shoulder and tightened.

  “Limp!” her father shouted. “Don’t move.”

  “No! It’s a good one!” Limpy screamed, but it was too late.

  The jaw shot out, all bone and teeth.

  Chup sprang, first onto her head, its claws digging into her scalp as it springboarded to the couch to launch out the broken window, her father’s axe sailing after it.

  Her father was already out the door and yelling for Dylan to shoot. Three shots rang out. Limpy burst into the yard.

  “Get back in the house,” her father called. She cowered from the rage in his face and he turned away.

  “I got it, sure I got it,” Dylan shouted, but there was confusion in his voice.

  “Then how did it still get away?” her father demanded.

  They needed her. Chup needed her. And she wasn’t just a girl to be ordered about.

  Chup, chup. The chirps came from behind her, from the house. Her father hadn’t heard; he was running with Dylan toward the barn. She allowed herself a small smile of victory as she strode back inside. Chup had circled back.

  “You’re so smart!” she said, but Chup wasn’t in the kitchen. “You don’t have to hide . . .” She checked under the table. And then in the bedroom.

  On her dresser crouched a chupacabra. But it wasn’t Chup—it was Ghost, now a beast more frightening than even the images on the internet.

  Claws hooked around the edge of the dresser and shone like red knives. As she watched, they lengthened. Furless scales flexed over muscle and sinew. If not for the head, she might have described it as a small dinosaur, but its head was alien. Ears had turned forward and hardened, jutting like horns.