* * *
He watched the Old Sheriff’s car roll off the road into the tree and he was sad for him. He told the moose that it could go now and it wandered slowly, in that wonderful way those majestic creatures did, off into the forest. He smiled for a moment because he sacrificed something wonderful for the sake of the town. The town would mourn the loss of the Old Sheriff. That was for certain. They loved him and needed him and even though he stopped being Sheriff they never stopped hoping he would start being Sheriff again. But he knew better. He knew the Old Sheriff could never be Sheriff again because he knew that the town needed sacrifices but he did not want to accept it. So the Old Sheriff thought he could discover the nature of the sacrifices and stop them. But to stop the sacrifices would be to stop the town from existing.
He kept the town alive, damn it! Some damned Old Sheriff could never do for the town what he did because the Old Sheriff was filled with duty and not love. He was filled with love for the town and would do whatever was necessary, even removing the beloved Old Sheriff. For certain, that would make the Black Cloud bigger and darker. It needed to be unleashed so the Teacher Girl could feel his love.
He pulled out his vessel’s phone and made a call.
“There has been an accident just north of town.”
And that was all it took. And they would come and find the Old Sheriff and they would call the Black Cloud or come and see it in person. It didn’t matter. It would be unleashed.
He waited until the sirens were almost there and then he left. He needed to be near the Black Cloud when it learned. He needed to feel its love and its grief, and its grief would be strong because its love was strong, stronger than perhaps it knew. And its grief would be chaotic and its force would shock the town and the town would be on the verge of death and then he would sacrifice the Teacher Girl and the town would come right and then he could wait for another girl to love.
Lakebridge: Spring (Supernatural Horror Literary Fiction) Page 36
