David grabbed the key with shaking fingers. He moved his hand to the tree trunk. The bark was slick with blood. The world’s blood. He reached into the tree’s rotten flesh and found the keyhole. David shoved the key into the lock and turned it with a CLICK. The door began to open. The light poured from the tree.
— Death is coming —
Mrs. Henderson climbed the ladder to the tree house. The freshly made mailbox people moaned behind her as her husband called out from the tree house. “Climb, honey! Let’s go on that weekend trip! Just open the door, honey. I’m waiting in bed for you. It’s time.”
— Death is here —
Christopher looked into the light. He moved his foot over the threshold. He felt something running at him from the other side. He couldn’t see it, but the sound was deafening. It was a stampede. They were coming. The people on the real side. Rushing to get in.
The worlds began to blur.
If he didn’t get out, they would all come in. The door between the two worlds would be open. The layers of Hell and Earth would bleed together in “FLOODS! FLOODS!”
— We’ll die —
Mrs. Henderson put her hand on the tree house doorknob. “You don’t need to stab me, honey. Just come into the hotel room,” her husband said on the other side of the door. “I love you more than I ever did.”
Mrs. Henderson turned the doorknob.
— on —
The nice man ran at the tree. His eyes exactly like the eye of the clearing. Christopher could feel the cold around him. The light was life.
“David, come with me!” Christopher yelled.
David shook his head sadly and touched Christopher’s hand. The boys locked eyes. In an instant Christopher understood. David couldn’t leave. He had no body to go back to. David put the key in Christopher’s hand just as the nice man ran at the tree, screaming at the top of his lungs.
— Christmas —
Mrs. Henderson turned the doorknob and opened the door. She looked into the tree house and saw Special Ed, Mike, and Matt, crouched down and waiting for her.
“It’s ours. We built it,” Special Ed said.
Then, he pulled out his father’s gun and shot her between the eyes.
Mrs. Henderson fell backward, taking Jenny, Brady, and Ms. Lasko down to the ground with her.
— Day —
David shoved Christopher back into the light and closed the door just as the nice man crashed into the tree. Christopher put the key in the other side of the door, locking it.
Click.
Christopher had escaped from Hell.
Chapter 105
tHe nIce Man stared at the tree. the moment lasted a second on earth. but for hIm, it was just another eternity. hE had been right. this child was the child. hE had not seen anything like the boy for two thousand years. hE needed him. hE knew that after he broke the boy, hE would get out. and hE knew how to break the boy. hE knew how to get that key. hE was going to be free. finally.
hE turned to the woods as the deer swarmed David Olson. hiS petS biting the boy and dragging him back like a mouse for their master. hE took David’s neck in hiS hand and held him up, squirming like a man in a noose. tHe nIce Man grabbed the dull, silver blade from David’s hand and put it back in hiS pocket.
“i told you what would happen if you betrayed me, david,” hE said.
hE left a part of himself to stitch David’s eyes and mouth closed. then, he walked over to mrs. henderson. sweet mrs. henderson. she was on the ground on the real side, still stunned by the bullet that bounced off her forehead. she was lucky hE made people stop dying, or she would never get the chance to see her husband again.
“get up, honey,” hE called out in her husband’s voice. “we can still go on that weekend trip.”
“we can?” she said hopefully.
“yes. i want to show you how much i appreciate the home you’ve given me. the body you’ve shared with me. but i need you to do something first. okay, honey?”
hE left hImself to whisper to mrs. henderson and moved to brady collins. hE turned hImself into the smell of a warm kitchen.
“brady, get up now. come into the kitchen. you’ll never be cold again.”
“I won’t?” the little boy said.
“of course not. mommy loves you. i just need you to do something for me. okay?”
hE stayed with brady collins as hE became the smell of a safe bedroom for jenny hertzog…
“do you want to drown Scott in floods?” hE asked as jenny’s mother.
…just as he became the smell of jenny’s bedroom for her stepbrother scott.
“you can have me, scott,” hE said in jenny’s voice. “i just need you to do something for me first.”
hE slithered up the giant tree to christopher’s tree house—his latest and most prized ornament. hE looked through the window at the three little boys, three little pigs, crouched behind special ed’s father’s gun, still smoking in his little hand. hE knew that christopher’s love protected these boys. that was the risk with making someone god. but still, hE was surprised by this turn of events. hE had gone to a lot of trouble to get special ed bullets. hE had turned him into a zealous little sentry to keep the tree house door open. not closed. and now, hE had a problem. but there were solutions. christopher’s protection wouldn’t last forever. those who couldn’t be turned could be tricked. it was so easy to trick boys into playing war. almost as easy as grown men. the tree house would be hiS when it really mattered. just keep whispering. and waiting. whispering and waiting.
“nice guys win wars, eddie. listen to grandma.”
“they’re going to kill your brother, matt.”
“you have to protect the avengers, mike.”
hE left hImself outside of the tree house and slithered back down the ladder.
h
s
s
s
s
hE crawled around the rest of the clearing, leaving impressions of hImself like little wisps of clouds. whispering to each person as hE did to mary katherine as she drove her car straight into christopher. whispering to mrs. henderson to underline the book. whispering to christopher as he slept on the tree for 6 days. stroking his hair. always smiling. always calm. always gentle. touching people’s arms. that little itch. people think it’s dry skin. it’s not. it’S mE. hE was the taste of alcohol on ms. lasko’s lips that was so pure that she wept when hE took the drunk feeling away from her. hE was the ecstasy for debbie dunham that she always felt before the shame and loneliness returned. hE was the thought racing through doug’s mind.
she cheated on you, doug. she’s a whore and she cheated on you.
do you want a virgin? you can have a virgin, doug.
you know what you have to do. you know where you have to go.
hE was the promise of 72 virgins and the hAhA on the 73rd night.
no more vIrgIns. just 72 unhappy wIves and time. it’s tiMe.
hE was their memories and dreams and secret desires and thoughts.
as hE had been for centuries.
but it was different with christopher.
it was better with christopher.
at first, hE didn’t recognize it. that’s how long it had been. but after a few seconds, it was unmistakable. hE could smell again. it wasn’t the memory of smell. it was an actual smell. pine needles fresh and wet as sex. hE hadn’t felt this alive in decades. not since david olson. david could have taken him out of this place. but hE had made mistakes and david slipped through hiS fingers like sand. so hE had to search for the next child. not search land. but search time. watching the real world through the glass. waiting. whispering. how long had hE waited for this one. decadeS the way that children wait for the school bus. and the bus finally came. to tHis day. to tHis boy.
the nice man walked back through the clearing. hE could feel the wet grass on hIs feet. the cold snow crunching. it was glorious. hE passed the billy goat bridge. the man who buried the prostitute in the hollow l
og screamed as the deer ate his face. again. “please! make it stop! i’m sorry.”
hE walked out of the woods.
hE looked across the landscape. lit by the blue moon. hE walked across the slick field to the street hE created to burn her. the street warmed hIs cold feet like stockings hung over a fireplace. the man in the girl scout uniform pulled himself behind the bushes and screamed. the couple stopped kissing long enough to look at hIm through the madness in their eyes.
“please. we’re sorry!”
hE whispered in their ears. they forgot. and they kept right on cheating with each other. feeling the heartbreak they caused their dying spouses with each kiss. just like the man opening the door to the police and hearing how his child had been found murdered. 10 minutes of worry. 10 minutes of devastation. 30 seconds of joy when the child is born. then, 10 minutes of worry. 10 minutes of devastation. forEver. by hIs count, the man who murdered that child had experienced the pain he caused those parents 1,314,000 times by now. people thought that they would eventually get used to eternity. didn’t they realize that you can’t get used to something that you can’t remember experiencing? of course the answer was no. but hE thought someone would have realized how it works by now.
every day was the first day here.
and soon, it would be on earth.
hE looked at the mailbox people on the sides of the street. waiting for their turn at eternity. not knowing what they would see when the zippers keeping them blind were finally opened. the top of a cloud. or this place. forEver.
then hE saw
her.
she crawled across the lawn. desperate to get back to david’s house on the corner. she had already begun to heal. she always could. she always did. hE could make her insane. hE could turn all of her words of warning into terrifying screams. hE could take all of her maternal gestures and shouts of “run away. he is evil. you must not help him.” and twist them into hisses and nightmares and rage that terrified the very children she was trying to save. hE could turn all of her kindness into terror as easily as hE could turn men’s love into mankind’s wars. but it didn’t matter how many times hE stabbed her. how many times hE shot her.
hE could not kill her.
and she kept hIm in here.
forEver.
they balanced each other like two children on a seesaw. the energy between them intertwined like an ocean’s ebb and flow. neither of them owned the power. they simply channeled it like the moon’s gravity through water. some decades her. others hIm. except in those rare times when hE could find that even rarer child. so pure. so kind. so trusting. with enough intelligence to know everything except the one piece hE had to keep hidden like a rabbit straining for breath inside the hat.
which one of them was actually holding the strings.
hE had tried many stories over the centuries. and hE had learned from hIs mistakes. in the end, hE found it somewhat ironic that honesty was the best policy. christopher was too smart not to find the inconsistencies in the story otherwise. so, most of what hE told the boy was true. there was indeed something of a one-way mirror between the worlds. there was a way to whisper to people on the real side. the tree house was in fact a portal between the worlds. there were 4 ways in. 3 ways out.
but
the imaginary world was not exactly imaginary. the 3rd way out did not exactly require anything more than the key. and the hissing lady was not exactly the one who would be considered evil between the two of them.
except by hIm.
hE picked her up, broken and bleeding. she spat at hIm. cursed hIm. stared at hIm. eye-to-eye. i-to-I. hE pulled out the dull, silver blade. hE sharpened it on his teeth like a barber’s razor on a leather strap. hE plunged it into her chest. then hE pulled the blade out of her flesh. the wound healed instantly. hE plunged the silver blade into her over and over and over again, stabbing her like a woodpecker. he could feel her bones crunch, dulling the blade until the silver was no more. just like she did. Every time. ForEver.
“why don’t you just fucking die already?” hE sighed.
then hE kissed hEr.
hE left hImself with the hissing lady as hE broke apart and spread through the town like a cloud. walking down the hallways of the hospital. marveling at the pieces on the game board. there was no coincidence. everyone was where they needed to be. all of those people sick with it. so much anger. so much flu. all of that heat. the frogs were squirming in the water.
do you know why you all stopped dying?
he walked through the old folks home and the church.
do you know what that means?
hE walked past the rubberneckers on route 19. hE sat in the passenger side of each and every car. whispering. rubbing up against people like two sticks making fire.
you all stopped dying.
do you know what that means?
hE had been in solitary confinement for two thousand years. watching. waiting. testing the fence until hE found this night. this boy. for one moment, hE brought all of the pieces of hImself together. from the middle east where the next shot of the endless war was just fired, through europe and africa to this little out-of-the-way no-one-would-ever-notice town in pennsylvania. the perfect place to hide hIs back door. hE hadn’t done this in decades. hE looked up at the heavens through hIs eye. past the blue moon lying there like a ball of yarn for a lion. hE stared at his Father hiding Himself inside one hundred billion stars. the one hundred billion people who had lived and died. hE always lost the people to his Father. hE always lost the people to those stars. they could be taken away from hIm when they died. because goD is a murderer, daDdy.
but you all stopped dying.
do you know what that really means?
it means that the frogs will live.
boiling.
forEVEr.
that’s all eternity is
just the absence of death
and soon, i will be tHere
to make you all understand
that hell has come to earth
all it needs now is its kIng
hE was so close. hE knew it. hE would get out. out of the woods. out of the shadows. out of the creeps up and down a person’s neck. this was hiS chance to finally look god’s children in the eye and introduce hImself to all of them. hE would take over hIs Father’s little blue planet. hE would rip the blue right out of hIs Father’s fucking eyes. those eyes filled with clouds. and all hE needed to do was make it possible for a small group of people to die.
christopher and everyone he loved.
all around town, hE walked, spreading hIs word like the flu by every means available. a whisper. a hint. a forgotten dream. a family’s touch, the fear that keeps the old awake at night. the anger that haunts the middle aged. and slowly, over the past several months, through the very milk that emily bertovich’s father had spent a fortune to turn into hope of his daughter’s return.
only hE knew she never would.
all over town, people had memories and heard whispers from loved ones long dead. those who were touched by christopher shook it off. to them, it was a strange little whisper or a terrifying warning. but to everyone else, the whisper grew and grew until it was screaming in their ears. the thing they could all blame. the reason they were unhappy. the reason their lives never worked. finally, something made sense. finally, something explained all of the problems of the world. this was the answer to all of their prayers. the people finally admitted to each other out loud…they didn’t know why…they just knew what had to be done to finally make heaven on earth…
“We have to kill that little boy Christopher and everyone who gets in our way. Because he is the enemy. This is a war. And good guys win wars.”
hE smiled so wide that hE almost ran out of baby teeth.
Part VI
Run foR Your Life
Chapter 106
beEp.
Christopher opened his eyes.
He blinked through the harsh fluorescent light. He strained to s
ee where he was. His eyes found a life-support machine breathing for him. In and out. Up and down.
Beep.
The sound came to him. And with it, the pain. All of the power he’d felt on the imaginary side came crashing into his body like the break of a wave. He had never known such agony. He felt like he had been hit with a car—because he had. His eyes were sore as if he hadn’t used them since the car accident—because he hadn’t. His eyes had been closed. He had been lying in a hospital bed, unconscious. He had come close to death, but he was still alive. For now.
Beep.
Christopher took a hard swallow. His throat felt like sandpaper. The breathing tube pushed cold air down his throat like hard plastic vomit. He had to get this breathing tube out. He looked around the room for help, but all he could see was the white curtain around his bed.
He saw the button for the nurse to his right. He reached up to press it, but something stopped him.
The hissing lady’s key was still in his hand.
Beep. Beep.
Christopher heard muffled voices outside in the hallway. He knew what was happening. He could feel it swarming around him.
The nice man is…
The nice man is…starting the war.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Christopher’s heart began to pound. He had to slow it down, or the nurses would know he was awake. He reached with his right arm, still battered and bruised from the car accident, and picked at the gel holding the sensors to his chest.
My mother is…in the house.
My mother is…in danger.
He gripped the breathing tube and ripped it out of his mouth. He immediately turned over and threw up all the air from his stomach. The retch smelled like acrid bile. Acidic and awful.
Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.
Christopher kept the clip on his finger and swung his legs out of the bed. His bare feet hit the freezing tile. He put the pillow under the covers to make it look like he was still sleeping. Then Christopher slowly slid the white curtain open. He saw that another person had been moved into his room.
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