~~~~~
The next day he was assigned to work with Bobby again. He drove them to Arby’s for lunch and they sat in the cab of the ambulance, eating to the sounds of classic rock.
“County Coroner’s office called Curtis today,” Bobby said suddenly, watching two young girls in short skirts walk by.
Jason swallowed his bite of roast beef with difficulty. “Oh yeah?”
“Said someone stole a victim’s purse out of the lockers at the morgue. Who would do such a thing, ya think?”
“Who knows?” Jason said, frowning. “There’s some sick people out there.”
“Yeah, no !@#$%^&*. Speaking of which, did you get an eyeful of that Harvey chick’s !@#$%^&*? She must have made some lucky man pretty happy.”
Jason glared at him and started the engine, ignoring his comment. Bobby giggled and tossed his trash out the window.
“Don’t be so serious, man,” Bobby said, still chewing the last of his sandwich. “It’s okay to have a sense of humor. Hell, in our line of work it’s a must.”
“When I find anything you say funny, I’ll let you know.”
~~~~~
One week later, Jason was starting to get antsy. He hadn’t slept more than three hours a night since Angela and his anxiety was at an all-time high. On his days off he found himself taking three or four showers, all of them in the dark. He’d even taken to wearing Angela’s necklace beneath his shirt at all times, but nothing helped. He went for long drives at night along the back roads, the ones that were so dangerous and which kept him earning a paycheck, and thought about all the people whose lives had been claimed in their cars. He wondered briefly if he would have to stoop to causing an accident just to get a good night’s sleep, but quickly pushed the thought away. He wouldn’t do that.
Then on Saturday, a three-car pileup on the interstate saved him. Eight people were involved, two of which died on impact, another at the hospital.
The two on-site victims were Jennifer Groves and Ashley Mackenzie. College students. Ashley had a purse with her, but Jennifer had a purse and a backpack. Jason could barely concentrate as he and his coworkers did their jobs, tending to the wounded as quickly as they could. His eyes kept straying to the car that held Jennifer and Ashley, his fingers itching to get hold of their belongings. Bobby noticed how distracted Jason was and nudged him as they were bandaging one of the other drivers.
“You okay, man?”
“I’m fine,” Jason said, edging away from him.
“You look a little pale. Could be you’re coming down with that flu that’s been going around. If you need to take a break, I’ve got this—“
“I said I’m fine,” Jason said through his teeth.
He could feel Bobby looking at him, could see it from his periphery. Suddenly he was sure that Bobby knew. He wasn’t the smartest person in the world, but he had somehow figured out that it was Jason who had taken the purse. He had figured it out and he could see, in the way Jason’s eyes were darting back to the car with the dead girls that he meant to do it again.
“I think I will take a break,” he said after a moment. He walked toward the side of the highway, where there was a grassy area. He felt Bobby’s eyes on his back the entire way.
~~~~~
Six hours later, Jason was back in the relative comfort of his apartment.
He hadn’t been able to stop himself from taking the purses and Jennifer’s backpack, despite his concern that Bobby knew what was going on. The thought of a good night’s sleep — and of what he might find — was too good to resist.
He placed the purses in their own space on the kitchen table and chose one at random to go through first. It was bright yellow and shiny, like plastic. A look inside the wallet told him it was Ashley’s. She’d been a deeply tanned girl, so tan she was almost orange, and her hair was dyed black. Not Jason’s typical style, but still, she was good looking beneath it all: pretty green eyes, nice mouth, a lovely body.
But the inside of her purse yielded nothing particularly interesting. It was the same as he’d found before: receipts, scraps of paper, change and a bit of paper money, makeup (although she did have more makeup than the others, almost a whole bag full), gum. Nothing personal at all, nothing as good as Angela’s necklace.
He wondered — for the first time — why he was doing this. For the thrill, yes. He understood that part of it. Because he liked to snoop? Was that why he was risking his job and his reputation? His career? Certainly he would never work as an EMT in this town again if he was found out.
He was lonely. So, so lonely. He hadn’t been on a date in over a year, and the last one hadn’t gone well. Girls didn’t seem to get him. His sense of humor was too broad, he supposed. Or perhaps his intelligence put them off. Also, he loved horror movies and most girls weren’t into those.
“What are you looking for?” he whispered.
But he thought he knew the answer to that. His hand found the strap of Jennifer’s purse and he dumped it unceremoniously on the table, among the mess of Ashley’s bag. He had come too far to stop now.
Jennifer’s was much the same as the others. There was no makeup, but otherwise it could have belonged to any of them.
He let out a bellow of rage and slung the purses across the room.
They were all the same. He had done this for nothing. He thought of Lucinda and her steely gaze, her too-tight bun, her cutting words. She was a grade-A !@#$%^&*, he thought disgustedly. She’d get hers. And Bobby, that fat nosy pig. He might have something coming to him, too.
~~~~~
Bobby climbed the steps to Jason’s apartment holding a brown paper bag. He whistled as he climbed the first flight, glad to be off work for the next 24 hours, then took a deep breath as he began the second flight. He was really getting out of shape, and that flu hadn’t helped matters. He still felt like he was breathing through cheesecloth when he laid down at night. He was sure Jason was coming down with it; the poor guy had been positively white on their last run. They might have had their differences, but Jason had done him a favor and covered his ass after he screwed up, so he figured the least he could do was bring him some chicken noodle soup and a six-pack.
He began the last flight of steps, clutching the bag tighter.
~~~~~
Jason had just started the fire when someone pounded on his door.
He straightened up so fast his spine cracked audibly and looked at the door, eyes wild, hair standing up in spikes from where he’d run his hands through it in frustration.
“Jason? It’s Bobby.”
!@#$%^&*! That nosy prick had decided to call him out. He would confront Jason with what he knew and threaten to turn him in. No, he would blackmail him probably. The smelly bastard.
“You in there, man?” Bobby called. His voice was muffled through the thick door.
“I’m in here,” Jason whispered. He picked up the heavy, iron fireplace poker.
“I know what’s been making you act weird lately,” Bobby said. “Let me in.”
Jason put his hand on the doorknob, felt how slick his palm was with sweat, and wiped his hand on his shirt before returning it to the brass knob. He wrapped his hand tighter around the poker and flung open the door.
“Hey man,” Bobby said. “There you are. Wow, you look like !@#$%^&*. I bet you are coming down w—“
He trailed off as he got a view of the apartment over Jason’s shoulder, where there were two familiar bags lying on the carpet amidst a litter of paper.
“Hey,” he said. “What’s that?”
He stepped over the threshold and Jason struck.
~~~~~
One hour later, Jason sat on his living room floor, looking confusedly around him. There were things that did not belong: purses, blood, a fireplace poker matted with hair and bits of brain. He vaguely remembered where they had come from, but he didn’t want to think about that. There was something in the bathtub which would require his attention later, and he didn’t want to think ab
out that, either.
Something caught his eye. Something bright pink, beneath the kitchen table.
He had forgotten all about Jennifer’s backpack. He crawled over to it and unzipped it carefully, reverently. Perhaps it held the things he had been missing. Fragile things.
He took out everything carefully and laid each item on the carpet, taking in every detail. Here was a well-worn and much loved copy of The Catcher In The Rye, Jason’s favorite book. An anatomy textbook. She had been smart. Various pens and pencils, some for sketching. Artistically inclined. He liked that. Folders containing her homework, notebooks containing her notes. And in the large front pocket, a small tube of deodorant and a travel-size bottle of perfume. He lifted the cap and inhaled its scent — light and flowery. Perfect. There was also a small leather-bound book.
A journal.
He sat with the book in his hands for perhaps five minutes, simply staring at the cover. Here was the most personal thing he’d found thus far, and it belonged to a girl who seemed to be the one from his dreams. The one he’d never been lucky enough to find on his own.
Finally, he opened the cover. The first page was covered in doodles. Hearts, stars, little moons, a funny man with a mustache. And there, on the inside, was a ticket stub for a midnight movie at the multiplex over on Glendale.
Friday the 13th.
He stood up in one smooth movement, tucking the journal inside his shirt as he did so. He would have to read it at length later.
Right now, he needed to get to the morgue.
~~~~~
~~~~~
Amanda Crum is a writer and artist from Kentucky. She has a love of horror and things that haunt the senses and has been published in Bay Laurel, Dark Eclipse, and SQ Magazine. She currently lives in a small town with her husband, two kids, and their husky, Danzig.
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The Friends
by Luke Dykowski; published October 28, 2014
Second Place Winner, 2014 Fiction Vortex Horror Contest
Conner Nilsen did not leave his property often. At least — not anymore. But that didn’t matter. Even though he lived on Haskell Lake, twenty-four miles from the nearest town, Rockville, and had to go in often to buy bread and milk and toilet paper and fishing lures, it didn’t matter. Not since he had met his new friends.
It had been a week now — no, two weeks. Or was it a week? Who knew? Not Conner. A month?
It didn’t matter anymore.
He had found the fungus ... three days before he met his friends? It was hard to tell.
The stuff had been growing, just a small patch of it, no larger than his thumb, on the edge of the television set. Right next to the screen.
He noticed because the TV was turned on. It had been broken for eight years. Now it was on.
Well, not really on. There was just static, a lot of static, and faintly, very faintly, a shape. Who knew what. Who cared.
The static was quite quiet — in fact, he barely heard it. It was like the fungus — too small to really notice it. But day by day, the static grew louder. He could not turn off the TV, or adjust the volume. The shape behind the static grew clearer. Now it looked like a silhouette. Of what, he couldn’t tell. As the sound of the static and the figure’s clarity grew, so did the fungus.
Now, the reddish fuzz blanketed every wall of his modest cabin and every surface within it. Except for the TV screen. But who cared? Not Conner. And not his friends.
The friend’s didn’t care at all. On the third day after the fungus started, they began to talk to Conner from behind that grey, rippling veil.
And, Oh! How they loved to talk!
They would babble on, in voices, voices, so many voices for hours and hours! And oh how Conner loved to listen to them. He had been lonely in the cabin — just him, an old man, and Haskell Lake — all alone in the north woods. But now! Now was different. He loved his friends, so, so dearly. He loved to hear them talk in their strange and terrible voices, speaking without real words of worlds cold and lonely, nestled in the harsh glare of a million foreign stars. At first, he had been afraid of those voices. They came from the TV, yes — that he knew — but they were not in the TV. He heard them in his head, but they were not in his head. They were somewhere else.
At first he had tried to run, tried to break the TV when he heard his friends (before he knew they were indeed his friends). But he could not smash it in, he could not shatter that static veil over the dead TV screen. He tried, but he couldn’t. They wouldn’t let him.
Conner had tried to leave, but his truck would not start. He had gas, and the old Ford had been repaired a month ago. Every appliance in the vehicle was dead — save the radio. The radio had been broken longer than the TV — he had spilled coffee on it. But the voices came out of the radio, still drifting through the static, telling him to stay, stay, stay...
So he stayed. What choice did he have? Maybe they would go away.
But of course, they didn’t, and he grew to love those sighing voices and their chilling laughter that would echo through the silent house in the odd hours of the night. He grew to love his friends.
That’s why he had built the pyramid for them. His friends had threatened a whole assortment of unpleasant things — and he had seen these terrors on his eyelids when he went to sleep — but there was no need to threaten. He loved his friends. He would do anything for them. The request for the pyramid — or whatever it was — had come ... how long ago? Conner couldn’t say. He knew it was the same day his tooth had fallen out — a perfectly healthy tooth — and in its place he had felt the fungus that now enveloped the living room like a plush crimson carpet. The stuff was in its mouth. But the friends told him not to worry, hush hush, not to worry, and then they had told him about the pyramid. He had been so wrapped up in pleasing his friends with the thing that he barely noticed when his hair — thick, despite his age — began to fall away too.
In its place grew the fungus.
Conner Nilsen had worked for days and nights he could not remember — everything was a blur of activity, and, ever louder, the static and the voices of his friends. Now the pyramid was done. It sat in the front yard, by the Lake - eight feet long and wide, and eight feet high. He had cobbled it together from God knew what — his friends had told him what to use. Yes to the lawn mower deck, no to the picture frame, yes to the boat hull, and so on and so forth, yes to this and no to that, seemingly without rhyme or reason. But Conner didn’t worry. His friends knew what they were doing.
At the pointed top of the pyramid was an empty slot — about a foot wide and deep. Countless wires from varying appliances — the phone, the toaster, the copper strands inside his heating blanket, and who knew what else — snaked into, from, and around the slot. What would fill it, Conner did not know. His friends would tell him when they were ready to come for a visit. This they had told him. How badly he wanted to meet them. "How long must I wait?" he asked.
Not much longer, they told him. Hush hush, not much longer.
Meanwhile, the fungus grew inside the car to, covering the seats and the roof and the windshield in a thick swathe of crimson. Everything except the broken radio, which had been stripped of its remaining wires and electricals completely for the pyramid and was now little more than a plastic shell with a dial. Inside that radio, the voices continued their babble, louder than ever before.
Today, at last, was the day. It was time to fill the socket and complete the pyramid. His friends told him from the TV. By now, the sound of the static had reached an unbearable volume, but to Conner, it was the loveliest sound he had ever heard. It was the sound of his friends.
In addition to that, the figure behind the static had grown clearer. It was closer now, much closer, and he could see that it was humanoid, but by no stretch of the imagination was it human.
It was, however, his friends. Or at least one of them. This he knew.
The friends told him, in their awful, beautiful voices, to take th
e truck and go into town.
But, he told them, the truck would not work, so he could not go into town, and would have to walk.
Too slow! Too slow! The voices screamed.
A bolt of pain shot through his head, and he felt the fungus in his mouth throb as the stuff on his head tightened against his skull. Never had his friends hurt him before, and he almost cried out in pain and alarm. Then the pain was gone.
Foolish foolish, his friends shrieked with impatience. The truck will start. Now go!
Obediently, lovingly, Conner went out to the truck. He had removed most of the engine block for the pyramid, but, regardless, the truck was running. He had to heave the fungus off the windshield with a snow scraper in order to see the road. Hurry, hurry! His friends urged. There is no time to waste. Hurry!
On the way to town, Conner asked his friends why they had hurt him.
Hush hush, they soothed through the mangled radio. We didn’t mean to, we love you. We are eager, very eager to visit you.
When will you come?
Soon, soon.
The friends told Conner what he needed was at Mike's Hardware and Goods.
3000 batteries, they said.
So parked the engineless truck outside of Mike's and went in.
"Heya, Nilsen!" Mike called from inside his office, behind the counter. Conner tried to move his hand to wave, but the friends wouldn't let him.
Hurry, hurry, hurry!
So he didn't stop to wave. He didn't need Mike. He had his new friends.
Into the battery aisle. Overhead, the lights flickered like strobes.
“Sorry about those damn lights,” Mike called from the back room. “Been actin’ like that for nearly a week. Can’t even call the ‘lectrician to come fix ‘em ‘cause the phone line’s good as dead.” Conner barely heard. He (or was it the friends? It was hard to tell where he ended and the friends began. They were a blur now) swept his arm along the shelf. Batteries fell into the shopping cart in heaps.
More, more! Cried the friends.
Soon, the shelves in the aisle were bare and the cart was heaped almost as high as Conner's shoulders with batteries.
The cart was heavy, but he
(the friends)
wheeled it over to the front desk without a problem.
Fiction Vortex - October 2014 Horror Issue Page 4
