“Later, guys,” Frank said. He hurried back across Johnny’s lawn to the sidewalk, looking toward the witch’s place, half-hoping to see his dad, but the old man was nowhere in sight and the dilapidated house was completely dark.
The entire street seemed much more threatening than it had earlier this evening, the night not merely a darker version of the day but an entity unto itself. Glancing back periodically at the witch’s house—
Why hadn’t he shouted out to his dad?
—Frank jogged down the sidewalk toward home, humming a song to himself, trying to keep his fears at bay.
“hello?”
The voice was small, soft, barely audible. It was a girl’s voice, and it came from up ahead, from behind the Millers’ hedges.
“hello?”
Frank slowed, stopped. He thought for a moment, then walked into the street, making a big detour around the hedges. If something was hiding behind there, waiting for him, ready to jump out at him, he wasn’t going to sit still for it and make the attacker’s job easy. He walked out to the middle of the circle, then passed by the hedge boundary and looked back toward the Millers’.
It really was a girl.
And she was naked!
She was sitting on one of the decorative boulders that the Millers had in their Southwest-themed yard, and he could see everything! She didn’t even seem to care! A streetlight in front of the house shone on her like a spotlight, and he saw her long blond hair, her small pointy breasts, the triangle of hair between her legs.
He felt like he’d died and gone to heaven, and he quickly looked to the right to see if Chase or Johnny were still around— though even if they were, he was not sure he’d invite them over. There was no sign of either of his friends, however, and Frank walked back over the asphalt to the sidewalk, stopping at the edge of the Millers’ property, about five feet away from her.
She looked at him. Her eyes, he saw, were large and blue. “hello?” she said in that soft small voice.
“Hi,” Frank responded. His own voice sounded much softer than he’d intended, and his throat felt dry.
She stood up from the boulder and walked carefully across the Millers’ gravel toward him, the small rocks obviously hurting the soft bottoms of her bare feet. She grimaced as she stepped onto the sidewalk next to him. Her approach was so open and straightforward that he half-expected her to put her arms around his neck and kiss him—
Had Chase been wishing for a naked girl when they were crouched near the shrine? Had his wish been granted?
—but instead she said, “Where am I?”
Frank didn’t know how to answer, didn’t know what she was asking. “Uh, William Tell Circle,” he said.
She nodded, looked around.
“Where are you from?” he asked her.
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Well, where are your parents?”
She looked at him as if she didn’t understand the question. “I don’t know,” she said finally.
They seemed to have reached the end of their conversation. She apparently had no more questions to ask, and despite the fact that she was a naked babe, maybe because she was a naked babe, he was a little freaked by her. He looked down the sidewalk toward his house, wishing he’d never sneaked out tonight. Behind him, though he couldn’t see it, he was acutely aware of the dark tangled jungle that was the witch’s house.
Where his dad was.
“I… I have to go home,” he said.
The girl touched his arm. “My name’s Sue,” she said. “What’s your name?”
He swallowed hard. “Frank,” he told her. It was the first time any girl had touched him, let alone a naked girl, and he thought about the story he’d have to tell Chase and Johnny. Once more, he glanced toward their houses to see if they were out and watching what was going on. It was going to be impossible to make them believe this unless they saw it for themselves.
The girl, Sue, took her hand away, letting her fingers trail down his wrist, over the back of his hand.
“I have to go home,” he said again, thinking about his dad and prodded by a vague sense of urgency.
She nodded, but when he started walking, she followed him. Like a puppy dog, he thought.
He stopped. She stopped.
He turned and asked the question he’d been wanting to ask since he saw her: “Where are your clothes?”
She smiled. “I don’t have any.”
“O-Kay.” He stretched the word out, in that sarcastic way he’d heard high school kids do.
She kept smiling.
“Look, it’s late at night, and I really do have to go home, all right?” He glanced over at the witch’s house. No sign of movement. No sign of his father.
“All right,” Sue said.
Not only did she follow him, but she took his hand, holding it in hers like they were boyfriend and girlfriend. He wanted to shake her off him, wanted to get the hell away from her. How was he going to explain this to his mom? But he also wanted to keep holding her hand, keep touching her, maybe touch her somewhere else, and he was beginning to think that he might be in love with her.
Was she in love with him?
It seemed so.
Together they walked back to his house and up the driveway.
He left her out front, in the patio between the garage and the house, while he went inside. He had a feeling it wasn’t a good idea to spring a naked space cadet on his mom without warning her first. Luckily, Sue didn’t ask any questions but acceded to his bluntly stated wishes.
His mom was in the family room. Alone. Eating an apple and watching an old Harrison Ford movie.
Frank frowned. “Where’s Chaz?” he said. “Did you guys call the police?”
“What?”
He knew from his mother’s tone of voice that Chaz had never made it here, that she had no idea what had happened. He suddenly felt cold. “Where’s Aarfy?” he asked.
“Oh, your dad took him for a walk.” She squinted as she looked at him, seeming to notice for the first time that he was dressed and not in pajamas. She put on her Mom voice. “Where have you been?”
“That—” witch’s house, he’d been about to say, but instead he said, “—lady professor’s house. Chase’s brother and his friend Paul were going back there to ask for three thousand dollars from the shrine to buy a car, only Paul got killed and Chaz ran into Dad and told him about it and Dad’s back there now and Chaz was supposed to bring Aarfy back home and come here and tell you and call the police.” It all spilled out in a confusing torrent—and he hadn’t even gotten to the naked girl yet—but his mom seemed to understand his story even as she dismissed it.
“Chaz Pittman probably just scared himself—”
“We were there, mom. We saw it. Me and Chase and Johnny.”
“Hello?”
Great. Sue wandered into the living room, peeking tentatively around the comer before stepping forward in all her glory. This was all he needed.
“Dad could get killed!” he yelled. “Call the damn police!”
He had never sworn in front of either of his parents before, and that got her attention.
“What did you say?” She stood, put her apple down on the table and glared at him.
Frank felt like sobbing with frustration. “Chaz’s friend Paul was killed in that woman’s backyard. By a little burned monster. I saw it. Dad went back there to check up on it, and I should have stopped him but 1 didn’t, and now he might get killed, too.” He did start to cry. “Call the police.”
Some of his fear must have translated because now anger and worry were battling it out on his mother’s face, and she strode past the naked girl, opened the front door and scanned the street. “Gil?” she called. There was no answer, and she shouted his name again, louder. “Gil!”
“Call ‘em,” Frank said, crying.
She ran into the kitchen, where the nearest phone was, and he returned to the living room, slumping down gratefully in her chair. On TV, Harrison
Ford was hiding in a barn from some bad guys who were trying to kill him. How nice that would be, he thought. You could get away from a person. You could hide, you could fight, you could win. But the thing that came out of that shrine …
He sat up suddenly. Where was Sue? She’d been standing there only a few minutes ago, and he’d expected her to follow him into the room, thought she’d probably sit herself down right next to him. And where was his mom? She should’ve been back in here by now. Or at least he should have been able to hear her voice. He picked up the remote control, pressed the Mute button.
The house was silent.
No.
Frank jumped up and ran to the kitchen. He should have sneaked over, should have approached carefully, but the last thing he was thinking about was his own safety—he wanted to know if his mom was okay, and he wanted to know now—and he dashed through the entryway and swung around the side of the refrigerator until he could see the entire room.
His mom was not okay. She was lying on the floor just below the wall phone, the receiver dangling above her head, spinning on its spiral cord. Her eyes were open, staring at nothing, and blood dripped from her mouth in a thick mucus-like strand. There was blood on her back, too, deep animal-like scratches. Frank could see her back because Sue had ripped his mother’s shirt off. The naked girl was kneeling on the floor behind her, trying to pull down her pants, humming a nursery-rhyme ditty that sounded suspiciously like Here We Go ‘Round the Mulberry Bush. The girl’s chest and stomach were smeared with blood, though there didn’t appear to be a scratch on her.
Frank stood there for a moment, frozen, torn between wanting to rush at the little bitch, beat the shit out of her, give his mom mouth-to-mouth and save her life, and wanting to turn tail and run like hell away from that monster.
Fear won out. His mom’s eyes were open, unblinking; it was obvious that she was dead and there was nothing he could do to bring her back. Sue had somehow murdered her in— what? four minutes?—and unless he got out of here quick, she’d be doing the same to him.
So he ran back out of the kitchen, through the entryway, out the front door, down the driveway and onto the sidewalk. He glanced quickly behind him, but Sue wasn’t following, and he looked over at the witch’s house. As he’d feared, as he’d known, there was no sign of his dad.
Frank dashed next door to the Boykins’ house, but changed his mind at the last minute and ran across their lawn to the Millers’, leaping the small line of rose bushes in between. The Boykins’ porch light was on, but he’d seen when he got closer that there was no light in their living room or kitchen, and he figured they were probably asleep. They were old, went to bed early, and he didn’t want to spend ten minutes ringing their bell and pounding on their door while he waited for them to open up.
He might not have ten minutes.
That was the thought in the forefront of his mind, and he saw again his mom’s dead staring eyes, her drool of thick blood, the deep scratches on her bare back.
The Millers’ house was dark, too, and he swerved up their driveway and back onto the sidewalk, running next door. He knew he could just knock on Johnny’s bedroom window and get his friend’s attention, so he bypassed the front stoop and ran around the side of the house, rapping both fists on the windowglass. “Open up!” he yelled. “Hurry!” He looked over his shoulder, expecting to see Sue coming toward him, arms outstretched, covered in his mom’s blood, but the coast was clear.
“Johnny!” he called.
The drapes did not part, no light shone between the cracks.
Frank kept pounding, his stomach sinking a little. “Johnny!”
No noise, no light.
He stopped rapping on the window and pressed his face against the glass, trying in vain to see something through the narrow breach where the curtains met. Behind him was the Millers’ bedroom window. The two homes were close together, and he half-hoped that his pounding and shouting had woken up either Mr. or Mrs. Miller, but when he looked over there, the house was dark.
He’d found Sue in front of the Millers’ home.
Johnny’s side yard suddenly didn’t seem quite so safe. But this was his friend’s place. He knew this house, knew these people, and he ran into the backyard, ready to take one last chance and pound the shit out of Johnny’s parents’ bedroom window.
Their window was open, though, as were their drapes. The light was off in the room, but a back porch lamp was on, and by that indirect illumination he could see their bodies naked and strewn across the blood-splattered bed. Between them was another naked form, a girl, a blond girl. It wasn’t Sue, but there was definitely a resemblance, and she was on all fours, licking blood off Johnny’s dad’s face. He heard the lapping of the girl’s tongue, smelled the horrid heavy stink of death, and he immediately started puking. Instinct and decorum dictated that he should bend over and remain in place until he finished regurgitating the contents of his stomach, but his brain knew that to do so would mean almost certain death and overrode that impulse. Still throwing up, the vomit splashing over his shirtfront and onto the ground, Frank fled, running back around the side yard the way he’d come.
Johnny’s parents were dead.
That meant Johnny was dead, too.
He wanted to scream in terror, wanted to run straight down the street and not stop running until he hit the police station two miles away, but his dad was still at the witch’s house, and though he doubted there was anything he could do to save his father if he was really in trouble, Frank knew he had to try. He was more frightened than he had ever been in his life, but he hurried without hesitation down the sidewalk toward the light-less black space that was the professor’s yard. He was drawing on strength he didn’t even know he possessed, and he thought it was probably like the resolve that sent firemen into burning buildings, that made soldiers run through gunfire to save their buddies in time of war.
He thought about those naked girls as he ran. What were they? They had something to do with the shrine, of that he was sure, but why were they going around the neighborhood killing people?
Had they gotten Chaz and Aarfy?
He’d forgotten about Chase’s brother and the dog until now, and he wished he hadn’t remembered. The two of them had obviously disappeared somewhere between the spot where they’d left his dad, and his home, where they were supposed to be headed. Even though that was only four houses away.
He kept running, acutely aware that at any second he might be attacked, that one of the naked girls or… something else might suddenly take him out and make him disappear. He glanced over at Chase’s home, saw the porch light on, saw the flickering blue light of a television through the sheer curtains. Everything looked normal. But Chaz had disappeared, and for all Frank knew Chase and his parents lay slaughtered inside. He looked back at Johnny’s place, at the Millers’, at his own. The entire street looked normal, actually, a typical night in a typical suburban neighborhood, and it was scary how deceptive appearances could be.
Then he was running across the dark front yard of the witch’s house for the second time this night, and though his heart was pounding with terror, though his feet wanted to veer back toward the street, he turned around the side of the building and ran past the lawnmower, the washing machine, the tree stump, the buckets, into the backyard.
The moon was up now, and he could see better than he could before, but the backyard still seemed darker, filled with horrors he could not see and not imagine. He remembered that burnt waddling doll-like thing and the terrible squeaking it made, and his blood felt like ice water. He could not continue to run back here, it was too crowded. He stopped, looked around. He didn’t want to draw attention to himself, didn’t want anyone or anything to know he was here, but he had to find his father. “Dad!” he called out, searching the darkness for signs of movement. “Dad!”
As he’d expected, as he’d feared, there was no answer, but he refused to give up, refused to let himself believe that his dad was dead.
He pressed on, moved farther into the backyard. “Dad!” he called, but he did not shout as loudly this time.
“Dad?” Volume falling.
“Dad.” A low rough whisper.
Something about this place discouraged loudness, intimidated him into silence. He didn’t want to go anywhere near the shrine, but he knew that was exactly where he needed to go if he really wanted to know what had happened to his father. He walked around a tangled dead stickerbush, then down the narrow path that he seemed to remember leading to the shrine.
“Dad,” he said—
—and tripped over something in the dirt.
There wasn’t time to break his fall. He tumbled forward, sprawling, and his forehead hit something soft and smelly that he thought was a rotten watermelon. One hand and arm scraped the hard dirt ground while the other twisted beneath him but luckily did not break. His knees and legs fell on what felt like a sack of sand, and he immediately pulled himself forward, lurching to his feet.
It wasn’t a sack of sand. It was a dead body.
It was Chase.
He was on his back, facing up. His face had been chewed on, and over his forehead and what remained of his cheeks scurried big black beetles that in the moonlight appeared to be the same shade of pitch as the burnt creature in the shrine.
Frank screamed once, an instinctive reaction of shock and horror, but he immediately stopped and shut up. Whatever did this was still out there, and he couldn’t let it know he was here, couldn’t give away his location.
Ahead was the shrine, but he could not continue on. He was in way over his head here, and it was time to call in the cops. For all he knew, everyone in the neighborhood was dead, so he couldn’t count on being able to rouse a neighbor. He didn’t even want to take a chance with someone on the next street over. He would go to the Arco station over on Washington. Even if the gas station was closed, it had a pay phone out front, and he was pretty sure you could dial 911 from a pay phone without having to put in money. If not, there was a Circle K farther down that was open twenty-four hours.
He stepped carefully over Chase’s body, not looking down, then hurried up the path the way he’d come.
Four Dark Nights Page 4
