At length, I found the strength to open my good eye.
Sophie stood before me. “Good,” she said, and took a step back.
I blinked to force her into focus, and when at last she gained definition, I saw that she was soaked from head to toe in blood like the prom girl from that Stephen King movie.
“What’s...?” My head turned on muscles that felt like rusted cables. “What’s happening?” They must have chopped up her body, I thought, and then immediately dismissed that as madness. What kind of a man forces his daughter to help him dispose of her mother’s body? But if not that, then where had all the blood come from?
“His throat, mostly,” Sophie said, and I blinked a few more times to appraise her anew. “It never ceases to amaze me how much and how easily you people bleed.” When she stared straight at me, I saw that her eyes were the brightest lights in the room. Bright enough to send shadows dancing across the walls. Cobalt stars moving and shifting around the black holes of her pupils.
“Who are you?” I asked her, suddenly more terrified of her than I had ever been of her father, now lying dead somewhere upstairs.
“I would think you’d know,” she said. Something thin moved beneath the skin of her face and left ripples in its wake, as if she were made of milk. “After all, we traveled here together.”
I shook my head in denial of what I was seeing, of everything that had happened.
“I came to you,” she said, rising from her seat. “I used you to get me here. I slaughtered the woman, and once they bound you, I jumped into...” She grinned and indicated the sixteen-year-old girl’s body. “...well, me.”
It came to me then, the look of shock on Sophie’s face when I’d tried to talk to her. No, not talk. When I’d tried to reach her. She’d jolted because something had jumped from me into her, infecting her, possessing her. The Traveler, switching rides.
“Why are you doing this to me?” I asked, hating the fear and self-pity in my voice. “I’ve done nothing to you.”
The Traveler’s face darkened. “Haven’t you? Haven’t you all done something to us?”
“Who? Who’s us?”
“Your betters.”
“I don’t know what that means. Please, just let me go.”
The girl laughed with the sound of gravel crunching underfoot. “You’re already free to go. Your hands have been unbound for days.” She folded her arms, her misaligned face crinkled in amusement.
Though it took me a while, I realized The Traveler had spoken the truth. My arms had been freed, but it had been so long since I’d used them, and they were so drained of blood, I couldn’t move them. I stood and realized the same thing applied to my legs. I pitched forward but did not fall. The Traveler’s hand on my throat arrested my descent and those eyes became my world, and when I dropped to my knees, she mirrored the movement. We knelt on the concrete floor together like penitents. The room around us began to shimmer. Threads of ink unraveled in the air. I sensed rather than saw the impatient pacing of enormous things above and below where I sat in thrall. Felt a multitude of eyes regarding me with tangible hate.
My body began to quake as The Traveler brought her face closer to mine. Beneath her skin, the veins were moving, rearranging themselves into topographical maps of alien places. And above them, her eyes, ancient suns blazing, burning their way into my mind. I saw things of which I would never speak as my tongue turned to ash in my mouth and my lips began to burn. My flesh began to shrivel, to turn to stone, my teeth cracking, gums rupturing, eyes bleeding...
“Upon the altar,” said The Traveler, “Your skin will dress The Prince.”
I felt myself changing, being reduced to nothing, a dying star in a monstrous universe.
And then...
My hand. It twitched, the nails scratching the concrete. In my daze, I realized I was still here, still in the basement no matter the intrusive illusion of this alien thing and her abhorrent display. I moved my hand and The Traveler’s eyes shifted in that direction. She spotted Ronald’s hammer, and smiled as my fingers found it, dragged it, grabbed it and swung it toward eyes burning bright with amusement.
✽✽✽
Wake up...
Before me stood a policeman, his hand still raised to knock on the door, but now his attention was no longer on that door or the man who stood holding it open before him. He was looking up toward his hat and the claw hammer that protruded from it, a quizzical expression on his face that only vanished when the blood began to flow. With a soft sigh, he collapsed against the wall, tumbled over onto his face and was still.
I looked up, confused, into the flashing lights of the police cruisers parked in Ronald’s yard. A dozen or so police officers were screaming things at me, but I heard nothing but The Traveler’s voice in my head, a maddening thing that made my skull vibrate with pain.
Stricken, I turned and looked back over my shoulder at the bodies of the man and his wife and daughter spread out across the living room floor in some bizarre kind of human jigsaw puzzle and began to weep. It made no sound.
“The Prince awaits his clothes,” said The Traveler.
I turned back to the police, knowing there was no place left to run.
“Come, now, or we’ll let him come to you.”
And ran anyway.
Right into the swirling cobalt lights.
THE MANNEQUIN CHALLENGE
THEO SAT IN HIS CAR BROODING for close to twenty minutes before killing the engine. There was still time to leave, still time to concede to the voice inside his head that told him this was a bad idea. He didn’t do parties, festive or otherwise. To him, it was all a bunch of small talk and big expense with no reward at all. Thus, the notion of standing in a room off the clock with a bunch of people he could barely stand to be around during work hours made the muscles in his shoulders tense up until he felt like he’d forgotten to remove the hangar when he’d put on his coat.
He looked out across the dark parking lot to the block of lights on the second floor of the building in which he had worked for the past eleven years. In honor of the season, orange blinds had been installed in place of the customary Venetians. They were shut, but through them he could see the silhouettes of people dancing, guffawing, or swilling drinks. Multicolored spots of light flashed against the windows, presumably from some kind of disco machine. Theo rolled down his window and heard the faint rhythmic thump of a bass, as if the building had developed a heartbeat in the three hours since he’d gone home. A pair of corn dollies flanked the entrance, arms spread in idiot welcome. Black vinyl silhouettes of witches, bats, and haunted houses had been stuck all over the glass double doors. Those were going to be a nightmare to remove, and Theo didn’t intend to be the one to do it. No, sir. Let whomever put them there be responsible for their removal.
Squat pumpkins grinned toothily at him from the steps to the front doors, the candles in their heads flickering in the slight autumnal breeze.
Theo pictured the faces of the people in the office, many of whom would be drunk by now, some of them obnoxiously so. He imagined trying to navigate a room full of gyrating hips and flailing limbs, hooded eyes and insincere cheer, spilled drinks and dropped finger food, and shook his head. Keying the ignition, he felt reassured by the hum of the engine, which represented one of his most critical tenets: forward momentum. Always be moving forward to the next place, the next goal, the next objective. No, he was not the partying type. It represented stalled motion with no legitimate benefit. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d gone out in the afternoon to anything more exciting than a movie at the dollar theater (he’d be damned if he was going to suffer the exorbitant costs imposed by the bigger chains), or to walk his Labrador, Freddy around the neighborhood. Thinking of his beloved pet, dear uncomplicated and quiet Freddy, made him yearn for the warmth and familiarity of home, and he started to put the car in gear. Started, then stopped, his hands on the wheel at ten and two, eyes on the empty cars around his own, foot poised above the gas
pedal.
Nothing about this idea appealed to him.
Nothing at all.
And yet...
And yet sometimes he found himself wishing that it did, that he would awake one morning with renewed vigor and a more adventurous outlook on what had, without him knowing, become a very dull and predictable existence. Oh, he couldn’t deny that there was a certain comfort and security in routine, in knowing ahead of time how his day was going to play out. A place for everything and everything in its place, as his dear departed mother used to say, and though she had meant it in regard to neatness, he’d nevertheless applied it to his life as a whole. Still though, he hadn’t always been quite so rigid, or so joyless. He’d never found it easy to make friends or be around other people, had certainly never been popular, but he’d had acquaintances, people with whom he’d enjoy the occasional meal, or a drink, while discussing topics of mutual interest. He’d played golf before the arthritis in his knees had removed the luxury, had wandered around town browsing the antique and book stores, or just to get out and see what there was to be seen. He’d had a charming little nook in a nearby Irish pub from which he could enjoy random encounters with strangers or watch the patrons and imagine life stories for them, only to stop when he realized that the lives he imagined were invariably better than his own. This created an enmity for them they had done nothing to deserve and he never went back there again.
His life was cheerless now, devoid of randomness, and without it, without the unexpected, what was there to do but sit at home and wait for his time to run out? He would be sixty next year, and the liver spots were already annexing patches of territory across his body. A glance in the rearview mirror showed a sad-eyed man with a hangdog face and a mouth that had forgotten how to smile.
He sighed.
Freddy could wait a little while longer.
Freddy would understand.
Theo killed the engine and, bracing himself against the chill and the uncertainty of the evening, stepped out of the car.
✽✽✽
As he stowed his hands in the pockets of his jacket and walked the short distance to the door, he wondered if it was nothing more than manners or a sense of obligation that had led the employees to invite him to their Halloween party. His desk had, after all, been the only one that had survived the decorating blitz. When offered some orange and black crepe paper, he had nodded politely and then stowed it in his drawer. He had sat out the pumpkin carving during lunch break, preferring instead to utilize that time as it had been intended: for eating. And, perhaps most significantly, he was the only one who had come to work today not dressed in a costume other than the one required of him: his customary charcoal suit, of which he owned four. He’d noticed his coworkers noticing and assumed their disapproval would mark the end of their attempts to include him in their pointless celebrating.
The invitation waiting on his desk at the close of day said otherwise. He had stowed it in his briefcase with nary a glance, only to give it a proper inspection at home where he could do so without anyone assuming it indicated interest, or a commitment to attend. The invitation was a cheap photocopy, typical Halloween fare, pumpkins and bats all over the place. In comic sans, the message read:
OFFICE PARTY 2NITE!
8.30 TIL WHENEVER
PRIZES 4 BEST COSTUME
STAY 4 TRIVIA QUIZ & MANNEQUIN CHALENGE!
FOOD & DRINKS CURTESY OF MANAGEMENT
He reached the front door and hurried inside. Before him was the corridor leading to the administration office. To the right, a wide stairwell led up to the accounts office on the second floor. Here Theo lingered, plagued with renewed uncertainty, until the front doors swung open with a squeal behind him. Startled, he turned around and found himself face to face with a witch in green makeup, much like the one from The Wizard of Oz, complete with fake nose and ugly moles on her chin, though Theo was pretty sure he didn’t remember that witch showing off so much cleavage.
“Hey, Theo,” the girl he now recognized as Sally Thurston said as she hurried past him and mounted the stairs. “You waiting for someone?”
“Hello,” he said, his response drowned out by the staccato sound of her stiletto heels clapping against the tile steps as she vanished up into the darkness. “No, I...” He trailed off and stared up the stairs, unsure what to do. He glanced at his watch. There was still time to leave but the more that presented itself as the best course of action, the more annoyed at himself he became.
“Suck it up, Theo,” he mumbled, and headed up the stairs.
If regrets proved to be the cost of his uncharacteristic abandon, he could entertain them tomorrow. For now, there was little to be lost from popping in to show his face and say hello. Perhaps the gesture would be appreciated and remove some of the negative stigma he had quickly (and to be honest, willingly) generated for himself among his coworkers. Maybe they would look at him anew. And even if the change wasn’t anything so dramatic, maybe they’d include him in more of their ventures. He was free to decline at any point, obviously, but wouldn’t it be pleasant just to be asked?
Slightly out of breath, he reached the second-floor landing and shrugged off his jacket to look more casual, though it was unlikely to count for much given that, without it, he still looked dressed for work. Still, he told himself, baby steps.
He headed down the hallway to the accounts department. Here, too, the door was festooned with Halloween stickers. In the middle was a giant pumpkin wearing shades with the legend HAPPY HOLLA-WEEN! printed under its crooked maw. Another orange shade had been drawn down over the glass, making it impossible to see inside. Theo touched the door handle and a jolt of static traveled up his arm, rendering it unpleasantly numb. Mid-scowl, he looked at the handle as if expecting to see a novelty buzzer attached to it. There was nothing there, but now Theo cocked his head slightly, listening for the sound that should have been there, that he only now realized he hadn’t heard since he’d stepped out of the car.
He thought he might hear laughter.
He thought he might hear voices.
What he heard instead, was nothing at all.
He waited. Did the absence of that pulsing heartbeat mean the party had died?
A dreadful thought occurred to him, warring with curiosity to send him back down the stairs, outside to the car, and home to the comfort of the predictable.
Sally told them I’m here.
He imagined her hurrying into the office after running into him downstairs and waving to get everyone’s attention. “Guys, you won’t believe who showed up.”
Had that indeed been the scenario, he wanted to believe their reaction had been benevolent surprise, and yet that’s not how his luck had ever run, and thus he imagined hushed laughter, the rolling of eyes, the low whispers as they agreed as one to lock the door and pretend the party had ended. Worse, having run into Sally, they’d know he’d know they were deliberately shutting him out. We’ll show that old crank what we think of him. Shut off the music and stay quiet everyone. He’ll go away soon...
Paralyzed by indecision, Theo stared at the glass and the grinning pumpkin sticker. He knew he should go, but wasn’t that giving them what they wanted? After all, cruel people only thrived because their victims did nothing. Sally had seen him. They knew he was here. If he turned around and went home, they’d laugh about it for the rest of the night and he’d be the butt of their jokes every day from this moment on. Remember the night of the Halloween Party, when we locked the door on Old Man Theo? He had come here to be more sociable, to get out of himself for a spell, to make friends a part of his forward momentum. Instead he found himself, as he so often had, automatically excluded for daring to try.
And that angered him.
So, no, he was not going to go home. Instead he would draw on every ounce of assertiveness and stay right here until they admitted him. He would be a part of this night if only to spite them, and would relish the discomfort on their faces when they realized their plan to make a f
ool of him had failed.
Nodding to himself, he raised a hand to knock on the shaded glass, but then thought better of it. No matter what they might want him to think, he was not a guest. This was where he worked, and he had an equal right to be here. He lowered his hand, grabbed the door handle, and raised an eyebrow in surprise when it opened easily before him.
✽✽✽
He’d expected to find the office empty, all his coworkers in hiding, pretending the party was over so that Theo would go home. But they were there, all of them.
They just weren’t moving.
As the door eased shut, Theo hung his coat on the rack inside the door, just as he did every morning, and stood there taking in the scene before him.
His coworkers had placed orange filters over the spotlights in the acoustic tile, which had the desired effect of making the room look like the inside of a candlelit cave. The disco lights he had seen from the parking lot continued to spin in the corners, but with no music to accompany them, they seemed more like emergency lights.
Death stood by the photocopy machine, a drink raised to its bony mouth. Beside it, a mummy leaned in close, its head resting affectionately on his shoulder. They were frozen in place, as if waiting for their picture to be taken. Beyond them in the aisles between the desks, more revelers were gathered. Hips were thrust out, faces were upraised, arms were akimbo, bodies pressed together, a menagerie of ghouls frozen in seductive thrall to the memory of music. They’d been dancing, clearly, but had, like everyone else in the room, stopped at the announcement of Theo’s arrival.
Sophie, the witch, sat with one heel on the edge of her desk, her chair tilted back, a full drink in her hand. Sugar made the rim of her glass glisten. Strands of honey colored hair threaded out from beneath her black wig. She, too, was unmoving.
At the far end of the room, Frankenstein’s monster and his bride were caught in an embrace, their pale lips touching. Theo caught a glimpse of tongue and quickly looked away. Between the couple and the dancers, Raggedy Ann had stalled with a tray of food in her hand.
We Live Inside Your Eyes Page 4
