Dark Halls - A Horror Novel

by Jeff Menapace

  “No,” Rebecca said flatly. “His mother said he left his cell phone behind, but his car is gone.”

  “Where will you look?”

  “I have a funny feeling he may be at the school.”

  “At the school? Why on Earth would he be there?”

  “I don’t know. A feeling. Something’s not right, though.” Rebecca nudged her mother aside and opened the door.

  “Rebecca…”

  Rebecca was already getting into her car.

  40

  Karl watched Ryan for a long time in the teachers’ lounge. Watched him sit perfectly upright at that lounge table even though it was clear the boy was either asleep or in some type of trance. When Ryan finally stood, Karl flinched and took a step back.

  Ryan turned and faced Karl but never saw him. In fact, as Ryan began to move, he would have collided with Karl had the old man not backed up flat against the soda machine like a convict caught in a searchlight.

  Ryan exited the lounge. Karl followed close behind. The school was dark, Ryan’s eyes still fluttering slits, but just as before, the boy seemed to have no trouble finding his way.

  He’s being guided, Karl thought to himself, patting the hairs now standing up on the back of his neck. Someone’s guiding him.

  ***

  Ryan followed John Gray, John’s image occasionally flickering like a shoddy projection of the man. The closer they got to their destination, the more John flickered, his image often disappearing entirely for a second or two.

  “Down there,” John said.

  They were standing outside the door to the boiler room. Ryan tried the knob, expecting it to be locked. It was not. He peered down into

  (the abyss)

  complete blackness. Stood there for a moment, unable to look away.

  (“…if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.”)

  Nietzsche’s words, filling him with dread. Was someone or something from that abyss staring back now? And though no great dissector of philosophy, Ryan was learned enough to know that if the abyss was staring back, it was one of his own making.

  Nietzsche’s quote whole now, bringing an even greater—and far more frightening clarity—to his situation: “He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.”

  Only he hadn’t picked this fight. The fight had picked him, and now he had no choice but to become someone who might never be the same.

  Scratch that: I will never be the same.

  Fear gripped him whole. He looked at John.

  “I’m afraid.”

  “So am I,” John said.

  “What the hell do you have to be afraid of? You’re already dead.”

  John Gray said nothing.

  “Sorry. Are you coming?”

  “I will try.”

  ***

  Karl watched Ryan open the door to the boiler room and head down the stairs. The boy did not even hit the light switch on the wall to his left before descending into the blackness below. And why should he? He hadn’t turned on the light when he’d entered the teachers’ lounge, and the boy had made his way just fine. Karl had hit the light in the lounge, of course, and the boy hadn’t stirred. Should he risk doing the same now?

  No. The lounge had been different. Karl wasn’t entirely sure whether the boy had been just sleepwalking. Now he knew better. He knew the boy’s journey held some sort of purpose, that someone or something was guiding him. To risk disturbing his trance now would be foolish. He wanted to see it through, watch how it all played out. Unsure of his elderly feet that he was,

  (feet don’t fail me now)

  Karl would follow the boy down into the dark. And, after all, he had his flashlight on him—just in case.

  Karl followed Ryan, a death grip on the handrail to his right. He was thankful Ryan had not bothered to close the door behind him; it offered some light to trickle below. Karl only hoped that what consolatory light it did offer would be sufficient for him to see.

  See what? is the question.

  Feet? Karl was now unsure of his heart.

  ***

  Ryan and John stood next to the giant boiler.

  “Can you see it?” John asked. An absurd question considering the surrounding darkness, but like the inexplicable hand that guided him blind to and inside the teachers’ lounge, so too had something navigated Ryan here without his conventional means of seeing.

  “What is it that I’m looking for?”

  John’s visage was flickering uncontrollably now, an image on a shit TV seconds from shorting out.

  “We must be close,” John said. “I feel weak. I feel I’ll be gone at any moment. You have to hurry.”

  Ryan searched.

  He was behind the boiler now, inches from the panel on the wall that led to something deep within.

  Led to a sacrificial chamber that contained countless photographs of men, women, and children, unknown substances, instruments, and symbols carefully smeared, placed and drawn onto the photos that required them.

  Contained John Gray’s photo, soaked through with his own urine, a noose drawn with chicken’s blood long caked over around the man’s neck.

  Contained a canvas scribbled with Trish Cooke’s name, the canvas adorned in the bloodied bandages she’d been repeatedly discarding on the day she died, a multitude of razor blades entwined within.

  Contained a canvas with Ryan’s full name scrawled onto it, endless spirals covering his name in the medium of dried chicken’s blood, dried semen. His semen.

  Ryan knew this because he saw it, the images coming all at once and without pity, a flash flood of atrocity that attempted to drown his mind as it tried to swim towards sanity.

  And then instantly the flood relented, allowing his mind to break the surface and gasp a breath of control back into its gray, the things he’d seen still ever present, circling his battered mind in the ocean of horror the flood had created.

  Ryan spun towards John, frenzied in his desire to tell him what he’d seen.

  John was gone.

  Worse still, whatever ability had been granted to Ryan to find his way was gone too. He stood alone in complete darkness.

  And yet not alone. Something was here with him. He felt it in his bones. And his bones also knew with certainty that this something was well aware of what Ryan had just seen. And that this something was very…displeased.

  He thought again, I will never be the same, and this harrowing truth did not exclude death. After all, one could certainly argue that being dead was not the same as being fucking alive.

  Ryan’s next thought was: I wonder how it’ll have me kill myself.

  41

  Karl watched Ryan gaze unblinking at the wall behind the boiler for close to a minute before he turned and looked directly at Karl.

  “Ryan?” Karl risked.

  Ryan said nothing in return. Did not even blink when Karl spoke his name. Whatever trance held the boy was clearly still in effect.

  “Ryan?” Karl tried again.

  Ryan spoke, low, almost in a whisper. “I’ll never be the same,” he said.

  “Ryan, can you hear me?”

  Ryan still looked through Karl as though he wasn’t there; the trance had its hooks in damned good.

  “I wonder how it’ll have me kill myself,” Ryan said.

  “Jesus, son; wake up.”

  Ryan dropped to the floor as though shot from above. He gripped the sides of his head and cried out.

  Karl no longer cared if he broke the boy’s trance; the boy’s words, what was happening to him now, proved he needed saving.

  Karl ran to Ryan and shined his flashlight down into Ryan’s face, taking him by the shoulder, shaking him, calling out his name repeatedly.

  Ryan rolled onto all fours and promptly vomited on Karl’s shoes. Crumpled onto his stomach and then rolled onto his back again. Vomited again. Unrelenting streams of black bil
e that were now choking the boy on his upturned position on the floor.

  Karl immediately dropped to his knees, attempted to roll the boy back to his side to keep him from choking on his own vomit. Ryan wouldn’t budge. His weight was unnaturally heavy,

  (something is pinning him down, holding him in place, watching him choke)

  far greater than Karl’s old muscles—hell, probably even Stew’s muscles—could move.

  Karl scrambled to his feet, began frantically waving his flashlight throughout the boiler room’s interior, looking for something, anything as Ryan continued to choke to death at his feet, the black bile unrelenting

  (so much! So fucking much!!!)

  as the boy fought to expel it.

  Karl’s flashlight caught the sink in the far corner of the boiler room. Next to that sink, a large white bucket. Karl ran to it. Began filling the bucket, periodically glancing back at Ryan, urging him to hold on.

  Ryan had stopped moving, the bile unrelenting still as it continued to ooze from his open mouth.

  Karl hoisted the giant bucket of water, felt his back cry out in protest, ignored it and hurried back towards Ryan, nearly tumbling before arrival from the cumbersome act of carrying the bucket of water’s substantial and uneven weight.

  And then panic gripped Karl further still. The boy was choking. Had choked. Was currently without breath. The bucket of water had been a desperate attempt to rouse the boy from his trance. Pouring water on him now would be akin to throwing gasoline on a damn fire.

  Mouth-to-mouth. Gotta give the boy mouth-to-mouth.

  The thought was revolting. All that bile, still inexplicably oozing its way out of Ryan’s now unresisting mouth.

  You want the boy to die? Do it now!!!

  Karl did, wiping as much of the bile from Ryan’s mouth as he could, bent and pressed his lips to Ryan’s, attempting to breathe life into him. Stopped instantly and withdrew, his lips on fire. His hands too.

  The bile BURNED? What in the name of all that’s holy…???

  The bucket was now a godsend. Karl reached into it and splashed water over his mouth, wiping furiously, the water ridding his lips and hands of the burning. Scooped more water and wiped the remaining bile from Ryan’s lips, bent to the boy again and resumed.

  Now CPR. Karl’s hands on Ryan’s chest, compressing accordingly and steadily. Back to mouth-to-mouth. Then more compressions on Ryan’s chest. Then more mouth-to-mouth.

  Ryan came to life, expelling a generous amount of bile into Karl’s face, the bile singeing Karl’s cheeks and eyes, Karl crying out, blindly groping for the bucket to cleanse his face, Ryan still coughing his way back to life before him.

  His face now clean, Karl immediately attempted to roll Ryan onto his side again.

  This time he budged.

  Ryan now lay on his side, coughing and sputtering the last of it, his breath labored but now approaching normalcy. He made his way back onto all fours.

  Karl, vision still blurred from the bile, was nevertheless able to locate the flashlight from its solitary glow in the blackness of the boiler room. He snatched it at once and shined it on Ryan, blinking away the burn that still lingered.

  “Ryan? Ryan, you with me?”

  Ryan turned towards Karl’s voice. He was still on all fours, his eyes wide and wild in the flashlight’s beam; a frightened animal caught in a hunter’s sights. “Where…?” he managed, his voice rough from the incessant vomiting, his choking.

  “It’s okay, son.” Karl placed a hand on Ryan’s back and began to rub it. “It’s okay.”

  “Where?” Ryan asked again.

  “You’re in the school. In the boiler room. Are you all right?”

  Ryan attempted to find his feet, stumbled, and fell back down to all fours.

  “I feel sick,” he said.

  “It’s okay now, son—”

  (is it?)

  “—let’s get you on your feet and get the hell out of here.”

  “Why I am here?” Ryan asked. “How did I get here?”

  “Ryan, I really think we should leave first.”

  Ryan was suddenly aware that his hands were in vomit. Was suddenly aware that vomit was everywhere.

  “I think…I think I might have thrown up a little.”

  Karl flopped onto his butt and sighed. “I know.”

  42

  Three people watched Cynthia Herb and Rebecca Lawrence hurry towards the front entrance of Pinewood Elementary: Stew Taylor, Barbara Forsythe, and Carol Lawrence.

  Stew and Barbara were together, waiting. They were in Stew’s car, ignition off and parked far enough away on school grounds to stay out of sight, yet close enough to see. They were there because Karl had phoned them privately after leaving Ryan briefly for what he described as a much-needed cleaning up in the boys’ room. Karl had told Stew and Barbara everything. He had told Rebecca and Cynthia just enough: that the boy must have been sleepwalking, and that Karl, working late, had found Ryan unconscious in the school’s boiler room, of all places. Karl told them that the boy was clearly sick; he had thrown up.

  Carol Lawrence was not in her car. She had parked a block away and had made the rest of her way on foot. She was now crouched behind one of many low walls near the main entrance, hidden. She too was waiting. Watching. There to see whether her daughter’s hunch about Ryan being at the school and in trouble had been correct. When she saw Ryan—looking very much the worse for wear—being led out of the front entrance with Rebecca on one arm and Ryan’s mother on the other, she felt conflicted. There was immense joy for Ryan’s condition, and there was concern for her daughter’s growing attachment to Ryan. It was going to complicate things.

  43

  Karl wished Ryan well and accepted the many thanks from Cynthia, Rebecca, and Ryan himself.

  Once the women had gotten Ryan safely into Rebecca’s car and were gone, Karl pulled out his cell phone to dial the same number he had dialed only moments before. Stew answered on the first ring.

  “Where are you?” Karl asked.

  “Here. West end of the building.”

  “Is Barbara with you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay. I’ll be there in five. I think we should go somewhere else to talk.”

  ***

  Carol was just about to head back to her car when she spotted Karl the janitor leave the building. She did not know he was inside with Ryan, Rebecca, and Mrs. Herb. Had he been there the whole time?

  Karl made his way down the front steps of the main entrance and headed, not towards his truck in the school lot, but towards the west end of the building. Curious.

  Follow him? Rebecca would undoubtedly be at Cynthia Herb’s house, helping her tend to Ryan. Likely, she would even be staying the night.

  She had time to follow.

  ***

  Stew rolled down his window as Karl approached.

  “This is wrong,” Karl said.

  Barbara leaned across Stew’s lap, her trademark scowl ever present. “What is?” she said.

  “We’re using that poor boy. He almost died in there tonight.”

  Stew nudged Barbara off his lap, back into her seat. “How bad was it?” he asked.

  “Bad.”

  Stew unlocked the doors. “Get in. We’ll go somewhere and talk.”

  ***

  Carol watched them drive off. She did not know what was going on, but she suspected the worst. Was their little meeting about her? Maybe. It may not have been directly about her, but it was certainly about what she’d been doing. And her experience up until now had always told her that any potential obstacle needed to be dealt with.

  All three were as good as dead.

  44

  Cynthia Herb headed straight for the teakettle as Rebecca helped Ryan into the den and onto the sofa. Cynthia made mint tea in an effort to settle her son’s stomach and placed it on the coffee table before him. Ryan never acknowledged it. He just lay on the sofa with his eyes closed, breathing slowly and deeply th
rough his nose in a bid to stem his nausea.

  Cynthia retrieved her nursing equipment. She took Ryan’s blood pressure. The sharp, unmistakable sound of Velcro tearing as she removed the pressure cuff from her son’s arm was as dramatic as the look on her face.

  “I think we should get you to the hospital.”

  “Is it that bad?” he asked.

  “Not if you just had fifty cups of coffee.”

  “I’m fine, Ma. I don’t need to go to the hospital. I just want to rest.”

  Cynthia and Rebecca exchanged a look.

  “What happened tonight, sweetheart?” Cynthia asked.

  Ryan closed his eyes again and kept them closed as he spoke. “I have no idea, Ma. I went to sleep here and woke up at the school. That’s all I remember.”

  “Karl said he found you in the school’s basement. In the boiler room,” Rebecca said. “Do you remember that?”

  The words “boiler room” resonated instantly with Ryan. He was well aware of their significance, yet chose not to share that significance with Rebecca or his mother.

  “I remember waking up down there. That’s all.”

  “He said you threw up,” Cynthia said.

  “I didn’t feel well earlier. You know that.”

  “You don’t remember anything?” Rebecca asked again.

  Ryan strained to recall. It was not unlike the day after a hard night on the town. Brief flashes here and there, all of them hazy and fragmented, all of them causing deeper nausea the more he tried to get them to coalesce.

  “No—not right now,” he said. “I just need to rest. Maybe I’ll remember more in the morning. Right now I just want to rest. Please.”

  Cynthia kissed her son’s forehead. Rebecca kissed his cheek. Ryan offered a weak smile to both and fell asleep almost instantly. Cynthia motioned for Rebecca to follow her to the front door. They stepped outside, Cynthia closing the door gently behind them. “He’s never had a sleepwalking episode in the thirty years I raised him,” Cynthia said. “And, my God, he managed to drive a car.” Cynthia closed her eyes and shook her head, clearly envisioning her son behind the wheel in his state. “He hasn’t been himself lately. His dreams, his bouts of sickness, and now this. Please don’t take this the wrong way, but as a mother, I have to ask. Are the two of you using any sort of recreational drugs?”