To Watch You Bleed

by Jordon Greene

  The boom of the door slamming against its frame sent an unexpected shudder through Dalton. He had lured himself into the false belief that the night could not get any worse, that it wouldn’t be long before this nightmare was over. Now, as Skull-face made pursuit of his Aiden, he saw how frail a hope it truly was.

  Was it possible that there was no bottom to how badly events could turn? Was the spiral down infinite, unknown? Maybe death was the lighter option. Nothingness. An ending.

  No, Dalton! Stop acting like that, he chided himself

  For the first time since their hell bound trio had graced his home’s doors, Bullet's demeanor had changed substantially. His body swayed back and forth in quick short pumps. It looked like a nervous movement, erratic, involuntary. The boy held his hand up by his face. Dalton glimpsed his fingers fidgeting around and under that horrid white mask.

  Something has him worried, Dalton thought, bewildered by the sudden exhibition of nervousness in the boy.

  The knife was down by Bullet's left thigh. It seemed that the boy's mind and hand were disconnected as it hung limply, barely gripping the blade's handle. To his right, Freddie had relinquished his position behind Mara. Instead, he stood a foot away from Bullet, whispering quietly to him.

  On the couch, Lenore and Mara sat covered in tears. Their combined visage mirrored their vexed bodies. They shivered not from the cold night air outside, but the shock of mental anguish. Lenore attempted to open her mouth but recanted quickly as the three stitches drew tight around her lips. She quivered and drove her mouth shut, closing her eyes, sobbing.

  Heat gathered in Dalton’s head as his fists clenched and unclenched, then came to a close as solid balls of flesh and bone. Their captors were off balance, and something had their leader spooked. Dalton knew that now was the time to act, if there ever would be a time.

  He jumped from the recliner and closed the five feet between him and the two boys before either had time to react. He arched both arms out wide and wrapped an arm around each as he came at them hard. They fell to the ground as one mass with a loud crack of tile.

  There was a moan, a slow noise to his left, Bullet, and then movement to his right. Before Dalton could react to the incoming vision, a gloved fist found purchase under his jaw. He grunted in pain, but was still able to get to his hands and knees. Dalton jerked back as another fist attempted to lay a bruise along his cheek, barely missing. He took the opportunity and brought his own clenched fist up under Freddie and dug into his gut. He earned a deep grunt followed by a spattering of saliva. A flash of light glinted off a blade as one of the boys resumed their attack. Barely thinking, Dalton grappled for the wrist behind the small hunting knife and gripped on tight. Freddie pulled and yanked, trying to get free from Dalton's firm grip.

  Freddie punched out with his free arm but Dalton caught him by the wrist and pushed both arms up into the air, applying all the pressure he could to the wrist just beyond the shining blade. Dalton pushed hard, grunting. To his left, Bullet was getting his bearings. Dalton squeezed Freddie’s hands and finally the boy’s hand gave way and the knife toppled to the ground. It clanked to the tile and skittered a few feet away. Dalton shoved backward, realizing that he could overpower the boy.

  As he forced Freddie backward, his back flared like fire. His chest jutted painfully forward as a fist had buried itself into the most vulnerable part of Dalton’s lower back. He stumbled and then suddenly his feet were swooped out from under him. He fell to the ground, cracking his ear and forehead against the cold tile.

  Everything went fuzzy, spinning in circles. Someone was talking, about what he couldn't quite make out, it sounded like gibberish a hundred miles away. He stared out, squinting and stretching his eyelids open. As his vision cleared, his eyes settled on the corpses that occupied the corner of the room. Tamieka’s glassy cold eyes stared back at him. He shivered and jerked back.

  Before Dalton could get his hands underneath himself, a hand gripped under his armpit and wrenched him up with a strength that Freddie did not possess. His body was yanked around to face Bullet. The boy’s empty eyes were only inches from Dalton’s own terrified eyes.

  “I thought I had made it plenty clear that you were to cooperate,” the boy stated slowly, his raspy tone chopping up the words to drive the point home. The boy’s warm breath was dank and soggy against Dalton’s lips and nose. The words were cold and angry, they sent a chill up Dalton's spine. Then the chill of metal against his throat grabbed his attention. Bullet's blade.

  Dalton swallowed though he had no spit to drown.

  “Now you’re going to sit down like a good little boy, aren’t you?”

  Dalton only nodded without even thinking about what he was doing. Fear had him on autopilot, making the decisions for him. Guided by Bullet’s firm grip under his armpit, Dalton walked a semi-circle around the boy, his face never moving more than an inch from the white mask. Abruptly Dalton found himself thrust back. He landed hard on the recliner, its cushy leather felt bare and firm as his body slammed against the cushion. It rocked to and fro, but Dalton did not dare move.

  Breathing heavily, Dalton ripped his gaze from the masked boy, still surprised by the strength that had wrenched him off the ground. His eyes settled on his wife and then his daughter, not knowing what to say, not knowing what to do.

  “Now I’m pissed.” The voice behind the white mask was angry, livid. “You just keep screwing up my evening! My evening!”

  Confused and scared, Dalton watched the boy pace briskly by him and around the couch before stopping behind Lenore. His hands moved quickly. He gripped his fingers under Lenore's chin and wrenched her head backward. In the same instant, his blood-stained blade appeared over the crook in her neck. There was a bloodlust in those dark eyes. His lips pursed and writhed between the small slit, his breathing becoming heavy and labored.

  “No—” Dalton yelled.

  “Shut the fuck up!” the boy bellowed. The knife shimmied. Dalton was shaking. Bullet was shaking too, not in fear, but in rage. Dalton’s eyes widened.

  “Now, Dalton, tell your darling little wife that you love so much that it’s going to be okay,” Bullet instructed in a deliberate and menacing tone. “Tell her that everything is going to be fine.”

  “What?” Dalton asked, though somehow he knew what it meant. He could not bring himself to acknowledge it. Not now, not after all they had been through and survived. Not after how much he realized he had missed her, mistreated her. No.

  “Tell her it’s all going to be okay,” he repeated.

  “I…uh…” The words would not come to him.

  “I said tell her it will be okay,” he screamed madly. The knife jerked back and forth. Lenore yelped as the blade made a paper thin cut across her neck. “Oh, now look what you made me do, Dalton.”

  “No….”

  “Tell her!” Bullet screamed. It split through the room. Dalton squinted at the sheer volume and the suddenness of it.

  Dalton's body shook. A tear carved a path down his cheek as he locked eyes with his wife. With only a look, he conveyed to her all the sorrow and shame he felt before he finally opened his lips.

  “It’s…it’s going to be okay, honey," he nearly wept. He sniffled, trying to stay strong, if only for her.

  A saddened grin broke onto Lenore’s lips for the faintest of seconds, restrained by the cruel bands of fishing string. Beside her Mara whimpered, confused and scared, rocking back and forth.

  “See, that wasn’t so hard,” the boy’s voice was calm again, almost kind. He lifted the blade from Lenore’s neck and pursed his lips, blowing a small rush of air through the small opening in his mask. He looked down at the back of Lenore’s head and massaged her shoulder with his free hand. “Not hard at all.”

  Dalton let a relieved sigh escape his lips.

  Without warning, Bullet raised the bloody blade in the air and then plummeted down with all his might. The curved silver sunk between Lenore’s breasts. Her body caved backwards as
the cold metal pierced through her organs. She gasped, mouth open wide, eyes shocked, gleaming a brilliant horrified green.

  “No!” Dalton yelled. The single word seemed to stretch on for minutes as his eyes reached out to his wife. She stared back in pain and agony. Mara screamed. He went to move, but Freddie quickly reminded him of the knife under Mara’s neck. “No…”

  Bullet wrenched the blade from side-to-side, earning grunts and screams from Lenore. Dalton let his eyes well up as he begged, “Please! Stop! Please, just stop! You're a monster!”

  “A monster?” Bullet chided him. “It’s your fault, Dalton, don’t blame me.”

  Then he tugged on the knife and pulled it from Lenore's flesh, out of its sheath of meat and bone. He smiled at Dalton as the blood dripped freely down onto Lenore's cheek and clothes. Then he leaned down and kissed her on the cheek. He stood up erect again, never losing the wicked grin that tore at Dalton’s soul.

  As Lenore’s breathing became fitful, Bullet raised the knife above his head ceremoniously and sighed. Dalton squinted his eyes between sobs. Then he brought the blade down again. It hacked into her chest, buried deep. Then it was torn back out, blood and meat trailing the blade. Dalton could not look away. The boy brought the blade down a third time, and then a fourth. Over and over and over again. Blood flung across the room, splattering onto Dalton’s shirt and his hand.

  Dalton never broke eye contact, staring into those scared green eyes. He cried to her one last time, “I'm sorry. I love you so much.”

  Then her eyes went cold and glassy, and she slumped over. Dalton shuddered at the sight of his wife’s limp body, a bloody cavity where once a baby bump had been. Helpless, damn helpless.

  The air was stale in the small work closet. The smell had always afflicted Aiden's senses but he ignored the scent of old tools and leaned an ear against the door. Outside, on the other side of the door, every few seconds he heard his name called in a quiet but high tone. The boy in the skull mask. The calls had moved further away from him, becoming faint echoes.

  The pickaxe rested at his side. He held on to the tool with a determined grip, squeezing and relaxing his palm around the wooden handle. The thought of using the axe in his own defense had yet to enter his mind, but its simple presence gave Aiden courage.

  He recounted his plan in his head again. Get to the car. Get the phone. Call 911. Simple. Right? He rolled his eyes.

  Why did you have to forget it in the car, dipshit?! Aiden chided himself. This would be so much easier if you hadn’t.

  The skull-faced boy’s calls for him had faded. Aiden waited a moment longer, pressing his ear against the door, listening. Nothing. No footsteps, no calls or cackles. With his free hand, Aiden reached for the lock. He twisted the small device on the knob and carefully cracked it open. Peeking through the small opening, he saw nothing but trees to his left and the lake to his right. The sound of crickets and cicadas met in the opening along with frigid air. The immediate area seemed to be clear, but the forest beyond the trees was a mess of pure black.

  Aiden took a deep breath and raised the sharp end of the pickaxe level with his eyes. He held it firmly in both hands. Cautiously, he stepped out of the closet, leaving behind the safety of his locked hideaway. To his right, the back yard stretched out until it ended by the lake. The family pontoon rocked gently next to the dock, its Charlotte green cloth roof appeared a drab grey as did the cylinders that kept it afloat. The stars overhead were beginning to disappear behind wispy gray clouds. He could see thicker more ominous puffs of gray and black moving in behind them. Still no sign of his tracker.

  Axe still raised, he stepped lightly through the grass at a quick walk. His eyes jerked back and forth at every shadow that jumped near or far. He made the bend around the house, cautious to check the corner before proceeding. There was nothing but empty space between him and the woods. He kept moving up the hill by the house. His heart pounded with such ferocity that it felt as though it might burst through his chest, ending him before even his skull-faced foe would have a chance.

  Crack.

  Aiden froze and then backed up against the stone wall of the house, trying to conceal himself in the slight overhanging shadow. He squinted, peering out into the woods for the source of the noise. Beyond the rustling of a few leaves in the gentle breeze, the woods were quiet. He felt like they were laughing back at him, at his predicament. He saw nothing. No more movement, and no more noises.

  Determined that he imagined the noise, or that it had been some forest critter, Aiden turned. Immediately he wished he'd paid more attention to the totality of his surroundings instead of staring out into the woods.

  A crack of pain shot up his nose as a fist collided with his face. Aiden stumbled back and lost his grip on the only thing that stood between him and getting away. The pickaxe dropped to the ground with little more than a quiet thud on the compacted dirt. Realizing his mistake, Aiden jerked around to retrieve the weapon.

  “Don’t even think about it,” Skull-face commanded. The pistol in his hand gave him an authority that his voice would not ordinarily command.

  Aiden froze in place, eyes glued to his salvation. Just within reach, but a bullet was faster, far faster.

  “All right now, you’re going to cooperate now or I swear I’ll blow your fucking brains out right here. They’ll just hear a boom and it’ll all be over. All over.”

  Aiden nodded and redirected his eyes to follow Skull-face after he let out the breath he had been holding in.

  “Now, you’re going to lead the way back up to the house and we’re going to go in through the front door, all right?” Skull-face explained. Aiden nodded.

  Walking the precarious yards past the skull-faced boy felt like walking on hot embers, but Aiden forced himself to keep moving. He kept his eyes straight ahead, refusing to look back at the menacing mask and continued up the grassy hill. As he made the turn around the front of the house by the garage, the boy poked the barrel of the pistol into his lower back.

  “Hey, change of plans. Give me your keys.”

  Aiden turned and looked at him quizzically.

  “It wasn’t a request. Give me your keys.”

  Aiden withdrew his keys and was about to toss them to Skull-face before the boy threw his hands up.

  “No, no! We’re not playing that.” Skull-face laid his left hand out flat, palm up, in front of Aiden. “Just lay them in my hand.”

  Restraining his frustration, Aiden placed the keys in the boy's outspread hand and immediately stepped back as if he were afraid that the black plague of old might seep out of those God-forsaken palms and carry him away. He pursed his lips angrily.

  Skull-face grinned. With the pistol never losing sight of Aiden, the boy walked around the passenger side of Aiden’s Camaro like he was ready for a midnight joy ride. Then he looked back to Aiden.

  “You all think so much of yourselves in your big house,” the disgust in his voice was evident. “Hundred and fifty dollar shoes, condescending looks and expensive cars.”

  Aiden’s brow crinkled at the sudden diatribe. Then a harsh screeching of metal against metal weighed on his ears. Aiden cringed, inwardly fuming, as the key dug into the paint along the passenger door, leaving a long jagged line behind it.

  “Okay,” Skull-face sighed like a significant weight had lifted from his shoulders. “Now that that’s done, we’ll get you back inside. Let’s go.”

  Aiden turned and made his way for the front porch. Knowledge of the pistol somewhere behind him motivated him to keep moving. At the entrance, Aiden stopped and looked back to Skull-face. He nodded and Aiden opened the door.

  There was movement inside as the door swung slowly inward. For the most part, everyone was as he remembered them minutes ago. Except now the white-masked figure was standing behind his mother, who he couldn't see from his current vantage point. Everyone turned to see him, except her.

  “What took you so long?” Bullet’s words bit at Aiden’s captor. Then Aiden sa
w the blood all over Bullet. His brow crinkled.

  “The little prick hid,” Skull-face explained.

  A hint of surprise in his movements, Bullet turned slightly, “Why is he bleeding?”

  “He tried to stab me with an axe. I punched him in the face,” Skull-face said. “Thanks for caring.”

  Dalton’s eyes met Aiden’s. They were sad, torn. Aiden frowned in confusion. It was not simple fear in his dad’s eyes, there was something more.

  “Come on in, Aiden,” Bullet invited the boy.

  Confused and scared, Aiden stepped slowly over the threshold and then down into the living room. He circled around the couch and froze.

  “Mom…”

  CHAPTER 16

  The frosty air sent a chill up Deputy Ashton Keating’s spine as he walked down the broken sidewalk back to his patrol car. Sprigs of dead grass and weeds poked up between the barely illuminated cracked slabs of concrete under his thick legs.

  It was the second call he had responded to in the past hour and the second call of the night over an overly zealous Halloween prankster. The elderly occupant of the bland apartment unit, a Peggy Church, had not appreciated the teenage boys’ idea of a fun night out at her expense. When Ashton arrived at the complex, he had found the elderly Church keeping the two teens under the small overhang beyond her front door with a short-barreled shotgun.

  At first it had worried him, but as he swung open the door of the brown squad car with the Cabarrus County Sheriff’s Office logo on the side and slid in, he let himself laugh quietly. Those kids got what they deserved, a good scare for bothering their elder. Hopefully two less troublesome teens for next Halloween.