Bleed

by Ed Kurtz

  Like the house, the barn had once been painted red. Now what little paint remained was a faded pink. The rest of the decrepit structure was gray and brown—black where the wood was rotted completely through. The barn’s roof was half caved in at one corner and the crater formed there was filled with forest detritus and debris.

  The wide doors slowly opened at the pressure of her shoulder and she pumped her tired, aching legs as hard as she could in a mad dash for the barn’s relative safety. She was fairly sure Blackmore didn’t follow her through the window, but that only meant he would race back down to the front door and come running after her any second. She was right about that—as soon as she plunged into the cold darkness of the abandoned barn, she saw her insane teacher round the house. He was screaming like a Viking berserker and holding the axe over his head as he crossed the yard with astonishing speed. Alice whimpered and pushed deeper into the stuffy shadows.

  Almost immediately she tripped over something long and metal, some farming instrument. She slammed into it with her knees and pitched forward, tumbling over and smacking against a spiny post with a thud. The accident kicked up a cloud of dust that filled the air and got in her nose and mouth. She hacked and sneezed. The silhouette between the open barn doors laughed and readjusted the axe.

  “Bless you, child,” Blackmore said.

  Something in Alice’s subconscious suggested that she plead for her life, but her reason argued that such a pathetic display would do her no good. A man like this felt no sympathy. He was too far gone. Instead, she heaved herself back up and scrambled into the corner, her hands thrust out in front of her. She felt blindly in the darkness for something to save her, a weapon or a means of escape. She found dry, frayed ropes and slippery piles of rotten hay. A plastic broom handle and a burlap sack half filled with dirt or seed. Then the corner, which was solid and offered no exit. No matter how much she fought it, despair was beginning to set in. Alice pounded her fist against the wall. She might as well have tried to push over a skyscraper.

  She sank to her knees and let herself drop back. A tiny, quiet sob erupted from her throat. When something smacked hard like metal against wood, she knew Mr. Blackmore was only a few yards away. A thin, dry chuckle trickled out of his mouth like sand.

  This is it, Alice told herself. This is how I die.

  She covered her face with her trembling hands and waited for the axe to fall.

  54

  Stupid girl.

  Walt could hear her sniveling back there. Undoubtedly she believed she was hiding well, masked by the total darkness of the barn, but he could hear her sobbing. Giving up.

  A smile cut across his stiff, winter-beaten face.

  Gwyn would have been so pleased with him, happy as a newlywed when he brought home this bacon.

  “Here, piggy, piggy, piggy,” he sang. “It’s time to come out now. Farmer Walt’s got something nice for you.” He laughed. “Nice and sharp.”

  “No,” the girl whispered.

  Walt shook his head.

  “No? No? You don’t tell me no, you little shit. You don’t tell me anything!”

  He was surprised by his own sudden switch from mirth to rage, but he embraced it. And he charged toward the corner of the barn, lifting the axe high over his head, screaming with frenzied anger.

  When he was sure that he was close enough to reach her, he brought the axe down hard.

  So pleased.

  Bacon for Gwyn.

  Piggy piggy piggy.

  Abruptly he felt a sharp pull and he was yanked backward and up. The axe fell out of his hands and made two thudding sounds as it hit whatever was beneath him. Not Alice. Just dirt and useless farming supplies. He squealed and clawed at his neck. He felt rope, scratchy and frayed but strong enough to hold his weight. His face flooded with blood and the fusty air was difficult to gulp. His temples throbbed painfully.

  Someone had roped him like a steer and he was beginning to black out.

  Who?

  ***

  Alice heard the impact, the drop of the axe, but she felt no pain. She supposed it was the same thing as her ankles when she dropped out of the second story window—it didn’t come right away then, either. In just a second or two, though, she knew the agony would finally reach her fear-addled mind and then she would know she was cut and bleeding and dying. So she squeezed her eyes and waited for it.

  But it never came.

  Instead, her senses only registered the cold, the stifling, decayed air, and the muted gagging sound that seemed to emanate from above. Alice opened her eyes, half expecting to see Blackmore leering over her, waiting to strike. But only the dark remained. The muffled retching continued. That, and the creak of an old rope pulled taut and slowly swinging back and forth.

  All she wanted to do was curl up into a ball and disappear. She was still alive and relatively unharmed, but the panic had not subdued. She swallowed hard. Her throat was dry and sore.

  “Hello?” she whispered.

  “Hurry,” a feminine voice called back. It sounded like it came from the rafters.

  “Hello? Who’s there?”

  “I cannot hold him forever. Come and help.”

  “What—” The words got caught in her gullet. She swallowed again and cleared her throat. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Come here. Find him with your hands.”

  “Find who? Mr. Blackmore?”

  “Who else?” The voice tsked.

  “Who…who are you?”

  “I can drop him if you want. Let him get his axe and hack you to bits.”

  “No!”

  “Then come here, girl.”

  Alice rose slowly to her feet. Her weight seemed to crush her throbbing ankles. She winced and took a step forward.

  “What do you want me to do?” she asked hesitantly of the disembodied voice.

  “I have him strung up by a rope. But he must have gotten his fingers between the loop and his neck. He is struggling, but he is not dying.”

  Alice felt the blood drain out of her face. “God,” she said softly.

  “This is kill or be killed, child,” the voice continued. “When I let go of the rope, if Walt is still alive he will chop you apart. Do you understand?”

  Her breath came in short, shuddery bursts.

  “I asked you if you understand me, child.”

  “Y—Yes, I understand.”

  “Excellent. Find the axe.”

  “What?”

  “The axe!” the voice bellowed.

  “Okay! But—what for?”

  “Surely you would not have lived through this ordeal so long if you are as stupid as you sound.”

  “I’m not stupid.”

  “No?”

  “No! I’m not!”

  Despite her terror and befuddlement, the accusation rankled her. She knew that she was fat and that she was awkward, but the charge of stupidity would not stand. If she had anything going for her at all, it was her smarts. Her neck flashed hot and she sneered in the dark, wishing the stranger could see it. Wishing she could see the stranger.

  “Then do as I tell you. Find the axe.”

  “All right, fine.”

  Falling into a crouch, Alice fanned her arms out and commenced the search. Everything she touched was cold and rough against her palms. Layers of grime and dust coated everything inside the barn. She didn’t like it at all.

  After groping at clods of earth and pebbles and what felt like a greasy engine part, she came at last upon the handle of the axe. Brushing her fingers up the shaft she then felt the cool, sticky head of the thing. She picked it up with both hands and stood back up again.

  “I’ve got it,” she said.

  “Can you hear him struggling?” the voice asked with macabre glee.

  Alice listened. She could.

  “Yes.”

  “Musical, isn’t it?”

  Blackmore wheezed and croaked. Something in his throat clicked wetly. Alice did not find it musical at all. To he
r, it sounded horrific.

  “If you say so,” she said, wondering how the person with that weird voice could even see in there.

  The voice laughed softly. “Follow the sound, girl. Find him. Find him, and I’ll give him to you. You will have him and kill him.”

  Alice gasped. Some naïve part of her wanted to believe that the stranger in the rafters only wanted her to get the axe for defense, for protection. Her more reasonable faculties knew that this was not true from the start, but she sometimes chose to ignore that voice. She’d ignored it now, but the heavy truth of the matter ended up smashing into her like a sixteen-wheeler.

  “No!” she cried. “I can’t!”

  “You must. You don’t want to die, do you?”

  “I’ll call the cops. I’ll go back into the house and call them…”

  “There’s no phone there. The line is dead.”

  “Then I’ll call from his house.”

  “I can’t hold him that long.”

  Can’t or won’t? Alice wondered.

  “Use the axe,” she offered.

  “That’s your job.”

  “I meant to keep him here. Until the police arrive.”

  “Kill him!” the voice roared.

  Alice jumped. She was starting to feel as afraid of the owner of that deceptively feminine voice as she was of Walt Blackmore.

  “KILL HIM!” it screamed again, louder this time.

  “But I can’t!” Alice sobbed. “I won’t!”

  A loud sigh drifted down from above.

  “Then I will let him go,” the exasperated voice said. “Good luck, Alice.”

  She heard the whine of the rope skidding over wood, followed by a thump. Blackmore coughed and hacked. He moved around, adjusting this and scraping that. Then he said, “Bitch.”

  Alice shook and gripped the axe handle more tightly.

  “Bitch!” Walt rasped wrathfully.

  Dirt and rocks scratched and kicked up. Blackmore groaned, and the groan turned into a mad wail. His feet pounded the ground as he blindly lunged in Alice’s direction.

  “NOW, ALICE!” the voice shouted.

  Alice swung the axe as hard as she could. It halted abruptly in mid-swing, blade meeting flesh. Blackmore moaned. Then his grubby fingers found Alice’s face and neck.

  “Fuck…ing…kill…you,” he gasped.

  She shrieked, half from fear and half from the adrenaline rush of her fury. She kicked Blackmore with the flat of her foot, separating him from the axe. He dropped to the ground like dead weight. She bolted for the barn doors, for the light.

  Blackmore gurgled and grunted. And then he lifted himself up again and came at her. He emerged from the darkness covered in dirt. Foamy blood flecked his lips and face. He held one hand firmly against his midsection. Blood bubbled up between his fingers.

  His grimy face was twisted from pain and anger, but he forced a strained grin.

  “O there are days…in this life,” he croaked, “worth life…and worth death.” Scarlet saliva sprayed out of his mouth with every word. His teeth were stained red.

  Alice gave a wild scream and ran at him with the axe hefted over one shoulder. Blackmore had no time to react; in a second the glistening blade tore into his face and cut clean through to the other side. A wet, red slab of flesh curled off the front of his skull and dropped to the snow with a dull splat. Blackmore wobbled for a moment, and then fell backward. He landed hard without so much as bending his knees.

  Alice hyperventilated and stared with shiny, bulging eyes at the ghastly fruit of her bloody labor. Walt Blackmore’s face was almost completely sheared off, leaving a cross-section of his head that exposed brain and bone before quickly filling up with red-black blood. Half an eyeball bobbed at the surface of the steaming fluid, tethered to a stringy red stalk. When the blood spilled over, a ruby red puddle blotted out on the white snow around the body.

  Alice emitted a wet sob and let the dripping axe fall. Mr. Blackmore, her ninth grade English teacher in whom she had found a kind of kindred spirit only hours earlier, was dead by her hand.

  “I killed him,” she said, too quietly to hear. “Oh God…oh my God.”

  A series of sharp slaps erupted from the shadows inside the barn. She lifted her head to see what it was. Her head felt as though it was filled with concrete.

  From the darkness emerged a completely nude woman. Her hair was shaved down to a buzz cut, her flawless skin nearly as white as the snow into which she walked, barefoot.

  She didn’t seem cold at all; her skin was not pink and she didn’t shiver. She merely applauded and smiled like a proud parent at a spelling bee. When she reached the gruesome remains of Walt Blackmore, she gave him nothing more than a brief glance before spreading her arms out like wings and looking adoringly into Alice’s eyes.

  She stared. There was puzzlement and wonder in the gaze, but she was too exhausted to speak. After the sensory overload of fear and rage, and the grisly killing of the dead madman in the snow, she had nothing left to say.

  The naked woman wrapped her arms around her and squeezed her into a tight embrace. Alice did not resist.

  “What a day,” the woman whispered into her ear. She delivered a quick, cold kiss on Alice’s neck. “But everything is going to be all right now. Everything is going to be just fine.”

  SPRING

  OPHELIA

  55

  Her side of the bed was warm from her own body heat, but when Alice rolled over she found the sheets to be cool, as if they hadn’t been slept in. Shrinking away from the sudden chill, she quickly returned to the familiar comfort of her own warmth. That was when she felt the dampness underneath her, soaking against her thigh. She switched sides once more and threw back the blankets to investigate.

  The late morning sun shone through the cracks in the blinds, delivering a hazy saffron glow to the dinner plate-sized bloodstain on the fitted sheet. Alice exhaled noisily.

  “Goddamnit,” she grumbled.

  The boy’s boxers she wore to bed—white with a yellow smiley face on the ass—were soaked through as well. The formerly white cotton was now bright red and glistening from the crotch of the underwear all the way down to her thighs. Her period had come a week early, just as it had the month before and the month before that. Ever since she moved in with Ophelia.

  Alice had never actually observed any signs that Ophelia suffered from the monthly visitor herself, but she was young and healthy and surely did. Alice supposed her cycle was just adjusting to more closely match that of Ophelia’s. A hundred women’s magazines had insisted to her that such things were common, that it happened all the time. She was just going to have to get used to the new routine.

  She threw her prickly legs over the edge of the mattress and sucked in a sharp breath when her bare toes touched the cold hardwood floor. Winter was gone, but the mornings were still too chilly for her liking. Once there had been a large Oriental rug on the floor in this room, but it got ruined by all the blood and dirt and human waste. There just wasn’t anything for a mess like that. The rug had to go.

  Now she quickly tiptoed across the room to where her fuzzy bunny slippers rested, right beside the bedroom door where she left them. She shoved her pudgy feet into them and wiggled her toes. It felt good. Then she grabbed a fresh pair of boxers out of the wardrobe at the foot of the bed and padded down the hallway to the bathroom.

  Sliding the soiled drawers down, Alice felt the sting of the stubble and decided to shave her legs before stepping into the shower. She felt like a royal mess, like she woke up a substantially less attractive girl than the one she’d been when she went to bed. Standing in the middle of the bathroom in nothing but the white tank top she’d woken up in, she turned to get a look at herself in the mirror. She didn’t particularly like what she saw. Cheeks too round and ruddy; breasts already beginning to sag despite her scant fifteen years; nipples enormous and too puffy, which she could see through the shirt, along with the push of her belly rolls. Her hair was
greasy and needed cutting. If she squinted she was sure she could make out the faintest trace of a moustache coming in on her upper lip.

  I’m a fucking hag, she told herself, pouting.

  Behind her, from the hallway, Ophelia said, “Beautiful girl.”

  Alice flashed her a look of incredulity.

  “Angelic,” Ophelia added.

  Alice cocked her head to one side and pursed her lips. Per usual, Ophelia was not wearing a stitch of clothing. Her shoulder-length, blood-red hair was shiny and perfect, even though she never brushed it. The triangle of equally red hair between her legs jutted out in wild spirals. Alice thought it complemented her faultless alabaster skin. Ophelia’s eyes met hers, then slowly worked their way down the length of Alice’s body. When Alice realized that Ophelia was seeing the bloodied place between her stubbly legs, she threw her hands over her groin and flushed pink.

  “I started my period. While I was sleeping. It got all over the fucking bed.”

  Ophelia smiled, although it didn’t show in her icy blue eyes. It rarely ever did.

  “Out, damned spot,” she said.

  “That was Lady Macbeth,” Alice said mock-pedantically, “not Ophelia.”

  Ophelia only grinned in lieu of response.

  Pulling the top over her head, Alice bent naked over the bathtub faucet and started the water. Over the crashing din of the tub, she looked over her shoulder at the stunning red-haired beauty in the doorway.

  “Where were you, by the way? When I woke up you were gone. The bed was cold.”

  Ophelia answered, “Breakfast.”

  Alice nodded soberly. The water was hot enough to her liking now, so she pulled the plunger that shut off the faucet and turned on the shower head.

  “Oh,” she said.

  “All gone now, our Walt.”

  A brief tremor rocked Alice’s stomach. So much blood. So much awful violence. Necessary, yes. But so repugnant to her.

  First, Ophelia ate the woman—Blackmore’s sister, she said. That bounty lasted her three weeks, and that was really parceling it out. She’d explained to Alice that the dead woman was her brother’s partner-in-crime, as it were, that together they were responsible for the deaths of those two nasty boys from school. There were others, too—the bones in the lime pit and the putrefied corpses in the bedroom Alice and Ophelia now called their own. But Ophelia’s hands were not sullied by the blood of murder. She had to eat, but she was no killer. It took plenty of time for Alice to process the fantastic, singularly grotesque nature of the thing, and even now it turned her stomach to think about so much death and rot, and to remember what she had done to Mr. Blackmore. It was all for the best, however—this she knew and at least vaguely understood. Alice loved Ophelia, truly and deeply loved her in a way she had never loved anybody before. The strange and incredible woman came into her life in a burst of terror and bloodshed, but ever since that dreadful winter day, Ophelia had done nothing but take care of her. She was Alice’s only friend; her mother, big sister and lover all rolled into one.