by Mike Kraus
“It would have been easier if we’d buried them a little closer to the house and not all the way across the property.” Darren tamped down on a raised mound and leaned on his shovel.
“I didn’t want them anywhere near the house,” Barbara replied in earnest. “It would have creeped us all out. The kids would have had nightmares, and I couldn’t sleep myself with them lying just outside the door.”
“A corpse is a corpse,” Darren stated, flatly. “They don’t dig their way out of graves or give off ghostly visages.”
“This coming from the man who can’t watch a scary movie without having nightmares.” Maria slapped her husband on the arm.
Barbara put her hand against a nearby tree and looked over the grave site. They’d picked a spot at the far end of the trail near the property line, a place that would be impossible to see from the house, the road or anywhere else any people might wander through to see a group of raised dirt mounds standing side-by-side in neat order.
“I should have given the cops a call,” Barbara shook her head nervously. “Hell, I still should. I mean, there’s five dead men on my property. That’s something right off a crime show.”
“I wouldn’t worry too much about it,” replied Darren. He stepped away from the graves, sliding on some loose dirt. “The way things are deteriorating, I doubt the police will spare time to investigate the deaths of some intruders who broke in on multiple occasions and tried to cause harm to your family.”
“You’re probably right.” She bit her lip. “It’s not like I can call them with the phone lines down, anyway. And I’m not driving into town again.”
“That’s what I’m saying. And Marie and I won’t speak to anyone about it.”
Marie wiped the beads of sweat from her brow as she stood back from the four graves, looking them over. “Nothing to speak of, is there?”
Darren shook his head. “I can’t imagine a thing.”
Marie gave Barbara a comforting look. “I think the best thing to do is take stock of your situation and stay prepared. You can’t control the rest.”
“You’re right about that,” her husband agreed and Barbara nodded absentmindedly, still transfixed by the mounds of earth. “You want us to say a few words for them?”
“Fu—I mean hell no.” Barbara’s reply was immediate, both in words and body, jolting from her stock-still position as she looked over at Darren. “No. There’s no words worth saying over scum like these.”
Together they gathered the shovels and picks and placed them in the basket of her Gator next to Barbara’s Colt carbine, then tossed their gloves on top as Barbara climbed behind the wheel. Marie got in the passenger side while Darren took the rear seat, turning sideways so he could fit his knees into the small seating area. She started the vehicle and pulled toward the house with a growl of tires on the gravel and dirt path. The sheep and mules had drifted closer to the woods and when they saw the Gator emerge they crowded around with expectant bleats and mewls, hungry for their breakfast and steadfastly refusing to accept any excuses – including ones that involved cleaning dead bodies out of the house.
“I appreciate the help, folks,” she told the Everetts as she parked the Gator near the back patio and climbed out, preparing to go for the feed. “I’ll call you if I need you.”
Darren remained sitting. “Looks like you’ve got some hungry beasts to feed.”
“Normally, they’re fed and happy by now,” she replied with a shake of her head, “but we had the bodies to deal with, and now there’s the blood and gore to deal with and...” Her words trailed off in a shaky sigh.
“Well, don’t expect us to leave without helping you, darling,” Marie said. The older woman clutched her arm and gave it a friendly squeeze.
“I shouldn’t keep you.” Barbara’s eyebrows arched. “But it’s been one helluva night, and I really don’t want you to go.”
Without warning, her chin fell, and tears welled up around the bottoms of her eyes. They pooled there for a moment before streaking down her face, chilled by the cold breeze that gusted across her cheeks. Her breath hitched in her chest and finally burst out in a loud and embarrassing sob.
“Now, now.” Marie extended her arm around Barbara’s shoulders and hugged her. “You’ve had a rough night, but we’re here to help you get through it. And you will get through it.”
“Thank you. Truly.” Barbara allowed herself to be held and then gestured toward the chicken coop, taking Marie up on her offer. “Feed barn is this way.”
She got back behind the wheel and carefully drove them through the noisy, roused animals before parking the Gator outside the shed, killing the engine and leading the Everetts inside.
Barbara moved to the feed bench and touched her palm to one small bucket and then another. “These are for the chickens and rabbits and the feed is right there in that trashcan.”
“Got it,” Marie said. She handed Darren his own pail before turning to peer inside the can. The woman nodded. “We use the same feed mix for our own animals.”
Barbara filled her bucket with the usual oat, barley, and wheat mix, then led them outside and gestured at the chicken and rabbit coops.
“We have running water to the troughs,” she pointed out. “All you have to do is check them for muck and clear it. The troughs will automatically refill if you scoop enough out.” Barbara held her bucket of feed against her stomach and walked toward the animals as they bleated and rushed around her legs. Some of them peeled off and followed the Everetts until she started slinging the mix across the yard.
“There you go.” She nodded at the incessantly braying donkeys and clucking chickens. Barbara thought about putting the kids on the feeding chores, but she’d given them the morning off with the express instructions to stay in their rooms. They were to do lessons, play games, watch movies, sleep or basically whatever they wanted, all in an effort to help give their minds some breathing room to help process the previous night’s events. There had been crying, hugging, consoling of one another, awkward questions, long bouts of silence, and what the pair needed next was some time alone to just sit and think through things in their own unique ways.
They finished feeding all the animals, then the trio returned to the shed and put the buckets away, Darren dusting his hands off and stepping outside with a smile. “You now have a yard full of happy beasts.”
“Thanks again.” Barbara smiled at the couple as they watched Chuck the Rooster cluck and crow his way around the chicken yard. “They do all seem pretty happy.”
“Anything else we can help you with?”
“I was going to check on the greenhouse, but that’ll have to wait until I get the house cleaned up. I don’t want to leave that mess there for the kids.” She climbed into the Gator and started it up.
“We’re right there with you,” Marie announced as the couple got inside.
Barbara drove carefully around the animals and parked near their concrete patio. The man who’d died out there with his dog catching noose had done so in the dirt, and his blood had mostly soaked in. Pulling the hose from its carrier, she sprayed over the spot to camouflage it even more. She then headed up to the house and motioned for the Everetts to follow her inside and they stepped through the broken sliding glass door to find Linda on her hands and knees, scrubbing at the red-stained kitchen tiles.
Barbara rested her fists on her hips. “What are you doing?”
Her daughter gave a surprised yelp and quickly stood, pink water dripping from the sponge she held. “Sorry, Mom. Jack fell asleep, and my mind was racing. I just wanted to do something, so I came down and started cleaning. I...” The girl’s eyes glossed over with moisture, a mix of fear of her mother’s disapproval and the memory of the last night’s events.
Barbara crossed the kitchen in two steps and rested her hands on Linda’s shoulders. “I know, baby. I can’t stop shaking myself. It’s okay. What happened last night was terrible, but we did what any rational people would have done.”
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br /> “We controlled the situation,” Linda lifted her face with an imploring expression, looking once again for solace and atonement. “That’s what we were supposed to do, right?”
“In this case, absolutely,” Barbara nodded. “You were super brave.”
“You poor girls.” Marie ventured over and reached out with a tentative hand. “You did the right thing. You can’t just let someone march in here and threaten you. They sealed their own fate when they decided to step foot on the McKnight property.”
Barbara squeezed her daughter’s shoulders again and turned to see Darren standing at the line where the kitchen tile met the living room carpet. The man scratched his head as he stared down at the massive bloodstain on the nickel-gray floor.
“We’ll have to cut around that stain and rip it out. Padding, too.” Darren winced. “Maybe even the wood if we can’t get the stains up.”
“I figured,” Barbara nodded, coming over. “We’ve got some plywood out back.”
“And we’ve got spare carpet in our garage from our last project,” Marie assured her. “It’s light blue, so it won’t look pretty. But it’ll patch this spot up fine.”
“Thank you.”
They started the cleanup, opening the front door to allow the place to air out while Linda scrubbed the tile and hardwood with bleach while the adults cut a square out of the carpet using a box cutter. They ripped it and the padding out, rolled it up, and handed it to Darren as Linda sat back and admired her work on the hardwood before going after the few droplets that had sprayed out from the main stain, onto the wood, walls and carpet.
“I’ll take this out to the fire pit,” Darren said. “We’ll burn it later.”
“Great idea,” Marie replied.
He dragged the stained materials outside and loaded it into the Gator, driving it out toward the woods while Linda finished with her scrubbing. She came out of the hall with her bucket and sponges, eying the wood, walls and carpet carefully for any spots she missed before turning to her mother.
“All done. I think. The main patch was on the wood and carpet but there were some droplets I had to go pretty far out to get.”
Barbara turned to stare at the gleaming tiles and wood, then looked over at Marie. “It looks great. Do you think we got it all up?”
“Blood is notoriously hard to get off surfaces.” Marie frowned. “From what I’ve heard, anyway. But as far as the tile and hardwood, if it looks as clean as this, then I think we’re good. Linda, why don’t you get a fresh bucket and let’s spot check everything together just to make sure there wasn’t anything left. Barbara, do you have a different kind of cleaner? If we keep using bleach, it’s going to discolor the carpets.”
“At this point, I don’t care.” Barbara waved her hand. “I just want it disinfected. We’ll worry about remodeling later.”
When Darren returned, the trio hauled out the destroyed couch and left it on the concrete patio. After a brief conversation about possibly refurbishing the piece of furniture, Barbara shook her head emphatically, insisting that she hated it anyway and just wanted it gone and he promised to disassemble it later and drag it out to the fire pit to be burned along with the rest.
“Let’s run and get that replacement carpet,” Marie said. The older woman studied Barbara’s face, raised her hand and let her thumb drift across Barbara’s cheek. “While we’re gone, why don’t you get cleaned up. You’re still covered in blood.”
“Good idea,” Barbara agreed with a dark chuckle. “I guess I should have done that first thing, but it’s not every day we get attacked.”
“That might not be true anymore,” Marie said. “We need to be ready every minute of the day.”
Barbara nodded. “I plan on it. While you guys are away, I’ll throw together an early dinner. It’s the least I can do for all the help you’ve given us.”
“A home cooked meal sounds wonderful,” Darren beamed.
“We’ll be right back.” Marie assured her before patting her husband’s arm and guiding him to the front door.
Barbara saw them out but left the door open, staring out at the property for a few long moments, her thoughts racing but her mind feeling very much blank, a spinning gear without anything to drive. While she wanted nothing more than step into the master bathroom and take a shower, she couldn’t – wouldn’t – stop working.
She went to the laundry room and opened the door with a gasp, looking in on Smooch where they’d left her to rest. The German Shepherd lay on her dog bed, curled up on her good side. They’d shaved the fur around her stab wounds, disinfected them, and dressed them with gauze and tape and Barbara had even sprayed some nasty-smelling stuff on the bandages to keep the dog from ripping them off.
The biggest puncture was above the Shepherd’s right shoulder and, judging from the four-inch knife they’d found in the yard, she could be suffering from internal bleeding, but only time would tell how serious it really was. The lacerations around the ribs had pierced well through her skin and muscle but thankfully hadn’t punched too deep as far as Barbara could see.
The sight of her son curled up next to the dog with his face nestled in her fur had elicited Barbara’s shock, the exhalation of emotion causing the boy to stir against the animal’s back before pulling himself closer to her, tucking his head into her side, careful even in his sleepy stupor to avoid her wounds. Smooch, for her part, barely moved at both Barbara and Jack’s motions, merely opening her eyes and whining softly before shutting them again, her breathing deep and labored.
“He snuck down,” Linda explained from the kitchen in a quiet voice. “I… didn’t have the heart to make him leave.”
Barbara put her hand to her mouth, but she had no more tears left to cry, just an undying love for the boy and his dog that would remain etched in her heart forever.
“It’s okay,” she said and quietly shut the door behind her.
***
“Aaaand there we go. That should do it!” Darren ran the last bead of caulk along the inside of the sliding door, sealing the plywood into the pane. They’d cut the piece to fit the door snugly, then used epoxy glue and exterior caulk to seal the gaps. While it negated her ability to see outside, it did make a mostly weatherproof barrier to keep out the occasional drizzles and, most importantly, the cold air.
Barbara set her pot of potatoes on the stove burner and came to inspect his work, nodding in satisfaction. “That’s a tight seal. Thank you.”
“Not a problem,” the broad-shouldered man said, beaming with no small amount of pride.
“Darren can patch anything,” Marie called from where she was frying sausages in a pan as a pot of sauerkraut simmered on the back burner, kicking up a strong smell of cabbage. Barbara glanced into the living room at the patched carpet where Darren had replaced the stained carpeting and padding with freshly cut pieces before gluing the carpet in place. Aside from the colors being wildly off, it was a perfect fit, and it was hard to tell that anything had taken place in the home less than twenty-four hours prior.
Barbara clucked and shook her head in admiration as she stood next to Darren. “This is just downright amazing. Where’d you learn how to do all this?”
“That’s from a lifetime of doing patches and jerry-rigs on our own house,” he admitted. “We were dead broke when we first got married, so we couldn’t afford to pay anyone to do the work for us. I did it all myself. Roofs, walls, floors, plumbing... you name it, I figured out how to fix it.”
“You even mended my heart,” Marie cooed from the kitchen, eliciting a laugh from her husband and Barbara, who smiled and headed back to join her friend.
“Well, let me get back to mashing the potatoes, and we’ll patch our bellies next.”
“I’ll mash them suckers!” Darren shouted, setting his caulk gun down and making his way to the sink to wash his hands before grabbing a potato masher and wagging it at the drained pot. “I make them a little lumpy. Is that okay?”
“Go ahead,” Barbara called b
ack.
“Eww,” Jack interjected. “Lumpy taters.”
“You’re going to love them, son,” the man scoffed. “Mind if I add a little garlic and onion powder, Barb?”
“Have at it,” she replied called with a smile. “Use some butter, too.”
“Oh, yes,” Darren sang as he sidestepped to the refrigerator, opened the door, and retrieved the butter tub. “Butter is my middle name. And a dash of sour cream!”
“Heart Attack is going to be your middle name,” Marie murmured, loud enough for everyone to hear. Barbara stifled a snicker then turned to watch as the kids set the table. She came over to help when Linda glanced up, pulling the silverware back from her mother’s grasping hands.
“We’ve got this, Mom. You chill out.”
She put her hands on her hips and looked around for something else to do, finding very little that hadn’t already been taken care of. In addition to the burials, repairs and cleaning, they’d also brought out Smooch’s bed and placed it where the couch had been. The dog rested her head comfortably on her paws with her ears relaxed and her eyes ticking back and forth from person to person, watching the humans work while she breathed slow and hard, still laboring, but her breaths sounded cleaner and less congested than they had a few hours prior.
“I can go out and get the bonfire started.” She moved toward the door, but Darren interjected.
“We’re saving that for later,” he said. “Remember, we’re going to cook some snacks on it for the kids.” When Barbara made a face, the big man turned and held his hands up. “Hey, it was your idea.”
“Go get cleaned up!” Marie called a gentle warning. “I told you to do that before, and you ignored me.”
“I did clean up,” Barbara defended herself.
“You changed your shirt and washed your face a little. You’ve still got smudges here and there.”
She wanted to argue, but Marie’s words rung true. Barbara hadn’t taken a moment’s break since the Everetts had gone home to bring back carpet and padding, busying herself with cleaning the living room walls and doing odd jobs until the couple returned, trying to settle the inner nervousness she couldn’t shake no matter how hard she tried. Barbara was sore, exhausted, and anxious and while the prospect of dinner had everyone in high spirits, Barbara couldn’t relax. Not without Tom and Sam. Her tight chest was packed tight with emotion, and she felt like she might break down in tears at any moment – hell, she already had broken down multiple times, her insides feeling hollowed out as hope for her loved ones’ return grew more distant with every passing minute.
