The Mahogany Door

by Mark Boliek

Chapter 10

  The breaking, honing wind from the storm outside blew a branch through one of the windows and down a long hallway connected to the dining room with a loud “Crash!” Glass rained down and scattered along the floor. All of the children and most of the grown-ups gave a loud shriek. I turned around quickly and also let out a small yelp, but I think I was more controlled than the rest of my dedicated story listeners. At least I hoped.

  I think the mere mention of Billy’s presence in the old, worn down house gave us the frights because after the window in the hall burst and we cried out, silence echoed hastily from the walls of the dining room and my group eyed each other in synchronicity, much like Michael, JT, and Kali had done when they heard the creature’s voice rise and expand from within Warhead Dale.

  My grandson, in his most organized way, ran down the hall to see what he could do about the broken window. I stared at my young audience and they back at me. I always thought that I was a poor judge of others’ moods, but I could tell by my group’s eyes that they wondered if we should stop the story and call it a night. The storm was getting stronger as time went by, and it was becoming more alarming. I would also be lying if I claimed I didn’t harbor feelings for the old spirit that used to dwell in this big old house. I had to keep reminding myself that the creature known as Billy once inhabited Ol’ Captain Luke’s house. Even though the old guide had not been seen or heard from for decades, I kept a sharp eye and attentive ear just the same.

  Many of the children’s parents were uneasy and understandably so. They tried to call out on their cell phones, but the batteries of the electronics were running very low and there was no power in the house to recharge them. Regardless of the situation with the storm, the lack of power, and the anxious feelings, there was absolutely no way I could let anyone leave the house. The weather was just too bad. I had to think about keeping the children and their parents in Warhead Dale overnight.

  My mind and body were jelly. I couldn’t possibly foresee what else might go wrong. My grandson’s simple idea of having me tell my old story was turning into a nightmare.

  After the parents and children had a few moments to calm down from the nerve-racking circumstances, they gathered in a committee. I turned to look at the crackling fire in the dining room and shook my head. I couldn’t control this situation, which was the root of one of the reasons I wanted to tell my story. There are just some things you cannot control. I decided that I had to make the right decision, but just as I was about to throw my hands up in surrender and quit for the night, a group of very straight standing young boys pulled on my arm. They let me know that in no certain terms was any spirit guide creature thing going to get the best of them. They felt that if they had made it this far, why shouldn’t I continue with the story? I chuckled under my breath so the young boys did not hear me. I realized that they wanted to show their courage to the little girls. Of course I continued the story; however, I didn’t want to tell the boys at that time that no matter how much courage they thought they had, or thought they could conjure, Billy would get to them. We all gathered around the great cherry table once again, and I continued the story.

  “‘Say it,’ JT, Michael, and Kali heard once again from the dark, slimy voice coming from the depths of Warhead Dale. They stood petrified. A few moments passed.

  ‘Say it,’ the voice was a little more forceful and abrasive, but this time the laugh was gone. Billy was becoming restlessly impatient.

  ‘Say what?!’ JT barked back at the house after a few more edgy moments. Only silence answered. ‘What does he want now?’ JT whispered in a dry voice to Kali and Michael. His fingers shook.

  ‘Why are you whispering?’ Kali asked back in a concerned tone.

  ‘So he won’t hear us,’ JT answered with the same breathy, dry, serious undertone.

  ‘JT.’ Kali looked at him as though he had three heads. She cocked her chin to one side shifting her auburn hair from her blazing blue eyes. The left side of her lip lifted in a huff, ‘He can enter our dreams, you idiot. I don’t think he’s too concerned that he won’t be able to hear us.’ Her face turned to disgust. ‘I’m pretty sure he wants us to say that stupid little poem he made up.’

  ‘What’s that?’ asked JT. He used a louder voice that rose and cracked at the end of his question.

  ‘The rules,’ said Michael. Fear penetrated him. His eyes were sunken and his skin was pallid. Confronting Billy and those large, awful red eyes in his dreams was one thing, but behind those huge oak doors, the creature, breathing and living, manifested in all of his unrecognizable glory. Facing the monster in the flesh and staring into his black pupils, those pools of eternal dread, was almost more than Michael could stand. ‘Remember I told you there were a lot of rules with the door and the cane,’ continued Michael. ‘Well, Billy was the mastermind behind a lot of those rules.’

  ‘Say it,’ the dark, hungry, vibrating voice danced on the early evening sky.

  ‘I thought only the Vryheid could establish the rules involving Bruinduer,’ responded JT. He could have sworn Michael told him that. ‘It would have been nice if you had mentioned this.’ JT’s frustration swelled. ‘Again, that would’ve been helpful.’

  ‘Ha!’ laughed Michael. ‘Maybe you can tell him that he can’t make up any rules when you see him.’

  ‘So,’ snapped JT, ‘say it then.’

  ‘One problem.’ Michael realized with horror. His hands quaked and the only way he could settle them was by clutching his fists and releasing them. ‘We have to say it together.’

  ‘What? Why?’ asked JT.

  ‘The rules; I told you,’ said Michael. His breath became shallow.

  ‘Would you two stop!’ roared Kali. She reached in her purse and pulled out a pen and a little flashlight. She then dug back into her pack and raked around for something to write on. When she came up empty, she reached for JT’s duffel bag. She pulled out Captain Luke’s journal. The wind swirled around the house. A few of the boards that blocked the windows slammed against the panes. The dying, overgrown grass rustled gently. ‘May I?’ asked Kali, but was ready to write on the page of the journal regardless of JT’s answer. ‘Hold this.’ She handed the little flashlight to JT, flipped open the journal, and then began to scribble on the back of one of the journal’s entries.

  ‘You actually know the poem Billy wants us to say?’ asked JT in a surprised, nervous manner. The flashlight jiggled in his hand and the circle of light bounced around the open pages.

  ‘Hmm... JT,’ Kali snickered. ‘No matter how bad you want to, there are just some things that happen to you in this world you can’t forget. And trust me when I say I’ve tried to forget about all of this.’ Kali swirled her hands around in the air in front of her as though she were outlining Warhead Dale. She then gripped JT’s arm. ‘Please hold the light still.’

  ‘Right, sorry.’ JT seized the flashlight with both hands and tried to hide the fact that he was anxious. He focused intensely on the page he shined the light on, but as Kali wrote, his mind was fuzzy. The moment seemed blurry and confusing. After a couple of minutes, Kali ripped the loose paper from the journal and handed it to JT.

  ‘Say it,’ the voice from Warhead Dale calmed. It knew it was about to receive what it wanted.

  JT’s mind raced and his heart palpitated in his chest. He felt like each heartbeat was strong enough to jump through his shirt. He held the little flashlight with one hand and tried to focus the light toward the paper Kali had written on. JT tried to act as though he knew what he was doing, but his insides flipped upside down.

  ‘Are you set, Michael?’ JT asked, and Michael nodded with a quick jerk of his neck. ‘Well, serve it up then.’

  JT focused intensely on the page in front of him to remain calm. In his study, he had noticed on the piece of paper what looked like drawings made by his grandfather. It looked like the outline of simple hourglasses around the margins. He flipped the page over curiously to see if he could make out anything else.


  Maybe it was the brightness of Kali’s little flashlight or his eyes adjusting to the settling darkness, but the handwritten words of Ol’ Captain Luke had faded even more from the night before when he had strained to read the journal in his bedroom. The letters Kali wrote on the front of the page, however, were dark and legible.

  The moment had come quickly. The eight years on the Shorts’ farm and the last three days felt instantaneous. Billy was ready to hear those words scorched on the paper. He had been germinating long enough. It was time to give. A soft, deepening, diabolical laugh echoed through the old mansion out into the night and hung in the sky.

  JT had told Gregory at breakfast just a morning before that he couldn’t find what he was looking for with them. He needed to find out where he came from. He had to learn about a childhood that was stolen from him by the wheels of a water truck and the failure of an airplane. Now he was unexpectedly, hesitantly, and exultantly in that place for that knowledge: Warhead Dale - the house of his grandfather, ‘Ol Captain Luke.

  He thought about Michael, who struggled with his destiny, but maybe, just maybe his own identity was staring him in the face. The answers to all of his questions, questions that had haunted and puzzled him for years, were behind the two huge oak doors sealed before him. Fear now engulfed him. He could feel his knees buckle and his thighs spasm. He wanted to run. He leaned away from the house, ready to sprint, but the cane in his hand stopped him. The adrenaline that flooded his body and the dread that arrested him scuttled his brain. He had forgotten about his knee and realized that he would not have made it far. As he leaned back toward the house, he knew the only choice he had was to open those doors.

  As they recited the poem, Kali spoke very quietly, almost in a whisper. She hoped that in some dark hidden place in her mind Billy might not hear her saying his poem just as JT had thought a few moments before, but she knew that it was futile. Billy could get into her head no matter what barriers she tried to put up. It dawned on her that it probably didn’t matter if she even spoke the words. The fact that she thought about them would be enough for the monster feeding on their fears, waiting for their return to fill his need. She stood as strong, if not stronger than JT. She didn’t want to give the beast the pleasure of rummaging around her mind and forcing his will.

  Michael focused very differently. His throat dropped. He had craved this for such a long time, a chance to go through the Mahogany Door and back to Bruinduer. It was time for him to have his own sense of control over a life that had stumbled repeatedly since JT had left. He could taste the sweet alluring air of Bruinduer. His destiny seemed only heartbeats away, but his will grew weaker by the second. The endless nights of Billy taunting and hazing him unremorsefully in his dreams smoldered at his very core. The power the monster had over him made him stand with the little strength he had left. He needed to get back to Bruinduer, and he knew going through Billy was the only way it would happen. Mostly, however, he was too afraid not to give the monster what he wanted.

  The three stood in the empty, chilly night, nailed to the earth. The putrid smell of wood, plaster, and fear burrowed through their nostrils. There was a slight hesitation while the breeze weaved gently along the grass. The bright, golden moon melted behind ominous, dreadful clouds. The pause lingered; then Michael began to recite the poem Billy had made a part of the rules:

  Slip the soul between space and time

  Where up is down and five is nine.

  Michael felt his heart start to hammer and his hands turned sticky. The breeze halted, and the leaves on the tree tunnel outlining the driveway hung lifeless against their branches.

  JT and Kali toiled at the beginning of the poem and stumbled over the first couple of words. Michael failed to let them know he was starting. JT tried his best to keep focused on the paper in front of him, but Michael’s hustled pace left him lagging. Time seemed to stop. Anxiety pulsed through their veins.

  Place the palm upon the door

  Enter the universe upon its shore.

  JT lost his focus on Kali’s writing. He clenched the journal’s page. Despite his initial stammering, he immediately and shockingly regurgitated the words of the poem without help. He had control of his body, but the words coming out of his mouth were not his own. It was as if some mind controller had gained the power of his voice.

  The ground and house began to tremble. The boards, tiles, splintered glass, and mortar vibrated. With each passing word that slipped from their mouths, the shaking became more intense.

  In a village or on a beach

  Nothing there is out of reach.

  JT, Kali, and Michael were now in perfect unison. JT’s hand, which held the cane, started to pulse and tug toward the house as the mansion rumbled and quaked more forcefully. He strangled the skull and crossbones, laboring to keep it steady.

  Take me where I cannot go

  Make me a king or let it snow.

  Michael’s breath was shallow. Kali tried to speak even softer; her futile thought that Billy wouldn’t hear entered her mind. The pulsing in JT’s hand throbbed, but the cane continued to tug him toward the house. Two bright beams of red light shot from the cane’s eyes. The lights focused themselves on the two large oak doors of Warhead Dale. The wind began to howl, and the sound from the vibrating mansion was deafening.

  Billy, please hear our beckoning

  For in Bruinduer, you are The Reckoning.

  They did not hear the last two lines themselves, but after the last word, silence fell like a curtain on a stage at the end of a play. The beam of red lights remained fixed on the doors.

  ‘Did it work?’ asked JT with an exhausted voice, breaking the icy calm. ‘Should we say it again? It seemed like we were rolling there with the poem for a second, but I think I might have messed up at the start. You never told us when you were gonna begin.’ JT looked at Michael still grappling with the cane, and cracked a sarcastic half smile.

  A small rumble was suddenly felt beneath Kali, Michael, and JT. JT’s smirk vanished with concern. The rumbling turned to distinct, rhythmic thumps deep beneath the ground. The three gaped at each other with eyebrows raised. Instinctively, they leaned their heads toward the ground to study the sound. Then the thumps penetrated the ground a little louder, ‘boom.’ The three thrust their torsos straight up and looked anxiously at each other.

  The sound then intensified again, ‘Boom.’ It became louder and closer, ‘Boom, Boom!’ The booming grew with a crescendo and sounded as though thunder was rolling directly under their feet. It was as if the Devil himself was pounding an enormous drum in some sick symphony. The percussion of sound rapping the ground caused JT, Michael, and Kali to bounce up and down. ‘BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!’

  The house’s foundation quaked more violently. Small bits of the clay tile jacketing the roof dribbled down like small snowflakes to the ground.

  ‘What in the world!’ JT barked, but no one heard because of the piercing, thunderous, driving, rolling beats.

  Kali screamed wildly, but her expanding and deflating chest was the only proof. She clasped JT’s empty hand in a natural reaction to her terror. Michael scanned frantically between JT and Kali, then back at the doors. He stood mortified. His thoughts were contradicting - he couldn’t decide whether to run or bury his head in the dirt and hide.

  Suddenly, there was a fleeting pause that dangled in the chill-bitten night air. The vibrations ceased. The cane’s eyes were extinguished and it stopped tugging on JT. The three gasped for breath, still staring at the spot where the beams of red light had been centered on the two large oak doors.

  Without warning, there was a loud ‘KA-BOOM!’ and the enormous doors blew apart. Michael, JT, and Kali dropped immediately to the dirt and covered their heads, trying to protect themselves from the millions of splinters hurling toward them.

  After a few anxious moments, the debris stopped raining down on them and they regained their composure. Sile
ntly, they returned to their feet and brushed the wreckage from their clothes. They peered into the empty black opening left from the explosion. With trepidation, they wondered how Billy would appear from Ol’ Captain Luke’s house.

  Though they never saw the monster entirely, Michael and Kali knew that the beast that haunted their dreams was not the same spirit guide they once knew as children. He had changed. He was much meaner and nastier. JT, who had also seen only the empty, dark, menacing, bloodshot eyes in his visions of Billy, fully expected the worst. He was certain the monster would not manifest as the cute little blonde-haired boy he met in the horse barn on the Shorts’ farm.

  Their stomachs tumbled as their skin went white. Their knees turned to jelly. They could never have prepared themselves for what happened next. Slowly, two gruesome hands appeared and gingerly clenched either side of the door jambs where the oak doors once stood; one finger layering itself on top of another. The huge, snow white appendages poked out of ripped, tattered cloth gloves. Emerging from the vast, drained darkness was a shocking, titanic site.

  The creature squeezed through the jambs almost banging his head on the top of the crossbeam of the covered porch. When he completely cleared the opening, he stood some ten feet tall. His hair was matted in thick, greasy, red dreadlocks, and a ceremonial lion skin headdress was smashed on top of his motley hair. Feathers, attached to the cover, looked as though had come from exotic birds in a past life; however, now they were faded and ruffled. His face was repulsive and agonizing. Blue and white paint streaked down his cheeks and chin in no recognizable pattern. The monster’s omniscient, bloodshot red eyes were even more beaming, scanning, piercing, and barren than JT had remembered from his dream.

  He wore a brown, tattered and torn toga that draped over his body from his shoulders to just below his knees. The skin on his legs was drenched in grease and grime. The single-soled sandals he wore were dark burgundy with straps wrapped halfway up his lower legs.

  The creature, standing in the open night just outside of Warhead Dale, sucked in an ocean of air and released it with a tremendous sigh. When he straightened himself, a cracking, ripping noise sounded out and echoed across the grounds.

  ‘WOO-HOOO!’ screamed Billy. Birds from the surrounding trees previously retired for the night, launched into the night with reckless abandon. ‘It’s so good to be out in the fresh air,’ continued the monster. He exposed a gritty, grisly smile with rotten, yellow teeth that fell out and grew back instantaneously.

  Forgetfully, Billy smacked his forehead. ‘Oh YEAH! Where are my favorite people in the world?!’ He angled down at Kali and JT as the light from the moon peeked through the thick black clouds.

  ‘Where’s Michael?’ JT asked with panic. The spot where Michael had stood was vacant.

  ‘Heh, heh...,’ Billy scoffed in a deep raspy tone, shaking his head nonchalantly. ‘Run little rabbit, run.’

  Michael couldn’t take it anymore. After he saw the horrible sight of Billy emerge from Warhead Dale, his will along with his courage snapped. He turned and ran with all of his capacity toward the arching canopy of trees over the driveway. His legs pounded the ground and his heart battered his ribcage. His arms pumped like shafts spinning a locomotive’s wheels at top speed.

  All along he muttered in a high, squeak between breaths, ‘He’s changed too much. I don’t remember that. I don’t remember that. I don’t remember that.’

  JT whipped around to follow suit. He clutched his cane, but with one lunging step, a throbbing pain surged through his knee. He fixed himself still. He then caught a transitory glimpse of an enormous hand and arm fly over his head like a slow moving jet. Billy snatched the back of Michael’s shirt collar and lifted him off the ground; his legs still churning in place. Billy then returned the very frightened, thrashing, and vocal young man right back to the place he once stood as though he had never darted away. As soon as his feet touched the ground, Michael froze. He could only stare back at Billy sheepishly.

  ‘There they all are now - my favorite people in the world. Where have you all been?’ Billy groaned sarcastically with an elastic smile. He looked at JT, Michael, and Kali with admiration. His smile went flat.

  The three stood silent and stationary; afraid to even twitch. They could not believe or comprehend what stood before them. It was a sight from all of their worst nightmares rolled and manifested into one. JT could only wish now that the monster had revealed himself in the form of the annoying little boy, Willy, from the farm.

  Billy paced back and forth with his arms crossed behind his back saying nothing. JT, Kali, and Michael could feel each vibrating step and a slight burst of air as the gruesome spectacle strolled past. The monster moved with surprising agility. The look on Billy’s face was impenetrable, and he seemed strained while gathering his thoughts. Suddenly, an emotion washed over the monster’s face as though he planned to crush the three travelers to Warhead Dale at any second. His fists clutched, but the infinite patience that Billy could summon won out, and as he made another turn in front of the trio, his merciless expression abated and his fists released.

  ‘So - I’m guessing you all want to know why I’m out here like this,’ Billy growled nonthreateningly. His voice was low and coarse. ‘Why I look the way I do.’

  The thought had bounced between JT’s ears, but like Kali and Michael, he remained astonished and speechless. His eyes were fixated on Billy. The sight, though hideous, mesmerized him. He thought back to the vision of Billy’s eyes in his dreams the night before and remembered how he was conflicted about how he would confront the monster then. He couldn’t decide whether he would be fearful or commanding on their meeting. In the safety of his dreams, he decided at that point to launch at the creature and demand answers; however, with the monster pacing, breathing, and contemplating in front of him in the flesh, JT felt that discretion and assent was a more favorable course.

  ‘I just want you to see what you have forgotten. I don’t like it.’ Billy’s voice was deep and somber and he continued to walk from side to side. ‘Sure two of you can remember a little bit; little rabbit and Kali girl. Sorry, JT, that you are all jumbled up and can’t think straight, but you still forgot about me.’ Billy’s voice was infused with pain and anger. The streaks that ran down his cheeks were more prominent. ‘The only way you can understand is if you see; see what you forgot. The mind can play tricks on you. It can make you perceive what you desire. Your eyes… your eyes are different. People believe what they can see and touch.’ Billy halted his marching and faced JT, Kali, and Michael. He gestured with his hands toward his body. ‘You see me standing right in front of you, torn up and forgotten.’ He then placed his gigantic hand in front of the trio. He shook it up and down very quickly as though he wanted one of the three to stretch out and grab it. No one reached their hand out to him. Billy stopped his shaking and retracted his hand. He chuckled faintly, ‘Now you gotta make it right.’ He peered at Michael and winked. It was as if he knew that Michael had come to the same conclusion in the parking lot of Linda’s diner.

  Michael wobbled on his feet. He felt as though he was going to pass out.

  A surge of adrenaline tainted with rage inoculated JT. His temper rose and he struggled to keep his mouth shut to avoid entering a verbal sparring match with Billy.

  Kali tried to keep her head down, but the dreadful site of Billy and the curiosity that gripped her only made her want to gaze upon the disappointed, abandoned, bitter monster.

  Billy bent down; his bones cracked. He slithered his head a few inches from Kali, JT, and Michael’s faces. Its back and forth motion between them was like a vengeful snake ready to strike; his breath singed their cheeks with a putrid gas. ‘And this time, you better not mess it up.’ Billy jerked straight back. He then turned on his heels and lazily proceeded up the marble steps and disappeared into the shadowed opening of Warhead Dale. Though the initial meeting of Billy was short, his message was clear.

  The three travelers stared at the bl
ack, foreboding entrance into which Billy had vanished. After a protracted pause, realization settled back into Kali, JT, and Michael. They started to pan around the old mansion, the vast grounds, and the unyielding night. At one point during this exercise, they turned and peered behind them toward the tunnel of trees. One glaring option was to run.

  Their emotions stilled and they concluded that Billy was not going to hurt them. If he had wanted to hurt them, they probably would already have been dead. They then stared back at the empty hole into Warhead Dale.

  ‘What did he want?’ JT thought. ‘What did Billy want them to correct?’ He recalled his earlier conversation in the car with Michael about Billy and the Mahogany Door. ‘Control of Bruinduer back? Maybe?’ JT sucked on his teeth and thought about what to do next. The way to his lost memories and childhood was there for his taking.

  The clouds quickly swallowed the moon once again, and the wind blew crisply. A low laugh reverberated across the breeze as it began to rain.

  ‘You have got to be kidding me,’ JT said and tilted his head upward. The raindrops smacked him on the face and became stronger and thicker after each passing second. He then understood why his temper flared when he was around Billy; the big brute annoyed him.

  ‘I guess we’re going in the house,’ said Michael as the heavy raindrops pelted his head as well. Though he looked calm on the outside, his insides were a jumbled mess. He was relieved that Billy wasn’t going to crush him, but he was hesitant in passing through the gloomy, vacant hole. It was what he had ultimately wanted; to go back to Bruinduer and relive the life he once knew as a child, but the adventures he had as a kid in Bruinduer seemed to come with a much larger price - a price he wasn’t certain he wanted to pay now after all that had transpired.

  ‘Entering against my better judgment,’ Kali responded to Michael. ‘But necessary, I suppose.’ She had made the right decision to come to the old mansion with her lost friends and confront Billy. There was no way that she could face the gruesome sight she had just witnessed in her dreams every night. It would be very difficult to gaze into those red and black, seething void-like eyes over and over again.

  As the raindrops began to cascade on top of their heads and seep through their clothes, JT, Michael, and Kali picked up their things. They took one last look at the tunnel of trees over the driveway now bleary through the sheets of heavy rain. In the end, they knew what their only course would be. They turned and filed into the unknown darkness of Warhead Dale.”