These Walls: The idea behind this story was simple. We got to talking one day about the many, many clichéd tellings of the “haunted house” story, and decided that maybe the haunted houses of the world were catching a bad rap. The only thing we can compare this tale to, in retrospect, is Richard Matheson’s “Mad House,” which is actually quite different but you ought to read it anyway because it’s a lot of fun.
Life and Limb: Brandon once worked inside of a mannequin factory. It was one of the biggest in the world, was very creepy, and very much deserved its own story. We don’t know if a real life “George” works there, and frankly, we don’t want to know.
The Unusual Debt of William T. Bellows: Bryan once sold his soul for a cup of mediocre coffee. The results were disastrous. This story is a tribute to that.
No corpses were harmed in the making of this book.
As always, thanks for reading! We hope you enjoyed yourself. If not, sorry, no refunds.
Cheers and stay classy, friends,
-B&B
(Denver, CO - August 26, 2013)
Acknowledgments
We would like to take a moment to thank all of the folks whose help has been instrumental in the successful production of this novel.
First off, we offer a big thank you to our friends and family for their unending support. Well, the ones who supported us, anyhow. You know who you are. You help to keep our necks out of gallows neckties.
Next, we say thanks to our online friends in the blog community, and the many random fans of our fiction who leave notes of praise in our e-mail inbox when you could just have easily sent a bomb. You guys and gals rock.
Also, while we were digging around our archives to put all these stories together we came across a strange book bound in blood-smattered leather, handwritten in pale blue ink. And it fell open to this page:
Rabbit
I have spent my entire life trapped and unwilling to move forward. I see that now, in full and dangerous clarity. This is a realization that has punched through my heart like a bullet, a futile fact incapable of being evaded.
I have ducked and dodged, and made excuses by the thousand. Others have borne the brunt of my shirked responsibilities, my failed decisions. I recognize all of this now. Because the end is near.
Today, I have reached the end of the road, and I am trapped, only this time it’s for good. What began as a simple hike in Rocky Mountain National Park—a scramble up Lookout Mountain—has become a nightmare.
No, the time for moving forward is gone. I can do nothing but cower in fear, squatting on my aching haunches.
I am about to be murdered. We are about to be murdered.
From the corner of my eye I register movement. It’s not from the depths of shaded pines surrounding the trail, but causes me to flinch nonetheless. The movement is from Craig, whose back is hugging the same boulder as mine. Our knees touch as we huddle together and I feel the clammy coolness of his skin against mine. Unconsciously I shy away from it.
“I’m going to look,” Craig says. “I-I think he might be gone.”
“Don’t,” I say. “Goddammit, don’t.”
“This—this is all just a huge misunderstanding. He must have seen your dark clothes and thought you were a—a deer or something.”
I look at my neon green backpack, studying the two holes made by the rifle’s bullet. The bag is a mess of exploded energy drinks and Gatorade.
“Deer don’t wear Day-Glo,” I say hoarsely, in a voice I don’t recognize. My throat is sore from the screaming that followed the death of my backpack. If that one had been an accident, the five that had followed were not. As I trace a shaking finger over the holes I realize that my hands are numb.
Craig lifts his head to peek over the boulder and I bury my face in my hands.
This is not happening. We are not being hunted like helpless animals. I will return to the mundane life I spent so much time complaining about this weekend and I will force myself into the happiness I always say I’m going to find. I cannot die. People with reckless lives and drug problems and loud mouths get shot. But not nobodies like me. I’m not supposed to die like this.
“I don’t see anyone,” Craig says. This is a sentence that’s supposed to give me a glimmer of hope, but it doesn’t. There is so much doubt.
“Maybe he left,” I suggest.
“I…I don’t know.” Craig swallows, and I can see tears forming in his eyes. “I don’t want to find out and be wrong.”
But then two shots pop off, echoing madly in the forest, and I hear the sound of rock chipping away beside me. He’s not gone. He’s still very much here, still very much hunting us.
I’m trapped. If I get up and run, I’m going to expose myself to the man that’s trying to kill me. I’m going to be alone in a forest that extends for hundreds of miles on each side. And so I must stay here, cowering and useless, hoping against hope that somehow he runs out of bullets or gives up.
I want to get up and move forward, but I can’t. I have no idea where the bullets are even coming from. What if I ran straight into the gunman? What if I attempted to run and all I did was deliver myself to him like a neat little package?
I’m trapped.
“I don’t know what to do,” I tell Craig. “What do we do?”
Craig doesn’t answer. When I turn to face him I see that his eyes carry a dull glaze, and his mouth is slacked open. Only then do I see the hole just above his left eyebrow and the white fragments of his skull that have chipped away like a broken rock. Blood babbles from the wound like the brook we passed not but ten minutes ago.
It’s then I realize that to live I must move forward. I can only stay huddled behind a boulder for so long before my own bullet comes. It is terrifying, and it takes everything in my body just to get my legs to push me upward, but once I do I realize that I am alive.
More shots ring out, and my heart is hammering against my sternum and my backpack is emptying Gatorade onto the dirt behind me, but for now I am alive, I am moving forward, and I will not look back.
About the Authors
We (Brandon and Bryan) are a pair of fraternal, mostly unrelated twins. Bryan is from just outside of Denver, Colorado and has never left because of a fear of the outside world. His glowing white skin is a testament to this. And Brandon was once from the same city but moved to Chicago, Illinois to pursue his dream of dodging stray gunfire. He’s back now. Please don’t shoot him.
When we aren’t penning collaborative novels together, you can find us throttling our livers at the local bar, posting politically incorrect web-comics, or indulging in one of life’s greatest victories: a beer in the shower (separately, we assure you—get your mind out of the gutter).
Our collaborative novels include: The Sensationally Absurd Life and Times of Slim Dyson, Dead and Moaning in Las Vegas, The Missing Link, the short story collection The Graveyard Shift, and the popular web-comic, www.abeerfortheshower.com . And unless you’re a tax collector or a Nigerian internet scammer, you’re also invited to e-mail us at [email protected]. Love and/or hate mail is always welcomed.
We also have solo e-books available through amazon.com. Bryan’s is a humorous novel about a love story between a man and a blow-up doll entitled Demetri and the Banana Flavored Rocketship. And Brandon’s book is a collection of 21 dark and spooky short stories called Chasing the Sandman.
The Graveyard Shift Page 21
