A Place for Sinners
Page 35
“Count yourself lucky I love you, Suzie,” she said, wishing her daughter were old enough to start lying like everyone else. They kissed goodnight, all forgiven. She watched her daughter pull the door shut.
Suzie passed a cabinet full of her gymnastics trophies in the hallway, the glass planes shaking as she bounced along. Her reflection twittered from one family photo to another. Leaping into the kitchen, she slid to the refrigerator in her socks. It was covered in drawings and magnets, school reports and shopping receipts.
Alone at last.
Her father was away on another business trip. Where he went she rarely knew, but she was always glad to see him go, as he never came back empty handed. Once he brought a packet of wind up crayons –the good kind, unlike those some of her friends owned, which would have to be thrown away if you twisted too far– and another time, the ballet shoes.
She watched Sailor Moon over cereal. Afterwards, she pulled her hair into a ponytail and brushed her teeth, the bristles as frayed as the wheat stalks on her uncle's farm after a storm. Suzie didn't see much of her extended family any more, least of all her uncle in Morpeth, not with her father always travelling and her mother sleeping day after day.
Donna Marten found dried toothpaste splashes on the mirror a week later. She licked them off and fell to the floor, her mouth tasting of mint and tears.
Suzie put on her headphones even though the padding itched her ears, and slipped into a pink leotard and tutu. She pressed play on her Walkman and music filled her ears. She slammed the front door as she went into the yard.
In the house a hum escaped the freezer, the grandfather clock ticked. Gentle draughts tickled a wind chime near the window. Donna snored.
Suzie danced to Mister Boombastic on the front lawn. In her opinion, she lived on the most boring street in all of James Bridge, maybe even all of Australia: a rarely travelled stretch of road on the outskirts of town. Suzie had no neighbors, but should a car come along she liked the idea of being seen.
Autumn was hot that year, the house surrounded by matchstick grass. The valley hissed when the wind blew through the dead trees, a desperate, lonely sound.
Suzie spun and curtsied. She laughed to herself. I could do this all day, she thought. And I will!
She loved watching her shadow on the lawn, the way it was a part of her. But when she leapt into the air they were separated. If only she could fly forever, but she would miss her shadow. That would be sad, like losing a friend.
Four hours after she fell asleep, panic reached into the dark and ripped Donna from her bed. Her stomach knotted, brow flecked with sweat. It had not been the sounds of screeching tires, or the muted gunshot that woke her—fatigue had seen to that. It was that her mind had fled her body and her flesh had no choice but to follow.
She threw open the door and ran from room to room. Nothing.
“Suzie!” she yelled. Her voice was feral, unrecognizable as her own. Something inside fuelled her dread. The house was empty.
Donna stumbled outside, her eyes squinting against the sunlight. Pain thudded in her head and shot down her spine. Suzie was not in the backyard. As she rounded the house and neared the front gate, she felt heat waves coming off the brick wall to her right. She fumbled with the latch. Next to her were the trashcans, their stench reaching out for her. The latch opened and the gate swung wide.
Donna ran onto the front lawn and stopped.
The Walkman was shattered near the gutter, ribbons of grey tape fluttering in the wind.
Suzie Marten was strewn in pieces across the road.
Crows fluttered over intestines, disturbing the stillness. One hopped onto Suzie’s head, spread its bloodied wings and squawked. It lowered its beak and bit the child’s tongue, which had been cooking against the tar.
Her daughter’s ballet shoe lay in front of her, distorted by heat waves and the foot still inside. Donna screamed.
Her breath came short as her nostrils filled with the smell; a mixture of burnt chemicals and sugarcane, shit, and salt. She would never forget it. Darkness flittered over her vision. Donna ran to her child. She lashed out at the birds. They twirled and cawed, sprinkling blood drops over her face. “Get away from my baby!” she screamed, arms thrashing. But the beaks returned to meat, making soft stabbing sounds at ankle height. One crow settled on her shoulder, feathers brushed against her cheek. Her world emptied. Color drained from her face. She clambered over gravel. This isn’t happening, she thought. It can’t be. I’m dreaming—that’s it! I’m still sleeping, my baby isn’t torn to pieces. Donna started to laugh, short deep bleats. Parents were not equipped to see such sights; to smell such insane, bitter scents.
She fought the birds again, kicked out, punching. She didn’t comprehend what she was doing until she held one of the animals in her hand. Its scream mingled with her own, formed a single high-pitched mewl that echoed across the fields. Donna let it drop, its wings broken.
Donna fell to her knees and attempted to scoop up as much of her daughter as she could. Her arms swept wide in manic, possessive hugs, pulling the larger chunks close to her chest. Tears slipped down her face. She gave in and settled on the largest intact fragment: Suzie’s head, neck, collarbone and left arm, which hung on by a thread. The birds were hungry and would not let their bounty escape without a fight. They swooped, their black eyes empty.
The chunk of Suzie was only a quarter of the corpse, but Donna thought it was heavier than her daughter had ever been intact. She turned her back to the crows, deflecting swoops and scratches. Without warning the weight in her arms lessened and Donna felt something slap against her shins. Something warm and wet.
Donna was a nurse and assisted doctors in surgery. What she saw sitting on her shins was unlike anything she had ever seen at work. It was small and childlike. A healthy heart that still had many years of beating left to do.
Donna collapsed amid a flurry of dark wings, dark shadows.
The road to forgiveness is covered in blood!
The Fallen Boys
© 2012 Aaron Dries
“The Fallen Boys is like a long fuse that's been lit at both ends, with these two seemingly separate stories burning toward an inevitably explosive collision... I think we've found an exciting new voice in horror fiction."
—FearNet.com
Marshall Deakins has tried to come to terms with the tragic suicide of his young son. But it still tortures him. His search for answers will lead him down a twisted path paved with secrets and grotesque lies. Instead of peace he finds madness, held captive as part of a deranged plan filled with suffering…and blood. As the nature of his captors’ insanity is revealed, Marshall will need to confront the truth about his son and his own past if he hopes to have a future.
Enjoy the following excerpt for The Fallen Boys:
The house was a moonlit carving in the dark. There were no chirping crickets, no birdsong–just winter silence. The sigh of trees. Stacy Norman slept inside, unaware of her role in The Forgiveness. She'd been chosen because she appeared innocent, but she would suffer because she'd committed the crime of kindness.
Her murderer had appeared at her doorstep two months earlier, asking if a particular family lived there. Stacy had smiled at him and told the tall, deep-voiced man no. “Not much help to you, am I? Good luck, though,” she said, and closed the door, catching a glimpse of his smile.
This was the first of three visits he would pay to her house. The second was to scout for hiding places, surveying turns and locating the stairs, accumulating all the information he would need to make the third visit a problem-free affair.
A breath of air through the house, coming from an open window somewhere– it had nothing to do with their entry. Stacy's murderers had used the key under the doormat, which they had discovered on visit number two. Stacy would suffer because she was kind, but she would die because she was trusting.
The tinkle of ladles, suspended from the kitchen range.
It was a small, rented house on t
he outskirts of Preston–redbrick exterior and shingled roof that trembled when the winds blew hard. It was a lengthy commute to work at the architecture firm in Seattle, but Stacy knew it was worth it. There in Preston she had privacy and silence; that was enough for her.
She used to be afraid of living alone but not any more. The solitary life grew more inviting with each passing year. Her loneliness wore thin and soon, her rented redbrick house became a home she was proud of. She didn't own it– but that was okay. Renting taught her the value of patience, of working towards what you want. One day she would live in a house that she herself had designed and paid for. It, too, would be on the fringe of a city surrounded by trees. And silence. Just the way she liked it.
Clocks ticked in the living room. Photographs of Stacy's family from Maine lined the walls, faces trapped under glass. A dog-eared copy of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues was bent over the arm of a chair. She was fifty pages from finishing.
Her diary sat on the desk in the study, an eagle feather marking her place. Her father had slipped it into her suitcase the day she had left home to study in Seattle. That had been six years ago.
James stayed over last night, read one entry. At first I didn't want him to, but I gave in. Not to him, but to my damn hunger. I know that sounds stupid. Hunger. But I don't know any other word for it. I'm not making excuses– it was nice. He was rougher than I like but what the hell, right? He made me coffee in the morning. I think I'm falling hard. I don't know if I want that.
Stacy Norman, the pretty architect who walked the homes of others in her mind, who no longer feared the dark. Stacy, who knew that time was short but life was long– that it was okay to be in love, but dangerous to fall. Stacy Norman slept with the knowledge that the world would be the same tomorrow. Hard and lonely. She could live with that.
The two men were under her bed. They knew what time Stacy returned from work, what time to hide.
Once her breathing had grown labored, they crawled out from under their hiding spot, Stacy's gentle snores the soundtrack to their achievement. Their hearts were beating fast, excited. A little frightened. Stacy was their first.
Not a fingerprint was left behind; there were no stray hairs curled up in the carpet fibers to be found. Not a trace. Just their heavy imprints on the carpet, disappearing in slow motion. They were careful. The musk of sweat-on-dried-sweat radiated from them. They both needed to piss.
Their breathing in the dark.
The man who had knocked on Stacy's door and asked about the family was tall and thin, but full of wiry strength. His comrade was short and solid, a little overweight. Fitting under the bed had been a struggle. The tall man straightened up, looking enormous below the room's low ceiling, stepped forward and flinched when his kneecap popped. The sound shattered the silence. Whatever control they thought they had, disappeared.
Stacy opened her eyes, bolted upright, the mattress creaking under her weight. She wasn't afraid. The old house groaned at night and the trees outside often played music against the gutters. When she'd first moved in, such sounds would send her room to room, armed with frying pan and cell phone, searching for intruders who were not there. True, Maine had its fair share of trees, gutters, old redbrick houses –and intruders too– but this was the city. Her parents had cautioned her about home invasions and suburban drug crime in their thick, New England drawls. So when she heard those sounds in the night she often heard their voices too.
Stace, you got to keep the house bolted tight. Tight as a robin's asshole.
“Jesus, Dad!” They had laughed.
Yessum, always ask who's knocking before you go and open up that door.
“Okay, Mom.”
Maybe we should get you a gun for Christmas.
“Ha, yeah right. There's a spirited idea. No thanks, I think I'll settle for the usual Sears socks and Barnes & Noble gift cards if that's okay with you.”
Once Stacy had learned the noises of her new home, her decision to not get that gun and to leave a spare key under the back door mat was a deliberate one. She refused to live in fear any more.
Stacy Norman would die because she was proud.
In the dim light she saw two white faces bleed out of the darkness. One smiled and the other looked sad. In the fleeting moment between seeing them and the pinprick stab of the needle in her neck, she recognized the faces for what they were. Greek dramaturgical masks.
Comedy and Tragedy.
A Place for Sinners
Aaron Dries
Sometimes, survival is a sin.
Amity Collins has been deaf since she was seven. That was the day the wild dogs attacked, fighting for her bones. The day her father died. This trip to Thailand is exactly what Amity and her brother, Caleb, need—freedom.
As their boat slits through saltwater, Amity, Caleb and the other passengers are having the time of their lives. They watch the island emerge on the horizon. Its trees twitch, as though impatient or hungry. Within its shadows, secrets best kept hidden will be unearthed. Sacrifices will be made. Terror will reach out to grasp Amity, as real and frightening as what’s lurking in the dark.
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
A Place for Sinners
Copyright © 2014 by Aaron Dries
ISBN: 978-1-61922-264-9
Edited by Don D’Auria
Cover by Kanaxa
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First Samhain Publishing, Ltd. electronic publication: May 2014
www.samhainpublishing.com
Table of Contents
Dedication
Part One
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Part Two
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Part Three
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Part Four
Chapter Twenty-Three
Author’s Note
About the Author
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