They tried the windows, the sole route of escape. They were unlocked. But they would not open.
It was as if they were trapped in some nightmare world, a land in which the Stranger was a god, and Brains and Shorty were helpless captives.
Fierce hits bombarded the door: thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud ...
Brains and Shorty edged in front of Jason. Jason was sprawled in the recliner, head lolling, legs splayed before him. His chest rose and fell slowly.
“Jason, wake up!” Shorty said. He opened Brains’s bottle of ice water and dumped the water on Jason’s face.
Jason did not awaken.
The crack of splitting wood called their attention away from Jason. A fissure mapping the length of the door had appeared.
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud ...
More cracks crazed across the door.
Brains aimed the gun. He had an absurd desire for the door to give way, so he could see what the Stranger looked like. If he could only see him, he might not be half as frightened as he was now.
The bolts popped off the doorjamb and clattered to the floor.
Brains held the .22, held his breath.
One last, savage whack: thud!
Like a chopped tree, the door fell forward, Brains’s finger sweating on the trigger, about to fire ...
And the instant the door should have struck the floor, Brains found himself sitting in the chair, in front of Jason.
“What the fuck?” Shorty said. He was back in position beside Brains. The camcorder rested on his shoulder.
Brains’s mouth had dropped open. He shut it, swallowed.
He pulled up his pant leg. The .22 he had clutched only seconds ago gleamed in his ankle holster.
He examined the door. It had only a few nicks and scratches, the same markings it had borne for years. He opened it. He heard Shorty’s parents watching TV downstairs.
Shorty lifted the window. “It doesn’t look like there was a storm outside. I don’t see a drop of rain on the glass, and the sky’s clear.”
Brains attempted to move the bed. It shifted easily.
He read his watch. It read 8:32, which meant only one minute had passed since he had last looked at it. He was sure he had checked the time about five minutes ago. All of those weird things could not have occurred within one minute.
His heart pounded painfully.
Jason groaned. His eyes had rolled back into their normal position. Brains noted that Jason’s face and shirt were dry, too, though Mike had dumped a bottle of water on him to try to rouse him from the trance. The water could not have evaporated so quickly. Impossible.
Blinkly slowly, clearly disoriented, Jason looked at them. “Hey, fellas, what’s going on?”
“You don’t know?” Shorty said.
“The last thing I remember is sitting down, then Brains telling me to close my eyes. Why? Did something important happen?”
“Yeah,” Shorty said.
“What?” Jason said.
Shorty looked at Jason, then at Brains.
“We don’t really know,” Shorty said.
* * *
In Shorty’s basement, after Brains and Shorty related to Jason what had happened, Jason rose from the sofa and paced. His mind was spinning.
“Then this is what we know, fellas. I’ve had this friend since I was four years old. I can go to wherever this guy lives, but no one else can go there. I used to be really close to him, felt I could depend on him for anything. And lastly, I don’t want to tell anyone about him, because I’m scared no one will understand.” He stopped pacing, shook his head. “Well, even with knowing all of that stuff, I can’t tell you who the Stranger is, or why he’s doing these things. It’s a mystery to me.”
“I figured as much,” Brains said, sitting on the sofa. “We weren’t able to tear down your memory block. We were interrupted.”
“Ambushed is a better word,” Shorty said, seated beside Brains on the couch. “When the Stranger came, he tore shit up.”
“Did you catch it on tape?” Jason said. “Maybe if we watch what he did, we can find some more clues.”
“I got everything,” Shorty said. “I’ll show you.”
Shorty walked to the VCR, which sat atop the TV. He switched on the machine and inserted the videotape on which he had filmed the hypnotic regression. He pressed PLAY and returned to his seat.
Jason sat on the overstuffed chair beside the television and watched.
On the large screen, Brains was sitting in front of Jason and speaking to him.
“Okay, Jason. Lean back in the chair and relax. “
Shorty picked up the remote control and fast-forwarded the cassette. Colorful images twitched and blurred. He pressed Play again.
On the screen, Brains talked.
Jason, it’s now three-twenty on that same day. “What are you doing?”
Tension draws Jason’s face taut. “When he speaks, his voice is pained.
“I’m arguing with Mom. She’s drunk, and she won’t leave me alone. Why does she keep beating on me?”
Viewing that segment of the recording twisted Jason’s stomach. Thankfully, Shorty fast-forwarded the tape again.
He pushed PLAY.
On TV, ensconced in the recliner, Jason spoke.
“There,” he says. “I’m finally at the top, resting between a couple of limbs.”
“What are you going to do up there?” Brains asks.
“Not much. I rest my head against the trunk, look up at the sky, and see thunderclouds. I can smell rain coming, but I’m going to stay up here anyway. I just want to clear my mind and forget everything. I close my eyes, let out a deep breath, and just listen to different sounds around me. Birds, a car honking, dogs barking, the wind blowing. Then, I hear a voice.”
Brains jumps forward. “Whose voice?”
“My friend’s.”
“Your friend is talking to you?” Brains asks.
Jason nods.
Brains leans on the edge of his seat.
“What does your friend say?” Brains asks.
Jason smiles.
“He says ...” Jason says, and then his tone abruptly changes, becoming deep, sonorous, and nothing like his natural voice.
“I’m here.”
Suddenly, electric snow consumed the screen.
“Hey!” Shorty rushed toward the TV. The instant he reached the television, the screen cleared. The camcorder focused on Jason slumped in the recliner. But Shorty, out of view, spoke.
“What the fuck?” Shorty says.
Brains’s mouth has dropped open. He shuts it, swallows.
The camera abruptly panned to the floor. Then it was shut off. Snow filled the screen again.
Shorty switched off the VCR and television. He stood in the center of the room, fists on his waist.
“Shit, I don’t get it,” he said. “I got everything. But nothing that the Stranger did is on there. It’s been erased, man.”
“If it was ever on tape to begin with,” Brains said. “But I guarantee you, Jason, it actually happened. Whatever it was.”
Jason looked from Shorty to Brains. “You say your watches froze?”
They nodded.
“And you saw this really fierce storm that ended in a flash, without a trace that it had ever hit?”
They nodded.
“And the Stranger made the lights go crazy, pounded on the door, and trapped you guys in the room by making it impossible for you to move anything?”
“Hell, yeah, man,” Shorty said.
‘That’s exactly what happened,” Brains said.
Jason tapped his lip.
“I have an idea,” he said. “It’s a wild one, but listen. If all the amazing stuff you guys saw had happened in the real world, Shorty would have recorded it. But it didn’t show up on the tape. So maybe it took place ... somewhere else.”
“Somewhere else?” Standing in front of him, Shorty frowned. “Like where?”
“I don’t
know,” Jason said. “I guess somewhere different from here. Different from here, but the same in a lot of ways. Kind of like a ... parallel dimension.”
Shorty and Brains looked at him speculatively.
“It’s a crazy idea,” Jason said. “But the only other answer is that you guys hallucinated everything. Just imagined it all. I know you don’t buy that explanation. I sure don’t.”
“I don’t either,” Shorty said. “Man, I was wide awake.”
“Besides,” Brains said, “how could both Mike and I hallucinate the same incident, down to the smallest detail? The idea that we could have shared a delusion is really unlikely. On top of that, why did our watches freeze at eight-thirty-one? My theory is that it’s a signal that we’ve entered another zone or dimension, in the same way that your ears popping is a signal that you’re entering a different altitude. The moment everything went back to normal, my watch ticked onto eight-thirty-two, and I know at least five minutes had passed.”
“Five minutes of hell,” Shorty said.
“Yeah, the time thing sounds like a signal to me,” Jason said. “The storm might be a sign, too. We should look out for that stuff, in case we’re pulled into that place again.”
“I hope we aren’t,” Brains said. “The Stranger seems to be a god there. I couldn’t move a flimsy chair.”
“I couldn’t open a damn window,” Shorty said.
Jason clasped his hands. “Do we agree on this alternate-world idea? Do both of you believe that’s what it is, another dimension?”
“I do,” Shorty said.
“I don’t know what else it could be,” Brains said. “I don’t think there’s scientific proof to support the existence of alternate dimensions—nothing that I know about, anyway—so I’ll accept it as an unsolved mystery.”
“Good,” Jason said. “Then maybe we’ve nailed down one mystery. I figure we should give the place a name, make it easy to refer to. How about ... Thunderland?”
“Thunderland.” Shorty nodded. “Works for me. I ain’t never felt thunder that strong, man. I thought the ceiling was gonna crash down on us.”
“I agree, the name fits, Jason,” Brains said.
“Okay,” Jason said. “I hate to say this, but I have a feeling that we’ll be in Thunderland again soon. I think the Stranger was only giving us a taste of it. Since we have some idea of what it is, maybe we’ll be ready next time.”
Brains and Shorty nodded grimly.
A week ago, Jason would have dismissed a conversation like this as insane. But as the Stranger drew them deeper into his enigmatic scheme, it became increasingly easy to believe the unbelievable. What would he do next to push the boundaries of their minds? If he continued to pile improbability upon improbability, would they ever reach a breaking point? To Jason, it seemed that a world in which anything was possible was a world of madness. Already, the world was a lot madder than it had been last week.
A headache throbbed above his right eyebrow. Probably his brain straining to process and organize these harrowing, incredible events—mind overload. Based on everything they had experienced, he would’ve expected one of them to have passed out from the sheer terror, to have deteriorated into a human vegetable. But they were hanging tough. They were too frightened to slip, lower their guard, get soft. Fear could be the most powerful motivator in the world.
In fact, he doubted he would sleep that night. He was too drunk on adrenaline to relax.
Shorty sat on the couch. “I’m not sleeping, fellas. I can’t. This is getting so wild I can barely keep up. I’m too damn hyper to sleep, I’ll pull all the shifts tonight.”
“I’m wound up, too,” Jason said. “But you shouldn’t watch all night, Shorty. If you do, you’ll be dragging tomorrow.”
“He won’t be alone,” Brains said. He removed his glasses, massaged the bridge of his nose. “I’m not sleeping either. I need to calm down, sort out these issues. I’ll help Mike watch.”
“Well, all right,” Jason said. “Then we’ll all stay up together and watch.” As he regarded his wrung-out friends, his headache intensified. He could feel the gears of his brain grinding and turning fitfully. Like a stressed engine struggling to avert breakdown.
Thomas was not sleeping well. A few minutes past two o’clock in the morning, he climbed out of bed. He grabbed his house robe from the hook on the bedroom door, wrapped it around himself, and shuffled downstairs.
These damn dreams, he thought as he went to the kitchen. In each dream he’d had that night, he drove around Spring Harbor while Jason sat beside him in the car. He stopped at the homes of various women. After he visited each girlfriend, he grabbed Jason’s throat and threatened to kill him if he told Linda. Jason would only stare at him silently, fear and hate burning in his eyes. It was likely the same glare that, as a child, he’d given Big George after he made his rounds to his women.
Thomas wondered if he would ever sleep soundly again.
In the kitchen he fixed a bowl of corn flakes, then headed to the living room. He switched on the TV, turning the volume low so as not to disturb Linda. He settled in the recliner and flipped through channels, slowly eating the cereal. There was nothing on TV worth watching, but anything was preferable to viewing the nightmares that filled his mind’s eye.
As he raised the spoon to his lips, the telephone rang.
Startled, he looked at the phone on the end table beside him.
Who could be calling at that hour? Was there an emergency?
Maybe Big George is dead, he thought, with a spark of hope. He reprimanded himself for thinking such a thing.
The phone rang again. He picked up the handset.
“Hello?” he said.
“Hey, baby.” It was a woman’s voice that he did not recognize. “How are you doing?”
“Who is this?” he said, frowning.
“That’s no way to greet a lady, sweetie.”
“When I get a call at two in the morning, I forget my manners. Now will you tell me who you are?”
She chuckled-a low, throaty sound. “I’m whoever you want me to be, honey.”
This is crazy, he thought. An obscene call from a woman. He had no idea who she was, and he would have remembered her. She had a smooth, undeniably sensuous voice; she would have made a bundle as a phone-sex operator.
“Are you lonely tonight?” she said. “Want me to give you some company?”
“I’m married.”
“Married men get lonely sometimes. Every man can use a friend on the side ... every now and then.”
Guilt churned through him. This woman, whoever she was, could not possibly know about his affair, yet he had the strange feeling that she knew about him and Rose.
“I would be a perfect friend, sweetie. You’d like me. I have what you love in a woman: smooth brown skin, a lean, toned body, nice breasts, a tight ass.”
“I don’t think so.” He could not believe this conversation. He should hang up. But her voice ... he’d be damned if she didn’t have the sexiest voice he’d ever heard. As if by magnetic force, her alluring voice kept the handset pressed against his ear.
“Oh, I think so. I think I want to ride you, baby. I want to take you inside me and squeeze you until you beg for me to let go, and then I want to put my nipples in your mouth and let you suck on them. Would you like that?”
He did not answer. Could not answer. His heart knocked.
“Then I’ll kneel before you and take you in my moist, warm mouth. Does your wife do that for you, baby? I bet she doesn’t. I’ll run my lips and tongue all over it, work it in and out, make chills of pleasure ripple through your body ...”
“Look, whoever the hell you are, don’t call me again,” he said, and hung up. His hand shook.
The phone rang.
He snatched it up. “Hello?”
“I’m in the backyard, sweetie,” the woman said. “Why don’t you come out to meet me?”
“Go to hell!” He slammed down the phone.
Heat flushed his face. That crazy-assed woman had punched his buttons. Her honey-smooth voice and her vivid descriptions of the acts she would perform had fanned his desire to a fever pitch. He was angry at himself for listening to her, for succumbing to lust so easily. He was acting like a damn animal, not a responsible, committed husband.
Like father, like son.
He wanted to go to sleep. He didn’t want to dream, think, or do anything else. He wanted to sleep like a stone and wake up some time tomorrow. He only wanted some peace.
Thankfully, the phone did not ring again.
All hopes for relaxation gone, he clicked off the TV and went to the kitchen to place the bowl and spoon in the sink. Above the sink, there was a window. It provided a view of the backyard.
I’m in the backyard, sweetie. Why don’t you come out to meet me?
Although he was certain the woman had only been teasing him, he peered out of the glass. Thick mist filled the yard; it roiled and churned in phosphorescent waves.
Through the mist, he thought he glimpsed a figure standing near the big oak tree.
It couldn’t be her. He had to be imagining this.
As he watched, the figure approached the house. The fog seemed to part in its wake. Because the fog concealed the ground, however, it appeared that the figure was walking on air.
Now, that was really crazy.
The visitor drew closer, revealed by the light glowing on the back porch. It was definitely a woman, and she had described herself accurately: brown-skinned, a lean, taut physique, full breasts. She was completely nude. Ravishing.
He wanted to look away, couldn’t. He wanted to run, but his feet seemed to be nailed to the floor.
If this was a dream, it was the most lifelike dream he’d ever experienced.
As she came closer, he saw that her face was as beautiful as her body: large, almond-shaped eyes, a generous mouth, and lustrous dark hair.
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