Where The Bodies Rest: A Heart-Stopping Psychological Thriller

by Kate Sten

  ‘I am getting you the cash, okay. So just stop antagonizing him already. He is just a kid.’ Molly expressed her displeasure at the scruffy man’s heavy-handedness.

  Scruffy man sucked his lips and steadied his feet. It just occurred to me that he had been walking with a slight limp. It seemed likely that he had sprained his ankle doing something that was most likely clandestine in nature. Those stiff, uncaring eyes in his head did not look as if they belonged on the face of a choir boy.

  His grip on me had not slackened, and I felt myself being hauled even closer towards him like I was a dog on a very short leash, his unkempt fingernails crawling over my skin. The pointy, grubby things stuck out of his gloves and were as rough as jagged edges of uncut wood with every prickly splinter poking you wherever such prodding wasn’t wanted.

  ‘Not so hard. It hurts,’ I shrieked under the strain of his hurtful hands.

  ‘Quit your bitching, little runt. I haven't even started yet. Kids today are just too damn soft and too spoiled. You lot get it easy - That's the problem. A good belting on the backside ought to straighten you up and quieten that lip you keep flapping so willfully,’ The scruffy man shook a fist at me, baring his bare knuckles right in my face where I could see them.

  He didn’t hit me. He just put the freaking fear of God in me in that particularly tense moment. I dared not spit out another word. My tongue stuck to the roof of my pallet like superglue and I remained rooted to the spot where I stood in front of the psycho burglar.

  The ATM made the drum roll noise and the money fell out. Molly snatched the cash from the machine - a couple of neat twenties and shoved it right in the scruffy man’s extended hand. He shoved me forward towards her and proceeded to count the money.

  A threatening frown soon appeared on his face. ‘What the hell is this? A hundred fucking pounds? What the fuck am I supposed to do with that! Buy a few pints of milk maybe!’

  ‘I was overdrawn on that card. I don’t have an extra penny to my name. That is all the cash I have got left in the world.’ Molly pushed me behind her, using her body as some sort of defensive wall. ‘Just take it and leave us alone!’

  ‘And what am I supposed to tell the missus? That I brought home a few measly pound notes because you were too cheap to pony up or I was too stupid to believe your bullshit?” The scruffy man walked in circles around us, his eyes focused on me, no doubt waiting for an opportune moment to steal me away from Molly.

  He soon lost his cool and tugged on Molly's clothes. They grappled for a moment or two but he was stronger and threw her to the ground. She reeled from the fall and gnashed her teeth, still sore from the bruises she had sustained from the car accident.

  He shuffled quickly towards me to grab me again but I ducked and ran under his feet. He wasn’t too pleased with that. His hands fumbled around and he dragged out a gun and pointed it at Molly, his eyes reddened with rage. ‘Play time is over, you little shit! Get over here or ill scatter her brains all over the snow! Red is not so pretty when it's blood and brains. You can quote me on that one.” The scruffy man sucked his lips and shook the gun threateningly.

  I went to him without hesitation. I did not want him to hurt Molly with the gun in his hand. His finger was already snugly resting on the trigger. There was no other play than to at least adhere to his whims, at least for the time being.

  ‘Is this how you get off? Harassing defenseless women and children!’ Henry strolled right in front of the gun, his eyes bereft of fear - A weirdo like the locals said he was.

  I did not hear nor see him walk up the path behind us. He must have been a light walker. That was probably why they called him freaky Henry. Creeping up on people must have been his super power if he were a super villain.

  ‘Do you want to die, pretty boy? Is that it?’ The scruffy man laughed at Henry's brashness.

  Henry turned his back and appeared to be walking away from confrontation. The scruffy man saw this as a win and gloated, ‘Yeah, that's what I thought! Run on home to mommy, you big dopey baby!’

  The scruffy man did not see it, but quick as lighting, a fist came crashing into his cheek, dropping him instantly. He was knocked out cold on the floor with the gun still in his slackened grasp.

  ‘Is he?’ Molly asked, crawling towards the sprawled body of our assailant.

  ‘No he isn't dead. Just out cold.’ Henry laughed confidently.

  ‘Shouldn't we call the police to lock him up or something?’ Molly staggered up to her feet, shaking the haze away from her drowsy eyes.

  Henry paused for a minute to think on what Molly had just said and put his big, strong hands over her shoulders, looking her straight in the eye, ‘Don’t worry about him. I don’t think the coppers would lock him up for long for possession of a toy gun. The only thing that fake gun will be doing damage to is a man made of straw.’

  Molly shook her head in agreement, recoiled from Henry's slack grasp and strolled towards me. Her hands locked in me, I was led away from the shop and through the brightly lit roads. She made sure we walked over the pavements, safe from any oncoming vehicles bounding towards us.

  She might not have noticed but I saw her smile as she swung her neck to the left to catch a brief glimpse of Henry - the knight that had come to her rescue. Though he did look pretty good even though he did not have a steed beneath him when he blindsided the scruffy man with a sucker punch.

  The sad, blue, lost eyes in his face and the soft spoken confident tone of his voice must have gotten under her skin. I hadn't seen her look at anything with such unshakable fascination. It was as if she was being pulled by an invisible lasso towards that guy.

  I had to pinch her hand to regain her attention which was anything but sustained and coherent.

  ‘Shouldn't we be getting home? It is getting cold out here!’ I shoved my hands deep in my pockets and hopped from one foot to the other.

  ‘Oh sorry! I was just making sure Henry wasn’t getting into any trouble back there with that ruffian.’ Molly waved her hand casually, grinning stupidly without much logic behind her sheepish smile.

  It was Henry, now? Whatever was going to happen next? She barely spoke to this guy before the car crash, now she is flippantly uttering his first name.

  ‘He can handle himself. He is big and strong. Let's get out of the snow, already.’ I kicked up a storm, protesting Molly's mindless gawking at the fit neighbour who had just saved our bacon.

  ‘Sure! Sure, Henry! I mean John!’ She almost bit her tongue correcting herself.

  ‘My name is John - J-o-h-n. And not Henry.’ I fumed, folding my hands in indignation at Molly.

  THIRTEEN

  JOHN

  The door was still broken. Molly had wedged it shut with a chair, pressed against the door knob. The bags under her eyes in the morning indicated that she had not slept much the night before. She traipsed past a sink full of dirty dishes rather casually and stretched her arms out, letting out a protracted yawn.

  What was that she was wearing?

  I hadn't recalled her owning such an item of clothing. The sleeves were way too long for her arms and her entire body seemed to have disappeared within the centre of it. Her thighs were exposed and the furry flip-flops that clung over her feet were the only things on her that seemed to be hers.

  She frantically scrubbed a frying pan with a scourer, her lips pouting and her eyes positively glowing with merriment.

  ‘These words are my own. Straight from the heart. I love you. I love you. I love you,’ Molly burst into shameful, unapologetic, carefree singing.

  Pan wiped dry, she hurriedly placed it over the biggest ring on the cooker - The one that got the cooking done more quickly. An strong, sweet scent of peppers sizzling in the pan rushed through my nostrils. The smell caused my nose to itch and an explosive sneeze rumbled out of my widened nostrils.

  ‘Are you trying to suffocate me? You know I don’t like peppers! They make me... Acheww.’ I paused briefly rubbing my nose for comfort. ‘Peppers make me s
neeze.’

  ‘Yes I get that. I was just trying to be polite to our guest.’ Molly batted her eyes at me for daring to raise an objection to her pepper frying.

  ‘What guest? Since when did we have guests?’ I snapped impatiently.

  ‘Henry of course!’ Her eyes lit up like a light bulb. ‘Henry loves peppers in his omelette. He was kind enough to offer to stay over last light in case that mean man came back.’

  ‘We don’t need him. We would have been just fine, the both of us, you and me. We are a team aren't we?’ I raised a brow and flew into a small strop.

  ‘You have heard of guardian angels, haven't you?’ Molly giggled, placing an arm on my shoulder, her eyes looking straight at mine.

  I shrugged my shoulders and acted aloof, as if I wasn’t on the same planet as she was. And I really wasn’t. she seemed to have been overtaken by a warm sort of glow that seemed wholly repugnant to me. The persistent glimmer in her eyes just repulsed me, mostly because it seemed almost robotic, as if she had somehow been programmed to be in that state.

  ‘Well, I shall illuminate you on what a guardian angel is. They are sort of a bit like fairies but they watch over us, keep bad things away from us.’ Molly took the time to explain.

  ‘I hope he doesn't mind smelly feet?’ My lips dropped into a bow.

  Molly slapped my thighs with a cloth, her brow raised disapprovingly at my comment. ‘You take that back, John. I do not have smelly feet.’

  I ran to the living room and she chased after me. I found a hiding place beside one of the sofas. She walked straight past me, and somehow instinctively stopped right in front of the exact sofa where I had wedged myself between that item of furniture and the wall.

  ‘I can see your foot John. Now, you get out here and take your tickle like a man.’ Molly climbed over the sofa and dug her fingers into my sides, tickling the hell out of my ribs.

  Tears dropped fell from my eyes and I exploded into a fit of laughter. They were the giggly kind of tears.

  She had lifted me up, suspending me upside down in her arms. I could see him. I could see Henry chiseling away at the door. He seemed to be in some sort of sleeveless sweat shirt, working furiously on our broken door frame. He seemed to be deep in concentration, restoring what he could on the wooden frame.

  ‘Do you think that will hold? Will we need to call a tradesman in to do something to that? What is the prognosis?’ Molly dropped me close to the door where Henry had stooped low.

  ‘Most of the wood is in good condition. I just needed to add a bit of extra wood to replace the hollow parts. The glue and nails should hold the frame. Just a few more bashes and this door frame should be almost as good as new.’ Henry smiled.

  ‘You have no idea how glad I am that we do not have to spend money on a new frame. This month really has been hellish for my finances. The outgoings were just completely outrageous.’ Molly rubbed her palms together, brimming with excitement.

  FOURTEEN

  HENRY

  Face cap over his head, and eyes frantically scanning the area, a gaunt, slender man stood in front of a family residence - somewhere he was familiar with and had been before.

  He was not on edge or nervous but his hands trembled terribly, exposed to the harsh cold. The holes in his gloves barely kept the punishing frost at bay. Face bitter as a vinegar condiment, he cursed at the empty howling wind. ‘Bloody frost! Can a guy not catch a break from this shitty weather?’

  Bending his lanky frame slightly, he stood unsure of whether to smash his fist into the front door, or to simply wait outside to be tended to by whomever he seemed to be so desperately looking for.

  ‘You have some nerve showing up here.’ Henry's stern voice forced the guy in the face cap to turn around.

  ‘Don't fucking do that! You almost gave me a heart attack!’ His facial expression shifted from scared witless to relieved.

  Henry beamed a cross look at the guy in the face cap, ‘Keep your bloody voice down. What if Molly and the kid hear you? Can you imagine how that would look?’

  ‘I suppose I could imagine how that would look? I could imagine how she would feel about her new hero man-friend being all cosy with the guy that mugged her?’ The guy in the face cap pouted a bit and poked Henry in the chest with a straight finger. ‘Do you think she wouldn't smell a jock-sized rat and uh, I don’t know, maybe call the pigs on you? She is sweet on the eye, I admit, but she is far from being brain dead!’

  Henry's breathing deepened, his nostrils flaring up with tempestuous anger towards the other man in front of him. The skin on his knuckles tightened as the bones crunched in his hand. He could scarcely contain the urges to do something savage to the blackmailing scum before his rage-filled eyes.

  ‘You know what? There is a hot cup of tea with your name on it brewing in the kitchen. You should come in and warm up. Your hands look like popsicles.’ Henry patted the haggard-looking man on the back, smiling briefly at him.

  He had come crawling out of the woodwork like the cockroach that he was, cap in the hand, asking for more money. The man in the face cap seemed slightly apprehensive at Henry's sudden change of tone but his own ego was hard to roll away from his own eyes.

  ‘Now that is what I call service with a smile. What about your new girlfriend? Aren't you bothered about her seeing us together?’ The guy in the face cap raised a brow in suspicion.

  ‘She is out shopping with the kid. I gave her my credit card.’ Henry squinted and grinned confidently, placing his arms loosely on either side of him.

  ‘You are a braver man than me, giving a bird a credit card to go on a guilt-free spending spree.’ the guy in the face cap shook his head, laughing as he walked past the front door which Henry held open for him.

  He was offered a table that faced a pair of sliding doors. His reflection portrayed the contentment on his face as he seeped the warm tea from a generic white tea cup which did not have any hallmarks etched on some obscure part of the crockery. He took a deep whiff of the strong lemon smell rising up to his nostrils from the hot liquid in the cup and exhaled. ‘This is good strong tea. I can feel my brain freeze melting away. My whole head was starting to feel like one giant ice cube.’

  ‘Glad to see that you are in good health. We wouldn't want you falling apart like Bert,’Henry turned his back to the man he had invited in to sup with him.

  ‘Ahem… Who is Bert?’ The man in the face cap cleared his throat.

  ‘The snowman, of course. The kid made me spend all day with him building that hideous thing. Shame that the wind had to blow his head right off,’ Henry arched his lips, as he slowly turned his face backwards, taking a full measure of the man behind him. ‘The kid will be rather upset.’

  The man in the face cap slurped. ‘I am sure that little scrote will find a much more fulfilling way to entertain himself than fooling around with snowmen. Whatever happened to a decent water gun fight, or throwing rocks at the neighbors cars?’

  Henry shifted his gaze from the scrawny emaciated man who seemed to be comfortably sat in the chair behind him, clearly irritated by his choice of language and the sheer crassness of him. He bulked at the prospect of actually breathing the same air as the lowlife perched on a chair, a few inches away from him.

  ‘So about the money? Tell me you have got it under a pillow somewhere, preferably as unmarked bills?’ The guy in the face cap spat, fingers wrapped tightly around the warm cup on the table.

  ‘Yeah, I shall just go pull that out of a sock while I am at it. You are an incorrigible one, aren't you?’ Henry's tone went almost inaudible.

  The other man in the room heard what was said and exploded into irrepressible laughter, his eyeball watering with hot salty tears that trickled slowly down his cheek.

  ‘Did you ever think of being a comedian? Seems like you’ve got a knack for it!’ Guy in the face cap struggled to choke back the laughter that was erupting from his chest.

  Henry laughed along with him, patting him repeatedly on the back in a con
vivial sort of manner. ‘Yes I should really remember to stick that one on my resume. Clowning around does seem to rub off rather well on me.’

  ‘Tell me are you a rum or gin man?’ Henry's smile receded, and a more calm ardour prevailed.

  ‘Me? I will drink anything that doesn't taste like it belongs in a kids lunch bag!’ The man in the face cap gave the thumbs up. ‘If you’ve got anything strong? Lay it on me!’

  ‘Sure. You wont be standing after you’ve had this.’ Henry smirked brandishing an unscrewed bottle of Bombay sapphire.

  The lanky man's face lit up, as if all his Christmases had come to him all at one, rolled up into a large bottle of dry gin. He knew the strength of it. That was near neat alcohol in that shiny bottle. He licked his lips and his hands shook in rabid anticipation of wetting his throat with the contents of that bottle.

  The eyes in his skull were completely enthralled, and tracked the migration of the contents of the bottle into a shot glass. ‘Hell yes, I am downing that!’

  ‘Hit me again!’ The enthused skinny man in the face cap ordered.

  ‘Are you sure that's a good idea? This is pretty strong stuff?’ Henry asked, his face looking rather concerned. ‘Besides you're going to need to be able to walk to take the money you came here for home to Leticia. You know she will kill you if you show up drunk with just your man parts in your hands after someone robs you of it in the streets because you were too off your face on booze to fight them off.’

  ‘Huh? What are you, my mom? Fuck Leticia and those runts of hers! I would need to DNA those runts to believe their mine! I get told that the fat sow has been putting it about every time the pigs take my liberty so you see - I don’t owe the bitch fuck all!’ His tone got less amicable and his fist curled up into a ball as he struck the table. ‘Hit me again, now!’