“No!” she cried, and whirled toward the boy. “Tommy Murchison, you come near me and I will split your head open! I mean it!”
She raised her hatchet tool in warning, although he hadn’t moved toward her or even looked at her yet.
“Sir…” he began, disregarding the weapon being waved in his direction.
“Casey, stop it! We don’t have time for this!”
“Well you better make time, because you are not going out there without me!”
I could barely make out the distant torch of the others disappearing into the darkness to our south. They must have been hustling to have covered so much ground so fast. Considering the scene they left behind, I couldn’t blame them. But it widened the gap that Tommy and Casey would have to make up.
“Tommy, you guys need to go. If you need me to take her hatchet…”
“Don’t you dare!”
I don’t think I’d ever seen her so enraged. She was literally mad to the point of tears.
“You’re not giving me any choice!” I clenched my teeth, suddenly hating this a lot more than I anticipated. “Now stop behaving like this. You’re not coming!”
“Like hell, I’m not!”
“Like hell, you are! You were supposed to be with the others anyway! Who said you could stay with us back there?!”
“I didn’t ask! And I’m not asking now, either!”
“Mr. Garrett…” Tommy deadpanned, “your wife is not on Coventry.”
“Oh, you’re not?” I stared at her with incredulity. “You think youuuuu….”
It took a second, but then I trailed to a stop as the boy’s words finally sunk in. I actually had to pause and replay what he said in my head, before wheeling to face him.
“Waitaminute…what?”
“Your wife isn’t on Coventry,” he repeated in a soft monotone. “I live on Coventry. The cops had it blocked off up at the entrance for half an hour before the lights went out.”
Oh.
I blinked stupidly at the kid, trying to digest that information. He simply stared back, apparently having said all he intended to on the subject. Then the import of his words truly hit home.
Oh!
That changed everything!
If the police had the entrance to Coventry blocked off for twenty minutes before things went to shit, then Stella never had a chance to make it into the neighborhood at all. She might be perfectly okay! She might have turned around and gone elsewhere, but couldn’t call because the cell phones were also blocked. Maybe she had avoided this whole horror show altogether!
At least now there existed a real chance. Real hope that she sat out there, either at a restaurant or a friend’s house, waiting for word on our situation.
And yet…
…and yet that assumed Darla had it wrong and there really was an “out there” for her to be waiting in. Otherwise, she remained lost somewhere out in the same madness without me having any idea where to look for her. The thought of that made me too sick to contemplate it.
So now everything depended on whether the world still existed out there, and I had absolutely no idea if it did or not.
But I knew one surefire way to find out. I needed to get to the cell tower and settle the question once and for all. That would be my primary focus now…
…or so I thought until Casey forcibly reminded me of the clash that led to this revelation.
“You son of a bitch,” her whispered voice broke into my reverie. “You were really going to do it. You were going to go after Mom and leave me behind.”
Oh shit…
What had I done?
I looked over to see her staring at me with eyes way too wide and shiny. She opened her mouth as if to say something else, then snapped it closed and swallowed hard. For a second she appeared to have trouble catching her breath.
“Casey…”
“You were really going to do it.” She shook her head slowly in disbelief, “And just when I started to think I could trust you.”
Nope, I didn’t like where this headed at all.
I’ve never been a big fan of “surly and quarrelsome Casey” but right then I would have happily taken that version of her over this. This wasn’t mad…
…this was hurt.
Which meant I now walked in uncharted territory.
“Casey…” I reached out a hand to lay on her shoulder. “Listen, I was only trying to protect you. I know what it looked like, but I was trying to do what’s right for you.”
“Right for me?!” She shook her head in violent negation and stepped back. “You don’t know me! How the hell can you know what’s right for me?”
“Then I’ll settle for keeping you safe!”
“Safe? There is no ‘safe’, Mark! There’s only left behind. Get it? And now you’re doing the same damn thing! Well, screw you, ‘Dad!’ I’m done with that crap!”
“Whaa…? Casey?”
“You know what? Forget it,” she snarled, wiping an eye, while I tried to adjust to the sudden left field direction her rant had taken. “I was stupid. I should have known better. Forget the whole thing.”
Without warning, she stooped to pick up the lantern, then turned and started marching down the path.
“Casey, hold on!”
“Stay away from me, Mark,” she snapped without looking back. “Just stay the hell away from me!”
I stared open-mouthed at her retreating back, wondering what I had missed.
What in the world? Nobody would mistake Casey for being the clingy type, so what had happened here?
I looked over at Tommy to see if he had any input on the issue. He merely gazed after her, as if he simply happened to be looking in that direction at the moment. Whatever thoughts he had on her outburst, if any, were apparently going to remain unsaid.
“Come on,” I motioned for him to follow with a sigh, “we can’t let her get too far in front of us. Crazy or not, she would just be a snack for some of the things out there.”
It was the usual “God, the silliness women make us put up with” type of sigh us guys often give to each other, but down deep I didn’t feel it. Casey had been hurt, and beyond mad, and I had the growing concern I had crossed some kind of line I might not be able to uncross.
Although I knew I needed to keep my mind on more important matters, I couldn’t avoid the sickening feeling she now left shredded scraps of my “adoption papers” on the asphalt behind her. And the thought of that made me miserable. It started to dawn on me that this time I had really and truly screwed up. But I didn’t know what to do about it, and she had apparently gone past the point of helping me out.
So with a feeling of hollow resignation, I accepted the only option left to me. I would settle for getting her back to Ed in one piece, and then try and focus on what our next step as a group should be.
We followed at a distance of about fifteen feet, meaning the light from our torch overlapped the lantern’s illumination, making for a wider field of vision. There wasn’t much to see. Nothing but the narrow tunnel of the path, bordered by wooden back yard fences on one side and the creek on the other. The narrowness of the confines bothered me, making me worry about our ability to retreat in the event of a sudden encounter.
Fortunately, nothing attacked as we made our silent way in the gloom, although we had two encounters that drove home the madness still threatening to swallow us.
The first was an empty suit of clothes.
It lay in a steaming, drenched heap on the asphalt, complete with socks and shoes. The foul stench of bile and vomit rose from the sodden mess, and none of us missed the implication. Apparently something found modern clothing indigestible. But at the same time, it appeared whoever had worn them hadn’t been so lucky. And although Casey didn’t say a word, she slowed down a tad, allowing Tommy and me to walk a little closer behind her.
The second was the sound of sobbing from over a backyard fence.
We peered through cracks in the wooden slats to see a bald
ing, obese man with a great white beard kneeling next to an expensive gas barbecue grill and a decorative tiki torch in the middle of a brick patio. He looked like the type of guy who could easily get a job playing a mall Santa. At the moment though, he wore nothing but a threadbare wife-beater shirt and striped boxers, and there was nothing jolly about the gasping sobs that shook his frame.
But what caught my horrified attention was the can of charcoal lighter fluid he raised over his head, and the large, segmented worms burrowing into his huge torso.
They looked like legless millipedes, and were thick as a man’s forearm. Whatever they had for heads were buried in large bloody holes they had chewed through the poor bastard’s shirt. I could only guess he had tried to pull them free and failed. Now they squirmed and writhed, as if trying to push themselves deeper into him.
He clenched his eyes shut, and started pouring the flammable liquid over his upturned face. I couldn’t imagine the level of suffering it would take to bring a man to that point. His features bore a look of agonized ecstasy as it splashed over him and soaked into his clothes. Then he picked up a small object from the shelf of the barbecue grill…
…and we turned away, knowing what had to come next.
The fwump of the fluid igniting carried over the fence, and I hunched my shoulders against the anguished howl that followed as we trudged onward down the path.
There had been nothing we could do for him. He had simply been another victim who lost his own private battle against this current madness. There were probably a hundred more being fought out there in the darkness as we moved on…just ordinary men, women, and children who discovered that tonight the monster in the closet was real.
The three of us moved on in silence.
At least these last two reminders of the horrors around us had Casey walking only about five or six feet in front of us now. As selfish as it sounds, I found myself hoping they also tempered her anger at me somewhat…or at least put things in perspective a little bit.
At the same time, the enormity of everything I had witnessed started to put some things into perspective for me as well. While I had only meant to protect her, I realized my attempt to have Tommy enforce my dictates on her had been partially motivated by anger at her staying with us as opposed to retreating with the others. She had been maddeningly difficult when it came to letting me look out for her tonight, and the incident on Howard Circle had been the proverbial last straw.
And like an old writer friend once told me, “Making your decisions based on last straws makes for great drama in books…but in real life it means you haven’t been dealing with something you should have dealt with earlier, and now you are probably handling it the worst way possible.”
Which pretty well summed up what I’d been doing.
I liked to think of myself as the adult in the exchanges we’d had tonight, but now I realized that had been true only in the shallowest of senses. In truth, I’d been as guilty of constantly relighting this feud as Casey, even if I had convinced myself my motives were noble.
And since this whole issue weighed on my mind to the point it took my focus off of other matters—like survival—then the “adult” thing to do would be to try and resolve it. Not just try and win the argument, but figure this damn thing out. Which meant removing my pride and my need to be right from the equation, and truly trying to reach her.
I could only hope it wasn’t too late.
I spent a couple minutes formulating and discarding approaches as we walked. Then, as the jogging path finally started its predicted turn to the right I realized there was only one way to do this that had any hope of working. And it needed to be done before we rejoined the others.
“Casey, stop a second,” I called softly, just as she motioned for us to follow her into a gap in the brush now along the left side of the path.
She stopped, but the shuttered look she turned back in my direction told me that whatever perspective she might have gained the past few minutes hadn’t helped much. Despite the expressionless mask she now wore, I could still see the pain around the edges of her façade.
Whatever this was, it had continued to eat her up inside even worse than me. And as I looked at those veiled, pain-filled eyes, I realized what my real “job” was tonight.
It was being there for her.
And now the time had come to find out how to do that.
“Tommy,” I continued in a quiet voice, “would you mind going a little farther down the path? Casey and I need to talk, and we’re going to need a little privacy.”
###
Tommy didn’t say a word. He simply did as instructed and walked about fifty feet ahead, only stopping at the dim edge of the lantern light. I hadn’t intended him to go quite so far, but I guess if he didn’t mind then I couldn’t complain.
I turned back to Casey to see the girl still standing at the opening in the brush, her arms folded tightly, and staring at the ground with her jaw set. She looked like she expected me to yell at her, but I knew better. She had her own pride, and showing this kind of pain would be the same as showing weakness in her book.
Next to the anger, this would be the other hurdle I needed to cross.
But first things first.
“Casey,” I began, “I need to say something, and I really need you to listen. Okay?”
“Mark,” she growled, still staring at the ground. “Don’t. Just don’t. I know what you’re going to say, and it doesn’t…”
“I’m sorry. I was wrong. You were absolutely right, and I was wrong.”
“…matter anywaaa…,” she trailed off and looked up at me with surprise. I suppose, considering our history of snarky exchanges and below the surface feuding, I couldn’t blame her. Besides, it’s not like apologizing came as a common thing with me anyway.
At the same time I could also see the wariness in her features.
She hadn’t bought anything yet. We didn’t have near enough trust between us at the moment for that to be enough.
“No bullshit,” I continued, as serious as I have ever been, “and I’m not just saying it to try and get you to stop being mad, or calm down, or any other condescending crap like that. I mean it. I’m sorry, and you have my word I will never pull a stunt like that again.”
I watched her absorb that, and think it over for a moment. At least she hadn’t snapped back with something sarcastic and dismissive. That counted as a hopeful sign all by itself.
I could tell at least a part of her wanted to believe it, but I could also tell that desire only came from the part where the initial anger had started to fade. At the moment, I would concentrate there.
The deeper part, where the hurt lay, was where our problem truly existed…but first things first.
“You’ve got every right to be pissed off,” I admitted. “I was thinking of nothing but how I felt about things, and acted a complete asshole.”
I’ll give her credit, she let a golden opportunity to jump in and agree with me pass right then. I guess it showed how serious things were that she let an easy shot like that one go by. Instead she continued to watch me with a guarded expression.
“I truly wish I could undo the whole stupid thing. I mean this from the bottom of my heart. But since I can’t, all I can do is say I am sorry and you will never, ever see another move like that come from me.”
“You promise?”
I think the question popped out before she had truly decided to talk to me. She gave a faint wince as if irritated with herself, but then apparently chose to go with it and watched for my response.
“I give you my solemn word. Never again.”
Casey studied me for a couple seconds longer before looking away and staring off into the darkness. I had pissed her off royally, and I knew I asked a lot for her to let it go this soon. Under normal conditions I would have given her a day or two to cool down. But the conditions weren’t normal and I didn’t have the luxury. Tonight, I could only lay it out there and hope it was enough.
<
br /> I watched her jaw work and wondered if she was thinking along the same lines and trying to make the extra effort. Then she hung her head and gave a long, slow exhale, before raising it to favor me with a look of grudging acceptance.
“Okay Mark, you win,” she grumbled, “Apology accepted.”
I wonder if the relief on my face came anywhere near to matching the weight that lifted from my shoulders. It had been a close thing.
“But just so you know,” she continued, with reproach in her eyes, “what you did back there was a really rotten thing to do. You scared the crap out of me.”
“I see that now,” I agreed gently. “I really am sorry. And just so you know…you scared the living shit out of me after that.”
“I did?” she gave me a doubtful frown. “How?”
And here it came.
I had intended to do it anyway, but this would probably be the best opening to broach the subject I would get. This would be my one chance to truly reach her, and it would take a tightrope walk of trying to convince her to really trust me without scaring her off.
“I thought I had truly blown it with you, Casey. And after what you told Ashlyn, I realized that was something I couldn’t bear to live with.”
“What I told Ashlyn?”
“Yeah, back on Darla’s patio.” I really didn’t like simply standing there, talking down at the girl, so I squatted on my heels in front of her. “Casey, I know I am one of the least qualified men on the planet to be a stepfather. It’s a role I don’t know a damn thing about. But when you told Ashlyn I was your ‘adopted’ dad, I almost forgot to breathe. Words cannot express how honored I was you would even allow me in the same sentence with a word like that.”
She shrugged and looked away, while taking a deep breath. I think she was slightly embarrassed by this speech, but at the same time she hadn’t stopped listening.
“But the thing is,” I now stressed, “I’m screwing it up, and I’m going to need your help to stop doing that.”
“My help?” She eyed me warily again. “What do you mean?”
Nightwalk Page 19
