She swapped cards and played the outraged defender, casting you as the bad guy trying to pawn your guilt off on him. So you’re the evil jerk with an agenda and she’s now the only reasonable one he can trust. You never had a chance arguing with her because you were playing straight while she only played to win. She didn’t care whether it hurt you or not, or whether it caused more trouble between Tommy and everybody else. That ain’t her problem.
There are monsters out there, and Tommy kills monsters. That’s all that matters to her.”
I listened to this little speech in mild amazement. I had never confused Casey for the naive or sheltered type, but this was surprisingly adult stuff. It was also pretty harsh.
“Wow. You really think she’s so cold blooded?”
Casey snorted, and attempted an amused look that did little to hide how badly Ashlyn’s death had affected her as well.
“You’re the mystery writer, and you don’t recognize a…what do they call it…femme fatale when you see one? Well, now you’re meeting the real deal. You should take notes.”
I considered that while glancing over to where Darla gave Tommy a reassuring pat on the shoulder. He didn’t exactly look like he needed reassurance, but he definitely followed her every word. I studied the scene for a second before turning back to Casey and shaking my head.
“I think I’ll pass,” I winced. “Somehow, the mystique is gone.”
“Yeah.”
We both stared into the little fire a minute before I spoke again.
“So how is he doing?” I nodded to where Ed leaned back against the tower support.
She started to answer but got cut off.
“Oh, I’m doing okay,” Ed chuckled with his eyes still closed. “But carrying all this age and wisdom around kind of wears on a man after a few blocks.”
I think Casey managed to turn six different shades of mortified red over the next few seconds.
“I didn’t mean it like that, Uncle Ed!”
“I know,” he groaned, “but I’m feeling it all the same. I’m just resting here a bit while trying to figure out what our next move ought to be. Our goals have gotten clearer, but things are more complicated than before.”
“What do you mean? How?”
“I mean,” Ed opened his eyes, leaned forward, and rested his hands on his knees, “we now know Houston is still out there, and we need to get to it. That’s our goal. But we’ve been pushed off course, and there’s a whole new danger to deal with as well. Mark, you said you saw other things in the sky, right?”
“Yeah,” I suppressed a shudder at the memory. “There’s some pretty bad stuff up there.”
“Which means these trees have been doing us a favor without us knowing it. That’s good for now, but it also puts a serious new crimp in our plans.”
“It does? What’s the problem?”
“The problem is we’re going to run out of trees. There’s a shopping center at the entrance to Coventry Woods and it’s all wide open parking lot. The buildings don’t even have front awnings. We would be exposed to anything willing to come down after us, and we know at least some of those things are willing.”
I realized with dismay he was right.
And the implications were crushing.
To continue on our present course of action would mean attempting to fight our way through whatever ghastly surprises awaited us, only to reach an open killing field for the same type of monsters that had destroyed Ashlyn. It was pointless. Our primary avenue of escape would be a deathtrap.
“So we’re stuck then?” Casey asked softly. “We hole up here and hope for the best?”
“Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” a new voice cut in.
We looked up to see Allen Treadwell had quietly slipped out of the shed and now walked toward us. He still didn’t look well, but better than before. He leaned the shotgun against the leg of the tower, then eased himself to the ground next to Ed.
“Sure, we don’t have food,” he continued, “but we didn’t have any before. And at least this place is defensible. We’ve got two lines of defense, and shelter if the weather gets crazy too. And unless something stumbles right on top us, we’re pretty much invisible in all directions. We’re probably set up better right now than anybody else in the neighborhood.”
“Allen,” I shook my head, “that’s not really true. Like I told Ed, there are all kinds of things up there in the sky. Nasty things. And while I don’t think the type of monster that got Ashlyn can reach us, there isn’t a damn thing in the world preventing some of those other things from landing up there in the dark and crawling right down to us.”
That brought him up short.
“Shit,” he breathed, looking up to where the tower disappeared into the blackness. “There’s a cheery thought. But what can we do? Ed says we’re out of options.”
“Not exactly,” Ed grimaced. “I only said Plan A isn’t going to work anymore. There’s still another way out of here, if we decide to take it. Otherwise, this place is about as safe as we’re going to get.”
Allen gave him a doubtful look.
“You mean heading for the nearest edge of the neighborhood and climbing over fences?”
“No,” Ed shook his head, “that’s the absolute last resort. Getting Mrs. Treadwell over multiple fences would be difficult, and very hard on her. Not to mention, I’m not the greatest fence climber myself. Nor would I want to go through dark back yards I can’t really see into. I prefer to stick to the roads, if at all possible, or at least the paths.”
“So what’s left?” I chimed back in. “There are only two entrances to Coventry Woods, and we’ve eliminated the one we were heading for as too dangerous. The other one is on the north side of the neighborhood and a whole lot further away. I hate to say it, but if that’s Plan B, then our odds may be better hiding out here and keeping a close watch on the tower up there.”
“Oh, I agree,” Ed nodded. “The north entrance isn’t a realistic option. It’s too far, and even if we did make it we would still have to come a ways back down the highway to get to the overpass over the train yard.”
“So that’s it then…”
“But,” he held up a finger, “we’ve been thinking a little too conventionally when it comes to roads and entrances. There is a third way out of here. And the good news is, it’s nearby and we would have tree cover all the way to the highway. Better yet, it would land us almost across the highway from the southern overpass crossing the train yard.”
“Really?” I blinked in surprise. “That’s great…or at least it is if you didn’t use the words ‘good news’ to imply there is bad news too.”
“I’m not sure there really is,” he shrugged. “But if so, then the bad news is it would mean walking through Woodlawn Gardens. If you follow Deer Ridge, there’ll be a gravel utility road off to the left right before it turns north. That little road leads to a back service gate into Woodlawn Gardens. Go in there, and we could follow the little road inside all the way to the front. Then it would only be a short distance down the highway to the Crossroads Store and the overpass would be right across the road.”
I started to voice a concern, but another new voice entered the conversation.
“Woodlawn Gardens?” Darla’s voice rang out. “Are you crazy? Woodlawn Gardens is a cemetery!”
Apparently her hearing was as sharp as her tongue. She paraded back over to our little circle, with Tommy following as silent backup. They made a strange looking pair, like the head harem girl with her palace guard in tow.
It would have been a ridiculous scene if the “guard” in question wasn’t a possible murderer with real blood on his hands.
But I guess the way I almost automatically saw them as a pair drove home Casey’s point about Darla’s motives earlier. She had played the situation perfectly. And I had handed him to her on a silver platter. Now with Tommy lined up behind her, she presented even more of a force to be reckoned with.
“True,” Ed shrug
ged. “But I don’t see how it’s any more dangerous than anywhere else.”
“Then maybe you haven’t been paying attention to current events! The normal rules are gone. Get it? There are monsters out there! And now you want to go traipsing through a graveyard!?”
“Monsters,” Ed agreed, “not ghosts. Think about it, Mrs. Dower. Everything we’ve seen tonight has been monstrous, but it’s all been animals and plants. Bad stuff, frightening stuff, but it’s all been biological. Not supernatural.”
“Oh, really? What about all those people who won’t wake up? And what about the way the world seemed to fall down like it did when this whole thing started? How is that ‘biological’?”
“I’m pretty sure one caused the other,” Ed shrugged. “And I’ll agree the whole event was different. But that doesn’t make it supernatural. It just means we don’t know all the facts yet.”
“Yeah?” she retorted with hands on hips. “Well you’re gonna have to do a whole lot better than ‘not knowing all the facts yet’ for me to start prancing through the tombstones. On a night like tonight, that’s completely insane. Besides, I’ve got a better destination for us in mind.”
“You do?” Ed frowned up at her. “Where?”
“The playground. Ashlyn said she saw a streetlight working at the playground, and there were people there. Remember? Not to mention, we’re already on the edge of the park so it’s even closer.”
“Okay,” Ed frowned up at her, “I remember what she said about the playground, but how does going there help us? We’d still be inside this thing. If we’re not heading for the outside, we’re better off here. At least here we would have defense against threats on the ground.”
“There’s light! There’s other people! Safety in numbers!”
“But,” Allen Treadwell spoke up, “it’s not a solution. We would be risking our necks going out there, only to move to a different spot still inside this whole thing.”
“Maybe there’s a doctor there. A real doctor for your son. There are a few of those living in this neighborhood.”
“Even if there is, he wouldn’t do us any good,” Allen replied softly. “Ethan can’t be helped by a doctor in his pajamas, Darla. He needs a hospital.”
She stared from one man to the other before shaking her head in dismay.
“Aw shit,” she sighed. “I knew it. We’re actually going to do this.”
“Darla,” Allen attempted in a placating voice, “Ed’s right. We need to get out of here. If we’re going to stay inside this thing, then we would be better off staying here with the tall fence and the shed.”
Which went over about as well as expected.
Darla closed her eyes and exhaled through clenched teeth.
“I don’t believe this,” she gritted in a tight whisper. “I simply don’t believe this. There are people and light less than ten minutes away, and we’re all going to die wandering around out there in the dark.”
Her voice shook with real emotion, and I admit for a second there I actually felt sorry for her. Instead of heading for a known oasis of light and fellow human beings, we had chosen to venture deeper into the carnivorous night in search of a border that we only knew “had to be out there somewhere.”
I reminded myself she was as frightened as any of us. And if Casey had been right about her—and I began to truly believe she nailed it—it simply meant most of her decision making was fear-based at its most basic level.
“Darla,” I tried in my most calming voice. “We’ll make it. We’re going to be okay.”
I should have kept my mouth shut.
She whirled on me, her eyes now frighteningly wide and intense. The sudden transformation took me aback. It was like she morphed into someone else right before our eyes. Someone frightening. The sultry harem girl had been replaced by some rabid version of a gypsy wild woman.
“You mean you’ll make it,” she snarled with barely restrained violence. “You always make it! I can see that right now. That’s just who you are. You’re the type who will keep going on, losing one person after another until you go staggering back out into the real world, all alone, with a great big tragic story to share.”
“Wait…what…?” I stammered.
“But what you don’t seem to get,” her voice rose to a screech, “is your ‘co-stars’ in this little drama are real people who don’t want to die either! I know I damn sure don’t! And I don’t intend to! I can see what you are, and there is no way I’m going to allow myself to be the next Sid or Ashlyn or Tony Gallagher in your little march of drama. Not me! You get that?!”
I opened my mouth without really having anything to say, mainly because I found myself at an utter loss of words. As it turned out, Casey filled the void for me.
“Holy shit, Darla,” she sounded slightly taken aback herself, “take a pill.”
“And youuu…” the woman hissed, driving her bejeweled finger at a half-alarmed looking Casey. “You think you’re going to be different? You think you’re the exception? Well, I’ve got news for you, little girl. You’ll be last. It will be down to you and him, and you will be the last tragic death for him to make a big show of sorrow over when he gets back out to the world. And you know what? You’ll be every bit as dead as the rest of us.”
Casey now stared at Darla with open disbelief. I briefly wondered if this crazed exhibition had managed to stun even her to the point of speechlessness.
I should have known better.
“Hey, Mark?” she leaned back slightly and said out of the side of her mouth, as she peered around Darla’s quivering finger at the wild-eyed woman, “I’m afraid Darla’s gone bye-bye on us. I think from this point on we can pretty much replace anything she says with funny monkey noises.”
Which didn’t help at all.
I thought Darla was going to attack her. The fury in her eyes now bordered on the maniacal and I truly feared she would go for Casey’s throat.
Instead, she kept her finger in the girl’s face as she finished up her diatribe.
“Laugh all you want, you little snot,” her voice shook with barely contained rage, “but you better remember this, when it’s down to you and him…you’re next. You understand? You’re…next…”
Casey gave a slow nod, but said nothing else.
Then, with a shaky sneer, Darla turned away and marched back the way she came. She walked with both fists clenched at her sides and her head down, muttering to herself the whole way. Tommy followed without saying a word.
All eyes followed their progress until they stopped at the far corner of the enclosure. Even then, none of us talked for a minute until Casey broke the uncomfortable silence.
“Wow,” she whispered, “Guys, we totally broke Darla.”
Her tone was nowhere near as flippant as her words, and I could tell the other woman’s performance had unsettled her. Darla’s last words had almost come out as a curse, and although I doubt Casey put much stock in such things, being on the receiving end of it couldn’t have been pleasant. And like Darla said earlier, “especially on a night like tonight.”
“Then let’s leave her be,” Ed groaned. “We need to go start getting Mrs. Treadwell ready to travel anyway. Allen, mind giving me a hand up?”
Assorted grunts and groans issued forth as we came to our feet, with Allen giving Ed the requested hand. Despite the fact we had covered less distance than the average neighborhood jogger on any given day, tonight’s exertions had taken their toll. Fighting and running for your life is hard work. The constant fear didn’t help either.
As if on cue, another mighty howl echoed through the night around us.
“What the hell is that?” Allen wondered aloud.
“It’s something to the east of us,” Ed replied, “and we’re going west. That’s all it needs to be.”
“Good point.”
“Casey?” Ed continued as they headed for the little metal shed, “Since I didn’t get a chance earlier, I want to show you how I did a couple of things wi
th Mrs. Treadwell’s splint.”
“Will I need my bag of rags?”
“No, leave them. I’m not rebandaging her, just making sure her splint is still secure. And it’s going to be crowded enough as it is. If we need them, you can always come back for them.”
“Right.”
“Allen, I noticed she’s beginning to run a bit of a fever herself so I want you there to help keep her calm. I’ll give her some more ibuprofen, but I’ve about maxxed her out on the stuff.”
“Okay.”
“Mark?”
“Yeah?” I looked up from the fire. I hadn’t gone with them because of my limited knowledge of first aid, and I didn’t want to be in their way.
“I need you to come with us for a second.”
“Me? Why?”
“It’s really cramped quarters in there, and I’m not the most graceful at moving around anyway. So I’m going to have Allen hand Ethan out to you so we’ll have more room.
“Hand Ethan to me?” I said with slight alarm. It took me a second to remember Ethan was the name of the Treadwell child since he had only been called by name once within my hearing.
“Yes. It’s no big deal, Mark. It’s like carrying any other sleeping child. Allen will hand him out the door to you, and you’ll carry him back over here and lay him gently by the fire. Then just stay with him to keep any ants or other stuff off of him. Can you do that for us?”
“Right,” I winced. “No problem.”
Truthfully, the idea of carrying a brain-dead kid creeped the shit out of me. But I reminded myself that however hard this might be for me, it paled in comparison to the pain Allen and his wife were going through. They still held out hope of there being some way he could be brought back to them, and that probably provided a large part of what kept them going tonight.
I followed them to the shed in abashed silence.
They filed in while I waited beside the door. Light spilled out from the lantern inside, and I caught a glimpse of Agnes lying on the floor. It looked like she had passed out, which probably counted as a blessing, all things considered. I heard Ed muttering directions, then the scuff of Allen’s slippers as he returned.
Nightwalk Page 23
