Raymond rose wearily to his own feet. He noticed the blood on the stoop still pouring from Eric’s wounds. His endorphins tweaked and a cold chill crept throughout his body making him shiver under the already cool, night air. He grabbed the knife once more, this time with both hands, and kept his eyes fixated upon Eric. He pulled mightily, but it did not move. He put his left hand against the door and pulled with only his right; it still didn’t move. He re-gripped the handle, again with both hands, and rocked it up and down.
Raymond heard the wood splintering and saw the small orifice that had once been a peephole widen.
Up and down.
It loosened some, and he could feel it beginning to slip out a bit.
Up and down.
The thin piece of paneling tacked over the actual wood of the door ripped away.
Up and down.
The knife pulled free.
Raymond was beyond appreciative to realize that Eric hadn’t moved other than the occasional jerk or jolt or wince of pain. “I enjoyed that,” he announced. “I really did. The thrill of the chase, you know? Kind of makes it more meaningful; more...more...what’s the word?” He tapped the knife’s blade to his chin like a man pondering some life-altering decision. “Memorable. That’s it. Memorable. I definitely won’t forget this time.”
Raymond inched up to where Eric lay half-in and half-out of the front door. He moved this way until he straddled Eric’s midsection, the heels of his boots lined symmetrically with Eric’s hips. He raised the knife up above his head with both hands. “Goodnight, Eric,” he said as he lowered the knife.
Raymond heard a belated, loud yell, but it wasn’t Isabella. She had yelled, but this one sounded more like a grunt. He did not pay it much mind.
Just as he had the knife lowered to his own chest level and still bearing further down towards Eric’s throat, another befuddled groan roared out, much closer this time. Before he could get the butcher knife lowered down past his own abdomen, a huge WHACK echoed out and a sharp pain shot up his back.
Raymond kept his grip around the knife’s handle as he toppled forward. The tip of the blade burrowed into the concrete and held, leaning at a slight angle, the sharp side gleaming up at Raymond. Raymond tried his hardest to avoid it; even released his grip from around the handle, but it was too late. Once he realized how the knife landed, all he could do was ball his fists up and let his knuckles hit the concrete first and pray they held, pray he had enough strength to hold himself up in a push-up position, hovering above the blade.
They hold briefly, long enough to slow his fall but not thwart it completely. His stomach—just above the navel—scraped the bulk of the blade first, making a small incision much like a pen-prick or laceration from a scalpel. Minimal pain followed, but he still flinched in surprise. The belated jerking of astonishment forced his knuckles to roll forward, scraping each of them atop the concrete in the process, before both arms pivoted out from underneath him.
His abdomen bore down on the blade, forcing it a little deeper as his knuckles rolled, and when his arms flailed outwards from underneath him, he slid forward like a baseball player sliding head first into home plate. The knife spliced from the original incision down to just below his waistline, unsnapping the button of his faded carpenter jeans.
He knew the blade could not have gone too deep, but the blood spewing out and soaking his t-shirt suggested otherwise. He ran his hand over the length of the wound, the blood puddling up between his fingers and then submerging them. His index finger fell at least a quarter of an inch—maybe a half inch—deep into the wound.
It’s going to scar over like a woman that’s had a c-section, Raymond thought as he lay on the ground next to Eric grimacing at the slight discomfort. I’m gonna look like I had a fucking baby. The thought almost made him cackle aloud, but he thought better of it. The laughter definitely would not sit well with the gash on his abdomen and in his present state.
It occurred to him that fighting back laughter was not the only underlying problem at this moment. If he couldn’t laugh, then surely he could not even sit up. Standing was out of the question, but sitting upright was far more important at this point.
One cannot learn to walk without first learning to crawl, came barreling through his mind. “And I cannot stand without first learning to sit,” he blurted out.
Raymond scraped the ground searching for the butcher knife and found it when it sliced into one of his fingers. He found the handle, picked it up, spun it around, and slammed the blade through the softening ground next to the concrete slab leading off the steps that was soaked from his blood. He sucked the fresh droplets of blood from his fingertip, savoring it like a cannibal devouring human flesh. He places his hands (palms down) to the ground, being careful not to touch the blade of the knife again, and tried sitting up.
It felt...right...at first. That was until his stomach rolled forward and tightened up, straining the muscles targeted by a sit-up or crunch. As his intestines barrel rolled and his stomach clinched, a thin sheet of blood the entire length of the wound spurted out and pain emerged, pain that he could think may only equal to having his stomach ripped open by the Jaws of Life.
Raymond screamed as the cesarean-type gash stretched further open, peeling the flesh back. He fell back to the concrete again, trying not vomit at any further explosion of pain. He closes his eyes and envisioned when he had been sincerely happy and not hell-bent on revenge (and yes, there was a time)...back when he had people to call his family. A small smile spread across his face as he began to succumb to the pain and the inevitable doubt lingering in the depths of his own mind: the end of Raymond Jeffery Cahill.
*****
Isabella once again watched the escapades from a safe distance, not the third-story window but from across the way on one of the sun porches. John surprised her by getting up once, but she didn’t expect the same valiant effort on his behalf a second time. Eric seemed to be breathing from what she could tell, but other than the up-and-down heaves of his back and chest, he was not moving. But Raymond—she had a bond with Raymond—she could sense him, feel his heart beating. He was alive but in pain and distress, and unfortunately, as long as his heart still beat, she knew that it would not bode well for the boys no matter how bad his wounds appeared.
The thick blanket of stars in the sky vanished one by one into their mediocre daytime existence. The sun would soon rise. All three of the persons inside the gates of Cahill Manor were awake but not lively.
Raymond continued to envision the better times.
Eric, knocked unconscious by the fall, was coming to. His head throbbed like a pounding migraine; his nose was swollen and distorted; his mouth ached.
John managed to roll to his back. It was painful at first, but when he finally settled into a comfortable position off the concrete and the dew tickled at his wound, it felt soothing (like cold water or lotion on a sunburn).
All three of them had their eyes fixated upon the gaping hole where the front door used to stand erect. Each were seemingly unaware of the others’ presences.
In the doorway, appeared the little girl, Isabella, who had disappeared from her safe haven of the sun porch and reappeared here. Her body omitted a beautiful radiance like none of them have seen before (not even Raymond had seen her like this before). An unearthly radiance. She looked as though she were an angel.
The rest of the dearly departed Cahill family followed out in unison behind her, stepping through Eric one by one as if he wasn’t even there. They were all here to witness the “grand finale”, as Raymond had put it.
John and Eric welcomed them. Angels, they both thought simultaneously. Our salvation. They were both caught up in the obedient radiance orbiting around not just Isabella, but around every member of the Cahill family (barring Raymond, of course) like a deer caught in headlights. Each Cahill now seemed to will the boys, giving them the strength to rise to their feet.
They did.
Their wounds were nearly nonex
istent now. Painless. The boys rose, joining the once seemingly malevolent but now angelic Cahill family. They stood in unison with their saviors, encircling Raymond and watching him closely as if they were watching an escaped and wounded animal from some exotic zoo exhibit.
Finally, Raymond moved.
At first, Raymond watched with the same interest as the boys. The embodiment of his sister was angelic in every sense of the word, but it was something else as well. Something peculiar; distasteful; evil even. It was not until he saw his own brother and father and the rest of his deceased siblings that he came to a bitter and concrete realization.
She—better yet, they—was not his guardian angel at all. She had always been fond of trying to help his victims but never like this. He assumed it was just because she didn’t like or condone the violence, but now...well, she had never been this persistent. So maybe they were Eric and John’s guardian angels, but most certainly not for himself.
Raymond stared in awe as the boys rose to their feet and joined the deceased Cahill family. They were definitely aiding the boys, giving them strength and power, but Raymond knew something the boys did not; something that he assumed his entire dear old family had probably neglected to tell the boys. The empowerment would only be temporary if he, too, could manage to rise to his feet. They think I’m dying and that’s giving the boys’ power. But they cannot interfere directly...not even Isabella. That was the deal.
Raymond’s faint and almost loving gaze changed, turning to those deceitful lunatic’s eyes again. His memories of the good and better times faded away, replaced with misplaced memories of his various victims over the years. With darkness beginning to reclaim its throne within his body, he tried again. Arms out, palms down, and into the sitting position. The pain returned. He ignored it.
He rose cautiously and carefully up on his knees as the boys fell to theirs. Losing your precious power, Raymond thought with a smile. He rose to his own feet. The looks of downright shock on his family’s faces was priceless, and it only fed the darkness.
Raymond bent over and grabbed the knife, spilling out another rush of blood and bodily fluids, but it no longer mattered. It was nearly over now.
*****
“Get up, Eric,” Isabella screamed. “You have to get up now.”
Eric heard her but she sounded distant.
“Eric?”
The blood had now encrusted over his face like a deep-moisturizing mask.
“Please.”
His entire face throbbed as his vision blurred.
“Get up.”
I have to, Eric thought as Raymond once again raised the knife.
“NOW.”
Eric lay on his stomach, half-in and half-out the door. He dug the toes of his tennis shoes into the hardwood floor and leapt forward off the steps. His shoulder dug into Raymond’s abdomen. Raymond shouted obscenities in an agonizing tone. Eric’s shoulder immediately grew warm and wet, ringing with blood from within Raymond’s stomach.
“You fucking punk,” Raymond shouted knowing he had been outsmarted once more. “I’m gonna fucking kill you.”
The blood spilled from his stomach, but Raymond managed to bring the knife down the rest of the way, weakly (weak but with all the strength he had left) down into Eric’s lower back. Eric shouted some obscenities of his own as they hit the ground together. Raymond hit first, and then Eric came crashing down, the butcher knife still implanted in his back, his shoulder still burrowing deeper into Raymond’s wound.
Neither one of them had so much as an ounce of strength left. They both just laid there, totally accepting of whatever may come next.
I’ve got nothing left, John told himself when he heard Isabella screaming. I can’t move. I’m done. It seemed evident for both he and his friend...that was until Eric leapt.
“Eric?” he wanted to scream. “Don’t.” But he was far too late.
Raymond screamed. The knife hit. Eric screamed. They hit the ground simultaneously and lay perfectly still, Eric on top of Raymond.
They’re both dead, John thought now with a certain dreadful clarity. Eric got the son of a bitch...but he got Eric, too.
His back throbbed menacingly, to the point of making him feel incomplete somehow, but he rose to his feet. It felt as if the pain was beginning to subside, but he doubted it. He stepped over to the mass of bodies, and without thinking or hesitating or giving Eric the slightest feeling of grief or pity or compassion, grabbed the black handle protruding from Eric’s lower back and jerked it out. A small gusher of blood followed out closely behind.
John spun the knife around until the blade pointed down and shoved it into Raymond’s chest, being extra careful not to go too low and possibly nip Eric’s shoulder or too high and possibly miss altogether. A loud CRACK broke out as the blade punctured through Raymond’s breastplate. John never would have thought that he’d have strength to do that, not even on his healthiest and strongest day let alone on a night when he was near death.
Raymond lunged upward in shock, tumbling Eric to the ground. He ripped the knife from his chest, and rather than trying to get up again, merely tossed it aside. John could not believe it. Raymond pressed two fingers, index and middle, firmly over the wound, applying as much pressure as possible in an attempt to stop the hemorrhaging as he fell back to the ground, gasping for air.
Was it possible that after all of this, he—Raymond—was just giving up?
*****
John, still operating on pure aggression, knelt slowly and carefully at Eric’s side. His own wounds seemed indiscreet at this moment. He was relieved to see Eric breathing rather normally.
He wanted to cry but fought it. He wanted to lie down next to Eric but could not. If help didn’t arrive soon, then all three of them probably would not make it to see morning’s first light, which was less than an hour away now.
Isabella vanished from the gathering of immortal Cahills, and he noticed her approaching the front door. He followed, not sure what else to do. She stopped abruptly in the destroyed doorway and pointed to her left.
John struggled up behind her and glanced left, followed her finger, and discarded atop the porch swing that he had sit upon and broke (now once again hanging loosely from the rafters above, just as it had been prior to John and Eric’s visit) were two black duffle bags.
He nodded. He searched them briefly before grasping what she led him here to get. The cell phone. John had absolutely no clue as to why, but thanked Eric for putting it in the bag.
John flipped it open and immediately noticed the battery dying rapidly. Three service bars accompanied by a blue E next to them was what mattered. Service out here was a miracle. They needed a miracle. 9-1-1 he pressed frantically followed by CALL.
John expected to be put on hold, but no. A sweet, nasally womanly voice clicked on. “9-1-1. What’s your emergency?”
He spoke calmly. He spilled everything, leaving out only the part about the homicidal maniac thought to be dead, who had killed his entire family and framed his own father for it and had killed many other victims over the years and has been trying to kill them as well for the better part of the night. He found it irrelevant and quite unbelievable for an outside party. Let them sort it out when they actually get here, he thought. He told her there were three badly injured persons. Why he lumped Raymond in with himself and Eric escaped him. John supposed not mentioning Raymond would make him, on some level, just as bad as Raymond himself. He requested three separate ambulances. John didn’t know the address but when he mentioned Cahill Manor, the woman knew immediately. “Hurry,” was the last thing he demanded of the nasally woman before closing the phone shut and lying down next to his friend.
The cavalry arrived in a matter of minutes, although it seemed like hours to the semi-conscious John Parker. Three ambulances, as per request, arrived first. Behind them were two Caldwell Parish squad cars. The pad lock on the front gate was cut for a second time by a pair of bolt cutters from one of the officers’ trunks. Six EM
Ts, two from each ambulance, strolled in carrying three different stretchers.
In a matter of seconds, the three of them were strapped to separate gurneys and wheeled back to their respected ambulance. In minutes, they would be stabilized—at least hopefully—and pulling up in front of the emergency room. And then only time would tell their fates.
CHAPTER 25
In the end, the local authorities searched the Cahill Manor thoroughly. They found many disturbing things (in some cases, there were literally skeletons in the closets). However, when no substantial evidence other than the butcher knife (which was so badly bludgeoned, bloodied, and possessing only two usable prints: one belonging to Jonathan Parker and the other they presumed belonged to the unknown John Doe they found at the scene) and no motive whatsoever, outside investigators were called in. They, too, found no concrete evidence.
The authorities ran a check through their databases on the unknown third party’s prints. They found nothing. A dental x-ray was taken and sent to the local dentists’ offices and sent to those in surrounding parishes. Nothing. A photograph was placed into the databases and sent to the police departments in the surrounding parishes as well. No matches. All of this was set in motion while awaiting results on blood work from the third party to return.
*****
A week from the day of the incident at Cahill Manor, Eric Richardson awoke (not for the first time) and sat upright in his hospital bed. He searched briefly for the television remote and found it on the small table separating the two beds in this particular room. He flicked the power button. A sweet, innocent voice came rumbling through the speakers on the remote. His mind wandered to the Cahill living room, the movie playing. He shuddered; his body broke out in a rash of gooseflesh. The volume dial on the side of the remote was pushed upwards all the way to MAX, probably as a joke from the last patient to scare the shit out of' the next. He spun the dial on the side of the remote just as the woman spoke again.
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