In the dream he heard voices coming to the top of the steps. A ray of light sliced into the darkness and he heard someone say, “Darn, we’ll have to straighten it up some before we can skate down there, it’s a real mess, Jimmy.” Skinny legs covered in blue jeans appeared on the stair’s landing.
“Then we’ll clean it up, Sis. Is the broom up here or down there?” another voice piped up. The voices were familiar. He heard scuffling above him.
“I got the dustpan.” Giggles poured down the steps and the hanging light bulb shed its dim light into the basement. The basement’s wooden rafters were covered with nails and floating spider webs. In the worst weather their mom would use the nails to string lines for drying their clothes.
“Let’s get a move on,” he heard his sister say, “or we’ll never get to skate today.”
He remembered she’d always been afraid of the basement as a kid. She’d never go down if there were no lights. Once when Sarah was very young she’d made their mother angry for some reason long forgotten, their mother had locked her in the dark basement to teach her a lesson. She’d cried down there alone, in the dark, until Dad came home and brought her out. Sarah had never gotten over it, and she’d been afraid of the darkened basement from then on.
As an adult Jim watched, fascinated, as the two dream children cleaned up the basement. They piled the junk in neater, more compact piles in corners, cleaning out a skating area. Jim smiled as he remembered.
“Can I skate, too?” Another timid voice asked. It was Ann. Perched up on the top step, her big blue eyes pleading to be allowed to play with the bigger kids. She couldn’t have been more than four or five years old. In her lap sat her teddy bear. She loved that bear more than anything else in the world. “Can I?”
“Did you ever find the key to your skates?” Sarah questioned.
“I think so. I’ll go get it.” Ann was gone.
Jim often lost his skate key, too. Sarah was the smart one, she tied hers on a long string around her neck.
“Let’s not wait for her. Let’s skate,” Jimmy said.
The look that spread across his sister’s face was one he was well acquainted with. Disgust. “You can skate, but me, I’m waiting. You know Ann can’t put her skates on by herself. Someone has to help her. Go ahead, start without me.”
Sarah could never be mean to anyone.
Had he always been so selfish, he wondered. Was he still selfish? He found himself wishing he could rewind time and change things, be a better person. He understood, now, how little he’d liked himself. He’d been a coward and sometimes spiteful towards the other children, especially Charlie. Poor Charlie.
The dream wound on as dreams do and soon most of his brothers and sisters were skating and laughing in the basement. Ann had found her key and was there, too.
“Charlie, come on down and skate,” Sarah yelled up to a boy about six or so.
Little Jimmy hissed to his sister, “We don’t want him down here.”
Charlie sat sulking on the steps, his face propped in his grimy hands.
“Why it’s the cry baby. You gonna cry for us now, cry baby?” taunted young Jimmy. The words were as cruel as one child can be to another. Jim was ashamed for the child he’d been.
“Leave him alone, Jimmy.” Sarah skated to the steps and reaching up, patted Charlie on the arm. “You can skate if you want to. Come on down.” She threw a warning look towards her mean brother. Leave him alone. Stop picking on him. He never means you any harm.
Charlie was glaring hatefully at his older brother. There’d been a silent feud between the two from the very beginning. Why? Jim would never know now. No one would. All the children were dead.
“You can’t skate with us, Charlie,” small Jimmy reminded him. “You’re being punished for what you did, remember? So get out of here or I’ll call Mom.”
“Don’t do that!” Sarah exclaimed.
She always felt sorry for the brat. Jimmy ignored her. “I will, Charlie. I’ll tell Mom. Now get back upstairs. Leave us alone.”
“No, I won’t, besides Mom knows I’m out of my room,” Charlie mouthed smugly. “She said I could get out.” His smile was sly. “Dad told her to.”
Typical. Mom would punish and Dad would give early reprieves. “I wanna skate!” Charlie demanded.
Jimmy grumbled and skated off, as Sarah helped Charlie put on his skates. But when Charlie began to skate, he’d come up fast behind the younger kids and make it dangerous to be anywhere near him.
It was then Jim remembered what the dream was coming to and what had happened next. He could feel the sweat trickling down his back already. One never forgot pain.
There was a shrill scream and sobbing in one of the darkened corners. A child had fallen and broken a leg.
How could Jim have forgotten that day? Or forgotten why Charlie had been punished in the first place? Because he hadn’t wanted to remember it. There were many things about the past Jim had swept under the rug and conveniently forgotten.
Like the day Charlie had found the nest of baby birds and gotten jealous over the attention the birds had received. Everyone was out digging up tiny worms for the hungry creatures and everyone tiptoed around the rock garden so as not to scare them. Everyone “oohing” and “aahing” over them and saying how precious and cute they were. Charlie had found them and had been forgotten. He hadn’t liked that so, as he figured it, since he’d found the baby birds he had the right to do what he wanted with them. In a moment of ugly spite he’d lifted his foot and crushed them, killed every one of them in front of his brothers’ and sisters’ shocked eyes.
Sarah cried as she’d buried the poor mashed piles of feathers.
Charlie spent a day or two in his room for punishment, but the problem went far deeper than that. Something in Charlie wasn’t right. He was a cruel and vindictive child. Punishment never seemed to bother him. He always got even. Charlie would get his revenge, because he was a master at it.
It was what Jim remembered and the dream had shown. Charlie’s revenge. Charlie had tripped him in the basement as he’d been skating, faster and faster around the curves. His leg had been broken in three places.
Dreaming about it so many years later, he could still feel the gut wrenching pain. But it hadn’t been only the broken leg that had hurt. As he sprawled, screaming on the cold basement floor that day, he’d looked up through his tears at Charlie and seen the look of pleasure playing on Charlie’s face. His own brother had purposely hurt him. If he could do such a thing at six years old, it horrified Jim to think of what he’d do when he was stronger and older.
Of course, Charlie never grew much stronger or much older.
Jim’s dream had shattered at the remembered pain and it was with great relief he found himself twisted in his bed’s blankets and not on the cold basement floor. But the vision had left him weakly shaken.
He trudged into his motel bathroom. The reflected image in the cracked mirror was tired and unshaven. He looked a hell of a lot older than he was. He turned away with the usual self-loathing. He knew why he looked this way. Ghosts. Ghosts and vengeance. They’d never leave him alone.
For years he’d been on the run. A desperate, mad dash for safety and utter forgetfulness. He’d run when Charlie had died, run again when Leslie had been killed…and Jonathan, Ann, and Samantha. His mother and father. Each time, with his music and the bands, he’d run farther. Faster. But the memories still gnawed away at his brain and soul.
He hung his head and one tear after another hit the basin as he shaved with trembling hands.
He’d fled in his own way, too, when his sweet Amy had disappeared. Though he’d never admit it to any living soul, not even Sarah. He’d known all along what had most likely happened to her.
It had gotten her, too, like all the rest.
It had taken h
er away.
Until a few years ago, he’d tricked himself into believing one lie and then another, anything but the bitter truth, which was too hard to swallow, and until a few years ago he hadn’t known what the game was, or what the thing in the woods really wanted. Not until he’d been home again had the pieces fallen into place.
He knew now, and he knew how to stop it. There was only one way.
Wherever he went or whatever he did, the evil thing stalked him. It always found him. At the worst times, during the dark haunted nights or at dawn when he’d lie awake remembering. He fervently wished it would kill him and get it over with. He couldn’t sleep anymore, because he was waiting for it to come. He couldn’t think straight half the time and he’d lost his appetite. He’d become a shadow of a man. Heck, a man wasn’t supposed to be terrified of dark and empty houses, of going home or cars or…life. But he was. Oh, he was always afraid. Afraid he’d end up dead like those children in the basement. Lately, he’d become more afraid he’d never be allowed to die. To have to live like this the rest of his life. Torture.
The glow was faint these days; how much longer could he hold on?
Sometimes he thought he was only crazy. Those were the good times.
Sometimes he prayed late at night in churches. For what? No one ever answered his prayers, and yet, it seemed to help. Gave him peace of mind, for a short while. He’d never been in any way religious, not like Sarah. He smiled, thinking of his sister. She was one of the reasons he didn’t throw himself under a train…her and his cowardice.
He finished shaving and took a shower. He telephoned Sarah to let her know he was still breathing and told her, what was happening in the continuing search for his replacement. So far, he hadn’t been able to think of leaving the band, until he’d found them someone. The drummer’s sickly mother had a setback and was in the hospital. The bills were staggering. The doctor had informed Rich that Beth’s baby could be twins. Any day. How could he leave them in such a bind unless another lead guitarist had been found? There was no way out, he had to stay.
When he finished talking to his sister he lay back on the bed and stared at the ceiling. He should go home. He should be there with Sarah. Who was he fooling? For the first in a long time he’d not been lonely, back there in Sarah’s home with her and Jeremy. Now, without them, he felt the loneliness more than ever.
From Sarah and Jeremy, his thoughts logically revisited his long lost Amy “Oh, Amy,” he moaned into his pillow and let himself wallow in the ironic misery of it all. How he missed her. How he’d loved the woman.
Unable to stand being alone another miserable second, he dragged himself from the bed, grabbed his guitar and walked out of the room in search of one or more of his band members.
He headed for Kyle’s room down the hall. Halfway there, he had a creeping sensation up his spine and spun around to glare into the murky hallway.
Was something standing there? His heart froze cold like a hunk of ice and he dropped the guitar case in the middle of the hall. He barely made it to Kyle’s room before the fear turned him into a mindless idiot. Kyle had stared at him wondering, probably as all the guys were these days, what the hell had gotten into good old Jim.
He was shaking inside and praying. “Leave me us alone. Stop stalking us!” Hasn’t it been long enough…an eternity?
“Hey old buddy, take it easy,” Kyle soothed him. “You look like you could use a cup of coffee. How about some breakfast?”
“Sounds good to me,” Jim said. Anything, as long as he wasn’t alone. He was vulnerable alone.
Over breakfast all Jim could think about was getting away. He had to rejoin Sarah and Jeremy. Before it was too late.
“I’ve had a call from Rich,” Kyle informed him between bites of toast. “Beth’s had her kid, kids, I should say. A girl and a boy.” Despite the happy news, he acted as if there was something wrong.
“What’s the matter?” Jim took in Kyle’s strained face and swallowed.
“I feel sorry for the guy. Beth’s real sick. Some kind of complications I can’t begin to explain. Female stuff.” Kyle went on talking but Jim wasn’t listening anymore. All he was aware of was the ropes that kept tightening around him, the trap that gripped him tighter. Beth was sick. It meant more hospital bills.
It meant he couldn’t go home. Not yet.
Chapter Twenty-Three
The weeks went by and life fell into a normal routine again. I continued painting the house, and waiting. I waited for Jim’s call every day to be sure he was still well and alive. I waited for another vision to tell me what was to happen, but there was nothing. I waited for Jeremy to walk in the door from school. I waited for anything…anything at all to happen and nothing did.
After a few weeks I felt lulled by the calm and as usual found myself wondering if all the bad stuff had happened at all. Each morning as I got up and padded around in my sunny kitchen I said a prayer that nothing terrible had happened the day or night before.
I wasn’t going to ask for trouble. It’d come soon enough.
The days grew longer and warmer and I gladly let some of the despair slip from my shoulders. I had the damaged front door fixed. A friend of Ben’s came out one morning and did it for a fair price.
Ben was around a lot. An unspoken agreement had grown between us. We were more than friends and yet we weren’t lovers. For now, that’s all I wanted and would allow. The police department had put their men on a twenty-four hour alert since the first murder. Ben was intimately involved with the case and spent most of his time hunting down leads and searching. Searching for what, no one seemed to know. Ben was working too hard and that’s what started the night visits.
He knew I stayed up late to read, draw or do crafts after Jeremy was tucked in bed. I’d sit on the floor in the front room and make my macramé hangers or draw as I watched television. I wasn’t lonely. I had Jeremy sleeping upstairs and I had my home, though I missed Jim.
One night very late I heard a soft knocking on my door and saw it was a tired-looking Ben on my doorstep. At first I was scared something awful had happened, my fears were dispelled when he smiled at me.
“May I come in for a while and talk?” he asked. “I’ve come off duty and, well, I thought you might like some company?”
I let him in and gave him leftovers from supper I’d saved on a covered plate in the refrigerator. It was as if I knew I’d be getting a hungry night visitor.
It wasn’t for only a while. We sat and talked for hours. That was how it began.
As the weeks went by he took to coming over one or two nights a week. We’d chat or I’d fix him something to eat or we’d watch television together like an old married couple. But unlike old married people, we were acutely aware of each other. Sometimes he’d put his arm around me. Sometimes he wouldn’t touch me the whole night. Our relationship was comfortable, and I was content. I grew happy hearing his late night knock, knowing he was there outside the door. I enjoyed having him close and sharing things.
I began to understand Ben, and as strange as it sounds, perhaps better than any other man I’d ever known, except Jim. I knew I understood him better than I’d understood Jonathan, who during the last few years of our marriage hadn’t wanted to talk much about anything, least of all us. Jonathan had always seemed distant, even to me. He wasn’t sensitive, as Ben was. Maybe our bond had something to do with his dream farm out there on the other side of town. I knew what it was like to love a place, a house, a home.
Ben didn’t push me and never made demands. One night he brought steak dinners for all of us because it was earlier than usual and he hoped Jeremy was still up to enjoy it. He’d gone to bed, but I called him down and he ate some of it before sleep reclaimed him, then Ben carried him up to bed. One night Ben brought donuts and another night he brought me flowers and candy. It began to be a game. He brought me litt
le gifts and I’d try to guess what they were. I got it right ninety-five percent of the time.
He’d told me it’d been a while since he’d cared enough about someone to give things, and now he wanted to make up for lost time. The man had a generous heart.
I was getting in too deep, I thought, when he didn’t show up for three nights in a row and I found myself missing him. How had that happened? A few months ago I thought there’d never be another man for me. It would only be Jeremy and me forever, or as long as it took him to grow up. I couldn’t conceive loving anyone else. Couldn’t conceive trusting anyone else. But here I was missing Ben. Another cop. Crazy, is what I was. Crazy.
Time passed too quickly
It’d gotten warm at night. It was midsummer and the heat during the day suddenly became unbearable. For many years I hadn’t cared much for hot weather. I liked the cold. I was glad our home was one of those houses with high ceilings, and surrounded by lofty shade trees, that like a cave stayed cool most of the day.
At night, Jeremy and I would go and sit on the front porch as we had the first morning, which now seemed so long ago. We’d discuss the day and share time with each other until he went to bed. School was out for the year and some nights I let him stay up later than I should have.
One evening we were sitting on the porch watching the rain, a light, soft warming waterfall it was a joy to share with someone. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened in so long that the danger seemed far away. Unreal.
Everything felt so normal.
“Is there enough room here on this porch for a tired old cop?” Ben’s voice came from out of the dark, followed by his tall lanky figure.
“Sure, sit right down here by me.” Jeremy seemed pleased when he did.
I smiled at Ben in the dark and felt his hand touch mine. We didn’t need words.
Evil Stalks the Night Page 23
