4.
He can feel his heart beating as he opens the package simply marked Dennis.
His hands shake.
The light overhead seems too cold and too dim in this cold, dim house.
He slides open the folder.
And then he reads the note.
Hey Dennis.
Someone’s really messing with your mind. Here are several pictures. The first is a shot of an arrest photo for Daniel Cillian Reed taken in 2003. Another is for disorderly conduct taken in 2005. There are a few copies of some newspaper articles in the Tribune and the Daily Herald detailing Daniel’s death. Pretty grisly stuff. But as I said, this can’ t be your guy unless he’s a ghost.
Call me.
Ryan
Dennis starts to look at the photo, but he already knows.
He already believes what’s happening.
He knew it the moment it clicked, when he thought about the text Cillian sent about Marooned, about how Cillian seemed to be lurking in his thoughts.
Grinning with that delirious smile is Cillian in a mug shot, then Cillian in another mug shot looking drunk and obnoxious. And then the papers showing photos of Daniel Cillian Reed from high school.
It’s the same guy who showed up at his book signing, the same guy who’s been stalking and harassing and threatening him, the same guy he beat to a pulp.
The same guy who was murdered a year ago.
2008
He waited in the veiled covering of the atrium tucked under the ghostlike trees in the forest preserve. Wind blew around him and through him and he shivered, zipping up his coat. He wasn’t sure why Bob had wanted to meet here, but since the debacle the other night, he would do whatever Bob wanted him to do.
And Bob wanted to meet him here at midnight.
The moon reflected off the slow moving river. He had walked here, leaving his car parked a couple miles away. The forest preserve closed at dusk, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t easy to get into. He had simply walked through the woods and down past the oriental garden to reach this metal-encased dwelling.
The sound of shuffling feet gave Bob away. He wasn’t trying to slip up on Cillian. Maybe tonight Bob would show him something new, something else that horrified and shocked and fascinated. With the big guy, Cillian was constantly surprised.
“You made it,” he said.
“Yeah,” the reply came, along with a sigh.
“So what’s going on?”
For a moment Bob just lingered in the gloom of the enclosed building. Cillian could barely make out the big guy’s face, but he could see the outline of his shoulder and towering head.
Bob looked out toward the river. “Why do you always talk about fear?”
“What?” The question seemed out of the ordinary—and out of the blue—for the big guy. “What do you mean fear?”
“You’re always talking about finding ways to scare yourself. What do you mean by that?”
Cillian’s laugh felt hollow and forced. “Not a lot frightens me.”
“No?”
“Very little.”
Cillian squinted, trying to make out Bob’s face, to see if he had anything in his hand, to see what this was about.
“What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever seen?” the big guy asked.
“You mean the scariest movie?”
“No, I mean in real life. Ever.”
Cillian slowly shifted toward the edge of the atrium, a three foot concrete wall behind him. If he wanted to—if he needed to—he could get out of here.
You frighten me like no one else has because there is no fear on your face and no sensation in your soul. There is just black like this night, like this place, darker than anything I could ever paint or imagine. Blackness.
Cillian lit up a cigarette, a habit he had picked up since being around Bob. “I have to think about that question.”
“What happened with the girl?”
“I just—I froze. It won’t happen again.”
“It’s one thing to hurt someone, but can you understand what it’s like?”
Cillian inhaled his cigarette and kept his eyes focused on Bob. “What what’s like?”
“To kill. You’ve hurt. The man you chased in the woods. You hurt him and maimed him, but you didn’t finish him off.”
“I know. I tried. I couldn’t.”
“Does death scare you?”
“Killing does.”
Bob’s face was expressionless, emotionless.
“It just—I don’t know. I thought—”
“It’s permanent,” Bob said. “And that’s what scares you, isn’t it? There’s no going back. And it’s not a movie or a book. It’s a real life and it’s suddenly gone and there’s nothing else to do except dispose of the parts.”
“Yeah.”
This was a bad idea coming here, being with him. This was a bad idea.
Cillian had a crazy thought. Even as Bob continued to talk.
“You said you wanted to see something scary, didn’t you?”
“I’ve seen some pretty freaky stuff, man,” Cillian said.
He thought of the switchblade in his pocket. He thought of using that.
He thought of finally killing, this time not out of curiosity but out of self defense.
“Do you know that when people die, there’s no magical thing they say, no special way they die. The one thing is always this.”
Do it, do it now, man. Do it.
Cillian started to put a hand in his pocket. “What’s that?”
And then something ripped in his side. And he looked down to see Bob’s hand plunged against his gut.
“It’s surprise,” Bob said, pressing the blade so far into his gut that Cillian wondered if it was sticking out his back.
He couldn’t say anything, couldn’t breathe.
“Surprise at how stupid they are. Surprise at knowing they only have seconds to live.”
Cillian coughed and choked and spit up blood. The blade started to slowly cut up his chest. He could smell Bob’s breath and feel his warm skin.
“Hey—Bob—what—”
He couldn’t talk, was too surprised, too horrified.
Stupid. You’re stupid to have ever gotten involved with this guy. He’s the real deal, and you’re just an amateur. You’re just a poser and now…
“It doesn’t hurt as much as it shocks, does it?”
“Bob, man, what are you doing?”
“I’m doing something you couldn’t do and would never be able to do. I’m showing you. This…is…how…you…do…it.”
At each word, the blade worked itself up and around Cillian’s open cavity of a chest.
But Cillian still watched and listened and comprehended.
And Bob started to twitch and laugh and grin.
All while he kept thrusting the knife in, deep, deep, deeper.
“What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever seen?” he asked Cillian again, all while Cillian tried to pull the knife out and push Bob away, even as he knew he was about to die, that he only had a few seconds left.
His voice came out shaky, distorted, gargled. “You…”
Bob didn’t respond to his answer. He just looked at him with a blank stare.
I can see his face. Even in the darkness I can see it. What’s happening? What is this? No, this can’t. No, dear God. No, please. No, it can’t, I can’t, it cannot be.
Just as Cillian started to scream, the big guy put a hand over his mouth.
“There is no fear left. Not anymore.”
The hand clamped over his mouth and another hand worked the blade around. Cillian finally saw blackness cover him and realized the horror was not over and everything he had imagined and believed in and hoped for was just the start of the horror that awaited him.
Pain and Suffering
1.
The house’s heartbeat awakens him. Steady, pulsing, tapping against his eardrums, against his mind. Dennis sits up in a large bed with pillows and b
lankets intertwined over him. He turns on the lamp and wipes a forehead full of sweat. Either he has a raging fever or something he ate at Ward’s didn’t agree with him or he finally realizes what’s going on and it’s terrifying him.
But he stands and opens a window and forbids it to be the latter.
He looks at the small bookshelf with special printings of some of his books. There they are: there’s his little ghost story that could, Breathe, in its original hardcover printing, before the movie and the madness and the second better-looking hardcover came out. There’s the last book he actually wrote, The Thin Ice, that caused Publishers Weekly to write, “Dennis Shore, even while on autopilot, can still scare with the best of them.” What did they know? There’s Sorrow, a serial-killer story that gave him an ulcer.
They’re just made up, Dennis, stories in your head, and this is one of them. This is a made-up story. This isn’t really happening. You’re going to wake up and find that Cillian isn’t there and everything was just a big dream.
He hears cries from outside.
Dennis looks through the window but sees only thick darkness.
“Dad!”
He recognizes the voice.
“Dad, help me!”
And without thinking or hesitating Dennis sprints down the stairs and tears through the kitchen to the back deck and the back lawn, which is wet and cool against his bare feet.
The voice is louder.
“Dad, over here! Daddy!”
She hasn’t called him daddy in a long time.
His feet take him down to the edge of the water. And then he sees her in the smoky, shadowy waters of the Fox River. Her curls, her long pigtails.
“Daddy, help me!”
Audrey is desperately trying to swim toward him but is being pulled away.
A flashlight beams over the water, and Dennis sees where it’s coming from. It’s a small boat, the figure inside leering at him with white teeth and dead eyes and long stringy hair.
It’s Samantha.
“She’s dead just like I am, just like Lucy, just like we all will be, so join us, Dennis. Join us. Take a step and don’t come back. It’s better down here with the dead, with the disbelieving. Join us, won’t you?”
Dennis.
Suddenly the light and the loud chanting voice and the figure in the water all dissolve.
Dennis, wake up.
And he does and finds himself in his bed in the darkness, the comforter and blankets on his side messy, the other side neat.
He sits on the edge of the bed, wiping his forehead.
He opens the window, hearing nothing but the slight spill of rain.
He remembers the voice that urged him awake, and he wants to hear it again.
It was Lucy’s voice, and it felt like it came from right next to him.
He would do anything to hear that voice talk to him again. Just once. That’s all.
2.
In the morning Dennis felt like someone had grabbed him feet first out of bed and swung him around a dozen or more times before leaving him resting on a cold hard rock.
All morning long he examined the pictures from Ryan. He debated calling the deputy, unsure what he would tell him. He’d lie, of course. Ryan would think he’d lost his mind if he told him the truth.
And what exactly is the truth, Den?
He couldn’t shrug this off, couldn’t bury this in that stone psyche of his. He couldn’t outrun this or outwork this or out-think this.
Something nagged at him, and he found himself sorting through his office, something he usually avoided. He wanted to find something, anything, that might have the name Cillian Reed attached to it.
When they had first moved into this house, Dennis had arranged the office exactly the way he always wanted an office to look. There were framed record covers hanging on the wall, a closet full of his books, a wall of shelves with his CD collection organized in ways only he could fully understand. There were pictures of Lucy and Audrey and reminders of his career achievements scattered throughout the office. Over time, even though they had been stored in his closet and out of mind, the piles of clutter had grown, and since Lucy’s death, they had become immovable fixtures in his life. The three boxes of fan letters and e-mails, the stack of marketing information, the folders filled with contracts and royalty reports. Audrey had been on him for some time to hire an assistant, but Dennis kept avoiding it.
Lucy was always my helper. Nobody can ever replace her.
Perhaps it was stupid to refuse clerical help. He needed assistance with the small things, things that usually didn’t get done. Answering reader mail, for instance. He had long since neglected it, especially after Lucy passed.
Now he found himself on the floor with the closet doors open, going through the boxes, ruffling through letters and printed pages, trying to find anything with Cillian’s name on it.
And after two hours, much of it spent reading author mail for the first time, he spotted an envelope with crisp black writing on it. It was open, the letter inside folded neatly. The return address was from Mr. Cillian Reed.
Mr.
It was just like him to call himself a mister.
Dennis quickly took out the one-page letter and read it. He couldn’t remember reading this before.
Dear Mr. Shore:
I’ve been a big fan of yours since I came across a copy of Breathe years ago. I’ve read all your books and written to you several times. I even sent you a copy of my novel Reptile in hopes you’d read at least some of it and give me your honest input. Having not heard from you, and having been let down by your last few novels, I felt I needed to write you one last time to share some of my frustrations. Whether or not you answer this letter—whether or not you even read this letter—is something I can’t think about. All I can do is share my thoughts and feelings and let the rest go.
I believe that something happened to you somewhere along the great yellow brick road of writing stories. I can’t say which book it started with, but I have an idea. I’m thinking Marooned was where it began, and Fearless was where it finally blossomed and remained. Your first two novels were exceptional, but since then… well… the well went dry, the inspiration evaporated, the storytelling went on autopilot.
You let us down, Mr. Shore.
I wish you could know what it’s like to be a fan of someone, to have high hopes, to await the next book with anticipation, and to finish that work and be so disappointed. It’s not one book. No. It’s a career. A wasted career. A wasted talent. A waste of time. My time.
Furthermore, it’s been disappointing to write and never hear back. Time and time again.
I will continue reading, not because I think your inspiration might come back. No. I need to read things that make me laugh out loud, even if that’s not the author’s intention.
Keep cashing those checks.
Keep selling out.
Sincerely,
Cillian Reed
The letter felt heavy in his hands. The postmark said November 2005, six months after the publication of Fearless. Could he really have overlooked this?
There were other things going on in my life back then.
He tore the letter up.
For a moment Dennis looked around the office. Surrounding him on the carpeted floor were hundreds of handwritten letters and printed pages. A wealth of praises and thank-yous. But somehow he had found the needle in the haystack.
Maybe if he continued looking he would find more.
But he was tired.
He hadn’t felt this tired in a long time.
He needed to get out of the house and breathe and sort this out.
Stepping outside to a chilly day, a statement sounded over and over in his head.
“You let us down, Mr. Shore.”
But if Cillian had been so utterly disappointed, then why bother Dennis now?
Especially if he was dead?
3.
He drove in silence. A thousand thoughts filled his
mind.
This can’t be happening. Somehow all of this is my imagination.
The dead don’t speak. The dead don’t bleed.
I spoke with Cillian. I saw him. I still have scabs on my knuckles from beating him.
What if this is someone else posing as Cillian?
I saw the photos—it’s him—the same guy who wrote to me, the same guy I angered by ignoring, the same guy I somehow let down, the same guy I stole from, the same guy haunting me.
But you don’t believe in ghosts, do you? So now what?
“I’ll see you on the dark side of the moon…”
The skies were cloudy. As he drove home, the stereo in his car turned on.
His hands were on the steering wheel.
Pink Floyd blared through the speakers, hurting his ears. The song was “Empty Spaces” from The Wall.
Then he heard static, then voices. He heard the last conversation between Cillian and himself, as though it had been recorded in a tunnel, with strange, eerie echoes following their voices. Floyd continued playing in the background, softer, so Dennis could hear Cillian’s taunt.
“Look at you. Look at your face. You’re scared to death, aren’t you? You’re scared of what you’ve done, but more than that you’re scared because of what you can’t or won’t do, right?
“You’re scared to death.
“Scared to death.
“Scared.
“Death.”
It sounded like there were a dozen Cillians, all talking while Floyd grew louder and louder.
And then the phone rang. And the voices and the music stopped.
Dennis didn’t want to answer it. But if he was losing his mind, the phone would be talking to him soon enough. He opened it and didn’t say a word. He could hear the laughter on the other end.
“So now you know.”
“What do you want?”
“What do I want, Dennis? What do I want? How dare you ask that question?”
“I’m finished with you.”
“No you’re not,” Cillian said.
“Yeah I am. I don’t care who or what you are—I’m done with you.”
Ghostwriter Page 17
