Phobias

by Ryan Horvath

  “Some… Someone painted my bedroom windows black. I woke up this morning, looked at my clock and knew it should have been light in my room but it was pitch black,” Calvin said. He ran a hand through his drying chestnut hair smoothing some away from his brow.

  “Shit,” Walt said. “What did your mom say?”

  “Hasn’t seen it,” Calvin answered. “And probably won’t. My room’s on the back of the house near the fence, you know. She never goes on that side of the house.”

  Walt puzzled on this and when they reached their lockers, they began to dress. Most of the rest of the team was already gone by now. “Anything else?” Walt said fastening the button of his jeans.

  Calvin slowly nodded while he pulled a simple white T-shirt over his head. “I think something… looks a little different with my pills.”

  “Your dream drugs?” Walt asked.

  Calvin nodded confirmation. “But I can’t be sure. To tell the truth, I never really looked at them that close before but…”

  “But what, Cal?” Walt pressed.

  “But the pills… I don’t know… I think… I think they just looked ever so slightly different,” Calvin revealed.

  “Well, did you tell your mom that, at least?” Walt said.

  Calvin looked down at his feet with shame and shook his head.

  Walt sensed his best friend had more to tell him. “What is it?”

  Calvin looked around and confirmed they were alone. A tear leaked out of his eye. “What woke me up this morning… to the black windows… Fuck! It’s been a while. B… B… But… the bad dreams are back.” He looked at Walt with desperate eyes. “Shit, Walt. What the fuck am I gonna do?” He broke down in tears. He didn’t bother to reconfirm they were alone. He didn’t give a shit.

  Walt didn’t know what else to do. He stepped to his best friend, put his arms around him, and held Calvin while he sobbed against his chest.

  ~~6~~

  “Alright, Cal,” Walt said. They were now outside of the locker room and the school standing in the student parking lot next to Walt’s car: a relic Chevrolet Cavalier convertible from the mid-nineties that still looked and ran pretty well. Walt eyed his best friend. Calvin looked tired and more than a little scared. His crying in the locker room lasted nearly five minutes and his eyes were bloodshot. “You should really tell your mom. And maybe you should switch pharmacies too. Get your dream drugs somewhere new. Just in case it’s someone at the pharmacy.”

  “I stopped by the pharmacist this morning and showed him my pills and asked him about them,” Calvin said. “The fucker said I was taking the right stuff… that he dispensed it himself… same as he has for years.” He sighed. “Of course I don’t think he really looked at them all that close.”

  Walt slightly nodded. “What happens if you stop taking the dream drugs?” He extracted keys from his duffel bag and used one to unlock the driver’s door to his car. He reached in and pressed the button to open the trunk.

  “I’ve never tried stopping,” Calvin said immediately.

  Walt saw Calvin shudder at the idea and he moved to the back of the car where he deposited his duffel. “Have you looked at your pill bottle? Maybe the dosage got changed somehow,” he suggested.

  Calvin looked taken aback for a moment and then subsequently brightened. “Shit, Walt! I didn’t think of that. Maybe somebody just fucked up and accidentally gave me smaller pills.”

  “Check it out,” Walt directed. “You got ‘em on you?”

  “No,” Calvin said and pulled one side of his mouth back into a grimace. “Never bring ‘em to school. Nothing is sacred in this place.” He went to the other side of the car, tossed his own gym bag in the back seat and sat down in the passenger seat.

  “So let’s go over to your place and check it out,” Walt said optimistically as he plopped himself behind the wheel and started the car. Calvin nodded enthusiastically in the seat next to him. Walt zipped out of the school lot and onto the surface streets of northwest Minneapolis. In a few minutes, they were on Victory Memorial Parkway heading north. Walt made a right off the parkway and then a left onto the street Calvin lived on. He pulled his car in front of the house Calvin shared with his mother, a quaint looking Cape Cod style home that was at the end of a dead-end street that abutted against a decrepit and now unused train track.

  They’d made small talk on the short drive from the school but now that they were here, Calvin was visibly excited. He practically jumped out of the Cavalier and dashed up the front sidewalk while he extracted his house key which he eagerly plunged into the door knob.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  As soon as he opened the door, Calvin’s excitement about looking into his pill bottle was instantly quashed. The house was quiet, empty, and covered in random shadows scattered all over. The fact that there was no light coming in from his bedroom windows at the far end of the house made the darkness seem worse and Calvin suddenly felt the house grow smaller. Sweat formed on his brow and above his upper lip. He felt his heart accelerate and his bladder give a nervous twitch.

  But Calvin had had plenty of time in the last few years to outfit the house to combat his nyctophobia. He looked to the wall just beside the open door and spotted the three light switches there. He flashed a hand over to them and moved them all into the up position simultaneously. The living room, dining room, the space to the side that his mother used as a small office, and the beginning of the short hall to his bed and bath rooms were immediately cast in bright light. The shadows were swallowed instantly.

  “Calvin one… Darkness zero,” he said softly as he felt his heart begin to relax. He’d said the same expression or something like it every time he flushed the darkness away. With one phobia out of the way, he quickly headed for his room.

  But suddenly, Calvin realized the quiet in the house was still too heavy. There should be ample noise coursing around with two teenage football players moving. But Calvin’s own din seemed insufficient.

  “Hey, Walt? Does it seem really quiet in here to you?” Calvin asked without stopping.

  But he didn’t get an answer.

  “Walt?” he said slowing his step.

  Still no response.

  Calvin stopped and whirled around.

  Walt wasn’t there. Calvin was alone.

  “Walt?” Calvin said louder this time. “What the fuck, man?”

  Calvin continued to get nothing from Walt. He stared with wide eyes around the rooms that were void of any life except his own. “WALT!” Calvin shouted. His heart started to thunder in his chest. He was alone in here and that wasn’t good. He hurried to the open front door. As he was about to cross the threshold, he became convinced one of his dream monsters was right behind him and about to seize him. Fear edged on panic and, as he spilled back outside, he collided with something.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  “Whoa! Hey, buddy,” Walt said as Calvin plowed into him.

  “Where the fuck were you!?” Calvin growled at Walt. Even though he still felt terrified, the mere sight of his best friend was already alleviating his monophobia.

  “Sorry… Sorry,” Walt said taking Calvin’s shoulders. “I went to go look at your windows.”

  “Warn me the next time, you asshole,” Calvin chastised. “I nearly flipped my lid.”

  Walt could see Calvin trying to get his breath back and calm down. “It’s okay buddy. You’re not alone. I’m right here. And your mom’ll be home soon,” Walt assured.

  “Let’s just check the damn pills,” Calvin grumbled. He wiped visible perspiration from his forehead and turned back toward his room.

  Walt saw Calvin check more than once to make sure he was still there.

  While they walked, Walt thought about what he saw outside. Calvin was wrong about his bedroom windows. He must have never actually gone outside and checked them. What Calvin thought was black paint was actually thick sticky ebony roofing tar. Whoever put the goo there wanted to make sure it wasn’t going to come off.

  Walt
furrowed his brow at this as Calvin turned on the light to his bedroom and they stepped in.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  Calvin walked over to his bed passing a small pile of laundry in a basket, a pair of sneakers next to it, his computer desk where a Hustler magazine slightly protruded from behind the CPU, and his dresser with some of the drawers partially open. He plopped himself on his bed. Next to the bed, like most everyone’s, was a night stand. He opened the drawer and moved a couple things before he found the bottle of pills. His “dream drugs” as Walt liked to call them. He picked the bottle up and turned it until the label faced him.

  “Anything?” Walt said.

  But Calvin barely heard him. He was reading the name of the medication on his bottle and his heart, once again, started to pound beneath his sternum.

  He had to read the name of the medication three times before he was certain of what he was seeing.

  “Cal?” Walt said. “What is it? It’s the wrong dose. Right?”

  Calvin looked up at Walt with wide eyes. He shook his head. “It’s not the dose.”

  “Well, what is it?” Walt said shrugging his shoulders.

  “Wrong medicine,” Calvin said and tossed to bottle to Walt who caught it making the pills inside clatter.

  Calvin watched Walt examine the bottle. “My dream drugs are called tryptophol.”

  Walt scrunched his brow. “Isn’t that what this says?”

  “Look closer. My dream drugs end in p…h…o…l,” Calvin said.

  Walt raised a finger to the bottle and pointed to the tiny letters as he orated them. “T…r…y…p…t…o…p…h…y…l.”

  “You see that?” Calvin asked nervously. “Two y’s when there should be two o’s.”

  “Oh!” Walt said and raised his eyebrows. “Yeah. This is spelled differently. Maybe they just slightly changed the name.”

  “Maybe,” Calvin said sounding not the least bit convinced.

  “Here,” Walt said, handing the bottle back. He pulled his phone from his pocket and opened up a Google window. “Spell that for me again,” he directed.

  Calvin read off the letters from his bottle while Walt entered them in the search engine. Calvin waited for what felt like an eternity while the page loaded.

  “Huh,” Walt said as he began scrolling.

  “What?” Calvin asked. He felt shivers run up his spine.

  “The only thing that comes up is the name of your dream drug with the two o’s,” Walt said. “It’s gotta be a typo on your label or something. That’s all. Which pharmacy do you go to?”

  “It’s just some little rinky-dink dispensary on the first floor of my shrink’s office. Mom likes it because they automatically give her ten percent off. At least since my dad died, anyway,” Calvin said. He laughed unpleasantly and slapped a hand to his forehead. “Shit! Could you imagine losing your spouse and finding people giving you ten percent off for it? Now I think it’s kind of strange she goes there.” He set the bottle of pills on the nightstand.

  “Well, let’s stop over there on the way to school on Monday and ask someone about this,” Walt proposed. He glanced back at his phone. “Oh shit! I gotta go, Cal. It’s almost 5:30 and I promised my mom I’d get a jump on painting the fence today. She’s been after me to get it done all summer.”

  Calvin listened and still heard silence in his house. 5:30 meant his mother should have been home by now. She worked close and didn’t have to contend with the awful Twin Cities freeway traffic. “But my mom’s not home yet… which is weird,” Calvin said.

  Walt thought for a minute and then said. “So come over to my house. Man, I could sure use the help painting. Plus my mom’ll feed you dinner. Your mom probably just stopped off somewhere for happy hour.”

  “Maybe,” Calvin said again with no conviction. He pulled his lower lip back with his teeth. He really didn’t have a choice. Without his mom here, he couldn’t stay, especially because his mind would surely be racing about the spelling of his medication from now until he talked to someone at the pharmacy. “Alright, buddy. Let’s go paint. Just let me change clothes quick.” Calvin stood up from the bed and stripped off his jeans and Polo shirt and draped them over the footboard of his bed. He dug in the bottom drawer of his dresser and pulled out an old T-shirt and pair of running shorts that he usually mowed the lawn in. He quickly re-dressed and said, “Let’s get out of here. I’ll send my mom a text on the way.” And Calvin did text his mother when they were back in Walt’s convertible. But she was already into a third vodka Collins at the bar near her work and she didn’t notice her phone vibrating in her purse.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  Calvin and Walt were at Walt’s house minutes later and, by ten to six, they were slapping white paint onto the fence that surrounded the Bailer property. After about an hour, they wrapped around to the alley and were no longer visible from Walt’s house.

  “I gotta take a leak,” Walt said, dropping his brush into the paint can.

  “Just pee out here,” Calvin said. In spite of the distraction of whitewashing the fence, he was still worried about the medication and didn’t want to be alone.

  “Can’t,” Walt said and nodded his head discreetly to across the alley. “Old lady Timmons is sitting on her porch. She caught me pissing out here one too many times and told my mom. If she sees me do it again, she’ll probably call the cops.”

  Calvin looked across the alley to where Walt was referring. He couldn’t be sure but he thought he saw a figure wearing glasses shrouded in shadows on a screened-in porch. The burning end of a cigarette confirmed someone was there. “Okay,” Calvin said. I won’t be entirely alone if old lady Timmons is out here too his mind said. “Just hurry back.” He looked up at the sky. “It’s gonna be dark soon.”

  “I’ll be back in two shakes. Three at the most,” Walt joked and dashed out of sight.

  Calvin dipped his brush in the paint and continued to work. Seconds later, he heard soft footsteps approaching.

  “Hey, Calvin,” a voice said.

  A little startled, Calvin whirled around to see the speaker. He creased his brow when faced with the new arrival. “What are you doing here?” he said to the man before him; a man he knew.

  “I came to get you, Calvin,” the man said. “I came to collect you.” A smile formed on this man’s face unlike any other Calvin had ever seen.

  Calvin knew he was in trouble.

  “It’s time to bring you closer into the game,” the man said.

  “G…G…Game?” Calvin questioned.

  “That’s right. Come over here,” the man said. “You don’t want to be alone, do you?”

  His inflection on the word “alone” made Calvin’s stomach queasy. But he still moved two steps closer to the man without even realizing he was doing it. Those two steps also took him out of view of old lady Timmons.

  “Dumb ass,” the man said viciously raising a funny-looking gun and pointing it at Calvin.

  Calvin heard a soft paff and felt a sharp sting in his neck. He dropped his paintbrush in the alley and moved his hand to his neck knocking free whatever stung him. It landed with a soft clank on the concrete and bounced away before he could get his hands on it. One second later, he was dizzy. The next second, his world went dark. His nyctophobia didn’t have a chance to take hold of him.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  Miedo chuckled to himself softly at how easy it was to take down the boy. But he needed to move quickly. His prey’s friend only went inside for a couple minutes.

  Miedo squatted down and effortlessly slung Calvin Vale’s limp body over his shoulder. He parked three doors away at a vacant house and he carried Calvin to his car. He dropped the body in the trunk and quickly drove away.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  “I’m back!” Walt said, coming out of the garage. “Mom says dinner will be ready in about forty minutes. That should give us enough time to finish…” But he stopped short when he saw the abandoned paintbrush on the ground. He looked up and down the alley and saw no
sign of Calvin. He knew his best friend would not have been able to leave on his own. A slight reflection from something next to the fallen brush caught Walt’s eye. He moved to it.

  On the ground, was a small dart. Inside its clear body, a tiny about of a greenish liquid remained. Walt had never before seen anything that shade of green. On the needle tip of the dart, a small amount of blood was visible.

  “Oh… shit…,” Walt slowly said. “Cal…” His own heart took its turn to race and he hurried back into the house to tell his mother.

  ~~7~~

  Forty-five minutes later there was a car parked in the alley behind the Bailer garage. One man sat inside the vehicle; really tired and even more really wanting a drink. Chad had been up since the wee hours of the morning after all.

  His head throbbed and his eyes seemed to drum along with it while he watched through the windshield as Terry talked with the teenage boy and his mother and took notes.

  ~*~0~0~*~

  “He really thinks someone was fu… er… messing with him,” Walt said to Terry. His mother stood beside him with a protective arm wrapped around the middle of his back. While they waited for the police to arrive, Walt tried calling Calvin over a dozen times and received no response. He tried Mrs. Vale twice but also got nothing. He even drove over to Calvin’s house and found it dark and empty.

  “Like a prank or something?” Terry questioned.

  “No. Worse than that. Someone tarred his bedroom windows and his dream drugs were different. Or at least he thought they were,” Walt said.

  “Dream drugs?” Terry asked cocking an eyebrow.

  Walt put up defensive hands. “Totally legal, Detective. Cal had a ‘scrip for ‘em. We’re both on the football team and don’t mess with drugs,” Walt returned in a partial lie. He and Calvin occasionally took a couple tokes from a joint if one got passed around, but nothing more than that and certainly not now during the season when a random drug test could happen on any given practice day.

  Terry nodded and pressed on. “Show me this dart you were talking about.”