Widowmakers: A Benefit Anthology of Dark Fiction

by James Newman Benefit Anthology

  The pain returned with full force, sending Evie doubled over into the water. She bit her lip but couldn’t hold back a shriek. Water washed over her face in rippling black waves. She choked on a dirty mouthful before regaining her footing in the shifting slurry. While clutching her stomach, she rose to her feet, tears filling her eyes. Gram hadn’t moved with all the commotion.

  A bedroom door slammed shut above her. Heavy footfalls hammered across the floor, shaking dust loose from the cellar beams.

  “Gram, he’s coming. The baby, I think the baby’s coming, too.” Evie felt something slither across her thigh. She pulled up her dress and saw dark, clotted blood trailing down her thighs. For some reason, the sight of blood was more chilling than seeing a snake circling her leg. “Gram, please, Gram. I’m bleeding and I don’t know what to do.”

  The cellar door flew open.

  “Gram!” Evie shrieked, and still her grandmother made no motion. Before another labor pain could cripple her, Evie sloshed through the water to the cellar’s farthest corner. She wanted to curl up into herself, form a small protective shell and hide. No, more than just hide. She wanted to disappear. Never see or be seen by anything. Never touch or be touched by anyone. Just stop existing. Above her, the window gleamed brightly, yet out of reach.

  Her father trampled down the stairs with such a clamor that the whole cellar seemed to shake. Halfway down the stairs, his feet flew away from the runners like a pair of batted baseballs. With his full weight, he fell onto his back, crashing through the rotting pine steps, taking the entire stairwell down with him.

  Evie paused, her limbs trembling uncontrollably. Of course, neither of them had the desire to eat today. He’d slipped on the congealed stew he’d slathered onto the steps.

  There was a cry of nails pulling free of aged lumber before the ruined stairwell finally settled. The floodwater’s waves reached her legs, lapping at her skin. Evie felt paralyzed. There was no way out now. She was trapped. Her father had yet to move but she thought she heard a faint moan. She backed into the sharp point of a broken table leg, bringing her to her senses. Forgetting her homicidal father, her unconscious grandmother, even her labor to a certain extent, she began to climb the pile of junk leading to the window. Her center of gravity was different from when she could climb trees as good as any boy just the summer before. She tilted too far back and more than once was certain she would fall. The clotted blood caked her thighs and a disturbing twisting tore through her abdomen. Something was wrong. Something had to be wrong for all the dark blood and knifing pains. Gram had mentioned nothing of this when trying to reassure her about giving birth.

  When she managed to crest the junk pile, her tears returned at the sight of the unending trees and blackened sky. Overgrown brambles obscured much of her view. She’d climbed the pile just once, when the adrenaline of hope carried her up the pile, the letter tucked between her lips. That climb was such a blur, yet was a mere two days ago. She’d done just as Gram had instructed:

  Open wide the window, child, let the full-moon’s light fall upon you with grace, hold aloft the letter, as high as your arm will stretch. Close your eyes, and let the winds spirit away our message to the person who will be our savior.

  When her arm muscles had quivered from the strain and she’d wanted to open her eyes to see if Gram was pulling some twisted trick, a cold breeze blew from inside the cellar, the fresh, clean air of a snowy February dawn. It swept over her skin like gentle fingers of ice and grabbed the letter, sending it on its way.

  As she climbed this time she had little hope, no grace, and clouds buried the moon in a tumescent gray blanket. The rest of the world seemed so far away. Bobby seemed so far away.

  A guttural wail emanated from the ruined steps, and the wood began to shift.

  “Evie! You get over here, help your Pa.” His voice was a blade at her throat.

  She didn’t dare say a word, but when another wrenching pain ripped through her, a cry escaped her lungs that could’ve been heard a mile wide.

  “I knew it, girl. My son’s coming, ain’t he? I knew it!” His exuberance forced the wood to spill away as he regained strength enough to stand.

  Evie yanked the window and it groaned with rust. A band of gaunt moonlight seemed to swell through the narrow gap, enveloping her. She turned in time to see him take a shambling step. A spike of wood pierced the side of his neck, yet he didn’t seem to notice. His left elbow was bent the wrong way and hung lower than the other arm. The fall had sheared his bottom lip away from his jaw, leaving a flap of bloody flesh dangling from his chin.

  “You get down from there. Don’t make me get you.”

  He halved the distance between them, holding his mangled arm against his expansive beer gut.

  Evie’s vision began to waver from loss of blood and mounting fright. She shook her head like a dog trying to clear its ears of fleas and turned back to the pale moonlight. She wedged her elbows on the window frame and kicked up, landing with her full weight on the baby roiling in its delicate liquid world. The pain forced her bladder to empty, or maybe it was her water breaking. She didn’t know, didn’t know anything about what was going on with her body. The staggering wave of pain eased. She threw her arm outside and her fingers met the rough edge of rock half buried in the mud. Her fingers curled around it and she pulled with all her strength, no matter how much pain it brought her.

  She could no longer see inside the cellar but she heard her father reach the junk pile. His weight shifted the mound. Rotten boxes, broken mirror frames, sagging mattresses; everything shifted and cried but still he climbed.

  Evie smiled, free up to the shoulder blades. Just a little more and she’d be in the side yard. She was going to make it. Her grip on the buried rock was solid, and her fingers ached, but still she pulled. The bony nubs of her spine smashed against the top of the window frame. She was stuck, unable to free herself in either direction.

  “Oh, you know you don’t make your Pa mad. Gonna be some trouble for you girl!”

  Fingers coiled around her blood-soaked ankles. He pulled, bending her body to his will, as was his wont over the years. Evie’s limbs grew cold and she had little will left to fight.

  * * *

  Bobby’s T.V. screamed white noise after the local channel switched off for the night. The chaotic hiss worked its way through his slumber, nudging him awake. His eyes fluttered, still more asleep than not, when something snapped alert inside his subconscious. In the glare of dead channel static, he sprang to his feet. His alarm clock read 1:19 am. He’d slept most the night away.

  He jumped from his bed, straightening his twisted clothes as he ran around the room. Afraid he might have imagined the whole thing, he checked to make sure Evie’s letter was still secure in his pocket. Supplies he thought might come in handy weighed down his yellow rain slicker’s pockets: matches in a plastic baggy, a flashlight, and a dull pocketknife his dad had given him on his ninth birthday. When he opened the front door, rain fell in flat sheets with no hint of wind to break the symmetrical deluge. Seeing the rain and the endless night, doubt crowded his already clouded mind.

  What did he know about Evie or Gram anyway? If he could track down their house, what could a scrawny eleven-year old do? He turned to get back inside where it was warm and dry, then saw a hazy image of them huddled together, their lips turning blue from the cold.

  He stepped outside, pulled his coat tight, and closed the door. He couldn’t let someone suffer like that. Even if he’d never met them before. Not if there was anything he could do to prevent it. Bobby kicked his bike’s kickstand and mounted the soaked seat. He was drenched in seconds, cold waterfalls trickling down the skin of his back. The street was nearly invisible to him when he started pedaling. He touched the letter tucked inside his pocket, somehow gaining strength from it.

  After turning onto the street, he pedaled harder than he ever thought he could. Puddles choked the bike spokes and nearly dumped him to the ground as he hammered through t
he first turn. At any moment, he expected a police car to pull up beside him. His mother would be riding in the passenger seat, drying tears from her eyes. But there weren’t any police cars, no cars at all for that matter. Besides, Mom was safely at work, without even a notion he might be out after dark. Few windows from the surrounding homes were alight. He felt like the only person awake in the entire world. Maple Road approached quickly as he thought about what he would do once he found their house. He couldn’t think of a single thing.

  The houses on Maple grew together as the yards got smaller. He was looking for 207 Maple and was descending through the 400s. The cold rain stung his eyes as he struggled to make out the address numbers. 429, 417, 401, the numbers fell as he pummeled his aching legs through blurring revolutions.

  379, 361, 353, Bobby flew over the handlebars as his bike crashed into a stump at the end of the road. He tumbled over so many times he had enough time to listen for the sound of his bones breaking. He came to rest in a flooded ditch and stayed still for what seemed like a long time. In shock, he let the rain wash over his face. His limbs ached but he was lucky; nothing was broken.

  He considered the woods at the end of the road. A narrow gap opened into the overgrown weeds. Perhaps an animal trail. Perhaps something more. Bobby grabbed the remains of his bike and heaved them into the underbrush. He stepped into the darkness of the woods, sensing that Evie and Gram were somewhere close.

  * * *

  Evie swooned from blood loss. Agony swept over her entire body.

  “He’s beautiful...” Her father’s voice was caustic yet distant.

  Light shone through the window, white and nearly blinding. The baby moved in her father’s arms and she caught a glimpse of him. Evie had been right all along. She was right for not wanting to see her own baby. She had spawned a disfigured monster.

  An ice-cold mass pressed next to Evie, prying the heat from her shivering body. Her fluttering eyes wouldn’t focus. She reached out with a trembling hand and immediately wished she hadn’t. Her fingers touched Gram’s dead cheek, traced her furrowed brow, her narrow lips. Evie could no longer cry even though she would trade her last breath to do so. Anything to ease the throbbing in her chest. She shuddered, gave up trying to focus her eyes, drifted off. The graceless hand of unconsciousness pulled her closer to death.

  * * *

  His flashlight beam cut a path into the night only as deep as Bobby was tall. He glanced over his shoulder and no longer saw the streetlights or any other sign that he’d just come from a sprawling neighborhood. A good number of minutes had elapsed since he entered the woods. He just hoped he would be able to find his way back out.

  A fallen tree blocked his path and he paused to catch his breath and consider the impasse. The trunk was massive, but after finding a good purchase, he climbed it, no sweat. When he was at the top and ready to make his way down, a flash of light caught his attention. Rain obscured his view, but the light seemed to be the burning end of a cigar.

  After climbing down to the muddy ground, Bobby could make out more detail. A lamp’s light like golden eyes pouring from twin windows. A covered and listing porch. An open screen door silhouetting the hulking shape of a large man, and of course, the burning cigar jiggering in his mouth. Gram and Evie’s house. It had to be.

  Bobby stood stark still. The cigar’s red embers danced, as if the man were focusing his attention where Bobby stood. Bobby neither heard the rain, nor felt it. He wanted to run away, back home, or to anywhere else but here. But he dared not move, not as long as the man with the cigar was staring in his general direction.

  As Bobby considered his chances of outrunning a grown man, the ember red end of the cigar went tumbling down the porch steps. He watched it hiss dead in a puddle. When he looked up, the front door had closed as the man went inside.

  * * *

  Thankfully, Evie was not strong enough to open her eyes. Mumbled splices of a one-sided conversation broke through her mental morass.

  “...I won’t let you go... think you can get away, not now, not ever.”

  She was hoping to die, waiting for it and left wanting.

  “Gonna be a family. You, me, Gram, the boy... think I’ll call’m Jessup. Good, strong name. Gonna be a family forever...”

  Evie felt her father’s rough hand touch her face, and then heard the baby coo and maybe even laugh. Death couldn’t come soon enough.

  * * *

  Bobby knew he should climb back over the fallen tree and get away while he still could. He didn’t know if the man with the cigar had seen him. Maybe he’d gone inside to get a gun. Bobby couldn’t do it, though. Couldn’t escape to warmth and safety, knowing Evie and Gram were in so much trouble.

  He crept toward the one story house, using trees and the heavy undergrowth for cover. Metal numbers hung askew near the porch. 207. Thirty years ago, there could have been a fine yard surrounding the house, but nothing close to a maintained lawn or well-trimmed trees were in sight. The roof sagged under the weight of rotten leaves. Spindly saplings grew among the shingles like weird antennae. The rest of the world had forgotten this house. The forest had swallowed it away from civilization, and the brambles, trees and foraging animals were all working in concert to make it disappear altogether.

  His feet slipped along in the mud and he was lucky he didn’t fall flat on his face. When he reached the house, he sloshed around, keeping low while looking for a cellar window. He turned a corner and splashed along the side of the house, coming across a small pane of glass. The water was up to his ankles and he had to kneel in order to get a look inside.

  He wondered if he’d be able to lower something inside for them to climb. Even if he thought enough ahead of time to bring a rope, he doubted he was strong enough to pull them free, especially with one about to give birth, and the other frail with age. He couldn’t see any details through the clouded glass window. There were shapes that could have been Evie or Gram, but he wouldn’t have bet on it. When he pushed the window, a hinge opened into the cellar with a rusty screech. He looked above to the nearest window, waiting for any sign of Evie’s dad. Seconds ticked off slowly. After a tense stretch without any movement, Bobby peered into the cellar.

  Floodwater rushed through the opened window, splashing into the cellar. It was hard to judge, but the water seemed to be at least three feet deep.

  “Evie, Gram, you there?”

  There was no answer. With the rising water and all that junk strewn about, he couldn’t imagine anyone living in such a place.

  “It’s Bobby. I got your letter. Sorry I didn’t come sooner. Hello? Say something... make a noise. Anything.”

  When he pulled away from the window, the house was dark. Faint music cut through the rain. It was some old tune, maybe jazz considering the lulling trumpet, Bobby didn’t know old music enough to know for sure. It must’ve been a record, considering the scratchy warble. He hoped the man hadn’t seen him and had simply gone off to bed. Why else would he turn off all the lights?

  He hurried along the side of the house and around to the back door. He wanted to throw it wide and charge inside, demanding to know where they were. Instead, he held his breath and approached with caution. When he tested the knob, the works turned over with a metallic clunking sound. He pushed the door open and stepped inside. The lights weren’t all out; a candle burned somewhere on the far side of the house, creating overlarge shadows that danced as a draft hit the flame. He stood in a kitchen. A big iron stove covered one wall. One crooked chair was at a rough-hewn table. Shelves of antique glass filled another wall, covered in thick dust.

  Bobby strained for any sound from anywhere else in the house. He inched forward along the hardwood floor but kept the door ajar in case he needed to make a run for it. A woman’s voice dominated the scratchy record. A brassy big band tried to keep up as she belted out a song that Bobby thought was pretty good. The volume grew with each step he took. In the next room, he saw a couch and a cabinet holding a crowded assortment o
f curios and knick-knacks. He was unable to tell if anyone was lurking in the room.

  As if it was possible to forget, Bobby thought about what he was doing, where he was and just how stupid he was for entering this house. His palms were dripping sweat and he was certain that a trail of rainwater from his soaked clothes would follow him wherever he went. For a moment he thought he would never be able to move, that Evie’s dad would find him still standing stark still sometime in the morning. Then something caught his attention.

  In the next room, a set of eyes had honed in on Bobby. Two coal-black orbs just as unmoving as Bobby felt immobilized by fear. His eyes were adjusting to the darkness and he saw more and more detail. He was looking into the eyes of a raccoon standing on a coffee table. Then he saw a squirrel sitting up with its hands clasped together as if in prayer. In a corner, a beaver stood high on its back legs, balancing with its tail. They were all stuffed and mounted. Every available space held a dead and displayed animal. The walls were all heads and glassy-eyed dead things. Mice, rabbits, woodchucks, deer. In the candlelight, they all seemed alive.

  Bobby was shaking. That was a good thing. Shaking meant he could still move and if he could move, then he could run out of this nightmare. The idea of saving Evie or Gram no longer meant anything to him. They didn’t feel real to him anymore, not after seeing all this. He turned and ran toward the back door. When he neared the kitchen, a massive shadow filled the doorway. Bobby couldn’t stop; his momentum was too great. He crashed into an immovable object that turned out to be the hulking man he had seen earlier. Somehow, the man had stayed hidden out of sight. As Bobby wondered how he could miss seeing someone so large, his legs gave out. The shadows no longer seemed to dance. Instead, they descended over him like a fog.