Where the Cats Will Not Follow

by Stephen Stromp

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this work may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Kindle Press, Seattle, 2017

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, Kindle Scout, and Kindle Press are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  In memory of Thomas

  Contents

  The Trick

  Part I

  1

  2

  3

  4

  Part II

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  Part III

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  Part IV

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  Part V

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  Part VI

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  About the Author

  Books primarily rely...

  The Trick

  I found myself lost in an apple orchard at dusk. It was so foggy, I couldn’t make out the trees. I could only see the ends of their twisted, pointy branches. Behind the cloak of fog, I could hear scurrying and hushed chatter. I knew it was the monsters. They were waiting patiently in the mist for the right moment to attack and devour me.

  I stepped forward blindly, hugging myself, waiting for the inevitable to happen—when suddenly, down the center of the path, the fog parted. Through the tunnel of swirling fog, Everett appeared, riding a bike. As he pedaled toward me, it looked as if he had just broken free from a smoldering fire. Behind the bike, he pulled a makeshift rickshaw. It looked like something he had made himself. Nothing more than a large wicker basket on wheels.

  When he reached me, he climbed off the bike and gently lowered the kickstand before steadying the frame in the loose gravel. I couldn’t help but find the juxtaposition humorous: our ominous surroundings and him casually riding a bike through them. Moreover, taking the time to assure he had parked it properly.

  “You know, they won’t get you if they think you’re already dead,” he reminded me.

  “I know,” I replied. But I always forgot.

  He pulled a sheet out of the basket and motioned for me to climb inside. So I did. He draped the sheet over my body. Since it was too small to conceal me completely, I hung over the edge with my arms stretched low and my head limp, trying my best to look like a corpse. As he began to pedal, I heard the grunts and whispers of the monsters slinking out from the trees and spilling onto the path. They crept behind us curiously, cautiously. Close enough to grab my dangling arms. Close enough to pull me deep into the murky night. Yet they did not.

  Everett pedaled through the orchard. He pedaled until the fog lifted. He pedaled until dawn. The trick worked. Of course it did.

  Part I

  Cabin on Another Planet

  1

  Hero in Restraints

  My feet poking outside the covers made me feel even more vulnerable. Yet I didn’t dare reach for the blanket. Not that my stillness mattered all that much. I knew that what hid in the corners could smell me. Could see in the darkness. Could hear my heartbeat. To them, the simple functioning of my organs—my heart beating, my lungs rising and falling—must’ve sounded like thundering convulsions.

  I scanned the room, lit dimly by the moon. The pale light allowed me to view the sinister faces hidden in the pattern of the faux wood paneling. Some had sloped, vacant eyes. Others had twisted, melted skin. And then there were the ones with sharp teeth and thick horns protruding from the sides of their heads. But the cheap paneling wasn’t the cause of my fear. It was the thought that these macabre portraits were merely impressions of what had escaped the wall, what had materialized into flesh and become whole. They could’ve been anywhere. The fields. The woods. Even within the swelling shadows. Watching. Waiting for the perfect moment to pull me off the bed and swallow me whole.

  If only I could’ve gathered the nerve to leap out from the covers, maybe I could’ve been saved by the light. Maybe by my flipping on the switch, the brightness would’ve killed the shadows and disinfected the entire room of evil. But there I lay, worrying that my movements would only entice an attack, fearing that perhaps the switch was already on and that the light had been sucked away, overpowered by the darkness.

  I desperately wanted to call out to Everett across the hall. He wouldn’t have been afraid. He would’ve protected me. But I couldn’t call out to him. My voice wouldn’t allow it. If I shouted his name, I just knew it would’ve come out a whisper. If I screamed, it would’ve come out a muted shriek. And I knew if I had tried and my voice had failed to reach his ears, it would’ve been worse than movement. It would’ve compelled them to instantly rush upon me. No, paralyzed silence was my best hope for survival.

  Yet the longer I remained still, the more I became a ball of unreleasable energy. My neck ached. My legs boiled under the covers. And in the center of my stomach sprouted the most unbearable itch. I clenched my hands into tight fists, fighting against the temptation to scratch. But my concentration only made it more intense. No longer able to withstand the agony, cautiously I inched my hand beneath the covers. My movements were so slow, so careful, that the blanket barely moved. When I at last reached my stomach, I dug my nails into my skin with fervor. I had my relief. But what was more, I had moved—and hadn’t been attacked.

  Released from my immobile prison, I looked down to see the hair on my chest—and a spark of awareness came over me. It was a peculiar sensation, realizing that although I was in my parents’ house, in the small twin bed of my childhood, I was in my adult twenty-six-year-old body. I was not the child I had once been, sleeping in that room, living in that house. Why then was I stuck, helpless, with Everett being the only one who could save me?

  Brashly, I flung the covers to the floor. Warm air rushed over my legs and torso. In a flash, I scooted to the end of the bed, stood upon my electrified legs, and grabbed the doorknob. Yet before I left, I took one final look at the room behind me. It was then I realized my self-assuredness was premature. No matter what age my body was, I was still as vulnerable as a child. The shadows had grown into a single mass enveloping half the room. Darkness as black as oil oozed over the edge of the bed and inched near my feet. I hurriedly slipped through the door and pulled it tight behind me.

  In the hall, I stood before Everett’s door. I gently placed my hand on it, and it creaked open slightly. I pulled away without looking inside, not wanting to know. Frightened he wouldn’t be there. Frightened to confirm I was alone.

  I headed down the open stairway. A low wind must’ve picked up because the enormous blue spruces relentlessly scraped against the side of the house. They scratched not with violence, but with the slow persistence of a pendulum swinging without a force to stop it. Yet the more I listened, the less it sounded like pine needles at all. It was more like pointy fingernails
poking through the window screens and tapping on the panes. So polite they were, as if asking permission to be let in. As I crept across the living room, a low growl overlapped with the taps that I hoped were nothing more than sudden gusts of air forced between the needles.

  As I entered the dining room, I pleaded under my breath for the noises to stop. The pines pressed against the row of windows overlooking the table. Outside, the night was still. There was barely a breeze. No leaves dashed through the yard. And the pines—stood motionless. Yet something was ripping through the screens and incessantly tapping on the windows. And something outside was growling. The long row of windows was designed to let in light. Yet it was darkness that wanted to be let in that night. I rushed down the line, slapping shut the slats and latching every wooden blind. My stirring activity caused whatever was outside to become even more insistent. Tap! Tap! Tap!

  Dizzy with terror, I tugged on the front door and then the side door by the basement steps to ensure they were secure. But the thought of checking the sliding glass door in the sunroom made me the most uneasy. If I was in front of the wall of glass, they would see me. And clearly, I would see them. Yet as I took one timid step into the room, I could only see my reflection in the glass. There was nothing but blackness on the other side. The stars that had shown themselves on so many nights had been snuffed out by the thick Michigan clouds.

  Before I could test the lock, the sound of stairs creaking held me back. Our house was built over a hundred years before, and you could always hear when a person made their way down the stairs, even from the other end of the house. My mind raced, thinking of places to hide. But hiding would’ve been futile. What had escaped from my bedroom walls already knew all the hiding places. It dwelled in the hiding places. So I stood right where I was, deciding to finally face what pursued me. And into the sunroom, with his hands kept coolly in the pockets of his jeans, stepped—Everett. Everett, whose imposing stature alone could scare away demons. Everett, my protector.

  “You’re home!” I shouted. It wasn’t a surprise that in his presence I could actually speak.

  He smirked at me looking so frantic in my underwear. “What’re you doing up?” he asked.

  “You know,” I replied gravely. I knew he did. He lowered his eyebrows, seemingly disappointed I wasn’t keeping up my half of the charade. “I wasn’t sure you’d be here.”

  “I just came down for a drink.” He continued to play along with it all yet at the same time threw me a quick wink.

  I was just glad he was there. I wanted him close until it was over, until the terrible night ended. I pushed on his broad shoulders like a needy child, insisting he be the one to check the door. It wasn’t like him to turn down a challenge. But Everett wouldn’t budge. And that’s when I remembered. It wasn’t as if he didn’t want to help. He couldn’t. Wasn’t allowed. So instead, in a reversal of roles, he gently grabbed my shoulders and positioned me in front of him, at arm’s length, facing the glass door. I looked upon my reflection and took a deep, uneasy breath. “Remember the cats,” he whispered.

  For him to bring up the cats, he understood my degree of fear. They were the furthest thing from my mind that night. But because of Everett, I did think of them. I thought of them circling me like they were performing a ritualistic dance. Momentarily, I was transported to the wonderful scene. The sun was a soft yellow, making the coats of the felines shimmer. I held my hand out to touch them. Their fur was soft. Such large cats. Healthy and muscular. They were perfect. I feared they’d be scared away. Yet no careless child stomped through the field. Not even a distant gunshot was heard. I smiled. On a night I never thought I would’ve been able to, I smiled.

  Everett released me. Alone, I stepped forward, imagining the cats circling my body like a shield. While their faces remained hidden, as I approached the door, I could see their hands crowding the window. Their wet fingertips squeaked across the glass. Pressing. Sliding. Smearing. Their fingers were green, moldy green with black fingertips. The tips didn’t appear to be nails but rather bones, sharpened to a point, poking through the ends of their fingers. The reflection of my face warped and twisted as the glass strained from the pressure.

  They were under the powerful floodlights that had allowed us to play outside at night when we were children. And light, I knew, they were not fond of. I flipped the switch beside the door and was elated to see that even against the oppressing darkness surrounding the house, the bulbs actually worked. Glorious light burst upon them. It shot over the patio and stretched into the garden. At last, the monsters were exposed.

  It was the horned ones, at least a dozen of them. They were no more than four feet tall. The skin on the rest of their body was as moldy green as the skin of their fingers. And just like their impressions on the wall, bulky black horns protruded from the sides of their heads in the shape of shark fins turned sideways. Their red pupils had difficulty adjusting to the light, yet they dared stay beneath it. In fact, they seemed to relish the exposure no matter how painful it was. They opened their oversize jaws and bared their long, sharp teeth. They smashed their faces against the window, smearing it with their juices.

  In the reflection, I could see Everett behind me. He looked on with his arms folded across his chest. Saddened. Powerless. They saw him too, and his presence made them furious. They rammed their horns against the glass. It shook and began to splinter.

  I rushed to the dining room, petrified. In a final, desperate panic, I grabbed the edge of the table. As I managed to topple it over, the vase that sat upon it, filled with freshly cut lilac blossoms, rolled to the floor. The lavender blooms were crushed as I dragged the table into the sunroom. Their sweet scent permeated the air. I frantically propped the table on its side and shoved it against the door. The monsters crowded near me, licking the other side of the cracking glass. As soon as I had the table in position, the door finally gave way, showering me with broken glass. I stumbled backward. The monsters chewed on the shards, letting the broken pieces slice their lips and tongues. They grinned with delight as their teeth dripped green blood.

  Drained, defeated, and as if a magnet had pinned me there, I surrendered by lying on the dining room floor. I looked up to see Everett towering over me. I couldn’t see his face at first, just the bristles on his neck and chin. When he finally brought himself to look upon me, I saw tears welling in his eyes. One slid down his cheek. I closed my eyes and waited for it to land on my face, but I didn’t feel it. Perhaps he had caught it? Everett was the one who watched them shred the table. He was the one who saw their small haunting bodies creep into the house and crowd around me.

  I felt their bony fingers all over my body. On my chest and in my mouth. I felt their hot breath on my stomach. They liked my stomach most. They went for it first. It was like being tickled too hard when they tore into it. They used their pointy fingers to take the pieces they wanted and crammed their heads in to slurp up the rest. It didn’t hurt so bad. I wanted to tell Everett that it hardly hurt at all. I wanted to tell him there was pleasure in being devoured by these demons. Pleasure in finally submitting and being released from their torture. It might have made him feel better. But they were crawling all over my body, and I couldn’t communicate. I could only smell the powerful lilacs.

  2

  Eight Minutes

  I woke to the overwhelming scent of lilacs. I could hear birds. Bugs humming. I didn’t open my eyes. I didn't want to confirm any assumptions that I had about my surroundings. I liked not knowing where I was. I could be anywhere I wanted as long as I didn't open my eyes. Once I opened them, wherever I was couldn’t be changed, even if I decided to close them again. I imagined I was in my own bed. I imagined the familiar surroundings of my small apartment: my Siamese fighting fish in his bowl upon the dresser, my ivy plant cascading down the stand in the corner. I even began hearing the morning traffic not too far away on Holland Avenue becoming heavier and heavier the longer I procrastinated.

  Yet as I attempted to trick my brain
into believing this scenario, I couldn't help but sense the musty smell of the room. I couldn't ignore the rays of morning sun striking me when my apartment had no window facing east. And the aching in my wrists called attention to the fact that my hands were locked in place over my head. But most of all, his presence kept me from escaping the room. I knew that he was there. I sensed his slight movements beside the bed. He'd been waiting. If I opened my eyes, I knew I’d have to face him, disappoint him. Bits of my bedroom disintegrated with each floorboard creak and breath I heard him breathe. Slowly I was dragged away, flooded instead with fragments of how I had arrived in that foreign bed.

  I recalled lying in the fetal position, my head resting on his leg or perhaps a bunched-up coat. My consciousness was hazy at best. The constant whirring of the vibrating engine held me under its spell, although the occasional bumps caused my eyes to slip open. It was in those moments that I realized how stiff my muscles were. How dizzy I was. My head pounded with painful rhythms that seemed connected to the beating of my heart. I caught glimpses of his black dress shoe on the gas pedal. But I could only hold my eyes open a few moments at a time before the droning engine would call me back.

  I wondered how he got me from the truck to the bed. I was too heavy for him to carry, and I was sure he was alone. Perhaps I was dragged. I adjusted my legs under the scratchy blanket. If only I had the nerve to peel back the disgusting covering, at least the dry breeze could’ve reached my legs. My hair stuck to my face. The pillow was soaked in my sweat. There was a kink in my neck. I jerked my tingling arms forward only to be reminded that my wrists were affixed to the bedpost.

  The power of the physical world was just too great. I was no longer able to drift. My surroundings, though my mind still hadn't a picture of them, were winning. He had to suspect by then, anyhow, that I was truly awake. I feared that he'd call my bluff and shake me into joining him in cruel reality. So before I would let that happen, I opened my eyes, barely a squint. Immediately, a painful blaze of light exploded before me. All I could see were millions of dust particles dancing in the air, illuminated by the morning sun. Slowly I forced open my eyes the rest of the way, focusing on the figure bathed in light. Sunlight struck his blond hair, making it glow. I had caught my first glimpse. There was no turning back.