Fear of the Dark: An Anthology of Dark Fiction

by Maria Grazia Cavicchioli

  “What is it?” Willie called again.

  “I’m coming down. You guys have to see this.” Eddy held the bag between his teeth and climbed down the face of the building with great agility, despite his inebriation, using the series of randomly protruding bricks as footholds. He jumped the last five feet to the ground and looked into the bag as he ran across the street.

  “There’s hundreds of dollars in here!” he said, holding the bag high above his head. Willie tried, unsuccessfully, to pluck it from Eddy’s hand.

  “Easy there, cheese-dick,” Eddy said and slapped Willie hard on the back.

  “Whose is it?” Kurt asked.

  “I don’t fucking know. I thought I heard something by the chimney, and found this just sitting there.” Eddy grabbed the cigarette dangling out of Willie’s mouth and pretended to brand him with it.

  “Cut the shit,” Willie yelped, dancing around to avoid Eddy’s quick jabs. “You’re wasting it. I hardly smoked that one.”

  “This stuff will kill you,” Eddy replied, spitting on the tip of the cigarette. It sizzled, then went out as he dropped it to the sidewalk. “I did you a favor.”

  He shook the black bag in Kurt’s face. “Let’s go upstairs and count this crap.”

  They jostled each other playfully as they hurried up the stairwell and into their nearly empty third level apartment, slamming the door behind them. The first room in the apartment was the kitchen, and smelled of stale beer and pepperoni pizza. Eddy placed the bag on top of the white island countertop in the center of the room and emptied its contents. Several twenties and fifties spilled out, along with a driver’s license, a small, multi-colored smoking pipe, and a key. Eddy quickly collected the money and counted it out.

  “Five hundred bucks. This is unbelievable.”

  “Let me see that driver’s license,” Kurt said.

  Eddy looked up with bloodshot eyes as he recounted the money and pointed to the license now in Kurt’s hands. “Unless that’s some incredibly hot babe’s ID, don’t tell me that you’re even thinking of giving this money back.”

  Kurt’s large, cobalt-colored eyes narrowed as he studied the card in his hands. “It won’t be easy,” he replied.

  “No shit,” Willie stammered, and then paused. “Wait, what do you mean, ‘It won’t be easy’?”

  “Look.” Kurt slid the license down to Willie, who pounded down on it with his hand. It bounced off his knobby fingertips and onto the gray-blue linoleum floor. Willie picked up the card and looked it over. “This is weird. There’s a picture of a woman on this, but you can’t make anything else out. All the information is scratched out.”

  “But you can see the state: Utah,” Kurt said. “What was a bag with all this money and a license from Utah doing on top of that building?”

  “Let me see that,” Eddy said, at last satisfied with the total count of twenties and fifties. He flipped the license over and back in his burly hands. “This thing is fucked up, but who cares. She has some hippy-looking crack pipe in here too, you know. Maybe she’s a hooker, or she’s in trouble with the law, or whatever. Who knows? Who cares?”

  “We can’t keep this stuff. We should call the cops,” Kurt said.

  “Don’t be stupid. What are we going to say, that I was climbing buildings and trespassing on University property while I was hammered? No way. We’re keeping this cash. I don’t know about you guys, but for me, some easy cash will come in very handy to start the summer.”

  “Yeah, finders keepers, Kurt,” Willie added. “There's more than a hundred and fifty for each of us. You can buy a necklace or some other queer gift for Trish.” Willie hugged and kissed an imaginary girl, reaching his hand down to where her bottom would be.

  “At least he can get a girl, oinker,” Eddy said. He turned to Kurt and grinned. “Are we going to see that fine piece of ass tonight?”

  “Fuck you.”

  “Come on, don’t you know a complement when you hear it?” Eddy asked.

  “Sorry, guess not.”

  Eddy bounced his shoulders up and down, cavorting to an unheard beat. “Anyway... I found this bag. I get four hundred.”

  “Bullshit. We’re splitting it three ways,” Willie barked. Eddy scowled at him.

  “Guys, the license. There’s something very wrong about this. We can’t ignore that. The girl who owns it might be in some kind of trouble. I’m not that drunk. I’ll say I found the bag out on the lawn across the street,” Kurt said.

  Eddy threw the license, pipe, and key back into the bag and pulled it tightly shut by its drawstrings. The money remained on the counter. He placed the palms of his hands flat on the counter and leaned forward, directly over the pile of bills. His bulky trapezius muscles flared out from high up his neck and down to his shoulders.

  “I don’t give a shit about that license. It looks like someone tried to make a fake ID and screwed it up. Giving this money away to the cops is retarded. Kurt, you’re an Econ major. You know all about capitalism — survival of the fittest, man.”

  Kurt picked up his book bag from the foot of his bedroom door and slung it across his shoulders. “You know what I think should be done.”

  “Listen. I won’t make this much dough in two weeks working at that shitty country club back home this summer. This money is ours; end of conversation.”

  Kurt took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I guess it won’t do any good to argue with you. You always end up doing what you want.”

  Eddy flashed a grin of a thousand teeth. “I am doing the right thing. If Eddy doesn’t take care of Eddy, who will?”

  “Do whatever you decide, but I’m not involved.” Kurt started towards the front door, shaking his head.

  “Where are you going?” Willie asked.

  Kurt paused. “To Trish’s. She probably still hasn’t finished packing all her stuff yet, and I want to head back home first thing tomorrow morning.”

  Eddy took Kurt by his elbow. “Lighten up, judge. Don’t head out of here all pissed off at us.”

  “I’m fine,” Kurt replied, removing his elbow from Eddy’s loosened grip. He shook his roommates’ hands and continued on. “Take it easy.”

  “I always do,” Eddy said. “Call me when your parents head up to Michigan in July. You supply the brew, I’ll bring the girls. Just keep Trish away that weekend.”

  “Okay, I’ll write that down in my calendar first chance I get,” Kurt quipped. He gave one last look back as he opened the door. “I wouldn’t keep it...” he trailed off, motioning to the bag on the counter.

  “Okay, already,” Willie sighed. Kurt nodded and went off into the warmth of the late-May night.

  “I don’t get him. He never seems to know it when a great thing hits him right in the face,” Eddy said.

  “You think this has something to do with his dad going missing?” Willie asked.

  “How?”

  “Well, Kurt had a point. Maybe the girl on the license was kidnapped or something. You know how weird Kurt acted after what happened to his father last year. I’m not saying that this is the case with this Utah girl here, but who knows?”

  “Kurt always acts weird. He never even told us the whole story about his dad anyway. Then he takes the fall semester off and you never hear from the guy while he’s gone. Add on top of that that he’s been a major pain in my ass since he’s been back. All things considered, I don’t give a shit what his opinion is.”

  “His dad disappeared. What else was there to tell?”

  “I don’t know. But if Kurt, for whatever reason, drew a comparison in his mind to his dad and this girl, don’t you think he would have said something about it?”

  “Like you said, Kurt doesn’t like talking about it, so I doubt it.”

  “Sometimes I think he’s really fucked up,” Eddy mumbled, shaking his head and staring at the bag.

  “He knew he wasn’t going to change your mind, Eddy. But I think we’d really piss him off
if we don’t call the cops. It would kind of be an insult against him.”

  Eddy narrowed his eyes and stared at Willie. “You have to be kidding. Are you actually telling me that you want to give away this money, too?”

  Willie shrugged.

  “I can’t even believe this,” Eddy said, throwing his hands up and rolling his eyes.

  “I’m not saying anything one way or the other. I’m just telling you what I think.” Willie cracked his knuckles and looked around, avoiding direct eye contact with Eddy. “So, what do you want to do?”

  “Told you already. I’m keeping four hundred, and now because Saint Kurt left without his share, you’ll get one hundred.” Eddy slid two fifties over to Willie. Willie took the bills and shoved them into the pocket of his jeans shorts. Eddy picked up the bag and strutted towards the front door.

  “I’m getting rid of the evidence,” he said, laughing and putting air-quotes around the word evidence. “You want to come?”

  “Not unless you’re going to pay me another one-fifty for my company,” Willie pouted.

  “You’re lucky I’m giving you Kurt’s share.”

  “Gee, thanks for your incredible generosity.”

  “No problem. See you later.” Eddy let out a yelping laugh and left Willie yawning in the kitchen.

  On the sidewalk below, Eddy took a quick right out of the apartment complex and jogged thirty yards down to a dimly lit alley behind Yoshii’s, the Japanese restaurant that he had spent countless late nights pounding down beer and sake with his roommates and other fraternity brothers during the past three years. The alley reeked of rancid sushi and unidentifiable yet equally pungent odors. He approached the rusty dumpster adjacent to Yoshii’s back wall and took a brief glance around. With the school year having finished in the past week, the restaurant was already closed for the night and no one else was in sight. He lifted the dumpster’s lid with his left hand and was about to dump the bag inside, when a strange sensation numbed his right arm. This was immediately followed by an intense pressure squeezing from his fingertips up to the top of his shoulder. It felt as though his arm would implode. He threw the bag in, let the lid down harder than he wanted to, and shook his arm so vigorously that the clasp on his watch came undone. Immediately, his arm felt normal again.

  “I have to quit drinking,” he said softly, laughing at his own sardonic revelation. He adjusted the clasp on his watch and ran back up the deserted street, chasing his emerging and receding shadows from the overhead street lamps.

  By the time he reached his apartment, he was already calculating how many cases of Icehouse he could buy with his four hundred dollars. Once back inside, he kicked off his shoes and stretched out his arms. Willie’s bedroom door to the right was closed. Eddy could hear Willie snoring through the thin wall separating them. It sounded like a nasal machinegun sporadically going off.

  “Goodnight, needle-dick,” Eddy called out and switched off the lights. Willie continued to fire away.

  Eddy washed his face with cold water in the bathroom and gargled away as much of the stench of beer from his breath that he could with the half ounce or so of Scope that remained under the sink. He flexed in the mirror and smiled. “Huge,” he whispered to his reflection.

  All the beer and excitement of the evening began to take its toll. Suddenly exhausted, he staggered into his bedroom, closing the door behind him. He collapsed onto the bare bed and fell asleep almost immediately.

  ○

  Eddy awoke from a nightmare in which he was free-falling down into a frozen, bottomless abyss. The quick transition from dream to wide-awake reality disorientated him. In one jerking motion, he sat up and looked around unsteadily. He instinctively reached for the lamp by his bed and cursed the darkness when he found it missing. Perhaps an hour had gone by, maybe more, since he had passed out. With his alarm clock also already packed away in his car, he looked at his watch — the glowing hands told him it was half past two in the morning.

  Eddy shivered. The air in the room was cold and crisp. It had to be nearly eighty degrees outside, yet he was freezing. He decided a quick check of the thermostat was in order.

  A loud bang came from out in the kitchen as he stood up. Rubbing his hands along his arms for warmth, he slowly walked the six paces to his bedroom door. There was no light from the kitchen or living room shining from underneath the door. Perhaps Willie was stumbling into something in the darkness, maybe on his way to the bathroom. Easing forward, he placed one ear against the door and listened. There was only silence.

  “What are you doing, Willie?” he called out. No response. “Willie?” Nothing. Eddy slowly twisted the knob, cold to the touch, and opened the door.

  As in Eddy’s bedroom, the kitchen and living room were frigid.

  The front door stood wide open. A stiff breeze bellowed into the apartment. Eddy approached the door and turned on the kitchen light. It cast off a yellow tint, like some sort of a sickly, translucent skin upon everything in the kitchen and part of the adjoining living room.

  He went outside and looked up and down the concrete corridor. No one was in sight. The concrete felt warm under his bare feet. The night air was humid and smelled of oncoming rain. Aside from the brisk wind, all else was still. Eddy walked over to the railing running along the inner portion of the rectangular apartment complex and looked down over the courtyard and east end of the parking lot. He figured Willie might have gone out for a late-night snack, as he often had after a hefty night of drinking, and accidentally left the door open. But from his vantage point, Eddy could see most of Willie’s red Chevy Spectrum parked in its spot.

  He rubbed the short, thick stubble growing over his chin and pondered. Maybe he’d left the door unlocked when he returned from the dumpster.

  Eddy reentered the apartment and locked the door. His attention immediately returned to the strange cold front that just happened to be running through their apartment for no particular reason. The thermostat was attached to the wall a few feet to the right of the kitchen sink, where the kitchen ended and the living room began. He wondered if he’d turned the temperature dial down before passing out. Upon inspection, it read a comfortable seventy-one degrees Fahrenheit. He adjusted the dial up to eighty and turned it on “Heat,” blowing into his hands for a few seconds to keep warm.

  Just as he lowered himself onto one knee in anticipation of the outward rush of warm air from the floor vents, he heard a squeaking sound from somewhere behind him. He got up and turned in the direction of where he thought it came from. Willie’s bedroom door stood a few inches ajar.

  “You up, Willie?” Eddy asked. There was no response. He approached the door.

  “Willie?”

  Eddy peeked inside and saw that his roommate was gone. Where Willie should have been, however, lay a small object. Before stepping another foot into the room, Eddy recognized it as the black leather bag. A feeling of intense curiosity mixed with odd apprehension seized him. He advanced through the doorway and took the bag off the bed. It was ice cold. The room, in fact, was absolutely freezing. Eddy carried the bag into the living room and sat on the couch. The bag felt like an ice pack through his jeans as he rested it on his lap. He reached into his pocket, took out his cell phone, and dialed.

  “Where the hell are you,” he said aloud as he waited for the first ring. The leather bag rang. He jumped, knocking the bag onto the carpeted floor. The bag continued to ring. He slowly lowered the phone from his ear and pressed the call-cancel button. The room went silent. He shoved his phone into his pocket, picked up the bag, and pulled it open. Inside, the LCD from Willie’s cell phone glowed pale blue, then went out.

  Eddy ran to the kitchen island counter and emptied the bag’s contents for the second time that night. Out spilled two fifty-dollar bills, the cell phone, a box of Marlboro Ultra Lights, and a driver’s license. Eddy’s heart hiccupped. With shaking hands, he inspected the plastic card. It was from Illinois, with Willie’s picture on i
t. All other information was scratched off of the license.

  “Willie!” Eddy yelled out. “Where are you? Stop fucking around with me!” With the license still in hand, Eddy ran throughout the apartment, even checking each bedroom closet as he went. He half expected to find Willie, laughing at pulling one over on him, somewhere in the apartment. He very quickly realized that he wished he had found Willie laughing somewhere. All the rooms and closets were empty. His head began to pound. He was having a hard time breathing, as though his lungs were shriveling up. In some surreal way, the apartment itself seemed to be closing in on him. The corners of the ceiling felt like they were rapidly collapsing inward. A sudden urge to throw up overcame him. Vomit spewed out from between his clenched teeth and onto his shirt before he could reach the kitchen sink. It reeked of acidic bile and beer.

  He rinsed his mouth out with cold water and lowered his head under the sink’s faucet. The water poured over his scalp and neck, temporarily clearing his head. He removed his shirt and leaned back against the sink, running both hands over his face. The edge of Willie’s license scratched the side of his cheek. Until that moment, he had forgotten that the license was still in his hands. Looking at it again almost sent a new wave of panic over him, but he fought against it.

  “Calm down. You’re still a little drunk. Just stop acting like a little fucking girl.”

  The ever-lowering temperature was becoming too painful to tolerate. The heat seemed to have no effect, although Eddy could hear the humming of the warm air from the vents.

  Eddy wrapped his crumpled shirt into a ball and wiped off the puke from around the kitchen sink. It left streaks of dark red against the light brown cabinets, like the blood of roadkill smeared across a dirt road. He dropped the ruined shirt into the sink and put on his sneakers. In need of fresh air and a new shirt, he left the apartment (making sure to lock the door this time) and went down to the parking lot.

  His car was parked across from Willie’s, on the west end of the lot. Eddy popped the automatic lock on his trunk and grabbed a U of I sweatshirt. Although he didn’t need it outside, he threw it on and reveled in the extra warmth it provided.