Abby shook her head. “I don’t remember. I was a little preoccupied listening to a different earful.”
“Probably for the best. It’s not the kind of thing you need to hear right now.”
Abby smirked, “What like an angry ghost that lures people into the river and they’re never heard from again.”
“And the waters run red with their blood,” Diane added with an ominous tone.
Abby went to the front of her car and tugged on the switchblade in her tire. It came loose with a soft hiss of air. She held it up for Diane to see. “I can take care of myself.”
“I’m sure,” Diane smiled. “But let’s not take any chances. Come on, I’ll give you a ride. This will be my good deed for the week.”
“You’re sure I’m not putting you out?”
“Absolutely not. I come here all the time, I can skip one Dirty Birdie Thursday.”
“Well, ok. Sure. Thank you so much.” She grabbed her purse from the hood of her useless car and followed Diane to her SUV.
Inside, she put her purse in the backseat while Diane climbed into the driver’s seat. It was a clean car, mostly empty. There was a large blue tarp in the backseat floorboards, the nylon kind that crinkled when you moved it. Good for covering vehicles in the rain. The only other thing in the car was an air freshening clip on the vents and a bobble-head hanging from the rearview mirror. It looked like a small tree in a flower pot. A big square head bloomed on top. Abby vaguely recognized it from a movie.
“Guess I won’t be needing this,” Abby held up the switchblade and laughed.
“You never know,” Diane said, cranking the engine to life and putting it in reverse.
“This thing always scared me. I always thought Jessie would cut his finger off closing it, or pluck his eye out. They’re illegal, aren’t they?”
“I’m pretty sure.”
“Maybe I should put it in the back then.”
She did, tossing it on the blue tarp which crinkled on cue. Diane gave her bobble head a small tap and took a left out of Birdie's parking lot, onto the highway. The sun was low, practically a warm orange stripe on the horizon. What little light remained was behind them, casting long slanted shadows on the road ahead.
"Thanks again Diane," Abby said. "No telling what kind of creep I might come across in another hour or so."
Abby was a short girl, not skinny but nowhere near fat. Most people called her curvy. Or thick. She preferred the former. Diane on the other hand was tall and thin, a magazine model type. When she turned to answer Abby, she had to tilt her head down to do so.
"Speaking of creeps, what kind of man leaves his girlfriend at a bar in the middle of the night?"
Abby sighed. "The kind you see in the movies. The cool jock that never grows out of his lettermen jacket. Treats girls like crap because he knows how to make it their fault."
"And he carries a green switchblade.” Diane cocked her head, “I don’t know how to tell you this, but I think your dating a Greaser. Does he snap his fingers a lot?"
Abby burst into laughter. "And I was his teen sweetheart, rocking the school sweater with my hair pulled back in a high ponytail."
"I could see that," Diane said. "But I get it. Sometimes it's hard to let go."
"It's not all bad. Sometimes he's charming. He gets things done, good with his hands, you know."
"I know the type."
There was very little traffic on the highway. Once the bar was about two miles in the rear, Diane turned on to a long winding country lane. It meandered briefly through a thicket of trees, then came out on a straight-shot in farm country. She rolled her window down, letting the cool night air inside.
"What about you?” Abby said. “Any men in your life worth keeping. Or trashing?"
"Not exactly."
"Sounds like there's a but coming," Abby grinned. "Come on, spill."
"Well, there is this one guy.”
“Ooh, that’s the line.”
Diane blushed. “He says he’s from the old country. I’m not sure where exactly, but he’s definitely not from around here. He’s got this voice; it makes you think of old places, like if you close your eyes you imagine him walking you down the streets of Victorian London. Or Italy during the Renaissance.”
Abby fanned herself playfully. “My, I think I’m swooning. What does he look like?”
“I don’t know, really.”
“You don’t know?”
“We haven’t been able to meet yet. We talk to each other though. Every day.”
“Oh no, don’t tell me he’s catfishing you?”
“No, nothing like that. He’s much too sophisticated for that. He told me once that the moment we meet will be like the moment the last drop of rain falls and the sun shines through the clouds. And I believe him.”
Abby leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. “Sounds dreamy. Hope that moment comes soon.”
“Soon just isn’t be soon enough,” Diane said. Abby picked up on a yearning in her words. A real desire.
The SUV rode along the country lane, mounting small hills and hugging long curves. The sun was fully set and the sky was full of ambient twilight. The trees went by as dark blurs and a white picket fence flashed by on Abby’s side of the road. Rolling pastures stretched as far as the twilight allowed and after another mile, the smell of freshly cut grass and manure filled the car. The first breath of it was almost too sweet, it made Abby swallow involuntarily. After that, it smelled like a buttery baked potato, earthy and sweet.
The scent relaxed her and she settled deeper into the SUV’s leather chair. “You live out here?” Abby asked.
“Sort of. I live on a ranch by the river. A few miles from here. But I have to drop something off for a friend before we get there.”
“Does this friend happen to be Mr. Renaissance?”
Sparks of red touched Diane’s cheeks and Abby nearly squealed again.
“Is this the night?”
“No,” Diane replied. They were approaching a stop sign at the end of the road and Diane signaled a left turn. “It’s coming though.”
They pulled off the side of the road and Diane drove the SUV up to a rusty orange gate. It was the kind you might find on any southern backroad, large steel bars planted at the entrance of a dirt road to keep out ATVs and trucks. Posted signs hammered to the trees around it and a chain snaking between the bars.
Diane parked in front of it, stuck her hand out the window, and opened her door from the outside. The overhead light didn’t turn on, but the light reflecting from the headlights and the dash was bright enough to see. She took a key from the sun visor and said, “Be right back.”
She slammed the door and walked in the glare of the headlights until she reached the gate and fumbled with the padlock. It was a thick chain, coiled at least four times between the gate and the post.
Abby took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Her nerves were wound tight in her legs and shoulders, but not for the reasons she expected them to be. She had a sudden urge for a cigarette, but with some effort she denied it. She’d given up smoking five years ago, when she got pregnant with Jessie’s baby. She miscarried and that was enough to keep her from getting back on the wagon.
When the urge overcame her now, she chewed gum.
She leaned over the seat and reached for into the back for her purse and the pack of Juicy Fruit tucked inside it. As she dug through her purse, she glanced down at the tarp and noticed something strange.
The switchblade she’d dropped on the tarp was gone. Not only that, but the tarp didn’t look right. It was clumped on one end and a corner was folded over the other. She reached down to put it back in place.
The tarp crinkled like a nylon wave as a man sat up, appearing from beneath it like a corpse rising from his grave. A black mask covered his face and in his hand was the pearly green handle of the switchblade.
Abby jerked back, nearly hitting the dashboard in her surprise. The man stared at her for a long moment,
the switchblade raised in his hand. Abby had to fight back her scream.
“Christ, Jessie, not yet.” She looked over her shoulder, seeing Diane unwinding the first loop of chain from the fence. The headlights glinted off the metal like snake eyes.
The man lowered his knife. “How much longer?” He looked over Abby’s shoulder, saw the gate in the middle of the woods. “Where the hell are we? I thought you said she lived in a big country house.”
“She does, moron. Didn’t you hear her say she was dropping something off first?”
“I can’t hear anything but the motor and this damn tarp. Sounds like a goat chewing a tin can in my ear. And whatever she’s got in the trunk keeps sliding around, banging next to my head every time she turns. Like to make me scream the first time.”
Abby glanced back to see Diane had coiled the chain neatly on the post and was walking the gate open. “Just cover back up. I’ll tell you when it’s time go-time.”
“Fine. This score better be worth it, Ab.”
“Wasn’t the last one?”
Jessie rolled his eyes and laid back in the floor. Abby helped cover him up just as the door opened and Diane slid inside. “What are you doing?” she asked.
Abby pulled her purse to the front, double checking to make sure Jessie’s head was covered. She took the Juicy Fruit from her bag and held it out to Diane.
“No thanks,” she said, putting the car in drive. “I’m a Big Red kind of girl.”
She pulled the SUV along a narrow dirt road, going just over 10 miles an hour. Every now and then a rock beneath the tire made the SUV bounce. The tarp crinkled every time, while the bobble-head danced to the sound. Abby looked out her window at the forest. It grew thicker by the minute. Crabgrass and weeds seemed to crowd the road, climbing to where Abby thought they might soon graze the windows.
It was darker here, not even the moonlight could breach the thickness of the woods.
“What exactly does Mr. Renaissance want you to do out here?” she said when she could hold her curious tongue no more.
“There’s a clearing in about another quarter mile,” Diane said. Her flinty brown eyes stayed on the road as she spoke. “He’s big into hunting and camping.”
“Oh.” Abby let her voice trail off, implying her question hadn’t been answered.
The clock on the dash was nearing 10:00 pm, but in the forest, Abby was sure it was midnight. It was the kind of night that stretches on for eternity and daylight seems like a forsaken memory.
“Here it is,” Diane said.
The headlights broke the tree line and filled a clearing with their pale light. It was rugged, probably two acres total. At the very end of the headlight’s reach, a small picnic area sat next to a grassy knoll. Diane killed the engine and the unmistakable sound of running water took its place.
“Is that a river?” Abby asked.
“More like a creek,” Diane said. “It picks up somewhere downstream and goes right by my ranch.” She flipped the key backward so that the headlights would stay on, then pulled a latch that popped the trunk. She rolled up the window before stepping out. “Be right back.”
Abby nodded but Diane was already out of the car. A heavy silence settled over the car. Abby looked up again at the picnic area. There were two wooden tables beneath a shed with a tin roof. The tables, even at a distance, looked rotted. Behind them, wisps of fog, like ethereal fingers, rose up from the hidden creek.
The water flowed steadily in the gloom. It sounded black, as if the water were so polluted it made a noise all its own. As if it were alive.
She closed her eyes and tried to block out the sound, but it was no use. The current spoke to her in a soft voice that seemed only a few syllables away from being English. She could have sworn it was asking her something.
“Jessie,” she whispered.
The tarp crinkled but he didn’t rise.
“Have you ever heard of the Red River?”
A harsh breeze swept through the back as Diane raised the trunk. The cold air smelled of grass and fresh rainfall, but it didn’t soothe her like before. She kept her eyes on the clearing, not daring to speak again with Diane so close.
The river whispered once again and Abby felt her flesh goose over. Her eyes traveled to the corner of the clearing, where the headlights barely reached. Just before the beam faded into darkness, she made out a shape on the ground. It looked like a mound of dirt. Or sand, like you’d find at the bottom of a river. The wind circled around it, making it swell and shift. To Abby it appeared to be breathing.
The SUV bounced on its shocks and Diane grunted. Abby turned to see her bent over the trunk, trying to lift something from the floor. Probably whatever Jessie had felt sliding around. One more grunt and the shocks released as she dragged what was in the trunk to the dirt. It thumped heavily when she dropped it.
She shut the trunk and Abby found her voice. “Jessie. Something ain’t right here.”
“You think?” came his reply. He still didn’t sit up, but it was obvious he could feel the same thing she felt. His voice took on a husky whisper that Abby had never heard before. A rasp that didn’t make her feel any better.
“What do we do?”
Outside, Abby could see the arch of Diane’s back through the rear driver’s side window. She watched her straining and wrestling until, with one jerking twist, Diane hauled her package into the air.
A hand slapped against the glass and Abby screamed. It wasn’t Diane’s hand, but the thick, hairy knuckles of a man. The fingers fell from the window, leaving a dripping smear of blood on the glass. Abby saw the man’s loose neck swing by and caught a glimpse of his open eyes before Diane dropped him again.
Abby’s scream continued as Diane started dragging the body into the headlights. Forgetting Jessie, forgetting the score, Abby lunged to the door and clawed at the handle. It slid right out of her grip. She pulled and pushed buttons and threw her shoulder into it but the door wouldn’t open.
Jessie sat up to the sound of her screaming and looked around. “Abby, what’s wrong?”
“She locked us in. She’s locked us in.”
“That’s impossible.” But even as Jessie pulled at the back door handles with all his strength, he couldn’t open it.
Through the windshield, Abby saw a thin red trail following the man’s body, maybe coming from his head or his chest. Determination was scrawled across Diane’s sharp features as she lugged the man backwards. The trail of blood curved towards the sand mound.
Jessie gave up hitting the door and focused instead on the window. He tried wedging the switchblade into the top to pry it open, but it wouldn’t go. By the time Diane was a step away from the mound, he had resorted to using his fists to try to shatter it.
Abby watched in horror as Diane turned to the mound. The wind picked up, tousling the dead man’s sandy hair and making the mound breathe again. A sharp gust blew, hard enough to make the air whistle, and the sand shifted drastically. A hole opened up in the middle of the mound, growing wider and deeper as the sand either retreated from the edge or fell into the black opening.
Diane knelt next to the opening as the wind died. She looked into the abyss, just as the wind stopped completely. The sound of the river grew again and when it spoke, Abby understood it.
One word, clear and simple. “Blood.”
All the color drained from Abby’s face.
Diane stood and went back to the body. She hauled it upright, carrying it on her hip like a scarecrow, and positioned herself so it dangled over the pit. The blood dripped slowly down the man’s arms and legs until it fell into the pit.
There was silence until the red stream turned to a drip. Then the voice whispered, “More.”
Diane dropped the body and took a step back. Abby shrieked when the dead man fell up to his waist into the pit, then hung there as if he were a puppet on invisible strings. For a few seconds, he stood limply, his eyes staring emptily past the SUV.
Blood seeped up from t
he pit, then the dead man began to descend. Slowly at first, then more rapidly. His hips disappeared, then his stomach. His shirt disintegrated. Once the man was up to his chest, the last button dissolved and the shirt fell away completely. Abby could see the man’s body, what was left of it, was purple and bulging. His neck was swelling like an angry frog’s and his face looked bruised and bloated.
Abby had the sick thought that he was being squeeze at the bottom like an empty tube of toothpaste. All of his insides were rising to the top, and soon his cap would…
A gush of blood erupted into the sky. Diane was showered with drops as it rained back down and flowed into the pit. The man’s hair, now red and hanging sideways from his skull, disappeared into the pit.
Abby threw up into the driver’s seat. From the corner of her eye, she saw Jessie in the back. There were cuts on his hand but he no longer punched the window. Watching a man being devoured by a sand pit had claimed his attention.
“Ab,” he said slowly, placing his hand on her trembling shoulder. She didn’t hear him say anything else.
Diane stood and stared into the pit. Her lips were moving. Abby cut the radio off to listen.
Her flat voice drifted through the night. “Are you pleased, Master?”
“It is a start,” the strange voice whispered. It gave Abby chills the way it seemed to be in her head. Like the voice was part of her. “Where are the others?”
Diane started. “Others? I thought you only asked for two?”
“Yes. But you have brought me three.”
“I brought the man and there is another yet to be sacrificed. I only have two, unless there’s...”
“There is,” the voice whispered. “A second heartbeat, with the other.”
Diane glared over her shoulder at the car, squinting in the headlights. “Master, I didn’t know. Forgive me.”
“Yes. Forgiveness.”
The voice died away. In that moment, Abby understood what Diane had meant about Mr. Renaissance. About how he could make her feel things, see things with just his voice. A voice that dripped of other times. She knew why Diane cared, and it terrified her.
The voice rose up. “My beautiful servant.”
9 Tales Told in the Dark 18 Page 10
