Beneath the Boards

by David Haynes

He snatched an armful of items from the shelf and piled them into the basket. He just wanted to get out of there.

  He paid and almost ran across the car park. What he’d done was utterly shameful and there was no excuse for it. He did everything but smack the kid across the face. He threw everything onto the back seat and then just sat in the car. It was wrong, all very wrong. He should go back and apologise to Danny. Tell him he was sorry and that he was... what? Tired? Stressed? What exactly? Telling someone that every day you still saw the face of the woman who’d stabbed you wasn’t a good idea. It was apt to land you in hospital. So what would you tell him? Would you tell him you were scared? Is that what you’d say? Just march right on in there and tell him, ‘Listen, Danny, I’m sorry but I’m scared to death. I’m scared that this bitch I see each and every day only did half a job when she tried to gut me. She’s finishing the job now but this time she’s in my head poking about. Oh and by the way, she’s still got her nasty little blade with her and she’s taking ragged little chunks out of my brain. She’s a real stunner too. How would you like to meet her? Sure I can’t tempt you, Danny boy?’

  Stokes turned the ignition and revved the engine. He was tense and his right foot had a burning desire to see exactly how fast he could take the B-road back to Stormark. He couldn’t put his hands around Natalie’s throat and choke her but he could kill some rats. He could completely annihilate them. He put the car into first and drove out of the still-deserted car park.

  “Sorry, Danny.”

  *

  He should have bought a better torch, and if Just ask! Danny hadn’t been so eager to display his feelings about the killing of rats then he would have. He stared into the hole and bit his lip.

  “They’re only rats, Stokesy. Man up.”

  He looked at his purchases and picked up two packets with ‘Rat Killer Box’ on the front. According to the packaging, there was no need to handle any poison and each one could kill ten rats. He didn’t know how many were down there but this was a good start. He looked at the hole again and then at the boxes.

  “It’s time.”

  The hatch was just about wide enough to accommodate him but it was a snug fit. He gripped the torch beneath his teeth and lowered himself down. It couldn’t be too deep, the rat’s eyes had been clear and bright. Just as his shoulders started to complain about supporting him, the tips of his toes touched solid ground. He rested his chin on the dusty floorboards as he gathered some extra inner steel to drop into the hole completely.

  Had something just run over his foot?

  He closed his eyes and grimaced. Even if it had, so what? What was it going to do?

  “Nothing,” he answered his own question.

  He released his elbows and shoulders from the edge of the hatch and dropped down. Almost instantly he shone the torchlight down at his toes. There were no traces of any vermin and beneath his trainers was what looked like soil. He shone the weak torchlight around. If he wanted to move around in there, he’d have to do it hunched over in an awkward position. He reached up and grabbed the boxes. He had no intention on moving around any more than was absolutely necessary but there was no point in putting the boxes right next to each other.

  He placed the first one next to his feet. The soil was a fine powder and as dry as a bone. He shuddered, it probably wasn’t just soil but years of rat crap he’d just touched. The stench wasn’t as bad as the previous day but it was still strong and he covered his nose with the palm of his hand. He shuffled forward, crouching under the supporting beams. It was dark down here and although the house was well above the water line, he wondered if there was a chance of flooding in heavy rain. He flicked the light toward the direction of the lake but he could see nothing except unending darkness. He doubted even a powerful Maglite could reach into the gloom. This was a cavernous space and two traps wasn’t going to be enough, not by a long chalk.

  He dropped down, carefully avoiding putting his knee in the dirt, and placed the other trap down. A scratching noise came from behind him and he nearly smashed his head into the beams above in his haste to spin around. If there was a bleaker place on this earth, he’d yet to see it.

  “Enough,” he muttered and staggered back toward the hatch. One day, that was all he’d give it, then he’d come back with the rest of his arsenal and try something else. Once that lot ran out, he might have to find a new shop if he needed anything else. He doubted Danny would be waiting with open arms to welcome him back.

  *

  Stokes pulled the recliner back over the hatch and sat on it. He had a bottle of beer in one hand and his torch in the other. He hadn’t heard anything from them all day but he already knew they liked to come out at night. For animals that obviously preferred to exist in the perpetual gloom of a hole, they certainly knew how to hold a party once the lights upstairs went out.

  He sipped his beer. It was the last bottle of Peter’s brew and it tasted good. Dusk had settled over the lake and with it came a slight sense of dread. Natalie had by no means been exclusively nocturnal in her appearances but she’d certainly seemed to enjoy that time of day, especially since they’d both moved out to Stormark.

  Would he go to bed? Was it worth it? He dropped the torch on the floor and wriggled out of the chair. A night spent on the cold floorboards had made his body ache in all the wrong places. A night spent on the recliner was apt to render him immobile for a week. One thing was for absolute certain and that was his weariness. And if weariness was a problem now, how bad would it be in a week from now? Things couldn’t continue like this for much longer, they just couldn’t.

  He undressed, dropping his clothes in an untidy pile beside the bed, and slid under the duvet. He closed his eyes and saw his hands around Danny’s scrawny neck. He was simply too tired to prevent his mind from playing the whole fantasy out.

  *

  Scretch, scretch, screeetch.

  Stokes pushed the pillow against his ears. Not again. How long had he been asleep? It didn’t feel like long.

  Scretch, scretch, scretch.

  The noise echoed around the cottage as if it were an underground cavern. If he got up and banged on the hatch, would it shut them up? And if it did, then for how long?

  Scretch, scretch, scretch.

  And if he got up and went downstairs, what horrors would his mind conjure up from the shadows? He lay still waiting for the next bout but there was only the sound of wind weaving through the trees and slithering around the eaves of the cottage. It was at once comforting and disturbing. He felt himself drifting back to the point of sleep.

  Scretch, scretch, screeeetch.

  “Enough,” he barked into the gloom and jumped out of bed. How dare that bitch stab him? How dare that fucking bitch carry on stabbing him, each and every day?

  He leapt down the stairs and went straight to the kitchen. He knew what he wanted and where it was, but the moon guided him perfectly and shone a spotlight of silver light onto the knife block. He touched the handle of the cruel-looking paring knife and felt the icy-cold steel send a pleasant shock through his flesh.

  “Is this a dagger which I see before me?”

  He turned toward the hatch and smiled. The moonlight bounced off the blade but the reflection was nowhere near as bright as that from off his bared teeth.

  He took two steps toward the hatch, pausing only to reach down for the torch, and shoved the recliner back from the hole with his bare foot. Danny would be pretty upset to see what was about to happen. It was about to get messy, messy and as far away from humane as it was possible to be.

  He pulled open the hatch and dropped the lit torch into the pit.

  “I know I’m not invited but I’m coming anyway.” He didn’t notice the cool, ammonia-laced air rise up and tickle the hair on his balls. He had one thing on his mind, slitting as many throats as he could find.

  Scretch, scretch, scretch.

  He dropped down and lowered himself into the hole.

  The soil, or detritus, or whate
ver it was, felt surprisingly warm beneath his toes. It was almost like walking on a beach, not that he could really remember how that felt, it had been so long. He was angry. No, he didn’t feel angry, he’d gone way past that. He felt clarity. The kind of certainty which comes when you’ve set your mind on a course of action and you know it’s within your grasp to make it happen.

  “Here, ratty, ratty, ratty.” He made a squeaking noise and laughed at himself. No doubt they’d run away to all corners by now and buried themselves in the festering cesspits they called home. He looked down at the trap but he wasn’t expecting to see anything in it. He wasn’t disappointed.

  “Oh, don’t be like that. Come out and play.”

  He crouched as still as he could and waited for the slightest indication of where they were. It felt good to be holding the knife, he felt powerful. Above him a floorboard creaked but he barely noticed as he waited, eyes searching the darkness for gems of amber light glistening in the murk.

  “Come out, come out wherever you are,” he hissed. He could feel himself losing patience. He edged farther away from the hatch and from the torch. This was their territory but they couldn’t hide from him, not a chance. He peered into the darkness and waited again. Sooner or later one of them would come out again. Sooner or later they would have to start gnawing on whatever it was they were so fond of chewing.

  “Where are you?” he called.

  “I’m here,” a voice whispered into his ear.

  Stokes swallowed hard, forcing the bile back down his throat.

  “I’m behind you, Stokes.” He didn’t need to turn around to know who it was.

  “And I’m ready for you, bitch.” He turned quickly and swung the knife as he did. His head told him it was a stupid, futile gesture but it made him feel better.

  The blade swept cleanly through her face, carving a neat line across her features. He grinned and thrust the knife into her left eye socket before slashing the blade across her face again.

  “It hurts doesn’t it!” he roared and carried on trying to hack her to pieces. In the background, in the part of his brain which clung to reason, he was screaming at himself. Screaming at his own stupidity. This was not a real person, this was nothing more than a vision conjured up by his damaged mind; a toy with which to torture him. Yet he slashed, cut and drove the knife into the only thing he could find – the ghost of a woman who had tried to end his life and had succeeded with her own.

  Soon nothing was left and Stokes dropped to his knees in the dirt. What was he doing here? What was he doing, crawling around in the dirt like a rat?

  “I’m behind you,” her voice whispered again.

  He clutched the knife tightly and rose to his feet. He felt very cold all of a sudden and his arms ached but he wanted to fight on – he needed to.

  “Just shut up!” he screamed.

  Natalie laughed and caught the blade between her rotten teeth. He pulled the blade back and raised it above his head.

  “I said shut up!” He drove the blade down through her matted hair and into her skull.

  She made a noise like air being squeezed from a balloon, but her stupid grin showed the same old drug-induced defiance. He slashed and cut and stabbed and thrust but with each attack she only laughed back at him.

  He dropped to his knees and wiped his hands over his body. His skin was covered in a cold sweat and he wasn’t sure if he could lift the blade again. It’s just an image created by your sick mind, nothing more. His inner voice was faint but had it been as loud as a siren, he would not have listened.

  “Help me, someone please help me.” Even in the darkness his fingers found the scar on his torso. His fingers would always be able to find that.

  Natalie loomed over him again and he looked up. “What do you want from me?”

  She simply smiled down at him. Rats tumbled from her hair and scuttled off squealing into the shadows.

  “You want another pound of flesh, is that it?” He traced his greasy fingers over the scar again.

  “But that’s not enough is it, Natalie? You want it all, don’t you? You want me to suffer.”

  He drew the knife over the scar and felt the flesh pucker beneath the blade.

  She licked her lips.

  He flicked the blade and winced as it picked at the scar tissue.

  “Is that good?” he asked.

  He pushed the knife a little harder and gasped as the tip of the blade slipped beneath the surface of his skin.

  “More? You want more?” he snarled.

  Natalie’s eyes settled on his and for a moment they were locked together. Stokes frowned. Was she crying in there? Beneath the lunatic scrutiny of this mirage, was Natalie Sutton actually weeping?

  He pulled the submerged tip of the blade across the length of the scar, opening it up entirely. He screamed out in agony and dropped the sticky knife into the dirt.

  “You were crying. The day you stabbed me, you were crying.” He covered the wound with his hand and felt the warmth of the blood seep through his fingers.

  “I was trying to help you.” He reached out to touch Natalie’s face. “Help me?”

  A cold breath on his shoulder made him flinch.

  “I will help you. Stay with me.” It was not Natalie’s tone which fell on his ears but the voice of another and he recognised it. It was the voice of the dream who had come to him just two nights before.

  “Help me,” he whispered and fell face first into the dirt.

  *

  Edward Willis felt his eyes bulging in their sockets as Stokes rushed past him. Had he seen him? He held his breath for an eternity as Stokes rummaged around in the kitchen for something. He couldn’t move, not even if Lucifer himself was poking him up the backside with a burning spike. What on earth was he doing in there? Cooking dinner? It was a little late to be up to those sort of tricks. And what was he mumbling about? He covered the face of his watch to shield the fluorescent face. Besides, when he’d left home it had been just after three which meant it couldn’t be much later than half past by now.

  This had been an impromptu decision, made in the early hours. In the silence of his bedroom, at a time known only to the stressed, guilty and the insomniacs. He’d listened to the owl screeching its way toward dawn and thrown back the covers in bad-tempered haste. He didn’t need to look for the key, it was where it had been for the past two years – buried deep inside his sock drawer.

  He flinched as Stokes reappeared. Christ, the man was clutching a knife and he was utterly naked. Their eyes locked for an eternity. This had been a mistake, a huge and silly mistake. He opened his mouth to speak, to apologise for this terrible error of judgement but before he could, Stokes looked away.

  The man looked deranged. God alone knew what he was planning to do with the knife but it wasn’t cooking. He watched as Stokes pushed the chair away with his foot and revealed the hatch. The moonlight bounced off the blade and illuminated the brass loop.

  Willis swallowed and felt nauseous. He could vomit at any moment, he was absolutely sure of that. What on earth was this lunatic doing? He couldn’t be thinking about going down there, surely not. But he watched as Stokes lifted the hatch and shouted something down into the darkness. He couldn’t hear what it was because Stokes’s words sounded garbled. Then the man simply leapt into the hole, clutching the knife.

  He took a step forward. This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all.

  7

  “Good to see you again, Jim.” Peter pumped his hand with the usual enthusiasm.

  Stokes smiled and nodded.

  “You okay? You don’t look very well.”

  Stokes didn’t feel very well, in fact he felt terrible. “Fine, just got a bit of a cold coming I think.”

  It had been three days since he’d been in the pit with Natalie and he remembered it all, every last thrust of his knife, every last scream of pain and anguish. His body remembered it too. The aching arms, the stiff neck and the wound on his torso which throbbed with eve
ry thumping beat of his heart.

  “Sorry to hear that. Come on, I’ve got something to help bring you back to life.”

  Stokes allowed himself to be dragged across the room. He didn’t have the energy to resist. This all felt so false, so pathetic and pointless, yet why had he come? Why on earth had he come to this wretched little meeting?

  Peter pushed a glass into his hand. “Here, drink this and tell me what you think.”

  Stokes was aware of the chatter behind him, it was almost deafening. “I’m not sure I c...”

  “Come on, don’t be a killjoy. I brewed it up especially for tonight.”