by Glover, Dan
“You sound afraid, Yelena. Is knowing the future so terrifying?”
“Why know something no one can change?”
“Are you saying the future is set? Do you mean that even if we know what will happen we cannot change it?”
“This I do not know… when I was a little girl my grandmother always said: a person cannot run from death, only towards it. I would say, what does that mean? My grandmother would say, Yelena, you are but a young girl and you have many years ahead of you on this earth. Some people do not have so much time. Some people, they will die tomorrow. Nothing will change that. People say to her, Zoya, read my fortune and we will give you money. My grandmother tells them bad things and they get very angry with her. They say, oh no Zoya! We will not pay you for such terrible news. It is all a hoax anyway. No one can know the future. But what my grandmother says will happen, happened.”
“So you’re saying what you see will happen, no matter what?”
“No… I do not see anything. Only god sees all… I am Her voice.”
“I’m confused. I always thought the future is something that hasn’t happened yet so if we know something bad is going to happen we can steer away from it. But you seem to be saying the future is there already… that we cannot know it. Only god can."
"I think there are different paths to same end… but once we start down one path it is hard to change course to a different path. We see signs and we say, oh… this is the right way. But we only see the signs we want to see. Our eyes are not open enough to change.”
"You talk of god as a woman, not a man. Why is that?”
“My god, the god of my Gypsies, is an old god, much older than the God of your bible. She is both darkness and light. Her name is Nyx."
“Now I am really curious. What if I said to you… Yelena, please tell me my fortune.”
“I would say give me your hand… but first, let me sit somewhere else. Sometime I go to sleep and fall over… this barstool is too high.”
Yelena took her drink and moved to a nearby booth. The tavern was empty save for a couple in a far-off booth; both seemed oblivious to everything except each other.
“Listen close to what I say, Miss Justine. I will not remember when I wake.”
“Okay, I’ll listen.”
Yelena showed Justine how to lay her left hand on the table palm upward, hovering her own left hand over it, just grazing her skin… the room faded from her view. She seemed to be falling down a tunnel backwards, away from the light, glad she no longer sat on a barstool. She heard someone speaking but did not recognize the voice. She shook herself awake in what seemed like seconds.
“What do you mean, a trip?”
Justine seemed mystified. Yelena wondered what had transpired.
“I’m not planning a trip. Do you mean now? Or do you mean sometime in the future?”
“What did I say, Miss Justine? Tell me carefully.”
“You said: you are planning a trip. There is a great darkness at the end of it. Don’t go, pretty lady. Stay home.”
“What I say can happen tomorrow or it could happen twenty years from now… there is no telling. I’m sorry… I wish I could tell you more.”
“So I shouldn’t go anywhere?”
“I cannot tell you that, Miss Justine. If you go, go with god.”
Some thirty years later, on the day Yelena met Billy Austin, he’d proffered his hand. Normally she didn’t shake hands with anyone but Billy seemed so affable, reminding her of a pretty Gypsy boy she once knew back in Russia who had loved her very much until he left forever and his family moved on again like they always did leaving her behind. So without thinking Yelena took Billy’s hand in hers.
She stood looking at Billy but she saw someone else… a man, but more than that… a shadow darker than night, threatening to engulf anything he touched with the blackness that cloaked him like rancid fog. Yelena felt herself falling through the floor of the tavern into a pit that opened beneath her. It smelled of sickness and of blood.
When she looked up she saw Billy Austin hovering above her shining with an inner light all his own. In the pit she heard attractive whispers meant to lure her into the darkest chamber of all blocked by an enormous round rock. It moved of its own accord, slowly rolling itself aside to reveal what had been heretofore hidden from Yelena.
A girl lay there dying… the shadow lurked over her strangling the life from her, one hand on her throat the other clutching her head behind her left ear… the girl was strapped to a table… Yelena couldn’t tell the age of the girl… her face seemed to flicker in and out of existence… sometimes just a little girl… other times fully grown. When she looked up she saw Billy Austin lying dead in a pool of blood, the shadow smiling as it began engulfing him… carrying him away to some terrible place.
She had to warn him…
Chapter 31—Food of the Gods
"I've never smelled anything so delicious."
"Just wait until you taste it, my boy."
He had thought to surprise the old man but Kirk seemed to know what Oscuro had in mind when he walked into the RV without knocking.
"It's still alive."
He was holding out a cigar box.
"I can hear it scratching around in there."
"Give it here, please."
Kirk's hand shook as he opened the top of the box to remove the squirrel-like object still covered in the blood and excrement of its mother. A rushing sound filled his ears. He didn’t like to think about what he had in his hands.
"Oh, this is splendid, my boy, simply perfect."
The old man was a demon, sly and secretive. Oscuro knew he lied all the time but never called Kirk on it for fear of a reprisal too devastating to bear. All it would take is one phone call.
Oscuro observed Kirk prepare the delicacy following what seemed to be carefully prescribed steps. He wanted to take notes but didn’t wish to offend the old man. Instead he paid strict attention to Kirk's every move, searing the preparation into his psyche until he felt sure he'd be able to reproduce it on his own, if the need arose.
The old man scrubbed the dish thoroughly. It made small screeching noises like the animals Oscuro used to torture in the secret room he constructed in the attic above the garage where he grew up.
Though he prided himself on having no empathy towards any other living being, Oscuro pushed those memories away by focusing on the moment. As much as he wanted to be numb to the suffering he saw in the world and which he vaingloriously inflicted, he wasn’t.
He didn’t know why he did the things he did. Excusing it as a compulsion was easy enough until he discovered himself alone on a dark night with the maw of death opening before him showing off its tattered treasures and tainted trinkets.
It wasn’t his fault. The one thing he desired in life was to be a normal person... someone who went to work each morning, came home to a loving wife and family in the evening, went to bed, and got up the next morning to do it all over again.
He detested himself, the boy he had been, the man he was, the monster he would become. He deserved only the worst in life. The hate manifested in ways unforeseen. Old man Kirk coming into his life unlooked for was a product of destiny. Oscuro was certain of it. Nothing he tried to do in order to change the course of his life ever worked out. It was only when he stopped attempting to alter his own true nature that the gates of hell opened to embrace him.
"We keep it alive as long as possible. As soon as death occurs the cellular structure begins breaking down, so—hand me that scalpel, my boy—we eviscerate it alive. The body doesn’t require entrails to live, at least not short term, and they are of no use to us."
Kirk winked at him. Oscuro shivered involuntarily hoping the old man didn’t notice. He remembered the asylum in Oklahoma, the sounds, the smells, and most of all the denizens of those dank hallways black with mold and slimy with mildew. He had only been there a few days but it was long enough to know most of those unfortunate souls were already gone.
Madness had claimed them and whatever was left had succumbed to the regimen of high potency anti-psychotic medication forced down their gullets.
Like it or not, he had fit right in. He belonged there. The screams of insanity sank into the fibers of his being like claws digging into his mind. He knew he could never shake free of those shrieks and moans permeating the night.
"Does it feel pain, old man?"
"Well, Oscuro, I don't rightly know for sure, but I'd say anything squealing like that isn't enjoying having its insides forcibly removed. Why? Does it bother you?"
"Oh no, not at all; it makes me feel... like..."
"God?"
"I was thinking more like Satan watching his minions fall into the lake of their eternal torments."
"Ah, yes, that's probably a more apt analogy, though this one is about to reach the end of its short and miserably unhappy life. Please hand me that pan, my boy."
He put the pan on the stove lighting the gas burner under it leaning over to adjust the flame just so.
"We cook it alive?"
"Once it hits the hot oil it dies quickly. Pour the pan about half full of the canola oil there on the shelf, please. Yes, that's good. Now we just let it heat up for a couple of minutes and we're ready."
Kirk dipped a cooking thermometer into the oil from time to time testing until it reached the desired temperature. Laying down the thermometer he picked up the still-writhing object and gently laid it into the hot oil. It emitted a scream not unlike the lobsters that Oscuro remembered his father and mother dropping into boiling water and then like the lobsters it fell silent.
"The trick is in the sautéing. Cook it too much and we'll fry away the essential ingredients. Cook it too little and we won't break down the pial capsule surrounding the pineal gland."
"Is that the secret? The pineal gland?"
"Only to the extent it mixes with the brain sand."
"How do you know when it's ready?"
"Test the side of the skull by slipping the tines of a fork into it, like this."
The old man tenderly inserted shiny metal into the bone.
"Don't push it all the way through, otherwise the membrane will pierce and we'll lose most of the medicinal qualities. Oh my, we're almost there, my boy. Set the table, if you please."
He felt like vomiting. At first, the odor of the meat frying in the pan made him salivate, but within a few seconds a sickly sweetness crawled up his nostrils and lodged at the back of his throat. Though he tried to wash away the foul taste with a long pull of beer it did no good.
Kirk looked ravenous, as if he hadn’t eaten in years. Oscuro wondered manically if it was too late to refuse the proffered morsel the old man was dishing up.
Chapter 32—Allison in Love
Her feet seemed mired in quicksand.
No matter how she tried she couldn’t gather the strength to flee the fast-approaching shadow that melted out of the wall like a creeping malevolent fungus. As she watched in terror the shadow transformed its form, morphing into the person she once adored. Only there was something different about him now, something feral, terrifying.
"Alex, please no!"
Her voice caught in her throat.
A whisper sounded from the darkness cloaked in hate.
"Don't worry, my precious sister. I'm coming for you soon. We belong together again. We'll be together forever."
"No!"
The scream reverberated in her ears pulling her from the depths of the nightmare threatening to engulf her very sanity. Daylight poured through the open window assuaging the feelings of dread still lingering at the corners of her senses as Allison unraveled the sheet tangled around her ankles.
"Jesus Christ, Lisa, I wish you were here."
She could almost feel her friend's arms wrapped around her shielding her from the night terrors that had only grown worse since Lisa had gone away to live with Billy Austin. The red numbers on the clock upon the bedside table blinked three o'clock.
"Damn it, I slept the day away again."
Going to the bathroom she stepped in the shower slathering off the night sweat under a stream of water as hot as she could stand. Toweling off and then dropping it on the floor she stood in front of the full-length mirror giving her image a good talking to.
"You promised you'd wait. It's only been couple weeks, Allison. You can't leave now. Lisa is coming back soon and if you go now you'll lose out on the love of your life. Yelena said so. Just stay, girl. The nightmares are going to follow you no matter where you go."
But despite the admonitions she wanted nothing more than to pack her bags and leave. She once loved this old house but now it reminded her of a haunted hall of mirrors, with a devil lurking in every corner. She had to disenthrall her very being from it before, before... before what? What menace did she face here other than a gripping loneliness that threatened to consume her sanity bit by little bit?
She drank too much. Not that anyone said anything to her about it. They were all too nice for that. And everyone drank at Twenty Nine Katz... that's what the place was all about, that's why she loved it so. Still, no one had to tell her she drank too much... she knew it viscerally. Ever since she was a girl she had drank too much, though, and until there was some reason to stop she would continue.
Though she was rarely hung over sometimes her hands shook when she woke up. Not much—imperceptibly, really—and no one ever seemed to notice it but her. Once she had a couple belts off the bottle the tremors ceased.
She leaned closer to the mirror examining the beautiful face staring back at her. The skin was flawlessly white and free of wrinkles. Though her eyes were a tad bloodshot she knew from experience they would clear up within an hour once she was on her feet again. She told herself the tiny veins burst on account of her lying down, not because of the alcohol.
Today she noticed barely perceptible purple spider veins forming around the edges of her nostrils. She thought at first they might have been there before but somehow she doubted it. She consoled herself in knowing that if she leaned back away from the mirror they disappeared.
She turned back and forth examining her body for unwanted bulges. Other than the scarred legs she was perfect. Though she had been cajoled into having her breasts enhanced by both her mother and her fiancé she had refused, mostly on account of the pain it entailed. She didn’t do pain.
She liked the shape of her body. Her slim waist combined with her smallish bust and hips gave her an ever so slight hourglass figure that put most of the other woman she met both at Twenty Nine Katz and in the world in general to shame... all except for Lisa.
She heard the outer door open and then close and her heart leaped.
"Lisa!"
She grabbed the tee shirt she wore yesterday pulling it over her head as she raced for the stairs.
"Allison? Are you here, sweetie?"
"Oh Lisa!"
Allison ran into her friend's arms as if an old lover had come home from the wars.
"God, I'm so happy to see you!"
"Sweetie, what's wrong? You're trembling."
"I had another one of those dreams. When I woke I felt so alone. I know I promised I'd wait for you, Lisa, but I don't know if I can do it much longer."
"I'll come home, then, my love. I've been a selfish bitch leaving you here all alone. Come on, let's go. You can help me pack my things and talk Billy into coming with us. But first, you really ought to put on some pants. Not that I don't appreciate the view, mind you. Allison, you really are the most gorgeous girl I've ever met."
"Do you mind if we have a drink before we go?"
Allison blushed realizing her shirt only came down to her waist. As she walked into the bedroom to do as Lisa suggested she purposely sashayed her rear end, knowing she was being watched.
"How about I make up some gin and tonics?"
"You read my mind, Lisa. There, is that better?"
Allison came back into the living room wearing short white shorts and having changed h
er shirt into a pink halter top with no bra underneath twirling around for her friend's approval.
"No. I liked you much better before."
Lisa smiled as she handed her friend a drink and winking at her.
"But you're stunning either way, my love."
Allison downed her drink in a couple gulps and quickly made two more, stronger than the first. Before she knew it the evening sun began breaking through the stained glass window at the top of the stairs
"We should go."
Lisa set down her glass and got up.
"Before we go I think I should tell you something."
Allison had been debating on whether to tell Lisa about the night she spent with Billy but now that he might well be moving into the house she thought it best to clear the air. She couldn’t help but wonder if it might be the liquor talking though.
"What is it, sweetie? You have such a look on your face."
"Billy and I met before you two did. I spent a night with him. We didn't have sex, I mean, not technically. God, Lisa, I should have told you months ago. But when you and Billy got together I didn’t want to spoil it. I didn’t know if it was my place to tell you. I'm so sorry."
"Tell me what happened?"
"Are you angry with me?"
"Oh no, Allison, but I'd love to hear what happened. Is it kinky?"
"Yes, no, I guess so. Do you really want to hear about it, Lisa?"
"I'll make us a couple more drinks. Then I have to hear this."
Chapter 33—Free
The little girl looked at Billy as her mother spoke.
“Jem, I have someone that I would love you to meet. This is Billy Austin.”
“Hi Jem! It’s so good to finally meet you!”
Billy hunkered down on his haunches holding out his arms.
She broke from her mother’s arms, ran to him, wrapping her arms around his neck, and kissing him on the cheek.
“I love you, Billy Austin. I dreamed of you. I knew you’d be coming to see me.”
