Don't Read After Dark: Keep the lights on while reading these! (A McCray Horror Collection)

by McCray, Carolyn

  After that last encounter? Nothing about the night could go wrong.

  * * *

  Keaton tried to hurry to unlock the room. After Granny, Stavros seemed a bit anxious. Ants in his pants. No, ants in his Armani pants.

  “Now this one features a live webcam of octopuses having sex,” he explained, trying to reignite the magic. “It’s huge in North Korea.” Stavros didn’t seem all that impressed, though. Keaton had to ratchet it up another notch, especially since he couldn’t find the key to this room to save his life. “Just imagine,” he said, with a sweeping motion of his free hand. “The banner ad reading, “Hot octopuses by Stavros.”

  The tall man sighed. “Octopi.”

  “What?” Keaton asked, then got it. He was quick like that. “A three way! A ménage of octopuses! Brilliant! I knew we thought alike!”

  The click of the lock finally sounded, but Stavros put his hand against the door. “The lab?”

  “But don’t you want to see —”

  “No,” Stavros said, putting his hand over Keaton’s and turning the key to lock the door again. “I definitely do not want to see what is in that room.”

  Keaton pulled his hand away from the door, signaling surrender.

  “The lab.” That wasn’t a question. That was an order.

  From the glare Keaton was getting, he knew that he couldn’t stall any longer. “Sure, okay.” Heading off to the right, Keaton couldn’t help but finish his pitch. “All I’m saying is that once you’ve got the North Korean market, Micronesia and Laos open right up.”

  “The lab.”

  If it was anything, Keaton knew when to shut up. So the rest of the long walk, all the way around the house and back again, was done in silence. Keaton checked his phone. He was supposed to get a text when the batch was ready. No such luck. Hopefully they would have enough cooked up to satisfy Mr. Panties-in-a-Bunch.

  They arrived at the bathroom door. No need to search for the key. He’d put Hello Kitty to work on that one. Sliding the key into the lock, Keaton glanced over his shoulder. The roundabout trek here hadn’t seemed to soften Stavros’s mood any.

  Hopefully a nice big pile of X would.

  Poking his head into the room, Keaton knew something was wrong. There was no buzz of activity. The lights were low. There was no lingering smell of cooking drugs.

  And then he saw it.

  Every single one of Keaton’s chemists was sprawled out dead on the floor.

  This was not the impression he wanted to make on Stavros. He pulled back out and tried to shut the door.

  “Wow. Gosh,” Keaton rambled on, “Looks like they are a little indisposed.”

  “Not for me,” Stavros said, pushing past Keaton with that darned perfect 20 BMI body of his.

  The drug dealer stopped cold in this tracks, though, once he took in the room. Keaton rushed to get in front of him. Drug dealers were used to bodies showing up, right? That shouldn’t stop the deal from going down. If anything, these men wouldn’t want their deaths to be in vain. They would want him to press on. Keaton didn’t see them arguing with that plan.

  “A minor setback,” Keaton said as he tried to brush the scene off.

  Stavros knelt down and felt the cook’s neck for a pulse. Guess there wasn’t one.

  “They’e dead.”

  Keaton gulped hard, frantically searching for a way to spin these lemons into a nice tangy lemon drop cocktail.

  “Bright side?” Keaton said. “I was thinking of downsizing anyway.”

  SUPPER: A Texas Chainsaw Massacre-style short story

  PROLOGUE

  Delia tried to move the tip of her finger, but it, too, refused to budge. The effort it took to simply keep her diaphragm moving up and down, up and down, required all of her focus.

  “I can’t see…” Megan moaned next to her.

  Struggling, Delia raised her eyelids, squinting against the harsh, late-afternoon sun. Once she saw Megan’s leathery skin, stretched gaunt over her cheekbones, putrefied fat oozing from the cracks, Delia wished she hadn’t bothered.

  “It’s going to be okay,” Delia tried to reassure her friend, but Megan just sobbed, the tears sliding patches of skin off with them. Nothing was going to be okay. Ever again.

  How had a stupid end-of-summer road trip ended like this? How could anything ever end like this?

  Flies buzzed around them in a swarm, all giddy that they’d hit the human remains jackpot. One landed on Megan’s cheek, and then crawled up her face and onto her eyeball. Megan didn’t even blink.

  Next to her “sat” Neko. Only with half the tissue gone from her face and jawbone protruding out, Delia didn’t think Neko really “did” much of anything anymore. Then, poor Roberto. The flies and maggots had nearly picked his skeleton clean.

  “Yah, yah, yah!” Ruf chanted, clapping his big fat hands together as he skipped around the adult-sized “playpen.” He leaned over into the overgrown weeds and picked up a moldy soccer ball and threw it. At over six feet tall and three hundred pounds, Ruf sent the ball zinging toward them.

  Delia tried to duck, but with her paralysis, she couldn’t even flinch as the ball hit her in the shoulder and then bounced against Neko’s skull, knocking Neko’s head from her shoulders. The ball and skull rolled around at Delia’s feet.

  “Oopsy!” Ruf giggled as he leaned over the side of the playpen and grabbed Neko’s skull. “Bad, Neko, bad!”

  He tossed the skull in the air, and then kicked it toward the squat and squalid house. The head tumbled under a truck up on blocks. Even out of gas, how had she and her friends not taken one look at this place and not realized that evil lived inside? They should have risked the walk in the dark down that long, lonely country road.

  “Oh, God! oh, God!” Megan cried as she lifted up an arm and her fingers melted off.

  Delia knew that she should be nauseated, but after five days of this? The torment had blurred into a black hole in her heart. If anything, Megan and the rest had been lucky to go out to the smoke shed when they did. Delia had been kept in the house. What Ruf and his sibling had done to her…

  She squeezed her eyes shut against the memories. At least they’d tired of her and put her “out back” to tenderize. Soon, she too would melt away. It was probably better that way. Her hair already smelled of hickory chips and piss. After another night in the shack, she wouldn’t be able to smell anything or feel anything.

  Like poor Megan simply dripping away.

  Delia heard the porch door slam open. She pushed her eyeballs over as far as she could, catching only part of the thin, knobby-jointed brother, Cliver, that stepped out from the house. Her muscles rebelled against drugs in her system, vainly trying to get her legs moving, to run far, far away, but the most they could do was tremble.

  “Ruf! A car’s comin’! Get yer mess cleaned up!”

  As Ruf picked up Neko’s head and casually tossed it into the playpen, Delia’s mind screamed, “No!” but all that came out was a strand of spittle.

  CHAPTER 1

  Stacey sat in the backseat watching Jonathan and Tamra, with her blonde locks and big boobs, giggle about something that Stacey couldn’t even hear. Next to her, Leo chuckled as well, sharing in the joke she missed. This was not how this trip was supposed to go.

  Fantasies of Jonathan actually giving her a second look were evaporating like spilt milk on a hot summer day. Couldn’t he see that Tamra was nothing but vapid? The only reason she came on this trip was to giggle her way through it.

  It was supposed to be Stacey up in that front seat, being Jonathan’s navigator. They had decided that since, you know, Stacey knew the difference between north and south on a map, unlike Miss if-we-are-going-uphill-we-must-be-going-north. Yet somehow, while Stacey helped pack the trunk, Tamra miraculously was already sitting in the front seat. When Stacey had protested, Jonathan had patted her shoulder and told her “not to be like that.”

  Not to be like what? Fair?

  Frustrated, Stacey crossed he
r arms, giving Tamra a good glare while she was at it, even though the blonde would never even glance back to see it.

  “I feel your pain,” Leo said as he patted her knee. His dark hand stark against her extremely pale leg. The reflection off her pasty-white legs could be literally used as a first-strike weapon.

  Stacey glanced at Tamra’s golden-brown shoulder. Maybe Stacey should have used a spray-on tan before leaving. But even that would never have compared to Tamra’s natural glow. Stacey tugged her walking shorts down to cover her knees. She wasn’t wearing short-shorts like Tamra. Those weren’t even Daisy Dukes. They were Daisy-I-hope-you-got-a-Brazilian-yesterday-Dukes.

  But she couldn’t be angry with Leo. He was as fascinated with Jonathan as she was. At least she had the fact that Jonathan batted for her team going for her. Poor Leo could only hope to pine away as Jonathan bounced from bimbo to bimbo.

  Actually, Stacey and Leo might as well be in the same boat. They both had exactly the same chance of getting laid this weekend. Looking over at Leo’s rippling muscles, close-cropped hair, and perfect onyx skin, Stacey sighed. More than likely if Jonathan had to pick, he’d go with Leo. Hell, she’d go with Leo.

  Fed up with what was happening inside the car, Stacey’s eyes scanned the trees as they drove by. They weren’t normal trees, or at least none like she’d seen before. Their branches were gnarled, and they dripped with moss or algae or fungus, or whatever the hell made the tree look like it was bleeding. Despite the sweltering heat, Stacey rubbed a hand up and down her arm, trying to chase away the chill that had descended.

  How many eyes were there out in those woods? Ever since making the stupid left turn, she had felt that someone was watching them. Tracking them. Like the car was the rabbit and the “watcher” the wolf. But that was stupid, right?

  She had to shake it off. The whole point of this trip was to explore “strange” places, wasn’t it? That’s what coeds did, right?

  Stacey feared that she was wrong in both circumstances.

  “Is that a gas station up ahead?” Jonathan asked.

  Tamra shook her head, sending a golden cascade into motion, her hair catching the waning light, nearly blinding the car with its radiance. Either that, or the sun just hit the hood of the car as they entered a clearing in the forest.

  “No, I think it’s a house,” Tamra answered.

  “Well, it had better be something,” Jonathan stated. “We’ve been on empty for seven miles.”

  “But the sign said ‘gas station,’ “ Leo said, leaning forward between the seats.

  He was right. After miles of lonely road, that little sign had promised gasoline, but after about half an hour of windy road filled with switchbacks, they had only found this lonesome house.

  The car jumped and lurched as they suddenly hit dirt road. Stacey looked out of the window. The pavement had just stopped. No warning. No sign.

  “Sorry!” Jonathan said as he slowed the car to barely a crawl.

  Still, rocks and sticks popped under the tires. This sedan was not exactly off-road material. But at this point, after three hours stuck in the car with Miss Ample Bosom, and Jonathan barely able to keep his eyes on the road, Stacey was ready to get out and walk the distance to the house.

  Anything had to be better than this.

  * * *

  Cliver smelled the soup. Somethin’ was missing.

  “Ruf!” Cliver bellowed as he stirred the huge pot. They were gonna have guests. They had to do this right.

  He heard the huge lummox of a brother coming up the back porch steps long before Cliver saw him. The house shook with the pounding of his feet.

  “Ya, Cliver?” Ruf asked puffing from the exertion.

  “Did ya put away your toys?” Cliver asked.

  Ruf nodded vigorously.

  He better have. Ma would have another stroke if Ruf left a head lying around again.

  “Did you bring the meat?”

  Ruf again nodded his head up and down like a bobblehead doll.

  “Well?” Cliver asked as he scraped a little burnt material from the bottle of the pot.

  “Well, what?” Ruf asked.

  “Do you have it?”

  “Oh yeah!” Ruf exclaimed, pulling a partially decomposed foot from his pocket.

  “Damn it, Ruf!” Cliver yelled, clanging the spoon on the cast iron pot. His brother was a great butcher. He was just not so clear on what he was supposed to be butchering. “I told you, a hand.” When his brother’s thick brows pinched together in confusion, Cliver put his own hand out. “A hand, Ruf. Not a foot!”

  Ruf laughed, though, hearty and loud, his fat stomach quaking in mirth. “Oh, I thought you meant give you a ‘hand,’ like help out with the soup!” His brother’s eyes teared up as he laughed again. “Want me to go out and get you one?”

  Cliver snatched the foot from Ruf. “No, we don’t have time. Give it here.”

  A foot did not release the same bouquet as a hand, but what were they to do? Their guests would arrive any minute. He tapped the foot on the counter to knock most of the dirt and straw off of it, and then dropped it into the deep pot.

  He turned back around to find his brother still giggling. “Hand…”

  “Did you put the live one back in the smokehouse?”

  “Sure enough,” Ruf said but you could tell he still wanted to giggle.

  “The live one?” Cliver asked again. You had to stay on top of Ruf or well, you got a foot instead of a hand.

  But his brother nodded again. “Yep. Had to gag her and everything.”

  Well, that did give Cliver some hope that Ruf had gotten it right. “Okay, then go get Ma cleaned up. We’ve got company coming.”

  Ruf clapped his hands and awkwardly skipped off down the hallway.

  Cliver heard footsteps above his head. Bitsy was coming down from the attic. His sister hurried into the kitchen, wiping her dirty hands on her skirt.

  “They’re nearly here. Dinner ready?”

  “Will be,” Cliver answered, looking at her stringy hair and bony body. If only Ma would let him marry Bitsy. He was getting tired of those outsiders. With all the crying and hysterics. Then if you paralyzed ‘em. they just lay there. Why couldn’t his mother let him have what she and Pa had?

  “And Ruf?” Bitsy asked. “Is he getting Ma?”

  Cliver scowled. Who did Bitsy think she was? He’d been doing this since before she was born. Just because she was the baby of the family and she and her twin sister got all the looks didn’t mean she was the boss of him.

  “Of course,” he snarled, suddenly pining for Bitsy’s twin, Betsy. Why’d she have to go off and leave anyway? He bet Ma would let him marry Betsy. Who else was she going to marry? Ruf?

  “And he fed the rest of the bodies to the pigs?” his sister pressed.

  “Bitsy!” Cliver exclaimed, although honestly he had forgotten to ask Ruf that. Still, what nerve did she have?

  “You know how special Ma thinks this next one is, right?” Bitsy asked, her hands on her hips.

  Cliver rolled his eyes. Ma had one of her visions. That finally they would find the missing piece to their family. She predicted a wedding within the fortnight. Bitsy and Ruf were impressed. Cliver wondered if it weren’t a bit of another stroke. Why would Ma think they needed another man around the house?

  Stirring the pot, spreading the flavor of the foot into the stock, Cliver wondered what any man in that car had that he didn’t.

  * * *

  Leo got out of the car and stretched his legs. The farmhouse looked like something out of an old, stained Civil War picture. He was sure the thick. gnarled trees had supported plenty of nooses in their day.

  Crinkling his nose, Leo wondered what in the world that stench was. He could see a thin trail of smoke snaking up into the sky from behind the house. Behind that it looked like a bunch of pigpens. A dull, rusted sign announced “Tullock Family Farm: The best- tasting pork in the state.”

  Leo doubted that very, very much.


  The others got out as well, although Stacey made sure to walk to the other side of the car, as far away from Tamra as possible. He had to give the blonde credit, though. God had given that girl some amazing assets, and he wasn’t just talking about her ta-tas, and Tamra used them to her greatest advantage. How she could squish those babies together, push them up, and tilt her head invitingly at the same time was simply amazing.

  But then again, how Jonathan wore a pair of chinos was pretty sublime as well.

  The porch door opened, and a mousy little woman came out. She laid her hand above her eyes, shielding them from the glow of the setting sun.

  “You folks lost?”

  Leo grinned. She tried to act like she was surprised that they were here. Come on. How many other cars came down that godforsaken road?

  “No,” Jonathan answered. “Well not originally,” he corrected.

  Dear Lord, could Jonathan get any cuter?

  “But now we are out of gas,” Jonathan finished.

  “Ya don’t have enough to get back to the main road? There’s a station just a few miles south.”

  Leo glanced over to see Stacey gritting her teeth. The words “I told you so,” were practically stamped on her forehead. She had been the sole voice to continue down the highway instead of turning down the narrow road.

  “Nope,” Jonathan said. “We got here on fumes.”

  Another figure emerged from the doorway. Barely taller than the woman, the man seemed hunched over, and his joints were malformed. Dark eyes peered out of thick, horn-rimmed glasses.

  Seriously, all they needed was a banjo playing. Given Leo’s skin color, and if they found out his sexual preference? Oh boy, this looked to be a lynching kind of place.

  “What have we got here, Bitsy?” the man asked.

  Tamra stepped forward. “The sign said ‘gas,’ but I don’t see any gas.”

  The man looked down on Tamra from the porch, squinting as if trying to see if a lost chick, out of gas, was really being that rude to the people who might be able to help them.