The dream always ended with Daryl’s needle-fingers thrusting through the air, their gleaming tips mere inches from Earl and Mama’s chests. A fraction of a second longer and they would both be impaled as the acid liquefied their organs and turned them into empty husks . . . but that moment of contact was always preempted with a jolt of consciousness and a choked sob. Sometimes, Daryl longed to see the dream through to completion, to see if his dream-self truly was capable of killing the only family he’d ever known. But then guilt would wash over him: he’d push the images to the back of his mind, would pull his own hair until the pain overpowered all thought and emotion, and rock back and forth while silently crying.
He didn’t really want to kill Mama. Sometimes, when he thought about the past for too long, images of the dream would bubble up from his subconscious like a dark and malevolent Leviathan rising from the depths . . . but, even then, part of him still knew that he’d brought it all upon himself. Mama simply wanted him to be a good boy, to grow up strong and brave, to be more like Earl and less like a sniveling child. Everything she’d ever done was due to love and he had no right to question the methods of her guidance. He just had to try harder, that was all.
Mona’s Secret Delights.
In this situation, maybe Daryl would be able to prove to her once and for all that he was a man worthy of his mother’s respect. Once Mama saw the book, once she knew how Daryl had pieced it all together and insisted that they rush back to her as soon as possible . . . once she had all this evidence in front of her, she’d have no choice but to heap praises upon her youngest son. He’d bask in her adoration and maybe even get one of the “secret gifts” that Earl was always being taken away for. He had no clue exactly what the gift was but understood that it was the highest form of approval Mama could give; and he wanted that more than anything else in the world.
A loud boom shuddered the car and jarred Daryl out of his thoughts as his body pitched forward. His head banged against the steering wheel and, for a moment, he simply sat there and blinked his eyes as he tried to understand what had happened.
He’d been so lost in thought that he’d forgotten to wipe the frost off the windshield for quite some time and every inch of glass was now covered with an icy film. The morning sun filtered through it, but everything beyond was nothing more than indistinct blobs of color. The car, however, was no longer moving forward . . . . Earl must have stopped for some reason and Daryl had been so engrossed in daydreaming that he’d never seen the flash of the taillights. Luckily, they hadn’t been going very fast; if they had, then the crash would have been a lot worse and there was a chance he could have damaged the old truck. If that had happened, Earl’s wrath would have been of biblical proportions; and, more importantly, they would never have been able to make it home in time.
“In time for what?” part of Daryl’s mind whispered. “What are you afraid of this time?”
His eyes drifted to the book again and he felt his breathe catch in his throat. Somehow it almost seemed as if, by opening its pages, he’d unleashed some dark and terrible demon upon the land. The chill bumps tingling the nape of his neck were the cold wind displaced by the flapping of leathery wings and the headache clustering behind his left eye was from talons sinking into the soft mass of his brain. He could feel the creature’s presence, pressing in on him from all sides as it repeatedly whispered three words like some archaic incantation: Mona’s Secret Delights . . . Mona’s Secret Delights . . . .
A flash of color in the rearview mirror caught Daryl’s attention and he saw red and blue strobing through the ice-encrusted glass of the hatchback’s window. The frost diffused the lights into fuzzy halos that flickered and flashed in an almost random pattern. At the same time, Daryl became aware of a sound from outside the car. It was like a voice emerging from the crackle and pop of static, distant enough that the words were indistinguishable but close enough that he instantly recognized the source: a police radio. So that’s why Earl had stopped the truck . . . he’d been pulled over.
The demon’s hot breath tickled Daryl’s ears as it hissed dire warnings into the man’s thoughts: too late, you’ll be too late, you’ll never be a good boy now, you’ll always be a useless simpering crybaby, no use to anyone, you’ll be too late and it will all be your fault . . . .
A shadow, vaguely man-shaped, passed the window and the tinny voice of the dispatcher sounded as if it were as close as the demon Daryl imagined to be latched onto his back. As the shadow receded, however, so did that sound of the radio, leaving Daryl with only the whispered litany of derision in his mind: dead, she’ll be dead because of you, all because of you, and you’ll never get to prove to her that you were anything other than what she always thought you were . . . .
A voice that sounded as if it were speaking through layers of cotton broke through the contempt that plagued Daryl’s consciousness.
“License and registration, sir.”
Daryl’s heart felt as if it were fluttering so fast that every other beat was missed; his breath came in quick pants and he felt slightly dizzy, as if the interior of the car had lost its grip on reality. And he felt a tremor somewhere deep within him that almost made it seem as if every organ in his body quivered in unison.
His eyes darted to the book again.
Mona’s Secret Delights.
The demon sank its claws deeper into his eye, shredding nerve endings and snyapses with barbed tips that were nearly molten from a thousand years in the lake of fire.
“Sir, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to step out of the vehicle.”
Earl’s voice, low and gravely. Daryl knew the tone all too well: anger tinted with frustration, the way even the most innocent words seemed to mock.
Mona’s Secret Delights.
“Step out of the vehicle now, sir!”
The demon crushed Daryl beneath its weight and caused the doors and ceiling to constrict in response to its incessant murmur: and she’ll hurt you, she’ll make you scream again, there in the dark with the rats and the mice and the scent of fresh blood all up and down your arms and chest, all because you weren’t good enough, weren’t strong enough, because you failed her when she needed you most and lacked the backbone to do what needed to be done . . . .
Earl was shouting now, his voice booming so loudly that the thud of the truck door almost seemed as inconsequential as the chatter on the cop’s radio.
“Fuckin’ pig, I know my damn rights, I wasn’t doin’ nothin’, you stupid piece of shit.”
“Put your hands on the hood of the car, sir . . .”
“What? You gonna shoot me, asshole? You gonna blow me away with your big, bad gun? Mother fucker, I ain’t scared of you and that tin fuckin’ badge . . .”
“Put your hands on the damn hood!”
Daryl panted so quickly that his breath seemed to warm the interior of the car to the point that sweat moistened his armpits and chest. He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping that he could force the talons out of his head with his tightly clenched eyes and grinding jaw.
But, even in the darkness, he could sense the book beside him.
Could picture that leather cover . . . .
“Sir, I’m not fucking telling you again!”
The little note card inside the gilded frame . . .
“Or what? Or what, you son of a bitch? You gonna taser me, pig? You gonna zap my fuckin’ ass? That it, big man?”
The curves and loops of such innocent looking handwriting . . .
“Step back! Step the fuck back!”
Mona’s Secret Delights.
The shouting from outside of the car now sounded distant, as if it were nothing more than a television playing a little too loudly through the walls of a padded room.
“Come on! Come on, mother fucker! Pig! Let’s do this . . . .”
The growl of Earl’s voice degraded into a garbled mash of sounds that, for some reason, made Daryl think of a man sitting in an electric chair. He could picture spittle spraying
from his brother’s lips, drool sliding down his chin as layers of fat quivered and jerked, his eyes rolling back into his head as his body flopped in the snow like a headless snake.
The demon’s spiel had now reached a frenzy and it filled Daryl’s head with a cacophony of hissed whispers whose words bled into one another: now, prove yourself now, show your worth, be a man for God’s sake, grow a pair and make her proud, oh so proud, be a good boy, be the best damn boy she could ever ask for . . . .
Daryl’s eyelids opened and the voice fell silent. Turning slightly in his seat, he looked into the back of the car. His eyes took in the mounds of clothes and baggage, the plastic bottles of brake fluid and motor oil, all the flotsam and jetsam that had come rushing forward when the vehicle had come to its abrupt stop.
And there, poking out from underneath a pink t-shirt, he saw the curved tip of a tire tool.
Reaching back, his fingers closed around the cold metal and he lifted it slowly. It was heavier than he thought it would be . . . thick and sturdy like they used to make them. Not one of those cheap aluminum rods with the swiveling lug head that came with newer model cars. This was solid, a single piece of forged steel.
Daryl lifted the lever on the door so gently that there was only the smallest of clicks as the latch freed itself. He pushed it open just enough to allow himself to slide through the gap.
Ten feet away, Earl laid on his stomach like some whale that had washed up on an arctic shore. Snow billowed around his body and the cop was behind him, one knee firmly planted in the small of his massive back. The cop had Earl’s arms pinned just below the shoulder blades and the morning sun glinted off the handcuffs as if they were made of silver flame.
Daryl placed one foot in front of the other as carefully as if the twinkling flakes of ice on the snow were actually broken glass. His stare was focused on the little knot at the base of the officer’s skull and every muscle in his body wanted to break into a run. He wanted to hoist the tire tool above his head like some primal hunter and rattle the stillness of the morning with a guttural battlecry.
But he forced himself to proceed calmly. As if he were stalking game in the woods.
And the closer he came, the heavier and more powerful the metal gripped in his hand felt.
One swift blow.
One dull thud coupled with the cracking of splintered bone.
A splash of blood, stark and red against a field of white.
And then he would be the man Mama had always wanted him to be.
He would be the hero.
The protector.
He would finally be a good boy . . . .
SCENE TEN
Mary opened the front door of the house and the cold, outside air rushed in. It forced its way through the thin fabric of her dress and rustled her white hair as flakes of snow blew into the foyer like tiny animals fleeing the approach of a ravenous predator. The metal blade of the knife absorbed the chill almost instantaneously and felt like a slender icicle weighing down her pocket. Hugging herself, the old woman rubbed her arms briskly as she blinked in the sudden glare of the sun.
“Mornin’, Chief Howarth. What’d them boys of mine do now?”
The man on the porch was dressed in a heavy, wool jacket and the blue material contrasted sharply with the white backdrop of winter. The silver buttons were polished almost as brightly as the star-shaped badge pinned just above the breast pocket and his angular face hid in the shadows of the wide brimmed hat that perched atop his close-cropped hair. He looked at her with eyes the color of mahogany and spoke through lips that were dry and cracked.
“Morning, Mary. Hope I didn’t wake you. I apologize for it being so early and all.”
Mary sniffed once as if she were testing the air and cocked her head to the side.
“Don’t sleep much when ya get t’ be my age. I reckon I’ll sleep enough when I’m dead.”
“How’s that knee been? Acting up with the cold and all?”
Chief Howarth glanced over the old woman’s shoulder and his eyebrows arched ever so slightly; the emphasis he’d placed on the word cold wasn’t lost on Mary . . . but she kept her body planted squarely in the doorway and simply hugged herself more tightly.
“I’ll live, I s’pose.”
They stood in silence for a moment as the chief shuffled forward a few steps while he licked his lips.
“Feels like you got the fireplace all nice and warm, at least.” He finally said. “Heater’s on the blink in the cruiser . . . cold as a witch’s tit out here, too.”
“More on the way . . . I reckon we might as well get used to it.”
The chief’s shoulders drooped and a cloud of vapor billowed from his mouth and nose as he sighed; somehow he seemed a little smaller now, almost as if the air he’d been holding within his lungs had been the only thing keeping him inflated. Mary stood as straight as a pine sapling in the doorway smiled. At the same time, she breathed in through her nose, inhaling the same air the chief of police had just expelled, and her chest seemed to swell. For a fraction of a second, she looked like a smug, old teacher who’d just bested a smart ass student . . . but the expression melted away and she was just a shivering pensioner again.
“Yeah,” the chief agreed, “I suppose I will.”
He glanced around, taking in the snow covered shrubs in the yard and the pines that towered on the edge of the property. Dawn had yet to force its way through the canopy of green needles overhead and darkness still held sway among the rows of trunks and undergrowth. The trees were so thick and dense, in fact, that it almost seemed as if the forest existed in some reality that had been freed from the bonds of time: in there, amid that brambles and fallen limbs, it was as black as the bottom of a deep water well. Almost as if the night had become lost in this labyrinth of wood and lacked even a trail of crumbs with which to find its way out again.
“Where are the boys, anyhow? Awful early to be out and about. Especially on a morning like this. Thought we were going to have to close the pass last night. Had the highway boys all ready to mobilize, but in the end . . . .”
“Now, Chief, I know you didn’t come all the way out here to pay me a social call.”
Mary’s tone was as sharp as a mother reprimanding a child; the chief sighed again and his head almost seemed to swivel beneath his hat as he shook it.
“No . . . no, I suppose I didn’t..”
Chief Howarth slipped his hand inside his coat and when it emerged he had two photographs fanned between his fingers.
“You seen either of these two folks around lately, Mary?” he asked as he handed the snapshots to her.
The old woman glanced down at the pictures and gasped as she saw the faces staring back up at her. Her jaw hung open for a fraction of a second and she blinked rapidly as if perhaps she’d just awoken from a dream and was attempting to rid her mind of the lingering afterimages. The chief leaned in so close that Mary could smell the coffee on his breath and gripped her elbow gently.
“You have, haven’t you? You know these kids, don’t you?”
In the same amount of time that it had taken for Mary’s facade to slip, she repaired the damage that had been done. She glanced at the pictures again, shook her head with a wry smile, and handed them back to Chief Howarth.
“Thought that fella was my Cousin Fred. Spittin’ image of him, he is. From back in the day, I mean. Reckon Fred hasn’t been that handsome since . . . well, since never I s’pose.”
The old woman laughed and flashed another smile at the policeman; the excitement that had touched his features when she’d caught her breath faded and he simply looked cold, tired, and slightly bored again. Inside, however, Mary felt as if someone had just goosed her soul. It was as if the deepest layers of fat and tissue were undulating with some sort of inner chill and her throat was as dry as when she’d fall asleep in front of the fireplace.
“Took me back a bit, I tell ya. ‘Ole Fred always was a good for nothin’. Always runnin’ afoul of the law and carryi
n’ on like you wouldn’t believe.”
She knew she had to guard her words as closely as if they were her grandmother’s antique silver. Howarth may have been overworked and underpaid, but the man was no fool . . . one slip and he’d seize upon it like a bobcat on a winter hare.
“You certain, Mary? Maybe, you didn’t look close enough or . . . .”
“Ain’t nothin’ wrong with my eyes, Chief. At least, nothin’ that these here glasses don’t fix. Aside from lookin’ like Fred, I ain’t never seen these two folks a day in my life. They missin’ or something?”
She tried to make the question sound as casual as if she were asking how the man’s children were. Nothing more than small talk to help pass the time.
“State troopers want to ask them some questions, that’s all. We heard they might be heading this way, so we’re checking with everyone. Just routine procedure, that’s all.”
Having lived on a farm for the majority of her life, Mary knew bullshit when she smelled it. There was something the Chief wasn’t telling her, something he was keeping as close as the pistol strapped to his hip.
“You see them around, you call me, you hear? Don’t try talking to them or anything. We don’t want to spook them by making them think they’re in trouble or anything. You just give me a call, okay?”
Were they dangerous? Is that why Howarth was trying to play it off as if this was nothing out of the ordinary while, at the same time, basically telling her not to be a hero?
“I reckon I can do that for ya, Chief. But we don’t get much in the way of company out here.”
Shut The Fuck Up And Die! Page 9
