It had been like staring into mouth of a nightmare: so pitch black that he could almost imagine hundreds of red, glowing eyes peering down at him. His stomach had gurgled as his hands began to shake and it almost looked like the shadows were creeping toward him, devouring more and more of the creosote coated bricks as they reached toward him with tentacles of darkness. He’d fallen backward and scooted across the floor like a dog with ass worms in reverse, his eyes never straying far from the open hearth while his pulse and breath quickened.
“Nothin’ up there.” He breathlessly muttered. “Nothin’ up there at all. Not her, not nothin’ else either.”
Picking himself up, he’d backed away as if he’d half expected a flock of bats to surge out from the chimney and cover him with their leathery wings and razor-like teeth. The cleaver he’d snatched from a kitchen drawer caught a stray shaft of sun and threw reflections of light that jerked and darted across the walls.
“Grow up. Ain’t no reason to be shakin’ like a palsy victim. You got the cleaver, right? And she ain’t nothin’ but one woman. You hack her ass a few times and it’ll take the fight plum out of her.”
The tremor in his voice, however, contradicted the bravado of his running monologue. Snapshots from Mona’s Secret Delights still burst through his mind like a slide presentation from a vacation in Hell. Maybe it was because, outwardly, she looked so sweet and innocent. Even a little shy, perhaps. She was the type of girl he would have imagined writing love poems; maybe dabbing her eyes with tissue as she silently moved her lips to a chick flick that had been watched so often that even the DVD player knew how everything would turn out. The type who should have been fair game.
And yet here he was, stalking through his own house like a sneak thief. Mama was dead, but it was this dark-haired bitch who haunted him.
He saw her with a cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth; one hand proudly displaying a thumbs up, the other pointing at the mound of bodies piled by her side in a grisly imitation of Lindy England and the infamous Abu Ghraib photo.
Daryl shook his head as if he could fling the image from his mind and looked up the stairs. She had to be up there somewhere. Crouching in silence.
Was she hiding?
Or waiting?
“Bitch killed Mama . . . you gonna let her get away with that shit?”
The voice he heard in his head was Earl’s and it was so clear and distinct that Daryl could almost believe that his brother were actually standing just behind him.
“You gonna let that little whore sit up there and laugh at you? Because you ain’t got the balls to go up there and show her who’s boss?”
His fingers tightened around the wooden handle of the cleaver and he flexed his arm as if testing its heft. He tried to imagine the rectangular piece of metal cracking into her skull and splitting that rounded forehead like it was a Christmas roast. But all that came to mind was a picture of her in faded, tight fitting jeans: she was turned slightly to the side and her pretty little mouth formed an oval and her eyes looked wide and surprised; her bare chest was pale white and contrasted starkly against the cocoa-colored flesh of the severed arms she held in either hand. With their palms covering her nipples, she looked like a modest psychopath caught in the act of undressing.
“There were two of ‘em.” Earl’s voice said. “She had help. This time it’s just you and her. You tellin’ me that you’re afraid this piece of pussy is gonna kick your ass? That what you tellin’ me?”
Daryl took a deep breath and started up the stairs. He walked as softly as possible, ensuring that each footfall resulted in nothing more than a slight tap. He listened to the silence that seemed to enshroud the house and his flesh crawled at the tiniest of noises.
That faint creak . . . was it the sound of her sneaking through the hallway?
Or just old wood expanding with the heat of dawn?
Was that her shallow breathing? Or nothing more than the sound of his own respiration bouncing back at him from the walls?
By the time he reached the top of the stairs, Daryl gripped the cleaver so tightly that the rivets attaching the handle to the tong had pushed dimples into the pads of his hand.. He felt sweat trickle down the back of his neck and his stomach was gurgling so loudly now that cramps pulled at the muscles in his abdomen.
Yet he somehow forced himself to go on. To take another step.
He passed the braided rug where Earl had beaten that Chinese guy to death with a pipe wrench. Then the bullet hole in the wall that Mama had always called “your Daddy’s last home improvement project”. When he slinked past the cabinet outside of Mama’s bedroom, he almost shattered the glass of the empty display case when his own reflection made his heart feel as if it had attempted to burst right through his chest. But even then, he forced himself to keep going. For he could feel Mama and Earl’s eyes upon him, judging every move and decision as if they were dark gods who held his fate in their hands.
The door to the bed room was partially open and he pushed it as forcefully as he’d always dreamed of shoving his brother. It banged against the wall so hard that it bounced back at him as if seeking retaliation for the assault. But its brief stand was put down easily with the touch of a hand and Daryl strode into the room, certain now that no one had been hiding behind it.
The chairs and rope lay on the floor and there were more traces of blood, but nothing else seemed to be disturbed here. Mama’s scrapbooking desk looked as if she might scuttle into the room at any moment with a fresh crop of old photos to cut and paste onto the thick pieces of colored paper. Daylight streamed through the window and everything seemed to glow in a color that reminded Daryl of fresh, golden honey.
Across the way, the door to the adjoining room was open at a forty-five degree angle. He could vaguely see half of the table that so many people had been nailed to but little else. With no windows of its own and the door only halfway open, the room was as gloomy as the interior of a crypt. Mama had taken out the light bulb years ago, preferring their victims to only have light when she deemed it so. If he were to go in there and that door somehow managed to swing closed . . . .
“Nuh-uh.” Daryl said aloud. “No way, no how. I ain’t goin’ in there. Not without light.”
“Don’t be a pussy.” His inner Earl snapped. “Get your ass in there and find that bitch.”
“Fuck that! You know I don’t like the dark, Earl. You know it. No way I’m gettin’ trapped in there without no light and no way out and God knows what all else.”
Daryl’s voiced had risen in pitch so sharply that it bordered on hysteria. Even the thought of being trapped in that lightless room was made his eyes shimmy behind a veil of tears and he paced about the room with short quick steps.
“I know Mama is dead and all but I ain’t fuckin’ goin’ in there, you here me? What if she comes runnin’ out from the hall and locks me in? What if it’s dark and I can’t get out and there ain’t nobody here to help me? What then? What the fuck then?”
Daryl stopped as if he’d come to some sort of invisible barrier as his voice trailed off. He laughed at himself with a nervous little chuckle and shook his head.
“Flashlight.” He said. “I’ll go get the flashlight. Then it won’t make a lick of difference if that bitch tries to lock me in the dark.”
He bounded out of the room like a rabbit and Mona watched through the crack in the door as she lowered the rusty machete that had been raised above her head. The corners of her lips were arched in a crooked smile that, in any other situation, would have been misconstrued as flirtatious.
So, the little prick was afraid of the dark was he? That was definitely something she could have a little fun with. And, as she recalled the black painted windows she’d noticed when she found the machete, she realized that she even knew the perfect place to play this particular game.
With the stealth of a cat, she slipped out of the two rooms and into the hallway, already giddy with what she had planned.
When Da
ryl saw the police cruiser parked outside, he slapped his forehead so hard that a red hand print was left in its wake. With everything that had happened, he’d completely forgot that they’d ditched the truck alongside the road. And, since the sun had already risen by that time, the MagLite had been safely tucked away inside the glovebox.
Still, a cop had to have a flashlight, right? He imagined they had to go into abandoned buildings all the time to chase out kids and squatters. And that time last summer when Earl had his license taken away for DUI, the cop had shone a light into their faces that was so bright any coon hunter would’ve been proud. So it stood to reason that there had to be a flashlight somewhere in the car.
After nearly five minutes of searching, however, Daryl was still empty handed. His mind flashed back to the officer sprawled in the middle of the road, but this time it wasn’t the pulp his face had become that came to mind. This time, he envisioned that shiny, black belt that encircled the cop’s waist. It was almost like a super hero’s utility belt with it’s pouches and holster. Pepper spray, handcuffs, the little cradle for the handheld radio . . . and also a slender, black flashlight attached by some sort of hook or clamp. To be honest, he’d been so busy looking for the handcuff keys that he couldn’t remember which. All he knew for certain was that there had been a flashlight. And that it was still attached to that now frozen corpse.
“Son of a bitch!”
Daryl wanted to hit something, to drive his fist through a piece of wood just like Earl had done when they discovered Mama’s spectacles laying inside the corpse of their former victim. Instead, he stamped his foot into the snow and slammed the car door shut with as much force as he could muster. From somewhere back in the woods, a gunshot rang out and he stared at the edge of the forest for a moment while the meaning of this dawned upon him. The initial shot was followed by two more, one right after the other, and he knew he had to get moving.
Earl was a damn good hunter and the chances that he’d missed his mark were about the same as finding an honest politician. Which meant that the man was now dead and Earl would soon be coming back to the house. If he found Daryl simply standing in the yard because he was too afraid to check the darkened room for the woman . . . well, that was something he really didn’t want to think about.
Inspired by the threat of his brother’s wrath, Daryl’s mind seized upon an alternative almost immediate. The kitchen. Mama had boxes of candles tucked away in the junk drawer for times when the power went out in the middle of a storm. Even if he somehow still managed to get locked in the dark room, Earl would be back long before the candle ever burnt out. He’d be pissed, no doubt, that his little brother had been so easily trapped . . . but it still wouldn’t be as bad as if he came home to find him doing absolutely nothing.
Daryl bolted up the front steps and careened around the corner of the hallway. He’d just passed the open cellar door when he skidded to a stop and cocked his head.
He’d thought he heard something. Very low and very soft, but he was sure it hadn’t been his imagination.
“Daryl . . . .”
There it was again. A voice, barely audible. It sounded old and tired and wavered as weakly as if the last vestiges of strength were being used to find the words.
“M . . . Mama?”
Hope stirred within Daryl’s chest and he remained perfectly still, straining to hear a reply.
“Daryl . . . help me . . . .”
Yes! That was definitely Mama’s voice. Even though it sounded as if she were in pain and fading fast, he would have recognized it anywhere.
“Daryl . . . .”
The cellar. Mama’s voice was coming from the cellar. And he saw it all as perfectly as if he’d been there: there’d been a struggle at which point the record player had been knocked over and, as they scuffled, they’d kicked ash out from the fireplace and onto the floor. Mama had fought them back, probably trying to drive them out of the house, but when they go to the cellar door something had happened. She’d tripped. Or perhaps been pushed. Either way, she ended up toppling down the stairs. She was down there right now. Probably with a broken hip or leg or arm. Or worse. She could have bashed her head open, could be bleeding to death even as he stood there putting it all together.
“Daryl, please . . . help.”
Normally, he didn’t like going downstairs and hadn’t set foot down there for nearly two years. But this time, he had no hesitation. He darted through the cellar door so quickly that he almost tripped around the piece of twine that Earl had apparently tied to the doorknob for some reason. His hand grabbed onto the rickety banister and he regained his balance before taking the rest of the steps two at a time.
The cellar floor was made of concrete and it was so cold that he could immediately see his breath in the harsh light of a bare 100 watt bulb. However, that same light also revealed what he took to be proof to his suspicions. For at the very bottom of the staircase was an oblong smear of blood, as if something large had lain there for quite some time.
She must have drug herself away, perhaps to somewhere safer. Or maybe there was a phone down here. Maybe she’d been trying to claw her way to it so she could call for help.
“Daryl . . . .”
Her voice was louder now, but only because he was closer to the source. It still sounded raspy and pained, as if each breath might be her last.
“I’m here, Mama! I’m comin’ for ya.”
The cellar was cluttered with bloated cardboard boxes that smelled of mildew, appliances that Earl had hauled down over the years, and a lifetime’s worth of castoffs. His Daddy’s old tools, dress forms that almost looked like dismembered torsos floating atop a sea of junk. So much stuff that it’d take forever for him to find her on his own.
“Keep talkin’, Mama. Guide me in. I’m comin’”
“Daryl, hurry . . . it hurts so bad.”
The old woman sounded as if she were nearly in tears and her son tore through the collected debris in a frenzy. Old newspapers fluttered in the air while boxes of books toppled their contents onto trunks that grated across the hard, bumpy floor.
“It hurts . . . .”
“Hang on, Mama!”
He rounded what almost appeared to be a miniature Stonehenge of bookshelves and end tables and saw her feet poking out from behind an old chest freezer. Scrambling through the junk, he cried out in relief: “I see you! I see you, Mama! Hold on, I’m almost there!”
As he came to the freezer he fell to his knees, so intent on helping his wounded mother that the jolt of pain may have as well been half a world away. He grabbed her shoulder as tears trickled from his eyes.
“Mama, I . . . .”
But something was wrong. Her skin was as cold as the floor he knelt on. She shouldn’t be that cold, should she? Even with blood loss, she . . . .
His confusion was cut short as her head lolled to the side. Where her eyes should have been were what looked like two squished slugs and the tip of her tongue poked out from between lips as dark and blistered as a singed hot dog. The he noticed, for the first time, that her dress was ripped and tattered. The yellow fabric was covered with inkblot-like stains and the waxen flesh below was marred with ragged gashes. One of the pockets she’d sewn almost seemed to be peeling away and he saw something that looked like a thin wedge of metal lodged into her belly like the head of a large staple. However, the piece that still stuck from the skin looked jagged, as if it had actually been the part of something large and had broken off.
Another scene replaced the one he’d imagined earlier. In this retake, Mama still toppled down the stairs, but only after she’d been brutalized by that bitch and bastard. Maybe she was already dead when they tossed her down like a bag of garbage. Or perhaps that first tumble snapped her neck. But at some point, as she rolled down into the darkness, the handle had snapped off . . . it all made sense.
Daryl then noticed the semi-circular gash in her lower abdomen and the something glistening and pink that seemed to be trying to
force its way through the cut. Lots of blood there. So much that it was impossible to tell that the dress had ever been yellow to begin within. And that was probably what killed her.
He shook his head vigorously as the weight of these thoughts finally sank in. When he’d first started noticing these things, his body had turned numb and that anesthetic-like feeling had quickly spread to his mind. He was actually able to think more clearly than he normally could . . . but, at the same time, he felt detached from the process. Almost as if it were a movie he were listening to as he faded off to sleep.
But now that feeling was beginning to fade.
Mama couldn’t be dead. She just couldn’t. If she were dead, then how did she call to him for help? How did she let him know that her body was even down here to begin with?
As Daryl struggled with these questions, Mona yanked on a piece of cord from her hiding place. The cord rounded one of the stair banisters and snaked up to the top of the steps. But when she pulled, the thin rope was drawn taut and the door it was tied to slammed shut.
Daryl sprang to his feet at the same moment Mona threw the switch on the breaker box and plunged the cellar into a darkness so complete that it seemed as if they’d been set adrift in space. She removed the welding goggles that had already adjusted her vision to the gloom and tried not to giggle as Daryl’s screams pierced the darkness. The acrid stench of urine flooded the air as he tripped and fell in the clutter and she suspected that by the time she was through playing, that shit would also add its pungency to this mess in the terrified man’s pants.
Shut The Fuck Up And Die! Page 14
