Inked: A Supernatural Short Story

by Zach Bohannon

  Easton placed the pen over the small notepad.

  “What time did they come by?”

  Terry looked up, trying to remember.

  “I think they showed up around three. They looked around for a little while. Ricky picked something out. Took about two hours or so to put it on him. They left just after five.”

  Easton scribbled on the pad. Labarbara looked to Terry.

  “Where did you go after they left?”

  Terry moved his eyes to Labarbara.

  “I locked up the shop and went home. We close at five.”

  Easton’s eyes came off the pad and he studied Terry’s face as he answered. Made a few more notes on the sheet of paper.

  “Straight home?” Labarbara asked.

  Terry looked away. The shop was located next to a highway and he watched as cars flew by. Many of the drivers’ heads turned his way to try and see why cops were standing in front of a tattoo shop talking to him.

  He looked back to the officers with dimness over his face.

  “Look, I don’t know what you guys are trying to get at, but yeah, I went straight home.”

  The two officers looked at each other.

  “We aren’t trying to get at anything,” Easton said. “Just trying to gather as much information as possible for our investigation.”

  “What were Ricky and his friend like?” Labarbara asked.

  “Fucking white trash assholes.” It came out of Terry’s mouth before he could even think about it. He felt his tongue go down into his throat and his face turned red.

  Easton stared into Terry’s face. Then he grinned.

  “Yeah, that’s pretty much what everyone else has said about ‘em.”

  Terry felt some relief come over him.

  “I think we have just about everything we need here,” Labarbara said.

  Easton put his pen to his mouth. He pointed it at Terry.

  “One more thing.”

  Terry took one of the final drags from his cigarette and nodded.

  “What did you tattoo on him?”

  Terry snickered. Threw his cigarette onto the ground and stomped his out with his Chucks.

  “Stupid redneck shit. I put a snake on him with a busty devil chick in the background.”

  Easton and Labarbara looked at each other. Slowly, Easton wrote down the thought.

  “Where did you put it on him?” Labarbara said.

  Terry shrugged. “The top of his right arm below the shoulder.”

  Easton stopped writing. He faced the ground and the look on his face concerned Terry.

  “Why? Didn’t you guys see it on the body?”

  Labarbara walked over to the squad car and came back with a folder. He opened it, pulled out a photograph, and handed it to Terry.

  Terry’s eyes widened.

  The full-color 8x10 showed a naked man sprawled out on his back. His face was mangled, but Terry knew who it was. Red covered the body and the floor. Terry studied the photo. He thought that his love of gory splatterpunk films had desensitized him. He was disgusted. Offended. But couldn’t look away.

  There were bruises all over the body. The middle section had turned purple, even across the arms. Terry scanned the body and noticed intense bite marks surrounded by swelling. The right arm could be seen clearly in the picture, and for a moment, Terry thought there was no way that this was Ricky. Or at least, no way that the photo was taken after he died. He brought his hand over his mouth.

  The tattoo was gone. Ricky’s muscle and bone were exposed all across his arm. The only place on his body that had been torn apart.

  Terry turned and let his stomach go on the concrete.

  ***

  Even though he had decided that he wanted to stay home that night, Amanda talked Terry into keeping their plans of going to Robb’s house to hang out with friends. He didn’t tell her that the cops had been by the shop to visit him, or anything about Ricky for that matter. Maybe this is best so I can go and keep my mind off things he thought.

  After Terry picked up Amanda from her place, they arrived at Robb’s twenty minutes later.

  “There you are,” Robb shouted as he opened the door.

  Terry smiled as they shook hands. He pulled Robb in for a hug and patted him on the back.

  “Shit,” Robb grimaced.

  Terry didn’t even think about the new tattoo he had put on Robb’s back earlier.

  “Oh fuck, dude. Sorry.”

  “It’s all good man,” Robb replied, reaching for the top of his back to try and relieve the burn. He leaned in to hug Amanda and kiss her on the cheek. She kept her arms to her side and didn’t even risk embracing him. “Come grab a beer.”

  They entered the house and were greeted by bass-heavy electronic music and friends. A small group of twelve friends were at the party and Terry made his rounds and chatted with each individually. Amanda grabbed a beer and went to sit with Robb’s girlfriend, Trish, whom she was good friends with.

  A little bit later, Terry, Robb, Amanda, and Trish hung out in the corner conversing with each other. A few more friends had shown up and most of them were smoking marijuana and dancing to the techno music.

  Seth, a scraggly blonde kid who waited tables at the hip local burger joint, joined their conversation.

  “Did you guys hear on the news about that dude that got all tore up at his house?” he asked.

  Terry turned his head to Robb, who kept his head still but moved his eyes to look at Terry.

  “They said it was pretty messed up,” Trish said as she took a drag off a cigarette. The cloud of smoke gave her blonde hair a dull appearance.

  Seth took a swig out of a beer.

  “I heard that the poor fuck’s arms were sawed off and shit,” Seth said.

  Terry rolled his eyes.

  “Shut the fuck up, Seth. That isn’t true.”

  A drunken, angry look came over Seth’s face.

  “How the fuck do you know, man? Were you fuckin’ there?”

  “Get the hell outta here. I don’t wanna hear about that shit,” Terry said.

  “Fuck you, man,” Seth said. He stumbled off into another conversation across the room.

  “Dumb ass,” Robb said.

  “They did say though that the body was pretty messed up,” Amanda said. “What if that guy is still out there?”

  Terry smiled, reached over to Amanda and began tickling her sides.

  “Then you better look out or he might get you!”

  She laughed. Appreciated that he lightened the mood.

  “We don’t need to think about shit like that,” Robb said. “And I got just the thing to help us forget about it.”

  Robb pulled a plastic bag out of his pocket and held it up. The white powder inside glistened from the light and rustled like sand in a high tide as he shook the bag.

  Terry squinted his face in disgust.

  “Fuck that, man. I’m not doing that shit.”

  Robb shrugged.

  “Suit yourself. More for me.”

  Trish reached over and snatched the bag away.

  “More for us.”

  She stood and grabbed Robb’s hand off of his knee. A grin spread across his face as he looked back at Terry and raised his eyebrows. Trish led him up the stairs.

  Terry rolled his eyes and then looked to Amanda.

  “I need to get some fresh air.”

  He stood and walked through the kitchen and onto the back patio.

  ***

  Outside, Terry removed the pack of cigarettes from his back pocket and cupped his mouth to light one of them through the night breeze. He leaned against the patio’s wooden railing and looked into the dark of the evening. The stars were out and he studied them.

  He heard footsteps behind him and then felt the small hand on his shoulder.

  “You alright?” Amanda asked.

  Terry took a drag of his cigarette. Flicked the ashes into the grass below.

  “That guy that they were talking about
in there,” Terry said. “The guy that was found dead.”

  “Yeah?”

  “He was in the shop. Hours before it happened, I tattooed him.”

  Amanda put her hand over her mouth.

  “Oh my God.”

  “Yeah.” Terry took another drag of the smoke. “The cops came to the shop earlier today to chat with me. Asked me a bunch of questions and shit.”

  Amanda took her hand from her mouth and placed it on Terry’s shoulder.

  “They don’t think you had something to do with it, do they?”

  Terry was irritated.

  “Of course I didn’t do it.”

  Amanda drew in a deep breath.

  “Sweetie, that’s not what I said. I know you didn’t do it. But do the police?”

  The cigarette ran out and Terry let it fall from his fingers and stomped it out with his foot.

  “Even if they thought I did it, they have no proof.” He put his arm around her. “So let’s just forget about it and enjoy ourselves, okay?”

  He leaned in and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and abided.

  Both of them whipped their heads toward the house as the deafening, high-pitched scream hit their ears at the same time. Terry broke their embrace and ran inside.

  The crowd stood in the middle of the living room, looking up the stairs.

  Another scream; the scream of the same woman.

  “Robb,” Terry mumbled to himself.

  Terry ran to the stairs and moved up them as fast as he could.

  He arrived at the door and tried opening it.

  Locked.

  Trish continued to scream inside.

  Amanda crept behind Terry, crying, with both her hands over her mouth as Terry gave the door repeated, swift knocks.

  “Trish,” he pleaded. “Trish, open the door.”

  Trish kept screaming.

  “Robb! Trish! One of you, open the fucking door!”

  The screaming stopped. Terry put his ear to the door and heard nothing.

  “Stand back,” he told Amanda.

  Terry leaned against the wall behind him and put his foot as hard as he could into the door.

  An intense heat came pouring out of the room. It irritated Terry and he started to sweat through his nerves and skin.

  He walked into the room and his eyes just stared, unable to process what they saw.

  Amanda came in behind him and yelled as the tears began to flow out of her eyes. She turned her head away and fell to the ground, sat down Indian style, and rocked back and forth, crying into her forearms.

  Robb’s entire body swung back and forth in the middle of the room. His neck was cocked to the side, only supported by the twine of the noose. His face had turned dark, but somehow also pale. All life was gone. Eyes bulging from the sockets. His tongue tucked between his purple lips.

  It took what seemed like hours for Terry to notice Trish standing in front of the body. Her blank stare looked up into Robb’s lifeless face. She had her arm out to her side as if embracing someone who wasn’t there; someone half her size.

  “Trish,” he said as he moved closer. She didn’t respond. He put his hands on her shoulder and shook her. “Trish.”

  She finally pulled her eyes away from Robb and looked at Terry. Her face turned grim.

  As hard as she could, she brought her hand across his face.

  He held his burning cheek and looked back at her.

  “You,” she said. “You did this to him!”

  Amanda came out of her ball and stood, concerned now for Terry.

  Terry didn’t respond. Looked at Trish in astonishment. It wasn’t the Trish he knew.

  Trish moved toward him. Her anger raged on.

  “You did this. You killed him!”

  The rest of the party gathered outside the door and began to gasp and scream as they saw the scene inside the bedroom.

  Terry crept backward away from Trish.

  “I didn’t do anything,” he mumbled. “Trish, he was my best friend, too.”

  “You’re the fucking devil!” Trish said.

  Terry looked around the room and observed the faces of everyone staring at him.

  Robb’s body spun around and his back turned to Terry.

  Terry’s eyes widened and his hands moved to the top of his head.

  The back of Robb’s shirt was torn apart. His flesh had been ripped from his body. Steam came off the exposed muscle and bone.

  The tattoo of the hanging gunslinger was gone.

  Terry stumbled out of the room and ran. Kept running.

  Behind him, he heard it over and over.

  “Devil!”

  ***

  When Terry made it home thirty minutes later, he slammed the door behind him and went to the ground. He sat with his back against the door and buried his hands into his face. He felt his phone vibrate but ignored it. Sweat came off his brow and he couldn’t get the image out of his head.

  The eyes. Robb’s eyes escaping from his skull. The flesh torn from his back and the muscles beneath it steaming.

  Terry banged his head against the door.

  Then he thought of Trish and how she’d stood in the middle of the room with her eyes fixed on Robb’s dangling body. And how she’d reacted when she snapped out of her trance. Accused him.

  He stood and began pacing back and forth through his studio.

  All he could see was Robb’s bloated face and Trish’s malevolent stare and the way she held her arm around an invisible figure.

  He started mumbling to himself through the tears.

  “It was just like the tattoo. The man hanging. The woman looking on while comforting the child. Exactly the same. How could it be exactly the same? How the fuck could it happen?”

  Terry pulled his phone out of his pocket and saw that he had 12 missed calls, 4 voice mails, and 16 text messages; all from Amanda.

  Terry froze. His grip loosened and he dropped the phone onto the tile floor of the apartment. His entire body went numb.

  “You have a gift,” the voice said.

  “Who is that?” Terry said, looking around.

  The voice was inside of his head. It felt as the voice had arms and was pushing on each of his temples from the inside of his skull. His body began to quiver.

  “Do you know what it is, Terry?”

  Involuntarily, Terry shook his head.

  “You truly bring art to the world.”

  A cold breeze came through the room and chilled his tears.

  Furious knocks came from the door.

  “Terry?” Amanda called, continuing her assault on the door.

  “A true darkness lies within the stroke of your hand,” the voice continued. “The art of tattooing brings the recipient’s soul to the surface of their flesh. But you have the power to peel the soul off of the flesh.”

  Amanda continued to knock and yell Terry’s name. She began to fumble through her keys.

  “A tattoo represents love, hate, death, emotion, and darkness. People love to stamp their worst fears on their skin. And you have the ability to bring these fears to life.”

  Terry began to pull at the hair on each side of his head.

  Without knowing why, his eyes began to move toward his art corner. They focused on the apocalyptic painting that he and Amanda had collaborated on, that would end up on her back. Mainly, his eyes stared into the face of the horseman who was the center of the piece. It was shown decapitating a woman with a large sword.

  “She is here,” the voice said. “You can hear her, right? She will get that door open any moment now.”

  The key entered the slot in the knob.

  “She has arrived, Terry. She is here to bring her fears to life. Show her.”

  “No!” Terry screamed.

  Amanda came through the door.

  “Oh my God,” she said, covering her mouth with her hands.

  She saw Terry on his knees, facing away from her, as he took turns punching himself on each s
ide of the head.

  “Terry! What are you doing?” she cried.

  His reply came through a raised voice with a tremble.

  “Go! Get out of here!”

  He punched himself in the jaw and she saw a tooth fly through the air.

  “Terry, no.”

  “Go!”

  She began to back up and the door slammed behind her. She turned and tried to open it but couldn’t.

  Terry turned and looked at her.

  He began to move toward her with the same cold look spread across his face that Trish had given him earlier in the night.

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Amanda.”

  She backed all the way up until her back pressed firmly against the door. Her hands came down and tried to open the door again. The tears flowed with no barriers down her face.

  Terry stood face to face with her and placed his palms on the door on each side of her head.

  He reared back.

  She screamed.

  He threw a punch as hard as he could just to his right of her face.

  Amanda ducked under him and turned to watch him punch the door. His entire hand turned red.

  She backed away pulling her hair. Kept screaming his name.

  Terry looked over at his bed side table and saw his tattoo machine laying on top of it. He went to it, took it into his hand, and sat down on the bed.

  He took off his pants and his underwear. Stepped on the tattoo machine’s pedal and started digging into his leg.

  The needle dug into his skin and blood began to seep out. He failed to pay any attention to how deep he was going. Didn’t care. He worked at a pace that he never had.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Amanda said.

  Terry kept digging. The buzz never stopped and it rang through Amanda’s ears like she had a chainsaw inside her skull.

  The curse inside of Terry gave him the ability to work at a furious pace. Within a few minutes, he threw the machine onto the floor. Stood and limped in front of the door.

  Terry kept gasping for air. He removed his shirt and used it to wipe away the blood from the new artful scar.

  Amanda looked down to the wound on his thigh. Though it continued to bleed, she saw a figure wearing a long, black robe. It held a large sword at its side.

  “Terry,” she cried as she began to move towards him.

  He went to his knees and let out a piercing scream.

  A loud bang came from the door behind him.