Journalstone's 2010 Warped Words for Twisted Minds

by Compiled by Christopher C. Payne

  When we did finally arrive, it was easy to tell nobody had used the cabin in a very long time. Opening the door kicked up a cloud of dust, and a squirrel on the roof started scolding us for invading his property. The air inside was stale, and there were cobwebs everywhere.

  We estimated it'd take three trips altogether to get our baggage from the car, but after that we could relax and begin our vacation. We were in the middle of our second trip back, all of us carrying bags, fly rods, or back packs, when disaster struck.

  Clarke was in front, and I was behind him. Becca followed me with Sandra bringing up the rear. We were at a point where the forest encroached on the path with trees and brush so thick we couldn't see anything off to either side. It was only a couple more hours until sunset. Cicadas sang in the trees, and the heat was beginning to wear on us.

  “Why is it so bloody hot?” Becca asked.

  “You can’t take a little heat? It's good for you,” I said in a not-so-nice tone.

  “This is a vacation,” Becca replied. “I don't go on a vacation to be miserable, Bruce. I go on a vacation to have a good time. I go on a vacation to relax. I don’t go to hike 800 miles, uphill, to some tiny little cabin with a portable potty and no shower just so you cannot catch fish for a couple of days.”

  “Becca--,” I started, but she ignored me.

  “It's a good thing we brought some beans with us. We won't be counting on you bringing dinner home. You're just not that good at bringing home the bacon, Bruce, we all know that. Of course, maybe bringing the beans along wasn't the perfect solution since there is only the one bathroom.”

  “Damn it, Becca, what do you want from me?” I asked. “What could I possibly do to--”

  Sandra screamed. It was a quick noise that sounded like it was cut off. I spun around and saw the bushes close to where she'd been moving violently. Then, they stopped. I thought I could hear something rustling in the brush, rapidly growing fainter. We all stood there for several seconds, unable to figure out what to do. I heard her scream again, already quite some distance away. It was an awful sound, full of despair and terror. I had never heard anything like that before.

  “Sandy!” Clarke shouted, running back past us, getting to the point on the path where she'd been. He pointed at the ground, looking at us, shock on his face.

  “There's blood here! Sandy!” He ran into the bush, following her path.

  Becca turned to me. “What do we do? Do we help him?”

  “Let's get to the cabin,” I said. “It's almost dark, and maybe we can find some flashlights or something to help us search.”

  As we trudged onward, my mind wandered back on how my demise had begun.

  * * *

  I was in my tiny office during a routine day. Nothing special going on when it had started.

  There was a knock on my door as I sat at my desk doing research for one of our clients online. Clarke came in, followed by Nick. Nick closed the door quietly.

  “Uh, Bruce, we need to talk.” Nick said. He seemed nervous as he and Clarke sat down in the cheap chairs I had been given to use for visitors. Clarke wouldn't look at me.

  “What's up?” I asked, trying to sound cheerful, knowing, though, that on this most routine of days, I was about to get some really bad news.

  “It's about the BAK account,” Nick said.

  “What about it? Their new rep rocking the boat?” I asked.

  Clarke shifted in his seat, looking at me, finally, a solemn expression on his face. “He called me, Bruce. He wants to work with me from now on.”

  “What?”

  BAK was our biggest account. According to Nick, it was our only account--the bowing and scraping that went on in our office when their rep visited was a bit of an embarrassment, I thought.

  “He wants to deal with Clarke,” Nick said. “It's what he prefers.”

  “So you're taking the account away from me,” I said. It wasn't a question.

  “Yes,” Nick said, and as I stared back at him, he simply shrugged.

  “I don't know why,” Clarke chimed in. “I'm so sorry. I haven't even talked to them, so I don't know why they want to make a switch. I especially don't know why they are insisting on dealing with me.”

  “I need you to forward anything you have on the account that isn't on the network servers to Clarke ASAP, Bruce,” Nick said. “He needs to be brought up to speed. I want you to know this is no reflection on your work. It's always top-notch. This is just what the client wants.”

  If it were any other client, they would have been told to stick with the account executive who had been assigned to them. Anybody else would have been told to shove it.

  Not BAK, though. No way. What they want, they get.

  Nick got out of the chair and looked in my direction. “You've still got the Imprector account, along with Zipmann Glover. That'll keep you busy. I'll be in my office.”

  Nick left, closing the door quickly, but quietly, behind him. I looked at Clarke who was leaning back in his chair.

  “I know this is a blow to you, Bruce,” he said. “Look, Nick's going to be in his office, and quitting time is in an hour, anyway. Why don't you head down to Kelly's, and I'll join you there in a little while?”

  A drink or three or five sounded good to me then. I got up, a bit weak in the knees. “Sure,” I said. “I'll see you there.”

  “Sure thing, buddy,” Clarke responded, walking with me across the floor outside my office, through the maze of desks of junior executives, interns, and assistants to the elevators. I pushed the button and turned, seeing everyone at a desk looking at me. I wondered if they all knew somehow. I felt like it was written on my face.

  The elevator doors opened, and I stepped in, turning back to see Clarke standing there staring at me, a faint smile on his face, and I suddenly remembered that, in my shock at getting the bad news, I'd forgotten to log off of my computer.

  “Clarke, could you log me off?” I asked.

  “Sure thing,” he said as the doors started closing. “See you in an a bit.”

  * * *

  After a short debate about possibly returning back to the car or continuing on to the cabin, the cabin held its luster since it was closer. We wanted to get out of the open as quickly as possible. We made it just as the sun seemed to disappear behind the mountains. It went from weak daylight to pitch-black in minutes.

  We hadn't brought the fuel for the generator yet so our only ability to see came from our flashlights. I opened the baggage we already had, but only found some food and water.

  “Why did we come here?” Becca asked me over and over again, while we dug through the luggage, looking for I don't know what. “We don't even like fishing.”

  “Oh, would you please just shut the hell up!” I said when the door opened, causing us both to jump.

  It was Clarke. His expression was blank as he came into the cabin and sat on a bunk, seeming not to see us for several moments. He was bloody, sweaty, and scratched, probably by branches from the bushes he'd gone through. He was filthy.

  “Did you find her?” Becca asked.

  He looked at her, his eyes finally focusing.

  “Yes,” he said, and it sounded like his voice came from a great distance away. “A hollow tree. She was at the base of a big old hollow tree. It had her arm up inside of it. I could hear it chewing . . . she looked at me, Bruce. She looked at me. Her mouth was moving, but she couldn't even scream. It was eating her alive. It was . . .”

  “Shhhh . . .,” Becca said, but Clarke went on.

  “It pulled her into the tree a little further. I could hear it. I could hear that thing eating my wife, Bruce. Her bones . . . she looked at me . . . she tried to say something, but she was in so much pain . . .”

  He let out a sob and stared at his trembling hands.

  “Do you know what it is?” I asked.

  “I didn't see it. It's inside the tree. I can find that tree again, though.”

  Clarke started looking around the room, f
inally seeing a bag he'd brought that we hadn't opened, yet. He got up, went over to it, opened it, and ripped through the clothes inside until he found what he was looking for.

  It was a revolver, a .38, I'd guess, nickel-plated.

  “You didn't say you were bringing a gun!” Becca gasped. I wanted to hit her.

  “All kinds of bastards hide out in these woods,” I said, instead. Clarke looked at me for a moment before running out of the door, slamming it behind him.

  “Clarke!” Becca shouted after him. At that point, I did hit her. I couldn't help it. She needed it, though.

  My knuckles stung, and Becca had blood in her mouth. But she shut up, looking at me, shock in her eyes.

  “Now be quiet, and sit down,” I said. I got up and dropped the bar across the door.

  “You're locking Clarke out there?” she whispered to me.

  “Better him out there with that . . . whatever . . . than having that thing able to just walk in the door,” I hissed back at her. “And if we stay here and stay quiet maybe it won't find us. Do you understand?”

  There must have been something in my tone because she nodded. I got up and started going through drawers and closets, as quietly as I could, seeing what else was there, figuring there was nothing else useful in the baggage.

  I found the shotgun in the back of a closet. It was ancient, a single-shot, and when I broke it open there was one solitary cartridge in it. It was coated with dust, and the powder was probably stale, but it was better than nothing.

  This sucker was huge, though, probably a 10-gauge. One shot from this thing would take out a grizzly, I figured. I thought of Clarke out there, with his little .38, and me in here, with my big old shotgun. I sadistically found that a little humorous.

  Yeah, I snickered about that for several minutes.

  * * *

  It was my 21st birthday party when I'd first met Becca.

  I was a junior in college – I came back to the apartment I shared with Clarke to find it decorated for a surprise party. It was all Clarke’s idea.

  Like a lot of parties on a college campus, we had a lot of gate crashers. Becca was one of them – she had come with some friends of hers. We all got drunk and loud, and the party broke up around 2 a.m. when the cops shut us down. Clarke took Sandra and went into his room, leaving me to fend for myself.

  Becca had told the cops she lived there because her ride had bailed on her. I offered to take her home – she lived on the other side of town. But she saw how drunk I was and declined. She really had no choice but to crash at my place.

  I didn't mind, even though we were both too drunk to do much fooling around that night. Instead, we lay on some blankets on some dingy old carpet and talked.

  “That guy, Clarke,” she said. “He lives here with you?”

  “Sure,” I said. “We've known each other for years.”

  “Is that his girlfriend he's with?”

  “Yeah. She used to be my girlfriend, but she dumped me for him.”

  “Jesus, Bruce. You let him get away with that?”

  “What do I care? He's my best friend. I was just looking to get into her pants. He's more serious.”

  “Serious? Really? Think they'll get married or something?”

  “I think it's possible,” I said.

  She sighed. “Damn, he's good looking. And he's charming.”

  “So? What does that have to do with anything at all?” I asked.

  Instead, she just looked at me a moment before turning over on her side, her back to me, and going to sleep. I did likewise and forgot all about her until the next morning when her vomiting in the bathroom woke me. That was when I felt sober enough to take her home.

  We'd been together ever since. What an inspired beginning to our wonderful relationship.

  * * *

  “We should save the flashlights,” I whispered.

  Becca was shining her light around the cabin, looking for who knows what. “I don't like sitting in the dark,” she hissed back at me.

  “We're on top of a hill,” I said. “The light probably shows for miles around.”

  “It'll give Clarke something to see,” she said. “He's still alive, I just know it.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” I said. “But I think that thing out there can also find us. Do you understand?”

  “Bruce, Clarke just lost his wife. He's gonna need us. He's going to need someone to comfort him, to help him get over--”

  “Jesus, please shut the hell up,” I whispered back at her. “Clarke will be fine. You just need to keep your mouth closed and turn out that light. Do you understand?”

  “Fine,” she said, and I heard her click off the light. It quickly got so dark we could barely make out each other’s silhouettes. “Now what?” she asked.

  “We sit here. Quietly. And wait until dawn.”

  “Oh, God, Bruce. Are you crazy?”

  “You have any other suggestions?”

  She didn't say anything, which was answer enough.

  * * *

  I sat at the bar in Kelly's for hours the night I managed to get myself kicked off the BAK account. Clarke never showed. I did manage to get really drunk, though – the barkeep took my keys, and I took a cab home.

  I was braced for a tongue-lashing from Becca, but instead she was sitting on the couch, reading a magazine. The TV set showed the local news. She looked up when I came in, accepted a kiss, and went back to reading while I went to change.

  There was something odd in the bathroom, I thought, but in my alcohol-dulled senses it took me a while to figure it out.

  The toilet seat was up. I went back into the living room, anger beginning to boil up inside me. “Who was here?” I demanded.

  Becca looked at me, alarm on her face for a moment. “Why do you think anyone was here?”

  “Because unless you haven't taken a piss in the four hours since you've been home a man has used the toilet.” I said.

  “Uh, it was the cable guy,” she said, after a couple of moments. “It was out when I got home. I called, and they had a guy in the neighborhood, so he came right over. He asked to use the bathroom while he was here. It only took him a few minutes to fix whatever it was. He just left right before you got home.”

  “I see,” I said, settling onto the couch next to her, picking up the TV remote and flipping through the channels, deciding to let the matter drop for the moment.

  “I was watching that,” she said.

  “No you weren't. You were reading. I'm sure there's a game on here somewhere.”

  “You've been drinking.”

  “No, I haven't. I'm just tired,” I responded.

  It was almost word-for-word the conversation we'd had for the past few years every night. She got up and went into the bedroom, taking her magazine., I knew she'd be reading until she fell asleep.

  Instead of moving to the bed, this one night, I dozed off on the couch and stayed there until morning. When Becca woke, she said nothing, not even waking me as she got herself ready for work.

  I waited for her to leave before beginning my own morning, making sure the toilet seat was down when I left the house.

  * * *

  It had been dark a couple of hours. Becca and I both settled onto the floor, backs against the wall, as far away as we could get from the door and the windows. The shotgun lay across my lap.

  Suddenly, I heard six rapid pops. It was probably Clarke's gun going off. Then, silence.

  “Do you suppose he killed it?” Becca whispered to me.

  “He'd try to come back if he did,” I whispered.

  “It's dark out there, and he's probably lost in the woods,” she said. “Maybe we should call for him or something. Maybe that's why he's not--”

  “Why do you care so intently anyway?” I asked. “What's this man to you?”

  “Bruce, he's in danger out there!” she whispered. “He's your best friend! Aren't you worried about him even a little bit?”

  “Sure,” I said. �
��But why are YOU worried about him, Becca?”

  “What the hell are you say--”

  She never finished her sentence. The window on the other side of the room shattered, and she screamed once, briefly. Then, she was gone, dragged several feet through the air and outside in less than a second.

  I could see in the moonlight blood on the jagged shards of glass still left in the window pane. Glass littered the floor, along with more blood. I heard her scream a couple more times, each time further away. I took a deep breath and let it out, slowly, feeling calmer and more content than I knew I should. I just sat there quietly, waiting for dawn.

  * * *

  It was another after-work night at Kelly's. Clarke made an appearance this time, joining me at the bar.

  “Sorry about the other night, Bruce,” he said, slapping me on the back when he got there, settling onto the barstool next to me. He held up a single finger at the bartender, who put a glass of beer on the bar in front of him without a word. “New guy at BAK has started in on me already. He's not letting the grass grow, let me tell you.”

  “Keeping you busy, are they?” I asked.

  “Sheesh. Demanding bastards, aren't they? They want this, they want that, and they want it now. I've come close to telling them to stuff it more than once. I don't know how you put up with them as long as you did.”

  “Thinking about asking Nick to put somebody else on the account?” I asked.

  “Not yet,” Clarke said. “I think I can get a handle on their new rep. He seems to know what he's doing, and we speak the same language. I'm just blowing off steam, you know? How are things with you? We never get the chance to hang out anymore.”

  “Okay, I guess. Becca and I are--”

  “Oh, speak of the Devil, there's Clyde. I'll be right back.”

  He got up and left me sitting there, going to talk to the new BAK representative who had just come in.