G-157

by K. M. Malloy

  “Why?”

  Richie rolled his eyes and let out a groan. “Do you want to spend the rest of your life playin with yourself or do you want to have fun with that girl?”

  Richie turned back to look at Stacey, his jeans becoming tight around the groin. A sick grin spread across his lips. “I want to have fun with her,” he whispered.

  “Alright then, you follow my lead.”

  Ronny nodded, and the two crouched silent in the bushes. He felt his jeans become even tighter as she ventured closer, and his heart began to beat faster as he thought of the fun they’d have. I’ll show you a real good time, honey, he thought, his hands beginning to shake. I’m gonna show you the time of your life.

  “Get ready,” Richie whispered.

  His knees trembled, the adrenaline pumping through his veins made his hands shake even more. Hot breath steamed from his nostrils as he kept his eyes on the girl, ready to pounce as soon as Richie gave the word. Ronny grew light headed when she came within twenty feet of them, and he felt as though he’d black out when she was within a few yards.

  “Now!” Richie hissed. The Tillman twins leapt from the bushes and rushed towards Stacey. Ronny felt a wetness in his pants as he landed a blow to the girl’s jaw before she had time to scream. Richie followed with another hard punch to her temple. Stacey’s eyes rolled back in her head as she dropped her books and crumpled into the dust.

  Ronny stood looking down at the blood trickling from her lip. He was breathing hard, the armpits of his shirt soaked with sweat. “What now?”

  “To the park,” Richie said as he scooped the girl up and threw her like a burlap sack of potatoes over his shoulder. Ronny nodded, and they began to walk towards the woods.

  ***

  Lucita Tillman’s face continued to smile as she walked towards Laura Wester and her friends. The little girls had found a young bullfrog along the banks, and laughed as they scurried around trying to catch it. It leapt into the pond just as Lucita joined them along the water’s edge.

  “Hi, Mrs. Tillman,” Laura said as she flipped a long blind braid over her shoulder and squinted to look up at the woman.

  “Hi, Mrs. Tillman,” Connie Sandoval called.

  “Hi, Mrs. Tillman,” Sandy Roberts echoed.

  Lucita Tillman continued to tower over the little girls, the smile never leaving her face. Laura shifted uncomfortably under the woman’s silent gaze.

  “Mrs. Tillman?” she asked. “Are you okay?”

  Lucita let out a jerky nod. “Swimming.”

  “No,” Laura shook her head. “Not today. It’s still too cold and I ain’t got my suit.”

  “Swimming,” Lucita repeated.

  “No, I can’t. I don’t have my suit and my momma would be mad if I got in with my school clothes on.”

  “Swimming.” Lucita took a step forward.

  “Mrs. Tillman?” Laura’s eyes were wide and glistened with fright. Her hands pawed at her pink school dress, bawling it into tufts and raising the hem nearly up to her undies.

  “Swimming.” Lucita continued towards the cowering girl. Connie and Sandy backed up quickly away from the banks, leaving Laura to the towering woman.

  “Mrs. Tillman, you’re scaring me,” Laura hiccupped, and began to cry.

  “Swimming.” Lucita took several more steps forward.

  “Mrs. Tillman,” Laura wailed, her buckled shoes now splashing backwards into the water. “Please, stop!”

  “Swimming!” Lucita bellowed, and lunged towards the girl. Her massive hand caught one of Laura’s braids as she turned to run. The girl let out a shrill screech as two thick arms wrapped around her torso and lifted her into the air.

  “Swimming!”

  Laura thrashed and screamed as she was carried into the pond. She cried and pleaded for Lucita to let her go, but the woman only continued to repeat that one word. Swimming. Her little body went into full blown panic when Lucita froze, the water reaching to the amazon woman’s chest.

  “Mrs. Tillman?” Laura choked in a small voice. Lucita turned her head to look down at the girl, and for a moment she thought the woman had come to her senses and would let her go.

  “Swimming!”

  Laura Wester sucked in a lungful of water as her head was thrust into the pond.

  ***

  Richie Tillman stared down at the sobbing, bleeding girl as his brother climbed off her. She lay naked on the ground, her eyes black, nose broken. Several of her teeth were gone, and more than three dozen cuts covered her body. She curled into the fetal position onto her side and gave a weak cough. Richie smiled when he saw blood spill forth from her lips.

  “That sure was something,” Ronny said as he zipped his fly up. “Wasn’t that fun?” he asked as he smacked Richie on the arm.

  “You know what would be even more fun?”

  “What? A brunette?”

  “If we ate her eyes.”

  Ronny’s dark skin paled. “Wh-what?”

  “Yeah,” Richie nodded, tapping the knife against his thigh. “Yeah, that would be really fun.”

  “Uh-uh,” Ronny shook his head as he took a few steps back from his brother. “No way, man. That’s sick.”

  Pain screamed from his spine as Richie slammed him against a tree. The warm knife pressed against his neck, and for a moment he thought he was going to lose control of his bladder.

  “You’re going to eat ‘em if I tell you to eat ‘em,” Richie screamed in his face, his breath hot and sour. “And you’re gonna like ‘em!”

  A tear rolled down Ronny’s cheek. “Richie-“

  “You’re gonna eat ‘em!”

  “No I-“

  Ronny’s eyes bulged as the blade ripped across his neck. His hands flew to his gushing throat. Gurgling, choking sounds erupted as he staggered a few feet and collapsed into the leaves, his body giving several violent spasms before stilling.

  Richie stared at his brother for several minutes, watching his dark skin turn from ebony to an ashy gray. He turned his back to Ronny, and kneeled by Stacey’s side.

  A thin blue film was beginning to build over her unblinking eyes. Her purple lips hung open in a frozen scream.

  “Dead.” Richie shook his head. “No good dead. What do we do with dead?” He pulled the booklet of matches from his pocket.

  “We burn dead,” he said. He struck a match and dropped it into the leaves. “We burn dead.”

  Richie struck another match.

  ***

  Walt Hadley couldn’t shake the sinking feeling from his gut. There had been something terribly wrong with Luctia, but for nearly a half an hour he struggled with himself on whether or not to go check on her. It was a struggle he regretted for the rest of his life.

  It didn’t take long to find her once he got into town. All he had to do was follow the screams.

  He began to run when he heard men and women shouting. Cold terror ripped through him when he heard an unnatural roar coming from the park.

  Duck Park was in chaos when he reached the pond. A fire roared from the woods in the west. Half a dozen men were in the water trying to wrestle a lunatic Lucita back to the shore. Scott Tilker was near the waterline with tears in his eyes as he frantically tried to give Laura Wester CPR. Four men held back Lucy Wester as she screamed for someone to help her baby. Twenty other parents rushed through the park looking for and herding their children away from the scene, with more running in all the time.

  Walt’s head spun as smoked filled the scene. He stood in shock as two fire trucks wailed and came to a halt at the tree line. Four military jeeps rushed in. He was vaguely aware of gunfire, vaguely aware that any non-Caucasian was dropping to their knees and collapsing in the grass. He watched in slow motion when he saw Lucita’s arms fly up and her body pitch forward. He fainted when he saw her bobbing face first in the black and red water.

  ***

  It took two days for the fire department from Parker to put out the blaze in the woods. Twenty houses and four buildings in the
business district burned. For three weeks the town was under house arrest, and people watched nervously as they saw the army jeeps go by as they sat by their windows with air filtered masks on waiting for the smoke to clear.

  It took six more days until the military found Richie Tillman. Sixteen more girls had been raped and murdered. Four were missing their eyes. After they’d taken him, there were no more non-Caucasians left in John’s Town.

  That was the first time the Army came in the daylight.

  Chapter Eight

  Monday March 15, 2010

  Population: 405

  The day was one of the longest she could ever remember. Between every class people were milling around her, asking about the outcome with Troy and how their ride around town Saturday night had been. She confirmed that Troy was taking her to the kick off dinner, and quickly changed the conversation to a different subject. Any talk about their ride made her skin grow pale with the thought of what had happened outside town. She did not speak of the perplexing event on campus. She had promised to tell no one at school, but only no one at school. This was a puzzle for an expert, and she wished the day would end so she could speak with him.

  The two thirty bell chirped through the classroom, followed by shutting books and zipping back packs. It took much longer than usual to escape the campus and evade invitations to after school meet ups before she could walk down Bourbon Street without hassle.

  The old brick building on the corner of Row and Bourbon was tucked away from the other businesses in the district. It reminded her of the old buildings in Chicago she had seen in a history book, charming in its simplicity yet depressing in its dire need of repair. Many of the bricks were chipped and stained. The railing up the steps was rickety atop the crumbling block steps. One good push was all it would take to rip the wrought iron from the concrete. Faded shutters holding on for dear life framed a window with a crack snailing its way across the pane. If left to the building’s owner these repairs would never be made. Dr. Caughlin was in his twilight and preferred to spend his time away from patients napping rather than housekeeping, and the old office allowed him to doze in his apartment above the practice in between the occasional patient or guest dropping by to say hello. Aire frowned at the rain gutter tottering over the second story window and made a note to get some volunteers to help clean up the building before the roof fell in on the old man as he slept his last few years away. She would ask Mike first. If anyone could get a group of people to help, it would be him.

  The smell of cleaning detergents and honey scented perfume she had loved since childhood rushed her nose as she entered the office. The receptionist, Darlene Sweeney, greeted her with a broad smile as she shut the door behind her, grunting as she struggled to close it against the will of its sagging hinges. Darlene giggled at her effort, continuing to file her nails with her bare feet propped up on the desk.

  “Hi there, honey. What brings you in today? You don’t look like you’ve got a cold or any broken bones.”

  “No, I’m fine,” Aire said.

  “One of those visits, huh?” Darlene smiled.

  “Yep, one of those visits.”

  She’d frequented the doctor’s office since she was a child. Only a handful of her hundreds of visits had been for medical reasons. The rest had been for Caughlin’s stories about the world outside of John’s Town and troubling moments of growing pains as she struggled to understand the world around her. John’s Town didn’t have a psychologist, but in Aire’s opinion, Doc was just as good.

  “Alright, honey. Have a seat and I’ll call him for you. He’s been upstairs for a while so he should be nice and rested. I don’t think he’d sleep so much if you weren’t always here pestering him,” Darlene said. She slipped her heels back on and grabbed the broom from propped in the corner. She gave the ceiling three sharps smacks with the broom handle, shouting for the doctor to wake up and get downstairs.

  An inarticulate rumbling filtered through the cracked office, the floorboards creaking as the doctor stood up and made his way towards the stairs. Aire followed the heavy thumps of his footsteps across the ceiling until she saw him come down the stairs, his stomach covered in old trousers up to the belly button leading the way.

  “Afternoon, Aire. What brings you in today? Got another busted wrist?” Dr. Caughlin said as he reached the final step.

  “No, sir,” she said. “I haven’t had any broken bones since last year’s Moto.”

  “Oh?” he said, raising his eyebrows. “What about those two broken knuckles from the swing you took at Lucy Mobley last Halloween?”

  Aire scrunched up her nose. “Those didn’t count.”

  Dr. Caughlin chuckled. “No, of course they don’t. Lucy still thinks very highly of you though.”

  “I don’t care what idiots think.”

  “Is that a reason to pop them one?”

  “No, but she copied my Halloween costume and wouldn’t stop following me and repeating everything I said.”

  “That’s still not a good excuse.”

  “Well, whatever. I ended up hitting the wall anyway so no harm done,” she said. “But, I’m not here to talk about that. Can we go into the exam room?”

  “Of course,” Caughlin said, and led her behind Darlene’s desk and into the only patient examination room in the practice. Aire closed the door securely behind them and sat down on the cracking grey chair next to the sink.

  “So,” Caughlin said, both man and chair grunting under his weight and he sat down on the stool. “What’s on your mind, Aire?”

  “Well,” she began. A cold feeling flooded over her, as though an ice dam had cracked and sent freezing water rushing upon her. She bit her tongue and looked to the floor. A sick, sinking feeling ripped at her gut. Beware, the feeling whispered, beware.

  Aire shook her head and tried to quiet the voice. There was no reason not to tell Dr. Caughlin about Saturday. She’d spent hours in this room over the course of her life speaking to him of her troubles, and he’d never betrayed her trust. He was like the grandfather she never had, and listened to his every word about stories from the outside world, stories of vending machines and houses with different floor plans and freedom to do as one so pleased, though his recollections were a bit empty at times from a car accident that had left a three inch scar at the base of his skull. He’d warned her of the dangers too, of the theft and violence and murder, never to deter her from leaving though, merely to caution. So why are you afraid to confide in him now, she asked herself. Beware, her gut whispered back, beware.

  “Aire?” Caughlin said, leaning his massive figure forward. “Did you do something you weren’t supposed to?”

  “Yes. Well, no. But sort of, I guess you could say.” She began picking her fingernails, her palms beginning to moisten.

  “Spit it out.”

  “Okay,” she said, taking a deep breath. “So this is what happened. Saturday night I asked Troy to take me to the hospital to go see Becky since I don’t have a bike anymore. We got out of the city and had passed a couple billboards when Troy had to stop. He was crying, like really bawling his eyes out. He said he couldn’t go on because he felt so hopeless and sad. But as soon as we got back into town, he felt like himself again.”

  “Yes.”

  Aire stared at the old man’s unchanged expression. “Well?”

  “What’s your question Aire?”

  “What do you mean ‘what’s my question?’ Have you become one of them?”

  Dr. Caughlin smiled down at her, his expansive, fleshy cheeks cloaking his cornflower blue eyes. “I know what your question is. It’s one that everyone in John’s Town knows the answer to so it surprises me you ask. It happens on occasion. Everyone born in this town loves the place so much that it breaks their hearts to leave it. Just about everyone has wandered a little too far from home and come to see me the next day asking me about the same thing that happened to Troy. It’s completely natural.”

  “But, it didn’t happen to me.”


  “Well.” He leaned back onto his stool and rubbed a hand over his knee. It gave another groan, and for a moment she thought it would give out. “You’ve always been a bit different. Never in a bad way, just unique.”

  “How come I’ve never heard of that before?”

  “Aire,” he said frowning. “Again with the questions you already know.”

  “I know,” she sighed. “We don’t talk about the bad stuff. But, if it’s so common then it can’t be bad, so why not share the experience?”

  “Don’t know,” he shrugged. “People get funny that way. You’ve gotten sick and lost your lunch before. Did you tell everyone about that? Or about any other unpleasant bodily functions that happen to everyone on a regular basis?”

  “No.”

  “There you go then.”

  “Hmm. Makes sense, I guess. Still weird though.” She tapped her finger on her chin, her head cocking to the left. Caughlin remained silent, waiting for her to continue. She bit her lip and began to pick at her palms, her gaze drifting from the peeling linoleum, to the jar of cotton balls on the counter, and finally back to the old man. “You have to go to college to be a doctor, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “What was it like? The university you went to back in the States?”

  Caughlin’s cheeks jiggled with laughter. “Oh it was a grand old time. We stayed up late, had parties and road trips and all the junk food we could eat. Grand old time. It wasn’t like the trade schools here. Why?”

  Aire shrugged. “I’d like to go to a school in the States.”

  “Hmm.” The smile faded from Caughlin’s face. He rubbed a wrinkled hand over the stubble on his cheeks. “A fine endeavor, but one I won’t be of much use helping you accomplish since I don’t remember much of it,” he said, tapping the scar on the back of his neck, “only that it was a wonderful time in my life. But I am about ready to retire. Mayor Jenkins gave me permission to take on an apprentice over the summer, if you’re interested.”