by Cat Knight
That night in bed, Julia pretended to sleep. Despite her best efforts, Rattler, the syringe in the rattlesnake eye, danced inside her head. His death was all she could think about. That vial, that syringe, why hadn’t she ever noticed them before. She had been through that basement a thousand times, and it had always escaped notice.
How? Why? She knew it would do no good to dwell on Rattler’s death. That was final, the last chord played. Still, telling herself to forget was far different from actually forgetting. Rattler, grinning and tapping those cowboy boots, teasing her with little tales from his youth. Little stories about growing up in Texas where everything was outsized.
She had heard them all before which was why she could conjure them up inside her head. And the worst thing, she told herself before sleep finally found her, was that she was pretty sure Rattler had never been to Texas. She supposed the cowboy shtick was nothing more than fabricated background meant to augment his talent. If he was a phony, then he was one of many she knew. Luckily, she didn’t dream of him.
Alden was gone when Julia woke the next morning. She was late, but she didn’t blame him. She supposed he had thought she needed sleep to heal. But she wasn’t healed. The small fear that had coursed through her veins for days had metastasised. It had turned into a form of sickness that was slipping past her defences and taking up residence in muscle and sinew.
It was the weakness in her muscles and the chant inside her head that told her she could do nothing. And the little cough that suddenly appeared in her throat. Her voice seemed to quaver and her fingers have the palsy while her lips quivered.
Julia could stay home and hide, but that wouldn’t stop the sickness. She needed to act, and she needed to act immediately before inertia chained her to a chair, the telly roaring mindlessly in front of her.
Where to begin?
She wasn’t sure, but she decided the first thing was to call Ears. She needed help.
On her way to the studio, Julia wondered if she needed some kind of weapon. In movies, the heroine usually waved some sort of talisman. Maybe holy water would work, or something that would protect her from demons.
Was it vampires who were afraid of a cross? Did parsley keep something at bay? Or was that thyme? She couldn’t remember, and stopping to pick up a cross or get a blessing didn’t make much sense. Better to start and finish what had to be done. At least, she thought it would be better.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Julia found Ears sitting on the front stoop of the studio, watching the construction equipment. He was smoking a cigarette which seemed odd since she had never seen him smoke.
“Can’t get in?” Julia asked.
He shook his head. “Didn’t want to be in there alone.”
“Why? Is something wrong?”
The basement. It’s… well, you should see for yourself.”
“That bad?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know about this Julia. I don’t know about any of it.”
“Come on. We’ll start this bloody thing together.”
She helped him to his feet, but she wasn’t at all sure they would manage to do what they wanted.
“Did you get what was on the list?”
“Yes, it’s in the basement.”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The basement was indeed scary, so scary it made Julia hug herself.
Perhaps it was the uncommon cold of the basement and not the fact that every box had been moved from its original place and stacked up against the far wall.
“I…I didn’t do it,” Ears said.
“I’m sure you didn’t,” she replied. “It’s some...some presence that moved the boxes. You know about Rattler?”
Ears shook his head. “Is he coming too?”
Julia shook her head, and she wondered if there were a good way to break the news. She decided there wasn’t.
“Rattler’s dead,” Julia said. “He died of an overdose.”
Ears closed his eyes, as if unwilling to face the truth.
“Right here in the basement,” she continued.
“You’re kidding.”
“I found him. It wasn’t what I wanted.”
Ears began to shake. His whole body shook, and Julia was pretty sure it wasn’t from the cold.
“I know it’s a lot to process, but you’ll have to mourn later. Right now, we have to move those boxes and breach that wall.”
“I don’t want to.”
She grabbed his arms and squeezed them. “I don’t either, but if we’re going to have a future here, we have to act. We don’t have the luxury of time. Do you understand?”
He nodded, and she had the sneaking suspicion that when she let him go, he would be gone.
If he had his way he would scoot up the steps and out the door quicker than a rat scooting down a hawser from a sinking ship.
But she had to let him go. To her joy, he didn’t run, instead he took a deep breath and nodded his head half a dozen times.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
She turned from him and spotted the gear Ears had brought. Gloves, goggles, hats, and sledge hammers stood to one side.
“Gear up,” she said as she headed for the hammers.
Moments later, they were wearing the safety things they needed. Julia felt an eeriness as she faced the boxes. Her mind did a momentary flip and she laughed hysterically. She could only guess what she must look like, an alien perhaps. Maybe whoever she met beyond that wall would be afraid of her.
Ears looked at, white faced and afraid. “Jules, Jules, don’t lose it on me, if you can’t keep sane, I gotta go.”
“I’m fine Ears. Grab some boxes.” She stepped forward and grabbed the first box. For a moment, she imagined that it was held in place by some force she couldn’t see. But the box moved easily enough. She tossed it aside and grabbed the next. As she threw it, she looked over her shoulder. Ears stood behind her, frozen or something.
“They won’t move themselves,” Julia said. He took a deep breath and stepped up beside her.
“This is crazy,” he said.
“Yes, but isn’t it great?”
She laughed, not hysterically, and he managed a chuckle. Then, they got to work. The boxes flew. In minutes, the wall was bare. They stepped back and stared.
“Where to start?” Ears asked.
Julia picked up a sledge and looked from one side to the other. Then, she swung the hammer as hard as she could. It smashed into the concrete, spraying shards in all directions.
“Right there,” she said. “We’ll start right there.”
Ears nodded and swung into the wall. More concrete split and flew. A feeling of regret flashed through her. This was madness, wasn’t it? She was tearing into a perfectly suitable wall for what reason? Because there was a presence behind it? Because boxes were moved and music files corrupted? Wasn’t that totally bonkers? Wasn’t that something that qualified a person for a white jacket and a small, padded cell? She was crazy as all get out!
But she wasn’t about to stop. She slammed the hammer into the wall. Crazy or not, she was going to do what had to be done, do what in her heart, she knew to be right.
They worked for half an hour before her arms felt too heavy to continue. She stepped away from a hole that was perhaps one foot by one foot. Ears stepped back with her, and they panted together.
“Tough work,” Ears said.
“We didn’t train for this. So, let’s slow down.” Julia panted.
“We can take turns,” Ears said. “I’ll go first. Ten minute shifts. That way, we won’t get worn out.”
She nodded and sat down in the dust.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
It had taken one and half hours so far. The hole was bigger, but it wasn’t yet big enough. For a moment, she peered into it, waiting for her eyes to adjust. She saw nothing but blackness, which made sense. What did she expect, red evil eyes? Taking a deep breath, she swung the hammer into the concrete. For some unexplained reason, when the hammer hit, it gave her a huge sense of satisfac
tion. Let the “presence” take that.
Two more hours and four blisters later, the hole looked big enough. She could fit through it, but even small as he was, she doubted Ears could. She stepped back and looked over her shoulder.
“What do you think?”
“I think we’re bloody daft,” he answered.
“Yeah, we just ruined a perfectly good wall.”
“Are you really going through?”
She nodded. “I don’t have a choice.” She looked around. “I forgot a torch.”
Ears pulled out his mobile and flicked on the torch app. A bright light shot out.“
Here,” he said.
“Thanks.” She took the phone and shined it into the hole. Gulping, she stuck in her head and looked around.
What she saw was a mass of debris. Boards and bricks and plaster and the stuff of houses. Topsy-turvy, it was the remnants of the former house.”
“Whatcha got?”
“Take a look,” she said as she pulled back her head.
Ears looked into the space. “What am I looking at?” he asked.
“What’s left of the original house, I think.”
“What do we do with that?”
Julia thought a moment. “I suppose we’ll start digging.
“Digging?”
“Pulling out the stuff. If there’s something untoward in this place, it’s in there.”
“That’s bonkers,” Ears said. “It’s all messed up.”
“We need tools,” she said. “Saws, pry bars, hammers, we need to be able to break things apart.”
She shined in the light, reached through, and grabbed a board. Pulling hard, she managed to dislodge it. As she pulled it out, the first box hit Julia in the back of her head.
Chapter Fifteen
Julia pulled out of the hole to find Ears battling a sea of flying boxes. The came from all directions and at all speeds, and it was all he could do to bat them away before they crashed into his glasses. She was reminded of those cash boxes where a person stood still as a draft blew money all around them. They could keep as much as they could snatch, which generally wasn’t much. The bills had a penchant for avoiding shooting hands. But Ears wasn’t waving at pound notes. He was smacking boxes out of the air.
To Julia, it seemed like something out of a comic movie. All Ears needed was a tennis racquet or something. She might have laughed hysterically again if she had had a chance. She didn’t. Half a dozen boxes jumped into the air and flew right at her.
The next five minutes was spent fighting her way out of the basement. The boxes, while not large or particularly fast, were relentless. She could knock them to the floor, but they didn’t stay there. They jumped up and flew at her afresh, which made her actions unfruitful. Her already fatigued arms could barely move.
“Upstairs!” she called to Ears as she worked her way through the maelstrom of boxes.
Ears didn’t answer, but he didn’t need to. He followed her out of the cardboard tornado and up the steps.
Ears shut the basement door and leaned against it. Panting, Julia leaned against a wall.
“What the bloody hell,” Ears said.
“Exactly,” she answered. “That was the ‘presence’.”
“It was more like a whirlwind.”
At that moment, a thud came from the other side of the door. The first thud was followed by many more as the boxes crashed into it. Ears stepped away and stared. Julia wondered if the door would hold. Cardboard boxes couldn’t crash through wood, could they? She gaped, unable to move, held in check by an event she had never considered possible. The craziness was straight out of Alice in Wonderland.
Even so, Julia doubted that Carroll could dream up something so outlandish. She stood there until the thuds stopped, utterly stopped.
“Do you think?” Ears asked.
“Yes, I think it’s done…for now.”
“We can go back?”
“Not as we are.” For the first time, she noticed the small little cuts on her arms. Were boxes so sharp? And even if they weren’t, she was going to have bruises. She frowned. “We need a better plan.”
“Like what?”
Julia didn’t really have a good idea. She knew they would never be able to work if the boxes were a flock of insane flying menaces intent on cutting them to pieces.
“We have to kill them,” she said.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In the hour it took Ears to bring in the needed equipment, Julia went through her email. Most of the mail was dull and repetitive. The only one she answered was from Alden.
She replied ‘All is well’. She didn’t have the energy for any discussions with him right now. Discussions wouldn’t go well.
After Ears arrived, Julia braced them both with tea and biscuits. If things turned dicey, she wanted them both to have energy. Then, they suited up. Helmets, jackets, clubs, goggles, they looked ready for anything, well, almost anything.
“Ready?” she asked.
Ears nodded.
“Open it up.”
Ears jerked open the door. What filled the space was more than Julia could have imagined. Boxes were stacked and packed until they formed a wall, a cardboard wall that denied them access to the basement.
“I don’t think it wants us down there,” Ears said.
“Too bloody bad,” she answered and swung her club into the boxes.
It took them ten minutes to demolish the box wall. It would have gone faster if they hadn’t flattened each and every box as they went along. As the stack of cardboard rose, they moved it out the back door and into the rubbish bin.
Then, they went back to work. It took another thirty minutes to kill the rest of the boxes, although it seemed an overreaction as the boxes no longer took to the air. Still, Julia was not taking any chances. It was only after every single box had been retired did she take off her jacket and ready herself for a trip through the hole in the wall.
“I should do it,” Ears said.
“You know you won’t fit,” she answered as she tied a rope around her waist. “Just be ready to pull me out of there.”
“Absolutely” Ears replied sheepishly. And I hope you don’t find anything, if you know what I mean.”
“I know exactly what you mean.” She turned on a torch, and a wide, bright beam lit up the small hole. “All right, let’s get this done.”
She stuck her head into the hole and looked around for a handhold. When she found one, she pulled herself half way in. Some squirming later, she was totally through the wall. The air was musty, and the area so cramped she could only inch her way along.
Grabbing a board and pulling it loose, she passed the board out the hole and looked for the next bit of debris she could dispose of. Avoiding a protruding nail, she grabbed another bit of wood and passed it along.
She had no idea what she might be looking for, and that was more than just a small fear in her mind. When would she know that she had found the ‘presence’?
How would she know? And when it happened, and she was pretty sure it would happen, she prayed it wouldn’t be something like a flying brick.
Julia worked at a steady pace for the next twenty minutes. Twice she had to use a hammer to loosen a timbers and bricks and push through rubble. Once, she sawed through a rafter that was simply too locked in place to move. Four times, the mass of refuse seemed to shift as she pulled out something, which worried her. This was a house of cards, and if she removed the wrong card, the whole thing would collapse.
The piece of plaster was broad and heavy, and Julia had trouble getting a grip on it. It took some minutes before she managed to get it past her and out the hole. For a few moments, she was still, reclaiming her breath and strength.
“All right in there?” Ears called.
“No, but that makes no difference,” she answered. Taking a deep breath, she swung the torch back to the narrow tunnel she was creating. For a moment she just looked, not really believing, and then she started screaming and s
creaming and screaming.
Chapter Sixteen
“JULIA!”
It was the sound of her name that got through to her. Once she had stopped screaming she merely stared at the skeleton that stared back at her. No skin, no flesh, it wore an old dress that looked as fragile as paper. Julia’s brain seemed to have halted its reasoning power. This couldn’t be happening. There couldn’t be a dead person under her house. This whole thing had been nothing but a nightmare and she hadn’t really believed there was a ghost. Had she? Well she didn’t know what she believed in this minute. Yet, here it was. At least a skeleton was there, and it was real, incredibly real.
“Are you all right?” Ears asked.
“I think so,” she rasped back. “I’m coming out.”
She backed away from the skeleton, careful not to take her eyes off it. After the boxes, she wasn’t about to turn her back on something that might come flying at her. Not that she really believed it would suddenly take flight, but she was taking no chances.
Ears helped her slide out of the hole.
“What was it? A rat?” Ears asked.
Julia shook her head.
“A body.”
Ears stepped back, and for a moment, she thought he might faint.
“A very dead body, a skeleton really,” she added.
“You must be kidding.”
“I wish I were.”
“Oh god, of god, of god, that can’t be.”
“It is, and if you ask me, it’s the cause of all the things that have happened. It’s the ‘presence’.”
Ears sat down on the steps, and for a moment, Julia thought he might pass out.
“In a minute,” Julia said. “I’m going back in and see if I can pull her out.”
“Shouldn’t we call the authorities? I mean, it might be…be…”
“A crime scene?” Julia shook her head. “That’s debris from world war two, bomb debris I think. No crime, just someone who got trapped.”
“But we should still call the authorities.”
“And we will. But I’d like to get her out before all that stuff collapses on her.”
“I’m not sure that’s wise.”
