As an Old Memory

by Vic Kerry

  “Miss Timmons, there’s been some killings. Sim McAdams here found the bodies. We need to get his statement down. This has to be very official.”

  She looked at Sim and at the sheriff. Her darting eyes made Sim a little uncomfortable. “Did he do it?”

  “I doubt it. Very few mass killers drive like a demon out of hell to tell the sheriff about what they did,” Sheriff Johnson said.

  “Why aren’t you dealing with the investigation?” she asked.

  “I have my best men working up at the gymnasium. The city police are there too, along with half a dozen or so ambulances to take those bodies down to the hospital.”

  “A half dozen or so?” Mrs. Timmons became pale.

  “Are you going to be able to do this or not?” the sheriff asked. “The last thing I need is you passing out when he starts telling his tale.”

  “Maybe something cool to drink would help,” she said.

  “Spence,” the sheriff yelled. “Get Miss Timmons a drink out of the box.”

  “Water will do,” she said out the door to the deputy.

  “It’s coming out of the tap brown,” Spence replied.

  “I don’t like the sound of that. A Grapico will do if you have it. I don’t like dark drinks.”

  Sheriff Johnson turned to Sim. The time had come for him to tell what he knew. Sim sank another burning slug from his bottle of Coke and put it on the desk. He drew a deep breath.

  “I had gone to the gym to check on how things were going up there,” Sim started. “A bunch of the seniors were decorating for the Homecoming dance. My sister, Charlotte, was one. One of the teachers—my fiancée, Connie Dearborn—was helping too.

  “So, I get there and walk into the lobby, but there’s not any noise coming from the basketball court. The only sound was a needle of a record player riding the end grooves. Charlotte’s car was parked out front, as were a couple of pickups. I recognized Jerry Madison’s.”

  “Couldn’t miss that thing. It’s fire-engine red and as loud,” the sheriff broke in. “No telling how many times I had to pull that speed demon over.”

  “She’s a fast truck. I told Charlotte that she better not ride with him. I always told her that he’d flip that thing over and kill himself one day,” Sim stopped and got very quiet. He shouldn’t have said it. He had found Jerry murdered with the rest of them.

  “Go on,” Sheriff Johnson said. “Tell us the rest.”

  “I walked into the basketball court and that’s when I found them. All sprawled out, covered in blood. I could tell they were all dead, except for Charlotte.”

  “How could you tell?” the sheriff asked.

  “They’d all been shot up and a few of them looked like they’d been hacked on with a knife.” Sim shook his head and grabbed his Coke for another swig to calm himself down. “It was horrible. I walked through the gore on the floor to my sister. She was breathing. Her chest rose and fell. I figure she got there after it happened and passed out when she found them. When I tried to rouse her, all she’d babble about was the color of the crepe paper and Tobias Abernathy, that Negro boy that was going to the high school.”

  “When she gets a little bit better, we’re going to talk to her,” the sheriff said. “Right now, they’ve taken her on to the hospital. Don’t worry, they’ll get her better.”

  Sim nodded. “I hope so. She didn’t need to see any of that. It was hard enough for a grown man to stomach, much less a girl. “

  “Tell me who all you found there,” the sheriff asked, “and how you found them.”

  “Besides Charlotte, the first person I saw was Connie slumped over a step ladder. The whole of her back was torn up. It looked almost like ground beef. I couldn’t see her face, but she’d lost enough blood that her hands were already gray.”

  Mrs. Timmons whimpered. Sim looked at her. The blood drained from her face.

  “Spence,” Sheriff Johnson yelled. “Where’s that drink?”

  Spence rushed in with a bottle of orange soda. “I was trying to find a Grapico, but we must be out. Only fruit drink we had was an Orange Crush. Is that okay, Miss Timmons?”

  “Anything’s fine,” she grabbed the bottle and drank about half of the soda before sitting the bottle down and picking back up her notebook. “I think I can go on now.”

  “Once I made sure Charlotte was okay, I moved her into the lobby, so she wouldn’t have to stay in that horrible place. I turned my attention to who else was there. Sue Browning lay face up on the floor in a big pool of blood. Next to her was Jerry. He’d been cut on. Looked like his throat had been slashed after he was shot. Sheila DeLeon dangled from a ladder. Ben Harris lay at the bottom of that ladder. He’d been cut too. Tommy Jones was in the back of the room. I didn’t go over there close enough to see what happened to him. I thought that was everyone there and started back to the lobby to get Charlotte and load her up in my truck to haul her down here. That’s when I found Debbie Eva. I won’t describe her. Not in mixed company.”

  Sim stopped and finished off his bottle of Coke. He almost asked Mrs. Timmons for her soda, but she’d finished hers when he stopped the story.

  “Anything else?” the sheriff asked.

  “Not that I can remember. Am I going to be arrested?” Sim asked.

  “Did you do it?” Sheriff Johnson asked.

  “Of course not. What kind of idiotic question is that? Connie was my fiancée.”

  “That being the case, we won’t be arresting you today.” The sheriff gnawed down on his stogie. “Why don’t you go home and get cleaned up. Head over to the hospital to check on your sister after that.”

  Sim nodded and stood to leave. “What about Connie’s folks?”

  “My chief deputy is responsible for contacting families. Whatever you want to do with her folks is up to you beyond that.”

  “Charlotte seemed awfully focused on that colored boy,” Sim said. “Kept repeating his name and ‘no.’ Oh yeah, I seen him tearing up the road away from the gym right before I got there.”

  “I’ll put up roadblocks, and we’ll have to talk with him,” the sheriff said. “Get on home now before you decide to do something stupid.”

  Sim left the sheriff’s department. He wanted to go home and clean up. Dried blood streaked his hands, and it painted his face as well. The smell of it filled his nostrils.

  Everything would have to be done in a hurry. Tobias Abernathy wouldn’t make it back to the Harrington Plantation that night. He and the boys had business to attend to.

  Chapter Three

  1996

  Josh looked up from his homework when his dad walked into the house. Thomas did the same from across the room, but he turned back to his math without much more attention paid. Josh wasn’t as easily distracted, mainly because he hated trigonometry and barely understood it.

  His dad looked different. Something about the loose expression on his face made Josh feel uncomfortable. Rarely did Alan McAdams walk around with a slack jaw and eyes that seemed to focus on nothing in particular.

  “Is everything okay?” Josh asked.

  “Huh? Yeah.” His dad said.

  “That didn’t sound convincing at all.” Thomas put down his textbook. “Are you sure?”

  Alan look at Josh and then at Thomas. His expression stayed the same. “Your grandfather’s fine.”

  “Did something happen to the car?” Josh almost jumped to his feet to look out the window.

  “No, no, the car’s fine. I’m fine. Your grandpa’s seeing things.” Alan sounded much clearer.

  “You said he was fine,” Thomas said. “Seeing things doesn’t sound fine to me.”

  “It sounds schizophrenic.” The words shot out of Josh’s mouth before he could stop them.

  He never liked his grandfather. As he grew up, he tried to hide that fact to keep from hurting his father’s feelings. Sometimes he got the impression that his dad didn’t like his grandfather very much either. Although they’d never explicitly talked about it, Josh was sur
e Thomas didn’t like him. That didn’t mean he wanted a member of his family to lose his mind. It was bad enough that they all had to deal with Aunt Charlotte. No matter how the thought weighed his mind down with guilt, it was the truth.

  On the other hand, he was relieved that it was his grandfather that troubled his father, not any damage to his car. Josh knew how his dad drove the car. One day it would end up smashed while Alan was driving it. To Josh, his car was the most important thing in his life. Without it, he’d have to ride to school with his dad. Worse would be borrowing the family car to have any kind of social life. That would place him squarely in the realm of the nerds, a wasteland of Chewbacca t-shirts and “Live long and prosper” salutes.

  “I thought you came in.” Josh’s mother, Diane, walked in and kissed Alan on the cheek. “What’s the matter with you? Is your dad worse?”

  Alan tried to change his expression. For the most part it worked fairly well, but that strange, distant look still clung around the corners of his eyes.

  “He said that he’s seeing faces again, but I think he’s exaggerating a bit. The doctor told us that seeing faces was common in Parkinson’s disease. His story sounds more like he’s trying to get us to pay more attention to him.”

  “Maybe we should,” Diane said. “He is your father.”

  Alan walked around the sofa and sat down. Josh’s mother followed him and took his hand. His dad looked at Thomas and at him. The look of distance changed to embarrassment.

  “I hate to say this in front of you boys, but I spend enough time with him. He wasn’t a good father, and he’s always had a horrible attitude.”

  “Especially toward black people,” Thomas said from behind his book.

  “And Mexicans, Italians, Jews, the Japanese,” Josh continued.

  “And women,” Alan added.

  “All of you stop. He’s your dad and grandfather,” Diane said. “You can’t talk about him like that.”

  Thomas peeked slyly over the top of his math textbook. “Come on, Mom. Josh and I heard what you called him under your breath when we told you Dad wasn’t going to be home for dinner.”

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  “I didn’t hear bastard,” Thomas said. “What about you, Josh?”

  “I thought you said mustard.”

  Alan snapped his fingers. “Both of you, stop. He’s a bad person, but he is still your grandfather, warts and all. Thomas, I better not hear you say anything like that again.”

  “I was quoting,” Thomas protested.

  “Paraphrasing is more like it,” Diane said.

  “You do it again, and you’ll be grounded for a week,” Alan said.

  “Mustard,” Thomas said, sticking his nose back into his book.

  “If Sim isn’t why you’re so worried, what is it?” Diane asked.

  “Boys, put your books down,” Alan said.

  Josh and Thomas did so. It was strange for his dad to make that request. Usually he demanded that they pick up their books more often, but he wouldn’t make a joke about it. A strange seriousness radiated from his father tonight.

  “What is it?” Josh asked.

  “Are kids at school planning a massacre anniversary dance?” Alan asked.

  “I think some of them have talked about it, but I don’t know if they are or not.”

  “They definitely are,” Thomas said. “Martin and Drew have been talking about it for days during practice and after. Apparently, a bunch of the seniors are getting psyched about it.”

  “How do you know all that when I’m the senior?”

  “Because I’m a football player, and you’re a nerd.”

  “I play baseball.”

  “Ooo, baseball. I hit a ball with a stick and maybe get to run around a field.”

  “Were they planning to have it at the old gym?” Alan asked.

  “I don’t know,” Thomas said.

  “I’ve not heard anyone say where they planned to do it,” Josh said.

  “That’s horrible,” Diane said. “Why would they be so insensitive to have such a ghoulish thing, especially where it happened?”

  “Why does the city maintain the place just to keep it locked up? This whole town has a morbid obsession with that place, with that event.” Alan paused. “I saw lights in the old gym when I was coming home. When I investigated, thinking it was probably some of those air-for-brains kids messing around, the doors were locked, and the light blinked out.”

  “Creepy,” Thomas said.

  A cold chill ran up Josh’s spine and froze his mouth before he could agree with his brother. Aunt Charlotte seemed to be slipping back to her adolescence more than usual, and his dad saw lights at the old gym. The fortieth anniversary of the massacre drew closer.

  Their mother patted Alan on the shoulder. “I think that your mind was playing tricks on you. The stuff with your dad, the big Homecoming game, and Charlotte are weighing on your nerves. Those lights were the reflection of headlights in the glass. It happens all the time when I’m driving past places at night.”

  Alan rubbed his face. “Perhaps. Maybe I should think about taking a personal day pretty soon. It’s too early in the school year for me to be this stressed.”

  “Try having trig with Mrs. Shaddix. I can’t understand a word the woman says.” Josh attempted to change the subject not only for his dad’s benefit but his own. The creeps had hold of him.

  “Is the class that tough?” Diane asked.

  “Math is hard enough for me,” Josh said, “but have you ever talked to her? She has a horrible speech impediment. I thought she was Chinese the first time I heard her speak without seeing her.”

  “That’s horrible,” his mother said.

  “It’s true, though,” Alan and Thomas said at the same time.

  Josh stood up. “I think I’m going to go for a walk.”

  “This late?” his mother asked.

  “I’m feeling antsy. I won’t go far.” He looked at his brother. “You want to go?”

  Thomas shook his head. Josh didn’t waste any more time. He squeezed between his chair and the couch and headed out the door.

  The cool October air refreshed him. The smell of autumn filled his nostrils, something he hadn’t noticed earlier when he was walking home. Too many other things distracted him. Smoke from a smoldering leaf fire somewhere drifted through the neighborhood. Each window in the houses on the cul-de-sac glowed. He walked from his house at the top of the street down toward the last house. He’d loop and walk back home.

  His dad’s attitude freaked him out. Never had he seen him so upset by something. Normally Josh would have shaken it off and gone about his business, but with the anniversary of the massacre coming up and his fellow students planning such a stupid dance, he felt like someone from the beyond might have taken notice. According to every scary movie he’d ever seen, that wasn’t a good thing.

  A dog barked in the distance as Josh rounded the end of the cul-de-sac. Its hollow, lonely sound floated on the long autumn night. Another joined in, until a small choir of howling and barking echoed through the trees. It was like in an old Western movie when the coyotes started to howl after the wagon train stopped for the night. The music of it pumped through Josh. It made him want to run with the wild animals. He started to jog up the street.

  Without noticing, he’d sprinted out of his neighborhood and headed toward his grandfather’s house. Something deep and unconscious kept pushing him forward even after his side split from a stitch of running at full speed for way too long. His chilled breath filled his lungs and pushed through his nostrils scalding hot. He lathered like a racehorse. Everything accelerated faster in his body until he felt himself ripping apart at the seams. Blood roared in his ears. His heart thumped in his chest like Animal beating the drums in the Electric Mayhem. His insides quivered to the point that he felt they would explode.

  Then, in the distance, something did.

  Josh fell onto his back. The pavement slammed the air out of hi
s lungs. He attempted to gasp, but nothing would come. The echo of the explosion reverberated through him and down the street. It surrounded him. It engulfed him, drowned him. He wasn’t certain he hadn’t been the thing that exploded. Once his breath returned, his sense of awareness did as well. None of his vital parts lay sprayed across pavement. He stood, twinging a bit from the hard spill on the sidewalk. The sky looked normal. The expectation of some fireball floating up into the sky faded.

  He looked around. Everything was the same. Nothing seemed affected by the explosion. The houses stood on their foundations. The lights still glowed in their windows. No one stood on porches or stoops to see what the commotion had been. The only thing different was that no dogs barked. Josh wasn’t even sure how long they had actually barked after the compulsion to run overtook him.

  He took another moment to get his bearings. As he’d somehow suspected, he stood at the bottom of the hill the old gymnasium stood on. It loomed in the darkness, looking like it might have in 1956 on the night his aunt and grandfather had found the massacre victims. No lights illuminated the high windows like what his father had seen. Nothing lit the place, not even the moon. Josh wanted the fact that it looked like it always did to give him some sort of comfort, but it didn’t. Instead, the place seemed to watch him through its high narrow windows.

  He wasted no time. Despite his aching feet and burning legs, Josh started running home. He hoped that the faster he could get away from that place, the better he would feel.

  As he got farther and farther from the gym, his pace slowed to a jog, then a trot, a walk, and an amble with a limp. He held his side. Maybe his dad had been right about his needing to shape up. He definitely didn’t have to run as much as he did during baseball season, and right now, he wished that wasn’t the case.

  An hour passed while Josh limped home. The stitch never went away, although he caught his breath halfway there.

  The dishwasher ran in the kitchen, making the only noise in the dark house. When he walked into the living room, the time on the VCR flashed 9:30 as he passed through the living room to head up to his bedroom. He couldn’t imagine that he had been gone so long, and that his folks had gone to bed without giving him some kind of lecture. They had to be concerned for his safety after the explosion.