A Voice So Soft

by Patrick Lacey

  Green?

  No, that wasn’t right. Her daughter’s eyes were sky blue. It was a joke they’d shared ages ago, when their family was still a family. If you looked into those eyes long enough, Kristen would say, you could see the sun.

  But the sun had gone down tonight, replaced with an odd green hue that reminded her of reptiles. Vanity contact lenses? Something Glenda had suggested she wear for the homecoming show?

  “You’d like to think you’re calling the shots,” Angie said. “But we both know it’s the other way around. We both know I’m in charge. The second I got picked for the show, your eyes lit up like a slot machine. You saw all your debt going bye-bye but that’s not all you saw, was it? No, you saw a new house and a new car and a new everything. The life you’d always wanted. Not a care in the world. But you’re getting antsy. You haven’t seen a dime of that money. And if we’re being perfectly honest, Mother Dearest, you never will.”

  The tears flowed faster. Mostly because Angie was right. She’d been banking on the money because without it she was, to put it lightly, fucked. She could no longer afford the mortgage of a house that was too big to begin with. Her husband had suggested they buy something smaller after his vasectomy. It would only be the four of them—five if they adopted that cat they’d been discussing. But Kristen’s tastes did not agree. She wanted something big, something they could “grow into” even though they never had and never would.

  She wiped her eyes and reached behind her just as someone grabbed her arms.

  She screamed as the other two Robes restrained her. How had they gotten in? She’d locked the garage door, checked it twice. She was obsessed with such things, with keeping her too-large house secure.

  “The change affects everyone differently,” Angie said. “It’s taking a lot longer with you than others.”

  “What change? Tell them to let me go. They’re hurting me.” She struggled to break free, felt her shoulder threaten to dislocate.

  “You’ve got to get out more, Mother. How many times have you listened to my songs? Did you watch the entire show on mute?”

  What was she talking about? Of course she’d heard Angie’s songs, albeit infrequently. Modern music didn’t do much for her. She was proud of her daughter, sure, but that didn’t mean she had to like her songs. Too poppy. Too squeaky clean for her tastes. As long as Angie was bringing in the money, then she could sing death metal for all Kristen cared.

  “You really should take in an interest in your daughter’s career,” Glenda said. She put a hand on Angie’s arm and they shared a look, a moment, like they were family and Kristen was just a stand-in.

  “She’s right, Mom. It’s time you give my music a good listen.” She signaled the Robes standing behind Kristen. One of them held her hands in place while the other lifted something over her head. For a moment, she was certain it was the rolling pin. They’d bring it down against her skull and all that worrying over debt and bills would vanish.

  Instead, the Robe placed headphones over her ears.

  Kristen struggled. “We don’t have time for this. We have to find Shawna.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Angie said. “Glenda is already on it. We have a feeling she’ll try something stupid tomorrow night. She’s a lot like you. She doesn’t know when to give up.” She told the Robe to press play.

  Kristen opened her mouth but no words came. Nothing but a small rattle in the back of her throat. Not a scream exactly but a plea nonetheless. A plea for the music to stop. It spun into her ears, the volume much too loud, but hearing loss was the least of her worries. She gritted her teeth against the melody. Her muscles tensed.

  “Beautiful,” Angie mouthed, “isn’t it?”

  Kristen did not agree with her daughter’s choice of words. The music was not beautiful in the least. It was boring and generic and horrible all at once. Because there was something else there, something beneath the lifeless lyrics that threatened her mind. Her entire body convulsed. A seizure perhaps. Something warm dripped out of her mouth and, eventually, she fell to the floor.

  Her head bashed against the linoleum, vision turning white and black, white and black.

  Wherever Shawna had gone, she prayed it was far away from Salem. Far away from her twin sister. She prayed she never turned on the radio again, never heard this abomination disguised as a song.

  A stranger stood above her, howling with laughter. A stranger with green, lizard-like eyes that never seemed to blink. A stranger who, her dying mind reasoned, did not seem all that human.

  A stranger who—

  Forever with you.

  —had rough, calloused skin and obscene cheek bones and—

  I’ll never leave your side.

  —and long fangs the shape of spikes—

  Forever with you.

  —that could cut deep without a moment’s notice, without any effort and—

  You can never hide.

  —and a face that reminded her of every nightmare she’d ever had or worse and—

  The stage was complete.

  It had taken just under two weeks from start to finish, not a marvel of construction but impressive nonetheless. More so when you considered the manpower. The team consisted of a mere thirty members, all of them overworked, all of them presently dead.

  Dan Peterson had been the first but the rest followed quickly. Gary Lawson purchased a nine-millimeter Beretta two weeks before the stage’s completion. He was thirty-five and in excellent health when he lined up his family—two girls, one boy, and a wife ten years his junior—and pressed the barrel against their temples. He fired twice each time, just to be sure.

  That left seven rounds for him, though he’d only needed one.

  Jaime Martinez had joined the job illegally. He was living in a cramped apartment with his cousins, hoping to send the money back home to his immediate family. The pay was good and his wife and children would soon be able to purchase a home big enough for the four of them. While urinating in the second to last porta potty, just three hours shy of his last shift, he’d heard Angie’s song playing in his head. The lyrics had been floating through his mind all day. The Robes insisted on playing her songs over and over while they worked. He found them annoying, sure, but they’d never bothered him quite like this. He grew angry in a way he couldn’t explain. So angry he began to elbow the cheap plastic until his flesh tore and bled and bruised but, still, it was not enough, for the lyrics had attached themselves to the base of his skull.

  He knelt down and submerged his head into the toilet. Then and only then did the song stop.

  Jeffrey Gottlieb smoked three joints his last morning, two more than usual. It was just about the only thing that helped with his anxiety and today he thanked the cannabis gods for the good shit. It calmed his nerves right up until he saw the most interesting rock on the ground. It was large and heavy and vaguely star shaped. It reminded him of that symbol on Angie’s album cover. He picked it up to show his coworkers William and Corey but instead bashed their skulls in before he could comprehend what he’d done. He stared in shock for a minute and half, about the same time it took him to smoke another joint, before he lifted the rock above his own head and brought it down.

  A concerned neighbor, wishing to remain anonymous, had called the police after watching the scene. Two officers—Taylor and Perez—arrived a half hour later. Taylor, well over six feet and three hundred pounds, was imposing to say the least. His friends on the force called him Godzilla. He had forgotten to wear pants that day, though no one dared to joke about his white briefs, stained yellow from sweat. He’d come down with something the night before. A flu of some kind. His husband insisted he take the day off but Taylor had ignored him, holding a pillow over Chuck’s face while he slept. He thrashed only for a few moments before he stopped moving altogether.

  Perez had worn his uniform properly, save for his belt, which he held in his hand and studied intently during the drive. Moments after they arrived, he slid the belt around
his own neck and tightened it. He choked to death slowly and painfully.

  Taylor took no notice. Instead he exited the vehicle, questioned the crew, who pointed him in the direction of the concerned citizen, one Betty Hersh. He made his way across the street to the ranch-style house, knocking on the door several times before she finally answered.

  She asked him if everything was okay.

  Taylor nodded, eyes vacant, and assured her nothing would ever be okay again. He shot her once in the stomach, then used his night stick to finish the job.

  All the while he hummed the nation’s number one song.

  The same song the group of robed figures hummed that night and well into the early hours of the morning while Salem slept fitfully. Many had already undergone the change but the majority of them would not fully transform until the concert.

  The figures danced and sang and recited lines older than the trees themselves from a leather-bound book their queen had provided. They paused only to catch their breaths and fuck and bathe in blood and repeat the process until the sun showed itself for the final time.

  It was the last day of the old world.

  Nothing but night from here on.

  Cold, dark night.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  THEY REMIND ME OF MOUTHS

  JOSH MEYERS HATED ROLLER COASTERS.

  He’d never been to a theme park in his life, not even Six Flags or Canobie Lake. Sure, he could’ve just played the games or visited the other attractions but he’d still be able to see the rides, behemoths that seemed to stretch for miles into the sky. Just the idea made his palms sweat.

  When he woke on Halloween morning, he thought for a moment his worst fear had come true. Someone had drugged him, carried his unconscious body onto the world’s tallest roller coaster, and launched him on a death ride without strapping him in.

  The world spun a dozen different directions and he vomited as many times, mostly on himself. The pain in his head was beyond description, temples ready to burst. He longed to find the nearest power drill and relieve the pressure.

  When he finally managed to open his eyes he saw neither a theme park nor a roller coaster, but reality was, in a way, much worse.

  He lay on his living room floor surrounded by empty beer cans.

  The prior night came at him like a thunderstorm. After finding the tickets on his windshield, he’d gone to the liquor store and stocked up, drinking a pint of rum (or had it been gin?) on the walk home. He’d gotten plastered in record time and, from what he remembered, he made sure the world knew it. He could not recall what he’d screamed into the streets but they’d been along the lines of Fuck Angie Everstein, that cold-hearted, manufactured piece of poppy bullshit.

  Paraphrasing of course.

  He’d had the distinct feeling his words did not go unheard. The streets were eerily quiet for this time of year. Perhaps the tourists were in their hotel rooms, resting up for the big day.

  But it wasn’t tourists watching him from every angle. It was something less definable, less tangible. He’d stared into alleyways despite his last bit of sobriety telling him to run. He’d seen nothing out of the ordinary but something had seen him. Then he’d gone to town on the rest of the booze.

  Hence the mother of all hangovers.

  He managed to get up, slipping on vomit several times, and hobbled into the bathroom, where he took a piss that mostly landed on his feet on account of the throbbing erection. It wasn’t all that unusual. He’d woken with them almost daily since puberty but never this intense.

  Never this persistent.

  The arousal was against his wishes. His head hurt beyond description. He felt flu-like and fucking was the last thing on his mind.

  He waited for relief after flushing the toilet but his erection held. He tried cold water, tried pacing his apartment, tried eating tasteless oatmeal after popping two Aleve.

  Nothing worked.

  He poured a cup of week-old coffee and heated it for thirty seconds in the microwave. It burned his insides but he could already feel the caffeine taking glorious effect. His boxers felt loosened and for a moment he thought he’d grown relaxed until he looked down and saw his penis had simply shifted direction.

  There were a few drops of coffee left and he couldn’t help but wonder as he looked back and forth between the cup and his crotch. It was hot enough to burn his mouth but not permanently so. Perhaps if he just splashed a few drops onto himself . . . maybe that would do the trick. Or better yet: brew a fresh batch and submerge his manhood into the carafe. That ought to take care of his problem.

  He shook his head and dumped the coffee into the sink, let go of the cup.

  What the hell was wrong with him?

  He theorized only for a moment before he heard the voice.

  Make that voices.

  Not in his apartment but too close for comfort, just the same. They giggled and whispered and hummed a song that was familiar at once. The same song that played on a loop through his head.

  He locked his door, didn’t dare look out the window at the back stairs, the direction from which the voices resided.

  His stereo set-up was in the living room, took up most of the living room, though that wasn’t hard to achieve in an apartment the size of a bathroom stall. He searched through his records for something loud and settled on a thrash band called Sodom. Original pressing. Worth hundreds on Ebay. Sure, he could’ve just streamed it for free but he was old school.

  The power chords and kick drums drowned out the voices. He lay on his floor. The wood was cold and rough but he could’ve fallen asleep. Would have if it wasn’t for the record skipping. The song distorted. He didn’t need to look at the turntable to know the needle had gone rogue even though he’d replaced it just last month. He could hear the sound of his precious first pressing being scratched.

  The music stopped.

  The humming returned.

  He covered his ears, searched for headphones until he remembered he’d left them in the car. “Stop it,” he said. “Stop humming that fucking song!”

  “Now why would we do that, silly?” the first voice said.

  “Why don’t you come out, Josh?” the second voice said. “We’ve been waiting all night and it’s so boring and cold. Won’t you entertain us?”

  He peered through the window and immediately regretted the decision. There were two women on his back stairs. The first was Trish, though she looked like a stranger now. No more metal shirts and black eye liner. They’d been swapped for sparkles and sequins and glitter. So much glitter.

  The second figure made him nearly faint.

  Melissa caught him staring and beamed. “Josh! There you are. Let us in, okay? We’ve got a lot to do today and we need your help. We have to make sure everyone goes to the homecoming show.”

  “Go away.”

  Melissa snorted. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you? If I went away and never came back. But we both know that’ll never happen. You’re the one who always backs down. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be living in this shithole instead of a condo you bought with your own money. If you had any balls, you would’ve kicked me out instead.”

  “She’s right,” Trish said. “You’re a pushover, so why bother fighting anymore? Just give in to our queen. It’ll be easier that way. Trust us.”

  “I should’ve never married you,” he said weakly, watery eyes not helping matters.

  Melissa shrugged. “You know what they say about hindsight and all that.” She held up her bandaged wrists. They were soaked in red. “It’s so itchy, Josh. I can’t stop scratching. I know, I know. It’ll probably get infected. That’s what you’re thinking, right? You’ve got to relax.” She bit into her right bandage, then the left, tore the fabric until the wounds were exposed. “They look cool in a way, don’t they?”

  “I love them,” Trish said, taking the hands in her own. “Do you mind?”

  Melissa shook her head. “Go right ahead.”

  Trish traced the edge
of the slits. The stitches had mostly been torn out and the flesh had turned purple.

  “They remind me of mouths,” Melissa said. “And if they could talk, they wouldn’t be talking at all. They’d be singing.”

  Trish smiled, nodded. “Oh yeah? What song would they sing?”

  They turned toward Josh and hummed “Forever with You.” The melody went through skin and bone and into his core. He slid back down to the floor and felt the world slipping away. Blackness prevailed, though the song still played in his head somewhere. His entire body went limp.

  Save for one section.

  “Rise and shine.”

  Shawna opened her eyes and saw Mike Mallory standing over her. For a quick moment, her sleep still fading, she thought he was her father waking her for school. He hadn’t abandoned his family after all. He’d been away on a business trip all this time. But he’d worked as a mechanic during the weekdays and as a gas station attendant on weekends. Worked his ass off while his wife insisted she couldn’t work. While she spent their entire life’s savings. He didn’t go on business trips. Didn’t go much of anywhere aside from bed and the couch during football season.

  “You sleep okay?”

  She rubbed crusted eyes and groaned and he was Mike Mallory again. “What do you think?”

  “Nightmares?”

  “A boat load.”

  “I know the feeling.”

  She wondered if his dreams had been filled with teenage girls of the eyeless variety. Her own had been much less obscene, yet somehow just as bad.

  She’d dreamed of her childhood.

  Nothing in particular. Just glimpses of birthday parties and family get-togethers. Angie getting all the attention, of course. Even back then, before the talent show—before the talent—she was still the prodigy of the Eversteins. But she hadn’t been quite as malicious.

  Because there was no Ethel, no creeping things. She was a different person.

  The girl that would be on that stage tonight was not her sister. Not anymore. Her forearm itched and for a moment she forgot all about her new tattoo. She scratched the flesh and yelped as a scab tore off, fresh blood beading.