The Flat: A Novel of Supernatural Horror

by Jack Douglas

  “What was the name of that Italian place in Waikiki? That was my favorite, I think.”

  “Matteo’s, right. I could go for a nice fat loaf of taro bread,” he said. “Even some poi.”

  Amy leaned back on the carpet, curled her feet behind her. “I know where you would take us if we could leave right now. That cheeseburger place on Kalakaua across from the beach.”

  “I’ll never understand why you wouldn’t try one of those.”

  “I don’t like burgers,” she said. “But, between you and me, I’d eat one right now.”

  “I’d settle for a glass of ice water.”

  With that, he rose to his feet. He lifted the bedpost and eyed the damaged wall. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “Do you smell that?” he asked.

  She stopped digging at the wall with her hands and stepped back. She smelled the combination of vomit and feces assaulting them from the bathroom along with their own pungent sweat. The temperature in the room had to be in triple digits by now-- a thick, sweltering heat that made the backbreaking work even more difficult. She could hardly breathe, let alone smell anything else.

  “It smells like smoke,” he said, after getting no reply.

  The room filled with silence. The fado had ceased hours ago and Amy had discovered that the quiet was as unnerving as the music. Maybe more so.

  There was a large hole where wall had once been and a large section of wooden laths and plaster was exposed. She would need another tool to hammer away at the laths. The oven rack was fine for picking apart the stucco, but it wouldn’t fare very well against the boards.

  “Keep digging,” she said. “I’m going to see if I can find something else.”

  Out in the living room she plopped down on the couch. She was exhausted, didn’t think she could dig anymore. Didn’t think she could help break through the laths. She didn’t see how Craig was still standing. He had been so dependent on her for everything back in the States.

  He’d needed her, sure as he needed oxygen. But did he love her? That had been another question altogether.

  Her mother had said no. She’d said the very fact that Craig needed her for the simplest of daily tasks spoke volumes. That was neither love nor desire. On and on her mother went, going so far as to quote twentieth century German Marxist philosopher Erich Fromm: “Immature love says, ‘I love you because I need you.’ Mature love says, ‘I need you because I love you.’”

  But the more Amy thought about it now, the more she realized her mom had been wrong. And she hated her for pushing her so long in the wrong direction. Christ, Mom, Amy thought now, get a fucking life.

  She got to her feet, willing away the pain. She headed over to the window to catch sight of the dog in the alley.

  He wasn’t there.

  Only the trash and the cobblestones and the building across the way, illuminated by a sky as gray as a day-old corpse. No movement whatsoever, no sign of life.

  Behind her, the television clicked on.

  #

  Craig continued digging.

  So she had loved the smell of pineapples as they drove past the fields up to the North Shore. She’d loved the rainbows, the beaches, the ocean, the mountains, the people, the restaurants, the food. She had loved Hawaii. Just not him—at least not enough to stay with him. At least not there on Oahu. Not with her mother folding her arms and tapping her foot back on the east coast. Could he blame her? What was there to love? A burned-out junkie lawyer who couldn’t sell a fucking novel to save his life? So Amy had listened to her mother. Who knows? Maybe her fucking mother was right. Certainly his own mother would have agreed with her, confirmed that her son was a waste of life. He shouldn’t have followed Amy home to Manhattan. He should have just stayed there on the island, tied weights to his legs, jumped into the Pacific and drowned himself. Now look at the fucking mess he had gotten Amy into. Trapped in a fucking flat thousands of miles from home.

  His face itched, the course hairs on his cheeks and beneath his chin curling back toward his sensitive skin, tickling, teasing, irritating him. He pulled his hands from the wall but he couldn’t scratch. He looked down at them, covered in plaster and filth. He cringed. There was nothing he could do, no way to clean them. He stuck them back into the wall and attacked the stucco.

  I got her into this mess, he thought. I’m gonna get her the fuck out.

  #

  She turned toward the television and squinted. A snowy image appeared in black and white. It was a pretty female talking-head on CNN. No, not CNN, but the BBC. She crept closer and double-checked the cord. The cord was still plugged into the wall.

  She knelt in front of the screen and turned up the sound.

  #

  He shook a large chunk of the wall loose and set it down on the floor.

  Maybe she had loved him all along. Or at least liked him a lot. Surely enough to go to Honolulu with him in the first place, to accept his marriage proposal. Enough to lay all her savings on the line and to rack up her credit in order to try to make things work. Maybe she did love him.

  He had certainly thought so back when they were kayaking out to the Mokulua Islands. When they were driving up Tantalus to capture that stunning view of Diamond Head. He’d thought so when they swam to Goat Island and Chinaman’s Hat. All those times they’d tossed the frisbee in Ko Olina and sat sipping Kona coffee on their lanai.

  Sure, she had loved him. But then why all of this? Why leave him behind in Hawaii? Why abandon him when he needed her most?

  The pulse in his ear started up again. Then came the soft sound of fado through the ruined wall.

  (It’s a tumor.)

  And why in the hell had she fucked that bastardo downstairs?

  (Or an aneurism.)

  (With an aneurism you go like that!)

  #

  The woman on television spoke in a British accent.

  “...Flight 1726 from Newark to Lisbon was carrying four-hundred and thirty-two passengers and twenty-seven crew members when it crashed into the Atlantic, killing everyone on board...”

  Amy fell off her haunches and onto the floor. Her heart pounded. That is, if she still had a heart. She held her right hand against the left side of her chest and felt the rapid beating, like a fetus kicking in its mother’s womb.

  The picture turned fuzzy but she could make out shots of flaming wreckage in the sea. Definitely the airline they’d flown, almost certainly their plane, though she could no longer recall their flight number. The anchor’s voice finally fell victim to static.

  She pushed herself to her knees, winced from the inexplicable pain in her joints and got to her feet. Despite the fierce heat she had broken out in gooseflesh again. She tried to rub it away but it wouldn’t leave.

  “What do I do?” she whispered.

  The anchor’s voice suddenly rose above the static. It was a calm, smoky voice; distinctively British as before but now with a hint of menace.

  “The dead don’t whisper,” the woman said evenly. “They scream.”

  #

  And she didn’t just fuck that prick downstairs, she was in love with him. She was going to run away with him. Flit off to the Azores and leave him in Lisbon to rot. To waste away alone in this very fucking flat, with its memories and its music and its constant goddamn loneliness.

  But not anymore.

  #

  She hurried into the bedroom, found him standing stone still, staring at the wall.

  “Craig,” she cried, “come here, quick. You have to see this.”

  Slowly he turned to face her. His eyes were dark and his head was tilted to one side. “See what?”

  “Oh my god,” she said, her chest heaving. “The TV. Craig, I think we’re dead.”

  He laughed. It was a full-throated, hearty laugh, the kind she had only seen him use around Danny.

  “That’s crazy talk! You’re out of your fucking mind. Batshit crazy. Maluco.” He threw his hands in the a
ir, wiggling his fingers, mocking her. “You’re mad as a loon.”

  She took a step backward, too frightened to cry. “I’m not crazy. I swear. It was on the television in the living room. Come see for yourself. They’re saying our plane went down.”

  His mouth contorted into a depraved grin. “Guess that means we won’t have to go to your mother’s next Christmas.”

  “Craig,” she yelled, “this is serious.”

  The grin disappeared. “Oh, it’s serious all right. Serious as a heart attack. Or an aneurism. Do you realize, Amy, that with an aneurism...” He clicked his fingers. “With an aneurism you go like that!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He hunched down and picked up the knife he’d been using earlier to scrape at the wall. “What I’m talking about, honeybunch, is this…” He turned the blade and held it over the palm of his right hand.

  “What are you doing?”

  “We’re not dead. The dead don’t bleed. Look.” He jammed the blade into his flesh and screamed.

  Blood fell down his fingers and onto the stained carpet. He lifted his arm but continued to bleed, the crimson pouring down, forming a puddle at his feet.

  She spun toward the dresser and pulled it open, tore out a set of spare sheets. She flung a pillowcase toward him and he quickly wrapped it around his hand, biting down on it with his teeth.

  She wanted so badly to help but was afraid to approach him. The knife was on the bloody carpet but still within his reach.

  He continued screaming. “Fuck, shit, fuck. That hurt like a bitch.”

  Finally she moved toward him, careful to kick the handle of the knife away with her foot.

  “Let me see,” she said, taking hold of his injured hand.

  He looked up at her, tears filling his bloodshot eyes. He looked like Craig again. The way she imagined him when she’d decided to leave him behind.

  Carefully she unwrapped the pillowcase and exposed his hand. She tried to stifle her reaction but she couldn’t hold back the gasp.

  His right ring finger was completely severed, hanging backward, barely clinging to his hand by a thin strip of skin. Blood continued to gush from the open stump.

  “It’s going to be all right,” she assured him. “You’re going to be just fine.”

  But as soon as she finished the sentence, Craig swayed on his feet, then fainted dead away.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  She continued digging as he rested on the mattress nearby.

  She had to get them out. She had to tear down the rest of this stucco and then break through the laths. It all fell on her now. If they were going to get to safety, she had to keep going. She had to set aside her exhaustion, forget about her headache and nausea, her hunger, her thirst, and keep clawing at the wall. She had to prevail.

  Once she broke through she would help Craig get up, help him through the wall and into the flat next door. Then they’d leave that apartment through the front door, flee down the hall and down the stairs and out the downstairs door, into the street. They would find a cab or get to a pay phone and call the police. They’d escape the Alfama and head straight for the hospital. Craig would get stitched up. They would eat a meal, drink some water, then they’d book their flight. They’d leave for Lisbon Airport, take a plane back to Newark. They would stay in a hotel for a few days. They’d order room service and make love day and night. She’d stop taking the pill.

  Then she would ask him—no, beg him—to marry her. However and wherever in the world he wanted to tie the knot. A quickie wedding in Vegas, an island wedding for two in the Caribbean. Any way he wanted was fine with her. And no one had to be there except for the two of them.

  Then they would move. Back to Hawaii if he wanted. Back to Oahu, to the same Waikiki condo if it became available. Craig could finish his book on the beach. She could go back to work at Wahiawa General Hospital. They could start a family and someday they would buy a house. Maybe a cozy cottage in Kailua, or a townhome in Ko Olina, where Craig loved it so much. Or maybe they would move to Maui as he always talked about. Wherever he decided would be fine.

  She wanted to grow old with him. Nothing else mattered anymore. Only that they would be together, that they’d support and love each other forever more.

  Her mother would understand. And if she didn’t, then to hell with her.

  Once they were well clear of the flat, she would tell Craig he was right. She would apologize for all she’d put him through, and this time she’d really mean it. She’d tell him how sorry she was for stranding him in Hawaii, how wrong she was to abandon him not once but twice. And for considering doing it again in Lisbon. For making him think she would leave him alone in the flat.

  The flat. What kind of hell had they stepped into when they signed that goddamn lease? When they got on the plane? When they exited the taxi and walked up the broken stone steps? What kind of hell had they stepped into when they stepped into the flat?

  They weren’t dead. She was all but sure of it now. She could see, she could taste, she could smell, and she could sure as hell feel. And the blood Craig bled when he accidentally cut off his finger was real as it gets. Even now it was still coagulating on the carpet.

  So they weren’t dead. But they were well on the way to dying. She was equally sure of that. Whatever evil was in possession of this flat, it was winning. They could only last another day or two without water. Maybe not even that. Craig had lost a lot of blood. She was weak in the knees and could barely stand. Their bodies were breaking down and already may never fully recover.

  But this flat wasn’t where she wanted their story to end.

  She wanted children she and Craig could spoil. She wanted a home. She wanted to laugh and cry and live and only die from old age. For the first time she could remember, she wanted a life. Not the life her mother had envisioned for her, not the life her mother couldn’t lead herself. She had her own unique vision with puppies and kittens and Craig and cocktails on the beach. Of rainbows and mountains. Of being surrounded on all sides by the beautiful blue Pacific, as clear and as warm as a bath. She wanted what for one year they had actually had. She wanted it all back.

  And if she could break through this goddamn wall she could get it. So she tore through the stucco with her bare hands, tossed it to the floor. She ripped at the plaster and pounded with her fists on the boards.

  There was now enough of a hole for her to get through. All she needed to do was break down the laths. She lifted the bedpost that Craig had been using. It was far too heavy for her to swing. So she knelt back down and lifted the oven rack.

  She glanced at Craig on the mattress, then turned and swung the rack at the laths as hard as she could. It vibrated in her fingers and stung her palms. But she struck at the boards again and again, each time applying more force.

  For a half hour she worked through the silence. Occasionally, she looked over at Craig, who was still asleep or unconscious on the mattress.

  Then she struck at the laths again. Many were damaged and some had started to crack.

  She thought, Not long now; a few more minutes and we’ll be out of this fucking flat.

  With that thought the heat seemed to increase. She suddenly felt a flash. She paused for a moment, then struck at the wood again. Drove the metal in between the laths.

  The support started to crumble.

  She felt a rush of excitement, her eyes darting from the laths to the plaster to the exposed wires. A small bit of light filtered through the cracks.

  She lifted the rack again, this time above her head. She closed her eyes in case some wood or plaster flew up in her face.

  On her face now was a smile, a look of contentment and relief.

  Then she brought the oven rack down and immediately the power shorted out. She heard the sizzle. The current traveled through her body like a subway train. Through her fingers, up her arms, across her shoulders, into her neck, down her chest and up into her head. She smelled the burning flesh but cou
ldn’t let go.

  She released a desperate, chilling scream.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  He came to and heard her screaming. His eyelids seemed glued shut but he peeled them open. The scene was fuzzy and refused to come into focus. He tried to lift his head but couldn’t. His neck felt as though It were tied down by ten-pound weights. He squeezed his eyes shut again then forced them open. Saw Amy with the oven rack, the metal implement lodged in the wall, her hair standing on end like a cartoon cat that stuck its paw into a light socket.

  He pushed away the fog and jumped from the bed. He felt faint but steadied himself on his feet, as though he were trying to act sober in front of a cop. He swallowed; the lining of his throat felt as though it were lined with glass but he knocked away the pain and tried to focus. If he grabbed hold of her he’d only share the current. He would be electrocuted, too. He couldn’t pull her off, no, but he could push her away, sure as he pushed away the pain and the fog.

  He ran at her, tucking his shoulder as though he were back on the field at Bailey Ellard, playing strong safety for the Bishops, bearing down on a running back who had managed to break into the secondary. He had only played in one junior varsity exhibition game before his mother had forced him to quit. Had demanded he return to work at their fucking sports memorabilia store. But that one game was enough.

  He led with his shoulder and ran into her, hitting her in the ribs. The current bore into him for only a moment but it was enough to give him a taste. Together he and Amy went down to the floor.

  He smelled the seared flesh, felt a sudden emptiness in the room. He got to his knees and crawled toward her. Her chest lay as still as a flag on a windless night. She wasn’t breathing.

  He began to panic.

  But this had happened to him before. Three years ago, thousands of miles away in New York, in Craig’s Battery Park apartment. In his living room, he had dragged Danny’s body off the couch. Set it on the floor. And he’d begun to panic.