by Luca Veste
Or run back to my car and get the hell out of there.
On the outside of the farmhouse, I could see the faint outline of a cross. The religious kind.
I started moving. The ground underfoot was damp, but not overly muddy. I was wearing trainers that had been white a few years earlier, but were now a dull, almost egg-shell brown from overuse. A darker tone could now be added to them.
I checked the metal structure first, glancing inside and seeing a broken-down piece of machinery on the ground. There didn’t appear to be my friend lying in there, so I kept going. Walking around, closer to the house.
There was a hole the size of a fist in the first window I came to. I could see cobwebs and dirt and grime covering the inside. I cupped my hands around my face as I looked through, seeing an almost empty room on the other side. I could smell damp and decay emanating from within. A broken table and a single chair with three legs, propped up against a brick wall.
I moved to the next window and saw much the same. And the next. Whoever had lived there had either lived incredibly sparsely, or the furniture had been removed in a hurry. Every look inside made me more nervous, as if I was going to see something I didn’t want to behind each pane of glass.
I didn’t want to be there. I wanted to be home.
I swallowed back my fear and moved back to the front door. It was solid and immovable but I tried the handle anyway. It was stuck tight. Locked. I knocked and the rap echoed around the woodland surrounding me.
No answer. Of course. All I had done was announce my presence if someone was there.
My hands were shaking as I’d lifted them to try again but I lowered them without repeating the effort.
There was only the rear of the property to check now. I walked slowly to the side of it and found the missing furniture from inside. A threadbare sofa, with a black cooker lying on top of it that would probably have failed any kind of health and safety check. Two stained mattresses were propped up against the side wall of the house, bending in the middle, ready to fall at any moment.
I picked my way through the detritus outside, checking the ground with each footstep. I could smell rotting meat and came across a fridge with its door open. I glanced inside it and saw yellowed shelves and food packaging I wouldn’t want to check the sell-by date on. As I passed it, I lifted the sleeve of my jacket to breathe through that instead.
I was fourteen years old again. Picking my way through a scrapyard. Scared and wanting to go home. Back to safety.
I had to keep going. Not for me. For her. For all of us.
In the trees to my left – away from the house and back towards the woods – I heard a noise. A sound like footsteps on dead leaves.
I froze in place, midstride, my head cocked to one side. I listened intently for any other sound to follow. Closed my mouth and heard my breathing heavy through my nose. I stood there for at least five minutes, waiting for someone to emerge from the trees and rush me without warning.
I could feel eyes on me. Someone watching. I wasn’t sure how I could sense that, but my mind was gone now.
After what felt like an eternity, I started moving again. Made it around the corner to the back of the property. Waited for someone to hit me from behind, but it never came.
I soon forgot about the noise when I looked over the back of the house to what had once been a patch of grass, but was now blackened by fire. A circular area of burned ground. A fire pit, of some sort, I thought. That wasn’t what I was focused on.
On the back step. Sitting on a grey concrete block, which served as the way to step up and into the house from the back door.
A metal storm lantern.
I was walking towards it without thinking. Crouching down as I reached it. Trying to open its lid and failing.
I could see inside, although I knew without looking what I would find.
A melted red candle. Only the wax left. It had burned there for an indeterminate amount of time, until all that was left was a puddle of blood.
I looked up and could see a wooden roof that jutted out above the door, protecting the storm lantern.
I was at his house.
There was no doubt in my mind now. The Candle Man was William Moore. And we had killed him a year earlier.
I stood back up and looked across the small yard area and waited. There was no one there. I was on my own. I looked down at my hands and saw they were shaking. I wanted to collapse onto the ground and pretend this wasn’t happening. Close my eyes and wake up back in my house. Click my fingers and be anywhere else than at this damn farm.
It wasn’t going to happen. With what little courage remained, I forced myself to keep going. It was a blur now. Acting on instinct, almost. I had come this far. I had to finish.
I tried the back door. Putting my shoulder to it when I felt a little give. It opened with a clunk and months of neglect escaped, hitting me in the face in a rush of air.
‘Hello?’ I said, hearing the fear in my own voice. I cleared my throat and tried again. ‘Michelle, are you here?’
I knew she wouldn’t be. Logic told me this place had been abandoned. Sold off, a new place found. A long time ago.
I moved inside, feeling floorboards underneath my feet groan at my weight. Newspaper was crumpled on the floor, sticking to my trainers as I continued moving. I imagined mice and rats scuttling around me and in the walls, but all I could hear was silence.
Silence.
I couldn’t breathe.
Still, I kept going. Moving forwards, going through rooms without knowing what I was trying to find. Knowing there was nothing there for me.
Everything was gone.
No trace of him left. No trace of Michelle.
It hit me at the bottom of the stairs. Wooden and rotting. Missing posts on the banisters. Cracked walls and peeling paint. Darkness and dust.
I wouldn’t hear her sing again.
Ever.
I was too late. I was in the wrong place. I had no clue where she was and she was already gone.
And I could hear something in the darkness, as it grew around me and the shadows took form and tried to claw at me.
It was the sound of my own voice. Saying the same words over and over.
‘I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you.’
Thirty-Five
I left the house. Left the rubbish piled up outside. Left the rickety metal lean-to, the building covered in overgrown ivy, the abandoned pathways and ill-maintained grounds.
Left the candle.
Left it all behind, with my body shaking uncontrollably and each step a risk of falling to the ground and screaming at the sky.
Managed to get into my car, untouched where I’d left it. Pounded the steering wheel until my hands hurt and my head screamed with pain.
It was a good twenty minutes until I felt calm enough to drive again.
On the drive back north, I got hold of everyone on the phone. The bags of potatoes, tomatoes and eggs I’d purchased gave the car a sickly earthy smell; after an hour on the road, I had to open the window a crack to breathe through. I soon pulled over and threw the food over a hedge after I’d checked the coast was clear.
They were all prepared to meet and when I finally arrived back as the sun set and the sky darkened. Chris and Nicola were waiting outside for me. We greeted each other awkwardly and I let them inside, the whole time trying to ignore their questions about what was wrong with me. Telling them to wait until Alexandra arrived.
She arrived a few minutes later, walking into the house like she was approaching death row. We were sitting in the living room, silence growing form by the second, everyone refusing the offers of drinks or takeaways. My stomach rumbled in protest, but I wasn’t sure I’d manage to get through more than a few mouthfuls. I could still feel that farmhouse on my skin and wanted to get in the shower and wash the stain of it away.
‘I can’t remember when we were all together like this,’ Chris said, breaking the tension finally. ‘Ju
st the four of us.’
‘Stuart’s funeral,’ Alexandra replied, sitting back on the sofa and crossing one leg over the other. ‘Although I suppose that doesn’t count.’
‘The week before the festival,’ I said, sitting on the armchair opposite the sofa and leaning forward. I was itching to tell them where I had been, but another part of me wanted to try and get my thoughts in order first. ‘We had that meal to christen the cooker. We’d only just moved in and I couldn’t get the oven to work properly, do you remember?’
We all smiled thinly at the memory, but just like everything else, it was tainted by what had happened. That’s how it would always be, I guessed.
‘Did you tell Chris?’ I said, looking at Nicola and trying to gauge a response before she gave one.
‘Yes, I did.’
Chris’s head was hanging down now and his shoulders hunched over. At first I thought he was about to break down in tears, but when he looked up, there was something else in his eyes.
‘We need to work out what we’re going to do about this,’ Chris said, a hard edge to his voice that I hadn’t heard in a long, long time. ‘This is it. Michelle has disappeared. And now . . .’
‘What are you talking about?’ Alexandra looked between Chris and me. She finally settled on Nicola. ‘What is it?’
‘I found a red candle this morning,’ Nicola said, her arms cradled around her body. ‘Same thing that Michelle had. And Stuart, apparently. It was in a storm lantern, so it could still be burning, even outside.’
‘Bloody hell,’ Alexandra replied, her voice quiet as she closed her eyes briefly. Her shoulders sank into her body a little. ‘Maybe you were right after all.’
She looked at me as she spoke, but I couldn’t maintain eye contact with her. I shifted uncomfortably on the chair and looked up towards the ceiling.
‘Well, that’s why we’re here,’ Chris said, putting an arm around Nicola and pulling her closer to him. ‘I don’t think we can just pretend that there isn’t someone after us anymore.’
‘I agree,’ I replied, waiting for Alexandra to argue, but she stayed silent, which I took for agreement. ‘So, what do we do now?’
‘Has anyone heard anything from Michelle?’
I shook my head at Chris and looked at Nicola and Alexandra who both slowly did the same thing. ‘I found his old house.’
‘Whose house?’ Chris said, frowning at me. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘The man from the woods. The Candle Man.’
There was silence as they waited for me to continue. I swallowed and found the words. ‘There was a story online about a missing farmer in the area. Only a short thing, but it all tallied up. I’ve been down to Brock Hope today.’
I told them what I had found and when I got to the discovery of the candle in a storm lantern, everyone in the room took a deep intake of breath.
‘She wasn’t there though,’ I said, when I was done. ‘It didn’t look like anyone had been there for a long time. Apparently the son sold the place to another farmer. I don’t know who the son is yet.’
‘So, we know who he was,’ Chris said, then cleared his throat. He shook his head, his face filled with tension. ‘Is it the son then?’
I shrugged my shoulders. ‘That seems the best guess.’
‘What do we do then?’
I turned to Nicola, who seemed to be taking it in better than anyone else in the room. ‘Try and track him down, I guess. I’m not sure where to start with that.’
I thought of the man who called himself Peter, knowing that was where I was going to start. Kept the decision to myself.
‘In the meantime, Michelle is still missing,’ Alexandra said, picking at a thread on the arm of the sofa. ‘Have you spoken to her mum?’
‘I called her just before I got back here. She’s rung the police now. She waited twenty-four hours, the poor woman. She had a key for her house and went over to check if she was home or not. House was empty. Car’s gone and her phone goes straight to voicemail.’
‘It could still be the case that she’s decided to hide instead,’ Nicola said, but she sounded unconvinced. ‘Maybe she was worried about putting her mum in danger or something?’
‘I want that to be the reason.’ I bit down on my lower lip in order to quell the rapidly forming lump forming in the back of my throat. I coughed and continued. ‘But I don’t think there would be another candle if that was the case. It’s like we’re on a list and being ticked off one by one. And it’s now happening closer together.’
‘It’s the year anniversary in two days,’ Alexandra said, and I could hear her struggle to keep her composure too. ‘Do you think he wants to deal with us all by then?’
‘He’s got some way to go,’ Chris replied, removing his arm from around Nicola and wiping a sleeve across his cheek. ‘There’s still four of us left. He’s taking his time.’
‘Maybe he’s also going to get a little sloppy. You have to remember that we’re not dealing with the original man here.’
I nodded towards Alexandra and told them what I thought. I was now sure about what we were facing. ‘It’s the son. The apple doesn’t fall all that far.’
‘Some things I don’t understand,’ Chris said, sitting forward and allowing his hands to hang in front of him. He ticked each item off on his fingers. ‘One, we are forced to defend ourselves against an attacker in the woods and we learn that the reason he was out there was because he had killed someone a few yards away, right? We all think it’s this supposed serial killer because of the red candle thing. Only we don’t know for sure because he’s never been identified by police as actually existing. Secondly, we . . . erm . . . we move Mark Welsh’s body and then that disappears. We spend a year pretending that we weren’t all just waiting for a knock on the door because someone knows what we did. Then, Stuart is found dead. Now Michelle is missing. Both of them have these candles in their homes. Another one shows up this morning. And we’re all just convinced that this man’s son – who must have known his dad was a serial killer, by the way – has just been, what, waiting for the year anniversary to deal with us all? Why wait until now? It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Maybe it’s taken him this long to find us?’
I shook my head. ‘I think it’s more than that, Alexandra. The whole thing is ritualistic. The thirteen names I narrowed down as being the most likely victims of the Candle Man all have a certain thing in common. They all went missing between October and January. You read about how important rituals are to some of these serial killers; I’m guessing that was passed down. You could be right though. It’s not like we left a lot of clues behind about who we were. It could be that it’s just taken him this long.’
‘Or Stuart sticking his head above the parapet gave the game away,’ Nicola said quietly, but with enough malice in her tone that we were sure of her feelings. ‘And put us all in danger.’
‘It doesn’t put us any closer to figuring out a way to deal with any of this though,’ Alexandra replied, shifting her body on the sofa and groaning to herself. ‘What the hell do we do?’
‘I think we know my stance on it,’ I said, getting to my feet and stretching my arms out to the sides. My muscles ached from the long journey. The tension I had felt as I’d looked around that farmhouse. It was taking an age to ease, even as the feeling of being safe at home grew. ‘I believe there’s only one sure way to stop this. Bringing it out in the open. Secrecy isn’t helping any of us.’
‘I agree,’ Chris replied, avoiding Nicola’s stare as he spoke. ‘I’m done with all of it now. I just want it over.’
Nicola and Alexandra began speaking at the same time, as Nicola turned on Chris and began telling him what they had to lose and Alexandra backed her up. The crescendo of noise built, as everyone began to talk over each other until we were all shouting to be heard. I stopped, as Alexandra turned on me and began pleading for us to find another way out.
‘I can’t believe this is our lives,’ I said, t
hen repeated myself. The shouting stopped and they turned towards me, as I started laughing. ‘Listen to us. We’re supposed to be normal people and instead we’re having a serious discussion about how we avoid being killed off by someone who uses candles to choose his victims, or whatever they mean.’
Once I’d started, I couldn’t stop, until I was hysterical. I could almost see myself, doubled over as I collapsed in the chair, and put my head in my hands. I didn’t calm down until I felt a hand on the back of my head. I looked up to see Alexandra shushing me as she stroked the back of my neck.
None of it was helping. I wasn’t sure what it was meant to do anyway – a meeting of the four of us who were left. I was sure within a day or so, there would be fewer, as the hours counted down. We were all marked.
‘We need to fight back,’ Nicola said, but didn’t get much further as I stopped her with another bark of laughter.
‘Fight back?’ I said, shaking my head at the ridiculousness of it all. ‘We don’t even have anyone we can fight back against.’
‘That’s not true,’ Nicola replied, her jaw tensing as she spoke to me. ‘If it’s the son, we have his name and I’m sure we can find someone who could give us a description of him. Then there’s the bloke you met online. What if it’s him?’
I shook my head and thought of the usefulness of trying to find someone with the surname Moore. It wouldn’t take long to show her how futile that would be, but I could already see that she knew that. I opened my mouth to say so, then changed my mind. ‘Let’s just accept that we’re in over our heads here. We have been since this all began. We made a bad choice back then and we’ve made a series of them since. We’re not going to fight our way out of this.’
There was silence between us all then, as Alexandra rested her hand on my shoulder and stroked her thumb against it.
‘We’re never going to agree on the best course of action,’ Chris said finally, slapping his knees with a crack. ‘I think the only thing we can do now is to stay on guard for the next day. I’ll go to Michelle’s house and see if I can find anything. Maybe try and speak to her workmates or something? See if she spoke about going somewhere. In the meantime, me and Nicola should check into a hotel. We can both take time off work, right?’