The peeling wood was bowed in the middle and looked unsafe. I didn’t care. It was my only way out. I cut my arms and legs climbing through the jagged glass but didn’t feel a thing until much later.
I dropped to the ground, spraining my ankle and scrambled to stand.
When I looked up I saw the monster at the window.
For a second, blind panic made me want to run, but I knew I couldn’t outrun the Ishtikini. I thought of my mother who slept with an open window and the dead, little girl in the bedroom upstairs. When I jumped, the knife fell out of my sheath. The blade lay on the ground a few inches in front of me. I felt my pocket. The cigarette lighter was there. My heart was pounding so loud, it sounded like thunder in my ears. I picked up the knife, headed back inside. Tearing off a curtain, I lit it and set fire to the other curtains and the rickety, wooden stairs. They went up as if they were soaked with gasoline. The Ishtikini appeared on the landing.
Changing into the Horned Owl, he flew right at me.
I threw the knife with all my strength. It hit him in the chest. He let out a piercing, ear-splitting screech and fell halfway down the stairs changing back into a man with black hair and a beard. The flames rushed up the stairs crackling and spitting, engulfing his body. He tried to stand but his charred flesh fell off him in chunks until only his skeleton was visible for a second before he collapsed in the flames. I fled the house as the flames licked my feet.
Outside, I took a back way home, limping as fast as I could.
Out of breath, I climbed in my bedroom window, shut and locked it. Sneaking into my mother’s bedroom, I closed her windows and locked them too. I stripped off ripped clothes that stank of fire, and took a quick shower before crawling into bed. I heard the fire engines roar past.
The next morning, I had dark circles under my eyes and hurt all over from the cuts I received climbing through the broken window and spraining my ankle but did my best to hide it. Shirley asked me where the filleting knife was.
I told her “No.”
When the police determined along with the bodies of four children, a man in the inferno had a knife buried in his ribs, she stopped complaining and bought another. It would do no good to have a Negro admit a knife used to kill a white man, was missing from her kitchen.
That’s when the nightmares and sleep walking began.
***
All that happened twenty years ago. My mother died shortly after and I returned to New York to live with my father and his new family. I told no one about the Ishtikini or my part in the fire. The nightmares and sleepwalking gradually receded. I almost came to believe it never happened.
Last night I partied with friends dancing to some of my favorite songs, ushering in not only the New Year, but my thirtieth birthday. I drank too much of the spiked punch and spent a couple of hours in the bathroom wishing I was dead. All that liquor must have released the nightmares.
I took a hot shower to relax, and played the boom box as I dressed.
The song Cats in the Cradle blared out. I’d heard it last night and the music triggered a memory I froze. I was drunk and weaving to the music. Everyone was happy. Musky incense mingled with the pot smoke.
A girl was standing in a corner all by herself, watching everyone. She had the face of an angel and wore faded hip huggers, a peasant blouse, and large silver hoops. Her long, straight blonde hair fell to her waist. I didn’t recognize her. She looked about fourteen, too young to be at an adult party and I wondered who she was. More people joined in the dancing and the crowd surged. I ended up close to the girl.
At that moment she looked up. Her black eyes were dead and underneath the sweet perfume was a faint, putrid odor that reminded me of the monster I killed in 1955.
She smiled.
I knew she knew I knew.
BIOGRAPHY: The Janus Demon, Roxanne Dent’s ninth novel is a paranormal fantasy, Great Old Ones Publishing. “Heart of Stone,” a short horror appeared in Enter at Your Own Risk: Dreamscapes Into Darkness, Firblog Publishing. “The Haunting of Jemima Nash,” a ghost story is included in the anthology, Zombies, Tales of the Supernatural, an anthology created for the Whittier Museum based on a Whittier poem. Roxanne and her sister Karen collaborated on “The Death of Honeysuckle Rose,” a mystery written for the anthology, Murder Ink, Thirteen Tales of New England Newsroom Crime, Plaidswede Publishing.
THE SONG AT THE EDGE OF THE UNFINISHED ROAD
Jack Bates
Richard Forsythe couldn’t remember if he was the first resident or the last resident of the Sprawling Oaks development. He did know that the oaks were few and far between inside the gated entrance of the eight house community. Four houses lined each side of Thornhill Lane. At the east end waited a roundabout with a little extension of pavement that at one time suggested a future expansion. Now that unfinished road reminded the residents of an untimely end to any further developments.
Before Phase One of Sprawling Oaks could be completed, the builder seemingly had a nervous breakdown. They found him in a nearby creek. Face down. Floating under a fallen tree limb. Fish had eaten his face. Speculation was he had gone to hang himself, but the limb broke under his weight, trapping him beneath the surface. Problem with that theory was no one ever found any rope.
How many years had Forsythe stared beyond the end of the forgotten road?
Once he even walked over to it, actually walked out onto it and put a foot to the gravel. He didn’t step completely off the unfinished road. Something warned him not to go any farther. He simply stood there, both feet firmly on the pavement, and watched the moon rise in a pale indigo sky. Since then he only went halfway down—or was it up—of the segment.
Paul Benton, a neighbor, walked up behind Richard. “Hey. What’s out there?”
Forsythe shrugged. “A field, I guess.”
Benton shook his head. “Nah. Gotta be more. We should get flashlights and go take a look.”
“I don’t think so.” Forsythe couldn’t explain why. He’d feel foolish saying that the one time he did step off the end of the pavement he felt the ground shifting, as if a giant beetle was rolling around beneath the stone and dirt.
“Come on. It’ll be fun. We’ll go to the top of the next hill and we’ll explore. When we were kids we would’ve run there and back by now. Maybe twice.”
“When we were kids we stayed out till the first streetlight came on and then it was home before the boogey man scratched you.”
“See? Life was exciting back then. Mysterious. Full of wonder. Now we read things on portable screens that scare us into staying inside.”
“We’re not inside.”
“No. I saw you out here staring off at the darkening horizon. Thought maybe I’d get you to go for a walk to that next hill.”
“What’s so fascinating about that next hill?”
Benton shrugged. “It’s there.”
“That’s it?” Forsythe had hoped for more. A collaborator. Someone else who felt rolling beetles beneath their feet.
Benton stared off into the distance. “No. There’s something more.”
Forsythe watched his neighbor. He waited. He thought he knew what Benton was going to say. When the man didn’t speak, Forsythe prodded him. “What is it, Benton?”
Benton’s mouth moved. Nothing came out. He walked back along the roundabout to his house. Forsythe watched his neighbor stagger, turnabout with uncertainty.
“Benton? What’s the matter?”
“Nothing. I just got a bit dizzy. I wasn’t certain I knew where I live.”
“Where you live? You’re right there. Next to that couple with the child.”
“Couple with a child?”
“Don’t they have a child?”
“I thought the other houses were empty.” Benton stumbled up to the third house from the gate on the south side of Thornhill Lane.
Forsythe watched Benton go inside. He looked at the other homes. Were the other homes all empty? Was it just Forsythe and Benton in the whole co
mmunity? He swore he saw other neighbors. Wasn’t one of them a child? Oddly, they did all look similar. Minor differences. The addresses, for example. Forsythe lived in number sixty-seven. Benton lived in number seventy-six. The couple with the child owned number fifty-eight. The house immediately west of Forsythe’s was number eighty-five.
He wasn’t a numerologist, but the combinations, when added together, all equaled thirteen. He also wasn’t superstitious but when thirteen was added together the sum was four. He knew some cultures viewed the number of four as a symbol of death.
Nonsense.
The quarter moon stretched higher. Just like its pull on tides, it pulled at Forsythe. It begged him to come to it, to come out into the field, to walk to that next hill.
His toe touched the gravel.
The ground shifted. He felt uncontrollably nervous. Richard Forsythe pulled his foot back. The anxiety still burned within.
“Maybe I’ll feel better in the morning.”
Behind him, porchlights automatically snapped on.
***
Forsythe woke the next morning—he assumed it was the next morning.
Sometimes when he woke he wondered how long he had been asleep. Not by hours but by years. Sometimes at night he felt like he could slip into another time, another reality. Sometimes he opened his eyes expecting to see his wife.
Ridiculous, of course. Forsythe had never been married.
Had he?
His head throbbed like he’d had one too many nightcaps. A loud, engine-like hum filled not only his head but his house as well. He pulled on a robe and looked out his upstairs window.
Below, Benton faced the rising sun, his arms raised high and hands reaching.
And he was as naked as the day he was born.
Forsythe quickly put on his own clothes. He hurried down the carpeted stairs stopping long enough to slip his bare feet into a pair of loafers. Forsythe ran from the house to the roundabout where he draped the robe around Benton.
“No. No, no, no . . . ” Benton sobbed. “No. Don’t go.”
It was hard to hear over the hum. Just beneath the whirr of a power engine there was a ribbon of something else. Forsythe thought of an underground river, water rushing over rocks. Faint to the untrained ears.
Benton bowed his head. He kept his arms raised. Tears fell to the white concrete beneath his bare feet.
“Don’t go. Come back.” His voice was much softer.
“Are you talking to the sun?”
“The sun?”
Nothing but bewilderment on Benton’s face then. He looked down at the robe. “Forsythe? Why am I wearing this robe?”
Forsythe laughed. “I put it on you this morning.”
“This morning? Why?”
“You were standing here naked, talking to the sun.”
Benton put a hand on Forsythe’s arm. “Oh dear God, Forsythe. I just haven’t been myself lately. I woke up to the most beautiful singing. Chant actually. A single sound running through a variety of octaves.” He closed his eyes. Hummed. Pointed with a long, narrow finger at the faraway hill. “It came from over the hill. And then I saw them.”
“Saw who, Benton?”
“Our neighbors. The people who used to live in these houses.”
“What are you talking about? People still live there.”
“Do they? Who else have you seen here? I swear it’s just you and me. Forsythe, may I ask you a personal question?”
“You’re standing naked in the street. Anything you say seems personal.” The jest fell flat.
“Forsythe, where’s your wife?”
“My wife? You’re mistaken, Benton. I’m not married. I’ve never been married.”
“But you were, Forsythe. When you first moved here to Sprawling Oaks you were married. I want to say her name was Mandy.”
“You’re mistaken, Benton.”
Benton half laughed, half cried. He shook his head. “No. I remember her. Very pretty. She loved you.”
Forsythe could feel the anger rising inside him. “Stop it, Benton. I’ve never been married.”
“Yes, you were. And she was friends with Kirstin and Andy who lived in number forty-nine.”
The house number triggered something in Forsythe’s head. “Pete. I have to ask you something now. Have you noticed all of our house numbers individually add up to thirteen?”
“And next to me lived Catherine and Jason and their daughter Allison, and on the other side of them were John and Ethel, and over there were—”
Forsythe shook his neighbor’s arm. “Over there were who?”
Bewilderment returned to Benton’s face. “Forsythe. Could you help me into my house? I’m suddenly very light headed.”
“Of course.”
“It’s been a long day. Maybe I just need some sleep.”
Forsythe looked at the sun going down behind the gate. Had a whole day just passed?
“Look at that, Forsythe. It’s made another pass.”
“What has?”
Benton laughed. “The sun of course. But don’t worry. It’ll return. It always returns.”
They reached Benton’s door. His neighbor looked up at the two numbers nailed above the door. “You’re right, Forsythe. It does add to thirteen. Why do you suppose the developer numbered them this way?”
“Guess we’ll never know.”
“It’s like he was trying to send us a message.”
“About what?”
Benton patted Forsythe’s hand. “Let not your mind be troubled over trivial matters. I think Shakespeare said that.”
“You going to be okay?”
“Are you?” Benton smiled. “I’ll return your robe in the morning.”
Benton went inside. Forsythe stared at his neighbor’s door before he turned and walked across Thornhill Lane. He stopped midway.
There were thirteen letters in the name of the street.
There were thirteen letters in Sprawling Oaks.
He turned back to Benton’s house. The lights inside went off. Forsythe didn’t know why but he no longer wanted to be out in the street.
An hour later he sat in his den, computer on. He searched the internet for meanings behind the number thirteen. There were the usual theories; thirteen attended the Last Supper, on the thirteenth of October King Philip the IV of France ordered the arrests of the Knights Templar. No restaurant would take a reservation for thirteen after the deadly fire at a popular night club. He got nowhere. Whatever the developer’s message behind the use of the number thirteen was he couldn’t decipher. Maybe if he knew more about the developer, he’d know. Forsythe couldn’t remember the builder’s name. He typed in the name of the gated community.
Nothing came up.
He typed it in again and got the same result. Just to be certain he hadn’t broken the internet, he typed in ‘gregarious cheese dust’ and got over five and a half million hits. Forsythe found this amusing and troubling. He closed his laptop. It was late. He had to go into work in the morning, didn’t he?
Didn’t he?
He stood up to leave. Outside his window it sounded like heavy rain fell. He moved over to it in the dark and looked outside.
It wasn’t raining.
Hundreds of giant, eight legged beetles clicked their mandibles and fluttered wings from beneath open shells on their backs. They marched or hovered or scurried from the unfinished road to all the empty houses. They pounced on the homes, and crushed them into dust. Behind them came tall, humanlike figures with four, long spindly arms. They wore Fedoras down on their brows to cover their egg shaped eyes, scarves to block their missing noses and sideways, figure-eight shaped mouths in case they were spotted. Black cloaks covered humps on their backs. Each arm held a long, tube-like worm. The worms’ mouths opened and closed until the figures squeezed the worms behind the mouths. They held the worms over the powdered debris and sucked it up like a multi-hosed vacuum cleaner.
Above it all was that roar of a phantom engine, and bene
ath that the singing of a single note by a multitude of the damned. A doomed choir praying to its dynamo.
Forsythe couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
He scrambled upstairs for his phone. He’d have to get pictures of this. Benton would never believe him without proof.
He was halfway up the staircase when a chill washed over him. No, more than a chill. Dread. It filled his thoughts and seeped into his bones. He sat down on the carpeted steps and leaned his face against the bannister railings. He looked down.
Mandy looked up at him. Once upon a time she had the prettiest green eyes. Now they were the color of ashes inside cracked eggshells. The luster of her smile had tarnished, her mouth twisted, her teeth gnarled.
“You came home,” he said.
“I can’t stay.”
“No. Of course you can’t.”
“But you can come with me.”
“I can’t do that.”
“I can’t stay long. They let me out long enough to see if you’d come back with me.”
“I’m not ready to go yet.”
“You’re not going to have much say in the matter. They want you to return with the rest of us. The thirteen passings are coming to a close.”
“But I’m not ready.”
“They’ve sent the grudes and the four-armed guards to eradicate the settlement.”
“I know. I saw them. I was going to take pictures with my phone to show Benton. Then I remembered . . . I remembered . . . and here you are.”
Outside some great beast bellowed.
Mandy looked up at Richard. She was less like him and more like who they were when they arrived.
“I have to go.”
Richard nodded. “I know.”
“You won’t survive. You won’t be able to hold their look or shape. They’ll see who you really are and they’ll hunt you down.”
The beast outside roared again.
Richard looked away from her. “You’d better go, Mandy.”
But she was already gone.
Forsythe no longer wished to photograph the grudes eating the empty houses, or the four-armed guards vacuuming the dust. He didn’t even feel like going the rest of the way up the stairs to bed or down the stairs to close the front door. He leaned his head against the rails.
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