by Ninie Hammon
Sam said nothing because she could think of nothing to say. It was insane. Yeah, that’s right. It was insane.
“Then she came here and got Rusty. Why would she want them both? What did she plan to do with them?”
Sam had no idea.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Stuart staggered forward, gasping for breath, grabbed Jolene’s shoulders and lifted her upright in one mighty yank, shoving her toward the equipment in the back of the van.
“Turn it off!” he cried, shouted in her ear as he shoved her, felt himself falling forward from the momentum, crashing into the back of her as she fell through the open door onto the floor of the van.
Half in, half out of the van, the top part of Stuart’s body was pinning Jolene down and Stuart managed to roll over to get his weight off her. Moving to the side placed him on his back next to the big box-like thing that was like some kind of speaker, the ghost-buster thingy. He hadn’t the strength to move away from it, but gravity dragged him out of the van when his knees buckled, unable to hold his weight, and he began to slide down to the ground beside the open side door. Beyond the van was only writhing shadows and faces … faces in the mist above.
The screech in his head was—
The sound stopped. It still rang in his skull in aftershocks, but the screaming and wailing had ceased. He drew in a breath and there was air, enough to give him the strength not to sink all the way to the ground but to catch himself and push his body upward with his knees, staggering to his feet.
It was lighter, brighter. The monsters were not as black, were fading. He reached out his hand to Jolene, she took it and …
Something banged into the door beside him and the glass shattered, raining down on the ground around him.
He heard the sound then, even in the reverberations in his ears, he heard the gunshot.
“Jolene!” he cried.
Jolene was going blind, a circle of blackness all around her was closing like the mouth of a drawstring bag. Then she felt Stuart’s hands lift her, shove her toward the open side door of the van. “Turn it off!”
He fell on top of her, then rolled away and she reached out feeling, barely able to see. There was not one single switch that would … She had to flip the … and dial down the … turn the knob.
She couldn’t think.
The machine made no sound, at least not one in a decibel range of the human ear. But reverberating out from the van, the sound waves had hit something solid … invisible, but solid, and bounced back. As more and more waves pulsed out, blasted out, the pressure inside the … what? Some kind of invisible bubble! … grew greater and greater. Incredible pressure. There should only have been a hum she could feel in the fillings of her teeth as the sound waves pulsed out and away. Instead, the pressure of the confined sound waves was … suffocating.
A random handful of synapses firing somewhere in her brain registered understanding. The Elmer Fudd rifle had fired after all, had hit its mark, had hurt the Jabberwock. Hurt it bad and it had screamed, squealed in agony … and then fought back, dropped an invisible bell jar around the van to make them turn it off. No … it didn’t scream. They screamed. Plural.
Fine, okay, I give up, you win. Uncle!
Jolene’s searching hands fell on a wire and she yanked, pulled as hard as she could, felt it let go. The little green light on the machine blinked out. The humming vibration stilled.
The iron band that had been around her chest loosened. She could draw in a breath, sucked in a huge gasp of air. Stuart was standing beside the open van door with his hand extended. She shakily reached out to him and he pulled her … and then the window beside her suddenly exploded, pieces of glass flying everywhere.
What in the worl—?
She felt a sudden stab of pain, like she’d been impaled with a skewer and the force of the blow knocked her into Stuart. She heard her name from a long way off. Then the drawstring bag around Jolene’s vision pulled shut and the world went black.
“Somebody’s shooting at us,” Cotton cried.
Jolene had lurched toward Stuart and collapsed in his arms, knocking him to the ground beside Cotton, who had been on his knees, but flattened himself on his belly at the sound of the second “bang.”
Cotton had no idea what direction the shots were coming from. Suddenly, the rain hit, like driving out into a blinding storm from beneath an overpass. Cotton could see hardly anything in the downpour, but he poked Stuart’s leg and pointed.
“This way,” he cried and began to belly crawl around the front of the van to the driver’s side.
He heard more gunfire and he kept crawling.
When he reached the driver’s side door, he looked under the van and could see Stuart still on the ground on the other side of the van in front of the open side door. Though reluctant to stand because he had no idea where the gunfire was coming from, he had to take the chance. In his best old man’s imitation of leaping to his feet he yanked open the door and leapt inside.
The sudden absence of rain in his face granted Cotton vision and he looked over the seat to see Stuart leap up and shove Jolene into the van in front of him. Without closing the door, Stuart cried, “Drive!” then threw his body on top of Jolene’s.
There was a thunk, thunk-thunk, thunk sound on the passenger side of the van.
Cotton turned the key, and started the engine just as the back window blew out. He shoved the transmission into drive, and slammed his foot down on the accelerator and the van leapt forward into the downpour. Jolene had parked beside the big tree stump with the front of the van pointed at the road. Cotton took it on faith there wasn’t anything in front of them because he could see nothing in the downpour.
Fumbling for the windshield wipers, they suddenly came to life, clearing the windshield in time for Cotton to turn the wheel to keep the van from sideswiping the raised walkway of a porch.
With the back of the van fishtailing on the wet dirt, they flew down the road in the rain.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Rusty had broken his arm playing on a jungle gym when he was in the first grade. It had hurt so bad he had vomited from the pain. He didn’t believe anything would ever again hurt as bad as that had hurt. He’d been wrong. This did. A back full of buckshot did.
“I told you to pick him up,” Mrs. McFarland said and all he could do was look at her and try not to cry.
“I can’t carry him. When we were in the woods, I tried—”
She came at him, lunged at him, and he thought she was going to hit him with the rifle. She probably intended to do just that, but she caught herself before she did.
“Don’t you dare stand there and lie to me about trying to help my baby. You forced him to go into the woods where it’s dangerous. I know my baby. I told him not to go there and he wouldn’t have if you hadn’t forced him. You had it all planned out, all along.”
He could barely speak, the pain so took his breath away.
“What planned …?”
“You wanted to ride the Jabberwock. Thought it would be fun, like all them boys did when it first happened, all them stupid teenagers thought it would be a good time. You’s just like ‘em. But you was a coward, afraid to do it by yourself. You planned all along to force my Dougie to go with you. Didn’t you? Didn’t you?”
He was afraid of what she would do if he said no, so he said nothing at all.
“But my Dougie wouldn’t do it, would he? He knew I wouldn’t want him to do a thing like that. He refused. He turned and walked away, didn’t he? Stood up to you even though you was bigger and stronger. Wouldn’t let you push him around, no sir. And then that little snake bit him.” She paused and her eyes grew brighter. “You had that all planned out, too, didn’t you? You seen that snake and you shoved him down, tripped him so he landed right on top of it.” She was so infuriated at the scene she was painting in her head Rusty was certain she would shoot him down where he stood.
“No … I didn’t trip …”
Ru
sty hurt so bad he couldn’t form words.
Her eyes blazed, then the look in them shifted.
“Of course, you didn’t. My precious Dougie saw the snake and fell on it on purpose!” Her eyes were clouded with insanity. “He did it to save you. Like a soldier jumps on a hand grenade to save his buddies. My brave boy sacrificed himself for you!”
Her eyes refocused on him, her look razor sharp with rage.
“And what did you do? Were you grateful that he’d saved your life? No! You took advantage of him. He was hurt, too sick to fight you off so you dragged him into the Jabberwock with you and the Jabberwock ki—”
She stopped herself, literally clamped her mouth shut so she couldn’t continue. When she spoke again, she had that funny glazed look in her eye again.
“The Jabberwock made him so sick! But it didn’t make you as sick as it did Dougie — did it?”
He said nothing.
“Did it?”
“No ma’am,” he managed.
“That’s right, it didn’t. You sucked the life out of Dougie. Not the Jabberwock — you! Bigger than he is, stronger than he is, him weakened by saving your life from that snake … and what did you do? You sucked him dry, stole all the energy from his pure soul. You stole his life. And now you’re going to give it back.”
He wanted to ask her what it was she wanted him to give back, but he was afraid to speak now because he could feel his stomach reeling, was afraid if he tried to talk he would just open his mouth and vomit.
She gestured with the barrel of the gun.
“Now, you pick my baby up and you take him with you. You’re going back through and this time you’re going to give your life to Dougie instead of the other way around. This time, you’re the one who’s going to be real sick, and my Dougie …”
She looked at the stiff body of her dead son tenderly.
“My Dougie will be well.”
She pointed the rifle at Rusty’s chest.
“Pick him up.”
Rusty leaned over and began to heave. There was nothing left in his stomach to vomit, but the pain-fueled nausea had grabbed hold of his guts and was trying to turn him wrong side out anyway. He tried to stop, wanted to beg her not to shoot him for not obeying her, that he’d do anything if she just wouldn’t shoot him again. But all he could do was heave.
The world grayed. He swayed, dizzy, his throat raw from stomach acid and heaving.
Finally the heaving subsided and he stood leaning over with his hands on his knees, tears running down his cheeks, gasping for breath.
“Come over here.”
When he looked up, Mrs. McFarland had moved Dougie’s body. Now it lay stretched out in front of the shimmer of the Jabberwock in the middle of the road.
“Come. Here. Now!”
Rusty staggered forward, unable to stand upright because of the pain in his back, staring at his own shimmering reflection in the Jabberwock in front of him.
Mrs. McFarland put the rifle down on the road and went to her son’s body. She put her hands under his arms and stood him up! He was as rigid as a mannequin in a department store window. Rusty’s mother had told him that happened after somebody died, that they got stiff.
“Hold him!” she commanded.
Rusty looked at the distorted face of his dead friend and if he’d been able to vomit, he would have started again. He didn’t want to touch him.
“I will blow your whole leg off if you don’t—”
He reached out and put his arms around the body. It smelled like nothing Rusty had ever smelled before. Though he knew Douglas had never been buried, Rusty was certain that what he smelled was the aroma of a grave.
Rusty stood there swaying, holding Douglas’s body.
He felt Mrs. McFarland grab his shoulder and shove, and he and Douglas fell forward. Then the world dissolved into sparkling black light and he could hear the sound of static in his ears.
Shep fired again and again, feeling the recoil of the rifle. He’d already pulled off two shots before Claude began to fire beside him. He could barely see the end of his rifle, but out in front was that clear spot where the van was parked and he did his best to hit the people he could see gathered around the open door on the side of it.
And then the clear spot vanished. Like you was standing outside in the rain, looking in a window, and it suddenly started raining inside the house. All at once, there was a solid wall of drenching rain, stretching in front of Shep, and nothing to be seen out there beyond.
He kept firing anyway. Caught sight of the white blob of the van — it was moving. He fired at it repeatedly, but the image was gone in seconds.
“They’re gone,” Claude said, putting his hand on Shep’s shoulder. Meaning he’d ought to quit shooting because there wasn’t nothing to shoot at. “We’ll get them next time.”
And they would get them next time. Shep knew now where he’d ought to lay in wait. He wouldn’t come with just Claude next time, neither. He’d get others, round up everybody he could find who’d lost someone in Nowhere County, tell them the only way to get back those they loved was to kill these intruders. They’d do it. Wasn’t no doubt in Shep’s mind they would.
Them people down there, they’d come back right here to this spot. Shep didn’t know how he was so certain of that, but he was. And when they did, him and the others would be waiting for them. They’d set up all around in the vacant buildings, cut the nosey outsiders down in their tracks, soak the ground in their blood.
Then, the Jabberwock would let everybody go.
And Shep would have his Abby back.
Chapter Forty
Sam heard the jangle of her telephone and she leapt up off Rusty’s bed and raced into the kitchen to answer it. She caught it before it had a chance to ring a second time.
“What?” she cried.
Charlie’s voice was curt. “You need to get back here, Sam. Rusty’s here. With Douglas’s body.”
And Sam knew. She didn’t need an explanation of how the two had gotten there. They’d ridden the Jabberwock.
The night that Sam had driven like a crazy woman from the county line to the Middle of Nowhere to get the key to the kiln out of Abby Clayton’s pocket, time had telescoped. It did the same thing now. She had been at the county line where Charlie was helping the wounded Malachi into her car, and then she’d pulled into the parking lot of the Dollar Store. And there’d been no passage of time in between.
It was just like that now.
Sam leapt into her car beside Malachi in her driveway and then Malachi was careening the car into the parking lot by the Middle of Nowhere bus shelter and it had all happened between one heartbeat and the next.
There was a crowd gathered.
She must have run from her car to Rusty’s side.
She must have shoved everyone out of the way so she could kneel on the asphalt beside his body. She must have done those things, but there was no memory. She was just there, instantly beside him.
Rusty lay on his back, shirtless and barefoot. His face was pale, tissue-paper white so it made his chestnut hair shine red in the failing light of sunset. He was not moving.
For one horror-filled instant — that she would relive a thousand times a day of every day of the rest of her life if — she’d thought he wasn’t breathing. She put her ear to his chest. His heart was beating. It was a solid beat, regular rhythm. It was as if the boy were asleep.
Then she spotted the blood oozing out from under him. She lifted him gently a few inches off the pavement and cried out in horror. His whole back was raw, the skin flayed off, with little pellets of … buckshot? Rusty had been shot in the back with a shotgun.
Suddenly, a car came flying into the parking lot and screeched to a halt so close to where she knelt with Rusty that Charlie, Raylynn and Pete had to leap out of its way.
Claire McFarland jumped out of the car, turned and reached back inside and pulled out a shotgun.
“Where’s my baby?” she cried.
> Sam looked around then, noticed the body lying on the ground a few feet from Rusty. It was the swollen, bloated horror of Douglas Taylor’s corpse.
Claire raced forward, let out a little cry, then turned the gun on Sam and nodded toward Rusty.
“You, pick him up and put him in my car.”
Sam felt her hands clenching into firsts as she began to rise.
“You shot him! You shot Rusty!”
The woman held the gun firm, as if she were unaware Sam had spoken. Then Claire gestured to Charlie and Pete Rutherford, standing side by side behind Sam.
“You two — pick up my baby. Be careful. He’s not well yet, but he will be as soon as—”
Sam advanced on Claire, oblivious to the rifle leveled at her chest. There was no clear intent in Sam’s mind. Her head was clouded with a red haze of rage.
Claire snapped back the hammers on both barrels of the shotgun.
“Take one more step, and I’ll—”
There was a blur of movement then. In a single lightning motion, Malachi leapt forward, knocked the shotgun sideways out of Claire’s hands and slammed a fist into the side of her face. She folded up in a heap on the ground.
Sam knelt again beside Rusty. She lifted his eyelids. The pupils were responsive to light. Took his pulse again. Steady. Then she saw it. She would have gasped at the sight if she’d had any air to gasp.
Reaching out with trembling fingers, she touched the single stream of blood dripping out of Rusty’s right ear.
Malachi knelt beside her and she grabbed his gaze to keep herself from falling off the edge of the universe.
“We have to get him to a doctor.” That was like saying they had to get the boy to the moon. “We have to … now. Malachi, he could have brain damage.”
She looked around then, felt smothered, as if the Jabberwock had closed in tight around the parking lot.
“We have to get out of here!”