by West, Sam
Snap, snap, snap, went all twelve ribs down his left-hand side. Brett howled. Or at least, in his mind he howled because all that existed for him now was pain; pain that had stolen his ability to speak.
The Undertaker lowered his head, and, in a grotesque parody of a lover’s kiss, he pressed his freezing, shadowy face to the right side of his neck. The pointy teeth sunk effortlessly into him, like a knife in soft butter, and Brett felt the side of his neck rip in the monster’s mouth.
He was fading fast now, and he became aware of a wailing sound. Distantly, he realised that the sound was coming from him, that The Undertaker had removed his hand and had replaced it with his icy lips. Like a mother bird, he plopped something grotesque into his mouth.
My own flesh, came the half-formed thought.
Coppery blood slipped down the back of his throat and the lump of meat that was his own neck rested on the top of his tongue. His tongue curled in repulsion, and The Undertaker forcefully tilted back his head, gently encouraging him to swallow the meat.
Almost lovingly, The Undertaker brought up his knife fingers and curled them around his heart. In the final seconds before his death, Brett felt his heart explode in his chest. His vision dimmed, the image of His infernal face with the blood dripping off the black fangs imprinted on his retinas.
As soon as Brett’s body expired, The Undertaker faded to nothing, leaving on the same tide of silence that had brought him to the hotel room.
CHAPTER NINE
2017
Malcom Green sat on the beach on the warm, bright and blustery Spring day, squinting out to sea. He wasn’t on the little harbour beach where his mackerel boat was moored, but on the other beach around the corner; the beach where they used to hang out, back in the day.
He leaned back against the sun-warmed rock.
They’ll be here soon. I wonder what Brett will say, when he finds out that I’m a fisherman, just like his child-beating father…
Then his thoughts drifted to Jane, as they so often hand over the years. He had never got over her, why pretend that he had? His heart belonged to her; it always did and it always would. He closed his eyes for a moment, enjoying the warmth of his sun on his upturned face, listening to the cawing gulls. He let his thoughts drift back; back to the beginning of the end. Back to when the group had drifted apart.
1990
The now thirteen-year-old Malcom leaned against the sun-warmed rock, on the main beach around the corner from the harbour beach. Jane sat next to him, burying her bare toes in the golden sand. He held her hand in his, and it felt so right, so natural.
“Do you think they’ll come?” she asked.
And by ‘they’, Malcom knew exactly who she was talking about.
Brett.
Malcom shrugged. “I think so. Sean said he had something important to tell us.”
They lapsed into silence, both of them leaning against the rock and staring out to sea. Things hadn’t been the same since ‘The Game’. Somehow, their solid little group had begun to unravel at the seams. They were drifting apart. Apart from him and Jane, that was, who were seeing more and more of each other, and the others less.
Absently, he wondered if she would one day soon let him touch her ‘down there’. He wanted to, but he understood that there was no rush. They had their whole lives ahead of them. He could wait. He would do anything for her.
He swivelled his head and saw Sean ambling along the beach towards them, weaving his way through the sunbathing holiday-makers. Malcom thought that he looked different, somehow. More grown-up. He had a swagger now to his gangly frame that made him seem much older.
‘What’s up?” he said, plonking himself down on the sand opposite them.
“Hello, Sean,” Malcom said, hating the way he sounded so formal, like they were practically strangers. “Thanks for coming.”
“Yeah.” He smiled his crooked smile, but his expression was hidden by the sunglasses he wore. “Look, here come the others.”
Brett and Amber had arrived separately, approaching from opposite sides of the beach. The arrived at the same time, mumbling their hellos.
The gang was back together.
Together for the final time.
The strange thought startled him, followed by a crushing sadness that washed over him. He pushed the misplaced melancholy to one side.
“So what did you want to tell us, Sean?” Brett asked in a less than friendly manner.
He had changed a lot the past month, or so. Gone was the shy boy, and in his place was this youth with a hard glint in his eye and overdeveloped muscles for one so young. He had fallen in with a bad crowd – a group of lads who were a few years older than them and had a bad reputation.
“I’m leaving Treave next week. Mum lost her job at the fudge factory and she got offered a supervisor’s position in a factory in London. Money’s much better so we’re moving,” Sean said.
Malcom’s heart sank. Jane, who still gripped his hand gave it a gentle squeeze.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said.
“Yeah, me too,” Malcom agreed.
He would miss his friend, even if they didn’t really hang out much anymore, but it was more than that.
Sean was on my side about the game. If he leaves, we’ll never be able to play it again and send the monster back.
“Oh, right. Is that it?” Brett said, hopping to his feet.
“I’m leaving, too,” Amber said quietly.
That stopped Brett in his tracks, and slowly he sat back down again. Malcom experienced a bitter stab of satisfaction.
He does still have feelings, then. He does still love Amber.
“What?” Jane said.
Malcom felt bad for her. He knew how much she loved Amber, and how hurt she had been when Amber had effectively dumped her by not hanging out with her anymore. He knew it was because of the game. He got that Amber was scared and didn’t want to be reminded of it.
He got that she had probably seen Him. Just like he had. Just like they undoubtedly all had.
“Yeah, in a few months time,” she said. “Dad’s gran died and she left us this huge house up in Scotland. So we’re moving up there later this year.”
“Scotland,” Sean said. He sounded shocked.
“So that’s that, then,” Jane said.
“So how many of you have seen Him?” Malcom blurted out. He hadn’t intended to, but time was running out for them. If they didn’t talk about it now, they may never get another chance.
Brett let out a harsh sounding laugh. “Dunno what you’re talking about, mate.”
“Yes, you do,” Malcom said slowly. “Him. The man in the shadows. The Undertaker.”
“Me. I have,” Sean mumbled. “But you shouldn’t have named him. It gives him more power.”
Shit, Malcom thought. He could be right. He thought about how he and Jane had talked about him. Not often, but sometimes they talked about the man in the tall hat they had seen in the dead of night, standing at the foot of bed, or peeking out from a shadowy door or cupboard. He resolved there and then that they would never talk about Him again.
“Yeah, I get you. But we still have to talk about it now. We need to play the game again. We need to send him back.”
Sean nodded solemnly. “Yeah. We do.”
“You’re all a bunch of stupid cunts,” Brett said, getting to his feet. There’s no such thing as ghosts. Goodbye. Have a nice life.”
“For fuck’s sake, Brett,” Sean said. “Malcom’s right!”
“Please, Brett,” Malcom called after his departing figure. “I know you’ve seen him too. You can deny it ‘til you’re blue in the face, but it’s the truth. We have to make a promise to each other, right here, right now. If it gets bad, no matter where we are in life, we meet up and we end it.”
But it was too late, he was talking to thin air because Brett had gone.
Amber clambered to her feet. “I’ve got to go.”
“Why are you in denial? I k
now you’ve seen him, too. It’s written all over your face,” Jane said.
“You’re all mad, this is like group hysteria, or mass hallucination, or some crap. I’m sorry, but I’ve really got to go.”
Malcom watched in despair as Amber too, walked away.
“Amber! Wait!” Sean called after her.
She turned to face them, the sunlight glowing in her blonde hair, framing her face like a golden cloud. Quite objectively, and for the first time, Malcom noticed how beautiful she was. He quite clearly saw the beautiful woman that she would one day become.
Yeah. That’s if The Undertaker doesn’t get her first.
“Just promise us one thing,” Sean said. “Promise that you’ll always come back if things get bad. No matter where you are, you’ll come back.”
She stood there for a moment longer, as if debating something in her head.
“Goodbye,” she said.
She turned her back on them and walked away.
CHAPTER TEN
2017
Malcom sighed deeply. He was sitting in the exact same spot he had sat all those years ago, when Brett and Amber had walked away in every sense of the word. Sean, too, had drifted away and that was pretty much the last time Malcom had ever spoken to him.
At least Jane had stayed with him for a while, right up to the point when she had left for University at the age of eighteen. He was grateful for those years they did have together. True to his word, they had never spoken of The Undertaker again, and neither Jane nor he had seen him again.
Until now.
Instinctively, he knew that the others had seen him, too. The creature that they had conjured up from beyond was back. He almost laughed at that melodramatic statement that sounded like something out of a bad horror movie, but it was the truth. He just prayed that the others would have the good sense to come back here before it was too late.
He trusted that they did.
A shadow fell across him, and even before he lifted his head, he knew who it was. His heart somersaulted at the sound of the voice he had longed to hear for so long:
“Hello, Malcom. Long time, no see.”
She sat down next to him, leaning against the rock. With a hammering heart, he drank in the sight of her. She was a little fatter round the middle, a little slimmer round the hips. Her face was a lot thinner and a little worn looking, but otherwise, she was still beautiful. She was still her.
“How did you know where to find me?” he asked.
“I went to your house, and a strange woman opened the door. She said you sold the house to them five years ago and bought a place on Backstreet East. It didn’t take a genius to work out that you’d bought Brett’s old place. So then I went there, and there was no one home. Why did you buy Brett’s old house?”
“When Brett’s dad died of alcoholism, the house came up for sale. So I bought it. It’s a good property, nearer the harbour for me, and Gran’s place was just too small…”
His voice trailed off, as he wasn’t being entirely honest. Yes, on the face of it, all the above was true. When his parents had died in a tragic car accident when he was just three, his then fifty-five-year-old gran had brought him up in her tiny little house. She had passed away just after Jane had left for Uni, leaving the house to him. Brett’s old place was much bigger and as he could afford to move, it made perfect sense.
But that’s not the real reason, is it?
The real reason was because that was where they had played the game. They had to finish this where they had started it. And Malcom had been waiting a long time for this day to come.
“Did you see Brett when you bought his house?”
“No. When he left at eighteen, he never came back. He handled the house through a third party, he may not have even known it was me that bought the house.”
Malcom said the words, but he doubted them. “You still haven’t told me how you knew where to find me.”
“Call it women’s intuition. This is the last place we were all together.”
“Are you still happily married?” he suddenly asked, surprising even himself.
She turned and looked at him properly for the first time. “Married, yes. Happily, no.”
She then proceeded to tell him how her husband had left her for someone else, and how as soon as he had left, she had seen Him.
“He’s come back, hasn’t he?”
Subconsciously, he rubbed his side. Two nights ago, the shadow-man had pinned him to the bed and sunk his knives into his torso. But before He could do any real damage, he had faded away.
“Yeah.”
He lifted up his plain, white t-shirt, and peeled back the fresh bandage. Jane sucked in a sharp intake of breath, her big brown eyes widening in horror.
“He touched you?”
“I’d say that he did more than just touch.”
He hadn’t meant it to come out quite so bitchy, but he couldn’t take it back now. But Jane didn’t seem to have taken offence. In fact, she reached for his hand and squeezed it gently, like she used to do.
His heart soared. “It’s only ever been you, Jane.”
“You mean you never…”
“What? Of course I did. I meant, in here.” He placed a hand over his heart and stared gravely into her eyes. “Why didn’t you ever come back?”
“Because when my parents moved to Kent when I was away at Uni, I had nothing to come back for.”
Her words stung as surely as a slap across the face, but he didn’t pull his hand out of hers. That would’ve been churlish.
“I was something to come back for.”
“I couldn’t. It felt too much like moving backwards.”
“So you moved forwards. With Sebastian.”
She visibly flinched. “I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I was so young, I did what I thought was right.”
Malcom didn’t add anything more. The past was the past, and she was here now, that was all that mattered.
“What happens next?” she said.
“Next? We wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“For the others to arrive.”
She was silent for a moment, as if contemplating his words. “Do you think they’ll come?”
“Yes.” If they’re not dead already, he silently added.
“But we don’t have the game. I guess we could maybe replicate it as best we could, and make up a poem that was near the original. Maybe it doesn’t have to be exact…”
“I kept the game.”
Jane gasped. “What? You did? How?”
“After we played it, I knew Brett would bin it. So that night I snuck round the side of his house and fished it out of their wheelie-bin.”
“All those years, you had it? And you never thought to tell me?”
“I kept it in the bottom of my wardrobe. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to scare you.”
“You didn’t tell me in case I got rid of the damn thing, you mean.”
Okay, he thought, so maybe that had been part of the reason… But certainly not the whole one. He floundered, wondering how best to reply.
To his surprise, she cupped her face in her hands and kissed him firmly on the mouth.
“You, are a genius.”
Despite being thirty-nine-years-old, he blushed like a schoolboy. “Nah. I’m just a fisherman.”
“Just like Brett’s dad,” she said softly. “I wonder what Brett will think of that, if he comes.”
Yeah. If he comes. A moment of doubt assailed him. If he isn’t dead.
He pushed aside the morbid thought, remembering his encounter with The Undertaker. He wasn’t strong enough yet, they still had time...
He jumped to his feet, and extended his hand to the only woman he had ever loved. She took it, and he pulled her up.
“Come on, let’s go back to mine. We have to prepare.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
2017
Sean had spent seventy of his last ninety quid on a train ti
cket from Victoria to Penzance, and was feeling decidedly sorry for himself. He stood shivering on the Penzance train platform, wondering if any buses ran at eight thirty-nine on a Sunday night. Hell, Treave was only seven miles away; he could just walk it if it came down to it.
Shivering in the cooling, early summer-evening night, he shifted his beat-up rucksack from his left shoulder to his right, and pulled his equally beat-up leather jacket more tightly around himself.
As he left the station and walked along the rapidly darkening promenade in search of a bus, a bad feeling churned in his guts.
It felt like he was being watched. He stopped, turning slowly on the spot.
Aw, fuck it. Not again.
When he saw Him up ahead, he had been fully expecting it. Like in London, he was standing under the shadow of a tree, his form indistinct but unmistakable.
He won’t come for me in a public place.
He told himself that, but he didn’t quite believe it. Crossing the moderately busy main road, he refused to look.
But the bastard thing was getting stronger now, he could feel it. He had to find the others before it was too late. He thought back to the last time they had all been together on the beach at Treave, remembering their promise. Well, remembering his, Malcom’s, and Jane’s promise, to be exact. Because it wasn’t like Amber and Brett had promised fuck all.
But they’ll come. They have to come.
Painfully aware that time was running out, he picked up his pace. He had to get to Treave.
He had to find the others.
* * * * *
Amber was exhausted. After her ordeal with the shadow-creature three nights ago, and her subsequent stitch-up job at the hospital, she had boarded the first plane to England. She had told the disapproving doctors that she liked it rough and that her lover had gotten carried away. The doctor had strongly advised that she abstain from sodomy for at least a few months, and that next time she should use a lubricant.