Out Are the Lights

by Richard Laymon

  above him. She twisted, writhed as if trying to grind his spike deeper into her slick tightness, impale herself on it, ream out her hugging sheath.

  ***

  Connie glanced at the movie posters, at the grim, coloured stills above them. The girl in the ticket window was reading a paperback.

  Clever, Connie thought, dressing her up like a vampire.

  She looked at the posted showtimes.

  A triple feature?

  No, the one in the middle, Schreck the Vampire, was only a short.

  She glanced at her wristwatch.

  Schreck the Vampire should be starting soon.

  Wouldn't Dal be surprised if she went in, and sat down beside him?

  He might be pissed, though.

  What if he's not alone, if he's sitting with his arm around a girl…?

  No. He wouldn't.

  But the fear of it was enough to keep her from entering.

  She looked again at the showtimes. Nightcrawlers would be next, after the vampire thing. Then Heads, You Lose came on again, at 11:20.

  Give him five minutes to drive home.

  So she could expect him by 11:25 or so.

  As she walked away, she wondered if he would remember the Good 'n Plenty.

  ***

  'Shall we go for a swim?' Elizabeth asked.

  'That'd be great. I think I'll hit the john, first.'

  Elizabeth smiled strangely. She sat up. and pointed into the shadows across the room.

  'See the doorway?'

  'I think so.'

  'It's right through there.'

  Dal climbed from the bed. He walked over the thick, soft carpet toward a patch of darkness deeper than the shadows.

  'Don't trip,' Elizabeth said.

  He looked back at her. The bed and Elizabeth were closer than he expected, so bright and starkly clear in the overhead lamp that he could see the red marks his mouth had left on her skin.

  'I'll try not to,' he said.

  He stepped into the doorway, bumped a dark shape, and lurched backwards. 'What the hell!'

  'Here, let me get it out of your way.'

  Elizabeth leaped from the bed. She rushed to Dal's side, patted him on the rump, and stepped past him. Leaning into the doorway, she pulled something forward.

  Then she turned on the bright, fluorescent lights of the bathroom.

  'Jesus!' Dal gasped.

  The withered, bald man in the wheelchair blinked his eyes.

  Elizabeth grinned. 'Dal, I'd like you to meet my husband, Herbert. He likes to watch. I know he must enjoy it.' She patted the old man's cheek. Patted it hard. 'You do enjoy watching us, don't you, Herbert?'

  SCREAM GEMS PRESENTS OTTO SCHRECK

  in

  SCHRECK THE VAMPIRE

  Near the head of the coffin, two black candles bum. They are in a statue's stone hands. Only blunt stubs remain of the candles. The hands of the statue are clotted with black. The mouth gapes with silent agony. The eye holes are empty.

  Bones litter the dirt floor of the cellar. The small, fragile bones of rodents. Bigger bones. Of dogs and cats. Of humans.

  In a shadowy comer of the cellar, a human rib cage trembles. A rat, inside it, waddles up the spinal column. It squeezes underneath a collar bone, pauses, then moves up the neck and climbs onto the pale, hanging jaw.

  The jawbone breaks loose. The rat tumbles. It starts towards the skull again, but stops and raises its head at the faint, rumbling sound of an engine.

  The engine goes silent.

  ***

  In front of the house, a woman climbs the porch steps. She is young and cute, her blonde hair windblown, her legs bare under the tails of a plaid blouse.

  A slim, dark-haired man follows her up the stairs.

  Smiling, the woman searches her handbag and takes out a key. 'Ready?' She opens the door, enters, and leaps back against the man. He hugs her, laughing.

  'So who's the horny one?' he asks.

  She tugs open the waistband of his swimming trunks. 'Aren't you?'

  The woman turns toward the stairway. 'The bedroom's probably up there.'

  She follows him up the stairs. As they climb, she suddenly jerks his swimming trunks. They drop from his pale buttocks.

  'Don't!' He clutches them. 'Want me to trip?'

  'Then don't be so damned handsome.'

  'Sorry, Mary.' He pulls up his trunks, and continues to climb.

  'Nice ass.'

  'Thank you.'

  'Cracked, though.'

  At the end of the upstairs hallway, she pushes open a door. 'Voila!'

  He hurries to join her.

  'Now this isn't so shabby, is it?'

  'It's all right,' he says.

  Leaving her sandals on the carpet, she says, 'Ain't so shabby at all,' and leaps onto the bed. She walks on the mattress, hands on hips, turning to look at the room. 'I think this'll do just fine, don't you?'

  The man grins.

  Mary falls backwards, bouncing slightly as she hits the mattress. With a seductive smile, she opens her blouse.

  The man steps toward her.

  Out of the blouse, she rolls over and unties the back of her bikini.

  The man bends over her. He strokes her back. He kisses her between the shoulder blades.

  ***

  In the cellar, black gummy wax drips from the hands of the statue. The candles are nearly spent. Their flames waver and stretch, as if struggling not to die.

  The rat crouches beside the coffin, nibbling a bit of raw meat.

  Fingers curl around the edge of the coffin lid, lift it. and slide it aside.

  The rat pauses at the sound of scraping wood.

  A hand snatches it from the ground. It squeals as Schreck, sitting upright in the coffin, raises it toward his pallid face.

  'The blood is the life,' he whispers.

  He bites off the rat's head, and spits it out. He raises the rat above him like a wine bottle, the blood splashing his face, spilling into his wide mouth, running in dark rivulets down his cheeks and chin.

  ***

  In the dark bedroom, Mary lies awake beside the sleeping man.

  ***

  The wooden steps of the cellar stairway groan as Schreck slowly climbs. At the top, he pushes open a door. His hand leaves a bloody print on the wood.

  ***

  Mary climbs from bed, and steps silently across the carpet to a window. She stares out.

  ***

  Schreck climbs the main stairway. When he reaches the top, he looks up the long, dimly lit hall.

  ***

  Mary crosses the bedroom. She pauses in the doorway, and glances to her right.

  ***

  Schreck, seeing her, slips through a door. For a moment, he watches her. She is naked. She skips and twirls, dancing down the hallway, waving her arms overhead.

  Schreck silently closes the door. Leaning against it, he stares at the ceiling and runs his tongue over his dry lips. He moans.

  ***

  Mary stops. She gazes at the door. Quickly, she puts on her blouse and fastens it. She reaches for the knob, then jerks her hand away and runs. She runs up the long, dim hall, bare legs flying, the tail of her blouse flapping above her buttocks.

  She lunges through the bedroom door. 'Hey! Hey!'

  'What?'

  The light comes on. The man sits up, shading his eyes against the brightness. 'What're you doing?'

  'Let's get out of here.'

  'I thought…'

  'I heard something.'

  'What'd you hear?' he asks, pulling on his trunks.

  'Sounded like a moan.'

  'Jesus!'

  'Could've been my imagination, Arthur.'

  'But what if it wasn't?'

  As he rushes toward the door, Mary retrieves her bikini from the mussed bed. She steps into the shorts, and stuffs the top into her handbag.

  'Where'd you hear it?'

  The end of the hall. By the stairs.'

  'Christ, that means w
e've gotta go past it!'

  'Maybe it was nothing.'

  ***

  Schreck, in the dark room, grins at the sound of rushing footsteps. He jerks open the door. Leaping into the hallway, he grabs the throat of the running man and flings him against a wall.

  The terrified woman halts. She simply watches, aghast, as Schreck picks up the man and throws him over the railing. With a smile, he walks toward her. 'You will be my bride.'

  'No. Come on!'

  'We shall wander the nights together, you and I-all the nights of eternity-feasting on the blood of the innocents.' As he reaches for her, she throws herself through a doorway. She tries to shut the door, but Schreck blocks it with his arm. Then he punches through the frail wood, and clutches her throat. He thrusts her away. He rushes into the room for her.

  He pulls her into the hallway. He tears open her blouse. Fingers plying her full breasts, he lowers his head. He licks the blood from her splinter-torn face.

  He kisses the side of her neck.

  He bites. Blood spurts from the torn vein, painting his face, spraying the nearby wall. He presses his mouth tightly to the wound, and swallows furiously.

  Breathless, he raises his head. The blood, no longer shooting, throbs out. He cups his hands to catch the flow.

  When the hands are full, he raises them high. 'The blood is the life,' he says. He washes his face in it.

  ***

  Then he is carrying the woman's naked body down the cellar steps. Her skin is pale in the dim light.

  He lowers her into his coffin.

  He lights two black candles, and fixes them upright in the hands of the statue. As the eyeless, stone face looks on, Schreck climbs into his coffin. On his knees above the corpse, he whispers, 'My bride.'

  THE END

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The audience hissed, booed, clapped and cheered. The theater lights came on.

  Pete turned to Brit. 'What'd you think?'

  'Gross-out. You know what's funny though? That girl who played Mary looks just like my best friend. Best girl friend,' she corrected.

  'Was it?'

  'Guess not. The credits said her name was Wilma Payne. The voice wasn't like Tina's, either.'

  'Well, they say we all have a double somewhere.'

  'This was really uncanny, though. I mean, she's identical. Even the way she walked and acted-you know, her mannerisms. And the things she said, like the cracked ass. She says that kind of stuff. It was kind of spooky, if you ask me.'

  'Tina isn't an actress, is she?'

  'She's a history teacher at Pacifica Coast University. That's where I went, you know. We were roomies there, and she went back, after grad school, and got a job. You know, what I ought to do is give her a call, tomorrow. She'd probably get a kick out of this thing.'

  'Bruno said it's only shown here.'

  Brit shrugged. 'Well, maybe she could drive down, or something. PCU's only a couple of hours up the coast.'

  'If she looks like the gal in the movie, I wouldn't mind seeing her, myself.'

  'You!' Brit pounded his knee. 'Why don't you get me some Milk Duds before the intermission's over?'

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Elizabeth rolled the wheelchair toward the bed. 'Help me put him in.'

  'In that?' Dal asked.

  'It's his bed.'

  Dal shook his head. He felt as if he might throw up. 'We did it in his bed, with him watching?'

  'Don't blame yourself, dear. You had no way of knowing.'

  'It's sick.'

  'But doesn't it excite you, now that you know?'

  'I think I'd better leave.'

  She smiled as if amused by his timidity. 'Won't you help me, first? You wouldn't want poor Herbert to spend the night in his wheelchair, would you?'

  'You can move him alone,' he said. The words sounded nasty, and he immediately regretted them.

  'Certainly I can,' Elizabeth said. 'I don't think I shall, however. If you want to be responsible for the poor man spending the entire night…'

  'I'll help.'

  'Herbert thanks you.'

  'Where are the sheets?'

  'On the bed.'

  'But they're a mess! They're all wet and ucky. We can't put him down on those.'

  Elizabeth patted a shoulder of the motionless man. 'Certainly we can. Herbert understands, don't you dear?'

  ***

  A car slowed down, and drove alongside Connie. Heart suddenly racing, she walked more quickly. The car kept pace.

  This is what I get, she thought, angry with herself in spite of her fear.

  She glanced at the car. A light-colored Mustang. Its passenger window was rolled down. She saw the dark shapes, inside, of two men.

  An arm beckoned to her from the window.

  'Not interested,' she said.

  The car sped up. At the end of the block, it turned right and vanished.

  'Oh shit,' she muttered.

  They'd be waiting for her. She knew. It had happened once before. On a summer night five years ago, in Tucson.

  Only then, she hadn't been alone.

  Tears suddenly stung her eyes, making the streetlights streak and blur.

  Those bastards.

  Those goddamn punk bastards.

  She would never again find a man like Dave, and they… Two of the three had knives. She could still hear the sound as one of the boys jammed a blade into Dave's belly, a sound like a punch, then Dave's breath blasting out. It was the last sound she heard before the third punk, the one with the tire iron, knocked her senseless.

  Wiping the tears from her face, she crossed the street in the middle of the block.

  If they want me, she thought, they'll have to work for it.

  ***

  'Now can I go?' Dal asked, stepping away from the bed.

  'Now you may.' Elizabeth moved close to him. Her nipples brushed his chest. She fingered his limp penis. 'Wouldn't you prefer, however, to join me in the shower? Unless you would rather take your incriminating odors home with you. Your darling Connie might be suspicious, if you do.'

  'I suppose. I can't get my hair wet, though.'

  'My blow-drier will take care of that.'

  ***

  Connie looked at the corner across the street. A car was parked there. A light-colored Mustang. Its lights off.

  With any luck…

  She started to cross the intersection. The Mustang swung around in a U-turn and shot toward her. She ran down the street, leaping onto the curb as the Mustang bore down.

  Its passenger door flew open. A teenaged boy jumped out. Connie backed away, staring at him. At his white T-shirt, his tan work-pants, his black hair and nervous grin.

  Just like the others. Like a fucking clone of the ones who killed Dave, who beat and raped her.

  'Get away from me,' she said.

  The other man came up behind him. This one was heavier than the first, but he wore the same uniform. 'Come on for a…' She couldn't make out the rest of it.

  'Yeah,' said the first. 'I'm hungry. Feel like eating some pussy.'

  'Your mother-,' Connie snapped.

  'Puto!' He pulled out a switchblade knife.

  Connie backed into the entry way of a shoe store.

  'My mother, you don't talk about her that way!'

  She stopped, back to the door.

  'Not here, Joe,' said the other. 'Too much traffic, man.'

  'My mother, she's no whore!'

  'No more than your sister,' Connie said.

  Joe snarled and stabbed. Sidestepping, Connie grabbed his wrist and elbow. Her knee shot up, snapping his forearm. As he fell, she swung around and kicked. Her foot caught the other man in the groin. He dropped to his knees, clutching himself. Her next kick hammered his forehead. He fell facedown. Connie picked up the knife.

  'Who'd you steal the car from?' she asked Joe.

  'Nobody! Check the registration, cunt.'

  She kicked his broken arm.

  He was still sobbing as she walked o
ver to the Mustang. She climbed in, and drove away.

  ***

  'Almost dry,' Elizabeth said, running her fingers through Dal's hair as she stroked it with the hot air of the blower. 'Your girlfriend will never suspect you've been copulating behind her back.'

  'I hope not.'

  'What would she do?'

  'Ask me to leave, I suppose.'

  'That would be a pity.'

  'It'd be a disaster. Do you have any idea what I'd have to pay for an apartment in this city?'

  'Considerable, I should imagine. If that's the worst you have to fear, however, you've little to fear.'

  'Well, I don't think she's the type to stab me, if that's what you mean.'

  'Does she love you?'

  'Who knows? I guess so.'

  'Then you'd best be careful. A woman's vengeance is often remarkably savage.'

  'I noticed.'

  She laughed. 'Herbert is getting no worse than he deserves. Save your sympathy.'

  ***

  Connie drove the Mustang to the Seven-Eleven store. She couldn't pass the book rack without checking on Barhary Rage. After seeing that nobody had bought a copy in the last half-hour, she hurried on.

  She bought a screwdriver, a single can of Budweiser, a quart can of charcoal lighter, and a pack of Marlboros.

  The clerk dropped two books of matches into her sack.

  Connie drank the beer as she drove. Illegal, she knew. For tonight, though, she was making her own laws.

  'I hereby legalize the consumption of alcoholic beverages in stolen motor vehicles,' she said.

  It tasted very good.

  She parked in the lot of the Safeway supermarket. The store was closed, the lot deserted except for a lone VW near the far side. It looked empty.

  Connie left the engine running. With the screwdriver, she punched holes into the top of the charcoal lighter can. She emptied the can, shaking fluid onto the back seat, the floor, the front seat.