What kind of a name is Bernard, anyway? It’s like a stupid old-fashioned fat major-general name. You should wear a top hat if you’re called Bernard, I reckon. But Bernard isn’t like that at all. He’s younger than Mum, and he’s skinny and pale and his eyes are too far apart from each other and all wide and popping-out, like a chameleon’s or something. He never seems to blink. What’s that all about?
Plus he has a disgusting, wispy beard. You can see nasty, individual, thick, light-brown hairs in it, twining round like snakes. I’d pull it off if I could bear to touch it. I’m grossing myself out just thinking about it.
“Look, Nate!” says Mum. “Bernard brought us some new flowers!”
The whole place smells sickly with the flowers. They’re all tropical ones, orchids, and they look like brightly coloured snot in my not-so-humble opinion.
“Cheer this old place up,” says Bernard with a too-wide smile. I can feel his eyes on me as I slump upstairs.
“Not too much TV, Nate,” Bernard calls up. “It’ll rot your brains!”
I wish something would rot YOUR brains, I think as I slam my door. Probably did already – hah!
♦
I watch ‘Wizards Versus Aliens’ in my high-ceilinged room, and then it’s teatime. I’m starving, like always. I rattle down to the dusky kitchen at the back of the house.
Bernard watches me as I shove endless mouthfuls of fish fingers into my mouth. “Quite an appetite.” He never seems to eat much.
“I’m a growing lad,” I say, which is what everyone says to me. Not really rude, but I say it in a bit of a rude voice. He has to smile weakly and pretend it’s a joke.
♦
On Wednesday night, Bernard comes over. (He’s got his own key, which is triple rubbish with sprinkles on.) He looks very pleased with himself. He’s carrying a big, heavy parcel. He calls to Mum and she comes running, like always. They don’t see me sitting at the top of the stairs.
“This is it?” says Mum.
Bernard opens the package and Mum gasps.
“Oh yes,” says Bernard. “Yes indeed! The things I had to do to get this book. Don’t–” He slaps Mum’s hand away as she tries to open it.
She looks at him all hurt and wide-eyed, but of course he doesn’t notice. He never does.
“Don’t touch it,” he says, in a voice that makes me want to punch him. “It’s extremely potent.”
“This will help? It really will?”
“I guarantee it,” says Bernard. “It’s our last and only chance to –”
He looks up and sees me and he rushes off while Mum goes up to me and tells me off for listening. (It’s a free country isn’t it? I can sit on my own stairs, can’t I?) They don’t know that I hear a click as Bernard bustles in the dining room. He’s hidden the book in the tall cabinet in the corner. Nice try, fungus-face, I think.
♦
That night, I wait until everyone’s asleep. It takes ages. Bernard always stays up really late in the garden shed, pruning his weirdo plants with his great, sharp secateurs.
It’s 2 a.m. by the time they’re tucked up, but I’m not even slightly tired. I creep out of the room, ninja style. No sound at all. (Dad taught me that. He’s great with outdoor stuff, unlike old Bug-Eyed Bernie.) As I go past his stinking orchids, I swear they turn their heads to follow me.
Downstairs, I creak open the cabinet doors. All that’s inside is Mum’s porcelain doll collection, eyeing me up like they know I’ve done something wrong. I get a chair and pull it over to the cabinet, then click open the top cupboard. It swings open slowly. I can’t see up into it – it’s too high.
I reach my hand up and feel inside. Nothing... then something leathery and almost warm. I pull out the book slowly. It’s really heavy. There’s something on the cover, some words or symbols that seem to flow away from my gaze in the darkness.
I try and open it, but as I reach for the cover, I can feel my skin suddenly crackle, like I’ve put my hand too close to a fire. There’s a feeling in my head like someone tapped all my teeth with metal, all at once. I shoot my arm back and stuff the thing back into the cabinet, closing it quickly.
In the moonlight through the curtains, I look down at my shaking arm. There is a tiny line of blackness on it. I rub at the blackness, but it’s like a tiny slit in my skin, almost invisible. Doesn’t hurt – itches a bit.
♦
The next Sunday, I run down to where Dad’s waiting, just within sight of the house. “Are they giving you enough food?” Dad asks anxiously. “Because you’re a growing lad.”
“That’s what I tell them!” I say, trying to look extra hungry (although I had a massive bowl of Frosties about an hour ago.)
“Come on,” says Dad, “Let’s go and get you a proper feed.”
Later, I tell him about the book. “If he does anything more, you let me know, and I’ll tell the Authorities,” says Dad. “Anything, you understand?”
“Can’t the Authorities come round and take me away now, so I can live with you forever?”
He sighs. “That’s not how it works. There are procedures you have to follow, or you get in big trouble. You don’t want your dad to get in trouble, do you?”
I shake my head but really I’m thinking, yes, all sorts of trouble, anything to get me out of there.
♦
All that week, the line of blackness still itches. I check for the book a few days later, but it’s gone. I bet Bernard’s got it in the shed. It’s where he stashes all his stupid stuff, along with his useless plants.
I go to the garden door, but Bernard’s already out there, nattering away on that stupid ancient mobile brick he calls a phone.
“Yes. The Leshek Concordance. No, the genuine thing. Poland, 1280, but originally from –” He lowers his voice “– Leng. A ritual of severance.”
He peeps all around him with those buggy, far-apart eyes and keeps his voice down. As he’s talking, he sees me, smiles with all his teeth, and takes his conversation down the other end of the garden.
I go back into the kitchen where Mum’s making tea. “Mum,” I ask, “what does severance mean?”
She jumps like I’d just pricked her with a pin. “Where did you learn that word?”
Think fast, Nate! “Vocabulary test,” I say.
“It means splitting up,” Mum says.
“Like you and Dad?”
“Um. Sometimes. But sometimes more like – well, if there’s someone who’s got two sides to him, and you want to get rid of the bad side, you have to cut it out. Do you see?” She looks terrified.
I shake my head and she grins weakly.
“Don’t worry,” she says vaguely, and gets up, pretending to tidy up.
Worry about what?
♦
Thursday night, after I get in from school, Mum and Bernard sit me down. Nothing good ever comes out of getting sat down. Not ever.
“What’s this about?” I say suspiciously. “School’s fine. I’ve not done anything wrong.”
They both laugh – aHAHhahahahhahh! – in that way that means “We’re going to pretend that was a surprise to us, even though we both thought you’d say that.”
Bernard goes to pull something from behind the sofa. I flinch, but it’s a large present.
“Go on, open it!” says Mum, looking doubtful.
It’s a plasticky-looking Bontempi organ. Pretty much the worst bribe I’ve ever seen.
“You can learn to play,” grins Bernard. “Give you something to do while you’re moping around in your room.”
“I don’t like music,” I say.
“Everyone likes music,” says Bernard hopefully.
“Not me,” I say.
“Told you,” says Mum, who is rewarded with a baleful stare.
I’m wearing long sleeves, because the black mark on my arm has curled itself round into a nasty little shape. At night, it’s started to tingle, as if it’s moving.
♦
The next night, me and Bernard have a manly heart-to-heart talk, at the kitchen table. Mum’s nowhere to be seen. She’s obviously scarpered so he can go on at me.
“Here’s the thing, little guy,” says Bernard, flipping away his dreadlocks like an idiot. “Do you know what a co-dependent relationship is?” He doesn’t wait for me to reply. “Sometimes, you think you need somebody else, but actually they’re no good for you. Do you see?”
I see, all right.
“Like...” He pretends to think about his example. “ Like – you and your dad. Now I know you’re close, but he’s not a good sort, is he? You know he’s done some things. And maybe he’s trying to get you to do things, too. Criminal stuff. Stuff you could get arrested for, even.”
I make an exasperated sound. “Are you done?”
“What did we agree we have to try and practice, little guy?” Bernard says. “Positivity? Isn’t it? Seeing the good in everything?” His horrible, thick chin-hair wags when he talks. He’s saying ‘positivity’, but he means, ‘Filthy little bastard.’
I look him straight in his bulgy little eyes. “What if everything’s not good?”
His face turns ugly. “Well maybe you’re seeing it wrong.”
“Is that what a Ritual of Severance is for?”
His face freezes and for a second his lip curls in rage. He stands up abruptly, shaking the big wooden table. “It’s this kind of sneaky thing – listening in on other people’s private conversations – that’s got to stop,” he says, trying to sound concerned instead of furious. “Your dad’s a bad influence. And we’re going to have to put a stop to that.”
♦
There’s a big argument on Sunday morning about whether I should see Dad or not. Makes no difference to me, since I’ll just run out and see him anyway. Bernard is against it but I hear Mum say ‘One last time.”
I’m not crying when I run down to Dad. I’m not.
We’re barely out of sight of the house when I tell him about the Ritual of Severance. He goes cold and hard all of a sudden. We go over to the round pond, where it’s quiet. He kneels down and holds my arms, looking straight at me.
“Nate,” he says, “I think if they do what they’re planning to do, you’ll die.”
A cold shock goes right through me. I can’t believe he said it.
He must have seen my expression, but he nods gravely. “Not right after, I mean, not if they do it right. But one day. When you’re eighty years old, or so.”
“You mean, like normal people.”
He nods. “All those idiots out there. All the humans.” When you look straight at Dad you can tell he’s not like them. His eyes don’t work like theirs. Most people never look, though.
I sit and think about it. “Mmm. I mean – eighty years seems a long time, though.”
Dad holds my gaze. “You know you’re special, don’t you? When you come with me, you won’t get old and wither away like the rest of them. Like Bernard’s flowers you told me about. That’s all humans are, really. They’re just pretty flowers. They wilt and they rot and they have such a short time in the sun. But us, we never die.” He looks up to the sky as he says it. “Your Mum and Bernard – they want to take everything from my side of the family out of you. Make you all human.”
“Can they do it?”
“No,” he says. “I don’t think so.” He doesn’t sound sure though. “Come on,” he tells me, his eyes glinting silver. “Let’s get you fed.”
I have the Bontempi organ in my backpack, so we put it in the trees in the dark end of the park behind McDonalds, where nobody ever comes. We have to wait ages and ages but eventually some skinny guy in a beanie cap comes along, smoking a fag. He spots the organ sticking out of its box and looks around sneakily, but he doesn’t see me and Dad behind the tree.
As the bloke bends over to pick it up, Dad slips out silently and pulls back his face like a fleshy mask. What’s underneath slashes the man’s face and slits his throat in three easy flicks.
We drag the body further into the woods and feed.
“We never used to have to do this,” says Dad, mouth full. “All this hiding. So demeaning. In the good old days, humans worshipped us, you know. They were our cattle, too. We’d stride around, high as the stars, and when we got hungry, we’d reach down and pluck off a head. Just a head!”
“And one day soon, our time will come again,” I say, before he can.
He looks at me appreciatively. “Not long now.”
“Mmph,” I say. “Can I have the eyes this time?”
“Oh, go on then,” says Dad, blood all down his chin. “After all, you’re a growing lad.”
Dad makes me go back because he says if I don’t, it’ll look really suspicious. I’ve eaten properly, so I don’t feel so bad. Eating with Dad is the only time I feel full, to be honest. When I get back, Bernard’s nowhere to be seen for once. Mum cleans the blood off my face, then we watch Countryfile on the sofa together.
♦
It happens on Wednesday.
“No school for you today,” says Mum. “Put on some loose clothes. We’re going to go out today. Special treat.”
Loose clothes? Mum can’t look me in the eye.
We go downstairs, but instead of getting ready to go out, we march out into the garden. Everything is very big today, as if the spaces between things have all increased. The garden seems stark, chilly, too empty somehow.
“Bernard says it’s for the best,” she says. She leads me into the big shed. The bare bulb in the ceiling is switched off and there are candles stuck messily to every surface. It’s full of plants and they’re writhing slowly, as if they’re underwater.
“Mum? What’s going on?”
“We need to do a... ceremony.” Her face is turned away.
“A ritual,” says Bernard. He’s wearing black clothes I’ve never seen before, and he’s holding the book open. The pages are buzzing with tiny black lines, writhing like the plants, searching for something. For me. On the workbench, he has several different workman’s tools laid out. A retractable Stanley knife, garden cutters, even a thick steak knife. They look very sharp.
The mark on my arm blazes in pain, as if it’s trying to get out. Dad, I think. Oh, Dad. I’m too scared to move.
Mum cups my face in her hands. She looks so old, suddenly.
“I made a big mistake with your father,” she says, and it’s not like she’s really talking to me at all. She’s talking to herself. “I was young – I thought it was cool, all the sacrifices, and the dancing, and the secrets. I knew what he was – I knew what he was – I didn’t go into it blind – but I never – I never –”
“Mum,” I cry. “Let me go, this is all wrong.”
She falters, then summons up all her courage. “You don’t have to grow up like him.”
“I WANT to be like him!” I yell. “I don’t want to be like YOU!”
I wrench myself out of her grasp. The words start spilling out of me, words that have been building up in me since Mum and Dad parted. “What’s so great about being a stupid human anyway?”
She looks at me, eyes wide with shock as I spit out the words. “What’s so great about having to love and hate and miss people and watch people split up and hurt each other and you can’t do anything about it? Dad doesn’t do that! Dad doesn’t have to care!”
As I shout, I see a thousand strands of black snaking out of the book towards me, searching blindly. Where they touch, they sting like needles. I cry out at the sudden agony. Bernard leans forward, his eyes blazing.
“You said it wouldn’t hurt him!
” Mum cries.
Bernard ignores her, and thrusts the book towards me. The strands are pulling me back towards him. I try to crawl, but even the slightest movement away is more pain than I can stand.
“We’ll cut out the part that belongs to the Old Ones,” pants Bernard. “We’ll give you a brand new soul – a nice clean one – and you’ll be free!”
I’m crawling helplessly on the floor, the strands pulling me over to where Bernard stands with bare feet on the musty shed floor. I reach up, open up my true face, and bite Bernard’s left hand clean off.
Everything is a blur. Bernard roars in pain, and the threads instantly recede. I fumble at the shed door while Mum wails behind me. Stumbling, falling, I run inside the house. Bernard is scrambling behind me, screaming at me incoherently in rage.
I make it to the hallway, but all my strength is sapped. I hear Bernard mutter a few strange syllables, and then the threads are drilling into my back again.
I grab at the front door, pull it, but it’s too late. I can’t move forward for the pain.
The door swings open slowly, and I see that there’s someone there.
It’s Dad. He’s come to take me home. Not just Dad, either. Behind him, draped tall and monstrous across the sky, are the Authorities.
I think I see Grandad. It’s hard to tell, because it hurts a bit to look.
Bernard runs screaming to the door, and then halts, skidding on the carpet runner. Dad has shrugged off his skin like a robe, and is reaching out his thin arms to Bernard.
Cthulhu Lives!: An Eldritch Tribute to H. P. Lovecraft Page 22