Susan nearly dropped her sack. “You scared the piss out of me!”
“Sorry.”
“What are you doing in the bushes? You know, it could rain at any minute.”
“Yeah, I know. I’m waiting to see if that damn dog is going to show up tonight.”
Susan noticed the rifle and cocked her head to one side. “Give me a break. You’d never shoot that poor thing and you know it.”
He sighed and nodded. Truthfully, he wanted to have it handy for when the guys showed up. Since he said he was going to do it, he wanted to appear as though he’d been trying. If the dog had indeed walked by, he would have stayed quiet and let it pass.
“You really shouldn’t have that out,” Susan continued. “You might mess up and shoot Mr. Banner’s house across the street.”
“I’m not that drunk.”
His wife smiled. “Good.” She loved giving him a hard time. He looked adorable when she had him on the spot. Before going inside, she said, “Try not to stay out too long. I have something important to tell you before I go to bed.”
“Sure thing, boss.” He cracked a playful grin and resumed his watch. They lived on a dirt road a few miles from town with four neighbors. The couple living on Mike’s left rented the house and had a habit of making an obscene amount of noise in the bedroom with the windows wide open. Susan was annoyed until Mike made a game of it. He would lip sync the woman with wild facial expressions, encouraging her to mimic the man. It was great for a laugh, and sometimes it got them in the mood to make their own noise.
The nice old hillbilly, Mr. Banner, lived directly across the street from Mike and Susan. He was usually only seen when taking out the trash or mowing the lawn. Otherwise, he was busy doing chores with his sons who had farms elsewhere. Jim Horrison lived to the right of Mr. Banner, and everything surrounding them was pasture and woods.
David Hampton’s car pulled in front of Jim’s house to drop him off. Mike glared at them from the hedges, his grip on the gun tightening as they drove by and tossed a beer bottle into his ditch. Once they were gone, Mike sulked for a bit, but almost forgot about them as he watched the golden retriever wander onto the road.
The dog paused to look around, and then trotted to Mr. Banner’s garbage cans at the end of his driveway.
Eh, what the hell? Mike raised the rifle to take aim while the dog sniffed at a can and rose to get into the top of it.
“Pkew!” To Mike’s surprise, the moment after he made the quiet shooting sound with his mouth - because the gun wasn’t actually loaded - the dog emitted a yelp and ran down the road as fast as possible.
Mike lowered the gun, confused, but then he remembered: earlier that morning, Mr. Banner hooked an electric fence charger to the metal cans, and apparently it worked like a charm.
The cold of a large raindrop stung his cheek. Another and another followed that. Mike got up and ran to the front door just in time to miss getting drenched in the downpour. As he entered the house, he leaned the gun against the wall and found Susan in the kitchen making a sandwich.
“Looks good,” he said. “I think I’ll have one.” He reached for the bread.
Susan picked up the knife she’d sliced a tomato with and cut her sandwich diagonally. “Here, take half of mine.”
Mike accepted it with a saucer and they sat together at the table. Little things like sharing a sandwich were what warmed his heart the most. Any woman in his life prior to Susan would simply step out of the way so he could make his own, and there was nothing wrong with that but still… He gazed at her while she ate, wondering how he ended up with someone so beautiful, thoughtful, and intelligent. Her hair was golden blond with blue eyes and pouty lips, and she had the kind of figure one would see on the troubled ladies in old detective movies.
She’d moved to Kansas City six years ago for a job she was pursuing. After spending a few years at a trade school, there was a specific computer system she intended to work on at a local military equipment factory. There was no problem with securing the job, except the place shut down shortly afterward. Now the site was a recycling plant.
Susan had spent all of her money settling in at Tapperville, and although her parents would have helped her come home had she asked, she’d fallen for the area and didn’t want to leave. Besides, she’d gotten enough of a taste for the job to know she’d wasted her time. It was boring - insanely boring - something the school hadn’t prepared her for. So she took up waitressing, where she got plenty of exercise and interacted with all sorts of people. One of those people was Mike.
They’d been married for nearly four years now, and he was still unable to figure what she saw in him. She deserved someone better, or at least he thought so. But he vowed to always show his appreciation in everything they did.
She looked up from her sandwich, noticing his stare. “How’s Bob?”
He blinked out of his daze. “He’s fine. Well, he got in a fight and his cheek is busted open.”
“Why didn’t you have him come by so I could look at it?” She had been a nurse’s assistant while working through trade school.
“That’s what I was really waiting on outside, but he didn’t show.”
“Hmm, I hope he doesn’t need stitches.” Susan took another bite and said with a bit of hesitation, “Um, I’ve got some news for you, but I’m worried if you’ll like it or not.”
“Oh yeah! The important stuff. Is it bad?”
“Well, I think it’s good.”
Mike was getting concerned now. “What is it, honey?”
Susan gazed at him with a hopeful look. “I’m pregnant.”
“Pregnant?”
“Pregnant.”
Mike’s eyes widened and his jaw dropped, chewed bread nearly falling to the table. “Pregnant!” He jumped to his feet, knocking the chair over. Susan flinched, unsure at first. Then he motioned for her to come closer while he swallowed hard. He stooped to pet her belly, then looked up with a tear in his eye. He embraced her with a kiss and held her tight, burying his face in her soft hair that curled around her ears and lay across her shoulders.
They stood there for what seemed like hours, when finally Susan looked him in the eyes. “Are you really happy about this?”
“I couldn’t wish for anything better.”
She rested her head on his chest and whispered with a smile, “Great, I’m happy too.”
And Mike knew why she stuck around with a guy like him, why she put up with his low-paying jobs, his snoring, stinky armpits and occasional drunken silliness. She loved him.
*****
Jeezy made it home at 1:30 in the morning, soaked and chilled to the bone. He tossed the tote bag on the table, peeled his clothes off, and headed straight for the bed. He was too exhausted to do anything else. On his journey home, he pondered calling the police immediately, but he wanted to see what became of the tree first. The way it reacted to his spell, there may be a better way to exact revenge than what the law could provide.
Before reaching his bed, the headless body of Bob’s gerbil ran into his bare foot and stopped. With a frustrated sigh, he reached down to grab it by the tail but it skittered off under the dresser, where it thumped against the wall.
Screw it, he thought, I’ll get it in the morning.
As he drifted off to sleep, he was haunted by the small patch of blood on his foot where the gerbil had struck, the sounds of it traveling blind throughout the house, and the smell of mud drying on his shoes nearby. Ichobod’s thumps worked their way into his dreams, adding further discomfort to the steady visions of Bob’s mangled face. And somewhere in the woods, perhaps from the things offering guidance for the grimoire, he could hear laughter.
*****
Meanwhile in Oakview, the rain had stopped and the winds died down, but clouds still layered the sky. Stan was driving home from the local radio station. It had been a long evening, made longer when the dipshit following him showed up late for the next shift, and he could barely keep his eyes open. I
n his rush to head home, he paid no attention to the empty pizza delivery car at the edge of the station’s parking lot. After pulling into his driveway, he stepped out of the truck and headed straight for the front steps, sure that if he didn’t reach his bed within the next few minutes, he would fall flat on his face asleep. As he unlocked the door and entered the house, something stirred under a tarp in the bed of his truck.
Stan kicked his shoes off at the door and made a beeline for the bedroom, drunk with sleep deprivation. He would probably feel better if not for the two-day cocaine binge prior to coming to work that day. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, plus there was a Three’s Company marathon on television. He loved that show, especially on coke.
The moment he turned on the bedroom light, his doorbell rang. He groaned and returned to the front door but before opening it, he yelled, “Who is it?”
No one answered.
“I am too tired to mess with this shit.” Stan started back to the bedroom. The doorbell began to ring repeatedly.
“That does it. Whoever it is - if it’s not a hot chick with big tits - I’m kickin’ ass!”
He stormed to the door and jerked it open. On the top step stood a thin, well-built man in a red shirt and black pants. Stan stared at the stranger, waiting for him to talk.
Rick Jenderson grinned. “Dresses, eh?” Not only did he see the DJ covered in blood, but skin was sloughing off of his hulky frame. It would be a pleasure disposing of this lump of waste for the spirits.
“What the fu-” Stan tensed and exhaled hard as Rick’s knife jabbed into his stomach, turning slowly back and forth. The last thing he saw before dying was the excited look in Rick’ eyes.
“I’ll show you dresses!”
Bonus #2
Rough draft previews from further into Fear the Woods (final versions may differ, and some may show up in future books, depending on how final products come about). They were carefully chosen and edited to avoid spoilers.
Preview #1
In the center of town, two men ran down the sidewalk past several closed stores in desperate hopes of escaping a large vampire. It was toying with them, of course. It could catch them at any time, but then there wouldn’t be any sport. It needed some cheering up after the blow it had taken from Jake earlier.
Eventually, it began to lose interest and decided to slow one of them down. As it passed a hardware store, it leapt through the window, setting off the alarm, and in a flash was back out with a riding lawnmower in its hands.
With virtually no effort, it threw the mower at one of the men, which struck him square in the back and pinned him to the sidewalk. The other man paused momentarily, but then continued to run. The vampire stopped at the mower and lifted the man’s head up. There was a smeared puddle of blood from his nose and mouth. The man moaned, then screamed as the creature bit into the bridge of his nose and sucked. Next, it turned his head and finished draining him through his neck.
As the other man turned the corner of a building, he came to a dead stop. His eyes grew wide and he exhaled hard. He had run right into Rick Jenderson’s knife.
“Hurts, doesn’t it?”
The man dropped to his knees and Rick knelt with him.
“What were you running from?” He’d heard the noise in the near distance and the alarm was still sounding off.
“What were you running from?” he repeated, but the man didn’t answer. He fell over and died with the same surprised look on his face.
“Damn.” He heard a scream behind him and decided to investigate. He had to walk down another street to find the source, but after listening closely, he could hear someone breathing slow and loud between houses. He approached a middle-aged woman on the ground and lifted her to her feet. She was able to stand a little on her own, but her head lolled against her shoulders, baring puncture wounds in her neck.
“What’s wrong with you?” Rick said.
She moaned.
“Tell me what’s wrong with you.”
She began to convulse in his arms. He didn’t know what to do. He stared at her, confused, as her arms lifted above her head. When he felt her skin harden, he let her go and stepped back. She stood there and shook with her feet planted in the ground. Her waist widened, ripping her clothes apart. He watched, amazed, as her breasts stopped quivering and stretched upwards against her shoulders. From there, they grew into limbs and she continued to turn into a tree before Rick’s eyes.
Rick checked his pocket for the small cellophane sack. No, he thought, it’s not the acid. I haven’t taken it yet.
Preview #2
After Robert’s car was out of sight, things grew quiet again. Mike was about to turn the ignition off when something heavy hit the roof of the truck, denting it in.
“Holy shit!” Jeezy turned to see what it was.
Mike gritted his teeth. “Don’t stick your head out the window. It might get taken off.”
“If it’s one of them, it can’t hurt me. Remember?”
“Yeah, well it might figure out a way to get around that.” Mike shifted the truck in reverse and stomped on the pedal. The Chevy lurched backward and the vampire fell onto the hood. Next, Mike shifted into second and sped forward. The vampire went against the windshield, its face pressed hard against the glass.
“Call on the radio,” Mike said. “I’ve got an idea.”
Jeezy did as he was told, but he was unsure of where they were headed for giving directions to the others. Mike swerved onto an older road and sped down it. The vampire managed to stay on the windshield and, once it had regained its balance, it reared its fist back to punch through it. Just before impact, however, Jeezy pressed a crucifix against the glass and the only thing it managed to break was its knuckles. It groaned at them and began banging on the hood. Mike stepped on the brakes just hard enough to make it tumble forward and hang from the grill.
Mike was getting close to his destination. He turned onto a dirt driveway just out of city limits and sped up. The vampire got a foothold on the front bumper and rose up, smiling at the men, eyes glowing brightly.
Mike pressed harder on the accelerator. “Brace yourself,” he said to Jeezy.
“You wouldn’t,” Jeezy said.
The vampire was almost on the hood, but then slipped against the grill when they hit a bump.
“I’m telling you,” Mike said. “Hold on.”
“You wouldn’t.” Jeezy’s eyes opened wide. “You are!” He propped his feet up against the dashboard and held onto the door. The truck went up the steps of an old country church and Mike stomped on the brakes. They smashed into the double wooden doors before the truck came to an abrupt halt. The vampire spit up green, sappy blood across the hood and windshield just before it flew through the entrance.
Mike backed the truck down the steps before getting out. Before they entered the church, Mike looked up at the sky and said, “No hard feelings, okay?” They walked in, stepped on and over broken boards, and found the vampire on the floor, completely dried up in a crippled position.
Bonus #3
Complete Silliness
Armageddon in the Snappy Snack Shack
It was a bright, sunny day outside the little fast food joint. Then Hell walked in; pure, unforgiving, loathsome evil.
The clean cut, middle-aged man approached the counter with a smile. He wasn’t the evil one. It was the adorable toddler strapped to his chest like a parasite.
A voluptuous woman with purple and black hair greeted them and asked if they’d like to try the special. The cartoon chicken on her smock seemed pleased to be nested between such plump eggs.
“I think I’d like the number six combo,” the man said.
His son looked up at him with such a stern look for a young face. “I am hungry, Father! Feed me now!”
“He’ll have the kid’s nugget meal.”
The woman rang it up. “That’s wild how he calls you ‘Father’ instead of ‘Daddy’ or some other cute name.”
The t
oddler said, “He is my father, not my daddy.”
“Oh.” She dropped it to avoid any awkwardness.
The man gritted his teeth. “You’ll have to excuse him. You see… he’s the antichrist and I bear the curse of raising him.”
She giggled. “I understand. I’ve a nephew that’s also going through his terrible two’s.”
The boy reached for her.
“Aw, he wants a hug.” She leaned over to embrace him with a kiss on the forehead.
His tiny voice managed to carry throughout the restaurant. “Boobies!”
The woman jumped back and blushed. “Yow! That’s quite a grip you’ve got there.”
Jealous, the man sighed. Children can get away with anything. He carried their tray of food to a table and situated young Lucian in a high chair. They were barely into their meals when a lady walked by, catching the boy’s attention. She wore a gaudy cross around her neck and it infuriated him. “Bitch!”
Her jaw dropped but then she laughed. Children that cussed were hilarious, so long as they weren’t her kids.
Offended, Lucian spoke with a deep, inhuman voice. “Your mother wears socks that smell!”
The lady stopped laughing. “How-how did you know that? She can’t help it. She has a recurring foot fungus.” Her shocked face turned to the father. “How did he know that, and how can he talk like that?”
Before he could answer, Lucian spewed green vomit that splattered across her chest. She screamed and ran to the restroom to clean up. People sitting nearby - an elderly couple, members of a choir, and a group of teenagers - noticed but said nothing. A nerdy employee stepped over to them with a mop for the floor.
The father began to eat faster so they could be moving along, but unfortunately, more trouble walked through the front entrance. It was a scruffy man of about thirty with hair down to his shoulders and a full beard. He lumbered to the counter wearing sandals, cut-off jeans, and a tie-dye Grateful Dead T-shirt, and he ordered a number three meal.
Zombies, Werewolves, Whores, and More! Page 15