by Tom Fletcher
‘“I don’t think there’s anything here,” declared the boy. “But maybe we knew that there was nothing here all along.”
‘“You’re right,” she said, and nodded. “Maybe the fixed point that everything revolves around is just a kind of empty space.” She gestured carelessly at the world with her empty hand.
‘They threw the shovels up on to the desert floor and climbed out of the hole. They were exhausted and their arms were on fire. Their skin was stinging because of the radiation from the sun. Their hands were stained red. The sky seemed bigger than ever before and they both felt incredibly small, incredibly unimportant. The boy was filled with a kind of ultimate peace and the girl was filled with a savage despair. She picked up her shovel and swung it at the boy’s head with such force that it chipped the top of his skull right off so that the inside of his head was exposed to the elements. He remained standing and slowly raised his hand so that he could feel the texture of his brain with his long, dextrous fingers. The girl hit him again and this time she knocked his hand into his brain and he died and fell into the hole. She spent the rest of the night and the following morning burying him. She then got back into the four-wheel drive and fell asleep. Next time, she thought. Next time somebody comes looking they’ll find something here.’
‘Erin,’ I say. ‘That was a horrible story.’
‘What?’ She refocuses on me. She is incredibly pale in the gathering dark. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said, that was a horrible story. Where did you get it?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. I just made it up. Did you like it?’ Her smile is wan as she asks the question. Behind her the dead farmer swivels around in mid-air. I know he is a farmer because I imagined him. This is my logic. He is some sort of hallucination brought on by the thing in my head. And because he has come from me and only from me, I can tell you that he is a farmer. Also, he killed his wife. And then he killed himself. In my mind’s eye, he rows out into the lake and dumps her body.
‘Did I like it?’ I repeat, absently. But I don’t answer the question. My pain suddenly diminishes. Then I feel movement inside me. It can’t really be movement inside me. But it doesn’t feel like anything else. It feels like my bones are realigning and clicking back together. The pain flows out of me. Erin starts again.
‘This one’s called “Depth Perception”. It’s about a woman. I never knew her, but I always imagine her reading; curled up in an armchair under a standard lamp, the room bathed in a lovely warm light, and she is very pretty, with thick, curly brown hair and the vestiges of a healthy tan. Without thinking, she puts her hand to her mouth every time the story gets tense, or some mystery is about to be resolved. She doesn’t realise she’s doing it – it’s a reflex thing, like blinking. She’s wearing heavy gold jewellery and it suits her.
‘This is an image that I have in my head as vividly as if I’d seen her only yesterday.
‘I don’t know his name, and I never knew what he looked like. But he did it at night, and so it would have been dark (very dark – it was cloudy, the way I imagine it, and there are no streetlights in Wasdale) and so what he looked like doesn’t matter. We can’t see his face.
‘It’s possible that there were a lot of rowing boats moored around the edges of the lake in the sixties. So either he found one of those, if they were there at all, or he had his own. The only boats there now are a few rotten old shells in the boathouse at the western end, but the boathouse is too far away from the road. Too far to carry the body.
‘He is parked on the road on the northern shore. To avoid being seen, all of his car lights have been turned off. For the sake of this story, he has brought his own boat. He has taken it from the trailer and dragged it to the little pebbly beach. At this time of night, in this weather, the lake is difficult to see. There is no light for the surface to catch. It’s windy; it sounds as if the lake is whispering. He’s scared. He’s scared that at any minute a car might approach, and slow down, and stop, and that somebody might wind down their window and ask him exactly what it is that he’s doing out here, in the dark, in the cold, all alone … he’s scared that, after coming all this way, he’ll be found out. He’s scared that all his planning might amount to nothing. He looks out at the invisible, whispering water. He’s scared that he might capsize. He’s scared that he might drown. He’s scared, suddenly, of the deep, dark cold … he is scared of forgetting how to swim. He is scared of whatever might be hiding at the bottom. He wonders how many people have had the same idea as him. He is reassured by the fact that he has never heard of any of them. By the fact that they have never been found out. He opens the boot. He lifts his dead wife, wrapped in the dirty bed-sheets, easily. She had always been quite light; slim. He carries her over to the boat, lays her down gently, her head towards the stern. He takes off his shoes and socks, rolls up his trousers. He pushes the boat out and, once it’s freed from the ground and he can feel it floating, pulls himself in. He is sitting with his back to the prow, facing the body of his wife. He loses himself in his thoughts for a moment, looking at the corpse. Am I going to sell the jewellery? Am I going to pretend that all of her books are mine? Oh God, he thinks. I always envied the way she could lose herself in a book like that. Oh God. How much she loved reading. I would come in from the farm and lean in the doorway and watch her just reading. And I loved the way that she would express so much through her face and her body, even when she thought she was on her own. If the people she was reading about were happy, she would actually smile. If they were in danger, she would look worried. Oh God. These are his thoughts.
‘He realises that he is drifting in the wind. He takes the oars from the bottom of the boat, places them in their brackets, and begins to row out into the middle of the lake. As he does so, he notices that there is water in the bottom of the boat. He panics; he asks himself, how long has it been since I used it? Did I check it for leaks? Am I sinking?
‘He keeps on rowing. He reassures himself that this is the way with rowing boats. He is not sinking.
‘He wonders what he will do with the boat. He cannot tolerate the idea of waiting for it to dry out so that he can burn it. Besides, somebody might see the flames and ask questions.
‘He thinks that he has rowed far enough. We can’t blame him for this; he doesn’t know the lake, he doesn’t know where the shelf ends. He doesn’t even know how far he is from the shore. It’s all a question of depth perception, and let’s not forget – it’s very dark out here. He takes the corpse in both arms and lifts it over the edge and drops it into the black, and the white of the bed-sheets disappears immediately. The boat rocks alarmingly, and suddenly he feels very alone. He realises that now he can’t get caught, he was expecting the worry and tension to run out of him, like water, and into the lake. But it hasn’t happened. Instead, the lake is draining into him, the night-water creeping in through cracks in his mind and filling him with a lake’s worth of fear.
‘Oh God, he thinks. She’s gone.’
Erin rolls her shoulders as she finishes. Her eyes change. It is as if she is waking up. I am sitting up. I am staring at her.
‘Francis,’ Erin says. ‘My God. You’re sitting up.’
‘Where did you get that story?’
‘Francis.’ She looks amazed. ‘How on earth are you sitting up?’
‘Where the fuck did you get that story?’ I ask again. I climb out of bed. I am naked. I am whole.
‘What do you mean?’ she says. ‘Francis, you’re standing up. Here, put some trousers on.’ She throws me my jeans. ‘What – how are you standing up?’
‘Never mind that. Where the fuck did you get that story? I had that story in my head. It was in here.’ I point at my skull. ‘It was in there.’ I am salivating uncontrollably. ‘Erin. Erin. Tell me.’
‘I don’t know,’ she shrugs. She leans back just a tiny amount. Enough to show me that she’s uncomfortable. Her white dress is torn and muddy and bloody. I sit back down. I put my head in my hands. A moment’s silence.
‘Erin,’ I say. ‘Imagine the clothes that the man in your story was wearing. But don’t say anything. Imagine what he looks like. You got a picture in your head?’
She nods, hesitantly.
‘Checked shirt,’ I say. ‘Dark jeans. Grey hair, in his sixties or seventies. Big hands.’
She nods, eyes wide. Around the house, the wind cracks like thunder. But the skies are clear now. We know that it’s not thunder. I can smell sweat. It’s mine. The scent of it rises in waves from the damp bedding. I am hot. Energy courses through me. Or maybe I can just feel the blood in my body. ‘He’s here,’ I say. ‘I can see him. Hanging from the beam. After he dumped his wife’s body, he hung himself here in this room. I can see him, Erin. Look up there. Behind you.’
Erin turns and looks up at the beam. Slowly. She turns back. She opens her mouth to speak. She croaks something before clearing her throat and shaking her head. ‘I can’t see anything.’
‘There’s something wrong with this house,’ I say. ‘There is something here. Some history. Something getting into our heads.’
‘Maybe that’s what’s wrong with Jack and Jennifer. They don’t seem so happy.’
I stand up and make for my clothes. They’re piled up on the floor by the door. But I don’t manage it. Something in my back shifts and I fall to the floor. Suddenly I can’t move my legs any more.
Erin starts talking. That voice. The voice. I don’t even think it is completely hers. ‘This one’s called “Bearpit”.’
‘What?’ I say, from the floor. ‘What?’
‘The sun beat down relentlessly, bleaching the grass and the stone and turning the whole fellside yellowish-brown. The house wavered in the heat. It was this house. Fell House. Where the barn stands now, there was nothing but a hole.
‘The boy had been a shepherd. His long black hair was greasy and kept falling into his eyes. Tiredly, he swept it back. And again. And again. He wore black trousers held up with string, and nothing else. The sun had turned his skin the colour of iron ore. His wrists and ankles bore the raw marks of recent captivity and his legs were weak. He stumbled. The mountains were steep. But he was less likely to get caught up there.
‘Fell House lay somewhere behind him, and he knew that it would not be long before somehow it tried to find him. Despite the heat, despite his burning back, despite his bleeding wrists and ankles, despite the pain in his head and the heaviness of his feet and of his eyelids, he continued to lift one foot up and put it down again in front of the other. And again. And again. And again.
‘He woke up and found grass in his mouth. The day had cooled, although the sun was still up. He could see that he was lying in shadow.
‘“They know that you’ve escaped,” somebody advised him. “They’re sending out the dogs as we speak. You don’t have long. You should not have slept.”
‘The boy got to his feet and shaded his eyes in order to look up at the man in front of him. The man sat atop a huge black horse with beautiful big eyes and wore a black cloak. Beneath the cloak, the boy could make out a strangely shaped black leather boot. It didn’t seem to have much room for the foot – it was almost a ball. A flat-bottomed ball. In the distance, the sun was approaching the ocean. “Who are you?” asked the boy.
‘The man dismounted, but even without the horse he stood a good two feet higher than the boy. The boy saw that both boots were the same unusual shape. His face was lean and lined, and his mouth was thin and flat, and his eyes were black and his hair was short and white. “I am the Lord of hereabouts,” said the man. “And I know what happens at Fell House. And I want to help you because I know what they have in store for you.” His eyes searched those of the boy for a moment, finding confirmation. “They will find you, boy. And they will take you back.”
‘The boy shook his head a little and, despite the shame of it, started to cry. “They want me to fight,” he said. “Although really they just want to see me die.” There was a silence. And then, “Have you any water, Lord?”
‘“Water? Here.” The man unhooked a black leather water carrier from the black tack of the horse and handed it to the boy. The boy drank deeply, and wiped his lips, and handed the carrier back.
‘“Thank you,” he said. The man smiled broadly, and the boy saw that his teeth were small and pointed. His ears too. The man put his head back and drank also. The boy heard a hissing sound as the water disappeared into the man’s mouth, as if it had been poured on to hot metal.
‘“So then,” the man said. “Let me help you.”
‘“What can you do? Will you take me away? Take me to the town? Will you arrest them that live there? That man and his wife? The things they do, Lord. Them’s not people, Lord, not real people like you an’ me. Help me. Please.”
‘“I won’t do any of those things.” The man took the boy’s throat in his black leather glove. “That man and his wife, boy, are indeed people. They are as human as anybody can be. And as for me – well, no, I’m not. And as for you – that’s your choice.”
‘The man looked at the ground. They heard the rough, wet barking of savage dogs. The boy looked at the man and didn’t really understand. The man looked back up. “I could take you away. I could destroy that house, and the people inside it. But I won’t, because I built that house, and it is my house, and it will always be my house. And besides, it would be of far greater value to give you everything you need in order for you to do it yourself. Not just this time. But any time. Boy. I can give you power and strength beyond your imagining. All you need to do is pledge your allegiance to me. To me and my name. To me and my standard. When the time comes, your body and your soul are mine to command. Do you understand me?”
‘The boy nodded, his throat still held in the iron grip of the Lord.
‘“Good. In return, then. If ever you feel the need, or the desire, you can change yourself into something far greater. Something older and purer. Simpler. Stronger. Something like the wolves that haunt the forests and the moors. I have put much of the wolf into you now. And your soul is mine. Do you still understand me?”
‘The boy nodded. The man took his hand from the boy’s throat and blood sprang from the marks that it left and ran down the boy’s neck. The man smiled again, teeth glinting in the fading light, and mounted his horse. A black fiddle was slung across his back, like a sword.’
‘He let the men from the farm beat him and whip him and tie him up. He let them carry him back to Fell House. He thought about the bodies of the dogs; he thought about the earthy, fatty taste of the dogs’ blood. He let the men untie him in the yard of Fell House, and he let them kick him, and he let them beat him some more. He let them throw him into the pit in front of the three-deep crowd that stood around the edge of it, whooping and jeering. He stood up in the bottom of the pit, illuminated by the the flaming torches, and looked up at the faces of the spectators. He let them spit on him, piss on him, worse. He looked at the wooden barricade – the trunks of three trees lashed together – that covered the hole in the floor of the pit that led to deeper holes, and he wondered who – or what – would be hidden down there tonight. He somehow knew the kind of games that had been played there before. The people that stood up above roared and laughed and placed bets. People. The boy smiled.
‘A voice rang out. A depraved, cracked, creaky wheeze of a voice that reeked of decades of cruelty. “Bets in! Wiv git ready ’n’s all set t’gor. On’t three!”
‘The boy tensed. He closed his eyes and willed the change upon himself.
‘“One!” the crowd bellowed, a broken chorus. The ropes tied to the wooden barricade tensed. The boy fell over and his body jerked about like it was on strings being pulled viciously, randomly. The crowd laughed. “Two!” they shouted, and the boy found himself on all fours, coughing up blood and hair. He felt something rising up from his stomach and up his throat. The pain was so great he could hear it tearing through his muscles and nerves. He could not shake the feeling that he was dying. Everything inside him was ru
shing towards his face. The tree-trunks shifted slightly, maybe because of the people pulling the ropes, maybe because something underneath was trying to get out.
‘“Three!”
‘The word rose up from their hopeless, misguided mouths, insignificant in itself, but significant in that it was the signal for the raising of the wooden barrier. Significant in that it immediately preceded the transformation from boy into something else, not man, not animal, but something else entirely, something completely other, and outside their understanding. They watched, and their eyes – eyes that had seen the vilest things – watered as they conveyed visions to their brains that would induce such horror that, had these people survived, they would never have been able to escape the memory of it.
‘Above the pit, the house and the fells, the stars hung in their empty spaces.
‘The boy died and was reborn as something evil, monstrous. The boy’s blood coloured the walls and the floor of the pit. The crowd stood stock-still, rooted partly through their own morbid fascination and partly through some other magic.
‘Slowly, carefully, a huge animal emerged from behind the barrier: dark brown, bulky, hungry-looking and noble, in a sense. The bear revealed itself. It could smell the blood, and despite being able to sense the deeply unnatural nature of its companion in the pit, it had to eat. It approached the thing that had been a boy slowly at first, and then with a suddenness that shocked the onlookers, launched itself at the wolf-thing.
‘The fight – not that it was much of a fight – was over before it had begun. The bear died painfully and messily. Its opponent leapt from the pit and killed every last man and woman that had been there; those that tried to run, it hunted and found and savaged. It ate some of them. It found that it preferred the taste of women.
‘The day dawned on a young-looking boy with ancient eyes licking bear blood off his skin by the side of a pit half full of broken bodies. The boy who would henceforth be named Bearpit looked over the yard, the house, the fellside, the lake reflecting the glory of the newly risen sun, and he could not deny the joy inside him.’