Behind him, he dragged the carcass of Digger, Fibber McClain’s big white German shepherd, by its collar. Carl hated Digger almost as much as he hated Scott. A little antifreeze took care of the dog. Too bad it couldn’t be that simple with the boy.
The mutt’s carcass weighed a ton and snagged every stub, sapling, and brier in the thicket. Carl tired of kicking it loose every few steps. Even though frost coated the ground that morning, beads of sweat rolled down his forehead.
"I’m getting too old for this shit," he murmured and spat out a plume of fog that hung dead in front of his face. He gave a heavy tug and pulled the dog loose from another tangle. As Digger pulled free, Carl lost his balance and fell into a nest of waiting briers. They gnawed through his overalls and bit his flesh.
This is your last chance, kid.
Maybe Scott wouldn’t take a hint this time either. If he didn’t, Carl could just knock the boy in the head and burn the house down around his ears. Maybe instead, he’d tie Scott up along with his retard baby and they could watch what he would do with Brenda. Scott’s wife was an uppity little bitch. Carl would enjoy doing her tight ass. At the thought, he could feel Brenda’s flesh give way beneath him and felt himself stiffen. The sudden vigor surprised him, but no time for wishing now.
Closer now, he could see the house and out into Sutton’s yard. Not only did Carl hate Scott, but the house as well. Local legend said the old Banks place was haunted. He knew better than anyone else why. Thinking of the time he spent there sickened him. The first time he went as a kid, he’d looked for old Captain Murphy’s buried gold. Carl was six then. He’d put on airs just to be allowed around long enough to search. That pathetic water head, Johnny Banks, was five.
Johnny’s mother, Missy Banks, welcomed the company and thought it was good for little Johnny, but Carl despised the little freak. Johnny wallowed through life, nothing more than a snot driveling little animal. Missy Banks was just as warped and pathetic for giving that monster life. Even more so for keeping it alive.
Carl saw that nothing stirred around the house. Good. No one but that little terrier mutt of Sutton’s ought to be around. He couldn’t see the dog, but no problem. He would just wring its neck, put it with Digger, and add to the stink.
Carl towed Digger out into the yard. He’d done this before with a dead possum. That odor must not have been strong enough. The German shepherd sure ought to raise a stink under the house. The same low sinkhole below the kitchen would be the spot. Digger was getting stiff and hard to drag. He was much bigger than a possum, but the dog would still be hard to see in that hole. Scott would never find him unless he crawled under the house blind and stuck a hand in Digger’s rotting carcass.
Carl hated patiently, but even a patient hate only went so far. His patience with Scott had reached its end long ago.
***
Carl pretended to be Johnny Banks’ playmate until he couldn’t stand it anymore. He never really played with retard Johnny, but hung around to torment him when Missy wasn’t looking.
He poked Johnny with straight pins to start. He just wanted to make Johnny cry, but the boy never cried. Carl soon learned Johnny couldn’t cry. Pumpkinhead Johnny only made two sounds. He either grunted a loud buck-deer snort or he laughed. Oh, Pumpkinhead Johnny could laugh. The sound made the bile swarm inside Carl and rise in his throat. When Johnny laughed his huge, deformed head swung back and forth like a clock pendulum. His crooked mouth gaped wide showing its jagged bat teeth. The sight made Carl want to puke.
***
Finally, he made it to the back porch. Digger was too heavy to drag much further. Scott’s mutt still showed no sign of himself. Please let the mutt show. Carl would enjoy choking the life out of the furry little bastard. It would do Sutton good to know a little loss.
The gray sky opened a light drizzle. The air felt cold enough to freeze rain on the trees and power lines. Just what he wanted on his birthday, an ice storm. As Carl opened the plywood hatch to the crawlspace, a few stray pellets of sleet bounced off the faded sleeve of his canvas work coat. Ancient musty air rolled out of the hatch and squirmed around his body as he wormed his way through. As Carl’s eyes adjusted to the moonscape below the old Banks house, he remembered how many times he’d been in the rear bedroom just above that spot.
The latest time was during the Sutton’s house warming party four months ago. When he got home from work, Carl snuck through the thicket the same way he’d came today. No one at the party saw him. Everyone was too busy kissing Brenda’s pert ass. Instead of going under the house like he did now, he climbed in through the bedroom window. There, he fired up Scott’s computer and tried to delete the files for that book Scott always worked on. Scott hid the files well or he kept them on a disk, because Carl couldn’t find them. He thought about formatting the hard drive, but there wasn’t time. Any minute, some party guest might bounce through the door and catch him. The best he could do was open the word processor and type a bunch of obscenities and gibberish. Then, an idea popped into his head. He deleted his previous work and in a large fifty-point font he typed, "LEAVE WHITE TRASH LEAVE WHITE TRASH LEAVE WHITE TRASH...," until he filled the page. Carl made sure there was enough paper in the tray and ordered the computer to print 100 copies.
His work done, he climbed back out the window. As he closed the window, a breeze pulled the curtains out around him. The bedroom door swung and slammed like a gunshot. He heard a commotion inside the house and lit out. He knew that Scott, or even better, Brenda, was coming to find his poltergeist activity.
Perfect.
Carl relished the stunt he pulled that day, but some hardheaded people just couldn’t take a hint. The crawlspace spread before him about thirty feet to the sunken spot below the kitchen. It was a hard crawl for a man of his age even though working the boiler room at Tucker Paper kept him in shape. Dragging a hundred pounds of dead weight behind him didn’t help. As he towed the dog forward, he kept watch for the spiders and scorpions that loved to winter in damp dark places.
***
For years, Carl kept up his little game of tormenting Pumpkinhead Johnny. Missy never guessed what went on when she wasn’t looking. Every few days he came over and looked for the gold and silver that lay waiting. When Johnny wanted attention, Carl jabbed him with a pin. That soon grew old, so he got creative. Once he helped Johnny stick pennies up the misshapen nostrils of his pig-like snout. Three days later old Doc Simmons dug through all the jellied snot and snagged them with needle-nosed pliers.
Another time, the boys were out behind the barn. Thirteen now, he stood a head taller than Johnny. Johnny’s misshapen mouth sucked noisily at a grape Popsicle. The racket he made so annoyed Carl that he took it away and teased Johnny with it. The laughing Pumpkinhead chased him all around the old hog lot to get it back. Grunting and grabbing after the Popsicle with his stumbling lope, Johnny soon tired. Carl stopped and brought what was left of it back. For once, he thought, Pumpkinhead might just cry. Johnny stood there out of breath and reaching. He opened and closed his mitts like crab claws, while grunting his animal noises, begging for the Popsicle.
Carl taunted Johnny with the melting Popsicle once more, then rubbed grape goop all over Johnny’s bald head and threw the remains in the dust. For once, Carl thought he saw a spark of humanity in Johnny’s face as the retard looked down at the melting mess lying in the dust. Carl flew into a rage. He knew there was no way a monster like Johnny harbored a human spirit. Johnny Banks couldn’t have a soul like him, like anyone else. Trash like the Banks’ weren’t real people. They were livestock, nothing more and lived only for the pleasure of others.
But, he saw that spark in Johnny’s eyes. Damn him. Deep down it terrified Carl to think that Johnny might feel. Johnny might think that he was the same, as good as him and everyone else. He pushed Johnny down and sat on his back, holding the ogre face down in an anthill. Johnny struggled as the red swarm gnawed the flesh from his eyes and ears. Carl held him, hating him more than he ever had
before. Johnny squalled like a pig in the slaughterhouse, choking on the dirt and stinging ants. He struggled, throwing dirt and hog shit in all directions.
When Johnny’s resistance faded, Carl let him up. He brushed the ants away and led Johnny to his mother. Once again, he played the dutiful, protective friend in her presence. The ants had done Johnny terrible. As Missy Banks ministered to her son, Carl realized how warm and caring she really was. She looked soft and attractive, but the widow hadn’t allowed a man around the farm for years. For the first time, Carl felt something stir deep inside.
***
He had just about given up towing the dead dog when Digger tottered over the edge and fell into the depression. Carl had tired long before as the crawlspace pressed in tight around him. He’d worked thirty years squirming into tight spaces in the mill power plant without a hint of claustrophobia. Now, the surroundings closed in on him.
Could it be bad air? Carl blinked his eyes, but saw none of the little sparklies on his retina he knew as the telltale signs of poisoned air. He smelled no gas either. Probably just his imagination, but space between the rock piers that supported the house looked smaller. The floor joists hugged closer to the ground than he remembered. He must have gained some weight in the last few weeks.
Carl knew he had taken too much time getting Digger under the house. He wormed his way around the depression until his head and shoulders pointed toward the exit hatch. Even the way out looked further from this direction. He couldn’t be more than thirty feet away, but it looked more like a hundred.
He had to get out now. His perception was out of whack and every sense skewed wildly. He wanted escape, just like the night he first found the gold.
***
Carl stayed away from the Banks place for more than a week while Johnny healed from his ant stings. Doc Simmons said he didn’t know how Johnny survived with so many bites and stings. Miracle. He used that word.
Before, Carl wouldn’t have cared. He would even have welcomed Johnny’s death, but that attitude changed after the hog lot. When he went back, Carl gave little thought to torturing Johnny, even less to treasure. He had a new fascination.
Missy Banks.
All Carl could think about was Johnny’s mother. She prowled his dreams at night and consumed his thoughts by day. Missy was in her mid thirties. She was at least twenty years older than Carl, but in his mind, that didn’t matter.
One day, while Johnny played in the hayloft, Carl spied on Missy through cracks in the siding as she hung out the wash. The evening sun shone through her simple cotton housedress revealing the silhouette of her slender shape. Autumn light set her auburn hair afire with colors that rivaled the changing leaves.
Sitting there under Missy’s spell, it occurred to him that he hadn’t thought of treasure in weeks. Treasure could wait. Carl had already found the gold he wanted. He would have it, too. His fourteenth birthday was in four weeks, so he had plenty of time to plan. He would hold the only gold he cared for.
The golden hair and flesh of Missy Banks would be his own.
***
Carl stopped crawling, out of breath again. Halfway to the doorway, the hip pocket of his overalls had snagged on a nail hanging from one of the floor joists. He reached back with his left hand and wrenched it free. The nail bit into the back of his hand.
"Shit."
Blood streamed from the wound. He bit his lip and struggled forward. Splinters from the rough sawn joists tore into the back of his neck and down his back. They left his jacket in shreds.
Now Carl saw the sparklies. Bad air hid under the house after all, and it sapped his strength. He could feel the life seeping from his body. He had to hurry. There wasn’t far to crawl. When he reached the door, he would breathe.
A shadow perched in the small door opening now. Sutton’s terrier looked in at him and wagged its tail. Good. He’d wring that fuzzy little neck and toss it under here with Digger. The more stink the better.
Carl struggled forward to the door. This wasn’t his imagination. It was tighter under the house. With his hands, he scooped the dirt from in front of him, pushed it away to the side, and squeezed his way forward. He had to hurry. The kids were coming over for his birthday supper.
Now, he smelled something more than bad air. Something dead.
***
Two days before his fourteenth birthday, Carl’s family relented and gave him his present. The .22 rifle was just what he wanted. He treasured it and fondled the blued steel. That evening he took it over to Johnny’s house and proudly showed it to Missy. The deadly eye staring from the end of the muzzle impressed her so much that she did everything Carl told her to do.
First, he had her lock Johnny in the closet. Carl propped a chair against the doorknob for extra security. Then, he had Missy strip naked and tied her to the bed. He savored the sight of her soft flesh, so white and creamy. It almost glowed sky blue in the dark room except where the sun had caressed Missy’s arms and face to gold. Carl used her off and on all night.
He returned from school the next day, removed the gag from Missy’s mouth, and tried to kiss her. She responded with curses and a wicked bite instead of the affection he craved. Carl put the gag back and resumed the previous night’s game.
Before, he had been timid and cautious, but now he felt so free. He worked more confident, more brutal.
By the third night, it all began to bore him. He let Johnny out of the closet and tied him to the foot of the bed looking down at his mother. He placed a plastic bag over Johnny’s head and raped his mother again as Johnny watched and suffocated.
That chore out of the way, Carl unbagged and untied Johnny. He cleaned him up, dressed him in his pajamas, and placed Johnny in bed so people would think he died in his sleep. Then, Carl took a bath, set an alarm clock, and crawled into bed beside Missy. She lay there in shock, dehydrated, and catatonic with grief while he got a quick nap.
It was midnight when the alarm rang. Missy lay quiet beside Carl. Drugged with shock, she no longer even wept. He could tell she just didn’t care anymore. This was no fun. He untied her and held her at gunpoint as he made her bathe, fix her hair, and put on make up. Then, Carl guided her back to the bedroom and ordered her into the old black dress she wore to funerals. No underwear. No stockings. Just the dress.
Carl tied Missy’s hands again, but loose this time. He knew she wouldn’t resist even if she could. As she staggered ahead of him toward the barn, he couldn’t help appreciating her quiet beauty. He wished this could go on forever, but it couldn’t. Carl had used Missy up just like every other possession he ever had. He hated that it had to end, but now she was just another broken toy with sharp edges he had to destroy for safety’s sake.
They climbed to the hayloft and Carl ordered her to kneel. Missy obeyed and moaned the Lord’s Prayer.
"Our Father, Who art in—"
"Stop!"
The words burned in his head. She kept up in a whisper that filled the barn with a wail of deafening loudness.
"—deliver us from evil—"
The barn creaked and shuddered. It leaned as if it would fall any minute.
"Quit it!"
Missy kept praying. He noticed that, just like her son, she wouldn't cry. How touching. Carl told Missy he loved her and kissed her cheek. He placed the same plastic bag he used on Johnny over her head. She didn't struggle. She just waited and prayed in a plastic-muffled whisper. Carl held her close until she died.
After removing the bag and the rope from her wrists, Carl went to the house and tidied up. He came back to the barn, tied a grass rope noose around Missy's neck, and tied the other end to a rafter. As he shoved her body out the hayloft door, Carl smiled and sang Happy Birthday to himself.
The rope grew taut and Missy’s lifeless neck snapped. Three days passed before a neighbor found her hanging there. The whole of Lovely County thought Missy had hanged herself after finding her Johnny dead. That was fifty years ago today.
***
&n
bsp; Sutton's little black mutt stared at Carl struggling toward the crawl space door for almost an hour. The terrier stood just out of reach. Carl struggled with each breath and sucked in only the stench of whatever was decomposing behind him. He knew it wasn't Digger, but he didn't have time to care.
With one more surge forward, he grasped the doorframe leading out of the crawl space and pulled himself forward. His face almost at the opening, Carl inhaled deep of the fresh air until his head cleared. He glanced back over his shoulder. Now, everything looked normal. The floor joists loomed with two feet of room between them and the ground. A man could crawl on his hands and knees let alone slither on his belly as he had just done.
Carl hated that place.
He pulled himself further toward the door. Scott's terrier bounced and wagged its tail, wanting to play. Carl grabbed for it, but the little dog leapt away from his grasp.
"You think you're sharp. Just wait till you see what I do to your family."
The image of Scott bound and helpless while he had his way with Brenda struck him as a most desirable outcome. He hoped they stayed. She could use a good boogerin’.
Carl felt the sudden clasp of cold hands on his ankles, jerking him backwards. He struggled and regained his grip on the doorframe. He glanced back over his shoulder. The stench of rotting flesh took his breath. The sight tore a scream from his lips, but with no wind in his lungs, he made no sound.
This couldn't be happening. Pumpkinhead Johnny Banks was alive, pulling him backwards and laughing that snot-slinging retard laugh. Carl pulled to the door as hard as he could and gained some ground. His body levitated on his strength, suspended clear of the ground between his grip on the doorframe and Johnny’s grasp on his ankles.
Carl doubled his efforts, surged toward the doorway, and felt Johnny’s grasp slip. Almost free, he would win again. Carl watched as the door to the crawlspace slammed in his face. Stars burst in his eyes. His fingers sheared away with a searing pain. Johnny dragged him backwards as he clawed at the ground with the bloody stubs of severed fingers. No use. Johnny pulled him back toward the sunken spot, laughing all the way. Carl looked back again and saw Johnny descend into the depression.
Ruthless: An Extreme Shock Horror Collection Page 16