by Smith, Bryan
On the jukebox, a Buck Owens song gave way to Bob Marley’s “Lively Up Yourself.”
Luke opened his eyes.
His head slowly swiveled in the direction of the jukebox. He stared at it for a long moment. His gaze shifted back to the bartender. Stu had just picked up his old pulp paperback and was about resume reading when he sensed Luke staring at him and glanced his way.
“Need another refill already?”
Luke shook his head. “Soon, probably. But for the moment I’m a lot more curious about the current musical selection.”
Stu frowned. “What? You got something against Bob Marley?”
Luke took a contemplative sip of Pabst before responding to this. “Not at all. Big fan, myself.” In reality, he had only a passing familiarity with the late reggae singer’s most popular songs. He thought they were okay, though the genre wasn’t really his thing. Neither was the shitkicker music that had been the norm here for as far back as he could remember, but this was a blue collar dive in a small town. That stuff made sense here. Bob Marley, maybe not so much. “It’s just that I’m pretty sure I never heard any reggae on the juke here back in the day.”
Stu shrugged. “I made some minor changes to the music selection when I took over the run of the place. You’ll also hear some Grateful Dead and classic rock stuff now and then.”
The old guy to the right of the fat guy said, “And thank Christ for that. The rock and roll brings in the babes.”
Luke frowned.
He took a look around the place. There were still no women present.
He looked at the old guy. The guy was somewhere well north of seventy, Luke was pretty sure. The top of his head was shiny and bald. His remaining hair was wispy and snow-white. His wrinkled hands were dotted with age spots. If this guy was scoring any “babes” on a regular basis, Luke would have to take it as final confirmation that the universe was a strange and fucked-up place.
“So where are all these babes tonight?”
The old guy snorted. “Hell, son. It’s Christmas Eve. They’re all at home with their regular fellas or visiting with family.”
The fat guy nodded. “It’s only us alcoholics here tonight. The confirmed dipsomaniacs.”
The old guy raised his glass in a toast. “To alcoholism!”
The fat guy clinked his beer bottle against the old man’s whiskey glass. “To alcoholism!”
At the far end of the bar were two more gray-haired older gentlemen. Both raised their glasses and echoed the toast, albeit a bit less heartily than Fatso and Old Guy.
What the hell? Luke thought.
He raised his double whiskey and said, “To alcoholism!”
He drained the glass and slammed it down on the bar.
Stu arched an eyebrow. “Refill?”
“Absolutely.”
Luke sipped from his Pabst while he waited for the next double whiskey to arrive. He listened as Fatso and Old Guy lapsed into a bit of sports talk. They had differing opinions on how the NFL playoffs picture was shaping up. Years ago, Luke might have held a reasonably well-informed opinion on that subject himself. Like with so many other things, though, he’d long ago stopped giving a damn.
On a disconnected level, he was aware of the bar’s front door opening again. A gust of cold wind swept into the place, making him shiver. But rather than looking toward the door to take in the new arrival, he sat there in silent imitation of the don’t-give-a-shit stoicism evinced by the regulars. In the next instant, the influx of cold air was cut off as the door was eased back into the frame.
Booted feet clomped slowly across the hardwood floor.
Another double whiskey was in front of Luke now. He picked up the glass and brought it to his mouth. Before he could tip his head back for a swallow, he felt something hard prod against the back of his neck.
“Put the whiskey down and take out your wallet, cocksucker,” a gruff voice told him. “This here’s a robbery.”
Luke slowly lowered his glass to the bar.
He let out a big breath.
Then he spun around on the stool with his fist swinging.
3.
It was already dark by the time the Ford Explorer made it to the top of Haunted Hill and pulled to a stop alongside the porch of the old Herzinger place. The snow was coming down harder now and the drive up the winding, pothole-dotted narrow drive had been an unexpectedly treacherous one. According to weather reports earlier in the day, a heavier snowfall wasn’t due to begin until much deeper into the evening, maybe not even until the early hours of the morning. But the forecasts had been wrong because the white stuff was coming down so thickly it’d reduced visibility to almost nothing.
On the way up, the Explorer’s tires lost traction and slid on the decaying stretch of ancient asphalt multiple times, eliciting screams and shouts of alarm from every occupant but the driver. Riding in the front passenger seat, Simone Barclay screamed at least as loudly as any of her friends, maybe even more so. Her vantage point gave her a significantly better view of the deteriorating situation outside than what was available to those seated in the back. She saw, for instance, how close the Explorer’s front end came to actually sliding off the edge of the road at one point. If that had happened, the vehicle would have gone tumbling down a steep slope, resulting in serious injury or death for all of them. It didn’t happen, but it was a very close thing. The brush with near disaster brought forth her loudest, shrillest scream of the night.
Spence Chandler, her boyfriend, was driving, and he kept yelling at her to shut her stupid fucking mouth. Under any other circumstances, Simone would have slapped him silly for talking to her that way, but she was too terrified to do anything but brace her hands against the dash and pray they made it to the top of the hill safely. She felt close to hyperventilating by the time the ground beneath them finally evened out, allowing the SUV to make the remainder of the journey to the deserted old house in relatively smooth fashion.
After Spence pulled up alongside the porch and parked, Simone shivered in relief and settled back in her seat. “Maybe we should go back.”
Spence scowled. “After all that? Are you shitting me?”
Simone’s gaze was fixed on the dark line of trees at the edge of the abandoned property. The trees were just barely visible through the gusting snow, more like shadowy suggestions of trees than the real thing. The shadowy forms shifted in the hard-blowing wind, igniting a tingle of unease. In her imagination, they weren’t trees at all. Instead, they were monsters emerging from the woods. Soon they would creep up on the SUV and pounce on the helpless human prey inside. They could be Bigfoots. Maybe werewolves. Or something else big and scary. But it was just the hard wind blowing the branches around. Simone knew that, but the knowledge made the notion no less creepy.
Now she slowly turned her head and leveled a withering glare at Spence. “I am not shitting you. Yes, you got us up here. Awesome job. But that pitiful excuse for a drive is only gonna get worse. We could wind up trapped up here if we stay too long. So, yes, we should leave. Also, if you ever speak that rudely to me again, you can start looking for a new girlfriend.”
“She’s right,” Terry Cooper said, piping up from the back of the vehicle. There were two rows of rear passenger seats. Terry was alone in the very back. “I just checked the updated forecast on my phone. It’s saying this stuff won’t let up for hours. We should definitely head back while we still can.”
Karen Hogan, who was in the middle seat with her boyfriend, Bradley Shaw, made a loud sound of exasperation. “You’re a couple of chickenshit alarmists. I want to be here at midnight and see the ghost of old man Herzinger. We’ve been talking about this for weeks. I’m gonna be really fucking pissed if we actually made it up here only to turn around and head back.”
Simone rolled her eyes. Karen’s screams of fright during the drive up had been nearly as loud as her own. Undoing her seatbelt, she turned about to peer through the gap between the front seats at the other girl. She and Kar
en had been close since grammar school. Lately, though, she’d increasingly been making a habit of voicing views that were in direct opposition to whatever Simone’s position was on any given thing. Simone didn’t quite know what to make of it, but the undercurrent of passive-aggressiveness had become annoying.
She’d just about had enough.
“Hey, I get it, Karen. I really do. You are a tough chick. Way tougher than me. I’m a total wimp. I admit it. None of which changes the fact that staying up on this hill for hours in the middle of a damn blizzard is completely fucking stupid.”
Karen’s features shifted, pulling back in a look of disbelieving contempt. “What the actual fuck is your problem?”
Simone showed her a small, frosty smile. “You tell me. Honestly, I’m more interested in knowing what your problem is, since you obviously have one with me.”
Bradley shook his head. “Girls, girls. Can’t we all just get along?”
Karen shushed him and glared at Simone. “That must be your conscience talking, bitch. I have no idea what you’re talking about, but obviously you feel guilty about something.”
Simone clenched her teeth and drew in a breath through her nostrils. A blowup with Karen had been inevitable for a while, but this wasn’t exactly the ideal time for it. She had no clue what was going on with Karen, except that she clearly believed Simone had slighted or betrayed her in some mysterious way. But whatever it was didn’t matter at the moment, because Simone was now certain they were sitting on the brink of a genuine crisis. She needed to somehow defuse the brewing personal conflict and make these people come to their senses.
She unclenched her teeth and blew out a breath. “I’m sorry about whatever I’ve done to offend you. I really am. But--”
“Enough!”
Simone winced at her boyfriend’s shouted exclamation. She glanced at him and saw him shut off the SUV’s engine and pluck the keys from the ignition. “What are you doing?”
Spence waggled the keys at her. “The two of you can argue until you’re blue in the fucking face, but no one’s going anywhere without these.” He sneered. “We’re staying until midnight, as fucking planned.”
Before Simone could think of a response to this, Spence opened the door on his side, stepped out into the howling wind, and slammed the door shut.
Karen chuckled. “Got put in your place, didn’t you? Gotta love it when a guy shows a whiny bitch who’s wearing the pants in a relationship.” She nudged Bradley hard in the ribs with an elbow. “Get out, goddammit. And grab the beer.”
Bradley grabbed a case of Budweiser cans from the floor, opened the door to his left, and got out of the SUV. Once again, a chill wind blew into the vehicle, driving out the last of the warmth that had only moments ago suffused its interior. Karen wasted no time following him into the wind and snow. She reached back inside for a second and thrust an upraised middle finger at Simone before slamming the door shut.
A silent moment elapsed.
Terry Cooper cleared his throat. “So…that was awkward.”
Simone sighed. “Yeah.”
“What do you think her problem is?”
“I don’t know. I really don’t.”
Another silence descended.
Simone turned her head and saw the rest of them climb the steps to the long front porch. She watched as Spence tried the door and found it locked. Bradley tentatively tried his luck with one of the windows, but even from this distance it was clear the attempt was doomed to failure. The windows had been nailed shut (or were just frozen to the frames) and were boarded-up from the inside. After a few half-hearted pulls at one of the handles, he gave it up and exchanged a few words with Spence that were inaudible over the howling wind.
Spence waved a hand in a gesture of contempt and turned away from Bradley to face the door again. Simone could tell from his body language what he was about to attempt. She hoped the door would prove as unyielding as the windows. Maybe then these assholes would give up and finally see this mission as the lost cause it so obviously was. The door didn’t yield to Spence’s first kick, but Simone’s heart sank when she saw how it buckled.
The second kick did the trick. The door popped open, revealing a sliver of inner blackness. Glimpsing that blackness made Simone shiver. Given what had happened here all those years ago, she felt like she was peering into a forgotten dark corner of hell. It made her feel like a ghoul. Back when Spence first suggested they visit the site of the Herzinger Family Massacre on the night of the bloody event’s tenth anniversary, she’d thought it sounded like a fun, spooky time.
But now no trace of that initial perception remained.
Spence aimed a flashlight through the opening and stood just outside the doorway for a moment as he swept the beam of light over the section of the interior viewable from his vantage point. After a moment or so of this, he glanced at Bradley and Karen, indicating with a tilt of his head that they should follow him into the house. Spence stepped through the doorway and disappeared into the blackness. Karen was right behind him. Bradley grabbed the case of beer from where he’d set it down on the porch and followed them inside.
A squeak of seat leather from the rear of the SUV made Simone’s head turn in that direction. Terry Cooper emerged from the back and, moving in a crouch, made his way to the bench seat in the middle. Clutched in his right hand were the flimsy straps of a white plastic bag, the bottom of which was strained by a six-pack of that fancy beer he liked. He settled into the center of the seat and set the beer on the floor.
He sighed and showed Simone an earnest, sorrowful expression. “I think Karen likes Spence.”
Simone frowned. “Really?”
“Yeah.”
He said it with a note of sad reluctance in his voice Simone suspected was at least partly contrivance. She knew Terry had a crush on her. In fact, he’d harbored barely concealed amorous feelings for her going back to junior high. They were now seniors in high school. She supposed anything of that duration wasn’t just a crush. It was possible he was actually in love with her. His big hope here was probably that she’d get mad enough at Spence to break up with him, then maybe turn to him for comfort.
Silly boy, she thought. Silly, sad little boy.
Simone liked Terry, but in a strictly platonic way. Her affection for him was the only reason the others allowed him to tag along on excursions like this one. Otherwise they would have nothing to do with him. Terry was a sweet boy, but he wasn’t good-looking enough for her. Thinking this made Simone feel shallow and slightly ashamed, but this in no way changed the reality of the situation.
But she thought maybe he was right in his suspicions about Karen. The theory would go a long way toward explaining the nasty turn in their decaying friendship. It was possible Karen’s bad attitude and strange, unspecified insinuations were part of an overall plan to drive a wedge between Simone and her boyfriend. If so, it was kind of working. And the conniving bitch was in that house with Spence right now while she was shivering out here in the SUV with poor, deluded Terry.
She heaved a breath. “Fuck it. Let’s go inside.”
Terry frowned. “I know you don’t want to. We could just stay out here in the car until those idiots get tired of banging around in that old dump.”
It’s the banging part I’m worried about, Simone thought.
Yes, it was highly unlikely Spence and Karen would wind up fucking in there tonight. Bradley would surely have some strenuous objections to that, after all. But even the merest suggestion of the possibility ignited Simone’s paranoia. She probably would break up with Spence someday in the not too distant future, but it would happen when she wanted it to and on her terms, dammit.
Simone shook her head. “I’m going. Please come with me. I think I’ll need somebody on my side in there.” She summoned her sweetest, most heart-melting smile and repeated the entreaty. “Please? Pretty please?”
Terry sighed in surrender. “Okay. Fine. I’d just like my objections duly noted for the r
ecord.”
“Done. Let’s go.”
Simone opened her door and stepped outside, the cold wind hitting her face like a slap from an icy hand.
4.
Luke’s fist connected with nothing but air as the man who’d demanded his wallet danced backward, grinning as the tip of his chin narrowly avoided being clipped by hard knuckles. Rising from the stool, Luke drew his fist back to take a second swing. Then the man’s identity belatedly registered.
The face was ruddier and a bit more grizzled-looking in general than he remembered, but it was still recognizably that of Greg Lancaster. Greg had been one of his best buddies growing up, but they had fallen out of touch during Luke’s long period of self-imposed exile from his hometown.
The “gun” he’d pressed to the back of Luke’s neck was actually the rounded end of a folded pocketknife. Still grinning, he tucked the knife back inside an inner pocket of his leather jacket. “You should see the look on your face, brother,” he said, chuckling. “You look like you did that time back in high school when Vivian Sloan walked up to you in the cafeteria at lunch, pulled down that skin-tight purple tube top, and flashed her tits at you. Total stupefaction.”
Luke smirked. “She did that on a dare.”
Greg nodded. “Right. Her friends bet her twenty bucks she wouldn’t do it. You just stood there with your mouth hanging open while she asked you if you saw anything you liked. When you didn’t say anything, she said ‘guess not’, pulled up her top, and walked away.”
“You guys gave me no end of shit about that.”
Luke laughed. “You deserved it.”
“But I wound up banging her at that field kegger a few weeks later, so I got the last laugh.”