The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 22

by Stephen Jones

  “Good morning,” she said.

  “Good morning,” he replied, and then automatically, ridiculously, “did you sleep well?”

  She smirked at this, treated it as a deliberate joke. “Well, I’m sure the hotel would have been nicer.”

  “Yes,” he said. And then, still being ridiculous, “I think we nearly got there, though. The Sat Nav said we were about three miles off.”

  She didn’t smirk this time. “I’m hungry,” she said.

  “We’ll get out of this soon,” he said.

  “All right.”

  “Are you in pain?” he asked.

  “No,” she said. “Just the itching. The itching is horrible. You know.”

  “Yes,” he said, although he didn’t. “I’m in a fair amount of pain,” he added, almost as an afterthought. “I don’t think I can move.”

  “Not much point bothering with that hotel now,” said Esther. “I say we move right on to the next, put it down as a bad lot.”

  He smiled. “Yes, all right.”

  “And I don’t think we’ll be doing a stately home today. Not like this. Besides, I think I’ve had my fill of stately homes. They’re just houses, aren’t they, with better furniture in? I don’t care about any of that. I don’t need better furniture, so long as I have you. Our own house, as simple as it might be, does me fine, darling. With you in it, darling.”

  “Yes,” he said. “Darling, you do know we’ve been in a car crash. Don’t you?” (And that you’re covered in blood.)

  “Of course I do,” she said, and she sounded a bit testy. “I’m itchy, aren’t I? I’m itching all over. The feathers.” And then she smiled at him, a confrontation neatly avoided. Everything smoothed over. “You couldn’t scratch my back, could you, darling? Really, the itching is terrible.”

  “No,” he reminded her. “I can’t move, can I?”

  “Oh yes,” she said.

  “And I’m in pain.”

  “You said,” she snapped, and she stuck out her bottom lip in something of a sulk. He wished she hadn’t, it distorted her face all the more.

  “I’m really sorry about all this,” he said. “Driving us off the road. Getting us into all this. Ruining the holiday.”

  “Oh, darling,” she said, and the lip was back in, and the sulk was gone. “I’m sure it wasn’t your fault.”

  “I don’t know what happened.”

  “I’m sure the holiday isn’t ruined.”

  Harry laughed. “Well, it’s not going too well! The car’s a write-off!” He didn’t like laughing. He stopped. “I’ll get you out of this. I promise.” He decided he wouldn’t tell Esther about the rescue attempt, just in case it wasn’t real, he couldn’t entirely be sure what had actually happened back there in the pitch black. But he couldn’t keep anything from Esther, it’d have been wrong, it’d have felt wrong. “Help is on its way. I saw a farmer last night. He went to get an ambulance.”

  If the Scottish farmer were real, then he wouldn’t ever need to bend his arm to reach his cell phone. The thought of his cell phone suddenly made him sick with fear. His arm would snap. His arm would snap right off.

  “A farmer?” she asked.

  “A Scottish farmer,” he said. “With a dog,” he added.

  “Oh.”

  They didn’t say anything for a while. He smiled at her, she smiled at him. He felt a little embarrassed doing this after a minute or two – which was absurd, she was his wife, he shouldn’t feel awkward around his wife. After a little while her eyes wandered away, began looking through him, behind him, for something which might be more interesting – and he was stung by that, just a little, as if he’d been dismissed somehow. And he was just about to turn his head away from her anyway, no matter how much it hurt, when he saw her suddenly shudder.

  “The itch,” she said. “Oh God!” And she tried to rub herself against the back of the seat, but she couldn’t really do it, she could barely move. The most she could do was spasm a bit. Like a broken puppet trying to jerk itself into life – she looked pathetic, he actually wanted to laugh at the sight of her writhing there, he nearly did, and yet he felt such a pang of sympathy for her, his heart went out to her at that moment like no other. On her face was such childlike despair, help me, it said. And then: “Can’t you scratch my fucking back?” she screamed. “What fucking use are you?”

  He didn’t think he’d ever heard her swear before. Not serious swears. Not “fucking”. No. No, he hadn’t. “Frigging” a few times. That was it. Oh dear. Oh dear.

  She breathed heavily, glaring at him. “Sorry,” she said at last. But she didn’t seem sorry. And then she closed her eyes.

  And at last he could turn from her, without guilt, he hadn’t looked away, he hadn’t given up on her, in spite of everything he was still watching over her. And then he saw what Esther had been looking at behind his shoulder all that time.

  Oddly enough, it wasn’t the wings that caught his attention at first. Because you’d have thought the wings were the strangest thing. But no, it was the face, just the face. So round, so perfectly round, no, like a sphere, the head a complete sphere. You could have cut off that head and played football with it. And there was no blemish to the face, it was like this had come straight from the factory, newly minted, and every other face you had ever seen was like a crude copy of it, some cheap hack knock-off. The eyes were bright and large and very very deep, the nose a cute little pug. The cheeks were full and fat and fleshy, all puffed out.

  But then Harry’s eyes, of course, were drawn to the wings. There was only so long he could deny they were there. Large and white and jutting out of the shoulder blades. They gave occasional little flaps, as the perfect child bobbed about idly outside the car window. Creamy pale skin, a shock of bright yellow hair, and a bright yellow halo hovering above it – there was nothing to keep it there, it tilted independently of the head, sometimes at a rather rakish angle – it looked like someone had hammered a dinner tray into the skull with invisible nails. Little toes. Little fingers. Babies’ fingers. And (because, yes, Harry did steal a look) there was nothing between the legs at all, the child’s genitals had been smoothed out like it was a naked Action Man toy.

  The little child smiled amiably at him. Then raised a knuckle. And tapped three times against the glass.

  “What are you?” – which Harry knew was a pointless question, it was pretty bloody obvious what it was – and even the cherub rolled his eyes at that, but then smiled back as if to say, just kidding, no offence, no hard feelings.

  The child seemed to imitate Harry’s expressions, maybe he was sending him up a little – he’d put his head to one side like he did, he’d frown just the same, blink in astonishment, the whole parade. When Harry put his face close to the window it hurt, but he did it anyway – and the child put its head as close as it could too. There was just a sheet of glass between them. They could have puckered up, they could almost have kissed had they wanted! And at one point it seemed to Harry the child did pucker up those lips, but no, it was just taking in a breath, like a sigh, a hiss. “Can you understand me? Can you hear what I’m saying?” The child blinked in astonishment again, fluttered its wings a bit. “Can you get help?” And what did he expect, that it’d find a phone box and ring the emergency services, that it’d fly into the nearest police station? “Are you here to watch over us?”

  And then the cherub opened its mouth. And it wasn’t a sigh, it was a hiss. Hot breath stained the glass; Harry recoiled from it. And the teeth were so sharp, and there were so many, how could so many teeth fit into such a small mouth? And hiding such a dainty tongue too, just a little tongue, a baby’s tongue. The child attacked the window, it gnawed on the glass with its fangs. Desperately, hungrily, the wings now flapping wild. It couldn’t break through. It glared, those bright eyes now blazing with fury, and the hissing became seething, and then it was gone – with a screech it had flown away.

  There was a scratch left streaked across the pane.

&n
bsp; Harry sat back, hard, his heart thumping. It didn’t hurt to do so. There was pain, but it was something distant now, his body had other things to worry about. And whilst it was still confused, before it could catch up – and before he could change his mind – he was lifting his arm, he was bending it, and twisting it back on itself (and it didn’t snap, not at all), he was going for his coat, pulling at the zip, pulling it down hard, he was reaching inside the coat, reaching inside the jacket inside the coat, reaching inside the pocket inside the jacket inside the – and he had it, his fingers were brushing it, his fingers were gripping it, the phone, the cell phone.

  By the time he pulled it out his body had woken up to what he was trying to do. Oh no, it said, not allowed, and told him off with a flush of hot agony – but he was having none of that, not now. The phone was turned off. Of course it was. He stabbed at the pin number, got it right second time. “Come on, come on,” he said. The phone gave a merry little tune as it lit up. He just hoped there was enough battery power.

  There was enough battery power. What it didn’t have was any network coverage. Not this far out in the Highlands! Not in one of the many middles of nowhere that Scotland seemed to offer. The signal bar was down to zero.

  “No, “he insisted, “no.” And the body really didn’t want him to do this, it was telling him it was a very bad idea, but Harry began to wave the phone about, trying to pick up any signal he could. By the time a bar showed, he was raising the phone above his head, and he was crying.

  He stabbed at 999. The phone was too far away for him to hear whether there was any response. “Hello!” he shouted. “There’s been a car crash! We’ve crashed the car. Help us! We’re in . . . I don’t know where we are. We’re in Scotland. Scotland! Find us! Help!” And his arm was shaking with the pain, and he couldn’t hold on any longer, and he dropped it, it clattered behind his seat to the floor. And at last he allowed himself a scream as he lowered his arm, and that scream felt good.

  The scream didn’t wake Esther. That was a good thing. At least she was sleeping soundly.

  For a few minutes he let himself believe his message had been heard. That he’d held on to a signal for long enough. That the police had taken notice if he had. That they’d be able to track his position from the few seconds he’d given them. And then he just cried again, because really, why the hell shouldn’t he?

  He was interrupted by a voice. “Turn around when possible.” His heart thumped again, and then he realised it was the Sat Nav. It was that nice man from the Sat Nav, the one who spoke well enough for telly. The display had lit up, and there was some attempt at finding a road, but they weren’t on a road, were they? And the Sat Nav was confused, poor thing, it couldn’t work out what on earth was going on. “Turn around when possible,” the Sat Nav suggested again.

  Harry had to laugh, really. He spoke to the Sat Nav. It made him feel better to speak to someone. “I thought I’d heard the last of you!”

  And then the Sat Nav said, “Daddy.”

  And nothing else. Not for a while.

  For the rest of the day he didn’t see anything else of the child. He didn’t see much else of Esther either; once in a while she seemed to surface from a sleep, and he’d ask her if she were all right. And sometimes she’d glare at him, and sometimes she’d smile kindly, and most often she wouldn’t seem to know who he was at all. And he’d doze fitfully. At one point he jerked bolt upright in the night when he thought he heard tapping against the window – “No, go away!” – but he decided this time it really was the wind, because it soon stopped. Yes, the wind. Or the branches. Or a Scottish farmer this time, who can tell? Who can tell?

  In the morning he woke to find, once again, Esther was looking straight at him. She was smiling. This was one of her smiling times.

  “Good morning!” she said.

  “Good morning,” he replied. “How are you feeling?”

  “I feel hungry,” she said.

  “I’m sure,” he said. “We haven’t eaten in ages.”

  She nodded at that.

  Harry said, “The last time would have been at that stately home. You know, we had the cream tea. You gave me one of your scones.”

  She nodded at that.

  Harry said, “I bet you regret that now. Eh? Giving me one of your scones!”

  She nodded at that. Grinned.

  “The itching’s stopped,” she declared. “Do you know, there was a time back there that I really thought it might drive me mad. Really, utterly loop the loop. But it’s stopped now. Everything’s okay.”

  “That’s nice,” he said. “I’m going to get you out of here, I promise.”

  “I don’t care about that any more,” she said. “I’m very comfortable, thanks.” She grinned again. He saw how puffed her cheeks were. He supposed her face had been bruised; he supposed there was a lot of dried blood in the mouth, distorting her features like that. “In fact,” she said, “I feel as light as a feather.”

  “You’re feeling all right?”

  She nodded at that.

  “Can you open the door?” he asked. She looked at him stupidly. “The door on your side. Can you open it? I can’t open mine.”

  She shrugged, turned a little to the left, pulled at the handle. The door swung open. The air outside was cold and delicious.

  “Can you go and get help?” he asked. She turned back to him, frowned. “I can’t move,” he said. “I can’t get out. Can you get out?”

  “Why would I want to do that?” she asked.

  He didn’t know what to say. She tilted her head to one side, waiting for an answer.

  “Because you’re hungry,” he said.

  She considered this. Then tutted. “I’m sure I’ll find something in here,” she said. “If I put my mind to it.” And she reached for the door, reached right outside for it, then slammed it shut. And as she did so, Harry saw how his wife’s back bulged. That there was a lump underneath her blouse, and it was moving, it rippled. And he saw where some of it had pushed a hole through the blouse, and he saw white, he saw feathers.

  “Still a bit of growing to do, but the itching has stopped,” she said. “But don’t you worry about me, I’ll be fine.” She grinned again, and there were lots of teeth, there were too many teeth, weren’t there? And then she yawned, and then she went back to sleep.

  She didn’t stir, not for hours. Not until the child came back. “Daddy,” said the Sat Nav, and it wasn’t a child’s voice, it was still the cultured man, calm and collected, as if he were about to navigate Harry over a roundabout. And there was the cherub! – all smiles, all teeth, his temper tantrum forgotten, bobbing about the window, even waving at Harry as if greeting an old friend. And, indeed, he’d brought friends with him, a whole party of them! Lots of little cherubs, it was impossible to tell how many, they would keep on bobbing so! – a dozen, maybe two dozen, who knows? And each of them had the same perfect face, the same spherical head, the same halos listing off the same gleaming hair. Tapping at the window for play, beating on the roof, beating at the door – laughing, mostly laughing, they wanted to get in but this was a game, they liked a challenge! Mostly laughing, though there was the odd shriek of frustration, the odd hiss, lots more scratches on the glass.

  One little cherub did something very bad-tempered with the radio aerial. Another little cherub punched an identical brother in the face in a dispute over the rear-view mirror. They scampered all over the car, but there was no way in. It all reminded Harry of monkeys at a safari park. He’d never taken Esther to a safari park. He never would now. “Daddy Daddy,” said the Sat Nav. “Daddy Daddy,” it kept on saying, emotionless, even cold – and the little children danced merrily outside.

  “Oh, aren’t they beautiful!” cooed Esther. She reached for the door. “Shall we let them in?”

  “Please,” said Harry. “Please. Don’t.”

  “No. All right.” And she closed her eyes again. “Just leaves more for me,” she said.

  For the first few
days he was very hungry. Then one day he found he wasn’t hungry at all. He doubted that was a good thing.

  He understood that the cherubs were hungry too. Most of them had flown away, they’d decided that they weren’t going to get into this particular sardine tin – but there were always one or two about, tapping away, ever more forlorn. Once in a while a cherub would turn to Harry, and pull its most innocent face, eyes all wide and Disney-dewed, it’d look so sad. It’d beg, it’d rub its naked belly with its baby fingers, and it’d cry. “Daddy,” the Sat Nav would say at such moments. But however winning their performance, the cherubs still looked fat and oily, and their puffy cheeks were glowing.

  Harry supposed they probably were starving to death. But not before he would.

  One day Harry woke up to find Esther was on top of him. “Good morning,” she said to him, brightly. It should have been agony she was there, but she was as light as air, as light as a feather.

  Her face was so very close to his, it was her hot breath that had roused him. Now unfurled, the wings stretched the breadth of the entire car. Her halo was grazing the roof. The wings twitched a little as she smiled down at him and bared her teeth.

  “I love you,” she said.

  “I know you do.”

  “I want you to know that.”

  “I do know it.”

  “Do you love me too?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  And she brought that head towards his – that now spherical head, he could still recognise Esther in the features, but this was probably Esther as a child, as a darling baby girl – she brought down that head, and he couldn’t move from it, she could do whatever she wanted. She opened her mouth. She kissed the tip of his nose.

  She sighed. “I’m so sorry, darling,” she said.

  “I’m sorry too.”

  “All the things we could have done together,” she said. “All the places we could have been. Where would we have gone, darling?”