by Anthology
Devon yanked my arm to propel me right and into step with him.
"Dinner."
I had forgotten. I did things like that around him. Forgot my name, when to go home, where I lived. I had sat on his sofa for three days once. Well, I had slept in between. But I had sat in a peaceful, blissful daze unaware of anything or anyone except him. Until he threw me out and made me walk home. The course of true love...
I was in the mood for steak. Devon knew this. After he tucked me and my paper bag into his car, he drove us to one of the two places a person could get a steak in Corbin. All gentleman, he held my door and helped me from the car. I tried to avoid his eyes and failed. And almost tripped over the curb. He shook his head. Inside, he told me to go on and find us a table away from everybody. I did and waited while he inched his way through the 'cattle chute' to the counter to order our steaks.
Outside, the rain that had fallen for days now beat against the thick, dark-colored windows as if it wanted to come inside to get away from itself. The shifting wind startled me, and I knocked over everything on the condiment tray sitting in the center of the table. Luckily, given where I had chosen to sit, no one had seen me. But Devon had told me 'out of the way', so 'out of the way' I had gone. Before long, he came toward the table, a red plastic tent card bearing a white number 42 in his hand.
Behind him marched the woman I took to be our waitress. She wore too-tight jeans, a too-tight black polo bearing the Western Steer logo, and a little black apron tied around her waist. Paper-wrapped straws, ink pens, and a small notepad stuck out of the apron pockets. Devon didn't have time to sit down before the waitress asked what we were drinking and placed a basket of hot dinner rolls in front of us.
After she came back with our drinks and left again, Devon and I broke bread and sipped our Pepsis. He knew the questions before I had a chance to formulate them. "We eat first," he said. We took our time, even ordered dessert and had coffee.
The first sip of coffee hadn't reached my lips when Devon said, "I need you to do some work for me again."
With unnecessary care, I set down my cup. I only knew he paid me well for casting dark magics which he refused or was unable to spin for himself. But he hadn't wanted or needed my gifts for such a long time I had begun to think he had found someone else. "I think you've beaten around the bush long enough," I said. "Spill."
He downed the last of a steaming cup of coffee before he spoke again. "Two kids are missing, and I need you to find their bodies."
"Bodies?" Chills raced over my own body. Water, lost pets, misplaced cars I could find. I hadn't ever tried to find a missing person before. Or a dead body. The thought made me sick to my stomach.
A cold draft down my back woke me, told me I lay alone in my bed. I wanted to pull my pillow close and cry into its depths, soak it with my tears. Not over the missing kids we had discussed before Devon brought me to bed, like he always did. But over the mess Devon always made of my heart and soul whenever we were intimate. Over how hollow I always felt when he left afterward. Sighing, I left the bed, pulled my clothes back on and went over to the window. Tears spilled down my face, and I wiped at them as I peered into the alley through the rain. I half-expected to see Devon, soaked through, looking back up at me.
But he was long gone, and I had work to do.
In the living room, I found what remained of the bottle of wine Devon and I had drank while we talked, or rather while he had convinced me to take this job. Which as much work as I had done for him in the past and as easily as he could talk me into anything, it hadn't taken all that much to convince me.
After I downed the wine and gathered my supplies, I set to work.
I pushed the coffee table out of the way against the front door. I wasn't expecting company. With my few tools placed in the center of the floor, I poured some salt in my right palm and used it to draw a clockwise circle on the carpet. Then, I sat behind my tools, my eyes closed, and with a deep breath, pushed my emotions, my senses, my awareness, outward.
Soon, much sooner than I expected, my booted feet landed in the mud of a rain-soaked road. I frowned. I never landed at any target and had to find my way and take myself to it. Sometimes I had to do a bit of walking and searching. And something told me tonight would be hard work. Old, dark, heavy forest hugged the trail on both sides. I cursed Devon for convincing me to do this and cursed myself for not waiting for daylight. As blessed as my sight was, I wasn't able to switch nighttime for day when I sought something.
Rain poured over me, but since I wasn't actually there, I was a ghost, I didn't get wet. I stood on the trail and gave my awareness a nudge until my fingers tingled, a sense of a spark giving me direction. With care and with trepidation of what I might find along the way, I turned and slogged through the mud the way the spark led me.
Eventually, what remained of the dirt and gravel road ended in a dirt trail. Trees and bushes and wild undergrowth hunched against the trail. I ducked, went around, and in two instances climbed over growth that threatened to overtake the narrow path. All around me, darkness pressed. Thunder roared. Lightning dropped like rain. I kept reminding myself that I wasn't really there. Ghosts couldn't be struck by lightning. At least, I'd never heard of such a thing. Straddling a large fallen tree, I wondered if I was going the right way still, although Granny's Rock had only the single trail. Had I gone too far? No. Every instinct I had told me I hadn't gone far enough. Not yet. I sighed.
Why me? Why always me?
Tears rose in my eyes. I couldn't fall apart. Not with a job to do.
The trail narrowed so far that even though I am as thin as a shadow even when I'm not a ghost, I had to turn sideways to push through. Brambles and branches snagged my hair, my skin, my clothes. It resounded in my head much like a metaphor for my life—the constant mire, the threat of failure—and I almost laughed. But alone as I was out there, I feared becoming hysterical and forced my feet to move further through the mud.
Now, this particular road-cum-trail lay on a slight incline. The few times I had ever come out here with my friends to get wasted, we would all be grateful to reach the rocky end, to drop onto the logs around the firepit beneath the evergreens and hardwoods. The angle didn't bother me so much in my current incorporeal state, but I knew my physical body would feel the wear and tear later.
I paused long enough to push my hair from my eyes, to hook loose, stray strands behind my ears. My fingertips pulsed with energy. My target was close. But it had to be. The end of the trail—the rocks, the cliff, and the firepit—was just around the corner.
I wanted to run screaming in the opposite direction. Duty to my job held me to the muddy trail.
Sure enough, when I neared the firepit, something large and lumpy lay out of place in the drenched darkness. Bile rose in my throat. I couldn't tell if I looked at two boys, two girls, or one of each. The bodies had been burned beyond recognition. They had been blindfolded, gagged, and bound at the wrists and feet.
I woke with the sun streaming into my eyes, my head in a pool of my own fetid vomit on my living room carpet. I gagged. Acid and stale vomit burned my nose, mouth, and throat as I hauled myself to my feet. Obligation dictated I call Devon before I did anything else, but I bypassed the telephone to stagger into the bathroom. I sat on the bottom of the bathtub beneath the hot shower spray and cried.
Devon and I trudged through the mud, him often stopping to help me around a quagmire or over a fallen tree. The rain had stopped. Even so, the mud sometimes came two or three inches over my ankles, and I was grateful for my boots. We spoke as we walked, but not about anything consequential and certainly not about what waited for us at the end of the trail. Had we walked along Main Street in the daylight, it would have been a normal, friendly stroll. He had insisted on picking me up half an hour before sunset which I found strange. And he had insisted on not bringing his partner along which I found even stranger. But everything about Devon was strange and always had been, so I didn't complain or ask questions.
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br /> The closer we grew to Granny's Rock, the higher my anxiety climbed. Seeing dead bodies while in astral form was one thing but seeing such up close in person was quite another. I again wondered why Devon insisted I come with him. He knew well enough on his own how to find the place. Unless he needed my gifts to provide more information once we arrived; about this, though, he hadn't said one word.
I shivered, my metaphysical senses kicking into gear.
"Are you okay?" Devon asked. His fingers laced with mine; his thumb caressed the back of my hand.
“We're close," I replied.
He gave a short laugh. "I should hope so. Otherwise we'll go over the cliff and into the river."
That didn't sound pleasant.
From here forward, the ground sloped upward to the cliff face. My pace slowed imperceptibly until Devon turned around and made a sour face. I forced a smile. Something not quite right niggled at my senses. I blamed it on being at the site in my own skin, on having never been at a crime scene before. Again I wondered why Devon had seen fit to bring me along. "They're at the firepit," I said as we turned the corner and walked toward the clearing where the scent of charred meat and wood pierced our nostrils. I fought to remind myself this wasn't meat, that the bodies of two teenagers lay in that firepit. My mind disbelieved this information.
Devon broke away from me to examine the area, to prod with the toe of his boot the ash and other debris surrounding the firepit. "Yes," he said. "Now I remember."
Part of me wanted to think I misheard him since I stood some distance away, near the cliff, but I knew in my gut he spoke aloud to himself, not meaning for me to hear. Fearful for my safety—a 200 foot cliff wasn't safe for anyone—I, with as much nonchalance as I could muster, made my way back toward the trail to put myself between the mouth of the clearing and Devon. In the near-darkness, his attention more on the bodies than anything else, he failed to notice my movements until I stood across the firepit from him. Our eyes locked. "Is this who you were looking for?" I asked.
"Yes," he said. "Do you know how they died?"
I wondered if I imagined the crooked smile that made a brief appearance on his face. "Do you need me to see?" My stomach turned.
"Only if you want to. We do have an investigative team."
I didn't want, but my senses, my gifts often had a mind of their own. Even at the distance I stood away from the bodies, images, sounds, and emotions filtered into my mind. Against my better judgment, I sat on the nearest fallen log. I needed something solid beneath me. Tears streaked my face; I fought sobs. Both teenagers, a boy and a girl, had been violently raped and strangled to death by their attacker. The boy had been forced to watch the assault on his girlfriend before he died. Then their killer had managed to bring them all the way out here to burn their bodies.
I opened my eyes to find Devon standing over me, his eyes wild, his breathing rapid and hard.
"You saw all of it, didn't you?" His chest puffed up with the pride expressed in his words.
Fear propelled me backward, unsure of how I crawled over the log and scrambled backward to my find, my mind screaming for me to run. But I could only stand there rooted to the spot and gaping at the man I thought I knew. Revulsion screamed through me, soured my stomach. "Why, Devon? Why did you do this?" I walked backward as I spoke, trying to put as much distance between us as possible.
"We all have our means of relaxation, don't we?"
Relaxation? By now, darkness had fallen so completely, I could barely see and made my way around the clearing from memory.
"I couldn't see to bury them," Devon said, still at the firepit. "I only needed you because I couldn't remember where I left them."
Part of me believed him. The part of me who knew and loved the pacifistic Devon cried in utter confusion. Would anyone believe me if I managed to run to safety and tell my story? Who would believe the word of a bank teller over that of a police officer?
Devon grabbed my arm, and I screamed.
"I can't let you leave, Erin."
Without thinking or taking aim, I balled up my fist and swung. My fist made contact with the corner of his eye and side of his nose, causing enough pain for him to release me. I took the chance to run, the mud slowing me down.
"ERIN!" Devon bellowed behind me.
I had to leave the trail so he couldn't hear my boots slapping into the mud. This made my escape even more difficult, and I hid in the underbrush. In the pitch darkness, I couldn't see Devon.
But I knew I would never leave Granny's Rock. I knew Devon's secrets.
After my heartbeat and breathing slowed somewhat and I had control of myself again, I gathered my energy, my awareness and pushed outward to separate my astral self from my body. Now I could hover over or move around the area, and Devon would never see or hear me, not unless I wanted him to.
Just then, he crashed through the brambles and briars screaming, "Did you think you could hide from me, you bitch?" He grabbed my body and threw it into the muck, unaware in his fury that it contained no conscious life while he kicked it with his feet, pummeled it with his fists.
Even as a ghost, each blow came to me just as they came to my physical body. Because of this, I bit my lip to keep from crying out and alighted on the soggy ground some distance away. Leaned against a tree to steady myself, with my eyes to show me and the night forest to cradle me in its arms, I bore witness to my own murder.
Devon removed his hands from my battered neck and let my body drop into the mud.
At this I moved forward to walk near him as he left his place.
He gave me no notice until I came close enough to be the cold wind in his hair. Annoyed, he tried to brush me away.
I laughed, making sure he heard.
A damp spot grew on the front of his jeans.
I laughed harder. "What's wrong, Devon? Did you think you could get rid of me that easy?"
If you enjoyed the regional flavor of Mari’s story then you might like her Appalachian-themed horror and dark fantasy anthology HARLAN COUNTY HORRORS.
In the black heart of coal country, malevolent spirits and unearthly creatures slip from the shadows into the minds and hearts of men. Young women, twisted by pain, call for love and revenge by the light of the moon. A dead dog by the side of the road is more than it seems. In Harlan County, Kentucky, the supernatural and the mundane mingle in the depths of the earth, filling the mines with powerful forces that draw people down and corrupt from within.
Harlan County Horrors is a regional based horror anthology by Apex Magazine submissions editor Mari Adkins. It will feature stories by Alethea Kontis, Debbie Kuhn, Earl Dean, Geoffrey Girard, Jason Sizemore, Jeremy Shipp, Maurice Broaddus, Robby Sparks, Ronald Kelly, Stephanie Lenz, Steven Shrewsbury, and TL Trevaskis.
“It’s been a while since I’ve read an anthology as good as Harlan County Horrors. Throughout the project, Harlan County maintains her individuality while the authors offer varying plots and characters that define her people, mountains, and valleys. All the while, Mari Adkins does a great job as tour guide, ensuring a bushel of great old-fashioned storytelling, Appalachian folklore, and well-developed characters. I had a hankerin’ for a chaw of tobacco the whole time I read it.”
—Michael Knost, editor of Writers Workshop of Horror and Legends of the Mountain State
Available today from Apex Publications
http://www.apexbookcompany.com
POWERED
Deb Taber
Deb Taber has been editing for Apex Publications since 2006. During that time, she has gone from slush editor to the senior editor of the Apex book division. While editing is one of her passions, she also has an affinity to hanging from rafters (she’s a lighting producer for theatres).
This story first appeared in Shadowed Realms, issue 11, 2006.
Miss Taber calls this story an example of the sub-genre of ‘Tool Porn’. Frankly, I’m not sure if that’s even a sub-genre, but I’m not about to go digging around on Google to find out.
—§—
The spinning teeth, the motor's squall, the sawdust hanging in the air; it all means more than work to Cassie. It means life.
Two hundred and forty volts of alternating current course through the wired veins of the antique table saw. Measure, cut, measure, cut: the craft has been in her family since the first Appalachian Pine box formed under triple-great Uncle Hank's handsaw. He bought the table-saw for double-great Aunt Selli back before he died in that nasty shop accident.
Now the saw is Cassie's—was Mama Marie's until just last week, but now she's resting six feet under in Cassie's best work. It shouldn't have been Mama's time to go, and Cassie still feels bad about that.
The saw had been acting up again. It kicked back a board, almost hitting Cassie right in her heart. All she'd done was use a piece of wood with a few more knots than might be pretty.
"It shouldn't a'done it," Cassie complained to Mama Marie at dinner.
Mama smiled at the saw and ran her hand down its cord. She always set dinner for the two of them out in the shop and polished the saw blade until it shone brighter than the silverware.
"Growing pains," she murmured. "Saw knows it's got to give me up and go on to you, but you don't treat it right. If you treat it good, it does the same for you. I swear, Cass, you got the brains to figure that much out, at least."
Cassie watched as Mama touched the saw down under the table, where she thought Cassie couldn't see. It made her sick, and that was the truth of it, to see Mama liking the saw like that. Especially 'cause Cassie had seen what it did to her.
Twenty-three tooth marks, a quarter inch apart just like on the blade, right across Mama Marie's belly, way down low. It happened before Cassie was born, but she'd seen the scars, and it didn't take even the brains Mama said she had to figure out where the scar had come from.