She stopped pacing abruptly. “I think I know my son,” she said curtly and immediately regretted it. Matt was just trying to help. “I’m sorry,” she said with a weak smile, and started walking again. Back and forth. Back and forth.
Her boyfriend held up his hand in surrender. “You don’t have to apologize, I know how upset you are. And I’m not trying to say I know him as well as you do. The cops are looking for him and by now so is pretty much everyone in town. Someone will find him. He’ll show up. Let’s not panic.”
The telephone rang and Julie sprinted across the floor, reaching the receiver before Matt could even move. She put her hand on it and then pulled back as if she had been burned. “You get it,” she said. “I’m too nervous to talk to anyone.”
She continued pacing, chewing her fingernails as Matt answered the call. She tried to pay attention to his end of the conversation but couldn’t seem to concentrate. Where are you, baby?
Finally her boyfriend replaced the receiver and turned to look at her. His face seemed to have paled a bit. “That was the police. They talked to all of his friends again and one of them mentioned some crazy idea Tim had talked about.”
He hesitated and Julie wanted to scream. “Well? What was it?”
“Apparently he tried to talk his buddies into skipping school and exploring the site of the old Tonopah Mine, the one that was closed down back in the 1920’s after a miner disappeared following an underground explosion and fire.”
Julie’s legs turned to jelly and refused to support the weight of her body any longer. Her eyes filled with tears and she crumpled to the floor. She thought she might throw up, even though she hadn’t had anything to eat since yesterday at lunchtime. Before Timmy had gone missing. “Are you saying my baby is lost in a mine?”
Matt moved to the middle of the kitchen floor and sat next to her. He put his arms around her. “We don’t know that,” he said quietly. You know how kids shoot their mouths off, trying to look cool in front of their friends. The old mine is just one possibility, and the cops are heading out there right now to check it out. They say it’s sealed up tight, anyway, that there’s no way anyone break into it and fall into a shaft, especially one twelve year old boy. They’re going to call as soon as they know anything. Let’s wait and see what they say.”
“I’m not waiting for anything,” she said. She pushed herself up off the floor. “We’re going out there right now.”
***
Julie could not believe the ruggedness of the terrain. Matt’s four wheel drive Jeep bounced and skidded, navigating the abandoned road leading to the old mine agonizingly slowly. She wanted to shout at him to step on it, that she needed to get to her baby, but she knew he was doing the best he could. Any faster and the truck would probably just ricochet off the rutted, overgrown path into a tree, or break an axle or something, and then where would they be?
So she held her tongue, and her breath, and finally the Jeep rounded a corner and the woods opened up into a massive clearing and they were there. A chain-link fence, rusted and bent, surrounded the site of the old mine, its front gate standing open. Two police vehicles, a four wheel drive pickup truck and a four wheel drive SUV, were parked in front of a dilapidated shack roughly in the middle of the clearing, their hazard lights flashing busily, the officers nowhere to be seen.
Clouds boiled overhead, dark and threatening, a blackish-purple smear hanging low over the scene. Matt gunned the engine and the Jeep shot through the open gate, the ground at last flat and relatively clear. He rolled up next to the two police vehicles and Julie leapt out the passenger door before the truck had even stopped moving.
She pounded up to the ramshackle door, vaguely aware of Matt following behind telling her to slow down. “Be careful,” he said. “You won’t be doing Tim any favors if the building falls on you and you have to be taken out of here in an ambulance.” She ignored him. Her baby was here, she just knew it, and he needed her.
She pushed through the doorway and into the building’s nearly empty interior. Her attention was immediately drawn to the far side of what had clearly once been an office, or a base building of some sort. Through a pair of windows filthy with grime and crud she could just barely make out the two policemen standing together, maybe fifty feet behind the building. They seemed to be staring at a rise in the earth, and one of them was talking into what looked like a walkie-talkie or some type of radio.
Julie clapped a hand to her mouth, terrified, and ran out the half-open rear door. Once again, she could hear Matt behind her telling her to slow down, and once again she ignored him. “Is it him?” she cried as she ran. “Did you find him? Is he okay?”
The two officers jumped in surprise and looked up, the one with the radio reaching toward the weapon at his hip. Julie didn’t care. She kept running; it wasn’t like they were going to shoot her just because she had surprised them.
She stopped right behind the two policemen. They were standing in front of what was clearly the mine’s entrance. It had been dug into a small hill, maybe six feet high, and capped with a big concrete block, probably way back when the mine was shut down. Now the block was destroyed, half of it in pieces on the ground, the other half pulled partly away from the big wooden beams to which it had been bolted.
It didn’t seem possible that a twelve year old boy—and a small one, at that—could have smashed the concrete apart, but Julie knew immediately Tim had done exactly that. He had broken the seal to the old mine shafts and was now trapped underground, lost inside a maze of tunnels and warrens, some of them over one hundred fifty years old.
“We’ll find him,” the cop with the radio told her, understanding immediately she must be the lost child’s mother. “We’ve already called out a search and rescue team, with dogs and plenty of men. He can’t have gotten far. We’ll find him,” he said again, although more quietly.
Julie whimpered helplessly, staring at the ground in front of the tunnel as Matt finally caught up to her and curled an arm around her waist. Scattered among the rubble of the broken mine seal were the tools Tim must have used to smash the concrete: a heavy hammer and a gigantic screwdriver, as well as his backpack, filled with water bottles and snacks. Lying a few feet away was his flashlight, still switched on.
Tears spilled from her eyes. His flashlight was on the ground. Tim would never have voluntarily entered a pitch-black tunnel all by himself without a flashlight.
But his flashlight was right here.
On the ground.
And Tim was nowhere in sight.
***
Julie was exhausted. She felt as though she had searched the entire Tonopah Mine herself, tramping through miles of confusing underground pathways, none of which had seen human beings for nearly a century.
And she would have done it, too, had the search and rescue team allowed it, but instead she had been forced to cool her heels outside the entrance, pacing back and forth on the dusty ground, waiting for word of her missing son’s fate. Praying. Dozens of men had come, with dogs as promised, and disappeared inside the old mine, toting flashlights and survival gear and GPS units.
And weapons.
“Why do they need guns to look for a twelve year old boy?” she asked, and no one looked her in the eye. No one answered, either. Julie McKenna had lived in town less than a year, but she had heard the stories—whispered rumors, really—of the supposedly haunted Tonopah Mine, the one from which grown men had disappeared, never to be heard from again.
She had heard the stories, and she had scoffed at them. This was the twenty-first century, a time of reason, with instantaneous worldwide electronic communication and earth-shattering scientific advances being made almost daily. Nobody believed in ghosts and boogiemen anymore; at least no one with half a serving of common sense.
But that was two days ago, back when things made sense. That was before her trustworthy young son lied to her face, faking illness so he could go traipsing into a long-abandoned pit hundreds, if not thousands, of f
eet deep in the earth, abandoning his flashlight before entering the tunnel.
That was before seeing tough, burly outdoorsmen filing into the mine shaft, faces pale and drawn, packing weapons along with water and survival gear while searching for her little boy.
Seeing these things made the possibility of ghosts and boogiemen seem, if not likely, at least possible, to Julie McKenna. Because she knew one thing as surely as she knew her own name: Tim would not have entered that mine shaft without his flashlight.
So she paced in front of the mine’s entrance—back and forth, back and forth—just as she done inside her kitchen. Trying to stay out of the way, not wanting to be a distraction but unable to force herself to move more than fifteen or twenty feet from that awful black gaping maw, that hole in the earth with the smashed concrete and the grim-faced men filing in and out.
Finally, after several endless hours with no clue as to her son’s whereabouts, the search and rescue leader had prevailed upon her to go home. “We’re going to find him,” the man had said—Julie was so stressed and upset she never even asked him his name—“and when we find him, you’re going to have to be able to take care of him. You won’t be able to do that if you’re exhausted. Go get some rest; we’ll call you the minute we know anything.”
And Julie had allowed Matt to walk her to the Jeep and drive away from the old Tonopah Mine without her son. She wanted to scream at them all, to tell them there was no way in holy hell she was going to be able to rest until Tim was back home where he belonged. She wouldn’t be able to sleep, she wouldn’t be able to rest, she wouldn’t be able to eat. She just simply would not be able to do it.
But she didn’t scream at them, didn’t do much of anything, in fact. Matt strapped her into the passenger’s seat and drove home, the Jeep bouncing and jolting along the old rutted path just as it had done on the way in.
She walked into the house, her insides simultaneously empty and filled with fear. What if the searchers never found Tim? What if her son simply disappeared, just as those miners supposedly had a hundred years ago, lost forever without a trace? What if that happened?
***
The moment she entered the house, Julie crossed the living room and walked straight down the short hallway to Tim’s room. She had to sit on his bed, to smell his pillow, hold one of his T-shirts in her hands. She had to. It was a visceral need. She needed to feel her son’s presence and convince herself of his existence and that she really was going to see him again.
She opened his bedroom door and her breath caught in her throat.
Lying unmoving on the bed, staring up at her with unblinking eyes, was Tim McKenna.
***
He was filthy. Dirt and dust covered his clothing. It was smeared through his hair and on every inch of exposed skin. His sneakers, formerly white, were now a dull brown. The pillow behind his head had morphed from white to brown as well, and so had the bed covers under Tim’s prone body.
Julie crossed the room to his bed, sobbing without realizing she was doing so, and leaned down to hug her son. He stiffened slightly but otherwise did not move. He didn’t cry or laugh or return her hug. He lay on the bed, staring at nothing.
Julie leaned back, her eyes wet with tears, and gazed into the face of her son. “Thank God you’re okay,” she said. “What were you thinking going out to that awful mine, especially all by yourself?”
He didn’t respond.
Julie turned and saw Matt standing in the doorway. He was watching with a look on his face that Julie could not decipher. “We need to let the searchers know he’s okay . . .”
He nodded. “I’ll make the call,” he said, and retreated down the hallway toward the phone in the kitchen.
“Look at you,” she fretted. “Are you all right? Do you need a doctor?”
“I’m fine,” Tim answered, and his voice sounded somehow . . . muted. Unlike his normal voice. Almost inhuman, she thought, and quickly pushed the notion away. Where had that come from?
Julie realized with a start that those were the first words her normally gregarious son had spoken since she walked into his room. Well, of course he’s a little off. He’s been through a terrible ordeal. He’ll be okay. He just needs some rest and then he’ll be himself again.
4
Matt watched as Tim McKenna sat in the stuffed chair in front of the big-screen TV in the living room, answering questions from Tonopah Police detectives while his mother hovered protectively a few feet away. The chair was normally reserved for Matt, but this afternoon Julie had commandeered it for Tim to use during the police interview. The boy was small and the chair was large; it looked as though he was in the process of being devoured by the thing.
Matt tried to stay out of the way, standing in the background watching the interaction, an indefinable uneasiness eating away at him. He had struggled to make a connection with his girlfriend’s son in the year since the two of them had moved from Harrisburg to Tonopah, there was no question about that, so he was used to awkward conversations and stilted silences. They were par for the course where Tim was concerned, especially when his mother wasn’t around.
But this was different. Every time he was asked a question—by the investigators or by his mom—he answered in almost exactly the same way.
“Why in the world did you go out to that old abandoned mine?
“I don’t know.”
“Didn’t you realize it could be dangerous?”
“I don’t know.”
“How did you manage to fall into the mine shaft? Did you slip and fall?”
“I don’t remember.”
And then the biggie, the question Matt himself was struggling with: “How did you get out of the shaft all by yourself?” He had seen the tunnel while waiting with Julie at the old mining camp, and it sloped dangerously downward just a few feet inside the entrance, becoming almost vertical. It didn’t seem possible that a twelve year old boy, alone and with no equipment, could fall into it and manage to get himself back out again.
That question, like all the others, was answered the same way: “I don’t remember.”
It wasn’t just the words Tim was speaking; the whole vibe he gave off was disturbing: Body posture rigid, eyes unfocused and staring into the distance. It was as if the spark of life had disappeared from the kid’s face. The worst part wasn’t even something the police officers would notice. The worst part, well, Matt couldn’t even be sure he was seeing it himself.
Tim seemed to be . . . changing, physically. Becoming somehow bulkier, like he had started working out, only the changes were happening too fast to be from some workout regimen. Besides, Tim wasn’t working out, he knew that. And his hands looked bigger, fingernails longer, almost . . . claw-like. Matt blinked twice and stared at Julie’s son, shaking his head almost imperceptibly. He was almost certain.
Matt could sense the frustration of the officers. He knew they would give up soon. After issuing a stern warning to the boy to stay away from the old mine, they would look at each other, shrug their shoulders and go home, chalking the entire incident up to childish foolishness, thanking their lucky stars they had recovered the kid alive.
Maybe that was what they believed. Maybe that was even what Julie believed. And maybe that was how it had started. But Matt Hardiman had lived in Tonopah, Pennsylvania his whole life. He had heard all the stories about the Tonopah Mine. Hell, he even knew a couple of guys who’d had relatives—great-grandfathers, he thought it was—vanish without a trace way back around 1900.
So Matt knew better. Tim had gone into the Tonopah Mine and somehow come out a changed person. And that scared the shit out of him.
***
The bedroom felt stuffy and hot; Matt tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Julie had sat up with Tim for a couple of hours after his usual bedtime, trying to comfort him or maybe just trying to get a handle on what the hell had happened to her son. She kept talking about how Tim had undergone such a horrible trauma and would be himself soon, just wait a
nd see, but to Matt it sounded like so much wishful thinking. In his opinion she was whistling past the graveyard.
Matt had stayed up for a while, too, but he had to work in the morning—trauma or no trauma, bills still had to be paid—so eventually he said goodnight and shuffled off to bed. Julie had offered up a wan smile and Tim seemed not to notice when Matt tousled his hair. He stared straight ahead, body stiff and unmoving, as had become his habit since returning from the mine.
Later, Matt had no idea what time it was, Julie slid in beside him, mumbling something about Tim finally falling asleep. She had gone on to say there was no way she way she would be able to get any rest tonight, but a few minutes later had dropped off into what seemed to be a deep sleep.
The ceiling fan moved the hot air around the room. Matt listened to Julie’s steady breathing next to him and tried to sleep. Eventually he nodded off.
***
Someone was in the room with them. Matt didn’t know how he knew, he just knew. He awoke with a start, confused and disoriented from a nightmare, a collage of jagged edges and blood-red colors and unrelenting terror.
His eyes flew open and there was Tim. The kid stood motionless next to the bed in the hazy predawn half-light. It was too dark to tell whether his eyes were open or closed. Matt bolted upright, the covers twisting around his waist. Tim seemed not to notice.
Matt rubbed his eyes and tried to comprehend what was happening and out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw what looked like a thick rope or perhaps a long snake slip off Julie’s face. It slid away like a hose being reeled in, and he would have sworn he saw the rope-snake-thing disappear into Tim’s open mouth. A stealthy slithering sound accompanied the movement that Matt was even now beginning to doubt he saw.
Shaken, he leaned to the side, fumbling with the switch on the lamp next to the bed. It snapped on and sixty watts of blessed light flooded the room and Tim was still standing there, he hadn’t moved at all as far as Matt could see, but there was no rope and no snake and Matt wondered whether he had imagined the whole thing.
The Becoming - a novella Page 5