by Aiden James
He understood. A mirror would suffice if he needed any further reminders, where the four scratches throbbed painfully beneath the protective gauze on his neck. Evelyn gave him a warm hug and exited the cabin. Before John could turn on the porch light to better illuminate the parking area in front of his home, she had already left his property. Her sporty Nissan raced down the long driveway toward the park’s main thoroughfare.
Chapter Thirty-three
“She’s right, you know,” said John, peering out through the window curtain beside the front door. The red glow from Evelyn’s taillights faded from view. “You’re safer staying here.”
He closed the curtain and moved into the kitchen, grabbing a couple of Miller long necks from the refrigerator. He handed one to David.
“Your granddaughter is a lovely young lady” said David, as the two returned to the living room. “She could have her pick of any young man she wanted, I imagine.”
“I wish she’d wait to get married,” John replied, sadly. He reclaimed his recliner. “His family’s nice, but she can do better than him.”
David nodded thoughtfully and sat down on the couch across from him.
“Michael’s handsome and wealthy, with a good sense of humor,” John continued. “But, something’s missing from his soul. He will hurt her.”
He gazed into the waning fire, his expression grim. David recalled how he grew quiet during dinner once Evelyn began to talk about her beau and how much she loved him.
“I imagine it’s tough for you,” said David, his tone compassionate. “I can picture how I’d feel if Jill hooks up with someone Miriam or I have doubts about when she grows up.” He frowned after he said this, realizing in a year she’d be a teenager, and dating a few years after that.
“They grow up fast,” John agreed, looking over at David. “Evelyn has a clear path to lasting happiness if she’ll take it. But as gifted and focused as she’s been in regard to her career and spiritual talents, she lacks sound judgment when it comes to the men she chooses to love. She gives her heart easily, and I’ve seen it broken before by kinder men than this one….”
His voice trailed off and he looked toward the back door. David followed his gaze, and soon became aware of a soft scratching sound from outside the door’s base. John stood up and set his beer on the coffee table.
“Wait here.”
He moved over to the door, turning on the back porch light as well as the security floodlights. The scratching at the door became more urgent, accompanied by a high-pitched whine. He opened the door and a beautiful white husky with light blue eyes jumped up and placed its paws on his chest, dragging a chain attached to its neck inside the cabin.
“What’s the matter, boy?” John patted the top of the dog’s head and stroked the fur under its neck. “There, there…it’s all right, Shawn. Good boy.”
He removed the leash and threw it back outside, poking his head through the doorway and casting a wary glance to either side. The dog stood next to him, following his gaze. He whined again, pawing at John to pay attention to him.
“He’s rarely skittish,” John remarked after he closed and locked the back door, patting the dog’s side as he turned to face David.
“I’ll bet he keeps you good company,” said David.
John motioned for him to call the dog. When he did, Shawn came over to him, bending his head low to the ground and almost knocking himself over while he wagged his tail.
“He’s gorgeous.”
“He’s my buddy,” said John, moving back into the living room. “He’ll be seven next month, and was a Christmas present as a pup from my other granddaughter, Hanna.”
“I’ve always wanted a bigger dog,” said David, massaging Shawn’s neck and throat, soon finding the sensitive spot that every canine seems to have. “We have a terrier named Sadie, and I’ve grown quite attached to her. Miriam and the kids love her even more…. But, it would be nice to have a dog the kids and I could play Frisbee with.”
He chuckled at the thought, but stopped once he saw John frowning, his attention drawn to the back door again.
“What’s up?”
“I’m not sure yet.”
Shawn left David’s side to seek his attention. John bent down to offer his own loving strokes and the dog curled up on the floor next to him.
“Shawn rarely seeks to come inside, and prefers his doghouse,” he said. “Only during the coldest spells in January and February does he stay inside the cabin. Did you feel him shaking?”
“Yeah, I did,” said David. He thought the dog’s excitement came from finding out his owner had company. Sadie sometimes did that. But now he thought of how she responded to the ghost’s presence two Sundays ago back in Littleton. “Do you think Allie Mae is here?”
“Yes,” he replied. His tone even, he brought his gaze back to where David sat. “I couldn’t see anything out back, but it felt like someone was watching. Shawn should’ve barked, as he usually does when either a stray bear or some other critter is on the premises. I was surprised he didn’t bark earlier when you arrived, but that’s happened before when other likeable folks stop by. For him to simply scratch at the door and whine like he did tells me he feels threatened.”
He got up and walked over to the dining table, calling Shawn to him. The dog didn’t budge, but curled up even tighter on the living room floor.
“Animals are much more perceptive of danger than we are, as I’m sure you know,” said John as he moved back into the living room. “That’s the first time since I’ve had him that Shawn refused to come to me. I think it best we follow Evelyn’s admonitions tonight....”
His words trailed off again and he looked up toward the upstairs loft. Behind it, the immense picture window faced out toward the front of the property. David followed John’s gaze. For the moment, very little was visible beyond the illuminated A-shaped eve outside the window. The varnished logs glistened in the front security light’s glow.
“Do you see her?”
“Not yet, but she’s definitely near,” said John. “I think it’d be wise to also close the curtains in here. I’ll be right back and you can help me close the rest of them.”
He moved over to a narrow staircase on the left side of the fireplace that led to the loft. As he climbed the stairs, the wind that had been a gentle, almost unnoticeable, breeze outside picked up strength. He reached the loft and looked down at David, a puzzled look on his face.
“Do you hear that?”
“The wind?”
“No. Something else,” he said, worriedly, and moved to the side of the window where the curtain’s draw cord hung.
He began closing the curtains. When they more than halfway closed, a dark shadow approached the glass, obscuring the security lights’ glow and distracting John’s focus to keep the cord straight so it wouldn’t snag. A high pitched screech filled the air around them as the darkness grew deeper, moving through the window’s glass as if it didn’t exist. A flowing mass of reddish-blond hair appeared in the midst of the darkness that crept into the cabin, and the icy blue and hellish red eyes David had seen two nights before appeared within the mass of swirling strands.
John dropped the cord in surprise, stepping back from the window. A frigid draft moved through the living room, lifting the dream catchers and spirit chasers on the walls as it flowed toward David, who stumbled back onto the couch in terror.
“Leave him alone!” John shouted, grabbing the cord and working furiously to close the curtain before the hostile shadow made it fully inside. “You’re not welcome here—spirit be gone!!”
Angered, the eyes turned toward him, the blue one narrowed with malice. John continued to rebuke the entity despite enduring a litany of garbled threats that didn’t cease until the curtain had been drawn shut.
“We better go through the cabin to make sure all of the windows are locked and the curtains shut!” he said, clambering down the stairs. “David, you check the bedrooms and the bathroom and I’ll make su
re everything else is secure!”
Spurred on by adrenaline, David hurried down the hallway. After checking the bedrooms, he saw the shadowed edge of the apparition descend toward the ground through the uncovered bathroom window. He ignored what sounded like fingernail taps on the window’s glass as he closed a pair of wooden shutters and then exited the bathroom. He closed the door for good measure and went to look for John.
“She might be inside the cabin!” he told John, who had just rechecked the lock on the front door. “I heard her tap on the bathroom window when I was in there just now!”
“Did you close the shutters before you heard the noise?” John moved toward the hallway.
“Yeah, I did. I shut the door in case she snuck in there!” David ran to catch up with him.
John threw open the bathroom door. The room sat empty, though noticeably cooler than the hallway. After peeking through the shutter blinds and glancing inside the bathtub, he shrugged his shoulders and motioned for David to follow him back into the main living area.
“I believe we got her out of here in time,” he advised, after taking a few short breaths and closing his eyes to meditate for a moment. “She’s still near—just not inside the cabin.”
“Sweet Jesus!” The words whispered, David bent over as if struggling for breath. His heart pounded furiously within his chest. The sudden attack completely caught him off guard, though he expected something to happen at some point. Just not here, inside a shaman’s home. “So what do you suggest we do next?”
“Well, I think we should stay calm and try not to put ourselves in harm’s way...at least until morning,” John advised. He paused to grab another hickory log beside the fireplace and threw it on top of the dying embers on the hearth. David noticed there were only four more logs, and he worried there might not be enough to get them through the night. “I expect her to try again to get in here, but the protection already in place should thwart her efforts now that the windows are blocked.” He motioned to the items covering the walls around them, no longer swaying from the earlier breeze.
David started to say something, but the ceiling creaked as if someone walked on the roof above them, stepping across the shingles. Several knocks erupted from the northeast corner of the ceiling.
“Unfortunately, we’ll probably be entertained like this for the duration of the evening.” John shook his head and returned to his chair, and Shawn buried his head in John’s lap. The knocks continued, moving to the other corners of the ceiling. As they did, they became louder and more fervent.
“It’s almost like dealing with one of my kids when they don’t get their way about something,” observed David, forcing a smile that poorly disguised his unease.
“It would be best to ignore her, as if she were indeed a spoiled little girl,” added John, turning up the television.
David tried to ignore the spirit’s antics, but difficult to do when loud scraping sounds joined the knocks, spreading across the ceiling from all corners, similar to what he experienced at home in Littleton. Nonchalant, John flipped through the channels on the TV, as if only light raindrops assaulted the roof.
“You’ll survive this,” he told David, noticing his wary gaze remained fixed on the ceiling. “You were destined at sometime in your life to encounter the spirit, and she has waited long for this. The Great Spirit has allowed it so. It doesn’t mean she’ll win. Not if your spirit remains strong.” He offered an assuring smile.
A loud thud on the roof followed his words, and the overhead brass light fixture began to sway. David instinctively ducked away, feeling John’s assurance drain away while he expected a splintered hole to appear above him. For now, the logs and split beams held up.
“We need a better distraction.” John started flipping through the channels again. He found a movie on HBO that David said was a decent flick, having seen it last year at a theatre with Miriam.
Soon the other activity waned, and by eight o’clock the noises ceased. Shawn lay asleep at John’s feet, and David stood up to stretch. He suddenly thought about Miriam, and realized she didn’t have John’s number, should she need to contact him for any reason.
He removed his cell phone from his belt clip. The ‘no service’ symbol lit up on the phone’s display. He recalled having two bars of signal strength when he drove up the gravel road to John’s cabin earlier, but he sure as hell wasn’t about to step outside to see if the reception got better.
“Call her on my phone,” offered John, after David disgustedly put his phone back on its clip. “I’ve got free nationwide long distance, or so says the bill insert I get every month.” He pointed to where his landline phone sat, in a small cove next to the refrigerator.
“Thanks, John.”
David stood and walked over to it. Miriam said something about her and the kids moving back into their house today, so he tried that number first. The line crackled and hummed as it rang, and after four rings he got the voicemail. He tried it again and got the same thing. Since it was just after six o’clock in Littleton, he wondered if they’d gone out for dinner. But when he got the same noise and Miriam’s voicemail each time he tried her cell phone, he started to worry. He chided himself for overreacting until he tried Janice’s townhouse and cell numbers.
After two attempts on each, David called John over to him, his hand holding the phone’s receiver…shaking. John took it from him, and his sullen expression told David he heard the same thing. The shrill garbled noise grew loud enough to force him to pull the receiver away from his ear, and then they both heard a high-pitch cackle resounding from the receiver followed by a dial tone.
Panicked, David grabbed the phone back from John, dialing frantically despite the continuous fast busy. John’s worried look only made things worse, revealing they shared a mutual conclusion: Miriam and the kids were in real danger.
Allie Mae returned to Colorado.
Chapter Thirty-four
“Mom says dinner will be ready in five minutes!” Jillian peered inside Tyler’s bedroom to make her announcement.
“Tell her I’ll be right down after I wash this stuff off my face,” said Tyler, shooing his sister out of the haven he had reclaimed less than thirty minutes earlier.
Jillian frowned but heeded her brother’s wishes, disappearing into the hallway. He listened as she limped down the stairs to the main floor, feeling a tad bit guilty for being so harsh. He lingered a moment in his room, rubbing his fingers over the smooth plaster that filled the holes around his once-torn window frame. The new window still bore the sales sticker, which he chose to leave on until Dad returned home from Tennessee. Mom told him earlier today he could paint his room in any color he wanted, and she’d help him do it sometime next week.
“Why don’t you wait until after dinner to wash your face, son, so I can help you with your sling?” Miriam called to him from the bottom of the stairs. She wore an apron and carried a spatula in her hand. “Besides, cabbage rolls are better while they’re hot!”
“It’ll just take a few minutes, Mom—I’ll be fine!” he called back to her from the hallway, grabbing a face towel from the linen closet next to the main bathroom. “This stuff’s really starting to itch!”
Going on six o’clock, Miriam told him if it took longer than fifteen minutes they’d start eating without him. Tyler flipped on the bathroom light and stepped inside. When he caught his reflection in the mirror, he smiled. Christopher and Jillian had been right: he did look like the real thing, ‘The Hulk’. Even though the green makeup had begun to crack and the black circles around his eyes now smeared, he looked frightful. The sling on his right shoulder made a weird contrast to the costume covering his left shoulder and arm. He flexed his fake Hulk arm muscles and roared at his reflection, forcing as much malice as he could muster. Good to be frightful instead of fearful, he did it again and again, until Jillian called from downstairs to remind him the clock was ticking.
“All right, all right—I’m hurrying!”
He looked
at himself again, unhappy at the thought he’d have to go through this process of getting dressed up in costume two more times, once on Sunday for the Benson’s Halloween Party and then again on Halloween night. It meant he had to be careful with the costume and wig, and getting either item wet probably wasn’t a good idea.
He sighed as he trudged back to his bedroom, where he removed the wig and gingerly slipped out of the arm and shoulder cover that Miriam altered from the original full torso ‘Hulk’ suit. He then returned to the bathroom.
As he stepped inside, he noticed the tiled floor seemed cold under his socked feet and the air much cooler than a moment ago. Since it made him think about what happened last week, he hurried to loosen the sling and set it on the counter next to the sink. Doing things one-handed had gotten easier for him. He grabbed his foaming face wash from the toiletry bag he had yet to unpack and turned on the faucet, letting hot water run in the sink until misty heat rose into the air. When warm enough to wash his face he glanced into the mirror.
Tyler gasped, wanting to run out of the bathroom but unable to move. The bathroom door closed slowly. As it did, he saw the highlights from a beautiful head of strawberry-blond hair, hanging down in soft ringlets on a Victorian-style blue dress similar to what he once saw on display in a Central City boutique.
“Hello, again, Zachariah-h-h!”
The hollow voice was thick and sultry.
He tried to speak, but only a low guttural sound came out. His legs felt like they might give way as he watched the form move up closer in the mirror’s reflection. The voice the same one he heard three days earlier, where it emanated from hard to say. It couldn’t be from the girl’s face, because there wasn’t one. A dark shadow floated where her head should be, eerily surrounded by her shimmering hair. Like a China doll the skin on her arms and hands ashen, as well as her exposed neckline.