Bitter Cold

by J. Joseph Wright

  “What the hell?” Doug tiptoed to the railing.

  Jeff pulled the shivering man away. “It’s coming! We gotta go–NOW!”

  Eyes wide, Carrie splashed to the other side of the tub, the sloshing water snuffing out several candles and making her eyeliner run. “Oh Shit! What is it, honey! A bear? Is it a bear?”

  Doug craned his neck to get a look behind Jeff. “I don’t know, honey. Jeff! What the hell’s going on!”

  “It’s some kind of creature—a monster!” Jeff kept pulling. “In the snow! And it’s coming! Please, you gotta listen! You gotta believe me!” he shot his stare to his son. “Logan, GO!”

  Logan screamed something incoherent. He took a giant step and lost traction, one leg sliding left, the other to the right, resulting in scissor-splits. He groaned and fell to his side, holding his groin.

  Carrie climbed out of the hot tub before slipping on the smooth outer ledge. She yelped and stumbled back into the water, flailing, trying to get out again.

  Doug, the only calm one, tapped Jeff on the shoulder and cleared his throat. “Is this the monster you were talking about?” he pointed.

  Jeff had no time to play. “Just go, Doug! I’ll explain later!”

  “Dad,” Logan sounded annoyed. “Look.”

  Jeff didn’t see what he’d expected. Instead of an evil darkness at the top of the stairs, it was Sadie, the Mitchell family German Shepard, jowl wide open, tongue hanging, tail wagging.

  Doug erupted, filling his little apple grove with laughter. “That’s what you’re so goddamned freaked out about, Keller? A dog? Man, you need to lay off the pot!”

  Sadie hustled to her master, whining softly. He bent to stroke her lustrous, black and beige fur, running his hand twice down her back.

  “Not now, girl,” he pointed at the house. “Go inside, Sadie. Go on, get in the house.”

  Sadie lowered her head and sulked to a pet door which looked like it went to the pantry.

  “I don’t believe it,” Jeff eyed the stairs. “I saw something else. It wasn’t a dog. It was—”

  “Come on, Dad,” Logan took his hand. “Let’s go home, okay?”

  “No!” he shook his head. “No, something’s out there. I know it is.”

  Doug laughed again. Carrie joined him.

  “It’s not funny!” Jeff shot a scowl at them, then returned his attention to the snowdrifts below. Boards creaked under his feet. His eyes flashed to the deck, to the snow around his boots. Was it under the wood planks?

  “Dad,” Logan tugged his arm. “Come on. Let’s go.”

  “What’s gotten into you, Jeff?” Carrie leaned her arms over the edge of the hot tub. “Amy said you kicked her and the other kids out of the canyon. Is that true?”

  He stood silent, watching the shadows shift and reshape in an intermittent breeze along the tree line.

  Carrie ignored the fact that Jeff ignored her. “She says you claim there’s some kind of a-a monster down there. What’s this all about, Jeff?”

  Doug snickered yet again. “Good one, man. Good one. I know what you were doing. You wanted to get rid of those kids so you could have the hill all to yourself. I get it. Hey, I can understand. I mean, she’s my own daughter and even I want to get rid of her sometimes.”

  Carrie bristled. “Douglas Mitchell!”

  He shrugged, climbing up the steps to get into the spa. “It’s that boyfriend of hers,” he unwrapped his towel and eased into the hot water.

  Jeff didn’t dwell too long on his neighbors and their strange nocturnal activities. He still had a suspicion something might have been sneaking up on them. His skin crawled at the thought. Out there, somewhere, that creature was waiting. He felt its stare, remembering the sensation he had when it came so close to him he could touch it, when it had Dexter’s leg in its jaws. He got that same feeling now, a deep dread, a cold hand running down his back. Something just didn’t feel right.

  He walked to the railing, brushed off the snow, and studied the ground, paying close attention to the shadows. He asked the Mitchells, “What were you two doing down there?”

  “What the fuck are you now, the neighborhood morality police?” Carrie got loud. “What’s the matter? You’re not gettin’ any so you gotta stop us from doin’ it, too?”

  Doug patted her shoulder. “Honey, please,” he looked at Jeff. “If you must know, we thought it’d be fun to run naked in the snow. You know, shock your body in the freezing cold, then jump in the hot tub. It’s a rush.”

  “Yeah,” Carrie leaned against her headrest. “But it’s a lot more fun when the neighbor isn’t peeping on you.”

  “I wasn’t peeping,” Jeff’s gaze moved deliberately from one suspicious area in the yard to the next. “I came here to warn you. It’s dangerous out there. You didn’t see anything, did you? Anything at all out of the ordinary?”

  “Out of the ordinary?” she laughed. “You mean except for about three feet of snow and counting. If you haven’t noticed, that’s pretty out of the ordinary for this part of Oregon.”

  Jeff shook his head, keeping his eyes on a steady path, scanning for any anomaly. “That’s not what I mean.”

  “Then what are you talking about, Jeff?” Doug sat up. “Because I’d like to know.”

  “We’d like to know,” Carrie punctuated her husband’s request.

  “I’m talking about,” Jeff pulled up his cap and ran his fingers over his closely cropped head, scratching and massaging his scalp. “I don’t know. Goddammit, I don’t know! It looks like snow, only black. Imagine the blackest black you’ve ever seen. Now make it even blacker, and you’ve got what this thing looks like.”

  Doug lifted his palms. “If it looks like snow, how can it be black? Snow’s white, dummy,” he shook his head and smiled at his wife. She rolled her eyes.

  “I didn’t say it was snow,” Jeff glared at him. “It looks like snow, except instead of white…”

  “It’s black,” Carrie sipped from her wine glass. “We get it. Since when does snow turn black? What was it? Some sort of pollution?”

  “Or maybe it was just a shadow, Jeff,” Doug took a draw from his Coors bottle and belched.

  “Doug!” she glared.

  “Sorry. But anyway, Jeff, did you think about that? Maybe all you saw was a shadow.”

  “A shadow can’t take a kid’s foot off,” he said.

  “By god, Amy was telling the truth for once,” Doug stared at his wife. “And here I thought she was just making all of it up so she would have an excuse to leave. What do you know, hon’? Our daughter was right. We do have a nutjob for a neighbor.”

  Carrie snickered, letting a little wine slip from her nose. Doug laughed at her. He chugged some more beer and let out another hollow burst of gas.

  Jeff ran out of places to look. Short of walking down and checking, the property seemed clean. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling. Something about the dead silence. Their road usually had a relaxed, country feel to it, and the white wintry blanket made the air even softer yet. However, there seemed to be more of a hush over the Mitchell estate than should have been natural. The snowflakes made no sound, as if they were afraid to be heard by the dark creature. The rows of bent, leafless apple trees told no secrets, shutting their twisted, knotted mouths and not speaking of the ancient evil living in their valley.

  “Dad!” Logan’s voice was barely louder than a whisper. “We should go.”

  “Listen to your son, Jeff,” Carrie’s speech became slurred. “That boy seems to have more sense than you do. A lot more sense. At least he’s not stupid enough to play with matches. Or maybe you taught him that lesson, huh?”

  “Carrie!” Doug splashed water in his beer. “Don’t bring that up. Not now.”

  “Why not!” she demanded. “I think we should. I mean, look at him. Something’s not right with him. He’s a danger now just like he was a danger twenty-five years ago when he let our little boy die!”

  “Come on, Dad,” Logan touched Jeff’
s back.

  Jeff locked glassy stares with Carrie. “I tried to save Eddy!”

  “Don’t you DARE say his name!” Carrie flared.

  “Aren’t you ever going to let it go?”

  “Let it go? You want me to let it go? You let my son die!”

  “I tried to save his life!” Jeff clenched his fists. “Just like I’m trying to save yours, now!”

  “Is that it?” Carrie snickered. She turned to her dumbfounded husband. “You hear that? He’s trying to make up for killing our son. Here he is, twenty-five years later, and he’s gonna be our savior,” she returned her glare to Jeff. “We don’t need rescuing. If you can’t tell, we’ve done just fine for ourselves. We have moved on. Looks to me like it’s you who hasn’t. I mean really, monsters turning the snow black and eating people. Come on, Jeff. Can’t you do better than that? Or has your guilt thrown you over the edge?”

  “Okay, honey,” Doug tried to stop her. Carrie was on a roll.

  “No, no. I have to say this. I don’t care if his son hears. It needs to be said. Jeff, we think something’s wrong with you. We knew that the day our son died. I loved your grandmother. We all did. God bless her soul, but she sure did have one rotten grandkid.”

  “You stop talking about my dad like that, you bitch!” Logan’s face looked angrier than Jeff had ever seen.

  “Logan, no,” he pushed the boy back, digging his heels in the ice.

  “Carrie,” Doug made another attempt at squelching her tirade, though Jeff got the feeling the man secretly wanted his wife to continue. He’d seen the way Doug looked at him on the road, passing in their pickups. He’d always wanted to make some sort of peace with the Mitchells. But the looks they’d give him. They seemed to see past him, through him. Maybe they were seeing Eddy.

  “Just forget about it,” Jeff forced his son to turn around and made him take the lead out of there. “Just forget I ever came over.”

  Carrie didn’t hesitate to respond. “You know what? We’d love to forget, but we can’t. Neither can you, Jeff. That’s why you’re here. You can’t take the guilt anymore. Your guilty conscious has conjured up this, this crazy monster so you can make up for our boy. Well you can’t make up for him! Ever!”

  “Carrie. That’s enough.” Doug said.

  “Come on,” Jeff prodded his boy. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”

  They tore around the deck to the front yard, heading straight through the landscaping for the Ford, tripping over several random juniper bushes buried in the snow.

  “Get in and let’s go!” Jeff reached his door first. Logan had to go around, hastening to the passenger side and flinging open the door. Jeff turned the key and cranked the engine as the boy hopped in the cab. When Logan pulled the door closed, something came out of the dark hedgerow along the driveway. Jeff’s blood iced over when a hand reached from the shadows and took hold of his son’s wrist.

  “Wait a sec, guys,” Doug’s face became decipherable in the gloom. Cheeks red, lips chapped, he wore a charcoal gray robe, cinched tight against the frigid gale. “I wanted to tell you something,” he made eye contact with Jeff. “Carrie didn’t mean that stuff, okay? She’s just really emotional lately, because of Amy dating older boys and all. It’s been hard on both of us. Listen, I know we’ve been distant, and I’m sorry. That’s our fault. Really, it’s been all us.”

  Jeff held up his hand, “No, Mr. Mitchell. I’ve had a lot to do with it, too.”

  “Call me Doug, okay? And I appreciate that, but you know as well as I do we haven’t exactly been warm and inviting to you and your son,” he smiled at Logan. “We’d like to change that.”

  “We’d like that, too,” Jeff shifted the pickup into reverse and held the brake. “Doug, I know you don’t believe me, but please, be careful. Watch the shadows. I swear something’s out there.”

  Doug contorted his face. “So you’re not shitting me, here? No joke? You’re not just trying to pull a prank on your neighbors?”

  “Trust me. This is no joke. I don’t pull pranks. Never have,” Jeff maintained a steady, serious stare. Doug backed away, looking at the ground near his feet.

  “Uh, what did it look like again?”

  “You do believe me, then, don’t you?”

  Doug sighed loud enough for Jeff to hear over the Ford’s rattling tailpipe. “Kid, I don’t know what to believe,” he looked over his shoulder. “But I know one thing. You have me spooked.”

  Jeff checked the rearview mirror. He eased his foot off the brake, letting the truck inch back. “Just be on the lookout, okay? If nothing else.”

  “You don’t have to worry about that,” Doug reached into his robe pocket and produced a sleek, silver flashlight. With a click, he had the beam pointed behind a young cypress. “Your little horror story’s gonna have me up all night. Thanks a lot, man.”

  Jeff grinned. Not in a happy way. He drove past Doug and watched him in the mirror as the pickup pushed down the narrow driveway, through a white landscape, twinkling and flickering in subdued moonlight.

  “Dad,” Logan broke his silence. “Can we please go home now?”

  Jeff nodded. “Sure.”

  FOUR-WHEELING THROUGH A MIDNIGHT blizzard, the Ford’s headlights hit something odd. Jeff squinted, then rubbed his eyes. He saw it again and slammed the brakes.

  “Dad!” Logan pitched forward against the shoulder harness.

  Jeff realized it was a person. A woman. Her strawberry blond hair matted and disheveled, she limped toward the truck, eyes glossy with horror. She lifted a forearm, shielding her rosy face. Jeff flicked it to the low beams. He saw blood on her hand. Her coat sleeve looked torn.

  “It’s April!” Jeff ripped off his seatbelt. He pushed the door open and fell out, stumbling in the deep frost. He popped up and sprinted to the despondent young woman. He took April by the hand and asked her what happened as Logan, slipping the whole way, finally got to them.

  “It killed him…that-that thing…killed him!” her chest heaved, her breath a thick fog about her face. “It ate him alive! Right in front of me!”

  She fell forward. He opened his arms just in time to catch her against his chest. He stepped back, yet kept her upright. Several inches shorter, April didn’t weigh much, not compared to Jeff’s two hundred pounds.

  “Just hold on,” his pulse began to build, a steady Thump! Thump! in his ears. “Slow down, slow down.”

  “Jeff, he’s dead! That thing killed him!”

  “You mean the black snow? That thing?” he looked at his son.

  “Yeah!” she was still short of breath. “The thing that ate Dexter’s foot. It came back for more and it killed him.”

  “Killed who?”

  “The NWP guy! The guy that tried to kill me!”

  “Wait!” he held her shoulders, staring into her tear-stained eyes. “What the hell are you talking about? What do you mean he tried to kill you? You mean the monster tried to kill you, right?”

  “No, HE tried to kill me. Ran me off the road! My car flipped into a ditch and he tried to shoot me!”

  “Whoa! No way!” Logan stepped closer. “Where?”

  Sobbing, she indicated to the south. “Down there. Not far from here. Oh my god it was terrible! It crept up and trapped his feet! He looked like some kind of helpless animal! The blackness just digested him—it was disgusting!”

  She pushed from him and bent over to heave. Nothing came out, still she heaved again. Jeff didn’t know what to do. He stood close, his hand hovering over her back.

  “Are you gonna be okay, or should we take you to the hospital? I mean, you said he shot at you…are you hit at all.”

  She coughed, then wiped her mouth and stood straight. “No,” she coughed again. “No. We need to call the police. We need to call the police right now.”

  She bent over and heaved once more, letting out a loud moan.

  “What’s wrong with her, Dad?”

  “Just go in the house.”

  “But Dad
, I…”

  “Get INSIDE!”

  The boy lowered his head but kept his stare fixed on April, scanning her up and down.

  “Logan!”

  He trotted inside. Jeff shook his head.

  “Jeff, it’s worse than we thought.”

  “Come on,” he guided her to the house.

  FOURTEEN

  DOUG MITCHELL SNAPPED HIS SIGHT to the darkest corner of the backyard, where an old pine tree swayed in the wind. Its complex silhouette mixed in countless shapes and subtle movements on the snowy ground, a shifting black web, becoming longer and thinner, then shorter and fatter. It gave him a chill despite the 103 degree water.

  “You keep looking over there,” Carrie cracked an uneasy smile. “Your girlfriend hiding back there or something?”

  He exhaled a half-hearted chuckle. “Yeah, right. She’s down there right now, freezing her ass off, waiting for you to get drunk and pass out. So hurry the hell up, will you?”

  “Ha-ha. Very funny,” she peered at him sideways. “You know I’d kill you, right?”

  He went back to watching the ever-changing shadows in the yard.

  “Stop looking down there, dammit! You’re freaking me out!”

  “I can’t help it. Jeff got me thinking.”

  She splashed water at him. “Don’t tell me you believe what that deranged maniac had to say.”

  “I don’t know,” he looked over her shoulder, thinking he saw a change in the background, darkness within darkness.

  “What do you mean you don’t know? What is there to know? He’s mentally ill. That’s all there is to it. I don’t want to hear any more about it, okay? We’ve got the house to ourselves for the night. Let’s have some fun, babe.”

  She tried sidling next to him, but in her drunken state, slipped on the floor of the tub. Waves crested over the side, washing away another candle. He grunted when she landed on him, their naked bodies slapping together. He felt her hands run down his chest and belly to his crotch where she clasped his dick like an expert. He took pride in how quickly he could become aroused. Even at his age, the old Johnson fired up on the first try. His wife had something to do with it. Despite pushing fifty and popping out five babies, she still had what he considered an incredibly sensuous body. She might not have been one of those anorexic, model types, but she had a sexy, full figure. And she knew how to give a handjob, too.