Holiday of the Dead

by David Dunwoody; Wayne Simmons; Remy Porter; Thomas Emson; Rod Glenn; Shaun Jeffrey; John Russo; Tony Burgess; A P Fuchs; Bowie V Ibarra

  They were thin and long, even in the confines of the rail car, but they were the sounds of agony and fear, bleeding into one another to create a cacophony that chilled the bones of those huddled around a smart phone five hundred miles away.

  “Holy Jesus!” The commentator was back. The excitement in his voice gone, replaced by a hoarse rasping whisper, vocal chords taut with horror. “I can’t believe it! Oh, Christ on a bike, this is the most hideous thing I’ve ever seen. They’re attacking the medical team, wrestling them to the ground, biting them.”

  Not biting the medical team, I noted. Eating them. White coats made red with gore, skin torn and ripped as cloth, in strands, in chunks, by mouths that were wide and mewling. I watched, dumbfounded, as the crawling image of a middle aged medic screamed silently at the camera as his head was pulled away from his body by a teen in a bloodied school uniform.

  The screen shuddered and it was not the camera man this time. It was my hand shaking so violently I almost dropped the phone.

  “Hey, keep the thing still, man,” a large black guy said; his eyes wide with fear. “We gotta know how this happened.”

  But we never did know, did we? No, all that came out of it was a town cordoned and burned by the army. And “The Sickness”, a term that rendered the ultimate act of inhumanity into a sterile noun, two words to be whispered for fear they should suddenly become aware and return, reaping their terrible wrath.

  “John? You still there?”

  “I’m here, Linz.”

  “So what do we do?”

  “You’re asking me?” I said. “You’re the practical one, remember?”

  “I need you here,” she said, putting the obvious into words. “I need your support.”

  There it was, Lindsey cashing in her dividends, recouping her investment when she needed it the most. Years of protecting her younger brother from the monster who was now destined to become a monster right there in the family home.

  “What stage is he at?” I said; voice low. Accepting.

  “Early,” she said. “The fever and tracking.”

  Tracking. The veins coming up to the surface of the skin, blue tributaries that would turn rose red, morphing the skin into a lattice of livid wheals. Then the shakes would begin. Vicious and final.

  And death would come, followed by rebirth and the quest for flesh.

  “Ten hours tops, start to finish,” I concluded. “Two hours to get to you, traffic being good. When did the tracking start?”

  “Three hours.”

  “Then time’s ticking. Okay, Linz, I’m there.”

  “Okay, John,” she said, relief clear in her tone. “Thanks. I’m not sure I could finish it.”

  I now understood her dilemma; the reason why she was determined to call in her chips from the past. Lindsey’s memories were forgiving enough to stay and play nurse maid to mean Daddy Dearest. She was dutiful enough to put aside her hate of him and mix in some duty to sweeten the taste and make her life more palatable. But when the man died and the monster emerged she couldn’t say with certainty she could do what needed to be done. She didn’t trust herself to go to the wood shed and get the axe from the shelf, next to the tacks and screws and cobwebs, and take it to Daddy Dearest, take it to his head until it was cleaved from his quivering, shivering body.

  No she knew she may not be able to do such a thing. But she was sure that I could.

  My sister knows me well.

  The city lights were a memory, winking out on me over ninety minutes and a hundred and fifty miles ago. The view from the window was that of white lines in the yellow haze of my head lights and the twinkling blues and greens of the car’s interior dash splashed against the wind shield.

  As I drove I listened to news reports and weather bulletins, flipping between channels to listen to any announcement suggesting that The Sickness had returned to our fair land. I found nothing. But I knew all too well that this meant little. There had been sporadic incidents since the village of the damned had chowed down on the three medics on national TV. The Sickness was often popping up, but the incidents were isolated, townsfolk raising the alarm as well as their axes and shot guns before things got out of hand.

  The military would come, scientists in tow, and neutralise the site, either spraying the locale with a clear liquid that gave off the sweet aroma of liquorice, or the flame throwers would come and raise the site of the occurrence to the ground.

  My mobile purred into life and I activated my Bluetooth.

  “Linz? You okay?” I swallowed the panic trying to climb out of my throat.

  “Not Lindsey,” a voice said. “Dr Conlon.”

  The family doctor. Our family doctor. The one who had resided over our cuts and bruises and breaks and said not one fucking word to the world.

  “What you doing there?” I said coldly.

  “Your sister called and said your father is sick,” Conlon said carefully.

  “First, he ain’t my father,” I said. “Second, since when did you come runnin’ when someone says they’re hurt?”

  “Now, son, I’ll be the first to admit that things were misinterpreted. But that stuff is done. We have to look at what’s being dealt out to us.”

  “Keep an eye on Linz,” I replied, my words greasy with malice. “When I get there I want you gone, got that?”

  I hung up, the road and a pack of cigarettes becoming my companions for a while.

  The house appeared from behind a group of maple trees, the car headlights giving the broad leaves a sheen that writhed like flames as they were tousled in the breeze.

  Its omnipotent image brought the kind of memories that I’d sought to bury over the years. The kind of memories that had driven an eighteen year old kid to bail and put distance between this house and its secrets. But the miles did nothing to blunt the experiences, not really. Not in a way that really mattered, the way that would allow me to move through life without the booze.

  I pulled the car onto the short drive, alongside a blue Ford I presumed belonged to Conlon. No sooner had I switched off the engine, the porch door opened and the slim figure of Lindsey appeared and ran to me. I held onto her in silence, the moment filled with the tick ticking of the car’s engine blocks cooling down after their late night drive.

  “Thanks for being here,” she said into my shoulder. I could smell her perfume, something cheap from the local store.

  “Why the doctor?” I said.

  “He dropped by. I needed the company until you got here. Better than being on my own, I guess.”

  “You should be used to it,” I said pointedly.

  “Maybe. But this is different.” She stepped away from me, her face wan with embarrassment. I felt guilt pulse through me and I feigned a smile to soften the moment. She bought it, but only just.

  “Come inside,” she said. “He’s in his bedroom.”

  Lindsey turned and walked into the house I’d left behind years ago. I followed, stepping reluctantly into the past, hoping that I’d have enough in reserve to stop me going to the dresser in search of some comfort from Ol’ Jack. Maybe I’d get lucky and my sister who fought for me, took the hurt for me, sacrificing her heart and soul in the process, wouldn’t see just what a disappointment I’d become. And if all else failed, there was always the hip flask I kept in my pockets.

  The lounge was as I remembered it, the heavy leather sofas were soft with use, the big cushions moulded in the shape of our asses over the years. Threadbare rugs covered the beaten floorboards and in the fireplace flames licked at the kindling of a recently lit, half assed fire.

  The cake was there, no surprise, still with the "Happy Father's Day" lie emblazoned in blue icing. The candle wasn't lit. Seems there was always darkness around Daddy Dearest.

  I scanned the walls, my mind making a conscious effort to block out the drinks cabinet in the corner of the room, where bottles lay imprisoned behind leaded glass, muting the temptation, but not stopping it from calling, calling to me.

 
It was the axe that silenced them as abruptly as a concrete path silences the screams of a high rise jumper. A wedge of bright metal rested on the tattered rug, its long wooden stave dull against the highly polished rosewood cabinet. It seemed fitting that the tools of daddy’s demise should keep company. The axe, it seemed, was a statement; our salvation fashioned from iron and oak. And in its shadow things would end; Lindsey’s life of blind servitude; my life of guilt and self loathing.

  And Daddy Dearest? Well he’d die twice today, though he deserved more. I would cleave his head from his scrawny neck, retribution wearing the face of mercy. And as the blood pumped out onto the floor I would see the red tide was turning and life would be so very different, life would be right.

  “What stage is he at?” I asked her as I stared at the stairs just visible beyond the lounge doors.

  “The doctor says it's advanced,” Lindsey said. “He hasn’t long to go.”

  “Conlon needs to leave,” I said. “For his own good.”

  “I was hoping that you’d be there before it comes to that,” my sister said slowly.

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  She looked at me for a second yet in that moment we exchanged a lifetime; Conlon’s disregard of the Hippocratic Oath on his road to become hypocrite incarnate. All the years of abuse selectively shelved in lofty positions, safe from prying eyes. And part of me knew that the doctor’s presence was an extension of the family need to keep the dirty linen in the basket for fear the stink brought too much attention, for fear that people would need to see exactly what kind of stain was soiling the air.

  “Let’s go take a look at him,” I said heading for the stairs, which were in deep shadow.

  “Maybe you should take this,” Lindsey said dragging the axe away from the cabinet. “You know, for later?”

  “For the cake?" I said, my voice tight.

  "Funny guy."

  "Yeah,” I said without enthusiasm.

  I took it from her without comment. It was heavy and the weightiness gave me assurance that it would do the job and save us all.

  I mounted the stairs leaving Lindsey to stare after me, her bright blue eyes muted by the darkness. Ahead, a slab of light appeared; a door opening in the gloom. But not just any door.

  His door.

  The sanctum of Daddy Dearest, the place where he kept company with his new companion: The Sickness. In the doorway a figure wavered in the light. I held my breath, stopping my advance mid way on the stairs, my hands lifting the axe in a subconscious act of preparation. I sensed danger. But it was muted, as though drifting through a thick mist.

  “Hope you’re not planning to use that on the living, John.”

  Conlon’s tone was passive, but far from cordial. I lowered the axe, but only a little.

  “I hadn’t intended to but who knows? It may give those not willing to take a hint a little incentive.”

  Despite his age, Conlon was a big man. He had height, a good head and shoulders over me, and he had weight, his waist an inner tube of flesh that was barely contained by the belt of his pants. In the light of the doorway he stood a bloated bell shaped silhouette using the frame as support.

  “Maybe we should accept that in this we’re on the same side?” he suggested.

  “Just leave,” I said. “Then I’ll accept whatever you want.”

  His shape sagged a little, his belly bouncing. “Maybe I should call the authorities?” he said softly. “Maybe I should let folk know that The Sickness is in town and it’s stopped to pay you guys a visit?”

  “Maybe I take this axe to you and say it was a piece of mercy, that Daddy Dearest chowed down on your lard ass and you begged for someone to end it?”

  It started out as a bluff, the ego rising from the ashes like a phoenix ready for magnificent rebirth. But as the words formed, becoming real in the gloomy stairwell, I considered it. And as fleeting as the thought was, it felt so right I became numb with shock that I even paid it any mind. I ushered the errant thought into a dark corner where it glowered, resentful and defiant.

  “A boy left here,” Conlon said. “And a man has returned. Time works its magic doesn’t it?”

  “Not on everything.”

  “Happen that’s true,” the doctor said.

  The silence rolled in the way a sea fog clogs the coastline in spring. I felt someone far away lower the axe, a sign that nothing changes. Not really. There’s no end to the war but there is always place for a cease fire. And that time was here, now, in the gloomy stairwell of a house choked with bad memories.

  “You gonna help with this?” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “You know I hate you, right?”

  “Yes,” the big man said. “The shine might come off of that hate once this is done.”

  There was hope in his tone, absolution seeking out a chink in my armour. But why now? Years of regret perhaps? Years of guilt eating him away like a cancer?

  “You coming to do this John? You coming to do the deed?”

  Not Conlon this time. No resonance to the voice. Just a hiss, reed thin and gasping for air.

  Daddy Dearest.

  My skin crawled and my balls shrank. The hairs on my neck played host to goose flesh and the little boy who wet his pants when he heard the door click open at midnight, bringing Daddy Dearest and the stale sour odour of Ol’ Jack, screamed soundlessly in the locker chained shut at the back of my mind.

  “Yes,” I said. But my voice was a small thing, lacking real conviction. “I’m coming to finish it.”

  There were only seven steps separating the landing and me, yet there may as well have been ten storeys. My legs were uncooperative cylinders of leaden flesh, jittering with each footfall, and my heart was pumping way too fast.

  My bravado had taken a vacation, gone off to console itself with false promises that it may return sometime soon with new vigour. I called out to it, but it was useless. The little boy was here, his bladder a ball of hot steel getting ready to flow.

  “You need to hurry Johnny boy,” Daddy Dearest whispered. “My times almost up. And I don’t want to be coming back. Oh, my. No, I don’t, but I can feel the hunger, like a hard day on Ol' Jack, the need to feed.”

  I was on the landing now, my feet shuffling across the heavy pile. The axe, now a sudden weight against my arm, trailed behind like a lame third leg, its steel heel bringing with it fibres and dust devils. My lungs were steel and my throat, fire. I fought to stay focused but the world wanted to flip, and send me screaming into a pit of fear.

  Conlon watched my trial, his face a mixture of bemusement and remorse. In that moment, as I realised that perhaps bridges, whilst not returned to their former glory, may be patched up just enough to allow safe passage, a huge cry punched through the air. It was agony vented into the ether, agony coupled with anger that is born from the last vestiges of hope.

  Daddy Dearest was dying. It was the sound that in another time, another place I would have celebrated. Hell, I’d have probably cranked up the dial and danced to its tune. But this wasn’t the dark corners I found when Ol’ Jack was hauling the shots. I was stone cold sober and Daddy Dearest was in the room barred only by a doctor stewing in the juices of guilt.

  “Time to do the do, John,” Conlon said. “Then I’ll sign the certificate. And no one knows.”

  “Your price for absolution?” I said.

  “I already paid that this evenin’.”

  He stepped aside and the light played on a large damp stain on the arm of his shirt sleeve. Blood. Soaking into the cotton fabric.

  My face acted puzzled on behalf of a dawning mind and he nodded sadly.

  “The hunger starts early.” His words explained more than just the chunk Daddy Dearest had relieved from the bad doctor’s arm. It also gave an answer to his sudden change of heart. The Sickness was in him. And soon he would follow Daddy Dearest into its endless world of hunger. The Dear Doctor needed out.

  And he needed me to do it. I was taken aback t
hat my earlier thoughts of murder would now come with sanction.

  “I’ll help you to help me,” Conlon said, his smile slack and forlorn.

  I never thought the time would come when such an enemy would become an ally. But that time had come knocking; dressed in its Sunday best.

  I stepped into the room, where a small part of hell played out before me.

  Daddy Dearest lay still upon his bed, the bedding a ruffled mess, streaked with blood. His limbs, twig thin and bare save for the crimson wheals cross-crossing his skin, jutted out from his pale blue pyjamas, toes and fingers clawed by the agony that had taken him to his momentary death. My eyes traced his gaunt stiffened outline until they alighted upon Daddy Dearest’s face, which was twisted into a mask of pain, mouth clamped in a crimson, oval grimace, cheeks sallow, and his eyes so wide they appeared to be without lids. I had seen those eyes many times, looked into them, and they were as terrifying in death as they were in life: piercing blue, devoid of expression or remorse, love or morality, rolling back into his head like a shark about to take a bite.

  The blood on the sheets belonged to Conlon. I felt both disgusted and relieved by this knowledge. After all, it could so easily have been Lindsey with a chunk missing from her forearm.

  “You’re going to have to do it soon. John,” Conlon said beside me, “I can support you through it. Then you know you’ll be able to do me.”

  I know that now, I thought.

  “Got to take his head clean off. No other medicine for The Sickness.”

  “If you’re the expert, maybe you should do it?” I hissed.

  “I can’t swing that axe hard enough,” Conlon said holding out his bloodied arm towards me, just in case I wasn’t getting the message. “No, John, this is your duty.”

  I was about to respond, saying anything that would get the time passing without having to focus on what was unavoidable, but then I saw Daddy Dearest move. Only a finger at first, the one that used to have a wedding band as a sign of his eternal love for the mother I’d never known. It was a slight and deliberate movement, the clawed digit unfolding as though it were a flower seen through time lapse TV. The other fingers followed suit, accompanied by the protesting pop and snap of seized knuckles.