The Deadenders

by Bruce Jones

  Richard awoke in the visitor’s chair near Scroogie’s bed with a stiff neck.

  He hadn’t remembered dozing off but someone, a nurse probably, had come and turned the hospital room’s lights down to nearly dark, just a soft glow from the panel over Scroogie’s bed. Richard looked at his watch but found, in his haste to leave the house, that he’d left it there. Left it there with Laurie. Taken it off to make love to Laurie. He should really call her, check in.

  Richard pushed up in the visitor’s chair, the vinyl seat making a squeaking sound, like a small, startled animal in the silent room.

  “Don’t move.”

  Richard froze in the chair. Felt his heart lurch painfully an instant later.

  Was someone else in the room with them? Shivers? Maser?

  It hadn’t sounded like them, though. It had sounded like Scroogie, came from his direction atop the bed.

  Richard turned with exaggerated slowness, fingers gripping the arms of the chair. He squinted at the dim outline of Scroogie, a shapeless lump under the soft panel lighting. The air felt very close inside the room suddenly. “Scroogie?”

  “Shh. Just sit still, Rich. I don’t think it’s seen you yet.”

  Richard felt an insect run down the base of his spine that he realized from his damp palms must have been a bead of sweat. His heart would not stop its aching thud; the rush of blood in his ear was so loud that Scroogie surely must hear it. And it was Scroogie for sure now, he’d know that voice anywhere. Even those quiet, near-whispered tones.

  “Scroogie?”

  “Just be still, Rich and you’ll be all right. I don’t think it knows you’re here. It’s come for me. Just you be still now.”

  Richard felt abruptly dipped in ice water. He shook so hard he swore the chair made that squeaking sound again. “Scroogie, I don’t understand! Are you all right?”

  Silence.

  But the awful cold would not leave.

  Then came the terrible smell.

  “Scroogie? Please. What is it?”

  Silence.

  Richard felt his bladder ready to burst.

  “Scroogie?”

  “Over there. In the corner. Can’t you smell it?”

  Yes, he could smell it. It sickened him, the smell of it. But there were two corners of the hospital room hidden from Richard’s line of vision, the one that met the wall that held the TV and the one next to the bathroom, and both were pitched in blackness. “I don’t see anything…”

  Scroogie’s voice seemed to float to him, disembodied. Was he hearing it only in his head? They had all—all the Deadenders—had that weird kind of telepathy when they were kids. Is that what he was hearing now? Or was Scroogie talking to him from his coma?

  “Right hand corner, Rich…opposite the bathroom. Two little red dots. The eyes.”

  Richard squinted. Thought maybe he did see the smallest pinpoints of red. “What is it, Scrooge?”

  “You’ve seen it before. It’s come calling on all of us. All but Maze. The dog thing.”

  Richard screamed at the articulation of the thing and pressed back hard in the vinyl chair. He knew this because he heard the little animal squeak again, but the screaming part he felt was probably mostly in his head. Maybe the whole thing was in his head. And he winced inwardly again at the word ‘thing,’ saw it pushing up through the gray matter of his brain the way he’d seen it push up rotted leaves and damp loam.

  Now the smell was almost overpowering. He recognized the coppery taste of bile and felt his insides roil like a listing deck. He needed to get to the bathroom and quick, but to do that he’d have to go past the…

  “Scroogie, what does it want?”

  Silence.

  Don’t play games, Scrooge, not now!

  “Scroogie, talk to me!”

  “Me. For now it only wants me. For later? All of us I would think. Anyone who was there, who read the book, saw The Pyx.”

  “The what?”

  “Never mind. It’s probably best you don’t remember, Rich. It’s the recalling, those little leaks of memory, that attract it, I think.”

  Richard didn’t want to say it, didn’t want to. But he had to somehow. “Attracts what?”

  What amounted to a dry chuckle emanated from Scroogie’s bed, a chuckle wholly bereft of humor. “Think of those old movies, Rich. Those old Roger Corman movies at the Grand and the Dickinson and the Jayhawk. Think of the worst possible monster in the worst of those films. Then multiply it by ten.”

  Another mirthless chuckle from the direction of the darkened bed, then Scroogie’s dry, rasping voice said, “--or maybe not ten. Maybe just two. Two, I think, is the answer.”

  “Scrooge, I don’t understand.”

  “Just as well. You will soon enough. You saw The Pyx. You saw the gold book.”

  “What book?”

  “The missing book. Maser has it. We messed up, Rich. Messed up bad. And now it’s come back.”

  “Messed up how? What did we do? What does it want?”

  “Aye,” Scroogie said, the timbre in his voice nearly unrecognizable now in his fear, “that’s the rub. Goodbye, Rich.”

  Richard started to say something but then he saw it.

  It rose up out of the corner of the room, a black hood of shapeless horror, and surged on, unsteady but quite determinedly, quite confidently toward Scroogie’s bed.

  And flung itself on him.

  Scroogie screamed.

  Richard screamed. Tried hard, so very hard, to unglue himself from the visitor’s chair, rush to his friend’s aid, but found no strength in his legs to accomplish this, no strength inside at all but the almost maniacal ability to scream.

  Then the lights blinked on.

  What was left of Scroogie—very little unless you counted little globs of red pulp—dripped from hospital white sheets. The dog-thing, also dripping red from its nightmarishly distorted muzzle, turned to look at the man still screaming in the visitor’s chair nearby. Turned to study him a moment with eyes both penetrating and strangely familiar. Then it launched itself across the bed at him, fangs glistening scarlet.

  “Well,” a disgusted Maser said from the wall switch, “what did you expect?”

  * * *

  “—hey.”

  Light in his eyes now, hurting. The room shaking.

  “Hey. Rich. Hey.”

  Richard opened his eyes and looked up at Maser gently shaking his shoulder. “Wake up, buddy.”

  Richard sat up, blinked away the dream. “Maze.”

  “You okay? You’re sweating, Sport. And it’s freezing in here the way they keep the AC.”

  Richard sat up, eyes jerking instantly to the bed. Scroogie was there, still a shapeless lump, still trailing tubes and wires, still unbloodied.

  “I fell asleep.”

  Maser smiled. “An amazing feat in the world’s most uncomfortable chair.”

  Richard rubbed at his eyes. His neck hurt. Maser was right, it was an uncomfortable chair. Maybe the hospital made them that way on purpose, so visitors wouldn’t fall asleep in them. He glanced over at the bed. “Is he okay?”

  “Scroogie’s fine. Stable, anyway.”

  Richard looked around. “Where’s Shivers?”

  “Pete’s gone back to his apartment to get some rest. Nothing for him to do here. You should go home too. You look terrible.”

  “Thanks.”

  Maser smiled.

  Richard took a cleansing breath, happy just to still be breathing. “Had a dream. A nightmare.”

  “Yeah? What about?”

  “Here in this room. It was so real.”

  “You need to get home, get in a real bed.”

  Home. Laurie was at his home. He needed to call her. He looked at his watch. Oh, yeah, he’d forgotten his watch in his rush to get here. Richard sat frowning.

  “What’s the matter, Rich?”

  “I forgot my watch.”

  Maser smiled. “It’s just going on eleven.”

  “P.M.,
of course.”

  “Yes.”

  Richard nodded. “Funny. I looked down at my watch a few minutes ago, saw I’d left it at home…but I can’t remember if I dreamed that or not.”

  “You want some coffee before you go? I can order some up.”

  Richard stared into space.

  “Rich?”

  Richard looked up at Maser. “This dream… it was so real. I could swear Scroogie was really talking to me. I can still hear the sound of his voice.”

  “Dreams are funny.”

  Richard rubbed at his wrist, at the naked place his watch usually covered. “Before, when Shivers was here with me, I saw him open his eyes. Scroogie, I mean. Pete says Scroogie does that sometimes.”

  “At times. But he’s still in a coma.”

  “So he doesn’t really see anything?”

  Maser took a deep breath of his own, with maybe some frustration in it, and glanced over at Scroogie’s sleeping form. “Afraid we don’t really know. For all our vaunted knowledge of medicine we still don’t understand much about comas.”

  Richard followed his eyes. “Do comatose patients ever talk?”

  Maser nodded. “They can. Some experts encourage relatives to talk to patients in coma, they believe they can hear us, even understand us, that talking to them increases the chance of reconnection, of awakening. It’s all theory. Man, you really do look like shit, Rich.”

  Richard rubbed at his shoulders now, remembering the terrible coldness. “It was here in the room with us, Maze. That… thing.”

  “In your dream?”

  “Didn’t seem like a dream.”

  “What did it look like, this ‘thing’?”

  “Just this--shapeless mass. This big shadow. Two little red dots of eyes. Scroogie kept telling me to keep quiet, that it had come here for him, not me.”

  “Why him?”

  Richard thought about it. “I’m not sure. I got the feeling…I don’t know, maybe that he was being punished. For something. That we all were being punished, all the Deadenders. He kept talking about a book of yours.”

  “A book?”

  “Some book you have. We all saw it, he said. And we messed up. We messed up bad. And that’s why the thing’s come back.”

  Maser’s forehead knitted a little. “What kind of book?”

  Richard shook his head. “I don’t know. A gold one, I think. ” He looked away a weary moment, then looked quickly back at Maser. “Maze, what’s a Pyx?”

  “A what?”

  “Pyx.” Richard guessed at the spelling.

  Maser’s frown deepened. He shook his head. “I’ve no idea. Why?”

  Richard rubbed at his eyes. They felt set in hot sand. “Scroogie mentioned it, along with the book.”

  “The gold book.”

  “Yes.”

  “Huh.”

  Richard looked up, expecting a patronizing expression from Maser. If the doctor had one he was quick to hide it. “It sounded important, Maze. I know it sounds like a stupid dream now, but if you could have heard his voice…”

  Richard’s stomach growled noisily, inadvertently taking the drama from the moment.

  Maser smiled. “When did you eat last?”

  Richard couldn’t remember. Maser consulted his watch. “Look, I’ve got a break coming up and I haven’t eaten either. The food’s awful in the cafeteria, why don’t we drop over to my place and grab a sandwich, I’ve got cold cuts, fresh from the deli. Give you a chance to look for this gold book of yours.”

  He did sound patronizing. “It isn’t my book, Maze—“

  Maser held up defensive hands, hunching theatrically. “Okay, okay! Hey, I’ve got a lot of books in my study, maybe even a gold one. C’mon, you look like you could use a decent meal. Christ, Allie goes away a few weeks and you’re a fruggin’ wreck.”

  I’m not going to case your goddamn library for some stupid book, Maze. He almost said it aloud, but held back, finally, nodded.

  Cold cuts did sound good, actually.

  * * *

  Richard followed Maser’s Cadillac taillights to Maser Manse.

  That’s what the other Enders all called it, ‘The Maser Manse off Snot Nose Drive.’ A big old stone colonial they used to throw rocks at as kids. The Topeka Town Fathers had argued for a couple of generations about whether to raze it or see if it qualified for National Registry of Historical Buildings. Richard never knew what the outcome was, but Maser had fixed the place up beautifully after he acquired it, sand-blasting the gray stones white again, recultivated the garden and arboretum, putting in a pool (at which he’d had a pool party for them all earlier this summer), and refurbished every inch of original mahogany trim that hadn’t fallen to dry rot.

  They came in through the mud room in back. They had to be quiet, Maser’s invalid mother was sleeping. Richard had seen her for a moment at the pool party, in a wheelchair but every bit the exuberant gypsy she’d been when they were kids. After her private nurse took her back to her room, Maser had whispered to Richard furtively, “Alzheimer’s…”

  Now Maser pointed down a long pine scented hallway. “Study’s down there. Every book’s under bibliophile so don’t steal anything. You want ham or turkey, Munster or Swiss?”

  “Yes,” Richard said, heading quietly down the hall as Maser turned toward the kitchen. He passed two massive staircases on the way, glowing white under soft lamplight. If the thing ever decides to visit Maser’s house, he thought, craning up at mahogany balustrades, it’s got a hell of a climb ahead of it.

  He came to the study door, swept the inside wall, found the switch and lit the room.

  Not as large a room as he’d imagined, even with the beautifully ornate fireplace, currently not in use, and the high ceilings and the big glass chandelier overhead. He remembered Maser telling him once how long he’d searched for the proper English Tudor desk to go with the rest of the room, then found out how much they went for and settled for Early eBay.

  There was no book on the desk, the first place he looked.

  There was a magazine though: Famous Monsters of Filmland. A rich painting of Vincent Price graced the front. Richard recognized it from his youth, started to pick it up and thumb through the nostalgia, then realized it was probably a collector’s item and left it untouched. Maser could be cranky about his plastic monsters.

  Richard scanned the wonderful built-in bookcases, the rows of neatly stacked mahogany shelves. Lots of books, most of them medical in origin, fronted by the occasional Aurora plastic Frankenstein or Mummy. Anybody but me, Richard mused, would think Maze was nuts—me and the other Enders.

  Lots of books. None of them with gold covers.

  He stepped around the side of the Early eBay Victorian desk and let his eyes scan down one final row, top to bottom. Near the baseboard he found himself staring into Maser’s black wicker wastebasket. Something gleamed dully there in the crystal light of the chandelier, dull but brighter than its crumpled paper companions. Richard stepped closer and peered down. A pencil point jutting from beneath the surrounding trash. A pencil with a very long, thin lead. He started to turn away, then turned back instead and discovered the lead to be an elegant length of steel, the wood holding it translucent plastic, ribbed with tiny red measuring marks. A syringe.

  Richard blinked.

  In Maser’s study, not his examining room. A syringe.

  “Find it?” Maser said behind him.

  Richard turned, shaking his head, and accepted a plateful of generously stacked deli meat and a cold beer. He turned again at the solid tones of the ancient grandfather clock behind him. A smiling metal moon and sun turned behind the big filigreed hands: 11:30.

  “Laurie Seasons is at my house,” Richard said, “I need to call her.”

  Maser, seated in his red leather swivel chair with a full mouth, pointed to his desk.

  Richard reached for the handset of an old black rotary dial that looked like a movie prop. He spun the dial of the old fashioned rotary phone Maser ha
d no doubt installed as another reminder of his lost childhood.

  He took a swig of beer.

  “Nobody home,” Richard said. Then he punched one of the cradle tabs a moment and redialed, Laurie’s home this time.

  “Maybe it was a library book or something,” Maser offered around ham and cheese.

  “What?” Richard said. Then: “Laurie? Hey. It’s me. Sorry to be so late in getting back. Yeah, still at the hospital. You didn’t have to go ho-- What? Like how? Dizzy how? Are you sick?”

  Richard stood suddenly, making the visitor’s chair squeak. Maser watched him closely.

  “He’s in a coma but he’s stable. Maser right here with him. But what about you?”

  Maser leaned closer as if trying to catch the other side of the conversation.

  “Are you sure, honey? Well, okay. But I think I should drop by anyway. It isn’t any trouble. Well, it’s important to me. All right. See you in a few minutes.” He hung the black handset carefully in its ancient cradle.

  “Is Laurie all right?”

  Richard stared at the phone another moment. “A little lightheaded, she says.” He lifted his eyes to the shelves of books again.

  “Were you two drinking?”

  “Some.” Richard put down his untouched plate. “I’m going to drop by, check on her. Probably overreacting but—“

  Maser caught his arm before he could get past him. “Not until you goddamn eat something! That’s Goodman’s Deli smoked Virginia ham!”

  Richard picked up the sandwich, crammed it in his mouth on the way out, fishing for his keys.

  Maser yelled at him from the hallway. “You heading over to her house now?”

  Richard nodded, turning toward the mud room.

  “Call me from her place, huh? Just so I’ll know.”

  “I’m sure she’s fine, Maze!” Richard called back.

  “Call me anyway, after you get there!”

  “Yes, doctor!”

  “And eat all that sandwich, you bastard!”

  “Yes, doctor!”

  SEVENTEEN

  “Hi.”

  “Hi.” He kissed her lips at the doorstep to the farmhouse, pulled her closer for a deep kiss, was a bit disappointed when she didn’t kiss back with more urgency.