by Bruce Jones
His mind reeled. Everything seemed to be coming very fast now, too many questions to follow, but at least questions with a definite size and shape, a sense of meaning, circling there at the periphery of thought, waiting to be answered.
He made it back to his old neighborhood and into his parents’ old garage without incident of flashing lights or sirens. Perhaps Laurie hadn’t called the police after all.
But something happened between the garage and the kitchen door of his parents’ house. Something that made him stop in his tracks and stand numb with fear and unable to enter his childhood home. Was the thing waiting for him in there? Crouched in some dark corner just waiting for him to fall into an exhausted sleep, then climb the staircase to his room? Yes.
And no. Some innate instinct told him the house was empty. That his fears were all in his head, because the thing was in his head, only his head. But knowing this and believing it were two different things. We are our own worst enemies.
But we can’t stand about in dark garages all our lives.
Richard pushed though the door to the kitchen, summoning his anger again for help.
* * *
The first thing he did was grab his newly bought cell phone from the dining room table and stare at the keypad, thinking of Laurie. Then he slipped the phone in his pocket and went up to his bedroom, retrieving his watch and snapping it onto his wrist. On the way, he’d turned on every light in the house.
…wait…didn’t I have my watch at Laurie’s house, wasn’t I just looking--?
He stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, seeing that the smear of red had now turned brown across his shirt, and winced in disgust. He ripped off his clothes, threw them in the hamper—would have burned them if logs had been blazing in the fireplace—stepped into a scalding shower and let its driving pain cleanse body and mind.
He toweled, picked up his jeans and took out the cell phone again. Stared at the keypad. Couldn’t bring himself to punch in her number.
He walked the house.
There was fear here to be sure, waves of it almost tangible, but he couldn’t discern, upstairs or down, their point of origin. Maybe there was no focal point, maybe the whole house, the walls themselves were permeated with fear, a lifetime of it that had begun in his childhood…
He stopped in his tracks again in the middle of the living room carpet.
The four of them, all his Topeka pals, all the Deadenders, had flashed before his eyes at the thought of the word ‘childhood’.
He could see every fresh, laughing face as though it was yesterday: Pete Shivers, Bobby Maser, Scroogie…
Scroogie.
He flipped open the cell phone and tapped Scroogie’s room number.
“Dr. Maser.”
“Bobby? You’re still at the hospital? How’s Scroogie?”
“About the same. Where the hell you been? I thought you were going to call me from Laurie’s after you got there!”
Richard walked to his bedroom window shirtless, stared out the dark panes at his backyard, half-expecting to see a shambling shadow creeping across the lawn toward the house. “Yeah, I—we got to talking, I forgot.”
“Laurie’s okay?”
Richard nodded at the phone. “She’s okay. She didn’t call you, did she?”
“No. Why should she call me?”
Richard cleared his throat. “No reason. She had a little temperature…I thought—“
“But she’s okay? Not coming down with anything? Are you there now?”
“No. No, I’m home, just got in.”
“What’s the matter, Rich?”
Richard cleared his throat again. “What do you mean?”
“It’s two o’clock in the morning, you left your childhood sweetheart’s arms to come home and call me.”
“I just—I wanted to check on Scroogie is all.”
“Did you hurt her?”
“What!”
“Laurie. Did you hurt her feelings or something? You two have a fight? Allie call right in the middle of it, something like that?”
“No. Nothing like that. We just…”
“I understand. It’s been a lot of years.”
Richard nodded at the dark window. “A lot of years.”
“So get some sleep and send her flowers in the morning.”
“Right. Good idea.”
“I mean it about the sleep. You look like shit.”
“So you’ve told me.”
“’Night, moron.”
Richard rang off, slipped the phone in his pocket, and stood staring out the dark panes. Had something moved there by the fence bordering the two properties? He stepped closer to the glass, squinted down into the night.
All at once he was yelling at the top of his lungs. “Come on then, goddamn you! Come on! I’m right here! What’s stopping you! Step right up! Only be a man about it! Use the front door this time!”
And he stood there breathing hard a moment, smiling at his own silliness.
Downstairs there came a hollow knocking boom at the front door.
NINETEEN
Another impatient booming knock sounded before he could get to the door. A pounding, really.
Something about the sound of it filled him with more anger than fear. Richard reached out and yanked it wide, flipping the porch light with his free hand.
“Are you Richard Denning?”
He stood there staring, shoulders sagging a bit with relief.
“Are you Richard Denning?”
“Laurie—“
“Answer the question!” she snapped. “Who are you?”
He took a breath. “I’m Richard.”
She waited.
“Richard Denning,” he sighed.
“Well, that’s established at least! You remember who you are!”
A miller was already banging at the porch light. Richard glanced at her arm. There was a band-aid on the underside below the elbow. A big band-aid, but just a band-aid. The wound was less severe than he’d feared. “Are you all right?”
Her eyes narrowed and he was sure she was going to scream at him again. But it was little more like a sharp whisper. Very sharp. “No, you asshole, I am not all right. I am still coming down from a state of what I believe they call high dungeon. See, common though it may be to you, it’s been awhile since I’ve been chased around my bedroom by a maniac with a carving knife.”
“Laurie—“
“Shut up, you…” she had to think for a moment, “…you shit! I am not coming in. I am not staying. I only came by to tell you that I did not phone the sheriff’s office. I saw you from the kitchen on your way out the door. And the only reason I didn’t call was because there happen to be very good locks on all my doors and I considered the possibility that whatever your illness is, there might be a prior arrest involved, a parole or something, or that you may have missed your medication somehow—“
“Laurie—“
“As a courtesy to my actions I suggest you let me finish!”
Richard fell silent.
Laurie straightened her shoulders, tossed her chin as if marshalling her thoughts for the next round, throwing out her chest in the motion. “Don’t you dare look at my breasts!”
“I’m sor—“
“I could have you in prison, you bastard!”
“I know.”
She sucked in breath to fire back, but something seemed to catch in her throat. She stood there quietly instead, hard eyes softening slightly. As they began to moisten, she yanked her head away from his eyes. Laurie turned on one heel about to charge back to her car, the outline of which he could see at his curb, then stopped herself, arms rigid at her sides, ending in white-clenched fists. “You should have told me, Richard,” so softly he almost didn’t catch it.
His chest tightened suddenly. “Told you? What?”
She whirled, astonished, the tornado hair and panicked eyes almost back again. “What! What!”
“I mean—“
“Wh
at the fuck do you think!” One brimming eyes spilled over now but she didn’t seem to notice or care. “You said you lov—I thought we were…”
“Laurie, I know how you feel—“
“Do you!”
“But you must let me explain. I can explain. Truly I can.”
“Oh good!” she smiled, tossing her shoulders, looking a little goofy, a little scary, “that’s just great! Maybe while you’re at it you can give me one good reason for listening.”
“I can give you one.”
“Fine, fine! Fire away!”
“Because I think,” he said gently, “you could have called and said all this.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“I think you came over to see me again.”
“Oh, you do, huh?”
“To make sure I was all right. That I didn’t, in my…state, drive into a tree or something.”
She didn’t look convinced.
“Because believe me, I thought of it.”
She still didn’t look convinced. But she didn’t march away.
* * *
He handed her a glass of wine in his living room.
“I told you I didn’t care for anything, thanks.” She sat on his couch, arms crossed, leg crossed, body posture on full alert.
Richard placed her glass on the coffee table before her and began pacing the rug. “I wish I just tell you how much I love you and it would be enough.”
She sighed.
He nodded. “I know it won’t. I know I may have lost you…” it made him choke a moment to admit that, “…and I have no idea if what follows will make any difference where that’s concerned. I already lost you once. Then I lost my career. Then I lost my wife. I’m used to losing. Well, familiar with it, anyway. But maybe if you can’t love me anymore in the way I hoped…maybe you can still like me enough, remember me enough, to still be a friend.”
“It’s late, Richard. And I dislike your using our past as leverage to your present day ends. It’s disingenuous and the least like you of anything you’ve done so far.”
He nodded conciliation, pacing.
Then he stopped, stared down at the rug. “I asked them once to let you in.”
“Who?”
“The Deadenders. When we were teenagers. I asked them once to make you a member.” He smiled envisioning it. “Scroogie was the most aghast. “But she’s a girl!’ he said.”
On the sofa, Laurie crossed her other leg. “Is that supposed to impress me?”
He began pacing again back and forth before her. “We didn’t have anything like a real credo, I guess,” Richard said, “or some list of pledges like the Boy Scouts. But one thing we all agreed on, one thing we shook hands on at least once a week. We would always be there for the other guy. Not just today, but forever. Forever.”
Laurie looked at her watch.
“I know it’s late, Laurie. Maybe later than you think, than any of us thought.” He shook his head as he paced. “I really wish just telling you how much I love you could be enough—“
“I think we covered this ground.”
“—but even if it were, it still wouldn’t be enough.”
She looked over at him now.
“And the only way for that to happen is for you to know all of it. For me to tell you everything. Everything I know, anyway. It’s kind of… disorganized. Sorry.”
And he told her.
Everything he knew.
* * *
Richard was on the sofa now, sipping at his wine glass.
Laurie paced before him. She’d been doing that for the past fifteen minutes, in complete silence. Finally: “Some story.”
“You don’t believe me. You think I’m crazy.”
“Are you?” she said.
“No, Laurie.”
“Then why shouldn’t I believe you?”
She paced some more.
“So. A monster. And you’ve all seen it, all except Maser. Do you believe it’s real?”
Richard drained his glass, reached for the bottle. Had to stop himself from picking it up; he was drinking too much wine. Not a good thing to do right now in front of her. “I don’t know.” He added: “It seems real.”
He’d thought it sounded lame, but immediately afterwards knew he’d spoken the truth. Laurie’s expression seemed to agree. She didn’t look like she was suddenly on his side, just that she believed in his veracity.
“And you think this thing, it drove Scroogie to attempt suicide?”
He stared to nod, looked up at her instead. “Did I say that? I mean, did I say those exact words?”
She stopped pacing in front of him. “Not exactly.” Laurie frowned, then looked thoughtful.
Richard was staring into space. “But I told you he was pretty undone about losing his fortune, his house.”
“Yes.”
“So you made the leap that it was the monster that drove him to…off the deep end.”
“I suppose so, yes. What are you driving at?”
Richard shook his head. “I’m not—nothing.”
She watched him a moment. Then paced again. “Okay. So. You’re afraid though, right?”
It bridled him, the thought of that, that Laurie might think that. He wanted to be strong for her, perfect for her. But being honest first won out over the other. “Yes,” he said.
“Of the monster.”
“Yes.”
“And the house.”
Richard blinked. “What?”
“You said you were afraid to come in here earlier. That you stood in the garage afraid to open the kitchen door, to come into the house.”
He nodded. “I was, yes.”
“Afraid of the house?”
He grew impatient. “Yes, yes! Didn’t I just say that?” He sighed. “Sorry.”
“You said a lot, Richard. Some of it pretty mixed up. I’m just trying to understand. Is it the monster you fear or the house?”
Both, he started to say. Then he thought about it. Was he afraid of the house, his childhood home, a place he once revered as the pinnacle of safety, of all that was right and normal about the world? He could feel Laurie watching him, waiting. “I…am afraid of the monster, for sure.”
“And the house?”
“You’re driving at something, what is i—“
“Where the monster comes from.”
He looked at her. “You think it comes from my parents’ house. From my childhood, some trauma in my childhood, is that it?” He smiled. “Now I remember, you minored in Psychology.”
She didn’t return the smile. Just waited for him to speak again.
“I loved this house.” When she still said nothing he searched her face. “What--?”
“You used past tense.”
He shrugged. “So what? The house has been the locus of some pretty bad karma lately. Allie leaving. The thing…dreaming about the thing coming in, climbing the stairs.”
“Then you do think it’s all a dream?”
He sighed through clenched teeth; he was becoming exasperated. With her, with all of it. He poured himself another glassful. “Where’s this going, Laurie?” He’d almost said ‘doctor’ instead of ‘Laurie,’ was glad he hadn’t.
“Tell me this. Were you ever afraid, even uncomfortable in the house before you had the first dream?”
“I don’t know if it’s a dream, Laurie!”
“Before you thought you saw the creature, then.”
He shook his head. “No.” He drank wine.
Laurie paced. “Half human, half animal, you said.”
He nodded, swallowing.
“ ‘Sort of like a dog’, you said.”
He nodded. “All of us said. It looked the same to all of…all of us.”
She turned to him. “You started to say something else.”
“No.”
“Richard.”
“I just…I’m not positive, but…”
“But?”
“I told you Maser said he never saw it. N
ever even had the dream.”
“Did he ever say why?’
“Shit.” Richard was staring into empty space again.
“What?”
“I am afraid of the house. Of one place in the house, anyway. The basement.” It was a revelation, if a soul-chilling one. Something his inner mind hadn’t wanted to dredge up, admittedly. A breakthrough?
Laurie watched him. “You mean the way lots of little kids are afraid to go down in the basement? Afraid of the dark? That’s pretty common, Richard. My mother used to send me down to our cellar to fetch canned goods. All those creepy shadows, hiding the boogey man. I hated her for that. Not really hated, but—“ she broke off. Richard was pallid.
She came to him, bent down. “Hey. What is it? What was in your childhood basement, Richard?”
He turned to her, looked straight into her eyes. “A gold book.”
* * *
“Well, that’s not a good sign,” Richard said.
He stood with Laurie at the top of the cellar stairs, his hand on the light switch he’d just thrown. Thrown the switch but no light. The hallway light behind them gifted them with a view of the first four cellar steps which quickly vanished downward into blackness. Like Dante’s Inferno, Richard was thinking, like the steps down to Hell.
“Maybe just a burnt out bulb,” from Laurie, though even in her voice there was a ring of apprehension.
“No,” Richard shook his head, “it does that sometimes, a short, I guess.”
“Do you have a flashlight?”
“A torch,” Richard absently, staring into black funnel.
“What?”
“The British call them ‘torches.’” He shrugged. “Seems more apropos somehow.”
He didn’t even know if he and Allie had a flashlight. But he found one, finally, under the kitchen sink, one of old metal kind, or aluminum, still shiny silver and still working, though not up to full capacity: what should have been a bright cone of white was dimmed and yellowish at the penumbra. Richard cast it toward the steps as Laurie took hold of his hand. He was glad. He’d wanted to take hold of hers.
“It’s just a cellar,” she said, and the sentence hung in air both unnecessarily obvious and strangely confirming, meant dismissively to Richard, surely, but sounding more like a warning to the cellar itself.