by Joseph Rubas
For a long time, I just sat in the Explorer, steeling myself for the meeting. Once I had my nerves settled, it was nearly half past. It felt like time had sped up. I expected the light to drain from the sky and then reignite and then to weaken again, all as I opened the car door and stepped out. Ahead, the house sat quiet and shady on its green, manicured lawn. I stumbled as I took the first step, delirious with joy. Here it was. I was finally going to meet the man of my dreams!
I crossed the street and the yard, my eyes glued to the house; oh, boy! I was salivating like a Sponge getting ready to bite into a hot Krabby Patty.
I think I was rubbing my hands as I mounted the steps. I know I was grinning. I caught a watery glimpse of myself in the glass screen door. I had reason to. I was so close to Dean I could hear Him scream if He stubbed His toe.
I hesitated at the door. I took a deep breath, steadied my nerves, and knocked.
Nothing.
Again, I knocked.
Come on, come to the door! I was bursting with anticipation. If Dean didn’t appear soon, I’d explode all over the place.
I knocked again, more frantically; the door rattled in the frame.
I was starting to get pissed.
“Let me in!” I cried.
No answer.
“Let me in!”
Behind me, someone called out: “Hey, who are you?”
I spun on my heels. It was a black guy in blue shorts and a blue button up. He wore a cap and had a brown bag slung over his shoulder. Mailman.
“I want Dean Knootz!”
“He ain’t in there, man! He moved two years ago!”
My heart dropped. Moved? He wasn’t here? Bullshit. After all I went through, He was here and He was waiting for me, a metaphorical erection pushing out the crotch of His khakis. “You’re lying!”
He cocked his head. “Look, man, I’m telling you: the mutha moved.”
Something snapped in me then, and I went loony-tunes. I yanked out the Heckler and Koch and aimed. For a split second, the postman was frozen in place. Then, just as I squeezed off two rounds, he dove, landing behind a small red car at the curb.
“DEAN!!!” I wailed, “GIVE ME MY DEAN KOONTZ! NOW! NOW! NOW! NOW!”
I was like a mad beast. I stood there panting and grunting, more insane ape than human, rage, fear, disappointment, fury coursing through me.
Snarling through bared teeth, I leapt off the porch and fired wildly. I think the bullet struck a window. I heard something shatter.
People started coming out of their houses. I saw a few curtains slide back. As soon as something happens, people are right there, gawking with wide eyes and drooling mouths. Ire swept through me. Retarded motherfuckers. Go back to watching The Price is Right!
“What’s going on out here?” an old woman called from her porch. She was standing hunched like Quasimodo under a hanging plant, squinting into the sunlight, her face like cracked leather and her sparse white hair flipping in the breeze.
Nosey old bitch! She was probably the neighborhood gossip, looking out her window all day and studying every little detail of every little thing.
I aimed and fired. The bullet missed her and embedded itself into the side of the house.
She screamed and went down. I heard shouts and yells. The black postman cried something out.
“SHUT UP!!!” I demanded, and fired at the car. The round crashed through the passenger window and out the driver’s side. Someone on his front lawn ducked to the side, fell, and then jumped up again, jogging away as if I were a walking, talking doughnut and he a fitness freak.
“WHERE IS DEAN? TELL ME!”
“He lives next door to that old woman you killed!” the postman cried. “Go shoot at him!”
I whipped around. There it was.
“The brown house?” I called.
“Yeah! Yeah! He’s in there chillin’ out. Take all that noise in there.”
“DEAN!!!”I broke out and ran for the house. In the distance, sirens began to wail.
I was on the lawn. I could hear Him clicking away, and Trixie nibbling on a bone. Gerda was in the kitchen, making dinner.
I was almost to the steps when something fast and hard from the right took me down, plowed into me like a freight train driven by Casey Jones. I don’t know if he was high on cocaine or that notion just crossed his mind, but he sure took me outta the game. I hit the ground, the wind knocked from my lungs. The gun flew from my hand and skitted away. The postman was on top of me, and others were rushing to his aid. Someone kicked the gun into the shrubbery along Dean’s front porch, and another stepped on my wrist, cracking it.
“AHHHH, THAT HURTS!!!” I screamed.
The sirens grew closer. I strained against my captors, but couldn’t move. I opened my mouth to scream something else, but before I could, someone spoke, and my lungs locked up. I knew that voice, that beautiful, wispy, angelic voice.
“What’s happening?”
“This crazy motherfucker was gonna kill you, Mr. Koontz.”
“Oh my God.”
“DEAN!!!!”I cried, and fainted.
July 4, 2014 – That bitch picked me out of a line up, and the police linked Trixie to that guy I killed. The old lady didn’t die, un-fucking-fortunately. She was shaken, but survived.
My dignity, though, didn’t.
GUNMAN SUBDUED ON NOVELIST’S FRONT LAWN and MADMAN “KRAZY” FOR KOONTZ appeared on newspapers from coast-to-coast, and video of me being dragged away raving and screaming played endlessly on Fox and MSNBC. Dean even gave a press conference I wasn’t allowed to watch. It wasn’t actually Dean, I read in the paper, just some spokesman. He said the Koontz family was shocked and saddened by the events of the last few days. How embarrassing. I’ve never been so humiliated in my life.
I could have shook his hand!
Last Rites
The last light of the dying day crept slowly across the darkening western sky, cooling gradually from blazing orange to cold purple.
Father Allen Tozzi sighed as he watched the coming night, his heart palpitating in his scrawny chest. The streetlamps along Riverside Drive clicked automatically on, casting pools of wan light across the cracked and overgrown sidewalk. One near the intersection of Riverside and Oak shorted out, faded, exploded brightly back, and then went dark for all time.
Tozzi let the curtain fall back over the dirty window and left the rectory. A small open-air walkway connected his private quarters to Saint Anthony’s. Crossing the shaggy lawn, Tozzi felt the same tightening of fear he did every time he gathered the courage to venture out after dark. They never came onto the grounds of the church, but nevertheless Tozzi loathed being anywhere but inside after dusk. Once, one of them threw a rock at him as he scurried like a rat from the church, and it gashed his scalp open. That was the night he had to drive himself to the hospital in Hot Sulfur Springs. As soon as he crept from the parking lot they set upon his car, punching at the windows and clinging to the hood, their glowing yellow eyes wide, hungry mouths yawning, pale blue faces shinning in the moonlight. He almost crashed, the attack was so intense, but, praise God, he made it across the Route 3 bridge south of town, and, screaming and mewling like overgrown animals, they left him be.
Running water was one thing they couldn’t tolerate, he discovered. Why, he didn’t know.
Reaching the back door, Tozzi quickly unlocked it, his hand trembling and his throat tight. He looked once over his shoulder, and nearly collapsed in an agony of terror when a loud shriek sounded from somewhere in the center of town, echoing against the abandoned shops and storefronts along Main.
Panting, Tozzi stepped in and slammed the door behind him, his fear lessening as he locked and deadbolted it. Peering into the gloom, he wondered if he shouldn’t spend the night in the church. He’d done it before. The pews were hard and cold, but that was a small price to pay.
Tozzi flipped on a light, the warm electric glow filling the room like seawater and dispelling the gathered shadows. Nothing
was waiting for him, save for a broom leaned in one dusty corner, shackled to the wall by thin and wispy cobwebs. Sometimes Tozzi had nightmares in which he turned on a light and it revealed one of them, sitting in a chair and grinning, its crooked fangs overhanging its lower lip and its torn and dirty clothes rotting from its emaciated body. It was usually Don Cheevas, the high school principal, the wooden stake Tozzi had been forced to plant in his chest jutting awkwardly out and his shirt covered in vile black ichor. Other times it was Mabel Watts, and little Timmy Johnson, or the Bally boys.
Shaking thoughts of ambush away, Tozzi crossed the room and stepped into the nave, the lit candles flickering across the walls and in the high corners. Father Daniel sat at the end of the pew closest to the altar, one arm draped across the back and the other resting on his lap. He looked up and smiled as Tozzi approached.
“Father,” he greeted.
“Father,” Tozzi croaked in reply.
Daniel smiled. “Okay, cut the shit. Sit down.”
Tozzi did.
Daniel balled his hands as if in prayer and leaned forward like a man trying to detect a dollop of dog poo on his Phat Pharms. He sighed and said: “How long has it been now? Two years?”
Tozzi nodded. “Two and a half last week.”
“And you haven’t killed them all yet?”
There seemed to be a hint of accusation in Daniel’s tone.
“I’m only one man, Father; and there are only so many hours in a day.”
Daniel didn’t look moved. “This town only had five hundred residents when it happened. Two and a half years is more than enough time. And I’ve offered my assistance…”
Tozzi shook his head. “No. It’s my parish. I’ll handle it.”
“Okay. Okay. Fine.” Daniel went quiet, and remained that way for a long time, the only sounds the occasional scream from outside. They were communicating with each other, Tozzi thought darkly. They didn’t talk like they did in movies.
“I want you to take a vacation.”
“What?”
Daniel stood with a weary moan. “A vacation. You’ve been here for two years doing…what you have to do, and…I don’t think it’s healthy.”
“Dan…”
Daniel held up a forestalling hand. “I know, I know; you feel a responsibility here. That’s good, that’s fine, but you need a break.”
“No.”
“Allen…”
“I’m sorry, Dan; I’ll rest when it’s done.”
Father Daniel left after dinner, walking straight out the door and to his car with not even the slightest show of fear. Tozzi watched him with a reverent wonder he usually only reserved for statues of the Virgin.
He was right, Tozzi realized as headlights winked on and the car backed out of its slot; he could have killed them all two times over by now.
But he didn't want to. God, how he didn't want to. These people were his friends and neighbors, he’d married, baptized, and preached to many of them. They were people once, damn it.
Once, Tozzi thought with a heavy sigh, but no more. They were no longer people, they were demons, their souls gone and their bodies infested with evil.
That was little consolation, but, for now, at the end of a long, tiring day, it was enough. Tomorrow he would go out and hunt. It had been a month since he last killed one of them; it was time to begin the final play. This was his parish, and it fell to him to see it cleansed.
Tozzi woke at dawn, dressed silently in the dark, and went into the small kitchen abutting the living room. He put a pot of coffee on and fried himself two eggs and several strips of bacon. He ate in front of the TV, watching a lighthearted segment on Good Morning America about a dog who had taken a litter of abandoned kittens under his wing. Done, he washed the dishes and sipped another mug of coffee as he watched the sun rise over the eastern forest.
He gathered a bagful of wooden stakes, his mallet, several vials of holy water, and his Bible, and threw them into the passenger seat of his Volvo. He sat behind the wheel for several long moments, mentally preparing himself for the day. Though he told himself they were demons now and not his neighbors and friends, that he was doing God’s work, it was difficult. No matter how many of them he staked in their beds, in their closets and basements, he never got used to it.
He drove across town to the Howard Johnson’s Inn along Route 6. There were several cars parked in the lot that hadn’t been there the day before. He suspected that they used the motel to lure in travelers, much the same way they probably used Uncle Dave’s Diner down the street.
Tozzi parked in one of the spaces and killed the engine, the dry wind whistling eerily. Father Daniel had specifically forbid him from burning down the motel, but today Tozzi planned to do just that. There was no way he could let them pick people off the highway anymore. If he did only one thing, it had to be this.
Tozzi took his bag and left the car in the lot. He visited three houses that didn’t feature his red mark on the door. In one he found Sandy Davis, the teller at the bank. She was asleep in the attic, her boyfriend, Mark something, nearby.
After reading an abridged version of the last rites over them, Tozzi released their tortured souls. Sandy died quietly, but Mark struggled, his and mouth flying open and his body jittering.
In the second, Tozzi found nothing. In the third, the Jacobs family. They were all in the root cellar, reposing in bloody-thirsty dreams. Tozzi killed all of them except Sarah. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t bring himself to pound the wood into her heart. The hammer hovered above the stake for nearly three full minutes as Tozzi gazed upon her face. She was just as repulsive and unnatural as the others…but she was a child! Six years old when the plague swept town.
Tozzi remembered baptizing her as a newborn, and his resolve crumbled. He nailed a sheet of plywood over the cellar entrance and then a crucifix to that.
By then it was three in the afternoon, and Tozzi was famished. He walked back to the church and made himself a sandwich. Sated, he fetched his car and drove out to the Texaco station in Warner, seven miles south. Old Charlie was sitting on the porch in a pair of grease stained overalls, and when he saw Tozzi he froze in the middle of rolling one of his nasty cigarettes. A lot of people knew something was wrong in Pine Falls, something…horrible, and regarded him as almost a pariah.
Tozzi filled three seven-gallon gas cans and paid with cash. Back in town ten minutes later, he went to the motel. From room-to-room he went, splashing beds and curtains and tables and linens. He found several dozen of them. He let the fire take them. By the time the volunteer fire department arrived from Cedar Falls, the building was engulfed, long stalks of flame rising into the sky and smoke pouring into the heavens. Tozzi watched the ominous glow from the front porch of the church.
The next morning, Tozzi was up before the sun. He showered, shaved, and dressed in the slowly dispelling gloom. Done, he forced himself to eat a light, bland breakfast, which he washed down with cold coffee.
Just as Tozzi was planning to walk out the door, the phone rang, its shrill shriek echoing eerily throughout the quiet rectory. Tozzi knew it was Father Daniel, and dreaded the confrontation he knew was coming.
Regardless, he went back into the kitchen and picked up the handset. "Hello?"
"Allen." The single word, sharp and admonishing.
"Father."
"Allen...I told you not to burn down that damn motel. Now we're going to have a shitload of outsiders poking around."
Tozzi shrugged. Maybe the world was ready to accept the existence of vampires. At least the general public would be aware of the dangers of the night and be able to protect themselves.
"Father..."
"This is a delicate situation, Allen. You can't go around torching shit like that."
"Father...I can and I will."
This display of insolence shocked Father Daniel into silence.
"You told me to take care of this, and I am. I've been weak, Father; I've been a coward. I know that. T
his is my parish and my responsibility."
"Good. About time you grew a set, Allen; but don't burn shit like that."
"I can't do it any other way. I just can't. Yesterday proved that. I...I'm still weak. God forgive me, but I'm not strong enough to kill them one-by-one."
"Allen! If you light one more fire, I'll have you excommunicated so fast you're collar will spin."
"I'll light dozens then. Goodbye, Father."
"Allen!"
Tozzi hung up the phone, his heart racing and his mouth dry. The day lay ahead. Tozzi moved from house to house, business to business, like an angel of death, splashing gasoline where ever he went. He paused at noon, and walked back to his car, which he had parked in front of the old cafe. He ate in the front seat as he listened to public radio, the sandwiches hot and dry, the Pepsi flat and warm. Down the street, trash skitted across the pavement.
Finishing the last bite, Tozzi crumpled the brown bag, got out of the car, and tossed it into a waste can near the cafe's door. CLOSED FOR FLU said the sign in the dust-coated window. That's what they thought it was in the beginning. The nightmares, the lethargy, the exhaustion. They were wrong. So very wrong.
Tozzi sighed and looked around the once vibrant little town. The storefronts lining Main Street were dark and forlorn, the traffic light over the intersection of Main and Pine swayed back and forth in the arid summer breeze, the cars at the curb were rusting and rotting.
A profound wave of loss swept over Tozzi, so deep and strong that his head swam. He remembered what it had been like when he first came to town, fifteen years before. He saw children playing in the streets, old men sitting on their porches and listening to baseball on transistor radios, smiling merchants beckoning to happy townspeople strolling the sidewalk. So alive, then, but now it was a ghost town. Blinking back sudden tears of mourning, Tozzi went back to work.