Still the most enjoyable part of Ellie’s day was in the evening when her family came to visit. Seeing Aiden so distraught always filled her heart with sadness, but she knew that Randall was taking good care of him and he always told her excitedly about their fishing trips or when grandpa let him help out around the store. So when Randall called her earlier today and told her that they weren’t coming tonight it was as if someone had driven a wooden stake through her heart.
Randall was exhausted, he had been pulling twelve-hour shifts to keep up with his sheriff duties and help the detectives with their homicide investigation. Cletus too needed rest. The emotional strain and late visiting hours night after night had left him groggy and slow. They were all going to stay home and get some rest. When Randall called to break the news, Ellie did her best to sound understanding, but it was a difficult task. She wanted to scream at him, to tell him that he was being selfish, going home to sleep in his nice warm cozy bed while he left her here to rot with the rest of the alkies and pill poppers, but she could not. He had been nothing but wonderful and supportive, and she couldn’t fault him for wanting to get a little rest.
Ellie collapsed on her bed, feeling truly alone for the first time. She flopped her feet up on the wall above her headboard, resting her soles flat and staring down the length of her thighs to her toes. A three inch pink scar ran from the top of her knee to the beginning of her thigh, inflicted on her when she was six years old. She had fallen out of a pine tree, breaking a branch on the way down and feeling the sharp pointed wood of the severed branch cut into her tender flesh. The scar was faded and faint now. You had to squint to see it, and then only if you knew it was there. Over the years it had melded back into her flesh as though the accident had never happened, until nothing but an almost forgotten memory remained. It was funny though, the girls in her kindergarten class had teased her about it incessantly, calling her names and saying she would be a monster for life. The taunting had stayed with her much longer than the mark upon her flesh. Emotional scars run deepest Ellie supposed. This night, she was sure that one of those emotional scars would be branded on her forever.
Ellie lay there and pondered the mysteries of life for about fifteen minutes before the heavy fog of sleep began to build behind her eyes. She swung her feet over the bed and rose, heading for the door and cinching her robe tight about her waist as she entered the hallway. She proceeded to the communal bathroom located midway between her room and the next ward. She flipped on the switch and listened to the fluorescent light above her pop and crackle to life. One of the long cylindrical light bulbs had burned out and the other remaining bulb struggled to cast shadows over the rest of the room. It gave Ellie the creeps. The plastic light covering was dingy and yellow, stained with time and nicotine, and harboring an immense graveyard of insects, their wispy bodies hollow and legs curled upward, they cast shadows on the wall fifty times their size. What other light did escape for its intended illumination purposes was yellow and dim, clinging to what it touched in small irritating patches like dryer lint on black socks. The floor was tile, consisting of a patchwork of different colored earth tones pieced together randomly in an arrogant display of artistic vomit. Formerly white paint flaked off the walls in curling strips that hung motionless before eventually falling to the tile and being swept away by a janitorial push broom. A rusted cast iron radiator sat in one corner, occasionally clanging grumpily and daring anyone to accidentally touch it and feel the searing heat cascading off its surface. On the south wall sat a small collection of footlockers, two feet by two feet with built-in combination locks. Each resident was assigned one to house his or her personal toiletry items. In the center of that wall a small corridor led back to six shower stalls, each one complete with two sets of beige mildew-stained shower curtains. The first curtain concealed a small changing station complete with a small wooded bench, and the second concealed the shower itself.
Ellie faced her locker and began the combination sequence, fourteen right, six left, twenty-four right. The tumblers clicked into place and the door fell open. Inside sat her hairbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, toothbrush, and disposable safety razor, with a small hotel-sized canister of shave gel issued by the clinic. Residents were allowed no more items than this and their lockers were examined everyday by staff members to ensure that no one was stashing drugs. It was a demeaning way to live. Ellie felt like a prisoner having her meager cell searched daily by over zealous guards looking for contraband. Hairspray! Cell six! One night in solitary and one week of scrubbing the mess hall pots and pans. We’ll go easy on you this time, but your second offense will cost you dearly, don’t press your luck. Ellie sighed and retrieved her toothbrush and paste. She ambled in that swaggering motion that all exhausted people seemed to have until she stood face to face with her own reflection in the mirror. She felt as though she had aged ten years and looked like it had been fifteen. New wrinkles had formed under her eyes and around the corners of her mouth, giving her the middle-aged appearance that all women dread. Life passed by like tumble weeds in a desert windstorm, don’t blink or you’ll miss it.
She turned the nozzle letting the water run and waited for it to turn cool. When it was frigid she splashed the stinging drops on her face, feeling her pores cinch shut against the cold. She shivered slightly, but not just from the water and cold tiles upon her feet, something else had chilled her to the bone. She looked up at her reflection again, shuddering in the cool night air. It was then that she saw the streak. Behind her, reflected in the mirror something moved. As quickly as it had appeared it was gone, leaving Ellie to rub her eyes and wonder what it was she had just seen. The goose pimples formed up and down her spine leaving her petrified with fright, unable to turn around. What in the hell was that? She wasn’t sure she wanted to know, but she had to find out. Slowly she forced herself to turn around with methodical movements. The bathroom was empty, save for herself and the shadows of her insect friends.
Ellie swallowed the lump in her throat and forced her voice to come out. It was small and meek but thundered in her head due to the terror in her heart.
“Who’s there?”
There was no answer. She called out again, trying to control the shaking in her hands. The result was the same, deafening silence. And then in the shadows, against the wall next to the far shower stall she saw the movement again, slower this time. Something small jerked its way along the tile floor, moving towards the shower curtain. Ellie tried to focus her eyes but to no avail, she couldn’t make anything out except for the movement in the darkness. Christ Ellie, you’re hallucinating. It’s all part of the detox process, that’s all, just your body and your mind screaming out for fix, nothing more. She closed her eyes for a moment and felt dizzy upon her feet. When she opened them the shadows laid still, unmoving, lending credibility to her hallucination theory. And that theory would have made perfect sense if it weren’t for one thing. The shower curtain on the last stall swayed back and forth slightly as though someone had just walked through it.
Ellie stood motionless for a while, watching the curtain swing gently back and forth like a medieval pit and pendulum, the axe dropping lower ever so slightly with each passing, creating unspeakable dread for the victim below, and right now Ellie felt like that victim.
“Who’s there Goddamn it.”
Silence.
“I saw you, so you might as well come out. This isn’t funny.”
She tried to speak with authority but her voice crackled on the last syllable betraying her fear. With as much courage as she could muster Ellie began to move forward. Her feet sounded like a herd of elephants in her head and her palms beaded with sweat, but she pressed onward. The curtain made its last final gyration before coming to a stop and hanging stoically from the rod above. Somehow the lack of motion began to terrorize Ellie more than when the curtain was moving, the stillness exaggerating the anticipation. Still she pressed onward, watching the tiles disappear beneath her feet with each step. At last she stood bef
ore the curtain, drawing ragged breaths and trying in vain to slow her heart rate. She reached out tentatively for the edge of the curtain and hesitated. What the hell am I doing? Just go on back to your bed and forget this whole thing ever happened. It was the best advice her subconscious had offered yet, but for some reason she could not heed it. Her curiosity overcoming all else, she yanked the curtain back in a violent motion. The changing station was empty. Ellie’s heart slowed a beat, until she looked down. On the tile were tiny footprints -like those that a child would make she thought- printed on the tile until they disappeared beneath the next curtain. The thing that disturbed Elli most was that the footprints seemed to have been left in ash?
(Oh no, no fucking way. This is way too creepy.)
Horror movies started out this way, with some stupid girl with large breasts and a flat stomach pressing onward despite the ominous warning signs. And it always ended the same, with her getting ripped to shreds by some knife-wielding maniac, or decapitated by some monster from beyond the grave. Ellie always found herself yelling at the screen. Don’t go in there, are you frickin’ crazy? You’re going to die. Just leave, turn and walk away, ride off into the sunset with that hunk on the motorcycle before you both become garden mulch. But they never listened, and for some reason, neither could she. She had to know what was behind that curtain. She wiped her sweaty palms against her nightgown and braced herself one more time. Come on Ellie, won’t take much now, just one more curtain.
She grabbed the edge and yanked. The next moment played out before her eyes in slow motion like a scene in one of those awful horror movies. The metal curtain rings screeched against the steel shower rod like nails on a chalkboard, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. Ellie’s eyes bulged at the sight in front of her. She managed to stifle her scream by placing her hand over her mouth and holding her breath. There on the tile wall before her were words written in ash that had absorbed the moisture from the air creating a slushy paste. The thick mixture dripped down the wall with deliberate slowness, warping the message and leaving long streaks of black all the way to the floor. The words read simply: Help Abby.
In the basement of Talcott manor Brenda stood trapped behind a wall of energy. She had tried without success to breach it many times. With every effort she made, the translucent walls closed in about her an inch at a time. The demon had grown strong, too strong for her. She withdrew her hands and looked about her. It was a room that she had never been in before, but she knew she was in the basement somewhere within the demon’s lair. Consisting of black brick walls the room was perfectly cubicle, spanning forty feet long, wide, and high.
She had been here for weeks, at least as far as she could tell. The passage of time for those beyond the world of the living was a difficult thing to gauge. In the center of the room sat a large pile of wood consisting of an array of logs and sticks, branches and roots, anything flammable all lumped together in a massive pyre, a funeral pyre. Lying on top was a vision so horrifying it was difficult to imagine. The corpse was putrid, nothing but a mass of rotted flesh and black bone. It was tall, nearly seven feet from skull to the cloven hooves. The skull itself was elongated almost like that of an ox, with two sharp slightly curved horns that jutted from the head mounted above two closely set eye sockets black as midnight. Razor sharp teeth grinned out at Brenda in a macabre smile. It was here that the demon drew its power, deep within the walls of the Talcott mansion basement, for the corpse that she gazed upon was the earthly remains of the demon itself. Brenda shuddered at the thought that this creature had once walked the earth, just as she had. Now its only desire was to awaken once again. She didn’t know how it had gotten here and she didn’t care, all that she knew was that someone had to stop it.
Brenda had tried several times to communicate with Abby, but the field of energy was too strong. It extended upward, blocking her from the floors above. The more she tried, the stronger the force became. In desperation she tried to reach outward. To find someone in the town beyond that could help. The sheriff had been here before, she had sensed his presence and knew him to be a good man, but all of her efforts to reach him telepathically had failed. He was strong willed and his mind was sealed. There had to be others, those weak enough to hear her cries for help. At last she had focused on one, a woman whose mind was weak, deteriorated by the use of drugs and susceptible to her cries. She was her only hope. She reached outward, focusing her energy. It was a difficult process, her mind felt as though it were going to explode. At last she felt the woman pay heed to her pleas. With all of her mental energy Brenda focused her thoughts into two simple words. Help Abby.
She could only pray that the woman would understand.
At the top of the stairs the demon paused. He had breached the second floor but he could feel his power waning. Oh how he longed to reach the bedroom down the hall, to rip apart limb from limb the bitch that lay within, but he knew at that moment that he could not, not yet at least. Darrow’s last victim had given him strength but it was not yet enough. He felt his physical form waning with each step he took. He peered at his hands, they were almost translucent, fading from sight right before his eyes. The energy that he had absorbed from the kill was not enough to relieve him of the constraints of his earthly body in the basement below. He let out a low guttural scream, the frustration within him was building. He was so close. Close enough to taste her blood. He would bide his time, it would not be long now, not long at all.
TWENTY-EIGHT
In the early morning Randall prepared Aiden to go to the store. He was easy to rouse, always ready to spring from his bed and begin a new day. It was six A.M. and Randall was making breakfast. The popping sizzle of frying bacon filled his small house. Aiden was busy brushing his teeth, working the brush back and forth like his mother had taught him. He was happy to spend his days at the store. Grandpa always made him feel special and always had something for him to do to help out like a big boy, but he missed his mother terribly. He stood on the plastic stool that Randall had bought him, allowing him to reach the sink. When he was finished brushing he smiled at his reflection, looking at his baby teeth and admiring the job he had done. Mommy would be proud.
He placed the cap back on the toothpaste as he was instructed and then wandered into the kitchen. Randall heard him approach and looked back over his shoulder from the stove.
“Hiya champ. How’d you sleep?”
“Good. I guess.”
“You guess? Well either you slept well or you didn’t, so which is it?”
“Good.” He looked down at his feet, avoiding eye contact, he didn’t want Randall to think he was a baby, but he couldn’t help but feel sad.
“You miss mommy don’t you.”
Aiden nodded. “Yeah.”
“Well let me let you in on a little secret.” Aiden was all ears. “It’s okay to miss your mommy, I miss her too.”
His eyes widened. “You do?”
“Uh huh, very much. But don’t you worry, she’s going to be home very soon and then we can all be together again. Now why don’t you hop up on your stool and have some breakfast?”
Aiden climbed up and took his perch on the stool. Randall set a plate down in front of him with scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. Aiden liked Randall’s cooking, he made the eggs fluffy and the toast was always done just right. He liked the house too, it was much better than the small apartment he and his mother lived at in San
Francisco. Yeah, he decided he liked it here and it would have been perfect if his mother wasn’t sick.
When they were finished eating Randall loaded him up in the Cherokee and dropped him off at the store, Cletus was waiting to take him and Aiden ran up to hug his great grandfather at Bernie’s front porch. Randall gave them a little wave that Cletus returned in kind. With that he sped off, heading for the station, he had a lot of work to do.
His cell phone rang, cutting through his frazzled nerves. He looked down at the display, it was Ellie. Randall opened the fli
p phone and placed it to his ear.
“Hey darling, how’re doing?”
There was a slight hesitation on the other end. When she spoke her voice was shaky. “Not good. Can you come by?”
“I’m on my way to work, can it wait?”
“No.” the tone in her voice left no room for argument. “It can’t. Something happened and I don’t know how to explain it, but I really need you right now.”
He didn’t need this right now, but what else could he do? He loved Ellie with all his heart, but she was beginning to interfere with his work. The decision weighed heavily on his shoulders.
“I’ll call Denny and see if he can cover for me, then I’ll be right over. Just hang in there.”
“Thanks,” was all she could say.
Randall pulled into the rehab center and clicked off the ignition. Inside he did the usual formalities, working his way past the receptionist, explaining that he had to see Ellie unannounced. She relented and Randall trekked back to her room. He knocked gently on the door.
“Come in.”
He opened the door and stepped inside. The first sight of Ellie made his breath catch in his throat. She looked terrible. She had lost weight, but that was to be expected, hospital food was never very good. But it was her complexion that raised the most concern within him. She was pale, white as a ghost you might say, and that was probably due to the fact that Ellie believed she had seen one. Her eyes were dark and heavy, large black rings lined the upper portions of her cheekbones. She was covered in a thin sheet of perspiration, giving her the appearance of an anorexic that had been jogging for a week without much sleep.
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