***
Sometimes our daily lives take a turn we wouldn’t usually expect. It’s no one’s fault, there’s nobody to blame, and that makes us all the more mad.
We like to think we’re in control, and in fact, have deluded ourselves into believing we’re the masters of our little corner of the universe. It’s quite shocking when we realize we’re nothing more than passengers, and even more brutal the surprise when we discover our trivial desires are of little consequence.
Every moment of our lives we are manipulated by forces far greater than ourselves. We are held sway by higher concepts, but rarely do we fight our imprisonment. We don’t like to admit we are bombarded by these external powers and held fast by them, don’t like to think about it, for it would call our own fragile identities into question. False excuses and even weaker justifications are given to make sense of the lunacy we routinely experience. In all honesty, we are raw things, quite malleable, and out there beyond our safe bubbles of contentment, are players that would see us fashioned into their own toys. Arguments can be made that we live in a more enlightened era, more informed, that we are aware and awake.
Unfortunately, we remain that green, budding plant. We grow, taking in their poison as we ripen, never realizing we’ve become infected and yellowing, until it’s too late to recognize the rot.
Take the celebration of Halloween. It is a holiday, once known as the Celtic Samhain meant to honor the dead and dedicated to the harvest. The Catholic Church merged it with their All Saint’s Day many centuries ago, and today we have children clad in the plastic masks of the latest cartoon craze knocking on their neighbor’s door for candy. An idea taken, changed to fit, used, taken again. This is by far not a new thing. Creations and cultures have been stolen and passed of as new longer than there has been written word. The true origins of Halloween are undoubtedly lost to modern societies – and we don’t really care. But don’t forget how ripe you still are.
When does that poison factor in, that decay come in to play?
You’re already a corpse before you know it’s happened.
Dusk comes early at the tail end of October in Ohio. It was Saturday, the 30th, technically the day before Halloween, but most of Logres had it’s Trick Or Treating hours tonight. While the city officials would claim it was due to Saturday being an easier night for more parents, it was really to appease those few religious folk who would run screeching down to the Mayor’s Office should a “pagan festival” occur on the Lord’s Day.
The morning had been busy at Thru-Drug. Although the date was pretty self-evident, the local newspaper had been printing the Trick Or Treat times wrong for the past three days. Only today had the moneys at work over at The Logres Daily printed a correction notice, adding a small apology at the bottom. Kim didn’t think it had helped much. Mostly she heard people swearing and threatening a Frankenstein-like “pitchfork and torches” style lynching of the newspaper building as they frantically bought their candy. Overall, she was pretty pleased with the idiots at the paper – they had nearly sold out of their seasonal candy stock thanks to the rush.
Leaning back against the counter, Kim tried to decide if she wanted a cigarette or not. She had only ever been a social smoker, but this past semester had been far more stressful that any previous. Eyeing her neon pink purse emblazoned with green skulls where it was hidden under the counter, she chewed on her lip. The corner of a pack of Camels peeked out at her invitingly.
“Hey, Kim,” yelled Wes from his register. “I’m going out for a smoke, okay?”
“You’re a bastard, Wes.”
Her co-worker gave her a goofy grin as he locked his drawer and slid out from behind his counter. His brown hair a perpetual mess in that questionable style, his blue shirt had two thin paint marks across the front.
They looked relatively fresh.
“What happened to you?”
“Huh?” replied Wes, looking down at his slim frame to where she was pointing. “Oh, I was helping Angie in the back. Dwight was, er… busy.”
“For fuck’s sake,” muttered Kim. “Go smoke.”
As Wes ambled out the door, Kim hit the buzzer to ring for Angie back in receiving. She liked both Angie and Wes, Kim and Wes even had some of the same tastes in music, but he had been holding Angie’s hand on this job for too long. Especially when it came to Dwight.
Kim didn’t mind her job, but she had harbored a few reservations about taking the assistant manager’s position. At twenty-eight, she was in a distinctly weird age bracket at Thru-Drug. A larger chain pharmacy and convenience store, almost all of the employees were either firmly in middle age or right out of high school. She had snagged part-time after she had moved back to Logres over a year ago when she had re-enrolled at Franklin State University. Kim felt ancient compared to the kids who made up most of the cashiers and stockers, and felt like a freakin’ alien compared to the PTA homeowners who comprised the pharmacy team and management.
“Um, yeah Kim?”
Kim sighed inwardly. Angie was a year or two younger than Wes, and had about as many curves. Thin blonde hair and anime-large blue eyes that hid behind glasses made her seem even younger. Was I ever this innocent? thought Kim, as she stared at Angie. Angie just stood there awkwardly, not making eye contact.
“So… why does Wes have paint all over him?”
“Um…”
“Yes?”
“He was helping me?”
“He was? And where was Dwight?”
Silence.
Kim sighed loudly this time. “Angie, when you’re on receiving duty, you get to boss around the stockers. Dwight is a stocker. Wes is a cashier. I know you and Wes have been tight since you were little, but I need everybody to do their job. Is there a problem with Dwight?”
“Dwight is…” she whispered.
“Dwight is what?”
“Nothing.”
Kim peered at Angie and didn’t say anything. Dwight was the general bane in her Thru-Drug existence. The only other employee in their late twenties, he was Dr. Melissa Homme’s cousin and an all-around annoyance to the other workers. He was lazy, he didn’t like any form of authority, and he occasionally said creepy shit to the younger females on staff. Wes had been dumb enough to get in his face one time after he had said something to Angie. Dwight was six-foot-four and over two hundred and fifty pounds.
“Listen, I’ll make sure Dwight does…”
“Excuse me?”
Kim jumped. She hadn’t seen the old woman walk up.
“I’m sorry, can I help you?”
“Yes. Yes…”
Angie took a step back. So did Kim. The old woman had drawn the word out almost like a hiss. Kim gave her a once over and blinked. Her clothes were faded, a strange dingy brown and her styled hair looked messed. Angie gave a little cough when the woman reached up with a dirty finger to slowly rub a rotting tooth exposed when she gave them a smile.
“Yes?” Kim tried again.
“Do you have any fish hooks?”
“Fish hooks?”
“I don’t think…” began Angie.
The old woman interrupted, “Oh, that’s okay.” She hummed badly off key as she wandered away.
Once she had vanished around into aisle, Angie let out a breath.
“What the hell was that?”
Off to the west, the sun lost its daily battle to the darkness and the sky grew into deeper shades of purple and orange. Kim sat outside on the tiny bench beside the soda machines that nobody ever used and smoked a cigarette, thinking about her abnormal psychology test. At least, she was
trying to think about it. Mostly, she was trying not to think about Drew.
After two years with Drew down in Atlanta, she had left. It had been her choice in the end, but it still hurt. Returning to Logres had seemed like admitting defeat at the time, but once she had come back she had realized that she had fared far better than most of her peers.
So many of her old friends had settled down –
or simply settled.
Loveless marriages, dead-end jobs, two-point-five kids, the white picket fence dream that didn’t really exist anymore. Of course, that was Logres.
The manager, Joyce, was an old family friend and was thrilled to hire Kim while she returned to school. Dr. Homme, on the other hand, the pharmacy head with her Volvo and her PTA meetings, took one look at Kim’s tattoos, piercings and black hair and felt instant revulsion. All of it amused Kim greatly. She took out her lip ring before shift and all of her tats were covered.
“Fucking Ohio,” stated Kim, as she flicked her spent cigarette butt out into the parking lot in an act of immature defiance. She’d be the one to clean it up later.
Stepping back inside, she saw Wes leaning over the counter and trying to engage a customer in conversation. He glanced over to her with a pleading look on his face. Brows creased, she walked past.
“What’s wrong?”
“Ah, I don’t even know,” replied Wes, clearly exasperated.
Diagonally, at one of the corner displays, a heavy-set man was digging through the candy bars. He made desperate wheezing sounds, punctuated by short whines. His frantic search grew more aggressive.
“Sir, can I help you find anything?”
His snapped up, rigid for a moment, then his head teetered like a bobble dolls’. Kim and Wes gasped in unison. His eyes were bloodshot and he had something that suspiciously looked like mucus running from his nose and mouth. When he opened his mouth to whine, they could see his teeth were just as grime-encrusted as the fingernails gripping handfuls of candy bars.
“Wants… you gots…”
“Sir, are… are you okay?” asked Kim.
He wheezed twice then whined loudly before shambling off quickly down an aisle still clutching a dozen candy bars. Kim and Wes stood frozen for a three count. Then Wes shook his head violently.
“Did you just see that?”
“We had an old lady earlier… listen, he’s gotta be sick or something.
Get Dwight on the buzzer. I’m gonna go find him.”
“You sure?”
Kim took off down through the store, hearing Wes yell Be careful!
behind her. She passed along the front so that she could see down the aisles.
The store was essentially one big box, and the set up was designed to allow the employees a better way of keeping track of “customers’ needs.” This translated into shoplifters. Even though the second row of aisles were slightly off-angle… nothing.
“Where the hell did he go?” Kim murmured to herself.
So intent on her search down the aisles, she didn’t notice the little boy until she ran into him. Stumbling into a display table of donuts and other assorted pastries, Kim stood back and looked down to see him peering fascinated into a freezer unit. From behind him, she could just make out his reflection in the glass door. Words tried to tumble out at the same time she took in the blackened, filthy little fingers pressed against the cool glass.
“Meat!” came an itty-bitty voice. “I like meat. Mommy is meat, and Daddy is meat. And I like meat!”
“Where… where are your mommy and daddy?” asked Kim as she backed away from the boy.
“They’re meat!” said the boy, never turning from the freezer unit door.
Kim sped down the frozen food aisle. She spun around past the beer and wine and stopped short by the open door leading back to the stockroom.
She could hear Joyce and Dr. Homme babbling with Maria, the pharmacy tech, only feet away, but for some reason she hesitated at the dark opening.
She knew Angie was right through the short hall, working on pricing. She knew…
Something touched her shoulder and she screamed.
“Jesus, Kim! What’s with you?”
She stared up at Dwight’s pale, chubby face screwed up into a scowl.
Letting a sigh of relief that almost turned into hysterical laughter, she patted him on the arm. He flinched at the touch.
“Nothing, it’s… I’m sorry. There are some serious weird people in the store right now.”
He cocked an eyebrow high on her for this one. Dwight found her
“Goth” lifestyle quite high on his weird meter. He had made it blatantly obvious that he was both disgusted and freaked out by her – and disliked the fact that he had to answer to her as an assistant manager.
“There’s a… overweight gentleman. And a little boy. I think he’s sick. The man I mean, not the little boy. Just, shit, just help me find both of them, okay?”
“Help you find a fat guy and a kid?”
“Just… please, Dwight?”
Maybe it was the “please.” Probably it was the look on Kim’s face.
Dwight continued his bug-eyed examination of her for a few more seconds, then shrugged. He went off towards beer and wine with less stomping than he usually employed. Kim closed her eyes, dry washed her face and quietly counted to five. When she opened her eyes, she heard laughter ringing out from the pharmacy.
Moving along, she came to the pickup window and Joyce’s brightly smiling face. Kim had known Joyce most of her life, the older woman growing up with Kim’s mom. They had always stayed friends and Kim had looked on her much like a surrogate aunt. Her wavy brown hair had gone almost all grey, but Joyce refused to get what she called a “matron-cut.” She still wore it long and often in a ponytail.
“Hey Kim, what’s the word?”
“Hey Joyce, have you…”
The question drifted off as Dr. Homme strolled around the corner, giving her a cold glare.
“Hi, Melissa.”
“Kim,” she replied.
Kim tried not to grit her teeth when it became apparent Dr. Homme wasn’t going anywhere. “Have either of you seen, well… an overweight man or a little boy come past here recently? They may have looked sick?”
“A lot of people we see here look sick, Kim.”
Kim fought back the urge to jump the counter and strangle the pharmacist.
“As in the last few minutes?”
“No, I don’t think so,” said Joyce.
Kim pondered this as Maria, the pharmacy tech, hefted an armload of paperwork past and gave her a boisterous greeting she hardly heard. When she thought about it, except for now, she hadn’t been away from the front registers in hours except to smoke – out front. She had never noticed either of the customers enter. In fact…
“What about an older lady?” Kim asked.
“Huh?”
“I… I saw an old lady earlier. She looked kinda sick, too. Same as the other two.”
“Sick how, Kim?” Dr. Homme asked, displeased the conversation was continuing.
She tried to figure out how to explain it. “Um, red eyes and snotty.
Talking weird? Something wrong with their… mouths and fingers.”
“Kim, I don’t think…”
“Ewww! I saw some old dude like that earlier!” shouted Maria from the back.
“What?”
Maria sauntered her considerable bulk out from her cubby space, eyes lit and ready for gossip. “Oh yeah, tall and old. What’s the word?
Emancipated?”
“Emaciated?”
“Yeah! His fingernails and teeth were all black, like he’d been chewing on an ink pen and he was saying all kindsa nasty stuff. Somethin’
about killing dogs.”
Kim just stared at her.
“Freakazoid. Eh, it’s been a slow evening at least. Hey, I’m going to go grab me a diet shake… you gals want anything?”
Dr. Homme simply walked away as Kim shook her head and Joyce said a pleasant no thank you, trying to keep the smirk from her face. Maria drank an average of six “diet shakes” per shift. Usually while eating a bag of chips. Kim turned to leave as well, but Joyce gave a tiny yank on her sleeve.
“Kim, I really wish you and Melissa could figure out how to get along.”
“Joyce, I have nothing against her, “ Kim said in a low growl. “But Dr. Homme h
as made it clear she doesn’t care for me.”
“She’s just…” trailed off Joyce, trying to find the word.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Kim stormed off back towards the front of the store, momentarily too pissed off to worry about all the creepy folks running around. Thru-Drug was a larger chain, but far from one of the biggest. Joyce had lost her last two pharmacists to national chains who could pay more. Basically if it came down to it, Kim was dispensable if the risk was losing Dr. Homme.
Swearing to herself. Kim rounded the corner to the checkout area and stopped short. It was empty, abandoned. No customers, no employees.
Wes wasn’t at his register, Maria wasn’t raiding the cooler. Dwight wasn’t even loitering about.
“Wes?” she heard herself whisper.
Mankind does not truly know the meaning of silence. We still can hear vehicles in the distance, the hum of electrical lighting and other mechanized devices running. In more primitive times, that silence would have been filled with the rustle of leaves, the movement of furtive animals and perhaps water lapping against whatever nearby shore. Yet, were we to have those few seconds of utter quiet, it would still not be true silence. We can not help, in those times, but hear the beating of our own heart.
Standing there beside a towering display of men’s shaving products, Kim heard the sound of her own heartbeat and nothing else. What she felt, however, was something horribly foreign, something incorrect and near-reprehensible. This feeling is what made her scream.
“Wes!”
“Kim! What the…” squealed Wes as he popped up from behind his counter and promptly fell over. “Ow! Damn it!”
“What were you doing?” Kim said, her voice shrill as she ran over to him. “Where were you?”
“Fucking hell, I was stocking the gum! I was just sitting here reading the stupid new flavor descriptions. Why are you freaking out on me?” Sure enough, five cases of bubble gum lay scattered out in the space behind the counter, a rainbow of sugary yumminess. Kim clutched at her face and tried to get her breathing back under control. Something was definitely off today, something more than just her being spooked by weird customers – she was sure of it. Looking out, she saw that night had fully enveloped Logres, Trick Or Treating in full swing in other parts of the town.
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