by Joe Russell
But alas, Will had indeed been affected by the event, although in a much different way than either of his two younger associates, at least as far as he could tell. He was not going to move through life unaffected by the event, nor was he going to let it defeat him. He had never been a naive person, in his own opinion, but unlike a soldier, a seasoned law enforcement officer, or a civilian who has seen firsthand how brutal humanity could be, he didn’t fully grasp the concept until he’d witnessed what he had and spent a little time digesting it. He was a big guy, both in stature and in spirit, but the thought of what could have happened scared him to death. Could he have protected himself from an armed mob? What if something would have happened to himself, or to Mark and Jill, something that would have been preventable had he had more awareness and taken a little preparation? It didn’t take long for this dawning to make him remember all those conversations with Dave about how this stuff could happen a lot easier than most people seemed to think, and then he began thinking about other things Dave had said. The two had spent a lot of time talking about the riot and their thoughts stemming from the experience, and over the course of the months following the event, Will began to take these risks a little more seriously than he had before. He hoped that there wouldn’t be a next time, but knew it was foolish to be unprepared based on nothing but a likely naive hope. Next time the world struck, Will wouldn’t be a potential victim. Not only did he have his Glock 19, which he had generally taken to carrying with him pretty much everywhere, but he kept an even bigger stick, as Dave would say, locked in a file cabinet in his office. It was a Kel-Tec KSG, a mere twenty-six-inch bullpup shotgun with an impressive capacity of fourteen plus one when loaded with 2 ¾ inch shells. He knew that most would consider this a little overkill, but most hadn’t seen what he had. And, as his wise young friend would say, it was better to have something and not need it, than to need it and not have it.
✽ ✽ ✽
Two blocks away, sat an empty chair in an empty Doctor’s office. Of course, it was empty right now because it was Sunday, and the office wasn’t opened on Sundays and no one had extra work to get done like Will did. However, tomorrow the office was scheduled to be open, but the chair would still be empty.
The chair and its desk belonged to Abigail Jude, the main administrative assistant for the office. She and her husband Vick lived in Charlestown, West Virginia with their ten-year-old son, Josh. At that very moment, Abigail, or Abby, as she was more commonly known, and her family were at the outlet mall in Leesburg, looking for new boots for her husband. Normally, she would want to take the opportunity to go check out some of the other stores, ones that interested her a little bit more. Right now, however, she just wanted to be finished, so she could go home. She had on her big, dark sunglasses that she had found herself wearing more frequently lately, but was still afraid that being the town she worked in, she’d see someone that might recognize her. She hated living like this. She was going to have to use another vacation day tomorrow, she thought. They can’t see me like this. She didn’t know what she had done to deserve the life she had, but she hated it. She hated her husband for who he had become and she knew someday, she would get away from him. She just didn’t know how. She did know one thing, though. After what happened last night, she wasn’t going to let it keep happening. The thought of standing up to Vick was even scarier than the thought of what he would do to her next time he got… the way he got. But after so long, she knew that until she stood up for herself and Josh, nothing was going to change. She had tried to talk to Vick when he was sober and even in a good mood, hoping that he would listen, but he’d only brush her concerns off. That was, until he was drunk again. Then he’d not only remember, but become upset at her out-of-line behavior, and with interest. The only way she would ever get through to him was by speaking to him in his own language, and though the dawning realization terrified her, it only made her more resolute. Someday, she and Josh would get away from him. Someday, things would be different. She just didn’t know when.
He didn’t use to be this way. They had grown up together, right down the road in Winchester, Virginia, and had begun dating in high school. Abby was a beautiful girl, with a figure that was both lean and curvy, and a thick head of raven-black curly hair. However, despite her beauty, she never really saw herself as beautiful. She was popular in school, but she didn’t know why. She didn’t hate herself, but she didn’t think she was anything special, didn’t think she had any unique worth that made her desirable to anyone in any way over the next person. That was why when Vick, a charming senior and the star of the football team, took an interest in the humble sophomore, she fell for him hook, line, and sinker.
When he graduated, Vick got a job at a concrete plant in Frederick, Maryland. For the time-being, he continued to live in Winchester while Abby finished high school, but after she became pregnant the summer before her senior year, she dropped out over Christmas break to take care of their baby, Josh. She wanted to stay in high school. Hell, she wanted to go to college, but Vick made it clear to her that if she wanted him to stick around, she needed to take care of the baby, not go off to school and make him do it. He made decent money at the plant, getting two promotions in the first couple of years and even earning a role in the Union. Rubbed wrongly by the ultimatum he’d given her, but afraid of being a teenaged single mom with no high school diploma, she gave in to him. And thus, began the way of the following ten years.
Shortly after Josh was born, Vick moved to Charlestown where both his commute and his mortgage would be a little less. Despite her parents’ and friends’ wishes, Abby and Josh moved in with him, and they got married the fall she would have gone off to college as a freshman. She stayed home for the first few years, but once Josh was in preschool, she got a part-time job at a doctor’s office in Charlestown doing bookkeeping and answering phones. She didn’t love the work, but it helped pay the bills and got her out of the house when Josh was at school anyway. Things had begun to change between her and Vick. No more was he the charming jock who had won her young heart in school. At only twenty-four, he was beginning to go bald, and his gut was slowly gaining what his shoulders were losing. He spent less time in the gym and more at the bar with his Union buddies. He was still a decent-looking guy, but a far cry from what he’d once been. Not that Abby really cared about all that. Sure, once upon a time, she was impressed by and proud of his looks and brawn, but anymore, all she wanted was a companion. Unfortunately, his once attractive personality was fleeting at an even greater rate, giving way to something dark that Abby did not like. He was changing, becoming someone she didn’t know. Someone she wouldn’t have married had she known, child or no child.
But now, she was stuck. As much as she felt no love for him, even despised him, she couldn’t leave. She was scared, not only of the world, but of what he would do to her if she tried to leave. What he would do to Josh. What if she lost custody? Even if he only had Josh part of the time, she couldn’t trust him. Not with the temper he had, not with the drinking that seemed to be slowly taking over his life. It had been about a year now since he’d started beating her. Although for several years prior their relationship certainly wasn’t healthy by anyone’s standards, there at least seemed to be a line that he wouldn’t cross, even when he drank. However, one Saturday night about this time last year, he had come home drunk, like he had been more and more. Except this time, instead of harmlessly passing out on the couch, he stumbled upstairs to wake up Abby, and demanded they have a little fun. Their sex life all but non-existent anymore, at least if Abby had her way, and her being further uninterested because of his sloppy drunken state, she’d refused. She had tried to refuse, at least. He had backhanded her so hard that she had temporarily blacked out, and when she regained consciousness, he was on her, and there was nothing she could do. She’d wanted to scream, to run away, to call the police, but she was scared. Scared of what he would do to her to make her stay. Somehow privy to her secret desires, he had occasional
ly hinted at how he would punish her if she ever turned on him. Sometimes it involved her, and sometimes Josh, but it was always horrible. It kept her in line, just the way he liked it. She loved that boy more than her life itself, and he knew that all too well.
Now, riding shotgun in Vick’s new Dodge Ram on the way back from Leesburg, Abby reflected on the previous night. In a sense, it was nothing new, but it was also the worst night yet. Vick had been out with his friends, like he usually was on Saturday nights, when he’d come home a little later than usual. And, a little drunker than usual. Although it was after midnight, Abby had been up reading, and was getting out of the shower when she heard the unmistakable sound of her husband, a human bull, making his way ungracefully through the house. She’d rushed to put on her bathrobe, hoping that somehow all he would want to do would be to go to sleep. That was usually not the case, but anything she could do to not sexually provoke him was worth trying. A second later he burst through the door, and Abby knew that tonight was not going to be good. There it was. The darkness she had begun to see in him almost a decade earlier was there, more present than ever. It was a darkness that she could see in his eyes, like the glow of a candle through a jack o' lantern’s sinister smile. Vick had given her his own sinister smile, and it had chilled her to the bone. She knew what was coming.
Fifteen minutes later, Abby lay face down on the bed. Her naked body was still with unconsciousness, its only movement her slow, rhythmic breathing, and the bruises already beginning to form on her face.
Josh crept as silently as he could from his bedroom to the edge of the stairs to make sure his father was passed out in his favorite spot before going any further. Sure enough, he was there on the couch, ESPN on the television and a half-drunk beer on the coffee table. Vick was snoring loudly, his gut rising and falling with each heavy breath. Josh glared at him from the top of the stairs. He wanted to do something. He knew what his father did to his momma. He did it again tonight, he could hear it. He didn’t know why his father did this, but Josh hated him for it. His eyes settled on the wrought iron fire poker by the cold fireplace. That would do it, he thought. That would fix that son of a bitch. The only reason Josh knew those words was because it was Vick’s favorite way of addressing him when Vick was drunk. He didn’t really want to kill his father, did he? That was a scary thought. It just didn’t seem right. But then again, was it right that his daddy treated his mommy like a punching bag? Josh knew that wasn’t the case. He was so conflicted. He knew his daddy was a bad man, but he was still his daddy. He wished he was big, like his daddy. Bigger. Stronger. Then he could protect his mommy from his daddy and all the other bad men in the world.
Josh gave the fire poker one last long glance, like the look you give an item in the store that you want to buy but know you can’t afford before moving on. He got up and went to his parents’ room. His mommy was naked on the bed. He didn’t know what to do, but knew that if she was awake, she wouldn’t want him to see her like this. He picked up her bathrobe that was laying in a heap in the corner of the room and used it to cover her body on the bed. He sat down on the bed near her head and looked down at her face. Despite the nasty bruise that was forming around her left eye, her pretty face was peaceful. He touched her soft cheek, then her hair. He loved her hair. He loved her. He wanted to protect her. When he was big, he thought, he’d do something about all this. Daddy would be sorry, he thought. But for now… for now he wasn’t big, and he was afraid of his Daddy hurting him too. Sometimes, Josh was afraid that he would. A tear fell from the boy’s downturned face, landing on Abby. Someday, he thought, things will be different. He just didn’t know when.
Chapter 13
Spruce Knob, West Virginia. Present Day.
Dave sat watching for at least ten minutes. Instead of charging right in the front door, he decided to circle around the rear of the cabin in the relative concealment of the woods and try to observe whether or not anyone was there. After moving around the house in a clockwise direction, he settled in a thick brushy spot about fifty yards from a back door that led out onto a rough-looking patio. Centered in the patio was a large fire pit, still smoking from a fire that had been left to die but was still smoldering. He stared at the house, glancing around at the different windows of the single-story cabin that had seen better days long before he’d been around. There were two small windows for what looked to be a cellar and it almost looked like there was light coming from them. But he couldn’t tell for sure with all the grime that made them barely translucent. After another couple of minutes of watching and not seeing any apparent signs of life, Dave decided to move in for an even closer look.
He stole a glance back toward the front of the house to where Mike was hiding but didn’t see him, and carefully moved quietly but quickly to the edge of the house between the back door and a dark window. He listened for another minute, then silently moved to try the back door. It was unlocked, and Dave slowly opened it. He cringed when it screeched in the quiet of the forest. He hadn’t realized how quiet it truly was until the ancient door hinges ruined it. He froze, listening intently for any movement, anyone reacting to the noise that didn’t fit. He looked back at the forest for no reason; the huge trees silently watching him, beckoning him forward. He turned back to the dark doorway breached before him and slid through.
The house was dark, too dark for Dave to feel that he could effectively assess his surroundings. He had his flashlight with him, two, in fact. He always carried a tiny Maglite Solitaire, a single AAA cell LED flashlight in his pocket, but for this mission, as it had become, he had taken his slightly larger and much brighter XL50 Maglite out of his backpack for exactly this reason. Still, he didn’t want to turn on any lights, fearing it would give him away to someone in another room. He wished he had his Armasight night vision monocular, but it was resting uselessly in the truck on the other side of the mountain. Of course, he wouldn't need night vision on a family camping trip… Oh, well. He couldn’t have made this situation up.
Dave crept along the wall of the hallway, trying above all else to be as silent as possible. The place was as quiet as a crypt and made him feel about as comfortable. The little light that made its way in through the filthy windows was an eerie dull color, giving the interior the look of a scene from a horror movie. Dave was now holding the Ruger in one hand and his flashlight in the other, ready to blind and then open fire on anything it if was hostile. From the looks of this place, he wouldn’t have been surprised to run into a zombie as much as a man. He tried to control his breathing and stay mentally focused. It’s just a dark, old cabin, he thought to himself. Creepy as shit, but just a cabin.
The first doorway he came to was an opening into the kitchen on the right, with another room, maybe a living room, branching off it toward the front. He decided to continue down the hall and see where it led before searching the kitchen area. It was darker here in the center of the house with no direct light from any windows. However, his eyes were adjusting well and he could see better than he had when he’d first entered. At the end of the hallway was a single door, standing partially ajar. He moved to it, careful not to make the old floor creak. He scooted to his left in order to see around the door, but it was too dark to tell what was beyond. Gripping the pistol firmly in his right hand and the flashlight in his left, he slowly opened the door with his foot. It appeared to be a stairway leading down to a cellar; although all he could see were a couple of dusty gray steps that faded and disappeared into a black abyss. Dave felt a chill on his spine and checked behind him for the hundredth time since he’d entered, fifteen feet and an eternity earlier. Turning back to the stairs, he debated on whether or not to explore the cellar or clear the rest of the house first. Logic told him to search the upstairs before moving on, but as terrifying as this doorway was, he needed a peek down there before turning away. After all, he was already here.
He moved a step closer to the doorway so his body was almost in the threshold, his flashlight and pistol blindly stari
ng down into the darkness on the other side. He took a deep breath and clicked on the light, making himself flinch at the sudden change. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust back and for a second, he felt like he had just watched a lightning strike in front of him. Another second later, he had regained his vision and composure and saw he was staring down into an empty cellar.
He sighed in relief, not knowing exactly what he’d been afraid he would find, but was nevertheless happy he hadn’t found it. He was about to turn his light back off and return to the kitchen area when he heard a sudden movement behind him. His mind processed it before his body could react and when he began turning to face the source, it seemed to happen in slow motion. His body was only half turned when he fixed his gaze on a silhouette moving quickly at him. He swung his pistol around as fast as he could, leveling it into the hallway without taking the time to aim. He didn’t have the time. He fired with one hand a moment before the figure crashed into him, shoving him backward through the open doorway. In the bright but instantly vanished muzzle flash, he saw that it was a man, but that was all his mind could process before moving on to much more important matters. Out of instinct, he put his foot backward to catch himself from falling, but nothing was there. By the time his foot had landed on one of the stairs below him, he had completely lost his balance. He flailed his arms in an involuntary attempt to grab anything that would catch him, dropping both his pistol and flashlight in the process. It was of no use however, and the only things he managed to catch were the hard stairs as he tumbled down them into the darkness. He hit the floor of the cellar head first and lay there dazed, partially aware of what was happening, but unable to move. He fought hard to maintain consciousness, focusing on the small amount of light coming from the top of the stairs a million miles away, fading in and out of focus. Then the light was gone, blotted out by something else. It was moving toward him down the stairs. His mind tried frantically to get up, but it was no use. His body was unable to do anything but watch it happen. The figure had reached him and with one solid kick to the face, made the light go out.