“You burnt down my home,” I mutter, watching him scowl again at my noncompliance. The room stays silent as I watch him, an eerie hush taking over as the other two men quietly scuttle towards the tall man. They hover by him, one of them crouched low as if ready to launch, just as a dog would. The vision puzzles me, but somehow reassures me regardless of its incongruity. It about blocks my view of Lewis completely, allowing me to feel safe behind these men even if they do look like zombies with their absent gazes and mutilated frames. “You killed Callie.”
“Stop being a child, Mads. Come, now. Callie’s fine. She’s gone home. I talked to her. She couldn’t get hold of you on your cell phone, told me you’d come to a meeting here.” Did she? He must have threatened her to get that information. “I don’t know what the fuck you mean about your stupid little house.” I frown, trying to work out why he’s lying, what he really wants. “And put the damn gun down. You need help. Look at you.” I briefly glance down at myself, taking in my appearance. Naked apart from a fur coat, the front of it open as I stand here with a gun, showing off the hand prints of another man who’s been inside me. “What the hell are you doing here?” And my feet are covered with mud from running with Jack, laughing, loving. It makes me smile and embrace this cold air, enjoying Selma’s hold on my madness. I’m freer like this than I’ve ever been.
“I tried to get away, but you wouldn’t let me, Lewis, would you?” I mumble to myself, the gun rising slightly as I peek through the shoulders of the three. Why wouldn’t just let me go? Why? He scoffs at that, a sneer developing on that handsome face to reinforce my hatred of his being. That’s what I remember from him—that half sneer, permanently etched in to demean me, belittle me. “You should leave before it’s too late, Lewis. Let me get on with my life free of you.”
He takes a step forward, disdain heavy in his movement, his hand reaching for me. I glare in response, my back inching closer to Jack for more protection. It causes another frown from him, enough to stop his movement.
“I don’t want to leave with you, Lewis. We’re over. Finished. You’re not hurting me again.” He snarls and begins moving again, ready to push through the three men blocking him, and my hand raises of its own accord, ready to defend myself. “Stay back. I have all the help I need right here, Lewis. I’m warning you. I’ll kill you before I let you take me away from this place.”
I can feel the trigger on my finger, feel something making me want to pull at it. It’s Selma. She’s here inside me again, rallying me into killing without thought. I quiver, trying to fight the impulse, but he moves again and panics me into action. I jump back, trying to get out of his way, but knock into the wall in the scurry. The impact causes the gun to shoot into the room without true intention to harm, noise exploding in the confines.
Before I know what’s happened, the tall man has leapt for him, sounds snarling through the room in his wake. Lewis turns and bolts, and the other two launch after him, too, all three of them in pursuit as howling suddenly erupts in the house. I run after them, no thought other than what’s going to happen when they catch him. I didn’t mean to shoot. I didn’t. I just wanted to scare him off, make him leave me alone so I could be free.
The second I’m out the door, I see the small man turning the top of the spiral, his feet scampering around the corner, and I triple my pace in the hope that I’ll get to them before they do permanent damage. The gun bashes against the wood work as I travel downwards, my own feet stuttering each step for fear of losing balance. Another howl sounds below, already a distance in front, like a pack of hounds chasing their kill. It’s sickening to hear, making me bound onwards and keep turning, desperate to end this before it begins.
Too late. That’s what I said. Before it’s too late. Oh god. They heard that in me, didn’t they? Jack said to use them. That they’d protect me. And that’s what they’re doing now. Protecting me. Killing the thing that threatens me.
“Jack!” I call back, still rounding corners and trying to take two steps at a time. “Jack, help.”
I spin my head back, looking for him, but he’s nowhere to be seen and I haven’t got time. These men are going to kill Lewis, aren’t they? They’re maniacal. Probably mad, certainly that way inclined because of whatever Jack’s been doing. I just need to catch up with them, tell them to stop. They can frighten Lewis off, make him too scared to come for me again, but he doesn’t need to be dead. If Callie’s alive then he just needs to go and leave me alone.
“Run, Lewis,” I shout out, feet clambering around the curves.
I career around the bottom of the spiral, heading straight for the open main door at the end of the hall in the hope I can catch up with them, but by the time I reach the outside, it’s black as the night, the fog of Selma already rolling in across the gravel drive and proving ghostly nightmares.
“Selma, I don’t want this,” I pant out, searching the blackness for them and listening for more volleys of howls. None come other than the faint sound of birds chattering somewhere and the eerie silence she always brings. I lift the gun again, ready to defend myself if needed but unsure what that means anymore. The dogs? Lewis? I’m not certain who should be chasing who anymore, or why any of this is happening. “He doesn’t have to die, Selma. We can let him go. We’ll be safe then.”
You’re nearly home, Maddy.
The fog becomes denser as I rush onto the drive, hindering any sight at all. I listen to the last of her echo as I plough through the thick, heavy haze, trying to remember my way into the woods that we were in earlier. I don’t know what she means. This isn’t my home. This is their home, their life and their love. I’m so confused and panicked that I turn towards the treehouse. Perhaps they’ve chased him in there. If not, there’s always the headland or the bog. It’s not somewhere anyone wants to go in this murk, but I guess when you’re running for your life, fear of death pushing you onwards, and you don’t know when you’re running to, anywhere is good enough to escape to.
Sure footing underneath or not.
Chapter 19
Jack
T hey’re running out there. I can hear them.
I rub the ring in my pocket and then pull it out, ready to put it on the finger of my wife again. She’s so close to me now. I can smell her here each time the fog looms over us, taste her in every kiss that Madeline delivers. It’s a love that will not be halted by arrogant abusers and their whims. He will die out here, never to be found again. They will kill as they’ve been asked to do, protecting her at all costs, including their own life should that be necessary. They’ll hunt him down for daring to touch her. That’s what I trained them to do. It’s their chance at repentance, their offer of contrition to her.
All those months of me training them. Teaching them. All those times I beat them as they looked into her picture, warning them of storms that followed when they disobeyed me, and this is what it was for. I thought it just my vengeance at the time. Thought it was for self punishment perhaps. But it has been far from that, far from my own wallowing and self-repugnance. It has been so Madeline Cavannagh could get her freedom, so Selma could help them both come home.
My fingers drop the ring on the hall table as I head out into the darkness and murk my wife so easily delivers, knowing that by the time we return I’ll be able to lodge it back where it belongs. She’ll wear it again then, have it wrapped around her skin with nothing more to get in our way.
I smile as I wander deeper into the swirl of obscurity dancing around my legs, watching as it claws at me and ripples through my soul. It’s her again, stirring the ground around us all, showing herself in the only way she can since they sliced the heart out of her and left her for dead.
Not for much longer, though.
“It’s nearly over, baby,” I mutter, walking towards the howls that keep coming in the distance. They have the same tone as they do when the chase is nearing conclusion, the same morbid desperation to kill revving them up to rip flesh from limb and eat their prize. It’s anot
her thing that makes me smile into the night, gazing at the tall trees that shroud this old house with their cover. “You happy now?”
She doesn’t answer, but warmth sweeps around my legs, enthusing me with the thought that she’s nearly here with me. I don’t know what will happen to Madeline. Perhaps she’ll stay in some form, part locked in this spectral mirage we’ve all made happen. Or maybe she’ll disappear, never to return and hinder my view of Selma again. I don’t fucking care in reality. My wife is nearly home. She’s almost with me. And our son will come with time, his endless chatter making me feel like a father again.
The thought has me looking back at the car, wondering what I should do with it. It should be removed so that no one can find out he was here. Perhaps old Bob can organise that when this is done, find a way of drowning it in the bog. It’s deep on the other side of the brook, deep enough to disappear into. Everything disappears in there.
For once I haven’t brought the zapper with me. There’s nothing to punish them for anymore. No reason for me to continue with my retaliation now that she’s coming back. It doesn’t matter anymore. They can go after this, or die out here in the wild. Perhaps they’ll just guard this place from now on, not knowing how to return to reality now I’ve stolen that option from them. They can hunt these grounds, cry their pained howls into the night as we sleep safe in the knowledge that nothing will ever happen to break us apart again. They’re barely human now anyway. That’s been crushed out of them. All they have left are the base instincts to hunt and survive, the latter of which I’ve only just provided.
The thought makes me chuckle to myself as I keep walking, crossing though the first brook to wander towards the headland. That’s where they are. I can hear their continued cries from here, the smaller one shrieking to keep up. Fucking useless dog. He always was the lacking one. It wouldn’t surprise me if he didn’t even touch my wife while the other two took their fun. His dick certainly isn’t big enough to fuck anything successfully.
“JACK?”
Madeline’s loud voice rebounds at me from somewhere, a slight frenzy about it. I peer through the gloom, hastening my pace from its relaxed amble. She shouldn’t be in any danger out here now, but knowing her she’ll have fallen feet first into the bog all of her own accord. That image makes me chortle quietly, the memory of her tumbling onto me that first time coming back to remind me where this all started.
“Jack, help me.”
Help her? I smile and then frown in thought. There’s nothing left for me to help her with. My dogs are doing that now. The only thing I need to ensure is that this man doesn’t take her from the ground beneath our feet, that she stays on it so she can be fused into my wife somehow.
I quicken my pace regardless, brushing the scrub away as I turn through the thicket of brambles to get to her voice. Apart from that it’s so quiet out here, no sound other than the occasional call of dogs in pursuit, their disposition so familiar to me regardless of what they’re in pursuit of. Some would say it’s miserable and melancholy out here, this permanent nightfall obliterating what should be spring days, but to me it’s nothing but light and effervescence irrespective of the darkness that surrounds us all.
It’s the return of those I love. A re-birth.
Spring will come tomorrow.
A small field lies between us, the spread of it heightening the distance it’ll take to get my wife back to me. It might happen by the time I’ve trudged these last few metres. She might take over completely when the sound of the chase concludes. I wonder about the sound that will come or the vision that might occur as I open a small gate and close it quietly. Will light explode, some spectral reincarnation making her appear within Madeline’s form? Or will the fog just dissipate, receding into Madeline’s body to form that darker hair I long for.
I snort, amused with my interpretation of ghostly ramblings. Perhaps none of that will happen. Perhaps she’ll just look at me differently and I’ll see nothing but Selma as I gaze at azure eyes and remember our life together.
The tall hedgerow breaks open onto the headland as my feet choose my route through the last of the bog, and then I turn to the sound of dog one yelping enthusiastically. It’s nearly time. He’s almost there like the good damned dog he is. I smile again and follow the noise, hurrying to ensure I’m there this time. I want this vision, want to hold it inside so I can consider my job done for a wife and child I didn’t protect. I need it. This whole fucking thing is as much a penitence for me as it is for them now. I want to see her acknowledge what I’ve done for them, tell me I was right to do it. It’s all I have to give them, all these bloody hands could do to rectify my mistake.
“We need him dead, don’t’ we?” I whisper quietly, searching the area and hoping for a glimpse of her. “Clever Selma. Is that how it works? He dies and then you come back?”
Nothing but fog still, but I can feel her all the same as I turn towards the growing agitation of dogs in full cry, listening and hurrying my pace again. She climbs over me, ready to get to the kill, too, wrapping me in more thoughts of love and pulling me forward into the cacophony of sound that increases with each pace forward. They’re so close to him, so close I can smell their heated scent coming from somewhere up front as I keep powering through the mud to reach them in time.
I round the last of the headland, and the sight of Madeline scrambling over the rocky ground catches me off guard. She notices me, her eyes frantic as she chases onwards, naked legs propelling her faster no matter the distance she’s already run. I look to see what she’s following, and find the feet of the small one half a field in front of her scurrying through the opaque ground below. She forges over to the left bank of tall trees, her fur coat still billowing out behind her as she goes as if pointing out where her husband is. Good, he’s heading back to the bog. He can die in there, his bones swallowed down so that no one finds the evidence.
I swing that way, crossing the undulations of ploughed ground to punish my body with more sweat and vigour. This is all I have to give any of them. This power that I still hold ensures someone will die here. I have to get there and see this, see her transformation. The husband, the dogs, all of them can rot beneath this ground if I get to have my family back again because of it. I need them home now. I need to feel them all beneath my skin and let this guilt go.
“Stop them, Jack,” she shouts, her breath panted as she turns and powers on again to try to get in front of me. “Please.”
I’m not stopping a damn thing, and neither is she.
Fury pushes my limbs faster at the thought, and I crash through the brook again as I duck under the low hanging branches. Stop this? I’m so incensed by the thought that I turn at her instead, remembering the gun in her pocket, and jump the old stone boundaries to cut through the small wood to get to her. She’s not stopping anything. Selma is nearly here now. All these dogs need to do is kill the one thing that threatens her return. Madeline will be locked here then. She’ll know the point of all this, understand like I do.
The sound of gun fire from my left infuriates me further, and the squeal of a pained yelp following the noise makes me desperate to get to her before she kills my hopes.
“Madeline, stop shooting,” I yell, crashing through more rough brambles.
She doesn’t, and as I break out into open ground, the rapid fire of another two shots followed by the vision of her managing to make ground on the last dog makes me charge at her.
Her eyes widen as I storm towards her, fingers fumbling over the barrel as she tries to keep running and aim. His feet scuttle through the undergrowth, branches swinging back in her face as I strengthen everything I’ve got to get to her and cut across the outskirts of the bog.
“I’ve got to stop them. I’ve got to end this,” she calls, her body disappearing behind the bank of trees.
My feet quicken until I’m within meters of her, mud sluicing the dirt she’s already run through, and I grab out at her. She damn well swerves before I have a chance t
o get her in my hold. I snatch out at a trunk, levering myself over the boulders that she’s managed to veer off around, and then scramble though the small brook passing along the bog’s edge. She bolts right, jumping to gain distance and refusing to look at me as I keep calling her name.
“Stop, Madeline.”
She doesn’t stop. She runs with renewed vigour, somehow increasing her pace and steeling her resolve to help the bastard in front of us.
The next shot makes me sneer and reach for her swinging coat regardless of the distance between us, desperate to stop her before she gets to the lead dog. He’s going mad with his howls, and the sounds of terror splay the darkness as I begin to hear the abuser pleading for his life up ahead somewhere. He cries out, pain evident in his tone, and then he begins begging as uselessly as he’s probably lived. Snivelling and shouting. Whinging. Whining.
I snort and let the pained sounds of death mix with my images of Selma’s prone body. It slows my pace as I blank out what’s around us, choosing to see the bloody form of my wife rather than this insidious little hunt that’s continued. Good dogs. They’ve paid their dues, given their all so our lives can entwine again.
My feet walk on, blind to where they’re heading until all becomes still again. There’s no sound at all for me, just the ground beneath me ghosting by gently, occasionally gifting whispers of Selma’s voice. I’ve no interest in catching Madeline anymore. It’s done. Finished. Over. She can find what’s offered by her protectors and then we’ll find our path together. Selma will show us. But first they can both see the chaos these dogs can cause. Let them see what they did to her on that fateful night.
Words whisper to me again, talking of harmony and love, passion and forgiveness. I can almost see her travelling through the mist to get to Madeline, sense her leaving the part of me she clung to through this chase. She looks beautiful as she walks slowly, her white dress layering out behind her and brightening this murky land we’ve run over.
The Spiral Page 21