Lurk

by Adam Vine

I didn’t think hash oil could make you hallucinate, but I didn’t know much about it. Jay would tell me if there was anything else in the weed he gave me, right?

  My memory jumped to the other times I’d heard that soft, androgynous weeping in our house. My silhouette was blocking the light from the bathroom window, so whoever was outside knew I was there. I stepped down from the window to go outside.

  That’s when I saw the words written on the mirror, words that hadn’t been there when I came in. WE WILL NEVER BE REMEMBERED.

  I gasped and lost my footing, smashing my tailbone on the lip of the bathtub. I bit my tongue hard, tasting blood. Adrenaline dumped through my body and I jolted back to my feet. There was blood on my knee. I’d split it open on the way down. The huge, brown smears covered the mirror. The message looked like it had been written in human feces, spread by hand.

  WE WILL NEVER BE REMEMBERED.

  My mind raced as I gaped at the mirror. Who will never be remembered? And how the hell did this get here? There was no one in the bathroom but me, and the mirror had been clean when I came in; I was sure of it. I wanted to cry. I closed my eyes, hoping I was hallucinating, that I’d wake up in a few seconds in my bed and realize it had all been another one of my paranoid psychotic episodes. I wanted it all to be gone: the crying, the pictures, the sleeping bag in the basement, the man outside my window, Carter's bullshit sobriety, Jay and Bea.

  But I wasn’t hallucinating. I opened my eyes, and the words were still there. It’s not shit, I realized. It’s mud. And I already knew where it had come from.

  We will never be remembered.

  I imagined Mr. DeLucio stalking through our house, mud and masturbatory semen fresh on his hands, eager to seek revenge on us for burning his precious college pictures, but too scared of Carter to actually do anything about it.

  Fear transmuted into anger. I could still get him, redeem myself in Bea’s eyes, maybe even enough to push Jay out of the picture – if he was still outside.

  I snuck through the house, careful to avoid passing by any windows. I wanted to surprise him, sneak up on him while he was hiding out in the yard. I grabbed the fire poker from the living room, almost stumbling over the sleeping bodies of Ry and Rob in the process.

  Someone had left the kitchen lights on and the faucet running. So much for the element of surprise, I thought. All the blinds in the kitchen were open, giving full view to anyone outside.

  I sighed and turned the faucet off. I was about to formulate a Plan B when I saw the little girl looking in at me through the window.

  I fell back, crashing into the oven. I’m lucky it didn’t break.

  When I looked again, she was gone. I had only seen her for a split second, and the deck lights were off, but the light through the window had been enough.

  There had been a muddy teenage girl staring in at me from the sun deck. Her face was grimy, and there was something strange about her eyes.

  I adjusted my grip on the poker and swallowed down my fear. My heart beat so fast I thought it would burst.

  Was she the one I’d heard crying all those times? Was she the one who had been sleeping in our basement? Was I wrong about DeLucio? Who the hell was she?

  I cocked my arm back, ready to swing the fire poker at the first moving thing I saw, and crept outside.

  She wasn’t there when I turned the light on. The deck was clear. I searched along the whitewashed handrails, looking over the sides for a gap in the hedges below where someone might have jumped over.

  I heard music echoing from the garage. When I looked over to see what it was, the girl was standing in our driveway, smoking a cigarette.

  I leaned over the handrail so I could get a better view. I’d never seen the girl before in my life. She either didn’t notice me watching her, or pretended not to. Her body language was comfortable, as if she was used to people staring at her. There was mud caked in her hair and dead leaves on her torn sack dress. Her skin was pale and covered in brown bruises. When she put the cigarette to her lips, it didn’t flare, because she didn’t inhale.

  She turned to look up at me. Or rather, her head turned, but her eyes didn’t. They slid gelatinously through her sockets like fluid in a bowl. Her face was cut badly, but there was no blood. Her bottom lip hung down flap-like where it had been torn halfway off her face, a white sail lagging behind the movement of her skull, which itself bore a huge crater under her hair where it had been smashed in.

  My first thought was that it was makeup, and my roommates were hosting a Halloween party. But Halloween had been months ago, and my roommates were asleep.

  The dead girl frowned. I felt my legs giving out. I put my full weight on the railing, which creaked, and I pulled back from the edge before it could break. The fire poker felt like it would fly from my shaking grip. I held it tighter, not sure what I would do if she tried to come up the stairs.

  I've seen zombie movies, I've gotta destroy her brain, bash her skull in, but her skull's already bashed in. Shit, decapitate her, don't let her bite me, oh shit oh FUCK her face is hanging off maybe the tree trimmers, oh Christ, she was right outside my window, she could’ve killed me, I could get the trimmers and slice her head off or set her on fire, if I had gas maybe, maybe I could get some gas, I could…

  The dead girl dropped her cigarette and went into the garage.

  It isn’t real. It isn’t. Real.

  The last thing I wanted to do was go down the stairs, but I had to know. If I was in the middle of a full-blown mental breakdown; if that smoldering cigarette wasn't there when I reached it, then at least I would have my answer. I could set down the fire poker, walk inside, step over Rob and Ry, and call the authorities, even make a frozen burrito while I waited for them to take me to my padded cell. I was starving.

  The next thing I knew, I was holding her cigarette. It was real tobacco, hand-rolled in real cigarette paper, really burning. Okay, so maybe the cigarette’s real, but she isn’t. The music isn’t. This is a vivid dream caused by the hash. I can fly if I want to. Ready? Fly.

  I didn’t fly.

  I’m going to have sex with a beautiful naked girl right now, with Bea. If I can make Bea appear, naked and ready, then this is just a dream. Bea didn’t appear, naked or otherwise. The only thing I felt pressing against my body was the freezing January cold, as real as the rough wet concrete under the bare soles of my feet. I’m not dreaming.

  I walked towards the garage door, the din growing louder with each step, forty or fifty people all laughing and clapping along with the upbeat tempo of the music. It was old time New Orleans zydeco, a man singing and playing accordion. No one in this house listens to that kind of music. Plus, they wouldn’t have a party without telling me.

  The cloying smells of cigarette smoke and spilled beer filled my nostrils as I pushed open the garage door.

  I’m dreaming. I’m not dreaming.

  I stepped into the garage and saw head wounds, gunshot wounds, stab wounds, broken bottles jutting out of ragged flesh, neck bruises from being hanged, torn-up clothes, mud on bloodless blue skin, flesh rotten and falling off or not there at all, and bones, bones, only bones.

  At least fifty corpses were dancing and drinking in a huge gathering, as real as people in costumes at a Halloween party, only it wasn’t a Halloween party, and it wasn’t makeup. A bunch of dead people were partying in our garage.

  I’m dreaming. I reached for the light switch and turned it on. The corpses disappeared. The garage was silent and empty except for some beer bottles, our cigarette burn-covered couches, some old movie posters, and the joke of three spare doors nailed together we called a bar.

  Lights off, the dead returned. Dead men in suspenders and rolled-up canvas pants sat drinking mud-smeared tankards of beer, bony legs sloshing in muddy boots as they tapped their feet in time with the tune. Some talked. Some danced. White, black, Hispanic, or Asian, their dead, rotten skin all looked the same now. There were dead women, too; some dressed like wealthy ladies, others like pr
ostitutes. One was naked.

  On. They vanished. I was alone again.

  Off. They reappeared. The decorations became older, like they were pulled out of the 1920s – flashy tinsel instead of Christmas lights, bar stools instead of couches, all freshly upholstered with new leather.

  On. The garage, empty. The shadows evaporated. A hollow cacophony of wind.

  Off. Surrounded by corpses, joining in their unholy merriment amid the furious light of the flames.

  I left the lights off. I’m dreaming. I’m not dreaming.

  Departing the safety of the door, I began to wander through the crowd. I saw the dead girl from outside dancing and weaving through the bodies. She appeared oblivious to my presence as she one-two-stepped, twirling her rotten sackcloth skirt between the corpses of rail workers and ship hands. None of them noticed I was there. And all of them were covered in thick, black mud.

  Huge, smokeless trashcan fires blazed. The sweltering heat blasted me from all four corners of the garage, their stench carried on it like an airborne sickness. Maybe if I was dead I’d want to warm up, too. Is that what it’s like to be dead, to be cold and muddy all the time?

  A dead woman was dancing by herself next to one of the burning trash cans. She wore a sweat-stained ballerina’s tutu two sizes too small, complete with dirty ballet shoes and heavily caked-on stage makeup. Or is she just that pale? She's dead. She looks like she was sick or something, like she died of a bad flu. The shallow holes of her eyes were ringed with tired black circles, and she was smiling a fixed, impermeable smile.

  Next to her, a very fat, naked woman – or was it a man? It was hard to tell in that light, especially since the huge rolls of fat from its stomach covered whatever genitals it might’ve still had – stood barbequing something meaty on a spit held over open flames. Is that what I’m smelling? My stomach turned at the smell of crackling, cooking flesh. What kind of meat is that, anyway? I decided I didn’t want to know.

  A dead man leaned against the wall. His mouth and jaw were bisected by old scar tissue, like he’d swallowed acid. He was picking at something embedded in the palm of his hand with a giant buck knife. When he dug it out, I saw it was a human tooth.

  My head swam and my limbs shook. Weak, exhausted, and scatterbrained, it took everything I had simply to draw and hold a deep breath and catch my bearings. I squeezed my eyes shut, but none of it went away. When I opened them again, I was still there, in the garage of Sunny Hill, surrounded by partying corpses.

  That’s when I saw who was singing. It was Scudds Gurney.

  Scudds sat on a stool in the far back corner of the garage, next to the door leading to the basement. He was wearing the same pinstripe suit and beaver hat I’d seen in the photographs at the library, and was holding the same accordion in his lap, squeezing out every note with gusto.

  I recognized the song Scudds was singing, too:

  I opened a hole, I opened a hole,

  The broken pieces go in the soil,

  Down they fall, and never touch dirt,

  There are many holes under the Earth!

  Scudds’ eyes locked on me, and the feeling of ice water spilled down my spine. Not eyes, I saw. Flashbulbs. Like from the inside of a camera. The round, glittering bulbs protruded from his raw, red sockets.

  The tempo of the music quickened.

  I opened a hole, ‘neath a Sunny Hill-

  I took a stumble, then took a spill,

  Now I’m the Hole, and the Hole is me,

  A ho ho ho, and a ho he he he!

  The dead girl moved to the center of the dance floor, slamming and kicking her feet, her skirts held up in one hand. The rest surrounded her, clapping and cheering her on. The song sped up with each new refrain.

  I opened a hole, I opened a hole…

  A dead boy, five or six, shoeless and grimy, with half his skull blown off and no brains inside, shoved past me to see. My hand fell to my pocket. My wallet was gone.

  But I’m not wearing pants. I have no wallet. I’m in my underwear.

  The pickpocket snickered and disappeared back into the crowd.

  The broken pieces go in the soil…

  The dead girl did a handstand. The corpses raised their glasses and cheered, beer spilling everywhere, showering me, splashing my face. They still didn’t seem to know I was there.

  Down they fall, and never touch dirt!

  There are many holes under the earth!

  The dead girl struggled to keep up with the lightning-fast tempo. She stumbled and rolled her ankle. Her foot snapped off and she fell flat on her face, the ankle oozing out a dark brown fluid where the bone poked cleanly from the flesh. The crowd cheered and slammed their mugs together.

  There are many holes under the earth!

  The music stopped. Silence. The dead girl hastily pulled herself to her knees and bowed, then crawled off the dance floor to re-attach her foot to her leg.

  They were looking at me, I realized. I suddenly wanted very much to be back in my own bed.

  “Who’s there a-lurking?” Scudds Gurney said, breaking the silence. His tongue rolled as he spoke, notes of pleasure and unshakable calm playing in the depths of his voice. His flashbulb eyes gleamed, examining me.

  I couldn’t hold his gaze. I gasped and looked away, only to find myself staring the dead girl in the eyes, or where her eyes should’ve been. She was inches in front of me, her breath like a sickening waft of cold air coming out of a fridge full of rotten food. “I said it’s one dollar, mister. Ya don’t like it, you can go ta hell.”

  I brushed past her towards the door, but the pickpocket blocked my way. He, too, had gaping abysses in place of his eyes. The boy looped his thumbs through his suspenders, kicked one of his heels and said, “Father White says I’m the Devil’s child. He says I don’t behave. So he taught me…” The boy pulled his shirt up. Blue-green guts fell out onto the floor with a hiss through the open, worm-mottled rift of his stomach. “…with his shovel.”

  I shrieked and stumbled back into the ballet dancer. Her body was cold and wet. I sprawled on the floor, but she kept her balance. She twirled on her toes and her head tilted down slowly to look at me, like it was part of her performance and I was her audience. The twin voids of her eyes studied me and she said, passively, “I was the best there ever was. The best,” like I should’ve known.

  Somehow, I found my feet. I started walking through the door, but they were all looking at me, staring, penetrating me with fifty pairs of black, empty eye sockets. I was losing my mind.

  The obese, androgynous thing cooking by the trashcan fire tried to beckon me over. I finally saw what type of meat was on the menu. It was a human child, no more than a year old, and blackened from the waist down. It tugged one of the crispy little legs off and took a big, savory bite, the sizzling, tender meat tearing as easily as pulled pork. It offered me the leg and said with an extreme, grunting speech impediment, “You want… s-some? These… are m-my favorite. Th-they… n-never tell.”

  Run. Run for your life. Run, you fat piece of shit, my inner monologue screamed. But my legs wouldn’t move. My feet were a million miles below me, dragging like giant, eldritch abominations trapped in the deepest, thickest mud of the sea floor.

  A not-so-gentle hand shoved into my chest. I looked up. The corpse with the acid scar on his face towered over me, standing between me and the door. He was at least seven feet tall. I brandished the fire poker at him, but he took it out of my hand as easily as I would steal candy out of the bulk bins at the grocery store and dropped it on the ground. Then, saying nothing, he motioned for me to turn around. There was a wound on his index finger where someone had bitten off half the skin and muscle, leaving pallid bone and tendon exposed.

  I did as I was commanded.

  “Hey kid. Do you like magic tricks?” Scudds Gurney said.

  The crowd closed behind me. I couldn’t walk out the door I’d come in. They weren’t going to let me leave until I answered.

  Slowly, I nodded.


  Scudds chuckled. “All good little boys do, because magic tricks are bad. And good little boys love bad things!”

  The corpses mumbled their agreement.

  “It just so happens, there’s a magic trick waiting for you right on the other side of that door.” Scudds Gurney pointed to the Hobbit door with a white-gloved hand. The magician waited, hand and index finger outstretched, for me to walk through. The crowd cleared a path.

  “I-I d-don’t want to,” I said, but Scudds didn’t move. The corpses pressed in closer, forcing me towards the door. This isn’t happening, I told myself, but Sam’s padlock felt pretty fucking real as my quaking hands struggled to unlock it. Somehow, I got the lock off, and the basement door swung open. Scudds Gurney smiled at me. His teeth were mirrors.

  ***

  I stepped through the basement door into our backyard orchard.

  I was walking through the fruit trees under a full and pale moon, the bare black branches replaced by vibrant fruit. Instead of chilly winter, I felt a warm summer breeze. Someone was toking a chronic blunt nearby, its rank odor thick between the sweet scents of apple and grapefruit blossoms. A few paces ahead, through a break in the trees, I saw a group of people jumping on a trampoline.

  There were five of them. I recognized their faces instantly: Andy, Apple, Marty, Gloria, Rebecca. Benny the Piano Man was missing, but his absence aside, the entire 1993 Sunny Hill Crew was there.

  Andy did a backflip and called out, “Drew-buddy!

  Apple bounced and folded her legs mid-air like a yogi, the ginger parachute of her hair furling and unfurling. She put one leg behind her head, bounced and said, “Dude, like, come jump on this thing with us! It’s super chill!” Super chill. Something Bea would say.

  Marty bounced casually, took a mid-air puff off of the blunt in his hand, then bounced over and passed the weed to Rebecca. “Get up here, dawg,” Marty said to me. “You too uptight. Stay a while. Hang out with us.” Carter calls me dawg, too, never seriously, but with the same ironic tone Marty just used.

  Rebecca smiled at me. “You’re pretty cute. But I can see why that girl doesn’t like you. You don’t know how to have fun.”