by Bryn Roar
“And the crowd goes, ROARRRR!!” Ralph said, playing along.
“Go on with your bad self, Opie,” Rusty laughed.
Embarrassed by the attention, Tubby blushed and put a blanket around Bill’s shoulders.
Bud set a coffeepot full of water and grounds beside the Duraflame logs Tubby had dropped on the sand.
“That was a good idea getting these starter logs, Pop. A campfire should help keep us safe tonight. Maybe we can even manage some sleep. We’ll need some more wood, though. Ya’ll get a fire pit started, while I collect some tender. Rusty, hand me that big flashlight of yours.”
“Stay clear of the dunes, son,” yawned his father. He tossed a pack of matches to Tubby and made himself cozy on the sand. Now that he’d done his part, exhaustion took hold of Bill Brown. Bud had told him everything that had transpired in the cellar and in the O’Hara kitchen, and the terrible news had stolen what meager strength he’d managed to regain, dozing in the trunk of the car.
He was so tired. So very, very tired.
“I’ll stay clear,” Bud promised him. Expecting another argument from Josie, he was surprised when she didn’t insist on going with him. Josie just gave him a look that told him he better not get hurt—otherwise there’d be hell to pay. He smiled, letting her know he got the message.
Josie watched the beam from Bud’s flashlight flicker up and down the beach, searching for suitable tender. She held on to the shotgun, ready to run after him at the first hint of trouble. True to his word, though, Bud avoided the dangerous dunes and kept close to the waterline, where most of the driftwood was anyway.
Soon he was heading back towards their little camp with his arms full, dumping the driftwood beside Tubby’s fire pit. Two successive trips ensured enough tender for the rest of the night. The enamel coffeepot now sat percolating on a flat rock close to the fire.
Even though it was a warm night, Rusty added some of the larger pieces of wood to the blaze and settled down close to the flames, his back to the water. In fact, the only one in-between the fire and the sand dunes was Bill. The rest were playing it safe, sitting close to the surf.
With nothing left to do now till morning, Bud sat beside Josie and allowed her to wrap the blanket around the both of them. He felt her silently sobbing, her tears soaking into his shirtsleeve. “I’m so sorry, Joe.” He wanted to say more, but comforting words were never his strong suit.
She nodded her head on his shoulder, just content to be in his arms. “Are we going to run John Cutter’s boat over to the Center tomorrow morning?”
Bud doodled in the sand with a reed.
“No. I doubt the Coast Guard would allow that. Even if they did, I wouldn’t want them to see me go over there. I think it’s better if we can claim ignorance after all this is over. We’ll just have to hope Christine can get us through most of the woods tomorrow.”
“Even if you wanted to use his boat, you couldn’t,” Rusty said, beside them. He pointed down the shore. The Moon Island Harbor was an inferno. “In the morning there won’t be so much as a rowboat left floating over there.”
“Too true,” Josie said, staring at the bright red glow.
Rusty and Tubby sat huddled together, sharing the only coffee cup Bill had retrieved from the cabin. Both kept glancing nervously over at the sand dunes several yards beyond their campfire. Every now and then catching sight of red furtive eyes, darting back and forth within the swaying sea oats. So far, Bill was right. The nearby surf and the regular sweep of the lighthouse beacon were proving their worth as deterrents—not to mention their little bonfire. Bud held on to the 12 gauge, regardless. He looked down in surprise at the dozing girl in his arms. He had assumed sleep would be a long time coming for Josie. Across from the crackling flames, Bill lay fully extended, the RS13 virus raging unchallenged through his veins.
Bud could almost hear the ticking of that damn clock in the O’Hara kitchen, counting down the remaining seconds, minutes, and hours of his father’s life...
Tick…Tick…Tick…Tick…Tick…
He figured once the sun rose he’d have about eight hours to find the two strains of vaccine, and hopefully some sort of instructions on combining them. A long shot, to be sure. Once that Herculean task was accomplished, his job was only half-done. Then he had to get the medicine safely to his father, where it could still have a chance to fight off the virus. After that, it was up to God. A heavenly deity Bud hadn’t had much use for, for a very long time. Now he realized he’d been wrong to blame God for his mother’s death. Nor was their current quandary God’s doing, either. Like the vast majority of suffering on earth, the only ones responsible were God’s own ruthless children.
Buddy boy bowed his head and he began to pray.
Chapter Eighteen:
What Dreams May Come…
The dreams always start out the same…
October 13th, 1996. I’m nine years old, waiting in the darkness of my bedroom, mom’s late…
Plip. Plip. Plop…
Noxzema floods the senses…
A friend in need, sobbing on the front steps…
He’s one of us now. The Fourth. It begins anew…
Dark winds blowing ill tidings. Death on still waters…
Broken treetops, like missing teeth on a comb…
A black murder…
Fireflies dancing in the night…
Robbie takes an evening stroll…
Footfalls in a dark tunnel, feathers on a brick floor…
Ted Bundy’s hiding something…
Leftovers in a sink. Death, She marks us all now…
Woods whipping by in the night…
A blood red moon, in the lake below…
A race with the Red Eyed Man…
As always, the dream has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The beginning never varies, while the middle and end always seem to be in flux. What appears one night may not reappear for several more. Tonight is no different. The dreams stutter on his mind’s eye, one image bleeding into the next, until it nears the end. The Bunker.
All at once, he’s in real time; seeing his future through his own eyes. The sights, sounds, and textures so real, it almost startles him into consciousness.
Bud is there.
A bright glow illuminates the alcove in the Bunker. Like the empty shotgun shells everywhere, bodies litter the floor, their faces obscured by a fog of indecision.
“The future, like all of Time, Buddy boy, is a river. A swift and strong tributary, running eternally over a deep and wide bed that is our destiny. Old River Time is an unstoppable current that knows no bounds…and yet He always travels in the line of least resistance. Therefore, if the will is great and your heart stout, you might possibly redirect it at the crucial juncture. Remember that, Buddy boy! Only at the crucial juncture…
Although Bud hasn’t heard those gentle tones in eight years, the soft voice is at once recognizable.
“Momma?” he whimpers in his sleep.
Beside him, Ralph Tolson is taking his turn at the watch. He wonders if he should wake his friend from what sounds like a terrible nightmare.
His hand hovers over Bud’s shoulder…
Bud struggles to stay within the dream, already fragmenting into its customary puzzle pieces. Only this time they seem to fall into a construct that makes sense. Several pieces are more prominent than others, more insistent, like the USA Today newspaper with the front-page headline:
MUTANT RABIES VIRUS SPEADING OUT OF CONTROL!
The mysterious dimpled shotgun shell. The weapons he would need to survive that night, all lined up neatly on a display stand. A bloody tide, sweeping inexorably across the globe, the dark red fading first to a dull pink, and then winking out of sight altogether. And most inexplicable of all: Fresh wash on a clothesline, dingy socks and underwear flapping in the wind…
Bud understands, though, that these are only peripheral pieces to the puzzle. Like the frame encasing the Mona Lisa, the binding of the Bible, what they
cleave to is all that matters: Hordes of demons chasing him through the darkened Pines. Faceless denizens, except for the fiery eyes, floating about like fireflies in a storm…the Pines a chaos of gunfire, screams, flames and death…Lizard Lake lit by a blood red moon…empty bullet casings dropping at his feet like copper, clinking rain…a frantic drop into the earth…the Bunker, his Cave, illuminated by a hellish glow…the vault door swinging shut with only three inside…two of them would not make it…a rusty streak arcing down at him, followed by a sudden searing agony.
A grief too raw for words…
Then darkness. All-encompassing darkness.
So that’s it. That’s how it all shakes out—unless he can divert that damn river, that is. He knows this will be the last of his dream/visions he’ll have to suffer through, yet that knowledge brings him no comfort. No sense of relief at all. For he understands now that they weren’t really nightmares after all, though they’d certainly had that dreamlike quality. It wasn’t his tortured psyche attempting to take out the trash, as good old Dr. Ellis had claimed, nor was it Beelzebub’s idea of a rip-roaring good joke.
Josie had been wrong, too! He was no psychic! All this time and he hadn’t realized their single true source: His mother. She’d been with him all this time, communicating in the only way left to her: In his dreams. Mental apparitions sent by her to forewarn him of the dark days ahead—that’s what they were! Flickers of the future yet to be. Yet they were more than that, and he knew it, too. From the moment of her death, she’d been trying to say goodbye to him. It was the one thing, after all, tying her to this mortal plane. And what was the best way to say goodbye? Why, an affirmation of love.
He felt her angelic fingers upon his face, so cool and soft, and then heard, as clear as day, the five words he’d most wanted to hear her say since the Red Eyed Man staggered into his bedroom. The same five words she most longed to utter: “I love you, Buddy boy...”
Bud awoke in an instant, his eyes snapping open. Tubby was looking down at him in concern.
“Dadgumit it, Bud! You had me scared silly! I’ve been shaking you for over a minute now! Must’a been some creepshow, huh? You all right?”
Feeling his mother’s breath, still warm in his ear, Bud smiled and said: “Right as rain, Ralph. Right as rain.”
*******
“A drop hits me below the eye, right before the head lands in my lap. I stare down inanely at it. Heavy. Impossibly heavy. Who knew a head could weigh so much? The smell of Noxzema floods my senses and I scream. I scream and I scream and I scream and I scream…”
Josie startled awake from the grip of the nightmare. It was of that first day, so long ago, when Bud told her and Rusty of his recurring dreams. The one with his mother’s murder starting off the gruesome hit parade. She looked around the dying campfire but Buddy boy was long gone. Rusty and Bilbo were still asleep. Tubby was awake and staring at the rising sun, inching its way over the hazy horizon. He sat on the sand, his chin resting on his knees, his arms clamped around his legs, silent and still as a park statue. The 12 gauge lay beside him on a blanket. The sight of the Remington startled Josie even more than Bud’s absence. She jumped to her feet and looked up and down the empty stretch of beach—not a soul in sight in either direction. She felt something in her pocket, and stuck her hand inside. The few remaining shotgun shells.
Bud must’ve put them there last night. They and the abandoned shotgun spoke volumes. Told Josie where Bud was going, what his oh, so noble intentions were, and quite frankly it pissed her off. That big dumb lummox! He didn’t even say goodbye! Too damned scared to, I bet.
Josie shook her head in disgust. For all his He-Man heroics, Bud Brown could be a real pussy at times.
She rummaged in her bag, past the finished pages of her novel—wondering why she’d brought the damn thing along—to get to a clean pair of underwear. After retrieving her shampoo, a towel, her favorite shorts, and a clean T-shirt, Josie located a bench of sorts, a stripped palmetto tree, washed ashore, some twenty yards down the beach. She considered the tampons, but her period, thank God, was at an end. She set her things on the log and looked back towards the fire pit. Tubby was still staring out at the horizon, his face impassive. She considered moving further along the beach, until he couldn’t see her, but realized maybe that wasn’t such a good idea. Turning her back to the camp, she removed her blue jeans and the t-shirt she was wearing. She then shed her bra and panties, laid them out on the log, and ran naked into the surf, the shampoo bottle held tight in one hand. She felt eyes upon her and could only hope they belonged to Tubby, and not to any nearby Rabids intent on ravaging her. The surf was a little rough for bathing, but good hygiene was only a secondary cause for the morning dip. After squeezing a generous dollop of shampoo into her hair, she tossed the bottle back onto the beach, out of reach of the tide. She got a good lather going and rinsed off the soap, diving under the surface. She anchored herself on the rippled ocean floor, her fingers and toes curling into the sand. Down here the current was less noticeable. It was safe under the sea. She felt herself relax, the tension leaving her body in a cold rush. She looked up at the familiar green roof overhead, the light barely filtering through the murky Atlantic dome. Down here, no Rabids existed. No dead parents roaming obtusely about. No brother’s remains piled high in a kitchen sink. When she was a little girl, her dad had taken her to see The Little Mermaid at the Moonlite Drive-In. Just the two of them in his old Fiat Spider convertible, their bare feet propped up on the padded dash; his feet comically huge, hers endearingly tiny. That had been a good night. One of those memories you know is a keeper the moment they’re happening. Something to dust off and replay whenever you needed a giggle or smile. The movie had enchanted her as well. It thrilled her that the heroine, Ariel, had red hair, too! Until that movie came along she’d been embarrassed by the color of her hair. (“I’d rather be dead, than have red on my head,” was a taunt, heard often in the halls of the Academy.) She felt an affinity with the little red headed mermaid and fantasized about becoming one herself. It was a little girl daydream, like teatime with her stuffed animals, or building sandcastles at the beach, where she awaited true love’s first kiss, in a lonely sandy chamber. An innocent diversion to fill the long, yet carefree days of childhood. But the daydream turned to something else after her father fell through the emerald ceiling. After her childhood ended so prematurely. Somewhere, under this same dappled roof, Joe Rusty O’Hara yet lived!
He hadn’t drowned! That was a feckin’ lie! He’d simply metamorphosed into something-of-the-sea.
Kind of like The Incredible Mr. Limpet—only more human than icky fish.
After that awful day, Josie liked to come down to the South Side shore whenever she could get a moment alone and run straight into the ocean. She didn’t go there to boogieboard with all the other kids. Or to lie out in the sun. Her sole reason for returning, again and again, was to shatter the emerald ceiling. The name she’d given to the expansive marine roof, from which her father had vanished without a trace. Once below that green roof, she’d stay until her lungs cried out for air. Day by day she’d practice holding her breath, in hopes that someday she wouldn’t have to anymore. That she, too, would evolve into a being of the sea. A beautiful, shapely mermaid. Then, with a dismissive flick of her long, shimmering tailfin, she would leave this island in search of her father. For that fabled City Under the Sea, where a life of immortal bliss awaited her…
She’d gotten very good at holding her breath—Ham said she was the strongest swimmer on Moon—but she never did change into that mermaid. Not that it was a waste of time. Those moments spent under the emerald ceiling had been her way of communing with her father—much more so than the times spent by his empty grave in the Pines! She felt so close to him down here. So at peace. She felt so now. Josie’s tears became one with the sea. Salt into salt. Why did you leave me, Daddy? Why didn’t you say goodbye? I miss you so very much…
Shayna had cracked up the Fiat during on
e of her binges and never bothered getting it fixed. Where it ended up, Josie hadn’t a clue. She had loved that old car and mourned its loss. After her father left them, she used to sit in the Spider, her eyes closed, her bare feet on the dash, and imagine her daddy beside her, smelling of Old Spice and sun block. Laughing uproariously at the antics of that silly old fiddler crab. Like much of her childhood, her mother had stolen that from her as well. But no one could steal her green roof! Underneath the dappled emerald ceiling, Josie’s old fantasy flared to life. She shut her eyes tightly and wished that old wish: Gills to breathe underwater and a shimmering tailfin to take her far, far away. Then she could be with her daddy, always and always…