The Reaping

by M. Leighton

She moved so quickly it was over before I really knew what happened. Bodie was lying on his side, behind his doghouse, whimpering quietly as Leah fed from his neck. I couldn’t see any of her face; it was buried deep in his fur. I was so appalled and so taken aback, I just stood there watching for the longest time before it occurred to me to try and stop her.

  Finally, I jerked into action, grabbing Leah by her shoulders and pulling as hard as I could. Nothing would dislodge her from the dog’s throat, though. Her control was complete. “Leah,” I whispered, my voice a little shaky. “Leah, please stop. We’ve got to go.”

  I could hear wet slopping sounds that made my stomach roll and saliva pour into my mouth. I liked dogs, but not that much.

  “Leah, please.”

  I tugged again and this time she released her hold on the dog. When she looked up at me, her face was covered in blood and blood spatter from her nose down. There were even a few specks dotting as far up as her forehead.

  Her expression was strangely blank. I really don’t think she had any idea at that moment who I was. I think the only reason she stopped was because she was finished feeding.

  I grabbed her arm and pulled. Mechanically, Leah got up and followed me.

  By the time I got her home, Leah was coherent. And very upset. She ran straight into my bathroom and slammed the door behind her. I could hear her retching, but it didn’t sound as if anything was coming back up. I heard the water run and some splashing sounds. Finally, the door opened and one very subdued Leah emerged. Her face was shiny and clean, but her eyes were dull and burdened and a little teary.

  She walked to the bed and perched on the edge, her shoulders slumped in dejection.

  “I can’t believe I did that,” she said, her voice wavering. “I love animals, especially dogs.” Though her head was lowered as she picked at her fingernails nervously, I could see that her chin was trembling with suppressed emotion.

  I sat beside her, shoulder to shoulder. “Leah, don’t be so hard on yourself. It’s going to take time for you to learn how to control this, to manage it. I mean, it’s not like you set out to do it,” I said, hoping to encourage her. “Look at it this way, at least you didn’t hurt somebody, like your mom or dad. Or me.” I smiled then bumped her shoulder playfully. “Especially not me.” I saw her lips twitch in a weak smile and I took that as a good sign.

  Leah fell back on the bed and pulled a pillow over her face. She lay like that for several minutes. I debated leaving her to herself for a while, but then she spoke. Her words were muffled by the pillow.

  “What? I couldn’t understand you.”

  Leah lifted the pillow just enough to clear her mouth so I could hear her. “I said, ‘Why don’t you smell like that’?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like that? They smelled so delicious, my parents. Even the dog smelled good,” she complained.

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s a chemistry thing.”

  “Maybe,” she said doubtfully. She flung the pillow off and sat up, her brows pulled together in a tight little frown. She bit her lip pensively. “You smell more…I don’t know. Maybe it’s less, less…fresh and juicy, like you’re not quite…I don’t know.” She watched me thoughtfully, unable to articulate what she was sensing.

  “Alive?”

  She mulled that word for a while, looking at me as if she was trying to see deep inside my cells. “Maybe, but how could that be?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said vaguely.

  “And we’ve got,” Leah looked down at her watch then back at me, “eight days until school’s back in. I’m all ears,” she declared, her smile a little stronger and more genuine. She needed a distraction from her worries and she saw one in hearing about my worries.

  I deliberated for a moment. Having held my secrets so close for so long, the thought of confiding in someone felt strange. But then I realized that Leah had nearly as much going on as I did, only with more to lose. If there was anyone I could trust to keep my confidences at this point, it would undoubtedly be her. “I’ll tell you all about it after you call your parents. Deal?”

  With a nod, Leah hopped off the bed and agreed. “Deal.” She walked past me and a minute later I heard her end of the conversation with her parents.

  When she returned, Leah and I sat on the bed and I told her the whole story, beginning with the accident that revealed my shiny layer of skin and ending with me tackling Grey as she attempted to reap Leah for Fahl.

  “I guess I owe you, well, my life then, don’t I?”

  “Look at it as a second chance, one that you have to make the best of.” I thought of my father drowning right before my eyes. “Trust me, I don’t think you want to spend eternity in Hell or the Darkness.”

  Later that night, as Leah and I sat on the couch watching a Christmas movie, I felt lighter, better for having shared my troubles with someone. I guess misery really does love company and Leah and I were quite the pair. Talk about your odd couples!

  The relative tranquility of the evening was short-lived, however, when a young blonde girl appeared in my living room floor. She was walking backward, talking and gesturing to someone I couldn’t see.

  I glanced at Leah to see if she had noticed her, but she was still watching television.

  “Leah, can you see that?”

  Leah looked around curiously. “See what?”

  I guess that was my answer.

  As I watched, the girl pulled a sweater she was wearing over her head, leaving her in only a camisole, and then she lay back on a bed that suddenly appeared beneath her. That’s when I saw a boy’s dark head come into the picture. He picked up her leg and began kissing at her ankle, working his way up her slim leg and pushing her skirt up as he went. He stopped and paid particular attention to a geometric tattoo that graced the outside of her knee, rubbing it with his thumb then flicking his tongue over it.

  When he continued his ascent, I looked away, embarrassed for watching them. My eyes met Leah’s. She was eyeing me suspiciously.

  “What are you looking at?”

  “There’s a girl right there,” I said, pointing to where the couple lay, but keeping my eyes averted and trained on Leah.

  “I don’t see anyone.”

  “Obviously,” I said, rolling my eyes in that way that says duh. “I guess this is one of those weird visions,” I explained. Then it hit me. The other two visions had been centered around someone’s death, or imminent death in Leah’s case. If that held true here, maybe if I watched closely enough, I could find out who and where the couple was so that I could intervene, like I did with Leah.

  “Who is it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  With heated cheeks, I turned my gaze back to the couple. I squashed the urge to look away and give them privacy as they fooled around.

  At one point, the couple was kissing passionately and I thought of Derek, remembering the pleasure we’d shared. Shaking my head as if shaking off the memories, I concentrated on the couple, dissecting them and their surroundings, waiting for some clue as to their location and/or identity.

  I watched as the boy slid his hand beneath one of her spaghetti straps. She tore her mouth from his. “Nathan, that’s too far. I told you I’m not ready for that yet,” she said.

  Nathan! At least I had that to go on.

  Not taking her protest seriously, Nathan responded, “You knew you were playing with fire.” Breathing heavily, he began kissing her neck, his hand trailing down over her breast to the bottom of her shirt. He pushed the thin material up high on the girl’s ribs. She grabbed his wrist to stay his hand.

  Even to my eyes, it seemed Nathan’s hands were everywhere. While she was tugging at one, the other found its way to her bare leg, gliding up her thigh to disappear beneath the edge of her skirt.

  The girl squirmed uncomfortably beneath his increasing ardor, pushing at his other hand now. She had zero luck. Neither hand budged so she began pushing at his shoulders. “Nathan, I said no,” she crie
d. I could hear the rising panic in her tone.

  Ignoring her, Nathan’s arm jerked as he pulled violently at something I couldn’t see. I heard the ripping sound of seams giving way; I assumed it was her panties.

  The girl began to struggle in earnest, realizing what he was attempting. “Nathan!” Her voice trembled. She was about to cry. Cold chills raced down my arms. She just realized she was in serious trouble.

  With a growl, Nathan reached between their bodies and I heard the sound of a zipper. I raised my hand to my mouth to smother a gasp. It was horrifying to watch, yet I couldn’t look away.

  Despite her thrashing, the girl must’ve heard it, too. She raised a hand and dug her fingernails into the side of his face, dragging them down his neck, leaving long bloody gashes in his skin. With a growl, Nathan clenched his fingers into a fist and hit her in the side of the head.

  The girl’s head lolled back and forth for a minute; she seemed addled by the punch. I scooted to the edge of my cushion, every muscle in my body tensed and ready for action, action that could not help her no matter how much I might wish it. Hot tears streamed silently down my face as I willed the girl to do something, anything, to save herself.

  Within seconds, I saw the light of alertness come back into the girl’s eyes. I watched as it shifted first to panic. It swelled in her face and my heart broke for her. I felt her fear and her helplessness almost as if they were my own. And then I saw something that I had experienced too many times in the last several months not to recognize. I saw her panic turn to rage.

  Nathan’s ardor had only increased by her resistance. He was going to persist, whether she wanted him to or not.

  As his mouth skated across her jaw line dropping unwanted kisses toward her mouth, the girl turned her head. She found his nose with her teeth and she bit down. Hard.

  Nathan screamed and rolled off the girl, coming to his feet beside the bed. He was holding a hand over his face. Blood was oozing between his fingers. Though his voice was muffled, I could plainly make out what he called her. And she heard it, too.

  As he turned to walk across the room, I glimpsed the wall behind him. It looked like the interior of a cabin, with its large exposed beams and whitish chinch fill in between. He stopped at a dresser that sat against the wall opposite the bed. He leaned in to the mirror that hung above it. As I watched his reflection, I caught sight of something else moving in the glass. In the image of the window near the bed, I could see a pale face floating eerily against the black of the night.

  It was Grey. Her eyes met mine in the mirror. Anticipation was gleaming in the obsidian depths.

  “Look what you did to me!” Nathan yelled, turning back to her, fists clenched at his sides.

  “You deserved that. And more!” The girl had risen to her feet and was standing in the center of the bed, shouting defiantly at Nathan. “Just wait until people find out what kind of monster you really are. Only a total loser has to take what he wants because no one is willing to give it to him. And that’s what you are—a monster and a loser.”

  Nathan’s blood-streaked face blanched at her words and a look of utter satisfaction settled over her pretty features. But, alas, it was short-lived.

  Suddenly the blood rushed back into Nathan’s face, turning it beet red, and he began to shake. The smugness drained from the girl’s expression when she realized that she’d overshot her mark. She’d made her threats before she was out of harm’s way. And her mistake was a fatal one.

  With a cry that sent chills racing down my arms, Nathan leapt up onto the bed and grabbed the girl by the throat. Her eyes widened in shock and she pulled at his wrists. She couldn’t move them an inch. She beat and smacked at his arms then turned her fingernails to his face once more. When that didn’t work, she reached for his nose, but he was able to turn his face this way and that, keeping his wounded nose from her grasp.

  He tightened his grip on her neck and began to shake her. She made coughing, sputtering sounds, her face turning an unhealthy purplish red. Tighter and tighter he squeezed, her struggles becoming less and less robust. Finally, her eyes rolled back in her head and a whitish ring began to develop around her mouth. Seconds later, she went limp in his arms.

  Nathan followed her down to the bed, where he straddled her lifeless body. He continued to strangle her even though she showed no signs of consciousness. He muttered something under his breath and shook her again.

  Furiously, he growled and mumbled, spittle flying from his lips and peppering her ruddy face. Again and again, he shook her, her head snapping back and forth violently.

  Finally, Nathan released his grip on the girl’s neck. Behind him, I saw Grey walk to the bed and slide in beside the girl’s limp body. With a toothy smile that turned my blood to ice, she lowered her mouth to the girl’s throat and bit down.

  The girl’s body twitched, almost as if she’d felt it. I wanted to shout to the boy, “Check her pulse! Check her pulse!” I knew it wouldn’t have mattered, though. He wanted her to be dead. That much was obvious.

  And then my living room floor was empty once more, all the characters in the macabre play vanishing into thin air.

  I sat on the couch, appalled at what I’d seen, but also thankful that my tryst with Stephen Fitchco hadn’t gone that far awry, ending in a similar manner.

  My mind raced with one thought. What can I do? What can I do? What can I do?

  Derek’s words broke the loop, so clearly he could’ve spoken them aloud.

  Now that you’ve made the deal, there’s a house you can use... has a bunch of doors...take you to the marked.

  A house with a bunch of doors? I thought of the house that I’d dreamt of, that huge, dark monstrosity that seemed to ooze evil from every nook and cranny. Could he have meant that house? “But how do I even get there?” I asked absently, speaking to no one in particular.

  “Get where?” I’d forgotten that Leah was there.

  “Oh, uh, nowhere. I was just thinking.”

  Leah tipped her head to the side. “Car-son,” she said warningly. “Spill.”

  “I just, um, I, uh—”

  “Stop trying to lie without lying,” she interrupted. “Just tell me the truth. Aren’t we kind of past keeping secrets by now anyway?”

  She had a valid point. It’s not like I hadn’t just told her all the gory details about my insane life anyway. What was I afraid of? What was I hiding?

  I told Leah what I’d seen (foregoing most of the detail) and then explained my dilemma. Leave it to Leah to see the logic.

  “If you’ve been dreaming of the house and Derek knows about it, it’s probably not over here,” she reasoned. “Maybe you should start with the clearing. Seems like the woods are where all sorts of bad things happen anyway.” She said the last under her breath and with no small amount of bitterness.

  I couldn’t fully agree, considering all the good times Derek and I had shared in the woods, but Leah didn’t have to know that so I didn’t argue with her.

  “You may have a point,” I conceded, still trying to think of another way, one that didn’t involve going to the clearing.

  “What exactly is your plan anyway?”

  I looked at Leah, puzzled. “What do you mean? I’m going to save her. What do you think my plan is?”

  “Save her?” Leah sounded skeptical, which was odd since she’d very recently benefited from just such a plan.

  “Yes. Is there a problem with that?” Leah’s attitude rubbed me the wrong way, aggravating me.

  “No,” she said, looking away, but her body language and expression clearly said there was.

  “Alright, Leah. Out with it.”

  “Nothing,” she maintained then, after a moment, reconsidered. When she lifted her eyes to mine, anger simmered in their sable depths. “Well, look at me. It’s not like your rescue of me worked out so perfectly, you know?”

  I was speechless. Did she really feel like this was somehow my fault?

  “Well, excuse me for saving
your life. Maybe I should’ve thought of the pros and cons first, asked around a little bit even. Oh wait,” I snapped. “I was too busy saving your life.”

  Leah opened her mouth to rebut, but I wasn’t interested in anything she had to say. I turned on my heel and stalked out of the living room. I grabbed my jacket and the keys then walked out to the garage.

  On the short drive to the forks, I seethed over Leah’s audacity, the conversation playing over and over in my head. Then, unbidden, a cryptic warning Fahl had given me popped into my mind. I hadn’t known how to make sense of it at the time, but now…

  …as long as you don’t try anything reckless, Leah will be enjoying her cookies by Christmas.

  Was this what he’d meant? Had I really somehow caused what had befallen Leah?