by Tim Waggoner
Maegarr hasn’t removed his face, though. He’s their leader, and the rules don’t apply to him. Still standing at the podium, he leans forward and speaks into the microphone. “Eat the Night” should have obliterated his words, but Debbie hears them as clearly as if the Pavilion were completely silent and he spoke them directly into her ear.
“You’ve been deceitful, Debbie. You’re nothing but masks, one over another.”
She can’t turn to look at him, but she can hear the smile in his voice.
“We’ve decided to give you a going-away present,” he says, “and since you’re so fond of masks…”
The couple steps forward, and Monica shoves her detached face toward Debbie’s mouth. Debbie tries to turn away, but Nathan releases her arms, grabs hold of her head from behind, and forces her to her knees. He then inserts blood-smeared fingers between her teeth and pries her mouth open. Monica grins, her teeth a startling slash of white in her red face, and jams her no-longer-wanted mask into Debbie’s mouth. She tastes sweat-salt and blood-tang, and then Monica pushes and shoves the hideously slick, smooth flesh down Debbie’s throat. Debbie struggles to breathe, and her abdominal muscles cramp as her body tries to reject what is being forced into it. Brian steps forward then and does the same, shoving Monica’s flesh farther down Debbie’s gullet as he adds his.
Debbie’s lungs scream for air, and her throat burns as if it’s being torn apart from within. She prays that this will be over soon, even if it means her death, but when she sees the rest of the Congregation start moving forward, forming a line as they come, she knows her prayer is destined to go unanswered.
* * *
“Joan! Wake up!”
Someone was shaking her, and her first reaction was to try and push whoever it was away. It was dark, and she couldn’t see the person, and that only added to her terror. But he—the person was bigger and stronger and just felt like a he—grabbed hold of her wrists and prevented her from struggling. She attempted to draw a breath, but her throat felt as if it were closed shut, and she couldn’t draw in any air. She remembered the feeling of blood-slick flesh being crammed into her mouth, and she fought even harder to pull free from the man holding her wrists.
“You’re having an asthma attack! You need your inhaler!”
She kneed him in the stomach before she realized what he’d said. He made an oomph! sound, but she stopped struggling, and he let go of her wrists and reached over her and pulled open her nightstand drawer. She heard him fumble around for a moment, and then he withdrew his hand. He pressed the plastic inhaler into her right hand, and she sat up, put it in her mouth, and took a hit. She needed two more before her throat and lungs relaxed and she was able to breathe freely again. As always, the albuterol made her jittery and she began shaking.
Jon slid his arms around her and pulled her close. She knew he was only trying to comfort her, but she didn’t like to be touched when she was upset. They’d been married for six years—Jon and Joan, isn’t that so cute?—and they’d dated for several years before that. And in all that time, he’d never been able to remember not to touch her until she was ready. She suspected he was more interested in playing the role of a supportive, loving spouse—or at least his interpretation of it—than in actually giving her what she needed at the moment. Still, she did her best to relax against him, and if her body remained a little stiff, he’d put it down to her still being upset, if he noticed at all.
“Bad dream?” he asked.
What was your first clue? “Yes.”
“Was it—”
“No. Something different. Weird. I don’t remember much.” This part was a lie. She remembered every detail, but she didn’t feel like talking about it. Not yet, anyway. She wanted to process it first. Besides, if she told Jon, he’d probably start worrying that she was suppressing something and he’d urge her to speak to a psychologist. She could almost hear him. You’re a drug-dependency counselor. You should know all kinds of shrinks to talk to. Her husband was a typical Mr. Fix-It in every way. He might’ve worked as the manager of a home-improvement store, but he saw himself as able to fix—or at least give others advice on how to fix—anything.
He started stroking her hair. It was a sweet gesture, but her hair was long and fine, and his fingers often snagged and snarled, causing her to wince in pain. At least with the light off, he wouldn’t see the face she’d make.
“Everything’s okay now.” He spoke in a near-whisper as he always did whenever they were in bed. They had no children and were alone in the house, but it didn’t matter to Jon. Nighttime was always quiet time to him. “It was only a dream.”
And a kick to the nuts might not kill you, but it still hurts like hell, she thought.
“Only a dream,” he repeated, his voice softer, the words less distinct. His breathing began to slow and deepen, and his hand slowed. Soon the hair-stroking stopped and she felt him become a dead weight beside her. Jon had the enviable ability to fall asleep almost instantly, even after being woken in the middle of the night by her thrashing beside him. She hated him a little right then.
She waited a few minutes to make sure he was finally asleep before slipping out of his arms and leaving the bed. She slept in her panties and an oversized T-shirt, but although the bedroom air was chilly, she didn’t bother putting on her robe or slippers. Instead she padded across the carpeted floor, checked the window to make sure it was locked, then opened the door as quietly as she could. She stepped into the hallway, then closed the door gently behind her. The hallway was dark, and she kept a hand on the wall to guide her as she walked. When she reached the hall bathroom, she went inside and flipped on the light. The sudden burst of illumination forced her to close her eyes. Why did she always forget to close them before turning on the light? She closed the door, peed, flushed, washed her hands, and then returned to the hall and headed for the kitchen. She still felt jittery from the albuterol, but she was no longer shaking, so that was something. Unlike Jon, she had a hard time going back to sleep once she awakened—especially if she took a hit from her inhaler. There was no point in even trying. She’d be up for hours.
She always left the stove light on at night, and although it wasn’t very bright, she had no trouble seeing. She went to the Keurig and turned it on, and while she waited for it to warm up, she checked the time on the microwave clock. 3:48. Only two hours and change before she was due to get up and start getting ready for work. She supposed it could’ve been worse. She could’ve woken even earlier.
When the Keurig was ready, she took a mug from the cupboard, put it in the machine, then inserted a cup of decaf coffee—no way she was going to have regular as jittery as she already was—and started it brewing. She’d left her phone in the bedroom, so she couldn’t check her email or Facebook. She didn’t feel like going back to the bedroom to get it, though. She wasn’t worried about waking Jon. He’d just go right back to sleep if she did. She didn’t want to return to the bedroom because—and she knew this was silly—it was the place where she’d had the dream. It wasn’t like she thought the bedroom was cursed or anything. She wasn’t superstitious. She just wanted to dissociate herself from the dream, and anything related to it, as much as possible. While the coffee finished brewing, she checked the back door and found it locked, just as it should be. She checked the window over the kitchen sink and found it the same. She gazed out the window. Moonlight made their neatly trimmed backyard seem to glow, and the leaves that had already started to fall from the old elm tree looked like black smudges of shadow on the ground.
When the coffee was done, she tossed the used cup into the trash receptacle, then picked up the hot mug without adding anything to it. The kitchen connected to the dining room, which in turn opened onto the sunporch. She headed to the double doors that opened onto the porch, and checked to make sure they were locked. They were. She flicked the light switch on the wall and illumination flooded the sunporch, which, like most of the rest of the house, was empty. She saw that the dead b
olt over its outside door was engaged, then turned the light off. She then returned to the kitchen and headed back into the hallway. She walked into the foyer and checked the front door (locked), then she checked the windows in the two empty bedrooms (locked). She then went into the living room, pushed back the curtain over the picture window, checked to make sure it was also locked, and then spent a couple moments gazing out at the front yard, the street, and the neighbors’ houses opposite them. The front yard was larger than the back, but there were few leaves in it. It was early September, and the Realtor who had sold them this place had said that, while the number of trees in the neighborhood added to its charm, everyone’s yards were covered with leaves by late fall. Joan didn’t care, though. It fact, she was looking forward to it. This was the first house she’d had since…well, just since—not counting foster homes—and this was the first one that was really hers. And Jon’s, of course. No matter what chores she would find herself doing as a homeowner, she’d do them gladly.
The living room was empty, except for the carpet the previous owners had put down, a bland beige that she intended to replace as soon as possible. She and Jon had moved in only a couple weeks ago, and the contents of their one-bedroom apartment had been divvied up between the master bedroom, the family room, and the kitchen. And none of those rooms were full. Two of the three bedrooms were as empty as the living room, and there were no photographs or art on the bare walls.
One step at a time, she told herself. They had a house. They could take their time finishing and decorating it.
She took a sip of her black coffee, and the hot liquid burned pleasantly on the way to her stomach. She headed into the family room to check the door to the garage and the windows—all locked, just as she’d left them before going to bed. She then sat on the threadbare couch that she and Jon had picked up at a secondhand store when they’d first moved in together years ago. The springs were shot and it was uncomfortable, but at least it was familiar, and that’s what she needed right then. She reached up to turn on the floor lamp that sat behind the couch, then she settled in as best she could and sipped her coffee.
She was glad Jon hadn’t been awake to see her go through her ritual of checking to make sure the doors and windows were locked. He’d tease her about being OCD, but if checking the locks really were a compulsion, wouldn’t she have raced through the house the moment she got up, checking all the doors and windows to make sure they were locked? But she took her time about it. Sure, she had to make herself go slow, but she could, and that was the point. She knew that despite Jon telling her that he understood her need to check the locks, in truth, her habit irritated him. But that was tough shit as far as she was concerned. Let him be irritated. If he’d experienced what she had…
She didn’t want to think about that any more than she wanted to think about the dream, so she turned on the television—a flat screen mounted to the wall—muted the volume, and skimmed the channel guide to see if anything interesting was on cable. But all she found was late-night dreck: boring old movies, stupid reality shows, and infomercials. She turned the TV off and spent the next several minutes sipping coffee and trying not to think.
* * *
When she first heard the noise, she told herself that it was her imagination. She was paranoid enough normally, but after that horrible dream, she was way on edge. And this wouldn’t be the first time she’d thought she’d heard noises that weren’t real. But then she heard it again. A dull thump, like the sound of a fist pounding against a door.
Nausea flooded her gut and a warm flush spread over her body. She recognized the signs of a panic attack—she’d had enough of them over the years—and she steeled herself against the fear. She couldn’t afford to let it get worse. Panic was like a fire, and if left to rage out of control, it could become crippling.
She heard the thump again, louder this time.
Doing her best to keep her breathing slow and even, she leaned forward, placed her mug on the coffee table, and rose from the couch. Her pulse thundered in her ears, and her equilibrium was off. Concentrating on maintaining her balance, she started walking in the direction the noise had come from. The family room opened onto the dining room—and the sunporch. She returned to the double doors and turned on the porch light. The outer porch door was still locked, and the room was empty. So what—
She heard the thump again. Only it didn’t come from the sunporch. It came from the wall to her right.
She turned to look at the wall. It was a blank, empty space, covered by truly hideous wallpaper with alternating vertical white-and-black stripes. It was the only section of the house that had been wallpapered, as if some previous owner had started the job and abandoned it. Probably realized how butt-ugly the pattern is, she thought.
Her heart still pounded and she still felt dizzy, but her panic was beginning to slowly ebb. So there was an intruder, but it looked like it was the fur-covered, four-legged variety. Could be a squirrel. This was the right time of year for them. Or maybe a raccoon. She hoped not, though. Their realtor had told them about a house she’d taken clients to once that had an entire family of raccoons living in the attic for months. Their accumulated piss and shit had ruined the attic floor to the point where sections of it collapsed into the downstairs. This was her home, and there was no fucking way she would let a bunch of flea-ridden little bastards ruin it. Anger drove away the last of her fear, and she slammed her fist against the ugly wallpaper.
“How do you like it, you furry fucker?”
She struck the wall again, then a third time. Her hand hurt, but she was too angry to give a shit. She was going to hit the wall for a fourth time when she saw that the wallpaper had torn a little. There was now a vertical line roughly four inches long in the paper, close to where she’d struck the wall. She frowned, pried up the paper’s edge so she could get her fingers on it, and pulled. A swatch of wallpaper tore away, revealing not wall, but wood. It took her only a few minutes to pull off enough wallpaper to expose a door. The knob had been removed, and there was no molding.
She stepped back and regarded the door for several moments, half wondering if maybe she’d never really woken from her dream and was still lying in bed asleep. Then she stepped forward, inserted a pair of fingers through the hole where a knob should’ve been, curled them downward, and pulled. The door opened smoothly, no resistance, no squeaking hinges. It was dark on the other side, but she could see a wooden handrail and steps.
“Surprise,” she said. “Looks like we have a basement.”
CHAPTER 2
“Can you hear me, Barry?”
Kevin breathed the words more than spoke them. The comm device built into his glasses was designed to pick up the wearer’s voice, no matter how softly he spoke, and the miniature cameras in the frames transmitted video of everything he saw, making Kevin a walking, talking television studio.
“Loud and clear.”
Barry’s voice issued from the tiny device inserted into Kevin’s left ear. It was so small that most people didn’t notice it, and if they did, they assumed it was a hearing aid.
“Visual?” Kevin asked.
“Online and fine.”
The audio and video feeds were transmitted to Barry back in the van, who recorded it for the Analysts’ later review. Kevin had worked for Maintenance for nearly a decade, but he still felt self-conscious whenever he had the glasses on. Even though Barry was the only one watching and listening at the moment, Kevin couldn’t help thinking about the nameless, faceless Analysts who’d eventually pour over each and every second of footage, judging his every move. He supposed that was the point, at least partially. Had to keep the field guys on their toes, right?
It was chilly tonight, in the low fifties, and he wished he’d put on a jacket before leaving the van. The Department’s uniform—long-sleeved white shirt, black tie, black pants, and black shoes—might be effectively nondescript, but it didn’t provide much in the way of warmth. He wasn’t exactly fat, but he was w
ell padded, and that helped a little. Still, he’d rather have a jacket.
He walked down an unlit sidewalk on a suburban street. Barry was parked a couple streets to the east. It was standard policy not to park Surveillance vans too close to places or persons of interest. Kevin understood the reasons for this, but would it have killed Barry to drop him off closer to the old man’s house? After all, it was four in the morning. Who was awake to see them?
Kevin was in something of a sour mood as he came to the end of the street and turned right into a cul-de-sac. The residents in this part of Ash Creek might not have wanted the garish fluorescence of streetlights glaring throughout the night, but that didn’t prevent them from leaving porch or driveway lights on. So he had no trouble making out his surroundings as he walked, but even if there had been no lights at all, not even moonlight, he would’ve been able to find his way. He was long used to working in darkness. Besides, his glasses had a night-vision function.
The houses in this part of town were larger two-story dwellings, most of which had been built decades ago. Some showed signs of their age—weathered brick, sagging roofs, cracked driveways—but others had been well tended over the years, and if they didn’t look brand-new, they displayed a respectable enough façade to the outside world. Kevin knew that façades didn’t mean shit, though. There was no telling what lay behind a mask until it was removed.
The yards were larger here, and there was more space between houses than in most of the other suburbs in town. The trees—oak and elm, primarily—were tall, with thick trunks and numerous branches. It was still early enough in the season for most of the leaves to still be on, but a scattering had fallen, dotting lawns, driveways, and the sidewalk. Kevin was careful not to step on any as he walked. Sure, everyone was probably asleep, but that was no reason to get sloppy. Sloppy bought you trouble, and trouble got you killed. And while no one who worked for Maintenance feared death—and in fact often looked forward to it—no one wanted to invite it to come any earlier than necessary. It went against everything Maintenance stood for. And all philosophy aside, they were always understaffed and there was too much to be done. The longer one lived, the longer one could be of service.