Red Creek Waltz

by Gregory Kay

  “Preacher!” Sheriff Tate stared while shock piled upon shock. “You killed him!”

  The pastor simply looked at him, a sickly pallor on his face.

  “I’m in the business of saving souls, Sheriff, and I just saved one. Think of it as ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ I pray that, if I were ever in Mr. Donald’s place, someone would have the mercy to shoot me before they could take me. If you want to arrest me for that, then I won't argue with you.”

  Scott stood there in shock, holding his father's body and covered with his blood and brains, for an instant, before his face reddened, his brow furrowed, and he leaped to his feet, his mouth open farther than humanly possible and his killing fangs on prominent display.

  “I'll kill you, you son of a bitch!” he was still screaming when he charged them, headed directly for the creek.

  “No!” Jenkins and all his daughters were suddenly shouting at once, “Not the water! Not the water!”

  Frank noted that their yelling and grabbing for him was every bit as desperate as their own had been when trying to stop Tim Donald, and every bit as futile. A suddenly detached part of him wondered if Scott's desperate effort would carry him across the creek just as his father had going the other direction, despite what the preacher had said, and, if that happened, he wondered what the hell they were going to do then.

  Scott's right foot hit the water, and he began to scream. Instantly throwing himself backward, helped along by Mr. Jenkins' vice-like grip on his collar, he crashed down on the bank on his back, his mouth gaping wide and his voice still raised in agony.

  His foot, where it had touched the water, was smoking and steaming through his sock.

  In an instant, both Jenkins and Joe Bob were kneeling beside him, and Katie was behind him, pulling his head into her lap and crying while he whimpered in pain.

  “It'll be alright, Scotty! Baby, it'll be alright!”

  “It'll hurt like hell for a few days, boy, but it'll heal,” Jenkins reassured him, “at least since you only went in it a little way. Never go near the runnin' water, cause if you fall in all the way...” He shuddered, then glared across the creek at Reverend McDermitt.

  “There wasn't any call for you to do that!” and the preacher slowly shook his head.

  “It wouldn't have been any kindness to let you kill him by sucking him dry.”

  “We weren't going to kill him, not permanent anyway. He came over to us of his own free will, and we'd have made him one of us.” He gestured at the whimpering Scott on the ground. “This boy would have still had his father, and I'd have had someone close to my own age – at least the age I was then – to talk to.”

  “That would have been even less of a mercy to let that happen.”

  “What the hell would you know about it?”

  “He's a preacher; they think they know everything.” Joe Bob slowly and deliberately rose to his feet, quartered toward the others and with his right hand nonchalantly concealed behind his leg. “Just like that loud-mouthed Bible-banger in my mama's church; knows it all and is always just dying to tell everybody about it.”

  “Son, I know – ”

  “No, you don't know; you don't know shit from apple butter, you sanctimonious, self-righteous son of a bitch! You don't know half what you think you do. Shit, you don't even know what's going on right under your nose.”

  Seeing he wasn't going to get a response, Joe Bob grinned cruelly without a speck of humor in the expression.

  “For instance, remember your granddaughters, Cindy and Lucy? Bet you don't know I screwed both of them at once, right there in the same bed, do you? Only threesome I ever had, and it was pretty damned good too!”

  The preacher's eyes widened, then narrowed and he dropped his gaze to the ground as he turned away, determined not to listen anymore, and Joe Bob's grin grew even bigger and more triumphant.

  “I just wanted you to know that before I kill you.”

  His left foot abruptly when up and then back down, his body torqued as his arm whipped forward like a baseball pitcher, propelling the smooth, round rock he'd secreted in his hand across the creek with inhuman force and unerring accuracy, and Reverend McDermitt's head literally exploded, sending a scarlet fan of blood and brains several feet beyond the spot where the old man's lifeless body came to rest.

  Instinctively, Sheriff Tate raised his riot gun and shot Joe Bob in the center of mass with a load of 00 buckshot, and both deputies followed suit. Joe Bob staggered under the impacts that shredded his shirt, then, an instant before they ran out of ammo, Robinson shot him directly in the open mouth with his AR15, rocking his head back.

  Frank started to aim, then lowered his weapon; he couldn't bring himself to shoot his son's best friend, the boy he'd watched grow up.

  As soon as the firing stopped, Joe Bob's response was to grin, wallow his tongue around in his mouth for a moment, looking for something, and then he spat the spent bullet back in their direction, where it fell into the icy waters of Red Creek with a plop. As a finishing touch, he turned his back, momentarily dropped his pants and mooned them, shaking his ass back and forth.

  “You're going to have to do better than that!” he sneered while he turned and fastened his pants Elizabeth came and proudly put her arms around him, hugging him close from behind. Then he looked at Frank.

  “I saw you lower your gun. Why didn't you shoot me too, Mr. Estep?”

  Frank shrugged, suddenly embarrassed.

  “I...I couldn't.”

  “Why not?”

  “Why the hell do you think? You and Scott are Jake's best friends; always have been. You spent half your time growing up in my house. I...damn it, boy, Kathy and I both love you two like you were our own sons too! No matter what you've done or what...you are now, I just...” He shrugged helplessly, and was startled to see moisture in the corners of Joe Bob's eyes.

  “That's really good to know, sir, especially now. We appreciate it, and we've always felt the same way about you and Mrs. Estep.” It was his turn to shrug and say with all sincerity, “I can't count the number of times I wished you were my parents, so...” He licked his lips hungrily, then flushed with embarrassment at the gesture. “So I'm just really glad you're over there on that side of that creek right now.”

  “Believe me, son, so am I. I'm even more glad Jake is on this side too.”

  Joe Bob replied with a sad but knowing look that said, loudly and clearly, For now, even though the words never reached his lips.

  Frank looked at Susie, standing alone and slightly apart from the rest.

  “You; you're the one, aren't you?”

  She nodded. “Yes sir. I'm the one that loves your son.”

  “You're the one who pulled me, aren't you, to show me where Jake was.”

  She waved a hand at the others.

  “That was all of us; me, my sisters, and Papa, all working together to get your attention. It wasn't easy, but we weren't going to let him die.”

  “Well, thank you for that, at least, but why? You were going to kill him when he was over there.”

  “He wouldn't have died,” Jenkins broke in, “at least not all the way, and not permanent. He would have woke up one of us.”

  “Well, he won't now.”

  “Yeah, he will. It'll take time, but he'll come back to my little girl, and back to his friends. It's ordained.”

  “Well, I'm un-ordaining it, because he's safe now, where you can't get at him.”

  “You all think you’re so damned smart!” Susie suddenly took a step forward, perilously close to the stream, and hissed at him across the water, baring her fangs and pointing at Frank. “You might not have let Scott have his father, but I’ll have your son! I’ll have Jake; I’ve marked him and he’s mine!”

  “Over my dead body!”

  Frank did fire this time, and he felt the rifle buck against his shoulder fast as he could squeeze his trigger. Bullets hammered into Susie again and again, but although she staggered, her
expression never changed.

  “We’re bound! I can’t come to him,” she continued, “but someday he’ll come to me!”

  Chapter 19

  Lost in his dream, Jake watched Susie approach the water's edge with a mixture of desire and terror. She was naked on the bank of Red Creek once more, and his eyes devoured her perfect body. She smiled and opened her arms.

  “I love you, Jake. Please come to me. Please.”

  He knew better, but his feet seemed to take on a life of their own, propelling him forward into the stream, step by inexorable step.

  “Please,” he begged, tears flowing from his eyes. “Please don’t!”

  “Shh.” Her voice was soothing. “Come a little closer, and we can be together forever. I love you, Jake Estep. I love you.”

  Something in her voice gave him no room for doubt that she meant it, and instead of reassuring him, it horrified him all the more. Unable to resist, he crossed the creek with reluctant, jerking steps, like a puppet on a string. Once on the other side, he took her in his arms and held her close for a long moment. She turned up her face with those strange glowing eyes, and he kissed her. Finally pulling his lips away, Jake tilted his head back against his will, baring his own throat to her.

  “Please! I don’t want to!”

  Her voice was sad and sweet.

  “I know.”

  He closed his eyes tightly but didn’t resist as her fangs slid through his skin like deliciously hot little knives.

  Jake jerked out of sleep into a sitting position, his right hand clutched against his throat. In a blind panic he thrashed wildly, lost for a moment until he recognized the dim light and white walls of his hospital room.

  Gasping for breath, he felt tears made both of fear and disappointment trickle down his cheeks. For the first time since he was a child, he put his face in his hands, curled into a ball and cried miserably. It would not be the last.

  Chapter 20

  Frank and Jake's doctor walked in silence, but Kathy was excited and rambling on as the nurse wheeled her just-released son down the hallway toward the hospital entrance. Jake, an impossibly tired but otherwise blank look on his face, was only dimly aware of her; the other voice in his head held his attention.

  “I'm still here with you, Jake; I'll always be here.”

  “Jake? Didn't you hear?”

  “Huh? Oh, sorry; what is it?”

  Kathy smiled, but it was forced.

  “Doctor Kincaid was just saying that he's never seen anyone heal as well as you have; not only will you get to keep all your toes – he was sure you were going to lose them all at first – but the cuts on your feet are pretty much closed already. As long as you take it easy, you should be off the crutches in a week or less; isn't that great?”

  “Yeah, great.”

  Frowning at his tone, the doctor told him, “I hope you realize what a lucky young man you are.”

  “Yeah,” he muttered with indifferent sarcasm, “I reckon I'm just lucky as hell.”

  Kathy admonished him, “Jake! Don't be that way. Aren't you glad to be going home?”

  Before he could answer, or decide whether he was going to answer at all or not, they passed a stainless steel drug cart in the hall, and Jake visibly started when he saw Susie's reflection in its polished surface, her face smiling, and her arms reaching for him. Frantically jerking his head around in the opposite direction, looking for the source and fully expecting her to be standing there, he was confronted with nothing but a bare wall.

  “Jake?”

  Dropping his head, he shook it slightly.

  “It won't make any difference.”

  His mother opened her mouth to speak, but Frank put his hand on her arm and shook his head.

  “Why don't you go on and take Jake out and help him in the truck? I need to talk to his doctor for a minute.”

  A cloud of worry crossed her face, but all Kathy could think of to do without making a scene – which her son definitely didn't need – was to nod and go on, trusting in her husband to tell her whatever it was later. As soon as she was out of earshot, Frank turned to the doctor.

  “What can you do for him?”

  “We're doing all we can. Just make sure he takes the anti-depressants, and watch him closely. Jake is suffering from the classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. He's well on his way to fully recovering physically, but his mental state is somewhat... unstable.”

  “What are you trying to tell me, Doc?”

  Doctor Kincaid paused, looking away and biting his lip for a moment, trying to decide exactly how to put what he had to say.

  “There's no easy way to put this, Mr. Estep. You were right; your son is not on drugs. All the tests came back completely negative. From a purely diagnostic standpoint, it would have been better if he had been, because the root cause of his current mental state could be more easily dealt with. To be blunt, the only choice we have now is to keep trying different medications until we find something that works. Until that happens, keep an eye on him, because he has the potential to be a danger to himself, and possibly to others. If I were you, I'd take the precaution of either removing all the guns from my house, or else locking them up separately from their ammunition.”

  Frank rocked back like someone had punched him in the jaw. This can't be happening! It can't! Not with Jake!

  “Are you telling me my boy is suicidal?

  “I'm telling you that your son is traumatized, depressed, delusional, and suffers from hallucinations. That's not too big of a jump from there.”

  His mouth twisting in anguish, Jake's father turned and looked in the direction his wife and son had gone, and muttered, “I'd give my right arm if that's all he was suffering from,” before following them.

  Chapter 21

  Jake couldn't seem to make his mother understand; he just didn't feel like eating. She kept fixing more and more elaborate meals, but the most he could do was to force himself to swallow a few bites, always of meat or dairy. Those were the only things he could even vaguely taste; everything else was like having a mouthful of paper pulp mixed with snot. It made him want to throw up, and sometimes he did.

  Limping into the kitchen for a glass of water, he noticed she'd set a beef roast out on the counter to thaw, so at least he'd have something.

  He'd just reached for the glass when he stopped suddenly, freezing in place, his eyes on the tray the meat was resting in, awash with blood seeping out as the ice melted. His mouth began to water, until he had to swallow to keep from slobbering.

  Shit, that looks good!

  Go ahead, Jake, Susie's voice came into his head, It's nothing compared to fresh and warm, but it won't hurt you. You need it.

  Kathy entered the kitchen and stopped dead in the doorway, locking up in shock at the sight of her son at the counter, her roast sitting bare on the Formica, and Jake, his eyes closed and a look of pure ecstasy on his face, greedily slurping down the drained blood.

  Once the tray was empty, he lowered it with a sigh of contentment, and was replacing the roast when he saw his mother in his peripheral vision.

  Both of them were stunned, and Jake abruptly reddened, muttered, “Sorry,” and quickly limped out.

  Frank came home to find the raw meat still on the counter where Jake had left it, and Kathy simply sitting in a kitchen chair, mouth open, staring at nothing. She looked so shocked that, at first, he was afraid she'd had a stroke; not that he would have been surprised, considering the stress both of them were under. Hurriedly crossing the room, he put his hand on her shoulder and gently shook her.

  “Hey, are you alright?”

  She started, then reached up and grasped his hand like a lifeline.

  “I...I don't know.”

  “What's wrong?

  “It's Jake. He...he...”

  “He what?”

  So she told him, and her tears finally came along with her words. He had to sit down himself by the time she finished.

  “Frank...i
s he becoming one...one of those...things?”

  He assured her that wasn't the case, and he had to bring out all his powers of persuasion to do so, because he wasn't real sure himself.

  “He may have some kind of vitamin deficiency or something, or have caught some symptoms from the bite or something. That's all it is.

  “Then we'd better take him back to the doctor.”

  “No.”

  Kathy was visibly startled.

  “No? Why not?”

  Frank heaved a sigh.

  “What do you think is going to happen if we tell Dr. Kincaid Jake is drinking blood? Even off a beef roast? Especially with all the depression and these so-called 'hallucinations' he's having?”

  Her expression was one of utter panic, and he nodded.

  “Yep; they'll want to commit him, and I don't want that, at least not as long as there's a chance we can help him here, do you?”

  “You know I don't! I'm just afraid...”

  “Of Jake?”

  She shook her head.

  “I'm afraid we won't be able to help him.”

  Frank took her in his arms, pulled her close, and simply held her, taking as well as giving comfort, because he was afraid of that same thing.

  Chapter 22

  “Jake, are you alright?”

  Looking up from the mashed potatoes he was absently stirring on his tray with no intention of eating, Jake never changed expression when he recognized Mary Allison sitting down across the cafeteria table from him. It was his first day back at school, and other kids sat on either side, but all of them gave him a wide berth, either because they instinctively feared contamination by the deaths he carried with him, or they just had no idea what the hell to say. Mary wasn't a deep enough thinker to consider the first, and had never let the latter stop her.