Suddenly Roland was looking directly into the sun. He shut his eyes in pain. When he opened them again, Boris was gone.
He raised himself slowly and returned to the bench. His cheek throbbed and felt moist. When he wiped it, his hand came away wet with something that was not blood.
He drove home. Coming into the living room, he found his mother vacuuming with intense concentration while her own thing stood beside her, pulling her hair upward with one hand. It lifted her so high that she danced nearly on tip toe, yet still she pushed the vacuum across floor as if that chore and nothing else deserved attention.
Roland deliberately slammed the door. The thing dropped her. It must have been there all morning, because when she shut the vacuum cleaner off and turned to face him, her eyes were so moist that she seemed about to burst into tears.
"Roland!" she said. "My poor baby, what happened?"
The thing ignored him. It kept pulling on a fistful of hair, causing her head to bob back and forth. "Nothing," he said. "I slipped and fell down, that's all."
"That's just like you. Always so accident prone."
He was about to reply, but the thing tugged so viciously that it yanked her head back. He pressed his lips together, then went to his bathroom and looked in the mirror. His cheek had a colorful bruise. He washed his face, then came back down the hall. She had turned on the vacuum cleaner again. "Did you see Julia this morning?" she asked over the din.
"I'm going there right now."
"Don't you want to call ahead?"
"I don't think that would be a good idea."
He went outside. The last he saw before closing the door was his mother bent over the vacuum cleaner with one hand vainly trying to wrest her hair from the thing's grasp.
***
Her parents were startled by his visit and they didn't want to let him in the house. Only out of courtesy did they relent. "How did you know?" her mother asked.
"My parents called me in Athens. I got here as soon as I could."
"You can't go up," said her father. "She's not seeing anyone."
That started an argument. Julia's mother wanted to allow it, her father did not. It was settled only when she went up and asked Julia, and the answer came back that she would. All the same, they accompanied him up the stairs and down the hall as if they were his chaperones.
Her room had changed. Gone were the Elvis and Buddy Holly posters, the pink walls, the oversized stuffed teddy bear on the bed. The room had been painted crème, and in place of the flowery girl's dresser against the wall was a businesslike desk covered with papers. He had heard she studied stenography and now worked part time in a lawyer's office, though she had not been to work since falling ill. She sat at the desk now, a willowy young blond woman with bright blue eyes. She turned in the chair as they entered, but she did not stand up. Her eyes brightened further when she saw him. They did not embrace because her parents were in the room.
Across her pale neck was a dark bruise. He knew then that he had made the correct decision.
"Hello, Roland," she said.
For a brief moment he was not frightened. He took a step forward, and she stood. Her cool hand held his, and he completely forgot Boris, and the others, and their families, and the unbearable tension in his chest. "What happened?" he said.
Her other hand floated to her neck. "Oh, they don't know what it is. They think it's a rash of some kind."
"You're a big city doctor," her father said. "Maybe you can talk some sense into them."
"Just pre-med," Roland said.
Julia dropped his hand and looked at her parents. "Daddy, could I talk to Roland alone?"
That started another argument. They didn't want him alone with her, the assumed concern being his crazy talk. But they finally relented. Before leaving, her father leaned close to Roland and said, "We'll be right outside the door. Don't try anything."
Roland nodded. They left and the door closed. She smiled and took his hand again, and pulled him to a chair beside the bed. He sat on it while she sat on the bed, still with his hand folded into both of hers. So broad was her grin that she seemed unable to speak.
"You never married," he said.
"And you?"
"No."
She laughed lightly. "Do you remember in high school, we nailed blocks to the wall and hid them behind the ivy vines so you could sneak into my room?"
"I remember."
"They're still there. Daddy never found them and I never took them down." Tears grew in her eyes, but she didn't cry. "I couldn't leave, Roland. Even though you begged me. I couldn't get married, even though you left."
"You still can."
She closed her eyes. Because of that, a tear leaked out.
"Come with me," he said. "I'm going to medical school. We'll live cheaply, I'll take care of you, you'll have a good life. All you have to do is leave."
"I can't, Roland. I'm too sick."
"You're not sick."
She yanked her hands away. "Don't talk like that. They'll hear you!"
They had reached their old impasse. He twisted his fingers together as the tension returned. He tried to think of something to say, something new that would change her mind, but he could only press his lips together in frustration.
She glanced up in fear at the walls. He wondered why, until at that moment a thing came into the room. He recognized it. He had seen it many times, hovering around her, pushing her into car doors, stealing her things, cutting her with its sharp nails so her parents could call her a clumsy child. Apparently it had tired of her after so many years. It came over, wrapped its strong fingers around her neck, and began to strangle her.
It overtook him as well. For a moment, sitting there in numbed shock, he could not move or speak as she gasped for breath, faltered, and fell back onto the pillows. She beat her heels on the mattress. She gagged and struggled. What she did not do was try to remove its hands from around her neck.
He did what everyone else seemed unable to do. He took a deep breath, and swallowed, and found his voice. "Julia!" he hissed, fearful that those outside the door might hear his crazy talk. "I know you can see it!"
"Shut up!" the thing said in its dripping voice, so loudly that they should have heard it outside. But the door remained closed.
Julia could not breathe. In rising terror, Roland did something even he thought he could never do. He stood and leaped to the bed. He wrapped one arm around the thing from behind and with the other hand tried to pry it loose. It was big and strong. It shrugged him off, and he stumbled to the floor and against the chair, which banged into the wall.
The door flew open. "What the hell!" her father said. He lunged past Roland and sat on the bed. As the thing continued strangling the life out of her, he brushed the hair from her brow and looked with concern at her grimacing face. Then he stood again. He was a large man and levered himself up by setting one hand on the thing's shoulder.
"Call the doctor," he said to his wife, who stood in the doorway. As she went running off, he aimed a finger at Roland. "And you! Get out of here!"
Roland gained his feet. He took a step and said, "Julia. . ."
"Get out!"
He came at Roland and shoved him to the door. Roland went downstairs where her mother was talking on the phone. From the stairwell came the sounds of Julia choking and struggling on the bed. Her mother hung up the phone. Roland paced back and forth, and neither of them spoke. The thing was playing with Julia, letting her breathe for a moment and then choking her again, while her mother sat miserably on the couch and Roland twisted his fingers together. When her father came down to ask about the doctor, he saw Roland in the living room and demanded that he leave.
Roland walked out to the driveway. He stood there for a moment, then went to sit in his car. When another car pulled up and a doctor rushed into the house, Roland started the engine and drove away. He went to the park and sat on the bench, twisting his fingers together and wondering how long it would let her live.
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Boris appeared. This time it did not sit down, but stood over Roland, who tried to press himself into the bench. He fully expected to get hit again, but Boris only said, "I came to tell you she's dead. We killed her."
Looking at his hands, Roland said, "No, she's not."
"You think I'd lie about something like that? It's the best day of my life."
"I know you would."
"You're so smart, don't take my word for it. She's dead. Find out for yourself."
Then it was gone again, leaving two moist stains on the grass where its feet had been. Roland sat looking at the marks. His back was stiff, his neck sore. His fingers had twisted so tightly about each other that they hurt. Suddenly he pulled himself up from the bench. He hurried across the street to a phone booth beside the store, dropped in a coin, and dialed her number.
Her father answered, and Roland identified himself.
"You again," her father said.
"Can I speak to her?"
"No."
"What did the doctor say?"
"She's worse. We may have to move her to the hospital permanently. And Roland, you're not welcome back."
The buzz of a dial tone pierced Roland's ear. He hung up and leaned his sweating forehead against the cool metal of the phone. In a sense, Boris had not lied. Roland knew with a clear certainty that if she went into the hospital, she would never come out again.
***
At two in the morning, he quietly packed his suitcase and left the house. He feared his parents would discover him. He feared her parents and her thing. But mostly, he feared Boris would show up.
He opened the trunk and put the suitcase inside, then he dug out the trinket box with the winged woman painted on the lid. He tipped it back and forth to hear the rolling inside. This time he did not return it to the trunk. He carried it to the front seat and pulled away from the curb with the headlights off so they would not shine into the house.
He turned them on for the drive over, and turned them off again as he parked around the corner from her house. With the trinket box in his hand, he walked up and around the block. The night was chilly. The stars shone in a bright spattering across the sky and his breath misted in front of his face, but he did not shiver. He stepped across the lawn, careful not to trip in the darkness over the hose snaking out from the bushes, or step on the dry branch hiding in the ivy bed that would have snapped loudly. He found the vines beneath her window and pushed them aside. As she had promised, the little blocks of wood still formed a ladder up the wall. Climbing it was difficult. He had to shove the box under his arm and push the vines aside, worrying all the while that someone in the house might hear him, or that Boris might appear and push him to the ground.
At the top, he tapped on her window. It was a code she would remember, three and two like a full house in a poker hand. She was asleep and it took a few tries. Finally a light came on and a moment later the window slid open.
"Roland!" she whispered, then giggled.
"Step back," he said.
She did so. He rolled over the sill and into the bedroom. The bruise across her neck had grown and darkened. Seeing him looking at it, she touched it lightly with her fingertips.
"I'm getting worse. They're taking me to the hospital in the morning."
"I'll ask you once more, Julia. Come away with me."
Fear flashed across her eyes, then she giggled again. "No."
"You'll die."
"You're talking crazy, Roland. This is exactly why our parents got between us."
"Do you trust me, Julia?"
She looked at him, not so much fearfully as somberly, and she nodded.
"Then turn around," he said.
She grinned at him, as if he was playing a game. He was not. She looked somber again. She gathered the nightclothes tight about her neck, and turned. Roland opened the box. Inside was a small amber bottle and a clean rag. He set the box on the floor, opened the bottle, and poured out a clear liquid onto the rag. With this, he reached around and covered her mouth.
She struggled at first and he had to fight against her flailing arms. But he managed to put her to sleep. He wanted to take the bottle with him, but found he could not get the box and her body down at the same time. So he settled for her alone. He struggled with her, nearly dropped her for one horrific moment halfway down, and finally reached the bed of ivy. He did not have the will to go back for the ether.
He stuffed her into the trunk. When he had driven far enough from the house, he turned the lights on. There were no other cars on the streets. Lights in the houses were out, doors were closed, and people slept. He came to a stoplight at the corner of the park. He wanted to get out of town quickly, but worried what would happen if a policeman should stop him, so he waited patiently. He looked at the darkened park, at the benches and the trees and the playground, setting it in his mind because he knew this would be the last time he would ever see it.
He had become calm. Thinking about Julia, he had for a time overcome the simmering apprehension of Testaville. But then the light turned green. At that moment the hand gripped his heart again, his breath came short in his lungs, and Boris appeared on the seat beside him.
"Kidnapping, Roland? That's no way to start a new life!"
Something splattered as Boris stomped on his foot. The engine surged and the car shot forward. Roland lost control of the wheel. He tried to turn and went too far, and the car slewed through the intersection and onto the sidewalk and slammed into a telephone pole. The engine died.
Blinking, Roland looked around. Boris was gone. The right fender and headlight were smashed and the car was tilted at a mad angle half into the street. Roland closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he turned the key, chanting, "Please start. Please, just start. . ."
It did. He carefully pulled off the curb. He wanted to open the trunk and check on Julia, but he was too frightened. Instead, he kept driving.
This time Boris let him get to the edge of town. It was part of the game, the same as throwing him off the roof but not high enough to kill him, or telling him Julia was dead when she wasn't. Just as houses fell away on either side and gave way to open starlit fields, Boris was suddenly in the seat beside him again, laughing as it said, "Let's try that again!"
Roland was trying to watch the trees and hills, but Boris' foot slid toward the pedal again. Roland let go of the wheel with one hand and hit Boris in the face. Boris looked shocked. It reached out and smashed Roland's head into the window. The glass didn't break, but it dazed him, and once again, Boris stomped on his foot.
They skewed onto the shoulder and back to the road as Boris clamped its hands onto the wheel. "You'll die!" it said, laughing wildly. "You and the girl. I'll just come back, you know that!"
Roland thought he had recognized a tree flashing by in the single headlight. He stopped fighting. He wriggled his foot out from under its foot, and took his hands off the wheel.
"You win. Just kill me."
"About time you learned that. Maybe I will. Maybe I'll kill you both right now."
Boris wrenched the wheel again. The car slid over the shoulder with such force that Roland bounced in the seat. But this time, as the headlight swept across a field beside the road, he was certain he recognized it and knew exactly where they were.
"Idiot!" Boris said. "Did you think I'd take you all the way out?"
The car slowed almost to a crawl. Boris began turning the wheel about. They crossed the line separating the two lanes. Roland had crammed himself as far as he could into the seat and still would not look at Boris.
"No," he said. "But you keep thinking I won't fight you."
He jammed his foot onto Boris' foot. The car lunged forward again and Boris yanked on the wheel with both hands, causing the car to veer completely off the road.
"I'm the only one who ever would!" Roland said.
He fought for the wheel. They bounced back over the shoulder and Boris slammed Roland's head twice more into the window, the
second time shattering it. The third time, Boris' hand went cleanly through Roland's head as if it wasn't there.
Roland felt his foot drop all the way to the accelerator. He turned his head just in time to see Boris fade completely away.
He kept driving. The fear flowed from him like water pouring down off a hill. He had almost made it to the next curve when he suddenly remembered Julia. He slammed the brakes and came to a screeching stop. He ran around to the trunk and opened it. Julia lay inside, unconscious, with her face bruised where she had banged it. But she was breathing normally and her pulse was strong. Roland lifted her out and set her gently in the back seat. He didn't want her waking up alone and frightened in the trunk.
He started the engine again, then looked in the mirror. His face was bloody and battered. He wiped the blood away with his sleeve until he could see well enough to drive. Then he put the car into gear and started off again, thinking he could not go back to his apartment in Athens. He would have to clean out his bank account, get far ahead of the police, hide her until he could explain what he had done and help her understand. He was thinking he would need a map of Canada when he glanced into the mirror again.
It stood in the road, in the shadows and moonlight, stopped at the border. The farther he drove the smaller it became, until he rounded a curve and it disappeared completely from sight.
M. Alan Ford lives and works in the Valley, dude. He's fifty years old and spends his time working, reading, writing, and engaging in various other studious pursuits. His interests are category fiction of all kinds and academic subjects of all kinds. He has a B.A. in Psychology and stays in school as much as he can. It's a hobby. Some people build model planes, M. Alan Ford attends school.
—STONE
by Catherine MacLeod
Sometimes the last person you expect to see shows up in the last place you imagined finding her. And here she is now.
Horror Library, Volume 4 Page 29