Horror Library, Volume 4

by Bentley Little

  Might as well get it over with, Lester thought, and turned.

  Rick was not there. Samantha was alone.

  Lester blinked, scanned the aisles on either side of her, but Rick's grinning face was nowhere in sight. Finally remembering to breathe, Lester hitched in a deep one.

  She stood in front of him, arms crossed under her plump and perky breasts, her bright blue eyes moving from his face to the case hanging from his hand, then back again.

  "Is it a private party or do I get an invite?" Her impatient foot tapping caused her already short denim skirt to ride up a few inches.

  "It's for my uncle." He searched the mostly empty store again. "Where's Rick?"

  Her narrow smile vanished. She raised an eyebrow. "You that anxious to run into him?"

  "No," he said quickly. Too quickly. He felt his cheeks glowing with embarrassment. "I just thought. . ."

  She stepped closer to him, and words failed. He couldn't honestly verbalize what he was thinking.

  "If I know Rick he's off at The Log Yard fucking some hillbilly skank."

  The Log Yard was an actual log yard. Durham Logging, owned by Rick's dad, put to use most nights by Rick and his friends as a place to get drunk and fuck girls.

  Samantha took another step toward him, and Lester had to fight an urge to retreat. She poked him in the chest with a long, pink fingernail.

  "Do you want to party with me or do I need to go find someone else?" She gripped his arm high up and pulled him close, her breasts pushing against him, and whispered in his ear. "This could be your lucky night. I want to get drunk and I want to fuck. If you want some of this, then make a fucking move or I'll find someone else to party with."

  She's only doing this to get even with Rick, he thought.

  Rick will kick my ass, he thought.

  Uncle Larry will kick my ass worse, he thought.

  It's fucking worth it, he thought.

  "Where do you want to go?"

  ***

  Samantha drove her father's pickup out of town and down the narrow, twisted highway as twilight sank into night. Lester couldn't help but notice the way she absentmindedly stroked the gear shifter's knob with her right hand.

  "You ever fuck before?" She gave him a quick, speculative glance before facing forward again to negotiate a sharp twist in the road. She shifted down, and Lester watched her skirt ride up her thighs as she worked the pedals. She did not attempt to pull it back down. "Lester?"

  Answer her, dumb ass.

  It was his big brother, Charlie's voice. Charlie always came to him at awkward moments to coach or berate him.

  Lester thought he should lie and say yes. Tonight appeared to be a sure thing, but he didn't want to look like a total loser.

  "No," he said.

  Shit.

  Samantha giggled, and drove on.

  "Where are we going?" Lester had never been this way before. The road had taken a decisive downward slant, and Lester wondered if she was taking him to the bottom of the mountain. He knew there was a river in the valley below. Maybe they were going skinny-dipping first.

  Lester imagined a look of disgust on Samantha's face at seeing him naked, and felt sick to his stomach.

  Good thing you brought a whole case, little bro. You'd better get her shit-faced before you show her your man-tits.

  "Have you heard of Campbell's Pond?"

  "Uh, no," Lester said, though the name did sound familiar to him. He liked the sound of her voice, and if he could keep her talking, there would be fewer uncomfortable questions about him.

  "It's an old campground down the highway a little ways." A car passed coming the other way and honked. Samantha waved out the window and honked twice in return. "It has about twenty camping spots with fire-pits, tables, bathrooms, and it's all around a big pond. It used to be popular, but a few years ago a boy from town got lost there. He never turned up, and when a reporter came to do a story about it she disappeared too."

  "Sounds creepy," Lester said, then wished he hadn't.

  God, you sound like a wimp.

  "A little," Samantha said, and winked at him. "Not too creepy, I hope."

  Lester laughed nervously and shook his head.

  "After the reporter disappeared, another boy fell in the pond and drowned. They never found him either."

  A long, straight stretch opened up before them, and Samantha shifted up again, putting on speed. Her skirt rode a little higher; Lester could see the color of her panties.

  Pink!

  His dick, which had spent the last half hour in a state of semi-hard anticipation, pushed at the crotch of his pants. He crossed his hands over his lap.

  "So no one goes there anymore," she continued. "Someone blocked the road that leads to it with trees. The Forest Service won't even maintain it. I mean, why bother? No one uses it."

  "Oh," Lester said. He tried to think of something better to say. "Have you ever been there?"

  "Only once, during the day. There it is," Samantha said, slowing and pointing to a faded sign in the truck's headlights.

  Campbell's Pond – 5 miles.

  A newer neon orange sign below it read, Closed To The Public.

  A narrow dirt road forked off the main road, swallowed by the trees.

  "Wow," Lester said. "It's a long way in there."

  "Uh-huh," Samantha said. "And since no one comes here, we can do anything we want without getting caught."

  Lester suddenly found it hard to breathe. He tried to say something witty but only managed a weak croak.

  Samantha leaned close to him as she slowed and turned onto the dirt road. "You've got almost five miles to think about how you want to do me," she said, and placed a hand on his thigh.

  "Oh Jesus," he said, panting, almost hyperventilating.

  This was just too good to be real.

  As if reading that thought, Samantha slid her hand along his leg and squeezed, reminding Lester that she was real.

  ***

  Lester watched the odometer turn and almost groaned when Samantha stopped the truck a half-mile shy of their destination. The road was still blocked. Two old logs lay crisscrossed in their path. A sign, fixed at the crux of the decomposing logs read God Damned This Place.

  "I guess we're going back now," he said, not able to keep the pouting tone from his voice.

  "Uh. . .no," Samantha said, and giggled. "You can walk, can't you?"

  She tore open his uncle's case of beer and opened one, tipping it back and guzzling the whole can. After an unladylike belch, she tossed the can out of her open window and snatched another as she stepped from the cab.

  Lester grabbed the case and followed. When he tried to pull a beer out for himself, she slapped his hand.

  "Not for you, big boy. I want you focused."

  She straddled the logs briefly as she climbed over them, pausing to throw a sly glance back at Lester. Then she slid her leg over, showing more panty, and waited for him.

  He set the beer down and worked his first leg carefully over the logs. He was much heavier than Samantha, and not nearly as limber. He heaved and strained for a moment, and almost fell over the other side.

  When he was finished he found Samantha holding the beer in the crook of her left arm. Her pink panties hung from the index finger of her tilted right hand. She flipped them at him, but his clumsy swipe was too slow. They hit his face, hanging for a moment from his nose before he snatched them off.

  She ran down the road ahead of him, looking back once to smile as she flipped the backside of her skirt up, exposing herself. He saw her ass for just a moment; it was perfect, shining pale pink in the moonlight.

  "Come and get some, Lester."

  Then the dark swallowed her, and Lester ran to catch up.

  ***

  When Lester found the lake minutes later he was out of breath. He stumbled to a stop and fell to his knees next to a cast-off sign that read Closed For The Season in faded letters. For a moment he thought he was going to puke, and he fought his
gorge. He couldn't see Samantha, but he knew she was there somewhere, watching, waiting for him to find her.

  He thought his chances of actually getting laid would suffer if she saw him puking his guts up in the dirt.

  When his trembling legs would support him again, he rose and scanned the area. There was the pond, its water dark and still, and a few nearby camp spaces, littered with what might have been years of old trash.

  No Samantha.

  He walked the remaining distance to the lake.

  Closer, Lester saw the outline of a dock that was poking into the dark water from the shore of a pond-side camp spot. Tied to a post at the end of it, a dilapidated raft rocked lazily. He spotted his beer at the foot of the dock, and smiled.

  He jogged the remaining distance and paused before reaching the dock. The case of beer was a few cans emptier. A discarded t-shirt, bra, and denim mini-skirt lay in the dust next to it.

  A hand slid by his cheek, coming from behind, and Lester screeched as it closed over his eyes, blinding him.

  "You're excitable," Samantha said, slapping the back of his head as he tried to face her.

  "Hey," he said, reaching up to rub his smarting head.

  "No you don't," Samantha said, giggling again, a sound Lester now associated with lust and the perfumed smell of her panties, which now slipped from his grasp and dropped next to her pile of clothes. "We're going to do this my way, to start."

  "Okay," Lester said, trembling.

  "Keep your eyes closed," she said, and he felt her hand slide away. "Now take your clothes off."

  This was the moment Lester dreaded. He'd hoped it would be too dark for her to see him, but he knew she could see him perfectly well in the moonlight cast against the lake. He did it with only the slightest hesitation though, starting with his shirt. He shook so badly he almost tripped stepping out of his pants.

  "Wow! Nice package," Samantha said from behind him, and he felt himself blush, his face burning with embarrassment, and a little pride.

  He kicked off his underwear, hoping she didn't notice the skid-marks that inevitably decorated every pair he'd ever owned, and waited.

  "Keep your eyes closed," she said, grabbing his arms from behind and guiding him onto the dock. It rocked beneath him, water splashing up between the worn and slimy boards to drench his feet. For just the barest moment he felt flesh press against his back, and thought, it's a nipple!

  Hold your wad, bro, the voice of his brother spoke in his head. You don't want to blow it over a nipple do you?

  Finally she stopped, and he stopped with her, ready to take whatever direction she gave. "Just one last step," she said. "You don't want to miss the raft, so make it a big one."

  But they did not take the last step. She held him in place. He felt her press against his back again, and her breath tickled the hair on the nape of his neck.

  "Have you ever been fucked in a cemetery?"

  "Uh. . .," he said, but she cut him off with another giggle.

  "Of course you haven't. You've never been fucked at all. You're going to be fucked in a cemetery tonight."

  "What?" Unease stabbed at his excitement.

  "We're standing over one right now," she said. "Beneath the water. Some crazy preacher dammed up a creek and flooded it, but it's still down there. They found headstones when they were looking for that boy."

  She urged Lester forward, and he took the last step reluctantly.

  A cemetery under the pond?

  "Lay down, I'll be right there."

  Lester lay down, his lust cooling a little when water lapped at his backside from between damp, warped boards.

  The raft rocked and whispered through the dark water.

  He waited, the night air blowing cool kisses on his naked skin.

  The giggle came again, this time from farther away.

  Lester opened his eyes and groaned when he saw her standing on the dock. Her skirt hung crooked on her hips as she tugged her shirt back into place.

  Standing behind her was Rick Dunham, and what remained of Lester's case of beer was hanging from his meat-hook hand. Lester's clothes were bundled under Rick's other arm. His laughter boomed across the pond. He raised an open can in mock-salute.

  "Now you've been fucked in a cemetery, Lester," Samantha said, and her giggle dissolved into shrieking laughter.

  She's got a point, bro. You certainly are fucked.

  Samantha waved goodbye before following Rick onto the dark path that led away from Campbell's Pond.

  ***

  Lester just lay there for a while, gazing into the sky at a fat, pale moon, trying not to cry; a fat, pale slug of a boy, stranded and naked on a wet old raft. Pondweed and water washed up between the warped boards and slapped his backside. His arms spread wide, his fingers brushed the dark water.

  "Ouch!"

  He jerked his right arm up, shaking his hand. Something had bitten him. He pulled his other hand from the water and sat up, examining the stinging middle finger of the injured hand.

  A spot of blood welled from a tiny cut on the tip, just below the fingernail.

  Even the fish had it in for him tonight.

  You plan to stick around here forever, bro?

  Lester sighed and scanned the shore. He didn't see Samantha or Rick, not that he'd thought they would stick around, but he wanted to make sure before going back to shore. His long trip back to town would be embarrassing enough without an audience, but he didn't know what he'd do if he had to face them again.

  He would have to face them again, though. In a town as small as Pierce there was no getting around it.

  He rolled onto his belly and slid closer to the edge of the raft so he could paddle back to the dock. His "package" had flopped into a crack between two boards, and he felt water splash up against it. He arched his back and slid to the side. He could imagine the fish down there, gazing up at what might look like a fat pink worm, trying to take a bite out of it as they had his finger.

  Samantha had complimented him on his "package" earlier, but he imagined her driving back to town, or wherever they were headed with his uncle's beer, laughing to Rick about it.

  The story would be all over town within hours. Everyone would know.

  Lester cursed his mother for what might have been the millionth time. The selfish old junkie cunt. It was her fault he was stuck here in this redneck infested shithole.

  His mom had assured him the move was not permanent. A few months, a year at most, and she'd be out of jail with her shit all together again. But he had a feeling when she did get out, she'd pull a quick fade and resume her life as a junkie whore in a new place.

  When you get a job and make enough money to go out on your own?

  Lester had thought about trying to reach Charles, he had the number for the institution he stayed in, but Uncle Larry wouldn't allow it.

  "Someone puts themselves in the boobie-hatch is even crazier than the ones that get put there," Larry said, then told Lester to shut up so he could watch Nascar.

  Fuck 'em, Charles said in Lester's head. Fuck 'em all. Just because everyone else in our family is screwed up doesn't mean you have to suffer.

  "Fuck 'em," Lester said, dipping his hands into the water and paddling, beginning his humiliating trip out of Campbell's Pond. "I'm out of here."

  It would be a long walk back to Pierce, but if he didn't stop to rest he might make it back before daylight, so he might not be seen waddling naked into town. There were clotheslines aplenty, so he'd pick out some clothes, maybe sneak into his uncle's house for a bite to eat, then he would be out of there. He'd hitchhike back to Missoula, or walk the whole way if he couldn't find a ride. Even if he didn't have any friends willing to take him in, Charles was there. Charles could leave the institution anytime he wanted to. He would help him.

  Lester let anger fuel him as he paddled back, but his throbbing finger reminded him to not let his hands linger. He didn't want another bite.

  As he neared shore, he felt something like
the pounding of a drum vibrating his belly through the water. He looked around for the source, but he was alone. The thumping smoothed to a steady thrum. The water seemed to vibrate.

  A fish jumped in front of him, and another one to his left.

  Lester paddled faster. He was nearly to the dock.

  Only feet away, Lester pulled his hands in and let the raft coast, steadying himself to grab it.

  A cry from shore shattered the nervous silence and made Lester jump.

  Samantha?

  She ran toward the lake, from the direction where she and Rick had disappeared. Her shirt was off, her breasts bouncing with each stride.

  Rick got drunk and raped her, Lester thought. A savage voice in his head, not his brother's this time, said, she deserved it!

  He waited for Rick to come from the darkness behind her, but Rick didn't follow. A sleek tan figure flew from the narrow, tree-lined road and landed on the moonlit ground. It chased her, and before she made another dozen steps, launched itself onto her back, taking her down.

  The mountain lion swiped at her back, and Samantha twisted under it, shrieking in pain. The giant cat screeched in return, a strangely unnatural sound, and lunged, fixing its jaws over the back of her head.

  Lester heard the crunch of bone, and Samantha's struggle ended.

  The mountain lion gave her a shake for good measure, then released her. It did not feed. It abandoned her body and turned toward Lester.

  Lester found his voice and screamed as his raft bumped the dock.

  The cat let loose another strange cry and streaked toward the pond.

  Lester screamed again and pushed himself away from the dock, paddling at the water furiously. The pond around him boiled with jumping fish, but he ignored them. Fish bites seemed much less intimidating now.

  The giant cat leapt onto the dock, but skidded to a stop before reaching the end. It growled, watching Lester as he put more distance between them. It didn't follow him out, the cat's natural fear of water outweighed its desire to kill, and as it paced at the end of the dock, Lester saw the mountain lion was in bad shape. One glowing feline eye watched him as he moved farther away from shore, but the other was gone.