When the Darkness Falls

by Gonzalez, J. F.

  “Bullshit!” Jack yelled.

  Carla was trying hard to hold the tears in, but she wasn’t doing a good job of it. For the first time since they were together, Jack saw how she would look as an old woman. He saw her as the old woman he’d seen early that afternoon, at that old gray house in the woods. “You don’t understand, Jack. You just don’t understand!”

  “I understand,” Jack said, trying to calm his anger down. He scooted toward her and tried to take her in his arms at an attempt at comfort. “I’m sorry I yelled at you. It’s just...you’ve got to understand what you’re saying, Carla. Your mother’s been living alone for who knows how long, and—”

  “And my father is gone!” Carla cried, drawing away from him. “He’s not dead, he’s gone! Gone to the other side, and I was supposed to be here! I was supposed to go with him! We all were! We were supposed to never feel pain or despair ever again, and in return for that we were to provide the opening for them to come into our world, so they could take over again.” And then she broke down completely, crying uncontrollably. Jack felt helpless; he could only sit beside her on the lumpy bed and make a clumsy attempt at consolation, stroking her back, her brown wavy hair.

  After awhile the sobbing eased up. Carla wiped her eyes. “I know it’s hard for you to understand. Nobody ever did. That’s why we were always shunned when I lived out here. But my father...he was very powerful. He still is very powerful, and...the things he called upon are more powerful than your...comfy little Judeo-Christian world-view. Daddy guided me back here. I can feel it. He helped me come home!”

  Jack didn’t know what else to say. There was no use in arguing with her. That would just create more problems, and it was something they didn’t need now. All he could do was listen and be there for her, to keep the demons at bay.

  Eventually she calmed down enough to sink back into bed again. Jack sat up in bed with her, rubbing her shoulders, holding her hand, until she fell asleep.

  Jack checked his watch. It was ten-thirty. He was wide-awake and far from tired.

  He waited until Carla went into a deep sleep. Then, when he was certain that she wasn’t going to wake up again, he let himself out quietly and sat outside and smoked and thought about the things she’d told him.

  HE COULDN'T SLEEP. No matter what position he lay in, he just couldn’t fall asleep. He’d returned to the room at midnight, stripped down to his boxers, and slipped into bed beside Carla, who lay snoring on her back. He’d tried to fall asleep to no avail. He just couldn’t sleep, and it wasn’t Carla’s snoring that kept him awake. It was his mind, which just couldn’t get the story she’d told him out of his head, that kept him awake.

  At some point he must have dozed. He lay in bed until six a.m. and when he knew he wasn’t going to get any more sleep, he got up and went to the bathroom. He urinated, flushed the toilet, then brushed his teeth and combed his hair. He checked on Carla, saw that she was still fast asleep, then he changed quickly. He let himself out quietly. He was hungry, but he had more on his mind than food. He wanted to prove Carla wrong, show her that her mother was nothing more than a senile, crazy old woman who belonged in a hospice or, better yet, a mental hospital.

  He climbed in the rental car and, using the map as guidance, drove back to the house where Carla had grown up.

  He got lost three times on the drive over. All those back roads looked the same and the trees hung over the road, stretching out branches that looked skeletal even in the bright bloom of summer. After forty minutes of driving he finally found it. He recognized the landscape as he drove up the heavily wooded terrain, heading into the deep woods of the mountains.

  When he rounded the curve that led to the house he leaned forward and squinted. The house was there all right, but it looked a little more decrepit than it looked yesterday. Of course the morning sun was hitting the structure at a different angle now, bathing it in more light. When they’d come by yesterday it had been in the long shadows of late afternoon. Jack pulled to the side of the road and got out of the car.

  As weathered and beaten-up as the house was yesterday, it definitely looked more jacked-up now. The driveway was still bare and empty. As he walked up the crumbling walkway, Jack noticed the weeds that were sprouting everywhere; poking through cracks in the concrete porch; climbing up the trellis. When he knocked on the door he was startled at how flimsy it felt, as if it was going to fall apart at the slightest hint of strength.

  He waited for a moment, listening for any sign of life from within. He knocked again, suddenly getting the feeling that whatever was in that house was as dead as the grounds outside.

  His heart was pounding in his chest; he felt light-headed with nervous tension. He gripped the doorknob and turned it. It opened and he stepped inside.

  The first thing he noticed was the strong, pervading odor of mold and rot as he stepped within the crumbling structure. A plume of dust swirled in front of him, clogging his nostrils. He coughed, blinking in the darkness as he tried to peer inside. “Hello? Mrs. Beck?”

  His voice echoed back. “Beck...Beck....Be...Be...”

  He stepped into the living room. It was in shambles; broken furniture leaning against the sagging walls, the carpet torn up. Jack saw an end table and touched it; it was thick with dust. He sneezed suddenly, and the force of the sneeze expelled the dust, swirling it into a cloud. This made him sneeze again, and he backed out of the living room, trying to control his sneezes.

  With rising trepidation, he stepped further into the house. It was dustier than it had been when he and Carla experienced it yesterday. He stopped at the stairway that led to the second floor, one hand on the crumbling banister, and debated on whether he should venture upstairs. The house was silent; it felt like there was nobody here except him.

  “Mrs. Beck?” he called. “Anybody home?”

  When the echoes died he put one foot on the bottom step. The wood creaked. He could tell that the minute he put all his weight on the stair that it would collapse. He tried the next step. It seemed sturdier. Carefully testing each step as he went along, he made his way to the second floor.

  He inspected every room on the second floor. Each room was empty and filled with dust. Some rooms, like what looked to be the master bedroom, bore crumbling, bare furniture, long since reduced to rot from disuse. The windows were closed, faint light filtering through dirty, filmy curtains. Jack didn’t even think of trying to flip on a light. Somehow, he had a feeling that there would be no electrical power in the place.

  He climbed the narrow stairway to the attic, feeling nervous as he entered. The attic room was large and, with the exception of a huge desk that took up most of one wall, completely bare. He approached the desk slowly. This was probably Carla’s father’s study, where he’d come to work on his supposed black magic. Jack took in the room, checking it out carefully. There were no books, no papers, no crude occult symbols drawn on the floor or the walls. There was no sign that this had been the ritual chamber of a black magician. Aside from the strong odor of rot—stronger here in this room for some reason—there was nothing out-of-the-ordinary.

  What the hell is going on? he thought, heading back downstairs to the living room, the odor of mold and dust everywhere. It was as if the place had been unoccupied for years. But how could it be? We were here yesterday! I saw Carla’s mother with my own eyes!

  His eyes tracked down the hall to the front door, and when he saw what was on the floor his heart skipped a beat.

  There were three sets of footprints in the dust. There was his set from today, going from the front door to the rest of the house and up the stairs. The other two pairs were his familiar tread again from the day before, and Carla’s. They went from the front door to the den, the only two rooms they’d entered in the house yesterday.

  There were no visible tracks of a fourth person.

  This can’t be right, Jack thought. He skirted around the footprints, grasped the doorknob and let himself out.

  He was almost
to his car when a boy of about ten years old rode by on his bike. Upon seeing Jack exiting the house, the boy stopped and looked up at him with surprise. “Hey Mister! Did you just come out of that house?”

  Jack stopped at the car, still trying to find a logical explanation for what he’d found in the house. “Yeah,” he said, fumbling with his keys.

  “Why would you want to go in there?” the kid asked. He was freckled, with brown hair, wearing a pair of cut-off jeans and a striped shirt. “That place has been abandoned for years.”

  “Abandoned?”

  “Yeah,” the kid said, snapping a wad of chewing gum. “It’s supposed to be haunted, too. Some crazy old lady died in there a long time ago. At least that’s what my older brother and his friends say.”

  “What else do they say?” Jack said, the door to the car open now.

  The kid shrugged. “Just that nobody goes in there because the people that lived there used to be witches ‘n stuff and did things. And now it’s haunted. Nobody goes there now.” Then, as if he’d made his point, the kid pedaled away.

  Jack watched him go, then turned back toward the house. Then who the hell did we talk to? Who was that old woman that claimed to be Carla’s mother?

  Jack drove away, these questions chasing him all the way back to the motel.

  WHEN HE RETURNED to the motel, he didn’t tell Carla what he’d found in the house. He’d thought about telling her on the drive over and decided that if he did, she would really freak out. As it turned out, she’d almost done so anyway. “I woke up this morning thinking you were gone,” she said, pacing the small room. At some point while he was gone she’d showered and changed into fresh clothing. Her hair was freshly brushed, gleaming on her shoulders. “I thought they had...come and gotten you or something.”

  “No way that’s happening,” Jack said.

  Carla lit a cigarette. She looked at him. “I don’t know what I was thinking when I went back there.”

  “It’s okay,” Jack said. He lit a cigarette, too. “You needed to go home to realize this.”

  “Maybe.” Carla thought about this, smoking silently. “I don’t know. I know that...everything that happened to me was so real, though.”

  “But it’s not. They manipulated you into believing that.”

  Carla sighed, took another drag. Now she didn’t look too sure. “I don’t know what to believe.”

  “I think we should leave,” Jack said. He moved toward his duffel bag at the foot of their bed. It was time to turn this shit around and get her mind off of this.

  Carla broke down. She buried her face in her hands, heaving sobs that shook her shoulders.

  “Hey,” Jack said, feeling like an idiot now. “Listen, everything will be fine. We’ll get out of here and—”

  “What do I have to go back to?” she cried, looking at him through tear-filled eyes. “A piece of shit job where everybody pushes me around and takes advantage of me, no friends. I’ve got a crappy life, and...I’ve got nobody back home!”

  “That’s not true,” Jack said. “You have me.”

  Carla sniffled. “That’s sweet.” She reached out and touched his face gently. “Really, it is. But face it. I’m so much older than you.” She held back a sob and at that moment she was so beautiful to Jack, so beautiful that he just wanted to take her in his arms and shield her from the world. “You don’t want to be with a crazy old woman like me.”

  “You’re not old,” Jack quickly said, but he silently agreed with her. True, she wasn’t that old, even though she had fifteen years on him. But she was crazy. Maybe not in the clinical sense, but she did have her problems. And he couldn’t deal with them. Still, he cared about her. “Listen,” he said, taking her shoulders, trying to calm her down and divert her attention to something else. “Why don’t we go out for a little bit. We won’t go back to the house. We won’t even talk about what happened. Our plane doesn’t leave till tomorrow; let’s use this day and have fun. Let’s drive around, explore, have a picnic in the woods or something. We can even find another place to stay tonight. Somewhere more romantic.” He kissed her. “C’mon, it’ll be fun.”

  She nodded and mustered a smile. “Okay,” she said, wiping a tear that trickled down her cheek. “Okay.” Jack didn’t know if she was agreeing to appease him or if she really meant it.

  They checked out of the motel, packed their stuff in the trunk, then climbed in the car and started driving. Carla told him to drive south, toward Berks County. It was closer to Philadelphia and maybe they could find a little bed-and-breakfast place. They drove on twisting turning roads until they found a two-story house with a large wrap-around porch. The sign in the yard advertised it as a bed-and-breakfast. Jack pulled up and they checked in for the evening. Jack felt better as he hauled their overnight bags to their rooms. He was determined to have a good time with her this last night in Pennsylvania. He was determined to keep her mind off of her parents.

  They spent the rest of the day taking a hike through the area, stopping to browse at an antique store. They had a late lunch at a little roadside cafe, then took a long walk back to the bed-and-breakfast. Once back in their room, they showered and changed into some clean clothes, then lounged on the bed, the television turned to the evening news. Carla was quiet all evening as they watched TV, and Jack could tell her mood had changed for the worst. She was probably thinking about what happened last night. Twice he thought about telling her about his encounter at the house this morning, then wisely vetoed it. As evening fell he put his hand on her shoulder. “Hey,” he said. “You okay?”

  She turned to him and he saw she’d started crying again. “No,” she said, shaking her head.

  Jack took her in her arms.

  He held her for a couple of minutes. Then, she climbed out of bed, her back to him. “I’ve made my decision,” she said.

  “What decision?”

  Carla didn’t look at him. She kept her gaze averted to the window, gazing out at the moon-filled night. “I know that what happened at the house yesterday was a sign. They’re waiting for me. I know what to do. I’m sorry Jack. I’m sorry you can’t understand, and I’m sorry...that I have to leave you. But it’s the only way.”

  Jack was about to protest again when she got down on her knees as if she were going to pray. She raised her arms and began singing, her voice high and musical yet weirdly fluttering, as if the notes she were singing were coming from some deep place in her soul. Jack watched in numbed surprise and confusion. Christ, she’s really lost her mind, he thought.

  He couldn’t tell what she was singing. The words weren’t any he’d ever heard before. They were guttural, primitive sounding. They floated and rode in crescendos, like the music coming from a flute. It was a steady stream, in a language Jack didn’t recognize. She’s making the shit up. She’s fucking crazy, she’s just spouting gibberish.

  The wind picked up outside, suddenly looming stronger than Carla’s singing. This only made Carla sing louder, and Jack could now see that her eyes were closed, face tilted to the heavens. It sounded like there was a hurricane going on outside; the wind howled mercilessly, the trees whipped violently, and he could feel and hear the house buckle under the strong gusts. A strong smell of excrement burst suddenly in the room and Jack fell back against the headboard, gagging. Carla was smiling now, her singing growing more urgently, as if she were encouraging whatever it was that was happening. The wind outside grew stronger and the building shook more, this time not from the wind but from a deep rumbling that seemed to burst forth from deep in the ground. Its shaking tumbled him off the bed.

  There was a sudden flash of light and an explosion knocked him against the wall. Something that looked like a hovering transparent mass of protoplasm with hundreds of writhing snakes attached to it hovered over Carla as she reached up with eager hands to embrace it. It made a sound like the croaking of a thousand bullfrogs, and the last thing Jack heard before he blacked out was Carla answering it in that same croaking bullfrog
voice.

  “I'M TELLING YOU, there was no storm last night!” The proprietress exclaimed as she stood behind the counter the next morning. Jack was in the lobby, his hair standing up in wild corkscrews, feeling haggard and worn. Contrary to what he heard last night, it was a bright and sunny day outside, without a hint that the region had been hit with a sudden, violent storm. “It was a perfectly peaceful night except for you and your girlfriend making all that racket.”

  “There wasn’t a storm, or an earthquake?” Jack asked, his voice rising in falsetto. “I can’t believe you didn’t feel it. It shook the whole building.”

  “There was nothing!” the proprietress snapped, her gaze fixed steadily on his. “Now I suggest you and your lady friend check out now.”

  “She’s gone,” Jack said, his mind still fumbling with what had happened. Carla’s strange singing, the sudden wind and rumble from the ground that knocked him out of bed, the sudden explosion, the bullfrog voice, that thing he saw before he blacked out. And then coming awake this morning on the floor with a nasty bump on his head, seeing Carla gone, her clothes scattered on the floor. “It took her. It came out of the sky and took her.”

  “If you aren’t out of here in five minutes I’m calling the police!” the proprietress warned.

  There was nothing else Jack could do. He wandered back up to his room and began gathering their things up. Maybe Carla climbed out of the window last night. He would check. He packed their things together then headed downstairs, spending only a minute at the front desk to pay the bill, the proprietress giving him the evil eye the whole time. Before he departed he would go behind the house and see if he could find anything in the back. Maybe she had torn a piece of clothing in her mad haste to escape to whatever it was she was escaping from. He didn’t give a damn if the proprietress called the police. He needed the police to help him look for Carla.