Casket for Sale, Only Used Once

by Jeff Strand

  "Then put everybody in the back. Including your ex-supervisor."

  "Yes, sir."

  Troll put his hands underneath Goblin's arms and dragged him toward the truck. He seemed very pleased to be doing it.

  Mr. Burke knelt down next to me. "Creepy, isn't it? Not being able to move like that? I tested it out on myself once and it freaked me out."

  "Oh, shit!" Troll exclaimed as he reached the truck.

  "What?"

  "The signal just went off. Somebody's coming. Same direction that you came."

  "Busy little road today. But that's fine. Without incompetent management running the show, we should be able to take care of them without much effort. Medusa, Witch, I want our three test subjects propped up against the truck," Mr. Burke said. "Based on what they've seen so far, they probably think we're all bumbling idiots, a joke. I want them to see very clearly that we are no joke."

  Medusa and Witch dragged me to the truck. I was unable to feel a thing as I slid over the dirt.

  Within a couple of minutes, Roger and Samantha were sitting next to me.

  I had to do something to save the people who were coming, but what? I couldn't even wiggle a toe.

  It seemed like hours before the car, a small white sedan, arrived. It stopped behind the limousine.

  Mr. Burke walked over to them. "Hi there," he said, as the driver rolled down his window. "We've had a bit of bad luck and I was wondering if we could get your assistance."

  "Of course," said the driver, a cheerful-looking blonde guy in his late thirties. He was badly sunburnt and wearing sunglasses. "What's the problem?"

  "Car trouble."

  "Oh, man, that's always miserable. This is, like, our first vacation without a flat tire or running out of gas or something like that." The driver grinned. "We probably cursed you. Sweet limo you've got there, though."

  Don't get out of your car don't get out of your car please don't get out of your car.

  The blonde guy opened his car door and got out.

  "Right over here," said Mr. Burke, leading him past the limousine. Two more doors opened on the sedan, and a beautiful woman, probably the guy's wife, got out, along with their son, who looked eleven or twelve.

  Please no...

  The blonde guy frowned and removed his sunglasses as he saw Roger, Samantha and I propped up against the truck. We had to look like zombies, or at least stoned out of our minds.

  "What happened to them?" he asked.

  "Shock," said Mr. Burke. "As you can see, there was a terrible accident. We tried to call the police, but we seem to be having trouble with our cell phone."

  The blonde guy was joined by his wife and son. "We've got one in the car. Alex, why don't you go grab it?"

  "No, that won't be necessary," Mr. Burke said. "I'd just like to give you a brief preamble, if I may. What you're going to see in a moment will frighten you very badly, and if you scream, you will die. So don't scream."

  Medusa casually pointed Goblin's gun at the family. The mother gasped but didn't scream.

  "Excellent. You're off to a good start. Two of my associates will see that the noise and struggling are kept to a minimum, so please cooperate."

  Witch and Troll quickly bound each of the family members' hands with duct tape. They also covered the woman and boy's mouth. After they were done, Mr. Burke nodded his approval and walked to the family. "What's your name?" he asked the blond guy.

  "Jim," he softly replied.

  "Full name, please."

  "Jim Kenyon."

  "James, correct?"

  "Yes. James Kenyon."

  "And is this your wife?"

  "Yes."

  "Her name?"

  "Heather."

  "Pleased to meet you, Heather. And this must be your son. His name is Alex, right?"

  "Yes," said James, his voice quivering.

  "Was Alex born in wedlock?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. Heather, Alex, please drop to your knees."

  Heather and Alex, both crying and shaking with fear, did as they were told.

  I focused every possible bit of mental energy I possessed on trying to move my body. A finger. A lip. Anything.

  "Heather looks like a fine woman, James," said Mr. Burke. "Is everything working out? No problems in your marriage?"

  "Yes."

  Mr. Burke chuckled. "I apologize. That wasn't a very well-phrased question. Are there any problems in your marriage?"

  "No."

  "Good, good. How about with young Alex there? Is he doing well in school?"

  "Yes."

  "Is he into sports? He looks like he'd be into sports."

  "Yes."

  "Which one?"

  "Basketball."

  "Really? He seems short for that. I would have thought baseball or soccer. Does he get a lot of game time or does he spend most of it on the bench?"

  "He plays."

  "Very impressive. You look like a nice, happy family. You're a very lucky man, James, to have such a wonderful wife and son. That does bring up the important question, though: Which of them do you like better?"

  "What?"

  "I'm not going to beat around the bush here, James. One of them is going to die within the next minute or so. You're going to make the choice."

  Move, damn it, move!

  I could beat whatever had been in the dart. Mind over matter. I'd break free of this paralyzing drug. I focused so hard it felt like my brain was going to burst inside my skull.

  "Now, before you speak, I know exactly what you're going to say. You're going to ask me to kill you instead. I hate that. I'm sick of it. If you try to be a martyr, I'll kill both of them. If you don't make the choice in a timely fashion, I'll kill both of them. My hope is that you won't be the type of coward who would let both his wife and child die because he couldn't make a simple decision."

  "Please don't do this," said the man in a soft, scared voice.

  "It will be a bullet to the back of the head, execution-style. Painless, as far as I know, not having been through that experience myself. Which one dies, James? Heather or Alex? Make the choice."

  "I can't..."

  Move move move!

  "Make the choice, James. Be a man."

  Heather and Alex both sobbed.

  "Five seconds until they both die. And you're going to be really disappointed if you think I'm bluffing."

  James let out a whimper, and choked out the word: "Her."

  "Her?"

  James nodded, tears gushing down his face.

  "Her meaning Heather? You want me to execute Heather instead of Alex?"

  Heather let out a muffled wail.

  James nodded.

  "Say it," Mr. Burke told him.

  "I can't."

  "Yes, you can. Say 'I want you to kill my wife, Heather.'"

  "No!"

  "You were man enough to make the choice, James. Don't fuck it up because you won't speak the words."

  My finger moved. I swore my finger moved.

  "I ... I want you to ... I want you to..."

  "It's not that difficult, James."

  "I want you to..."

  If I could move a finger, I could move my whole body. I could tackle that sadistic son of a bitch and rip his heart out of his chest.

  "Say it, James, or they both die!"

  "I want you to kill Heather!"

  "See, that wasn't so hard, now was it?" Mr. Burke grinned and motioned to Medusa.

  She shoved the barrel of her gun against the back of Alex's head, not Heather's...

  I can break free of this I can break free I can I can I can!

  ...and pulled the trigger.

  I couldn't look away. I couldn't even blink.

  The twelve year-old boy pitched forward onto the dirt.

  "Do you see what we did, James?" asked Mr. Burke. "We killed your son instead. Now you get to spend the rest of your life with poor Heather knowing you didn't pick her. You think there'll be problems in the marriage no
w, James?"

  Troll laughed.

  James didn't respond. His eyes looked dead.

  Mr. Burke raised the walkie-talkie to his mouth and pressed the button. "Did you hear that shot?" he asked.

  "Yes, it still sounds pretty far," Helen told him, "but we're moving as fast as we can."

  "Very good." He lowered the walkie-talkie and stroked his goatee. "I'm not a completely inhuman gentleman, James. I know that what you must be feeling now is a million times worse than any physical agony I could inflict upon you. So, I'm going to show you some mercy. Instead of making you live with your choice, I'm going to finish both of you off in an excruciatingly painful manner. Sound good?"

  "Can I do it?" asked Troll, holding up his hunting knife.

  Mr. Burke considered that. "Yes, but you only get five minutes to do both of them."

  "Mind if I slit his throat and spend the rest of the time with her?"

  Mr. Burke nodded. "That's fine. But slit his throat at the end so he can watch."

  "I can do that."

  "Tape his mouth. Let's avoid noise pollution as much as possible."

  Troll turned toward me, smiled, and waved his knife in front of my face. "Watch how creative I can be."

  I watched it all, screaming at my body to move.

  Mr. Burke was feeling generous and gave Troll an extra minute.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Helen's Side

  "CHOCOLATE CAKE WITH about a gallon of chocolate syrup poured over the top," I said. "What about you, Kyle?"

  "I don't know."

  "Sure you do. You can have anything in the entire whole wide world to eat when we get out of here. So what sounds really, really good?"

  "Nothing."

  I was desperately trying to keep my children alert and happy. Word games hadn't been effective, so I'd switched the subject to food.

  We walked slowly through the forest, Theresa following right behind me with her hands on my waist, and Kyle completing the human chain with his hands on his sister's waist. I tried to keep my tone of voice cheerful, but I also kept a close eye on every single step we took, watching for traps.

  Joe ran alongside of us. I'd carried the pug for a while, but he'd gotten too heavy and I let him go. On one hand, I didn't want my children to be traumatized by the sight of their beloved pet getting killed in a trap, but on the other hand, I'd rather have Joe accidentally run into a trap than us. And at this point, what was one more trauma?

  "C'mon, Kyle, any food in the world. If you don't pick one, I'll make you eat broccoli!"

  "Yuck," said Theresa.

  "That's right, yuck. And it will be the biggest piece of broccoli you've ever seen. Covered with turds."

  I was not the type of parent who normally joked about excrement with her children, but I really needed to keep their minds occupied.

  "Mommy, my arm hurts," said Kyle.

  "I know it does, sweetie. I promise, we'll get you to a doctor who will make it all better. For now you just have to be my brave little boy, okay?"

  "Okay," Kyle said without enthusiasm.

  "Now are you going to pick a food or do I have to cook you a turd-covered piece of broccoli?"

  "Maybe a mammoth," said Kyle.

  "A wooly mammoth?"

  "Yeah."

  "Do you want mammoth steak or mammoth stew?"

  Kyle thought for a moment. "I want mammoth pizza."

  "All right, it's a nice wooly mammoth pizza for Kyle as soon as we get out of here."

  What frightened me was that I didn't know when that would happen. We were admittedly taking it slow, but still, we'd been walking for an awful long time to not have reached the road. I wondered if we were lost.

  "Can I have mammoth pizza, too?" asked Theresa.

  "Sure. Have you ever seen a mammoth? Even Kyle couldn't eat a whole mammoth pizza all by himself."

  "And he's a big snorty pig."

  "I am not!"

  "Are too!"

  For the first time in my life, I welcomed an argument between my children. But it stopped as Theresa's voice turned serious. "Mommy, are we going to die?"

  "No," I told her. "We're not."

  "I'm scared that we are."

  "It's okay to be scared, sweetie. But we're not going to die, I promise you."

  "What if the man who bit Kyle had diseases?"

  "Theresa!"

  "Well, what if he did?"

  "Theresa Lynne Mayhem, stop talking like that. Your brother is going to be fine. The man didn't have any diseases, and he'll never come after us again, and none of us are going to die."

  "Do you think I have rabies?" asked Kyle.

  "No! Damn it, Theresa, see what you did? Kyle, you don't have rabies. You don't have any disease. Your arm got bit really bad, and I know it hurts, but it's going to be fine. There are no diseases you can catch from a human bite."

  As a parent, I tried to never lie to my children. Sure, Andrew and I did the whole Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, and Tooth Fairy thing, but for the most part I tried to speak honestly and directly with them. This wasn't one of those times. I was scared shitless that Kyle might have caught something from that monster's bite, but I couldn't let my son's overactive imagination go rampant right now. I had to keep them calm.

  But when Kyle made it to a hospital, he was getting every test in existence.

  "I don't think you know," said Theresa, softly.

  I successfully--but only barely--fought back tears.

  The walkie-talkie crackled.

  "Is anybody there?" an unfamiliar voice asked.

  I pressed the button. "Who is this?"

  "This is Officer Trevor Clemens from the Georgia State Patrol. We've managed to subdue the assailants who attacked you and your family, but your husband has been very badly injured. Could you give us your location?"

  "What happened to him?" I tried not to sound frantic.

  "He's been cut. He's been cut bad, ma'am. We can't move him until the ambulance gets here. Are you near the road?"

  "I'm ... I'm not sure," I admitted.

  "Are you lost?"

  "I think so."

  "That's not a problem, ma'am. We'll get you out of there. Do me a big favor and give us a shout, okay?"

  I'm embarrassed to admit I almost did it. I opened my mouth, took a deep breath ... and then drew the obvious conclusion that I might not really be talking to an Officer Trevor Clemens.

  "Let me talk to him," I said.

  "Ma'am, he's unconscious and losing blood fast. I'm not trying to scare you, and I promise we're doing everything we can, but he may not have much time left."

  "Shout out to me," I told him. "I'll follow your voice."

  I listened carefully.

  Nothing.

  "Did you hear that?"

  "No."

  Now a gunshot, far off in the distance.

  "What about that?"

  "Yes, I heard it."

  "Are we close?"

  "No, but I know which direction to go at least."

  "Then hurry. Get here as quickly as you can. We'll be waiting."

  There was something vaguely sinister in the way he said "We'll be waiting." My gut told me I wasn't speaking to a police officer. I'm sure I could've asked some appropriate questions and figured this out for sure, but then I'd risk letting him know what I knew ... or at least suspected.

  But whether I was talking to a killer or a cop, one thing was certain: Andrew's situation was not good.

  Was he really cut and bleeding to death?

  Or perhaps already dead?

  I needed to put that thought out of my mind. Andrew was one hell of a resilient guy. He'd be fine. He could be superglued to a nuclear warhead and he'd find a way out of it. I had to worry about getting Theresa and Kyle to safety.

  I wondered if I should leave them behind. Find a good hiding spot for them and head off on my own. I could move more quickly that way (though still carefully) and not run the risk of taking them right back into the hands of th
e killers.

  What if I couldn't find them again?

  They'd be found. We'd call the police, have search helicopters fly overhead, and rescue them. We couldn't possibly be that far into the woods.

  What if the killers found them first?

  Or wild animals?

  I couldn't do it. I couldn't leave them in the forest to fend for themselves. Kyle had almost been taken from me, and I wasn't going to let him out of my sight again. Hell, aside from restroom and shower breaks, he might stay under my watchful eye until he was eighteen.

  Though I did my best to stop obsessing over it, I was too distracted with thoughts of Andrew to continue playing word games with my children, so we walked in silence.

  At least I knew we were going the right way.

  * * * *

  JUST AS I WAS starting to unconsciously grow comfortable walking through the woods, I saw another fishing line. We gave it wide berth.

  Something moved next to us.

  I gasped and stopped in my tracks. Theresa walked into my back. "Mommy!"

  "Shhh!" I listened carefully.

  "What was that?" asked Kyle.

  "Shhh!" I repeated.

  "Is it them?"

  "Kyle, be quiet!" We stood there, listening.

  Branches crackled.

  My stomach lurched.

  The deer bounded past, about thirty feet away. It was gone before I could get a clear look.

  "What is that?" Kyle asked, his voice on the verge of panic.

  "It was just a deer," I assured him.

  "I didn't see it! Are you sure that's what it was?"

  "I'm positive. Theresa, did you see it?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "Tell Kyle it was just a deer."

  "It was just a deer, stupid."

  "Oh," said Kyle, uncharacteristically ignoring the "stupid" comment.

  "I hope it doesn't get killed in a trap," Theresa said.

  "It won't. It'll be fine. Come on, let's keep going."

  I kept my hands in front of me so that my kids couldn't see that they were trembling.

  * * * *

  "IS THAT THE road?" Theresa asked.

  It looked that way. I had to force myself to maintain our careful pace. It felt like we'd been walking for hours, though I was sure it wasn't nearly that long, and I didn't want to get us killed in a last-minute rush.

  As we got closer, I saw that yes, we were indeed approaching the dirt road.

  Or a dirt road, anyway.

  A few minutes later we emerged from the woods. I couldn't tell for certain, but it did seem to be the same dirt road we'd been on before. I raised the walkie-talkie to my lips and pressed the black button. "Hello?"