Deep Night

by Greg F. Gifune

  “We need to get this girl to a hospital,” Darian said softly.

  She went on, apparently having not heard him. “He had this big ax, and he got really drunk one night and said he was going to cut my heart out. I kept having these terrible nightmares, you know? Only it was like…like they weren’t really nightmares because I was awake, and I thought maybe I was going crazy. I kept thinking about the rain and that storm the night before he picked me up, it—I couldn’t get it out of my head. I still can’t.” Christy ran her hands through her hair and let out a quiet whimper. “I knew he was going to kill me that night. He took the blindfold off whenever he raped me but he usually left my hands tied. The last time, though, he didn’t, he cut the ropes and left my hands free. I knew then he was going to kill me. Like a big finale, you know? He even put the ax down right near me where I could reach it. He never did that before. I think he figured I was so scared and beat up by then I wouldn’t fight him anymore. But I did.

  “He was really wasted, and he started undoing his pants,” she continued. “It was a chance, so I took it, and…” She again began to sob.

  “Jesus H.,” Louis said, “she fucking killed this guy.”

  Her head snapped up, her eyes searching him out through the tears. “I didn’t mean to, I swear to God! I just—I didn’t want him near me, I—I didn’t wanting him touching me again. When I grabbed the ax I just wanted him to let me leave, but he came at me and I swung it out in front of me as hard as I could. I just wanted to keep him away from me, I…” She went quiet for a time. “He ran right into it. It hit him in the stomach. He fell into me and we both fell back and he ended up right on top of me. We were lying on the floor and I couldn’t get him off me. He was gagging and bleeding and I kept kicking and screaming, I—I just wanted him off me.” She took a deep breath, slowly exhaled. “I finally got him off and then I ran out the door and into the woods. I didn’t even know where I was but I just kept running as fast and as hard as I could. After a while I saw some smoke above the trees and tried running toward it. Must’ve been the fire from your cabin, I guess.”

  “When you ran, was the man still alive?” Darian asked.

  Louis answered for her. “Doesn’t matter, he’s not alive now. Bet on it. With that kind of wound the guy probably bled out right there on the floor within a few minutes.”

  Christy wrapped her arms around herself and shivered.

  “Lou’s right,” Raymond said from across the room. “He’s got to be dead by now.”

  Seth stood up, rubbed his tired eyes. “Bastard deserved it.”

  “I’m not about to argue that one,” Darian said. “But the fact of the matter is we have a kidnapping, sexual assaults and a probable murder on our hands. We need to get the police out here and let them handle this.”

  “Right,” Seth agreed, “absolutely.”

  “Please,” Christy said suddenly, “please don’t call the cops.”

  “If it played out like you say it did you got nothing to worry about,” Louis told her. “It’s self-defense.”

  “You don’t understand.” She was so upset now she nearly came off the bed. “You don’t understand, I can’t go to the police, I can’t!”

  Seth returned to his crouch and held her shoulders, steadying her and gently pushing her back onto the bed. “Easy now,” he said. “Easy. It’s all right, it’s all right.”

  Christy went limp again, laid back as more tears stained her cheeks. “I’ve had trouble with the cops before,” she said. “I have a record; I’ve been arrested a couple times.”

  “Arrested for what?” Louis asked.

  “Pot. And prostitution once.”

  “None of that matters,” Seth told her. “This man kidnapped you and was assaulting you, threatening to kill you. You had every right to defend yourself. Your prior record has nothing to do with any of that.”

  “You sound like a lawyer.” She eyed him with what seemed equal parts amusement and suspicion. “Or a cop.”

  “I’m neither,” he assured her, attempting a smile. “I’m a customer service manager. I calm people down for a living.”

  She combed her hair from her face with her fingers. “I’ve dealt with cops before. They’ll never believe somebody like me. Especially cops up in these parts. Everybody knows everybody else in areas like this. I’ve seen it before. They’re all related and shit. They’re not going to believe me, not over one of their own.”

  “Not our problem, lady.” Louis strode across the room and returned his rifle to the closet. “Get a lawyer.”

  “Please,” she said to Seth, “I’ve been in jail before. I’m not going back. I can’t.”

  “I can sympathize with that,” Raymond said.

  Rather than respond to his brother’s comment, Seth said, “Ray, I’ve got a couple old sweatshirts packed in my suitcase, grab one for her, would you? And get a pair of socks too.” He motioned to Christy, indicating the far side of the cabin where the bathroom was located. “You can wash up and change out of that shirt in there. I don’t have extra boots but socks are better than nothing, even if they’re big.”

  She nodded.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “A little, yeah, but I’m so…I’m just so tired.”

  “Darian’s making his world famous stew tonight. It’ll be ready in a bit.” Raymond appeared at his side holding an old gray sweatshirt and a pair of heavy white socks that had been rolled into a ball. Seth took them from him and held them out for Christy. “Go get changed then try to get some rest. With the storm coming in this fast nobody’s going anywhere for a while anyway. We’ll talk about all this later.”

  She took the items carefully, as if they were priceless artifacts. “Thanks.”

  Seth helped her from the bed, and as she stood up the blankets fell free.

  The blood on her shirt had grown darker and more ominous somehow. They all did their best not to notice.

  Christy walked slowly and with a degree of effort, her legs obviously not as strong or steady as they needed to be but still capable of carrying her. As if to be certain they were still there, she gave a final glance over her shoulder at the men then slipped into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Louis asked. “She can’t stay here, man.”

  “What are we supposed to do, put her outside?”

  Darian brought them all in closer. “Keep your voices down. This girl’s already been through enough of an ordeal.”

  “You believe her, Mother?”

  “Yes, Louis, I do.” Darian shrugged. “I see no reason for her to lie.”

  “I believe her too,” Seth said.

  “But we do have to involve the police,” Darian added. “We’re talking about murder, even in self-defense, and I don’t want any part of this. Once the storm passes we go into town and notify the police. End of discussion.”

  “Agreed,” Seth said. “I feel terrible for the poor kid but we can’t get involved in all this anymore than we already are.”

  “But we don’t know for sure what the truth is,” Louis reminded them. “Now goddamn it, this is my cabin and—”

  “It’s your uncle’s cabin,” Darian reminded him. “Calm down.”

  “Whatever. Point is, it’s my family’s property and I’m responsible for what happens here, for what goes on here while we’re using it, OK?”

  “Then what do we do?” Seth asked. “You’re the one who said we’d never make it back once the storm kicks in full force. We’re stuck here for the time being, right? I know it’s a crazy situation, but what choice do we have?”

  Louis folded his arms across his chest and shook his head wearily. “If this storm hits the way they say it’s gonna, we could be snowed in here for a day or more. We might not be able to get to the main road until Friday. That’s two days from now. What the hell we gonna do with her sleeping here and shit? What if she is some psycho?”

  Seth thought a moment. “We’ll do it subtly but w
e’ll take turns staying awake at night, how’s that? Once she goes to sleep we stay up one at a time in shifts until we know she’s no threat to us.”

  “I don’t like this, but I guess there’s not much else we can do,” Louis conceded.

  “You’ve been awfully quiet through all this, Ray,” Seth said. “What do you think?”

  “I think I’ll go have a smoke.” Raymond moved toward the door, cigarettes in hand.

  “Great,” Louis cracked. “Thanks for your input, man.”

  Ray shook a cigarette free from the pack, rolled one into the corner of his mouth and lit it with a Zippo. “Storm’s already here, snow’s already falling, what’s there to talk about? Like Seth said, nobody’s going anywhere anyway.” He extinguished the flame with a quick snap shut of the silver lighter then pulled open the door and stepped outside. “Least not anytime soon.”

  * * *

  The earlier events of the day faded away, returning Seth to the cabin, to night.

  He blinked away the memories and realized he was still lying there staring at the open door. “What’s going on?” he asked again.

  Rather than respond verbally, Louis shook his head in a slow uneven sweep, his movements rough and oddly hesitant, as if he’d yet to master maneuvering his body and was still familiarizing himself with it.

  Seth swung his feet around until they touched the floor. Even in heavy wool socks he could feel the cold coming through the floorboards. He rubbed his eyes and stood up.

  Louis did a half-pushup and craned his neck over his shoulder, following Seth’s gaze until he could see the door. Once he realized it was open he was on his feet as well. Like Seth, he wore only long underwear, a sweatshirt and a pair of thick socks. “What the hell’s the door doing open?” he asked groggily. He glanced back at the floor, to where Raymond should have been, then at Seth. “Where’s Ray?”

  Seth shrugged, still hazy. “I don’t know, I—he must’ve gone outside.”

  “Outside? For what?”

  “I’m not sure, I just woke up myself.” The snow had formed a miniature drift in the threshold. “That door’s been open a while,” Seth mumbled. “I think the cold woke me.”

  Louis scratched his head and looked over at the fireplace. They’d made a fire in the stone hearth earlier in the evening but it had long since burned out. The cabin, though quite small, had no heat, electricity or running water, but did have an indoor bathroom equipped with a chemical toilet. “Wait,” he said. “Maybe he’s in the can. Might be the door wasn’t latched right and blew open.”

  Feeling an immediate sense of relief at the possibility, Seth moved to the rear of the room to check the bathroom. The lamp inside was not lit but the door was ajar. “Ray?”

  When no answer came, Seth gave the door a slight push. It slowly swung open far enough for him to see inside. The tiny room was empty. He turned back to Louis and shook his head in the negative, his relief again becoming concern. He shuffled as close to the main door of the cabin as he could without stepping in the snow and peered out into the night.

  Nothing but darkness and snowflakes.

  “Raymond!” he called. “Ray?”

  “Why the hell would he go outside?” Louis grabbed his jeans from the foot of his bed, stepped into them with an off-balance hopping motion that would’ve been comical under different circumstances then began searching for his boots.

  Seth turned away from the door helplessly. “I don’t—I don’t know.”

  “There must be something wrong.”

  The more Seth’s mind cleared and distanced itself from sleep the more he felt Louis was right, something was terribly wrong. Raymond had never been up here and was completely unfamiliar with the area. To make matters worse, none of them were experienced outdoorsman. Louis was the only one who camped on a regular basis and had any idea about the wilderness—but even his knowledge was limited. At the end of the day he was a city boy like the rest of them. Add to the mix an unexpected snowstorm of near-blizzard proportions and the odds for disaster were high.

  “Wait a minute,” Louis said suddenly. “Christy’s gone too.”

  The remainder of that late afternoon and early evening had been awkward but uneventful. There had been little conversation with Christy, who spent most of the time sleeping and had only come awake once to eat some stew. Later that night they built a fire and eventually turned in. Of the three available beds, Christy occupied one and the other two they had flipped a coin for. Seth and Louis won so Darian and Raymond were relegated to sleeping bags.

  But even now that all seemed foggy and indistinct to Seth, like just beyond the periphery of his memory there existed things he should have remembered, needed to remember, but couldn’t. None of it seemed authentic anymore. Were they really memories or only dreams?

  At some earlier point in the evening, Seth remembered awakening to find Raymond in a chair near the fireplace, staring at the flames. As agreed, he had taken the first shift to stay awake and keep an eye on Christy.

  “Ray,” he whispered, “you OK?”

  He offered a slight nod.

  “I’ll take the next shift. You take the bed, OK? When I’m done I can use the sleeping bag, it’s not a big deal.”

  “It’s OK. Wanted to watch the fire a while anyway. Not real sleepy.”

  He looked over at the bed where Christy lay sound asleep. “You’re sure you’re OK?”

  “Too much to drink, that’s all.” Raymond held up a bottle of Jack Daniels and gave a feeble smile. He’d been drinking a lot that evening, the bottle was nearly empty. “Go ahead and get some more sleep, I’m cool.”

  That too seemed so long ago now, Seth thought, so distant and blurred, as if it had taken place years before rather than only a few hours.

  Darian came awake while Seth and Louis were dressing but remained in his sleeping bag, shivering. “What’s the matter—what—what’s happening?” He fumbled for his eyeglasses, found them and pulled them on. “It’s like a walk-in freezer in here.”

  “Ray went outside,” Louis told him. “Christy’s gone too.”

  “What? Why?”

  Rather than answer, Seth pulled on his jacket and followed Louis over to the open doorway. He kicked at the snow that had accumulated in the threshold then leaned out into the night. An endless sea of flakes swirled about and mixed with a thick darkness, making visibility less than a few yards.

  “Can’t see any tracks but the snow’s coming down so fast it’d only take a couple minutes to cover them anyway.” Louis cupped a hand on either side of his mouth and shouted into the darkness. “Ray! Hey, Ray!” His voice echoed through the nearby trees, swallowed by the soft bay of the wind.

  “What would possess them to go outside?” Darian asked from behind them.

  “I knew we shouldn’t have trusted that bitch.” Louis turned to Seth. “Get the rifle. We’re not going out there in the middle of the night without it.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. There’s a near blizzard going on.”

  “Just get the rifle, it’s in the closet.”

  “That’s my brother out there, Louis. We need to find him. Now. Right now!”

  Louis stared at him, his face tense in the dim light. “Then get the fucking rifle.”

  After a moment, Seth nodded and did as Louis had asked.

  Still inside his sleeping bag, Darian struggled to his feet and somehow maintained his balance as he hopped over to them. “Be careful. Don’t go too far.”

  Louis and Seth stepped out into the night.

  The snow was deeper than it initially appeared, and they found themselves sinking down into it a bit as they pushed on through the curtains of flakes. Draped in white, the silhouette of Louis’s SUV came into view alongside the cabin. Seth pulled his jacket in tighter around him and squinted through the storm to the nearby forest. The dirt road that eventually led to the state highway was lost in the accumulation, and it took him a moment to gain his bearings and figure out where he was. He couldn’
t imagine anyone lasting long out here, and Raymond had been drinking all day and hadn’t slept since the night before, which only made matters worse. Visions of his little brother—slumped against a tree somewhere beyond their scope of vision, disoriented and in shock, succumbing to frostbite and letting sleep take him—flashed across his mind’s eye.

  “Ray!” he called. “Raymond!”

  Louis continued on a few paces in front of him, crouched forward with the rifle out in front of him like a soldier on patrol. Despite the severity of the situation Seth couldn’t help but notice how absurd he looked, like some child playing war games. Louis hesitated and looked in both directions.

  Seth glanced behind them, glad to see the cabin and Darian in the doorway through the haze of snow.

  “You see anything?” Louis yelled.

  “Nothing!”

  “I’m gonna circle the cabin. You stay close behind me, OK? Right on my ass.”

  In single file, they clomped through the snow, along the side of the Explorer and to the rear of the cabin. There was nothing back there but more forest and a small storage shed. They hadn’t seen a single track, no sign of Raymond or Christy whatsoever. The wind picked up, howling and ripping through them, and Seth shivered uncontrollably, tucked chin against chest and forced himself forward. Where the hell are you, Ray? What’s happened to you?

  Memories of their childhood came to him then, images blinking through his mind of Raymond playing and laughing, his smiling face, young and innocent and full of joy. So long ago, he thought, so very long ago.

  If something’s happened, if she’s done something to him, I’ll never forgive myself.

  Despite the fact that his hands were stuffed in his coat pockets, by the time he and Louis checked the shed and reached the front of the cabin again, Seth had lost most of the feeling in his fingers. His nose was running and his eyes were watering so severely they hurt. Raymond, for God’s sake, where have you gone?

  Louis squinted, looking deep into the night in an attempt to see anything beyond their small encampment, but in the darkness and snow neither he nor Seth could make anything out. “If he had one of the flashlights with him I think we might be able to see a trace of it!” he called out.