by R. H. Dixon
‘Maybe I’ll tell you the rest some other time,’ Uncle Dean said at last.
‘Can’t you now?’ Sarah Jane said, hopefully, her hands relaxing a little. ‘She won’t hear. And I won’t tell.’
Uncle Dean laughed and nodded. His blue eye shone. ‘You’re funny, kid.’ But he turned and left, taking with him the knowledge of Whispering Woods.
The girls stayed in their room to unpack and Pollyanna drew the curtains against the woods, even though day hadn’t yet faded to dark. Sarah Jane removed clothes and toiletries from her holdall as loudly as she could, the room absorbing her bad mood. Less than an hour later everyone was eating tuna-topped baked potatoes at the dining table in the kitchen and there was no further talk of death or mutilation. Not even the merest mention of Whispering Woods. Afterwards, once the plates had been washed and cleared away, they all watched television in the lounge: Roxanne Miller on the couch with the two girls and Uncle Dean in a shabby, leather armchair on his own. Every now and then Sarah Jane caught the adults exchanging glances, glances that made her toes curl under and temples pulsate.
Just after ten Uncle Dean brought a bottle of Malbec from the kitchen and Roxanne Miller ordered Sarah Jane and Pollyanna to bed. They went begrudgingly but without argument.
‘Do you think Uncle Dean’s story was true?’ Pollyanna said, once she and Sarah Jane were settled into their individual night-soaked cocoons of duck down, listening to the soft, rhythmic sound of the night’s first rain. She’d taken the bed by the door, leaving Sarah Jane with the one by the window – the one closest to Whispering Woods.
‘You’re such an idiot, Poll.’ Sarah Jane was staring at the ceiling above the door. Greyness and shadows decorated the walls and furniture, and the smell of the woods was right there with them: a natural but indefinable smell that made her think of foliage decomposing on top of damp soil, under which scores of earwigs, woodlice and worms crawled, scurried and slithered. ‘Course it wasn’t true.’ And yet Sarah Jane had mindfully turned her back to the window, wary of the ghosts that might be breathing against the glass pane.
Since Uncle Dean had spoken of Whispering Woods earlier she imagined he had roused its victims from any ill-begotten slumber, bringing their torment back to life with his, the storyteller’s, second-hand words. And now disturbed, she thought it likely that they would want to get inside the cabin to bring their stories even closer. To whisper in her ear, in their own words, about the madness they’d suffered. They might even want to climb inside and make her…
A burst of exaggerated laughter made its way to the girls’ room. Anger immediately took over where fear left off. Sarah Jane scrunched her eyes shut and lay rigid, squeezing her hands closed so her fingernails bit into her palms.
‘Something must be funny out there,’ Pollyanna thought to say.
Sarah Jane’s fists clenched even tighter; she didn’t want to think about it. Tried to think of something, anything, else but couldn’t help imagining her mother, right now, touching Uncle Dean’s arm and smiling that infuriating smile. When she didn’t say anything in response to her cousin’s observation and a heavy, brooding silence had stretched out too far, Pollyanna said, ‘I wish this place was mine.’
Sarah Jane clicked her tongue in disdain. ‘Liar, you’re too much of a scaredy cat to live here.’
‘Am not. You said yourself that Uncle Dean’s story was just made up.’
‘Even so, you wouldn’t dare stay here alone.’
‘Yes I would. Easy peasy. And I’d never want to leave.’
‘Careful what you wish for, Rapunzel.’
‘Don’t be such a mong.’
‘Shut up, tit head!’
‘Make me, ginger nut.’
‘Ha! Says you!’
‘Dick-splat!’
Both girls then fell into fits of laughter and soon Sarah Jane was wiping her eyes and groaning because her belly ached. ‘I’m pleased you came, Poll.’
‘Me too,’ Pollyanna said, her words hiccupped with a lingering giggle. ‘What do you think we’ll do tomorrow?’
‘Not sure.’
‘Reckon Uncle Dean will show us the sights?’
‘Dunno.’ Sarah Jane became gravely serious in an instant.
Oblivious to her cousin’s sudden mood-dip, Pollyanna asked, ‘Do you think he has a boat for the lake?’
‘Dunno.’
‘He must do though, mustn’t he?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Cor, you don’t know much do you? What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Yes there is.’ Pollyanna sat up, her duvet crinkling noisily. ‘What is it? Tell me.’
‘Nothing,’ Sarah Jane said. ‘Just leave me alone and go to sleep.’
A few moments passed before Pollyanna guessed, ‘It’s him, isn’t it?’
‘Who?’
‘Uncle Dean.’
‘What about him?’
‘You’re acting all funny because of Uncle Dean.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘You fancy him.’
‘No I don’t!’
‘Yes you do. You’ve been staring at him all day.’
‘Haven’t.’
‘Have.’
‘Shut your stupid face.’
Pollyanna laughed. ‘Ha! I can’t believe you fancy Aunt Roxanne’s boyfriend.’
‘I said shut it!’ Sarah Jane’s head was suddenly pounding and she could feel hot blood swelling behind her eyes.
‘Else what?’
‘I’ll kill you.’ Sarah Jane rolled over so that her back was turned to her cousin. So that she now faced the window-wall that stood between her and the ghosts of Whispering Woods. ‘And he’s not her boyfriend.’
Pollyanna laughed again. ‘What would you call him then? Her special friend?’
When Sarah Jane failed to reply Pollyanna eventually lay down again, but Sarah Jane could tell she was grinning; her cousin’s smugness was as thick as the darkness that seeped from the woods and encapsulated the cabin. She felt ill with anger. It wasn’t long before the ensuing silence between the two girls was disturbed by another peal of over-the-top laughter from elsewhere in the cabin. Sarah Jane ground her teeth together so hard her face ached and she made a low grunting sound; a sound that escaped before she could stop it.
Pollyanna sniggered and whispered, ‘Sarah Jane and Dean, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.’
‘Fuck off, Poll,’ Sarah Jane said, no longer caring how loudly she spoke.
‘Eee, I’m telling.’
‘I don’t fucking care!’
‘You will when Aunt Roxanne belts you one.’
‘You’re so dead.’
‘Not.’
‘Are.’
‘Yeah well, I hope Aunt Roxanne is snogging Uncle Dean’s face off right now. It’d serve you right.’
‘Well I hope you have horrible dreams about Whispering Woods, ones you never wake up from.’
‘Well I hope those two ravens come and peck your eyes out while you’re asleep and then when you wake up and can’t see I hope Old Mally Murgatroyd sticks you with his knife.’
Sarah Jane held her breath, determined not to respond anymore. If she did she knew she’d lose it. Eventually she fell into an angry sleep and dreamt of dark spaces and black shapes and never-ending shadows in a labyrinth of woods, which tried to entangle her. Trees scraped her skin, puncturing and burrowing, their branches trying to fill her arteries. Night slithered all around her and over her, with reptile sleekness, and she could smell something familiar, something that urged her to continue further on into the woods, thicker and deeper, where the smell, she knew, would be stronger. There was a distant murmuring. Whispering. She could hear her name being called. Over and over. Again and again. And she knew then what it was, that smell. It was him. The clean tang of Uncle Dean blended with the life and death of Whispering Woods.
When she aw
oke it was still night time. Something had disturbed her, but she didn’t know what. She sat up and looked into the crushed-velvet darkness, her heart hammering. ‘Poll?’
Gentle snoring suggested her cousin was sleeping, so Sarah Jane eased out of bed. As she did, the room lit up white-blue; an electric blaze through the thin fabric that covered the window. Seconds later deep, resonant thunder rumbled overhead and underfoot. Sarah Jane stood still, allowing her eyes to adjust to the dark, which settled back into place like heavy curtains. When Pollyanna still didn’t stir, Sarah Jane snuck from the room and crept down the corridor towards the lounge, listening all the while for signs that her mother and Uncle Dean were still up or the trees of Whispering Woods were uprooting and repositioning themselves so the cabin would be lost in their midst come morning.
In the lounge, rain lashed against the windows that overlooked the lake and another flash of lightning highlighted that the room was unoccupied. The last coals in the wood burner had died to a burgundy ember and two empty wine glasses sat side by side on the coffee table. Sarah Jane stood close to the window and put her hands on the cold pane; a flimsy transparency given all that might be out there, watching. The lake was a combined blackness with all of its surroundings, and only when lightning flashed could Sarah Jane see where it lay. For a fleeting moment she thought she saw a figure at the lip of the shore, to the far right, but when lightning flashed again she saw nothing. Wind screamed through slits in the wooden window surround and she imagined the tree at the side of the house, the raven-laden branches buffeting about and the ravens themselves huddled tight against the trunk. She also thought about the trees to the rear of the cabin. Whispering Woods. The place where the once majestic King of the Woods might have lived before his head was mounted onto Uncle Dean’s bedroom wall.
The night here, at this place, was horrific. So dark. Arcane. But it was excitement not fear that coursed through Sarah Jane’s veins. She found it impossible to feel overly afraid. Not because she was especially brave, but because Uncle Dean was upstairs. If Whispering Woods was to swallow the cabin whole, the fallen sergeant, her uncle by convenience, was there to protect them. He would know what to do. Probably knew all there was to know about Whispering Woods and much worse besides.
Sarah Jane cast a glance towards the wooden staircase and saw his bedroom door was ajar. She stood there bare-footed, imagining him. Reckoned if she was quiet enough she would be able to sneak upstairs and peak into his room. See him sleeping. Beneath the King of the Woods. Beneath maroon velvet. Before she knew it she was edging up the stairs. Quietly, softly. Her feet clammy on the wooden boards. Halfway up lightning flashed, illuminating everything in the lounge below. Then thunder raged. The sound of her heart. She stopped and leaned her back flat against the wall and breathed in deeply.
Almost there.
Sensing Uncle Dean close by, she responded to the invisible pull with which his strong presence reeled her in. Her heart hot and heavy, filling her veins with a ferociousness that made her feel lightheaded. On the landing now, her fingers touched the doorframe. She buzzed with anticipation. Angled her face to the gap. Looked into the war hero’s lair. And, at once, stopped breathing.
Uncle Dean wasn’t asleep. Nor was he lying in bed. He was standing in the middle of the room, naked. Light blonde hair hung loose to his broad shoulders and his body was a taut mass of muscle and war story braille. His pubic hair was the same dirty blonde as his beard and the sight of his penis made her face flash hot. Still, she couldn’t look away. Not even when lightning flashed and his body was imprinted onto her retinas, for her to take away, to savour. She should have left. Gone back to bed. But Uncle Dean, right now, in this moment, was the most hypnotic thing she’d ever seen. Imperfect perfection. A Norse god in an erotic oil painting. She couldn’t move.
Thunder followed; her heartbeat rapturous.
Then just as quickly, it perished.
Roxanne Miller stepped into view, equally as naked as Uncle Dean.
No.
No! No! No!
Her mother touched Uncle Dean’s bare chest, caressing scar tissue she had no business caressing, and stepped on some explosive device inside Sarah Jane’s head.
BOOM!
White heat filled Sarah Jane’s thoughts and she scrunched her fists and closed her eyes against the blast. She wished everyone in the world was dead, including herself, because this was too awful. Too hideous to contemplate. As powerless and defunct as the King of the Woods, she was nothing more than a silent spectator to what was happening in Uncle Dean’s room. Haunted eyes to watch and be ignored.
An ugly duckling.
No! Just no!
She felt the pull of Whispering Woods and stopped resisting it. Its menace wrapped around her like black wings in an instant and she allowed herself to be enveloped till she could barely breathe, till all of the darkness she could possibly know came rushing inside of her, filling all of the empty gaps and making her more whole than she thought she ever had been. Whispering Woods’ energy was a depraved, ravenous, almost touchable thing, and it channelled through her ferociously. She could hear its voice too. Not the blast of a thousand trees talking all at once, but one voice. Quiet. Whispering. Filling her head. Urging her to do things. Bad things. Things that would make her feel good. Like necking the beautiful swan and drinking its blood and eating its flesh and decorating Uncle Dean’s bed with its white bloodied feathers, sewing them onto the maroon throw. This internal, external rage continued to charge, building to an awful, debilitating crescendo, till eventually Sarah Jane saw nothing but red. So much red. Maroon all over everything.
4
Smiler woke early. No strange thing. The birds in the ash tree were caw-cawing their observation that the sun had come up again. As if one day they expected it might not.
Chance would be a fine thing.
There was a mob of about thirty of them lived there, at the side of the house. Smiler heard them all the time, especially when he was in his room, but mostly on some subconscious level. He went through to the lounge with a mug of black coffee and a packet of cigarettes, as he always did, to watch out the window for interesting weather. Or wildlife. Or anything. Anything at all. The last thing he expected to see was a black Bentley GT parked up on the front lawn.
Fuck me sideways!
Dropping his morning fix, he raced along the hallway to the front door. His breaths came out in excitable gasps and his hands trembled, fingers not doing exactly as he wanted, as he undid the door’s security bolts.
Someone’s come. Someone’s here!
He pulled the door open then ran outside, not caring that his feet were bare or that he was wearing nothing but underpants. Seven-day-worn underpants. Jumping from the top step of the veranda, he landed at the edge of the dewy lawn and breathed in the chill-fresh morning air. He stood still, his bare skin bristling, and saw that it was still there. The Bentley. A monstrous black thing in its surreal state of being there. Smiler hardly dared to move again in case it was a mirage and that by making any more quick movements he might provoke it to fade out of existence. Or disappear in a sudden mental blip. From this distance he couldn’t see anybody inside. He glanced about the garden for signs of a driver. When he saw none he chanced creeping forward. The car remained where it was and the birds in the ash tree cheered him on. Or laughed. He couldn’t quite decide. Either way, suspicion gnawed at his initial hopefulness and his guts began to churn because of another new detail he noticed only now: one of the Bentley’s rear lights was lying on the lawn and its misplacement looked wholly inappropriate. Like a pulled nail on a lady’s manicured hand. Still, he continued on. Stalking and creeping till he was at the rear end of the car. Peering in through the back windows, he saw that the black leather seats were empty. Something didn’t feel right. Something about the whole situation felt staged. Wrong. He was so tense with edginess, the muscles in his arms and neck ached. And there was something else. Even though the Bentley being
there and its detached rear light lying on the lawn seemed too intentionally odd, neither of those things worried him nearly as much as the number plate did: L0S 3R.
Was it a personal slant against him? Or an elaborate trap: the car set out to lure him into some other realm of hell?
Seriously, could things get any worse?
Soon find out.
He reached out, breathed in deep and popped the boot.
Inside was a plump blonde. Early thirties. Bound up. Her blue eyes implored him with a genuineness that only true terror could substantiate. Then she screamed. Well, tried to. A gag was bunched in her mouth, strapped in place with a length of red ribbon tied like a gift bow at the back of her head. Smiler almost did a scream of his own. He cast another quick glance around the garden and down by the lakeside, to make sure nobody was lurking behind bushes, watching him. But there was no one. Not that he could see. He reached down and tackled the gag away from the woman’s mouth and said, ‘Whoa, whoa, calm down. It’s okay.’
‘Okay?’ The woman’s eyes bulged. She began moving her jaw up and down, then swiped her tongue around her stale-red lips. ‘It most certainly is not okay.’
Smiler held his hands up and took a step back. ‘Alright, alright, chill. So it’s not okay. But, I mean, do you know who did this? Like, who brought you here?’
‘No. No I bloody don’t.’ Her eyes were glassy and if not for the anger that seemed to be counterbalancing her upset, Smiler reckoned she’d be a hysterical wreck.
‘Who are you?’ he asked, tugging on his bottom lip, unsure what else to say or do. He’d never found himself in this kind of situation before.
‘Who am I?’ she said, squirming about and managing to rise up onto her knees while looking him up and down. ‘Who the fuck are you?’