Grimm Reapings

by R. Patrick Gates

  "Now I've checked on your brother and he's going to be fine, so don't worry."

  Jen basked in his reassurances and was glad to give over all worry to this wonderful physician.

  Debbie left Jen's bedroom and stepped into the hall. A moment later, Steve Nailer followed, closing the bedroom door behind him.

  "Things are getting fucked up, Little Angel. This shit wasn't supposed to happen today. It isn't part of the plan," he said, his mellifluous voice fading, returning to its squeaky adolescent norm. "The bitch and your brother are becoming a pain in the ass. We've got to keep her safe and quiet until Samhain, but your brother, him we can do without. Better to do it now, one less to worry about later." He took Debbie in his arms, kissing her deeply. "Now, Angel," he said, holding her away at arm's length. "Where is the prick? Did any of my commands get through?"

  Debbie smiled sweetly at first, but it quickly degenerated into a leering grin. "I think so. He's taking a bath, trying to wash off his sins." She giggled.

  Steve smiled, reached out, and pinched her left breast hard enough to make her wince, but she never made a sound.

  "Good girl." He kissed Debbie again and walked away.

  She stood in the hall, watching him, rubbing her bruised breast, a lustful sneer curling her lip.

  His sister was right; though he had already showered only a couple of hours earlier that morning, and despite the obvious seriousness ofJen's condition, Jeremy Watson felt dirty from the touch of the redhead and his fear that Jen had seen them, and had an overwhelming compulsion to take a bath. He felt foggy headed again, too, and didn't like it. He vaguely hoped the bath would help clear his head. He eased into the water up to his chin before closing his eyes. He was soon in the midst of a prolonged self-argument trying to convince himself that Jen hadn't seen him in the barn with the redhead, but he knew otherwise. Why else her reaction in the bedroom just now?

  She knew. He had seen the revulsion and disgust in her eyes.

  A feeling of being watched came over him. He opened one eye and peered about. No one. He closed the eye and resumed his train of thought. A moment later, he opened his eyes to locate the soap and let out a short, startled yelp.

  The redhead stood naked in the bathroom doorway, holding Jeremy's blow-dryer in her hands.

  "What are you doing here? My God! You gave me quite a shock!"

  "Not yet," the redhead said, smiling, and plugged the dryer into the electric socket on the side of the medicine cabinet, near the tub.

  "You've got to get out of here, you've caused me enough trouble already. Wait a minute. What the hell are you doing?"

  "Sorry," the redhead said, turning the blow-dryer on high. She looked at Jeremy and smiled. "In your case it's better to be sorry than safe!" She let out a horrid, cackling laugh and tossed the blow-dryer into the tub.

  Virginya Hoar woke and sat up straight in bed. Her eyes were wide open though she still slept, dreaming of the boy with the witch inside him. She had been seeing the witch-boy in her dreams and visions often enough of late. Enough to become worried, not for herself, but for Aunt Chalice. Aunt Chalice still didn't know that she knew the witch-boy. Despite Virginya's repeated requests to her mother to call Chalice and warn her, her mother had ignored her.

  Virginya's body jerked on the bed. The dream became a vision, and fear blossomed in the sleeping girl. The witch-boy was on the prowl, moving through a vast old mansion that she realized, as she watched, was the witch's old house. The witch-boy moved with purpose, unaware of Virginya's spying. He moved along a corridor, paused outside a door, knocked, and went in.

  Virginya glided through the wall next to the door as easily as smoke passing through a screen window. The witch-boy was in a bathroom and not alone. There was a long-haired, bearded man in the bathtub. He looked shocked and a little scared. Virginya realized why when she looked at the witch-boy again-only the witch boy was gone, transformed into a tall, naked, voluptuous, beautiful redheaded woman.

  The witch is casting a spell, Ginny thought, her fear growing stronger. There was something in the witchboy-redhead's hand-a blow-dryer picked up from the vanity. Ginny knew something bad was about to happen, but she was unprepared for it nonetheless when it did.

  The witch-boy-redhead plugged the blow-dryer into the wall socket next to the medicine cabinet, turned it on, smiled, said something Ginny couldn't hear, and tossed it into the tub.

  The result was horrifying.

  Before that moment, if asked what she thought would be the worst way to die, Virginya Hoar probably would have said in a fire or by drowning. Forever after the vision she now witnessed, it would be electrocution.

  As soon as the dryer hit the water there was a crackling explosion of sparks from the appliance and a puff of thick black smoke. There was an initial small splash followed by several tumultuous ones causing water to slosh over the sides of the tub as the man in it convulsed with the voltage running through him. He half rose from the tub, as if to get out, then fell back with a greater splash. Water flowed over the sides of the tub onto the floor and the witch-boyredhead took a step back to avoid it.

  The man in the tub continued to convulse violently, his arms and head banging repeatedly on the porcelain. His eyes widened so much, Ginny thought his eyelids would rip right off if they opened any more. His orbs bulged from their sockets until she thought they would pop out. Blood ran from the man's nose and ears and the hair on his head and face stood on end and crackled. The display came to an abrupt end when there was a loud pop. Sparks flew from the wall socket, and the man in the tub stopped thrashing and splashing. He sank slowly under the surface of the water.

  On her bed, Virginya toppled over onto the covers and lay senseless, eyes staring at the ceiling. A moment later, her eyes rolled into her head, and she had a seizure, emitting repeated rasping groans while convulsing almost as severely as the man in the tub she had just watched in her head.

  Stella Hoar woke from her normal drug- and alcoholladen sleep the way she usually did, naked, feeling sick and on the verge of puking. She swung her legs out of bed and lurched up to a sitting position. She swayed in danger of falling to the floor, but righted herself and belched and farted at the same time.

  "Why're you makin' 'at noise?" she mumbled, slurring her words. She half turned to look at her boyfriend, Eddy, but he was lying on his back, mouth closed, breathing deeply and silently.

  What the fuck is that noise?

  The annoying sound brought a measure of clarity to her head and she listened carefully. It was a weird, wheezing, hiccupping groan with the same irritating quality as nails on a chalkboard. It was coming from somewhere else in the tiny apartment. Unsteady on her legs, she stood, shuffled, and staggered to the bedroom door where she pulled a ratty terry-cloth bathrobe from the doorknob and slipped it on, barely tying the front with the belt. She leaned heavily against the jamb, exhausted with the effort.

  The sound was louder, coming from the room next door. Virginya's room.

  "tinny?" Stella called. The noise continued and there was no answer from her daughter. Head tilted to one side, captivated by the sound, she went into Ginny's room, and froze, her breath expelling from her in a surprised gasp. Virginya was making the noise, lying upside down at the foot of her bed, her head hanging over the end, her entire body jerking convulsively, bloody foam bubbling from her grimacing mouth.

  Stella didn't know what to do. The only she thing she could think was that she had seen this before when a guy at one of her parties a few years ago had a bad reaction to some Ecstasy. Eddy must have given Ginny E! she summarized, jumping to the conclusion in an attempt to explain and find someone-other than herself-to blame for what was happening; she already had enough trouble with DSS.

  "Ginny!" Stella finally shouted, finding her voice. Her head exploded with the effort, giving her a hammer ing, hangover headache that staggered her with the wedge of pain it drove into the center of her brain.

  "Wuzza matta?" Eddy slurred, stumbling into Vi
rginya's room, stark naked and sporting morning wood. His unashamed-though not uncommonnudity, along with his erection, immediately suggested to Stella that, not only had Eddy given Ginny E, he must have molested her as well.

  "You fuckin' son-of-a-bitch pervert," she shrieked despite the explosion of pain yelling released in her head. At the same time, she kicked Eddy squarely in his exposed, naked balls. Her long toenails tore into the sensitive skin of his testicles a half second before her toes, and the rest of her foot, mashed his stones.

  He yelped like a stung dog and crumpled to the floor heavily, doubling over so rapidly and violently that his forehead was the first thing to strike the floor, rendering him unconscious. Meanwhile, on the bed, her daughter's conniptions slowed and she grew limp, slipping into a deep sleep. Stella stood over the naked Eddy, and kicked him. She stopped only long enough to put on her heavy leather construction boots, which were in the hall, before putting them to work kicking her lover repeatedly in the groin.

  Jackie and Chalice were just finishing a morning lovemaking session when the phone rang. They quickly did rock, paper, scissors, and Chalice's scissors lost to Jackie's rock. She immediately squirmed out from under Jackie and grabbed her jeans.

  "We really need a phone in here, or we need an answering machine," she said, rolling her eyes at him.

  He shrugged and waved it off. "The exercise won't kill you."

  Chalice shot him a smiling dirty look and gave him the finger before hurrying out to the living room to catch the phone. Jackie sat up, pulling the tousled sheet and blankets around his midsection. He got out of bed, wrapping the bed linens around him like a toga, and went over to the window. The sun was bright and hot over the distant breast-shaped hills. It was promising to be a sweltering Fourth of July. He thought of calling Jen and canceling going to the barbecue and heading for the beach instead, but that, he unfortunately knew, was something that he couldn't do, not after he had bailed at Memorial Day. Besides, Diane was coming back from her honeymoon today and he was going to get to meet her new hubby.

  The sky was a fierce summer blue with long spears of clouds turned blood-red by the morning sun. Red skies at night, sailors delight, he thought, remembering the meteorological mnemonic. "Red skies at morning, sailor take warning."

  "Sorry, babe, I can't go to your sister's barbecue. I've got to go home!" Chalice announced, startling him upon her return to the bedroom. She immediately went to the closet and pulled out a soft, vinyl suitcase. "Can you call the bus station for me and find out when the next bus for Waterville is?"

  "What's wrong?"

  "It's my niece. There's something wrong with her and my dumb-ass sister won't take her to the doctor."

  "I'll drive you," Jackie said.

  Chalice shook her head. "No. I can't ask you to do that. You're supposed to go to your sister's for the party, and your mother's supposed to come back today, remember?"

  "I can eat cold hot dogs and rancid potato salad tomorrow, when I go there to start my research. Besides, you're not asking, I'm offering. No, I'm insisting, and I won't take no for an answer."Jackie was adamant, and secretly glad for the excuse to put off going tojen's cookout; he expected it to be hot and boring, despite the return of his mother and the opportunity to meet her new husband-his new stepfather. That sounded weird.

  In less than twenty minutes, they were in Jackie's car heading west. On the way-a three-hour driveChalice talked randomly and openly concerning her sister, niece, and her fears for both.

  "It's not that my sister's a bad person," she explained further, telling Jackie that her sister had not taken Ginny to the hospital after she'd had a seizure earlier. Chalice had been furious with her on the phone, angrily insisting her sister take the girl to the emergency room right away, but Stella Hoar was very stubborn and more worried about getting in trouble than she was for her daughter. Chalice didn't tell Jackie that, but she was thinking it. "She's just never had a good role model. She was my mother's favorite, and she's just like my mother." She smiled ruefully. "And ... I think I've told you that my mother was a complete and utter bimbo, totally devoid of morals, ethics, and common sense."

  By 10:30 they reached the interstate exit for Waterville, New York. Chalice had talked herself out an hour earlier and sat fretting, her leg jiggling nervously the rest of the way. Jackie followed her hurried directions through empty summer holiday streets to their destination, a dilapidated two-story apartment house in a neighborhood of gutted buildings and houses that appeared to be one step away from being condemned. Chalice led him inside and up a stiflingly hot, narrow, claustrophobic hall/stairway that smelled of boiled cabbage and urine mixed with stale tobacco. At the second-floor apartment door, Chalice turned to Jackie.

  "I apologize in advance for anything my sister, or her boyfriend, might say or do," she said, smiling wanly.

  "Don't sweat it,"Jackie reassured her. She knocked, and knocked again a few moments later. She was about to knock a third time when the door flew open. An older, tougher, harder version of Chalice stood in the doorway, glaring at them.

  "I tol' you not to come! It's not that big a fuckin' deal! " She had an unusual way of talking out of the side of her mouth, like Popeye, that Jackie found mesmerizing.

  Chalice did not and pushed past her older sister. "It is a big fucking deal, stupid. Where is she?"

  Chalice's sister eyed Jackie balefully as she answered, "She's sleepin'. She's fine."

  Chalice continued inside, but her sister remained in the doorway, staring at Jackie.

  "Leave him alone and let him in!" Chalice called from within the apartment.

  Stella sucked her lip at Jackie, did an about-face, and went inside. A hesitant Jackie followed.

  The apartment was dark, the air pungent with a cloying mix of pot, old beer, garbage, and body odor. Everything had a dinginess to it that defied color. Gloom predominated. What little light there was from any windows was gray and heavy with dust. Taking it all in, Jackie followed Stella down a narrow hallway past two closed doors into the kitchen. Chalice was waiting for them. She put her leather shoulder bag on the back of a kitchen chair and faced her older sister. From her stance and look, Jackie would have guessed she were the older one, if he hadn't known better.

  "You should've taken her to the hospital, Stella. A seizure is nothing to fuck around with," she said crossly.

  "It wasn't no fuckin' seizure," Stella spat out of the side of her mouth.

  Chalice unconsciously copied one of her sister's favorite gestures when she held up her hand in a traffic cop's hand signal for stop. "I'm not fucking arguing with you. Where is she? I want to see her. I'm taking her to the hospital. Jackie, will you drive us?"

  "Uh, yeah," Jackie agreed, aware of Stella turning those glaring eyes on him again.

  "Is she in her room?" Chalice asked, not waiting for an answer. She started to cross the room to the hallway but stopped when her sister spoke again.

  "It wasn't a seizure. That piece of shit fucker Eddy gave her some E." She looked at the expression of horror on Chalice's face and couldn't meet her eyes when she added, "I think he molested her, too."

  Jackie couldn't take his eyes off Chalice. At her sister's news, her face grew tight, her jaw muscles flexing, her eyes taking on an intense light. Her high cheekbones seemed to reflect her rage, jutting angrily from her face. He had never seen her like this. She looked dangerous ... and sexy as hell.

  "Where is that motherfucker?" Chalice asked in a low growl that sent a chill down Jackie's back.

  Stella grinned and finally looked at her baby sister. "I beat the shit out of him and kicked him out." She smiled, remembering. "He won't be molestin' nobody any time soon." She looked at Jackie and her grin broadened to a smile, showing teeth brown with reefer resin. "I kicked him seventy-two times in the balls. With my boots on. I kept count."

  Chalice let out a grunt of disgust and left the kitchen, stepping into the hallway and entering the first room on the left. The shades were drawn, the room
in shadows. Her niece lay on the bed, apparently asleep, but as soon as the door clicked closed behind Chalice, Ginny's eyes popped open.

  "Auntie Chalice!" she shrieked, leaping from the bed and into her aunt's arms.

  "Hey! What's this? I thought you were sick. You been fakin' it?"

  Ginny smiled. "A little. I been tryin' to get Mom to call you for weeks, but she wouldn't. So's I figured-"

  "You figured you'd try for an Academy Award, baby girl? So, you're okay?"

  Ginny shrugged and nodded.

  "What about what that asshole, Eddy, did? Did he give ya any drugs? Did he hurt you?" Chalice asked. "It's okay, ya can tell me everything. He's gone and he won't be back."

  Virginya's face scrunched up in an expression of puzzlement. "No, he never gave me no drugs. Huh!He'd never do that! My mom's always complainin' that he hogs 'em all for himself. But he yells at me a lot and calls me names. Oh! And he's always kickin' me when I get under the table," Ginny offered.

  "He didn't do anything else?" Chalice asked.

  "Like what?"

  Chalice wasn't sure how to proceed and searched for the correct words.

  Ginny saved her. "Do you mean, did he sexually (she said sexyally) molest me?" she asked.

  Chalice was surprised. "How do ya know about that?"

  "Oh, they teach us in school about it so's if anyone even tried it we'll know what to do."

  "Wow! " Chalice said, thinking what they taught in first grade had certainly changed since her day. "So ... did he do that?" she added, aloud.

  "No!" Ginny said quickly. "Eww! I'd never let him do that!" Her adamant tone was convincing.

  "So what happened? Ya mom said ya was shakin' an' foamin' at the mouth. What was wrong with ya?" Chalice probed.

  tinny looked away. The images that had accosted her, frightening her so badly, were already fading and growing vague as her mind wrapped them in buffering forgetfulness. But the most important thing remained: the witch was doing bad things.