“Hell yeah, baby!”
“We got dibs on this room,” Meat told Jenny and Saul. “So scram!”
Jenny shrugged in disbelief. “Please tell me you two aren’t going to actually make love in here.”
***
Jenny and Saul barely made it from the room before the door slammed shut behind them, farting a cloud of dust into the air.
“Jesus,” Jenny said. “They were like animals.”
“Sex makes people like that. ‘Cause it’s fun. Not that you would know.”
Jenny shot him a look, one that Saul was quite familiar with over the past month.
He figured he’d try another approach. “Ya know…” he said, smiling seductively. “There’s plenty of other rooms. I’m sure some with beds. We could finally lose that pesky virginity of yours right here in a haunted house. Wouldn’t that be cool?”
“No.”
“Than how ‘bout a blowjob?”
“I’m not dropping to my knees in this filthy place.”
“You won’t have to. I’ll find a chair to stand on.”
“Gee. How considerate.”
“Fine. Then how ‘bout a tuggie? Can’t you at least give me a handjob?”
“Nope.”
“C’mon. Five minutes is all I’m asking. If I’m not done by then, I’ll finish it myself.”
“How about you just start without me?”
“So what then? We’re just gonna wait out here while they have all the fun?”
“Yep.”
Animalistic grunts suddenly sounded from the other side of the bedroom door. Jenny looked around, trying to ignore them. Saul couldn’t help but smile. They heard Meat say, “Now, c’mon, babe. Bend over and show Daddy your fart-hole,” followed by Amanda’s giggles. Then the bedsprings squeaked—faster and faster.
Jenny threw her hands up. “That’s it. I’m going downstairs to look around.”
“Fine. Whatever. Have fun.”
She marched away, disappearing around the corner.
Saul glanced around the murky hallway and shuddered. Being alone in a place like this was not a good idea.
“Hey, wait. Don’t leave me,” he yelled, chasing after his girlfriend so she could keep him company.
***
Meat rolled off of Amanda, sending up a cloud of dust from the filthy bed. They both lay on their backs, fighting to catch their breath. Amanda cuddled up to him and traced her finger over his big belly.
“Good stuff?” she said.
“You know it, babe.” He kissed the top of her head and slid to the edge of the bed. “Gotta take a whiz.”
Amanda grabbed his arm. “You’re not leavin’ me all alone, are ya?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“Because I’m scared of Dookie Boy.”
“Oh, c’mon. I already told ya that old coot made him up. The guy’s probably homeless and crashes up here at night. So he came up with this Dookie Boy as some sort of boogeyman to keep people away.” He snatched his tightie-whities off the floor, stepped into them, and pulled them up. “There’s nothing to be scared of.”
“Tinkle over there.”
“What?”
She nodded to one of the corners. “Pee over there. Just don’t leave.”
Meat glanced over at the far corner where she was nodding. “Get outta here.” He stooped to kiss her and snatched up a flashlight. “Be right back,” he said, smacking her ass. “Don’t you go anywhere.”
Amanda giggled. Once Meat left the room, she rolled over, exposing her entire backside.
As Meat’s shadow disappeared down the hall to the right, a lumbering shadow approached from the left.
Trying to get comfortable, Amanda fluffed her pillow and coughed on the dust.
The floor creaked over her shoulder.
“Back so soon, sweetie?” she said, closing her eyes.
The mattress shifted behind her as someone crawled into the bed.
***
Jenny sat behind the desk in the small library next to the living room. Riffling through the dusty contents of its drawers, she hoped to find something in writing as proof of their exploration.
Saul was rolling a joint while stretched out on a chair in front of the desk. “Why don’t you forget about that and focus more on this?” He proudly displayed the blunt and fished for a lighter in his pocket.
“Saul, you know how I feel about you smoking marijuana cigarettes in front of me.”
“Sorry, babe. But firing this up might help numb the pain from the blue balls you gave me.”
Jenny bit her lip and returned to her search. That was it. Once they got home, she was going to break up with him. Thankfully, she’d only invested a month of her life with the idiot. Good thing her purity was still intact, having never lifted the embargo on the Spooge Trade with this stoner loser.
Saul fired up the joint, oblivious to the hulking figure creeping up behind him.
“Ya know,” he said, “you’re way too much of a goody-goody.”
Jenny kept her nose buried in a drawer, refusing to look at him.
“You’re a virgin. Don’t do drugs. Make straight A’s. Ya know, if this was some cheesy horror flick, where someone was running around killing us off one by one, you’d probably be the sole sur—”
A huge hand smacked the back of Saul’s head.
He screamed and almost fell from his chair. Jenny jumped in hers. Both were temporarily relieved that it was only Meat until they noticed his lack of attire. The beefy fellow was only wearing his briefs and tube socks.
Meat reached for the joint. “Don’t bogart it, man.”
“What are you doing down here?” Saul said.
Meat took a long drag. “Looking for the crapper.” He held up the joint. “But I guess I found another kind of pot, huh?”
Jenny rolled her eyes at the stupid stoner humor.
***
Nestling against the beefy body that spooned her, Amanda grabbed hold of the enormous hand cupping her breasts. She groaned, closed her eyes, and raised one of its fingers to her mouth.
“Guess you’re ready for round two, huh?” she said, sticking the grubby nub in her mouth to suck on it. She almost gagged. “Good God, Meat! How many times do I have to tell ya to wash your hands after ya go poo?”
“Clean…me…?” a child-like voice said, directly into her ear.
Amanda’s eyes widened in horror. That wasn’t her boyfriend’s voice. Meat could never speak in that high of a falsetto, even if his balls were caught in his zipper. She spun around and her jaw fell slack at the sight of the person behind her.
***
Amanda’s bloodcurdling scream echoed throughout the house.
Saul shrieked in response.
“Amanda!” Meat yelled. He and Jenny ran out of the library, sprinting toward the stairs.
Saul smashed out the joint on an end table. “Wait! Don’t leave me!”
***
With his bare belly and man boobs swinging like a pregnant go-go dancer, Meat burst through the bedroom door. Saul and Jenny rushed in behind him.
Amanda was gone.
All three scanned the dark room. “Amanda?” Jenny called out, her voice trembling.
Meat checked the floor on the other side of the bed. “Great. All our clothes are gone, too.” Walking back, his foot slid forward, almost causing him to do the splits. “SHIT!”
Jenny whipped her light at him. “What? What is it?”
Meat caught himself on the dresser. “Nothing. Just stepped in another pile of it.” Holding up his foot, his sock was smeared with excrement. “Dammit!”
Jenny gaped at the enormous dropping on the floor. “I don’t remember that being here. Do you?”
Peeling the soiled sock off his foot, Meat grimaced. “Nah, we would’ve smelled it. Wait a minute…” He held the sock up, dangling it in front of his face. “Is that…corn?”
“Poo-poo! Doo-doo!”
“Shut the hell up,” Meat snapped at S
aul, tossing the sock aside. “I know what it is, smart ass.”
Saul’s bulging eyes shifted back and forth. “I…I didn’t say anything,” he whispered. “It came from...” He pointed at the wall behind him.
Jenny and Meat stepped closer, inspecting the paisley-patterned wallpaper.
“I don’t see—whoa!” Meat lurched away from the bloodshot eye peering at him through a hole in the plaster. Jenny moved closer. Saul stayed planted.
“Hello? Is someone there?” Meat said.
The eye blinked.
“Who’s there?” Jenny said.
The eye suddenly disappeared and the hole sealed up from the other side.
“C’mon,” Meat said. “They’re right next door!” He ran out with Jenny following close behind.
As they passed Saul, he clawed for Jenny’s hand. “Wait! Don’t leave me!”
***
Meat kicked in the door with his socked foot. He and Jenny entered the darkness and waved their flashlights around. Saul slid behind them, peeking over their shoulders.
The room was bare. Windowless. Painted all black. A pile of plaster chips sat below a framed painting on the far wall. Jenny slid the frame aside, revealing the peep hole to next door.
Meat aimed his flashlight at something on the floor. “Amanda’s necklace,” he said, snatching up the silver chain with heart pendant.
“Looks like the clasp is still locked,” Jenny said. “Which means it was torn off her.”
“Oh, c’mon,” Saul said. “We don’t even know if it’s hers. It looks pretty common.”
“I gave it to her last Valentine’s Day. It’s hers.”
“Look.” Jenny pointed to a small door left slightly ajar in the corner of the room.
“My Ma’s got one of these in the back of her closet,” Meat whispered. “She used to use it for storage and shit.”
Jenny nodded. “My parents had one also. Only theirs was a passageway through the walls that me and my brother used to play in when we were little.”
Meat ripped the door open and blasted his light inside. Crouching down, he leaned in and looked around. “It’s a passage way, all right. And I bet we’ll find Amanda at the end of it.”
“You guys thinking what I’m thinking?” Jenny said.
Saul nodded. “Yeah, but we’ve gotta get our story straight. How about Amanda just ran away on us? Simple as that. Anything more complicated and we’re bound to slip up—”
“I’m not talking about leaving her here, you coward!”
Saul went to Meat for support. “C’mon, big guy. Ya wanna weigh in on this? Majority rules.”
“I love her, man. You know she’s my girl.” Meat shook his head. “Besides, the keys to the Firebird were in my pants. Wherever Amanda is, my pants are probably with her.”
“Fine,” Saul said, exhaling. “We’ll go look for your pants.” Glancing into the dark, cramped passageway, his face suddenly lit up. “Hold on a second. We don’t know if Amanda was even taken by whoever’s in this house, whether it’s this Dookie Boy or simply the old man from town playing a joke on us. Maybe she got freaked out by this whoever and took off. Just grabbed all your clothing and ran like hell outta the house. Ya know, back to the Firebird.”
Meat and Jenny weighed the possibility for a moment.
Then Jenny brushed it off. “Her necklace. It was in here, behind a locked door.”
“She’s right. We’re goin’ in,” Meat said, nodding to the crawlspace.
“Fine. You guys go, and I’ll check the Firebird.”
“I don’t think we should split up,” Jenny said. “Strength in numbers, right?”
“Look, I’ll run down real fast and check. If she’s there, I’ll blast the horn like crazy. If she isn’t, I’ll come back and catch up with you guys.”
“Hurry up, man,” Meat said.
“Sure thing. I’ll be right back,” Saul said, then ducked out of the room.
“You ready, Meat?”
“Yeah, just give me a second to psyche myself up. Being rather large, I ain’t too keen on tight places.” After handing Jenny his flashlight, Meat shoved Amanda’s necklace into his sock and pulled it up to his shin. He bounced his head from shoulder to shoulder, taking deep breaths, then hooked his thumbs in his underwear and snapped the elastic waist band.
“All right. Think I’m good.”
Jenny offered him the flashlight back.
“Woop. Wait, wait, wait.” His face scrunched up and he squeezed out a long, wet fart. He quickly cut it off with a tight clench of his ass cheeks. “Whoa! That was close,” he said, slightly scared. Taking his light back, he read her look of disgust. “What? I had to get it out. We’re gonna have to crawl in there and, with me leading the way, do you really want me ripping cheek flappers right in your face?”
Jenny didn’t know whether he was being crude or courteous.
Meat turned back to the crawlspace. “All right. Now let’s roll.”
***
Saul ran down the stairs, taking three at a time. He knew he wasn’t going to find Amanda at the car. She had to be somewhere in the house. But he wasn’t about to squeeze into some dark, dank crawlspace and search for her.
He skidded to a stop at the bottom of the stairs. “Ya gotta be kiddin’.”
The Firebird’s keys lay on the dusty floor.
Saul stood motionless, eyeballing the place and listening for anything strange. Was it a trap? Or had they simply fallen out of Meat’s pants when whoever stole them was rushing away? Whatever the case may be, once he got the keys, he was going to get the hell out of there. Amanda was probably dead, with Meat and Jenny about to be as good as. Since someone had to survive to tell the authorities what happened, Saul volunteered himself.
He stepped forward to snatch the keys. They slid across the floor away from him. Saul paused for a moment. In his haste, had he accidently kicked them?
He stooped again to grab them. And once again, they jumped forward…closer toward the closed drapes in the doorway.
Saul cursed his clumsiness for kicking them a second time, bent down, and snatched the ring up. Brushing at the dust bunnies and spider webs that clung to the keys, his eyes suddenly widened. That wasn’t any spider web…
It was a fishing line.
With his heart drumming in his chest, he visually followed the filament until it disappeared between the seams of the drawn drapery.
“Clean…meeeee…” someone whispered from the other side of the doorway, causing the curtains to slightly billow.
Saul’s scalp prickled and a ball of dread hardened in his belly. He took a step back, trying to be as stealthy as possible with his retreat. But a floorboard creaked under his weight.
Then…
The drapes ripped back.
Saul screamed as the hulking figure lunged at him.
***
“Did you hear something?” Meat said, frozen on all fours within the cramped crawlspace.
Jenny nodded at Meat’s plump ass staring her in the face. His butt crack was sweating and staining his white briefs with a vertical stripe. “Sounded like a scream,” she said, quickly turning away from the sight.
“Think it was Saul?”
“I hope not. But we did warn him. Come on. Keep moving.”
“Ya know,” Meat said, crawling again, “once we find Amanda and get the hell outta here, I’m gonna take her to Crofty’s Steakhouse and get us the biggest—”
His arms suddenly gave out and he fell, sliding forward. Jenny saw his upper body drop out of sight as if the floor had gobbled him up. She grabbed hold of his cankle, hoping to anchor him in place. But as Meat flew forward, his mighty mass yanked her up and over the lip of what was essentially an enormous dirt chute. They slid, tumbled, and rolled…
Then burst through a pair of swinging doors, dropping six feet onto a pile of filthy mattresses and linens. Sitting up, they glanced back at the double doors closing near the ceiling then looked around the candlelit room, winc
ing from the overwhelming stench—a nauseating trifecta of urine, feces, and body odor.
The large room appeared to be some sort of a subterranean hideout. It was windowless with long, mismatched planks of wood providing structural support to prevent the dirt walls from caving in. Tree roots hung between the various pieces of wood. All of the lumber was covered with illegible writing and crude, child-like drawings. One wall was practically hidden by a landslide of tattered stuffed animal toys.
Jenny scooted to the edge of the mattresses.
“Careful,” Meat said, pointing to the large piles of feces littering the floor.
As if maneuvering through a minefield, Jenny weaved around the droppings, moving toward the wooden object in the far corner of the room.
Meat peered at the wide array of empty bean cans next to the makeshift sleeping quarters. “The dude sure likes his fiber. No wonder there’s turds everywhere.”
“So it’s true…” Jenny nodded to the corner.
Meat climbed to his feet and came up behind her. Both stared at the rotting wooden structure that was once a baby’s crib. The word BOY was crudely scratched into the crib’s headboard.
“Boy?” Meat said. “That’s original, huh?”
Jenny gave the room the once over and felt a shudder race up her spine. “Dookie Boy’s real. He must be the offspring of the incestuous relationship between Hubei and Adele. That stockpile of beans is what they must have lived off of. Some of them probably taken from the cannery when Matthias first sold it and moved here.”
“What about all these stuffed animals?” Meat said. “How did he get so many when Hubei and Adele never even left the house?”
“Maybe Saul was on to something. About the townsfolk leaving a stuffed animal as an offering. I mean, the old man did mention that the town wanted to keep its dirty secret hidden. Maybe over the years, as long as they brought things here, such as beans and stuffed animals, Dookie Boy wouldn’t stray from the house to get them. He’d stay hidden. With this being his hideout.”
“Like some kid’s clubhouse?”
It Was a Dark and Stormy Night... Page 23