One of Us

by Craig DiLouie

  “Thank you for stopping by, Sheriff,” Willard said. “Anything we can do. You’ve got my vote in November.”

  “I thank ye for your time, Colonel, and your vote.”

  “You really think the kids are capable of this?” Gaines said. His face was no longer red but white as a sheet.

  “That’s just the thing,” Burton said. “We don’t know. So long.”

  The sheriff walked back out to the yard, eager to put this place in his rearview. He’d told Gaines he didn’t know if a creeper was capable of biting Bowie’s head off. The truth was he didn’t know anything about what the children could do. He didn’t even know what the children were. Prior experience meant nothing when living with demons out of mythology. Every day was new territory.

  A voice in the back of his mind told him this might not be just a problem with feral kids. He feared it might be a coming problem with all of them.

  Twenty-One

  Gaines rose from his chair. “Reggie’s waiting on me.”

  “Sit down, Mr. Gaines,” Willard said.

  He did as he was told.

  The principal stood and walked to the window. He put his hands in his pants pockets and looked out for a while. Gaines followed his gaze and spotted the old broken-down Ford that had been parked on the grass out there as long as he could remember.

  At last, the old man spoke: “Guess how many slave revolts succeeded during the days before the War Between the States. Take a wild guess off the top of your head.”

  “I’d have to say none, Colonel.”

  “Haves and have-nots make up the world, Mr. Gaines. Always and forever. Today, there is a new type of have-not. A type who has nothing at all, who barely even possesses a thin claim to humanity. I recognize you are no political philosopher, but I’m sure you know to whom I’m referring.”

  Gaines fidgeted in his chair, wondering if this was some kind of test. The principal had rarely spoken more than one or two sentences to him at a time before, even during all the hours they’d spent together in Discipline.

  “Why, you’re talking about the kids, sir.”

  “They are not slaves, not as we had in better times. As the children get older, however, they may see what normal people have and want it for themselves. Want what they can never get on account of their wretched condition.”

  “They get three squares a day and a roof over their heads,” Gaines said. “You’d think they’d be grateful for what our taxes give ’em.”

  “If they ever rebel in some organized fashion, they will be crushed.”

  “Yes, sir. Like a bug.”

  “But first, they will tear every faculty member they can find here to shreds.”

  “No, that’s—”

  Gaines stopped just in time. Nobody called Willard’s notions crazy to his face.

  The principal stared out the window. “Are you with the program, Mr. Gaines?”

  “Program, sir?”

  “I lost a good man in Ray Bowie. Reliable. I’m going to need you to step up.”

  “I’ll do as you say, Colonel.”

  “Mishaps happen,” Willard said. “Little accidents turn into terrible tragedies. Like young Tobias Freeman in Discipline. I need to know where you stand.”

  “I’m with the program, Colonel. You can count on me. Yes, sir.”

  “Very well. Run your crew up to the Albod farm. When you return, there will be a faculty meeting to review contingency plans.”

  Gaines left the principal’s office on shaky legs. The sheriff believed a creeper murdered Bowie. Not just murdered, but mutilated for some unknown end. When the sheriff left, Gaines expected Willard to smile and shake his head at such foolishness, but instead he pondered getting ready for some kind of uprising.

  His world suddenly looked a whole lot different.

  At least he knew where he stood with the Colonel. He hoped he’d put the man’s doubts to rest. He was with the program, any program the old man wanted. Just name it, and he was with it. The whole hog.

  His crew sat in the bed of the old Chevy the school assigned him for ag days. They turned their heads to eyeball him as he fumbled for his keys in his britches. He’d watched them grow up, these creepers. Ugly as sin, sure. Quirky and pathetic, yup. But dangerous, no, not ever.

  The threat of Discipline kept them in line. They were good boys. Domesticated, Bowie used to call them, but now Bowie was dead, his head shorn clean off, and Burton thought a creeper did it.

  A feral one, though, he reminded himself. Not a Home kid.

  Gaines wondered what separated a feral kid from a Home kid other than freedom. He realized he really didn’t understand their nature.

  “We’re late,” he told the kids. “Time to hit the road.”

  They didn’t answer, saving their energy for the long day ahead. George, Enoch, Edward, and Mary.

  “You know what,” he said. “You kids are all right.”

  The creepers glanced at each other in wonder but said nothing.

  “What I’m trying to say to you kids is I like you. I hope that goes both ways.”

  They nodded, their expressions unreadable. Just more blank stares.

  He thought, Ah, to hell with it. He thought about Ray Bowie, dead in a pond, his head chewed off by some monster.

  “Other times,” he added with anger fueled by a sudden rush of fear and loathing, “I think all y’all are demons out of Scripture.”

  “We ain’t demons, Mr. Gaines,” George said. “I know my Bible.”

  “What’d you say to me?”

  “The angels came down and laid with human women. Their union produced the giants. The heroes, men of renown. The Nephilim. Genesis, chapter four, verse six.”

  “You like working with the animals, George?”

  “That’s where Mr. Albod wants me. I don’t have a say in it.”

  “Well, you’re gonna be picking cotton the rest of your natural-born days, you don’t watch your mouth, boy.”

  George said nothing. Watching his mouth.

  “That’s right,” Gaines said. He got in the truck and slammed the door. Sat fuming. Yelled out the window, “Even the Devil can quote Scripture. And no more hanging out with normal kids, or I’ll write you up.”

  The truck coughed before settling into a steady rattle. Gaines drove to Albod’s farm like he always did Mondays. The farmer met him, as usual, and chewed him out for being late, as expected. Albod put George on the animals, Edward on the garden, Enoch and Mary out in the fields. The older Albod girls tramped out of the house with their dinner boxes and schoolbooks. Gaines paid them little heed today. He leaned against the truck, wishing he’d called in sick again. He felt like he’d caught a fever. His guts were rotten with worry.

  Then Sally rushed out of the house lugging her books.

  He mustered a warm smile. “Morning, Miss Sally.”

  She ignored him as she hurried past. His heart sank as he watched her go. After a while, he made up his mind and got back in his truck. When he twisted the key, the engine gave an asthmatic bark and died.

  “For land’s sake.” He twisted the key again. “Come on, girl.”

  The truck trembled and wheezed before growling back to life. Gaines threw the transmission into gear and drove back toward the road. He passed Sally, parked, and watched her in his rearview. She stood in his dust cloud, hugging her books.

  He got out. “Morning, Miss Sally.”

  “Stay right there or I’ll scream.”

  “I ain’t gonna hurt you,” he said, baffled. “Did you hear about the murder?”

  “What murder?” said Sally.

  He told her everything he knew. “Sheriff said it were a creeper.”

  “I’m sorry your friend died.”

  “Ray? Hell. I’m worried about you.”

  “I’d be just fine if you’d let me be, Mr. Gaines.”

  “You been hanging around with Enoch alone. Taking those walks together. I don’t think you should do that no more.”

&n
bsp; “That ain’t up to you,” she said.

  “I’ll have a talk with your daddy about it today. When he hears about Ray getting killed, he’ll agree with me about what’s right for you.”

  Sally advanced on him so fast he took a step backward. His rump thudded against the tailgate. “You don’t get it. I’m friends with him so he can protect me while I walk around my own property after school. Protect me from you.”

  None of this made sense to him. “You don’t mean that.”

  “You think he’s just a dumb kid, but he’s got big claws, I seen ’em. Between them and his fangs, he’d rip you up into little pieces.”

  “Oh, Lord,” he said. If Sally thought the big bad wolf would ever be Little Red Riding Hood’s friend, she was sorely mistook.

  “I don’t like you, Mr. Gaines. Take a hint and let me be.”

  “I’m in love with you, Miss Sally.”

  He was. He saw that clear as day now.

  “Lord God,” she said. “Listen to yourself. You’re old enough to be my daddy. Your boy is in my grade, you pervert.”

  “Age don’t matter. I love you.”

  “I hate you.”

  “Now I know for a fact that ain’t true,” he said.

  “I hate your stupid face and stupid eye. You make me want to puke.”

  “Didn’t you hear me say I love you?”

  “I want you to let me be,” she yelled. “Get it through your thick skull.”

  “I’ll tell your daddy what you been up to,” he said. “I’ll tell him about how you been hanging around at night with creepers like the sheriff told me. How you came to the Home and led me on. How Enoch ain’t your pet, he’s your good friend.”

  “He is my friend,” she shot back. “Meaning I like him more than I like you. That’s right, a creeper is better than you, because he’s good inside while you’re the ugly one. And if you breathe one word to Daddy, I’ll tell him all about everything you done. He’ll mount your head on the wall next to his ten-point buck. Or maybe I’ll tell Enoch how you been misbehaving and see what he does to your head.”

  Sally stormed past him. He said nothing. He just stared at the ground trying to make sense of what had just happened, confused how he’d gotten things all wrong. Wondering how again he’d missed the angle and in such a big way this time.

  “You like the creepers, do you?” he howled after her.

  She ignored him and kept on walking.

  Choking back tears, he shook his fist. “You want to make a monster baby?”

  Gaines watched her go until she’d dwindled along with his hopes.

  Dog’s nimble fingers plucked puffs of soft cotton from the bolls and stuffed them in the poke slung over his shoulder. In the next row, Mary picked her own with a blank expression on her face.

  “Darn, Mary,” he said. “Give me a chance, will you.”

  They were racing, and she was already edging ahead.

  She stopped cold and stared at him.

  “I was just kidding,” he told her.

  “Big Brother sad.”

  “No, no. You can win. I hope you do. Keep going.”

  Mary smiled and went back to work. Dog picked as fast as he could.

  Brain was right that times were hard, but Dog couldn’t control any of it. He found joy in the little things that made life worth living. Sunshine and friends, honest work with his hands. Miss Sally serving cold lemonade after they took a long stroll together under Pa Albod’s approving eye. Making Mary smile while having a race to make the time fly.

  “Weather teacher,” she said and pointed.

  Mr. Gaines marched across the yard and onto the cotton field. He tottered like a sleepwalker. A hawk spiraled in the sky behind him. Dog and Mary stopped working as he approached.

  Weather teacher. Some days sun, other days rain, sometimes a storm.

  “Hey, Enoch,” he said.

  “We’re doing fine, Mr. Gaines. Me and Mary is having ourselves a race.”

  “That’s good. That’s real good, Enoch.”

  “All right.”

  “I have a mind to do something,” Mr. Gaines said.

  “Sir?”

  “Go hunting next weekend. Take the boy out to shoot some quail in yonder woods, if Reggie will let me hunt on his land.”

  “That’s fine,” Dog said, feeling wary. Mr. Gaines’s empty stare made him nervous. He felt the claws in his fingers itch for release.

  “I seen you on all fours,” the teacher said. “You run real good that way.”

  “Miss Sally asked me to. I told her it’s not allowed. I’m real sorry—”

  “I was thinking you should come out with the boy and me.”

  “Sir?”

  “You might could help us out. Flush out the birds and round them up after we shoot them. We could have a cold supper together after. What do you say?”

  Dog didn’t know what to say. Mr. Gaines had been acting strange, blowing warm then cold. Calling them good kids one minute, demons the next. Dog liked the nice Mr. Gaines and wanted that man to like him, but the mean Mr. Gaines scared him. Right now, the teacher looked like both men at once, inviting Dog to supper with his dead face. His strange eye warm and simple, his good eye cold.

  Dog pulled a tuft of cotton and rammed it in his poke, his fingers acting on their own. “Sure, I might could do that.”

  “Fine if you don’t want to. I just thought you could help us out.”

  “Yeah,” Dog said.

  “And it might be fun for you, too. Your running on all fours could be our secret. But if you don’t want to come along, just say so.”

  He thought it over. Mr. Gaines wouldn’t hurt him, especially if he was helping the man out. Maybe he felt nervous because this was a new experience, like his walk with Sally. But like his walk, a normal thing. It was possible Mr. Gaines was acting strange because it was new for him, too.

  Maybe this was just part of growing up. Taking walks, hunting, and everything that grew from that. He’d wanted this. He’d put his hopes in it happening for as long as he could remember. He’d always seen himself reaching some magical age when he would gain the life he wanted, but his instincts knew the world didn’t work that way. The normals would never accept the plague kids just like that.

  It had to happen one bitty bit at a time. That’s how one made new friends. That’s how normals and plague kids would end up one day living together, everybody doing what they were special at doing.

  “I’d like that, Mr. Gaines,” he said. “I’d like that a lot.”

  The man’s dead face twisted into a wide smile. “That’s good. Real good. I’ll come get you tomorrow morning.”

  Brain made it sound like the future was already writ in stone, but Dog found it full of surprises. He smiled back at Mr. Gaines, marveling at God’s small gifts.

  Twenty-Two

  Linda Green had a monster of sorts inside her, a kind and loving thing. Mama’s little helper, and Lord, was he a thirsty boy. Sometimes it is only in the lack of something we discover how strong it is weaved into the fabric of the day. She’d have a finger of liquor in a glass to steady her nerves, one to brace her for a run down to the store. A finger to pamper after a long, hot bath, one or two to keep her company while she watched her soaps.

  You can get so used to a crutch it becomes a third leg.

  She lit another cigarette and gazed out the window, maintaining her vigil. The smoke hung in drifts in the dim room. The clock ticked on the mantle. Amy tossed and turned upstairs. Outside, the sun glared on the lush green world she’d forsaken for the comforting fog. Somebody would find the car. It was only a matter of time.

  Linda deserved a finger for what she’d done. Sticky blood clinging to everything. Copper smell so strong she could taste it, even with the windows rolled down. The long, fruitless search for a man’s head. Driving through the night with the corpse rolling around in the passenger seat with his pecker hanging out. Linda yelling, You got your just deserts, you son of a bitch. Watc
hing the taillights dwindle as the car rolled into the water and settled in the mud just halfway in. Frantic heaving at the bumper. The long walk home still ranting at the man who caused all this horror.

  Just a snort. A sip, even. She deserved it.

  Linda coughed into her fist, her version of laughing. That was how the Devil tempted you. With your own voice. Giving you what you wanted. Promising comfort. The stronger the voice, the more you wanted, the greater your need for comfort, the more the Devil got his grip on you. Knowing this had convinced her of the innate good in man that he worshipped a fatherly God who denied earthly cravings and answered prayers with guilt. Still, it amazed her even a single man remained a Christian. The Devil always said yes.

  A cloud of dust. Car coming.

  Not Jake Coombs this time, the preacher’s son courting her Amy, showing up at the door yesterday wringing his hands and asking about her health. Young love. So precious. Linda didn’t envy his youth, only his choices—all his biggest triumphs and mistakes still ahead of him. No germ in him. A handsome boy, gawky and earnest and in love. Linda knew she could teach him a thing or two about women. The Devil never stopped talking.

  A police car, the sun burning on its windshield.

  She cast a worried look at the stairs. Amy tossed and turned up in her room. Three days of missed school. Sheriff on his way. She had to get ready.

  Linda went to the desk where she paid her bills and rooted through the junk in the top drawer until she found her key. She unlocked the drawer underneath and pulled out the heavy .38 Smith & Wesson Special. After checking it was loaded, she stuck it between two cushions in the sofa where she watched her soaps in the long, empty afternoons.

  Then she took another look around. She’d cleaned up the morning after she’d disposed of the body and the car, scrubbing the house of anything that might be evidence. She’d messed it up again since. It wouldn’t do for the sheriff to walk in and say, Oh, hello, Linda, I see you was expecting company.

  She’d missed something while getting rid of the body. Or maybe somebody saw something. Whatever it was, it was important enough to lead Sheriff Burton all the way here like the bloodhound he was.