by Chris Neeley
"Oh, Lord," Seph breathed when he realized that he was looking into the eyes of a crazy woman.
She grinned at him. "Seph," she said, raising one pale hand toward him, reaching out.
Seph took a step backward. "W--what's wrong with you?"
"I have something to show you," she said. She started unwrapping the bundle that she held in her arms, the maniacal grin never leaving her face.
Seph's heart thumped. What was she doing here, so close to the house? My God, he could see the outline of the house and barn. They were that close. What was wrong with her? She looked like a hag. Tangled hair, wild eyes. And that crazy grin. She looked like someone had messed her up really bad. She's lost her mind, Seph told himself.
She had the bundle unwrapped and was holding something out to him.
His hands moved of their own volition and before his mind could register what he was doing, he was holding something that felt tiny and cold in his arms.
The crazy woman grinned, her teeth shining like fangs in the moonlight. She raised a finger, pointing at the thing in his hands. "Your babe. Babe Rose."
Seph looked down at the thing in his arms.
His heart ached with the sight of the tiny deformed thing that he held. He wanted to drop it, shove it back in her arms, run for the house, but his body refused to move. She was talking again, her voice eerie and distant sounding.
"...bury her. With a good stone. The name Mayhew across the top ..."
"Wait a minute," Seph said when he found his voice. "I'm not burying this child. This child isn't mine. Are you nuts, girl?" He tried to hand the babe back to her.
A breeze kicked up around them.
"You will take care of Babe Rose. You have to. If you don't give her your name, she will be damned," Anna said, clutching at Seph's shirt.
He shook her off and tried to put the child back in her arms. "This is not my child. I don't know what's happened to you and I don't think I--"
Anna's scream echoed through the trees. "She is your child."
"No," Seph said, backing away. He didn't know what she was capable of, but he had to get her to quiet down.
"Yes," Anna hissed, "she is yours. And if you don't do what's proper and right for her, Seph Mayhew, I'll curse your precious family. Mark my word and listen." The breeze picked up her tangled hair and whipped it around her head like a mass of coiling snakes ready to strike. "Do the right thing or I swear on my Momma's grave, your family won't live to see the trees go green in the spring!"
Seph stood, his arms still holding the child.
She glared at him. She touched the child once more, then raced off into the woods, her hair flying behind her, and disappeared.
Seph stood in the middle of the road, holding the stillborn child in his arms and felt his safe little world crumble down around him. The rain began again and Seph heard a bobcat wail at the coming storm somewhere in the woods.
He had no idea what he was going to do but one thing was certain.
His family would not, could not, know about this.
He would think of something.
Chapter Six
James could swear that he had heard voices and then a woman's scream. The wind was starting to blow wildly, threatening another storm. Had his ears been playing tricks on him? Had there been someone on the road? Rain started to splatter on the steps.
James moved out into the yard, his eyes searching the woods on the other side of the road. The encroaching storm clouds had covered the moon, cocooning the woods in darkness. The rain increased and drops fell hard onto James' shoulders. He squinted into the darkness looking for movement. The wind moaned in the eaves of the house.
James took three more steps across the yard, intent on going into the woods, when he heard an animal crash through the brush, followed by a bobcat's screech. It sent a shiver down his back.
A bobcat was nothing to mess with. Especially in the dark. James would be a fool to go into those woods with an angry cat about.
The rain was soaking him. He turned away from the woods and headed back to the house, satisfied that the noises he had heard had only been the wind in the eaves and a bobcat on the prowl.
He went in the screen door, removed his shoes, and went into the kitchen for a towel to dry himself up a bit.
He picked up the dishtowel that had covered the dishes in the dish drainer and wiped his face as he stood in front of the window overlooking the sink.
Where is Dad? James thought, running the towel roughly over his blond hair. He dropped the damp towel in the sink, then braced his hands on the edge of it. He stared out the window at the rain.
He missed Aunt Doll. She had been gone almost five years now. He wished that she was here to help him sort things out.
Aunt Doll had told him many things when he was young and he loved her dearly. He missed her often. Especially in the spring and summer. He practiced reading the signs that she had told him about. She had taught him the old southern ways. How to watch the caterpillar's coats to see if the winter would be a bad one, how to tell when the corn was ready to pick. She had taught him a lot. At first, he would tell his mother or his father when he saw a sign that something was going to happen. They would look at him funny and change the subject. He had been young and they hadn't taken him seriously. So he had practiced by himself, just to see how often the signs would read right. They were right more often than not.
James visited Aunt Doll's grave every chance that he got. She was buried in the town cemetery in Rockside. He tried to take care of her grave. He picked up trash around it and brought wild flowers. She had a small stone with her name and the dates of her birth and death and nothing else. James thought that she had deserved more than that but there was nothing that he could do about the headstone itself.
One day last year, James had found a beautiful stone down by the creek that ran at the back of their property. It was the right size and shape and had colors running all through it. Blacks and oranges, with a touch of red. He had run his hands over the stone. It was slick and smooth from the water running over it, polishing it. The stone seemed to speak to him. He worked it out of the creek bed, digging the mud out from under the edges with his fingers until it came loose enough that he could rock it back and forth. It came out of the mud much easier than he had thought it would. He had big plans for that stone.
He had brought it back to the house and cleaned the mud from it. Then, he had went to the town library and got a book about stone carving and read the book from cover to cover. He took his allowance and bought himself the right tools and started carving the stone, feeling his way through it.
It had taken him the better part of a month, but he finally finished it.
Out of the stone from the creek bed, James had carved a small kneeling angel with a bird sitting on its lap.
He had taken the angel to Aunt Doll's grave and placed it at the foot of her stone.
It had pleased him so much to do that, that he had made his mother a few small stone pieces for the front yard. He was getting better at it. It didn't take him near as long now, if he could find the right stone. He liked working with the tools and the stone, using his hands.
He felt like visiting Aunt Doll's grave right now, in the dark, in the storm. He knew that it was her voice that he had heard in his room. He hadn't doubted it for a second.
He wanted to know what she was trying to warn him about. He had seen two signs of death in the family. The bird in the house and the dog howling at the ground during the day time. He was worried. Two signs, then hearing Aunt Doll's voice on top of it. Something was going to happen for sure. He could feel it. A malevolent cloud crept into the house, surrounding him as he stood at the sink, staring at the rain running down the kitchen window.
Lightning flashed outside.
James frowned.
He shuffled over to the back door and pulled the curtain all the way to the side. He glimpsed a shape moving across the driveway in the quick flash of light and then i
t was gone. A ghost of his own reflection stared back at him from the dark glass of the window. He waited, hoping for lightning to flicker again.
It flashed finally, lighting up the whole front of the barn and driveway.
In the flashes of light, James saw a man, rain-soaked, wearing a cap pulled down low over his face. He was carrying something. The man was going in the direction of the barn.
Then, darkness closed in and thunder shook the house. The back door rattled in its frame.
A fist seized James' heart.
What the hell?
He waited, adrenaline starting to kick through his veins.
Lightning shattered the darkness again.
James saw the figure of the man duck through the barn door and go inside.
The man was in the barn. James hadn't seen his father's truck in the driveway, so he wasn't home yet. He couldn't wake his mother. He thought of Cliff. Maybe Cliff could go out with him and find out just what in the hell was going on around here.
That is, if Cliff would wake up.
James let the curtain drop, hoping that the man, whoever he was, hadn't seen him there at the window.
He waded through the darkness to the stairs and went up them, two at a time, keeping to the sides so they wouldn't creak. He got to the top of the stairs and listened. He could hear his heart beating in his ears. He went down the hall and stopped in front of Cliff's door.
Cliff was mumbling in his sleep.
James walked into the bedroom and felt for the post of Cliff's bed. He found it and worked his way to the head of the bed.
Cliff snorted and rolled over.
Cliff was almost fifteen, but he was built like their mother, on the small side. James figured if Cliff couldn't help him get this guy, at least he could run for help.
James reached out his hand and touched Cliff's shoulder. He gave it a shake.
Cliff moaned something and tried to turn away.
James shook him harder. "Cliff," he whispered.
"Hmm."
"Cliff, wake up." James shook him again. "I need some help."
"Okay, okay," Cliff said, throwing back the covers. "Why's it so dark?"
Thunder rumbled against the house.
"The power's out. Come on. Find some clothes."
"What do you mean 'find some clothes'? James, why did you wake me up?"
James whacked his brother on the shoulder. "Quiet down. Do you want to wake up the whole house?"
"All right, all right," Cliff said. James heard the bed creak. Cliff was sitting on the edge of it now. "I can't see a damn thing," he grumbled.
James waited impatiently while Cliff rummaged around on the floor, looking for something to wear.
"Come on ..."
"I'm coming. Geez," Cliff said.
James left the bedroom and went out into the hall. Cliff came up beside him a few seconds later. "Downstairs," James whispered.
He started down the stairs. Cliff came down behind him, sounding like an elephant.
"Cliff," James hissed between clenched teeth. Then, he continued down the stairs and went directly into the kitchen.
"Where are you?" Cliff whispered from the bottom of the stairs.
"In here," James answered.
James went back to the kitchen door and peeked through the window, holding the barest edge of the curtain back. All he could see was the rain and darkness.
"What are you looking for?" Cliff asked next to James' ear.
James jumped, the adrenaline feeding his bunched up muscles. He was wound tight as a spring.
"Someone's in the barn," he said, over his shoulder.
"How can you tell? You can't see a thing out there," Cliff said, peering over James' shoulder.
"You can, when the lightning flashes. I saw someone go in the barn. He was carrying something, too."
"Well, why didn't you get Dad up?" Cliff asked, leaning away from James.
"He's not home yet."
"Oh."
Cliff came back up close to James and stood beside him. "What do you think we should do?"
"We should go see who it is," James said.
***
Anna Caine let the storm thrash her, beat at her. It couldn't do her any harm.
She feared nothing now. Except maybe 'Mommadoll'.
She bounded through the woods, heading back to her shack. Branches and limbs grabbed at her clothes, ripping tiny pieces from them. The branches, whipping in the wind, caught her hair, threatening to pull it out. If the woods were trying to hold her back, it had better try harder because she had many things to do before the morning light and nothing was going to stop her.
She had to get back to the shack and get the book.
She'd get the book and bring it back with her to the log in the woods, across from Seph's house.
But first, she had to get to the shack. She wanted to get her hand mirror. She had to paint the mirror black, then read the spell from the book that told how to charge the mirror with the power. According to the book, she would be able to see things in the mirror after she had prepared it properly. Her Momma had had a mirror like that, Anna remembered. Her Momma would look in it to see what her Pa was doing. Momma liked to keep a close eye on Pa. Anna had asked her Momma what it was called, watching people in the mirror. Scrying, she had said.
Anna needed her own scrying mirror. She needed to see what kind of things Seph was doing. Things that she would need to know.
She placed her hand on a tree trunk, steadying herself so that she could straddle a big hunk of deadfall. Something latched onto her hand. Needle-like pains shot through it. Anna growled in anger, an animal herself, and jerked away. Whatever had her hand in its mouth didn't want to let go.
Anna fell backwards, landing full on her back across a rock that was lodged in the forest floor. The thing that had a hold on her hand came with her. She brought her other hand around and grabbed a handful of rough fur.
Something squealed, a raccoon she noted, now that she could see it close up, and the teeth that had been buried deep in the back of her hand released. Anna brought her uninjured hand up and closed it around the raccoon's throat. Her other hand followed and she squeezed. She could feel the raccoon's jaws working, the claws of its hind legs scraping at her forearms, trying to get her to release the pressure on its throat.
Anna started to laugh, softly at first, then louder, shouting out in her glee.
Suddenly, she stopped laughing.
She snapped the raccoon's neck.
***
Seph had stood in the road and listened to the girl, who obviously had no mind left what-so-ever, crash through the woods and disappear into the night.
He didn't know which way to turn. He felt like throwing up again, but there was nothing left in his stomach to bring up. He was lost in a world that had all of a sudden turned mad.
And the rain had started again.
He let it wash over him as he stood there in the middle of the road, holding the girl's still-born child.
He didn't know what to do. He couldn't call the cops. They would ask questions. He would have to tell them who the girl was and then, when they found her, she would tell them that he had been making visits to her shack. It wouldn't matter to them that she was crazy. Chloe would still find out. If Chloe found out...
Seph just wanted to crawl in the deepest hole the he could find and die.
Lightning flared, shining on the face of the child. Rain pounded its tiny face. Seph's heart broke. The child was deformed. Her nose was almost all the way over to one side of her face and one eye drooped almost an inch lower than the other one. Seph couldn't tell, and really didn't want to know, if the child's insides were as bad as what he could already see. He covered her face with his handkerchief, sorry that it wasn't a proper blanket. He wrapped the afghan tightly around her again.
Okay, he thought. He looked toward his house. The rain was really pouring, and he could barely make out the outline of it. Well, he told himself, I can'
t do anything about this right now.
He started walking toward home, holding the babe a little way away from him.
The child would have to be put in the barn for the night until he figured out what to do.
That was the only thing his weary mind could come up with.
He knew it was wrong. Hell, everything about the whole damn situation was wrong.
What was a man to do? The girl had tempted him and he had fallen. He couldn't change it now.
His work boots sloshed through the puddles in the driveway. His feet squished inside them.
Thank God, the power must be out, he thought when he saw that the light over the barn was dark. Knowing his luck, Chloe was probably up, pacing the house because of the storm. All because he wasn't home yet. At least with the light out, maybe she wouldn't see him go into the barn. He pulled his hat down lower and trudged up the driveway, water splashing up from the ground with every step he took.
Lightning flickered and Seph looked to the house. Had that curtain at the back door moved? he thought. No, he shook his head. His imagination was understandably over-active right now. That was probably it. He kept on walking.
Thunder came down around him. He felt it all through his bones. Lightning crackled again and the barn jumped out at him from the darkness, looking like a scene from a horror movie. He supposed that was about the right way for the barn to look, considering what he was doing.
He got to the barn and felt along the rough wood until he found the latch that held the small door closed. He opened it. Lightning flashed again and he slipped inside, closing the door behind him.
Now, he stood just inside the door and let the water drip from the bill of his cap. He needed a minute to think.
Where was he going to put the babe? He just needed a place to hide her until he could get away in the morning. What he would do then, he hadn't decided yet, but right now he had to find a place for her where no one would run onto her before he could do something about the situation.