by John Brhel
“You girls are a real pain in his ass,” said Brandon.
“That’s about as much of the story as we know.”
“Yep. He seems harmless enough, though,” added
Cameron.
“He probably told you that his family preserved this
land for hundreds of years,” said Kait. “He’s full of shit.
Our mothers were the first white settlers north of the Fulton Chain settlements, decades before his ancestors arrived...”
Another woman pulled Kait away from the small semi-
circle that had formed before she could finish her thought.
“He’d hate that you guys were over here,” stated Rebekka.
“You can stay as long as you’d like—even overnight.” She
winked at Cameron and returned to her friends.
The night went on and the women continued to dance
around the fire, largely ignoring the men. A few of them
got close enough to Brandon and Cameron that the two
friends could feel the sweat dripping off the women’s
bodies. Brandon and Cameron laughed at their luck and
thought about Seth sitting back at the house all alone,
scared off by his uncle’s kooky stories. Sure, these women were odd, but they had met plenty of strange hippie girls at college and didn’t think there was much danger in drinking and dancing with what were attractive women.
It was around 2 a.m., and the guys were having an
unbelievable night, when the women began chanting loudly.
Brandon and Cameron sat stunned as the women removed
the rest of their clothing and drew a circle around the fire.
“Holy shit,” said Brandon. “It’s about to get real.”
But Cameron wasn’t laughing. The incessant chanting
and the surreality of the situation alarmed him. He thought of Mr. Beasley’s claims, of the poisoned caretaker, as he
looked at the bottom of his cup. He was considering the
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CORPSE COLD: NEW AMERICAN FOLKLORE
possibility that they had been lured away from the safety
of the island, when he spotted one of the women’s legs lift from the ground. He stared intently at her feet to check
if she was standing on a platform, but there was nothing
beneath her; she appeared to be hovering. When he looked
around, all the other women were doing the same! He sat
in silence, dumbstruck, as the women rose several feet into the air, their chants now coalescing into a single unnerving voice. The fire reflected off the whites of the women’s
twitching eyes, which had rolled back into their heads.
Cameron looked over at Brandon, who seemed oddly
entranced by the specter of the levitating women. He tossed a pebble in Brandon’s direction to get his attention. The
two men locked eyes and, without saying a word, sprung
to their feet and hurried toward the shore. They weren’t
twenty feet from the fire when they heard Rebekka yell,
“They’re leaving!” the timbre of her voice now masculine,
unfamiliar.
Cameron and Brandon launched the rowboat and
dashed out onto the lake. They rowed furiously as they made their mad escape back to the island. And as they propelled the craft through the inky water which merged with the
surrounding darkness of an overcast night, Rebekka and
the others called out to them, yelling something about
magick, pleading with them to return to their shore.
Both men were exhausted by the time they reached
the island. Their arms were heavy and their heads were
throbbing. They scrambled out of the boat and hurried to
the house. To their relief, Seth and his uncle were outside, standing on the porch.
“Seth! Mr. Beasley! You were right!” said Cameron,
running up the steps.
“I told you to stay away from them!” shouted Albert.
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mOSS LAkE ISLAND
“We told you!” added Seth.
“Now you’ve endangered us,” said Albert, scowling at
the two visitors. “Those women want to destroy what I’ve
built. They’ve been here before and I’m sure they’ll be
back.”
Suddenly, the porch light went out and the men were
left in near darkness.
“Not again,” said Albert.
Brandon and Cameron were both shaken by the time
the lights flickered back on.
“It’s them,” said Albert, looking across the water. “The
generator kicked on, but it’ll only last so long. I don’t have enough fuel to last the night. Seth, you’ll need to go into town and get some diesel.” He tossed him the car keys and
Seth headed for the motorboat.
“You guys, follow me,” said Albert.
“Can’t we go with Seth?” asked Cameron.
Albert leered at him. “No. Come with me.” He had
them follow him to the side of the lodge, where he opened
two wide doors and led them into the basement. He turned
on the lights, illuminating the dank space, and Brandon
and Cameron could see that the room was set up less like
a basement than a doomsday shelter. The walls and floor
were a thick cement, and large racks occupied much of the
space, foodstuffs of all sorts lining the shelves.
“I want you two to stay put while I deal with this,” said
Albert. They were both disturbed when Albert retrieved a
shotgun from a nearby cabinet. But he paid them no mind
and hurried back up the steps, locking the doors behind
him.
“What are we going to do?” said Brandon, unsure of
what was transpiring, and considering the presumed threat
of the women, and a man, whom they had only just met,
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CORPSE COLD: NEW AMERICAN FOLKLORE
with a firearm.
“I don’t know. He’s a fucking nut,” said Cameron.
“We’ve got to get out of here.”
Under the dim light of a bare bulb, they searched for
another way out of the basement, inspecting each of the
walls, shifting boxes and shelves around. There appeared
to be no way up to the house itself. Outside they could hear something heavy being dragged through the sand.
Forty minutes of a controlled panic had passed in that
basement, when the two young men heard a rustling outside
the door.
“Dude, we hit him, get that rowboat by the dock, and
get back to town,” whispered Cameron. Brandon nodded.
They grabbed what they could to arm themselves—a
thick broom handle for Brandon and a hammer for
Cameron. The doors creaked open and they waited in the
dark, at ready.
“Guys, you down there?” asked Seth, as he stepped
into the basement.
Cameron and Brandon relaxed. “Jesus. Where have
you been? Your uncle’s gone crazy. He locked us down
here.”
“Huh?” said Seth, who was holding a fuel container.
“Quit messing around. You guys have no idea how serious this is.”
“He’s walking around with a shotgun. He locked us in
here. We’re not fucking around.”
Seth paused, looking at the makeshift weapons in his
friends’ hands. “Okay, let’s go.”
They followed Seth back outside. Brandon and
Cameron were about to make a run for the canoe, when
Albert appeared from behind a service shed,
his shotgun
aimed squarely at them.
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mOSS LAkE ISLAND
“I told you to stay put!” Albert barked.
Cameron froze, holding up his hands. “Sir, we just
want to get out of here.”
“We didn’t mean to cause any trouble. Please, just let
us go,” said Brandon.
Albert shook his head. “No, no. I can’t have that.
You’re too important.”
“What are you talking about?” said Cameron. He
turned to Seth. “Tell him to let us go, man. C’mon!”
Seth walked over to his uncle and handed him the fuel
container. “He’s right, guys.”
Brandon and Cameron stared at their friend in
disbelief. They ran, but Albert cocked his shotgun and
screamed: “Don’t fucking move!”
It wasn’t long before the Beasley men had tied Brandon and Cameron to stakes in the ground, which Albert had been
preparing on the shore facing the witches’ camp. The two
young men cried and struggled against the ropes, cursing,
then pleading with, their captors, as Albert took the fuel which Seth had retrieved, and poured it on the firewood
bundled around their legs.
“Why, Seth?!” screamed Cameron, struggling to free
himself from the tight ropes around his torso.
Seth remained silent, his head bowed.
Albert approached Cameron. “You don’t know what
those witches are capable of. We must do this. It’s the
only way to preserve our family’s land. The Beasleys have
practiced here since the early 19th century.”
Both friends called out for help as Albert removed a
matchbook from his shirt pocket and lit a single match. The old man tossed it at Cameron’s woodpile and backed away.
Flames shot up, engulfing the fuel-drenched young man.
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mOSS LAkE ISLAND
His agonized screams were drowned by the roar of the fire.
Albert recited an incantation, his hands held in defense
of the island. Brandon groaned, resigned to his fate, as he watched the fire consume his friend. He could feel the heat radiating off the burning man’s body.
Albert turned and handed the matchbook to Seth. His
nephew’s hands trembled.
“You’ve got to hurry,” said Albert, looking out at the
lake. The witches from the nearby encampment had taken
their boats to the water and were making their way toward
the island, chanting. “They’ll be here in minutes.”
Brandon gave one last desperate cry as Seth struck the
match and tossed it upon the woodpile.
Seth and Albert turned their attention from Brandon’s
writhing, burning body back to the lake, where heavy wind
and rain were suddenly battering the water. The women
in their boats struggled as they fought against the harsh, choppy water and violent downpour. Some of their canoes
flipped, and those that weren’t capsized by the sudden
storm burst were forced to turn back.
The storm didn’t impact the island like it had the water
around it. Only a soft drizzle fell, extinguishing some of the red char remaining from the sacrifice. “Those were my
friends, Uncle Albert,” said Seth, staring at Brandon and
Cameron’s black corpses. “They treated me like a brother.”
“You did what the Beasley men have always done to
protect our birthright. It will get easier with time.”
When they were finished cleaning up the sacrificial
site, Albert and Seth retired to their rooms, comforted
that Moss Lake Island would be safeguarded for yet another season.
• 117 •
• XII •
IT THAT DECAYS
Jim Patrick tried to relax during his dental exam, but the severe pain made it hard for him to think of anything
else. It had begun as a dull toothache, only a few days prior, and Jim had delayed making an appointment with his
dentist, Dr. Godbere. But that morning, he was in such
agony that he had pleaded with the office receptionist to be seen immediately.
“Well, Jim, overall your teeth look great, as always.
There’s just a small cavity on one of your bottom third
molars,” said Dr. Godbere. “Christ, it’s rare that I come
across a full set of wisdom teeth that have as much room as yours. You’ve got great genes.”
Jim grabbed his cheek and sighed. “I’ve never had a
cavity before. I didn’t know it would hurt this much.”
“The amount of pain you’re experiencing is out of
the ordinary. But in the realm of teeth, gums, and nerves, nothing surprises me anymore,” said the dentist. “We’ll
drill it and fill it.”
“Go ahead and drill, Doc. I’d never thought I’d be
saying that to a dentist.” Jim smiled faintly as the dentist clapped him on the shoulder.
“I’ve known these teeth since the 90s. You’re in good
hands.”
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CORPSE COLD: NEW AMERICAN FOLKLORE
Godbere began preparing for the minor dental
procedure. Jim tried to distract himself with a daytime talk show on the exam room’s TV, but he was already beginning
to sweat. He was neurotic about his dental care, and was
disappointed in himself for having to undergo a procedure
that was fully preventable.
“Jim, I’m surprised you have a cavity. Has your diet
changed since the last time you were in?”
Jim threw up his hands. “That’s the thing, Doc—
I’ve been eating healthier! More fruits, smoothies, even
drinking this special kombucha—my son said it did wonders
for his gut flora.”
“Ah, I see. Fruits and juices are really acidic, eat at
the enamel—not to mention the sugar,” said Godbere.
“I’ve heard kombucha can really stain the teeth—and that it might be more hocus pocus than digestive aid. But we can
talk about your diet later.”
Godbere tested his drill; the whirring of the motor
made Jim cringe. The dentist then retrieved a long needle
from his assistant and prepared to inject Jim with some
Novocain. “You ready?”
Jim nodded, gripping the armrests on the dental chair.
“Then let’s get to work.”
Jim returned home later that morning, satisfied that he
had dealt with his tooth troubles. It wasn’t until the early afternoon that the Novocain wore off, and he again felt the dull ache in his jaw. Dr. Godbere had told Jim it might take a day or two for the pain to completely fade, and had given him a prescription for Percocet.
By the time Jim was ready for bed that evening, his pain
was on par with what he had experienced before visiting the dentist. Jim took the medicine, and still he barely slept
• 120 •
IT THAT DECAYS
that night. He called the dentist during his lunch break
the following day, as he had been forced to down multiple
painkillers just to get through the morning.
Dr. Godbere managed to get Jim in for a late-afternoon
appointment. “Jim, you look good. I can’t believe you’re still in pain—it really was just a surface cavity, which I normally wouldn’t even bother filling. We’ll do some x-rays and
figure this thing out.”
After the x-rays were taken, Godbere went over them
with Jim in the exa
m room. “Here. Here’s the filling we
just did,” said the dentist, as he pointed at the black-and-white film.
Jim followed along with the dentist, but he also noticed
another blemish further down the tooth, and pointed it
out. “Doc, what’s this dark blotch here?”
Godbere leaned over Jim to get a closer view of the
film. “It’s not a cavity, and it’s probably not on the tooth itself. You sometimes see this sort of thing with wisdom
teeth. They tend to pull up extra tissue, since they rarely have enough room to fully irrupt without disturbing the
canals. Wisdom teeth are what we call ‘vestigial structures.’
They serve no purpose; they’re evolutionary holdovers
from millions of years ago.” Godbere sat back and wrote
out a prescription. “I’m prescribing you a rinse that’s
meant to treat serious gingivitis. It should alleviate the gum pain itself—if this is a gum issue.”
Jim left the dentist’s office that evening feeling like he had received no real answers. He filled his new prescription, followed the rinse regimen, and popped a Percocet before
retiring for the night.
To say Jim woke in pain each morning following his visit
with Dr. Godbere would be an understatement. He was
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CORPSE COLD: NEW AMERICAN FOLKLORE
taking so many pills that he could barely function. He was a zombie at work and slept at all hours when he was at home.
Jim was worried about getting hooked on opioids—he had
heard the horror stories—and worse, his whole jaw ached
when he wasn’t loaded up with Percocet. He called around
until he could make an appointment with a new dentist
and get a second opinion on his condition. He no longer
trusted Godbere’s judgment.
“So, you say you’ve had a cavity filled and now your
jaw hurts?” asked Dr. Robinson, as he examined Jim at his
private practice.
“Just look at the x-ray I brought, Doc. I don’t think
Dr. Godbere got all of the cavity or something.”
Dr. Robinson picked up the film and looked it over
briefly before setting it down. “We can get the filling out and take a look, clean up anything that needs to be corrected.”
The dentist was all too eager to replace the filling and
collect an easy $800. He knew Godbere was an experienced
dentist and considered the possibility that he was dealing with a hypochondriac.