“I’s Della,” said the girl in the middle. She smiled, showing a mouth filled with dirty, gapped teeth. My chest tightened. The girl had been bred and raised to be dumb. I wondered what the rest of her life was like, other than the little bit we already knew.
Probably sad.
Smiling, I said, “Hi, Della. You know our names, right?”
Della pointed at me. “Jody?”
“That’s right.”
Lee, sitting behind Seth, sat up. She put her hand on top of Seth’s head. “Seth.” Then she made a face. “Yore hair feels like the end of a comb.”
Seth laughed. “Don’t like it?”
Lee stared at her hand, rubbing her fingers together. The corner of her lip lifted, bearing brown teeth. “Why’s it like that?”
“I put gel in it.”
Lee stared at the back of his head, confused.
“You know what that is, right?” I asked.
“Stuff that makes hair glow?” Ruth asked.
Trying not to embarrass her by laughing, I nodded. “Right. Guys wear it to make it stick up like that.”
“Why?” Lee asked, making a face as if I’d just tried to explain how a wireless router works.
“Some people like it,” I said.
“You don’t?” Seth asked Lee, looking at her in the rearview. She looked up, saw him in the glass, and the repulsed scowl dropped away to something else. It was the look of a girl with a crush.
“I like’s it,” said Della. Being on the far right, she had to reach across Ruth’s lap to touch Seth’s head. Patting his styled spikes, she giggled.
“Me too,” said Lee, obviously lying.
Reaching up, Seth gave his hair a pat. “I don’t know, Lee. Maybe I put too much in. Feels like sharp teeth, doesn’t it?”
Lee laughed. “I thought it made my fingers bleed!”
Everybody in the car laughed. The good humor of our conversation was a distraction that all of us, even the girls, seemed glad to have. We all knew when the ride was over, there’d be no more moments like this.
“Where are we now?” Seth asked.
Still smiling, I turned around. I felt it melt away from my face when we came out of the heavily shaded area. It was like a cloth backdrop being ripped away to unveil another. With the rocks and trees behind us, we emerged into a blinding glare of sunlight. For a moment, I thought we were about to drive right off the side of the mountain.
But the car never left the road. With the laughter dying inside the car, I could hear the tires crackling across the gravel outside as we drove down. I noticed three stick-built houses below us, small shacks with uneven tin roofs with matching outhouses in the backs. Goats grazed in a field behind the first shack. Another disheveled structure had pens filled with pigs.
“Do you live down there?” I asked the girls.
Lee shook her head. “No. We’s in the woods.” She leaned up, rested her chin on top of the seat, and pointed between us. “See?”
Beyond the shacks was a barrier that stood like a dam of trees. Darkness filled the gaps between the trees, reminding me of haunted forests from every old Grimm fairy tale I’d ever read.
And I guess they were haunted.
“The Wilsons live back there, too?” Seth asked.
Ruth answered with a soft yes.
“Where?”
“We’ll show you,” said Della.
“Look,” said Jody, “we really appreciate it. But maybe this should be as far as you go.”
“Naw,” said Lee. “We says we’ll show you, and we are. Paw’s gonna be mad. If we ain’t gonna get to show you where they’s livin’, then our whippin’s gonna be for naught!”
I wanted to argue. And I could tell Seth did too.
Neither of us said a word, though. The car crept forward, making lethargic strides over the gravel.
Lee banged on the back of the seat. “Go here,” she said.
I turned sideways and saw her pointing out the window. Seth steered to the left, bringing the Nova onto two bare tracks, cutting through the tall grass. It looked as if this side path would take us around the shacks, and I was glad. The last thing I wanted was for the locals to see us and go crazy.
As we drove away from the shacks, I stared at them, expecting to spot some inbred monster from every backwoods horror movie I’d ever seen running after us. Nobody was there. I might’ve thought the shacks were abandoned had I not noticed smoke coming from one of the stone chimneys.
Somebody lived in there. And it was probably somebody I didn’t want to meet.
Though we were bounced and jostled often, the ride wasn’t too bad. A couple times I heard the undercarriage scrape something. Each time it made that awful crunching sound, Seth winced.
After a fifteen-minute ride of silence, we came off the dirt tracks and back onto the ribbed, gravel road. How uneven the road was, it could’ve been a dried-up stream. Sure felt like one from how bumpy it was. The dirt tracks weren’t nearly this bad.
We approached the darkened chasm between the trees. “Back there?” Seth asked.
“We’ll tell you’s when to stawp,” said Lee.
“Okay,” he said, taking a deep breath. “Here we go.” Seth reached down. There was a click and the headlights pushed through oily blackness before us.
Dread dropped like a heavy rock into my stomach. My mouth felt dry. I suddenly didn’t want to do this. It was a bad idea. I was wrong for making Seth come out here.
Something told me we’d never leave these woods.
But I kept my worries to myself as we drove into the woods.
One of the many stupid things I’ve done.
19
Jody
By the time Lee told us to stop, my stomach felt crawly, like an egg sack of worry bugs had hatched underneath my skin.
“They’s down thar,” said Lee.
Another path etched into the dark woods to our right, a pale stripe curling through the smudges of trees.
“They live back there?” Seth asked.
“Unnn,” said Della, nodding. “All the ways back.”
“All right,” said Seth. He turned sideways to look at me and the girls. “This is where the three of you and the two of us part ways.”
“You’s ditchin’ us?” Lee asked.
“We have to,” Seth said. “It’s going to get very dangerous and very bloody in a few minutes. I’d rather the three of you not be around for it.”
“I’s can handle it,” Lee said. She pressed her lips in a tight line.
“I believe you,” said Seth, “I really do. But I don’t want you coming along. Just in case…”
“Why don’t you three wait in the car?” I said, cutting off Seth. “Hang out in here, with the doors locked, until we get back.”
The two younger sisters looked at Lee, who nodded. “Aw’right.”
Seth looked at the oldest girl. “We’ll take you home afterward. And if you want me to, I’ll have a talk with your paw.”
A corner of Lee’s mouth lifted.
“All right,” said Seth. “Just remember what we said.”
“Wait here,” Lee repeated.
“Right.”
Seth looked at me, his brow pinched above his eyes, giving away how stressed he was. Worried. Even a little scared. To anyone else, he might’ve looked intent, focused. But I knew him, beyond the artificial ruggedness on the outside.
Besides, I felt the same way.
“Let’s go,” he said.
I gave a terse nod, opened my door, and climbed out. My legs felt a tad wobbly, mostly from the long car ride. The rest was my nerves. When I stretched, it did nothing to make my muscles feel better, and seemed to make the hollow coldness travel all the way through me.
Seth shut his door, then pointed down. Doors thumped as the girls locked them.
Leaning over, I poked my head into the car one more time. “Just hang tight, girls. Okay?”
Three heads nodded.
I put on a smile tha
t I hoped made me look confident. How it felt awkward and forced on my face, I figured it probably looked like I was straining to hold in a dump.
Seth, holding the keys in front of him, walked to the back of the car. I joined him as he popped the trunk open. Digging through the stuff we’d brought, he selected the baseball bat with brand-new nails, the length of pencils, punched through. Though the trees heavily shaded us, the nails gleamed.
Letting the bat rest on his shoulder, he reached back inside the trunk. Pulled out his knife. About to attach the sheath to his belt, he paused, holding it out to me. “You’ve gotten really good with using it.”
Smiling, I took the knife. “Thanks.”
Since I was wearing a denim skirt, I didn’t have a belt to hitch it to. So I hooked the backside of the sheath to a belt loop. Next, he handed me his .41 Magnum. The cylinder held six rounds. I could see the bullets gazing out like lead eyes inside. I slipped it behind the waistband of my skirt.
Seth pulled out a bandolier of shotgun shells. I counted twelve red tubes, their copper-colored caps dully gleaming. He tossed the strap over his shoulder, and I fastened it to his back. When he turned around, he reminded me of a gunslinger about to head out of the saloon for one last blaze of glory.
Don’t think like that, I told myself.
It was hard not to. Something felt off this time. Usually before a kill, my heart thudded with eager anticipation, same way it did if I was lying underneath Seth, waiting on him to enter me. Not this time. My heart ached, each beat feeling like a cold fist punching me inside.
“Are you okay?” Seth asked, handing me my mask and wig. “You look like you might be coming down with something.”
Yeah, the bad-idea flu, I wanted to say. Instead, I shook my head, stepping away from the car. “I’m fine. Just ready to get this over with.”
He slammed the trunk lid. Staring at each other, we masked up.
Seth and I started up the driveway, walking slowly. Each step was a soft crackle on the gravel. The driveway winded through the trees. In some spots, heavy branches slouched in our way. Some branches had snapped off the tree, lying in the middle of our path.
I pointed in front of us. “Seems to me, we’re walking straight to nowhere.” My voice sounded flat behind the mask.
“Could be.”
“What are we going to do if we are?”
“Nothing. Enjoy it.”
“Enjoy it?” I shook my head. “What do you mean?”
“It’s a nice day for a walk.”
“The hell it is, it’s hot.”
We laughed together. It felt a bit strange and relieving to laugh when the moment called for anxiety. The jerking caused the tightness in my chest to ease up, as if we were telling our situation we weren’t going to succumb to its pressure. I liked it.
But it didn’t last.
I spotted the smoke right before Seth threw up his arm to stop me. Sniffing the air, the scent reminded me of pig-pickings my dad used to drag me to. The only good thing about them had been the food.
“Smells good,” Seth said.
My stomach grumbled its agreement.
“Come on,” he said. “We need to be alert.”
Nodding, I followed Seth over to the left side of the driveway, inside the tree line, just enough that we shouldn’t be seen.
With Seth leading, I walked up against him, bumping into his back each time he slowed down. Suddenly, he stopped. Held out his arm, fist clenched. Then he pointed.
I could see a shack between the trees. Small, it seemed to have been concocted of whatever had been lying around: tin sheets, some planks of wood, and tiles of aluminum. The window was just an askew square-like hole with a ratty felt curtain hanging behind it. Moth holes dotted the fabric, showing dark inside.
Grabbing my hand, Seth dropped to a crouch, pulling me with him. I was about to ask what the problem was when I noticed a man standing in the window I’d just been looking at. The dingy curtain had been pulled back and now he filled the open space.
An ugly bastard, with frizzy white hair down to his shoulders on either side, a bowl of spiral curls on top, gazed out the opening. Even from where we were hiding, I could see his massive underbite. The lower teeth were an uneven row of brown bits. His eyes were small and beady, like something on an old baby doll that had been locked away in an attic for many years.
And he was staring right at us.
Holding my breath, I watched this old creep for several long seconds.
Finally, he looked to the right, slowly scanning to see the left side.
“What’s you staring at, Mackey?”
I jumped at the close voice. Gripping Seth’s shirt, I pressed myself against him. Reaching back, Seth lightly stroked my thigh. His hand made quiet wet sounds on my sweaty skin.
“Thought I heard something,” Mackey said.
The other man laughed. “Yeah, it was my stomach growling. I’m ready to eat.”
“Shut up, Goober. List’n. Don’tcha hear?”
Looking over Seth’s right shoulder, I saw the backside of a tall, gangly man step up to the window in a sleeveless brown shirt and navy blue work pants. The arms that hung nearly to his knees were emaciated stalks, elbows bulging like stones underneath a flesh-toned tarp. Most people would have to look up to speak to Mackey from where he stood, but not this guy. His bald head, shaped like a pale pyramid that glinted under the fading sunlight, reached a foot above the window frame. There seemed to be a narrow line of darkness that ran the length of his head, making it appear as if his skull was parted.
Then I realized what it was.
The string of an eyepatch.
I nearly gasped. Seth’s father had gouged out that eye.
We were in the right place.
“All I hear is the fire cooking the meat,” said Goober, “and the scufflin’ of critters in the woods.”
“I don’ hears it now,” said Mackey.
“Prob’ly didn’t hear it at all,” said Goober. “Come on, supper’s ready.”
Mackey looked in our direction again. This time, Goober turned around so I could see his face. It looked impossibly small on such a large, cone-shaped head. The eye inside the wrinkled brow matched Mackey’s tiny orbs, the other was hidden behind a black patch that looked like a dark, gaping hole from this distance. His lips were so thin; he might not have had any at all. A network of wrinkles set deep creases all over his face.
A dark space spread above his chin. I realized it was a smile when he started laughing. “You’re losin’ it, Mack.” Goober shook his head, walking to the right. “Been sayin’ it fore years.”
“Shut up, Goober.” Mackey kept staring our way before making a Bah grunt. Then he stepped back. The curtain swooped down, swaying this way and that. Each time it swayed away from the window, I glimpsed Mackey getting smaller as he walked away. When it swayed its final time, the old man was gone.
A few seconds later, something banged from behind the shack. Mackey appeared behind the house, walking with his head down. Well, it was more of a hurried shuffle than a walk. Where Goober was tall and thin, Mackey was short and squat, moving like a penguin. He had wide hips and a wilting gut that hung over his crotch like a tubby awning. His short arms swayed back and forth.
I rested my chin on Seth’s shoulder, whispered, “What do we do now?”
Seth’s head turned sideways. His cheek was inches from my mouth. I gently kissed it. “We wait,” he said.
“How long?”
“Till dark.”
“Okay.”
“Won’t be long.”
I looked at the sky through the space between the limbs above us. The blue had darkened to a discolored hue, so the sun had dipped below the mountains, probably creating a lovely sunset portrait we couldn’t see.
“The plan?” I asked.
“Go in quick, blasting. Don’t give them a chance to see who’s hitting them.”
I understood why Seth wanted to do it like that, but I felt mildl
y disappointed. I wanted them to know it was Seth, back for revenge, and finally ending this decades-long score.
“We need keep our eyes open for the other one. Maybe he’s dead, but if not, he’ll probably show up before long to eat. Might as well wait until they’re all together, in one spot. Take them out all at once.”
I nodded. “Sounds good.” Then I realized what he’d just said. “The other one?”
“Yeah.”
“What do you mean other one?”
“The third…brother, I guess.”
“There’s a third?”
Seth turned his head even more to look at me. “Yes. There were three.”
“Three? Pappy said…”
“The third one videotaped everything. He never got involved, but he was there. He was the one who came after me…I hid in a tree. He never found me…”
I couldn’t believe it. Pappy hadn’t mentioned anything about a third brother. Had he? I tried to recall how he’d told the story and couldn’t get a clear memory. Only snippets seemed to come through. And none of them told me anything about a third member.
But I supposed it didn’t matter. In my mind, we’d come to kill two. Seth had known all along there was a third. I wished I had. That might’ve been enough to sway me from making us come out here.
“Shit,” I said. “Where do you think he is?”
Before Seth could answer, I felt something cold and hard nudge the side of my head.
“Well,” a shrill, raspy voice said behind me. “Looks like this is my lucky day.”
20
Seth
He stood behind Jody, the barrel of a single-shot twelve-gauge vanishing inside her hair. Even with the tarnished metal and faded wood, it looked like the same gun that had blown a globe-sized hole through my sister’s chest. The hammer was cocked, his finger curling around the trigger.
Assembled from parts taken from Goober and Mackey, he had long legs supporting a heavy torso. The arms that held the shotgun were short and stubby, with fat hands and chubby fingers. Bald on top, frizzy white hair hung in lengthy tangles on either side of his craggy face, hiding his ears. When he smiled, I saw a maw with only a few teeth, the spaces between them big enough to stick two fingers through. Though much older, I recognized his hideous face. He’d chased me into the woods when I was little.
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