Michael R Collings

by The Slab- A Novel of Horror (retail) (epub)

  This time she had slipped into sleep, had even begun to dream—another of those vivid, surrealistically realistic, unmemorable dreams, even though she didn’t realize it, since the dream seemed merely an extension of the night’s alarms—when her eyes opened yet again.

  Sams.

  He didn’t speak

  He didn’t even wait.

  As soon as he saw that she was awake, he crawled onto the bed, over her, and under the covers between her and Willard.

  “What the hell…!” Willard shot out of bed, brushing frantically at the front of the well-worn Lakers T-shirt that was part of his night wear. That and his boxers. Winter or summer, never anything else.

  Catherine sat up just as abruptly.

  “Willard!”

  “He’s wet! Soaked! Just feel.”

  She did. She hadn’t noticed it when Sams crawled over her into the bed, but he was drenched, sopping, the front of his pajamas stained shades darker than the back.

  Sams had been wearing extra-thick pull-up night diapers for a couple of months now. He had never had an accident before. He was almost completely potty-trained. Both Catherine and Willard were proud of how well he had managed the transition.

  But now, he lay curled up on the bed, deeply asleep in spite of having just come into their room seconds before, and smelling pungently of urine. There was a dark spot spreading on the sheet beneath him, and a matching dark spot across most of Willard’s chest.

  “Okay, Willard. You change. I’ll take care of Sams. And the bed.”

  By the time she had picked the baby up, he was awake. He started to whimper.

  “You’re all right,” she began. Then: “Willard, he’s shaking like a leaf. Trembling all over.”

  Now that he was over the shock of awakening to the feel of wet-baby against him, Willard seemed more in control. He had stripped out of the T-shirt and, since they were damp as well, out of his boxers.

  Naked, he circled the bed and put his hand on Sams’ back.

  It felt like he was touching an electric vibrator set on ‘high.’

  Willard rummaged in the closet for an old sweat shirt while Catherine removed Sams’ pajamas and the diaper. Urine dripped from the plastic lining, ran glistening down the back of Sams’ legs.

  Willard grabbed him and wrapped him in the sweat shirt, holding him close while Catherine pulled sheets and blankets off the bed and threw a new set onto the top of the dresser.

  She had just tucked the last corner of the fitted bottom sheet around the mattress when: “Daddy, why aren’t you wearing any clothes?”

  Will, Jr., stood in the doorway, his eyes riveted on his father.

  Willard grabbed one of the cast-off blankets—fortunately mostly dry—and whipped it around his waist, never letting go of Sams.

  “Will, what are you …?”

  “Daddy didn’t have any clothes on?” That was Burt, coming up just behind his brother to stand in the doorway.

  “It’s okay,” Catherine said, hurrying over to the two. “Sams just wet himself in our bed and Daddy’s clothes got all wet, too.”

  “Oh.” Both boys nodded. Curious mystery of nature explained.

  “Why does Daddy…?”

  “That’s enough.” Willard let more than a little of his impatience—and embarrassment—show in his tone. “What are you guys doing up. It’s”—he glanced at the clock—“3:15.”

  “We couldn’t sleep.” Will answered for both of them.

  “And we can’t go back to bed.” That was Burt.

  “There’s something in....”

  “Oh, for....” Still wrapped in the blanked, still clutching Sams to his chest. Willard led the boys back down the hall. Catherine had told him about the frequent night-time visits over the past days, and Willard had thanked her for taking care of things and letting him sleep. She had also told him about the putting-which-ever-boy-it-was-to-bed routine.

  He didn’t have to put Sams in bed. The baby was still shaking, although not as much, and was fast asleep. Willard didn’t want to disturb him. And anyway the kid didn’t have a diaper on yet.

  But he could turn on the Mickey Mouse lamp, check the closet and with one hand shift the hangers around to reassure Will and Burt that nothing lurked behind them. He watched Burt crawl into his bunk and Willard climb up the end of his, then stretch out and pull the sheets up. He switched off the lamp, called a quiet “Good night,” and left before either of the boys could answer him.

  “Catherine, what in hell is going on?” He was whispering but his voice carried over the soft rustling of bedclothes being smoothed.

  “Let me have Sams. And you put something on.”

  She laid the sleeping Sams onto the bed and deftly dressed him in a dry diaper and fresh pajamas. She had already tossed the wet things in the hamper in the bathroom, but the air still carried an ammoniac tinge. Willard wrinkled his nose in distaste.

  He dressed in fresh boxers and a different—but just as faded—Lakers T-shirt and crawled into his side of the bed. Catherine laid Sams between them and settled herself.

  “Are you going to let him sleep in here? I thought we agreed that he was old enough....”

  “Just this once. I think the poor baby was really frightened. He felt like a nestling that has dropped to the ground, terrified and shaking and.... And I want him to stay with me tonight.”

  Willard stared for a moment.

  “Okay. Now let me get to sleep.” He grunted and rolled over, his back to Sams. Catherine noted that he left a small space between his body and his son’s. Just in case.

  The rest of the night—what was left of it—passed undisturbed. Willard managed to pull himself out of bed when the alarm clanged, changed quietly enough that Catherine and Sams never stirred. When he left, he carefully closed the door, although something inside of him wanted, oh so badly needed, to slam the door.

  Let them see what it was like to get wakened from a sound sleep.

  That morning at breakfast, the boys were subdued, even more than they had been for the past little while. Suze was fine; she chattered and ate and got ready for school with no problem.

  Sams was sleepier than usual but that was perhaps to be expected. And—Catherine noted with no little surprise—he didn’t bring his blanket with him to the table. As soon as he had eaten, though, he disappeared for a minute, then came wandering back into the kitchen with the wretched thing dragging behind him. Okay, so he was all right.

  Will spoke very little. He didn’t remember why he had come into his parent’s room that late. He didn’t remember dreaming, or thinking he had seen anything. Neither did Burt.

  Both boys did remember seeing their father without any clothes. Willard was fairly modest—except, of course, when he and Catherine were alone...they did have four children, after all. So none of the children had ever seen him naked.

  The boys started to ask questions, but Catherine simply shook her head. No, this is not the time.

  They both seemed unduly fascinated by what they had seen.

  5.

  The same thing happened over the next three nights, Tuesday through Thursday.

  Well, not the same thing, exactly, but for one reason or another all three of the boys found themselves, singly, in pairs, or as a triad—standing by Catherine’s bed in the middle of the night. Each night there was enough commotion to rouse Willard. Each night he handled the interruption of his sleep with less and less patience.

  “What is this,” he bellowed at Will, Jr., when the boy was leaving for his own bed at 4:15 on Thursday night, “a damned tag-team performance?”

  “Willard,” said Catherine, laying a hand on his arm.

  He shrugged it off, perhaps more vigorously that she expected.

  “Well,” he said, not modulating his voice at all out of deference to Suze, who was still asleep in the next room and hadn’t caused any problems all week. “It might as well be. It if isn’t one of them, it’s the other. If it’s not that one it’s the third. Or
all three of them.”

  To be fair, Catherine thought, he has a point. Not all of the nightly visits had been quiet, or easily resolved. More than once, Sams had been in tears. Burt came in on Tuesday night sobbing as if his best friend had died. Will, Jr., was generally quieter, but as Willard’s anger grew, he took to glaring at his father, as if trying to stare him down. Twice, it had been enough for Catherine to traipse down the hall with the wanderer—or wanderers—and go through what had become an established ritual. The other times, it took either Willard or both of them to persuade the boys to return.

  “Can’t.”

  “Won’t”

  “Don’t want to.”

  “Scared.”

  “Birds.”

  “Someone...something...in the closet.”

  At breakfast on Wednesday, long after Willard had departed for work, just as Will, Jr., was stepping out the front door to walk to school, he turned to Catherine.

  “Mom, there really was someone in the closet.”

  “Okay, Will.” She was distracted, trying to watch Burt and Suze as they made their way down Oleander.

  “Really. He was like Dad was the other night?”

  “What” Again absently.

  “You know. He wasn’t wearing anything/”

  She turned to stare down at her eldest son. “He.... Why on earth would you say something like that? We both know there was no one in the bedroom, there never has been anyone in the bedroom. The door are all locked at night, the windows are locked, we don’t even have a fireplace for Santa to come down on Christmas Eve. And we both know Santa wears a big red suit with white fur trim.” This last in an attempt to wrest a smile from Will.

  It worked...a bit.

  “But...okay. Bye, Mom. See you this afternoon.”

  And so went the remainder of the week.

  Until Friday night.

  6.

  “Okay, kids. Bedtime. Kiss your Daddy good night and come with me.”

  It was Friday evening. Catherine stood in the doorway between the front entry and the family room. The rest of the family was scattered in ones and two around the room, reading, playing, or—in Willard’s case—intently watching the evening news.

  His attention barely broke as each of the children leaned over his chair and kissed him on the cheek.

  “’Night,” he repeated four times.

  One by one the children clustered in front of Catherine. She led them down the hall and into the back bedroom, where she hunched on the edge of the lower bunks and they dropped to the floor, squatting or half-laying.

  “You all know what tomorrow is.”

  “Saturday,” Burt responded before the others could say anything. Burt and Suze nodded gravely, their expression matching Catherine’s. Sams just sat on the floor, cuddling his blanket in his arms and watching his mother.

  “That’s right. Saturday. Daddy’s day to sleep in.”

  She paused, and they all nodded again.

  “Daddy’s really, really tired right now. You’ve all had really rough nights this week, and he hasn’t gotten very much sleep. And you know he has to get up very, very early, even before the sun comes up, to get to work on time.”

  Again, they nodded.

  “So tomorrow, I want you to remember to be very, very quiet when you get up. Let’s let Daddy sleep as long as he can. All right?”

  Nods around.

  “When you wake up, I want you to play quietly in here until I have breakfast ready. Then we will all go very quietly into the kitchen and eat, and then you may watch T.V. in the family room.”

  “Can we all sleep in here?” Suze actually raised her hand before speaking, as if she were in school, and spoke in a soft, modulated, answering-the-teacher voice.

  Catherine considered for a moment. She wanted for Suze to be as independent as possible, to grow up self-sufficient, so even though the three boys were now crowded into this one room, Suze had always had her own. But this was an unusual night.

  “Okay. But you will all have to be quiet.”

  “Can I sleep on the bunk with Burt?” Suze again. Sometimes during the day, she and Burt—and occasionally Sams—would play on Burt’s bed, tucking his blanket under the edge of the mattress on Will’s bed and letting the rest of it hang down, making a kind of tent. At times they would play with Suze’s dolls, at other times with Burt’s small plastic army guys, using the rumpled bedding as hills and valleys and marching the toys across one by one. Sams usually just sat in one corner watching them, giggling along with them at some unspoken joke. Will rarely joined the fun, considering it too ‘baby’ for a twelve-year-old.

  Catherine had never let them do it at night.

  But tonight.

  “All right. But you have to be very quiet. You can’t shoot off cannons or anything like that. And no giggling and staying up until the middle of the night.”

  Nods again.

  “Can I leave the night light on and read?” For Will, that would count as a special occasion.

  “Yes.”

  “I promise I won’t turn the pages too loud,” he added, a quick grin crossing his face.

  Catherine laughed lightly.

  “See that you don’t, buster-boy, or I’ll have to come in and confiscate your book.” She grinned back.

  “Con-fi-scate,” Suze said carefully, as if tasting each sound as it crossed her lips. “That’s a funny word.”

  Everyone laughed...quietly. They were already practicing for tomorrow morning.

  “Okay, guys, get ready for bed. Here, give me kisses.”

  She waited until all four of the kids were settled—making sure that Sams’ night-time diaper was still clean and dry—then stepped into the hall and shut the door until only a crack of light showed from the Mickey Mouse lamp. Already she heard the rustling of bedding being arranged into a bunk-bed-tent.

  Someone on the other side of the door laughed again...quietly.

  She went on down the hall to join Willard in the family room.

  7.

  That Friday, no one woke up in the middle of the night.

  8.

  “Daddy! Mommy!”

  Two young male trebles, high-pitched and full of terror.

  A single, drawn-out shriek from a small girl.

  “Yaaaap!” That was Sams’s voice, breaking into tears.

  Catherine sat bolt upright in bed.

  Daylight struck her eyes. As she always did now, she reflexively glanced to the far corner of the room, where the patching plaster had been inexorably drawing away from the popcorn-textured ceiling. It was a dry year. The soil was compacting. She caught a glimpse of sunlight through the small slit that had formed.

  Then she was on her feet and grabbing for her robe.

  Willard threw himself onto his side, facing the far wall, and grunted angrily, “Damn those kids….” Then he, too was on his feet and racing around the end of the bed. He was out the door before Catherine. She heard his bare feet slapping against the hall floor.

  A door opened, slamming against the wall.

  A beat.

  “Catherine! Get in here!”

  She ran down the hall.

  What now?

  When she shot through the open doorway, Willard was standing by the low table beneath the window. All four kids were huddled together by the closet, tears either streaking their cheeks or still streaming from their eyes. None of them was speaking, although Sams—pressed against Will, Jr., whose hand curled protectively around his little brother’s shoulder—was whimpering softly.

  “Look!” Willard stabbed one finger toward the table top.

  Toward the cage where, now solitary, the single remaining hamster lay crushed against the side. The wire door hung open along the front. A few cedar chips lay strewn on the table top, looking in their roughly rectangular shapes like tiny, toppled tombstones.

  Catherine crossed the room.

  “Willard, why are you yelling at me?” she started to whisper. After all, they ha
d just gone through this a short while ago with Yip—another small, dead hamster, one of the expected traumas of childhood, given the average lifespan of the little creatures. This shouldn’t be that unexpected. She felt her blood pressure rise. Willard had been angry before—now she was too.

  Until she drew close enough to see clearly into the cage.

  The little thing was, indeed, dead. Anyone could see that.

  Including, unfortunately, the children.

  Its fur, rather than being fluffy and full, even in death as Yip’s had been, clumped matted against its body, stiff and crusted with russet brown that could only be dried blood. Blood had spattered all over the cedar chips lining the floor of the cage, all over the plastic exercise wheel now silent and still at the back, all over the thin wire of the cage itself.

  It was even spattered on the desk top for several inches beyond the cage.

  Catherine stared at the cage, then at Willard. His eyes were already fixed on her, dark with anger and fear.

  “What happened?” Catherine’s voice emerged thin and shaky.

  “He was like that when we woke up,” Will, Jr., answered from behind her. “We all saw him like that, then Sams started crying and Suze yelled and....”

  “Shut up!” Willard roared, not even bothering to turn to look at his children. “Not another word!”

  He grabbed the cage, twisted the wire door closed, and lifted the whole thing. Below, a clean square showed where it had been sitting—all around the square was a rough circle of dark brown splotches.

  “Clean that up,” he ordered as he passed Catherine.

  The door slammed behind him.

  “Okay, kids,” she said, as calmly as she could. “I want you all to sit right here on Burt’s bed”—she noticed that the blanket tent-wall had been pulled down—“until I get back.”

  She ran to the bathroom, drenched an old wash cloth with a spurt from the faucet and, water dripping from her hands, returned to the bedroom.

  White-faced and frightened, the children were sitting on the bunk, arranged in age and size from Will at the farther end to Sams at the nearer. Catherine crossed in front of them, and with a few judicious swipes of her hand scraped the brown crust from the table top. She wadded the cloth and dropped it in the waste basket by the table.