by Lewis Wolfe
It had happened because she had felt a such horrible pile of guilt and anxiety building up inside of her. She hadn’t been able to face it, hadn’t known how until only a few hours ago when the strange investigator had visited her in her dreams. Ellie knew that she had been saved by Jane Elring.
Jane Elring sat beside her bed now with a face that was deathly pale and red eyes that screamed for relief. Her smile was very thin, but it felt warm to Ellie’s tired mind and part of her wanted to bask in it forever.
Ellie could finally talk about Cleveland now because that horrible guilt that she had felt had somehow deserted her. It was the investigator’s work, the girl knew, though she had no idea how it had truly happened. In the end, Ellie could only come to one conclusion.
“Are you a witch or something?” she asked.
Jane Elring shook her tired head before looking at her bodyguard.
Caleb said, “Nah, she’s not a witch. There’s no magic here.”
“Then what is she? Why can’t she talk?”
“She’s, um… a psychic, I guess? But a weird one, with like all kinds of abilities I don’t even know about, I think,” Caleb replied. He added, “When she exerts herself, like with what she did to help you, her brain starts bleeding. The blood runs down her throat, making it hard for her to talk.”
A psychic? Ellie marveled at the idea that a psychic investigator had somehow entered her head and healed her of whatever afflicted her. Had taken from her the great burden that she hadn’t known how to get rid of on her own. Jane Elring had saved Ellie from herself, and she had to pay the price for it by drinking her own blood.
“I’m so sorry,” Ellie said softly.
Jane shook her head and slightly raised her hand.
Caleb said, “Don’t be sorry. She was happy to help.”
Arthur, who had sat in the room very quietly, spoke up for the first time in hours.
“So, Caleb, is she telling you what to say right now?”
Caleb nodded. “I can hear her inside my head.”
Ellie looked at Jane and found her red eyes looking back at her. She felt completely safe with the young investigator. Jane Elring had saved her and she owed the investigator more than a bit of gratitude. She owed her, so Ellie thought, complete acceptance.
Ellie asked, “People must be scared of you, huh?”
Jane nodded slightly.
“Well, I’m not afraid of you. You helped me when I needed it the most and I will always be grateful for that.”
Again the thin smile drew itself upon Jane’s face. Ellie wished it could stay there forever.
Ellie turned to her other side and found an exhausted Arthur leaning back and looking at the ceiling. He had been inside her head too, somehow. The girl felt embarrassed about all that he had seen. Yet she was happy that he had been there for her.
A wonderful person. That was what Arthur had called her, and for the first time in what felt like ages, Ellie thought that she might be able to believe that about herself again.
Caleb’s voice interrupted Ellie’s thoughts. “Mr. Toaves?”
Arthur looked away from the ceiling and at the big bodyguard that sat by Jane’s side. His eyes were tired and he looked at the odd couple wearily. As if he dreaded what the young investigator would ask Caleb to say next.
“She says you have something inside your head. Something you’ve been suppressing for years. Makes it hard for her to read it properly.”
Arthur cleared his throat. He seemed to ignore Caleb and looked straight at Jane. “I am thankful for what you did for Ellie, please understand this. But what makes you think I want you looking around inside my head?”
Ellie watched from left to right as the conversation unfolded. She saw Arthur’s tired but steadfast face and felt an old strength well up in his voice. The kind of strength that came with experience and was called upon only when there was no other way out.
She saw Jane Elring’s red eyes and thin lips. Her pale face. It looked as if the young investigator could pass out any minute now, but she never did. As if, somehow, she willed her body from collapsing on her.
Caleb said, “She says that what’s inside your head is very important for figuring all this out. If you want Brettville to be safe, you have to stop running away from what happened three years ago.”
Three years ago? If she had been able to, Ellie would have jumped from the bed right there. As it was, she interjected with as loud a voice as possible. “The car accident, Arthur!”
Then she turned toward Jane and said, “He still has nightmares about it too!”
Then she turned toward Arthur and said, “You never want to talk about it! But see? It’s important. You have to tell us!”
“Ellie….” Arthur’s voice was softer when he spoke to her. “Please stay calm. You’re still recovering.”
Caleb said, “He’s right. Jane says you should take it easy.”
Ellie sank back into the hospital bed. Defeat tasted bitter and the girl couldn’t help but shake her head.
“Still, you have to talk about it, Arthur.” Ellie almost whispered it this time.
With a loud groan Arthur got up from his plastic chair and walked over to the window. The old man stood there silently as he watched the twilight fill the October sky. His head sank slightly as if lost in thought, but his pointy shoulders refused to budge.
Caleb said, “She’s sorry for what she did. You know, surprising you like that. But—”
Arthur turned around and his expression was very grave. He looked straight at the young investigator.
“No. You must never apologize for that. You did what you had to do, using the tools that are available to you. That I do not understand your abilities is my limitation. You must never, ever make it yours.
“You are correct. Of course you are correct. Three years ago a terrible thing happened to me. Something that I caused entirely by myself and that could have, should have, killed me. But I am alive, though I do not understand why it is so, and now you say that my good fortune is at the very core of what plagues Brettville?”
Jane nodded and Caleb said for her, “She won’t lie. Once you start talking about it, she will gain full access to your mind. It is very likely that you won’t like what she finds.”
Ellie watched as Arthur sat back down on the plastic chair. His old body groaned underneath the pressure he felt and she wondered if she could do anything to make him feel better. To start being the wonderful person he had said she was.
Arthur said, “Very well, then. If this is how it must be, then I will tell you all that I can remember about the events that transpired three years ago.”
His voice had been one of experience. Experience that came from years and years of walking around on this planet. Experience that came with the many gains and the many losses that he knew were integral to human life.
That experience, now, fueled the old man. He knew what he had to do. He had to trust.
GOOD FORTUNE
(March 15, 2016)
The field had been very good to Baal. For ages he had been able to feed there off unwitting strangers that were tempted by its precious green grass and marvelous solitude.
He remembered fondly the massacre of his bride and daughters. How he had slaughtered them for their life force. They had consumed so many men by that point that their souls had been full and juicy. How delicious they had been.
Only the weakest he had allowed to live because she could be controlled. Controlled, perhaps, forever.
Right now she was living out her life in the town of Brettville, growing older and older and slowly losing her mind. It was good to have her. Good to know that he could bring her back at any point he wanted to. Perhaps, one day, he would need her.
For all the benefit the field had granted him, Baal was getting restless. The oak to which he had attached himself was strong as ever, with its roots planted deeply underneath the ground. If necessary, Baal knew he could stay here until the end of this tiny planet.
But he was bored, terribly so, and he knew that life had moved away from the fields that were once sweaty and stained with the blood of countless slaves. Very rarely now did somebody venture far enough out into the fields to find him, and when they did, they never stayed for very long.
When Baal tried, he could hear the countless voices that echoed through the nearby town. Brettville was small but sweet, with many inhabitants that Man would call ‘good’ that carried their own private little demons all the same.
Oh, Baal knew he could make those demons larger than life. He could play with these people until they broke, and then, he could eat. He could eat so much that he’d never be bored again.
Guilt. Anger. Fear. These were the emotions that sat at the core of the human experience. They were so incredibly tempting to the restless Baal.
It wasn’t that he hated human beings. Not at all. He thought they made very interesting distractions and, in a world that had no meaning, distractions were of the utmost importance.
Meaning was what Man had tried to create when he realized he was all alone with nobody to care for him. No mother to love him, no father to protect him. And, certainly, no God in those white clouds looking down on him, judging him and offering up an afterlife of love and pleasure.
Baal was much older than mankind and he had seen it all. He had seen the very beginning of life on this earth. He had watched it crawl up from the immeasurable ocean and evolve slowly over time. At first primitive, and then, a little less so.
He had seen large, feathered dinosaurs roam the land until they were taken by the great cataclysm that set their end into motion. Their beautiful screams of pain and fear still sounded in the back of his mind.
He had seen the rise of giant mammals that crushed all standing in their way without even so much as a thought. Until the ice age had come and the monstrosities succumbed to the low temperatures and scarcity. Brutes in a world that couldn’t sustain them.
And, to his great pleasure, he had seen the great apes that learned to use tools, mastered fire, and began to cook. These apes had steered their own evolution and, over the ages, became Man.
Baal had followed Man everywhere. He had watched Man in the ancient Middle East where he had first shown himself. Man had called him ‘Lord’ then and worshiped him.
The tribes in Africa. The geniuses of Egypt. The decadence of the ancient Greeks. Baal had seen it all and he loved Man for his arrogance and ignorance. To Baal, Man was the most beautiful distraction that could ever be.
The brave new world had been the most beautiful of all. It was here that Man had learned to indulge every single ego impulse he possessed. He had wanted land, so he killed the natives that roamed it. He had wanted resources, so he destroyed the natural habitat that surrounded him. He had wanted sex, so in his drunken stupor he raped the woman that stood closest. He had wanted profit, so he abused the life of his fellow, black, man.
Baal wanted things too. He and Man weren’t so very different. He wanted to consume and to be entertained. Nothing entertained Baal more than the suffering of Man.
He wanted his life force to grow through the souls of Man and he would stop at nothing—nothing—to accomplish his goals.
So Baal knew that he had to move on from the field that had been his home for centuries. He had to abandon the mighty oak that had been his vessel. He had to find a new host.
A solution came in the sound of a car crash on a road not that far from the field. It sounded through the air on a rainy afternoon in March and Baal knew that he had to take a closer look.
He detached himself from the mighty oak and assumed his human form. Then he swirled through the air, over the remaining pines, traversing the fields surrounding his old home. The black smoke that came from the crash told him exactly where he needed to be.
Baal landed on the road not far from where the car had crashed against a tree. It was a beautiful car, even Baal could see that, with its sleek black design. Even now, with its hood banged up into a messy pile of steel, it spoke to Baal’s sense of esthetics.
The silver imprint of a predator of some kind, a large cat, featured prominently on the car. Baal felt not unlike this predator now.
Slowly he stepped toward the left door of the vehicle and opened it. When he looked inside he saw an old man with his face bashed against a white cushion of some kind. It only took Baal a quick look to understand that the man’s old body had been no match for the impact he had suffered. He was dead.
Baal did not hesitate. This was the chance he had been waiting for. Gently he placed his hand on the old man’s head and entered him.
Baal coursed through the old body and found all the places that had been ruined by the impact. He restored the broken ribs. He unfolded the collapsed lungs. He restarted the old heart.Then Baal moved on to the old man’s brain and made sure blood could reach the sensitive organ again. Without this brain there would be no true home, so it had to endure. And endure it did.
Now there was only one problem left to solve for Baal. Somebody had to come and find the car before it was too late. How would he go about clearing this final obstacle? Through almost an infinity’s worth of experience, Baal soon found a way.
DAY 4
October 27, 2019 – Part 2
1
“I woke up in a hospital bed two days later. It was a miracle, the doctors said. I should have been dead. And I shouldn’t have been able to wake up from the coma they induced. But I did. I survived and my body was none the worse for wear. I had a small period of physical rehabilitation, of course, but I was back home two weeks after the accident.
“Apparently old Isabella found me. The woman that owns the arts and crafts store. Nobody knew what she was doing on that road—she herself couldn’t remember either—but that was probably my luck. If the old woman hadn’t found me in time I would have died for sure.
“I still get terrible nightmares. Or night terrors, really. Ellie can confirm that, I’m sure, sadly. I go into a frenzy sometimes during the night. It feels as if something is choking me but it’s on the inside of my body. Like it’s not grabbing my neck but applying pressure straight to the windpipe instead. I can’t really explain it. I see horrible things during those night terrors. Images of death and rape. Executions. Lynchings. Burnings of buildings and old trees. But they don’t feel like nightmares; they’re not just images. They’re….They feel like they’re old memories that are somehow being forced onto my mind.”
Once Arthur had started talking there was no more stopping him. The floodgates opened wide and the hospital room was filled with the dark pressure of his haunting experience.
Caleb felt deep sympathy for the old, exhausted man that seemed to age with every sentence he spoke.
“Do you think that my night terrors are somehow related to what is happening in Brettville?” he asked. “Am I sick too?”
Caleb saw that the old man’s eyes rested on his client. They were frightened eyes and, passing into the early evening, Arthur Toaves seemed almost desperate. Desperate to understand what was going on and, Caleb thought, desperate for his own private relief.
When he heard nothing echo in his head, Caleb turned toward Jane.
“What do you want me to tell him?”
Jane shook her head and gently patted him on his hand. Her touch was soft but very cold. If it was meant to be reassuring, it completely missed the mark.
It was then that Jane forced her voice through her bloody and bruised throat. It sounded rusty, like a car engine that refused to start because the battery was dead.
“Mr. Toaves… I am… I am so very sorry. You… asked if you were sick too. You are not… sick. I am afraid… that you are the sickness.”
Caleb heard her say these heartbreaking words to the tired old man and wondered what they were good for. How could she say something so horrible to the one man who had spent years, and no small fortune, on trying to make his world a better place? What could that possibly accomplish?
Jane replied, “I think… that you know. Deep down… way… way… down. Your night terrors…. These memories being… forced on… you.”
Caleb watched as his client choked down another gush of blood.
“Just tell me what you want to say, Jane! I’ll do it no problem,” he said.
Jane shook her head and Caleb understood her meaning. This was too important, and she appreciated the old man too much, not to say the words herself. It was her insight and so the message to relay had to be her burden.
“Mister Toaves…. The thing that haunts… Brettville. It lives in… you.”
2
Darkness clawed itself into the hearts of Brettville’s tired inhabitants. Another long day of work and hardship saw its ending reflected in a star-filled sky. Life was always quietest in the hours approaching midnight, a moment filled with anxiety for days still to come.
Tonight the cold air was underscored by a careful breeze that gently made its way through the lonely streets. It climbed up the houses toward the roofs, where it lingered like an invisible fog over the entire town. The breeze’s claim, though gentle it seemed, slowly choked the life out of Brettville.
If you had asked Gold what she was afraid of tonight, she wouldn’t have been able to tell you. All she knew was that a dark feeling roamed deep inside her core and tore at her throat. She felt as if an ugly stranger had entered her body and pierced her soul with his demanding stare.
Restlessly Gold walked around her apartment. Up and down the hallway, and again, and again.
She had spent the day shopping in this little town, looking for clothes that had proven to be hard to find.
In the course of her shopping spree she had lost many assumptions as to what a woman was supposed to wear in this day and age. Everything showed so much of a woman’s body now. Her arms, her legs…. Some upper-body wear had even laid bare her middle, covering only her chest.
So now Gold paced up and down the hallway of her apartment, wanting to go outside but being afraid to. Not so much because of what the men might think of her, but because of her mother’s voice that she still heard inside her head after all these countless years. The judgment Gold imagined was harsh and crippled her self-esteem.