Cruel Winter

by Anthony Izzo

  Jason Taylor stole the ball and raced down the court with Munch streaking after him. Taylor lobbed Chris the ball, and as Chris went in for the layup, Munch slammed his hand into the side of Chris’s head. Chris hit the floor and rolled.

  “Munch! Easy!” MacGregor yelled.

  “That’s it,” Chris said.

  As Munch started away, Chris lunged, gripping the legs of Munch’s shorts and yanking hard. They slid down his legs, exposing Munch’s white butt. A line of brown fuzz ran down the length of his crack, and it was more than Chris ever wanted to see of Robbie Munch, but the humiliation was worth it. MacGregor dropped his clipboard. The other guys stared at first, then started howling. Munch bent over and tried to pull up the shorts, but succeeded in stumbling and hitting the floor. Ass exposed, he wriggled on the floor and got the shorts over his backside.

  He got up, scowling at Chris, ready to charge. MacGregor swept in from the bleachers like a bird of prey. He grabbed Munch’s jersey.

  “Munch. Run a suicide drill. Francis, in the locker room. The rest of you girls run the full-court passing drill we did yesterday.”

  Chris trotted off the court with MacGregor behind him. Chris entered the locker room and sat on an aluminum bench.

  “Look at me,” MacGregor said. He slammed the door and it sounded like a rifle shot.

  “What?”

  “What the hell is wrong with you? Didn’t you learn anything the other day from doing six inches all practice?”

  “He fouled me.”

  “Boo fucking hoo. You took a hard foul. It’s part of the game, Chris. You don’t do that to a guy for fouling you. You want to get him back? Score twenty-five points on his ass.” MacGregor paced back and forth in front of the bench. “I don’t get you, Chris.”

  “If I didn’t do something, the other guys would call me a pussy.”

  “They respect you, Chris. They look up to you. Munch is a big mouth, a talker. The other guys think he’s a joke. I think he’s a joke. He won’t even make a high school team, but you’re different.”

  “I know. Just like my dad says, right?” Chris dismissed him with a wave of the hand.

  “I’ve known your dad a long time. He’s made a lot of mistakes, but I know he cares about you. You might not see it that way, but he does. Don’t you care?” MacGregor stopped pacing, placed his hands on his hips.

  “I know you’re not the best student. Let’s be honest. There’s teachers who want you off my team because of your grades. I’m not trying to be a jerk, but it’s the truth.”

  For a moment Chris felt tears welling up. The truth cut deep and hard. He really wasn’t going anywhere based on his grades. Even someone like MacGregor could see that.

  “I’m suspending you from the team for a week. Maybe you need to get yourself together. Talk to your father, even if it’s hard. I’m going to call him tonight and make sure you told him what happened.”

  MacGregor headed for the door and grabbed the handle. He stopped and turned to Chris. “Anyone else would be off this team. I hope you realize that.”

  As the door closed, Chris flipped him the bird. Dad was going to be pissed, but he really didn’t care at this point. Maybe it was time for him to focus less on sports and more on studying. He sometimes wished he would blow out his knee, or break an ankle. A career-ending injury, as they said in the pros. Then maybe he could work with a tutor, get his grades up. Whatever path he chose, he wanted to leave basketball far behind.

  John ordered another cup of coffee, took a sip after making a face. “Hot,” he said. “Like I said, she can manipulate minds, get into people’s heads. Confuse them. I think her finding out about the girlfriend was a matter of reading her husband’s thoughts.”

  The door to the diner opened and the wind blew inside. A bearded man and a girl of about six stepped in. He sat her on a stool and she spun around, kicking her legs and giggling.

  “Someone’s happy,” John said. “Cassie waited up for him one night. He had a flight coming in from the West Coast. Got in about three in the morning. I was sleeping. My room was upstairs at the time. It was three forty-one on the digital clock.”

  The numbers on the clock were etched into his head. Some people say they’ll never forget where they were when Kennedy got shot, and for John it was the same way with that night. He would never forget the moment he first heard the screams.

  “Cassie didn’t waste any time with him. Are you sure you can handle this?”

  “Sure we can,” Jack said.

  The other two nodded.

  “I heard screaming. I thought it was a woman at first, but there were none in the house. I grabbed my revolver from the nightstand and hurried downstairs.”

  “What happened?” Paul asked.

  “I’m getting there. They were coming from the study. I got down there and looked through the sliding doors.” He took a drink of coffee, wishing it were a beer instead.

  “She had him pinned to the big cherry table.”

  “She must be pretty darn strong,” Emma said.

  “Yep. She bound his hands and feet with phone cord. That woman did some awful things. Burned him with a hot poker from the fireplace. Slashed his face apart. Then she tore his eyes out. After that, she closed her eyes and laid her hands on him. The whole room went dark, even the fire in the fireplace went out. When the lights came back on, he was dead. His face was bone white. She wrapped his face in bandages and dragged him from the room.”

  He didn’t tell them that Cassie wasn’t Cassie when she did this. The creature he saw looked like a mutant version of her, and he remembered feeling his sanity start to slide when he saw what she had become.

  “What did she do to him?” Paul asked.

  “She can heal and she can kill. Just like that. But she made Ronnie’s dad into some sort of zombie. The next day I was fixing the garbage disposal and she came up behind me and said, ‘I know you saw.’ ”

  “What did you do?” Emma asked.

  “Almost crapped in my pants,” he said. This drew a chuckle from all of them.

  John said, “She took my family away, my wife and son. She says they’re locked away somewhere and if I ever went to the cops, she’d kill them.”

  “Are they still alive?” Jack asked.

  “I haven’t seen them in ten years. She took me to see them, but I can’t remember where it was. She messed up my head so I wouldn’t remember.”

  “I’m never going near that place again,” Jack said.

  “You have to. You’re Ronnie’s friend now, and if you stop hanging around with him, you’ll make her mad. Act like you never heard this,” John said.

  It was a lot to lay on a bunch of kids, but he needed to tell them for their own safety. They had to keep hanging with Ronnie, but they needed to be careful, too. If they deserted Ronnie now, they risked Cassie releasing the Wraith on them.

  “How are we supposed to hang around with him? What if she tries to kill us?”

  “We’re doomed,” Paul said.

  “Just hang out with him. Be his friend and you’ll have nothing to worry about,” John said.

  “Will you ever find your family?” Emma asked.

  “I don’t know, but it’s what keeps me going.”

  John raised his hand to flag down the waitress.

  Paul had just finished drying off with a cushy blue towel when the doorbell rang. He slid on his underwear and the sweat suit Jack had loaned him. The sleeves came down to his fingertips, so he rolled them up to his elbows. He felt sleepy from the hot bath and wanted to hit the cot, but the familiar voice coming from the door drew him away from bed.

  Paul cut through the kitchen and found Jack standing in the doorway leading to the back hallway. Jack turned around.

  “Your dad’s here,” Jack said.

  “Wonderful.”

  Paul slid next to Jack and peered down the steps. Mr. Harding stood in the door, the outdoor light spilling on his bald head. Paul’s own father stood outside, hair full of
snowflakes, pointing a finger at Jack’s dad.

  “You can’t keep him here. It’s kidnapping.”

  “It’s nothing like that and you know it,” Mr. Harding said.

  “Paul, you get out here.” Paul’s dad stepped forward, and Mr. Harding, a full head shorter, moved forward, blocking the doorway.

  “I’ll call the cops. He belongs at home.”

  “Why don’t you do that? I’d be glad to tell them how you’ve been beating Paul.”

  “Paul, I’m sorry. Why don’t you come home?”

  That was like a shark encouraging a swimmer to put his leg in the shark’s mouth, Paul thought. “I’m staying here.”

  “Did these two tell you what they did to me? One of them kicked me in the ass. I’m pretty sure it was your kid, Harding. You always let him get away with shit like that?”

  With the snow building in his beard, and the wild look in his eyes, Paul’s dad could pass for the abominable snowman.

  “I’ll talk to Jack about that. Meanwhile, Paul stays here. I’m not sending him home with you.”

  “Yeah,” Paul said.

  “You’re awful brave standing up there.”

  “Go home,” Mr. Harding said. “Now.”

  “Fucking hell with all of you.” The abominable one slammed his fist into the side of the house and stomped away, kicking up snow as he went.

  Mr. Harding shut the door and ascended the steps. He wiped his brow, face flushed.

  “You showed his ass,” Jack said.

  “Watch your mouth.”

  “You were great, Mr. Harding,” Paul said.

  Mr. Harding’s hands trembled. Apparently fights with bullies didn’t upset only kids. Paul had never seen anyone stare down his father like that. The General usually got his way.

  “He won’t hurt you, Paul. That’s a promise.”

  “Thanks.” He gave Mr. Harding a quick hug around the waist and let go.

  “What if he sends the cops here?” Jack said.

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  It had been a whirlwind day. Paul and Jack sat in the living room, Jack in the well-worn recliner and Paul on the couch. On the six o’clock news an ambulance crew loaded a sheet-covered body into their rig. It was the Wraith’s latest victim, though the police would never know that. They would look for a drifter or some criminal with a violent record. Someone already dead couldn’t be traced.

  “What do we do?” Paul asked.

  “Exactly what John said. We go to his sleepover and hang with him.”

  “You think she can read our minds right now?” Paul looked around the room, as if she might be hiding behind the couch.

  “No, doofus. I’ll tell you something though.”

  “Yeah?”

  “We have to protect ourselves.”

  From the kitchen, water ran and dishes clanked.

  “Kill her?” Paul said, in a big whisper.

  “I don’t know. But remember what John said. She controls the Wraith and it keeps killing. You forget already?”

  “Sure, Jack. I almost forgot being dragged to my death by a zombie.”

  “You know what I meant. I don’t want her coming after us, chopping us up like she did to Ronnie’s dad.”

  “So we go to the party at his house. Then what? Do we have to be his friend forever? What happens if we move away someday? Would she come after us?”

  “Don’t be a dork. I just don’t want to wait around to see if every time we have a disagreement with Ronnie she gets pissed. Do you?”

  Paul frowned. “No. But we can’t kill her.”

  “We can’t tell our parents or the cops, either. They won’t believe us.” Jack plucked at the hairs on his arm. “Our first step is finding out what makes her tick. We do some exploring around the mansion. Just like in Dungeons and Dragons.”

  He hoped to appeal to Paul’s sense of adventure. “As long as we’re in the house, I think we’re safe.”

  “If you say so.” Paul shifted on the couch.

  “Emma will go with us,” Jack said.

  “What about too-tall?”

  “We’ll work on Chris. Maybe he needs to see it for himself.”

  “But we’re not going into the tunnels again, right?” Paul said.

  “Nah.”

  “You’re still thinking about going down there, aren’t you?”

  “We might need to. Not to prove Chris wrong.”

  “What do you mean?” Paul said. He fidgeted in the chair.

  Jack leaned forward. “If we piss his mom off again, she could send it for us. We might need to go after it ourselves.”

  “We’ll go to the cops. They’ll know what to do,” Paul said.

  “Right. A guy with no eyes who’s already dead attacked us. But if we got proof . . .”

  “How? Ask it to pose for a picture? Not likely, bucko,” Paul said.

  “We’ll think about it.”

  “I feel sick,” Paul said.

  “Your dad has a gun if we need it, right?” Jack said.

  “It’s in his closet.”

  “Good.”

  CHAPTER 31

  Emma straightened her room, putting away a stack of folded sweatshirts and organizing the assorted deodorant, lip balm, and brushes on the dresser. She rehung the Celtics pennant on her mirror, thinking of the incident with Jacob the other day. Her nerves still crackled, as if tiny sparks might jump from her fingertips. Part of it was the upset of the experience with Jacob, and part of it was the thought of the date with Jack. She felt electric, good one moment and sick the next. It depended on what she thought about.

  She slid the dresser drawer closed and the phone rang downstairs. Mom’s footsteps echoed up the stairway. “Emma, phone,” she said.

  Emma went downstairs and her mother held the receiver out.

  “Who is it?”

  “Jacob.”

  She wanted to slam the receiver down in his ear right then and there.

  “I’m not talking to him,” she said.

  “Stop it. He’s your cousin.”

  “But, Mom.”

  “Talk to him.”

  She took a deep breath and picked up the receiver. “What do you want?” Emma said.

  Mom walked away.

  “Looking forward to coming over,” he said.

  “I’m not.”

  “We could listen to more music in your room,” Jacob said.

  “I’d rather have cockroaches in my room.”

  “Okay, dyke.”

  There was a click and then the dial tone came up.

  She slammed the receiver into the cradle and it gave a ding.

  There was no way around it anymore; she had to tell Mom about Jacob. She stormed into the kitchen to find her stirring a mixing bowl with a spoon.

  “I need to talk to you right now,” Emma said.

  “Watch your tone with me.”

  “Sorry. Can we talk now? Please?”

  “Can’t it wait? I’m trying to finish the potato pancakes.”

  “No.”

  Mom set the bowl down and wiped her hands with a pink dish towel hanging on the cupboard door. “What’s on your mind?”

  “Jacob.”

  She leaned back against the counter and folded her arms. “What about him?”

  “He’s been bothering me.”

  “Teasing you?”

  “Worse.”

  “What’s worse?”

  “Bothering.”

  “Get to the point, Emma.”

  She felt the familiar heat creep into her cheeks again and wondered if she shouldn’t just bolt from the room and deal with Jacob herself. “He touched me.”

  “How?”

  Jesus, she would rather talk about her period and girl parts (as Mom called them) than this. “On my butt and boobs,” she said.

  “When did he do this?”

  “In my room the other day. And last summer at Aunt Sam’s.”

  “Is that the noise I heard
up there?” Mom asked.

  Emma nodded.

  “He was probably just horsing around. Boys like to wrestle and roughhouse.”

  “He wasn’t horsing around. I hang around with boys and they don’t do that,” Emma said.

  “You should know, you’re with them enough.”

  That remark was like a tiny pinprick to the heart.

  “You don’t believe me.”

  “Jacob’s a shy boy. Awkward. He’s never even had a girlfriend.” She picked up the bowl again and started stirring. “I’m not sure he’s even interested in girls.”

  “I know one he’s interested in.”

  Mom didn’t answer.

  “He told me he was going to get me,” Emma said. “I kicked him in the balls.”

  “Watch the language. He said he was calling to see if you had the album he wanted.”

  “He called me a dyke.”

  “I’ll have Aunt Sam talk to him about that. Is that all?”

  She never had time for anything. The two of them used to walk to the park, to Shelby’s for banana splits and spend hours taking. Now it was all she could do to get a five-minute conversation out of her mother. It was like talking to a ghost.

  “Maybe when he rapes me you’ll care.”

  “Emma Greer. I know you don’t like your cousin but he’s not a rapist. He’s a little strange, but I doubt he’s trying to rape you.”

  “Fine.”

  Emma turned and stomped up the stairs. Once upstairs, she slammed the door and threw herself on the bed, realizing this was her problem to deal with.

  Kempf checked his watch, a Bulova that Jules had given him two Christmases ago. Ramsey’s press conference was in forty-five minutes. That left him plenty of time to give an interview and get back to Town Hall.