The Snow and The Darkness

by Matthew Warren Wilson

got a strange vibe from him, as if he was somehow brewing trouble even while he was asleep. But Frank didn’t seem to have a problem with him, and if he was just going to sleep, that was okay. He could sleep the whole way to wherever it was he was going and then he could get out. No harm done.

  Jason tried to relax. Valerie was actually falling asleep beside him, too, and when Valerie was less wound up than he was, he knew he was overreacting. But he still couldn’t shake the notion that something wasn’t right about this Cliff guy. Who walked alone in the middle of the night in a snowstorm unless they’d had some sort of accident or emergency? And if that was the case, who didn’t mention that there’d been an emergency and instead fell asleep in the car of the random strangers who’d picked him up? No one who was up to any good, that was for sure.

  Another thirty minutes passed with nothing but white flakes to look at and Jason heard Lucy speak up very quietly from the front seat.

  “I have to pee.”

  “How bad?” Frank asked, his voice just as low.

  “Pretty bad,” she said. “I can hold it for a little while, but we haven’t seen anything out here forever.”

  “You want me to stop now? You can just run off on the side of the road. It’ll be cold, but only for a minute.”

  “Not just yet,” she said. “Let’s hope we run into something soon.”

  Jason didn’t particularly like the idea of stopping out here, but he had to admit he was feeling the need to relieve himself, too. It would be easier for him, of course, than for Lucy, but he wasn’t looking forward to the cold.

  After another twenty minutes Lucy said, “Okay, I think we’d better stop.”

  “Okay everybody,” Frank said, his voice much louder. “Pee break. If you gotta go, go now, because we’re not stopping again.”

  Valerie was rubbing her eyes beside Jason. “Is he serious?” she whispered.

  Jason nodded. “And I’ve gotta go.”

  “Hell, I guess I better, too,” Valerie said. She pulled her jacket tight around her throat as Frank eased the car to a stop. He didn’t bother actually pulling off the road. They hadn’t seen any other traffic since they’d left the highway.

  “What’re we stopped for,” Cliff mumbled from the other side of Jason. “End of the line?”

  “Just a bathroom break,” Jason replied coldly. He didn’t want to get into a conversation with the man.

  “I reckon I could use a piss,” Cliff said, almost to himself, and flung his door open. The cold air whipped into the car.

  “No time like the present,” Frank said, and then they were all piling out of the car at the same time.

  The cold air bit into Jason’s cheeks instantly, sucking the breath out of him. He held his jacket tight at the collar with one hand. The other he placed lightly on Valerie’s back and guided her off the road.

  Visibility was still poor but Jason could see more now than when they’d been in the moving vehicle with its headlights reflecting off the snow. There was probably a good five inches on the road now, and embankments of at least four feet on the shoulders where the plows had piled it. Beyond those embankments Jason could see trees. Nothing but trees and snow. He suspected they were pine trees of some sort but didn’t have the botanical knowledge to be sure. Above the tree line the sky was dark.

  Everything was perfectly silent. Only the humming of the Acura’s engine broke the illusion that he had gone deaf.

  Valerie walked away from the car in the direction they’d come, keeping to the embankment. She didn’t go far; it was too cold. She turned her face to Jason.

  “Here?”

  “Good a spot as any.”

  They both looked behind them and saw Lucy just as she was climbing over the top of the embankment. She headed into the trees, out of their sight. Frank had walked over to the opposite side of the road. His back was to them and he’d already unzipped and let loose from the look of his posture.

  “Is she crazy?” Valerie asked, obviously meaning Lucy. “It’s freezing out here.”

  “Guess she doesn’t want anyone to see her go,” Jason said.

  “Speaking of which…” Valerie looked around suspiciously. “Where did Cliff go?”

  Jason looked around, too, but saw no sign of the bearded man. Perhaps he had also climbed over the embankment so no one would see him go, but that just didn’t seem to fit his style. Jason was pretty sure, just from the little he knew about the guy, that Cliff would have no problem taking a piss in front of a whole army battalion.

  “I don’t know,” he said, “but let’s just get done and get back to the car.”

  He walked about five steps farther up the road and unzipped his jeans. His penis was shriveled so much from the cold that he had a difficult time pulling it from his underwear, but he had no problem urinating. He hadn’t realized how much he really had to go.

  He finished, zipped his pants, and turned to see that Valerie was already standing up, pants fastened. She had a tissue in one hand.

  “What do you think I should do with this?” she asked.

  Jason was about to tell her to just throw it on the ground, but before he could speak, the hushed silence of their surroundings was interrupted. At first Jason didn’t let his mind grasp what it was. There was no conscious act of will, it just didn’t compute. But then it came again and there was no denying it.

  A scream.

  High pitched, piercing. It cut through the cold air with an unsettling resonance and was then swallowed up. It came from within the trees, within the darkness that lurked between them.

  It came from the direction Lucy had gone.

  Frank was running toward them.

  “What is it?” he shouted. “What happened?”

  Jason shook his head. “Not us,” he said and pointed off the road.

  Frank looked at the snow embankment, looked beyond it. “Fuck,” he said, and without another second’s hesitation he was scrambling over it.

  “Get back to the car,” Jason said and followed Frank.

  “I’m not staying here by myself!” Valerie shouted. She was close to panic already, Jason could tell. He didn’t have time to argue, though, and when she followed him he didn’t say another word.

  Suddenly another sound erupted from the darkness. A wailing, keening sound. There was something else in it, too, something that didn’t fit. To Jason it was the sound of someone gargling with mouthwash.

  Frank ran straight toward the wailing, plunging his boots into the knee-deep snow, heedless of any danger that might be there, and Jason followed. It was difficult to move fast. Valerie kept up right behind Jason, plumes of breath coming from her nose and mouth, her cheeks somehow flushed and pale at the same time.

  From the corner of his eye Jason saw a shape moving through the trees off to his left. He tried to focus on it but there was nothing there. Just shadows.

  And then he saw Lucy, on her hands and knees in the snow. The bearded man was in front of her, shouting. She was trying to back up, away from him, but the snow was too deep for her to crawl. The wailing was coming from her.

  “What happened? What happened?” Cliff was shouting, but Lucy didn’t say anything, just kept on with that wailing, gargling sound.

  “Get the fuck away from her!” Frank yelled, barging onto the scene and pushing Cliff hard enough to send him flailing backwards. He tripped and landed on his back.

  That was when Jason saw the blood. It stood out starkly against the white of the snow, a bright puddle in front of Lucy. Droplets extended from that puddle in all directions, like an explosion might look in a comic book panel.

  Frank squatted in front of Lucy. “Shh,” he said. “It’s okay. I’m here. What happened?”

  Lucy looked up at him. Her face was smeared with blood, mostly around her mouth as if she’d been punched in the teeth. She opened her mouth to speak and more blood poured from it.

  Valerie gasped.

  “What did you do to her?” Frank demanded. He stood up again and step
ped over to where Cliff was sprawled in the snow. “What did you do?” His hands were balled into fists. His body was obviously tense under his jacket. He looked like he might pounce.

  Lucy was whimpering now. Not a pleasant sound but better than the gargling wail.

  “Didn’t do nothin’!” Cliff shouted. “She was screamin’, I ran to help. Found her all bloody, same as you.”

  Lucy shook her head vehemently, more drops of blood flying from her mouth and splattering the snow. Frank looked at her again.

  “What happened, sugar?”

  But Lucy didn’t answer. Just opened her mouth again and more blood ran down her chin. She pointed at the center of the puddle of blood, already almost frozen. There were tears streaming down her cheeks. She said something unintelligible. Jason thought it might’ve been “Mom.”

  “What is it?” Frank said softly.

  Jason peered at the spot she was pointing to. There was something there, in all that blood. Something not quite as red. A small pink piece of flesh.

  Jason didn’t have to see Lucy open her mouth again to tell what it was.

  A tongue.

  Her tongue.

  Jason gagged. He swallowed hard and managed to avoid throwing up. Valerie was not so lucky. She turned and retched into the snow at the base of a nearby tree.

  It took Frank a moment longer to realize what had happened, but when he did he was on his feet in an instant.

  “What the fuck! You sick bastard!” He stood over Cliff, still sprawled on his back in the snow, and kicked him hard, once, in the side. Cliff grunted and rolled away. “What the fuck!” Frank shouted again. He didn’t seem to