A Splash of Crimson: A Collection of Short Horror Stories
Author: Jackson Arthur; Velox Books
Date: 2020-11-08 05:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Horror
Description: “I loved every story in this collection!” —Amanda Stuntz, author of New HopeJackson Arthur’s A Splash of Crimson is a thrilling collection of seven strange tales filled with creeping dread. A young couple on the brink of a breakup is drawn to an empty church, where they must confront the darkness within. When June King attempts suicide, she discovers a strange and impossible door, leading to unimaginable horrors. A single father will stop at nothing to save his dying daughter, even if it means making a deal with a mysterious young man. In these stories and others, life and death are black and

I dedicate this to April and Kennedy.

VELOX BOOKS

Published by arrangement with the author.

A Splash of Crimson copyright © 2023

By Jackson Arthur.

All Rights Reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. People, places, events, and situations are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or historical events, is purely coincidental.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author and publisher.

An Unfinished Door

As I sit here waiting for the pills to do their job, my butt on the floor and my back against my bed, I think about my husband and the night that we met. My bedroom is empty, quiet, and the silence allows my memories to be loud and vivid.

I want to say that the night I met my current husband, Nick, was the best, most important night of my life, but I don’t want to risk sounding corny. I want to avoid any cliches. I tend to enjoy a Daniel Steele novel or a romantic movie on the Hallmark Channel, now and then, but I try not to confuse those types of stories with real life. People, mostly women like me, invest in those kinds of cheesy love stories because we wish that our lives would work out in the same way. I like to occasionally take a peek into fluffy fantasy, at the ways I wish life actually was, so that I could escape what life actually… is. Deep down, to be honest, I wholeheartedly want my life to follow those same light and shiny storylines.

A soul mate found on Christmas Eve.

Or a forbidden romance that evolves into everlasting love.

But it hasn’t and never will.

My life has never followed a romantic script. It has never been a festive tale, an organized series of whacky events that maximize those cozy and heartfelt emotions, while also ending in the so-called happiness forever after.

My life is real.

And real life sucks.

Real life… is trash.

Many years before I met Nick, I had married a man named Roger. I was 19-years-young and still a little wet behind the ears. I was naive, to say the least. Roger had taken it upon himself to introduce me to the cold reality that existed outside of fantasy. He did so with a mixture of callousness and indifference, mainly by using his fists or other solid objects to beat it into my body and my mind. He personally and brutally forced that jagged pill down my throat, forcing me to swallow that bitter truth.

Looking back, I can’t say why I stayed with such a toxic human being. Or why I consistently endured emotional, physical, and sometimes sexual abuse for as long as I had. Maybe, after my girlish dreams were shattered, I figured that my marriage to Roger was how life was supposed to be for me. My new, cold reality had possibly numbed me, making it impossible for me to hope or wish for something better, at least for a while.

I did eventually escape that first marriage, though. After another hospital stay and yet another miscarriage, I managed to crawl away from it all, beaten and broken, no longer young and far from naive. However, I could not deny the one lesson that Roger had taught me, even if it acted against all the fantasies and dreams of an innocent girl.

Life, especially mine, would never be bound by fate or end in true happiness.

Thinking about my first marriage still gets my heart racing and my pulse pounding. I can almost hear my rapid, aggressive heartbeats echoing off the walls of my empty bedroom. I take a deep breath and try to calm down, but it doesn’t work. Closing my eyes, I stay with the memories that are flowing rapidly through my brain.

In time, I came to terms with the loss of my innocence, as I’m sure every adult had to at some point. It was all part of growing up; I guess. But it also left me detached and floating aimlessly for many years, untethered to anything real or meaningful. I wasn’t lost. But I also wasn’t found. I just simply… was.

Back in middle school, I had a best friend named Chrissy. Growing up, she and I were inseparable, two scrawny, skinny girls glued together at our mutually boney hips. We were almost like two parts of a single person. During the summer between sixth and seventh grades, Chrissy’s dad took a new job down south in North Carolina. Without warning or a moment to cope with the change, my best friend was gone.

One evening, my marriage to Roger a few years in my rearview, I found myself thinking about Chrissy, something that I had not done in a very long time. On a whim, I searched for her on Facebook, not really expecting much for the effort. Yet, there she was, happy and smiling and married to a military man named Sean. Browsing through her pictures, it was easy to see that Chrissy was satisfied with her life. Fulfilled. Glowing in ways that part of me envied. I wanted my life to fill me with the same amount of light, illuminate me with the same amount of joy.

In less than a week after contacting Chrissy, I took off on a road trip to visit her. It was around a nine-hour drive to get to where she lived on Camp Lejeune, and even though I was bone tired by the time I made it to her house, Chrissy and her husband talked me into going out to the bar that night. It was karaoke Wednesday, something they both liked to go to every week. I wasn’t one to sing badly in front of an audience, but a cold beer sounded good after such a long trip.

The bar was a quaint little dive, and the singers, including Chrissy’s husband Sean, weren’t all that bad. It was fun. We were there for less than an hour when Sean’s best friend Nick showed up. He was stopping by after a work shift so that he could meet some girl that he had been texting off and on with the previous week.

I instantly thought that Nick was cute. I will admit. The first thing that I noticed was his sexy bald head. I was never into bald guys, but the lack of hair worked in his favor, for some reason. He wore glasses and also appeared to be slightly shy, in a bashful sort of way.

The girl, whatever her name had been, was loud and obnoxious. I did not like her at all. I pulled an act of dominance and bought Nick a beer, instead of hoping that he might eventually buy me one. The other girl, what’s her name, wasn’t very happy about it, because I had grabbed Nick’s attention away from her.

It wasn’t long before I had packed up everything that I owned and moved to North Carolina to be with him. That single beer helped to start a conversation between Nick and I that has lasted until this day.

Nick isn’t a white knight sent to rescue the damsel in peril. And he is far from a perfect human being. He has his anger and his depression, like everyone else. The way that we met at that dive bar wasn’t like any bubbly, glitter covered event out of a romance comedy. It was… real. Our marriage has been far from perfect, full of rocks and bumps in the road. Like I already said. I have given up on those girly fantasies long ago.

Nick isn’t a hero. True. But that didn’t matter, doesn’t matter, because there is one important aspect about him that has always been obvious to me. Nick was not, is not, and will never be… a Roger.

What I began to feel started to go against everything that I have been saying so far, but I couldn’t help myself. I dared to dream again, a little bit anyway. Nick completed me, or at least he came pretty damn close to it. He was exactly what I had been looking for without realizing that I had been looking for it. He wasn’t a fantasy. He wasn’t a dream. He was dirty and raw and… very… very… real.

After we got married, and while everything was going good, I slipped up momentarily and began to once again believe in happy endings. Just for a short time, my Facebook was looking a lot like Chrissy’s page, glowing smiles and a fulfilled life, my world filled with that same bright light. But… of course… I would once again be reminded that happy endings are bullshit.

And that life… is trash.

I hate this. All of this bullshit. I want to scream, to hear my voice fill the empty bedroom. Emotions burn inside of me like a furnace, causing me to feel hot and uncomfortable. My forehead is drenched with frustration and a bead of sweat makes its way into my right eye. It only burns for a second or two, long enough for me to wipe it away.

Nick and I desperately wanted to start a family. We tried diligently to become pregnant for nearly a year, almost giving up at one point, before we finally got a positive result. I was so, so happy. And Nick was over the moon. My light, our light, had become even brighter than I had believed possible, even in my younger, innocent years.

Until Roger’s lesson returned to me, like a ghost from the past, and I once again was forced to choke down that same jagged pill.

The pregnancy was validated, and our baby had a heartbeat. I heard my baby’s heart beating on the ultrasound. Strong. Powerful. My little Jack. My little man. But my little man hadn’t been able to make it to my uterus. Instead, he was stuck. Trapped. The doctor told my husband and I that previous trauma and miscarriages had caused scar tissue to form, making it impossible for any fetus to make it beyond my tubes.

Little Jack would never live.

Nor would any other baby we try to create.

With the insistence of my doctor, they went in and removed everything inside of my body that fully made me a woman.

That was about two weeks ago. I am home from the hospital and mostly healed now, at least physically. Nick is pulling away from me. In small ways, at first. He is quiet when I am around, and he gets irritable when I try to speak to him. He doesn’t comfort me or even touch me, anymore, even when I am in pain. He works a lot and is away from home more and more often.

I have let him down.

Nicks wants to be a father, more than anything else, and I can’t give that to him, no matter how much I want to. He will never be complete without it. Our marriage will never be whole without it. There will always be something missing and there is nothing that I can do about it. One day, probably any day now, Nick will leave me to find someone else to give him what I can’t.

Earlier today, we had the biggest, most knock down fight we ever had. The way that he spoke to me and treated me was just like Roger, except Nick would never physically put his hands on me. He stormed out the front door, and I have no idea where he is or what he is doing. Or if he will come back. I am once again free floating.

Nick doesn’t love me anymore.

And how can I blame him?

What else was I honestly expecting?

Happily ever after is for Snow White or Rapunzel.

Not me.

This morning, before the big blow out, I ended up driving down to the pharmacy and turning in my one and only pain medication refill. I hadn’t really felt like taking a trip downtown, but a little voice came to me, whispering in my ear like a tiny gnat, insisting. My pain level was getting better and better, but there was always a chance of a flare-up.

Best to be safe than sorry.

The pill bottle is now empty, and as hollow as I am inside. It is tiny but extremely heavy in my grasp. My sweating is becoming a monsoon, nearly every inch of my skin is flooding with moisture. My already rapidly beating heart begins to thump so hard that it aches. Faster and faster, my heart starts to pound. The blood in my veins pulse and rush quicker and quicker.

My muscles turn weak. Without resistance, the empty pill bottle slips free of my grip and rolls several inches away.

I’m dying.

I knew that this was going to happen. It was the whole point, after all. I can’t stop from being scared, though. No. Terrified. And also sad. Not for myself. Not anymore. But for Nick. It won’t be easy for him, but he will be better off, in time. I just know it. He can find someone to give him the treasure that I am unable to provide.

A child.

A baby.

Even though I continue to sweat profusely, my body becomes ice cold. I begin to shiver and shake uncontrollably.

“Goodbye, Nick,” I whisper quietly.

My weakened muscles suddenly snap tight, like thick cords pulling taut and tense. My entire body becomes stiff and strained as I start to convulse. The pain is like nothing I have ever felt. The shaking is fierce and vicious.

I just want it to be over. Please, just let it all end.

“I’m sorry. I love you.”

And then everything stops. I become instantly still.

But I still… exist… somehow.

Darkness covers me, but after a second or two, I realize that it is because my eyes are closed. Slowly, I open them and take a look around. I am still in my bedroom, still sitting on the floor, my back still leaning against my bed.

I don’t understand. Why didn’t it work? Why am I still here?

As I continue looking around, my first impression is that everything about the room is exactly the same. Unkempt queen-sized bed behind me. Worn out brown carpet below me. To my left, the same wooden dresser Nick and I have been sharing for a couple of years. To my right, a tv stand with a 40-inch flat screen on its top. Exactly the same. Or so I at first believe. That is when I notice that there is indeed something different. It took me nearly a full minute to recognize, because it isn’t a change in the room that I need to see. Everything that had been there before is still there now. But among my familiar surroundings is something new, something added.

My bedroom has always had three doors. To the closet. To the attached master bathroom. And the main one, leading to the upstairs hallway.

Three doors.

Sitting here, confused and bewildered, I find myself somehow staring across the room at a fourth. On the right side of the room’s main entrance, a spot where only an empty wall had previously existed, now sits a strange new door. At the sight of this impossibility, I jump to my feet, and find that my legs, which had been weak and shaking not long before, are easily able to hold me up.

Am I hallucinating? Have I fallen asleep and am dreaming?

I take a few steps forward and stand directly in front of the new door.

Old. That is the first word to break into the forefront of my mind when I peer upon the impossible door. Ancient. Medieval, even. This new door is obviously quite sturdy, made from solid, vertical planks of wood, held in place by deeply driven iron studs, which creates a speckled pattern across the entire surface. Two long metal hinges bloom outward from its right side, running across the wood like steel trees. The top is not a square, but a wide arch, a sharp point at the peak.

The door looks alien, unnatural within the pale plaster wall of my home. The cheap material from which my house is made should never be stable or strong enough to hold something that hulking, that substantial, that massively heavy. A door of this making has no place in a modern structure of the 21st century. It belongs in a castle, where it is opened and closed by kings and queens.

Another word comes to the forefront of my thoughts.

Unfinished.

The natural color of the wood is a sharp red with a slight pink tone, possibly cherry or oak. I’m not sure. I don’t know much about trees or wood. But apparently, at some point after the impossible door had been constructed, it had been decided that the wood’s natural color needed to be concealed beneath a layer of solid black paint. However, the act of painting had, for whatever reason, been abandoned not long after beginning. Now black paint only covers the top area between the upper hinge and the arch, while the rest of the door remains uncovered.

Unfinished.

The thought repeats.

Built into the left side of the door is a single metal handle. Below the handle is a simple keyhole, from where I can see a metal key hanging. The key is also old in both appearance and style. It is long, thin, and most likely made from bronze. The bronze might have once been shiny, but it appears to have dulled with age and wear. At the end of the key, where a person would grip to turn, the metal had been flattened and molded into the shape of an elongated oval. Two words had been engraved into the center of the oval.

I lean down, bringing my face closer so that I can better read the words.

“June King,” I speak aloud.

My name.

Without realizing that I am moving, I reach out and grip the key with my fingers. The metal of the key feels cool against my skin, cool enough to cause gooseflesh to break out on the back of my neck and down my arms. I slowly twist the key and at once hear a locking mechanism release its hold. I then turn the key back to its original position before attempting to tug it free. However, the lock refuses to let it go, and the key remains held by the door.

I leave the key alone and turn my attention to the door. The metal of the door’s handle also feels cool on my skin as I place my hand on it. I expect the hefty looking door to be heavy or its old hinges to put up a fuss when I push it open, but it opens easily and without noise. Realistically, the only thing that I should find beyond the unfinished door is the guest bedroom and possibly the upstairs hallway. Yet, with the door fully pushed open, I find myself staring down a much different type of hallway.

The first thing I notice is that there is a very mild stream of air rolling down the impossible hallway, and carried on the air is an odor that causes me to turn up my nose. Mildew and rotten, moldy food. That is the closest thing to which I can compare the stench that is coming from somewhere down the hall.

While peering down this new hallway, I feel like I am looking through a portal into the past. Halfway down, a long wooden torch is hanging from the wall, its flames slightly swaying with the moving, moldy air. The light of that single torch dances against the walls, which seem to be made from blocks of stone. The stones of the wall are gray in color and appear rough and weathered. The hall floor is also made from a similar stone, but darker gray in color and much more smooth.

The ceiling of the hall is not made from stone, like the walls and floor, but built with wide wooden beams and rafters. If I listen close enough, I can hear the subtle, mildew filled breeze moving through them.

Less than 30 yards down, the strange hallway makes a sudden sharp turn left. I can’t see where or how much farther the hall goes beyond that point. Yet, I know that there is another torch hanging somewhere along that unseen stretch, because I can see more dancing light reflecting across the wall and along the floor of the hallway’s bend.

“June!” a howl erupts behind me, jolting me from the daze I must have entered. Startled, I swing around and witness my husband Nick entering the bedroom. “June!” He cries again, momentarily frozen in obvious fear. “Oh my god! June!”

As he calls my name, I notice that Nick is not looking in my direction. He is not looking at me, at all. Instead, his eyes are straight forward. I follow his gaze and then realize that he is actually looking at me, after all.

Crumpled on the floor next to our bed, my body lies. I want to be surprised. I want this to be a massive revelation. But, somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew it the whole time. I took the pills, and they did what I wanted them to.

I am dead.

I watch Nick suddenly lunge forward towards my body, but he stops after only taking a couple of steps. I’m not sure why he stops until I watch him reach down to his feet. He picks up the empty pill bottle and inspects it closely. He had stepped on it, his weight warping and cracking the plastic. He rolls it between his finger and thumb. When he finds the bottle’s label, the truth of what he is seeing hits home.

“Shit!” he exclaims, before dropping the empty bottle back to the floor.

It takes him another second to rush to my body and fall down beside its lifeless flesh. As I watch my husband begin to cradle my body in his arms, I begin to hear what might be footsteps coming from behind me, coming from the impossible hallway.

Turning back around, I look and listen.

Thump… thump… thump…

I am clearly hearing footsteps, but it does not sound like shoes tapping against a stone floor.

Thump… thump… thump…

Instead, the sound is closer to the slapping of bare skin.

Thump… thump… thump…

A form walks between the unseen torch and the hallway bend. I can clearly see a disturbance in the dancing light, as a human-like shadow is suddenly cast onto the stone wall.

Thump… thump… thump…

An extraordinarily tall, totally nude person abruptly enters the far bend of the hallway. By the bright light of the torch, I watch what appears to be a bald man, maybe seven feet or more in height, enter the stretch of hallway in front of me before turning in my direction.

No.

Not a man.

Not exactly.

Whoever… whatever… I am now looking at has the shape of a muscular man, but there is nothing hanging from where male genitals should be.

Pale flesh covers his… its… nude body.

No.

Not covering.

Not exactly.

Neither one of the arms nor the left leg has skin covering them. The muscles and tendons and everything else normally concealed beneath a thin layer of flesh are fully exposed to my eyes. Had the skin been stripped away, peeled away, at some point in the past? Or had there never been skin there in the first place? I can’t say. But either possibility terrifies my already frightened mind.

The strange man-like abomination continues casually making his way down the hall and toward me. It is at once apparent that the creature is not one bit surprised to see me standing in the open doorway, like it already knew that it would find me here. Maybe I am the whole reason for the thing’s arrival? The realization strikes me hard in the chest, and I quickly reach out for the handle of the open door. As I hastily pull the massive door closed, I try to keep my eyes on the nude creature up until the last possible moment. The whole time that I am in the act of closing the door, the creature does not slow or speed its pace, but calmly continues down the hall.

If it is there for me, why doesn’t it rush at me?

The answer becomes strikingly apparent. It doesn’t have to. Because no matter how hard I twist the bronze key, it will not turn, and I cannot re-engage the lock.

Somehow, the sight of the nude creature causes me to forget about Nick, but his voice manages to break through my fear. At some point, whenever I hadn’t been looking, Nick must have pulled out his cell phone to call 911. I don’t have to look behind me to know that he is now begging an emergency operator to save my life. I know his voice. I know… him.

“Please,” he pleads into his Samsung. “You have to help her. It’s my wife, June. She has… taken pills. I don’t… I don’t know if she is still breathing. You have to send someone to help her. Hurry. 618 Jupiter Street…”

A swift tug at the unfinished door from the other side pulls me away and again shoves Nick’s voice back into the cloud of fear and panic that fills my mind. Suddenly, an even stronger tug nearly pulls the unfinished door from my grasp. I place both hands on the door’s handle and try to grip with all the strength my arms can manage. I create additional support by planting my left foot against the wall at the side of the door.

Every coherent thought in my head is screaming at me, telling me that I cannot let this thing get its hands on me. But how do I stop it? Do I run? Do I fight back? Can I fight back? Or is this my fate? How things were always going to end for me?

Another brief tug threatens to rip the door from me. The thing is just messing with me. I know it. A sensation of helplessness and doom begins to fill me, causing my grip to lessen. Before I can regain my confidence and grasp, the nude man-thing finally stops playing games. With force and impatience, it yanks at the door one last time. I quickly let go to keep from being drug through the doorway and into the stone hall.

I freeze as I come face-to-face with the creature. The bare muscles of its arms wiggle and bulge. Lack of eyelids make its eyes appear wider than I had once believed possible. Its teeth were rotten and jagged and in full display without any lips to cover them. And the smell is like that of roadkill, a deer carcass left in the sun for a few days.

I attempt to run, but I am far too frightened, far too slow. I manage to turn away from the thing, but before I can get my body moving, the man-creature wraps a skinless arm around my neck. I feel the tissue of its muscle tighten against my skin and it’s an unnatural sensation. The thing immediately begins to rip me through the opened doorway. I flail my arms out wide, trying to grab anything and everything. One of my hands finds the framing of the door but fails to grab a hold. My other hand regains a tight grasp of the door’s metal handle. I hold on for dear life.

“Nick!” I scream, my voice straining and cracking. I know that my husband cannot hear me, but I continue howling, anyway. “Nick! Nick! Help me! I don’t want to die! I don’t want to be dead!”

Desperately peering outward through the open doorway, I look to my husband. He is holding my body again with both arms, his cell phone now laying at his side. Deep sobs and intense despair distort his facial features as he cradles my lifeless flesh.

My husband still loves me.

What have I done?

“Nick!”

And then, for some reason, his sobbing stops and his face changes.

Does he hear me?

Something is happening, but I can’t tell what.

I somehow manage to get both of my hands onto the metal handle. Holding tight, I try to buy myself as much time as I can. I am not going. Not yet.

When Nick doesn’t raise his head or look in my direction, I yell again, with even more venom and fire behind it.

“Niiicccck!!!”

My husband lowers his head closer to my limp body. What is he doing? Look at me, Nick. Please. Just look my way. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t hear me. I instantly begin to lose hope. Why doesn’t he hear me? I need him to hear me. I need him to save me.

I continue to struggle against the strength of the creature but am swiftly losing the fight. Nick places his head against my dead chest. Has he given up, too? No. I can see it on his face. He is thinking, listening. He does hear something. Not my screaming. But something else.

My heart?

Is my heart still beating?

“Nick!” I yell one last time as the metal handle finally slips from my hands.

As I am being violently dragged backward down the hall, I see something before Nick is completely removed from view. His hand. It moves. Toward my face. Toward my throat. And somehow, I can feel it. A phantom pressure entering my mouth, prodding at my throat. Pushing. Moving. Fingers. Nick’s fingers. And I start to gag on the invisible intrusion. The phantom fingers twist and turn and churn up the insides of my gut until nausea fully overtakes me. Either it doesn’t notice or care, but the man-creature fails to even pause when I start to projectile vomit. The puke shoots from my mouth in a white, foamy waterfall that splatters onto my chest and stomach.

My vision begins to dance, like the flames of the torch I pass.

Everything goes black.

And then, light somehow finds me in the darkness. Bright and blinding. Within the all-encompassing light, shadows and shapes slowly form and focus. A face. Nick. My head is swimming, and my body feels brittle, but I manage a slight smile.

And two words.

“I’m sorry.”

Nick helps me sit up.

From somewhere outside, I can hear wailing sirens.

I don’t want to look away from my husband’s wonderful face, but I do anyway. The unfinished door is gone. Empty wall is now the only thing to see there. Gone. Or is it? Maybe it isn’t really gone, not entirely. Maybe it is still there, existing wherever we go when we die, waiting for when I inevitably return.

I just can’t see it… right now.

Maybe we all have a door through which we must enter whenever we die, either by choice or by force, and there is nothing any of us can do about it. That possible truth doesn’t scare me. But I can feel my hurting chest and weakened heart becoming tense. As I glare at the empty spot where my doorway most likely awaits me, a single thought repeats over and over in my head.

The door is now unlocked.

The Church at the Edge of Town

The church at the edge of town seemed empty, as it usually was, which was why she and I found ourselves in the back of the building, sitting at the top of its high concrete staircase. We needed to be alone as our lives fell apart. We needed to come apart away from everyone else. And as I sat there, 17 years old and full of heartache, it honestly felt like my entire world was crashing down around me.

Even though we did our best to disappear into the early night hours, there was a bright light raining down on us from above the church’s backdoor, like a spotlight on our pain. As we sat there, we did our best to ignore the exposure.

“Did you really sleep with him?” I asked her again, for what might have been the hundredth time. Waiting for her familiar answer, I continued to look out across the open field behind the church. The field was wide and long, much larger than a football field, perhaps even as large as a couple of them. It marked the outskirts of my little town, ending with a treeline in the distance. As I peered out over the empty field, it wasn’t hard to imagine that she and I were the last two people remaining in the entire world.

What a depressing idea.

“Yes,” she finally answered after several seconds of silence.

Even though I already knew the answer, having heard it a hundred times before, I still held out a sliver of empty hope that her response would suddenly change. All she had to do was tell me no. One simple no would erase a hundred yesses. And, sadly, I would happily believe her. I would erase those yesses from memory and never think of them again. Anything for us to go back to the way we were, before her cousin had unexpectedly called my phone, before knowing about… him.

But the answer, along with reality, would not change.

A real yes would never become a fake no.

At least not for me.

“What do we do now?” I asked, my eyes feeling the threatening burn of oncoming tears.

I both heard and felt her puff out a breath of frustrated air. I wanted to look over and see her face, see her expressions, know that she was feeling the same type of way that I was, but at the same time, I couldn’t bear it. So, I continued to keep my sights on the dark field and the calm emptiness of it, which was the opposite of my full, chaotic brain.

Suddenly, she sprung to her feet. Startled, I cringed away from her unexpected movements, as if jolted from sleep. I had to finally look at her. Her slender body and beautiful face. Her caramel-colored skin. My love. My loss. Deep inside, I ached for her. An ache that resonated from my core. I did my best to bury that ache as I watched her move to the backdoor of the church.

Turning back to me, she replied, “Let’s ask God.”

As she placed her hand on the door’s knob, my eyes darted to the church’s gravel lot. I knew the building was unoccupied, but for some reason I still had to visually make sure that there were no cars.

I could only see the back half of the lot, but it was obviously empty. Like I knew it would be. As it usually was. Compared to the other handful of churches that are found along that particular stretch of road, a road I often referred to as Saint’s Row, that church was an oddity. It was an oddity because, having lived in the same town my whole life, I have never personally known anyone who attended it. Yet, I knew that there had to be at least a few people who went to this church because occasionally I would notice a handful of cars parked in the gravel lot. But unlike those who went to the other churches, which normally met on Sunday mornings and sometimes Wednesday evenings, outside of their special functions, there didn’t appear to be any rhyme or reason for when the people of that particular church, whomever they may be, came together to worship.

“If this door is unlocked,” she said, returning my attention to the cruel reality, “it means that God wants us to come inside.”

There was no way that the door would be unlocked.

No way.

There were two tall windows, one on each side of the door, but they were stained glass, strange abstract and obscure shapes in multiple vibrant colors, making it impossible for me to properly see through them. The only thing that I could make out through the colors of the stained glass was a subtle light coming from a dim source somewhere inside the building. I couldn’t tell if there was anyone inside moving around or moving past the windows, but I didn’t believe so.

From all appearances, it seemed like no one was home. That meant that the door should be locked. I mean, there was no way that the priest or pastor or whoever would leave the building without locking up behind them. Not in a town like ours. Yet, as I was getting ready to tell her this fact, she turned the knob.

It turned.

Without resistance or restraint.

I tried to plead. I wanted to tell her to stop. No. Don’t go in there. Before I could say anything out loud, she had the door pushed open before disappearing inside. Either by her hand or the force of physics, the door returned closed.

My heart pounded in my ears as my pulse began to race. I was suddenly terrified. We should not be doing this. This is wrong. My mouth became so dry that my tongue started to hurt. We should not be doing this.

But what if it was actually God’s will, whether it be my God or whatever God those of that church worshipped? What if she had been right and the door being unlocked was, in all reality, a signal for us to come inside?

A strange, animal-like scream suddenly erupted behind me.

Startled, my bones nearly jumped through my skin. Twisting around, my eyes fell on a broad concrete base, the gray slab illuminated by the light above the church door. Planted deeply into the grass and earth of the large field, the rock base sat several yards from the empty gravel lot. My eyes began on the base before swiftly running upward along the narrow stone pillar that the base held, tracking the source of the scream. At the top of the pillar, nearly two stories up, there was a statue of a man wearing a gray robe.

That statue always creeped me out.

Whenever I would happen to pass by that church, for whatever reason, it always felt as if the statue man was staring at me, his eyes following me, even though his face was completely concealed beneath an upturned hood. It always gave me the chills, as if his eyes were directly on me, following me.

Did the statue man even have eyes? Did whoever made him feel the need to add them? Or was he faceless under that hood?

The statue man, whether he was supposed to be a monk or a pilgrim or a wiseman of Jesus, had his left arm outstretched wide in the motion of a coming embrace. Yet, the embrace was only half-formed, because the statue man did not have a right arm. When I had first noticed the missing arm, I had assumed weathering and age had caused the piece of stone to merely fall off. Yet, looking closer, I wasn’t so sure. The right arm was indeed missing. However, the gray robe had a right sleeve hanging limp at the statue man’s side, an empty sleeve in which a right arm would fill.

At that moment, it seemed to me that there never was a right arm.

Strange.

Another animal-like screech rang out.

Perched on the statue man’s only arm was a large, dark feathered vulture. Like the statue man, the large corpse-eater was also staring intensely down at me. After adjusting its footing on the arm, the vulture opened its mouth wide and gave another eerie scream, which sounded like the mixture of a crying woman and a shrill wind blowing.

Trying to shake off the creepy feeling the statue man and the vulture gave me, I returned my attention to the church door. I should leave. Shouldn’t I? When I didn’t follow her, she would get the point and just come back out. Won’t she? She was trying to play a stupid game and I should not indulge her. Right? Right. I should just go home.

I didn’t, though.

I didn’t go home.

Instead, I followed her into the church. Once inside, I was immediately greeted by a wall of thick, hot air that nearly stole my breath away. It was stale and heavy and took me by surprise. While the air outside had been that of a cool spring night, the air inside was like hell itself. It was a little hard to breathe at first, and I had to pause to adjust. Heavy sweat erupted from my pores.

As I paused to gather my bearings, I noticed that I was now standing in a cramped foyer, which opened into a wide but short hallway. Along the hall, there were three open doorways. I could clearly see them against a yellow light that was brightly spilling from the nearest doorway and into the hall. The yellow light rolled down the short hall and into the foyer, causing me to believe that it was the same light that I had seen tapping against the vibrant colors of the stained-glass window.

I did not see her, though.

I listened closely for her, but all I could hear was my own heart beating against my ribs.

Slowly, I began to step through the foyer, before further moving into the hall. I tried to walk quietly, so that I could still listen for any signs of her, but the floorboards below the dingy brown carpet groaned and squeaked beneath my shifting weight.

I crept up on the first open doorway, the only door on the right side of the hall. Cautiously, I peeked through. I still did not find her, as I had been hoping. Instead, I looked into what appeared to be a normal, small office space, with the usual desk, chair, bookcase, and metal file cabinet often found in one. The source of the yellow light was a bare, burning bulb that hung from the ceiling. Had someone forgotten to turn the bulb off? Or did they leave it burning on purpose?

It didn’t matter.

I had to keep moving so that I could find her and get the hell out of there, before the person who possibly left the light burning returned to fix their mistake.

Continuing along the hall, I arrived at the second of the three doors. Beneath the shadows that fell through the open doorway, I could easily make out a simple bathroom, with a single toilet and a single sink. Empty. She was not there either.

Arriving at the last doorway, I once again found a simple room. A kitchen. Aside from its long stove and multiple fridges and freezers, it was also empty. She was not there either. Damn it. The game was getting annoying, and I was growing frustrated. I did not want to play hide and seek in some weird church.

I was tempted to yell for her.

For her to stop hiding.

For her to show herself.

Rather than filling the church with my booming voice, I chose to continue quietly moving, tiptoeing down the final stretch of hall. The hall eventually opened up into a large room. A sanctuary. Even though the office light had failed to fully reach into the room, I luckily had another light source by which to see. Several, in fact. Tiny orbs of light, to be more accurate, which were being emitted from the tips of white, electric candles that were scattered along the room’s four walls.

The tiny dots of light showed me a sanctuary that was more than merely large, but massive. It was a gigantic square room with high ceilings and a hardwood floor. The whole floor had been stained and varnished a glossy red, a contrast to the dingy brown carpet found back in the hall and other rooms. Filling the majority of the new room’s space were long wooden pews, which were also a glossy red.

It was easy to assume, like most common churches, that the sanctuary was the center of the building, the heart of the church.

On the room’s far right wall, I could make out a set of double doors that must be the front entrance to the building. Unlike the seemingly cheap back door, the set of front doors appeared to be built thick and sturdy, while also stained and varnished to match the floor and pews.

As I scanned the sanctuary further, I couldn’t help but notice that there was a total lack of the usual religious decorations. No hanging crosses. Or tortured messiah. Or paintings that depicted paradise or fluttering angels. There wasn’t anything like that. At all. Which seemed odd and unusual to me. Instead, there were only rows and rows of pews facing toward a slightly raised wooden stage, also stained and varnished like everything else. And at the head of the stage, there was only a single wooden podium.

My eyes began to dart around the massive room until they eventually stopped on the third row of pews. On her. She was sitting there motionless; her face pointed in the direction of the stage and podium.

From my distance in the hallway entrance, I tried to see her mood, to read her expression, but the light of the candles threw shadows across her face, concealing any revelations I might find. Had she even noticed me? Why wasn’t she looking my way? Why was she still playing games? After what she did to me, I should be the one playing the games.

Not her.

Not her.

Her head remained unturned as I walked over. There was just enough empty space between herself and the end of the pew for me to sit down at her side. As if she never doubted for a minute that I would chase her into an empty, shadowy church. She never doubted for a second. And she had been simply sitting there waiting for me to catch up.

Several seconds of silence passed between us, both of our eyes drawn to the empty stage. Finally, she spoke. “What do you think God is saying to us?”

Such a strange question.

“I don’t hear him,” I replied. Then added, “Or her.”

“Well,” she continued, before finally turning to look my way. “I hate him. Why would he do this to us?”

“God did this?” I responded, my voice raising, filling with venom. I turned and found her gaze among the shadows.

She didn’t answer, but through the shadows, I could vaguely make out some weird energy that was dancing behind her eyes.

“No,” I continued. “You did this. You are the one who slept with some guy that you just met. Some… stranger… at your cousin’s apartment. You. Not God. You. And you alone. You are the one who tore my heart out and stomped it. For what? I need to know. God doesn’t need to talk to me. But you do. Why did you do it? Why? You tore my world apart? Why?”

I heard her stifle back what sounded like the beginnings of a sob or burst of tears. Without saying another word, she rose and scrambled away, swiftly moving down the row of pews and out the other side. She ran in the opposite direction of the back hallway, while also moving away from the set of front doors.

Where the hell was she going?

I hadn’t noticed the set of stairs until I realized that she was running directly for them. At once, I leapt from my seat. Back on my feet, I dashed for her and these newly discovered steps. But I had no chance of getting to her before she reached them.

Down she went.

And out of sight.

A basement?

Perfect.

The game continues.

As I reached the top of the stairs, I paused to peer down into the dark abyss. None of the small orbs of lights behind me seemed strong enough to pierce the deep black of the basement. Suddenly remembering my cell phone, I pulled it from my pants’ pocket. After giving the screen several taps, I was able to turn on its flashlight. Using the newly emitted beam of light, I began to descend the stairs, their red stained boards creaking and groaning.

My throat tightened as I moved from one step to the next. It almost felt like plunging into a large body of dark, open water, unsure what dangers I might encounter once I broke through the surface.

At the bottom of the steps, I discovered an area much smaller than I had anticipated. The basement obviously did not run the full extent of the church. Instead, the area below wasn’t even half the size of the area above.

I threw the phone’s beam of light against the nearest corner of the basement, before slowly following along the concrete walls and concrete floors, as I attempted to take in everything the light revealed.

The area was sparsely furnished.

There were two tables. The main table, which appeared to be constructed using several pale folding tables positioned end to end, sat at the center of the basement. It ran quite long and cut the room down the middle. Lining the main table were at least 30 plastic chairs. To the left of the main table were three other similar foldable tables, but much shorter, most likely to be used by children. Tucked into the side of the shorter tables were close to a dozen or so plastic chairs, also small in size.

How many people went to this church?

A couple of feet from there and facing toward the kid’s tables, there was what I immediately observed to be a white, dry erase board held by a black tripod. Standing directly in front of the whiteboard, almost nose to nose with it, I found her.

She was like a statue, standing still and intensely staring at the whiteboard.

As my light fell over her, I nearly cried out at her sudden appearance from the dark. Hastily, I marched over. Like before in the sanctuary, she never turned to me or seemed to notice my arrival. It was like she was in a trance or something.

The hairs on my arms stood up. And a shiver rushed down my spine.

For several seconds, I simply stared at the side of her face, which looked ghostly in the phone’s bright beam of light. Before I could say a word to her, I noticed that she had a black marker in her hand. Two lines had been written across the center of the whiteboard.

The first line, written in what I knew well to be her handwriting:

God is not here for me

More games, I at once told myself. She was being a drama queen. And I have had just about enough of it.

But then I saw the second line, also in black, but written in handwriting that I did not recognize:

NO. But we are.

What the hell?

Who else was down here?

I didn’t get a chance to ask her or better search the basement for another person, because the sound of shuffling feet was unexpectedly heard moving above us. Or at least that’s what it seemed like to me. It was faint. But I was almost sure I had heard it. At once, I snuffed out the light. After throwing a blanket of darkness over the both of us, I returned the cell to my pocket.

Unconsciously, I held my breath.

And then I listened.

More faint shuffling.

Maybe.

Someone walking?

Pastor or priest?

More than one person?

I couldn’t be sure.

Void of light to guide my way, I somehow found her hand with mine. I squeezed it tight, forcing her to drop the black marker to the concrete floor. We needed to get out of here somehow. We should just make a run for it. Right? But I didn’t move. And neither did she. For a minute? Ten minutes? I can’t be sure how long we waited and listened for any more signs of movement coming from above us. All I know is that at some point, I concluded that the shuffling sounds had either been in my imagination or whoever had been moving around was gone. Either way, I began to slide toward the bottom of the steps, toward the only source of faint light, pulling her along behind me like a zombie.

I paused briefly, listening again. Nothing. After finally releasing my held breath, I began to ascend the stairs toward the room of worship. I tried to tread lightly, to keep the groaning of the wood to a minimum, but every step seemed like an axe splitting a log in two, fully announcing our presence. If one or more people were within earshot of the stairs, it was hard to believe that they would not be aware of us. Yet, we still tip-toed the rest of the way to the top.

I didn’t want to turn my head until we were all the way at the top and exposed, because I wanted to prolong our fate for as long as I could. Thinking back, I should have never stopped to look. I should have shielded my eyes or closed them altogether. I should have immediately and blindly rushed at the front doors, the closest exit, her hand still gripped in mine. Would I have made it? I can’t be sure. But that wouldn’t have been the point. Because I would make it, either way. But if I would have rushed at the front door as soon as we got to the top of the stairs, I might not have lost her.

I didn’t, though. I paused. And I looked.

I took a stumble back, unbalanced by what I was looking at. The red stained pews were no longer empty. They were nearly full. Filled with the living… and the dead; all of them motionless and staring forward.

I looked upon the sides of their many faces. Men and women. Some appeared young. Others seemed older. Some were pink and healthy looking. While others were covered in rotting, peeling flesh. And then, scattered among the healthy and rotting faces, were the shadows. They were not tricks of light cast by electric candles. They were something else. As odd as it might seem, somewhere in the back of my mind, I already knew what they were. They were the black remnants of people that were so long dead from the world that their physical vessels had become dust and dirt.

The smell. Oh God, that smell. I vomited into my mouth when the stench of death struck me, like a thick cloud of sewage and despair.

For whatever reason, I still did not run.

Why hadn’t I run right then?

Instead, I swallowed my puke and followed their gaze. The living and the dead, to the stage, to the podium. Standing at the podium, his single arm stretched out wide, was the statue from atop the pillar. Somehow, he had gotten down. His robe was no longer made of concrete, no longer gray, but instead it was a brilliant crimson cloth, like the color of blood as it spouts from a freshly opened wound.

I still didn’t know if a face existed within the black of his upturned hood, but at that moment there was no doubt that the statue man was looking directly at me.

At us.

That was when I finally ran.

I dashed full speed along the end of the pews and toward the front set of doors. I made it over halfway to the exit before I lost her hand. One minute I was still squeezing it tight and then the next minute there wasn’t anything for me to grip. Skidding to an abrupt stop, I looked behind to where she had been a second before.

She was gone.

As if on instinct, I began to desperately scan the pews, running my eyes back and forth across the mass of bodies still sitting there. All of them had continued to face blankly ahead to the statue man. All of them except one.

Her.

She was sitting again in the pews, at the end of the same row as before, except instead of peering blankly forward to the crimson man, she was looking to me for help, pain and guilt in her eyes, calling to me without words.

I want to say that I went for her.

That I rescued her, and we made it out safely.

But that would be a lie.

For the sake of honesty and truth, I ran away and left her there. I didn’t even pause to glance back as I escaped the church. I couldn’t take it when I saw her pleading face. Her cheating face. Once I was clear of the church and at the side of Saint’s Row, I paused only for a second or two. From my position, I could see along the side of the building and across its gravel lot. Where the space had previously been empty, sat cars and other vehicles.

Promptly looking away, I pointed myself down the road. I didn’t want to see the full lot or what was planted in the field beyond it. I turned my eyes before they could fall upon the tall stone pillar… and the emptiness I knew I would find at its peak.

Compounded in Clay

A hospital bed rolled down a white hall, pushed by a tall male doctor and laid upon by a young man, both oblivious to the two Guides standing along the wall. The tall doctor slowed as he approached the swinging double doors, knowing that the motion sensor would activate to let them pass.

The eyes of the young man, who had been lying flat on his back, did not look scared to Mary, even though he was on his way to an Operating Room. He merely seemed a little nervous.

He had no reason to be scared, Mary knew. Everything would go all right with the young man’s surgery, whatever that might be. Or else Malthus or herself would have been holding a green file with the young man’s name on the tab.

As the double door swung shut, Malthus turned to Mary. “Brave young fellow.”

Mary nodded.

Malthus’ face looked serious; the brown skin of his forehead stretched as he struggled for the right words to express his important thoughts. “This will be a very important night for you, my little Mary. You will remember it forever, young one.”

Even though Mary had the appearance of an 11-year-old girl, her essence was older and wiser than that of a mortal child. Yet, she did not mind when Malthus referred to her as “young” or “little,” because next to Malthus most Guides were young and little.

“Why do you say that?” Mary asked, hoping her instincts were not right. She was not ready for it.

“Tonight will be your final night as my trainee,” Malthus replied. “Tonight, I will teach you the final lesson, the most important lesson for all Guides to learn and understand.”

“Am I ready?”

“I think you are, my Mary,” Malthus replied, his gray hair catching a hint of the fluorescent lights. Sometimes Mary envied Malthus’ gray hair, because it was a mortal symbol of age and knowledge. Mary’s hair would always be long, curly, and dark black. “And I believe,” Malthus continued, “that deep down inside, you know that you are ready, too.”

Something in Malthus’ hand caught Mary’s attention. Green files. Plural. Two, instead of one.

Noticing that Mary had spotted the files, Malthus held them up and said, “Two.”

“Two?”

“One for me and one for you,” Malthus answered, a grin forming and spreading.

If Mary could still experience sensations of the flesh, then she would have had a cold chill. She would have trembled and shivered over her entire body. However, death had taken those types of experiences from her. Sometimes, though, Mary missed them.

“These two cases were personally picked for us, for the lesson they will teach,” Malthus said. “Walk with me, little one.”

Malthus headed toward the double doors, Mary a step behind. The sensor above the set of doors, being abnormally sensitive, picked up their phantom movements and activated, allowing the two doors to slowly slide outward.

Mary sped her pace, because Malthus did not like it when she walked behind him. They were equals in his mind, which meant that Mary should be beside him when they worked.

“This file is yours,” Malthus said, passing one of the files to Mary, before quickly adding, “Do not open it yet.”

Mary obeyed. However, the name on the tab was visible.

Tre Scott.

“I know that you sometimes cry after a job,” Malthus blurted, but even his blurts were well planned. “Not as much these days, but the tears are still there, tying you to the living world. Which could be good, for some of our kind. Guardians and Watchers, for example. That is why Boss lets that one sensation remain. Yet, those tears are not suited for Guides. We must be done with them tonight.”

Mary was surprised at how blunt Malthus was being. He was right, though. She knew that. Malthus always knew best. And Mary would follow him anywhere.

As a trainee and friend.

***

Trumbull County Hospital was kept pretty clean, for a building filled with the sick and the dying. During her training, Mary had seen many hospitals, along with other types of buildings that claimed to be hospitals, all of which were far less clean than the current one.

After strolling through several hallways and ascending three floors, Malthus finally stopped outside of a room’s open door.

Room 311.

“Once inside this room,” Malthus began, “I want you to speak only when spoken to. You are not here to converse, only to listen and learn. This case is very delicate… and old.”

“Old?”

Malthus held up the green file, as if Mary could see through the outside and read the case description within.

She read aloud the name on the tab

“Paul Edgecombe.”

“Paul,” Malthus began, lowering the file, “has been hanging out in this hospital for a little more than ten years.”

“Ten years? Why hasn’t he moved on?”

“His flesh is in a deep coma, by all means dead,” Malthus replied, “while his essence sits beside his flesh, in between, waiting.”

“Waiting for what?”

“That is the golden question, young one,” Malthus replied, grinning once again. “Follow. Listen. Learn.”

Upon entering the room, Mary immediately saw double, one figure sick and lying in a bed, tubes and wires protruding, while the other looked healthy and whole, sitting in a small chair. Paul, the healthy essence, was staring intensely at the top of an end table, which sat in the corner of the room. A chessboard was on the table.

Slowly, Paul began to turn his head, but then quickened the turn once he realized that Malthus and Mary were not simply two nurses. “Malthus!” Paul exclaimed. “You are just in time. I owe you a good beating after the last game.” Paul rose. His eyes then fell on Mary. “And who might this be?”

The chipper attitude did not fool Mary. There was a pain in Paul’s essence, deep and long-festering. The pain was so strongly rooted that Mary could almost visually see it, pulsing like a strobe light.

“This is little Mary,” Malthus stated.

“Hello, Mary,” Paul said.

“Hello,” Mary answered.

“It has been quite a while, Malthus,” Paul said. “I thought you forgot about me, and the fact that we are tied at three games each.” Paul slightly chuckled.

“I have been busy training my young Mary here,” Malthus replied.

“Well. Are you interested in playing? That was why you left me the board and pieces. Right?”

With those words, Mary identified the pain that filled Paul Edgecombe. Loneliness. Spending ten years in a room, alone, with no one but an old Guide to talk to, whenever he was actually able to visit.

What kind of existence would that be? Why does this man not move on? What was he waiting for?

Malthus still cradled the green file, proving to Mary that the time must have come. Boss had given the order. But, after ten years, what could have happened to finally make this man go with Malthus? Would Malthus force him to?

“No,” Malthus replied. “That is not why I am here, Paul.”

Paul became confused. “Why are you here, then?”

Malthus stepped forward, while Mary chose to remain behind, so that she could follow Malthus’ directions.

Listen.

Learn.

“Has Meredith visited yet, Paul?”

The question seemed to punch Paul in the jaw. Choosing to face away from Malthus, Paul replied, “Not yet.” Paul’s attention went to the window, and he pretended to watch the pink sunset. “She just needs time. She does not want to see me like this. I don’t want her to see me like this.” Paul’s voice trembled with the lie. “I will wake up soon, and she will never have to see me in this place. Like that.” He pointed to his flesh.

“You are not going to wake up,” Malthus replied.

“I will,” Paul said, returning his attention to Malthus.

“That hope is false, Paul. Your flesh is completely brain dead,” Malthus replied. “It is time that you realize that. It is your time to go, Paul.”

“Why are you here, Malthus?”

“Because I am your friend, Paul,” Malthus replied. “And I am tired of watching you suffer for no good reason.”

“No good reason? Who are you to say whether or not my reasons are good?” Paul grew angry. “Who are you to tell me that I should leave? I will not do it. I won’t leave.”

“You won’t leave Meredith.”

“I won’t leave Meredith.”

“Paul,” Malthus began, but then paused, trying to find the right words, as if his next words could and should cut. “Meredith is gone. She left you, Paul.”

“What do you mean?”

Mary watched as Malthus opened the green file. To Mary’s surprise, the file contained a single piece of paper. From her viewpoint, she knew that it was not a traditional Transfer Order from Boss. It was something else entirely.

Cautiously, Malthus handed Paul the paper.

“What is this?”

“She is gone, Paul.”

With lowered eyebrows, Paul began to read the paper. For Paul, each word was like another stroke. “What is this?”

“You know what it is.”

“A marriage license?”

“Meredith remarried this morning,” Malthus told him. “She has moved on. She has found love again. Do you not want that for her, Paul? Don’t you want her to love among the living, instead of hanging on to the dead? She is not deceased, Paul, you are. Let her live.”

“Of course,” was all that Paul Edgecombe could say.

“You see,” Malthus continued. “There is nothing left for you in this world. Come with me. I will guide you to another one. A better one.”

Mary witnessed Paul’s longing transform into acceptance. He even seemed a little relieved, as if a weight had been lifted. Paul was able to let go. After more than ten years of waiting and hoping, the truth brought pain, but also closure. He could finally detach himself from a world that had let him go a long time ago.

“I am ready,” Paul told Malthus.

The chessboard, file, and marriage license vanished. “Take my hand, Paul,” Malthus said. “The way is long, but I know the path well. I will guide you to your new life.”

“What am I to do?” Mary spoke, wondering if the two had forgotten that she was there.

“Open your file,” Malthus replied. With that said, Malthus and Paul were gone.

After remaining in the room, Mary slowly drew back the file’s cover. Beneath the green was a Transfer Order for Tre Scott, neatly typed. As she scanned the order, Mary felt her chest tighten. Panic filled her. She frantically searched the room, forgetting for a moment that she was alone.

How was she going to do this?

Malthus’ words replayed over and over, but the tears still threatened to flow. She could not do this. She was not ready.

Yet, Mary did not have any other choice except to do her duty.

Mary searched the Order for a time-of-death, wondering how long she would have to compose herself before Tre became her Traveler.

Who was she kidding? All the time in the world would never prepare her for the case that was in front of her.

Mary found time-of-death, but the slot was blank. What? What did that mean?

Slamming the file shut, Mary darted from the room, wondering if she was already too late. Without a Guide, Tre could wander away, lost forever, trapped in between.

***

Tre Scott continued to hold on.

Mary witnessed the ongoing struggle from the empty doorway. At the sight of Tre’s fragile body, the protruding wires and the IV, several tears escaped Mary’s eyes. They exited without a warning, there was no keeping the tears in. Yet, Mary was immediately ashamed of them.

Tre was deep within a medicated induced sleep, most likely for the pain. Mary wondered whether or not Tre was having a soft dream or a hard nightmare.

Mary could not take another step forward. She could only watch from afar, afraid that if she moved, then she would break down to weep.

Loose skin showed Mary that Tre had once been a healthy, heavy boy, before cancer had forced his body to eat itself. Now his flesh hung low, below his neck and around his eyes. Not only did Tre’s skin sag over his fragile, tired bones, but also the tint of Tre’s permanent tan had lightened, like soft caramel that had been diluted with soured milk.

Small lumps covered Tre.

Mary knew the lumps.

Before death, Mary too had hurt, while being sick and dying. That once was her. Lying in a bed. Suffering the woes of death.

Was that why Tre had to be her first solo case?

Putting those memories back down below, Mary scanned the room, finding Tre’s mother. She was asleep in a chair, which had been pulled alongside Tre’s bed.

Carla.

Mary knew the name from Tre’s file.

Carla Scott.

With her head cocked to the side, Carla slept. Her snoring came in sporadic spurts. Her eyes danced wildly behind their lids as a dream played out for her mind. Soft dream? Mary could only wonder.

“Mom!” Tre suddenly cried out, temporarily shaking off the drugged, forced slumber. Carla jumped to an upright position, both her hands quickly finding Tre’s arm. “Mom!” Tre repeated.

“I’m here, baby,” Carla assured him.

“Mom! Where are you!?”

“I’m here.”

“Mom! I can’t find my bear,” Tre said. Mary knew, by the lost look on his face, that, due to the morphine drip, Tre’s mind was no longer under his control. “Where is my bear, mommy?”

Through a burst of tears, Carla managed to say, “Look in your closet, sweetheart. I think that I saw your bear in there.”

“Okay.” Tre’s eyes closed as he drifted away again.

Letting go of Tre’s arm, Carla folded her hands to pray. “God. Please don’t take my little man away from me. Please. Will you make him strong again? Will you make him strong enough to fight again? He can beat this. He can get better if you give him the chance and strength. I need him. He is all that I have. Don’t take him away from me, please.” Unfolding her hands, Carla placed her face within them to weep.

“Don’t take…” Tre mumbled.

Mary retreated into the hallway. There would be time, Mary knew, for her to listen and learn. But, for the moment, she could not be in that room.

Tre was not going anywhere yet. That was why the time-of-death had been left blank, because Boss had given Tre all the time that he needed. And Tre would take the time to hold on to life with the grip of a spirit twice his age.

***

For three more days, Mary watched Tre, less than alive, but more than not. The young boy’s instinct and willpower kept death, meaning Mary, on the outside looking inward.

Neither one of them could lay a hand on Tre.

Not yet.

Without the need for sleep or food or a comfortable seat, Mary chose to stand still in the far corner of the room, listening and learning, only shifting when that space was needed by a mortal person. The tears flowed less often. Yet, they still seemed to flow.

Carla never strayed far from Tre’s bedside, as if her presence alone was keeping him alive.

Suddenly, the pieces came together, and the lesson that was directly in front of Mary’s face finally stood out. Tre was not fighting merely to live, but he was staying alive because he would not leave his mother. She needed him. He heard her prayers. Also, like all little boys, Tre did not want to leave his mommy.

Like Paul, Tre was surviving, trapped between two separate worlds. One that he was no longer part of. And one that called to him, but he refused to answer. Also, like Paul, Tre was in pain. Yet, Tre chose to be stuck, in spite of the pain, for the sake of another.

Mary saw her image as she thought about Paul and Tre. Her tears did tie her to the mortal world, as Malthus had said. But, they also meant that she was not fully in her own world, either. She lingered in between, refusing to let go and move on. She needed to move on if she was going to commit herself completely to her duty. There was no in between when dealing with death.

It was all or nothing.

Mary was death, or at least the guide through it.

Besides, death was not the end, but the trail from here to there. To cry for the dying was to cry for those left behind. That was no longer Mary’s world.

As the thoughts flowed, piercing shrieks of mechanical alarms interrupted Mary’s epiphany. Tre began to convulse, gripped tight by a violent seizure. A groan squeezed through his clenched teeth. While Tre’s body shook, monitors cried out for someone to help.

Carla leaped from her chair, bound for the door. Passing an inch from Mary, Carla rushed in search of a nurse, but a small group of them were already jogging toward the room.

“Help him!” Carla begged, following the nurses back into the room. “Help my son!”

“Stand back, Ms. Scott,” one of the nurses insisted.

Carla took a step backward but refused to go any further.

One of the nurses gripped Tre by the shoulders in an attempt to stabilize the quakes, but the violence would not be completely calmed.

Mary exited her corner to stand next to Carla, becoming close enough to hold the hand of Tre’s mother. “You have to let him go,” Mary told her.

A doctor charged in to join the nurses. More grunts rose from Tre; subconscious sounds of anguish, drawn from every fiber of Tre’s body and mind. His flesh wanted the suffering to be over, yet Tre still fought to live.

“You have to let him go.”

“Stop!” Carla shouted. “I don’t want him to hurt anymore!”

The group ignored Carla’s frightened cries.

“I am his mother,” Carla continued, “and I said to stop!”

They continued to work.

“Tre!” Carla called to her son. “It’s okay, baby. You can go. I want you to go where the pain can’t get to you anymore.”

The convulsing stopped. Tre became very still. As if it was a sigh of relief, Tre let out a long, final breath.

From his flesh, Mary watched Tre slide. He was no longer the sick, weak, thin little boy that was in the bed. His girth and color had been restored. No lumps remained. The sickness had been left behind him.

The confusion was always the first emotion of the newly arrived Traveler. Tre stood and looked around, deep in that emotion.

Mary quickly spoke, “Hello, Tre.” Tre’s gaze found her, and he smiled. “My name is Mary. Take my hand. The way is long, but I know the path well. I will guide you to your new life, far away from the pain.”

A Devil in the Midst

… Vincent is silly, Pau. He misses you too. I know it. He sleeps all day long. I feed him his favorite treats and everything. But he still won’t play catch or anything. Mom said that he is heartbroken, whatever that means. You get my camel yet…

“I don’t think you should wake him, Paul,” Tori called from the kitchen, insistent, but Paul was already approaching the closed bedroom door.

A half-full milk carton in her hand, Tori waved it back and forth to emphasize her point.

“He cried himself to sleep, again. Poor guy.” She put the milk back into the fridge without pouring a single drop.

“That is why I need to do this,” Paul replied. He tried to keep his tone a couple of notches below his normal inside voice. “I have to make this right. To him at least.” Tori swiftly turned her face away and Paul immediately felt a sting, the same sting that Tori must have been given by the words that Paul said. “You know what I mean.”

“I know… Paul,” Tori replied, taking the milk back out of the fridge.

As was Paul’s pale skin, the white liquid was a direct contrast of her ebony skin. But, when put together, Paul always loved how the colors came together. That was what made their relationship strong. They made the contrasts work, in spite of the bigotry and hatred in the world.

Paul enjoyed challenges.

Getting Tori to love him had been a definite challenge.

The fact that Tori had a little boy ended up being the biggest challenge of his life. He became a boyfriend and a father figure at the same instant.

But Caleb was beautiful and simple.

Paul presently had yet another challenge in front of him, one seemingly impossible. He had to reassure a seven-year-old boy that he would be coming back, even though there was a good chance he wouldn’t.

Paul took a deep breath and wished he didn’t have to let the air go. Reluctantly, he released, before gently knocking on Caleb’s door.

“Caleb? Are you awake?”

“Aren’t you gone yet?” The words hurt, but they were of anger and of love.

“Can I come in?” Paul was turning the knob before the question fully left him. “I need to talk to you, buddy.” Sticking his head through a newly formed crack, Paul added, “It’s important. It is guy stuff. That is why your mother is hiding in the kitchen. She is afraid of guy stuff.” Paul tried to smile.

“I guess,” Caleb mumbled. “Make it quick. I have school tomorrow and need my beauty sleep.”

The dark room was beginning to focus, and Paul could finally make out Caleb’s small form lying on his bed. Paul started a step forward, but then paused and said, “I almost forgot. I have a friend out here that wants to partake in some guy stuff, too. That should be alright. Right?”

Caleb perked up. “Who is out there?”

“Can he come in too?”

Caleb quickly nodded.

Pushing the door fully open, Paul let go of the blue leash he had been tightly grasping. Vincent rushed toward the bed, his black fur nearly blending with the air of the dark bedroom. Putting his two front paws against the side of the bed, Vincent began to yap at Caleb.

Caleb giggled happily and snatched him up.

It was the most perfect sound.

Paul found his way to the side of the bed and stared down at the spunky black mutt and the little boy. “Would you like Vincent to stay with you for a while?”

“You mean it?”

“I want him to be here so that he can protect you; look out for you,” Paul began, “at least until I can come back and take over again. How does that sound? Caleb? Sound like a plan?”

Caleb took his attention away from Vincent to ask, “Are you ever coming back, Paul?” The hurt made his voice quiver.

“Of course,” Paul assured Caleb. “No matter where I go, I will always come back. I promise.”

“Paul?” Caleb perked up again as he fought away the oncoming tears. Rubbing the tip of Vincent’s right ear, Caleb asked, “Will you bring me back a camel?”

Paul laughed out loud. “I will see what I can do, buddy.”

… Pastor Jared asked about you the other day. He wanted to know if you were keeping the sand out of your butt crack. It was so funny. You should have seen his face. It got so red. You would have loved it…

The small church was bright, and the air was filled with the deep voice of Pastor Jared, his fabulous tenor tone vibrating through the speakers as he spoke slowly into the black microphone.

“And in the end, in the end, Jesus walked out of that desert pure and without sin. He had looked Satan square in the eye and said… NO THANK YOU. He would not sin. He would not be seduced by evil. He would not serve in Hell. He would rule in Heaven, without regret, side by side with the almighty. He denounced the temptation of Satan and left the desert far behind him. All I can say is Amen to that. Do you agree with that statement?”

Sweat was rolling down the Pastor’s forehead and puddling along his neck, just above the spot of white on his collar.

“Amen!” The congregation rang out. Paul shouted the word loudly, picturing what it would be like to be tempted in the desert. Satan seems to rule in such lands as those, dry and without mercy. “Amen,” Paul repeated in a small breath.

Paul slipped his arm in and wrapped it around the back of Tori, who was sitting next to him, with Caleb on her lap. Her purple dress made her skin look like smooth caramel. Like a little gentleman, Caleb was very handsome in his dress pants and tie.

Leaning over, he dabbed both of them on the sides of their faces with his lips. He was kissing two angels, those who will keep him pure in the desert. “I love you guys.”

Tori glanced over at Paul and smirked, “I love you, too.”

“Pay attention,” Caleb ordered with a whisper. “I’m trying to praise Jesus here, and you two are too loud.”

“Sorry, sweetheart,” Tori replied.

Paul smiled.

Moments like that were what he would take with him into the desert, and they would help him fight the devils that he would surely encounter there. There will be devils in the desert, in many forms, right in the midst of the war, ready to corrupt and conquer those who fight. They would make the pure twist themselves into demons in order to win the fight. Not him, Paul swore. It would not happen to him.

“At this time, I would like everyone to bow their heads,” Pastor Jared requested, “so that we can say a prayer for Private Robinson and his family. Private Robinson is being sent to the belly of the beast over in Afghanistan, where the war against terror rages strong. The times will be harsh, and death will be apparent everywhere, along with the dirty deeds that men are capable of. He and his family, his girlfriend Tori and her son Caleb, will need God’s love to endure such a hard time. All together now, let us pray.”

Everyone lowered their eyes.

“Dear Lord,” Pastor Jared began, “we are sending another one of our own to fight in your name. He fights evil for you, Oh Lord, and we would like to ask one thing from you. Please, Lord, keep this good man safe so that he can return to his loved ones, whole and pure in heart. He will fight for you, tooth and nail, please, Lord, keep him in your favor and fight for him as he fights for you. In your name, we pray, Amen.”

“Amen!”

“Amen,” Paul whispered.

… I know that you don’t want me to say this to you, Paul, and my words might be falling on deaf ears… but… don’t be a hero over there. Keep your head down and come back in one solid piece. This war has been going on for a long time and will go on long after you are dead of old age. Come back to me, Paul. That is all that I am asking of you…

Paul listened closely to the recorded words. The memories attached to them could not be stopped, not even by the strongest and tallest dam built. They were too strong a river, and the fear was too sharp a force and there was no stopping the life that he left behind from flashing before Paul’s eyes.

Tori.

Caleb.

Their voices reached out to him from thousands of miles away. Even so, through the tiny recording device that Paul had hidden in his flack pocket, they were both beside him.

Another loud explosion erupted outside, shaking the walls of the rickety house in which Paul sat. He kept his back in a corner so that he could see the entire living room and kitchen of the house.

No one was going to sneak up on him.

A thin candle flickered, casting dancing shadows that swayed around a long couch and short table. The house was silent, but Paul was ready to react to any person who might enter, friend or foe.

The hole in the bottom corner of his gut was still pouring blood, even after Paul forcibly removed the piece of shrapnel and patched it with the bandages. White cloth soaked up as much liquid as they could hold, but it wouldn’t take long for them to reach their limits.

He needed help.

A jolt of pain shot from the wound, causing Paul’s vision to sway like the candlelight and shadows.

His ears rang, and for a brief moment, Paul swore he heard deep laughing all around him. Shaking it off, Paul grabbed his M-9 pistol and eased himself to his feet.

Paul placed himself alongside a glassless window, directly out of view. Groupings of gunfire could still be heard beyond the walls of the house, seemingly coming from every side of the building.

Slowly, Paul peeked out from the corner of the window, just enough to get an idea of what was going on outside, along with where the other soldiers in his unit might be.

Darkness and outlines and an occasional flash of a weapon were all that Paul could make out. Paul recognized the Humvee, which remained several feet beyond the window, destroyed and useless.

Paul hoped that Pattern, Danny, and Roberts had gotten out, too.

There had been little to no warning.

Only seconds to react.

“Damn,” he whispered, and the vibration of the word made his gut curse back at him. Paul fought off another dizzy spell and tried to focus his eyes.

He thought about trying the coms again but knew there would be a lot of static, like there was the first and second time he had tried. It had gotten broken during the same explosion that shredded the armored Humvee.

Finally taking the earbud away, Paul tucked the device back into his flack. The recording had come in the mail a week ago, filled with messages from home.

It had been the greatest thing that the mail had ever delivered to him.

The device, though, should never have left base, but Paul had snuck it along, never honestly believing he would risk listening to it.

It helped just having it on him.

It eased some of the never-ending stresses of patrol.

Paul continued to peer out of the window.

He squinted and stared hopelessly into the night. He wished that he had something that could better see through the dense dark, like night vision goggles. Only high-ranking officers got things like that, however. Because of the never-ending Depression, all Paul was armed with were weapons that have been obsolete since 2012.

He was given ancient tools to fight an ancient war.

Irony was a bitch.

Footsteps!

From somewhere in the house!

Running!

Paul turned in time to see a figure enter the kitchen through a side door, one that Paul himself had not even noticed.

The metallic click-clack of a weapon was easy to spot, and Paul dove toward the side of the couch to avoid the bullets that began to spray.

As the mud bricks of the wall became shredded by the impact, Paul threw up his pistol and blind fired in the direction of the shooter.

After four rapid shots, the spring jammed, and the pistol became instantly useless. But the sharp howl and wet thud told Paul that he had hit his target.

Leading with the pistol, as if it were still deadly, Paul stood up and slowly approached a gasping enemy.

Rounding the couch, Paul saw the enemy very clearly.

Dying on his side.

A young boy.

Barely a teenager.

Paul had hit him in the chest and the right side of the face. With his remaining eye, the young boy stared viciously at Paul.

No.

Not at Paul.

But beyond.

The boy was glaring so hard that Paul turned, thinking there might be someone behind him.

There wasn’t.

Only the same dancing shadows.

As the boy’s breathing quickened toward death, Paul knelt to one knee so that he may pray for him. But the words were never uttered. They were cut short by shuffling feet and the creaking of an opening door.

Rushing feet!

The shiny steel of a moving knife!

Swiftly dropping his useless M-9, Paul snatched the AK-90 from the dying boy.

The attacker was too close too fast, and Paul was unable to turn with the rifle and fire. Instead, Paul swung and connected the butt of the rifle with the abdomen of the attacker.

The attacker stumbled slightly, allowing Paul to strike again. The second swing hit harder against the attacker’s chest, but Paul completely lost his footing in the blood of the dying boy.

Stumbling forward, Paul lost his grip of the rifle and it tumbled to the floor. Instead of trying to keep himself upright, Paul shifted his weight as he fell and grabbed onto the attacker. Using his own momentum, Paul pulled the attacker down with him.

Landing across the attacker’s lower half, Paul immediately punched him twice in the groin, taking away whatever fight the person might have had left. Crawling and then straddling, Paul looked into the face of the attacker.

A middle-aged man.

Stubbled face.

Grey hair.

The boy’s father.

The one who had taught the young boy how to hate. The person who had taught the boy how to kill.

The man tried to raise his hand and stab Paul with the knife he still held, but Paul easily swatted the knife from his grip. Paul then wrapped both hands around the man’s neck and squeezed. As the man thrashed and struggled, Paul watched as the hatred drained from the man’s eyes.

Quickly getting up, Paul snatched the AK-90 from the floor. He then rushed through the open backdoor, hurriedly fleeing before someone else decided to show up.

The rear exit put Paul out into a small narrow alley that appeared to be empty. Once outside, Paul tensed and quickly scanned the area, looking up and down, back and forth, using the barrel of the AK-90 as a finger. There was no motion that Paul noticed, but the obtuse night could be hiding anything.

A sharp thunderous explosion erupted in the night, followed by a ball of fire rising over a distant building. Paul then heard a massive onslaught of machine-gun fire from the same direction.

Trying to keep his body moving, Paul headed toward the mouth of the alleyway. But before he managed more than a few steps, his body jolted and then numbed.

Paul sank heavily to his knees.

But he refused to cry out.

Vertigo took away his center of gravity and Paul felt weightless, as if he were flying to Heaven. Glancing to his backside, Paul searched for outstretched white wings, but only found a pale, naked figure lurking in the darkness, staring curiously.

The figure flickered and then was gone.

It was never there.

It was never there, Paul assured himself.

Paul pushed himself back to his feet. Gravity would not hold him. Instantly, the rifle was back up and Paul was moving forward again.

Before stepping fully from the alleyway, Paul noticed two figures standing nearby, whispering in what seemed like gibberish to an untrained ear. Both were heavily armed. Maybe they had heard the gunfire that had just occurred moments ago.

Before they could notice him and call out for help, Paul fired a cluster of bullets into both of the men’s midsections, dropping them instantly. Rushing by, Paul put another pair of shots into their foreheads and then moved on.

Returning to the main street, where his group had been brutally ambushed, Paul halted and tried to decide his next move.

Once again, he decided to keep moving forward.

Under the cover of night, Paul moved up the current street and then moved into an adjoining alley, one that eventually opened up into what appeared to be a large open area of some kind.

A large courtyard, maybe?

Marketplace?

Suddenly, a flare was shot into the sky, lighting up the massacre before him. The thick cloak of darkness was so much better, because the light often revealed wicked truths.

… There will be evil, Brother Robinson, all around you, naked and thriving on darkness. Stay true to what you believe is right and the devils can’t touch you. Do the good work and you will always find a way home…

Several soldiers were dead, blown to nothing but bits of flesh and blood. Their bodies were contorted, frozen in their final fury and fear. Paul lost his breath as he looked upon his dead brothers and sisters, but was quickly filled with rage.

Was there anyone else from his own unit still alive?

Why him?

Of all those in his unit, why did he survive? \Luck.

Anyone who survived combat owed it to luck and nothing more.

Not God, because the Lord would never choose one man over many to survive.

Would he?

There was fighting still going on in the distance.

Paul could hear it.

That was when Paul realized that his initial belief had been wrong. Not every soldier in the open area was dead.

Ten or so feet away Paul saw Pattern, his skin reflected the red glow of the falling flare. And it appeared that Pattern might still be breathing.

Paul leaned in as the light from the flare began to fade and tried to peer deeper without moving fully into the open space. Paul’s breath then caught when Pattern turned his head and looked directly at him, Pattern’s eyes pleading, as if asking Paul for help.

Trying not to think, Paul checked his flack and rifle, making sure everything was ready. He then scanned the immediate area before darting toward his fallen brother.

Paul’s rifle never went down. He was well aware of how stupid it was to rush in the way he was, but he couldn’t let Pattern die too, not if he could save him.

Muzzle flash from a roof!

Bullets whizzed by his face!

Paul turned and returned fire, forcing the shooter to back away for cover.

Paul hurried, trying to run faster, but his gut throbbed, and vomit was rising in his throat.

A lone gunman appeared in the street. Paul was quick to spread a straight line of bullets across the man’s body, sending him sprawling to the ground, but not before the man got a few shots off. Paul felt the sting of hot metal entering his hip, just below the flack.

He stumbled, but continued.

Reaching Pattern, Paul could see that he was living, barely. The rooftop shooter once again sent bullets whizzing by Paul. Snatching the last grenade that Pattern had attached to his flack, Paul launched it up and onto the roof.

It exploded.

But Paul didn’t wait to see if the threat was neutralized.

Grabbing Pattern’s flack, Paul began to drag the large man back towards the alley he had come out of. Pattern was heavy and Paul was hurting, but adrenaline made anything possible.

Once they were in the alley and behind some cover, Paul’s legs gave in, and he crumbled to the ground. Crawling, he got his body back over to Pattern, searching frantically for a working comm.

“Hang in there, big guy,” Paul told Pattern. “I can be your angel. Big ass white wings and all.”

Pattern spoke, but Paul had to lean in to hear it.

“Run…”

And then Paul saw the red light; flashing like a beacon of death.

IED!

He tried to scramble away, but the detonation came too fast to escape.

Flesh and hair struck Paul from behind.

Flying bone and a thousand shards of shrapnel stabbed into him at a million miles an hour.

Paul went down hard.

The air was filled with static.

Paul looked up and tried to make sense of the world. Slowly walking down the alley toward him, a pale, naked man moved with the slither of a snake. There was a smirk on the man’s face. He was enjoying Paul’s humiliated fate.

I love you, Tori!

I love you, Caled!

I’m sorry that I broke my promise!

As the naked man drew closer, Paul could see specks of blood all across his exposed skin, some dried and some wet. Stooping down, the strange man got nose-to-nose with Paul and began to laugh.

Hysterically.

But also with deeply seeded frustration.

No matter how close he got, the pale man never touched Paul and, as Paul was swallowed by a blinding white light, he was thankful for that.

… There will be evil, Brother Robinson, all around you, naked and thriving on darkness. Stay true to what you believe is right and the devils can’t touch you. Do the good work and you will always find a way home…

A Father’s Duty

“What the hell am I doing here?” I ask out loud, even though there is no one else in the car with me. The vehicle is off, and the inside is dark, the only light being a slight glow of red from the tip of my cigarette. I ignite the tip by taking a long drag. As I release a column of smoke, a cloud of gray that swirls and builds within the enclosed space around me, I take in my surroundings.

I am near enough to Cleveland that I can still see the electric glow emitting from the tall buildings, but I sit just beyond its reach, in the shadows, among the obscured and rundown parts at the edges of the city, abandoned apartment buildings and warehouses that are now only populated by rats and drug addicts.

“What the hell am I doing here?” I say again, a consistent nervousness running up and down my spine.

I check my gps for the thousandth time, making sure that I was in the right spot, knowing damned well that I was.

A deserted three-story building fills my windshield. The tall brick building is cracked and little more than a shell of what it might have been; a corpse of the past standing tall and dead against the night sky. But it is not the sight of the hollow, abandoned windows that fill me with a sense of dread and unease.

It is that one single burning bulb on the first floor.

That one speck of light among the gloom.

“What the hell am I doing here?” I say one last time.

Reaching across to the vacant passenger seat, I pick up a wallet-sized photo laying there. I place the picture close to my face so that I can make out the features of the young girl through the darkness.

Josephine.

Eight years old.

My angel.

The picture is little over a year old, back when her blonde hair still had bounce and her chubby cheeks were still rosy red. When the picture had been taken, I remember trying desperately to coax that little girl into a wide smile, a glowing grin, but instead I only got an uneven smirk for my troubles. I remember being just a little bit irritated. Yet, looking at that same photo now, the full, bent lips and cocky young smirk beamed brighter than any glow that I could have asked for.

I tuck the picture away into my coat pocket.

Stretching my arm back over to the passenger seat, I grab the shiny, chrome .22 pistol. After I slip the weapon into the same coat pocket, I extinguish my nearly deceased cigarette and then climb from my car. The chill of the night hits my face like a back-handed slap, but I pull up my collar and keep moving.

As I walk, I think about my daughter.

From a chair in the corner, I watched Josephine as she slept. Her petite figure appeared even more tiny and fragile laying on the large hospital bed. Her eyes danced and fluttered behind their lids. But it wasn’t because she was lost in happy, warm dreams. The discomfort and pain that I knew was plaguing my little girl was making it hard for her to rest peacefully.

I wanted to go to her and comfort her, but I knew that there would be no comfort for my daughter, at least none that I was able to provide. It was a father’s duty to protect his child from harm, to shield his child from pain, but at that moment, I was failing my duties.

A father. That has become my soul Identity in the world. And I was failing at the only thing that truly mattered to me. I was failing… her.

And as I watched Joesphine suffer, knowing that there was nothing that I could do to stop it, another part of me began to rot.

Hopeless… didn’t even begin to describe how I was feeling.

More like… worthless.

So, I was forced to watch helplessly as my little girl fidgeted and squirmed in her sleep, tortured, distressed, and trapped in the agonizing limbo between asleep and awake.

A gentle set of taps interrupted my thoughts. I turned toward the open door to see Josephine’s doctor standing there. Without speaking, Dr. Kolat motioned for me. I slipped from my chair quietly and followed her into the hallway. My shoulders became tense as a firm nervousness grabbed hold of my neck and began to squeeze.

I had been waiting for her all day. But the doctor’s presence immediately caused me unease.

After we walked a few feet from the door to my daughter’s room, Dr. Kolat turned to me, and I at once noticed that she was holding a piece of paper. “The results of your tissue test finally showed up, Mr. Thomas. I am sorry that it took so long,” she told me. She then looked at the piece of paper, even though we were both aware that she already knew what was on it.

What she was about to tell me would tip the scales for my little girl and me. It would be life or death. I wanted to hear it, but at the same time didn’t. If I didn’t have an answer to one or the other, then I could still pretend; I could still live in that fantasy world between hope and truth. Right then, that was where I wanted to exist more than anything.

“What does it say?” I asked.

“I’m sorry,” Dr. Kolat began, “but you are not a match.”

All around me nurses and patients chattered, machines beeped and chirped, footsteps echoed toward and away, but inside my mind there was only silence.

No matter how grand the fantasy, truth and reality will eventually pull you away.

“Are there any other family members that we might be able to test?” the doctor asked.

She had asked the question before.

And I gave her the same answer.

“No.”

“The mother?” she asked for what might have been the third time.

“Passed.”

Dr. Kolat reached out and put a hand on my shoulder. “We are going to make Josephine as comfortable as possible. She is at the top of the transplant list and will be the first one to get a liver if a match becomes available. Don’t lose hope.”

I watched the doctor turn and walk away. Once she was out of sight, I went back to my little girl’s bedside. With a damp cloth, I began to wipe at the sweat that had been gathering on her forehead. I could clean away the sweat, but I would never be able to wash away the sickly yellow tint that covered Josephine’s skin, no matter how firmly I scrubbed.

Her eyes opened, and she peered up at me.

“Daddy?” she asked. She seemed confused. “Where am I?”

I put down the cloth so that I could run my fingers through her flat, greasy hair. “It’s okay, sweetheart. Go back to sleep.”

“But the man needs to sit down,” she mumbled.

“What man?”

“He is very old,” she continues, her voice filled with sleep and exhaustion. “He is older than time and all the rivers of the world.”

She was speaking nonsense, so I didn’t answer.

A few seconds later, she returned to the epic struggle that was sleep.

The parking lot of the abandoned building is empty, as it probably has been for some time. Yet, instead of parking directly in front of the building, I park at the center of the fractured and mangled asphalt lot; that way, I can see everything on all sides.

“What the hell am I doing here?” I repeat for the hundredth time.

The moon is full, and the strong light causes deep shadows and dark corners, obscured spots that might conceal any number of dangers. I don’t know what I am walking into, and that unknown is causing my anxiety and imagination to spiral into strange places. I begin to question every subtle breeze or ambiguous noise as being something more ominous.

What might be hiding in the night?

Evil and monsters and lurking creatures ready to strike?

Maybe.

Even though I have no idea what is waiting for me, some impulse keeps me moving across the parking lot. But as I grow closer and closer to the dark structure, my grip on my pistol grows a little tighter. The gun doesn’t leave my coat pocket, but my hand remains wrapped around it just the same.

My other hand cradles another cigarette. I put it to my lips and continuously pull in smoke until my lungs can’t hold anymore and it starts to burn. Releasing a massive pillar of smoke into the air, I try to release some of my tension along with it. But the effort is fruitless. My anxiety and tension isn’t relieved one bit.

I briefly stop in front of the building and take a closer look at the light in the first-story window, which had been drawing me in like a moth to a flame. The glass in the window is somehow still intact and in one piece, but it’s filthy. I can’t see anything through it. I can only see the light from within being cast against the dirt and grime.

Immediately upon seeing the light in the window, I know that it can’t be electric. It is obvious that the abandoned structure hasn’t seen electricity in quite a few years. Now that I am closer, I can easily make out the shifting and swaying of the illumination, telling me that it is most likely candlelight that I am seeing.

Several candles, in fact.

I remain still for several more seconds and stare at the front entrance to the building, an empty, dark opening where a set of double doors might have once existed.

Apartment 1A.

Simple enough.

Shaking off a ripple of goosebumps, I toss my nearly finished smoke to the ground and enter the building. Once inside, it becomes nearly impossible to see. Luckily, a hint of the moonlight follows me into the building and allows me to see several feet beyond the entrance. And, thankfully, that is all I need.

Apartment 1A is the very first door on the left.

I consider knocking.

Instead, I grab the doorknob with my left hand, my right hand still touching my gun. When I touch the metal of the knob, I receive a brief shock through the tips of my fingers.

“Damn,” I curse, without removing my hand.

Twisting the knob, I push the door and let it swing all the way open without entering. Gazing through the open doorway, I can see an average looking, empty apartment. It is dusty and dirty and smells of mold and age, but other than that, it is nothing special.

I can clearly see the candlelight moving and wiggling within the space, but can’t yet see the actual candles.

And then something catches me off guard. A familiar voice telling me to… “Feel free to come inside, James.”

A new liver…

My little girl needed a new liver, and I can’t give her even a tiny part of mine…

Why… how… what the hell am I supposed to do?

I couldn’t just sit and watch my kid die…

Defeated thoughts ran through my mind as I sat on an empty bench several feet from the hospital’s entrance, far enough from the building to smoke a much-needed cigarette. But even the burn from the smoke and nicotine did nothing to distract me from the dark clouds that hung over my head.

The sun was bright and low in the sky, but the mass of sadness and hopelessness blocked any chance of the light finding me.

Gray clouds swirled directly above me, growing heavier and more dense by the minute. There was just nothing that I could do to stop the rain from coming. So, instead of trying to stop the coming storm from pouring down onto me, I exhaled my cigarette smoke upward into the clouds and helped the damned thing along.

“Mr. Thomas?” I hear a man’s voice ask.

I shook myself free of my haze and looked up to find a young man standing a few inches away. His young baby face immediately seemed familiar, but I couldn’t at first recognize him. He was wearing a worn out set of dark blue scrubs, so he obviously worked for the hospital, even though he seemed barely old enough to be out of high school. Outside of the hospital scrubs, I wasn’t sure how the young man could possibly know my name.

The young man was smiling at me, and for some reason, his strange half-grin made me uncomfortable.

“Do you mind if I sit with you?” the young man asked.

For a moment, I considered telling him that I wanted to be alone, but changed my mind and slid over to make room on the bench.

“Smoke?” I asked him, offering him my nearly full pack.

He shook his head. “No, thank you.”

When the young man sat down next to me, I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to say something or just let him sit in peace, as I had been. The confusion created a breath or two of awkward silence, but luckily the young man decided to be the one to bring the moment of discomfort to an end.

“Josephine is a lovely young lady,” he stated, the half-grin still on his face.

I bit back the taste of anger at the sound of my daughter’s name coming from the lips of a stranger.

“How do you know my kid?” I asked; the question holding more venom that I would have liked, but less than expected. “Mr.…?”

“Frank Constantine,” the young man explained, pointing a finger to a badge hanging from his ID shirt. “You can call me Frank, Mr. Thomas.”

I felt embarrassed by not noticing the badge, but pushed the emotion away and replied, “Call me James.”

“I…” Frank began, “I clean your daughter’s floor. Her room. Such a beautiful girl. So sad to see her in such a state. I bet you are just out of your mind with grief and worry.”

“You clean Josephine’s room?” I asked. “I don’t remember ever seeing you.”

“Who really notices the cleaning staff?” Frank replied, shrugging his shoulders. “You know what I mean? We are the invisible ones.”

I simply nodded, not sure what else to say to the weird young man.

“You seem like a good father,” Frank said.

A taste of anger was once again drawn into my mouth, but that time I couldn’t bite it back. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I mean no disrespect, James,” Frank explained, the half-grin finally falling away. “I am not always the best with words. All I mean is that… It is obvious that you love your daughter very much. Deeply. In your core. I know that your liver test was not a match, and I can see how much you are hurting. I can feel it pouring from your skin. You feel helpless. Lost. Out of options.”

“Maybe it is time for you to go back to work, Mr. Constantine,” I insisted.

“Hear me out first,” Frank pleaded. “I am a very good judge of character. It is a gift. And I can see you, James Thomas. I can see that you are the type of man who would do anything to help the ones they love. And that you love no one more than young Josephine.”

“And how the hell would you know anything about me?” I spat. “You don’t know me or my daughter or anything about nothing. So… move… along… please.”

When the strange man didn’t instantly get up and leave, I wanted to jump up and walk away myself. But I didn’t. And I can’t explain why. Something… kept me sitting there, even when my mind was screaming at me to run. I felt… an energy coming from him… an energy that I can’t explain in words. It was a feeling… like electricity. So, I continued sitting there. And I began to listen.

Frank continued.

“It is a father’s duty to keep their child safe,” the young man told me. “You think that you are failing that duty. Am I right? You think that you are out of options, but you are not.”

“What options do I have?” I grumbled.

“You have one more option,” Frank clarified. “Me.”

“You?”

As if from thin air, Frank was holding a folded piece of paper. He reached out and tried to hand it to me. “Come to this address tonight by 10 pm and bring everything on that list. I know it all sounds strange, but trust me. I am now your only option.”

The odd, invisible electrical sensation still crackled in the air, arcing between Frank Constantine and myself.

“Why the hell should I trust you?” I asked. “The doctor says that my little girl is on the transplant list and will have a new liver anytime now. Why the hell do I need to trust a strange little man like you?”

“No liver is coming,” Frank said. “And you know that. Not in time to save Josephine, anyway.”

He was right.

Damn it.

He was right.

“But I can save her, James,” the young man claimed.

And I believed him.

Without another word, I reached out and took hold of the piece of paper. When my fingers touched it, it gave me a minor shock, like building static finally released.

At the sound of the voice, I move swiftly through the open apartment door and enter into a dingy living room space. Immediately to my left, I see a row of four lit candles perched along a window ledge, throwing yellow light against a soiled sheet of glass.

All four candles are tall and red, thick wax runoff forming down the sides.

The row of candles momentarily draws my attention, but the voice speaks again, causing me to turn my sights in that direction.

“I am so glad that you came, James,” the voice says.

I swiftly pivot my head to the right, toward the voice, where I at once see a doorless entrance leading into a cramped kitchen. Standing in the abandoned kitchen, beside what might have once been a usable sink, I see the grinning face of Frank Constantine. At the man’s feet, spread across a nasty, white-tiled floor, I can see another row of four candles, tall and red, like the others. Laying next to the candles is a square sheet of clear plastic, positioned nice and neat and wrinkle free.

Something in my brain clicks when I see the candles and sheet of plastic. I free my pistol from my coat and, in one seamless motion, aim the weapon at the head of Frank. My hand slightly trembles with the weight of the gun, but I do my best to hide it.

“What the fuck is this?” I demand. “Are you playing sick games with me? Are you going to kill me and chop up my body into bite sized treats?”

I feel the sensation of electricity again, the tingle of current flowing through the air, and now understand that it is somehow coming from Frank. A part of me already knew it; but didn’t want to admit it.

“How are you doing that?” I ask him.

Frank shrugs his shoulders.

“Put the gun down, James,” he says, not a speck of worry in his tone. “That was not on my list. And you won’t have any use for it here.”

I don’t just lower the .22 pistol, but abruptly drop it onto the floor, surprised when it doesn’t misfire upon smacking onto the carpet. I no longer have the strength to hold the small weapon, because all the fight has suddenly left my body. The all-encompassing fatigue that I have been fending off for what feels like an eternity has finally taken full control of me. And what little bit of strength I do somehow hold onto is just barely enough for my legs to hold me up.

I’m tired.

Exhausted.

And at last, I am willing to hear what the man has to say.

“I am here to do what I said I would,” Frank states. “The real question isn’t what I am here to do, James. The real question is for you. Why are you here? Because I am here to save beautiful Josephine from her pain and suffering. From her dying. Are you? And are you willing to do whatever it takes to get it done?”

“Yes,” I reply weakly.

“Are you?” he asks again.

“Yes!” I respond with more vigor. “I will do whatever I have to do to save her!”

“Okay then,” Frank says. “Then step over here and give me what I have asked for.”

I step into the kitchen as I reach deep into my coat pocket.

The first thing I pull out is the wallet sized picture of Josephine that I had been looking at in the car. Giving the photo, her bouncy blonde hair and rosy cheeks, one last glance, I hand it to the strange man.

After Frank snatches the picture from me, I fish around in my coat pocket for the second item. A clipping of Josephine’s hair wrapped tightly with a pink ribbon. I cut it from her head a couple of hours before, while she was sound asleep.

After grabbing the hair from me, Frank asks, “And the third item?”

I stare back at him, confused. What third item? The man had only written down two things.

“You,” he explains. “You are the third item.”

Frank holds both items in his right hand and uses his left to motion to the sheet of plastic. He then asks, “Will you please take off your coat and shirt and lay down, please, James?”

I don’t have to ask why. I follow the man’s instructions, before going into the kitchen and lying down at his feet. I’m not entirely sure what is about to happen to me, but I don’t care anymore.

Whatever it takes.

“Is it going to hurt?” I ask.

“Yes.” In a low voice, Frank instructs me to, “Now, close your eyes and picture your daughter. Remember as clearly as you can the last words that you said to her.”

No matter how much I wiped at the sweat building across her forehead, Josephine never seemed to get clean. The damp cloth was useless. And the sticky sweat just kept coming back to cover her skin, moisten her cheeks, and cause her hair to look grimy.

Over and over, it returned.

An endless cycle.

And there was nothing I could do to stop it.

The frustration must have been written all over my face, because my little girl’s hand found mine. Her voice told me, “It will be okay, daddy. Sweat is a good thing. The body needs to sweat.”

Her soft hand settled on mine, and I put the cloth aside.

“You are way too smart,” I insisted. “Way smarter than your old man.”

“You are not that dumb, daddy,” she replied and then chuckled. “You are kind of smart. You might be as smart… as… a turtle.”

“A turtle?” I responded with my own laugh. “Yeah? I’ll take it. Turtles are pretty smart little rascals.”

She suddenly looked tired again. So I leaned down and kissed her forehead.

“Get some sleep,” I told her. “I have to run out, but I will be back when you wake you. Okay?”

Josephine nodded.

“I love you, daddy,” she said.

“Daddy loves you, too, sweetheart,” I replied. “I love you more than the Earth and the Moon.”

“And I love you more,” she responded, “than all the stars in the universe.”

From the floor, from atop the sheet of plastic, I watch as the man calling himself Frank Constantine slowly kneels down next to me, putting both of his knees to the floor. I notice that he is still tightly clutching the photo and patch of hair.

After shifting the patch of hair from one hand to the other, Frank then takes the photo and passes it directly over the flame of the nearest candle. The instant that the photo touches the fire, the flames burst into a bright flash of purple and blue, so bright that it forces me to glance away.

Quickly, the flash dissipates, and I am able to return my eyes to the man’s hand.

The photo of Josephine is gone.

Frank then does the same thing with the patch of hair and creates another burst of purples and blues, this time even brighter.

And then, like the photo, the hair is no more.

“You wanted to know if this is going to hurt?” Frank asks me.

I nod.

“The pain will be more than you have ever felt in your entire existence,” he explains. “More than you ever thought possible. But the agony needs to be. It must. What you are about to feel is the most crucial sensation that has ever been, because pain, physical and mental anguish, is what connects people in reality. There is nothing more important, more essential in all of the cosmos than pure and complete suffering.”

“What about love?”

“Love,” Franklin insists, “is just another form of pain.”

I can’t argue.

“Will I survive?” I ask.

“Does it matter?”

I shake my head.

Frank extends both of his hands so that they hover a foot over my stomach, palms downward. The static charge that has been flowing between this man and me begins to vastly intensify. I start to feel what can only be described as tiny, invisible lightning bolts that shoot across the surface of my skin.

It is energy, pure and unfiltered, and it flows from every pore of Frank Constantine.

“What are you?” I ask.

“I am nothing but a very old man, James,” the man replies. “Older than time itself and all the rivers of the world. And I am going to save your daughter.”

“How?”

“By making a simple trade,” he states.

“And what do you get out of it?”

“To prove,” Frank states, “that I am not a monster.”

And that is when the facade that is Frank Constantine shutters and falls away, leaving behind something else entirely.

Gravity grabs hold of his handsome baby face and pulls hard. The once tight, flawless flesh around his eyes and mouth begins to sink and sag as deep valleys and crevices form and spread from ear to ear.

His hair, full and without a stray strand, disappears, falling away into oblivion. His now bald scalp is not only covered in wrinkles and grooves, but it is also speckled with a million liver spots, dark and black.

The bright white, never ending half-grin is replaced with brown, rotted teeth.

And his hands are no longer the well-manicured hands of a young orderly. His fingers become grotesquely long and abnormally thin. At their tips, his nails become daggers, jagged and yellow.

“Embrace the pain,” the ancient creature says. “Use it to find Josephine. Connect with her in your agony.”

With the quickness of the young man the creature used to be, its sharp talons pierce the soft skin of my exposed abdomen. I howl as a strong surge of electricity also enters my body. Nothing could have prepared me for how it felt when the creature began to peel the flesh away from the area above my stomach.

“Embrace the pain,” it repeated. “Find Josephine.”

I fight against the pain and shocks of energy for the slightest fragment of clear thought. As the anguish and the lighting rip at my existence, I battle to remain awake, even while my consciousness wants nothing more than to fade away.

As the creature’s long fingers push deeply into me and begin to search my insides, I shut my eyes tight. I embrace the pain and pulsing energy and I use it to find my Josephine. Somehow, I am actually able to see her face, even through the storm that is destroying my mind.

What I am seeing is not the sick face in the hospital bed. No. Instead of seeing what is right now, I can clearly see what will be once again. Her beauty, her vibrant glow returning, reemerging from beneath all the sweat and grime.

“Daddy loves you, Josephine!” I scream as the creature pries from me what I instinctively know to be my liver.

I open my eyes to watch the creature sinking its rotting teeth into my tender organ, but I can only watch for a fleeting second. As I am being swallowed by the pain and electrical storm, I scream one last time.

“Daddy loves you!”

Many a Tear has to Fall

The whiskey seems to be putting up a fight, but I choke the liquid fire down, anyway. I was never one for drinking liquor, or just drinking in general, but I force it down anyway, hoping that it might grease the gears of my emotions, of my sadness. I’m tired of feeling empty. No. Not empty. I’m tired of feeling dry. No. Not dry either. Those words aren’t strong enough to describe my state of mind. To be more accurate, I have to say that I’m tired of feeling like a desert, void of the rain that I so desperately need.

Once my family and friends had gone back to their lives, the feelings of desolation and destitution became almost impossible to ignore, nearly impossible to bear.

I need to cry for my wife. I need for the tears to fall. It has been five days since I buried my beautiful LeeAnn and I have yet to shed a single drop. Maybe it is my guilt that is keeping me barren. Maybe I don’t deserve to weep for her, to be cleansed by the salty tears.

I force down another large gulp of the dark whiskey and sit my nearly empty glass on the coffee table. The tears will help me move on, to feel some sort of closure that I know that I need. I can’t keep living with my emotions as desolate as the Sahara. To be honest, though, I don’t want any fucking closure. I don’t want to move on. I don’t want my wife dead and in the ground. I want her alive. I want to see her smile and hear her voice. I want her… home.

But that isn’t possible.

I just have to face the facts.

I pick the glass back up and finish the final swallow, before slamming it back down onto the table. Sitting beside the empty glass is my cell phone. I lean toward it and jab my finger against the screen. I jab the screen a few more times before I eventually reach my voicemail. Reluctantly, I play my only saved message.

LeeAnn’s voice comes to life, resurrected from the dead.

“Honey. I know that you are mad at me, but please answer your phone. I need you. Damn it!”

I listen to the short message another time, probably for the hundredth time, before ending the call.

I need another drink.

But before I can reach for the bottle of Jim Bean to give myself a refill, I hear what at first resembles the front door to my house opening. But it couldn’t be. I live alone now that LeeAnn is gone.

And the front door is locked.

Isn’t it?

I’m not immediately sure.

“Front door open,” my home security system tells me.

I jump to my feet at the sound of the mechanical voice.

Slam!

“Front door closed.”

The slamming door rouses memories of LeeAnn.

My wife was always a delicate person with a wonderfully innocent soul, the type of person that often got kicked around by the cruel and harsh reality she had been forced to live in. As it was for everyone, life was rarely kind to her, but LeeAnn had an especially difficult time accepting that truth. Whenever she would come home from a hard day, I did my best to give her the love and comfort she never got from the outside world. However, some days were especially draining on her spirit. At the end of those days, she would rush through the front door, retreating from the world as fast as possible. Whether she meant to or not, she would always slam the front door behind her, often shaking the plaster walls.

But LeeAnn is gone.

Who is slamming my front door, then?

I can’t see my front entrance from where I stand, but I stare in that direction, watching for someone to exit the foyer. I think about calling out to whoever had come into my home uninvited, but for some reason I can’t find my voice.

A figure darts from the opening to the foyer and immediately turns into an adjoining hallway to the right. The person is a blur of motion, but what I am able to make out nearly sends me stumbling backward onto the couch.

Blonde wavy hair. Long pale arms and legs. The blue and white dress she had been buried in.

LeeAnn?

It can’t be.

Is the whiskey doing this somehow? Is it making me see shit?

I can’t immediately rush after the vision of my dead wife, because at first, I forget how to use my legs. As I stand there frozen, another familiar door slams shut.

Our bedroom.

I already know what is going to happen next.

At the end of those particularly bad days, LeeAnn would seek seclusion in our bedroom. She would hide, sometimes for hours. And I would give her the solitude that she sought, knowing that eventually she would reemerge back into the world, after she had been able to put her pieces back together to the best of her ability.

While she was putting herself back together, she would play the same CD of oldies over and over. I was never a fan of that type of music, but at some point, I came to absolutely loathe those particular songs. She especially liked to loop the one by Tommy Edwards. I can never remember the name of the song, but the voice of Tommy Edwards began to rub my nerves like nails on a chalkboard.

And right on cue, music begins to resonate from the bedroom, and I hear Tommy Edwards beginning to sing, “Many a tear has to fall…”

Before I know that I am moving, I find myself standing at my bedroom door. First, I try the knob, but it doesn’t turn. Locked from the inside. Using my knuckles, I lightly tap.

With a shaky voice, I say her name.

“LeeAnn?”

“Thomas?”

My legs become weak, and I nearly crumble to the floor. I never thought that I would ever hear that sweet voice saying my name again, but there it is… somehow. And it is just as sweet as I remember, like the red, fruity wine that she liked to sip on a Friday evening.

With memories of red wine, and the abnormally tall wine glass she liked to drink from, rapidly flowing through my brain, unexpected yet needed words begin to fall from my lips. “I should have answered the phone.”

“But you didn’t,” she replies. “And I died.”

I try turning the knob again, even though I know that the door is still locked. I give it a brief, pointless twist, while asking, “How are you here?”

“I died,” she repeats, “and then you put me in a box.”

“I did, but…” I begin, before being cut off.

“You put me in a fucking box!” she screams from the other side of the door, her miserable tone blending into the music like a form of orchestrated chaos.

“Will you open the door,” I plead. “I need to see you.”

“Why?”

I take a second before answering. “Because I don’t know if you are really here. Or if I am… crazy.” Maybe the lack of proper mourning, of proper weeping, had finally taken its toll on my mind.

This is crazy.

Or I am.

Am I?

For a few seconds her voice disappears, but Tony Edwards begins his song anew, taking it once more from the top.

“I… am… here.”

“How?” I ask again. “How are you here?”

“Something ran across the road in front of me,” she begins. “I… had been drinking. I shouldn’t have been driving. I called you… but…” LeeAnn trails off for a moment. “You told me not to go out. I should have stayed home. Something ran across the road. An animal. Small. I swerved and then I couldn’t stay on the road. It was dark. There was a large tree. I hit it. And then… black.”

I think about saying something, but I don’t.

“I woke up,” she continued. “And I knew… somehow, I knew that I was in the ground. The box was tight and dark. I couldn’t see anything. I couldn’t… do anything. So I screamed… as loud as I could. I screamed for you to save me. I screamed and screamed and screamed. But you never came.”

“I’m so sorry,” I mumble, my heart breaking beneath the weight of her sadness.

“I gave up,” LeeAnn tells me. “After… I don’t know how long… I stopped screaming. And that’s when I heard them.”

The hair on my arms is suddenly standing on end.

I ask, “Heard who?”

“I wasn’t the only one who had been put in a box,” she explains. “There were others. And they were screaming, too. I could hear them on all sides of me. Tormented and frightened voices screaming, like a choir of the damned. For days… the screaming. It felt like years. It felt like… an eternity. I started screaming again, too. Screaming. And screaming.”

“But you got out,” I say.

“All at once,” LeeAnn continues, “the screaming stopped. Silence. We all… felt… him. He had come for us, and we all felt it.”

“Felt who?”

Ignoring my questions, she goes on, “Without words, he calls for us… for us to rise to him. And we do. In a blink, we are free of our boxes and able to go to him, because we have no choice. When he calls…”

Her voice trails off.

“Who?” I ask.

In spite of the thick bedroom door between us, in spite of the music that continues to repeat unabated, I can hear her sigh. It is a sad sound filled with both hopelessness and fear. I give the doorknob another, more forceful twist, and try to push my shoulder against the door, but once again, my actions amount to little more than a toddler throwing a tantrum.

“The tall man,” she explains. “The tall man in the black top hat. His eyes are dark as coal and his teeth are sharp as knives. When he calls upon the dead, the dead must follow his call. And we did. We were not prisoners. We didn’t need to be chained or shackled, because our bodies followed him without question.”

LeeAnn briefly pauses.

“There were four other people with me,” she tells me. “The four other screamers. I might have recognized the others, but I was too scared to look at their faces. I did look around me, though, and I could see that it was nighttime. And I could see that a strong wind was whipping through the trees, but I could not feel it. I didn’t know if it was cold or warm, because the wind would not touch my skin. The tall man led us out of the cemetery, and we followed behind him like rats. Like children.”

“Where was he taking you?”

“To the place where the storms never end,” she replies. “And the rain never stops.”

“But you got away,” I state. “And you came home.”

“He led us through the town,” LeeAnn says. “Right down the center of everything. But no one could see us. We weren’t there. And then I saw it. 4th Ave West. Where it intersects Second Street. I used to drive that way every single day. It was my way home.”

She takes another brief pause.

“I started thinking about you, Thomas,” she says. “For some reason, I started to remember our wedding day and how everyone got drunk off their asses at our reception. Your uncle Danny threw up all over my cousin Vicky. Too much Jagermeister. I could picture our little house. Our tiny yard. And your face. I don’t know how… but… I started to run. I just kept running and running as fast as I could.”

“And then you made it home,” I say, finishing the thought.

“You didn’t answer the phone,” she replies.

“I am so sorry,” I tell her again.

“You were mad,” she begins, “that I went out. You ignored my call.”

“No!” I exclaim, but quickly lower my voice. “I went to bed. I didn’t… I forgot my phone in the living room. I was mad and… I just… I forgot it on the coffee table. I didn’t hear it ring. I figured that I would just go to sleep, and you would wake me when you got home and that I wouldn’t be mad anymore and that everything would be fine. Like it always was. I would get over it and everything would be fine. But you never came home.”

“I am home now.”

“Please… LeeAnn… let me in,” I beg.

I hear movement. And then a subtle click as the door’s lock disengages. I hastily twist the knob, finally feeling it make the full rotation. Slowly, I push on the door and hold my breath as it swings inward.

And there she is.

LeeAnn.

My wife.

The image of her I have had trapped in my head for days, the still-frame of my wife lying in the morgue, releases its hold on me at last. That gruesome picture is quickly replaced by the sight of her standing in front of me. Beautiful… is a word that fails in every way to capture how she looks at that moment.

Breathtaking… might be more fitting.

Impossible.

A miracle.

I can’t seem to find the right word.

Before I am able to take a single step into the bedroom, the weakness in my legs becomes too much for me and I crumble like bricks onto my knees. As I look upon my wife, dead but somehow home, I feel a familiar warmth flush over my face, and I know that tears are not far behind. LeeAnn simply watches me in silence. And then, without warning, the music stops. Silence steals the air, and I watch, confused, as LeeAnn’s eyes suddenly widen.

“He is here,” she says, fear distorting her expressions.

“No…” I begin to say, but my words are ended by the bedroom door being violently slammed shut in my face. In a flash, I am back on my feet and fighting with the doorknob, which has become locked once more.

I start pounding on the closed door with both fists.

I hear her shout my name.

“Thomas!”

“LeeAnn!” I start screaming back to her.

“Thomas!”

“I love you! I am sorry!”

Below our shouting, I hear another, much deeper voice coming from inside the bedroom.

“It is time to go.”

“LeeAnn!”

The deep voice speaks again.

“Try not to wander off this time.”

“Thomas!”

“No! LeeAnn, no!”

“Thomas! I forgive you!”

And with those final words, the door’s lock clicks free and the door swings open, revealing an empty bedroom. I rush into the room. I spin round and round for several seconds, but there is nothing to see.

She is gone.

Again.

Her words repeat in my head.

“I forgive you!”

I suddenly fall into a sitting position on the side of our bed.

“I forgive you!”

As I sit there, questioning my reality, questioning my sanity, the skies inside my mind, which have become dense and overpopulated by dark clouds, finally release and the rain that my desert so desperately needs begins to pour. And I hungrily and ravenously weep.

Remember the Horses

The wind caught the bottom of her sundress, lifting it up, letting it flutter around her legs like flapping wings. The gentle breeze that brushed against her bare legs tickled, causing Hannah to giggle and squirm. Gripping tightly to the second board of the tall wooden fence, she peered out over the wide meadow.

Nearby, moving in circles across the meadow, the twin ponies continued to play. Hannah watched them chase each other, running and bucking and whinnying in delight. Around and around, they would jog and run in perfect unison. When one was done chasing, the other instinctively knew to take over the pursuit.

They were in-sync in their mischief.

Her Pa would often say that they were born in mischief and would die chasing each other, as twins always did. They would know very little outside of each other, he also stated. Hannah didn’t know what that meant, but it sort of saddened her, for some reason. They would know so much more than that, she was sure.

Pa often said things that Hannah did not fully understand. It was mostly in times when he would mumble incoherently to himself. His face would grow stern, and his eyes would become far away, as if he was able to see things far beyond her own sight. When deep in those stares, her Pa would often look right through her, at something she could not see.

She pictured her Pa and heard his rough voice. Whenever he smiled, at least the crooked half-smirk that would rarely embrace his lips, it was a beautiful thing. He knew more about… everything than she did; she concluded. Maybe that was why he rarely smiled. Would she lose her smile when she grew up? Whatever her Pa saw when he looked out far, she never wanted to see. That would be a tragic day.

She took a gander back to the twins. Hannah did not see mischief, only playfulness.

Hannah always enjoyed watching the twins romping about in the morning hours, especially when the sky was blue and the sun was bright. The sun always reflected across their thick brown coats, giving a shine, almost illuminating them with light. It made the animals appear powerful, filled with sunshine and joy. They reminded her of what she was told angels looked like; being of God and the sun, full of brightness and joy and love.

Suddenly, Hannah dropped from the wooden fence to the grass below. Mimicking the ponies, she began to chase her own shadow around and around in circles, giggling and laughing as she did. Her short, young legs moved swiftly. She pretended to absorb the sunshine, getting faster and faster as she filled with light.

Whenever she played, Hannah felt completely free, as carefree as those two young ponies. She wished against age and time that she could play on the farm forever and ever, always in her sundress, always in the sunshine, and always with the horses.

But that could never be. Her Pa grew up and she would too. She would eventually get old, as her Pa had gotten old. And maybe, if the world was truly cruel, she would even lose her innocent smile.

She paused for a brief and unexpected moment. A longing filled her, and she turned toward her house, the beaten two-story structure sitting in the near distance. It stood tall and large against the blue sky, like her Pa often loomed over her, stern but caring. It was the only home that she had ever known, and it made her feel secure, far from any dangers that may harm her.

Momentarily, she was taken aback by the unwanted disturbance. She had not been playing for long, but it felt like she hadn’t seen her home in a very long time.

The emotions were weird and uncomfortable, but luckily faded. She broke into a spin, letting more air lift the bottom of her sundress. Again and again, she spun, letting her wings flap up and down.

Heavy stomping hooves caught her attention, and she returned her sights to the worn out wooden fence. As she peeked through, she witnessed the twins being pursued by a third older horse. Lela, their magnificent mother, was rounding up her boys, ending their games. Lela gathered her children and escorted them, against all reluctance, toward the barn. Pa must have filled their stalls with food.

If not for their mother, the twins might never stop playing, not even long enough to eat. Hannah was the same. If not for her Pa and his calls to breakfast, lunch, and supper, she would surely starve to death.

Turning, Hannah ended her own games and ran off.

Lela stood with her body halfway out the back door and watched the boys in the yard. Dinner was ready, and she wanted to call them in again, but was suddenly mesmerized by their mischief. It was the first time all day that she found a moment to breathe. In and out. There was just something calming about her twin sons and the way they were able to block out the rest of the world to simply enjoy each other unconditionally.

Nothing else existed but them.

Lela fondly remembered how her Mimi used to sit on the back porch for hours, watching as the two boys carried on, not a care in the world.

“Okay, boys!” Lela called, surprised how easily she got their attention. “It is time to get your behinds in here and at the table! Dinner will be up shortly!”

Their eyes brightened, and they howled, “Turkey!” Bushy, messy brown hair began to bounce all around as the twin toddlers jolted for the back door. As their short arms and legs began to flail as they ran, their faces never lost the playful intensity.

Eagerly, they rushed swiftly around here and through the door.

Turning about, Lela headed back inside. After the stampede of the twins subsided, sounds of football on low volume immediately filled her ears. She could slightly make out the announcers and whistles of the referees as she entered the low-lit living room. It was a drastic change from last Thanksgiving when she could barely hear her own thoughts over John Madden’s staggering voice.

The dim light barely revealed several figures slumped along and across her couch and loveseat. If her cousin had not looked up at her, she would have thought that she had found a crime scene filled with dead bodies.

There were no bodies, but the weight of death was affecting them all, Lela realized. She thought about saying something to them, but simply stood for a minute to take in the room. Everything that needed to be said had already been spoken.

“Who is winning?” The question didn’t even receive a mumble. “Who is playing?” Silence.

It was the beginning of a new tradition, one that was forced upon them only several weeks ago. Even the most solid traditions would eventually have to be altered or be ceased. Her family still had not fully decoded the recent changes and was reluctantly accepting the new reality of a different type of Thanksgiving. Things would forever be different. Yet, Lela still had faith and hope for new traditions.

And she was in charge of that new tradition. Taking pride in setting the new tones, Lela rushed from the room and headed into a hallway toward the kitchen. On her way out of the living room, she left the words, “Dinner will be served in a few minutes.”

Charging down the long hallway, Lela passed briefly by an open doorway. Through the doorway was a dining room with a long wooden table. Sitting along the table in sporadic clusters were other members of her family, grouped together in small to medium conversations.

Breezing by, Lela hurried in through another doorway and into the kitchen. Two odors at once slapped her in the face. Turkey and chocolate. It was an odd combination, but for some reason made her mouth instantly salivate.

The short figure of her nephew Donald startled her a little. “I’m hungry,” he complained, holding his stomach for emphasis.

“I’m going to bring in the food in just a second, sweety,” Lela replied, waving him from the kitchen.

Following her nose to the oven, she tossed on an oven mitt and snatched a large bakery pan from the hot oven. The aroma of chocolate increased immensely. Quickly, before the heat made its way through the mitt, she placed the desert next to the juicy turkey on a nearby counter.

The dessert was a dark chocolate cake with peanut butter fudge swirled across and throughout. She took pride in her accomplishment. She never considered herself much of a bakery chef, but it looked utterly delicious. And she hoped that Mimi would have agreed.

Her Mimi could make a pie or a cake or a cookie that would melt in the mouth and cover tastebuds with pure unadulterated goodness. It was a talent. It was an art form. But no matter how naturally talented, everyone at some point, even her Mimi, had to start from scratch, so to say. And this was Lela’s start, her scratchy beginnings.

If Lela kept baking, Mimi would be proud of her one day, she was sure of it.

Keeping on her oven mitts, Lela grabbed the turkey pan. The bird dripped with flavored perspiration and Lela knew that her family would enjoy sinking their teeth into it.

Everything seemed to be coming along nicely. Maybe Mimi was here with them, if only in spirit. If not, Lela tried to imagine where she would be. Where would Mimi want to spend her eternity?

Using her back, Lela pushed through the swinging door that connected the kitchen to the dining room.

Hannah rushed toward the large red barn. Once inside, it took several seconds for the darkness to clear and reveal the nearby rows of stalls. They were wide and wooden and open in the back for the horse to go to and from the fenced meadow. They could run and play whenever they wanted to. The horses were not prisoners or pets, Hannah appreciated, but family, and were treated to that basic level of respect and love.

The aroma of hay and manure floated across the bottom of her nose. Even at her age, Hannah understood that those were the smells that would always bring her back home. No matter how far she might travel in her life, one sniff and she would be on the farm with the horses.

That was if she ever left the farm.

A part of her knew that one day she would most likely go out into the world beyond the borders of the farm. She would be born into it. Eventually. Whenever she eventually did leave the farm, if she ever did leave, she would miss the horses madly, so madly that being away from them might be the actual death of her. No. That wasn’t entirely true. Because she knew that the horses would always be with her, no matter where she went.

They would be with her everywhere.

The smells of them.

The memories of them.

Hannah would never fully leave the horses.

Not completely.

A crunching, gnawing sound caught her attention. Smiling and giggling, Hannah did a quick spin, letting the bottom of her sundress dance. Taking a jump and skip, she made her way over to the first stall. Within the stall was a black stallion, tall but thinner than would be expected of the breed.

O.

He had his nose in the feeding trough. Slowly, the horse raised his face out of the food and glanced at Hannah’s tiny body. Taking large, rapid breaths in and out of his nostrils, O nodded his head a couple of times before coming to the stall’s gate. Putting his nose to the opening between the boards, he sniffed at Hannah’s dress.

Slipping her hand through the gate, Hannah began to rub O’s nose. His hair felt dry and coarse, but she didn’t care. She didn’t care at all. She loved to pet the skinny black stallion. It was because O was her favorite out of all the horses. Maybe because he was the underdog of the farm. Maybe it was that he was adopted from another farm. Maybe, in spite of his appearance, she saw the beauty within the dark-furred creature.

O was not born or brought up on their farm, which was important to her Pa, for some reason. Pa called the horse lazy and worthless. Yet, he fed O and gave him a home, which was more for Hannah’s sake than the sake of the animal.

Kissing the tips of her fingers. Hannah patted them upon the horse, reminding him of her love. As if he would ever forget. Just like she would never forget him.

Other stalls waited down the row. Hannah gave O one last pat.

Turning his eyes away from the food on his plate, Owen took his black pen and etched another couple of words upon a beaten white napkin. Each word was a groove within the thin paper, some almost ripping through to the other side. It almost felt like irony. The words his Mimi loved so much were being ripped through to the other side. Just like her. No… irony wasn’t the word that he wanted.

Conversations went on around him, but he let them circle him, keeping himself to the outside. Letting his imagination wander through a sunny meadow, Owen took his bony dark fingers and scribbled a few more words, completing the first stanza to a new poem. As he jotted, he thought of his great-grandmother and how often she would speak of horses. She told him stories about playing with them around her childhood farm.

You found me in the field,
lost in the rain, a flawed stallion.

You fed me and brushed me and broke me of the wild;
with love and a stern switch, you broke me of the wild.

Laying the pen down across the napkin, Owen sighed. He was so lost in thought, in his own head, where he often lived, that he didn’t hear the voice speak his name.

The voice repeated. “O?” For a moment he heard Mimi; calling him by her own special nickname. It was a simple bond they shared. Simple yet strong. But when the voice spoke again, “O?” He immediately recognized the tones of his aunt Lela.

She had never used that name before.

From behind him, Owen noticed her presence, but did not turn around to greet her. At his back, his aunt did something else that surprised him to the core. She took her fingers and slowly patted him on his dry, coarse hair. Briefly, she ran her fingers across the top of his rough hair. Another act that only Mimi ever did.

“Aren’t you hungry, sweetheart? The turkey is amazingly juicy.”

Glancing at his plate, Owen realized that he hadn’t taken a single bite of his turkey or his mashed potatoes. The biscuits were smothered in dripping, ignored butter, which was dribbling loosely on the second small plate they sat upon.

“Not really,” he replied, keeping his head lowered. He thought about picking up his fork and poking the meat, but refrained.

“I am so glad that you could make it,” Lela said. “It has been a while since I saw you… since anyone has seen you. College must be keeping you busy. It seems like you ran away as soon as you could. I don’t blame you.” She seemed to lightly choke on the words.

He didn’t reply.

“How are classes going?”

“All right,” he replied. “A lot of reading.”

“That is right up your alley, then,” Lela said.

“I guess.”

“You writing something?” Lela lowered herself closer to the table, trying to read her nephew’s scribble. Normally he would fight the urge to hide his poetry, to grab the paper and crumple it into his pocket. But for some reason, he was happy to let his aunt read it.

“Just a little thing,” he replied, still not meeting her eyes.

“Mimi always loved your writing,” Lela said. “She always said that your words brought her home. I’m not sure what that exactly meant, only that she loved to read whatever you write. And now I can see why. She was your biggest fan, you know.”

Owen smirked. He was never close to his aunt, but for some reason at that second, he regretted it. And he never regretted avoiding anyone else in his family. The only family he ever needed was Mimi.

“I would love to read some of your other stuff,” Lela insisted. “I want to be one of your fans, too. If you would let me.”

He considered it.

Lela reached down and took his hand. The contrast of dark to light was obvious. And no matter how hard Owen tried to ignore the contradiction between himself and the rest of the family, he never fully could. Except with Mimi, because she never made him feel different, darker than anyone else. His words may bring her home, but she was his home.

Where would his home be from then on?

“I don’t know where Mimi is right now, but…”

Owen quickly interrupted, “She is on the farm… with the horses.”

“I was going to say,” Lela began, “that she was perched on your shoulder, but I think you are right. Where else would she be?”

Owen closed his hand tighter around Lela’s

Stretching her short arms out as far as they could go, Hanna wished that she could extend them just a little further, so that she could run her fingers along the stalls on both sides of the row at the same time.

All the stalls were suddenly filled, every horse had seemingly come in from the meadow so they could heartily eat their grains and hay. Even though Hannah didn’t recall him doing it, her Pa must have filled their troughs, causing the animals to rush inside at once, so that they could receive their givings with thanks.

They were all gathered under the same roof.

And Hannah was thankful for them.

And no matter how gruff her Pa could be at times; she knew that he was thankful for the horses as well. They were his world as much as her own. Pa had to be stern and strict. It was his job to be that way. But he was kind and giving as well. He was both. Her Pa was complicated.

Arms still out wide, Hannah walked slowly between the stalls, swinging her head back and forth, taking in the sight of each horse. They were all unique. Large and small. Thick and thin. Pale or dark. They were all special. They were all her family.

As she reached the other side of the barn and found another large open doorway, Hannah stopped and turned around to take a final breath of hay and manure. She was almost saddened to let it go, but exhaled anyway.

Suddenly a booming voice called from the direction of the house, booming across the farm and into the barn, like the thunder that would sometimes roll across the meadow during a storm. It was her Pa. The voice was strong, and the call was urgent. Hannah had no choice but to obey.

Sprinting back through and out of the barn, she was forced to pause. Movements caught her attention. From their doorways, marched each and every horse. Tall and proud, the animals began to line up along the fence, facing forward toward Hannah. Staring at her were the creatures that she had loved her entire life, looking at her as if saying goodbye.

Blowing them a sweet kiss across the air, Hannah knew that she would see them all again shortly. She just had to go home and see her Pa. He was calling for her.

Turning away, Hannah ran and ran, quickly getting to the front door of her home. The white door was closed. Turning the knob, she opened it. Giving the horses a final glance, Hannah went home.

Lela struck her glass with her fork, for some reason ashamed that she had to get everyone’s attention that way. But she had nearly forgotten the most important tradition of thanksgiving. She would still do it, even if it was nearing the end of the meal, and nearly time for her chocolate dessert.

“Excuse me,” Lela said. “I’m sorry. Excuse me, everyone.” Once she had the attention of her family, she continued, “Thank you. I know this holiday has been hard… on us all. We have all gone through a great loss. But… I would like us to take a moment and remember those things in our lives that we are thankful for. Who would like to go first?”

“Me,” Owen said, raising his hand.

“O?” Lela asked, surprised to see her nephew raising his hand. “Please. What are you thankful for?”

“My great-grandmother,” Owen replied. “Hannah Stead. For everything. Everything. She stood by me when… others did not want to. She helped me and loved me… when others did not want to. I was the black sheep… the black horse of the farm… so to speak. But never to Mimi. I was always beautiful to her.

This will be the first of many holidays that we will be spending without her. And we all miss her, for our own personal reasons. It was her that brought us together for these types of occasions… and it will be her memory that will bring us together in the future. She was called home, back to the farm, back to the horses.

He raised his glass of yellow soda.

“Hannah Stead. We love you. We will always remember you.”

About the Author

After being brutally mauled by a dog as a toddler, Jackson Arthur grew up with a stutter, which caused him to be socially awkward. Instead of interacting with people, he chose to hide his nose in books, causing him to fall in love with fiction. At an early age, he began to read Goosebumps and Fear Street, before graduating to more adult novels like The Stand and The Green Mile. His love of scary stories blossomed into the desire to scare people himself.

If you enjoyed these stories, you can find more in Cellar Door and They Come When They Are Called, available now.

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Table of Contents

- An Unfinished Door
- The Church at the Edge of Town
- Compounded in Clay
- A Devil in the Midst
- A Father’s Duty
- Many a Tear has to Fall
- Remember the Horses
- About the Author
- More Creepy Reads
- Follow Velox on Social Media