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Written by Richard Raven
“Fear lurks in the heart of every person. It’s there – we’re born with it – and all we can do is try to limit how much of it we embrace and let influence our lives. That is often the difference that determines whether we live happily ever after, or live a nightmare and end up taking that fear with us to the grave.”
Someone had once said that to him. He was ten, maybe eleven at the time, but he wasn’t completely sure of that. Nor could he say for sure who had said it, the name and face long lost to him. What he could say with complete certainty was that he believed it, every word of it. He believed it because, as far back as he could remember, there had been a near paralyzing fear lurking in his heart. Since it had always been there, he had assumed he had been born with it.
The problem, as he had so often lamented over the years, was that he had obviously embraced the fear more than he should have; let it influence him and his life far too much. But what else could he have done?
That damned . . . Thing . . . had always been there, snarling and eyeing him from the shadows. That evil and hideous THING that always scared him senseless whenever it suddenly appeared. He had spent most of his life running from it, hiding wherever he felt safe, but it always found him eventually.
It had found him that awful night that still haunted him. The most savage and frightening attempt it had ever made for him. As it had done to the hapless others he happened upon that night, it had intended to rip him to bloody shreds. He had said that to the men and women who had put the metal restraints on his wrists that night and stuffed him into the back of the car with the flashing lights on the roof. Said the same thing to everyone who asked him questions about it afterwards. He swore to all of them that it was a miracle that he, alone, had escaped its wrath.
No one had believed him. They had all looked at him as if he was a lunatic.
The trouble, he reflected fearfully as he ran and stumbled through the woods alongside of the narrow and twisting highway, was that he was covered with the blood of those not as fortunate as he when the men and women in the black uniforms found him cowering in a culvert not far from the scene of the mayhem. That culvert was all that had saved him from the cruel fate suffered by the others. Howling and snarling like a pack of rabid wolves, that Thing had paced back and forth at the mouth of the culvert, unable to get at him. It finally had given up and ran away, and only a short time before those in the uniforms had pulled him resisting and crying hysterically from that culvert. He feared it would return for him at any moment and finish its bloody rampage.
Amazingly, though, that didn’t happen. He couldn’t understand it, but it didn’t come back. That was when he realized that those people in the uniforms, all shouting and pointing guns at him and threatening to shoot, had done him the greatest favor of all. As had everyone he had encountered after that. Somehow, they were all protecting him; keeping that awful Thing away. He was grateful to all of them; had embraced their protection, as he had the fear, itself. Almost five years later – the longest stretch since that Thing first appeared – and he had yet to see it again . . .
. . . until about thirty minutes ago.
He had known and feared the day would come because of all the times when he could almost sense it outside the walls; waiting for its next chance at him. The feeling always seemed to be worse at night, or when he was angry or something had upset him. Yet, day or night and regardless of his mood, it never seemed far away. Nor was it ever far from his thoughts. After what had happened, he knew better than to let it slip from his mind for even a moment, or to ever think that he had seen the last of it.
That was why he believed that if he stayed where he was, tucked behind those walls and out of reach, he would be safe. Why he had pleaded with his protectors not to move him. He was perfectly fine where he was, and it was too dangerous for him to set foot outside the walls. But, again, no one would believe or listen to him. To everyone he was, after all, just a crazy man. It was enough to drive a man insane. He had dreaded the move for days . . .
. . . and it was everything he had feared it would be.
The van had stopped for the red sign he had seen coming up through the windshield. One of his minders, the one sitting across from him, had stood up and moved past him to the sliding side door. Something had caught his attention outside the van – he had said that to the others. Then the man had opened the door.
And there it was, in all its seething, murderous fury, the Thing. It was all he ever knew to call it. Could never say for sure just what it was.
But it had come for him again. As much animal as anything human, drool dripping from its bared canine-like fangs, and more terrifying than he remembered, even in his worst nightmares. The foul, rotten smell of it – a smell he knew well and would never forget—had hit him as the man in the door yelled a warning to the others.
It was then, the shouts of surprise and outrage from his minders and the driver ringing in his ears, that everything turned a hazy blood red. The same thing that had happened to him the other time; when the haze lifted then, he was in the culvert, the Thing trying to get to him.
When the haze lifted this time, his wrists and feet were free of their restraints and he was running through the woods. He had escaped it again!
He had no idea how long he had been running through those woods, but he was dangerously out of breath and had to stop. Only for a second or two . . . can’t let it catch up to me. It’s done that so many times before, and can do it again whenever it wants, especially now. Grasping his thighs, his chest heaving with each gulping breath, he noticed for the first time the blood. It was all over him and his clothes, as it was the other time, and there was again a coppery and nauseating taste in his mouth.
He spat, shuddering in fear and revulsion.
When the shivers had passed, he stood up straight and looked around fearfully. All around him the woods were growing dark and eerie. Before that Thing had attacked the van, he had noticed the dark clouds building and knew there would be a storm later. But that was the least of his worries. Where was that Thing? He couldn’t hear its snarl or the approach of its heavy steps through the thick carpet of leaves. There was no sign of it at all in the thickening gloom.
But he knew it was out there somewhere. He also knew with a sinking and terrible certainty that, just as before, no one would believe what he would claim had happened. Nor was there any of the men and women in the black uniforms with guns to save him this time. The only protectors he had were back at the van, and they were all dead by now. He was sure of that.
As he had before, he felt immense guilt and remorse because of what that Thing had done to those men; because he had run away and left them to their grisly fate. But what chance did he have against a monstrosity like that? It was either run or let that Thing tear into him.
As it had wanted to do since that terrible day when he was just a kid.
So he had run.
And now, his breathing having slowed enough to allow it, he was running again. He had no idea where he was or in what direction he was running.
He just ran. Deeper and deeper into those darkening and frightening woods.
* * *
PATTY JACOBS WAS LATE getting away from the office and in a hurry to get home. She had to make a stop to pick up a bottle of wine to go with (she still found it amusing) the loaded pizza that Jay was bringing over to her place. Well, it was his idea, and she wasn’t about to tell him that it seemed a little ridiculous. Besides, a little wine would be just the thing to create to right mood. As she got behind the wheel of her dark blue Grand Am in the employees’ lot at the rear of the office complex, she eyed the gathering clouds that rolled like an advancing army across the sky. She had it from a co-worker, who had picked up a report on the radio in their office, that most of the state faced a moderate risk for severe weather.
“Active warnings are likely by sunset,” the woman had said as Patty was getting ready to leave. “They expect it to last through much of the night, too.”
“Wonderful,” Patty had replied sardonically. “They didn’t mention anything about tornadoes, did they?”
“A possibility, but the threat of that appears low. Not quite the right conditions.”
Patty had nodded. Tornadoes she could certainly do without, but the prospect of a little wind and thunder and lightning didn’t displease her. Not in the least, and that was a rare thing for her. Ordinarily, the mere thought of the power outages that usually came with a bout of nasty weather was enough to put her into something close to a panic. The reason was that she had an intense fear of the dark. It wasn’t so much the nights that bothered her – not Noctiphobia, exactly – but more a fear of the darkness, itself. It was worse when she was alone. The fear that would suddenly grip her could quickly turn paralyzing; just as quickly she would have herself convinced that she wasn’t alone. That she shared the darkness with something sinister that could and would, at any second, reach out and grab her.
She, of course, had never seen whoever or whatever it was. She couldn’t even picture the presence in her mind, but that didn’t lessen her fear. It was an affliction she had endured since she was a little girl.
She blamed her father for it. His favorite method of punishing her (his word for it, as she had seldom ever gotten into trouble that warranted punishment) had been to lock her in a dark closest. Always at night, when her mother was at work, and he warned her not to say a word about it to her mother. “Your mother works hard and doesn’t need to be worried over the way you’re misbehaving. Especially since I’ve got you and the situation under control. ”He made it plain that if she talked, it wouldn’t be her that he punished, but her mother.
She didn’t want that to happen, so she stayed silent.
Yet she understood that it wasn’t so much that she had done something wrong, but more that he simply didn’t want to be bothered with her, preferring to sit in front of the Tube with his buddies and drink beer. Many a night she had huddled in a corner of her bedroom closest, her eyes closed, her empty stomach growling, and her head firmly between her knees as the demons of the darkness tormented her. Even when her mother (never swift on the uptake, herself) finally discovered what had been going on and booted the lazy and drunken lout out of the house, Patty was scarred and never quite able to fully shake her fears.
From her early teens, right through graduating high-school, she had endured an exquisite level of hell at the hands of her classmates. It didn’t get any better when she reached adulthood. It had, in fact, ended her one and only marriage of three years to a man who, once he knew the full scope of her problems, had done nothing but laugh at her and criticize her unmercifully. In the end, realizing that he couldn’t shame her out of her fears and thoroughly disgusted with her by that time, he had simply walked out one night – and in the middle of a power failure, no less. “That should give you plenty to whimper and cry about, you pathetic bitch,” was the last thing he said to her on his way out. Her luck with men didn’t improve very much after his abrupt, though hardly unexpected exit from her life.
Not until she had met a certain dark-haired and dark-eyed man named Jay. Patty was smiling broadly as she backed out of her parking slot and pulled to the street.
William James Newsome (Billy when he was growing up; Billy J, so dubbed by his friends in high-school; finally, just Jay in college and beyond) was a different sort of man than Patty had grown accustomed to. They had met several months before when Jay had hired on with the firm where she worked. While he had always been friendly, it had seemed to her almost immediately that his interest in her went well beyond friendship. When he finally asked her out (in a sweet and shy kind of way that she found hopelessly charming), sorely tempted though she was to accept, she had automatically said no, believing she was in for yet another humiliating letdown. She let him down easily; that had only encouraged him and he had persisted. Did he ever persist! When she finally broke down and confessed her Nyctophobia and Lygophobia, he wasn’t put off or even the slightest dissuaded. He had, in fact, assured her that he understood; she had quickly discovered it wasn’t just words.
“I have my own demons,” he had explained. “Ever heard of Ceraunophobia?”
Patty had shaken her head and asked curiously what it was.
“Storms,” he had replied simply, then clarified, “More precisely, thunder.” He went on to say that a roll of thunder off in the distance would accelerate his breathing off the charts and he would start squirming and feeling sick to his stomach. A crack of it detonating overhead would almost always send him scrambling for a place to throw up or drop him in his tracks in a dead faint. He explained that he once had one of the fainting spells while in the company of a woman he had really wanted to get to know. “Suffice it to say,” he told Patty sheepishly, “when I came to, my date was long gone, and she would never answer or return my calls after that. Believe me, I’ve tried therapy and medication, and neither one worked. So I just have to deal with it.”
As soon as Patty heard this frank admission, she finally accepted his offer of a night out. God, it had been so long since she gone on an actual date!
Since then they had been out together several times. It was mostly dates in the afternoon to start with, but a few had been at night in well-lit restaurants and the like. Once, on a Saturday night, he coaxed her into a movie theater and for the late showing. She loved movies, but couldn’t remember the last time she had the nerve to set foot inside a theater. With Jay’s comforting arm firmly around her shoulders the whole time, Patty had gotten through it with no problems and thoroughly enjoyed the “chick-flick” he let her pick out.
It was that very night, when they got back to her place, that she let him take her to bed for the first time...the bedside lamp glowing faintly, of course. When they had finally exhausted themselves, Jay had switched off the light – over her fearful protests. He went right ahead with it, breathing assurances to her as the darkness enveloped them. She was shivering slightly when he pulled her to him, and he held her all night. She had slept that night as she had been unable to do in years, with or without a light on. That had been even better than the sex – and that had been the best she ever had.
They had also dealt with his demons together, having ridden out many storms in the time they had been dating. Throughout every one of them he had been as nervous as a school-boy about to pick up his very first date under the suspicious glare of her father, but he had yet to faint on her. Nor had he ducked out of sight to throw up. Had never come close to doing either one. One night, about a week ago, Jay had told her fervently that he had her to thank for it; that she was better for him than a herd of therapists or double handfuls of pills. Then, there in the darkness of her bedroom as rain continued to fall heavily from the passing storm, he had kissed her. After that he proceeded to thank her properly and, as always, he was quite thorough with his thanks. As she was with her own show of gratitude.
Talk about a dream come true, she thought as she braked for a red light. To give a man pleasure and to get it back from him. We’re good for each other . . . and I am growing very fond of that kind and gentle man.
But, she hastily corrected herself, it went beyond that. She was beginning to feel something that she hadn’t felt toward any man in a long time. Had begun to think she never would; that it would simply never happen. And tonight’s the night I’m going to tell him just how I feel. After that, unless I miss my guess, it’s going to be a night neither of us will ever forget.
* * *
SHE LOOKED OVER THE selection of wines, passed on several of the more expensive, and settled on a bottle of red she’d had before and liked. It had a smooth and pleasingly fruity bouquet that didn’t go down like a mouthful of cotton. She paid for it and hurried to her car, checking her watch. Time was getting away from her. Jay was probably, even then, already on his way to her place with the pizza, and she still had to change and fix up a little. Well, if she was running a bit late and Jay showed up, he could watch her get ready. Wouldn’t be the first time. Call it an appetizer.
Patty giggled, then chided herself for being silly. But, damn it, she was happy. The first time in a long time she had felt that way or could even claim to feel that way, even to herself. When she peered out the windshield and checked the sky, the good feeling running through her fizzled ever so slightly.
The sky was rapidly growing dark and ugly, creating a false dusk. She felt a twinge in her stomach and her throat went a little dry at the thought that darkness – even when it wasn’t true darkness – would catch her before she could make it home. Come on, girl, you can do this. Just keep your mind on Jay and being with him, and we’ll be fine. And while we’re doing that, what do you say we put a little more foot into it? Up ahead a light went from green to yellow; she shot through the intersection.
A few minutes later she had cleared downtown and had picked up the county road that led to her rented house. The sky was darkening ahead of her and beginning to lower as if the load of rain it held was growing too heavy for it to bear. By this time the city had given way to stretches of thick woods, to pastures and open fields overgrown with weeds and wild flowers; to neat little homes along the road with lights burning behind curtained windows. It had gotten dark enough that she had to switch on her headlights. The twinge in her stomach got a little worse and her throat, she realized, was tightening up. Come on, girl, not far to go now. Just take it easy. Might also be a good idea we tried to breathe, instead of holding our breath the way we’re doing.
Before reaching home, a speeding County Sheriff’s squad passed her, then a second right behind it. Both had sirens blaring and all lights flashing. Must’ve been a wreck somewhere further out. The road had a notorious reputation for bad accidents, especially between an intersection not far from her home and the old State Hospital about seven or eight miles beyond. In the two years or so she had lived in the area that section of road had claimed numerous victims. She seldom ventured beyond her home on that road. The State Hospital frightened her, and all the little white crosses and bunches of flowers that seemed to constantly multiply along the road were just too sad to look at or think about. She quickly put that out of her mind and concentrated on her driving.
Soon after the police cars had passed, she reached her driveway and pulled in. The house sat a short distance off the road, a pair of towering old white oaks that looked like a matching pair flanking the house at both front corners. It was an older house, but in excellent repair and well maintained by her landlord. One of the things she loved about it was its screened-in front porch. Until she had found Jay, there had been few things she enjoyed more than relaxing on that porch on pleasant days; a sweating glass of iced-tea or lemonade close to hand as she read a story on her Kindle or played with her laptop. To one side of the house was an old storage shed that someone had built from rough cut lumber. It had always looked to her like whoever built it (her landlord claimed it was there when he bought the property) had thrown it together as an afterthought. She had never used it. Seldom ventured past its opened door because it was always so dark inside. Even on the brightest and sunniest days it eerily reminded her of a closet.
It pleased her to find Jay’s white Pontiac GT parked in front of the house. He was getting out of the car as she pulled alongside and stopped. It surprised her, though, that she didn’t get the usual wide and pleased smile whenever he saw her. Instead, he reached back into his car and brought out a large multi-colored pizza box.
Then he just stood there, staring at her; waiting for her to get out of her car. His handsome face was oddly grim, even a little anxious.
It’s got to be the coming storm that’s got him feeling out of sorts. She grabbed her purse and the bottle of wine from the seat beside her. Well, we’ll soon take care of that and have that wonderful smile of his back where it belongs. She got out of her car, bumped the door closed with her hip, and hurried around to greet him.
“Hi,” she breathed softly, then raised herself on tiptoes to kiss him. He returned it, but not with his usual enthusiasm. She pulled away from him a little and frowned. He still had that same grim, anxious look on his face. It was enough to strike a resounding anxious chord with her. “Honey, is there something wrong?”
“Patty, have you heard any news in the last hour or so?” he asked quietly.
“You mean about the weather? Yeah, I heard as I was leaving the office-”
“That’s not what I mean,” he interrupted gently.
“Then what?”
“One of the patients at the State Hospital escaped. This was about two hours ago, and it happened not far from here at the crossroads. The last I heard, they haven’t caught him yet.”
“Oh, no,” she breathed, a shiver running through her. “Who was it?”
Jay hesitated; seemed reluctant to say. Finally, “Lloyd Witcher,” he said slowly.
Patty dropped her purse, her now free hand flying to her mouth. “Oh, my God.” Her voice was barely above a whisper and she was trembling visibly.
“Apparently,” Jay said, “they were moving him to that new facility across town and, somehow, he overpowered his two guards and the driver of the van and killed all three in the process. From all I’ve heard on the news, it was as bad as before, only not as many people this time and, thankfully, no women. They’re warning everyone in this area to either leave or stay inside and keep all doors and windows locked until he’s captured.”
“That explains the police cars,” she murmured, her hand still over her mouth.
“Yeah, I saw them when they went past, and they’re not the only ones I’ve seen heading out there, either.”
“Lloyd Witcher,” Patty breathed fearfully. The man that slaughtered four people: a man and his wife and a second couple. He had attacked the couples without warning; police at the scene declared that the victims looked like a wild animal had savaged them. The only ones who escaped the carnage was the couple’s two children, two boys aged six and eight. Both were traumatized, but otherwise unharmed. It had happened far away in another city, the two families enjoying a late-summer cookout one evening. This was before she moved to the area, but Patty had heard the stories; had seen the articles in the papers and the news coverage at the time. A real-life horror story that had turned her stomach. Especially the fact that the women were brutally raped and, apparently, after they were both already dead. Patty didn’t learn of that detail until after she had moved into the house. Upon learning that the man who could do something so heinous was less than ten miles away, she almost moved out. Would have done that if not for the fact that she was only a week into the new job and desperately needed to keep it. That and the fact that there wasn’t anything else within a reasonable driving distance available to rent that she could afford. Visions of that man and what he had reportedly done, combined with the fear already instilled in her, had ruined any chance she may have had for sleep many, many nights. It was only within the past eight or nine months that she had been able to put that man and the images of savage brutality he inspired out of her mind.
“Maybe we should go to your place,” she whispered.
Jay sighed resignedly. “Patty, I thought about that, but I think it’s too late now.” He waved his free hand at the sky. “With this weather moving in, getting darker by the second, and you as shaken as you are, I think it would be an even bigger risk if either of us tried to drive right now.”
Patty realized he was right. She was certainly in no shape to drive; in another few minutes, judging by the lightning she could already see streaking across the sky, neither would he. She berated herself and her miserable father for the fear that gripped her heart.
“We’ll be okay,” Jay said, his voice brimming with a confidence she was sure that he really didn’t feel. But he was trying – God love him, and trying so hard for her.
It was at that moment that she realized she loved him desperately.
“You’ve got strong doors and good locks on them and the windows,” Jay was saying. “And, if I remember correctly, you’ve also got that baseball bat under the bed. We just sit tight, keep a close eye on things, and either wait for this weather to move away or for daylight – whichever comes first. Then we go to my place.”
“Then let’s get inside,” Patty declared and shivered from head to toe. She knelt and reached for her purse. “I swear, Jay, it’s like I can feel eyes watching us right now.”
* * *
BOTH THE PIZZA AND bottle of wine sat untouched and unwanted on the kitchen table. Patty had hurried to her bedroom, flipping on every light switch she passed. As she quickly changed out of her slacks and blouse, pulling on a pair of shorts and a loose-fitting T-shirt, Jay had checked the backdoor and all the windows. Then, holding his hand tightly, she led him into the living room and turned on the TV. Lloyd Witcher’s bloody escape dominated the six o’clock news. As they sat on the sofa, she clinging to his hand and leaned against him, Patty never took her eyes from the screen. In her head were the images of the two women she had seen pictures of on the news years before; her imagination supplied its own version of what that animal did to them after snuffing out their lives.
It was during the news cast that the storm finally hit. It began with a sudden gust of wind that slammed into the house with a howling moan, immediately followed by an abrupt belch of rain that fell with a sibilant hiss. Only a few seconds after that came the first report of thunder; it was like an explosion and seemed to shake the entire house. Jay cringed; Patty gripped his hand harder and leaned even closer to him until she was all but in his lap. He breathed a heavy and grateful sigh and put an arm around her, drawing strength from her that calmed him. He was still tense as flash after flash of lightening danced in the living room windows and thunder roared overhead, his body rigid against hers, but he seemed in control.
The storm continued to vent its fury as the newscast ended, the anchor promising to break into regularly scheduled programming “As updates on this unfolding situation become available.” Patty could only wonder bitterly how the gorgeous blonde anchor could manage such a mega-watt smile. She supposed it was easy when the woman was in a safe and guarded TV studio and miles away from the “unfolding situation.”
“I don’t see how they can possibly catch him on a night like this,” Jay remarked. “While the cops are out stumbling around in this storm and chasing shadows, he’s probably holed-up somewhere right now, all nice and dry and laughing at all the fools getting wet.”
Patty had been thinking herself that trying to capture that animal seemed a near impossible undertaking. The woods, alone – some of the sections several square miles in size – made it seem hopeless. How could the authorities expect to search such a broad area that he could hide in with any hope of capturing him, let alone ever spotting him? A small shiver ran through her.
“Easy, honey,” Jay soothed and gently kissed the top of her head.
Patty was not only frightened but bitterly disappointed. Here we sit like a pair of scared kids, hiding from the boogeyman, when we should be in the bedroom and naked right this very second! She had been able to think of little else all day. She murmuring to him how she felt about him; he deftly laboring to make her every nerve ending spark and tingle in pleasure. And in that lustfully wonderful way he had with her.
Now she wanted to scream in frustration.
A moment later she did, but it was only a small screech of surprise when the lights suddenly blinked and dimmed. Then the lights did it again, stayed off for a few seconds this time, and came back on.
“Great,” she groaned. “Just what we need.”
Jay immediately scooted forward on the sofa. “Are your candles in the last kitchen drawer?” he asked.
“Where they always are, and the matches. You get those and I’ll get the flashlight out of the bedroom.” It took but a few seconds for her to hurry to the bedroom and grab the small LED flash from the nightstand. Yet before she could even turn around with it in her hand the lights flickered again and went out. The darkness, though it couldn’t have lasted for more than four or five seconds, was pure terrorizing agony. Patty tried but couldn’t stop the whimper that bubbled through her trembling lips. Her thumb, as if of its own accord, hit the switch and the flashlight’s beam cut a narrow, bright swath across the room just as both the light above her head and the bedside lamp blinked back on.
Patty’s mind had no more than registered the reappearance of light when, from outside one of the bedroom windows, there was a loud thump and a crash, immediately followed by what sounded like a startled and muffled curse.
Patty screamed, a shrill and terrified scream.
“What was that?”
Patty whirled around; Jay had come into the bedroom, several long and thin candles in one hand, a box of matches in the other. His eyes were huge circles of surprise. Patty, her own fearful eyes on him and using the hand holding the flashlight, pointed at the window, the beam of light hitting the curtains squarely.
“S-Someone’s o-out t-there,” she stammered.
Jay tossed the candles and matches on the bed and went to his knees on the right side of it. When he stood up, he was holding in both hands the wooden baseball bat she kept there. Patty immediately sensed his intent, could tell by the grim and determined set to his face, and could only stare at him incredulously.
“You’re not going out there,” she declared, the hand holding the light dropping to her side.
“Yes, I am,” he said, his voice perfectly calm and steady.
“Jay, no, please – ”
“Look,” he cut her off, “it’s probably nothing but the door to that shed blowing in the wind.” Patty hadn’t thought of that, but even after hearing him say it aloud and she didn’t believe it. One look at his face and she knew that he didn’t believe it, either. The last sound she had heard could only have been a voice; Jay had heard it the same as she had. His next words confirmed it. “Just the same, though, get your phone and call 911.Give me that flashlight and I’ll be right back.”
Patty didn’t move. “Jay, you can’t go out there,” she insisted. “What about the thunder?” It was still blasting from the heavens, though not as frequently now.
“To hell with it,” he declared vehemently. “For the first time I can remember I’ve got something more important to worry or think about than the damn thunder. Hell, it’s just noise, after all.” He went to her, the bat held in one hand down at his side. He reached for the flashlight, kissed her quickly on the lips; then again. “Make the call,” he told her calmly, and was quickly heading out of the room.
“Be careful,” Patty called to his back, pulling her phone out of a pocket of her shorts as she hurried after him. Before her fumbling thumb could punch in 911 and hit connect, Jay had opened the front door and vanished into the darkness of the porch. A second later she heard the porch’s storm door squeak open and swish shut.
“911, what is your emergency?”
“My name’s Patricia Jacobs and I live at 370019 Route 4-West, and I think there’s a prowler outside my house.”
A brief pause, then, “You said Route 4?”
“Yes, County Road 4, near the intersection with State 19.”
“Ma’am, are you there alone?”
“No, my boyfriend’s here with me, but he’s gone outside to take a look.”
“Ma’am, I’ve already alerted the Sheriff’s Department and units are on the way. If you can, get your boyfriend back inside, lock all the doors and wait for deputies to get there. Shouldn’t be more than one, maybe two minutes. Until then, keep this connection open and stay with me and tell me everything that’s happening.”
Patty hurried to the porch. As she passed it, she flipped on the switch to the outside light under the eave of the roof. She reached the storm door and pushed it open, her phone still pressed to her ear. Both vehicles and the rain and wind swept front yard were lit up; the sight gave her a decidedly creepy feeling.
“Jay?” she called, standing in the doorway as cold rain pelted her.
At first, she heard nothing but the splatter of rain and the low moan of the wind. Then she heard what sounded like a low hiss and a grunt. It had seemed to come from the side of the house where the old shed stood.
“Jay?” she called again and stepped through the door, the rain drenching her.
The only reply was the sound of the rain and wind. Damn it, where is he? Why doesn’t he answer me? In her ear were the words, “Ma’am, what’s happening?”
“I’m not sure. Hang on, I’m going to step out and look for him.” I’ve got to find him. I need him and he needs me – we need each other to get through this.
“Ma’am, don’t go out.” The voice now urgent and commanding. “Stay inside and lock the door. Sheriff’s units are not . . . “
Patty didn’t hear the rest; she had lowered the phone from her ear as she stepped from the porch and started toward the shed-side of the house. Behind her, the screen door pulled closed, clicking softly in its frame. The rain beat down on her, soaking her to the skin; chilling her to the bone. She reached the corner of the house and peered carefully around it.
In the swath of darkness between the corner of the house and the oak on that side she saw her flashlight lying on the ground, its beam angled to throw its circle of white on part of the shed’s front wall. That wasn’t all she could see, either. Only a few feet away from the flashlight and just barely in its beam was a face. She could see the dark hair plastered to the forehead and one eye that was open.
That one eye stared back at her, unblinking.
It was Jay. Before she could scream, before it could gather in her throat and rip from her mouth, a sudden burst of lightning lit up the whole scene before her.
Jay lay on his stomach near the shed. Even in the brief flare of lightening she saw with dreadful certainty there was no point in screaming his name; he would never hear it. His shirt looked to be in shreds, all but ripped from his body. She saw the soggy smears of blood around his neck, on one shoulder and arm; on his bare back. Patty stared, frozen by shock and fear, as the blaze of lightening faded and thunder cracked overhead.
Then, as the darkness returned and its frightening embrace was reaching for her again, she backed away from the corner and more into the spill of light in front of the house. It did little to quell her growing terror or mounting anxiety. I’ve got to get back inside . . . back into the light. The phone in her hand all but forgotten, she was only vaguely aware of the muffled but now almost frantic voice coming from it, trying to get her attention. Her throat felt constricted and it was hard to breathe. In her head was that horrible image of Jay. That kind and gentle man who had been so good to her; who had swallowed his own fear and tried so hard to protect her. Oh, my God . . . Jay.
The hiss and grunt she had heard before jarred her out of her grief and fear induced stupor. It had seemed to come from out of the darkness somewhere in front of her in the side yard. With a small, choking sob, Patty whirled around and dashed for the storm door.
She reached it, her hand closing around the handle and her thumb poised to push the button that would open it, when another burst of lightening turned the stormy night into day. Immediately after that was the loudest and most jarring explosion of thunder yet; it seemed to shake the very ground upon which she stood.
Then she was in pitch blackness as the outside light flickered and went out.
Her throat closed and she stopped breathing. Her phone fell from her hand, but she held on to the door handle with the other, waiting. Seconds passed, but the lights didn’t come back on. She started trembling. No...no. Please...don’t do this to me! At least let me get inside! But all she could do was stand there, one foot on the first step, shivering, the raw terror now gripping her total and complete. The hand holding the door handle was shaking so hard that the door was rattling in its frame.
Then, abruptly, she stopped shivering, her hand going still.
Something had crept up out of the darkness and now stood directly behind her. She could feel the menacing presence as she had so many times in that dark closest. She sensed more than heard it edging closer to her.
Then, straight from her every nightmare, she felt a puff of hot and foul breath on the back of her neck. Then another...and another.
Her head started spinning and she felt her knees coming unhinged.
In her last seconds of life, in another burst of lightening, she caught a glimpse of what she had feared for so long. Only a glimpse, but enough of one for her to see the face, the bloody and bared teeth; the glaring and evil eyes. The sight dragged a tiny, mewing whimper from her closed throat. So that’s what you look like.
Then the man grabbed her, and her scream tore through the darkness.
* * *
HE HAD SPOTTED THE shed when he stumbled out of the woods and into the backyard. Since no one appeared to be home, the shed had seemed the perfect place to hide. He had no more than stepped inside it and pulled the door closed when the first car arrived. He saw it and the man that got out of it through one of the cracks in the front wall. The urge to throw open the door and flee had seized him, but he had fought it down. The man would surely see him, as would that Thing. He could smell it – that putrid stench of death mingled with the fecund odor of neglected animal cages—and knew it was there somewhere in the backyard. Then the woman had shown up; that jarred him, and left him shaking in dread
For he knew what was coming, and that he would be blamed for it. Those who had asked him all the questions before had tried to blame him for the horrible things that Thing had done to those other two women. He had led that Thing to those women, yes, and for that he was guilty.
But the rest of what they tried to convince him that he had done?
The very idea of it had sickened him. As the thought that he had led that Thing to yet another woman and that it would likely happen again had sickened him.
How could they have thought that he was like his father?
The last days he had spent in the hell that had been his home – the only home he had ever known, save the time he spent behind the walls—ran through his splintered mind. He could see himself again creeping to the door of his parent’s bedroom late one afternoon; again, wondering why he hadn’t seen his mother since the morning before. She had claimed then that she wasn’t feeling well and was going to lay down. He had asked his father where she was; as usual, the man had brusquely brushed him aside and said, “Get out of my sight, boy, and quit asking damn questions.”
When he peeked through the crack in the door, he saw both his mother and father. Both were naked and in bed, his father on top of her and holding her legs apart. He knew what they were doing. He had seen naked men and women doing the very same thing in videos his father had left playing on the TV.
But something seemed wrong with his mother. She was so quiet – unlike the women in the videos—and why was her mouth hanging open like that? Why did her eyes look so dull and blank? Why was her face so gray? Why was his father whispering to her as if angry with her? “Wake up. Come on, damn it to hell, wake up.”
Even to the eyes of a bemused seven-year-old, it was clear that his mother wasn’t asleep. That could only mean . . .
But no one knew about that. It was a secret; his father had said so when the man noticed him through the crack in the door. If he ever said a word about it, his father had warned, he would feed him to those vicious animals in the cages in the backyard. He had always feared his father as much as those animals of his, so he had believed the threat and never breathed a word to anyone, and never would. He went to his room, as his father told him, and there he stayed, as far from his father as possible.
It was the afternoon of the third day when he heard the snarling and his father’s screams coming from the backyard. He had peeked out a window, and saw one of those awful half-dogs, half-wolves that his father raised and sold as it mauled him to death. The animal had somehow gotten out of its cage. After killing his father, it disappeared – had run off into the woods behind the house—but he had believed that it was still there somewhere, waiting out of sight for its chance to rip him to pieces. Later that night, his stomach empty and aching, he slipped through the silence and darkness to the kitchen for something to eat. Then he returned to his room and stayed there.
It was early the next morning, the sun just beginning to rise, when a man in a black uniform showed up and found what remained of his father, his cold and dead mother in their bedroom, and him cowering in fear in a corner of his room.
That Thing had been after him ever since.
He had forced the memories from his mind; was still hunkered there in the darkness of the shed when the man and woman finally went into the house. He would have fled the shed at that point, but that Thing was even closer, the smell of it stronger. He knew it had honed-in on the woman, as it had the other time. Too afraid to move, and knowing that fleeing then would serve no purpose beyond getting him torn to pieces, he had stayed put. It had seemed like hours that he had remained hidden in that shed, the storm raging outside as fiercely as his heart pounded in his chest, all the time knowing that Thing was out there, looking for a way in.
When the door had suddenly burst open with a crash and bang of old wood, he had yelped in surprise and terror. He knew then he had no other choice but to get out of there, and fast. He had run blindly into the storm, cut around behind the house and was heading toward the front...
...when he disappeared into the blood red haze.
It finally began to lift as the faint wail of a siren approached. When the last of the haze had faded from his mind, he found himself crouched in the ditch across the road from the house. He again had that sickening and metallic taste in his mouth. It was all he could do to keep from gagging.
In a flash of lightening, he saw what looked like the woman sprawled on the ground near the glass door. He quickly looked away, hoping that God had shown her more mercy than that Thing had shown the other two before her.
“Forgive me,” he murmured under his breath. “I was only wanting to get away from it. I didn’t mean to lead it to you.” He couldn’t see the man, but he feared the worst for him and silently asked him for forgiveness. Then, as he couldn’t smell that Thing anymore and wondering where it was, he half-climbed, half-stumbled over the wire fence behind him.
The sound of the wailing siren was drawing closer. He had splashed through a narrow clearing ankle-deep in rain water and had reached a small stand of trees beyond when he stopped running and looked back at the house. A car, from which the siren blared and with flashing lights on the roof, pulled off the road and stopped in front of the house. Right behind the first was another just like it. The cars looked so much like the ones he remembered from the other time. Thinking that the Thing had now fled as it had before, he wondered if he should go back and let those four men he could see with the bright lights in their hands protect him. As those in uniform had protected him before.
But would those four protect him? Even if they did, how long could they protect him before that Thing found him again? How long before they made the same mistake those in the van had made today? The same kind of mistake he made when he decided to hide in that shed. He had to stop making mistakes like that, and he couldn’t afford to let others make them, either. People died and horribly, when that happened.
And that wasn’t the worst of it. God, those poor women...and he knew it had happened again.
Those asking all the questions had tried to convince him the first time that he was the evil one; that he had done those terrible and unspeakable things. He knew it in his heart that he would get the blame for it again. Just as he knew with a dead certainty that, eventually, the Thing would catch him and kill him. Why let them blame him for more than he deserved? They wouldn’t listen to anything he said. They wouldn’t even try to understand how frightening it was to lose himself in a blood red haze.
So the only logical thing to do was run and hope that he could stay one step ahead of the Thing, and as far away from other people as possible. There was too much blood on his hands as it was now, and he would never again lead it straight to anyone else.
So Lloyd Witcher turned and fled into the woods.