Depravity (17 page)

A young blonde-haired woman moved her head to the left. She pushed Mrs Steadford's body off her lap and pressed her forefinger against her lips. Philip stumbled back, staring at Angela's bloodied mouth, he then heard a giggle.

The blonde woman opened her mouth and leaned forward, then pushed her fingers inside her mouth and pulled out a lump of red meat. Philip groaned aloud, this insane bitch had bitten out Angela's tongue.

His instinct for survival finally kicked in. He spun around and fled the bathroom, wiping the tears from his cheeks, still not believing what he'd just witnessed. He stumbled over his feet and crashed onto the carpet. Philip had to believe it, for that crazy, tongue eating woman wasn't content with staying inside that slaughterhouse, she was right behind him now, watching him crawl out of the room.

Philip managed to get to his feet and raced from the safety of his room and his Jack. The door slammed shut as soon as he reached his room.

“Let me in, Jack! For crying out loud, man,” he screamed, slamming his fists against the wood. “Will you please open this fucking door!” Philip felt his bladder let go when he saw the blonde woman standing in the middle of the corridor, thick blood dripped down her chin. She paused to lick the bottom of her lip before she pushed one of her shapely legs through the gap in her dressing gown and dragged a fingernail up her thigh.

“Oh fuck, no,” he blabbered. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Philip had to get out of here! He raced down the stairs, suppressing the hysterical laughter that threatened to burst from him when he saw the phone sat on the reception desk. The door to freedom and his jeep lay just metres away now. Philip risked a look behind him. She wasn't there, the crazy woman must have gone back inside that room. “Oh Jack, why didn't you open that door?”

He reached the main doors and stopped, his head felt as though it was going to burst open when he saw the door handle was missing, in fact, he saw no sign that there ever was a door handle, the wood was seamless.

“There must be another door.”

Philip ran past the desk, not even bothering to check to see if that bastard phone worked. He ran through the dining area and into the entertainment room. He and Jack had only entered here once yesterday, and that had been enough. The place had the grace and décor of a nineteen seventies day-room in a mental institution.

He looked past the two old sofas against the far wall, the rickety table with the box full of old and broken toys, and the black and white television bolted to the wall. He was more concerned about the double doors that should lead into the hotel grounds. They should be directly in front of him.

The wall was unbroken, from one edge to the next. His mind tilted again, especially at the sight of the scuffed footprints on the lino leading straight into the wall.

“The bloody kitchen!” he gasped. “They're bound to have some kind of goods entrance. Fuck you, wall.” Philip spun around and staggered back into the dining room. God, this place was fucking freezing! He skidded to a stop, wrapped his gown tighter around his body and so tried to calm down. This wasn't real, it couldn't be. Door handles don't just disappear, neither did badly made patio doors suddenly turn into a wall. He stuck his arm out and patted the thin air, guessing that he'd just tapped Jack on the arse. This had to be a dream, what else could it be? The white double doors that he remembered creepy, smiley, lemon-fresh man walking through earlier were right in front of him. “Dream or no dream, it's not like I have any other choice.”

Philip pushed his way through the double doors. He looked across the walls at the back, behind the silver worktops, the microwaves and the two aluminium sinks. He stopped looking when he saw something else that didn't belong in here. There was a small boy sitting on the far counter, swinging his legs from left to right. He raised his head and smiled at Philip.

It was the scary man's little lad. “Hell, there, sonny. Are you lost?”

The boy shrugged his shoulders, then he started to quietly weep.”

Philip hurried over to him. “You looking for mummy and daddy? Come on, let's see if we can find them.” He helped the child off the counter and took his hand. The fear that he felt before had all but gone now. It was still there, no doubt about that. He knew though he now had to be the responsible adult. This boy needed reuniting with his family, no way was he going to allow some optical illusion, or some freaky blonde woman stop him from completing his task. Although, deep down, he did pray that she'd gone back inside that room. Just in case though, Philip opened a drawer and picked out a metal handled knife. “I have an apple upstairs,” he said, showing the boy his most sincere smile. “I don't really like the peel, you see.”

It didn't surprise him to notice the handle on the main doors had reappeared. What did surprise him though was that he wasn't really all that bothered if this was reality or a dream. Taking this little boy back to his parents had instilled him with a sense of courage that he never knew he had. Philip frowned. It's strange how this new found fearlessness only appeared when he took hold of the boy's hand.

“Where did you last see you mummy and daddy?”

The boy released a big sigh and began to weep again.

“Hey, it's okay, they won't be far. We can try looking at your room, sonny. I bet that's where they'll be,” he said, smiling.

This last comment had the effect he'd hoped for. For the first time since finding the lad down there, he actually smiled. Philip grinned back, so glad he'd decided to help the boy. He could always ask the boy's parents to use their phone. He wasn't too sure why he wanted to use the phone, that piece of info had momentarily eluded him. It was important though, that much he was sure of. He smiled at the boy again, what a cute kid.

They both ran up the remaining few steps, hand in hand. The boy then stopped dead just before they reached his parent's room.

“Sonny, are you okay?”

He nodded then pointed to the door on the other side of the hallway. That's where the Stepfords' were staying. He'd given the woman a little wave earlier. He found this whole situation rather confusing. The door swung inwards. It wasn't Mrs Stepford who came out. Philip had seen her before, he was sure of it. For the life in him though, he couldn't place her. She smelled of old lady's perfume, something like his grandma used to wear. How strange, the woman couldn't be any older than thirty. He was sure that dressing gown didn't belong to her either. It was way too big for her. Then again, he should be the one to judge, considering he had Jack's gown on. Philip stifled a chuckle. Maybe that's what they were doing, it's a dressing gown party. He vaguely wondered why he felt so funny, he also wondered where Jack could be.

That poor woman looked absolutely terrified. It wasn't him though, she was scared of the sweet kid, still holding Philip's hand. He so wanted to give her a hug, to calm her down. He was only a little boy, nothing to fear from a little boy.

“You're new at this, so I won't hurt you,” said the boy.

“But, if you fail to keep track of your herd. You're going to find yourself hung up in the room. You won't believe the shit I had to pull to keep this one from leaving. Do we understand each other?”

“Yes,” murmured the woman. She dropped her gaze to her bare feet. “I'm sorry. It won't happen again.”

The boy then let go of Philip's hand. “Your new husband preaches 'Stick to the straight line', Angela. You could do with adopting that too.” He pushed Philip into the waiting arms of the woman. “No more warnings.”

The mental sludge that claimed him when the little boy grabbed his hand fell away, allowing his original emotions of terror and confusion to fill the vacuum. “Oh God. Please, no, let me go!” He struggled in her iron grip but no matter how hard he tried, Philip couldn't get away. His actions came to an abrupt halt when she head butted him.

“You're such an excitable one.” The woman pulled Philip into the room.

Philip felt blood stained tears coursing down his cheeks as this vile bitch pulled him further into the room. She growled at him.

“I'm supposed to do you quick, gay man, just like Kevin's doing to your man friend.” She swung him hard against the wall.

He howled in agony when he crashed into that wall, feeling something in his shoulder crack. The woman then pushed his weakened body onto the bed and straddled him.

“That can't happen though. You made me look dumb in front of the light. So no poison in your coffee for you, nasty gay man.” She reached over him and picked up something shiny from the bedside dresser.

He cried out one last time when the woman placed the two scissor blades up each nostril. “Please,” he begged. “Please don't do this!”

Angela leaned closer to his face. “Snip, snip,” she said, pressing the handles together.

4

Clouds of distant memory, combined with bewildering dream images prevented David Westwood from reaching the light. Florescent blue spikes pierced the miasma, giving him a glimpse of the dull and vapid reality that he so desired to grasp. Images of uniformed sprites and faintly menacing made-up giant animals constructed from scratched black metal threatened to drag David back down.

He bypassed the inorganic arms and poles that shot from the animals, he swam past the sprites, turning to find they all wore the faces of the men he’d seen die, on some forgotten sun-baked desert. David opened his mouth and roared out the name of his wife, watching the sound leave as a purple bubble.

The bubble rose faster than his body, but it did traverse past the obstacles. From a thousand miles away, he heard himself call out her name. David tried again to call but the sprites had caught up to him. They swarmed over his body, and pushed their spindly legs deep into his flesh, their own bodies then began to disintegrate. Their bodily glues seeped into his every orifice.

David Westwood shot up in bed. “Fuck me!” he gasped.

He rubbed his calloused fingers across his wet face and took a deep shaky breath, wondering exactly what had awoken him. Not that he was complaining, that was some fucked up dream. It was something about giant tanks and something slimy in uniforms. He sighed, feeling the last of the dream images fading away.

David absolutely detested the journeys where his damaged mind took him whilst he slept. No, it wasn't the distorted realities, these places plucked from his past and altered, that he had trouble with, it was the simple fact that his dreams would not allow him to take charge, to control their path.

He swung back the covers, allowing the air to cool his sweat-soaked body. Why now? Why, after so long had these bastard dreams suddenly decided to torment his sleep?

“Like you don't already know the answer to that one, David?” he murmured. Oh, he knew alright, he just didn't want to say it out loud. David swung his legs off the sheet and placed his feet on the carpet.

The source of his current worry lay just a few feet from their bed. To his left, next to the room door, was another door. This one led into another bedroom. Alistair had a room all to himself. It even had a working radio, something that even this room lacked. Then again, this weird place lacked just about anything technological. He guessed it one of the reasons why his wife chose the place.

David knew he ought to allow Anna to try this her own way. She deserved at least that. Even so, he still believed that treating the lad with kindness, understanding and tolerance was only going to make Alistair even worse.

“God help us if that happens,” he murmured. Still, he couldn't discount it until he'd at least gone with her crazy plan. If it doesn't do any good, then he'd just have to go back to the tried and tested method of grounding him and taking away his privileges when he misbehaved.

After all the crying and begging, followed by promises that he'd be a good boy and never be naughty again, after a couple of weeks, his old ways would return. He'd smack other kids, break windows, steal from the house, even daub paint over neighbour's cars.

His little boy had obviously inherited most of his genetics from him. David was just the same at Alistair's age. Even his dad's leather belt failed to reign in David's wild behaviour.  A spell in a young offenders' institution followed by the army was how he managed to keep himself from ending up behind bars.

He sighed. Perhaps his own history was the main reason as to why this plan of Anna's was doomed to failure. Oh, Alistair needed supervision alright, so in one sense, this was one good plan. He's unlikely to misbehave when he was within eyesight of one of them for the next few days. The lad still needed discipline though, and he wouldn't get that from Anna. She was such a soft touch, and Alistair knew it.

His wife turned over, giving him the full view of her slender naked back. David licked his finger and drew it down her spine, smiling as she moaned in her sleep. Okay, so maybe she was a soft touch and right now, that suited him just fine.

Her hand snaked around and landed on his hip. Her fingers slid down his front until they found his semi-rigid cock. David released his own man as her fingers expertly massaged his length, He pushed his body closer, moaning again when she parted her thigh and guided his hard cock inside her.

David gripped her tight, his hand squeezing Anna's small, firm breasts while he thrust into her. She cried out in pleasure, pushing her bottom hard against his crotch, tightening her fingers over David's hand, urging him to twist her nipples.