Authors: Rich Hawkins
CHAPTER NINE
Mason woke to grey daylight, in a soft bed positioned against a white wall. There was a door on the far side of the room. He eyed the glass of water next to the alarm clock on the nearby table. Then he lay there listening to the palpitations of his heart and the stirring of his loose insides. He held his hands before his face and turned them over, examining them in the dim light, as if they were newly-formed appendages.
Beyond the foot of the bed was a window, with curtains pulled back to the edges of the rail. Floral wallpaper. A carpet coloured somewhere between white and cream.
Weak and aching, he sat upright, and the thick duvet fell to his chest. He rubbed his eyes, ran his tongue over his teeth. Scratched at his throat with dirty fingernails and swung his legs from underneath the duvet. He sat on the edge of the bed, pinching the bridge of his nose and closing his eyes to let the dizziness pass from his head. And when he was done he looked at his bare legs, because someone had undressed him down to boxer shorts and his Metallica t-shirt. His clothes were draped over the back of a wooden chair near the end of the bed. He was flexing his toes on the carpet when the door opened.
He started, looked up, and was surprised to see Ellie enter the room.
*
In the awkward silence they regarded each other, and it was only broken by Mason’s nervous voice. “Is this real?”
Ellie didn’t move from the door, her face barely hiding her discomfort. Her hands were clasped together. She shifted on her feet. “How are you feeling?”
“What happened?”
“The police brought you here. They found you lying behind some rubbish bins.”
Mason exhaled into his hands. “I remember that part.”
“The bins?”
“Yeah.”
“What were you doing?”
He didn’t answer, for fear of being thought mad.
Ellie frowned. “They said you were delirious when they found you. Scared of something. Apparently you sat down on the pavement and cried. Told them that monsters were after you.”
His face burned red, and he couldn’t meet her eyes. He looked at the floor between his feet. “How did I end up here?”
“They found my address on a piece of paper in your jacket pocket. So, here you are.”
“I’m sorry,” Mason said.
“They knocked on my door at three in the morning. Woke me and half the street. You were almost passed out in the back of the squad car.”
He groaned and shook his head. “I am really sorry.”
“I told them you were homeless. They were going to put you in a cell for the night.”
“Thank you.” He kept his face lowered.
“It’s nothing,” she said. “But you’ll have to leave soon. You can’t stay here. You know that, right?”
He finally looked at her. The pensive shape of her mouth and the way she appraised him, with what was could only be embarrassment, broke his heart.
“I know,” he said. “I’ll leave once I’m dressed.”
Ellie drew in a breath and released it slowly through her mouth. She stayed by the door, keeping her distance.
“What happened to you?” There was genuine concern in her voice, and Mason loved her for it. But that unreciprocated love was like cold tendrils around his spine. Feelings change. Love dies. The remains of lost relationships were blackened hearts and broken promises.
Mason felt sick.
Ellie said, “You stank of weed when you arrived. Had you been drinking? I know it’s none of my business what you use now…” Her voice trailed away and she folded her arms.
“I’m not using anything; I only smoked a bit of weed.”
“Were you high?”
“Are you my mother now?”
“You’re a dickhead, Mason.”
“Sorry,” he muttered. “I didn’t mean to say that.”
“You’re a mess.”
“I know,” he said. “I know.”
Mason dipped his chin to his chest. He was accustomed to being ashamed, and self-hatred was a familiar travelling companion these days.
“You can stay the night, if you want,” Ellie said. “It’s late in the day, and I can’t throw you out on the street this close to dark. I’ll make you a cup of coffee and something to eat, if you want. You stink to high heaven, so feel free to have a shower and get cleaned up. Then I want you gone first thing in the morning, Mason, understand? I don’t know what happened to you last night, and I don’t much care, but you can’t go on like this. You need to sort yourself out and move on.”
He opened his mouth to speak, because he wanted to tell her about the things he’d seen last night, but in the end he just nodded in silence as she left the room.
The door shut. He sat there and listened to her walk away.
*
Mason showered and dressed. Last night’s memories came in stop-motion images. Being hunted. Being chased. Calvin’s scream as he was taken. The dead family that wasn’t dead.
His limbs began to tremble, and he sat on the bathroom floor for a short while. Acid frothed in his chest; the worst case of heartburn in living memory. A haze of steam obscured the ceiling. The warm wet air. The dripping in the shower.
He thought about returning to Zeke’s place to try and retrieve his rucksack. He wondered if Zeke and Calvin would ever be seen again, and if anyone would miss them. Would anyone even notice? Would the world notice if he went missing? He didn’t like to think about that too much.
Maybe the police would return later and ask him questions he couldn’t answer.
He retched and vomited stringy saliva into the toilet. He lowered the seat then placed his brow upon it and closed his eyes. Afterwards he went to the misted mirror and wiped away the condensation. Stared into his face, his eyes, and saw a broken thing pretending to be human.
He turned away from the mirror because he couldn’t look at himself any longer.
*
After handing Mason a coffee, Ellie cooked bacon and scrambled eggs. There was silence as she worked. When she was done she placed the plate before him on the dining table. Despite the aching hole in the pit of his stomach, he ate slowly and forked small amounts into his mouth. She watched him from across the table, a mug of milky tea steaming between her hands.
Winter sunlight through the window above the sink. Mason glanced at the wall clock. How long until dark? He tried not to think about it.
“Why are you still wearing your wedding ring?” Ellie asked him.
He paused with a forkful of scrambled egg at his mouth. Looked at her. “I don’t know.”
“Really?”
“Does it matter?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
She placed her mug on the table. “On what you’re after…”
“I’m not after anything.”
She shook her head. “You came to the town to see me. Did you think we’d reconcile or something? You’d sweep me into your arms and we’d live happily ever after?”
“No,” he said, and sighed. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know much, Mason.”
He chewed his food and swallowed. “I know.”
She finished her tea then stood and put her mug on the draining board. She rearranged the dirty plates and bowls in the sink.
“I have to go out in a minute,” Mason said.
“Okay.”
“I won’t be gone for long, I hope.”
“Okay.”
“You’re not going to ask me where?”
With her back to him, she turned on the taps. Thin streams of water fell into the sink. Her hands moved in the basin. “None of my business. Like you said, I’m not your mother.”
He looked at her. She didn’t turn around.
CHAPTER TEN
Mason stood before the abandoned house. The sky had darkened. Specks of rain fell against his face. The bread knife he’d taken from Ellie’s kitchen was in the pocket of his jacket. In one hand was the penlight torch. He took a deep breath. Cramps in his stomach and bile in his chest. He looked around then started towards the house.
*
The front door had been thrown into a large patch of weeds and brambles. Despite the rain Calvin’s blood stained the grass. Mason stood at the doorway and pointed the torch inside. It was a struggle to move his feet over the threshold and the dried blood just inside it, but in the end he did, then walked deeper into the house.
The downstairs rooms were empty of life. He swept the torch over the bare walls. He recovered his rucksack and went through it to check nothing was missing. Calvin and Zeke’s bedding was still on the floor. Their belongings were still stored in one corner and along the wall.
Mason stood in the sorry little room that still smelled of smoke and dust, and listened to the quickening rain upon the old house. Such sadness passed over him that he had to crouch upon the floor and bow his head for a moment.
And then he heard the creak of an upstairs floorboard.
*
Mason took the stairway one slow step at a time, his legs trembling, and mouth open as if he were preparing a scream.
The shifting of the walls around him. The voice of the wind through nooks and recesses. The flapping of something loose on the rain-dashed roof.
He stood on the landing in the dark, and the torch only lit a small patch of floor ahead of him. The bacon and eggs sloshed heavily in his gut.
He found them in a room at the back of the house, sprawled around one another on the floor. Sleeping or dead. Or both. Calvin, Zeke, and the family from the other house. And in the corners at the far end of the room were two women and three men huddled together, limbs entwined in rest, like creatures in a nest. All of them were pale to the point of being bloodless, and wearing the same clothes as last night, streaked and matted with dirt. There were dead leaves and black soil scattered around them. Twigs in Zeke’s hair, and scratches under his eyes. There was dried blood around Calvin’s mouth and on his beard, and smeared on parts of his face. A spider skittered across the little girl’s stomach and vanished into shadow. Her parents were locked in an embrace, their heads resting on the other’s shoulder.
Mason stood there for a while, too scared to raise his breathing above a whisper. The rain stopped. The torchlight waned, flickered for a heart-stopping second and then returned to its original brightness.
He stepped towards them. He crouched next to Calvin. The old man lay on his back; his face held an expression like the satisfaction of a long hunger had been sated. He looked at peace. His hands were clasped together over his stomach, raggedy fingernails filthy with blood and dirt.
Calvin’s silver cross hung limply from his neck. Mason thought about that for a minute.
“Are you asleep?” Mason asked. He reached out to check the pulse on Calvin’s neck, but hesitated when he saw the opened mess of the man’s throat. The wound was blackened, drying out, and if Mason wasn’t mistaken it was already healing around the edges. He winced, staring in fascination, as rational thought began to ebb away on tides of fear and primal dread. He said the word he’d been thinking since entering the room. He considered the wounds in the victims’ throats. The teeth. The suggestion of an awful hunger.
“No, no, no,” he muttered, sweat beading on his face. And with all the effort he could muster he placed his forefinger on Calvin’s neck to feel the carotid artery. The old man’s skin was cold. No pulse, no beat, no ticking of the signal from the heart.
He checked again. And again, there was nothing.
Calvin opened his eyes.
Mason fell back onto his arse and let out a boyish yelp.
Calvin grinned. His eyes were blood-red, bulging from their sockets. He reached out with one claw-like hand and grabbed for Mason’s feet, but Mason scuttled backwards against the wall, keeping the torch upon him.
Making a low sound, Calvin rose slowly to his knees, holding his wrists to the sides of his head and swaying from side to side. In the thin blade of light, his mouth yawned open like that of an enraged primate, to show stained yellow teeth sharp enough to puncture aluminium tins. The light glinted in his cruel eyes.
Mason scrambled to his feet, holding the knife out before him. “What happened to you, Calvin? What’s going on?”
Calvin sniffed the air, closed his eyes, and then opened them again. His mouth formed a malicious smile, and the voice that came from it was different, somehow, wheezed out of his dead chest. There were only a few yards between them. Close enough for grabbing distance.
“You’ll find out, lad. Why don’t you stay for a while and we can talk? Our King has been in town for a few days and nights, spreading his gospel, sharing his flesh and blood. The ones he’s converted will convert others in turn. It’s beautiful, is it not? This isn’t the only nest, Mason. Our King was very busy last night; I suspect there have been many absences from work and school in the last few days. By the end of tonight, there’ll be hundreds of us.”
Mason caught the sulphuric gust of Calvin’s breath. He edged towards the doorway. “I have to leave. I have to go…”
Calvin shrugged like he didn’t care, like it was a small matter, and said nothing. Then he lunged for Mason to claim him with eager hands.
*
The clouds had retreated from parts of the sky when Mason stumbled outside, and he felt something like elation at the last light of the winter sun.
Mason fled from the terrible house and across the wasteland, fear steaming from his skin; desperate to reach the streets of people and traffic and get away from the horror that had nearly claimed him. Calvin had been on his heels all the way from the room and down the stairs to the hallway and the threshold of the doorway. Mason had barely escaped; a few times Calvin’s fingers had swiped close to the back of his head. And if the chase had lasted any longer he would have been caught, like terrified prey, to join the others in that dark room.
Once Mason had staggered clear of the doorway and away from the house, he had stopped with his rucksack over one shoulder and turned back to see Calvin hunched over in the doorway, staring out at him and hissing at the pale sunlight.
Mason emerged onto the streets, heading back to Ellie’s house as Charlie’s last words announced themselves in his mind.
“I’ll see you soon, lad.”