Authors: Bryan Smith
Clayton peeled the liquor bottle from Mark’s fingers. Mark groped for it, mumbling a protest, but Clayton held the bottle out of reach and moved away from the kid to throw the door shut. “You’ve had enough. I don’t know what’s going on with you, but I
do
know that.”
He steered the boy into the living room, where he collapsed on the sofa and struggled to keep his eyes open. He was probably moments away from passing out. Clayton was okay with that. The kid needed to sleep his drunk off. It was strange. They usually only started drinking around this time, but Mark had evidently been at it for hours.
This kid’s parents aren’t paying any fucking attention to him at all
.
It made Clayton angry, largely because of how closely it paralleled his own youth.
What’s wrong with those assholes? Hell
, I’m
a better parent to these kids than their own flesh and blood
.
Clayton knew he was a lousy role model, too, but it felt fucking true, dammit.
Mark wasn’t ready to pass out yet, though. He sat there with his head back on the headrest for a few moments. His eyes fluttered some, but he did not lose consciousness. Eventually he gave his head a hard shake and scooted to the edge of the sofa to stare up at Clayton through red-rimmed eyes. “Dude, please . . . can I have a beer? I know I’ve had enough of the hard stuff.”
Clayton studied the kid a bit longer before replying. His eyes, while still nowhere close to sober, possessed a surprising steadiness. There was something he wanted to talk about and he was determined to stay conscious until he’d vomited all the words out. “Okay. Hang tight. Don’t go falling off the edge of the world while I’m gone, okay?”
Mark managed a woozy smile. “Yeah. Okay.”
Clayton went to the kitchen, where, he paused in front of the magnet-and-note-covered refrigerator door to peel the crinkled paper bag off the liquor bottle, grimacing when he saw the Bacardi 151 label.
Boy wasn’t kidding—this is definitely the hard stuff
.
He crumpled the brown bag and dropped it in the trash can. He then screwed the cap off the bottle and took a deep swig, his face twisting at the burn in his throat. It was good shit, but better mixed with something, both to soothe the palate and dilute the serious kick of the booze. Somehow the kid had downed nearly a third of the big bottle without slipping into a coma. Odds were good he’d be dead to the world by the time Clayton returned to the living room.
He cleared his throat. “You awake in there, son?”
The reply came back sooner and clearer than he’d expected: “Hell, yes. Hurry back with that beer.”
Clayton took one more drink from the bottle and screwed the cap back on. He set it on the counter and opened the fridge. The top shelf was dominated by a few dozen loose bottles of beer, an eclectic mixture of brewing styles and brands. When it came to beer, Clayton liked variety. There were pales ales, lagers, pilsners, stouts, porters, and various creative variations on those styles. There was also one bottle of Bud Light, a leftover from a previous visit by Mark Bell and friends. He grabbed the bottle of Bud Light and pushed aside some of the other bottles to grope around in the back. Just as he began to suspect the object of his search had gone missing, he spied it in a corner, wedged behind a big bottle of Dead Guy Ale. The bottle of nonalcoholic O’Doul’s was a relic of his latest, halfhearted effort at sobriety.
Doomed from the start
, he thought with a rueful smile.
You’ll never dry out, because there’s no part of you that really wants that
.
Clayton popped the caps off both bottles and dumped the contents of the Bud Light bottle in the sink. Still standing over the sink, he used both hands to carefully refill the empty Bud Light bottle with the nonalcoholic brew. He then dropped the O’Doul’s bottle in the trash can, grabbed a bottle of Snake Dog IPA for himself, and returned to the living room.
Mark accepted the bottle with a wry smile. “What, I’m not good enough for one of your beer-snob brews?”
Clayton dropped into a recliner positioned at an angle that allowed it to face both the TV and the sofa. “You wanted a beer, there ya go. I figured you should have a weak one.”
Mark took a tentative sip. “Ugh.”
Clayton shrugged. “It is what it is.”
“That’s fucking brilliant, man.”
Clayton smiled. “I know. I coined that phrase. Little-known fact.”
“You’re full of shit.”
“I know.” Clayton took a sip of his own beer. “Now why don’t you tell me why you look like death warmed over.”
Mark smirked. “Death warmed over, huh? You coin that one, too?”
“This is what your typical social worker son of a bitch would call an avoidance tactic. Cut the shit and tell me what’s up.”
Mark’s smirk withered. His face seemed to crumple. The tears came hard and fast. Rivulets of moisture ran down the boy’s forearm. As he watched the kid cry, he felt a heaviness in his chest, a swelling of dormant emotion.
You’ve been an idiot. These are just kids
. Really
just kids
.
Savvier and tougher than most, but really just kids when you get down to it
.
He didn’t know what to do. Had not the first idea what to say.
But he had to try.
“Kid . . . come on. It’ll be okay.”
“NO IT WON’T!”
he wailed. He angrily swiped moisture from his eyes and glared at Clayton. “I fucking love her, man. I love her
so
much. She won’t answer my goddamn calls or messages. She avoids me at school. I even went up to her house today and knocked on her door. I’ve never done that. Her parents don’t even know me. How fucked is that? Her mom answered, said Natasha doesn’t want to see me.”
“Hold on. How did she know that? You said she doesn’t know you.”
Mark threw up a hand in exasperation. “Shit, I don’t know, man. I guess Natasha gave her a fucking good description. She said I was to never show up there again or she’d call the fucking police.”
Clayton nodded. “Uh huh. Okay. So, and I’m not making light here, I just want this clear in my head—the reason you’re all tore up is your girlfriend dumped you. That’s all that’s going on?”
Mark visibly fought for control and when he had at least a semblance of it, he sipped from the Bud Light bottle. “No, man.” His voice was lower now, almost somber. No. Not that.
Scared
. “There’s something else. Something happened. Something so fucked up it’s got me wanting to fucking kill myself so I can stop thinking about it.”
Clayton took another drink. “Okay. So tell me about it.”
Mark heaved a breath. “There’s this house. Old and abandoned. Way back in the woods on the other side of Weakley Lane. We broke in, you know, just something to do. Something was there. Something . . . bad. It made us do things. Terrible, horrible fucking things.”
One phrase hit Clayton hard.
Something was there
.
The Snake Dog bottle slipped from suddenly numb fingers and cracked open on the hardwood floor. “Shit.”
Mark squinted at him. “Dude . . . are you all right?”
Clayton didn’t say anything. A deep chill insinuated itself around his heart.
An idea penetrated the thick cloud of inebriation engulfing Mark’s brain. “Hey . . . do you know something about that house?”
Clayton forced himself to swallow and take a deep breath. “It’s the Hollis house. What I know about it is what my father told me before he killed himself. I never believed any of it. Too crazy. But my father believed it. It’s
why
he killed himself. And if any part of that craziness was even a little bit true, it would explain why you’re acting this way, especially if you did something as completely fucking stupid as breaking into that house.”
The kid definitely looked scared now. “I wish we could take it back. Never go in that fucking place.”
Clayton groaned. “But you did.”
“Yeah.”
“You idiot. All of you. Fucking idiots.”
“Yeah.”
Clayton heaved himself out of the recliner and went to the kitchen. He came back with a dustpan and a little hand broom. He swept up the broken glass, returned to the kitchen to dispose of the pile of brown shards, and grabbed two more beers from the fridge.
In the living room, he shoved a bottle of Guinness at Mark. “Take that.”
Mark looked confused. “I still haven’t finished the first one.”
“It’s fucking O’Doul’s in a Bud Light bottle. I was trying to be responsible and shit, but fuck that. Take it.”
Mark took it.
Clayton settled in the recliner again. “Fuck. Okay. Look. You’re gonna need to be sober for this, so I’ll save most of it for later. Tomorrow night, say. And try to get as many of your friends over here as you can.”
“I’m not really talking to any of them right now.”
Clayton jabbed a finger in Mark’s direction. “It’s important.”
Mark nodded. “Okay. I’ll try. Do my best, whatever.”
“You do that. Now just tell me this—did you also manage to get your stupid asses down inside that basement?”
Mark’s jaw began to quiver at the mention of the basement.
It was all the answer Clayton needed.
“Right.”
Tears were leaking from Mark’s eyes again. “What did we do? Oh my God, what did we do?”
Clayton’s mouth was a grim, hard line. “Well, I’m still not saying I believe any of this, but . . .”
“But?” Mark prompted.
Clayton drained the rest of his beer in a single, long pull. “Be careful when approaching your friends about coming over here tomorrow.”
“Careful . . . how? You can trust them, Clay. They’re not gonna tell anybody about this shit.”
“That’s not what I mean. When you talk to them tomorrow, I want you to pay real close attention to how they act. Watch for any sign of something . . . off. It could be something subtle, or it could be something really fucking obvious right off the bat. I don’t know. All I have to go on is what my father told me when he was drunk that last night, babbling craziness about demon possession.”
Mark shivered. “You think one of my friends is possessed by a fucking
demon
?”
Clayton shrugged. “I don’t know, you tell me. You were the one there that night.
Something was there
. Remember? What do
you
think?”
“Andras.”
Clayton felt an unaccountable chill at the mention of the name. “Who is . . .”
“He says he’s a grand marquis of hell. I heard him speak in my head. We all did. I hoped I was imagining it . . . group hypnosis or some shit.”
Clayton snorted. “Group hypnosis, my fat ass. You’re not some slimy government agent covering up a UFO sighting. But just to eliminate any other alternate theories . . . I know you kids like to party . . . you sure you weren’t on anything hallucinogenic? Acid or mushrooms, shit like that?”
Mark shook his head a single, emphatic time. “No. Just the booze. A little weed, maybe.”
“I believe you. Had to ask, though. Well, if this shit is for real, maybe my father wasn’t so crazy after all. Which means there’s a good chance you and your idiot pals may have released a fucking demon from its prison. And, yeah, one of you is probably fucking possessed.” A humorless laugh. “Congratulations.”
Mark set the Guinness bottle down and buried his face in his hands again.
“Like I told you, watch your friends, Mark. Watch them close. You get any kind of wrong vibe, you shut your mouth about this meeting and get away from them. Got it?”
Mark lifted his tear-streaked face again.
He still looked scared and brokenhearted, but there was another quality there now, too, a hint of something like hope. The kid was putting his faith in Clayton Campbell.
Which, in Clayton Campbell’s informed opinion, was a hell of a fucking thing.
“Got it.”
T
WENTY-THREE
December 6, 1984
The mayor’s mansion in Ransom sat at the top of a gently rising hill. The enormous lawn was a neatly tended lush expanse of green. A crew of landscapers worked the lawn tirelessly to keep it looking as resplendent as any golf course on the PGA tour. The big plantation-style house was set a hundred yards back from the road and was surrounded by a tall wrought-iron privacy fence with a security gate at the foot of the driveway. Technically, of course, it wasn’t a private residence. On paper, the property belonged to the town. But everyone in Ransom knew the mansion essentially belonged to Luke Harper, who had occupied the office of mayor for close to thirty years.
After being buzzed through the gate, Norman Campbell sped up the long, semicircular driveway, bringing his Cadillac to a screeching, rubber-peeling halt alongside a high, many-stepped marble porch that looked nearly as grand as the Lincoln Memorial in D.C. Norman huffed and puffed as he flew up the steps. A stiffening wind lifted his tie and blew it backward over his shoulder. He was out of breath by the time he reached the door and jabbed a thumb at the round doorbell. He was still breathing hard and palming sweat from his forehead when the door opened. Frederick, a very proper English butler straight out of the pages of a Wodehouse story, greeted him with a look of intense dismay.
The butler opened his mouth to say something, but Norman cut him off with a wave of his hand. “I have to see Luke . . . the mayor . . . right now.”
Frederick’s expression remained wary. “I’m afraid the mayor is busy at the moment. You may wish to call his office and arrange an appointment.”
Norman fumed. He wasn’t some common Joe Blow with some kind of crackpot grievance against the city. “Don’t fuck with me, Freddy. This is a goddamn emergency and the mayor
will
want to hear about it. Believe me, it’s your ass if you drag your prissy little heels on this. Now hop to it, goddammit.”
Frederick’s expression darkened. Probably wanted to punch him in the face. Fat chance of that. The prick knew his place. He was the help. Nothing more. “I will apprise the mayor of your arrival. Wait here, sir.”
Norman smiled. “Sure thing, Freddy.”