FOUR
“Berry!” Andrea screamed. “Is that you? Because if it is, I’m not laughing.” She stood on tiptoe, hoping to get a glimpse of her obnoxious cousin. He’d been wearing a gray shirt, and she thought she saw something grayish crouching behind a large oak.
“Berry, you’re not funny. I see you. Leave me alone. I’m not going back and I’m not apologizing.”
Thoroughly annoyed now, Andrea marched to the oak, prepared to yank her cousin into the open and give him a piece of her mind. Before she’d taken half a dozen steps, she skidded to a stop and stared.
The blood drained from her head and a swarm of tiny black dots filled her peripheral vision.
* * * *
A warm, wet tongue startled Andrea into wakefulness. Opening her eyes, she stared into the soulful brown eyes of Thor, hunched over her, sending anxious licks to her face in rapid succession. Pushing him away, she sat up and gazed around the dark room in confusion. For a second, she didn’t know where she was.
The fire was nothing but glowing embers and the room was cold. Andrea turned over and pushed with her hands and knees to stand. She reached out to turn on the lamp beside the couch and then remembered. No power. On impulse, she tried anyway. No luck.
Flashlights and candles were kept in a cardboard box in the pantry, but the pantry was in the kitchen, and that seemed miles away. Thrusting her arms in front of her like a kid playing Blind Man’s Bluff, she shuffled through the darkened living room, past Great Uncle Fred, and into the kitchen. She couldn’t believe how incredibly dark it was. Even in the middle of the night, some light always filtered in. But this? This was more than a normal nighttime darkness, or even a storm-induced darkness. This was the very
essence
of darkness.
An end-of-the-world darkness.
She scuffed her feet along the floor, making her way to a window, where she peered out on a scene that stole her breath away. Pitch-black outside. No moon. No stars. No light whatsoever. It was like nothing she’d ever experienced before.
“Like being in a subterranean cavern or something,” she murmured. Thor, who’d followed her into the kitchen, whined. She touched the top of his head with her left hand
.
With her right hand she raked through her own shoulder-length brown hair. “Thor, I don’t know whether you know it or not, but we’re in trouble.” Her eyes looked up at the ceiling. “Oh, Lord, please tell me what’s going on. What’s happening?
Is
it the end of the world?”
Andrea continued to stare out at the strange scene being choreographed by sinister hands outside her once benign kitchen window. The yard that’d been the setting for so many family games and picnics was now an alien landscape. The thick cloud covering had lowered—if that were possible—and the absence of light was eerie. Last night’s full moon was long gone. No stars twinkled serenely against a velvet background. The oily, staining darkness was a living, breathing entity. It moved, pulsated, slithered in and out, over and under, like some gigantic serpent.
Turning at last from her brooding vigil, Andrea made her way into the walk-in pantry and found the box of candles. Grabbing two flashlights, an unopened package of D batteries—the candle box tucked under her chin—she returned to the living room and dropped the load onto the recliner. She opened the box, took out a big, squat candle, set it on the coffee table and lit it. She was amazed at how much light could be coaxed from one candle. Wrapping the afghan around her once again, she flopped in front of the now-cooling fireplace. Not one ember emitted a feeble glow. The fire was dead.
“Jesus loves me, this I know,” she sang in a childish voice that quivered on the high notes. “’Cause the Bible tells me so.” Not remembering the rest of the words, she hummed the simple tune over and over until her eyelids drooped. She tossed the blanket aside and got more wood out of the wood box. Laying the second fire was easier than the first. She had it roaring in less than a minute.
“Come on, doggie-boy,” she coaxed Thor. “Come sit closer to me. We’ll get some sleep. Maybe when we wake up, everything will be back to normal, and it’ll have just been a terrible, horrible dream. Right, boy? No more eating half a box of Oreos before bed.”
Thor wagged his tail and curled up on the hearthrug. Because he appeared content, Andrea was able to lie down and close her eyes. As sleep wove its mysterious net, she started The Lord’s Prayer. She didn’t like God—had given up on him when her father died, but praying was the only thing she could think to do. She was saying ‘deliver us from evil’ when the net caught her in its tangled weave, and she slipped into nothingness.
FIVE
Andrea screamed as she fell to her knees, her legs feeling like wet spaghetti. The
thing
was huge—a monster—bigger than she could have imagined. In her wildest dreams, she wouldn’t have believed an animal could be this big, this horrific. This was not the way she wanted to die. She screamed again…and again.
“Berry! Uncle Mike! Help me! Oh, God! Someone! Anyone! Help me!”
* * * *
Someone was crying. Andrea burrowed deeper into the folds of her blanket and tried to ignore the intrusion into her dream world but it wouldn’t stop. Someone needed help. Lost in her web of sleep, she didn’t know what to do.
The weeping grew louder. Heart wrenching. The sobbing tore at the soul like cats’ claws tearing a gauzy curtain. Andrea moaned. In her half-sleep, she writhed in discomfort. She wanted to help them, but she didn’t know how. “Who are you? What can I do?” she called out. “What can I give you? How can I help?”
The wailing stopped.
Andrea opened her eyes, blinked, and tried to focus. Where was she? Who’d been crying? Was her family back? It was so dark! She couldn’t see anything. Had she gone blind? She raised her hands in front of her face and barely made them out. Beside her, the neighbors’ dog was curled in a tight ball—nose to tail—not moving. She pushed her chilled body against the brute, hungry for any warmth he could spare.
Then she remembered.
“Good, doggie,” she whimpered. “Good boy. Don’t leave me, Thor. Please stay with me.”
Her eyes at last grew accustomed to the impossible blackness. She could make out the humps of furniture, see the burned stub of the candle on the table.
You should’ve blown it out before going to sleep
she scolded herself. She had to be prudent now. No telling how long this present darkness would last. She needed to practice economy, not be stupid or wasteful.
“Okay, Thor, first thing we’ve got to do is make better sleeping arrangements. I’m going upstairs and bring down some sleeping bags. Then we’ll see about getting you some proper food. But before I do anything, I really need to use the bathroom.”
She groped her way to the small restroom in the hall beside the staircase. Finished, she was about to rinse her hands when she remembered their water predicament. Then she thought of the toilet. She’d been able to flush this time, but what about the next…and the next? The tank at the back filled up with water—water brought in by way of the electric pump from their well via all the pipes and things she’d never in her entire life cared about.
“Okay,” she told Thor as though he were an interested party. “I have to bring in water from the creek. This is going to be a problem.” She made her way back to the living room and shuffled to the big picture window that faced the road. There was no way she’d be able to go outside—at least, not now, not while the evil, coiling, sinuous blackness filled the yard. As she watched, she swore it breathed. It pulsated, swelled and shrank, swelled and shrank, like the heaving chest of an enormous monster. Was it waiting for its prey? She grabbed a drape in each hand and tugged them closed.
“Okay…we’ll get the water later. I-I’ll get the sleeping bags now and-and then we’ll decide what to do next. How’s that?” Thor just sniffed.
Clinging to the banister, Andrea went upstairs. For some reason, this was more frightening than she’d expected. Her once familiar home had taken on a demonic personality. It didn’t know her, didn’t even recognize her. It treated her like a stranger. Memories of being five or six and being left upstairs while Berry ran on down ahead of her, turning off the lights as he fled, naughty giggles echoing after him, flooded over her. She didn’t like the upstairs, or the dark.
Oh, God, I hope I never need to go down to the basement…
Without much thought, she dragged out sleeping bags and blankets from the hall closet and tossed them, one by one, over the railing at the top of the stairs. They landed with dull thuds on the foyer floor below. One bag rolled near the grandfather clock. It was hers. It didn’t matter. She’d use Aunt Claire’s.
Scanning the area for anything else she might need, Andrea went into her own room and gathered an armful of underwear, long sleeved flannel shirts, some sweaters, and another pair of jeans. Then she hastened down the stairs to the relative comfort of the living room. Thor was occupying himself with a thorough sniffing of the scattered sleeping bags and rumpled blankets.
“Okay, boy. That’s taken care of. Now I’ll fix you something to eat.” She threw her clothes on one of the recliners and went to the kitchen. After a quick search of the cupboards, she concluded that a return trip to the Martins’ would have to be made, and soon. There just wasn’t anything really suitable for a large German shepherd to eat—especially since she too had to eat, and needed to be prudent about doling out her meager supplies.
Finding another can of vegetable soup, she opened it with the loathsome can opener, and emptied the contents into a big bowl. She didn’t bother to heat it, figuring the dog would be hungry enough not to care. She’d barely had time to remove her hand. The poor dog pushed his head deep into the bowl and slurped up the food in a few gulps.
“Okay, boy. I hope that’ll tide you over until I can get back to your house for some real dog food. I promise I’ll go as soon—” She looked out the kitchen window at the engulfing darkness. “As soon as I can.”
Not having much of an appetite herself—the chili still sitting in a congealed lump in her stomach—Andrea went back into the living room and sat cross-legged in front of the fireplace. It was growing colder, but she wasn’t sure she should light another fire. She had to conserve wood. Uncle Mike had a nice stack behind the garage, which should’ve lasted them the winter. However, with no electricity to warm the house, she’d go through it in a week if she weren’t careful.
Thor trotted in and lay beside her. He licked her hand, and she petted the top of his head. She didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t tired enough to sleep and yet…what else
was
there to do except worry? She looked at the dog, his long, pink tongue hanging out as he breathed in short little pants. She scratched behind his big ears. “Oh, Thor, what are we—”
A sound outside grabbed her attention. She froze, every hair on her head alert. She strained to hear the sound again. There it was, a faint scratching at the front door. A scratching, and a whimpering. She was arching her back so severely she thought her spine would snap. Someone or something was on their porch. A low, guttural rumble came from deep in Thor’s throat. His ruff went up and his eyes fixed on the front door.
“Okay,” Andrea whispered. “I-I’ll crawl over and look out the peephole.” Getting on all fours, she scooted across the living room carpet, then rising to her feet, peered out the little peephole three quarters of the way up the door. It was so dark, she couldn’t make out anything at first, and then, two shadowy forms—just inches from her—moved.
“Who’s out there?” Her voice cracked on the last word.
A man’s voice answered. “Help! Please, help us!”
Andrea unlocked the door and opened it a fraction. The pulsating darkness swirled around the hunched bodies of two human beings. Even in the thick mist, Andrea could see that the woman—a girl, hardly older than herself—was most definitely pregnant. The young man had a protective arm around her, more to hold her upright than as a means of comfort. He looked at Andrea, relief spreading across his chiseled features.
“Th-thank God,” he choked. “We couldn’t have gone another step.”
Andrea hesitated only for a second. Under normal circumstances, she never would’ve let strangers into the house when she was alone. But these weren’t normal circumstances. She opened the door wider and beckoned the couple in.
“Hurry. I don’t want to keep the door open any longer than I have to.”
The man stumbled in, half-dragging the woman behind him. He led her to a recliner and gently pushed her down, then looked at Andrea. “Is there a blanket I can cover her with? She’s chilled to the bone.”
“Poor thing.” Andrea scooped up the afghan lying in a heap beside the couch. “Here. Put this over her. I can make some tea. That should help.”
“You have a gas stove? That’s great! We only have electric appliances and none of them would work. I can’t believe we found you. We’ve gone to every house along the road. Nobody home. Nobody! Everybody has disappeared.”
“Yeah, I know. I woke up this morning—no, yesterday morning. Oh, I don’t know when. Anyway, my folks were gone. I checked our neighbors and they’re gone, too.”
“Do you know what’s happened?” he asked in a strained voice.
“No.”
“I tried the radio and all I could get was static.”
“Do you think someone dropped a bomb on us? You know, a nuclear missile attack, or something? Terrorists?”
The young man shook his head. “I don’t think so. It wouldn’t explain why all the people are gone. I mean, wouldn’t your folks take you with them, wherever they went?”
Andrea nodded. “Yeah, they would. They’d never leave without telling me. Never. And their cars are here.” She made a face. “But they won’t start.”
“I know.”
Just then the woman moaned. “Keith? Keith?”
Immediately he was down on his knees in front of her. “I’m here, Carrie. It’s all right. This nice girl is going to let us stay here.” He glanced up and Andrea nodded. “You just lie back and—” Again he looked up at Andrea, his eyebrows a furry line over his eyes. “Your name?”