Tom chuckled. He pushed her aside and peered out through the half-moon of glass. If he saw anything, he didn’t say so.
Bouncing on the balls of her feet, Maggie said, “Well? Do you see it? Tom?”
“Son of a bitch,” Tom muttered to himself. When he opened the door, the violent storm spilled into the house. Maggie whined and took two steps back, though she was unable to pull her eyes from the doorway. Tom hustled out into the rain, leaving the door open at his back, and marching across the wet grass. Maggie watched him until the darkness swallowed him up.
Finally, she was able to propel herself forward. She slammed into the door and threw it shut, locked it. Standing on her toes, she peered through the window at the top of the door but the yard was too dark to make out any details. She could see Tom’s form fading into the shadows, masked by a screen of silvery rain. Beyond Tom she could make out the dark, low, hulking shape of the Pontiac hiding in the darkness like a panther ready to spring.
“Fuck.” She slid along the wall and flicked on the rear floodlights again. Then she returned to the half-moon window in the door. The floodlights illuminated a wide, circular patch of lawn…but she couldn’t see Tom. His car was still there and his muddy footprints were quickly filling up with rainwater…but he was nowhere…
You’re losing your shit, Maggie,
said her head-voice.
Your pot is boiling over and your beer is foaming over the top of the glass.
“Stop it, stop it, stop it, stop it…”
In the darkness, beyond even the weeping willow tree, she thought she saw a flash of light. Then she heard a scream, a man’s scream. Tom.
She fumbled with the lock then swung the door open. Rainwater blew into her face. “Tom!” she screamed into the night. “Tom!”
There was movement toward the back of the property. She imagined it to be a struggle. What was out there? What had happened to Tom?
A second scream cracked the night, causing the hairs on Maggie’s arms to stand at attention. She retreated back into the house and slammed the door shut. As she fumbled to lock it again, the entire scene was underscored by yet another peal of thunder.
Maggie snatched the shotgun off the couch then went to the wall and turned off the living room lights. Now, only the outdoor floodlights were on, casting a dull, yellow glow over the grass, the dirt turnabout, the Pontiac and Tom Schuler’s ancient Maverick. Peering out one of the living room windows, Maggie’s breath fogged up the glass. She had the barrel of the shotgun nearly pressed against her cheek. Another flash of lightning brought into brief relief an image of two figures beyond the willow tree, one smaller than the other. But she couldn’t be sure. Fuck…she couldn’t be sure…
Whimpering, she reached up and clicked off the floodlights. She didn’t want to see anymore, didn’t want to be reminded of what was going on out there.
You hit it with your car, Maggie, and it’s not going to let you be.
“Shut up!” she screamed. “Just shut the fuck up!”
And you know what it is, Maggie…you know damn well what—
A face appeared in the living room window, a white oval with muddy, black eyes framed in darkness. Maggie screamed and jerked away. The curtains fell back into place, obscuring the hideous face. Scooting back across the floor, Maggie stopped when her shoulders struck the back of couch. She held the shotgun in both hands and had the barrel aimed at the window, her finger on the trigger.
Hit it with your car, Maggie,
said the head-voice.
Hit it with your car. But you did something much worse before that, didn’t you? Oh yes, you did…
Maggie wailed. Sobbing, she crawled around to the front of the couch, the shotgun dragging along the hardwood floor. She pulled the cushions off the couch and propped them up around her in some semblance of a barricade.
Yes,
said the head-voice.
Pillows and couch cushions will certainly protect you from the thing that fell out of the sky.
“Shut…the fuck…up,” she rasped.
Outside, lightning lit up the world like a nuclear bomb.
6
A blast of thunder woke her. It sounded like the whole world was about to end. Somehow, she had fallen asleep amidst the barricade of couch cushions and throw pillows on the floor of the living room. The second her eyes flipped open, she recalled all the events of that evening with brutal and frightening clarity. Something heavy sat across her lap. In the dark, she ran her fingers across it and discovered it was Evan’s shotgun.
Tom. Tom had gone outside. Had he ever come back?
“Tom?” she called, her voice was raw from sleep.
When no one answered, she remembered locking all the doors and windows. Just how in the world did she expect Tom Schuler to get back into the house?
He won’t be coming back into the house,
she thought, propping herself up on her elbows as her eyes acclimated to the gloom.
Something took him. Out there in the yard, something took Tom Schuler.
Still groggy, she managed to climb to her feet and, hefting the shotgun along with her, went to the bank of living room windows. Peeling away the curtain, she looked out upon the night. Rain still fell, churning the earth like muddy soup. The moon had cleared the strands of dark clouds, grinning down at her like the ghostly white face of a cadaver that had been cleaved in half.
Tom’s car was still in the turnabout, rain pattering its windshield and roof. Beyond, the yard was a sloping black mudslide of lightlessness. She could see nothing of substance beyond the far gate at the edge of the property.
What time was it? She went into the kitchen and checked the digital clock on the microwave. It read 1:47 a.m.
What the fuck happened to Tom?
No. She wouldn’t lose her shit again. She would remain cool. Tom was out there. He
had
to be out there.
Her sweaty fingers tightened around the shotgun.
Go check. You can do this.
It was the head-voice again, but this time it seemed intent on helping her through it.
Go out onto the patio and check. Call his name. Maybe he’s out there and he’s hurt. Maybe he needs your help.
Trembling, she went back to the rear door. The crescent of glass at the top was foggy from her panting respiration. She had turned the floodlights off earlier—at least, she thought she had—and the world beyond was nothing but outer space. Should she turn the floods on again and see what lay beyond the door, beyond the patio? What was out there in the muddy field along with Evan’s Pontiac and Tom’s old Maverick?
Her hand found the light switch beside the door. The switch pressed against the sweaty palm of her hand as she pressed hard against it. In her mind’s eye, she could see herself flipping on the floods…and seeing the horror that remained of Tom Schuler in the field, his body torn to shreds, his face mangled into a pulpy stew.
“I can’t,” she whined, crying again.
Do it,
said the head-voice.
That thing that had been crouched low on the roof of the car earlier…that horrible thing that had appeared at one of the living room windows as she had looked out…
She pulled her hand away from the light switch and brought it to the dead bolt on the door. She turned the bolt; the sound was like opening a bank vault, and it echoed in her ears. Under her breath she counted to three…then, gripping and turning the knob, she yanked the door open.
Icy wind and cold pellets of rain attacked her. With a shriek she thrust the barrel of the shotgun out the door and into the night, foolishly waving it around like a sword. She could see nothing, hear nothing.
“Tom!” she shouted into the monsoon. “Are you out there? Tom! Tom!”
Only the wind howled back, frightening her even more.
When she thought she caught movement off to her right, she screamed and almost dropped the shotgun. Something quick and catlike darted out from the approximate area of the willow tree and ran toward the house along the property line. A low, animalistic groan escaped from Maggie’s throat as she backed through the doorway, the barrel of the shotgun flailing about.
Back inside, terrified and soaking wet, Maggie slammed the door and bolted it again. Sobbing freely now, she carried the shotgun back to the spot on the floor where she’d erected the couch cushions and throw pillows into a makeshift pillbox, and lowered herself to her knees. She pulled the shotgun back into her lap and leaned back against the couch. The roof creaked as the storm pounded against it. Outside, lightning made the windows glow like sapphires.
Maggie squeezed her eyes shut and prayed for daylight.
7
It was nearly two in the morning when Ben finally arrived back home. The house greeted him with its usual silence and he didn’t bother turning on any of the lights as he came through the front door and staggered exhaustedly down the hallway toward the master bedroom. He stripped out of his uniform, set his gun on the nightstand beside the bed, and unbuckled his duty belt, which he hung over the back of a wooden chair that faced an antique rolltop desk. In the left breast pocket of his uniform shirt, Ben took out the gold-plated Zippo lighter he always kept with him—his father’s lighter. The old man’s initials, W. J., were etched onto one side. Feeling more nostalgic than usual, Ben turned the lighter over in his fingers a few times before finally setting it down on the nightstand beside the bed.
Check out your only son now, Dad.
Then he peeled off his undershirt and stepped out of his underwear. Instantly he felt about seventy pounds lighter and as naked and vulnerable as a turtle without a shell.
Too exhausted to shower, he washed his face and hands in the adjoining bathroom, brushed his teeth, popped out his contact lenses, and urinated with the zeal of someone who has just come off a cross-country road trip.
Back in the bedroom, he cracked open both windows just enough to let fresh air in but keep the raging storm at bay. Then he slipped into bed and, lying on his back, laced both hands beneath his head. Moonlight filtering through the windows reflected onto the ceiling; the shadows of raindrops rolled like comets above his head.
Out in the hallway, the floorboards creaked.
Ben held his breath. Listened.
After a moment, he called out, “Dad?” Then he waited for a response, already feeling indescribably foolish.
Five minutes later, sleep claimed him.
Chapter Five
1
The sound of birds woke her. Maggie’s eyes flipped open and, for a moment, disorientation caused her to question her surroundings. Stiffly, she sat up and found herself asleep on the living room floor, surrounded by cushions and pillows. Her husband’s shotgun sat at an angle across her lap.
It all rushed back to her.
Grabbing the barrel of the gun, Maggie stood and wended her way around the scattered pillows and the couch to the back door. Pink dawn pooled into the room from the crescent of glass at the top of the door. The whole house was warm. She realized that all the windows were shut.
Still clutching the shotgun, Maggie staggered into the kitchen and saw that the clock on the microwave read 5:22 a.m. Evan would be home in about an hour.
Back in the hall, she undid the dead bolt on the back door and pulled the door open. Beyond, the sloping lawn glistened in the premature daylight that broke through the valley between the mountains. Tom’s Maverick sat there, also glistening, and looking like a bloody fucking handprint.
Her eyes shifted toward the edge of the property and to the weeping willow tree, heavy with rain and sagging close to the earth. Shadows pooled at its base. She could see nothing incriminating around it.
Daylight made her fear seem less palpable; she stepped down off the steps and into the yard. The wet grass tickled her bare feet. The shotgun pointed dead ahead of her, she circled around the vehicles then went straight to the edge of the property and over to the willow tree.
It was a humped, spidery thing. Its branches, which were typically notched with narrow little leaves, were currently bare. Maggie searched around the base of the tree—the exact spot she thought she’d seen Tom struggling with the pale-skinned creature last night—but there was nothing for her to find.
Was she losing her mind?
“Stop it.” A nervous laugh threatened to erupt from her throat. Not wanting to take her eyes from the willow tree, she walked backwards all the way across the yard to the house. When she reached the patio steps, she cautiously ascended them backwards as well, the gun still aimed at the tree. In her mind’s eyes, she could too easily see that spidery tree uprooting itself from the wet soil and charging toward her on a system of roots like the many legs of an octopus.
Once again, she slammed and locked the door.
Inside, she set the shotgun down on the floor. Then she gathered up the couch cushions and pillows and put them back where they belonged. Tom’s dungaree jacket, still damp from the previous night’s rain, hung over the back of the couch. She stared hard at the tarnished copper buttons and the cigarette burns in the sleeves. A rubber key fob in the shape of a hand with its middle finger extended hung out of one pocket.