Bone White Read online

  Get off your ass and run!

  Ignoring the lightening-hot pain shooting through my arm, I scrambled to my feet, my thoughts turning to the window.

  Chapter 37

  It came from the front of the church, what her mother would have called a “ruckus.” A short scream followed by a low rumble. Nothing out of the ordinary really. Especially considering the arrival of their new guests. New guests always meant strange, new sounds in the church. Moans, screams, cries for help. But, something in this commotion sparked her curiosity.

  She set her mother’s dirty book down on the bed beside her and straightened out her nightgown. She was reading them herself now. The dirty books. One right after the other. Father was encouraging her to. They’d help her “grow up,” he’d said. After all, she was the woman of the house now. Father had his work, and she had hers.

  Rising to her feet, she scurried over to the open doorway and leaned her head out. She could hear shuffling sounds coming from the front of the church. Slightly muffled, but loud enough to be heard up in the loft. There were always strange sounds in the church when Father was working. Still, there was something about the scream that stuck in her head. Made her wonder. It didn’t sound like a boy’s scream. The boy in the coffin had a deep voice. Almost as deep as Father’s. This was higher pitched, like a girl’s. And she knew perfectly well what a girl’s scream sounded like. But, the only other girl in the church was Becca. Her new friend. And, she was deep in the bowels of the basement.

  Or was she? Was Father bringing her up? Was it Becca’s time to be harvested? The thought made her heart beat a little faster than normal. Her hand went to her mouth and she chewed a ragged fingernail that had long ago given up trying to grow.

  No, no, no.

  Not yet. She didn’t want Becca to be harvested yet. There was something different about Becca. She had spent more time with her than the others, and wasn’t sure she wanted her harvested. Not that she’d worked up the nerve to ask Father to let Becca stay. To be her permanent plaything, not temporary like the others. A real friend. But, asking for that would let Father know she had disobeyed him. She had gotten too close. She had asked a name, and look what it had led to.

  They’re just objects.

  He was right. He was always right. Still, she wanted this more than anything.

  Her eyes narrowed, drawing lines across her brow. Harvesting took place in the basement. Why would Father be bringing Becca upstairs? Had there been a change in plans? She wondered and wondered until once again, her curiosity got the best of her, and she tiptoed barefoot out onto the small landing at the top of the stairs. Then, she continued all the way down the stairs, skipping only the top step.

  The lights were on in the sanctuary. She noticed that before she was even halfway down. It was all lit up like she’d never seen it before. It was like her father was expecting more company, welcoming them by leaving on the light.

  That couldn’t be right. Every measure Father had taken to keep their presence hidden was done specifically to discourage company. Father preached against the presence of others. Had warned about the consequences, and what it might mean for the two of them. They would take her away. For that very reason, he disliked any lights being on at all, had rarely used them. The bright lights now made her wonder even more.

  From the bottom of the stairs, the second thing she noticed was the old, dirty coffin sitting on the stage. Its lid now stood upright. Open. The coffin empty. Her mind raced, and somewhere down deep, in that place where her most secret desires resided, she smiled.

  It was harvest time.

  Chapter 38

  The squat and camouflaged window taunted me from its heights. I needed something to climb onto just to reach it, and in the little time I had, I realized I had just that: little time. The first direct thud of a boot sounded on a wooden step. Then another. And just that quickly, I was already out of time. With Becca’s body having been cast aside, the bastard was already on his way down the stairs.

  I looked back up at the window and knew it would have to wait. That fractional part of me wanting a confrontation was going to get its wish. I needed to get my hands on a weapon of some sort. My mind immediately went to the lawnmower blade and the needle nose pliers. What had I done with them? Checking my pockets, I remembered laying them both on the floor once Becca was free. My heart sank.

  Idiot!

  They were only about fifteen feet away, but may as well have been a mile. Between them and me was the bottom of the stairs, and on the stairs, caught only in the faint light cast down from the church’s alcove, I saw legs. Legs clad in soiled denim that ended at blackened work boots, moving purposefully in my direction. I would never make it.

  Though the man was moving confidently slowly, like he was the one who had seen too many horror movies and knew just how to act, I still needed to think fast. I had to find something close. Something I could just grab. I searched nearby, but only came up with the ten-speed bicycle and bag after bag filled with Styrofoam peanuts, neither of which gave me much confidence in terms of a weapon. After all, this wasn’t a Three Stooges movie. Having quickly dismissed nearly everything around me, my thoughts turned to the only other thing within reach.

  The stack of limbs on the workbench. And beyond them, the beetle-covered skull.

  I had no time to debate the morality of the thoughts going through my mind. The tone of the approaching steps changed from rubber on wood, to concrete. I took three lunging strides, putting myself right in front of the workbench, a foot from the pile of limbs and nearly side by side with the man. The lack of light was actually working in my favor. We were standing so close, I could smell the sourness of his breath, but he didn’t know I was there.

  The soft scratching of metal against metal came from the ceiling above. I looked up, zeroing in on its source just in time to be blinded as the light bulb blazed to life between the man’s thick fingers. If he was shocked to see me standing beside him, he didn’t show it. Instead, his arms shot out without hesitation, grabbing me by the neck like he knew I had been there all along.

  White pinpricks joined the spots in my vision left by the light bulb. I fought to see through them, as my arms flailed. Through blind luck, I knocked aside the thin piece of glass from the blue tub. As I struggled through a lack of both vision and breath, my hand dove into the container, and I snatched up the skull by its eyeholes. I swung it, bugs and all, with all my might. The sturdy skull made contact upside the man’s temple with a sickening thump and a bone-splintering crack. The skull shattered on impact, leaving only a few shards of facial bone cradled in my fist, and the big bastard dazed and collapsed on the floor in a pool of vermilion blood that wasn’t his own.

  Chapter 39

  I leaned the dusty bicycle against the concrete wall beneath the window. To say that I was completely trusting of its sturdiness would be a lie, but it was going to have to do. Sure, a ladder or even my grandmother’s step stool would have been ideal, but my options were limited. And so was my time. The man was down, but not out. He was murmuring. Even worse, frenzied footsteps thundered across the floor upstairs. We were about to have company. Chances are, it was just the man’s daughter and while I was pretty sure I could take her, but there was no telling if she would have a weapon. I didn’t want another confrontation. The last one had been too close for comfort, and I had been lucky. Becca hadn’t. I wasn’t feeling confident in my luck enough to push it again.

  The bike wobbled beneath me as I stood on one of the pedals and hoisted my other foot up onto the crossbar. With my hands on the wall, I steadied myself and the bicycle, testing its stability before joining the one foot on the crossbar with the other. I prayed it would hold. Supporting all my weight, the bicycle threatened to buckle or to slide out and away from the wall. Luckily, it did neither. The cracked and deflated rubber tires gripped the floor, locking the bike in place.

  The window was eye level now, and I could hear a light rain tapped on the glass. Through the
layer of black paint, a faint glow was slightly visible. I assumed it was the floodlight above the tool shed, reaching out to me from the night, and I yearned to reach back. Like a proverbial carrot, freedom dangled its light in front of me. With escape so close, my mind went to Garrett.

  Where the hell are you? Last chance to come with me, buddy!

  Behind me, the murmurs grew quieter, became almost inaudible, before ultimately stopping altogether. I didn’t want to look, but I knew I had to. I didn’t like what I saw. The man was up on one knee. He had his hand against his head and was shaking the cobwebs free.

  I turned back and fumbled with the antique latch. Rust and corrosion teamed up against me to hold it firmly in place. This window hadn’t been opened in years. I pushed hard on the latch with the palm of my hand, but it still didn’t budge.

  Footsteps pounded down the stairs, sending my already elevated heart rate through the roof. I didn’t turn to look this time. I didn’t have to. Instead, I stopped pushing on the latch with my palm, began using it as a hammer, pounding away at the metal latch handle. Sharp pains cut into my hand, shooting up my arm with each and every blow. Small cries escaped my lips each time, and soon my trembling arm begged me to stop. But, this was my only way out now. It was too late to do anything else.

  “Come on, dammit!”

  I expected to be grabbed by the back of my shirt and pulled off the bicycle any moment. I imagined myself being thrown onto the cold, hard cement floor, much the same way I’d been thrown into the coffin earlier. My heart bludgeoned my chest, threatening to burst with every progressive beat. And for the first time since everything went south, tears blurred my vision, but still I pounded on the latch handle. Pounded and cried. From pain. From crippling grief. From the knowledge that, if this didn’t work, I was certainly dead.

  I was about to give in and use my elbow to bust out the glass when the latch slid out of its seat. Since I wouldn’t have had time to clear out all of the broken shards of glass, I wasn’t looking forward to the fillet job they would have done on my body. But that was no longer an issue. A small wave of relief came over me.

  Clean and shiny metal slowly appeared on the latch as it slid out from the rusted metal casing. With one final slam of my throbbing palm, it came completely free. Knowing it would take all I had, I grabbed the latch with both hands and yanked the window open, giving it no other choice. A loud tearing sound filled the room as the thick layer of paint separated itself. The momentum nearly toppled me from the bicycle, but I hung onto the window like a trapeze bar as it swung inward and was able to keep myself from falling.

  It was the sound of steady rainfall and the cool air against my face that welcomed me. Beckoned me. Practically grabbed me by the wrists and started pulling me from the sickening necropolis of death and insanity. The window was short and wide, barely tall enough for me to squeeze through. But, it was enough. The man would be too big to fit, and that knowledge alone was enough to urge me on. I only needed to get through this window and I’d be free. I smiled through the last of the tears.

  I grabbed the bottom of the windowsill. It was only when I had a death grip on the sill and was about to hoist myself up, that I risked a peek behind me – and wished I hadn’t. The daughter was beside her father, helping him to his feet. She glared at me, her eyes ablaze. If looks could kill, I’d be lying in a heap on the workbench, waiting to be picked clean by bugs. Fury rose up in her throat and burst out as the most God-awful scream, nearly dropping me from my perch. It was a crazed, obsessed scream, sending chills from the base of my skull, down through my entire body.

  As the scream faded, my eyes locked onto the man’s for the first time. We stared at each other for an eternity, he and I, gauging each other’s emotions, sizing up the adversary. His eyes bore a frightening union of anger and desperation. His life depended on catching me. And killing me.

  He took his first step in my direction.

  My arms and legs worked to raise me into the window frame. Once my feet left the bike, it clattered to the floor behind me, hopefully buying me an extra second or two. Almost immediately, my chest fell sharply against the metal window frame, making me wince. My legs were no longer of use. They blindly kicked the air behind me, as I flopped around like a fish out of water.

  The sound of metal hitting the concrete wall clanged beside me, then banged onto the floor. A knife? Something larger? I wasn’t sure, but something had been thrown at me and I chalked it up to another near miss. With all the strength in my arms, I pulled and wiggled the rest of my body through the window, expecting to be seized by my ankles at any moment. But, it never happened. The bicycle must have done its job.

  An overgrown flowerbed surrounded me as I lay face down in the mud. Weeds and vines and flowers, long dead, laid crumpled in the soggy earth beneath me. Cold rain pelted the back of my neck, and my only thought was that it had never felt so good to be caught out in it.

  I pulled myself up onto my knees, and peered back through the window. Like some classic cartoon, I expected to see the bad guy shaking his fist, telling me that this wasn’t over. The pool of light at the bottom of the stairs illuminated the concrete floor. There were white bone fragments from the skull scattered around bloody boot prints, but otherwise, the basement was empty. The man and his daughter were gone.

  PART III

  Yea, though I walk through the valley of the

  shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

  - Psalms 23:4

  Chapter 40

  With the front of the church to my right, the tool shed with its floodlight to the left, I bolted straight ahead toward the overgrown parking lot and long winding driveway that led Garrett and me into this nightmare in the first place. It seemed like days had gone by. Days since we’d been on the lake in Garrett’s boat. Days since we were enjoying the time away from New Paris and its missing girls.

  Days since I hadn’t felt fear.

  The good news, there was one less girl missing now. I’d found Becca Lewis, maybe even the other two amid a jumble of dismembered body parts on the workbench. Unfortunately, there was a whole shit ton of bad news. None of the girls would be going home. They wouldn’t be running into their kitchens and wrapping their arms around their mothers’ necks, thankful to be home. They wouldn’t be in class on Monday morning. They wouldn’t even be leaving that church alive.

  I wanted to go back and get Becca, to bring her with me. I knew it wasn’t possible, but as the falling rain ran off my forehead and into my eyes, I found myself choking back feelings of guilt and despair. Guilt that I had made it out while unable to save Becca like I’d promised. Despair at the knowledge that nothing in the world would ever be whole again. All the wrongs could never be made right. My life would never be the same.

  Like a crack of thunder, a sharp bang came from behind me that stopped me in my tracks, my shoes barely getting traction in the half gravel, half mud surface. Without thinking, I turned to see what the noise was. Big mistake.

  On the darkened stoop of the church, the front doors were bouncing back from having been thrown open against the church’s clapboard siding. In the doorway, silhouetted against the blazing light from inside the church, stood the outline of the massive man, his head working back and forth as his eyes scanned the grounds. My heart sank. It was too soon. He shouldn’t have been out there that quickly. As I suspected, the front doors had not been chained. Knowing we’d been so close and yet, Becca was dead because of it, was like a kick in the stomach.

  But, there would be plenty of time to grieve later. The way the man cleared the steps in one impressive leap let me know I’d been spotted. I wasn’t sure if it said more about his athleticism, or his desperation. As if either of those things wasn’t enough to instill fear, he carried something long, curved and shiny in his hand. The bolo knife. Athletic and carrying a weapon. That made two things he had over me. But desperation was on my side was well. I knew what was riding on him catching up to me. I knew what it would cost. Images of
how gruesome my death could be urged me to run.

  Chapter 41

  I considered joining track last fall for the only reason an un-athletic guy like me would ever consider joining track: because of a girl. Shari Maxwell. The only girl I’d ever met that made me want to try something that was outside of my comfort zone just to get close to her. Then, two weeks before tryouts, Shari found out she was pregnant, our starting tight end mysteriously chose to quit the football team and get a part-time job, and I ended up not joining track after all. Luckily, fate stepped in and saved me from two months of unnecessary athletic misery.

  Now, though, I wished I’d joined the team anyway. I probably had twenty years or more on this guy and was leaner by at least fifty pounds. Still, he was gaining fast. Gaining fast and closing the gap between us. I could hear his footsteps splashing on the soggy driveway behind me. And as impossible as it was, I swore I felt him literally breathing down my neck. Obviously, fear was skewing my perception. If he’d actually been that close, he would have cut my legs out from under me by now. It was then I decided that, just like joining a team because of a girl, running straight down the driveway was a piss poor plan.

  Ignoring a lifelong phobia, I cut sharply to my right and darted straight into the woods. Straight toward the lake. The dense wilderness and darkness I once feared now embraced me and swallowed me up, but in a good way. If I couldn’t outrun the guy, my best chance was to lose him in the trees. Chances were, he knew the area better than me. But, I couldn’t worry about that. I just had to put my faith in the notion that, if he couldn’t see me, he couldn’t catch me. Best case scenario: the woods were thick enough to provide cover, yet not so thick as to impede me from making my way through.