An Infinite Sorrow (6 page)

  Franklin lit up a flashlight.  "The night is young, my friends.  I have an idea, why don't we tell ghost stories?"

  Alice shrugged.  "Fine by me."

  Liz looked nervous, so Rich took her hand and sat next to her. 

  Alice shined the flashlight under her chin.  "Three young kids were trying to get home one evening..."

  Franklin got a stupid grin on his face.  "Always with the young kids and the evening...amateur."

  "Shut up.  Anyway, they are walking home through this fog and decide to cut through the graveyard." 

  Richard laughed a little.  "This is going to end well."

  "Suddenly, they see this light following them, and a dark figure.  There had been all these murders in the area, so they tried to move away from it.  But the light kept following them, moving faster...faster...FASTER!  Soon they were all running, and the dark figure was running after them.  They reached the fence at the far end of the graveyard.  They were trapped...TRAPPED, I TELL YOU!"

  Liz latched on to Rich's shoulder.  "What happened to them?" 

  "As the strange light illuminated the shadowy figure, they could see it was the night watchman.  The hunched-over old man calmly walked up to the children.  ‘What are you doing out here youngins? Don't you know there's a werewolf on the loose?’ he said.    The old man's sharp teeth glistened in the moonlight.  Terrified, one of the boys told the others they needed to get home.  One of the other boys turned to his friends and said RRRRRRRRROOOOAAAARRRRRR!!!!!"

  Liz jumped.  Franklin screamed like a little girl.  Even Rich jumped a little.  Alice exploded into uncontrollable laughter.  "Gotcha!"

Franklin had his head in his hands.  "Geez, Alice.  Sorry I called you an amateur.  Please don't tell anyone I yell like that.  So...embarrassed..."

  When everyone calmed down, Alice handed the flashlight to Franklin.  "Beat that, tough guy." 

  Franklin leaned over and whispered to Rich.  "You think Alice would go out with me?"

  Rich pointed at him.  "HA HA!  Really?  No, I don't.  At all." 

  Franklin scowled and turned back to the group.  I've got one for you, the Wilson House Horror."

  Alice shook her head.  "No way.  This is supposed to be ghost stories, not real-life murder stories."

  Rich shrugged.  "What's the difference?  Most of the stuff they make horror out of now is based on real life.  That guy who used to turn people into lamps.  That movie where the guy forces people to solve clues or be subjected to devices from the Spanish Inquisition.  Horrific viruses that wipe out the planet… All that sick stuff.  I enjoyed the werewolf story much better.  They don't make anything classic like that anymore.     

  Franklin didn't care.  "Too bad you guys didn't say that before we started.  I'm telling it babe, oh yeah!!"

  Rich nodded.  "What's the Wilson House Horror?" 

  "You can see the old Wilson House from here; it's that old crap shack off in the fog there.  Four years ago, a friend of my sister’s, Sharon, had invited her boyfriend over to watch a movie.  Her parents knew about it, but they were at a business dinner two towns over."

  "What happened?"

  "There were very few signs of a struggle.  Not many marks on the body.  No signs of forced entry.  The cops were pretty sure she let him in, and was taken completely off guard."

  "He killed her?"

  "With his bare hands.  Crushed every bone in her neck.  Hasn't moved or said a word in four years.  They say he's locked up in Desolation Asylum up on the hill." 

  "Why did he do it?"

  "Some say he went insane.  Some say he was possessed by a demon.  Some even say...that he escaped the asylum and is still killing out in the darkness.  BOOOO!!"

  No one even jumped.  Everyone started laughing.  "Oh, come on guys. That was a good one!" 

  Liz stretched her back.  "It was a good one.  But you made that last part up.  Oh!  Hey Sta..."

  In one swift motion, Stan wrapped his hands around her throat, and squeezed with impossible strength.  Franklin tried to jump on his back.  Stan barely touched his chest, and he went flying twelve feet into a gravestone.  The sickening crack of his skull echoed through the graves.

   "Men who fear demons see demons everywhere.  I have seen my inner demons, and they are me!!"

  Liz was crying and struggling, turning blue, trying to pull his hands off her neck.  Rich hit him with a rock.  He was scared for a moment then hit him in the back of the head really hard.  The blow should have killed him.  Stan punched him in the chest, and he went airborne.

  The last sounds he heard before blacking out were a little squeal, cut off by a sickening crack, and finally, a gunshot.  Then, he faded into the calm darkness.

******

  The funerals were held back to back.  Rich barely remembered them, he was still in shock.

  He hobbled into the psych ward at the hospital.  Cracked ribs and a stress fracture in his right leg; even after a few months, he was still walking with the cane.  As he did every Sunday, he was going to visit Alice.

  She had nearly been killed by Stan as well.  Turns out, she kept some extra protection in her car.  She'd shot him in the head as he was pouncing on her.  Now it haunted her.  Alice didn't sleep; she didn't eat unless she was forced.  She didn't talk much.  All she did, day after day, was sit in the psych ward and stare at the wall. 

  The room was overly clean, and gleamed white.  It smelled of old bleach.  "Hi, Alice. You feeling any better?"

  She turned her head to look at him with her bloodshot eyes.  Dark circles now dwelled beneath them.  "I didn't even give him a warning Rich."

  "Hey, from your perspective, he had just killed three of your best friends in less than two minutes.  What more could you have done?" 

  "I know.  But still..."

  "Yes?" 

  "I enjoyed it Rich.  I felt good for a while. That makes me an evil person.  I just can't believe I did it.  I can't believe I messed up this bad."

  Rich put his hand on her shoulder.  "This wasn't your fault.  None of it."

  "I can't get it out of my head.  I think about it every day."

  "I know.  It's hard for me too.  I couldn't save her."  He could feel himself tearing up.  The flush of embarrassment and loss flooded through his veins.  "We have to let it go.  You need to get healthy, move on with your life." 

  "Well, that's the pot calling the kettle black.  How's the leg?"

  "It sucks.  I'll be ok, though."

  "I know..."

  "Sweetie, you're not an evil person.  You need to pull it together, eat, and get some sleep so I can take you home to your mom and dad.  That's it.  After a while, they're not going to let you out of here.  Or worse, you'll go to the asylum. Then, even your dad won’t be able to pull enough strings to get you out of here. Do you want that?"

  "No, you're right. I can't end up there.  I'll take care of it.  Thanks for helping me, Rich."

  "No problem." 

  Rich left the hospital.  He felt empty inside.  The deaths of some people he had only known for a few months shouldn't have affected him so much.  But he had felt something real for Liz.  As he wandered out in the darkness, he found himself in front of the Wilson House.  As he looked up at it, he saw someone watching him from above.  The figure quickly ducked back into the darkness.  "Hey, who's there?  What do you want?"  The Wilson House had been abandoned for years; no one should have been in there. 

  Before he knew it, Rich was prying the loose boards off the front door. The door was no longer locked and had been smashed in at some point.  Of course, there was no power.  Mold had taken hold in a few places, and there were leaks everywhere. 

  Rich watched his footing as he crept upstairs.  It would have been very easy to slip, and he half expected his foot to go right through one of the steps.  As soon as he got upstairs, the figure ran from one bedroom into another.  Rich's leg and ribs were throbbing, and he had no weapon, but something was driving him.  "Come on, come out man!  I'm not messing around!  I'm giving you until the count of three, and then I'm coming in." 

  Rich heard something like hissing, and a few thuds, but no response.  "One...Two..."  And he moved into the bedroom as fast as his busted leg would let him.

  "Whoa, man!!  Whoa!  Just hold up a second."

  In the corner of the room stood Stan. 

  Rich just kept staring.  "You...you're dead.  You killed Liz and Franklin, and then Alice blew your brains out.  Are you a ghost?  Am I cracking up now?" 

  "Rich, listen.  I'm not that Stan.  I'm the Stan from before."

  "Before?  What the hell are you talking about?"

  "Try to remember.  We got attacked by a haunted Ouija Board.  You and Liz saw some freaky stuff at the school.  Then she disappeared.  When you went looking for her, you disappeared, and then no one remembered that either of you existed."

  "That was just some crazy dream I had when I moved here.  You're a hallucination."

  Stan walked across the room and pinched him.  "You are not hallucinating.  I'm a real guy.  And also, you didn't move here.  We've always been here."

  "I don't understand."

  "They're experimenting on us Rich.  Everyone in the town, beyond the town...if there is anything beyond this town…  They alter people's memories, or give them new ones entirely.  They kill people, or capture them for study, and simply clone new people.  It's like the matrix or some crap in here, man!  They're messing with our minds." 

  Richard wanted to reject everything he was being told.  It was crazy and impossible. And yet, somehow it also made sense.  He remembered parts of what Stan was talking about.  "How come they didn't mind wipe you?"

  "They did.  Seems like some of us are resistant to the treatment.  We remember parts of what happened, or all of it, even after they mess with us.  I managed to give them the slip, and now we have to go."

  "Go where?" 

  "Liz is still alive in there.  Of all of us, they seem to be most interested in her.  I'm not sure why.  We can save her, though."

  Rich still couldn't believe what he was hearing was the truth, but part of him deep down knew that it was.  If could save Liz...if he could find out what this nightmare was all about and get free of it..."Ok, I'm in.  What do we have to do?"

Chapter 4

  Stan gave Rich a nod and smiled.  "If we head down Main Street toward the old light house, the white one, there is some kind of medical complex beneath it.  That's where I escaped from, and that's where I saw them holding Liz." 

  "I think I was there.  I remember a little white room.  A man in a white suit talked to me, and made some kind of comment about resetting my memory." 

  "Well, if we want to save the others, we have to go back."

  They left the home quietly.  Maybe someone would notice the displaced boards in the morning and contact the police, but that would be hours from now.  Most likely, no one would notice.  Everyone from town stayed clear of the murder house. 

  As they walked through the darkness, Rich turned to Stan.  "So what's up with the random insanity attacks on people?  They say that weird gibberish about demons and strangle people, go on a rampage, and super strength.  When you...I mean ‘he’, killed Liz and Franklin, it was insane.  I had never seen anything like that."

  "That I haven't figured out.  With them, whoever they are, cloning people and messing with their heads, who knows?  It could be some kind of malfunction, or an actual demon or haunting.  I'm pretty sure that Ouija Board incident wasn't in the script, understand?"

  "I got ya."

  Stan stopped walking.  "Man, I'm starving.  We have to stop somewhere.  I woke up out of some kind of stasis, and I'm not sure how they were feeding me.  I'm sure feeling it now, though."

  "We'll walk to Peechin’s Market. It's only about a block away."

  When they had almost reached the store, Rich had to stop to catch his breath for a moment.  His injuries were flaring up.  As he looked across the street, he saw a group of kids standing in a little group.  They were all staring at him. 

  "Stan...I've seen this before...this is bad."

  As soon as Stan looked at them, the kids scattered.  "Guardians.  There were hordes of them patrolling the area around the light house.  I barely made it out.  We need to get into the light, get to that store.  They avoid light when they're ready to attack."

  Peechin’s was about the cheapest grocery store on the face of the Earth, and the prize grocery destination for the citizens of Desolation Falls.  It was also the most run down, dirtiest grocery store on the face of the Earth.  Even the rats avoided the place.  But with high turnover of goods, the food was fresh and cheap, and people came anyway.

  Once they were inside, Rich could see that there were a few roaches running around the main aisle.  It was late at night, after all.  The lighting was poor, and one kept flickering on and off.  The store smelled stale. 

  Old Burt was at his usual spot at the cash register.  Sometimes Rich believed he never left that spot.  He was a man of few words, usually drunk as a skunk, but good at restocking items and running the cash register.  "Hey Burt, how's it going?"