Silas: A Supernatural Thriller

This novel is a work of fiction.
 
Names, events, persons, and

locations are used in a fictitious and imaginative manner.
 
Any

resemblance to actual persons, living or deceased, circumstances,

or locales are purely coincidental.

Cover Design by Melissa Rico

Copyright
©
2010 by Robert J. Duperre

Cover Art
©
2010 by Jesse David Young

ISBN # 1461111587

EAN-13 # 978-1461111580

ALSO BY ROBERT J. DUPERRE

NOVELS:

The Fall: The Rift Book I

Dead of Winter: The Rift Book II

SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS:

For Leo, my best friend and companion for life…

BLOOD RED MORNING

Written and performed by Art Lonnigan

The numbers of my stranded soul

Rattle through the cages of time

Nine, six, eight, two, four

In my head without a rhyme

Five, seven, two, one, in a land once said

And through fields of green I can see the dead

In the shade of a blood-red morning

Which faulty math can’t repent

In the shade of a blood-red morning

With angels swimming ‘round my head

The symbols at the demon’s door

Three and nine once we pass the gate

Then one and one and one sublime

With a final two to seal my fate

Five, seven, two, one, in a land once said

And through fields of green I can see the dead

In the shade of a blood-red morning

Which faulty math can’t repent

In the shade of a blood-red morning

With an angel swimming ‘round my head

With an angel swimming ‘round my head

1

Ken Lowery is dying. Cancer. It started in his pancreas, but now he is riddled with it to the point where he lays in his hospital bed for hours on end, doped with Morphine to ease the pain, unconscious for much of the time. His foggy mind is a mishmash of current and past events. In one moment he is young again, playing in cornfields with Tommy Barnett, his best friend from childhood; the next he’s at his sixtieth birthday party, holding his four-week-old granddaughter for the first time. These images and memories keep him in a constant state of restlessness despite the drugs running through his body. Dreaming, though restive and unreal, is a better option than awareness.

The machine he is attached to pings and he opens his eyes. His three daughters are in the room. Becky, his youngest, sits beside him, holding his hand. He can’t feel her touch, his nerve endings deadened by the drugs. Carol, his middle child, paces around, cell phone pressed against her ear. He can’t make out exactly what she is saying, because all sound is a cluttered mess of booms and whispers, but he assumes it is something important, something to do with her job.

That’s Carol, always on the move, always searching for that next better thing.

The one that strikes him the most, however, is Deb. She’s his oldest, and she leans against the wall across from his bed. She has assumed that pose during her every visit since the day the ambulance rushed him in three weeks ago. Her light brown hair is a mess, her jaw quivers, her eyes dart back and forth. Surely she is thinking of her family, of Doug her husband, of Katy and Philip her children. And yet she stays, and her sadness hangs in the air like mist. It pains Ken to see her this way. He loves her – loves them all – so much. He wishes he could tell them that.

Ken watches his trio of angels in silence, and for the first time in days his thoughts are lucid. No more dreams invade them, no more syrupy memories. He is in the here and now, and he notices how much like their mother his girls have become. Dignity shines through in their eyes, a quiet strength that permeates their every movement. They are getting older, all three of them. Their hair is graying and the skin around their elbows is growing wrinkled. Yet when they look at him the way they do, afraid, sad, and somehow accepting, they appear to him as they did when they were little, when they played together in the sand dunes behind their house. Young. Innocent. Connected.

In those days Ken would run with them, Wendy by his side, determined to drink up every last ounce of experience he could, knowing that one day all his happiness and joy could be ripped from him. And speaking of Wendy…the woman was more than his wife. She was his stabilizing force of goodness. She gave everything to him, coddled him, often at the expense of her own needs. She’s been gone for more than ten years now, ten long, lonely years. Thoughts of her cause tears to form in his eyes, but the sadness is fading. He understands he will be with her soon and his loneliness will end.

With this realization comes fear.

He fears for his daughters, for his grandchildren, for his legacy. But mostly he fears for his own soul, for though he has come to grips with his mortality he is still not content, and this lack of gratification fills him with guilt.
If only I could see him again
, he thinks,
then all would be well with the world. Then I could die in peace.

He sees the face of the one he longs for, those sparkling hazel eyes, that constantly dripping nose, the smooth black hairs he’d sweep off the floor on a daily basis. He yearns to have him close once more, to have his head pressed into his chest, to have his large body resting at his feet, to feel his devotion and enduring love. He’s been gone for almost thirty years, and in that time the empty chasm in his heart has only expanded.

Am I wrong to feel this way?
he thinks.
Is it wrong that having my family around me is not enough?
He tilts his head to the side and groans. He knows that all he has, his family, his career, his happiness, would not have happened if not for his long-lost companion.

His name was Silas and he was Ken Lowery’s best friend.

I miss him so much…

*
 
 
*
 
 
*

He awakens in the middle of the night. He’s been dreaming of
that place
again, of monsters and wild children, of giant evergreens and the
Crystal
Mountain
. He rolls over and takes a deep breath, gazing at the monitors beside him. For the first time in a long while there is no pain. His elbow flexes easily, his knees pop when he stretches them. His mind, though still caught in the trappings of sleep, seems clear. Faint light fills his eyes.

There is someone in the room with him. He hears the rumbling of wheels rolling across the floor. Cocking his head, he gazes across the expanse.

There he sees a young black man wearing hospital scrubs. His hair is cropped and his eyes twinkle in the sparse light. He is checking instruments and cleaning the empty containers of food Ken’s daughters had left off the table. Ken hits the button on the remote control beside him, bringing his bed to an upright position. The young man turns at the sound of the softly whirring motor.

“Oh, hello,” he says with a smile. “Sorry, Mr. Lowery, I didn’t know you were awake.”

“It’s okay,” replies Ken. “I’ve been sleeping too much lately, anyhow.”

It takes Ken a moment to realize what he’s just said, and his shock comes not from the words spoken but that he spoke words at all. He’s been in a state of anguish for so long that he doesn’t remember the last time he muttered more than a simple
yes
or
no
. He flexes his arthritis-riddled hand, feeling the tendons stretch and the longed-for twinge of pain that follows, and then cracks his neck. His body feels renewed – or relatively so, anyway.

“What time is it?” he asks the young man.

“Just before
midnight
.”

“What time did my daughters leave?”

The young man smiles and it is beautiful, all sparkling teeth and deep dimples. “I’m not sure, Mr. Lowery. My shift just started an hour ago. I can go check the sign-in sheet if you like.”

“No, that’s okay,” replies Ken with a shake of his head. He chortles. “I feel so strange.”

“In what way?”

“In a way I haven’t felt in a long while.”

The young man nods at this and continues with his duties. Ken watches him, all the while relishing his newfound strength and vitality, but it isn’t only his body that feels refreshed.
 
His mind, as well, seems to have grown sharper, more aware. Thoughts and contemplations he hasn’t experienced in a decade spiral through his brain. A shiver runs through him. More than anything, in this moment, he wants to think, to ponder, to
experience
.