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Send to Friend“Yeah, no problem,” replied Nicole. “I know how much you hate being alone with Pete for any length of time. I have a younger brother myself, so I know how annoying they can be.”
Yeah, but I’ll take yours over mine any time, Nicole, Connie thought dismally. I wish Pete were more like your younger brother, Nicole. You’re lucky yours is just a pain in the butt and not a twisted little psychopath like mine is. At least you don’t have to live in constant fear of what Jason might do everyday of your life. At least you don’t have to make sure your bedroom door is locked every single night before you go to sleep.
They strolled on down the road, two adolescent girls the age of fifteen, both around five feet tall, slender, with a light complexion, hazel eyes, and small, upturned noses; their long hair glistening beneath the rays of the setting sun. Nicole’s hair was a bright auburn, Connie’s, caramel.
It was a Friday night and Nicole was sleeping over at Connie’s all weekend long, and they were going to have lots of fun together. They had their dinner already, and Connie had rented enough movies at Blockbuster Video to last the girls all night. They’d go to the mall tomorrow and spend the day their. At least that was the plan.
There was only one problem: Pete hadn’t come home yet. That shouldn’t have put a damper on Connie and Nicole’s good times that night and the weekend. It shouldn’t have affected them at all. There was absolutely no reason that that particular situation with Pete should put a damper on their plans, no reason at all. But it had. Connie’s parents waited a little while for Pete to come home, not having the slightest clue where he could be, getting worried about the twisted little runt, hoping he would come home. But Pete never showed up, and as a result, Connie’s father hesitantly asked Connie to help out in finding him.
Connie rolled her eyes back peevishly. God, I probably don’t even want to know what that sick little brat’s been up to all this time, she remembered thinking then, and was thinking that exact same thought right now as well. She sighed and then reluctantly agreed to go out and look for that sick little brat, hoping that she wouldn’t find him, hoping that he would come home on his own and would spare her the horrifying knowledge of the morbidly sick fun-filled activities his day had consisted of. She really did not want to know, thank you very much. Much to her relief, Nicole had agreed to go with her, to help in the search, and that was very good. Unlike Pete, Connie wasn’t the least bit afraid or uncomfortable around Nicole. Connie always had Nicole to turn to for comfort and to be there for her in times of stress and turmoil.
Connie hated her younger brother, Pete. As mean as that sounded, she hated him, she really did. He wasn’t in any way annoying, not a pest in the least bit. He was…well, he just plain weird, okay…a little too weird for her taste and comfort, even for a boy his age.
“He’s probably at the barrens torturing some wild animal or something,” Connie said warily, not even wanting to think about what the little prick could possibly be doing there. “Probably with Dave.” Dave was Pete’s best and only friend, an overweight, retarded boy around Pete’s age, with no other friends other than that little weirdo, Petey himself, who was also otherwise friendless.
“Whoa, check out that cute guy across the street!” exclaimed Nicole as she turned Connie’s attention toward a seventeen-year-old guy in blue jeans fixing his rundown Dodge Stratus parked at the side of the road, in front of a condemned three-story brick building whose windows were boarded up. The guy had put up the hood to his Stratus, looked toward the girls for a split-second before he began tinkering with his engine, with his butt pointing absently in their direction.
“Nice ass, huh?” Nicole said dreamily with a timid giggle.
“C’mon, Nicole,” said Connie as she grabbed her arm and dragged her away.
Connie was as boy-crazy as Nicole was, possibly even more so. But right now, her one and only priority was to find her brother, Pete the weirdo, not gaze dreamily at some cute guy’s nice ass.
* * *
They reached the barrens, and Connie’s nose was assaulted by all of the various odors that seared her sinuses as she breathed in, giving her a throbbing headache. A few pine and oak trees stood scattered around various places, making home to all sorts of wildlife such as birds and squirrels. One squirrel dashed up a tree and out of sight, and Connie flinched as another scurried past her. She didn’t like it here; it always got her allergies stirred up, which is what it was doing to her now, and she had seen much filthier places (this city had its fair share of places that were nice as well as places that weren’t so nice), this certainly wasn’t the cleanest either. Pinching her nose shut with her index and middle finger, Connie beckoned Nicole to follow and the two of them went in, Nicole following close behind Connie. The ground felt soggy beneath Connie’s feet in some spots, and she was sure to avoid stepping over the condoms, animal feces, shattered beer bottles, and scraps of litter mixed into the light carpet of dead pine needles as they went further into the barrens.
A skunk made a series of screeching noises, aggravating Connie’s headache all the more, and staggered drunkenly beneath the setting sun about fifty feet away.
They stopped dead by a small stream, watching as brown water flowed down rapidly, and Connie cringed, knowing full well that that water was being emptied out from the city’s sewer system and was sure to be rich in urine and diluted feces. The pungent stench of human waste products filled the air, and now she just wanted to get home; her head throbbing painfully as her nose itched and tickled and began to drip a thin stream of mucous down to her upper lip, and her eyes wouldn’t stop watering.
Nicole leaped over the stream gracefully, and then beckoned Connie to come with her. Ugh…if I don’t make it over that thing, I’m gonna be so sick when I wake up tomorrow morning, she thought drearily and then made the leap. She made it over safely--thank God!--and then lost her balance as her feet hit the ground, her legs fumbling drunkenly, and would have surely backed into that filthy stream of raw sewage had not Nicole grabbed her wrist at the very last second, pulling her forward and away from that pestilent stream.
“Thanks, Nicole.”
“Sure, no problem.”
And they walked on, and Connie struggled not to think about how close she had come to falling into that raw sewage stream and waking up the next morning with a bad case of Hepatitis, scabies, tape worm, or quite possibly some other disease or parasite that was richly disgusting and quite possibly fatal, diseases which made her skin crawl just thinking about them and which now left her feeling very sick all of a sudden.
Oh God, she though, sniffling and brushing away the snot from her nose absently with the back of her hand, I just wanna get outta here and go home already.
* * *
Deeper still into the forested barrens, a rat jumped on Connie’s jeans and she pelted it off with a closed fist, screaming and backing away frantically. “Whoa, whoa, watch it!” Nicole exclaimed just as Connie collided into her and they both fumbled, pinwheelling their arms and landed on their butts.
“Sorry,” Connie said, blushing.
“That’s okay,” Nicole replied, and they both giggled nervously. “You okay?”
“Yeah--a rat crawled on my leg and I panicked.” Connie rose to her feet and then helped Nicole back up. “I’m really sorry about that,” she said again, still blushing.
“It’s okay,” Nicole said and laughed, “I probably would’ve done the same thing.”
They made their way ever further into the barrens, sinking deeper into the woods, and they felt a very cold breeze rustling past them, making them shiver. “It’s getting kind of cold out here,” Connie said and Nicole nodded in agreement. “Starting to wish I brought my jacket.”
“Me, too,” Nicole agreed.
Along with the cold chills brushing callously against her back, Connie’s allergies were starting to get the best of her as well, and she found herself for the first time unsatisfied with her current allergy medication. It usually worked just fine to relieve her symptoms. But now, her head felt as though it had been crushed beneath a bulldozer, her eyes were flaming and watering at the same time and she had to brush the watering tears aside to see clearly, and her nose was burning irritably each time she inhaled. Connie placed her hands lightly over her nose and mouth and sneezed twice.
“God bless you,” said Nicole.
“Thank you,” Connie said meekly, sneezed again, and then rubbed her right index finger beneath her small upturned nose and sniffled lightly.
“Catching a cold?”
“No-allergies.”
“Oh,” Nicole said and nodded sympathetically, as Connie was pulled forward with the force of yet another three sneezes which burst forth from her very itchy and now slightly red now. “Bless you,” she said, patting Connie’s back tenderly.
“Ugh…yeah, thanks,” groaned Connie, sniffling once more.
* * *
Up ahead, about a hundred feet, they saw the rusting remains of an abandoned 1958 Cadillac, perhaps a gem at one time (Connie wouldn’t know, she wasn’t much of an expert on cars and didn’t even have her Learner’s Permit yet), but was now nothing more than an abandoned heap of rust left behind in these barrens since probably before Connie and Nicole were even born. It’s color was a dull gray, covered in rust and splotches of bird shit of a variety of shapes and sizes, the metal dented and corroding, all four tires flat and balled, possibly punctured--she couldn’t tell from this distance and obviously had no time to take a closer look. Beneath the car, she could make out a large pool of oil soaking into the soil like tar. The windows were all fogged and cracking, and on the windshield was a huge spider-web crack that ran down the middle. In other words, to put it kindly, that car was now a lemon. And while Connie wasn’t much of an expert on cars, she knew a piece of shit when she saw one and that ’58 Cadillac up ahead was definitely one fine, grade A piece of shit if she had ever seen one.
And up ahead about fifty feet, half the distance to that rusted relic of the mid-twentieth century, were the two little brats Connie and Nicole had been looking for. They moved closer to the two boys, who had been completely oblivious to their presence, and from the looks of things, it appeared that Dave was holding a rat in his pudgy hands, restraining it with stubby fingers.
“Told you he was probably torturing rats down here,” Connie whispered grudgingly to Nicole, starting to feel sick just imagining what Pete could be doing with the rodent. A part of her had hoped that the rat had rabies, but she pushed the thought away because it really wasn’t very nice.
“The sick little brat.” Nicole shuddered. “Probably going to grow up to be a serial killer.”
And it was Connie’s turn to shudder now. She had had an uncle who had been a serial killer in the nicer parts of the city, where Connie lived with her family. Her Uncle John wasn’t a big name serial killer, like Jeffrey Dahmer or Ted Bundy (Connie wasn’t much of an expert on serial killers either…and it was a topic she wanted nothing to do with either), but he had still managed to claim four victims before taking his own life in a police scuffle. Connie never like to think about Uncle John and neither did her parents; but Pete had idolized and greatly admired his Uncle. And the psycho-kid probably wanted to grow up to be just like him to.
“Does he wet the bed?” asked Nicole.
“Every single night.”
Nicole grinned good-naturedly. “Not a good sign, Connie. I heard once that bed-wetting’s a very common trait among serial killers.”
“Aw God, shut up, will you?” Connie snapped, trying to be firm but sounded very timid; her tone was that of a nervous whine more than anything else. “Just shut up, okay, Nicole? That’s not funny.”
Nicole shrugged absently, with that grin still on her face, but not as sharp as before. “Sorry.”
They approached the two boys and finally caught a more than a faint glimpse of the rat in Dave’s hands. They had gotten a good, long look at the dead and mutilated rodent, and it was more than Connie would have wanted to say. She was nauseated just looking at the thing. The rat wasn’t squirming; was barely twitching as it bled a thick crimson over Dave’s hands, its life fluid leaking out as Pete performed what looked to be a form of open-heart surgery on the rats with a rusty steak knife, saving the tiny organs in a small empty jar.
“Ugh…that’s just gross!” Connie cried, nearly retching, and Dave and Pete turned their attention toward her.
The gaze in Dave’s eyes was innocent enough; he never seemed to be the pillar of high intelligence to Connie. This “open-heart surgery” or “live dissection” or whatever you wanted to call it, on the rat was Pete’s idea, Connie was sure of it, and Dave most likely just went along with it as usual, without any question. Pete was always killing and pulling apart rats, stray cats, birds, and whatever else he could find and get his grubby little paws on in the barrens, and frankly, Connie found the whole thing to be nothing short of disturbing.
Oh God, I’m gonna be sick…think I’m gonna puke.
“Hiya, sis, how do you like my newest work of art?” asked Pete with a sharp grin on her face, a grin that made Connie even more distressed.
He was a bit of a scrawny little runt, a bit short for his age, but not quite reaching midget proportions. His flesh was extremely pale, ghost white, and he had dark hair, dark eyes and looked sort of like a ghoul with that emotionless reptilian gaze on his slack and pallid moonface. When he laughed, he sort of sounded like the Pillsbury Doughboy giggling at the end of those commercials when someone pokes him lightly on his belly, which, in itself, wasn’t disturbing but actually sort of cute, Connie thought, but it was the only thing she could ever find cute about her brother, the little devil child.
The rat slipped out through Dave’s grimy fingers and plopped on the cold, barren soil. He rubbed his hands together, the rat blood now partially dry, forming an adhesive resin over his palms, and the thought of what it would feel like to the touch made Connie feel like vomiting even more, and now the urge was nearly insurmountable.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, you stupid douche bag?” Pete yelled at Dave, nearly furious at him for what he had done. “Now you know the procedure, okay? You know how things have to be done. You can’t just throw the rat away, you-we haven’t even skinned the thing yet and now you’re throwing it aside? What the hell’s the matter with you. I’m warning you, we damned well better find it or so help me God--!”
“I’m sorry, Pete…Oh God, I’m just so sorry,” Dave whimpered fearfully, and for some reason, Connie couldn’t blame him at all for being afraid of Pete. He was scared of Pete, and Connie gazed at her with a look of empathy in her eyes, empathy for this slow-minded kid because she too had been frightened many times by her younger brother.
She heard something rustling through a bush behind her, from a distance but still just as sharp. It startled her and she bit down on her lip to stifle a fearful shriek. It’s probably just my imagination, she told herself. I’m just so nervous around Pete that I simply jump at ever sound, that’s all. Nothing’s out to get me and everything’s going to be all right. Pete’s a sicko, sure, but that’s no reason to be so jumpy, now is it?
Those footsteps again, rustling through the old, brown pine needles from behind. Someone…or something was coming for them. Footsteps…footsteps creeping ever closer to where she was standing…rats…no, not rats…something else entirely…but what…?
“I’m sorry, Pete…I’m sorry I did that,” Dave apologized nervously as he recoiled from Pete’s cold eyes. “I won’t do that again, I promise! I swear I won’t do it again, I--”
But before anything else could escape his lips, something…a Rottweiler, leapt from behind and pounced upon him, severing his jugular with its jaw, which, was like a steel trap, as it brought him down and pinned him to the ground with razor-sharp claws sinking into his chunky chest, drawing blood, which flowed and trickled over his torso. The dog bit into his neck again, with another spray of blood, and he made a sharp gurgling sound as blood began to flow from the corners of his lips, and the gaze in his eyes went from one of utter terror to one of death.
The Rottweiler looked up at the other three, its eyes blazing red and with a reddish white foam running down its lips. It growled at them fiercely as it bit off another chunk of flesh from Dave’s throat.
And finally that scream did escape from Connie’s lips, and then she puked all over herself, staining her cloths in her own vomit, leaving a battery-acid taste coating her tongue, and then was frozen in terror, her body numb all over. The Rottweiler looked up and growled at her and Connie was paralyzed in fear, almost hypnotized by the sight of those glaring red eyes pinning her in place. Her muscles cramped and went numbed, her heart racing, and she felt cold sweat run down her face and hot urine pour down her legs.
A hand closed around her wrist, and it was Nicole’s, trying to pull her away from the rabid beast whose bloodshot eyes seemed to burn a laser right through her. “Come on, Connie!” she screamed as she dragged her away to safety. Nicole was also scared out of her mind, but she had enough sense to get away to safety, and she dragged Connie along with her and they ran along with Pete, the three of them running in the same direction, as fast as they could, and with the drooling, rabid Rottweiler scuttling far behind, but gaining ground fast, getting closer with each passing second.
Up ahead, about fifty feet away, Connie could see that she and the other two were headed for that old rust-bucket of a car laying along the barrens, the ’58 Caddy that had probably been sitting here since, abandoned since before Connie was even born. It was definitely a useless hunk of junk that couldn’t pass inspection if the hypothetical owner’s life depended on it. It probably didn’t even run. But it was a safe haven, a place where the trio could hide safely from the rabid animal on their tail. Connie could see that and she was quite sure that Nicole and Pete could see that as well.
And so they headed for the hunk of junk gray Cadillac, their only saving grace from the savage beast chasing after them, snarling and foaming a thick white froth mixed in Dave’s blood from its mouth. It growled savagely, and the three of them ran even faster until they reached their destination, their safe haven in that hunk of junk car.
Once they reached the hunk of junk car, Pete went into the back seat of the vehicle with a sharp slam of the door, and Connie was so sure that he would lock her and Nicole out of the car, that he would find a way to lock the four doors quickly before the two girls managed to get in, and leaving them outside to be torn apart by the Rottweiler. Her first impulse was to hammer her fist against the windows, screaming hysterically for Pete to unlock the door…to unlock the fucking door right now and let her and Nicole in!
But the thing was that Pete hadn’t locked the door as Connie had feared he would. He instead sat still on the seat, unshaken, unconcerned with what had just happened, in a Zen-like state almost as he stared ahead with a completely blank expression on his face.
Don’t just sit there, you little twerp, open the damn door and let us in! Connie wanted to scream, but not a sound would escape her lips, save for a few hitched breaths. Panic had already gotten hold of her completely, nearly paralyzing her entirely. She’d been so petrified she couldn’t scream, couldn’t speak, and could barely even breathe. Time seemed to stand still on that one agonizing second before her impending death. She turned her head just a bare inch to the right, catching a brief glimpse of the Rottweiler coming for her in her peripheral, and immediately turned away, unable to witness her own demise.
“Oh God, Connie, you gotta snap out of it! Nicole screamed. “Snap out of it please!” Nicole tore the driver’s side door open and dived in immediately, beckoning Connie to come in after her. “Damn it, Connie snap out of it right now…please!”
But Connie couldn’t move, could barely hear her friends pleas, which rang distant in her ears as she felt the ground shaking, felt her muscles tightening even further as she grew even more terrified, as she felt the Rottweiler closing in on her.
She felt something close over her wrist, and the shock was enough to startle the scream that had seemed to be building up in her lungs forever in one high-pitched, deafening blast. The long, shrill scream lingered on even after she had realized that it was Nicole whom had once again grabbed her wrist and was once again pulling her to safety.
Yet it was enough to get her adrenaline going again, and instead of allowing herself to be pulled along for the ride this time, she had leapt into the car, landing hard on top of her friend, and while she would have under normal circumstances apologized for this, blushing brightly with embarrassment, but she was too frightened to care at this moment, and there wasn’t any time anyway.
She turned her head toward the door, noticing it was still open, noticing that the Rottweiler was still charging after them, now barely ten yards away from the Caddy. Connie threw herself immediately off of Nicole, grasped the inside door handle and pulled it shut with a hard slam right before the Rottweiler was about to leap in.
Aw God…that was too close, she thought, her nerves still frazzled, as she fell back lightly against the grimy car seat.
* * *
Darkness fell at last, and inside the car, it was freezing. Connie and Nicole held each other tightly, trying to draw from each other’s body heat for warmth, and were shivering in each other’s arms, white smoke pluming from their mouths and noses. Connie wondered which was worse, being in this car, or outside with the dog. It was cold outside as well, but at least it wasn’t as filthy as in here--not that the barrens outside would qualify for the Mr. Clean Seal of Approval either, but still…
Her allergies were ten times worse in here than out there with all the belligerent dust floating around in the air and the lint and mold lying over every surface of the interior. It was atrocious, the filth that was accumulating in this abandoned vehicle. On the dashboard was a thick layering of grayish brown dust. There was mold growing all over the upholstery, as well as on the seating. She, Nicole, and Pete were all sitting on some of the mold--it was impossible not to. The floor mats were the worst hit with mold, which coated them like a protective cover. And it absolutely reeked in the car, as though someone had died, left to rot in this toxic fortress.
But what did she expect? This thing was sitting here probably for over twenty years now.
And it was still better than being ripped to shreds out there, right?
Sitting in this car, while the Rottweiler stood vigilant outside like a sentry guard guarding his special post, not letting his guard down even for a second was like hell. This was truly what hell was all about. No raging inferno. No geek in red with huge horns poking you in the ass with a pitchfork. Just this constant fear, fear that the rabid dog might somehow find a way in, might suddenly burst in and kill them all in a matter of seconds, just savagely tear them apart.
Sitting here with her pants still damp and reeking of piss was now starting to give her a bad rash, which was the worst around her inner thighs and vaginal area. Her clothes must have reeked just now, her shirt stained in vomit and her pants still damp in piss. The acrid vapors secreted from all the dust and mold was burning up her flaring, irritated sinuses and stirring up her way-too-sensitive allergies. It was like she had inhaled beaker of acid, like someone had shoved a lit match all the way up her nose; and she was coughing and sneezing all too frequently. Her temples throbbed and her head felt as though it had been crushed by a speeding tanker truck and then having the truck back up and run her head over once more just for good luck. And her hazel eyes, now gone a heavy bloodshot, just couldn’t stop watering.
“How ya faring, sis?” asked Pete from behind.
“Leave me alone, you creep,” Connie muttered bitterly and muffled a sneeze into her cupped hands, feeling absolutely miserable. “Ugh…just leave me alone.”
She had completely lost track of time here, not having the slightest clue how long it had been. Oh if only she had a watch. Several hours in the car in reality, but to her it seemed like years…it might as well have been years. That’s literally what it felt like. She was only fifteen, but the way she felt now, and at the slow pace time was literally dragging by, it felt as though she should be twenty-one; long past being a minor and now a full adult with all rites allotted by now being twenty-one. But she wasn’t twenty-one, only fifteen.
She had never been so scared in her life. Her heart was hammering against her chest and her stomach was tightly coiled in a triple knot and then contorted in a twisted coil that was tearing at the seams.
She looked out the side window, gripping the handle and about to open the door. The Rottweiler was still there, but it appeared to be sleeping. She creaked it open barely a crack, and the dog heard it, shot its piercing red eyes in her direction in a predatory stare, and that was enough to make her flinch back and slam the door all the way. This time she even punched the lock down, making sure all the doors were locked in the vehicle because it suddenly seemed very necessary that all the doors were locked. Don’t be ridiculous, Connie, she told herself. Dogs can’t open car doors…especially dogs with rabies. But that didn’t matter. She still had to do it.
“Pete, make sure the doors are locked back there,” she ordered him sternly.
“What’s the point of that, sis?”
“Damn it, don’t argue with me! Just do it!”
She reached across the seat, past where Nicole was sitting, and slammed her lock down just as Pete locked the two rear doors.
There, that’s better, she thought, almost placidly.
Her head went down upon the seat once more, just hard enough to bring up a thin black cloud of dust that went up her nose and burned her sinuses. She sneezed noisily three times. Besides exacerbating her throbbing headache, increasing the flow of water from her bloodshot eyes and the flow of snot from her nose (she had also gotten snot all over her hands as well and wiped it over her jeans with wretched distaste), and raising the temperature of her sinuses another six hundred degrees, Connie’s sneezes also seemed to stir up the Rottweiler, who emerged shakily to its feet and started barking savagely. It barked and growled up at the full moon, with thick foam raining down its muzzle, and each savage, roaring bark sent more startling waves pulsing throughout Connie’s body, making her gasp fearfully and recoil back as far from the side window as possible until her shoulder brushed up against Nicole.
“God bless you, sis,” Pete said, grinning that creepy grin of his that sent chills up Connie’s spine.
“Thank you,” said Connie, listlessly and glanced to the side, at Nicole.
She was really getting worried about Nicole. Nicole wasn’t faring that well. She was in shock, sitting in a fetal position with her face pressed against her knees, crying and babbling incoherently to herself, her whole body shaking as she sat there in her own excretions and barely seemed to notice. Connie was worried about her now, worried about her mental state. None of them were going to escape totally intact (except maybe Pete), but Connie couldn’t help wondered whether Nicole was just hysterical (perfectly understandable under the circumstances) or if she had gone completely insane. Would there be any way for Nicole (or Connie for that matter) to escape with at least some of her sanity intact?
Would any of them escape from this dreaded piece of hell on earth alive and in one piece?
Would they make it out of here at all?
Not that it mattered either way to Pete, not judging from that grin on his face. From the looks of it, Pete was actually enjoying what was going on. He was thriving on it. God, he was crazy. He was a complete lunatic, in fact. He wasn’t in the least bit afraid by what could happen, not the least bit concerned at how this would all turn out, and not the least bit upset by what had already happened.
Dave, his best friend, his only friend, had been killed by the Rottweiler, his throat chewed open…oh God, it made Connie sick just thinking about it…but Pete wasn’t bothered by it at all. His best friend was dead now, just killed mere hours ago, and the devil child didn’t seem to care in the slightest. “Boy, Ol’ Rover there, he really chewed out that fat fuck back there, didn’t he, sis?” Pete had said earlier tonight and laughed heartily.
He was doing just fine, eerily fine, while Nicole was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, nearly falling over the edge of insanity perhaps never to return again, sitting there and soaking in her urine-soaked panties. Connie was sweating like a pig, hacking painfully, puking, sitting in her own urine, and sneezing her brains out as well. Why, Connie was on the verge of her own nervous breakdown.
And what was happening to Petey?
Nothing, that’s what. He was doing just fine. And Connie now hated him for it. Jealousy burned through her core and she hated Pete for being able to stay so damned calm, for being able to keep his mind so serene and so tranquil.
And that grin on his face…it was the same grin he was wearing when--
No, Connie, no, don’t think about that, okay, that was years ago and it has nothing to do with what’s happening now, okay, so just don’t think about it! Just concentrate on the here and now and not on the past. Just concentrate on finding a way to get you, Nicole…and yes, even Pete , out of this mess alive!
--when Aunt Vera had fallen down the flight of stairs to her death!
The loud crash had startled Connie and her parents out of their own little world and they came rushing toward the source of the sudden noise, only to find Aunt Vera dead at the bottom of the stairs. Cause of death: a broken neck. She had slipped down the stairs and had broken her neck on the fall.
There wasn’t much evidence saying that Pete had anything to do with the fall, and no one ever accused him...no one ever really suspected that he had anything to do with it. Even Connie wasn’t completely sure that Pete had intentionally made Aunt Vera slip and fall down the stairs. But it was Pete’s marbles that made Aunt Vera slip and fall down the stairs, Pete’s marbles, now scattered at the top of the stairs.
But their presence there might have been innocent enough, despite the horrid end result. Pete always was a slob, his bedroom always a pigsty, with his toys scattered on the floor and his bed a helter-skelter disarray of linen and blankets on a mattress on a bedstead, with a pillow sitting there like an artificial cherry on top.
But even if the presence of those deadly marbles on the top of those stairs wasn’t a deathtrap he had set for anyone unfortunate enough to walk up or down that flight of stairs, it still didn’t change what Connie saw. Her parents didn’t notice it--they were too busy with their futile attempts of struggling to revive Aunt Vera by any means necessary--but Connie did. She saw Pete standing at the top of the stairs, looking down upon Aunt Vera’s dead corpse. And Connie would never forget the look on Pete’s face just then. It was neither haggard, nor distressed, nor outright terror. Instead, what was on his face was a big, ugly, creepy grin a grin, of great pride and gratification.
It was that same totally creepy grin he had plastered over his face right now.
* * *
“How ya doing?” Connie asked Nicole soothingly, as they held each other in one another’s arms, giving each other comfort.
“I’m okay,” Nicole replied. “How ‘bout you?”
“I’m fine,” Connie answered, coughing hoarsely.
Outside, it was still dark. The full moon shone through the thin canopy above, gleaming off what was left of the panes on the broken side mirrors of the heap of junk car. And the Rottweiler was staggering drunkenly around the car, its rabid drool raining down from its snout in a thick froth, spittle flying from its lips with every savage bark. Its red eyes blazed in its furry dog skull as it stood vigilant guard, ready to pounce upon anyone foolish enough to come out.
What’re we gonna do? Connie thought grimly, sniffling wetly. We can’t stay here forever.
Nicole cleared her throat, coughed, and said: “Starting to get a little thirsty.”
“Yeah…me too,” Connie agreed, feeling a sharp thirst prickling the back of her own throat.
She wondered grimly how long she’d be able to keep lubricating the back of her throat with saliva (which was only effective in moistening it for a few seconds before it dried up again), before her salivating glands finally dried up. Her mouth was already feeling a bit on the dry side, and she had stopped sweating about a half-hour ago. Even if she had a cup to pee in, she doubted very much that she could actually go through with the act of drinking her own urine…it grossed her out just thinking about it. Yuck!
“What are we going to do?”
“I don’t know,” Connie said, stroking Nicole’s red hair and then rubbing her back. “But we’ll think of something…it’ll be okay, and we’ll somehow get out of this alive.” And then, after saying that, Connie thought: I hope.
“They’ll never find us here, Connie, they--”
“We’ll think of something. Don’t worry” But Connie had been unsure of that proclamation herself.
“Aw, ain’t this a touching scene here,” Pete said suddenly, grinning and laughing unpleasantly. “Truly a poignant, touching scene. Just brings tears to my eyes.” He put his hand to his face, brushing off imaginary tears. He then chuckled giddily and cracked his knuckles.
* * *
Connie had finally managed to doze off (barely) when she was suddenly awakened to full alertness when she felt the car shake slightly (she had always been a very light sleeper, particularly in times of great stress…like now for instance). It was Pete, who had gotten up and was now rolling down the window and unzipping his pants. “Pete, what the hell do you think you’re doing?” she asked, finding the whole thing extremely unsettling.
“Sorry, sis, didn’t mean to wake ya. But right now, I really gotta take a piss. Excuse me.” And he was then standing in front of the right window, behind Connie, and was peeing out the window, which had been rolled down halfway.
“Ugh…that’s disgusting, Pete!” moaned Connie. “And don’t call me sis .”
“Whatever you say…sis.”
“Aren’t you afraid the dog with rabies might get in here and--” Nicole began.
“I don’t think he fears anything,” Connie interrupted, whispering into Nicole’s ear.
Nicole nodded.
But she was right, the Rottweiler had seen the new opening, and came staggering drunkenly to it with heavy foam still dripping from its snout. And Pete was still standing there, keeping a straight face and peeing out the window without a care in the world and without an ounce of fear in his eyes.
It made Connie think back to all those long car trips they had been on during family outings and family vacations, where Pete would take his allowance and buy an extra large Coke at McDonald’s or the movies or somewhere, guzzle the whole thing down before they left (without telling Mommy and Daddy, of course), and then get into the car when they were ready to go, claiming to have gone to the bathroom when in fact he really didn’t.
And so the long car trip to wherever would begin. They would stop at a restaurant for lunch. They would stop at various gas stations and Seven-Elevens along the way for the whole family to go to the bathroom. But Pete would always say that he didn’t have to go to the bathroom right now, or he might stand in front of a urinal in the Men’s Room and make it look like he was urinating just to make Mommy and Daddy happy. But he would never go. Instead, he would hold it in, and hold it in, and hold it in some more. And then, around halfway through the long family car trip, Pete would finally void his bladder while everyone was still in the car and they were on the road. He would intentionally piss in his pants, just to gross everyone out.
And Connie, being in the back seat of Dad’s four-door Escort, would always be the first to notice. She would catch a glance at a newly formed dark patch around Pete’s crotch, expanding down his legs, and then would cringe in disgust as she moved closer and closer to the car door. Sometimes the urine would even get all over the seat and leave a stain. And he would sit in it in a perfectly natural sitting posture as though nothing were at all the matter, sitting in his own piss and with a sharp, creepy grin plastered over his face.
And when Mommy and Daddy found out about how their little Petey had pissed in his pants and confronted him about it, he would always look so remorseful and so ashamed about it. “I’m sorry, Mommy and Daddy,” he would say with wide, apologetic eyes, “I didn’t mean to do it.” And of course, Mom and Dad would always believe him, because he sounded so convincing. And as with everything else Pete did, they didn’t notice the way he was grinning. Only Connie noticed that ha-gotcha-again grin that was plastered all over his face.
He could fool his parents but not his older sister.
And if ever there were a time to pull that incredibly gross routine of intentionally wetting his pants to gross everyone else out, now probably would have been that time. But instead, he decided to pee through the wide-open car window, with the Rottweiler charging toward him, and without even flinching. Connie could just imagine the Rottweiler leaping into the car through the open window, tearing through Pete to get inside and then finishing off Connie and Nicole as well. It was a very feasible scenario, and one that was all-too real in Connie’s mind, but apparently not in Pete’s, for Pete was just standing their, voiding his bladder naturally, and without even flinching back.
Pete, I know you’re a little bit on the slow side upstairs, thought Connie, anxiously, but even you must realize the insanity of your actions.
And then, as if responding to that thought herself: Yeah right, Connie, wishful thinking. This is Pete we’re talking about, the devil child, not some normal kid. Insanity’s his middle name!
* * *
What exactly was wrong with Pete, Connie just couldn’t say. She knew that there was something within him that just wasn’t right, some abnormality, some abomination within his dark and morbid psyche. She had always known, always suspected for about as long as she could possibly remember that there was something within Pete that just wasn’t right.
Once, when she was eight and taking a bubble bath one night, just sitting around in suds up to her collarbone, perfectly relaxed, not concerned with anything at the moment, lost in a daydream of soap bubbles and scented bath oil, relaxing after a long day at school and another long couple of hours of homework, her mind edging toward a Zen-like state of contentment, the likes of which she only usually reached when sleeping. She was perfectly calm in that tub, and everything was perfectly fine…perfectly fine until Pete pushed the door open.
It was just a slight nudge really, nothing more than what was enough to get it open far enough. Far enough for Connie to see his hand reaching inside, holding that Connie had only at first gotten a brief glimpse of, something she couldn’t quite make out just yet. It was far enough for the Devil Child to toss that dreaded something into the tub, and then softly pull the door shut once more. She felt something plop down into the water, and then Pete went away. Annoyed, she opened her eyes and glanced down.
What she saw there made her breath stop and her eyes widen until they were round as saucers. Her mouth dropped open as her face contorted in horrified revulsion, as if to allow a scream to escape. Her jaw worked, but nothing came out of Connie’s mouth.
The crow’s open eyes, glazed and milky white, stared out at her. Not only was it dead, it appeared to have been so for some time, the victim of a stray cat or perhaps even a car. Its feathers were muddy and tangled, its rubbery yellow toes curled in rigor mortis. Poking out from its open beak, Connie could see the bird’s tongue, dry and gray. Then her sudden movements made the water move, causing the crow to lurch and stand almost upright, as if it were glaring right at her with those horrible dead eyes.
The girl recoiled, a hiss escaping her lips.
And that was when she saw the maggots. Not one, not two, but an entire colony beginning to tumble out into the water, convulsing as they drowned in the sweet smelling liquid where Connie had been resting peacefully only seconds ago. It was the maggots that finally gave Connie the power to leap out of the now contaminated bathwater, soaking wet, and utter a scream that tore through the quiet house like a sharpened knife.
Her screams were long, shrill, very, very loud, and seemingly endless. Not even when her parents rushed upstairs into the bathroom could she stop screaming. Terrified tears streamed down her face and she just couldn’t stop screaming.
“Connie…Connie, what is it…what’s wrong?” asked her mother as she and Daddy burst into the bathroom.
“In…in the tub…s-something in the…in the tub!” she cried out in a frightened stammer, unable to say anything more. Her mother then held Connie in her arms, comforting her as she wept fearfully.
Daddy then took a glance into the tub, his own eyes widening as he saw the decaying piece of road kill floating around in the now soiled bathwater, truly stunned and perhaps a bit disturbed at what he had found. “What the…? How…Jesus Christ…what’s a dead crow doin’ in there?”
Later on, after Connie had calmed down a bit, she explained what had happened and how Pete had been the one who had thrown the crow in the tub, and Mommy and Daddy had dismissed, albeit gently, her claims. It was almost patronizing the way they explained that in the shock of what had happened, she must have imagined something like that happening. And if they did question Pete regarding the incident, he know doubt denied any involvement, and they no doubt took his word for it, took the word of that demon, that devil child, that complete and total psychopath, over Connie’s.
Her parents were aware that Pete was somehow different. They would have agreed with her on that, they would have gone that far. As time went by, her father even began to suspect that Pete’s deviance might not be something one could easily shrug off. Connie had always lived in an open-minded family and had been brought up to be open-minded about other people’s differences as well, not to be racist or overly judgmental about certain deviant aspects of other people’s lives.
But with everything else, everyone had their limits and we each had to draw the line somewhere. No matter how open-minded you were, would you treat one of those famous serial killers as an equal, someone like Charles Manson or Timothy McVeigh if you were to ever get the chance to meet them face-to-face? Or somehow meet the two kids responsible for the Columbine shooting one year earlier, or perhaps go back in time sixty years to meet Adolph Hitler or some other historical tyrant?
Of course Pete hadn’t done nearly as much damage, caused nearly as much destruction or taken anywhere near that many human lives as some of those other guys, but give him a chance, Connie figured. He was still young and had his whole life ahead of him. Give him about ten or twenty years to see the kind of monster he would no doubt grow up to become if something wasn’t done about him and soon.
The boy needed help, desperately needed professional help while he was still young enough to be molded into something not quite as scary, and perhaps not quite as dangerous as well. Overtime, while at first refusing to believe any of it, her father slowly began to realize and come to terms with the truth as well. There was something wrong with Pete, something that needed to be corrected before it was too late. He was even willing to dish out hundreds of bucks on psychiatric help for Pete, as much of a cheapskate as Connie’s old man could be at times, if it would mean getting the boy the help that he so desperately needed.
“We do not need to waste our time and your hard-earned money on a shrink just so Pete can take an inkblot test and get hooked on Prozac,” she’d insisted fiercely many times, as though issues like time and money were really at the heart of the matter for her in the first place. “Just because your brother turned out to be some sicko serial killer doesn’t mean the same thing will happen to Pete, you know.”
It had been the source of many heated arguments for Connie’s parents over the years. While other couples bickered about finances, flirtations, and who was putting more into the relationship and who was getting more out of it, they argued over what should be done with Pete. Mom would have gone as far as to admit that Pete wasn’t like other boys his age, sure, and that he was a bit of a deviant; but would go no further than that. He was just quiet and soft-spoken, that’s all. So he had a tougher time making friends. Maybe he was just shy-nothing wrong with that, now was there? And despite the evidence presented, she would never even entertain the possibility that there was anything more to it than that.
And it seemed that she always had to have the last word on everything no matter what.
She looked at his messy room, and dismissed that as common boyish behavior to be a slob like that, as would have Connie--there was nothing unnatural about that. Sure, he was a habitual bed-wetter, but so were a lot of other children, both boys and girls (although Connie hadn’t done that sort of thing since she was about four or five). Regarding Pete’s low grades, well, there could be a number of reasons for that, such as a possible learning disability. Connie and her father would have acknowledged that as well.
But surely Mommy should have known of Pete’s various after-school activities, down here at the barrens and perhaps in a few other places in the city. And they also should have been aware of Pete’s collection of jars that he kept hidden in his closet, that Connie had once had the misfortune of glimpsing. Jars that contained dead flies floating around in aging urine filled a quarter inch below the top and then sealed off in that rancid tomb for all eternity if Pete had his way with things. Mom should have been aware of those things. But it seemed she wouldn’t allow herself to see them.
She would remain forever in denial.
To everyone else, Pete was just a quiet, soft-spoken young lad who mostly kept to himself, failing all or most of his subjects but really not causing any trouble, not picking on any of his fellow students and not getting picked on himself for the most part, and really just keeping a low profile, except for a gross little “prank” of his every now and then. He obviously didn’t have some kind of conduct disorder or anything like that. He had a rather colorful history of goosing some of the girls in his class, but other than that, he rarely ever openly caused any trouble, although he could be deceitful at times and was an occasional thief.
At one time, they might have suspected him of having ADD or something like that, but those suspicions were quickly debunked--the majority of the symptoms for ADD weren’t displayed from Pete; he just didn’t fit the paradigm (it was perhaps the only time ever that Mommy ever had taken Pete to a psychiatrist). And so, most people concluded, more or less, that Pete was simply withdrawn, a diagnosis that had yet to be either confirmed or debunked but which Connie and her father had rejected it all the same.
It was more than just skepticism on her part of that diagnosis. She knew it was wrong and that Pete was screwed up but in a much more dangerous and creepy way. It wasn’t withdrawal from the world but his own morbidly sick and twisted way of experiencing the environment around him. Some of the things he had done went well beyond a child innocently pulling the legs off an insect or some kind of curiosity, healthy or otherwise, about death, etc., well beyond the realm of morbid curiosity.
Little Brother Pete was a sick bastard and that was all there was to it!
And it wasn’t just Connie who had been at the butt end of one of Pete’s “cute little pranks” either, but sometimes the whole family and those whom came into contact with Pete for whatever reason: such as his teachers, classmates, etc. One example had been the time that Pete had put butcher knives where their mother had slept, beneath one of the pillows of their parents’ queen-sized bed. It had been years ago when Pete did that, for no apparent reason whatsoever. It was another one of his “cute little pranks,” Connie supposed.
Their mother had come home from working not really feeling too great--tired and a bit under the weather. She was planning on going straight to bed as soon as she was done going to the bathroom; and so Pete got a butcher knife from the kitchen and hid it by her pillow. She was a bit too dazed and disoriented, her mind in too much of a mental lull at the time to actually look where she was lying and notice something lying there that shouldn’t be there; she probably would have just jumped right in without a second thought. And had she lain down the wrong way, or made the wrong movement while in bed, with that knife lying sharply near the pillow the way it was…
Well, luckily Connie was there to take the knife off the bed and put it where it rightfully belonged.
But that was the thing with Pete, you really had to watch him--not for his sake, but for your own, because you never knew what he might do next.
It was why Connie always, always, always made sure to lock her bedroom door before going to sleep. Her mother protested heavily against that practice, insisting that should a fire break out in the house while Connie was asleep, she wouldn’t be able to get out of the house on time. But Connie rebutted that argument saying that she could easily get out through her bedroom window, seeing as how it was a single story house they lived in, and that she was better off doing so. But regardless, Connie locked the bedroom door anyway, regardless of what her mother had to say. Having never so much as witnessed a house burning down except on TV, let alone having her own house catch fire, it wasn’t really a concern in Connie’s mind. She was much more worried about Little Brother Pete coming into her bedroom and strangling her to death while she slept, which was a very legitimate concern on her part.
There was really no telling what insanely morbid stunts Pete might try to pull off next. He was completely unpredictable…spontaneous in all the wrong ways.
* * *
And now look at the sick little runt, standing by the halfway opened side window and peeing out there, not seeming to care in the slightest that the Rottweiler was charging ferociously at him, barking and snarling and splattering its rabid spittle every which way.
I know that when nature calls, nature calls, Connie thought, anxious for him to just be done with it and close that goddamned window already, but couldn’t you have just peed in the other window, on the side where the dog wasn’t standing guard?
Pete finally finished urinating and figured that the more prudent thing to do would be to zip his fly first and then close the window while the dog was gaining ground fast--and that’s exactly what he did.
I swear that little freak has absolutely no common sense whatsoever!
It was while Pete was in the midst of rolling the window back up that the Rottweiler finally made it to the car, and while the window was only rolled down three quarters of the way, the dog leapt up in midair with a quick slash, raking its claws against Pete’s face before bashing its head against the car door. The blow had taken Pete back a few inches, and blood was now trickling lightly down his cheek in a few thin crimson strings, but Pete didn’t seem to mind. He simply went over to the door and rolled the window back up.
The Rottweiler was in a mad frenzy now, desperate to get inside the car and kill its three occupants at any and all costs, and both Nicole and Connie were pressing back against the passenger side door, screaming long and shrilling as the rabid monster growled, snarled, and barked with great ferocity, bashing its head against the side door again and again, jumping up on its hind legs and then raking its claws against the window and leaving long scratch marks in the pane. Whatever it took for it to get into the car and tear the occupants apart, that’s what it would do.
Nicole and Connie continued to scream…they just couldn’t stop screaming…for the life of them, they just couldn’t stop.
And as for Pete…well, he was laughing.
The Rottweiler raked its claws once more against the side windowpane and then backed away from the car by a couple of feet. It was then that it charged toward the car once more, rammed its head against the car door, and Connie heard a loud crunch upon impact.
Please let that be its skull…please let that be its skull…oh God, please let that be its skull…please let it be its skull…
But it didn’t fracture its skull upon impact, but left a bit of a dent in the car door, and its forehead was now gushing blood, which streamed down its face.
“Oh for the love of God, could that fucking thing PLEASE just puke all over itself and DIE already!” Connie heard herself shout fiercely. She was crying now, tears streaming down her face, and Nicole was crying as well.
And as for Pete, well, Pete was still laughing.
"Stop laughing, Pete, right now! It’s not funny, Pete…just STOP laughing already!” she screamed at him hysterically. “Goddamn it, Pete, stop laughing because IT'S NOT FUNNY!”
But Pete just wouldn’t stop laughing.
The Rottweiler rammed its head against the car door again…and again…and again, and each time it did, Connie and Nicole drew closer and close together in each other’s arms. The Rottweiler forced its head against the door once more and then starting flailing and swinging about its front legs madly, savagely clawing at both the metal of the car and the window, and snarling insanely.
All of a sudden, a squirrel shot out from beneath the car and raced past the Rottweiler in a split-second before scurrying away, but it was enough to divert the Rottweiler’s attention from the three occupants of the junk-heap car, and it sped off after the squirrel instead, charging after it with full fury and forgetting all about Connie, Pete, and Nicole, leaving them alive and unharmed.
Pete stopped laughing, but still kept that grin on his pale, ghoulish face, and said: “Whoa…now that was a close one, wasn’t it?”
But the girls, while they had stopped screaming, were still crying in each other’s arms.
* * *
Their crying soon tapered off to a few sobs and sniffles and then stopped completely, although their nerves were still a bit frazzled and they were still shaking, even though they had already realized that the dog had just left and chosen a new target.
Nicole said: “We gotta do something guys. We gotta think of a way out of here. It…it just can’t go on like this. It can’t. We gotta think of a plan or something.”
“But what’re we gonna do?” asked Connie.
“Maybe what we need is a martyr,” suggested Pete and shot an eerie gaze at Nicole.
“What’s he mean by that?” Nicole was now suddenly very much afraid. “Why’s he looking at me like that? What the hell’s he talking about, a ‘martyr’?”
“Nothing, Nicole. Just ignore him, okay? He’s crazy. He needs help, okay? Just ignore him.”
“I’m just saying that maybe its time for Nicole here to sacrifice her life for the greater good, meaning our survival, sis. It’s truly the noble thing for her to do, wouldn’t you agree?” And his eyes were locked in this cold, reptile gaze that made Connie feel a sudden deathly chill sweep over her. And Connie realized--not for the first time ever, of course--that she really didn’t hate Pete as much as she feared him. He was a scrawny little runt, but he still scared her nonetheless. His very presence was eerie enough, and his ideas, the things he did, why, everything about that morbid little sociopath had scared Connie half to death nearly every single day of her life.
“That’s the plan, sis,” Pete went on. “We let Old Yeller over there have Nicole and tear her apart limb from limb, while we make a break for it. So, what do you say? You game?”
“No way, Pete, I’m not gonna do it!” Nicole cried out in sudden panic. “No way am I just gonna--”
“Relax, Nicole. Just ignore him like I told you. He’s full of shit, okay. He’s crazy, and he’s completely full of shit. Just ignore him and relax; we’re not going to do that. We’ll find another way. Don’t worry, we’ll find a way so that we can all get out alive.”
“Yeah, wishful thinkin’, sis,” Pete said and laughed, and right now, Connie just wanted to smack the sick little freak. And if you call me ‘sis’ one more time, Pete, I swear I’ll smack you. “Think about it, Dave sacrificed his life so the three of us could get in this car safe and sound. So maybe its time for Nicole to make that same sacrifice so the two of us can leave the dump unscathed and completely unmolested.”
“Damn it, Pete just shut up, okay. Just shut up!” Connie ordered sternly.
“Come on, Nicole, let’s get you prepared for your big sacrifice,” he said, giggling that Pillsbury Doughboy laugh of his. But despite the laugh, what he was saying wasn’t at all a joke to Pete; he was dead serious all the way, and Connie knew that the sick puppy devil child was more than willing to go through with it.
“If anyone gets sacrificed to the dog here it’s gonna be YOU, Pete! Now shut up!” Connie finally snapped, screaming at him with such vehemence and anger. And for that split-second, feeding Pete to the rabid Rottweiler had actually seemed like a very good idea.
* * *
For the fifteen minutes or so, the three of them remained in awkward silence.
Then, Nicole broke that silence with a subtle cough, and said: “We better think of some way out of this, guys…without sacrificing my life to the rabid K9, thank you very much.” She stuck her tongue out at Pete, then turned her attention back toward Connie and said, “There’s gotta be some way out of this, right?”
“I hear you,” Connie agreed, “and I have an idea.”
“What kind of idea is that?”
“I think maybe we should just leave, the three of us, right now and just walk out of here.”
“What? You’ve got to be kidding, Connie. That’s--”
“Now might be our best time to do it.”
“Are you crazy?”
“Look, we all saw the dog chase that squirrel, right? Its attention would be on catching and killing that squirrel, wouldn’t it? Even if it got the squirrel already, it might have gotten lost and forgotten all about us.”
“Yeah, but Connie, we don’t know for sure--”
“You said so yourself, Nicole. We can’t stay here forever.”
Nicole frowned and nodded reluctantly.
“Well, now might be our best and possibly only chance of escape. And I say we take it while we still can before we lose it.”
“Fine,” Nicole agreed reluctantly.
Pete said nothing, displaying no biases for or against Connie’s plan of escape.
* * *
They had left the car, and Connie was already starting to have doubts about her little plan. What if the dog was here all along, hiding in the shadows, behind a tree, waiting to ambush them when they were dumb enough to believe it was truly safe to come out of the car. Another few paces, and the compelling urge to just bolt right back into that car was strong in Connie, getting stronger by the second, and while a part of her just couldn’t take this anymore, just wanted to leave the barrens and finally have this be over, another part actually wanted to turn around right now and get the hell back into that safe haven of a piece of junk car that didn’t even work anymore.
Come on, Connie, this was your idea, so don’t chicken out now.
But on the other hand, the temptation to get back in that car was very strong. She fought to keep looking ahead, not wanting to look behind her, where the car was, not wanting to stare at it, but it was hard not to. It was almost as if the car were actually calling her back, begging her to get back inside; like it was a magnetic force, pulling her and the others back, back into its false sense of security, and Connie almost yearned to go back, to give into its pleas, its promises, its temptations.
Just keep going, Connie, don’t turn back, don’t chicken out now, she told herself. It’s a false sense of security in there and that’s all it is. Sure it can protect us from the dog. But how long can the three of us possibly last without any food or water? And let’s face it; I’m already dying of thirst.
And so they went on, and the farther they got from the car, the weaker the urge to rush back in there was for Connie, but she was still afraid. There was something about that car. She couldn’t put her finger on it, as she couldn’t put her finger on what was wrong with Pete, but she didn’t like that car, she didn’t like it at all. She hated that fucking car! She hated it in the car, and she hated having to worry about that dog, and having to worry about what Pete might decide he felt like doing.
It was out of the frying pan and into the fire for those three.
She noticed it was still dark outside, the full moon was clearly seen through the blackened sky, and it showed no signs of lightening up into dawn. It was still night, maybe really, really early in the morning, like one o’clock, two o’clock, or quite possibly three o’clock a.m., but definitely not a minute later than three a.m. It had seemed like they had spent an eternity in that car, but in reality, it had only been eight or nine hours at the most, possibly not even that.
It was almost as though time had frozen and stood still in the rest of the world, while it continued to pass by and the trio continued to age while inside that car. What was it about that car? It was like it had been cursed somehow. As scary as it was out here, knowing that that dog could be anywhere in these dark woods, Connie felt a sense of eerie relief to finally be out of that hellish car.
Still, Connie flinched at every corner, at every step she took, expecting the Rottweiler to leap out at any second, from behind any tree or large rock, and tear the three of them apart in as many seconds. But she had to get out of that car. She’d go insane if she didn’t. She could already feel herself sinking further and further down into the realm of pure insanity. She had to get out and salvage whatever sanity she actually had left. But the fear was still there and still strong, nonetheless. God, that dog could be anywhere, he could be following us right now and we wouldn’t even know it! And she had even clasped her hands to her mouth on a couple of turns to keep from screaming, she was so scared.
Nicole was probably just as nervous, she supposed.
But let’s face it, people, Petey was no doubt getting through this just fine.
* * *
The reached that small shit-and-piss stream, which was no more than ankle high from the looks of things. The rabid dog could easily get over it, and perhaps had already done so. Still, they had to cross it somehow to get out of here alive. Without hesitation, Connie leapt over the small stream and landed on the other side without a problem. Nicole followed suit. Pete went third.
Once all three of them had made the leap, they moved on.
* * *
“Hey, I wonder where the old, rabid dog is right about now,” Pete said suddenly--about ten minutes and half a mile after the jump over that filthy, biohazardous small stream--and what he did next, not even Connie could foresee. “HEY, ROVER, WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU, YA STUPID MUTT!” he screamed obnoxiously, and finally, Connie did smack him.
“What’s the matter with you, Pete?” She smacked him again, and then thought: God, the sick little brat’s gonna get us all killed! It’s his fault we’re here in the first place. We wouldn’t be in this mess right now if it weren’t for him. If we didn’t have to come here and get him after dinner because he didn’t show up, Nicole and I would be at our homes, sleeping in our beds, nice and safe. It’s his fault we’re here, and now he’s gonna get us all killed for no reason at all!
Connie felt someone tapping her shoulder, and nearly jumped out of her skin. She turned around and it was Nicole. “Connie, we have a bit of a…problem here,” she said and pointed up ahead. Connie could see the Rottweiler, staggering drunkenly and foaming at the mouth up ahead.
“Hey, now what do we have here,” said Pete. “Looks like we found the old rabid son of a bitch.”
“Pete, don’t…don’t even think about it Pete!”
“What’s he doing?” asked Nicole, frantically. “What’s he gonna do?”
“He’s crazy…he’s completely insane…and now he’s gonna get us all killed.”
“HEY, HERE BOY!” he called out at the dog, beckoning it over here. “COME ON AND GET US, BOY, COME ON, YOU BIG DUMB MUTT! YEAH, OVER HERE! HA-HA!”
“Stop it, Pete, stop it now!” Connie ordered, but Pete wouldn’t desist.
“YEAH, COME AND GET US, YOU STUPID SON OF A BITCH!” he shouted, and Connie smacked him in the face yet again. “Hey, gotta spice things up a bit, right sis?” And then he went back to shouting at the dog, who was already blazing a path to where they stood…getting closer…and closer…almost there…oh God, it was almost right on top of them! “YEAH, THAT’S IT, YA DUMB MUTT, SHAKE A LEG ON IT ALREADY. LET’S GO, MOVE YOUR ASS, HA-HA-HA, MOVE IT!”
The Rottweiler leapt in the air and pounced down upon Pete with enough force to bring him down. Its claws were now piercing into is chest, pinning him down, and all Connie could do was stand there, frozen, and watch as it bite him in the stomach, again and again, tearing at it with its teeth and chewing it open until his intestines began spilling out. He screamed hoarsely, writhing in pain as the dog continued to dig into him with its teeth and its claws. His shirt was soon soaked in crimson blood and soon the blood was leaking down the corners of his mouth and flowing down his chin. Connie felt sick to her stomach now, retching, getting that nauseous feeling you get when you feel like you want to vomit but can’t vomit because there’s nothing in your stomach to throw up with. Pete was nearly choking on the blood, coughing it up in thick chunks, scarlet freshets of blood leaping from his lips to the dog’s face. More and more of his intestines were slithering out now, and the blood from the stomach wound was pouring out by the gallons, soaking his pants in red as well as his shirt.
Nicole was pulling at her arm, “Come on, Connie,” she pleaded. “We gotta go and we gotta go now. Forget about him, he’s dead, the dog got ‘im. And he’s gonna get us too if we don’t high-tail it, like, right now!”
Connie turned from Pete’s dying body and the dog and then she and Nicole bolted. Connie heard one final scream from Pete, and then she knew that he was either dead or going to be soon enough.
The two of them just kept on running blindly, ignoring all the scurrying rats they went by and just concentrated on getting away from that rabid, rampaging beast that was now following them once more after finishing Pete the child psychopath off in one big, messy kill. But up ahead, Connie could see the gate. They just had to get to the gate and shut it before the dog got them and got out, and they were home free. Yes--they were going to make it! They--
Connie took a brief glance behind and…shit, the Rottweiler was gaining on them. She could see it charging toward them…getting closer…the mixture of foam and Pete’s blood flying thickly from its snout in a messy spatter.
The Rottweiler had leapt in midair, and Connie screamed as it nearly flew her way and about to kill her the same way it had killed Pete a minute ago…the same way it had killed Dave about a hundred years ago. Connie was sure this was it-the dog was about to pounce her within half a second and--
--and that’s when Nicole pushed her out of the way forcefully, and Connie fell to the side and landed on her butt. The dog instead pounced upon Nicole, and she screamed as it came down full force upon her body. “NOOOO!” Connie screamed and turned away, covering her eyes, unable to watch her best friend since first grade now getting killed and viciously torn apart by that rabid beast from the blackest reaches of hell.
Connie ran off crying, tears streaming down her face uncontrollably and she almost didn’t want to survive now but she kept running anyway; she just couldn’t help it.
She reached the gate and slammed it shut, locking the dog there, and then walked on down the road.
She was safe now, safe from the rabid Rottweiler.
But how could possibly digest it all in, all that had happened?
It was like a nightmare.
Locked up in that car, terrorized by that sick animal for…well, only a few hours had gone by in actuality, but for her at least, her consciousness, it had literally been an eternity. An eternity had literally gone by in her mind, literally an eternity in that car. In the real world, only a few hours at the most had gone by. But in that car, a million years, a billion, an eternity had dragged by in that car. It was almost as though that car had been an evil entity of some kind, draining the life out Connie and the others while at the same time providing a safe haven for them.
And the people who had died…well, she barely knew Dave.
But her own brother, whom she had known and feared for eleven years. She didn’t want this…she didn’t want him dead.
And Nicole, her best friend since first grade, who had sacrificed herself so that Connie could live. How was she going to live with that? It was Nicole’s death that had hit her worst of all. It was for the death of her best friend that she now felt the deepest amount of sadness and grief. And she now wondered, with the deepest amount of guilt and sorrow, why Nicole had to throw herself in the way of that rabid Rottweiler like that.
“Oh Nicole, why? Why did you do that?”
She walked on, wanting nothing more than to just get home.
Up ahead, she saw the headlights of an oncoming car flashing in front of her, looking more and more like a pair of glaring, watchful eyes in the front of the car to her as it came closer, and then zoomed right by her, bringing about a cold gust of wind that made her shiver.
Her nose tickled briefly just then, and she hunched over with the force of two soft sneezes into her cupped hands before pressing on. She had forgotten all about her allergies, but even now, after everything that had happened, they seemed like such a trivial concern, not even worth worrying about or giving a single thought to.
She kept to the side of the road, walking slowly and hoping to be able to hitch a ride, even though she knew how dangerous that could be, particularly this late at night. God only knew what sort of lunatic the driver who picked her up might be, what he might be capable of doing to her. Yet a potential molester somehow seemed like nothing compared to what she had just been through, and right now, she was just too tired, too hungry, and too thirsty to care.
She wanted nothing more than to finally go home and put it all behind her.
She suddenly grew very tired, her legs felt rubbery and then felt stiff, like heavy weights planted into the ground. She felt dizzy all of a sudden…the wave of vertigo had hit her abruptly, and she found herself staggering as drunkenly as that dog had been. The world was going black before her eyes, and for a few seconds, she found herself blinking in and out of consciousness. Getting darker now. She was blacking out, about to pass out. The world was going gray before her eyes. Her legs collapsed, and she finally fell over, landing on her face and finding that she was unable to get back up. Oh God, what did that fucking car do to me? she thought during the last few seconds she was conscious.
And that’s when the darkness finally swallowed her whole.
* * *
Connie woke up in a hospital bed the next day, late in the afternoon. She was groggy at first, not sure where she was and not remembering what had happened.
But then the memories all came flooding back to her mind all at once and she could remember everything that had happened. Being attacked and terrorized by that Rottweiler, having to hide in that rancid piece of junk car for what had seemed like an eternity, and worst of all, all the people who had died because of it--Nicole, Pete, and Dave. She was the lone survivor of all of them, and now, she could remember the whole thing in frightfully vivid detail, and would have given anything to be able to forget it again.
When her parents arrived with the police, she told them everything that had happened (well, almost everything. She was a little vague on the details regarding the deaths of Dave, Pete, and Nicole, and had intentionally left out the part about how she had wet her pants and was sitting in her own urine in that old, filthy car). It had taken her a very painful hour to get through it all, and she had broken down crying about three or four times during her narrative, but she had gotten through it, and cried another half-hour afterwards before falling asleep on her hospital bed.
The barrens were searched, and all three bodies were recovered, and the stray Rottweiler was shot and killed on sight (self-defense) and later tested positive for rabies.
The doctors had already treated Connie for dehydration when she had been admitted to the hospital, and after the doctors had heard what she had been through and what had happened, she was given the rabies vaccination as well, just as a precaution.
She didn’t attend Dave’s funeral (although her parents did).
Connie did attend Nicole’s funeral (that goes without saying, of course). She cried through the whole thing, and while she more than anything to step up to the podium and at least say a few words, she found herself unable to do it. She could utter not a sound save for a few sniffles and sobs, as the tears streamed down her face. Oh God, how she had missed her! She wondered how she could get along without her now. She missed her so much. And the guilt that stabbed at her each time she was reminded that she was still alive, that she had survived and Nicole had died. It just seemed so terribly unfair that Connie was still alive and well while her best friend was now dead and soon to be buried. In some ways, it almost seemed as though Connie had been the one who had been left behind instead of Nicole, and the thought of it had sunk her into an even deeper depression as she watched them lower Nicole’s casket six feet into the ground.
She attended Pete’s funeral two days after Nicole’s, and while she had cried through that one as well, the tears she had shed were those left over from Nicole’s funeral. For even though it was Pete they were burying now, it was Nicole’s death that Connie was still grieving over. And although she would never admit this to anyone else, not even to herself, she had found that she had felt absolutely nothing regarding Pete’s death, save for a small and perverse relief that it was finally over and that she had finally found a small measure of peace.
The End.
August 26, 2000
December 15, 2000