Night Conjurings: Tales of Terror Page 6

  “You first,” I whispered.

  Crank pulled a leaf off one of the cornstalks, tore it in two, and stuck the halves in his fist. “Short piece goes first,” he whispered.

  I drew the short piece. I always did.

  “Look through the cracks and see if the truck’s in there,” Crank said. “If it’s not there, give me a signal.”

  He stayed safely hidden inside the corn while I scurried over the fence and ran to the back of the barn. There were plenty of cracks in the siding, but it was so dark in there I couldn’t tell if the truck was inside. I moved to the corner of the barn and waited for a long scared-shitless time, watching the house and listening.

  There was no sign of anything, and I started thinking Crank was probably right. Why the hell would those bastards hang around here and wait for the police to show up? After all, any normal boys, any boys with brains in their heads, would have called the police.

  So I hunkered down again and ran awkwardly to the hanging door and peered inside. No truck. If that jalopy wasn’t in another state by now, it was because the motor had played out.

  I ran back behind the barn and signaled to Crank, and he soon came strolling up to me cool and cocky, not even bothering to keep to the shadows.

  “Told you they weren’t here,” he said.

  Still, I didn’t feel altogether comfortable going into the barn and groping through the dark to the stable where we’d hidden our bikes. But there they were, undiscovered and unmoved. We were wheeling them out when somebody out of nowhere leaped onto my back and knocked me down on top of my bicycle.

  My breath was punched out of my lungs, and while I was gagging for air I felt handcuffs being snapped onto my wrists, binding my hands behind my back. My first thought was thank God, it’s just the cops, but then I heard the kind of laughter that even the meanest cops wouldn’t make.

  “Didja come back for your bikes, boys?”

  “We kept ’em in here nice and safe for ya.”

  “Why don’ja just hop on ’em and ride on back home?”

  “Ha ha ha!”

  We were wrenched to our feet and marched backwards out of the barn toward the house.

  “Now don’ja try tuh scream.”

  “Like little sissy girls.”

  “Or we’ll cut your throats and the scream won’t know which hole tuh come out of!”

  “Ha ha ha!”

  “Bet ya was lookin’ for our truck.”

  “We ain’t that dumb.”

  “Ma didn’t raise no fools.”

  “We hid our truck.”

  The kitchen door was already unlocked. I was shoved inside and landed on my knees and chin with no way to break my fall. Crank fell on top of me, and before we could struggle to our feet the men had ahold of us again and were dragging us face down through the dining room to the living room.

  One of them lit a kerosene lantern and said, “Le’see what we got here.”

  “Looks like a couple juvenile delinquents tuh me.”

  “Looks like a couple white trash boys.”

  “Couple a gutter boys.”

  I twisted around on the filthy floor to look at them. They were sitting side by side on the sofa, tall and skinny, exactly the same, both wearing blue jeans and blue work shirts. Faces narrow, as if someone had stretched them out. They looked like jack-o-lanterns cut from long skinny pumpkins.

  One of them was holding a baseball bat, gently thumping it into the palm of his other hand. “What’s wrong with you damn-fool kids anyhow?” he said. “Why can’ja behave?”

  “Snoopin’ and prowlin’ and pokin’ ’round,” the other one said.

  “Gettin’ in our basement.”

  “We was just comin’ tuh clean it out too.”

  “Gotta clean it out ever so often. Maybe we put it off too long.”

  “Bet ya got cow shit for brains, is that your trouble?”

  “I’d just like tuh know what your ma and pa ever done tuh deserve such damn-fool trash like you.”

  “Rotten little shits. Bet your parents wish ya was never born.”

  One of them laughed. “Hey, we was kinda like that, wasn’t we, Tim?”

  “Shut up, Tom, you talk too damn much.”

  “Well we was. We done some wild stuff when we was young.”

  Now Tim laughed too. “We done some stuff I guess.”

  “We didn’t like our folks very much neither.”

  “Shut up, Tom.”

  “Well, they ain’t gonna tell no one.”

  “I s’pose they ain’t.”

  “Ma, she was something, wasn’t she?”

  “Ya didn’t want tuh fuck with Ma, that’s the plain damn truth.”

  “She’d knock your damn teeth out.”

  They both grinned widely in the lantern light, and I could see what they meant. They were both missing the same upper front teeth.

  “But you boys is a whole hell of a lot worse than we ever was. We never busted in tuh nobody’s houses.”

  “No sir. If Ma was tuh catch ya doin’ that sorta thing she’d cut your dicks off.”

  “She’d stick a coat hanger through your ear till it come out th’other ear.”

  “She’d poke out your eyes and pop ’em in your mouth like candy.”

  “She’d cut out your assholes and wear ’em on her fingers for rings.”

  “She’d break ever fuckin’ bone in your head till ya couldn’t think straight.”

  “Yeah, Ma didn’t put up with much.”

  “Dear ol’ Ma.”

  They got somber for a while and didn’t say anything. Then one of them said, “You ’member when she took that there darnin’ needle and—”

  “Shut up, Tom. You talk too damn much.”

  “Well, she did,” Tom said sullenly.

  “We figger you boys didn’t tell no one, or the cops’d be here already,” Tim said. “Ain’t that so? Now if ya tell us the truth we just might let ya go, but if ya lay there all quiet and don’t say nothin’ you’re gonna lay there forever.”

  “Cause we’re gonna set ya on fire.”

  “Burn this old dump down.”

  “With you in it.”

  I wanted to believe the part about letting us go, but it didn’t make any sense.

  “Pussy got your tongue?” Tom asked.

  “Well, it don’t make no difference if they talk or they don’t,” Tim said. “They didn’t call no cops, that much we can know for sure.”

  “Else they’d be here by now.”

  “You don’t see no cops ’round here, do ya, Tom?”

  “Not ’less they’re turnin’ ’em out awful young these days.”

  They both roared with laughter.

  “You boys had us scared for a spell though. Didn’t they, Tim?”

  “Yep. Spent the whole goddamn night scared half dead.”

  “Cleanin’ out that basement and wonderin’ if the cops was on their way.”

  “Ya put us through some godawful grief with your snoopin’ and pryin’.”

  “Didn’t get no sleep, so we ain’t in a real good mood right now.”

  “Been hid out in that cornfield all damn day.”

  “Just waitin’ and watchin’.”

  “Watchin’ for you or the cops tuh come.”

  “Figgered if the cops didn’t come, then you’d be comin’ back for your bikes.”

  “One or th’other.”

  “Hell of a way tuh spend your day.”

  “Had us a couple lawn chairs and a cooler full a beer.”

  “And some baloney sandwiches.”

  “Just sittin’ in the corn waitin’ and watchin’ and thinkin’ what tuh do.”

  “When night come we went to the barn.”

  “Figgered by then the cops wasn’t comin’.”

  “So we hid in the barn and waited for ya.”

  “So it don’t really matter one cat turd if ya talk or ya don’t.”

  “Gonna kill ya all the same.”

&n
bsp; I kept trying to say something, but my voice wouldn’t work. “I wrote a letter,” I got out at last.

  “What’s that you said?”

  “I wrote a letter that tells everything. I put it under my pillow. If anything bad happens, my mom will find it. Like if we don’t come home.”

  “Shit,” Tom said and looked at his brother to see what he thought. “I bet he’s lyin’.”

  “Don’t make a cat turd bit a difference nohow,” Tim said. “Once we burn down this house no one can prove nothin’.”

  “All they gonna find’s your bodies in here all burnt to a crisp.”

  “Couple dumb trashy brat boys get the notion tuh break in our house and set it on fire.”

  “Too goddamn dumb tuh get out in time.”

  “So fuckin’ dumb they splash gas all over theirselves.”

  “Got ’xactly what they deserve, the cops’ll say.”

  “Your parents will be glad tuh be rid a you ignorant shit-balls.”

  “We thought it out all day long in the cornfield.”

  “House ain’t much good tuh us no more no how.”

  “Wouldn’t feel safe bringin’ no women here now.”

  “Not after you boys busted in.”

  “We got the gas and we got the match.”

  “And we ain’t got all damn night.”

  They cackled together. “I’ll bust ’em over the head so we can get them cuffs off without no trouble,” Tom said.

  “Ya don’t wanna bust ’em too hard and cave in their skulls, Tom. Them bodies gotta look natural.”

  “What’s left of ’em anyhow.”

  Tom got up from the sofa and stepped over to Crank with his ball bat raised.

  “Wait a minute,” Tim said. “Ain’ja gonna fuck one of ’em first?”

  Tom stopped and looked at his brother.

  “Fuck you!” Crank said.

  “You shut your dirty mouth, boy!” Tom said. “Ma don’t allow that kinda talk in her house.”

  He kicked Crank hard in the side and looked back at his brother. “These here ain’t women, Tim,” he said. “I like tuh fuck women, but these here ain’t women.”

  Tim was staring down at his shoes and squirming a little. “That don’t matter so much,” he said quietly. “I mean it don’t have nothin’ tuh do with bein’ queer.”

  “It’s gettin’ late,” Tom said. “Let’s bust their stupid heads and get on with it.”

  “Ah come on, Tom, why don’ja fuck one a them first?”

  “I already tole ya why, Tim. These here ain’t women.”

  “Well, it ain’t got nothin’ tuh do with bein’ queer,” Tim said, still staring at his shoes. “I mean I wouldn’t wanna watch ya fuck a growed-up man, but a boy is different.”

  “You like boys so much, why don’t ya fuck ’em yourself?” Tom asked. He jerked his pelvis back and forth and hooted with laughter.

  “Shut up, Tom. It ain’t nothing tuh make fun of.”

  “Well, ya can’t fuck nothin’, and that’s the plain damn truth. Ma snipped off your nuts, and all you’re able tuh do is watch.”

  “I said shut up!” Tim yelled.

  I thought maybe I was hearing a car coming down the road. Tim got up and adjusted the portrait of his mother above the fireplace, which had been hanging crookedly.

  “I can do it just as good as you,” he said. He unzipped his pants and started pulling on his cock as if he meant to yank it out by the root, but it stayed soft.

  “Here ya go, Ma, you getting’ a good view?” Tim said. “How ya like that, Ma?”

  It wasn’t a car, it was just my ears. Crank had rolled onto his side, and I saw him struggling to fish his pocketknife out of his jeans pocket, not easy with handcuffs. I tried to say the Lord’s prayer in my head, but I couldn’t get the words straight. Our father, who art in heaven, deliver us from evil, thy rod and thy staff they comfort me…

  “You can go ahead play with that dead pecker all night long, Tim, but it ain’t gonna do you no good,” Tom said. “I’m gonna get some work done ’round here.”

  I was trying to get to my feet while his back was turned, but he saw me and swung his ball bat at my head. Blackness.

  ***

  The blackness was a hole. I was digging a hole. I was in a field with my father. The Massey-Ferguson sat nearby with the old rickety two-wheeled wagon attached. My father and I were digging a hole in the field. I looked up and was surprised to see he was weeping. I’d never seen him weep before, and it looked strange, tears running down that rugged face.

  “I was never very nice to Hank,” he said. “I never really liked him very much. And now I’ve got to bury him.”

  He went over to the wagon, and I watched him grab Crank’s feet and begin pulling the body from the back of the bed. “Well, give me a hand,” he said.

  I grabbed Crank’s wrists, but as my father and I lifted him from the wagon Crank’s eyes snapped open. “I’m not dead, goddammit!” he said. “Tell your crazy old man I’m not dead.”

  He let out a terrible cackle, half wicked witch, half Phyllis Diller. The cackle went on and on, making my skull throb. Goddamn it hurts, I thought, but the cackle became a scream so shrill that I opened my eyes.

  One of the twins was clutching his leg and screaming. I saw Crank’s pocketknife stuck in his calf.

  “Jesus fucking God, Jesus fucking God!” he was yelling. The other one was holding him, saying, “It’s okay, Tim, now hold still so I can pull it out!”

  Crank was crumpled on his side with his legs askew. He was staring straight at me, but his eyes weren’t moving or blinking. Blood was trickling down his face from an ugly wound in the side of his head, where he must have been hit by the ball bat.

  For a terrible moment I was certain he was dead, but then he yelled, “Get the fuck outta here, Peter-eater!”

  I suddenly realized my handcuffs were gone, and I felt myself scrambling up dizzily and lurching into the dining room.

  “Get your skinny ass moving, Peter!” Crank shouted.

  He was imitating the voice of Mr. Raddly, the phys ed teacher we both hated, but he wasn’t following me. I wondered if he was paralyzed, and I felt like a rat for abandoning him.

  But there was nothing I could do to help him. Someone was running a foot behind me, Tom I supposed, and the kitchen door seemed a mile away. Where was the fucking doorknob, Jesus it wouldn’t turn, maybe they had locked it—and Tom was right on top of me, his hands clutching my arm.

  The door opened and we tumbled out together, falling down the steps and rolling through the weeds, grappling and hitting, his fist slamming into my cheekbone like a hammer. He got ahold of my ankles and started dragging me back to the house, but I kicked and wrestled until he fell on top of me.

  We rolled through the thistles in a tight embrace, and then suddenly he was falling away from me, desperately grasping my shirt as he fell. The cloth ripped in his hands, and with a scream he plummeted into the earth.

  In the bright moonlight I could just barely see the filthy son of a bitch ten feet below me. The back of his head was leaning against the slimy brick wall of the cistern, the tip of his long chin submerged in the black water at the bottom. A month ago I’d told Crank to put the lid back on it, but as usual he had ignored me.

  I forced myself to my feet, my head throbbing like a drum. For some reason I ran to the barn instead of the field, intending to get my bike, but as soon as I got inside I heard the other one, Tim I guess, hobbling fast a few feet behind me, and I knew the barn was the stupidest place I could have gone.

  But nothing to do about it now. Hurrying through the darkness, I tripped and cracked my chin on the wagon. I scrambled under it, thinking I could hide down there and slip back out the door after he ran past me.

  “Goddamn you!” he yelled, just a few feet away. I heard him panting, and suddenly his face was peering under the wagon just a few feet from mine, his tongue licking his bare upper gum.

  Something flashed past my f
ace, missing it by inches. It was his knife, sweeping back and forth at the end of his long arm. And then another face appeared beside his.

  It was Crank.

  I was scrambling away from Tim on my hands and knees, trying to get to get out from under the other side of the wagon, when he grabbed my ankle. As I struggled to get loose, there was a loud crash and he screamed and let go.

  I didn’t know what had happened until I looked back. The far side of the wagon had fallen and had pinned his legs to the floor. He was squirming violently and screaming with pain.

  “Goddammit, Peter, are you blind?” Crank yelled. “There’s a pitchfork right there beside you.”

  My right hand grasped a long wooden handle lying on the dirt floor, and my arm moved before I had time to think. The two middle tines caught Tim square in the face, one tine for each eye, and the other two grazed each side of his head, that’s how narrow his face was. I shoved hard and the fork slid deep into his brain.

  I crawled out from under the wagon and came around to the other side. Crank was standing there holding a crowbar that he must have used to pry the wagon wheel loose. It was the same wheel he’d been trying to remove a month ago.

  That side of the heavy wagon had crashed down on Tim’s skinny calves, crushing them like sticks. Blood was soaking his jeans, and his feet were still twitching with meanness more than life.

  Crank’s face was bloody too, and there was a crater in the side of his head where the ball bat had bashed it.

  “Jesus, Crank, you’re hurt pretty bad,” I said. “We gotta get you to a hospital.”

  He threw down the crowbar and said, “It’s too late for that. I was flung into this goddamn world, and now I’ve been flung back out.”

  He let out his terrible cackle, half wicked witch, half Phyllis Diller, and then darted out of the barn into the night.

  I grabbed my bike from the stable and ran out the door. I heard a deep, hollow voice calling, “Help! Help!” and for a second I hoped it was Crank, but it was coming from the cistern.

  I knew my friend was dead, but somehow I forced myself to go back into that terrible house and make sure. He was dead all right, his eyes still wide open, staring at nothing.