Thomas O`Callaghan - The Screaming Room

The rain had stopped. The afternoon sun had resumed its assault on rotting corn shocks, casting distorted shadows across the abandoned farm. A pair of cicadas sounded, silencing the chirping of the nearby sparrows, sending them into flight.

In the middle of the field, a sturdy youth stood silently, eyes fixed on a mound of fresh clay.

A rush of cool air stirred wisps of his ripened wheat-colored hair. Bending down, he used a finger to inscribe the name Gus in the collected soil.

A second youth, a female, approached. “Can we go now?” she asked, wearily. “This is our tenth field and there’s nothing left of him to bury.”

“In a minute.”

The girl looked around. “Someone could be watching, you know.”

“Just need a minute.”

“Well, you’d better make it a quick one.”

The youth’s eyes lingered on the newly formed grave. With a nod of satisfaction, he uprighted himself. As a smile lit his face, he used the heel of his boot to eradicate their victim’s name. “Lovee,” he said, “may the bastard rest in peace.”

“You mean in pieces. Let’s go.”

Cassie turned her head on the pillow as a sudden flash of light woke her.

“What the hell are ya doing?” she hollered. “It’s two o’clock in the morning!”

Her brother, Angus, who was sitting up in bed next to her, grinned, his attention riveted to the gleam coming off the three-quarter-inch ball bearing he was holding between his thumb and index finger. The narrow beam of a pencil-thin flashlight had reflected off the ball’s chromelike finish and shone directly onto her eyelid.

“I liked you better when you got off pulling wings off flies,” she said, hiding her head under the pillow.

Angus, flashlight still directed at the ball bearing, brought his face to within inches of the tiny sphere, watching the reflection of his pupil get bigger and bigger, the closer he got. Hopelessly bored, and somewhat blind, he turned off the flashlight, slid his hand under the covers, and fondled his sister’s rump.

“Not tonight, we ain’t,” she said through clenched teeth. “We got lots to do tomorrow. Get some sleep!”

Angus slid out of bed, slipped into a pair of boxers, and ambled toward the door, opening it. A blast of warm air caressed his body. The sensation aroused him. He glanced over his shoulder. His sister was snoring. He pushed open the screen door, sat on the top step, and glanced upward. It was a cloudless night. The moon, just shy of full, cast shadows on the weeds and tall grass that surrounded home sweet home; a fitting salute, perhaps to what would begin at dawn. The thought of finally executing what they had planned brought on a surge of adrenaline. He wouldn’t sleep. Unlike his sister, he’d stay up and wait out the darkness.

A slug, slithering toward him on the surface of the step, caught his attention.

“I can kill ya, little fella. But I won’t.”

He had the urge to pet the small mollusk but decided instead to dabble his finger in the slime that trailed behind it. He brought it to his lips, applying it as a woman would lipstick.

Women. They fascinated Angus. Every curve. Every smell. Every everything. In his next life, he planned on returning as one. He could feel what they feel. Think as they think. God! Even screw as they screw!

He heard a rustling. It was not the willow tree, which was as limp as he was. No, something was pushing through the grass. A deer perhaps. He hoped so. He liked the sound they made just before dying, after he stalked them and twisted their neck, snapping their cervical vertebrae.

There it was again!

The rustling.

Following the example of the snail, he slithered down the rickety steps and began his pursuit, certain his sister wouldn’t start their big day without him.

The Greyhound’s Michelins groaned over the roadway scarred with jagged potholes. But Angus and Cassie didn’t let it interfere with their game. Despite the jostling, the plastic markers held firm, their bottoms magnetized to the shimmering surface of the game board. But the cards were a different story. Using an index finger, Angus pressed down on the Time of Your Life deck while Cassie did the same to the Pay the Piper pile, containing the cards tenaciously inside their holding trays.

Angus picked up the dice.

“C’mon ten,” he whispered, releasing the cubes, which rolled across the board and settled as a six and a three.

“Close enough!” he said, counting off nine squares on his trek along the path that meandered around and about the game’s playing field: a map of the city of New York, featuring its landmarks.

“That puts me on topa the town at the Empire Freakin’ State Building!” He slammed down his blue marker on the prized square.

His action activated a tiny speaker embedded under the skyscraper’s icon, and music sounded, replete with vocals: Frank Sinatra’s rendition of “New York, New York.”

He reached for a Time of Your Life card.

“Well, lookee here. I’ve just been awarded a three-hour shopping spree at Paragon Sports. And it entitles me to disregard the next Pay the Piper Card.” He reached in his pocket and ran a finger across the blade.

Touching the weapon aroused him.

Cassie sneered. She palmed the dice and blew into her fist.

“Mama needs a new paira shoes,” she said, letting loose the dice, which skittered across the board and settled as a one and a two. “Shit! I gotta pay the piper!”

Cassie counted off the three squares. Angus handed her the Pay the Piper card.

“Read it and weep,” he said.

Cassie’s lower lip jutted forward.

You’ve been caught shoplifting at Macy s.

Lose a turn.

“Hellhole of a city,” she muttered.

“Lemme show ya how it’s done.” Angus reached for the dice for the first of his next two turns, his and the one she had lost.

The cubes clattered across the board. A five and a six.

He eyed the board and counted off eleven squares.

“I’m halfway through their beloved Kings County! C’mon twelve!” He rattled the cubes in his hand.

Cassie groaned as a double six rolled to a stop.

“Yes!” he cheered, reaching for his marker.

“Hold it!” she said, gesturing at the Greyhound’s rain-slicked window. The bus had entered the terminal and was coming to a stop. “Remember what we said. Once the bus arrives, we set it all in motion at the tourist traps closest to our pieces.”

Angus eyed the board and grinned.

“Well, then, Coney Island’s my next stop.”

“And me?” said Cassie. “I get to start settling the score at the American Museum of Natural History.”

The sun cast slivers of light through the glass cupola of the American Museum of Natural History. Below the rotunda, Jurassic skeletons welcomed the sunrise.

A chime alerted the night watchman that his shift was over. It also prompted the electric illumination of all halls and galleries throughout the vast labyrinth. Light from halogen lamps flooded the museum, revealing the “Star of India”, the world’s largest blue sapphire; the fossilized skeleton of the “Turkana Boy,” a one-point-six-million-year-old specimen of Homo erectus, along with countless other natural and cultural treasures.

At 10:00 A.M., a second chime sounded and the watchman unlocked the massive entrance door. Within minutes, a swarm of seven-year-olds, chaperoned by the field-trip coordinator, Harriet Robbins, poured into the marble-floored lobby, shattering the repository’s silent solemnity with giggles and laughter.