Лорел Гамильтон - Strange Candy

The girl’s focus was strong and pure. Jasmine could not look away from the door. The sound of heavy footsteps scraped outside; the smell of rotting corpses, sweet and putrid, filled the room.

Jasmine concentrated, willing the walls to dissolve, the dream to end. Nothing happened. She took a deep breath and choked on the stinking air.

Malcolm’s voice was thin with fear. “Do something!”

She tried. Manipulating dreams was just a matter of will and concentration. Jasmine knew this wasn’t real; if you knew that, you could change it. But she had never been inside the dream of someone who matched her powers so exactly.

“I can’t break the dream.”

Malcolm made a small sound low in his throat. He sagged against her. “Oh, God,” he said, “oh, God.”

Jasmine swallowed the first rush of real fear, not Lisbeth’s creation but her very own fear. She was as trapped as the boy. Trapped in the mind of a sociopathic child.

Then things began to melt from the walls. Hands, arms reached outward; rotted flesh falling away from white bone, rags of clothes. Things long dead crawled out of the rotting walls and began to drag themselves closer.

One man had half his face blown away; his tongue rolled between bone and raw meat, a large fat worm twisted round the corpse’s tongue.

Malcolm screamed, one high shriek af ter another, as four of the things shambled toward them.

The faces were recognizable; a man, woman, two teenage children. They had been black; now they were the colors of old death.

Jasmine grabbed Malcolm’s hand; his fingernails dug into her palm. His screams became words. “My father, my father! Noooo!”

Of course, the dead things were Malcolm’s family. They were horrible, paralyzingly so to the boy, because this nightmare was designed with him in mind, not Jasmine. The dead things were slow; little pieces of them fell away as they walked, slow.

Jasmine dragged Malcolm toward the door. He fought her, the dead things turned toward them, but Jasmine was at the door with the boy screaming, tugging at her hand, trying to get free, to run, but there was nowhere to run.

Jasmine couldn’t break the dream, but maybe she could manipulate it. She unlocked the door and flung it open. The dream lurched; the dead things wavered. There was nothing on the other side of the door. Sloppy, Lisbeth, Jasmine thought. There was a sensation of vertigo, then Jasmine filling the emptiness with a stairway, leading down.

She dragged Malcolm onto the stairs and shut and locked the door behind them, with a thought. Malcolm was running now, still gripping her hand as if afraid she would vanish and abandon him. They clattered down the stairs; suddenly there were walls on either side. The stairs led downward, but now there were walls to hold them, rotting yellow walls.

Hands grew out of the wall, pale arms, they fluttered, hands wringing. A hand grabbed Jasmine’s wrist. The flesh was too soft, doughy, rubbery, but strong.

Malcolm screamed as hands grabbed his shirt.

Jasmine needed to be free of the hand; she thought of a sword. It levitated over the hand, and sliced downward in a glittering arc. The arm flopped, spraying warm blood into her face. The hand still clung to her wrist, but she pulled Malcolm free of the bloated hands, and they ran.

Jasmine sprayed the walls with blood from the sword as it sliced the hands in front of them like a thrasher, cutting wheat. The stairs were littered with pale hands that twitched and bled.

The stairs spilled onto a landing, and the walls closed in, dead end. Jasmine had been concentrating too much on the sword and the hands to maintain the stairs. The smell of rotting corpses began to fill the air.

“Malcolm, is this the same dream every time?”

“No.”

“Is there anything that is the same every time?”

“My family, she always kills my family.” Both of his hands dug into her arm. His fear was nearly choking her. Her fear was nearly a cold heat on her skin. The bloated hand had fallen off in the running. She and Malcolm stood alone on the landing, as the stench became stronger. The dead things were coming.

Malcolm’s family, turned into rotting corpses that would tear the boy apart, maybe eat parts of him alive while he watched.

Yes, that would be what Jasmine would do, if she really wanted to terrify. To horrify. If she really hated someone.

That was it: hatred. Jasmine called out, “Lisbeth, I know why you hate Malcolm. I know.”

The first rotted corpse began to pull itself from the wall. “You’re jealous of his family. Malcolm’s family loves him. They love him, Lisbeth. Malcolm’s father loves him. His mother loves him. His sister loves him. His brother loves him.”

The corpses had pulled free of the wall and were reaching for them, but the smell was fading. “You’re family hates you, Lisbeth. Your mother is afraid of you, Lisbeth. I read your file. Your father tried to kill you, and you punished him for it. Didn’t you? Didn’t you!”

The dead things began to melt. There was the sensation of something large sliding through the nightmare, like a whale swimming next to you in the dark. Lisbeth’s power.

“No one loves you. They hate you, Lisbeth. Everyone hates you. Even your own family.”

Silence, not of the ear, but sensation of feeling, silence more profound than soundlessness.

The dream broke and Jasmine was spilled back to wakefulness. She sat up in bed, heart hammering in her chest. That was it. Lisbeth had never been loved, not by anyone, ever. Even sociopaths need the illusion of acceptance from someone. Lisbeth needed to be loved.

THAT morning Jasmine went to Malcolm. They met for the first time in the flesh. She promised him that Lisbeth would never hurt him again. One way or another Jasmine meant to keep that promise.

LISBETH was playing with a nearly life-size doll when Jasmine walked through the door. She knew that Bromley was on the other side of the one-way glass. She no longer cared.

“Nice doll,” Jasmine said.

“My mommy sent it to me.”

“Why?”

Lisbeth frowned up at her. “Why what?”

“Why did your mommy send the doll to you?”

“What do you mean?” Lisbeth asked. The lovely, golden-haired doll lay very still in the child’s lap.

“Why did your mother send you a doll? Why would she send you anything? Most parents never contact their children once they come to the school.”

Lisbeth gave a lovely smile, eyes shining. “Because she loves me,” she said, very matter-of-fact, very sweet, and as soon as she said it, Lisbeth knew it had been a mistake.

Jasmine laughed, then the laughter died. She stared down at the child, met her brown eyes, and did not look away. “No one loves you, Lisbeth; you and I both know that.”

“I hate you,” Lisbeth said, voice quiet and precise.

“I know,” Jasmine said. “Why did you kill Nicky?”

“Didn’t.”

“Why, Lisbeth?”

“Why what?” the child said, voice sulky.

“Why did you kill Nicky?”

“I could have killed you last night.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“Get out! Get out!” She stood, screaming. Lisbeth began to beat the doll against the floor. Bits of plastic

began to shatter onto the floor. One blue eye lay winking to itself, naked against the floor. “Why did you kill Nicky?”

“Because he wouldn’t let me do what I wanted to do. Just like you won’t let me!”

“No,” Jasmine said, quietly, “I won’t.”

JASMINE waited the following night, waited until the children had been asleep for a couple of hours. Malcolm wasn’t sleeping tonight. Vanessa was sitting up with him, keeping him awake, at Jasmine’s request. He would be safe tonight, she could see to that.