Richard Laymon - Flesh

He knew that he hadn’t attached the manacles again.

Had she done it? No. Huh-uh. She’s dead.

Then how?

He felt a tingle of fear.

As he dug into the pocket where he kept the key, he wondered vaguely why he was wearing clothes at all. Hadn’t he left them upstairs?

The key wasn’t there.

Don’t worry, you’ll find it. You’ve got to find it.

Fighting panic, he searched every pocket. The key was gone.

This can’t be happening to me, he thought.

Fortunately, he had turned on the overhead light before following Celia into the cellar. The bulb cast only a dim yellow glow, but it should be enough. Getting to his knees, he scanned the concrete floor. The area surrounding them was pooled with blood. Could the key be under the blood? He began to sweep his free hand through the wet layer.

Out of a corner of his eye, he thought he saw Celia grin.

No.

He looked directly at her. She was scalped, her skull caved in (and brain gone, don’t forget that), her eyes shut, her face a mask of blood, and she was grinning.

Her eyelids slid up.

“You’re dead!” he shrieked.

Her jaw dropped. Her tongue lolled out. The handcuff key lay near the end of her tongue.

He reached for it.

Celia’s teeth snapped shut on his fingers. Crying out in agony, he jerked his hand back. The stumps of three severed fingers spouted blood.

In horror, he watched her chew his fingers.

The cellar suddenly went dark.

He heard the stairway creak.

“Who’s there?” he yelled.

No answer came, but Roland knew who was there. He knew. He began to whimper.

“Leave me alone!” he cried. “Go away!”

In a mocking singsong, a voice in the darkness chanted, “I don’t thinnnk sooo.” Dana’s voice.

“Youuu are go-ing to diiie noww,” sang Jason.

The voices came from high on the cellar stairs but something grabbed the front of Roland’s shirt (Celia’s hand?) and tugged him. He toppled forward. Onto her. Her legs locked around him. Her hands (why wasn’t one cuffed to him anymore?) clutched his hair and forced his face down. Down against her face. She pressed his mouth against her mouth. She huffed. Into Roland’s mouth gushed the mush and splintered bones of his half-masticated fingers.

He started to choke.

And he woke up, gasping for air. For a moment, he thought he must still be in his dream.

But the bulb still glowed from the cellar ceiling. He wasn’t on top of Celia’s body; he was sprawled on the concrete floor beside it. Quickly, he lifted his hands. Though they both trembled violently, neither was cuffed and he still had all his fingers.

He glanced toward the cellar stairs. Nobody there. Of course not.

Just a nightmare.

As Roland sat up, his bare back came unstuck from the floor.

He looked around and picked up his knife, but he didn’t see the handcuffs. Then he remembered leaving them upstairs with his clothes.

He groaned as he struggled to his feet. His body felt tight and chilled. His muscles were sore. It had been madness, allowing himself to fall asleep down here. What if he had slept through the night?

He was confident, however, that he had only been asleep for an hour or two. There would still be plenty of time to sneak away under cover of darkness.

He climbed the cellar stairs as quickly as his stiff muscles permitted, and opened the door. The brightness of day stung his eyes. He cowered, shielding his face. Sickened, he saw himself shrivel and crumble to dust like a vampire. He wanted to turn away from the light, rush down into the comforting gloom of the cellar.

But the warmth felt good. As he stood hunched in the doorway, the deep chill seemed to be drawn out of his body. As the chill diminished, so did his panic.

Major fuck-up, he told himself. Not the end of the world, though.

Consider it a challenge.

Right.

He looked down at himself. His naked body was crimson and flecked with gore.

A challenge.

He was no longer cold, but he felt shivery inside as if he might start to cry.

If anybody sees me like this…

I’ll figure out something.

Oh God, how could I have fallen asleep? How could I have slept till morning?

He rubbed his sticky face, let out a trembling sigh, and stepped to the kitchen’s bat-wing doors. Before opening them, he scanned the dining area. He listened. Satisfied that he was alone in the restaurant, he pushed through the doors.

Near the front, along with the stepladder, vacuum cleaner, toolbox and cans of cleaning fluids, he found several rags and old towels. The few rags were filthy, but two of the towels seemed reasonably clean. He took them with him.

He stepped to a window and looked out. His heart gave a sick lurch when he saw the car in the parking lot.

Just Jason’s car.

He turned away from the window. His shirt, pants, and handcuffs were on the floor near the rumpled blanket. Celia’s neatly folded gown lay on top of the bar counter.

Roland picked up his T-shirt. It was one of his favorites, orange with the slogan, “Trust me,” printed beneath a colorful, monstrous face. It was stiff with dried blood. He was about to throw it down when an idea came to him.

Why not wear his bloody clothes? He could probably walk right up to his dorm room in them. With his reputation, anyone seeing him would just assume it was another gag.

But he might be seen on the way back to campus. Townies didn’t know about his reputation for bizarre behavior.

Muttering, “Shit,” he threw the shirt down.

He knew that he could wash the blood from his hair and body. No problem, there. But he needed clothes. Jason’s, he knew, were even worse off than his. Only Celia’s gown was bloodless. No way, he thought. Talk about conspicuous.

If he’d had any brains, he would’ve stripped before he opened up Jason.

He felt trapped.

There must be a way out. Think!

Where there is a problem, there is a solution. There has to be.

Problem. I can’t leave here in bloody clothes. I can’t leave here naked. I can’t wear Celia’s gown.

Why is it a problem? Because if I’m seen by the wrong people, I might get arrested.

Solution?

Obvious. Don’t get seen. Stay here. Until say three o’clock in the morning.

Somebody might come. Like that guy yesterday.

Roland shuddered.

That guy yesterday.

That guy knew.

Roland had been inside the restaurant no more than ten minutes when he heard a car and rushed to the window. Out of the car stepped a man in boots and leather clothes, a man wearing a gun on his belt and carrying a machete. The sight of him sent an icy surge along Roland’s spine. Memories filled his mind of other men, in other times, dressed in protective gar ments and carrying sharp weapons: axes, scythes, sabers, longbladed knives. Other men who knew, just as this one did.

Confused and terrified, Roland had fled out the rear door and hidden in the field behind the restaurant. Lying in the weeds, he had waited until his panic subsided. Then he had crept through the field, keeping low, working his way around the restaurant until he could see the parking lot.

Who was this man?

A cortez.

What the hell is a cortez? Roland wondered, and his mind suddenly reeled with images of carnage: bearded soldiers with swords and battle-axes slaughtering Indians beneath a blood-red sky. In the background stood a strange pyramid. As quickly as the images had come, they were gone.

That Cortez, Roland thought. My God. He remembered reading an article in National Geographic a few years ago. His parents had a subscription, and he always used to look through the magazines for bare-breasted natives. But this article had caught his attention, and he’d read it. All about the Aztecs, how they not only offered the hearts of their victims as sacrifices to the sun god, but also how they ate the captured warriors. The greatest delicacy was the brain, and it always went to the high priests.