John Saul: Darkness

Last week, when she’d missed her period, Kelly had begun planning what she was going to do.

She wasn’t sure where the idea had come from. But now that the time had come, and she was alone in the house, and had made up her mind, she had the strange idea that she’d always known it would end this way — that some night, when she could no longer stand the sight of herself, she would end it all.

She left her room, not bothering to turn off the light, and entered the tiny bathroom that separated her room from her parents’. She stood in the gloom for a few minutes, staring at the image in the mirror. Only half her face was lit, illuminated by the dim light that filtered from the hall. She could see one of her eyes — the eyes her mother insisted were green, but that she knew were only a pale brown.

The eye stared back at her from the mirror, and she began to have the peculiar sensation that it wasn’t her own reflection she was seeing at all. It was someone else in the mirror, a girl she barely knew.

A stranger.

A stranger whose features looked older than her own sixteen years, whose skin seemed to have taken on the pallor of age, despite her youth.

She saw a lifeless face, devoid of the joy and eagerness of youth. The face of the orphan she truly was, despite what the parents who had adopted her tried to tell her.

And then, over her own darkened shoulder, another image appeared.

It was the man. The man Kelly had seen so often in her dreams but only caught glimpses of when she was awake. Now she saw him clearly.

He was old, his loose skin hanging in folds, his eyes sunken deep within their sockets. He was smiling at her, his lips drawn back to reveal yellowing teeth.

Kelly gasped and spun around.

Except for herself, the room was empty.

She reached out, switched on the light, and instantly the gloom was washed away. She stood still for a moment, her heart pounding, but then her pulse began to ease. Finally, controlling her panic with the same grim will with which she had hidden her madness for the last few years, she turned back to the mirror once more.

He was still there, leering at her, his aged, ugly face contorted, the claws that were his fingers reaching for her throat.

“No!” Kelly screamed. “No more!”

Her hands clenched into fists and she smashed them into the mirror above the sink. The mirror shattered and most of the glass dropped away. But a single shard, razor-sharp and shaped like a sword, remained where it was.

In the bladelike fragment Kelly could still see her ancient tormentor, mocking her, laughing at her, reaching out for her.

Another scream rose in her throat, but this time there were no words. Only a final cry of anguish echoed in the house as Kelly reached out and snatched the fragment of glass from its frame.

Clutching it in both hands, she stared at it as if mesmerized, then raised it up. Now. Now the time had come. In one swift motion she plunged the blade into her belly, determined to end the life of the monster that was growing inside her.

End its life, and end her own.

• • •

“Well, that was a major waste of time,” Mary Anderson sighed as she settled herself into the passenger seat of the five-year-old Chrysler. She regretted having said it instantly, knowing her words had been motivated by the heat of the Georgia night, combined with the five hours of effort she’d just put in doing her best to be charming to people she neither knew well nor liked. But it was too late. Before she could even apologize, Ted lashed out at her.

“It might not have been, if you had at least made the effort to be civil.” He started the engine, slammed the transmission into gear, and listened with satisfaction as the tires screeched in protest before shooting the car out into the streets of Atlanta. He glanced over at Mary, ready to continue the tirade that had been building in his mind for the last hour — ever since Bob Creighton had told him that, despite his personal regard for Ted, there was no job available for him in Creighton Construction. “Personal regard,” huh? It was bullshit, that’s what it was. Creighton was going to give the supervisor’s job to his own brother-in-law, and the hell with who was the better man! But that was what it always boiled down to — connections. It wasn’t what you could do, but whose ass you kissed, or who you were buddy-buddy with, or—

His thoughts were interrupted as he felt Mary slip her hand into his and squeeze it gently. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. As if she’d read his thoughts, her soothing voice went on, “If you ask me, he was never going to give you a fair shot at that job. He was always going to hire Elaine’s brother.”

“Then why the hell did he invite us over there tonight?” Ted asked. All the anger drained from his voice, replaced by a note of defeat that wounded Mary more than his rage had frightened her.

Her grip on his hand tightened. “Because he wanted to pick your brains. I figured it out an hour after we got there — all he wanted to do was find out how you’d deal with the marsh on that condo site. He knows where you’re from, and he knows how much you know. And he didn’t even have to hire you to get your advice — you gave it to him for nothing.”

“Dumb!” Ted erupted, pulling his hand free of his wife’s to slam it angrily on the dash. “Why didn’t you stop me? Why didn’t you—”

Suddenly, in spite of herself, Mary started laughing. “Stop you! Since when have I ever been able to stop you from doing anything? Besides, you’re not dumb — you’re very smart. You’re just too generous sometimes, that’s all. You give away ideas that you could sell, and then wonder why no one wants to buy them. And don’t argue with me, Ted — you know it’s true.”

When he remained grimly silent, she went on, “Please, Ted, relax. Stop worrying, and stop being mad at the world. You’ve always been able to find work before. You’ll find something this time, too.”

“Yeah,” Ted groused. “And in the meantime, my daughter looks at me like I’m a total incompetent, and my wife—”

“Your wife loves you very much,” Mary finished for him. “And if Kelly acts as though she thinks you’re incompetent, at least she acknowledges that you’re alive. In case you hadn’t noticed, she’s practically stopped speaking to me.”

Ted smiled thinly in the darkness of the car. “Maybe you should consider yourself lucky. At least she doesn’t tell you you’re stupid when you object to pink hair.”

“She did that three months ago, when she dyed it.” Mary sighed. “Besides, haven’t you seen the kids she hangs out with? Some of them have purple hair. And rings in their noses.”

“What the hell are they thinking of? Don’t they know—”

“They know they want to look different,” Mary interrupted. “For most of them, it’s just part of growing up. But with Kelly …”

She lapsed into silence as Ted turned the Chrysler into their driveway. She frowned, staring at the small house. Every light had been turned on. She should have been relieved; usually if she and Ted came home after midnight on a Friday night, the house was dark and empty. But tonight, even aside from the bright lights, she could sense Kelly’s presence.

Sense that something was wrong.

She sat still in the car, making no move to open the door even after Ted had switched the engine off. Her feeling of unease was growing.

“Mary?” Ted finally asked. “What is it? You okay?”

His words seemed to bring Mary back to life, and she groped for the door handle. The door stuck for a second, then opened. She got out, moved along the cracked sidewalk, then stopped at the front door. She should have reached out and tried the knob — Kelly practically never remembered to lock it — but didn’t. And when Ted came up beside her, she reached out to touch his arm, almost as if to prevent him from opening the door either.