Norman Partridge - Slippin' into Darkness

A pile of broken branches and torn leaves lay at the base of the fallen tree. Steve almost lost control, but then he noticed the slight indentation that tunneled beneath the tree.

A hole. Just enough room for a dog to squeeze under. Steve leaned against the trunk and looked on the other side. The small tunnel opened onto a ditch. The ditch ran downhill and became a gully.

There was no sign of the dog.

“Homer!” Steve called. “Homer!”‘

But it was no use. April’s dog had gone.

Steve climbed over the tree and knelt in the dry ditch.

His fingers explored the underside of the tree.

He found leaves that were the color of old paper. Or maybe they were the color of faded yellow paint. But there were other things under the tree. Bits of dried roots, twisted from fighting the hard earth, roots as hard as petrified bone. Steve held these things in his hand, closed his fist around them. They were roots, they were leaves.

Or they were the bones of a dog born in a dream, and skin from the back of a painted ghost.

Steve’s grip tightened.

He opened his hand.

The bones fell away.

And he blew the yellow dust into the cool mint shadows.

Amy had long since stopped screaming, but she hadn’t moved from the corner of the basement. Her shoulder muscles cramped. Earthen cold leeched from the concrete walls and chilled her bones.

It could have been worse. She could have been Doug Douglas, dead on the floor, with skin fading to arctic white.

Doug. He’d held his silence for nearly eighteen years. If he had kept his mouth shut another eighteen, he might still be alive.

The thought gave Amy no relief, and she turned away from the dead man. April Destino’s corpse stood unmoving in the far corner. Mud stains dappled the hem of her red dress; her long blonde hair was twisted in a dry, almost fashionable tangle; her skin was oyster gray and slack. April’s blue lips were swollen in a half pout, half pucker, as if she were awaiting a final kiss from an uncertain lover.

Amy drew a shallow breath. Her chest was so tight with fear that it seemed she was breathing through a straw. She had come here intending to give Doug a good scare. She had come here to teach April how an expert played the game.

And she realized that she hadn’t even known where she was. This wasn’t Doug’s house. It was Steve Austin’s. Ozzy Austin’s. Doug’s words came back to her: You get in that fancy car of yours and you follow the yellow brick road. She was the one who was learning. She had thought that she was the smart one, the unflappable one, but now here she was, huddled in a corner, hiding in the shadows, worrying that her body would shatter if she so much as moved an inch.

But she had to move. She eased away from the cool concrete wall. Dank air stirred behind her, and her naked legs grew gooseflesh under the short cheerleader’s skirt. She moved forward slowly, a wary prizefighter answering a final bell, but April’s corpse didn’t advance from the opposite corner. Thank God, Amy thought. This isn’t turning into a horror movie after all.

The doorknob twisted easily in her grip, and the lock popped free. Her heart jumped. She tugged the knob and the door gave a fraction of an inch, but then it held tight. Frustrated, she pulled harder. Something slapped against the wood, and she realized that there was another lock on the opposite side of the door.

Shit. Amy’s fists thudded against varnished oak, and the sound told her the door was solid. She backed off, eyeing it. Expensive knob. Brass hinges.

The basement air seemed suddenly colder, heavy with the earthy stink of the grave. An icy whisper filled Amy’s ears. She whirled, instinctively retreating toward the corner, her eyes trained on April’s pouting blue lips, but April’s corpse hadn’t moved. It still leaned at a crazy angle against the far wall-half hidden in shadow, half bathed in flickering light.

Light that created the illusion of movement.

It’s just an illusion.

The hem of the corpse’s dress was a curtain made of stone.

There’s the proof. She’s not moving. She’s not breathing. She’s dead.

Once again, Amy’s throat was nothing but a straw, only now someone was pinching it. The light brightened and April’s face became a pool of milk in a bone-china bowl, and then shadows poured over April’s forehead and dripped down her face, transforming the blue pout into a sagging frown.

An icy buzz redirected Amy’s attention to the bank of fluorescent tubes in the lone ceiling fixture. There were three tubes, and only one of them was working. It didn’t look like it would be working for long.

The tube buzzed, then flickered.

Shadows seemed to pour from the corners.

Now you see it, now you don’t.

Now you hear it, now you don’t.

The light was the source of the sound that had startled her. Her back had been turned while she examined the door, and she had heard the fluorescent light buzzing.

No. She had heard a whisper.

Don’t be an idiot. Stay cool and you’ll get out of this. Start imagining things and you’ll be swimming in dangerous waters.

The door. It was the only thing keeping her here. Maybe she could get the hinges off. If she had a screwdriver and a hammer, she could pop the pins easily enough. But a quick search told her that there weren’t any tools in the room. She tried to loosen the pins but couldn’t get a grip on them. They were lodged tight. And her purse was in the Mercedes. She kept a Swiss army knife, a gift from Ethan, in the zipper pocket. If she had that…

But she didn’t. Her car was parked out front.

Unless Steve Austin had moved it.

There had to be something she could use.

Doug Douglas lay at her feet. There was no other choice. She bent low, close to him. She could smell soap, deodorant, and blood…and she knew instantly that Doug had fouled himself in death.

But her hand was like a snake that had been charmed. Her fingers burrowed into the dead man’s pockets. A tangle of wet Kleenex was the first thing she found. She threw it into the shadows and wiped her fingers on Doug’s pants, gagging in disgust. She tried again. Found only his wallet. Then came a cheeseburger wrapper from MacDonald’s. Just one.

Empty. She was coming up empty.

Doug lay on his side. There was one pocket left, and she couldn’t get to it without rolling him over. She nudged his shoulder with the heel of her hand. He wobbled for a moment before collapsing onto his back, the sound like a huge blob of Jell-O dropping to the floor.

Doug’s chest sagged. He sighed, and his teeth clacked together sharply. Amy drew back in horror, but not fast enough to escape the cold breath of death that tickled over her cheek.

Just that one breath. That was all that was left in him. He was dead. He lay there, his lips peeled back in a sick little grin, a sliver of lettuce stuck between his teeth. Amy thought of the pathetic little cheeseburger wrapper and had to look away.

To his pocket. The one pocket that remained. The pocket which masked a bulge that was completely meaningless in death.

No. That was a lie. She wouldn’t reach into that pocket. She wouldn’t touch that thing, no matter how brief the contact was… He was dead…

But she had to. Unless…

Quickly, she tugged at the exposed corner of the pocket and pulled it inside out. The roll of film hit the floor. It had to be the roll that Doug had shot outside Ethan’s window, but Amy didn’t even smile, didn’t even take the time to destroy it, because the real treasure came next.

Doug’s keys. She snatched them up and went to work on the door a second time, trying to loosen the pins, the molding, anything. She worked until her fingers began to ache, with no success.