Alan Baxter - The Gulp - Five Tales of Horror

Their mother had been a small woman in life, barely over five feet tall, and she was wasted away to little more than bones now. They could surely wrap her up tight in something, maybe an old doona cover, rope it all together with weights inside. She wouldn’t make too big a parcel, they could flip her straight out of the boot of the little Toyota hatchback into the dinghy. If they picked their moment, no one would see a thing. They could take her from the bedroom to the car through the kitchen, so no one would see that. She’d only be out for a second while they dumped her in the boat, then they’d take her out as far as they dared and sink the bitch. Let the snails and worms of the seabed have her. If they wrapped her up enough, tied weights to her limbs tightly enough, she’d never surface again.

“What are you smiling about?” Dylan half-smiled himself in anticipation of her answer as he held out a fresh beer.

She didn’t realise she’d made any outward indication of her thoughts. “Nothing really,” she said quickly. “Just a little drunk, I guess. You want to get out of here?”

“Take outs back to the beach?”

“What about take outs back to your place?” She gave him a sultry look. Dylan had his own place, a rented flat that was barely more than a studio, but it was private. He kept trying to convince her to move in with him, but she wasn’t taking their relationship nearly as seriously as he was. One day she would have to let him down, she had no intention of staying with him long term, but for now it was fun.

He grinned. “Better skull these then.”

“Race ya!” She upended the schooner and downed the beer, Dylan grunting in surprise and trying to catch up, but she had him beat.

They both laughed, gasping as they caught their breath. Maddy’s head swam a little from the sudden impact of alcohol. She took his hand and they left the pub.

“More cordial, boys?”

“Muuu-uuum! I said before we’re fine, thanks!”

Josh’s mother made a roll-eyes face at Zack as Josh concentrated on the videogame, hunched forward over the controller. Zack grinned. A mother who cared enough to keep offering was one of the reasons he loved coming over here as much as he did. She was everything his mother wasn’t – kind, caring, well-fed. Alive. She had motherly curves and full curly hair, sparkling green eyes. He knew he loved her a little bit.

“We’re fine, thank you, Mrs Brady,” he said.

“Well, you holler if you need anything else. Want a snack?”

“Mum!”

“No, I’m so full from dinner. Your lasagne is…” Zack made a chef’s kiss gesture and grinned again.

“Oh, you!”

Mrs Brady ducked out, pulling Josh’s bedroom door almost but not quite closed. Zack stared at where she’d been for a moment, then turned his attention back to the game just as Josh died again.

“Dammit!” he snapped, and held the controller out to Zack.

“Why don’t we go two-player?”

“Nah, I want to get through these levels single-player. God, my mum is so annoying.”

Zack restarted the level. “She’s kinda cool, really.”

Josh looked at him with his eyebrows almost vanishing into his hair. “Cool? My mum? Earth to Zack, what have you been smoking?”

“I know she’s a dork, but you should appreciate all she does for you. And you’ve got a dad around who gives a shit. Don’t take that stuff for granted, man.”

Josh smiled. “Yeah, I guess it’s easy for me. You should have the same.”

“I do. I have it here. That’s why I’m always coming over.”

“For my parents?”

“Well, not just your parents. Your Xbox too.”

“Fuck you!” Josh slammed a good set of knuckles into Zack’s arm and Zack cried out, laughing through the pain as he desperately kept the character moving on screen.

“Also, your sister is hot ! So it’s sweet when she’s home from uni.”

“You want me to hit you again?”

Zack laughed and shook his head. “No, don’t! I can barely feel my right hand as it is!”

“You know, your sister is pretty hot too,” Josh said, turning back to look at the screen. “If she wasn’t so… I dunno, angry all the time.”

“Angry all the time?”

“Always scowling.”

“I guess she does it tough, looking after Mum and all that.”

“I thought you said you did most of it,” Josh said.

“Yeah, well, we both do. Mum has a lot of problems. And Maddy works too.”

They fell into silence for a while, except a Whoop! when Zack completed the level, comfortable in each other’s company. Zack took his turns, doing his best not to think about his mum, finally expired in the fetid bed at home. Josh’s house was so clean and bright compared to his own. It smelled so fresh. Even the air at home seemed dirty, notwithstanding the stench. Once they got rid of Mum, he planned to make sure Maddy helped him clean the place from top to bottom and back again. He wanted to scrub and polish everything, maybe even repaint. The house was finally theirs and he wanted to make it more like Josh’s. This was what a family home was supposed to be like.

Get rid of Mum. That was the tricky bit. His stomach started to go watery again at the thought. If they were caught, it would destroy everything. DoCS would come in, they’d be carted off somewhere, lose the house. He didn’t even know if they had extended family. His mum had talked about useless cousins in Bega, but what did that even mean?

He felt panic welling up again at the thought. Please, Maddy, he silently begged. Please have a plan by the morning.

“School night,” came a gruff but kind voice from the door.

They turned to see Josh’s dad, short hair, neat beard, still wearing the slacks and white shirt from his suit and tie office work combo. He was an accountant in Enden, or something like that. Advisor of something or other. He was just as kind as Mrs Brady. He smiled and nodded at Zack. “How are ya, mate?”

“Good, thanks.”

“And your mum?”

Zack made a face, shrugged. “She’s doing okay.”

“You know, if you ever need any help…”

“I know, Mr Brady, thanks.”

“Another half hour, Dad?”

“School night, Josh. It’s already getting late.”

Zack got up from the floor, grabbed his hoodie. “It is getting on,” he said. “Mum’ll be worried. I’d better go.”

Josh nodded, turning back to his game. “Until next time then, loser.”

“Which will be school tomorrow, friend of losers.”

Mr Brady stepped back to let Zack out of the room, then followed him down the hallway towards the front door. The well-lit hallway, with family photos on the walls. All that was on the walls in Zack’s house were flower-shaped mould stains.

“Seeya, champ!”

“Seeya, Mr Brady. Thanks!”

“Any time.”

He jogged the five hundred metres or so home, up the hill from Josh’s place near the beach to his own where the houses got smaller and closer together. He let himself in and stood in the dark hallway as the door clicked shut behind him. He could replace that blown light bulb if nothing else, that had been out for weeks. Tomorrow, he decided. He wouldn’t start until they’d done whatever they were going to do with Mum. Let it mark the beginning of a new era for him and Maddy. A free era.

He walked along and stared at the closed door of his mother’s room. The cloying stink reached his nostrils even here, creeping under the door like a mist. He’d left the window open and had a moment of panic that the neighbours might notice. Her room was at the back of the house, her window overlooking the scrappy patch of lawn and flowerbeds gone to seed. It was a half-decent size for a back yard in town, maybe twenty metres to a side, two-metre high wooden fence all around. No one could see in, all the neighbours yards backing onto each other. Someone would have to climb up onto the fence to see, and even then they wouldn’t get much of a view into the house. The curtains were drawn again even though the window was open. He shook his head. No, no one would see her. But would they smell her? Maybe when she started to really rot, that kind of stink was epic. You could smell a dead roo on the roadside even as you drove past at eighty Ks an hour. But they’d be rid of her before that happened.