Alan Baxter - The Gulp - Five Tales of Horror

“What about Edgar? The rest of the band.”

“They went out. With that German pair and the hot Irish chick.”

“Went out where?”

“I don’t fucken know, mate. I’m not a cop.”

“What?”

The woman hauled herself up out of the chair and staggered off towards the front door. She let herself out. Patrick turned back to the others in the room and they were all getting up, some casting suspicious glances his way.

“Do any of you know where the band went?” Patrick asked. “Or my friends? Ciara, Torsten and Simone?”

“What are you, their fucken dad?” one tall, long-haired young dude asked. He laughed and left the house.

The others followed and in moments Patrick stood alone in the lounge room, surrounded by the litter of the night before. Bottles and glasses, ashtrays with spliff butts, someone’s shoes. Who had left without their shoes?

Patrick turned a slow circle. Alone in the house. His gaze drifted upwards. Well, not entirely alone…

The man who made me, shall we say .

Patrick began to tremble as thoughts that had been orbiting his mind at a distance began to coalesce. He remembered one of his favourite films, The Lost Boys . Grandpa, right at the end, casually taking a drink from the refrigerator. One thing about living in Santa Carla I never could stomach: all the damn vampires.

Blind Eye Moon weren’t vampires, not exactly, but they were something similar, weren’t they? A week ago, Patrick would have scoffed at the idea, but the things he’d seen the last few days, the realisations he’d made. And they protected that old man upstairs.

The man who made me, shall we say .

Patrick could end all this, if that old man did hold the key to the power the band wielded. Ciara had said she’d talk in the morning with Torsten and Simone and they would leave. So where was she? She’d gone out with the band instead. Didn’t even wake him to invite him along. She’d said they would talk. She didn’t mean it, or didn’t remember. Either way, Edgar and his friends had a hold over her.

Patrick realised he was already heading towards the stairs. He stopped and went to the kitchen instead. He took the biggest carving knife from the wooden block by the stove and returned to the stairs, went up and headed along the hallway. His hand shook as it fell on the door handle but he clenched his teeth and pushed on. It was insane, but he had made a decision. Everything about this was insane. Even the fact that a band as good as Blind Eye Moon would play shitbox gigs like Monkton. From the moment they had struck those first chords, they had been putting spells on Patrick and his friends. But he saw through them. And he had a way out.

He mounted the narrow staircase leading up to the attic, breathing hard through his nose. Though his hands shook, his grip on the knife was unbreakable. The attic was lit from the large window at the end, the old man a collection of sticks under the covers of his bed. Bram, Patrick remembered. Edgar had called him Bram. Patrick braced himself, crept forward. He didn’t know what kind of strength to expect, but thought if he moved fast enough, it wouldn’t be an issue.

He was halfway across the large space when the old man stirred, turned to sit up. “Edgar? That you, boy?”

Bram was skeletally thin, long white hair in greasy tails around his skull-like head. His eyes were dark pools, those same black filament capillaries lost in the wrinkles of his cadaver-pale skin. His eyes were bloodshot, the pupils clouded over, but red like the band. In his shock before, Patrick hadn’t taken much in, beyond that flash of recognition. Now he saw it was indeed the man from the portrait, but so much older. He’d seemed elderly in the painting, now he was ancient.

Bram squinted as the covers fell from his bony shoulders. He wore stripy pyjamas. As Patrick got within a few metres, Bram said, “You again?”

The old man’s eyes widened and he hissed, opening his mouth wide to reveal half a dozen blackened teeth in red and bleeding gums. He lifted clawed hands up like he was about to cast a spell even as he surged from the bed with unnatural speed and agility. Patrick felt a harsh dragging on his chest. He remembered the dream when the creature had seemed to draw something out of him. He imagined the band drawing from his friends like that every night.

Let’s feed .

His breath left him and his vision blurred at the edges, like he was about to pass out. Bram continued to hiss, striding towards him, eyes flickering with red light like a fire burned in them.

Patrick hauled the knife up and it thunked into the old man’s toast rack chest as the distance between them closed. Bram coughed and wailed a high, thin sound. The sensation of drag eased so suddenly that Patrick nearly fell. He drove forward, pushed the old man back onto the bed. He pulled the knife out and slammed it down again. And again. Something warm spattered his face and the bed clothes blossomed with red stains. Bram’s pyjama top was soaked, the blood dark crimson, and he collapsed back.

The thin, keening wail faded and the old man lay still, head tipped back, red eyes staring sightlessly at the headboard. His mouth remained open in a silent scream.

Patrick staggered back, leaving the knife sticking up from Bram’s chest. He looked at his hands, saw them soaked in blood. “I did it!” he laughed, a thrill rushing through him. “I fucking did it!”

He staggered through the curtain into the old man’s bathroom and turned the taps on, washed his hands in the sink. A small mirror hung from the sloping roof above and he saw a scarlet spray of freckles across his face, even over his lips. He gagged and washed his face, again and again. Eventually he felt clean and thought for a moment he might vomit but swallowed it down.

Had Edgar and his friends just crumbled to dust out there in The Gulp, wherever they’d gone? Or had they lost their powers and aged in an instant. Were they older than they looked or not? Edgar had said something about them being around a long time. Patrick grinned. What did it matter? He had destroyed the man who made them. He needed to find his friends. They’d listen now, and they could leave.

He went back into his room thinking about how much other stuff he could take and decided to let his friends decide. They could pack if they wanted, or simply go. He had the most important stuff for himself and Ciara.

He went downstairs, headed for the kitchen and fixed himself a feed. An hour later he began to wonder if he should go out and look for Ciara, but The Gulp was a fairly big town. He could easily miss her. She would have to come back to the Manor at some point. If Edgar and the others had come to some horrible grief when old Bram had died, perhaps Ciara, Torsten and Simone had run into problems. If only their damn phones worked in this gods forsaken corner of Australia. Then again, Ciara’s phone was in the bag at his waist.

What if he was too late? What if Edgar had taken his friends somewhere and done away with them?

The days were short and it began to get dark a little after five. Patrick was beside himself with nerves, alone in the big house for hours, mind churning with possibilities. Just before six he heard voices outside. He jumped up and ran into the hall as the front door opened. The first person he saw was Edgar, looking hale and hearty. Behind him were his bandmates, and Ciara, and Torsten and Simone. His girlfriend and the Germans all looked thinner and paler than ever. He was reminded of his uncle, who had died from cancer in his fifties. The poor bastard had looked like Ciara looked now only days before his death. Patrick suddenly wished he still had the knife.

“We have to leave, right now!” he said.