Vanish (29 page)

After a moment his shoulders slumped. His voice was gone. “Please… ,” he rasped, “just look up.”

Splash!

Conner dashed back to the poolside. Matthew was floundering, beating the water with his hands, still trying to reach for the ball. Now out of desperation.

Howard’s voice was cool and even. “If only he had been able to grab hold of the ball… But it was just a few inches out of his reach.”

Conner tried to dive into the water but met with a force that knocked him backward, onto the ground. He tried again and again as Matthew struggled. He searched for something to throw to him, something he could reach. But every item, even the raft, was too heavy for him to move. As though everything in the yard was made of granite.

His eyes flooded with tears. “Matthew,” he sobbed. “Oh, God, please…
Matthew
!” Conner looked back to the house and saw himself get up from the table again and return to his office. Unaware. Lost in his work.

He was supposed to watch Matthew. Marta had told him, “Play soccer with your son.” She had told him before she left. But he had a brief to write. He had a case to research. He had…

Conner stared at the empty kitchen.

He had work to do.

He turned back to the pool, tears pouring down his cheeks, as Matthew’s head sank beneath the surface. He watched his son try to call out, only to suck in a lungful of water. His arms flailed. His eyes were round with fear. His beautiful blue eyes. Filled with fear. He choked and coughed and gasped for air but only took in another mouthful of water.

Conner’s mind clouded. The scene was too much. His legs buckled and he sank to his knees at the poolside. “Oh, Matthew… my beautiful little boy… my son… I’m so sorry.…”

Matthew was staring at him now. Right at him. Eyes round. Mouth open, drowning beneath the surface. Slowly, his legs stopped kicking and his arms grew still. His little body sank, legs together. Arms outstretched.

Conner could see his eyes grow calm.

Then glaze over.

“WE’RE LOSING HIM.” The voice was professional. Stable. But filled with urgency.

Rachel’s eyes widened again.

No!

They had revived him. He had been conscious. Just a few seconds ago, he had looked at her. He was alive.…

Time seemed to slow down.

The ER staff bustled with activity. The EKG monitor blared a steady tone. Rachel watched them work. Their voices died away in an echoing canyon. She could feel herself growing faint. Her vision began to tunnel. She clutched her mother’s arm, digging her fingers into her shirt.

“Mom?” Her voice sounded far away. Her mom’s hand swept down across her shoulder and pulled her close.

God, please don’t take him.…

The doctor charged the defibrillator again and checked the monitor.

“Clear!”

They backed away as he laid the paddles on her father’s bare chest. Rachel could hear the thump and deep hum as the current coursed through his flesh. His chest lifted slightly, held for a moment, then sank back down. The monitor hummed a steady tone.

The doctor swore and shook his head.

Conner knelt at the poolside. His eyes stung as tears streamed down his cheeks. His body shuddered with sobs.

“Matthew…”

Howard stood over him, arms folded, shaking his head. “You didn’t even come outside for another twenty-five minutes, Mr. Hayden.”

Conner’s eyes opened. He caught his breath.

Twenty-five minutes?

Had it been that long? He’d sworn he had just taken his eyes off the boy for a minute. He’d sworn he had been watching him the whole time.

“Tell me,” Howard said evenly, “how did your wife react? It must have been difficult for her. To come home from the mall and find an ambulance in her driveway. To see that tiny bundle of linen on the stretcher. And then to realize her worst nightmare had come true.”

Conner nodded, his chest tight. Marta’s reaction was violent, unabated sorrow. She had collapsed there on the driveway.

“I imagine it must have been difficult for her not to blame you.”

Conner struggled for breath. His heart raced. They had stopped speaking altogether for the first several days. And she was cold for several weeks more. He knew she blamed him. She never said as much. But he could see it in her eyes. In the way she avoided his gaze.

Howard leaned over Conner’s shoulder. His breath was cold on Conner’s neck. “Yet somehow, I can’t imagine you acknowledging your own culpability.”

Conner stared at the pool. Sunlight glinted off the water. “I didn’t.… I didn’t.…”

“But you did find someone to blame, yes?” Howard straightened up. “Someone at whom you could direct your anger. Someone to be the target of your rage.”

Conner shuddered. “Yes.…”

“Yes, the Almighty. It was
His
fault. He could have prevented it, after all. He could have intervened.…”

“Why didn’t He? Why didn’t He save my son?”

“Because He couldn’t.” Howard bent again to Conner’s ear. His voice was low, barely above a whisper. “Or perhaps He didn’t want to. Perhaps He wanted to teach you a lesson. He’s nothing but a schoolyard bully after all, isn’t He, Mr. Hayden.”

Conner opened his mouth but could not speak. A chill crept over him, down his torso, up to his neck. His rash was spreading. They had given up on him. They weren’t going to revive him. But he didn’t care. He didn’t care about fighting any longer. Numbness swept across his mind. A thick, black numbness.

“Or maybe… ,” Howard whispered, “maybe He wanted
you
to know what it was like to have to stand by and watch your only son die.”

Conner’s eyes began to roll back. The sunlight faded away; the pool was changing color. Darkness crept across the water, swallowing everything in its path. The trees disappeared, the yard and the house. The entire scene melted away before him, and Conner found himself kneeling again on the edge of the precipice. Staring down into the vast chasm of darkness.

The multitude of voices rose up like a wave and washed over him. Endless rage and despair of embittered souls swirled around him now. He could feel their terror and sorrow and anger. The knowledge of separation. Lost in unending darkness. Multitudes of souls, yet each one completely and utterly alone.

Conner could feel the presence of more than just Howard behind him now. He could hear the whispers. The creatures had brought him back. Conner looked down at his hands. His flesh was now all but swallowed by the rash creeping across his body.

“You are going to have a long time to consider these things, Mr. Hayden.” Howard’s voice fell to a deep, guttural tone. “A very long time.”

Conner turned around. Howard’s gaunt, pale face gazed back at him. It was vacant and expressionless.

And the gray creatures emerged from behind him. More than two. Now more than a dozen. White, soulless eyes gazed at him. Burned through him. Mouths gaped open. Black tongues rolled forward. Thick saliva, like tar, dripped from their jaws. The stench of death and rot filled Conner’s nostrils.

Howard’s face was changing as well, melting into a hideous gray mask. His eyes faded to white. He straightened up and towered over Conner, looming up against the gray clouds. His clothing grew dark and enveloped his body with a black mist. It swirled around him, shrouded him, spreading outward like a great cloak.

Conner could feel the darkness bearing down on him, as if it were a physical thing. A weight crushing him. He struggled for words. “Who… who are you?”

Howard laughed. “I have many names.” His deep voice rolled and growled. “I am the Hunger that cannot be filled. I am the Consuming Darkness that comes to all men. The Wasting that gnaws away at flesh and bone. I am the Devourer. I am Death.”

The ground began to crumble. Conner felt himself slipping backward, off the cliff. He clawed at the rocks, digging his icy fingers into the ground.

Fear broke through the numbness and clutched him. He struggled to hold on. His hands flailed helplessly at the rocks. He tried to cry out, but his voice was dried up. He looked up and could see beyond the creatures, on the embankment behind them…

Something moved.

RACHEL BIT HER LIP and watched the frantic activity over her father. Tears streamed down her cheeks. What was the last thing she had even said to him? They had argued, and she had said something mean. Her mind spun back to their conversation.

“I don’t even know who you are anymore.”

The words echoed in her head, haunting her.

Her mother pulled her close.

“Sweetheart, we need to pray,” she said, then whispered a prayer into Rachel’s ear. Her warm tears dripped onto Rachel’s neck, and her voice quivered.

Rachel squeezed her mother’s hand and prayed along silently.

Oh please, Jesus… he’s not ready.… Please… don’t let him die.

In the ER, the doctor returned the defibrillator paddles to the station. One of the nurses turned away from the gurney and tugged off her mask.

Rachel gasped.

No!

She tore herself loose from her mother and ran down the hall. “Please don’t stop! Please don’t give up! He’s not ready to die!”

The nurse blocked her path. Someone shouted, “Close that door!”

The door swung shut in Rachel’s face and the nurse pulled her back. “Please, miss. I’m sorry.…”

“He’s not ready!” Rachel screamed through her sobs. She pounded on the door. “Don’t stop! Please don’t give up! He’s not ready to die!”

Rachel felt her mother’s arm around her again. The doctor stared at Rachel through the window. His eyes seemed filled with regret.

Rachel wept. “
Please
!”

Conner’s arms grew numb. He was losing his hold. The wind howled in his ears, pulling him backward. And Howard—Death himself—loomed over him.

But a small figure climbed up the slope behind the creatures. Conner struggled to keep his hold. More ground crumbled away beneath him, and his feet swung loose over the precipice. The wind howled louder now. The voices hit a crescendo. Conner’s eyes narrowed, then widened.

The boy!

The boy stood on the edge of the embankment. Conner blinked. He had lost him on the boat. He thought they had taken him.

The wind whipped around the child, tugging at his old flannel shirt. His hair blew back. His dark eyes were fixed onto Conner now.

Death seemed to sense this new presence. He spun around to face the boy, and the black mist swirled, trailing his movement. It shrouded his torso, coiling around his face and limbs. The other creatures turned as well and fanned out as if to flank their leader. Shoulders pulled back, heads stretched forward, gaping jaws opened in a chorus of guttural hisses.

The boy stood his ground, bracing his frail body against the wind.

Death bellowed a deep, thunderous roar. His voice sounded like a multitude of inhuman voices crying in unison.

“You will not interfere!”

The ground shook with his fury. Conner slipped again, kicking his feet to gain a foothold. The rocks beneath him were jarring loose.

The boy’s eyes did not waver from Conner. He stood in the wind and the fury and shook his head.

Death stretched his hand forward. A tendril of black mist curled out like an enormous serpent and encircled the boy.

Conner cried out, “No!” But his voice was lost amid the howling wind.

Rachel pounded on the door. Another nurse removed her mask. They were giving up! They couldn’t give up!

“Miss, I’m very sorry,” the nurse beside her said. “There’s nothing more we can do.”

Rachel’s mother was weeping. She tried to pull Rachel away from the door.

But Rachel’s eyes were locked on the doctor. Her voice was hoarse, lost in her crying. “Please don’t let him die.…”

The doctor drew in a deep breath and nodded. He reached for the defibrillator paddles again.

“Charging…” His voice sounded grim.

Black mist coiled around the boy, swirling up to his torso. Only then did his eyes move from Conner, up into the face of Death.

And he spoke.

His voice sounded like an explosion of thunder. It rocked the entire precipice. The ground shook. The trees snapped at their trunks as the shock wave spread outward, blasting the gray creatures off the ledge, like hapless flies blown by a tornado. The force of it stripped Death of his black shroud, leaving his pale, withered frame naked and exposed.

The sky erupted with light. It blazed down, flowing around Death’s gnarled gray form, dissolving it like a twig dropped into acid.

The light pierced Conner as well, warm and clean, slicing through him, blinding him with its brilliance. He clung to the rocks as the ground shook. His raw hands began to slip as the ground dropped away beneath him.

Then the fury subsided.

Conner found himself in complete silence. He opened his eyes. Darkness yawned beneath him. He looked up. One hand clung to a rocky outcropping just below the top of the ledge. Dark clouds swirled overhead. His hand was slipping.

Slipping.

The boy’s face appeared over the edge as the rock fell away. Conner felt himself drop. But he didn’t fall. He looked up to see the boy’s fingers wrapped around his wrist. His brown eyes narrowed. His teeth clenched. Conner reached up with his free hand and clutched the boy’s arm.

Then Conner saw it. A gaping scar on the child’s wrist. Conner clung to him as he swung over the abyss. The boy’s arm stretched under Conner’s weight, tearing the wound open again. Blood rolled down from his wrist onto Conner’s hands.

The boy pulled. He reached down his other hand and pulled. Conner felt himself slowly moving upward. He kicked against the side of the cliff, searching for a foothold. There was no way this kid would be able to pull him up. Not alone.

He was just a boy.…

Conner’s arms emerged over the edge. Still the boy pulled him. He pulled until Conner’s upper torso was back on top of the ledge.