Bedbugs (50 page)

Writing books. Creating characters, trying different things, changing, letting that river of words flow and— most importantly—getting it out to the real world to read. It’s what people like old Sam in Jersey did. Forgotten. But not by me.

And it’s what Rick Hautala has done for nearly two decades. I’ve seen Rick when he was tasting some of that good stuff I talked about before—you know, money, success, and I’ve seen him when he’s been on a break from that particular feast. . . .

The one constant through it all has been his work. He’s always looking for the next book, his imagination is always filled with characters that won’t go away. It’s a writer’s legacy, a body of work accumulates, a library of books that represent what real writers do. Write, probe, grow, challenge, wonder . . .

And this collection?

Very special indeed. I’ve always told Rick that I felt he brought special freedom to his short fiction . . . as though the short stories didn’t have to fit into a certain niche of Rick Hautala books, and he could just wail. Some of these you’ve read in magazines, some have never appeared before—but any long-time reader of Rick’s who comes to this book will emerge with a different view of him as a writer.

It’s kind of like that moment in
The Godfather
when Lee Strasberg is taking Michael to task for whining about the organized crime life. “It’s the business we chose,” Strasberg almost spits out at his former student Pacino.

Rick knows that I’m sure. Though he might say the choice was the other way around. Some were born to dance, some to write . . . (and some to hype, but don’t even get me started on that one, honey).

So I’m really glad this
Bedbugs
volume appeared, collecting so many great stories written over so many years. It’s Rick playing at his craft, and art—and for an artist, play is the real work. And boy does Rick love to play.

1

K
ip Howard was lying on the couch, trying to keep his gaze from wandering out the window. Beyond the splashes of green leaves blowing gently by the window, he could see rafts of white clouds sliding smoothly along the horizon. Sunlight glinted from the wooden windowsill and caught spinning motes of dust.

This is getting to be too much like school
, he thought as he shifted uncomfortably,
me
,
wishing I was outside...not in here.

It was the middle of June. The last day of school was so close he could practically smell it; but this... the end of
this
wasn’t in sight. Not this month... not this year... not
ever
, he was beginning to feel.

“So,” the voice beside him said gently, “you said you had an ‘okay’ week. Do you want to tell me anything else about it?”

Kip shifted his head and took several seconds to look at Dr. Fielding. She sat with her left leg crossed over her right knee. Her gold Cross pen was poised over an open spiral-bound notebook, and she was looking at him over the large rims of her round glasses.

“Just okay,” he answered. “Nothin’ special.”

The sun reflecting off the windowsill caught the blue silky fabric of her blouse and shattered into a dazzle of light. The color made him think of the sky just after the sun had set, but for some reason, that thought sent a chill through him.

“Have you been getting along any better with your brother?” Dr. Fielding asked. She was trying not to let it show, but Kip was pretty sure she was getting impatient.
But why should she be the one getting impatient?
...
I’m
the one who doesn’t want to be here.

“Marty? He’s an as—He’s a jerk.” Kip had been close to letting the word
asshole
slip out, but he’d caught himself. He wondered why, if Dr. Fielding was supposed to be helping him, he felt so uncomfortable about swearing in front of her.

“Has he done anything—this week? Anything that bothered you?”

Kip shrugged and shifted his gaze back out the window. He pondered how long it had been since he started coming here. This was the second June he’d been doing this, so it had been more than a year... well over a year. But last June was different. After everything that had happened, spending time with Dr. Fielding had been—well, if not
new
, at least exciting. Now, it just felt like a chore.

“If it’s all the same to you,” Kip said, “I’d just as soon cut this session short today. I think maybe I got a touch of spring fever or something.”

He cleared his throat and started to shift to a sitting position, but Dr. Fielding’s next question took his strength from him, and he sagged back.

“You’re not hiding anything from me, now, are you, Kip?”

Kip shook his head... perhaps too vigorously. “Why would I do something like that?”

“Well... how’s school been going for you? Have you started to pull your grades up any?”

“Yeah... sure,” Kip said edgily. “I guess I’m doing okay.”

“Have you had any more nightmares?”

Again, Kip shook his head, answering honestly, “No. Not this past week, anyway.”

“Look, Kip,” Dr. Fielding said gently, but still, she held the pen poised over the paper. “I know you well enough to know when you’re holding back on me. I certainly hope by now I have your confidence.”

“You do... Really,” Kip answered, but he didn’t even try to mask the irritation he was feeling. He didn’t like the way she could
always
do that—make him feel like he was made of glass or something; how she could read him so easily. At twelve years old, he was starting to think he was a little more complicated than that.

“So...?”

Kip sighed. The sunlight on the windowsill wavered, and he thought for a moment that the clouds floating by had turned to gray, threatening rain.

“It’s my dad,” Kip said, fighting the constriction in his throat. The sound of her writing made him think, strangely enough, of the scraping sound of a fly caught between two panes of glass.

“What about your dad?” Dr. Fielding asked.

“He’s... umm.” Kip swallowed, but the lump in his throat wouldn’t go down. “He’s thinking about starting to work on the house again.”

“You mean the new house?”

“Um-hum.” Kip nodded, suddenly conscious of the tension building in his shoulders. “The new one.”

“How do you feel about that?”

“How do you
think
I feel?” Kip said, suddenly exploding. His eyes started stinging as tears gathered. He knew
that
feeling well enough, but he told himself not to start crying now... not in front of her... not again.

“I can see how much it upsets you,” Dr. Fielding said softly. “Can you tell me why?”

“You know damn well why,” Kip replied. He knew she meant well; he could hear the kindness and concern in her voice, but he couldn’t hold back his anger and pain any longer. His lower lip started trembling, and the stinging in his eyes got worse. “It’s the whole reason I’m coming here to see you, isn’t it?”

“Has coming here helped?” she asked, shifting forward but refraining from putting her hand on his shoulder.

“I still can’t remember what I... what I saw, if
that’s
what you mean. I know that I found—” His voice twisted off with a high note, and as much as he tried to stop it, tears spilled from his eyes. “She was dead... my mother was dead... there... in the cellar hole.”

Dr. Fielding reached behind her and snapped a tissue from the Kleenex designer box. She handed it to him and he took it without a word.

“She was all cut up... slashed. I remember—or
almost
remember what I saw. There was
something
down there with her. Some
things
in the cellar hole. Lots of them. But—still—you know, in my mind, it’s all a blur. I saw this... this flurry of activity... almost like they were giant rats or something...” His voice twisted off with a high note.

“Tell me some more about the cellar hole itself,” Dr. Fielding said mildly.

Kip dabbed his eyes, then blew his nose vigorously. The clouds floating beyond the trees had, he decided, definitely turned darker.

“The cellar... where my mom and dad were going to build the house.” He closed his eyes tightly until the pressure squeezed out a few more tears. “They had bought the land on
Kaulback Road
, in
Thornton
, a year before I was born, but with being so busy at his job and all, my dad never got a chance to start building until—I guess it was around when I was six he started clearing out the land.”

“And this cellar hole where he was planning to build the new house, there used to be another house there, right?” Dr. Fielding asked.

Kip nodded. “The kids at school—’specially Patrick MacNair—said it was where there used to be a witch’s house. My dad checked into it, and the best he ever found out was a few of the men around town said that sometime back in Colonial times there was a house there that burned down. When we were first clearing the land, when I was little, I remember finding old rusted pieces of metal and stuff—just junk my parents threw away, but it was like a treasure hunt for me.”

Dr. Fielding shrugged her shoulders, unable to suppress a shiver. “And what did you think about that, about the idea that the cellar hole might be haunted or cursed or something?”

Kip stifled a chuckle, but the thought of it made his stomach feel like he’d just swallowed a snowball. “I guess I was pretty scared... I mean, I was only seven at the time, and I was the new kid in town ‘n all; ‘n I didn’t know if they were serious or just teasing. But I guess—when I think about it—I wasn’t too keen on the idea of building the house where someone else’s house used to be.”

“How do you feel about it now?”

“Come on,” Kip said, suddenly angry. “I told you a hundred times everything I remember from that day.”

“Maybe if you tell me again, a little more of it will come back to you.”

Kip heaved a deep sigh and ran his fingers through his hair. “My dad was cutting down some trees so the backhoe and the cement truck would be able to get in to pour the foundation. My mom was—” Again, his voice hitched, and tears burned in his eyes. “She was down in the cellar, picking
 
up rocks and branches and stuff so they could dig the cellar deeper. I had a little toy saw and hammer, and I was over near my dad, pretending I was taking down trees. I remember the chainsaw he was using made an awful lot of noise, and it smoked a lot.

Kip sniffled and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

“I remember how every now and then I’d look over at the cellar hole, and I’d see some sticks or a rock come flying up out of there. I remember seeing my mom’s hands flash up above the level of the ground.”

“It was getting late. We were gonna be leaving soon. I was down toward the end of the driveway with my dad, and all of a sudden I got—I don’t know how to explain it, this really weird feeling, like something was wrong. I didn’t know what it was. I had seen
Bambi
recently, and I remember thinking how the deer must have felt when the forest was on fire. I got that same jumpy feeling except it was for myself. I couldn’t help myself. I started to scream, but my father didn’t hear me over the sound of the chainsaw, so I ran up to the cellar hole, and that’s when I—I saw—”

Kip’s voice choked off again, and he covered his eyes with both hands, pressing the heels of his palms so hard against his eyes squiggling point of light filled his vision. His thin shoulders shook like he had a chill.

“Kip,” Dr. Fielding said softly, sounding like she was a hundred miles away. “Kip, don’t force yourself to—”

“When I got there... to the cellar hole, it looked like it was... was too dark down there... like it was the first place where night came, even though the sun had just dropped behind the hill. Eagle Hill, they call it. And down there, in the shadows, I saw this... this activity—like everything was under water or something. My mother was lying on the ground, and there were these... these things moving all around her. They were moving so fast I couldn’t really see anything clearly.”