FEAST OF THE FEAR

FEAST OF THE FEAR

Four horrifying tales by Mark Edward Hall

Includes a sneak preview of the upcoming novel

SOUL THIEF

© 2012 Mark Edward Hall

http://www.markedwardhall.com

This book is a work of fiction. Names characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

THE FEAR

When Mitch Redlon woke up with
The Fear
inside him, he could only lay in bed, frozen in terror, as his throat, nearly closed from a vicious assault of nocturnal screaming, gagged and convulsed in its struggle to admit fresh air. For a long time he lay on his back staring up at the dark ceiling, trying to get his breathing and his nerves right again. When he was finally able to throw his legs over the side of the bed, he sat with his head in his hands, all sweat-soaked and feverish, trying to decide what his next move should be. Unwilling to try and make any immediate sense of the dream, Mitch struggled unsteadily to his feet and left the bedroom. There were no lights on in the small trailer house, but the moon was bright and its ambient light through the windows was sufficient enough to allow Mitch safe passage to the kitchen. There he stood at the sink, running a glass of water with trembling hands. He poured aspirin tablets into his mouth from an open bottle on the counter-top and chased them down with a swallow of the lukewarm water. Putting the glass atop the pile of dirty dishes there, Mitch limped to the door, moved the curtain aside, and peered out into the night. He surveyed the driveway and the ramshackle garage beyond. Nothing looked out of place, at least from his vantage point inside the house.

But why should anything be out of place?
His rational mind asked.

It can’t see you in here.
Not with the lights out.

What the hell are you talking about? What can’t see me in here?

It!

It?

Yeah, the thing you felt while you were sleeping. The thing that made you . . . scream. The thing that used to make you shit the bed, and tear at your scar trying to get it out of you.
The Fear.
It’s back!

Oh, God, no!

If you felt it while you were sleeping then it must already be inside the house, Mitch. Or maybe it’s already inside . . . you . . .

Mitch whirled, as he caught a glimpse of something out of the corner of his eye. A tiny bent form scurried across the living room carpet. Mitch screamed as his heart hammered into a gallop. “Oh, Jesus!” he said. “Oh, Jesus Christ, this can’t be happening.”

Mitch stood stark still, staring at the place where he thought he’d seen the tiny scurrying form. He saw no more movement, but that didn’t mean anything. The house was dark, and filled with shadows, and there were plenty of places for . . .
it
to hide.

Mitch bent over, resting his hands on his trembling knees as his breath sucked asthmatically through constricted airways. That’s when he noticed the dark stains. They were all over the front of his sweats and his nightshirt. He straightened up, raising his hands, holding the palms close to his face, straining to see them in the dim light. The dream intruded on him suddenly, in all its gruesome detail.

“
Oh, Jesus no,” he said, turning sharply and limping quickly down the corridor. In the bathroom Mitch flipped on the light and gawked at himself in the mirror. It was worse than he could have imagined. The blood was everywhere, smears of it on his face and clots of it in his unkempt hair. The front of his shirt and sweats appeared to be finger-painted with the stuff. They looked like a macabre map of some unknown continent. Most of it had dried, leaving his pants and shirt stiff, like a second skin frozen with rigor. On his face, however, the blood was still wet; it had mixed with his sweat and tears and the combination looked like a haphazard watercolor painting on the face of a ghoul.

Dear, God, what has happened here?

Certainly what he’d experienced had been a dream. Gruesome as it was. But if that was true, then where had all the blood come from? And what had he seen in the living room?
Jesus Christ, I must be losing my mind?

Mitch stumbled back into his bedroom and turned on the light. Sure enough, the sheets where he had lain tossing were covered in blood and there was a small pool of it on the floor beside the bed. Mitch peeled off his bloodstained garments and surveyed his body. Finding no signs of injury, other than the long, familiar scar that ran the entire length of his right torso, he got down on his hands and knees and tentatively peered under the bed. He didn’t really expect to find anything. He’d seen the small bent form before, of course, dozens of times. It always accompanied the dreams. But he’d never been able to catch it with his full vision before it disappeared, thus, he’d never been able to identify it.

Probably a good thing.

After searching the house thoroughly Mitch went back into the bathroom and ran a hot shower. When he was clean he dressed and walked slowly back into the living room.

The Fear!

Is that what this was about?

The Fear!

It was as familiar as an old acquaintance, as welcome as cancer.

The Fear
had gone out of him years ago, right about the time he had moved out of his mother’s house. He couldn’t remember the exact moment. The point was, just like that, one day it was gone. And he had been so grateful, so damned relieved. But now somehow it had found its way back to him, only worse. Before there had never been any blood. The dreams, yes, in gruesome detail, but never any
real
blood. None that he’d known about, at least. God almighty, now he would have to learn how to deal with that horrific thing in his life again, that feeling that there was something not in his house or his room, or even his bed. It was the sick and dreadful sensation that there was something inside
him,
some invader or infestation that made him go along and be a part of something unspeakable.

The Fear
had visited Mitch on a regular basis when he was growing up; his mother had had to get up in the night and comfort him, but no amount of comfort had been sufficient enough to stem Mitch’s night terrors. The episodes had resulted in psychiatric counseling, but they had not ended there. How do you explain to a doctor, a mother, or anybody else, for that matter, that it wasn’t the dark or the boogeyman that you were afraid of? It wasn’t what was waiting under the bed or hiding in the closet that frightened you. How does a kid explain something that he himself doesn’t even understand, could never hope to understand? That there was something getting inside of you at night and forcing you to . . . see things . . . maybe even . . . do things. Acts so unspeakable that they would always be with you, flawlessly remembered, each room and each body, frozen forever in your mind’s eye. Yes, Mitch had seen them all, through nightmare eyes, had he had watched as the butcher knife did its dirty business.

In those days,
The Fear,
as Mitch would come to know and name the infestation, would enter his body at night and take him along on its macabre journeys, force him to experience the horrors of murder and blood and evil. Mitch had never actually done any of those things, of course. He’d just been a reluctant witness to the atrocities, an unwitting partner-in-crime to something evil beyond articulation.

At least that’s what he chose to believe.

Nobody had ever been able to explain any of the deaths adequately, not even the police. Supposedly there was never enough evidence at the crime scenes to put a case together; a suspect had never been arrested, the cases had probably been filed away in the archives where they grew colder as years passed.

And Mitch had never dared mention the swelling of his torso scar following each incident. And what about the accompanying pain? Just like now, a terrible deep-rooted agony that no amount of medicine could quell.

I can’t stand to go through this again,
Mitch thought.
I need to talk to Ma.

No, Mitch! That’s exactly what you don’t need.

Why don’t you want me to talk to her?

Because she doesn’t have anything to tell you.

I think she does. I think she . . . knows.

Mitch, Don’t!

Don’t tell me what to do! I’m sick of it. And I’m sick of you! I’m going to talk to her.

Listen, Mitch, do you want the bitch to die?

What?

If you say one fucking word to her, she’s dead. I promise.

You’d better not hurt her, you son of a bitch?

I won’t make any guarantees, Mitch.

I’m going over there in the morning. I don’t care what you say.

Okay, Mitch, but remember, I warned you.

Mitch walked slowly to the couch and gingerly sat down on its worn upholstery, wondering what to do next. The aspirin was starting to work. The ache in his side was receding in slow, radiating waves. That was something, at least. He looked up at the clock. It said three twenty AM.
Maybe if I just sit here and don’t fall back to sleep, everything will be okay,
Mitch thought.
After the sun comes up I’ll go and see Ma, make sure she’s all right, and tell her that
The Fear
is back, and that I need some answers.
There’s no reason to believe that any harm will come to her. That other voice is just me talking to myself, nothing more. It can’t harm me, or her.

Mitch suddenly felt a small tug on his lower, right torso. He stiffened and sat upright, panic causing his respiration to accelerate. The tug turned into a finger of unpleasant sensation as it moved up the length of his torso, tracing the scar there, as if a worm crawled beneath his skin. Now the worm had moved into his chest, toward his heart. Mitch gave a small squawk of panic as the sensation blossomed into something otherworldly. He imagined a hand squeezing his heart, the pressure intensifying until he thought it would explode.

“
Noooo!” Mitch screamed, as he fell to the floor writhing in agony. The sensation stopped suddenly. Mitch lay on the dusty carpet for a long time, his breath coming and going in painful bursts, his entire body bathed in cold sweat. When he opened his eyes, a ray of sun slanting in through a nearby window nearly blinded him. He
had
fallen asleep. God, as much as he’d tried not to, he’d succumbed to sleep’s dreadful summons, and under its spell he’d experienced another terrifying bout with
The Fear.
He’d seen his mother! Jesus Christ, no! It couldn’t be!

Mitch clawed his way to a sitting position, keenly aware of his aching torso. When he realized he’d soiled himself he began to weep.

“
God Almighty!”
he cried. “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”

But of course there was no answer to his pathetic pleadings. Why should there be?

The Redlon home was a late nineteenth-century two-story building in a badly dilapidated state. Paint was peeling off in large sheets, and shutters hung askew. The grass all around the structure was three feet high and filled with booby traps. Several old cars sat rusted and wheel less in the tall grass, unpleasant reminders of years gone, and best left alone, of mother’s occasional boyfriends, of drunken rages and brutal fists.