Ghoul (29 page)

Timmy patted her back, unsure of what to do. “You okay?”

Gasping, she nodded. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

Timmy crawled over to Barry. Despite his injuries, Barry smiled.

“You're rescued.”

“What happened?”

Groaning, Barry struggled to his feet. “The ground caved in. I couldn't jump off because my old man--”

His eyes grew wide. He turned around quickly; then looked back to Timmy.

“Where is he?”

Timmy frowned. “The ghoul? I don't know. He must have took off when you came crashing through.”

“No,” Barry shook his head. “My old man. He was on the backhoe when it fell.”

They searched through the wreckage. The backhoe had landed on its front, and the scoop was imbedded in the tunnel floor. The dirt had piled up around it, burying the entire front end. The rear scoop jutted through the crevice in the ceiling and out to the surface. They clambered over the mounds of earth, searching.

Timmy gasped. “Is that...”

Barry knelt in the dirt. His father's hand jutted from the soil. Dane Graco's freemason ring was still on his finger. Without a word, Barry pulled the ring free and tossed it to Timmy.

“There. You should have this.”

“Thanks.” Timmy put the ring in his pocket. “Are you gonna be all right?”

Barry shrugged, his eyes not leaving the hand. "Yeah. I mean, maybe I should be sad, because he was my father, but I'm not. I don't even feel happy. I'm just ... empty. Does that make sense?"

Timmy nodded.

Barry ran his hands through his hair, shaking out the dirt. “He said I wasn't any son of his. Right before we fell.”

“That's not true.”

“Yeah, it is. He may have been my old man, biologically, but I ain't his son. No way. I'm nothing like him, and I'm never gonna be. I swear it.”

Karen stepped forward. “Can we go?”

“What about the other woman?” Timmy asked. “Deb? We can't just leave her down here.”

“Where is she?” Barry stared at Karen's breasts, then quickly looked away.

“Back there somewhere.” Timmy pointed past the pile of dirt choking the tunnel. “We'll have to dig through that.”

“With what,” Barry snorted. “Our bare hands?”

Karen climbed up the backhoe. "We'll get help. They can send a rescue squad in to dig her out, just like they do when a mine collapses. I'm not waiting for that thing to come back. She might not even be alive anymore. She was pretty ... out of it. I think her mind went after the first time the ghoul..."

Rather than finishing the sentence, she turned her face skyward.

Timmy and Barry watched her climb. Barry leaned close and whispered in his ear.

“Do you think the ghoul is dead?”

“I don't know,” Timmy said. “My eyes were shut. I didn't see where it went.”

“What about Doug? Did you find him?”

Timmy lowered his head. His lip quivered. “Yeah. He's ... I don't want to talk about it right now.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

Karen shimmied up the rear scoop's arm. When she reached the ceiling, she looked back down at them.

“You guys coming?”

Nodding, the boys climbed onto the backhoe. Barry started up first, followed by Timmy.

Timmy had only ascended a few feet when he heard a soft rustling noise. He glanced down at the mound of debris. It was moving.

“Shit. Go, go, go!”

“What is it?” Barry stopped, looking down in concern.

“Just go,” Timmy screamed. “Hurry!”

A clawed hand erupted from the dirt, followed by another. Several of the ghoul's talons had been ripped away, and its fingers were bleeding. Its arms thrust forward, followed by its pointed, oversized head. Its yellow eyes smoldered with rage.

Screaming, Barry began climbing again. Timmy pushed on his feet, urging him to go faster.

The ghoul sprang from the mound and shook off the dirt. Then it rose to its full height.

“My bride!” It beckoned to Karen. “Return now, and I shall not hurt you.”

With a shriek, Karen pulled herself up to the surface and out into the light. Barry and Timmy climbed higher.

“No,” the ghoul roared. “No, no, no, no, no. I will not allow this. My kind must live again. You will not take away my chance at parentage.”

It leaped onto the backhoe. The scoop arm rocked back and forth, and both boys had to cling tight to keep from falling. Like a spider, the ghoul raced up the side of the machine, its long arms and legs scrabbling for purchase. Barry reached the top and heaved himself over the side onto solid ground. He extended his hand down into the hole and Timmy grasped it.

“Hurry,” Barry shouted. “It's almost on you.”

Timmy pushed with his legs and reached the top. The ghoul was directly beneath him.

He could feel its breath on his ankles; hear it hissing with rage. Then it howled --but this time, the sound was different.

Timmy crawled out of the hole and glanced back down. The dim sunlight had touched the ghoul's arm, and the pale flesh sizzled. The slime coating the appendage bubbled and popped, and a thin line of smoke curled upward.

“Come on.” Barry grabbed Timmy's arm and pulled him to his feet.

Timmy shrugged him off and stared in horrified fascination, absolutely transfixed as the ghoul's arm continued to smolder.

“Timmy, let's go!”

Barry shoved him forward. Timmy stumbled, and then followed. They ran between the tombstones. Karen sprinted ahead of them, heading for the church. The sun 's upper half had cleared the treetops now, and the blue light of predawn had given way to the red glow of sunrise.

“No. My family...” The ghoul emerged from the crevice. Smoke billowed from its body as the light touched its flesh. Even as they ran, the boys heard it sizzling behind them. Still, it pursued them with determination, screaming for Karen to come back.

As they neared the church, the creature's shouts faded.

Timmy turned and stared.

The ghoul writhed in the grass, its body contorted with pain. Timmy had once found a slug on his parent's sidewalk, and had poured salt over the unfortunate creature. He was reminded of that now. The ghoul's pale flesh sloughed away each time the monster moved. The muscles and tissue beneath bubbled and burned. A layer of white foam covered everything. Timmy expected the ghoul to explode, like in the movies and comic books, but instead, it simply pawed at the earth, making pathetic mewling sounds and watching Karen race away. Even after its eyes had melted and run out onto the ground, its head remained upright and pointed in her direction.

“My ... family ...”

The boys watched until there was nothing left but a bubbling puddle.

And then Timmy began to cry. He thought about their attack on Catcher, the guilt and shame he'd felt after the fact. Like Doug had said, the dog wasn't a monster. It was just doing what it was supposed to do. What it had been bred to do. Protecting it's home. When they'd attacked, and Catcher had run around in a circle, yelping and whining and pawing at his eyes, he hadn't looked like a monster. He'd looked pitiful.

Timmy stared at the stewing remains of the ghoul. It didn't look like a monster anymore.

“Didn't it realize? Didn't it know what the sunlight would do?”

“It must have wanted Karen that bad,” Barry said. “Nothing else mattered.”

“Family,” Timmy whispered. “It was trying to save its family.”

“Come on,” Barry said. He put his arm around Timmy's shoulder and led him away.

Behind them, the sun rose into the sky. A new day had begun.

Epilogue The black Toyota SUV wheeled into the church parking lot and slowed to a halt. A satellite radio antenna was magnetically affixed to the roof, and the muffled sounds of a children's program drifted from inside the vehicle. A man sat in the driver's seat, gripping the wheel tightly. A woman sat next to him. After a moment, the Toyota slowly made its way down the graveyard's middle road. The path was wider than the man remembered it being, and looked as if it had recently been given a fresh coat of blacktop.

“Is this it, Daddy?”

The man nodded. “Yep. This is it. This used to be my playground.”

He shivered. His wife noticed and turned down the air conditioning. The man said nothing.

The SUV crawled past the graves, slowed again, and then stopped.

The man got out, and smoothed his suit. His tie fluttered in the warm June breeze.

He took a deep breath. He hadn't been there in a long time. He glanced around. The old utility shed was gone, replaced with a more modern structure. Farmer Jones's pasture now held duplex housing instead of cattle. Things were different. He closed his eyes for a moment and heard the sound of children 's laughter. Old ghosts. They'd been good ghosts, once upon a time.

Not anymore.

As an adult, the man was reminded of how children laughing often sounded like children screaming.

He opened his eyes and moved on.

Inside the vehicle, his wife and kids watched him approach the grave. Then the woman made a call on her cell phone.

The man stood in front of the grave-- a fresh, open hole in the earth. A wound. It would be filled later that day, and then covered back over with sod. A brandnew tombstone sat at the head of the hole.

It said that Randy Graco was a loving husband and father. Dane Graco 's tombstone stood a few feet away.

“Hey, Timmy.”

Tim jumped in surprise. He'd thought he was alone. He looked up. The cemetery's caretaker stepped out from behind a tall monument. A bashful young boy, around the same age as Tim's oldest son, crept out behind him, watching with curiosity. Both were dressed in work clothes, their jeans soiled with grass stains and dirt.

“Timmy?”

The caretaker pulled off his work gloves and walked toward him.

Tim frowned. Nobody had called him Timmy since he'd graduated college. Not even his parents. He didn't recognize the caretaker at first. He was bald, and his skin looked weathered from too much sun or stress-- or both. There were dark circles under his eyes that most men didn 't get until much later in life. But the scar was what gave his identity away: a narrow, pale line running up his cheek, carved years ago with a stolen ring --a ring that was now on Tim's right hand. The scar had happened on a night neither man would ever forget. The scar, like the memories, had faded over time, but was still there.

Smiling in disbelief, Tim stepped forward. “Barry? Jesus Christ...”

“Good to see you, too, man.” Barry laughed. “Thought maybe you didn't recognize me.”

“I didn't. At first, anyway. Took me a second. It's been a while.”

“Yes, it has. Twenty years, give or take.”

Still surprised, Tim was speechless.

“I keep up on you,” Barry said, his voice filled with pride. "The Hanover Evening Sun and the York Dispatch both had articles on you. I hear you're a famous comic book writer now."

Tim chuckled. “Well, I wouldn't say I'm famous or anything. But I do all right.”

“You and your funny books.” Barry pulled out a can of Husky tobacco and loaded some into his lip. “I remember you were crazy about those things when we were kids.”

“You were, too.”

Barry's brow furrowed. "Yeah, I guess maybe I was. I'd forgotten about that. I don't read much of anything these days, except the paper. But man, I remember how pissed you were when your dad ripped yours up."

“I remember, too,” Timmy whispered. “I don't think we'll ever forget.”

“No,” Barry agreed. "We won't. But shit, I didn't mean to bring up your old man.

I'm sorry."

“It's okay.”

Barry pointed at the grave. "I was sorry to hear about what happened. He was a good neighbor. Hell, I've been living next to him my whole life. It'll be weird not seeing him down over the hill."

Tim nodded sadly. "Yeah. It was pretty sudden. The heart attack hit him while he was watching the game. Happened quick. Mom's still in shock, I think. But at least he didn't suffer."

“Well, that's good.”

“Yeah.”

They stared at each other in silence, neither one knowing what to say.

Barry spat a wad of brown tobacco juice onto the grass. “That your family?”

“Yeah.” Tim turned back to the SUV. “That's my wife, Mara, and my sons, Dane and Doug.”

Barry paused. “Doug, huh? That's good. He'd have liked that.”

“I think so.”

“Wife's good-looking,” Barry said, staring at the Toyota. “You done good.”

“Yeah, I can't complain.”

“Ever hear from Katie Moore?”

“Not since graduation. I went to college. She had another year in school. You know how it is.”

“I always figured you two would get hitched. Young love and all that.”

“That only happens in songs, I guess.”

Barry nodded, and they fell silent again.

“That's my kid back there.” Barry turned, pointing at the shy boy, who'd crept back behind the monument again. “Richie. Get your ass out here and say hello.”

Tim frowned. Barry's voice had taken on a rough, unpleasant tone. The boy, Richie, slunk out from behind the marker, eyes cast to the ground, shoulders slumped. Tim finally got a good look at the kid. He was skinny, and his arms stuck out of his T-shirt like twigs. Both of them were bruised, and his right forearm had a nasty circular mark. Tim tried to keep a straight face, but inside he was shocked. It looked like a cigarette burn.

“Get over here,” Barry shouted.

The boy jumped at the sound of his father's voice, and dutifully shuffled over to them. As he got closer, Tim noticed the scars.

“This here is Timmy Graco,” Barry said, introducing him. “We was best friends when we were your age.”

“Hi.” Tim stuck out his hand.

Richie shook it. His grip was weak, his palms sweaty. He mumbled under his breath.

Barry slapped the back of his head. “Speak up. I told you before, nobody can understand shit when you mumble like that.”

“Sorry,” the boy apologized. “Nice to meet you.”

He didn't look into Tim's eyes, but kept his gaze focused on the ground.

“Get on back to work,” Barry commanded.

He prodded Richie with his boot. The boy ran off.

Barry grinned, looking sheepish.