Old Bones: A Collection of Short Stories (2 page)

Behind the school and beyond the field
lights, portions of Myers Ridge jut like jagged canine teeth trying
to bite into the remaining bands of sunset above it. The clouds are
turning dark, but not because of the failing sunlight.

Randy notices a sphere of white light
blinking along the cliffs of Myers Ridge and wonders what it is.
The light moves back and forth and up and down, then zips away for
a few seconds before it returns and repeats the pattern.

Randy thinks of UFOs, so he hurries back with
a digital camera. He zooms and snaps a picture. The orb blinks off
and on. Randy takes another picture. The crowd roars. The orb stops
blinking.

He waits for the strange light to blink on
again, but the ridge remains dark.

Bands of lightning spread out across the
northern sky, streaking and skipping over the pink and purple
clouds. Randy reaches to close the window when white light flashes
in front of the window and sends him falling backwards. Partially
blinded, he scrambles from the floor to the window and closes it.
Then he ducks and waits; he wonders if little gray beings will
enter his room and want to abduct him.

After several minutes, he peeks outside. Then
he pulls his curtains over the window and hurries to his desk. He
watches his window in the mirror for several minutes. The football
crowd is muffled on the other side; there is no other disturbance
out there.

No UFOs. No aliens. All is safe. Right?

Right
.

And the light?

He ponders the light for several minutes.
Perhaps, he decides, the flash of light wasn’t as close as he
thought.

He returns to his portrait and draws. His
hand, eyes and mind become synchronous and he discovers he really
likes what he is doing. He understands the rules of composition and
positive and negative space now. He has become an artist and he
knows it. Drawing what he sees is easy to do.

He looks at his face and studies the forms
made clear by the light from the lamp on his desk. Then behind his
mop of brown hair where thick green curtains should cover the
window he closed not long ago, he sees a closed door instead.

What? This can’t be
.

He slowly puts down his pencil, rubs his
eyes, and looks again at the mirror. The door is there! A plain
slab of dark oak with a glass doorknob on it, all in the exact spot
where his window should be. He quickly turns from the mirror and
looks at his window covered by green curtain. In the mirror, he
sees the door.

Fascinated and a little frightened, he
repeats the procedure until he is certain the mirror is not lying
to him.

He looks at his window. “Hello. Aliens?”

No answer.

He lifts the mirror from its propped up
position and crosses his room. Facing the curtain, he holds the
mirror by its wired back with his left hand and sees clearly in the
mirror the door now next to him. He reaches out to where he knows
there is curtain. He watches it happen in the mirror as he touches
cold wood instead.

He yanks his hand away and blows on his
fingers as though the wood had been ice.

He hears the muffled noise from the football
field where his parents and two young sisters are watching the
game. But he barely thinks of them now.

He lifts his hand to the curtain and watches
his hand in the mirror grasp the faceted doorknob. It is solid and
cold and he shivers and takes a deep breath to calm his excitement.
Then he turns the knob.

The door in the mirror swings out and he
feels its weight against his right shoulder as the door comes to
rest against him. He moves forward and watches the door open all
the way in the mirror.

Beyond the door is a hallway with a wood
floor as dark as the door and just as polished. Across the hall is
a plain, off-white wall where a large painting of a seascape hangs
from an ornate gold frame.

He reaches back toward his window and sees
his arm enter the hallway. He turns and looks at his hand pressing
against the curtain and the window behind it. He does not feel the
curtain or window, even when he leans his shoulder against the
curtain.

When he looks again at the hallway in the
mirror, he tumbles through the doorway.

In his bedroom, the boy holding the mirror
falls into the curtain and window, evaporating through green fabric
and window glass and wood frame and wall. His reflection continues
to tumble likewise into the hall, sprawling onto the cold, hard
wood.

In Randy’s room, the mirror falls to the
bedroom floor and bursts into shards and slivers.

At the window, Randy White has vanished.

At the window, glass begins to chatter on the
other side with the sound of rain. Two-hundred yards away the
football game has ended. Several minutes pass before the front door
at Randy’s house opens. His father calls upstairs to remind him of
their ritual of going out for ice cream after a home game. Wear a
jacket, Randy’s father says, it’s raining.

Minutes pass. The youngest girl impatiently
stomps upstairs calling for Randy to hurry. Inside his bedroom, the
girl sees on his desk his drawing pad and a self-portrait looking
back in wonderment. Past the desk, Randy’s camera lies near a
broken mirror below his window. She crosses the room, picks up the
camera and turns it on. She looks at the pictures that Randy took
of the flashing orb. The images are blank.

She puts down the camera and picks up a piece
of mirror glass, jabbing the end of her thumb on an edge. She cries
out, switches hands and sucks at the bead of blood from her injury.
She holds up the knife-like length of glass and sees the door. A
shadow falls across the polished floor. She looks closer. The
shadow is crouched over a body. A long, smooth, gray face turns.
Large glowing yellow eyes peer at her. A mouth of sharp teeth
consumes the Navy blue fabric of Randy’s shirt.

The creature lunges at her. She screams and
drops the broken mirror and runs from the room, crying and yelling
all the way downstairs. She races past her mother and older sister
and into the arms of her concerned father.

No one believes her when she tells them what
she saw. Upstairs, no one else sees the door or the hall or the
creature consuming Randy White’s body in the mirror. They see the
broken mirror, but nothing more than shards of glass and splintered
wood. Looking around, they see Randy’s drawings and evidence of a
boy missing from home.

Perhaps he ran away, a police officer
suggests.

He did stop enjoying sports, Randy’s father
says.

Another police officer suggests abduction,
which would explain how the mirror was broken.

Abducted and eaten, the little girl says. By
an alien.

No one believes her. Of course.

She says no more and takes one of Randy’s
sketchbooks and fills the pages with drawings of the creature she
saw in the mirror.

No one pays her any attention. No one ever
really believes the wild things that come from a child’s overactive
imagination. Not ever.

#

Something Special

RACHEL MCCUTCHEON AND her younger sister had the
house to themselves. Their parents and big brother Tim shopped
thirty-three miles away at New Cambridge for groceries and a new
air conditioner to replace the old one that stopped working last
night. April had brought a taste of summer with it, and its sticky
torment caused Rachel to pull at her green halter and white
terrycloth shorts. She struggled to sit up on her mom’s plushy
sofa. Then, upon sinking in a mushy spot on the middle cushion, she
freed a romance paperback wedged between the cushions and leafed
through it. It was from a bag of similar books Tim’s wife Josie had
dropped off an hour ago. Buxom women and muscular men seduced and
cheated on each other in graphic description. She threw the book
back in the bag on the floor and looked over at her eleven-year-old
sister Britt who lay in their dad’s huge recliner, her summer tan
glowing around the pink bikini top and bottom she wore. An
oscillating fan blew on her every fifteen seconds and played with
her long sable hair, the ruffles on her beachwear, and the pages of
her beauty magazine.

Like Rachel, Britt was barefoot. But Britt’s
toenails were expertly pedicured and painted light blue to match
her fingernails. Rachel’s nails were unpolished and her fingernails
kept short by her teeth.

“This stuff is flower petal porn,” she
declared as she stood and dropped the bag of books next to Britt,
who looked up with aquamarine eyes opened in wonderment.

“Whattaya mean?”

“I mean these books are for lonely old church
ladies and librarians,” Rachel said before she made her way to the
kitchen and peered in the refrigerator for her leftover Italian sub
from lunch. Not finding it among the assortment of diet food and
drinks and several plastic dishes labeled with leftover dinners,
she swore and slammed shut the door. Something fell over inside.
She ignored it as the doorbell’s annoying buzz took her from her
dilemma. She started for the sun porch and stopped. Two curious
eyes peered in at her through the door’s three diamond shaped
windows. She stopped and frowned, and then crossed her arms over
her chest.

“Can we talk?” the boy on the other side
asked, his voice muffled by the glass.

Rachel almost said no, but Britt, who was now
behind her, pushed past her and opened the door that stuck to its
jam for a moment because of the humidity and too much paint.

“Hi, Paul, come on in. I like your
T-shirt.”

Fourteen-year-old Paul Joseph looked down the
front of his plain aquamarine shirt and said, “Thanks.” He looked
up at Britt and smiled, his gaze resting on her bikini top. “Going
swimming?”

“I wish. The pool’s still covered from
winter.” Britt stuck out her bottom lip.

Rachel harrumphed and returned to the
kitchen. Paul quickly followed with Britt close behind.

“Can we talk?” he asked again. His squeaky
voice gave away his unease.

Rachel stopped. The ache to have him back in
her life stabbed at her chest. She said, “I’m still mad at you for
hitting me with that tomato.”

“That’s why I’m here … to apologize.”

Rachel felt her gaze linger on his face
longer than she wanted to. He was pleasant on the eyes. And she had
been dreaming about him a lot lately, often lying with him in a
postcoital embrace, running her fingers through his well-groomed,
silky and shiny auburn hair.

Her cheeks flushed. She tightened her arms
over her chest and said, “It was a rotten thing to do.”

“I know. And I’m sorry.” The serious look
from his steel blue eyes seemed to penetrate her soul.

She uncrossed her arms and ran a hand through
her short red hair, combing it away from her forehead.

“Forgive him already,” Britt said. Then to
Paul, “You want something to drink? I could go for something cold.
It’s so hot in here.”

Rachel stepped between them and took Paul by
the arm. “He’s coming with me,” she said, steering him to the
dining room and the stairs.

A frown replaced Britt’s flirty smile.

Rachel turned to her and said, “If you follow
us or try eavesdropping on us, I’ll tell Dad what you and Taylor
did at the movie theater last week.” Then she pushed Paul up the
stairs.

Inside her boxy bedroom, Rachel set the
ceiling fan’s speed at high, and then reclined on her narrow bed.
Paul plopped down in her yellow beanbag chair—the one he had bought
her last year for her thirteenth birthday. Her high school Fighting
Eagles swimming, volleyball and softball trophies littered her
nightstand next to him. He always admired her athletic
achievements, fondling at least one or two trophies when he
visited. He kept his hands free this time as he crossed his arms
and looked at her with eyes still serious.

After a moment, he cleared his throat and
said, “Sorry I lost my head and threw a tomato at you. But…”

Rachel’s frown deepened.

Paul sighed. “You told Justin we had
sex.”

Rachel relaxed her frown and forced herself
not to smile. “He saw us kissing at Pizza Hut and wanted to know
how serious we were. He’s been stalking me all school year, so I
told him we went all the way. Now he can’t play me like I’m some
virginally challenged moron that he needs to score with.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t have to tell him we had
sex.”

“Yes I did, so get over it. Besides, we know
the truth and that’s all that matters.”

Paul sighed again. His face and shoulders
relaxed, but his arms remained crossed and pressed against his
chest.

Rachel gave him a small smile and said, “I
had a good time that night, just the two of us talking. We should
date more often.”

“It wasn’t a—”

“Don’t you dare say it wasn’t a date, Paul
Joseph.” The frown returned. “You asked me out. You paid for my
food and drinks.
That’s
a date. Plus, we held hands and you
put your arm around me. And I know you liked it when I kissed
you.”

Paul squirmed, looked out her window, and
said, “Okay, I liked it. But my parents say I’m too young to date.
So, if … I mean
when
we go out again, no kissing … in
public.”

The frown left. Rachel sat up and moved
closer to him. She surprised herself when she almost said she had
wanted him to take her virginity that night after they left the
restaurant together. Instead, she said, “We’ve been neighbors all
our lives and have done things only best friends do. We know each
other’s closest secrets. I’d hate to do anything to jeopardize our
friendship.

“And you’re right to be mad at me,” she said,
standing. “It was reckless and stupid of me to lie to Justin. I’ve
been beating myself up over it ever since.” She stood in front of
him, forcing him to lie back in the chair to look up at her. “Can
you forgive me for telling him we had sex?” she asked.