Ravenous Ghosts (17 page)

"
Ooops," she said, grinning mischievously.

Jeff wasn
't impressed. He had managed to keep the affair a secret for almost six months now but there was no way he was going to be able to explain the four long scratch marks that ran from his shoulder to his elbow well enough to have Janice believe it.

"
Christ."

Her expression hardened.
"C'mon Jeff. It's not like she's going to inspect you when you get home. Wear a shirt to bed or something."

"
I don't wear anything but shorts going to bed. If I suddenly go to bed with a shirt on, she'll suspect something."

"
Say it got cold."

He spun around to face her.
"I'd like to have the luxury of being so goddamn blasé about this, I really would but unfortunately I didn't marry an idiot. She'll figure it out and I'll be out on my ass."

The look on her face gave him pause and he found himself swallowing a lump that had suddenly formed in his throat.

"Ungrateful prick," she spat and stalked off into the bedroom. She slammed the door hard enough to make him jump and he sighed.

"
What the hell am I going to do?" he asked his reflection.

It stared blankly back at him.

* * *

Janice awoke in darkness, her eyes moist.

Her breath rushed in and out of her lungs as if she had been smothering and she turned to see if Jeff was still there.

A touch of her finger against his flesh confirmed his presence.

She pulled the covers up around his neck in an attempt to stave off some of the chill infecting his skin.

"
Poor baby," she whispered and turned over on her back.

As she drifted back to sleep, she remembered and her mouth opened into a soundless scream as soon as sleep rushed in to get her.

* * *

"
Ashley, open the door."

He could hear her cursing and swearing in the bedroom but she refused to acknowledge him. Pressing his forehead against the door, he considered his options. Leaving her in a state of fury was definitely not a wise idea. A woman in her frame of mind was likely to do anything and that included calling Janice and spilling the beans on their little misadventures at the office.

Breaking down the door would only frighten her and God only knew what kind of a reaction that might provoke from her.

He decided to play it safe and sat down with his back to the door.

"Look I'm sorry. You know you mean more to me than that bitch I married."

It was a lie and it hurt him to say it, but he figured putting Janice down in front of Ashley might win her over.

He heard the sound of a drawer being opened and shut again to the accompaniment of the woman's growls.

"
C'mon baby. I was upset, okay? I don't want what we have to end, that's all and these scratches…well, you're right; she probably won't notice them at all. Dizzy little bitch doesn't know what day of the week it is at the best of times."

In an instant, he was on the flat of his back, the door open.

She stood naked over him and he smiled foolishly. "I knew you'd…"

"
It's over," she said flatly.

"
What? C'mon baby, we can…"

The rest of the sentence and his tongue were both scythed from his mouth in one quick snap of her wrist.

* * *

She was sweating heavily by the time she
'd dropped him in the hole and filled it in. The thought of a nice long bath made her skin tingle in anticipation as she dropped the shovel in the weeds that bordered her garden.

The first drops of rain pattered against her forehead and she raised her mud-streaked face to them, open-mouthed and smiling.

* * *

Janice was crying.

Thrashing through the subconscious depths of a dream populated by demons her body shuddered, wracked by spasms that mimicked the blows she was being dealt in her mind.

"
Nooooo," she said softly.

She felt his hands on her then and almost instantly the dream began to lessen in intensity as he chased the unseen phantoms back down the black spiral tunnel that had birthed them.

"Honey," he whispered into her ear.

She smiled and let his fingers trace invisible lines on her thigh, shuddering not uncomfortably at the iciness of his touch.

They moved downward and she made a low guttural moan.

Her eyes drifted open.

* * *

Lydia sat like a hungry vulture at the edge of the grave she had made for him. Her face was twisted into a scowl as she watched the rain gathering in muddy puddles at the bottom of the narrow trench.

It was empty.

The sky grumbled above her head as she rose up, cursing.

At least she had the consolation of knowing that wherever he had gone, he wouldn't be gone long. He would return as always in time for their game, in time for her to kill him again.

She turned away from the grave and shuddered.

Even in death you couldn't trust them not to wander.

And then she saw the footprints leading from the grave to the wooden gate between her yard and the one next door.

Cheater
, she thought, outraged.

She opened her mouth, her face twitching in rage and screamed.

* * *

As a final bubbling sigh escaped Jeff
's mouth, Ashley dropped the knife and backed away from the door. Her fingers crept towards her face like albino spiders, eyes widening in shock and horror as the full extent of what she had done suddenly dawned on her.

In the doorway, Jeff
's ravaged face moved and she scurried away.

"
I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry," she wailed as her lover's body suddenly rolled onto its side, a blood-soaked hand clutching at the carpet.

"
B…itchhhhh," he gurgled and began to crawl his way toward her, one punctured eyeball swinging on the end of its optic nerve.

When she reached the bedroom wall, she dared to close her eyes in an attempt to vanquish the morbid hallucination suddenly gripping her.

The hallucination reached for her.

* * *

Janice tried to move away but he held her tightly in his arms.

She struggled to turn her head toward him, even though he was holding her from behind and it was dark.

His face slid over her shoulder.

She saw his eyes and screamed, somehow still able to hear the sibilant whisper that hissed from his lifeless mouth.

"Honey…

NOT WHILE I'M AROUND

I'm a reader who craves atmosphere in stories. If the landscape is bare, chances are I'll grow bored quickly. Writers like Charles L. Grant, Ramsey Campbell, Thomas Liggoti and M. John Harrison can do this with their eyes closed, perhaps drawing on the influence of Arthur Machen, M..R. James, Blackwood et al. "Not While I'm Around" is me flexing my atmospheric knuckles.

Rachel stares at the phone, blood draining from her face. She winces at the shrill cry from the hunched beetle-like thing. It demands she answer.

Upstairs, Bill:
"Honey? You going to get that?"

Yes
, she replies and realizes she hasn't said it aloud. Then: "Yes, dear," and Bill shuffles away from the landing.

Outside the house, an autumn breeze moans with the agony of squeezing itself through the cracks and gaps in her home. Her hand moves to the phone, seemingly of its own accord for she certainly hasn
't willed it to do so, could never…

The phone falls silent. Relief. Her shoulders drop, the sweat between her shoulder blades cooling. The wind sighs, disappointed, then just as quickly resumes its hollow cry as Rachel jerks back to reality, pricked by the realization that the phone has stopped shrieking not because the caller has given up but because her hand is holding the receiver almost an inch above the cradle.

No!

Now the air grows heavy, despite the humming from the shower upstairs as Bill makes preparations for the night ahead. A night Rachel now thinks may not unfold as planned.

From the earpiece, the wind imitates the dead and above her head, the lightbulb hums. Fades.

"
Rachel…"

"
Honey?" Bill is struggling to be heard over the inner and outer elements, trapped beneath his own rainfall in the bathroom. "Honey? Did the lights flicker just now?"

Her hand hasn
't moved. Can't. She knows who the speaker is, knows for sure who whispers even though it's been so long. Worse still, she knows she was right all along, despite the condescending contradictions from the doctors. The thought angers her, adding a shiver to her already quivering body. All those nights she almost told the truth but deigned to protect that sonofabitch and now here he is calling her after all this time.

"
Rachel…"

Her teeth pinch the flesh on the inside of her mouth but she is indifferent to the pain and the salty taste that flows over her tongue. Her hand is frozen. Invisible tendrils of cold crawl over the fingers clenched around the receiver, pouring from the holes in the earpiece, softly brushing against her skin…

"I'm coming, Rachel…"

It occurs to her that she may have lost her mind. It wouldn
't be the first time she's been accused of it and what better way to usher in madness than to give audience to its greatest creation?

The shower stops but the wind doesn
't, making sounds like ghosts jostling for a view through the keyhole of the front door.

"
I'm coming for Billy boy, Rachel. I'm coming for the guy who's doing my baby…"

A contented whistling drifts down the stairs and Rachel hisses:
"You leave my husband alone, do you hear me? You just leave him alone!"

A chuckle: Wind-choked vortex on the stoop or a long dead lover?

"You know how it is, baby. You know how it's always been. How it always
will
be. He ain't allowed to touch you. Not while I'm around…"

Out go the lights. She flinches them back on. Bill curses and the sibilant hiss from the bathroom is quieted. The wind snickers beneath the door.

"Stay away." Pleading now. "Don't come here. Please."

The ensuing silence is unnatural, an ill-fitting costume for the night.

"But you want me to. You
need
me to."

A creak. Footsteps on the landing. Her husband grumbles into view, his face florid, glistening with moisture. He pauses on the top step, one thick-knuckled hand on the newel post, bushy eyebrows raised as he points at her hand, the one still holding the receiver above the phone.

She swallows and summons a wooden smile. "Wrong number."

"
Oh no, most definitely the
right
num--"

Rachel slams down the phone, both of them jumping at the resultant
ping!

"
Honey?" Bill's face contorts with worry. "Everything okay?"

She doesn
't answer but stares at a point somewhere over his head as he approaches. Then finally she speaks, and is surprised to find determination in her tone. "We need to talk."

She leads him into the living room.

"But the party…" he says, glancing at a pale band of skin on his wrist where his watch normally sits.

"
It might be coming
here
," she says and closes the door.

* * *

Through a gap in the curtains, she can see the twinkling of a streetlamp two blocks away, but distance is blanketed by darkness and perhaps it is something less benign, maybe the gleam in the eye of someone peeking into the room.

She tugs the folds together and turning away from the window, avoids Bill
's gaze. There is nothing to see in his face but the kind of spousal impatience that might stall her words, dent her courage and doom them both.

Bill is agitated, cocks his head and studies the clock faster than the second hand can count off a minute. Rachel stops before the fireplace, looks at him and feels what romance writers might call a
'tugging of the heartstrings' though these particular strings feel more like piano wire.