Into the Shadows: The Coming Dark (c) Chapter Four By Fiction Writer #13 (nosex, paranormal) The sun set completely behind the Highland Hills, leaving the neighborhood in darkness. Streetlights blazed into life illuminating small patches of the long winding road leading up to the isolated homes. The rattle of dried leaves accompanied a cold wind as it swept through the trees, bending the almost denuded branches before releasing them to point skyward once again. The effect caused the forest of maples to appear as a throng of religious zealots bowing in supplication as one, worshiping on bent knees before their God. But what God would trees deem fit enough for such piety? No, it was just the wind playing tricks in the dark. Winter was coming, but for the family huddled in the living room of 409 Klemm Avenue, a different kind of chill was causing them to shiver. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Steve stood up and moved to adjust the thermostat for the third time since returning home. It seemed no matter how high he set it, the house stayed cold. The dial already read eighty-five, but the thermometer barely reached fifty-two. "Damn it. Hey Hun, I think the heater's just as messed up as the electric in this place." Steve could actually see his own breath as he spoke. "I'm gonna kill that realtor when I see him." Steve turned back to his shivering family on the couch. Little Bethany was looking at him with her big green eyes. Her pale skin, normally dotted with freckles, was now red and blotchy from the chilly air. She was slowly shaking her head from side to side, her loosely curled red hair swaying gently. "It's not the heater, Daddy." Steve gave her a curious look. "It's Him. He's listening to what I tell you. Making sure I don't tell you too much. He doesn't like me talking to you." Bethany gave the slightest hint of a smile. "Wants to make sure I don't tell you 'bout some things." A small tremor ran through the whole house, rattling the windows and the few knick-knacks that had been unpacked and carefully arranged on the shelves. The smile on Bethany's face quickly evaporated, and with it so did the unnatural vibration. Mary nervously looked around the room, her eyes holding the briefest of contact with each member of her family. Their eyes mirrored her fear. 'No,' she told herself, 'I will not be afraid in my own home. Not after everything we've been through. Not now. Not ever. I have to be strong, strong enough for all of us.' Telling herself to be strong was one thing, mustering up the courage to act was another. "I... I'll go get some blankets for us." Mary stood and faced Tommy. "Why don't you go and get cleaned up. Steve, Bethany, why don't you see if you can make something for dinner? We'll meet back here when we're done, okay? I don't know about you guys, but I'm starved." She gave a weak smile and a nervous laugh before heading into the foyer to begin searching the towers of boxes still to be unpacked. Steve and Tommy looked at each other as Mary suddenly left them alone in the living room with Beth. They shrugged before standing on wobbly legs. Steve took Bethany's tiny hand in his and headed off to the kitchen. Tommy shivered with thoughts of being all alone upstairs in the shower. He'd be leaving the bathroom door unlocked and slightly open from now on, just in case... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Steve rifled through the mostly empty cabinets in the kitchen, searching for a meal to feed his hungry family. They'd planned on hitting the grocery store after Tommy's game, but that had been forgotten in the confusion that followed. Steve turned to Bethany who was struggling to climb up a tall stool by the breakfast bar. "You okay sweetie?" "Uhg... yeah Daddy." He watched as she heaved herself up on to the cushioned seat, her feet nowhere near touching the floor. Triumphantly she smiled at him before giving herself a good spin around. Slowly she came to a stop facing the wrong direction. Undeterred, she began swinging her legs in the direction she wished to go, hopping slightly on her precarious perch. Her efforts soon paid off, and after nearly falling a few times she once again faced her smiling Father. "Don't mess around over there; I don't want you getting hurt." "Okee Dokee." Steve returned to his rummaging. 'Hmmm... Not much to work with here.' He loved cooking. What began as a necessary skill in college developed into one of his favorite passions. Back then he became fed up with the normal college meals; spaghetti, ramen, pizza, and the worst, hamburger helper. He began experimenting in his dorm room, mixing flavors and substituting ingredients, but was severely limited by only having a microwave and a hot plate to cook with. During his junior year he got an apartment of his own. Armed with a fully working stove his culinary talents evolved by leaps and bounds. At first he just cooked for himself, but soon he learned the power of good food. Women loved a man who could cook! Word of his home cooked meals spread like wildfire among the sororities on campus. Never having been a lady's man, he'd spent his Fridays and Saturdays at home, but at least he was rarely alone. That's how he won the heart of his true love, Mary. She was way out of his league and he knew it. That's why he used that cheesy line about her being a model. Mary laughed and shot him a smile that melted his heart and fired his loins. He asked if she and her friends would like to come to his place for dinner, not expecting her to say yes, but she had. The meal he prepared that night would have rivaled that of Master Chef. Everything he attempted to cook in that one bedroom apartment turned to gold. By the end of the meal Mary asked him out, making all of her dining friends jealous by snagging him first. Tonight was another matter entirely. Even the best of Chef's had to have ingredients to work with, and Steve was severely lacking in that department at the moment. "Hey, how about we have tomato soup and grilled cheese for dinner?" "Okay Daddy. I like grilled cheesy" Steve pulled down four cans of the pre-made soup. 'Well, not quite five star dining, but at least I got one vote for comfort food.' ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hot water drenched Tommy as he stood in the shower. He stood motionless, head bowed low, arms out in front of him braced against the blue tiles. Water streamed through his long hair plastering it to his face. His eyes were shut tightly to the steamy world billowing around him. 'What have I done?' Memories of the day flashed in his mind; bloody fists, broken teeth, blackened eyes, cries of pain, feelings of hatred, of joy, of elation. 'It's all over.' He wasn't thinking of the fighting, it was his hockey career that he mourned. This season was nothing more than a protracted try-out for the High School team. From there he'd get a scholarship to play for a college team. Then on to the Minor League, and if things worked out, he be playing for the NHL in no time. That was his dream. Now it was over. 'Banned from the Junior League; who the hell gets banned from the fucking Junior League?' Though Bethany claimed to be the cause of his outburst, he knew better. He had been the one who attacked his attackers, not his little sister, not some monster in the darkness. The blame fell completely on him. He had wanted to fight. He'd felt joy when his fists began to fly. Elation when bone broke and blood spurted. Then, when it was all over, he'd felt satisfied with himself. Pleased by the suffering he'd dealt out. Those feelings lasted up until the moment when his Father yelled at him. Then, like a house of cards, his world crumbled to the floor. Water began pooling in the bottom of the shower, the washcloth clogging the drain by his feet. Tommy's skin had long since turned pink from the heat, but his insides remained cold. He still felt sickened by the violence he'd inflicted; his bleeding knuckles throbbed in time with his beating heart. Opening his eyes, his gaze followed the blood-tinted water as it snaked its way down the wall and diffused in the growing pool now rising to his ankles. He kicked his feet, splashing water and removing the plugging washcloth. The water began to swirl down the drain once more, a tiny tornado of liquid and air forming at his feet. 'That's where my life is going.' ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- It took some digging but Mary finally located the boxes with the extra bedding. Of course they were in the middle of one of the tallest remaining stacks. She found herself on tiptoe, arms extended upwards, fingers stretching out trying to remove the topmost box. The inevitable happened. Her trembling fingers lost their tenuous grip and the heavy box fell, striking her head and driving her to the hardwood floor. Stunned by the fall, and the idiocy of it all, Mary sat on the cold floor and began to laugh. Her head hurt where the corner had caught her, but the moment was definitely slap-stick at its finest. "So stupid." The box she'd been trying to get now lay at her feet by the front door. The front light spilled into the foyer through the frosted glass panels surrounding the heavy oak door. She always wanted to live in a house that had a big door with a brass knocker. Now that she did, the urge to get up and run out into the night, leaving everything and everyone behind was nearly overwhelming. It would be so easy. Her car was less than twenty steps away with a full tank of gas. A life without cancer, without hysterectomies, without bills and taxes and worries and, and... monsters. It was just outside that door, all she had to do was stand up and run away. The sound the running shower upstairs drifted down the steps. She could hear Bethany giggling in the kitchen with Steven hard at work with the task she had assigned. Tears filled her eyes, stinging tears that burned as they rolled down her cheeks. 'My God... what am I thinking? I could never leave them, not like that.' Alone and away from her family, Mary broke down, crying softly amongst the boxes containing memories of a life that had just taken another cruel jab at her. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Steven flipped a golden brown grilled cheese sandwich high into the air before catching it on a plate. He'd already done this several times with the others and still couldn't get Bethany's attention. He was showing off, trying to impress his little girl with his wild antics. It wasn't working, though. Bethany had taken a piece of paper and a pen and begun doodling about the same time he'd finished opening the cans of soup. She hadn't looked up or spoken once since then, but Steve was determined to change that. "Here we go! Last but not least, la piece de resistance!" Using his worst French accent, Steve flipped the last of the grilled cheeses off the griddle and into the air. Over and over it tumbled, sending golden crumbs everywhere. Steve, trying too hard to be flamboyant with his performance, misjudged the trajectory of the cheese filled goodness. It sailed clear over his and Bethany's heads, landing with a dull smack on the floor. It worked, even if the mishap was unintentional. "Ha!" Bethany began to giggle. "That one's yours!" "Not a chance, pumpkin." Steve moved around to retrieve the errant sandwich, leaning in to whisper into Bethany's ear, "We'll give that one to Mommy." "No..." still giggling, "... that's mean. Give it to Tommy!" Steve stooped to the floor and lifted Tommy's future dinner off the floor. The butter burned his fingers but he was still laughing. "Three second rule, right?" "More like ten!" "Hey, come on! If you keep that up I'll tell Tommy it was your idea to give him the dirty one!" Bethany continued to giggle to herself, never lifting her eyes from the doodle she'd been working on. Hearing her snickering almost made him forget that she had suffered so much pain in her short life. He still had so many questions that needed answers. If he had any hope of helping her, he had to find some things out for himself. He needed to find out more about her birth parents. As much as it pained him to do it, he had to ask. "Hey pumpkin, do you remember what your last name was? You know, back with your old parents?" Bethany stopped giggling but continued to draw. "I... I can't tell you. He doesn't want you to know that." Steve was disappointed but didn't want her to know that. He bent down and kissed the top of her head. "Okay sweetie, no problem. I won't ask again." He returned to the stovetop to stir the thickening tomato soup. He needed to change the subject quickly; he could see that she was getting scared again. "Whatcha drawing there, pumpkin?" "A picture," she said slyly. "Of what?" "It's a picture for you, Daddy." "Oh? You're drawing me a picture?" "Yep. It's so you can take it with you to work and look at it all day." "Can I see it pumpkin?" "Almost done... there!" She sat up, beaming at Steve. "Here you go! Make sure you take it with you to your work so you can know that I love you all day!" Steve smiled as he took the child's drawing from her hand. It was another one of the Johnson family portraits she had drawn for Dr. Lowery; the happy family holding hands, full of smiles and sunshine. Across the top she'd written 'I Love My Daddy!' in big bold letters. A lump formed in Steve's throat as he carefully folded the paper and placed it in his shirt pocket. "Thank you sweet heart, I love you too!" He scooped her off of the stool into an embrace and squeezed her tight. "Make sure you take it to work, okay Daddy?" "I promise sweetie." He gently set her feet on the floor, smiling brightly. "Now help me get the soup and grilled cheesy into the living room, okay?" "Okee dokee, Daddy!" ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Johnson's slowly drifted into the living room once again. The smiles on Bethany and Steve's faces were in stark contrast to the grim visages adorning Tommy and Mary's. Soon they snuggled under the warm blankets and dug into the tomato soup and grilled cheese. For a moment the worries of the day gave way to the comforts of food. Resting with full stomachs and warm bodies, they sat in silence listening to the wind blow leaves outside. If it weren't for the strange sense of impending doom, this would have been a fun and cozy evening for them all. Snuggling up to her older brother under the down comforter, Bethany broke the silence. "It really wasn't your fault, Tommy." Tommy immediately began to choke up at her soothing words. "He made you do those things." "No Beth, I did it, I... wanted to hurt them." A tear spilled down his face despite trying to keep himself under control. "You don't understand, Tommy," she began again. "Just because you wanted to hurt them doesn't mean that you would have." "Obviously it did..." "No!" she cut him off. "He made you do it. He takes your thoughts, and if he likes them he pushes you. He makes you do things you normally wouldn't." Bethany looked around the room. "He can make all of you do things you don't want to do, not really want to do anyway." Mary gripped Steve's hand under their blanket, unnerved by this turn of events. 'Things you want to do but normally wouldn't,' she thought to herself. 'This could be really dangerous. Without a conscience to stop us, who knows what we could do, what impulses might be allowed to flourish.' "Bethany." Steve spoke up now. "You mentioned living with someone named Schafer, but the adoption agency told us we were the first family to bring you home." "They asked me not to tell you guys." "Who? The Schafer's?" "No, the people at the adoption place. They didn't want to scare you into not wanting me. They said it was important that you take me home with you because they couldn't take me back if you didn't want me." Now it was Bethany's turn to mist up. "Why in the hell would they tell her something like that?" Steve asked Mary, not really expecting an answer. Mary leaned over and kissed Bethany on her cheek. "We love you Bethany, and we always will, no matter what you say or what may happen. We will always love you and Tommy both." Bethany smiled at her Mommy. "Thank you..." "Tell us about the Schafer's, sweetie, we want to know. It'll be okay." Mary kissed Bethany's cheek once more before returning to her place next to her husband. "Okay... I'll try to remember it all." Bethany took a deep breath and held it before letting it out as a long sigh. Continued in Chapter Five.... You can find more of my stories at: https://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/Moments_In_My_Mind/www/Index.html Join my forum and I'll send you an email notification of when I update my stories: http://fw13.suddenlaunch3.com/index.cgi Read what I've been up to on my Blog: http://fictionwriter13.blogspot.com Feedback, Questions or Comments can be sent here: FictionWriter13@msn.comThe Coming Dark 04