This is one of my favorite freaky stories, because it is completely filled with acts of unconscious violence and sets the characters up for a life time of greif. I look back at my thoughts while writing this story and still wonder how it managed to get into script. The suspense and outcome is haunting. It’s strange to think how we are set up to be knocked down, and no one is the wiser.

 

I left the references to smoking mushrooms , and the addictive nature of smoking mushrooms, because I was so nieve at that time ( grade 10 ) that it seems humorous now to think that some crazy mushroom eating fanatic would set out to go on a gore filled killing spree.

Night draped its evil curtain over the town of Mapleton and eventually there were almost no lights on to distinguish the town from the country. No snow fell tonight, or had fallen any night for the past week so there was no snow left undisturbed. Footprints sagged into the ground all around sidewalks and car doors. There were no sounds to be heard except the distant rumble of cars traveling on the highway, traveling to an unknown destination, their taillights glowing behind them like the piercing eyes of a hungry lion.

At ten o’clock a red Jeep exited towards Mapleton, leaving a new pair of tire tracks in the packed snow. As It neared the city limits the car slowed down and pulled over into a Conoco station. The driver’s door opened and a man of about thirty stepped out, his hair spiking out on the side and glistening with grease. He slammed the door shut, locking in the noise of the radio and locking out the cold night air, and walked into the building.

"May I help you with something?" the gas-man asked him in a too-nice tone.

 

"Yeah, you can wipe that fucking smile off of your face and tell me where the hell Nightshade avenue is." the man replied grumpily.

"O.K., O.K. Just calm down a bit," the clerk responded," You take a right at Willow and go down three blocks. You can't miss it, if you can turn on those Goddamn slippery roads."

'Oh yes I can. Just watch." the man bit back, obviously unimpressed with the clerks kindness. He stomped outside, letting the door close on its own and drove away in a cloud of blue smoke.

 

James opened his door slowly so it wouldn't creak and softly crept up the stairs, his feet making quiet padding sounds on the carpet. He walked over to the backroom, reached down and picked up his shoes. His mom and dad were upstairs in their room and that was fortunate. James walked downstairs and back into his room, turning off all the lights on the way. He pulled on his Adidas and hopped on top of his bed. His bedroom was in the basement, right below the kitchen, and he could climb out of his window whenever he wanted and nobody would see him leave. So now he unlocked the latch and pushed the window open. A cold breeze blew in and James scrambled outside, closing the window behind him. He placed a rock in front of it so the wind wouldn't blow it open and tightened the drawstrings on his coat.

Week-old snow crunched beneath his feet as he passed out of his yard and onto the road. He needed at least one radar detector tonight. If he could even get that he would have at least enough money for three or four day’s worth of mushrooms. He had been on the drug for a month now and had started stealing to get the money to pay for the habit a week after he had started smoking them.

 

Now all he had to do was find an unlocked car.

With a radar detector in it.

The red Jeep slid along Center Street, throwing up loose chunks of snow behind it. As it passed by the Money Talks casino it sent a snow-grenade hurling at the picture window, speckling the previously spotless glass. The man inside of the car was just a dark shadow but as it passed underneath a streetlight his face was illuminated. It was creased heavily with long scars and frown-lines but his nose was long and unmarked. The light reflected off of his cold, black eyes, making them resemble an eagle's dark stare. The inside of the truck was littered with empty Budweiser cans and wrappers from various chocolate bars. On the dashboard was an opened package of Camels and from it he grabbed one and, reaching into his hip pocket to grab a Bic, he lit the smoke.

The car filled up with cigarette smoke by the time the Jeep had reached Willow road but the man didn't care; he was used to breathing the shit and so as far as he could see the only thing that endangered his life were the icy roads. The street lights flashed by outside his window and the bright neon stare of those rich bars flickered annoyingly behind them. He pulled over at Charlie's Cafe and Bar, groaning loudly as the car slid to a stop.

"Not slippery my ass!!" he muttered to the steering wheel, a few loose beer cans rattled against the door as he pulled over into the parking lot. His rear wheels caught in the ice and started spinning, digging into it with their studs. He pumped the gas, first flooring the pedal then flooring the brake, the gas then the brake, rapidly wearing away the ice. When he finally realized that his attempt was futile, he grabbed his pack 'o cigs and lit one.

"Goddammit!! Those roads ain't slippery my fucking ass!" he shouted as his hand reached out from the wheel, like a snail coming out of Ws shell, and grasped the door handle. He squeezed, pushed and released, then stepped out, his beer belly jiggling in the eerie glow of the neon lights. He turned around, pushed his Dodgers hat away from his eyes, and locked the door shut with the steel toe of his work boots. Then he strode over to the swinging doors and pushed his way into the bar.

James was starting to turn off of the road, into the alley when he heard the noise. It was shrill and quiet, and to any other passerby it would have sounded like a branch off of a tree or a happy couple in bed, but to Jamie it sounded like danger. He whirled around and tried to let his eyes adjust to the darkness beyond the streetlights, the darkness of the alley, and only succeeded in scattering a few loose pebbles to the other side of the road. His well trained eyes could see almost anything in the dark; he had purposely started to read with all of the lights in his room turned off, just to train his eyes for those moments that he needed them. He had started to turn out all the lights in the pantry and try to find a certain can of beans or such and once, and only once, he had tried to take a piss in the dark. Bad idea.

But those exercises had helped him see at night and therefore had fulfilled their purpose. But he couldn't see what was making the noise. His eyes scanned the dark corners and the shadows but he couldn't see anything unusual. But he had heard a noise and...

"Braaaaaap, Braaaaaaap."

This time he couldn't mistake where it was because he turned his head to the side and could hear it radiating from the gutter not two feet away from him. He reached one foot out and set it down exactly where he had heard the noise. Nothing. James had at least expected a squeal as the sole of his shoe stamped down in the animals back, breaking the ribcage, but there was nothing. He looked down at his foot, his eyes picking out every little pebble in the gutter, and couldn't see anything there, even after he had lifted his foot.

"What the hell??" he questioned, whispering the words into a cloud of mist. Nothing responded. Something was there and could not have moved in the short amount of time that there had been. Most people would just have walked by, either not noticing or not caring about the noise, but Jamie had to worry. He couldn't let anything get by, because if one day he walked by a bird then the next he might not notice a person or the owner of the car he was robbing. Every night he would hear every noise, every whisper, and every night he would slink away into the shade of an elm or pine if the noise turned into anything bigger than a cat.

But Jamie couldn't find this one, it was gone and it was probably only a cricket or a beetle, but he still had to be careful. So he walked on, not letting his feet shuffle against the pavement as he put them down and then lifted them again as he walked on, gazing nonchalantly into the windshields of the parked cars.

 

The only things that he hated were warm beer, crowds... and fags. This bar had them all and to top it off, it even had ugly whores. He walked up to the counter, reached his arm around to his back pocket, snatched the wallet out of it and plopped his tall, stinking body onto the only free stool. The bar wench came over immediately and sat down in front of him, her perfect smile ruined by a sprig of parsley stuck between her front teeth. She was over forty, he could tell that right away by the way she walked, and had birthed many children by the way her varicose veins were holding out.

"What can I give to ya?" she asked, grinning widely as he opened his wallet and flicked a river onto the counter.

 

"Two Buds." he said, his eyes wandering towards the stairs and above those, to the beds. When she returned with the drinks he motioned her to sit down and then gave her one of them. The other one he picked up with one grubby hand and lifted it to his mouth. He grabbed a hold of the lid with his teeth and pulled, spitting out the cap as he let the foam drip onto the floor.

"Don't you just love these twist-offs." he said sarcastically, chugging down half of the beer afterwards. She looked away, disgusted, and then without even opening the bottle, sat it down and walked away to the other side of the counter. He got the picture as to what was happening and grabbed the two bottles, sat up and headed towards the doorway. He opened the door, took the last look of wishful thinking at the bedrooms, and strode outside. He now had a large beer stain to go along with all the others on his pants.

The man got in his red Jeep and slammed the door. As soon as his keys turned in the ignition a fuzzy rendition of one of the Beatle's classics blasted out through his speakers. He cranked down the window, tossed an empty Bud out of it and, as it hit a light post and shattered, he drove away.

Toward Nightshade Avenue.

 

Norton McLeod slept restlessly in the double-sized bed, one of his arms hanging limply off of the mattress and the other one curled around his wife. He was a deep-sleeper up to a month ago, when he would suddenly wake up, sweaty and disorientated, at about three o’clock almost every night. He would wake up again when his wife got out of bed at six-thirty to make breakfast now when two months ago she had to hit him to get him up. But he had changed, and so had his son James. Norton was worried about something he didn't know about, and James was worried too... for his own skin.

 

The night was now at its peak, crawling slowly towards the ending crescendo when the sun lifts itself into the sky, when James finally found the car he was looking for. It was a dark green Cadillac and the door on the passenger side was unlocked, the top of the lever glistening in the window. His eyes jittered back and forth in their sockets, trying to see evening at once. His arms were shaking and, as he reached out his left hand to open the door, it started quivering so bad that he had to drop it and clench his teeth together, malting a hollow grinding noise in the dead still of the early morning. He had stolen many times before, each time with the same, blinding speed; first finding what he was looking for, usually tapes or radar detectors, and then prying the door open and reaching in. He had never encountered an alarm or a self-locking door before and, of course, didn't know how to deal with the problem. Tonight was going to be different in many ways, he could feel it, and if you had gone along with him that night you would most likely have noticed that something was very, very wrong.

 

"Willow, Willow, wherefore art thou Willow..." the man muttered under his breath, trying to stay awake. He had gone to sleep last night against the wheel and had only succeeded in throwing the Jeep into a ditch, ruining the almost brand new paint job. He squinted at the signposts, trying to pick out the one distinguished marker that would set him back on track. The dark clouds that had been hovering ominously overhead finally decided to let it rip and fresh, wet flakes of snow started falling again. He cursed and lit up another Camel, again filling the car with a dense haze. He had been traveling for about three days and he was quite grumpy. The snow was falling consistently now, covering the old snow and filling in the tire tracks. The man glanced into his rearview mirror and let out a surprised grunt. He opened the car door and stuck his head out, looking straight at a signpost about fifty feet behind him. The letters on the sign were now covered over in a thin film of fresh snow but he could just make out the words Willow St. imprinted on it. He pulled himself back into the car, slammed the door and let out a victory hoot as the Jeep swung around and left tire tracks in the shape of a large, Martian U.

He brought his hand out from the folds of his coat and extended it towards the door handle, trying his damn best to keep the shading to a minimum. He had almost got his fingers under the lever when the noise sounded again, a short but shrill whistle. He jerked back, his sleeve catching on the mirror and ripping it open even more. He whirled around and tripped, his feet sliding across the ice and failing out from underneath him. The fresh snow had covered up most all of his footprints and now puffed out from beneath him as he landed, like an atomic cloud. He yelped out in agony as a shiver flew up his spine. He tried to stand up by pushing with his arms against the ground but his tailbone let out new spikes of pain every time he tried to move. James gritted his teeth together and with one final attempt brought his feet from under him and stood up. He almost toppled again but eventually got his balance back. He could feel his ass throbbing and he could almost see his shattered tailbone grinding against the jagged stump every time he flexed his muscles. From behind him came a noise, a dull rumble, like the sound of a stomach that has gone for a week without food. He stayed in the same place, not daring to turn about because of the pain in his ass. The sound ca me again and James turned his head as far as he could without moving his pelvis.

"Yeah, that's it, that's the ticket." he whispered, trying to push out all of the other thoughts that had been jamming his thought patterns and corrupting his mind. He wasn't all that scared anymore, now that he had figured out what that noise was. He only had one problem left, the problem that he couldn't really move that fast anymore. And that meant that he couldn't really get that radar detector. He took a step back and sturdied himself. The green Caddy was about a foot in front of him. The detector was about three feet away.

In the trees above him he saw something move and a few dead leaves fluttered to the snowy lawn.

 

 

The Jeep traveled along Willow St., it's tires throwing up roughly packed clumps of snow. The roads were covered over and its headlights were just powerful enough to see through the white haze. Up ahead was another signpost that spelled out, in letters that reflected green light, the words Nightshade Ave. The post was bent at a slight angle, as if to deny how closely it resembled all of the other signs in the town. The window on the driver's side was open just enough to let the steadily increasing smoke cloud out in a thin drift. He turned the corner and the rear tires started to skid across the icy street. He crashed into a heap of garbage bags and they split open, spilling empty tin cans and used condoms onto the sidewalk.

"Aww, fuck." he shouted, taking the Jeep out of its skid and straightening it. The radio faded out as he passed beneath a walkway, regaining its volume as soon as the car was away from it. The music changed to soft instrumental shit and so the man grabbed a hold of the dial with his oily hand and switched it to CXOV.

"Good morning, and welcome to the Radioactive Lunchbox - the tunes for the punk in you... " it whined, finally blasting the music the station is famous for. He only had to travel for a few more minutes; he was almost at his brother's house now.

 

James swung the door open and steadied himself as he got ready to lunge for his prize, his teeth grinding together and scraping a thin layer of enamel onto his tongue. He hurt, badly, but had vowed to himself that he would get this radar detector; even if it cost him his life. He had come too close to give up now. So he steadied himself and bent over the seat, crying from the pain in his waist, and reached for it. His fingers brushed over the cold plastic, and he could feel the pads on them starting to freeze. If he didn't get it soon he wouldn't be able to at all because his fingers would freeze and then he might drop it.

 

And behind him he heard a noise.

 

This time it was too familiar to be a hallucination or a trick of his brain. His body lay hanging half in and half out of the car, dangling like a wilted flower droops over the edge of a vase. His legs were sticking out of the car when the red Jeep hit them, shattering the bone and twisting them beyond recognition, blood swelling out of the slits in his skin and spraying onto the snow. He screamed loud and long, not knowing that it wouldn't be heard by the neighbors because they were gone for a weekend vacation. Not knowing and not really caring. The door slammed shut and hid him inside of the Cadillac, folding his legs up like an accordion underneath him.

His head lolled against the seat and his eyes rolled up to show their whites. Then his mind blacked out and he wouldn't wake up again.

Not totally.

 

When he hit the Cadillac, the man just thought that he had started another skid. He frantically twisted the steering wheel, trying to straighten the already straight car and ended up turning off into the driveway on the other side of the road. He didn't hear anything partly because of the noise of the stereo and partly because of his own cursing, as far as he could see, this was one hell of an icy road. When he looked back to turn out of the driveway, all that he could see was a dark green car and a few footprints around it. But there was something strange about the snow, it was darker than the rest and the door looked like it was dented. He got out of the 3eep and walked over to the Cadillac. He stooped down to the ground and dragged his finger through the bloody snow. A freakish grin spread across his face and he brought the finger to his mouth and started sucking on it like a baby sucks on its mothers breast. He scooped up a handful of the snow and shoved it into his mouth, red drool sliming his chin. He stood up and peered in through the door window immediately realizing what had happened.  The man opened the door and brought out the kid, carrying him by the scruff of his neck. After tossing him onto the luggage rack he got into his car and drove back towards the entrance to Nightshade Ave.

And when he would get to Norton McLeod's house later on that night he would park the car and get out. Happy to see his brother after eleven years and eager to see his nephew, James who should be 17 in a week.