Adermoor Cove: Here to Stay - 4. Chapter 4

Moira was sitting on the couch in her studio apartment, getting ready to down her second shot of Captain Morgan when Suzanne Salander showed up at the door. Without the twins, Moira noted with interest. It was rare when Suzanne didn't have the twins in tow.

"I tried calling you before I came over here," said Suzanne. "I was getting worried."

"Sorry," said Moira. She wasn't really sorry, not this time. Her mouth and mind were on autopilot.

"I was prepared to kick the door down," Suzanne said. "I was afraid I might find you dead."

Moira stepped back to let her in. "Well you don't have to worry about that...yet. I don't have enough energy to kill myself." It was meant to be a joke...sort of...just a little bit of gallows humor, completely harmless; but judging from the sad look on Suzanne's face she didn't find it very funny. She was looking at the bottle of Captain Morgan's sitting on top of the coffee table next to the shot glass.

"Plan on drinking that whole bottle by yourself?"

"I was going to, yes. You are more than welcome to join me. Grab a glass from the kitchenette."

Once Suzanne joined Moira on the futon, Moira passed the bottle. "So I know the answer is obvious," said Suzanne, "but for the sake of politeness I'm going to ask anyway...how are you?"

Moira made a face from the burning taste of the rum. At the rate I'm drinking I won't have a throat left by the time I finish this bottle.

"Well you know, I was just thinking, I've lived on this island for almost five years. In these last four years I've never felt like I truly belonged here. People have always been friendly to my face but it's not like anyone goes out of their way to invite me to Sunday brunch. But now that my girlfriend has been dragged into the woods by a bear and is most likely dead at this point, everyone wants to act like good samaritans.”

Suzanne poured herself more rum. The bottle was now only half full. “I know exactly what you mean. Sometimes, more often than not, I regret Colin and I ever came to this town. But Colin loves his job. He loves this town, so I must endure. The things we do for love, right?”

“I imagine Colin wants to know when I’m coming back to work.”

“I told Colin to let you take as long as you need, whether that’s two weeks or two months. He agreed. Why do you think schools have substitute teachers? And you’ve been through something very traumatic. Are you going to make an appointment with a therapist?”

“A therapist?” moira said the word as if it was new to her. “I haven’t even thought about going to see a therapist. I haven’t thought about seeing much of anyone. Yesterday i helped anne Sterling pick out her daughter’s coffin for Christ’s sake. Already I’ve given up on her.”

“Honey, I know you don’t want to,” Suzanne said, “but I recommend you see someone, someone who’s going to help you process how you’re feeling and get through this. Drinking a bottle of Captain Morgan’s isn’t exactly productive.”

Moira raised her drink to her. Yet here we are. “Bottoms up.”

…

Lane lay awake, listening to the storm rage outside. Rain lashed against the window. Bright blue flashes of light filled the sky, the crack of lightning so loud it sounded as if a giant gun had gone off. He couldn’t sleep, too much on his mind. He should’ve been able to sleep, it had been another busy day.

He’d taken one of the spare bedrooms upstairs. He hadn’t felt comfortable using Aunt Lena’s room. In fact he kept the door closed, almost superstitiously afraid to go into the room, just as he was now afraid to go up to the tower. He had a new bed now, a queen size, with new sheets. He’d bought candles and a small table to put them on. He’d gone downtown, trying to look for things to decorate his new bedroom with but it had been so long since he’d had one he didn’t know what he wanted to do with it. The bed was comfortable but the room felt too big. He didn’t feel safe up here like he did in the living room, on the couch.

You’ll just have to force yourself to get used to it. No more sleeping in cars or on the couch. It’s time to get civilized.

So he laid on his side, facing the window. Something small flashed past his window, a leaf maybe. The weather station had said it was supposed to storm for the next two days, signifying that autumn was quickly approaching. Lane found himself looking forward to the turning of the leaves and rainy, cool weather. The colder months had always been his favorite time of the year.

He tried to keep his eyes closed and remain still, but no matter how hard he tried his eyelids felt weightless. One minute he was hot and cold the next. His thoughts were an endless cycle of regret and guilt. He kept thinking about the moment Carlos and he had shared in the kitchen last night. Guilt that he hadn’t done more to put boundaries up, regret that he hadn’t given in to the attraction he felt towards Carlos. I did the right thing, he told himself. The more Carlos keeps his distance from me the safer he’ll be.

He kept hearing Carlos say, So what you're just going to be alone for the rest of your life?

If that's what it takes to be the hero then yeah.

But no one knew how difficult it was, how lonely it became to always do the right thing.

Lane must have fallen asleep for a moment because the next thing he knew he was jerking awake. He’d dreamed of being a young boy, walking home from school. Two boys, bigger than he was - he remembered their faces but could not remember their names - had jumped him and were beating him, stomping him into the ground with their feet, trying to kill him. There was something eerily familiar about the dream, like it was something he’d actually experienced, but the feeling was quickly replaced by a deeper sense of unease.

Something was wrong, very wrong. He was familiar now with the feeling to know to listen to it; his premonitions hadn’t failed him yet. Lane flicked on the light and grabbed the gun he kept hidden under the bed. He checked the chamber to make sure it was loaded. Satisfied, he closed the chamber with a click. Pale yellow light from inside the bedroom bled into the hallway, eating at the darkness. The light framed him as he crept out into the hallway, dressed in his boxers and a white T-shirt. Another clap of thunder boomed from somewhere outside, the tapping of rain against windows synched with the pounding of his heart. His eyes searched the ceiling and corners for anything that might try to attack him but so far everything was still. Silent. He’d been in this all too familiar situation many times.

Lane made it down the stairs without incident. He was just beginning to think he was safe when he saw the front door was open. The wind howled, strong enough to make it creak.

“What the fuck?” he said to himself. The sound of his own voice comforted him; it made him feel less alone.

He almost reached the door when his foot touched something wet and slick. Before he could grab the banister to balance himself, his foot slipped across the wooden floor. He felt the ground come up to meet him, knocking the air from his body. The back of his head smacked the floor.

Lane wasn’t sure how long he was on the floor before he had the will to move again. There was a deafening ringing in his ears, so loud it blocked out the sound of the storm. Dark spots flashed before his eyes. He managed to raise himself into a sitting position when he saw the footprints on the floor. Muddy, dirty footprints. Adult feet, but small. Feminine. With a dawning sense of horror, his eyes followed the footprints in reverse where they stopped at the door.

Someone’s in the house.

He still had the gun in his hand, glad he’d brought it with him. He was even more glad it hadn’t fired when he fell. I’m probably going to have a good knot there, soon. But a knot was the least of his problems at the moment.

Now would have been a good opportunity to leave the house, to try and get help. But Lane knew getting other people involved had never been effective - and neither had running. Lane, now more than ever, was ready to fight. But being able to fight didn’t stop him from being terrified. His heart was a leaping force within his chest and his hand gripped the gun tightly. He walked to the side, being careful not to trip on the muddy footprints again. He turned on the lamps, slightly comforted by the illumination. If there was light nothing could leap out at you from the corners and take you by surprise.

The footprints angled through the living room towards the dining room, childlike in the way they zigzagged slightly, as if the person had been skipping instead of walking. It made Lane think of the old reruns of Scooby Doo they used to show on Cartoon Network when he was a kid. He slid through the door of the dining room. He was reaching into the darkness, about to flick on the light, when something knocked the gun from his hand.

Lane instinctively moved to take a step back but before he could he was struck again on the side of his face. He fell onto his back. He was on the verge of losing consciousness. Darkness crept in on the edges of his vision, threatening to engulf him. Sheer terror and the need to survive were the only things that kept him from fully slipping under. A muddy foot kicked the gun over by the dining room table. There was no way Lane would be able to get it without having to get past his attacker.

The blurriness of his attacker slowly began to take shape as it moved leisurely towards him. The woman standing before him, he realized, was completely naked. Mud and dirt coated her skin and breasts, her forehead, and clung to her hair. There were several gashes from where she’d ben cut that looked like they’d been freshly healed, forming puckered scars. With the dread mounting, leaving a coppery taste in Lane’s mouth, Lane looked into the eyes of his assailant. Black, depthless eyes looked back at him. He’d looked into these eyes many times, in real life and in his nightmares.

But where there had only been mindless rage and a lack of self there was something human in these eyes. There was emotion. There was recognition. There was a sense of individuality not completely eroded by the darkness.

“Ramona?” he said.

Her lips peeled back from teeth covered in dirt and grime, as if she’d been living off of dirt. The voice that came from her lips was both velvety and childlike. “The king of darkness has awoken and he is hungry,” she said, “and he is angry.”

Then her foot connected with the side of his head and everything went black.

…

He came to, cold, wet and in pain.

He sat up, shaken and disoriented, feeling as if he’d emerged from a deep sleep. Rain fell on his bare skin, chilling him down to the bone. Above him, where the sky was black and desolate, the clouds were so thick it was impossible to see the stars and moon. Thunder flashed overhead, so loud it sounded as if God had just fired a shot with a gun.

Behind him, and to his left and right were trees. Their branches whipped about in the wind, seeming to reach for him with gnarled fingers. He stood, trying to remember how he’d gotten here, and turned around.

The mouth of the cave, like the open maw of a great beast, awaited to devour him. Inside, framed by jagged, glistening rock was a darkness Lane was all too familiar with. It was upon seeing the cave that Lane recalled what had happened. Ramona. She had come into his house and kidnapped him. She’d brought him out here for whatever purpose the darkness had intended. Ramona was alive but might as well be dead - the darkness had taken her.

The cave was back. It seemed to appear and disappear at will. But when it was gone where did it go?

Ramona’s words floated through his mind: The king of darkness has awoken and he is hungry, and he is angry.

There was something moving within the cave. He could see it because the shadows were shifting around it as if to make way. A voice in the back of Lane’s head screamed for him to get moving before whatever was coming emerged but Lane was rooted to the spot. With his T-shirt and shorts clinging to him the cold and fear had paralyzed him.

Ramona appeared from the mouth of the cave, her naked flesh glowing in the moonlight. Her hair hung around her face in a soggy curtain. She moved slowly, gracefully, her hips swinging, her breasts full and firm. Her eyes, like shiny pieces of cold, never left his.

More shapes were emerging from the cave - wolves. There were five of them and they walked on either side of Ramona, like knights guarding their queen. Their eyes were just as black as hers. Their muzzles opened to snarl at Lane, snapping their teeth at him. He could sense their need to pounce, to rip into him with their teeth, but somehow Lane knew they would not do so without Ramona commanding it.

“R-Ramona,” Lane said desperately, hugging himself, “if you’re in there I need you to fight the darkness.” He said these words, knowing there was no use, but he didn’t know what else to do.

Ramona smiled. “I am not Ramona. Ramona’s dead. I’m something else, something more. The king of darkness has asked for your blood as he has asked for the blood of all the Stantons,” she said, her voice carrying over the booming crash of the storm. “I shall make sure he has it.” She nodded towards Lane once and the five wolves broke off in different directions, lunging towards Lane.

Lane crashed through the trees, gulping in lungfuls of air. Rain battered at his face. Half blinding him. Somewhere, not far behind him, one of the wolves howled. The sound chilled his blood more than the rain ever could.

He could sense them close by, working to cut him off. It would only be a matter of time before they had him closed off. He had nothing to defend himself with, no gun, not even a knife, and he had no idea how to access his powers. Branches and twigs snagged at his feet every step of the way, slowing his escape; it seemed even the woods were working against him. Sheer terror and determination kept him going, ignoring the burn in his sides.

A flash of lightning struck a tree just inches away from him, close enough he could feel the heat as the leaves and branches caught flame. He looked over his shoulder just in time to see a black furred wolf leap over the burning embers. The snarling beast was quickly gaining on him. Within seconds the beast would close the distance on him. Lane could imagine the wolf leaping on him, ripping his throat out with its teeth.

The ground sloped down into a muddy stream. There was no time to hesitate or to try and find another avenue for escape. Lane began making his way down the hill. His feet left craters in the thick, cold mud. It took all his strength to pull his feet free and keep going. The wolves stood at the edge of the creek, snarling at him. Challenging him.

The water came up to his calves. Within a few steps it was almost up to his hips. The current was strong enough to almost sweep Lane off his feet. He fought against it, inching to the other side, but there were several heart wrenching moments when the current almost carried him away. That would just be my luck, he thought, to avoid being wolf food only to be swept off into the ocean. He had no doubt this stream was a tributary.

He was almost on the other side when his foot did slip this time. The current shoved at him, carrying him further east. One of the wolves, probably the pack leader, snarled at the others and they began following the bank of the stream. Lane’s head plunged beneath the surface of the water. He tried to kick up only to breathe in a stinging noseful of water. In the end it was a branch, hanging over the water within his reach that saved him. He grabbed a hold of it with both hands and clung on for dear life, kicking his way towards the bank. At long last, his body fell on the bank, in the mud. He ached all over. He was exhausted, in pain. But he knew the wolves were on the approach. With the darkness inside them they wouldn’t stop until he was dead.

Lane plodded to his feet, staggering drunkenly through the trees. He didn’t have the energy to run anymore. It was everything he could do to keep moving, to keep putting one foot in front of the other. By crossing the stream he’d bought himself a few minutes but he knew the wolves would find a way to get across. He could only hope he was moving in the right direction, towards safety.