After taking a few steps forward, she noticed the flicker of a candle in one of the rooms adjoining the main room where she stood. "Hello," she called, half expecting an answer. There was none. She headed for the door that was ajar, and with a shaking hand, she pushed the door open so she could see what was inside. There was a small dresser on the far wall in front of a window. The window was covered with plastic instead of glass. The cool air was licking the flame of the single candle that burned on the dresser. Then her eyes caught a figure lying in the old beat up bed on the side wall,but she couldn't see who or what was sleeping there. She was about to leave when a voice called out, "Is that you Heather?" She stopped in her tracks as her heart beat in her head. She wanted to bolt for the door, but a part of her wanted to know who it was that called out for someone named Heather.
The blanket on the bed moved and the figure sat up. Darla was about to let out a scream, she caught it in her throat. It was hard to swallow, but in her nervous state, she just stood there and peered into the cold gray eyes that followed her every movement. "Sorry miss," she said,"I was just walking through the woods and saw your cabin and thought that nobody lived here, so I came inside to find a place to rest for a while."
"Heather, what are you talking about?"
"I'm not Heather, my name is Darla and I live in town."
"For heavens sake, Heather, cut the crap and get your brothers and tell them to come here and help me out of bed so I can get something to drink. My throat is as dry as the devil's ass."
Not knowing what to do, Darla just stood there wondering who this woman was and why she kept calling her Heather. She started to insist again that she was not Heather, but the woman sat up even more erect and the crooked grin with few remaining teeth seemed to bid her to leave. She turned around and left the room and looked around the cabin at the dusty old sofa with holes the size of fists here and there, and at the torn painting of some countryside that hung on the wall.
|
On the other side of the room was another door, but this one was not open at all, and there was no light flowing from the cracks under and around it. She headed for the door and knocked, half expecting to hear the voice of a little boy since the lady said she had sons that lived with her. Nothing came from the other side, but there was a more acrid smell here that reminded her of the time when her dog was hit by a car and a few days later they found her a pulp of blood and bones. She felt her stomach turn and for a moment she thought that she might throw up.
She tried the knob and the door wouldn't open, so she gave it a push and flung it open. It hit the wall and the sound echoed through the room. A wave of air filled her head with a sickening scent and she choked back her own vomit. She stepped inside the room and since the light of day was shining through the window she could see the faces on the floor only seconds before she let out a shrill scream. Before her were two boys about the same age as her, lying on the floor. Their mouths agape in an expression of sheer terror. Their blood had seeped into the floorboards, and the buzzing of insects every-where. Their eyes stared at the heavens, only glazed over and unseeing. There were cuts all over their naked bodies, one of the boys had a hand missing, which was on the floor beside his brothers head. The blood was dried, but she could see where it had flowed from the stump of his wrist. She couldn't hold it back any longer. She loosened her gut and spilled its contents onto the floor where it mixed with the decaying flesh. She could hear laughter coming from the old woman's room, but she thought that it might be in her head too.
Darla turned from the sight and bolted for the front door, and just as she was about to leave, it slammed in her face. She pulled at the knob and sank to her knees screaming. There was laughter all around her, in her head and filling her ears.
She crawled around the dirty floor just to look into the face of the lady standing in the doorway looking at her with a crooked grin on her face. The woman's hair flowed like a dirty gray wave of wool down her shoulders and to her feet. Her face was pale and wrinkled with age. Her gray eyes seemed to glow with a light of their own.
|