The October Editor's Pick Writer is Trevor Denyer
Please feel free to contact Trevor at: tdenyer@ntlworld.com
THE MURDER HOUSE
by Trevor Denyer
See the prequel to this story HERE
They’d taken the bodies away, unsticking them from the fabric of the house, where time had settled like dust.
The mother and the little girl; hardly recognisable now that disfigurement and time had taken their toll. The man; his brains dry, like leather, ejected through the back of his blasted skull. The shotgun lying among body fluids on the hallway floor.
The stepson, not found among the carnage; escaped. The house was quiet for now, and so was the demon that waited in the shadows.
*****
John Wright had been a policeman for just over three months, having graduated as a Police Constable in May. When he thought of his job, he called it ‘PC’ in his mind.
He stood now, sweating in the heat of mid August, guarding the murder house. He wanted to remove his helmet and allow the air to his scalp, which itched under his sweat-soaked fair hair. He knew he could not do so as it represented his authority. An ordinary man in an extraordinary uniform, that’s how he saw himself.
Forensics had been and gone, as had the ambulance that removed the bodies. People stared at the house; at him. There was a fascination about death, especially violent death. The passers-by were curious, not knowing what had happened, but certain that it must be serious. If not, why was there a PC guarding the house, and blue-white tape with the words POLICE – DO NOT CROSS sealing the scene?
The sun beat down. John sweated in his uniform and tried to think of cool water, of drinking a nice, cold lager. He shook his head. He was drifting. It was important to ensure that no one entered the property, especially the photographers who were starting to turn up. Bloody paparazzi, he thought. Those bloodsucking morons….Newspapers had a lot to answer for; he hated newspapers, and he hated these fucking arsehole scumbag leeches, sucking the lifeblood from society, murdering decency….
John felt himself falling as the faint engulfed him. He felt vomit rising up, spewing forth, just before he lost consciousness, vaguely wondering what had brought on such aggressive feelings, such hate.
*****
Mick Carter saw the PC fall. His thin beard irritated the skin beneath and he scratched, knowing he shouldn’t. It would only raise another rash. Uncombed, greying hair topped his dishevelled appearance.
Mick was paparazzi, whatever that was. The principle that The Public Have A Right To Know was his justification for doing what he did. Being freelance, he felt that he had to grab every chance by the throat and metaphorically wring the life from it.
He had been doing that for the last twenty years, contributing work to most of the major tabloids and, more recently, to the on-line purveyors of what was euphemistically called ‘news’.
As he grew older, tiredness had slowly encroached upon his eagerness to succeed. Something about this location seemed to rekindle his passion to show the world what he was capable of. The policeman’s incapacity was his chance to shine once more.
He saw people run to the man’s aid and smiled as he took advantage of the heaven-sent opportunity. As he turned back briefly, he thought he saw the policeman standing there, not collapsed at all. He shook his head and shrugged off the illusion. He ducked under the police tape and disappeared into the shadow of the house, onto the pathway that led along the side of the building, to the back garden. He smiled as he thought of the price he might get for pictures from inside the murder house.
He winced at the sound of breaking glass. The back door had small, burglar-friendly panels of glass down half of its length. He placed the stone he had used in his backpack and reached through carefully. Avoiding the small remains of glass in the frame, he slid back the bolt that secured the door.
Inside, the house was gloomy. Curtains were drawn, shutting out the sun and keeping the interior cool. Mick found himself in the kitchen. There were wild patterns across the cupboards and up the walls. They made his stomach turn as he realised that these were the bloody patterns that death had left behind. The metallic smell of blood mixed with an old, fading scent of excreta and chemicals filled his nostrils as he breathed. He felt dizzy as his heart thumped uncomfortably in his chest. He withdrew the camera from his backpack and began to capture the images that constituted the aftermath of death.
*****
PC John Wright sucked in a huge lungful of warm air. He blinked and was surprised to see that the observers were still there, watching the house and talking amongst themselves. The press was gathering, but slowly; probably the local boys at the moment.
He still felt hot under the mid-day sun, and was certain that he had fainted and vomited over himself, but there was no evidence that he had. He must have day-dreamed the whole thing, but it felt so real…
One of the journalists was approaching. He recognised Andy Beckwith from school days. Andy had been part of a gang that bullied the younger, vulnerable kids whenever they thought they could get away with it.
He smiled conciliatorily as he approached. “Hey John, how are things? I see you made the grade as a defender of law and order, my friend.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but please move away.” The icy, detached, law enforcement approach seemed appropriate for this prick. They had never liked each other and John recalled one particularly embarrassing time when Andy Beckwith had pulled down John’s trousers and underpants, exposing him to the class. They had laughed at him and he had suffered a serious lack of confidence that had only returned after he met Mary. She had become his saviour and had persuaded him that he needed to do something useful with his life. So he had joined the Police Force.
“Hey, John, that’s no way to talk to an old schoolmate. I only want a little peek inside the house. Surely you can arrange it. If the shit hits the fan I’ll say I got in when you weren’t looking.” He lowered his voice and whispered conspiratorially, “…and of course, there will be something in it for you.”
John felt his anger rising and the heat of the day growing. Light spread, filling the space where he stood in a white hot expansion of air, an explosion of previously buried hate against this man.
He leaned forward. “Just fuck off, you bloodsucking bastard! Piss off back to the gutter. I’m not your fucking friend, okay? I never have and never would be,” he growled menacingly into the man’s ear. It felt good.
Andy backed away. There was something seriously deranged in the manic, icy blue eyes of this upholder of the law. The journalist knew he had wronged John in the past, but that was old history…water under the bridge, surely?
“Okay, man. For fuck’s sake, what’s got into you? That’s no way to speak to a law-abiding citizen.”
“Nothing’s wrong. I just hate blood-sucking arseholes like you!”
Andy smiled as he delivered the coup de grâce: “Well, you’d better go in there and get that other arsehole, Mick Carter out. He slipped by when you were day-dreaming!”
Andy backed off, laughing.
*****
PC Wright was in a quandary. He needed to stay at his post, but if what that creep, Andy Beckwith had said was true, then the other bastard was at this moment busy taking photographs of the obscenities inside the house. He had to go and get him out.
He could call for back-up, but that would make it obvious that he had failed in his duty. He could not afford to fail. There had been too many times in his past where that had happened and undermined his confidence. The rot started by Andy Beckwith had stayed with him through the years, undermining him and leading towards failure.
Thank God for Mary. She had saved him.
They met at the superstore. It was their first day, sat amongst the other newbies in a room where introductions and a short training session took place. John found himself mesmerised by the chestnut-haired beauty sitting next to him. Her clear brown eyes consumed him and, as she smiled at him, he had found the courage to ask her for a date.
From that moment, they were friends and very soon, were lovers; rarely apart. Her strength of character infused him with confidence and hope. They loved each other, planned their future lives together and revelled in the joyful madness that filled them.
As he remembered this, he decided to take a chance and go after the creep who had hoodwinked him. In the hidden recesses of the murder house, he would teach him a lesson he would never forget. That’s what Mary would have told him to do. A trace of unease unsettled him. Was this really what Mary would have advised, or was there something else suggesting….
He suppressed the thought and moved towards the house.
*****
Inside, the house was quiet; just the ticking of an old, cheap kitchen clock on the wall. Mick Carter felt a shiver slide down his spine like ice water. Goosebumps rose on his skin and he felt himself hyper-ventilating. He forced himself to calm down. There was something here. It was a presence he felt yet could not see. “Must be what happened here,” he muttered. “It’s all in your head, you stupid bastard. Just take your fucking photos and get out of here….”
A breeze stirred the dust and dried blood. Mick moved quickly into the hallway and was confronted with a large stain on the carpet. Most of it had been removed, but some remained. Several maggots oozed across the floor. In a dark corner there was a shape. It looked like a tiny naked baby. He peered closer and saw that it was a doll. Some of the dark matter had settled on it and, as he readied his camera, a large black spider crawled from under the doll and sat on its face.
Mick Carter gasped in surprise as he recoiled, tripping on the edge of the stairs that invaded the hall space and crashing into an occasional table with hard, sharp corners. He felt pain lance through him as his head caught the edge of the table and he fell to the ground, his blood flowing copiously into the carpet from the deep head wound.
Then something despairingly black slipped from the deep shadows beyond the hallway. The hot air became icily cold as it oozed across Mick, freezing his heart before moving into the shadows once more.
*****
PC John Wright eased his way along the side of the house until he reached the back garden. He peered cautiously round the corner and noticed the backdoor open, with one broken panel. It was clear that the intruder was inside. He wondered whether it was the photographer. In fact, he was beginning to doubt that the journalist that had approached him to tell him about the intruder was the bully from school.
It had to be. It was definitely Andy….who? He could not recall. He felt himself being drawn to the house and knew that he would be unable to resist the urge to enter.
*****
“You’re not so bad yourself.” Mary smiles at him.
“Do you fancy….”
“What?”
“….going for a walk or something.”
“I fancy the something.”
He pulls her towards him, feeling her warmth inside the frosted car. Her small breasts press against him and fine hair tickles his nose, the fresh scent of her filling his senses. He stifles a sneeze and she laughs.
They kiss. She tastes of chocolate from the sticky dessert she ate at the restaurant. He feels himself hardening. His breath comes faster and so does hers. They make love in the car. It’s uncomfortable but glorious….
*****
The memory stung. That was the beginning. She had been his saviour. With her encouragement, he could do anything. He could be a policeman. Some moral imperative drove him on and Mary was there to boost his confidence.
“I don’t care what you do,” she had said, “but you need to do something with your life. You deserve it.” The smile lit up her face, the brown eyes sparkling, the chestnut curls of hair catching the sunlight . “You’re such a nice person.”
Catching the sunlight. That’s what her bloody, broken body had done after the accident. The hit-and-run driver had never been caught. One second she had been walking next to him, then there was a wrench as her arm was torn from his and the squeal of brakes. The thud of her body against the side of the vehicle, acceleration and the bastard in the blue cavalier was gone. Mary lay gasping like a fish out of water. Her head was a mess of blood and something ominous was seeping into her hair. Her eyes were filled with terror for a moment, as if she had glimpsed hell. Then calmness descended as her eyes stilled and began to glaze over.
John’s cheeks were wet with tears. He stood looking through bleary eyes at the damaged door. “What is wrong with me?” he asked himself.
Nobody answered.
*****
From the shadows of the curtained house, something came. John could see the dark patches on the floor and cupboards in the kitchen. Beyond that, he could just make out the hallway where a dark shape crouched, as if ready to leap forward.
As he watched, the shape did not move. He realised as his eyes adjusted to the gloom that the shape was a body. Beyond that, from the deeper darkness, something moved. The figure materialised, coalescing impossibly into Mary, her slight figure dressed in a flowing, translucent shroud.
“Who are you?” John asked as his heart beat heavily in his chest and his breath grew shorter.
“You know who I am,” she says.
“But you can’t be Mary.” He sobs as grief fills him once more.
She smiles. “Can’t I?”
The world ceases to turn. Time stops and he feels himself wrapped in an invisible shroud of his own. He moves tentatively forward, holding out his hands, ready to embrace her. “My love….”
*****
The journalists found them, lying side by side; the photographer and the policeman. The cause of death in both cases was heart attack. Mick Carter had fractured his skull when he fell, but that had not killed him. John Wright lay curled up, as if trying to protect himself from something. His dead eyes stared into eternity, forever surprised and his mouth was fixed in the rigour of a scream, silent now and breathless.
*****
“What do you think?” Dave sees only what he and his new wife might do with the property.
“I don’t know, Dave. There’s something a bit creepy about the place.” Sue doesn’t want to be a killjoy, but she has heard rumours about death, about murder….about photographs recovered from the scene that showed a deep, impenetrable darkness where there should have been light.
Dave turns to her and smiles, a certain vagueness in his stare. “That was a long time ago, darling.” He smiles indulgently. “Think of the possibilities; and it’s a real bargain. We can afford to buy the place and have money to spare. We can modernise the place, ready for the kids.”
She smiles at him. The mention of children softens her. “Yes, it’ll be nice to have somewhere decent to raise a family.” She tries to ignore the malevolence that issues from the bricks and dark eyes of windows, waiting. The front door, once bright red, has darkened over the years, like dried blood.
Sue pushes away her doubts. She feels the excitement of a new life beginning with Dave. She hears the laughter of her dreamed-of children. Somehow, the house has transformed in her mind and doesn’t seem threatening at all. She wonders briefly why she had felt that way.
“Alright then,” she says and kisses Dave hard on the mouth. “Let’s get hold of the keys and take a look inside.
In the shadows, a presence sighs as it weaves its subtle web around the hopeful, ambitious thoughts of the couple.
From the window, the ghostly form of a child looks out. The Little Girl Lost brings the doll to her face and kisses it.
Trevor Denyer has been published in many magazines including Scheherazade, Nasty Piece of Work, Enigmatic Tales, Symphonie’s Gift and Night Dreams. He received an Honourable Mention in Ellen Datlow’s Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror and has appeared on line at Time Out Net Books and Gathering Darkness. His work has appeared in a number of anthologies including Nasty Snips and Gravity’s Angels.
More recently, he has been published in the Evil Jester Press anthology, Help! Wanted: Tales of On-The-Job Terror and A Feast of Frights From The Horror Zine. His work has also appeared in the e-zines, Estronomicon (Screaming Dreams Press) and Tales From The River (Dark River Press).
He has stories forthcoming in the anthology, After Death…, the on-line project, Nasty Snips II and the zine, Wordlands 2 - Honey, I’m Home.
His collection, The Edge of the Country is available through the websites below. He is the creator and editor of the critically acclaimed Roadworks, Legend and Midnight Street magazines. Visit the website at www.midnightstreet.co.uk, and his own website at www.trevordenyer.weebly.com
