Marion Smith sat with unreadable eyes in the pastel blue booth of the café, as if expecting someone at any second to take the seat across from her. She stared into space, her coffee mug sitting perfectly still on the table directly beneath her chin. Her chest rose and fell with each breath, the smell of the bitter drink barely registering in her brain.
Her eyes went dead the day they took her child away from her.
Susanna, the small, sweet child, had only been five when they came with their folders, their judgments, and removed her from Marion’s care. Marion tried to hold on to her, tried to fight as they pulled both of them from the house. There was no hiding anymore.
“Marion Smith, you are found by the court to be an unfit parent to Susanna Smith due to restricted mental capacity and chemical imbalance.”
She had taken Susanna on the run, told her they were going for ice-cream, and they left the state, moved from half-way house to half-way house, eventually going the whole-way over ten times before a worker identified Marion.
Marion was charged with kidnapping a ward of the state, and sentenced to ten years. When the bars slammed, her life ebbed away. Every night, when the metal clanged shut, she felt another piece of her slowly drifting off. Her dreams would be of only one thing – Susanna, the small child with the golden hair, her red and white dress with a bow tied neatly behind her back, her sparkling blue eyes, her seemingly ever missing front tooth.
Ten years, Marion sat and dreamed about Susanna, her daughter, the child that she loved, loved enough to risk it all. There was no reward for the endeavor she undertook. Only punishment.
Marion was released, and underwent mandatory psyche evaluations as an order of her parole. It had been eight years after she had seen Susanna, and was told that she was not allowed to go near the child – it would be in direct violation of her parole, and she would be charged with endangering the life of a child.
Her parole officer helped her find a desk job, something that wouldn’t tax her already fragile mind, and she worked hard for three long years in a cubicle, shut off from the world. Her desk face opposite the entrance to her workspace, every footfall behind her making her jump. It was just men, women, in suits and skirts, walking back and forth to the copier, the machine that was separated from Marion by a thin piece of wood covered with fabric.
It clanged to life every few minutes, the interior pieces slamming harshly against the plastic, causing the entire contraption to shake violently before spewing out a single piece of paper. Then the process, the long process, would repeat. Marion was the only person that had to listen to it. Everyone would drop off documents to print, and wander off, to the kitchen, to the cooler, to make conversation, while Marion worked hard. The job was the only thing she had left. Sorting documents. Making small corrections to official statements.
But the copier was enough to drive any person mad. The beast would howl and howl for what seemed like hours at a time, unwilling to stop, unwilling to die. In the event of a copier error, the machine would shake in an even more aggressive manner, like an oversized Yahtzee cup filled with metal die.
Marion kept to herself. She learned to deal with it, to try and shut out the noise. She was attuned to hearing the squeak of the mail trolley behind her, the one loose wheel, attuned to hearing the noise and then the slightly more intrusive sound of the cart passing. No one wrote.
Until May 5th.
She was surprised to hear the cart stop behind her. The copier still chugged along, an angry monster, but the squeaking wheel stopped.
“Marion Smith?”
Marion turned, her chair swiveling. She was not a bad looking person by any means – her fallow eyes betrayed her beauty. She too had blonde, curling hair. Her skin was fair, and she always dressed in a smart fashion.
“Yes?”
“Letter for you.”
“Oh. I haven’t gotten one of these here. I mean, I’ve gotten letters before, just not at work.”
The mail clerk smiled. “Yeah. I walk past your desk every day. I don’t know how you can work next to the copier. They said we were going to get a new one, a more quite one... but you know how they are.”
“How long ago did ‘they’ say that?”
“About a year.”
Marion faked a smile. “But a letter? Really? Didn’t know anyone cared to write to me.”
“Well, someone does. Someone in... Taper Town, New Hampshire. Never heard of it.”
Her blonde curls bounced as she shook her head. “Neither have I. Probably just junk mail. You can toss it.”
The clerk looked at the letter. “Looks like it was hand written. Maybe you should take a look at it after all.”
She reached out and took the letter from his hand. He stood for a second, as if waiting for her to open it. She stared at him – his bald head doing a very good job reflecting the overhead lights, his too-big glasses and too-small shirt – before he finally got the idea that she did not want company.
She turned back to her desk and pulled a pen from one drawer, sliding it under the right most corner of the envelope, making a straight line down the side. She pulled the letter out, and looked at the envelope.
“15156, Lake Crest Drive, Taper Town, New Hampshire,” was written in a very dry, very straight forward script. Her address, “45931 L. Craft Industries, El Paso, Texas” was written the same way.
She picked up the letter, and turned it over in her hands. It had been folded neatly into three sections. It unfolded easily in her hand. The color drained from her face when she read the first word, which was written unlike the address on the front of the envelope. The first word, the innocent but loving first word, was written in a small, stilted script, from the hands of a child.
“Mommy.”
Marion’s breath caught in her throat. She felt as if she had been punched hard in the stomach, the hard lines of her desk blurring. The world stopped – the copier muted, the quiet conversation behind her stilted. The color was pulled from her typically monochrome world, and she turned back to the letter, which looked to have been written in red crayon.
“Mommy,
“I miss you very much. The people that took me told me I wasn’t allowed to write you letters, but I decided that they weren’t my mommy, and that I could do whatever I wanted to.
“They said I shouldn’t write to you because you’d try to take me away again and what if that’s what I want I asked them and they said that I was too young to decide anything for myself, but I’m not young I’m 6 and thats pretty grown up.
“You can come take me away and I wont tell any person, I promise. Speschully not new mommy or new daddy. They always look at me funny cus I dont like talking to them or there frends.
“Please come get me mommy. Real mommy. MOMMY I LOVE.”
The letter was written on snow white paper. Beneath the final message was a stick figure drawing of a little girl with long hair holding the stick figure hand of a grown woman.
Marion read the letter, again and again, each time savoring all the details, the heartache in the letter as her child railed against her new guardians. In the back of her mind, something was not settling right about the letter in the least – it had arrested her lucid train of thought, however, and with each consecutive read, the letter turned into a cry for help.
As she folded the letter, she sat back. The paper hadn’t aged more than the three days it would have taken to get there, the waxy smell from the crayon still fresh on the paper.
It finally occurred to her what had been so off putting about the letter as she was packing her bag for the night. She picked it up, and ran her finger over the fine textures that the crayon had left behind.
“... I’m not young I’m 6 and thats pretty grown up.”
Susanna being six would have been more than twelve years ago, Marion thought to herself. But the letter looks like it was written yesterday. It was written yesterday. I don’t understand.
She left work that night puzzled, yet hopeful. Susanna hadn’t forgotten about her – and now she knew where to find her again. Taper Town, New Hampshire.
-
The pastel blue booth of the café matched Marion’s mood as she sat, barley acknowledging the coffee. She was staring out the window, past the vacant seat, through the parking lot, to a green highway sign that sat just off the exit.
“Now Ent. New Hampshire.”
She listlessly dropped a few dollars onto the table, grabbing her purse, and stepping onto the floor. The letter she had carried with her from Texas fell to the ground, to the feet of a stranger, who stooped down and picked it up.
“You dropped this, ma’am,” he said, in a slow drawl. She briefly glanced up at the man – who was wearing a too small shirt and whose bald head reflected the overhead light, the too big glasses sliding down his nose.
“Do I know you?” She asked, blinking.
“Don’t believe you do. But you did drop this,” he shook the letter. Marion glanced down, and looked back up. The face of the man had changed completely. He was now younger, with a head full of red hair, and freckles to match. He was chewing on a tooth pick, and once again shook the letter. “But I don’t have all day, miss.”
“I’m – I’m very sorry. I thought you were someone else,” she said.
The ginger man smiled. “I am someone else,” he said back.
“Pardon?”
“It’s a bad joke. You thought I was someone else, I am someone else... Sorry about that. I’d give you my name, but I have to be going. It’s nothing against you, I do love to flirt, but if I don’t leave soon, the storm is going to cut me off and I can’t drive worth a hoot in the rain. So if you’ll excuse me...”
She stared blankly at him as he tried to weasel his way around her. She kept closing her eyes and shaking her head, trying to conjure up the image of the bald man, but couldn’t quite bring him back. Every time she would open her eyes, the red headed man looked more and more impatient.
“Right,” she said, sighing. “I’m sorry. I’m just having an off day. I’m – “
“Don’t want you name, miss. I just want to get out of here.”
“Right. I’m very sorry,” she stepped out of the way.
Marion watched as he walked outside, making his way to a blue pickup truck. In between the partitions in the window, he would briefly change back and forth from the bald man to the red haired man. Her breath came in short gasps as he slid into the driver seat, casting a glance behind himself and grinning right at her, his teeth sharpened into points.
This happened to you before, little girl, and that’s why the court decided you were an UNFIT MOTHER and now you want to go see your –
“Not WANT. WILL see my little girl.”
- she’s not supposed to be your little girl anymore, Marion, she’s supposed to be all grown up and why don’t you just accept that?
-
The rain had already started to fall when she took exit 64B to Taper Town. The exit wound itself around a hill covered with thick trees, gradually sloping upward until she reached the crest. She idled her car as she stared over into the valley. The small town blanketed the floor, lights turning on one by one. She gauged the other hills surrounding the town, but couldn’t find another set of headlights going into or out of Taper Town. She put the car in gear, and inched her way down the hill, slowly, keeping her eyes peeled for any animals.
She might not recognize you. It’s been a long time. Unless you really believe she still is six. She might not even want to see you.
“No, no, she wrote the letter. She wrote the letter. She wants me to come get her. She really does.”
And what if you don’t recognize her, my friend? What then? It’s been a long, long time. Do you still even have a picture?
In her mind, but it was all that mattered. She could never forget Susanna’s face, her smile, her laugh, her smell.
The road led down into the valley, until it cut deep into the hill, bedrock and shale on both sides of her car. The rain began to pound down harder, cutting visibility to almost nothing, and she slowed to a crawl. No accidents now, not when she was so close.
The road led to a tunnel, and at the front of the tunnel was a small house, set off to the side. There was a booth with a crossing guard, and a man standing in front of it. Marion pulled up and rolled her window down. The man approached, his black poncho slick with the northern downpour.
“Miss, the tunnel closes during the rain. I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to turn around.”
She stared up at him. “It’s important.”
“No, ma’am, you’ll drown if you go through. Turn back around, try again later.”
“My daughter,” she pleaded, “My daughter has been kidnapped, and she’s on the other side of this tunnel. Please, please, you have to let me through.”
“Maybe you should try calling the police.”
“They’ll kill her. But if you’re worried about my safety, I can turn around.”
“No... Just... leave your car by the side here and use the maintenance walkway on the side, okay?”
“Okay,” she said. She put her car in gear and pulled next to the booth. She hefted her purse over one shoulder, and pulled her white coat tight around herself, before stepping into the tunnel.
“Wait,” he called after her. “You need a light. Don’t want to go tumbling over the railing, do you?”
“No,” she said. She grabbed it from his hand. It was heavier than it looked, and even after turning it on, she had to hit it a few times against the wall before it finally sprang to life. She turned the beam back to the man, and was relieved to find that he was not bald, and was dressed rather appropriately for the weather.
“Just watch out for the oldins in the there.”
“The what’s?”
“All manner of thing in the tunnel. Rain can wash em’ out of their hiding places. My kid and I, we call em’ the oldins. Like, ‘Youngins’, but the opposite.”
“Oh. What about grues?”
“What?”
“Nothing,” she muttered under her breath, turning back to the gaping mouth of the tunnel. Her light revealed the path she would be taking, down into the belly of the hill. It was concrete, but shining wet. To her left was a metal railing, broken in the same place every few feet by the same blunt force. She stepped inside and was immediately captured by the sound.
The water roaring down the road was deafening, and only grew louder the further she descended. There were grates every ten feet or so that were dripping wet, a manner of plant life extending forward from between the metal teeth, almost seeming to grip after her as she would walk path. At any moment an unspeakable pale terror could come crawling from any of the vents, pulling her into the ceiling, her screams masked by the sound of the rushing water.
Or what about the water? The creature that could live within? The scale skinned organism, nothing but a loose collection of teeth and tentacles that would wrap itself around her leg and pull her through one of the deliberate openings in the metal railing – because sure that is how they were all made, the scale men pulling wary travelers into the screaming deluge.
She reached the bottom – where the walkway began to rise – and the water no longer sounded like water rushing. It was a terrifying and angry yell, darkness cursing the light, low, and guttural before ascending to high and whining. It seemed unending. Marion stood and watched the water, her light held steadfast in her hands, as it came rushing down the road from either end of the tunnel, meeting in the middle like violent lovers embracing, sending up cold wave after cold wave.
The drainage sure is impressive to be able to handle this much water without the tunnel completely flooding. But what about what lives under the tunnel, Marion? What about that? Maybe there’s something under the tunnel drinking up all the water, Marion. Something with no teeth, but a million things that live inside its infinite belly waiting to tear you apart, piece by piece until there’s nothing left? Don’t fall, Marion. No one can here you scream down here.
She imagined the creature that lived beneath the tunnel, thick skinned, dripping with viscous moisture that would run off the creases in its skin in thick rivulets, attached to nothing and everything with countless arms and tentacles, hanging from the ceiling of space and time, waiting for her. Excited for her.
Marion shook her head, the rain falling from her hair, and she began to trek upwards, the angry cry dissipating behind her as she made her way. It was soon that she saw the exit of the tunnel – dark, but lighter than where she was. The rain fell in a waterfall over the exit, obscuring her view of the town, the water now dark instead of clear.
She stepped under the waterfall and let it wash over her, rinsing off her apprehension, carrying it backwards, down into the vertex of the road. She closed her eyes and felt it cleanse her. She stepped forward, her flashlight flickering, cutting glimpses of the town in front of her before dying completely.
She stared down at her light, but it was covered in shadow. As was her hands. She closed her eyes and shook her head again, trying to remove the darkness that was coating her, but to no avail. She turned and looked at the waterfall she had been standing under – it was pure black. Her coat was covered with the dark water, and she reached out her hand, a small part unaffected by the crashing cascade, and held it to the rain.
Thick, fat drops splashed against her hand like ink, painting her in darkness.
“Oh, God, what is this?”
She began to run, watching her step carefully, moving under an awning of the closest building. She looked at herself in the window’s reflection, splotches of darkness covering her body. She reached up and touched her face, smearing some of the liquid, but it would not come off. She moved to touch her reflection, but it was no longer moving in tandem with her. The Marion in the window was acting as a mime, playing out a sad scene. She recalled the moment – when they decided to take her daughter from her.
Marion shook her head, but the picture did not restore itself. She was still looking at someone that resembled Marion, but now she was being pulled by an invisible rope, upwards, until only her feet were kicking still in the window.
A flash of lightning struck the hill behind her, and she was returned, staring back at her reflection again, this time, the reflection staring right back at her. She was no longer covered in the dark water – rather, now, she only looked wet, miserable, and confused.
This same thing happened right before YOU KNOW WHAT, MARION. It’s happening AGAIN, isn’t it.
“No.”
It IS. You just won’t admit it. Admit it, Marion. Maybe you should turn to leave. Maybe THEY were right about you.
“No.”
If they were right, what kind of danger would you be putting Susanna in, Marion? Trying to protect her from invisible monsters, from spooks that go bump in the night? From nothing?
“No, I swear it.”
I wish I could believe you, Marion, I do.
“I’ll make you believe. We’ll see.”
It was with these words that the lights inside the house turned on. Marion jumped, and stared at the old man looking at her from inside.
“Good lord, come in, girl. You’ll catch the death out there”
Marion nodded, stepping inside.
The old man closed the door behind her, and the noise of the rainfall immediately stopped, as if he had shut off the elements entirely.
“I’m sorry to intrude, sir, I just came through the tunnel and – “
“It’s hell in there. I’m surprised you made it. Did you walk?”
“Yes, and –“
“That damn fool Johnny on the other side. Always letting people through. It’s dangerous in there. Dangerous out here when the rain falls.”
“I know, and –“
“Mind likely to play tricks on you out here, hundred miles away from anything. Some people like the solitude. I like the solitude. The name’s Darren.”
“It’s a pleasure,” she said. “My daughter wrote me a letter. I’m just looking for her – maybe for a place to stay before I go and pick her up. I want to surprise her, and... And it would just be great if I could just pick her up as soon as I saw her without having to worry about the rain, or the tunnel.”
“Well, sure. You can stay here, I suppose. We have an extra room. What did you say your name was?”
“Marion. Smith. Kind of dangerous inviting strangers in, don’t you think?”
“If you kill me, where would you go? The hills out there would eat you alive. Tunnel won’t be open for another day. So consider this as a piece of advice. Don’t go killin’ nobody while it’s raining out here. You’ll only be stuck.”
“Thanks,” she said, forcing a smile, suddenly uneasy.
“You’ll be up here,” he said, moving the staircase. “First door on the left.”
You’ll be stuck here, Mary my girl. Why don’t you turn around.
“It’s too late,” she muttered.
“What was that?” Darren called from behind her.
“Have a good night,” she called.
Her eyes went dead the day they took her child away from her.
Susanna, the small, sweet child, had only been five when they came with their folders, their judgments, and removed her from Marion’s care. Marion tried to hold on to her, tried to fight as they pulled both of them from the house. There was no hiding anymore.
“Marion Smith, you are found by the court to be an unfit parent to Susanna Smith due to restricted mental capacity and chemical imbalance.”
She had taken Susanna on the run, told her they were going for ice-cream, and they left the state, moved from half-way house to half-way house, eventually going the whole-way over ten times before a worker identified Marion.
Marion was charged with kidnapping a ward of the state, and sentenced to ten years. When the bars slammed, her life ebbed away. Every night, when the metal clanged shut, she felt another piece of her slowly drifting off. Her dreams would be of only one thing – Susanna, the small child with the golden hair, her red and white dress with a bow tied neatly behind her back, her sparkling blue eyes, her seemingly ever missing front tooth.
Ten years, Marion sat and dreamed about Susanna, her daughter, the child that she loved, loved enough to risk it all. There was no reward for the endeavor she undertook. Only punishment.
Marion was released, and underwent mandatory psyche evaluations as an order of her parole. It had been eight years after she had seen Susanna, and was told that she was not allowed to go near the child – it would be in direct violation of her parole, and she would be charged with endangering the life of a child.
Her parole officer helped her find a desk job, something that wouldn’t tax her already fragile mind, and she worked hard for three long years in a cubicle, shut off from the world. Her desk face opposite the entrance to her workspace, every footfall behind her making her jump. It was just men, women, in suits and skirts, walking back and forth to the copier, the machine that was separated from Marion by a thin piece of wood covered with fabric.
It clanged to life every few minutes, the interior pieces slamming harshly against the plastic, causing the entire contraption to shake violently before spewing out a single piece of paper. Then the process, the long process, would repeat. Marion was the only person that had to listen to it. Everyone would drop off documents to print, and wander off, to the kitchen, to the cooler, to make conversation, while Marion worked hard. The job was the only thing she had left. Sorting documents. Making small corrections to official statements.
But the copier was enough to drive any person mad. The beast would howl and howl for what seemed like hours at a time, unwilling to stop, unwilling to die. In the event of a copier error, the machine would shake in an even more aggressive manner, like an oversized Yahtzee cup filled with metal die.
Marion kept to herself. She learned to deal with it, to try and shut out the noise. She was attuned to hearing the squeak of the mail trolley behind her, the one loose wheel, attuned to hearing the noise and then the slightly more intrusive sound of the cart passing. No one wrote.
Until May 5th.
She was surprised to hear the cart stop behind her. The copier still chugged along, an angry monster, but the squeaking wheel stopped.
“Marion Smith?”
Marion turned, her chair swiveling. She was not a bad looking person by any means – her fallow eyes betrayed her beauty. She too had blonde, curling hair. Her skin was fair, and she always dressed in a smart fashion.
“Yes?”
“Letter for you.”
“Oh. I haven’t gotten one of these here. I mean, I’ve gotten letters before, just not at work.”
The mail clerk smiled. “Yeah. I walk past your desk every day. I don’t know how you can work next to the copier. They said we were going to get a new one, a more quite one... but you know how they are.”
“How long ago did ‘they’ say that?”
“About a year.”
Marion faked a smile. “But a letter? Really? Didn’t know anyone cared to write to me.”
“Well, someone does. Someone in... Taper Town, New Hampshire. Never heard of it.”
Her blonde curls bounced as she shook her head. “Neither have I. Probably just junk mail. You can toss it.”
The clerk looked at the letter. “Looks like it was hand written. Maybe you should take a look at it after all.”
She reached out and took the letter from his hand. He stood for a second, as if waiting for her to open it. She stared at him – his bald head doing a very good job reflecting the overhead lights, his too-big glasses and too-small shirt – before he finally got the idea that she did not want company.
She turned back to her desk and pulled a pen from one drawer, sliding it under the right most corner of the envelope, making a straight line down the side. She pulled the letter out, and looked at the envelope.
“15156, Lake Crest Drive, Taper Town, New Hampshire,” was written in a very dry, very straight forward script. Her address, “45931 L. Craft Industries, El Paso, Texas” was written the same way.
She picked up the letter, and turned it over in her hands. It had been folded neatly into three sections. It unfolded easily in her hand. The color drained from her face when she read the first word, which was written unlike the address on the front of the envelope. The first word, the innocent but loving first word, was written in a small, stilted script, from the hands of a child.
“Mommy.”
Marion’s breath caught in her throat. She felt as if she had been punched hard in the stomach, the hard lines of her desk blurring. The world stopped – the copier muted, the quiet conversation behind her stilted. The color was pulled from her typically monochrome world, and she turned back to the letter, which looked to have been written in red crayon.
“Mommy,
“I miss you very much. The people that took me told me I wasn’t allowed to write you letters, but I decided that they weren’t my mommy, and that I could do whatever I wanted to.
“They said I shouldn’t write to you because you’d try to take me away again and what if that’s what I want I asked them and they said that I was too young to decide anything for myself, but I’m not young I’m 6 and thats pretty grown up.
“You can come take me away and I wont tell any person, I promise. Speschully not new mommy or new daddy. They always look at me funny cus I dont like talking to them or there frends.
“Please come get me mommy. Real mommy. MOMMY I LOVE.”
The letter was written on snow white paper. Beneath the final message was a stick figure drawing of a little girl with long hair holding the stick figure hand of a grown woman.
Marion read the letter, again and again, each time savoring all the details, the heartache in the letter as her child railed against her new guardians. In the back of her mind, something was not settling right about the letter in the least – it had arrested her lucid train of thought, however, and with each consecutive read, the letter turned into a cry for help.
As she folded the letter, she sat back. The paper hadn’t aged more than the three days it would have taken to get there, the waxy smell from the crayon still fresh on the paper.
It finally occurred to her what had been so off putting about the letter as she was packing her bag for the night. She picked it up, and ran her finger over the fine textures that the crayon had left behind.
“... I’m not young I’m 6 and thats pretty grown up.”
Susanna being six would have been more than twelve years ago, Marion thought to herself. But the letter looks like it was written yesterday. It was written yesterday. I don’t understand.
She left work that night puzzled, yet hopeful. Susanna hadn’t forgotten about her – and now she knew where to find her again. Taper Town, New Hampshire.
-
The pastel blue booth of the café matched Marion’s mood as she sat, barley acknowledging the coffee. She was staring out the window, past the vacant seat, through the parking lot, to a green highway sign that sat just off the exit.
“Now Ent. New Hampshire.”
She listlessly dropped a few dollars onto the table, grabbing her purse, and stepping onto the floor. The letter she had carried with her from Texas fell to the ground, to the feet of a stranger, who stooped down and picked it up.
“You dropped this, ma’am,” he said, in a slow drawl. She briefly glanced up at the man – who was wearing a too small shirt and whose bald head reflected the overhead light, the too big glasses sliding down his nose.
“Do I know you?” She asked, blinking.
“Don’t believe you do. But you did drop this,” he shook the letter. Marion glanced down, and looked back up. The face of the man had changed completely. He was now younger, with a head full of red hair, and freckles to match. He was chewing on a tooth pick, and once again shook the letter. “But I don’t have all day, miss.”
“I’m – I’m very sorry. I thought you were someone else,” she said.
The ginger man smiled. “I am someone else,” he said back.
“Pardon?”
“It’s a bad joke. You thought I was someone else, I am someone else... Sorry about that. I’d give you my name, but I have to be going. It’s nothing against you, I do love to flirt, but if I don’t leave soon, the storm is going to cut me off and I can’t drive worth a hoot in the rain. So if you’ll excuse me...”
She stared blankly at him as he tried to weasel his way around her. She kept closing her eyes and shaking her head, trying to conjure up the image of the bald man, but couldn’t quite bring him back. Every time she would open her eyes, the red headed man looked more and more impatient.
“Right,” she said, sighing. “I’m sorry. I’m just having an off day. I’m – “
“Don’t want you name, miss. I just want to get out of here.”
“Right. I’m very sorry,” she stepped out of the way.
Marion watched as he walked outside, making his way to a blue pickup truck. In between the partitions in the window, he would briefly change back and forth from the bald man to the red haired man. Her breath came in short gasps as he slid into the driver seat, casting a glance behind himself and grinning right at her, his teeth sharpened into points.
This happened to you before, little girl, and that’s why the court decided you were an UNFIT MOTHER and now you want to go see your –
“Not WANT. WILL see my little girl.”
- she’s not supposed to be your little girl anymore, Marion, she’s supposed to be all grown up and why don’t you just accept that?
-
The rain had already started to fall when she took exit 64B to Taper Town. The exit wound itself around a hill covered with thick trees, gradually sloping upward until she reached the crest. She idled her car as she stared over into the valley. The small town blanketed the floor, lights turning on one by one. She gauged the other hills surrounding the town, but couldn’t find another set of headlights going into or out of Taper Town. She put the car in gear, and inched her way down the hill, slowly, keeping her eyes peeled for any animals.
She might not recognize you. It’s been a long time. Unless you really believe she still is six. She might not even want to see you.
“No, no, she wrote the letter. She wrote the letter. She wants me to come get her. She really does.”
And what if you don’t recognize her, my friend? What then? It’s been a long, long time. Do you still even have a picture?
In her mind, but it was all that mattered. She could never forget Susanna’s face, her smile, her laugh, her smell.
The road led down into the valley, until it cut deep into the hill, bedrock and shale on both sides of her car. The rain began to pound down harder, cutting visibility to almost nothing, and she slowed to a crawl. No accidents now, not when she was so close.
The road led to a tunnel, and at the front of the tunnel was a small house, set off to the side. There was a booth with a crossing guard, and a man standing in front of it. Marion pulled up and rolled her window down. The man approached, his black poncho slick with the northern downpour.
“Miss, the tunnel closes during the rain. I’m sorry, but you’re going to have to turn around.”
She stared up at him. “It’s important.”
“No, ma’am, you’ll drown if you go through. Turn back around, try again later.”
“My daughter,” she pleaded, “My daughter has been kidnapped, and she’s on the other side of this tunnel. Please, please, you have to let me through.”
“Maybe you should try calling the police.”
“They’ll kill her. But if you’re worried about my safety, I can turn around.”
“No... Just... leave your car by the side here and use the maintenance walkway on the side, okay?”
“Okay,” she said. She put her car in gear and pulled next to the booth. She hefted her purse over one shoulder, and pulled her white coat tight around herself, before stepping into the tunnel.
“Wait,” he called after her. “You need a light. Don’t want to go tumbling over the railing, do you?”
“No,” she said. She grabbed it from his hand. It was heavier than it looked, and even after turning it on, she had to hit it a few times against the wall before it finally sprang to life. She turned the beam back to the man, and was relieved to find that he was not bald, and was dressed rather appropriately for the weather.
“Just watch out for the oldins in the there.”
“The what’s?”
“All manner of thing in the tunnel. Rain can wash em’ out of their hiding places. My kid and I, we call em’ the oldins. Like, ‘Youngins’, but the opposite.”
“Oh. What about grues?”
“What?”
“Nothing,” she muttered under her breath, turning back to the gaping mouth of the tunnel. Her light revealed the path she would be taking, down into the belly of the hill. It was concrete, but shining wet. To her left was a metal railing, broken in the same place every few feet by the same blunt force. She stepped inside and was immediately captured by the sound.
The water roaring down the road was deafening, and only grew louder the further she descended. There were grates every ten feet or so that were dripping wet, a manner of plant life extending forward from between the metal teeth, almost seeming to grip after her as she would walk path. At any moment an unspeakable pale terror could come crawling from any of the vents, pulling her into the ceiling, her screams masked by the sound of the rushing water.
Or what about the water? The creature that could live within? The scale skinned organism, nothing but a loose collection of teeth and tentacles that would wrap itself around her leg and pull her through one of the deliberate openings in the metal railing – because sure that is how they were all made, the scale men pulling wary travelers into the screaming deluge.
She reached the bottom – where the walkway began to rise – and the water no longer sounded like water rushing. It was a terrifying and angry yell, darkness cursing the light, low, and guttural before ascending to high and whining. It seemed unending. Marion stood and watched the water, her light held steadfast in her hands, as it came rushing down the road from either end of the tunnel, meeting in the middle like violent lovers embracing, sending up cold wave after cold wave.
The drainage sure is impressive to be able to handle this much water without the tunnel completely flooding. But what about what lives under the tunnel, Marion? What about that? Maybe there’s something under the tunnel drinking up all the water, Marion. Something with no teeth, but a million things that live inside its infinite belly waiting to tear you apart, piece by piece until there’s nothing left? Don’t fall, Marion. No one can here you scream down here.
She imagined the creature that lived beneath the tunnel, thick skinned, dripping with viscous moisture that would run off the creases in its skin in thick rivulets, attached to nothing and everything with countless arms and tentacles, hanging from the ceiling of space and time, waiting for her. Excited for her.
Marion shook her head, the rain falling from her hair, and she began to trek upwards, the angry cry dissipating behind her as she made her way. It was soon that she saw the exit of the tunnel – dark, but lighter than where she was. The rain fell in a waterfall over the exit, obscuring her view of the town, the water now dark instead of clear.
She stepped under the waterfall and let it wash over her, rinsing off her apprehension, carrying it backwards, down into the vertex of the road. She closed her eyes and felt it cleanse her. She stepped forward, her flashlight flickering, cutting glimpses of the town in front of her before dying completely.
She stared down at her light, but it was covered in shadow. As was her hands. She closed her eyes and shook her head again, trying to remove the darkness that was coating her, but to no avail. She turned and looked at the waterfall she had been standing under – it was pure black. Her coat was covered with the dark water, and she reached out her hand, a small part unaffected by the crashing cascade, and held it to the rain.
Thick, fat drops splashed against her hand like ink, painting her in darkness.
“Oh, God, what is this?”
She began to run, watching her step carefully, moving under an awning of the closest building. She looked at herself in the window’s reflection, splotches of darkness covering her body. She reached up and touched her face, smearing some of the liquid, but it would not come off. She moved to touch her reflection, but it was no longer moving in tandem with her. The Marion in the window was acting as a mime, playing out a sad scene. She recalled the moment – when they decided to take her daughter from her.
Marion shook her head, but the picture did not restore itself. She was still looking at someone that resembled Marion, but now she was being pulled by an invisible rope, upwards, until only her feet were kicking still in the window.
A flash of lightning struck the hill behind her, and she was returned, staring back at her reflection again, this time, the reflection staring right back at her. She was no longer covered in the dark water – rather, now, she only looked wet, miserable, and confused.
This same thing happened right before YOU KNOW WHAT, MARION. It’s happening AGAIN, isn’t it.
“No.”
It IS. You just won’t admit it. Admit it, Marion. Maybe you should turn to leave. Maybe THEY were right about you.
“No.”
If they were right, what kind of danger would you be putting Susanna in, Marion? Trying to protect her from invisible monsters, from spooks that go bump in the night? From nothing?
“No, I swear it.”
I wish I could believe you, Marion, I do.
“I’ll make you believe. We’ll see.”
It was with these words that the lights inside the house turned on. Marion jumped, and stared at the old man looking at her from inside.
“Good lord, come in, girl. You’ll catch the death out there”
Marion nodded, stepping inside.
The old man closed the door behind her, and the noise of the rainfall immediately stopped, as if he had shut off the elements entirely.
“I’m sorry to intrude, sir, I just came through the tunnel and – “
“It’s hell in there. I’m surprised you made it. Did you walk?”
“Yes, and –“
“That damn fool Johnny on the other side. Always letting people through. It’s dangerous in there. Dangerous out here when the rain falls.”
“I know, and –“
“Mind likely to play tricks on you out here, hundred miles away from anything. Some people like the solitude. I like the solitude. The name’s Darren.”
“It’s a pleasure,” she said. “My daughter wrote me a letter. I’m just looking for her – maybe for a place to stay before I go and pick her up. I want to surprise her, and... And it would just be great if I could just pick her up as soon as I saw her without having to worry about the rain, or the tunnel.”
“Well, sure. You can stay here, I suppose. We have an extra room. What did you say your name was?”
“Marion. Smith. Kind of dangerous inviting strangers in, don’t you think?”
“If you kill me, where would you go? The hills out there would eat you alive. Tunnel won’t be open for another day. So consider this as a piece of advice. Don’t go killin’ nobody while it’s raining out here. You’ll only be stuck.”
“Thanks,” she said, forcing a smile, suddenly uneasy.
“You’ll be up here,” he said, moving the staircase. “First door on the left.”
You’ll be stuck here, Mary my girl. Why don’t you turn around.
“It’s too late,” she muttered.
“What was that?” Darren called from behind her.
“Have a good night,” she called.
<He Got Laid
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