The Horribles Read online

  f o u r

  Sheldon woke up, tangled in a knot of blankets, to what sounded like a jet engine firing right outside the bedroom window. Before he could fully wake up, he’d wrestled himself off the edge of the twin bed and come down hard on the floor. The curtains were drawn tight. Could’ve been midnight. Could’ve been noon. He rubbed his sore backside and scratched his head at the same time (which is supposed to be an impossible feat), trying to figure out if he was in a battle zone. He’d never heard anything so loud.

  Slowly, he worked the sailor knots out of the bedding and stood up. The eruptions outside weren’t from a rocket or an a-bomb. It was the motor parade rolling into town, boring down on their throttles just as highway met up with the corner of his house and the rest of the town. A startle like that, being woken up out of a sound sleep, could leave a guy a little unsteady on his feet. He noodle-walked over to the window, smashing the meaty part of his thigh on the nightstand before pulling back the curtains far enough to squeeze his nose through.

  Opening the curtain a bit farther, he pressed his fingertips against the glass and could feel all the horsepower drumming up against the window pane. The vibration continued all the way down his spine and out his toes.

  Sheldon shivered and . . . remembered.

  Mr. Delaney (Sr.) had owned a motorcycle. Not anything like the ones storming past the house, but it had two wheels, handlebars and a gas-powered engine, all the same. It was what he had been working on when . . . well, when he had died. He used to say it was his other son. And sometimes, the way he doted over it, incessantly polishing and fine-tuning, Sheldon thought it may have been his favorite son. He wasn’t jealous, though. Daddy was always more than happy to share it with him.

  “Come here, Sheldon,” he’d say before scooping Sheldon’s hands up in his enormous palms. “I want you to hold on tight right here. That’s right. Put your hands on the gas tank and I’ll start it up.” Daddy would straddle the motorcycle with Sheldon leaned up against the tank, holding on for dear life, not quite sure what he was about to be shown. The small engine would give off a few hiccoughs and continue to sputter, on the verge of stalling.

  “You don’t need your ears to know something ain’t right. You can feel it.” Daddy would grab a wrench from the workbench and begin to tighten something below the tank. “Now, keep holding on and tell me if you feel the difference.” He would crank the wrench a few times, pause, and place his own hands over Sheldon’s and then turn the wrench just slightly. Slowly the engine’s unsteady vibration became more fluid and monotone. Sheldon could feel the exact point where it became “tuned”. He looked up at his Daddy and grinned. He could hear it, or feel it, without using his ears.

  “Everything gets out of tune sometimes, Sheldon, and your ears aren’t what’s gonna tell you.” Daddy had put a hand over his heart and continued. “You use this, my boy.”

  The long string of motorcycles growling past the house felt out of tune. Sheldon jerked his hands away from the glass pane and stepped back. They were all . . . out of tune. There was no other way to put it. They sounded all right and he could appreciate the thunderous clapping of all that power, but he’d felt something in his fingertips; something emanating from the parade. There was a feeling of a peaked fever or the clammy skin of the terminal and, as impossible as it seemed, the rattling vibrations clung to his skin. He tried to wring the feeling from his hands and stepped back toward the window, being mindful not to touch the glass.

  Stiff leather. High-polished stainless steel contrasted against jet-black paint. The rising sun reflected off the gas tanks. Fat tires gripped solidly on the blacktop. Waves of gaseous heat sizzled off rider and engine. Some of the bikes towed matching trailers. Sheldon thought it must be full of props for the parade. Riders twisted down hard on ape-hanger throttles and the machines roared back. When the trumpeting gurgle from exhaust pipes hit Sheldon like an ocean wave, it drilled a hole right in the middle of his head. The motor parade had left the confines of his small town street and was inside of him, burning rubber on his frontal lobe. His brain screamed for utter silence, but the parade just grew louder.

  And the entire time he was struck with the overwhelming urge to go to the parade . . . to join their ranks.

  I could do it¸ he thought. Just step right outside and walk right over to them. They’d take me in. Yes. I can feel it.

  But then another voice spoke up. It was a younger and more frightened version of himself.

  No! Never go outside. Bad things out there. They are bad. The parade is bad. Those are the Horribles! Horrible things riding horrible machines.

  Sheldon breathed fast and hard, as if trying to keep pace with the parade. Even with bright white lights exploding between optic synapse and brain, he still had to see the parade. He felt obligated to watch, as if the parade demanded it. His breath had misted over the glass, making it hard to see. There was no way he’d touch the glass again, not with his bare skin. He used the corner of his pajama top to smear away the moisture.

  He watched the parade pass. The drum-drum still pounding into his head. The urge to go outside still strong. He squinted his eyes. From this distance, and his condition, he couldn’t tell whether the riders were male or female . . . or both. They were dressed in head-to-toe leather and each wore a helmet with full face mask. It was nauseating to try to focus too much on the details of the parade. Sheldon tried to take in the overall picture of the scene. And if it weren’t for the pain, it would definitely be badass. He sort of wished Evan were here with him to see it.

  Eventually, the tail-end of the parade came into view. Just in time, too. Sheldon was convinced his head would crack down the middle and his brain would bubble out of the fissure. Or, worse, he’d give into the urge to go outside. The last rider sat on a trike with slick, fat back tires. Sheldon was surprised when the trike stopped in front of his house. The rider waved at Sheldon, or toward him, at least, and Sheldon stepped back, startled.

  “How can they know I’m in here?” Sheldon asked his favorite companion. It was dark and there was only a slit in the curtains.

  There were two leather satchels on the back of the trike. The rider reached a gloved hand into one and pulled out a mass of reds, blues and greens, then threw the tangle onto Sheldon’s front lawn.

  “What the . . . ?” He asked, perplexed. Confetti? Streamers? A piñata?

  As if answering his question the rider made a halo with its hands and mimed placing the halo over its head.

  Beaded necklaces . . . what was this? Mardi Gras? The rider gave a wave and opened up the throttle. Sheldon tried to return the wave but winced in pain. He should not be waving at any of these things. They were disruptive and intrusive. The engine roared. Rubber howled against blacktop and the trike disappeared down the road. His headache seemed to follow its lead, waning as the distance increased between his house and the parade.

  He leaned forward, his forehead plastered up against the glass. It felt cool and refreshing and that feeling from the vibrations was gone. He no longer felt the desire to flee the confines of his home. He chalked the headache and the bad vibe up to just too much stimulation. It was just too much to take in at once. Going from absolute solitude and silence to being shoved into a wind tunnel of sound, he was amazed all he had was a headache.

  “Imagine if I was standing on the curb when that . . . monstrosity went by,” his skewed voice of reasoning reminded him why he wasn’t going to the parade. “I’d split right down the middle.” He yawned and stretched his arms toward the ceiling, freezing abruptly when movement from outside caught his attention.

  The ball of necklaces, or whatever it was, had moved. He’d swear it on the Bible he saw it wiggle closer to the house.

  All right. Now he was seeing things. He needed to step away from the window before going irreversibly crazy.

  No. It was his imagination. Had to be.

  It moved . . . again. Sheldon’s eyes grew big. He stepped back from the window, then forward. The
ball of red, green, and blue moved again. Sheldon stepped back. Forward. Movement out on his lawn. Backwards. Forward. Sheldon felt like he was stuck in the thrall of an absurd square dance. As the ball of necklaces moved, it began to take on a discernable shape. Backwards. Forward. The tangled ball folded in on itself. Multi-colored stalks—eight of them—shot out from the mass, bent at newly formed joints and dug into the grass. Backwards. Sheldon looked around his small room for something to defend himself with. He ran his hand across the small nightstand, sending the alarm clock sailing to the floor. His hand closed around the neck of a lamp. He ran back toward the window. It was still plugged in. The cord caught and almost put him on his ass. He looked outside again. It was up off the ground and mobile. A beaded mass of spindly legs made a bee-line for him. He hugged the brass lamp to his chest and hid behind the shade.

  “Oh, this isn’t good. Nonono . . . “ The gears were starting to slip and Sheldon wasn’t far from curling up into a ball on the floor. “This isn’t happening. I’ll . . . I’ll close my eyes and open them and . . . everything will be right and normal. Yeah . . . nuh-normal.”

  It was true. With his eyes closed, he couldn’t see the spider with the mechanical stride, hitching toward his home, but that didn’t stop him from hearing it. There was a loud thud against the window. The Horribles are trying to get in. He bit his lip hard enough to draw blood, but refused to open his eyes. Another thud, followed by the shriek of eight fingernails against a chalkboard. The next thud was accompanied by the screech of cracking glass. Something inside him cracked along with the glass and he wondered if what would escape from him would be as horrible as what was trying to break into his house.

  Open up and take a look, my man, before this thing’s in here with you.

  The nightmare his reality had become slowly came into focus. The gap of sunlight normally spilling in between the curtains was blocked by something large and moving. It was the spider. At that point, if it were physically possible, Sheldon would’ve crawled inside his own head and hidden from the impossible creature repeatedly throwing itself against the window.

  Never mind that a parade of motorcycles had given Sheldon the worst headache he had ever experienced. Try to forget entirely the parade had stopped in front of Sheldon’s house, acknowledged him through a tiny slit in the shades, and tossed a handful of party favors on his yard. The best thing he could do would be to forget that he had seen those necklaces form a giant, blood-thirsty spider. But he couldn’t forget. An underbelly lined with fangs as big and sharp as kitchen knives, eight legs filed to deadly points etching deep scratches into the glass, and a thick black fluid bubbling out of all its crevasses made it hard to dismiss from memory.

  The “spider” dropped from sight. Sheldon held his breath and then screamed when it once more smashed itself against the window. The glass shattered inward, spraying the room with jagged shards. It would’ve landed on him and sunk fangs into the jelly of his eyes, but the spider got hung up on the curtains on the way in. Sheldon held the lamp at arm’s length and braced for impact.

  When the cannonball of monster and linen crashed into him, the air rushed out from his lungs like a vacuumed leak. Sheldon fell hard on his back with the spider on top of him. He felt something elastic give in his muscles. He was in won’t-get-up-in-the-morning kind of pain, but refused to let go of his makeshift shield. The spider began to work itself free of the curtains. Shredded bits of fabric sprayed in all directions. Wretched legs tore through and skittered across the surface of the lamp. It sounded like dry bones clicking against aluminum. Fangs scissored free. A bubble of black tar stretched out from its hungry mouth and popped. Sheldon was sprayed with its contents; in his eyes, his mouth. It was venom, Sheldon was sure of it. He spat and braced for the neurotoxin to take its course.

  The liquid tasted a lot like motor oil and appeared to not be fatal if swallowed. But he was certain, without further analysis, that the rest of the creature was very, very deadly.

  His arms shook under his weight. His adrenaline surged. He was losing his grip. Beaded legs swept vicious arcs in the air just inches from his jugular. He shrieked and lobbed the lamp and spider to his left. His assailant crashed to the floor and skidded to a stop about five feet from him. On its back, the spider wrapped its legs around the girth of the brass lamp and squeezed. Sheldon was up and running just as the lamp buckled inwards like a soda can.

  The bedroom door opens inwards, you twit! He tried to order his stubborn body, but his muscles had yet to catch up with his frantic thoughts. He crashed into the door, blocking it from opening. The spider was upright. He could hear terrible click-clicks as it skittered across the hardwood floor. He shook the doorknob desperately, shuffling his feet out of the way until he had just enough room to slip through the door’s opening. He slammed the door and collapsed, his hand gripped tightly around the knob.

  He needed to regroup and reorient.

  “Ok . . . Ok . . . there’s a giant . . . thing on the other side of this door, which isn’t going to hold it for long. You gotta do something, brother. Ahhh, man, this is all sorts of bad.” He started to cry. He curled his legs up into his chest. A loud thud from the bedroom signaled the spider’s advance. His eyes began to glaze over. His head bobbed forward every time the spider crashed into the door. He went limp and his body slumped to the floor. He pressed his cheek against the floor and stared down the hallway into the kitchen. He could see the fridge, the white cupboards, the sink and the window above it. The shades were still drawn and the low light gave the entire scene a dreamlike feel. He thought he might be dreaming. And it was a familiar image. His kitchen looked a lot like Momma’s did . . . on that day.

  The day he had lain down on the floor in all that blood.

  Sheldon stared in horror, fixed in place by the terror of the monster with him now, and the memories of the ones from his past, the thought of all those Horrible outside waiting for him every day. Images of his parents’ death fluttered past his eyes in rapid succession; a constant film reel inundated with blood, fragmented bone, and the jagged lines of ragged tissue.

  A scream was jammed back down his throat by wave after wave of sickened psychosis. As the facade that he, and his psychiatrist, had spent so many years building began to crumble away, Sheldon felt the urge to laugh maniacally until he passed out.

  His father ran at him from the kitchen. Sheldon could see his shoes stop just inches from his face. A ghostly hand reached down and came to rest on his shoulder. Sheldon stared up at his imaginary father. He was mouthing—screaming two words over and over.

  Evan wasn’t the only person who could read lips.

  His father told him to fight, to rage.

  Fight. Rage. Anger spread over him like a fevered rash. Last time he did nothing. Whatever killed his parents could have finished him off effortlessly and he would’ve let it. If given the chance his father would’ve fought it, tooth and nail. His mother would’ve fought.

  Father nodded in agreement and faded.

  He owed it to them to fight with everything he had.

  The next time Sheldon tried to scream nothing stopped it from erupting out. He surprised himself with how loud it was. “NO! NOT AGAIN! NOT THIS TIME! I’M NOT GOING TO LAY DOWN AND JUST LET IT HAPPEN. I’M NOT GONNA LET IT HAPPEN, MOMMA!”

  Complete silence. Not a sound from his bedroom. Nothing from the rest of the house. He stood up. He got up on the balls of his feet and waited. When the bedroom door shattered and the spider broke through, he was already on the move, headed for the front door. He ran through the living room, grabbed an iron poker from the fireplace—sending the stand crashing to the floor—sprinted to the front door, heaved it open, and froze at the threshold.

  He couldn’t do it. The outside world was just too bright, too loud, too unforgiving. Too horrible. Even if it meant he would die, he couldn’t go outside. He spun around with the poker out in front of him. The spider was there to meet him. It jumped through the air. The spider, Sheldon, and
all his misery, tumbled outside.

  His senses erupted in a geyser. Bright lights exploded with the intensity of the sun. Bombs went off in his ears. He could smell everything: the malodorous stink emanating from the spider, the grass and flowers and air, his own fear sweating out of every pore. Then everything went black and Sheldon signed off.

  Sayonara.

  PART TWO

  WITHOUT

  Well, now it gettin’,

  Late on into the evenin’ and I feel like, like blowin’ my home.

  When I woke up this mornin’ all I, I had was gone.

  Now it gettin’, Late on into the evenin’, man now, I feel like, like blowin’ my home.

  - Muddy Waters

  f i v e

  “There’s nothing to fear, Sheldon. I’m here with you,” Dr. Nemiah spoke soothingly. The tone of her voice always made Sheldon feel safe. “You have to let go. Let go of what happened. Let go of your parents. Here, we’ll do it together.”

  “I can’t do it.”

  “You can’t do it or you don’t want to?”

  “Both.”

  “Give me your hand, Sheldon. Let’s open the door and just take one step outside.” Her hand felt wonderful in his. Her smooth skin was a lot like Momma’s.

  Sheldon looked straight into the face of his psychiatrist. Her entire countenance was lit up by bright light from behind. She was dark like his mother. And she had the most intelligent eyes. Her greying hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail. No make-up save for a conservative application of red lipstick. She was a sophisticated beauty, but no more real than his parents were. He knew this was a dream. He knew she wasn’t real, but it felt so safe. He took a step forward with Dr. Nemiah and then froze. “What if it . . . Horribles . . . are outside waiting for us?”