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Alma stepped between the two of them. “Stop
it, both of you! I’m okay now. I’m fine. I don’t want to
leave.”

“Yes you do, Alma,” said Paul. “Whatever
happened up there scared the shit out of you.”

“I know, but I’m okay now. I’m fine as long
as I’m down here.”

“What about my fucking camera?” asked
Stephen, still incensed.

“You should know better than to get in my
way,” said Paul as he cracked his knuckles, still ready for a
fight.

“Both of you stop it,” said Alma. “We all
need to settle down.”

“Hate to interrupt,” said Aubrey from the
top of the stairs, “but did you guys look in the bathroom up here?
The tub’s painted red, like it was filled with blood.”

“This place just keeps getting better and
better,” said Rachel. “Do you think they’re turning this place into
an amusement park? They could call it Fucked-Up-Disneyland and sell
group rates.” Her joke lightened the mood and she smiled as she
went to pick up the pieces of Stephen’s camera. “It’s like Jurassic
Park for ghosts.”

Stephen took the camera pieces from his wife
and groaned as he looked at them. “I can probably fix it.”

“Sorry, man,” said Paul. “This place just
sets me on edge.”

“The cabin is affecting us. I think we all
just need to calm down,” said Alma. “Maybe try to get some sleep.
If you guys are going to try and sneak out of here in the middle of
the night, maybe you should get some sleep first.”

“I’m not going if you’re not,” said
Paul.

“Yeah, I’m not going anywhere,” said
Stephen.

“Well,” said Aubrey as she came down the
stairs, “sorry to bust up the party, but I’m out of here as soon as
the sun sets. Fuck this place.”

“I’ll go with you,” said Jacker. “Then I can
go get my van.”

“You can’t do that,” said Paul. “Even if you
make it out, what if they’re watching the van? You’ll get
busted.”

“That’s the point,” said Jacker. “I need to
step up and face the music. I screwed up, and I can’t run from it
forever. You guys don’t need to get dragged down with me. I’ll go
out there, get the van, and tell the security that I was the only
one here. If they call the police, then I’ll be the only one they
charge with anything.”

“Wow, man,” said Stephen. “Thanks.”

“Come upstairs with me,” said Aubrey. “Let’s
try to get some sleep in the spare bedroom before we head out.”

The blonde bartender went back up the stairs
as Jacker followed. He looked at Paul with a wide smile and a wink.
Stephen patted Jacker on the back as he passed and said, “Go get
her, big guy.”

“I still owe you for this, buddy,” said
Jacker to Stephen.

“Not anymore,” said Stephen. “If you’re
taking the fall for us, then we’ll call it even.”

Alma watched Jacker go up the stairs to
sleep with Aubrey. Inside of her, a memory of her childhood was
screaming in hateful terror. How many times had she watched her
father ascend those stairs, ready to cheat on Alma’s mother? How
many times had he forced Alma to promise never to talk about what
happened in Widowsfield?

“I’ll kill you and your brother if you ever
say anything, Alma,” he used to tell her. “I swear to God, I’ll
kill you both.”

“Are they seriously going to go up there and
fuck?” asked Rachel. “In the middle of all this shit, they’re going
to have sex up there? Are they insane?”

Alma looked at the stairs as the hallway
light shined down. “It’s not their fault. This place is trying to
manipulate us. It’s putting emotions in us that were here sixteen
years ago. It’s trying to complete the circle.”

Widowsfield

March 14th, 1996

“What did you see?” asked The Skeleton Man.
He was hiding across the street, in front of a house where a little
boy had just found his mother’s body fused to the floor under his
bed. The child’s screams of terror were hard to ignore as Raymond
stood in the yard.

Fog swirled around the demon, and the
creature hid within it, staying a blur and lurking far enough
behind the veil to shroud his features. His chattering teeth never
ceased.

“I saw a little girl and boy,” said Raymond.
“I met them once before. Their father is one of my sister’s
friends. The boy was going up the stairs.”

“No, no,” said The Skeleton Man. “You’re
looking at the wrong moment. You have to look beyond.”

“I don’t understand,” said Raymond. “You
asked me to look in there, and I did.”

“Go back, look again,” The Skeleton Man
growled. “But this time forget what’s always been there. Look at
what’s new.”

“I don’t understand,” said Raymond.

The demon’s rage was revealed by the
crackling electricity in the fog around him. The green light
snapped at the tree in the front yard, which caused the bark to
sizzle. “Fine. Come with me then. Just keep an eye out for your
sister. I can’t be near her. You have to keep her away. Do hear me?
Keep her away.”

They went back to the cabin, and the fog
pressed up against the window. Raymond tried to peer in, but the
electricity crackled around him and he flinched in fear of it.

“She’s here,” said The Skeleton Man. “I can
feel her, but I can’t find her. There’re too many others. Who did
she bring?”

Raymond looked in through the window again,
but all he could see was a little girl crying in the kitchen. The
boy was talking to her from the stairs as he carried a pot up with
him.

“He’s not here,” said The Skeleton Man.

“Who?” asked Raymond.

“The one that burned us. The one your sister
is waiting for.”

Dogs ran through the fog behind them,
growling and snapping their jaws as they fought with one another.
Raymond was frightened of them, but knew he was safe as long as he
was with The Skeleton Man. He wondered what was happening to the
other children now that The Skeleton Man was fixated on the cabin.
Surely they must be dead already.

He took The Skeleton Man’s hand and felt the
wetness of the demon’s flesh sliding off the bone.

“I need to know them all,” said The Skeleton
Man. “I need to see if she’s replaced me.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Brother’s Parting

March 12th, 2012

Jacker was in an alley, though he didn’t
know how he’d arrived there. His skin was itching, as if bugs were
crawling on it, and he scratched at his arms as he walked. There
was a man beside a dumpster, smoking a cigarette. It was a young
man, thin and fit, with shoulder length blonde hair. Jacker knew
who he was.

“Kyle,” said Jacker as he approached. “Kyle
Beckner?”

“That’s me,” said the kid as he flicked ash
off the end of his cigarette. He was wearing an apron with the logo
of the grocery store on it. “What can I do for you?”

“You’re the one that Debbie’s been fucking,”
said Jacker.

The kid stiffened, fearful, and started to
reach for the back door of the grocery store. Jacker slammed his
hand against the door to keep it shut. “She’s my girlfriend, you
asshole.”

“Look man,” said the kid as he stepped back,
“I didn’t know she was with anyone.”

“Bullshit,” said Jacker. “I met you at the
Christmas Party.”

“Back off, asshole. Maybe if you could
please your bitch, she wouldn’t go looking for stray.” He flicked
his cigarette at Jacker and it bounced off the big man’s
jacket.

Kyle’s bravado was reliant on Jacker backing
off. There was no question who would win this fight, but the kid
assumed Jacker was too scared to fight. He was wrong.

Jacker pushed Kyle off the stoop, and the
kid fell into a pile of trash in the alley. He scrambled to stand
up and threw a bottle at Jacker as he did. The bottle hit Jacker in
the shoulder, but didn’t faze him.

“You want to fight?” asked the kid as he
started to hop around with his fists up. “I’m not scared of
you.”

“Big mistake.” Jacker advanced, and Kyle
threw a couple punches that connected, but delivered no sting.
Jacker was too large, and too high, to feel any pain that this puny
man could inflict.

Jacker grabbed the side of Kyle’s head and
slammed it into the brick wall on the other side of the alley. Kyle
fell, dazed, as blood broke free from the side of his head, like
oil seeping from dry earth. Jacker stared down at the beaten boy,
and should’ve walked away.

“How’d that feel?” asked Jacker.

Kyle couldn’t answer. He was on his knees,
wavering as if drunk, and staring up as the blood gushed down his
left cheek. The gash on his brow was already swelling, and it
looked like a golf ball was trying to burst through the boy’s
skull.

The fight was over, and Jacker knew he
should’ve walked away, but then he made the worst mistake of his
life: He imagined this blonde haired teenager having sex with
Debbie.

Jacker lifted Kyle up by the throat, and
then slammed the boy’s head against the wall again. More blood
gushed forth, and Kyle’s lip split open. Jacker hit the boy’s head
against the wall again, and then again. This was the part where the
boy’s eyes were supposed to roll back in his head. He was supposed
to start gagging on blood, and Jacker was supposed to drop him and
run. That’s the way this was supposed to go, but everything had
changed now. This wasn’t a memory, but a nightmare.

Kyle looked at Jacker and smiled. A flash of
green light illuminated the night sky as Kyle started to laugh. “I
see you now, Hank Waxman.”

Jacker slammed the boy into the wall again
and heard his skull split. Dark red blood sprayed out of the gaping
wound on the side of Kyle’s head, but the boy still laughed.

“I see you, Hank Waxman!”

Again, Jacker crushed the boy’s skull
against the wall. Again, the boy laughed. There were specks of
white bone in the pulp of flesh on the side of Kyle’s head now, and
Jacker sent the boy’s skull into the wall to do even more
damage.

“I see you, Hank Waxman!”

Kyle’s voice was marred by the flaps of skin
that drooped off the side of his head. Meat and bone, broken teeth
and a swollen tongue, teeth and blood, and two eyes still staring
up at him.

“I see you, Hank Waxman!”

Jacker backed away.

“I see you, Hank Waxman!”

Kyle crawled toward him, his head broken and
dripping, his brain pulsing beneath the gore. He reached out for
him, but Jacker turned and ran.

“I see you, Hank Waxman!”

Jacker awoke, his head mopped with sweat,
and struggled to breath. He gasped and clutched his throat, then
reached down to wake Aubrey. She was startled and turned to see
what was wrong.

“We’ve got to go,” said Jacker. “Now. Right
now.”

“Has the sun gone down?” she asked and
looked over at the drawn shade.

“I don’t care. We have to go, right now.”
Jacker got out of bed and started to put his clothes on.

Aubrey was nude, and pulled the cover over
herself. “What’s got you so spooked?”

“This place,” said Jacker. “We’ve got to go.
I’m going with or without you.”

“Okay, for crying out loud. Give me a second
to get my clothes on.”

“Hurry up,” said Jacker as he left the
room.

He went downstairs and found the others.
Paul and Alma were in the living room, while Stephen and Rachel
were in the kitchen.

“Hey big guy,” said Stephen. “Did you unwrap
your present up there?”

“I’m leaving.” Jacker wasn’t interested in
Stephen’s banter. He grabbed his wallet and keys, which he’d left
on the counter, and headed for the door.

“Jesus,” said Rachel. “What happened.”

Jacker stopped and looked at Alma. “You need
to leave.” Then he looked at the rest of them. “You all need to
leave. Don’t stay here. You don’t want to be here when he comes for
you.”

“Who?” asked Paul.

“I don’t know!” Jacker was still sweating
and swiped his brow. He was panicked, and his heart thumped hard
enough that he could feel it in his throat.

Paul came over to him and pointed to the
door. “Go outside with me. I want to talk to you.”

“Be careful, guys,” said Stephen. “The sun’s
not all the way down. Don’t get caught.”

Paul walked with Jacker out into the yard.
Then he took his friend by the arm and spun him around in anger.
“What have you been using?”

“What?” asked Jacker.

“You’re high. What did you and that slut do
up there?”

“I’m not high.”

“Bullshit,” said Paul. “I can fucking smell
it. What was it? Meth? Were you two smoking meth up there?”

“Get the fuck off me.” Jacker pushed Paul
away. “I’m not high.”

“Do you think I’m fucking stupid? I can
smell it. I smelled it ever since you went up there. I know you
were cheating with her.”

Jacker was confused and angry. “I’m not
high.” He took Paul’s sobriety coin out of his pocket and threw it
at his friend.

Paul caught the token and clasped his fist
around it. “You’re a cheater.”

“I had some drinks with Stephen,” said
Jacker. “There. You happy? You caught me. I’m a fucking drunk, but
I’m not high.”

“I’m not talking about drinking,” said Paul.
“You fucking cheated on her.”

“On who?” asked Jacker, abashed.

Paul stopped and his posture relaxed. “I
don’t know,” he admitted as if worried by his own addled thoughts.
He put his hand on his head and backed away as he repeated, “I
don’t know.”

“It’s this place, man,” said Jacker. “I
don’t know what’s going on in there, but it’s not good. That place
fucks with your head. Do yourself a favor and get as far away from
it as you can.”

“I’m not leaving Alma,” said Paul.

“Then you’re going to have to figure out a
way to get her away from here. You’ve got to. You’re not ready for
what’s happening here. No one is.”

The front door opened as Aubrey came out.
“Everything okay?”