Don't Open The Well (3 page)

Now in his mid-twenties, business was still booming for Michael and his
crematorium -- although it had literally been years since the furnace had
actually been lit.

You see, Michael had stuck to his guns and rather
than pay the extortionate fees required to fix the incinerator, he had begun to
dispose of the bodies in the old well.  They were now stacked so high that
if one shone a flashlight into the hole, the rotten remains could clearly be
seen, piled up.  It was a putrid mound of dead, rotting flesh that stunk
to high heaven in the deep of summer.

To mask the stench rising up from the well during
summer, Michael dumped some of his garbage in there on top of the bodies, as
even the smell of hot garbage was an improvement.

If anyone asked, he could tell them that it was his
land and he would do as he wished, after all,
it’s just garbage, right?

Everything was proceeding perfectly. The loved ones
of the deceased never questioned the ashes he gave them. Why would they? Flesh
ash was the same as most any other ash, and no one dared disrespect the dead --
he had that on his side.

Despite the success of the family business, Michael
remained alone – unmarried, in fact he didn’t even have a girlfriend, nor had
he ever had one. He seldom went into town and when he did, it was only for
supplies. He had no social life to speak of and his property had not had any
visitors, except for the loved ones of the deceased, for an age.

The bodies would come; Michael would wait until he
was alone and immediately dump the human remains into the well with the other
several hundred already down there, lying in the cold darkness, out of sight of
prying eyes.

One day, perhaps in a few years, he realized the well
would no longer be a viable option for dumping the bodies. He figured he had
enough saved to go through with the repairs when that time finally arrived but
he would cross that bridge when he came to it.

Until then, the well
would serve its purpose.

----------

Days later, Michael was wheeling a gurney out
towards the woods when he spotted a technician heavy with equipment and tools
standing next to the well, about to lift the cover.  Michael was stopped
in stunned horror. In one hand, the man carried a flashlight – he couldn’t
allow the man to look into the well, he would ruin everything that Michael had
worked so hard to conceal.   

Michael left the body on the gurney and ran as
quietly as he could towards the man, an expression of grim determination
clouding his face as he hefted his own bulky flashlight high into the
air.  As Michael neared the well, the man pulled out his flashlight, and
shone it down into the gloom below before immediately crying out in fear and
stumbling backwards, shock etched across his features.

His scream was cut off as Michael’s own flashlight
crushed his skull from behind, repeatedly landing blow after blow, as Michael
made sure the man wouldn’t spoil all he had worked so hard for. When he had
finished, Michael stood panting, his bloodied hands resting on the well’s edge
as he looked down into the abyss.  Michael quickly collected himself and
checked the dead technician for any signs of movement. 

There were none.  His skull had been completely
caved in from the repeated blows of Michael’s flashlight.

Who had sent him? Would more come looking for him
when he didn’t return?  

Afraid that the man’s colleagues might show up
looking for him, or worse, the police, Michael went to town and purchased a
heavy padlock and chain with which to better seal the well and protect his dark
secret.

Still, paranoia had become his new companion,
rearing its ugly head whenever he heard an engine or looked out of his window
in the morning.

If they came, he would kill them too.

Michael had come home from a trip to the grocery
store to find a very expensive looking vehicle parked out front of his old
house.  A late model BMW X5 in deep blue, not the type of car law
enforcement would drive.

As Michael exited his
car, so did four men inside the BWM, its diesel engine idling. 
“Michael, I presume,” stated the man in the impeccably tailored suit. 
“I’m Antonio Fagozzian, the head of this county’s water, sewage, and waste
management company.  May we come in?  We have some business we need
to discuss.”
Michael saw the glint in the man’s eyes, and the stone-cold seriousness in the
eyes of his associates, and immediately felt uneasy.  “Sorry,” Michael
spoke quickly, “but I have an appointment in just a few minutes, and I’m
running late.  So maybe we could meet at a more convenient time?”
The man in the suit smiled broadly. “The mountain of corpses in your well say
that ‘this’ is the ‘perfect’ time to speak.  Shall we?” he quipped,
gesturing to the front door of Michael’s property.  

----------

As it turned out, this man was a lot more than your
average county head of waste removal.  He removed all ‘kinds’ of waste,
including the occasional wasted life. 
“It’s fairly simple, Michael,” Antonio said softly. “You either spend the rest
of your short-ass life in agony, as my boys inflict revenge for our man you
murdered, or you help us hide the occasional body in your well.  It’s your
call.”

Antonio’s fingers drummed impatiently on the kitchen
table top as he regarded Michael. The man had piercing brown eyes,
predator-like. Michael killed when he had to – this man killed for fun.
 Or at least he ordered the killings.

This was not a
negotiation and there were no options.  Michael acquiesced.

----------

They only showed up once every few months, much to
Michael’s relief, and he began to forget about the unwelcome intruders. 
He would eventually start treating them like any other customer dropping off a
body. They’d deposit the payload in a body bag and Michael would simply place
it on the gurney and dispose of it in the body-filled well.
Things were going quite well for Michael.  That is, until Antonio paid him
another visit.  This time, Antonio was accompanied by a shifty looking man
in his fifties.  He was introduced as Dr. Chalmers, an associate of
Antonio’s.
The good doctor was doing illegal human experiments, and needed a place to
dispose of the bodies. Michael didn’t care why he was dumping bodies; he just
wanted him to stay out of his way. By now, Michael had accepted that he was no
longer alone in his crimes, and in fact, it actually made him feel more secure
knowing that what he was doing was less macabre than the actions of these men
who had suddenly shown up unannounced on his property.

He wondered what his father would make of all this.
No doubt he would disapprove.

That’s why it was you that went into the
furnace and not me…

Michael accepted Antonio’s offer, and this one ‘was’
generous.  Antonio was giving him a cut of the money this doctor was
paying for the body disposal service, and the money was ‘very’ good.

In time Michael forgot about the added danger and
began to enjoy his extra cash, making additions to his tree house.

Every few weeks, like
clockwork, the scientist would arrive early in the morning, flanked by a couple
of Antonio’s men.  They would always drop the body off in the proper body
bag, and Michael disposed of it just like any other, no questions asked. 
The well was becoming increasingly full with the bodies, but he still had
enough room for at least another few months of bodies, and per Antonio’s
suggestion, when the well did fill, Antonio offered to send a couple of his
guys and a cement truck to make sure that no one ever discovered their secret.

----------

Late one night, Michael was awoken by the incessant
honking of a car horn outside his house.  He climbed down the ladder from
his tree home, and saw the doctor waving his arms at him frantically, his white
lab coat splattered with deep ruby red liquid, and Michael realized it must
have been blood.
“Hurry,” the doctor shouted.  “Help me get him into the well!”
“Wait a second,” Michael interrupted. “Where are Antonio’s guys?”
“I’ll give you five-thousand dollars right now if you just help me. No more
questions.  Do you understand?”

The doctor’s eyes were wide and darting madly to the
left and right as if he feared something or someone were tracking him.
Michael nodded, thoughts of the money driving him on.  They lifted the body
bag from the trunk of the doctor’s car, and as they did, Michael could have
sworn he felt the body move, shifting slightly in his hands like a grounded
fish.  He stopped for a moment, a sudden realization washing over him –
this was no body, whoever it was in there was still alive. Maybe they hadn’t
finished him off.

Michael instinctively reached for the zipper but
before he could, the doctor’s hand immediately clamped over his.

“No, don’t!”

“But whoever it is, they are still alive. You want
to dump a live one in there?” Michael said, barely believing what the doctor
was about to do.

“Just don’t ‘open’ that bag … please … just do as I
ask,” the doctor said, his voice breaking as if he were terrified of something.

For a split second Michael looked at him, seeing the
fear in his watery eyes and the way his attention flitted around as if
searching for danger – what danger?

Seeing this, the doctor reached into the trunk
filled with equipment and a large suitcase, and pulled out a black gym
bag.  He opened it, and it was stuffed with cash.  He pulled one
stack out, a band around it had “$5,000” printed on the label.  He tossed
it at Michael, and Michael slipped the stack into his pocket and began to wheel
the gurney towards the well.

No questions asked. Whoever it was in there, they
would be dead by morning anyway, suffocation likely to kill them, so Michael
couldn’t care less.
At the well, Michael was removing the lock and chain when the body in the bag
began to thrash around manically, bumping into his legs again and again as
whoever was inside sought to escape.  Michael said nothing as he lifted
the body from the gurney and positioned it on the edge of the well, ready to be
dumped into the darkness below with the other rotting remains. 

Just as he was about to release the body, sending it
tumbling into the mass of flesh below, he felt the man inside the bag grab onto
his wrist viciously, twisting his flesh through the rubber – the grip was like
a vice.  Michael screamed and pushed the bag over the side, yanking his
hand away in the process.

“What the fuck, doc?” he screamed, rounding on the
doctor.

“Don’t ask, Michael … just don’t ask,” the doctor
said, his voice low, almost a whisper as though he were afraid the person in
the bag would hear him.

The doctor hurriedly
got back into his car and drove off into the night, leaving Michael to wonder
just who or ‘what’ they had deposited into his well.
He never saw the doctor again after that night.

A few days passed from the strange events of that night and Michael was opening
the well to deposit Mrs. Carmody, a local school teacher, to her final resting
place amongst the stinking heap.  That’s when he heard it the first time,
a deep monotone moan that was filled with anger and rage. Shutting it out of
his mind, Michael dropped the body into the well and quickly sealed it, his
hands shaking with fear.

Something was wrong in there. What was it they had
disposed of?  How was it still alive?

Michael had stopped soliciting new business weeks
ago, but the bodies continued to flow due to prearranged contracts with several
funeral homes and government agencies.  He couldn’t stop, even though he
desperately wanted to.
Every few days, he’d be back at the well to make his next deposit, and every
few days the moans increased in volume and tempo. He swore he could see
movement down there in the dimness of the interior, the uppermost bodies
quivering and shifting slightly as though something below them was fighting to
reach the surface – and then what?

Sleep didn’t come easy for Michael after that. He
would stay awake at night, watching at the window looking over the property,
watching the well cover for any signs that something might be trying to escape
but nothing moved – for a while.

Late one evening, as Michael bathed high up in his
tree home, he opened a window to let some of the cool night air in and as he
did so, he suddenly heard a loud, rhythmic pounding coming from somewhere
nearby.  Hurriedly, he threw on some clothes, all the while fighting
against the cold fear that surged through him.

He knew what it was… and from where it emanated –
THE WELL. 

He arrived at the covered and chained well to
discover that the wooden seal was shuddering hard, the metallic clang of the
heavy chains grating on his nerves as he placed his hands atop the shuddering
wood, barely believing what he was seeing.
“Hello?” he called out, his voice turning high-pitched like a young boy.
At the sound of his voice, a horrible series of shrieks and howls erupted from
within the well, echoing against the stone walls like a terrible orchestra of
horror, and the cover began shuddering even harder against the chains as
something below sought to escape.  Michael’s stomach dropped when he saw
the crack begin to form across the wooden cover.  They were breaking
through.

He knew what it was now. The bodies he had disposed
of were finally coming back for him, to punish him.

“
Ain’t no good thing you can’t turn rotten.”
Michael knew they were coming.  They were trying to escape.  They’d
all been denied their final requests for an honest cremation and for their
ashes to be scattered and given to the wind.  Now the well had granted
them all one final wish, and it was a wish that involved Michael – he knew it.

They wanted him.
He threw himself on top of the jarring cover, trying to prevent it being
battered apart, but even with his weight added, the cover was being viciously
smashed to pieces from underneath him.  He felt the wood giving way as it
split in two.  Rolling off, he landed in the dirt.  As he scrambled
to his feet, he could already see the rotted arms bursting through the wood
into the shafts of moonlight beaming through the canopy of trees. 
Turning around, he sprinted through the trees towards his home, knowing that if
he could get to it, he could retract the ladder and the angry spirits wouldn’t
be able to get near him.  Just as he broke through the clearing, however,
Antonio’s BMW tore onto the dirt road, illuminating Michael in its high beams
and blinding him, causing him to throw up his arm to shield his eyes from its
glare.
Antonio and three large bodyguards jumped out of the car, their guns drawn.
“Where is he?” Antonio asked; his voice filled with menace. “His assistant said
he came here and didn’t return.  What did you do with him you sick piece
of shit!  You killed him, didn’t you?” Antonio said, his gun pointed at
Michael’s chest.

“No… the doc?  He came here days ago and dumped
a body, it wasn’t even a body, it was still moving…” Michael stammered,
struggling to form the words.

Antonio nodded, lowering his weapon in frustration.
“So that’s what he did with patient zero?  I see, but now we have to kill
you and add you to that pile of stinking flesh in there – you know too much.”
Michael knew they were going to kill him, but he didn’t care. Those things were
about to descend upon them anyway and if the moans from within were anything to
go by, they were angry… and hungry.

Still, one last ray of hope sliced through his
mind.  In the next few minutes, if he could get away, he might yet forget
all this and start a new life. With the savings he had, he could retire and
hide away for the rest of his life – Mexico sounded nice.

Turning, he headed into the woods quickly, before
Antonio and his men could react.

“Don’t let him get away!”
Michael heard the bullets whizzing by, and then felt one slam into his right
shoulder, sending him screaming and tumbling to the ground hard, slamming his
temple into a tree root.  He immediately rolled back onto his feet, and
began running again at full speed.  The bullets were still flying, but no
longer in his direction.

The bodies had caught up with them.
“The fuck?” Antonio said aloud as he and his bodyguards unloaded into the howling
mob running their way. “Is that Sammy Tucci?  I killed that scum myself!”
The bodyguards continued to fire on the crowd, but as they drew near, it
quickly became apparent that it wasn’t people they were dealing with – the
bodies of all those they had slain were coming for them, rotted hands
outstretched and grasping air. 

“Jesus Christ…” Antonio breathed, stumbling
backwards towards the car. 
Antonio took a defensive position behind his men, but as the monsters rushed
their position, he made a run for it, leaving his three bodyguards to be
overrun by the relentless charge of the rotting carcasses that should have been
rotting inside the well.
Antonio saw Michael slipping into the crematorium just as the screams of his
dying men hit his ears.  He leapt into the driver’s seat and turned the
key, and when his headlights illuminated the scene before him, he proceeded to
vomit all over the steering wheel.  Piece by piece, his men were being
eaten alive by dozens of snarling corpses, each one more rotted and disfigured
than the next.
Antonio punched the gas, and just as he swung the BMW back onto the dirt road,
Sammy Tucci was standing there waiting.  Antonio tried to swerve, but lost
control and careened into a tree at full speed, the front of the vehicle
crumpled in on itself and Antonio’s head slammed against the steering wheel
hard. 
He tried in vain to wipe all of the blood out of his eyes, but he was having a
hard time figuring out where all it was coming from.  Suddenly, through
the sticky red liquid he saw a mottled pair of hands reaching through the
shattered hole in the windshield and he screamed.  The hands grabbed him
by his hair and the lapel of his tailored suit, savagely yanking him through
the jagged hole as though he were nothing more than a doll. 

On his back, pinned by the monstrous strength of the
rotted corpse atop him, Antonio managed to look up into the face of his
attacker – it was Sammy.
“No Sammy,” Antonio pleaded, as Sammy’s rotted lips curled back in a
snarl.  This thing that had once been human – a human Antonio had shot and
killed – readied its rotted jaws.

“I’m sorry!  I’m
sorry!”
And with one vicious motion, the left side of Antonio’s face now hung from the
blood-streaked mouth of his old partner Sammy Tucci.  Sammy, it appeared,
reveled in the taste for just a moment as his head cocked to the side. 
The beast chewed the ragged flesh, before going back for more.