The Sick Stuff (7 page)

"Mornin' to you," acknowledged the old man.
"You're Harry Dean's eldest boy, ain't you?"

"Yes, sir," I replied.

He stuck the almanac in the side pocket of
his overalls and removed his store-bought reading glasses. "Well,
come on and pull up a chair, young man." He grinned, looking his
eighty years and then some. "I don't get a whole lot of company way
out here in the sticks."

"Yes, sir," I said politely. I sat down in a
rocker identical to the one Mr. Hedgecomb occupied.

We sat there in silence for a good long time.
Then Old Hacker looked over at me, his eyes sparkling. "Just
dropped by for a neighborly visit... that right, son?"

I reached down to scratch behind Bones'
droopy ears. "That's right."

"Naw, I don't think so," he chuckled. "I seen
you watching me over at Dawes Market. I figure it was more
curiosity than good manners that brought you out here this fine
morn."

Then he leaned forward in his chair and
started that noisy hacking cough that I had grown to loath so much.
When he finally spat into the dry dust of the front yard, we both
sat there and watched. Bones bared his teeth and growled as the
gray-green glob slowly made a bee-line down the pathway, toward the
thicket.

"They always travel west," Old Hacker said,
as if discussing the migration of birds. "No matter where I am in
the county, whenever I cough up one of the little devils, they
always head west -- straight for the piney woods."

I held onto Bones' collar and watched the
high grass part as the living lunger disappeared into deep forest.
"Why is that?" I asked.

"Oh, I know why," Jess Hedgecomb told me.
"But maybe you shouldn't want to. Maybe you shouldn't want to know
anything about me or my... affliction."

Looking straight into that old man's haggard
eyes, I said "Yes, I do." I knew that I really didn't, that I would
probably be better off if I took my leave that instant and never
returned. But it was kind of like standing in line for the freak
show at the county fair. You have the creepy feeling that what
you're about to see will be horrible, but you still want to see it
all the same.

The strange tale that Jess Hedgecomb told me
that day was much worse than any freak show I could ever hope to
attend, real or imagined.

"I was born the son of a tobacco farmer," he
began innocently enough. "So were my boyhood buddies, Lester Wills
and Charlie Gooch. We worked the fields with our fathers. We
planted, harvested, and hung the leaves in the barn for curing. But
we were absolutely forbidden to partake of the stuff. 'I catch you
smoking before you come of age and I'll tan your hide right good,'
my papa would warn me. Of course, none of us listened. We'd do what
most kids our age did; smoke corn silk or sneak old butts outta the
ashtrays down at the train depot.

"I'd say we were about twelve years old that
summer we found our own little goldmine out in the dark hollows of
West Piney Woods. We were walking home from skinny-dipping in
Silver Creek, when we came upon a heavy patch of wild tobacco
growing pretty as you please. What a stroke of luck, we thought.
Now we could harvest our own little crop without anyone knowing
about it. Lester and Charlie smuggled boards and tin from home and
we built us a small curing barn about the size of a doghouse. We
stripped the leaves off the stalk, hung them up in that little
shed, and smoked them with charcoal I filched from my papa's barn.
We'd only cure them leaves for a couple of days before we couldn't
stand it no longer. Sometimes the leaves would still be half green
when we rolled them into cigars and set the match to them.

"Well, towards the month of September, we
were down by that patch of wild tobacco. We were shooting the
breeze and cutting up, when Lester tore apart one of those leaves,
like kids will do on a whim of the moment. And, Lordy Mercy, there
was something
alive
in it! The juice that dripped out of the
veins of that shredded leaf just twitched and squirmed like crazy.
Lester threw the leaf down and we watched that tobacco sap crawl
like tiny snakes through the thicket... straight for that wild
tobacco patch. Me and the boys hightailed it outta that section of
West Piney and never went back. But the damage was done. We'd
already smoked a summer's worth of that horrid stuff into our
lungs."

Mr. Hedgecomb paused, a pained expression on
his ancient face, then continued. "I've been to many a doctor in my
time, trying to find one who could rid me of this confounded stuff
I carry around inside. They all look at me like I'm batty and tell
me maybe I should see a psychiatrist. But I ain't crazy. I know the
damned things are inside of me. When I lay in my bed at night, I
can feel the little buggers stirring around, boiling in my lungs,
trying to find a way out. They never find it on their own. I have
to cough up the slimy bastards little by little, but there never
seems to be an end to it. I truly believe that I'll be cursed with
this awful infestation until my dying day. Then maybe we'll
both
be able to find the release we've been searching for
all these years."

Me and that old man sat there in stone cold
silence for a long time afterwards. I was wondering if his tale was
true and, at the same time, knowing it was. Old Hacker looked like
he was having second thoughts, like maybe he shouldn't have bared
his soul like he had. "I reckon you'll be wanting to get the hell
outta here now," Hedgecomb uttered bitterly. "Well, I can't say I
blame you. It ain't none of your concern anyhow."

I looked over at Jess Hedgecomb and, in those
rheumy old eyes of his, I saw a loneliness so dark and empty that
it made my heart ache. I knew then the true reason why Jess,
Lester, and Charlie had been lifelong bachelors. It wasn't because
they were queer for each other, like some folks in town thought.
No, they never married for fear that a single kiss might have
infected their spouses with that awful thing living inside their
bodies. For nearly seventy years they had endured the horror and
had endured it alone.

I just settled back in that rocking chair and
propped my feet up on the railing. "Naw, I reckon I'll sit a spell
longer," I told him.

Old Hacker smiled. Not that sad, little
half-grin that I had seen all my life, but an honest-to-goodness,
heartfelt smile.

We grew to be close friends during the months
that followed.

Every day after school, I would do the old
man's chores for him, then spend the evening playing checkers and
talking. My parents thought it was a fine thing, a young fellow
like me taking interest in a lonely old man like that. I do believe
those last eight months of Jess Hedgecomb's life were his happiest,
simply because he had someone there in that drafty cabin to pass
the time with.

But the happy days didn't last for long and,
by wintertime, both Old Hacker's health and his outlook on life hit
rock bottom.

I must admit, there were times during his
long bout with pneumonia when I felt like leaving that place for
good. But I didn't . There were times when his congestion and
coughing spells became so frequent that the old coffee can beside
his bed nearly overflowed with living phlegm... times when writhing,
green lungers crawled the bedroom floor until finally finding
escape through the cracks in the boards. But I didn't lose my
nerve. I stayed. I sat right there in the chair beside his bed,
doing whatever I could for him. I just didn't have the heart to
abandon him... not at a time like that.

It was a snowy day in early February when I
found the old man dead.

I walked into his dark room, a cold dread
heavy in the pit of my gut. The pneumonia had taken its toll,
drowning him in his own bodily fluids. His skin was icy to the
touch. I was just about to pull the blanket up over his head, when
his chest hitched violently. Stepping back, I watched in horror as
his chest rose and fell, his throat emitting a wet wheezing sound.
The old man was dead, yet he was breathing. I could hear the mucus
within his lungs churning and sloshing of its own accord.

Then his ribs began to snap... one by one.

I fled from that dark house, but lingered on
the front porch, torn between going and staying. From within the
house I could hear a terrible racket; the ugly sound of splintering
bone and ripping flesh. I stood on that porch for what seemed an
eternity, my hands clutching the frozen railing, my attention
focused on the tranquil snowscape of the West Piney Woods. Then I
was aware of a shuffling, liquid sound behind me... the sound of
ragged breathing from the open doorway.
I made a mistake,
I
tried to convince myself.
The old man's not really dead.

I turned around and screamed.

On the bare boards of the front porch,
trailing a gory residue of fresh blood and slime, was Jess
Hedgecomb's
lungs
. They heaved and deflated like a pair of
gruesome bellows, pulling themselves across the porch with a life
of their own. Then they paused, as if my screaming had drawn their
attention.

The gory windpipe, weaving like the head of a
serpent, turned my way and regarded me blindly, the hollow of the
gullet staring like a deep, eyeless socket. I pulled my own eyes
away, hearing the wet
clump, clump, clump
of the thing
making its way down the porch steps.

When I finally did gather the nerve to look,
it was gone, leaving an ugly trail of crimson slime across the
virgin snow. I could hear it thrashing through the dead tangle of
thicket, huffing and puffing, could see plumes of frosty breath
rise as it headed into the wooded hollow.

As far as I know, the thing never returned to
the dilapidated shack beside Silver Creek again... and neither did I
.

I mostly keep to myself these days,
preferring not to involve myself in other people's affairs. Every
now and then, I can't help it, though, especially where the old
man's childhood buddies are concerned. Lately there's beenalot of
talk going around about them and the grisly death of Jess
Hedgecomb. Whenever some busybody asks me about those last days
with Old Hacker, I politely tell them to mind their own damn
business.

Lester Wills died the other day over in
McMinnville. There was a big ruckus in the newspaper about it.
Seems that a wild animal got into the nursing home somehow and tore
out poor Lester's throat and lungs right there on his deathbed. Of
course, I know that ain't what happened... and so does Charlie Gooch,
the last remaining of the three. Charlie ain't looking so hot these
days, either. Every time I see him in town, his face is pale and
worried. And when he has one of his bad coughing spells, I turn my
head, afraid to look.

Sometimes when I'm out squirrel hunting in
the West Piney Woods, I can hear something crawling through the
honeysuckle. Something just a-puffing and a-wheezing as it makes
its way through the shadowy hollows along Silver Creek. Sometimes
it sounds as though there might be more than one.

My twelve-gauge is hanging in the window rack
of my pickup truck, cleaned and loaded with double-aught buckshot.
I hang around the general store and the courthouse in the evenings,
waiting, listening for word that old Charlie has finally kicked the
bucket.

And, when I do, I'll take my gun and a pack
of hounds, and I'll go hunting.

He remembered the night of Tanya's fury.

He remembered the night of her laughter, of
the delicate glint of honed steel and the sting of thin-edged pain.
He remembered the quick pulsating of blood released...
his
blood.

But, most of all, Nelson Trulane remembered
the moment of his awakening. The moment that he had realized the
true extent of his horrible loss.

The only link between that moment and now was
the letter he held in his trembling hands. Fear blossomed in
Nelson's gut like the dark bloom of some poisonous flower the
instant he saw the handwriting on the envelope. It was Tanya's
feminine script, there was no mistaking that. He ripped open the
envelope like a madman and unfolded the message within. The words
assaulted his fragile, ill-balanced psyche, threatening to destroy
the composure he had fought to maintain throughout that awful
ordeal.

LEAVE TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS IN A PLAIN
ENVELOPE UNDERNEATH THE BANDSTAND AT CENTENNIAL PARK AT EIGHT
O'CLOCK PM, THURSDAY NIGHT. X MARKS THE SPOT. PLAY IT BY THE BOOK
AND WITH NO POLICE, OR YOU WILL NEVER SEE YOUR PRECIOUS BUDDY
AGAIN.

It wasn't signed, but it didn't need to be.
He had been expecting the ransom note from Tanya for a number of
days now.

Nelson checked the postmark. The letter had
been mailed the previous day and from right there in Nashville.
Nelson thought that was pretty funny, since the police assumed that
Tanya had left the state with Buddy. That was the most common modus
operandi for a kidnapper. But, then, Tanya was too twisted to
adhere to the ways of the common criminal.

Nelson stared at the phone. He debated on
whether or not he should call the authorities, then thought better
of it and left the house. He climbed into his car and drove across
town to the bank. He withdrew ten thousand dollars in hundred
dollar bills from his savings account, then drove down the busy
thoroughfare of West End Avenue. Centennial Park stretched to the
right with its stately gardens and majestic replica of the Greek
Parthenon.

He found a parking spot across the street
from the park and fed some change into the meter. Then he took a
window booth in a little diner that catered to the faculty and
students of nearby Vanderbilt University. The place was familiar to
Nelson; he had eaten there many times before. In the past fifteen
years he had made the transition from student to teacher at the
college, and had feasted on the restaurant's greasy cheeseburgers
and limp french fries during many a lunchtime, over both text books
and exam papers. But that life of academic stability seemed to be
only a sour memory now. It was ironic that Tanya had picked such a
spot for the transaction. But, then, Tanya knew exactly what she
was doing choosing Centennial Park. She wanted to make this
experience as painful and humiliating as she possibly could.