Homecoming

Raker makes his way home, and two unsuspecting gothlings have an "interesting" encounter.

He walks; footsteps like the shuffle of a plastic bag through an empty parking lot at three a.m., all muted rustle and unsteady syncopation. Inside his head is nothing but white-noise and concave screams as one foot is set in front of the other on some half-remembered path. Ever, ever onward.
             The road twists and turns under his feet, winding its serpent coils toward some destination which he clings to like a talisman against evil. More than once he wonders if he even knows where he’s going. His feet don’t wait for him to answer, but rather plod forward with army-ant persistence.
             The street ceases its snaking and becomes the rigid, uniform avenue of the suburbs. Neat little homes with their neat little lawns and their neat little inhabitants stretch along either side of him, laughing at his confusion. His eyes drift closed, but he doesn’t need to see to know the way. Something drags him forward; some unseen force hurls him headlong toward his goal.
     In the abyssal shadow of the layer of night that can only laughingly be called morning, cut in stark relief by the halogen haloes of the evenly spaced streetlamps, he stops sharply. Slowly…ever so slowly, he turns his head, letting his body follow at length. He’s here.
             A wrought-iron gate topped with gothic points like the teeth of some archaic beast, and beyond a red brick house trimmed with white accents about the windows. He can feel sunlight…he can remember walking up those steps. He remembers. Gods above and below…he remembers.
             The dead man has come home.

             Raze took another hit, closing his eyes and sucking in his cheeks like a seasoned pro. He let the smoke into his lungs, felt the acrid burn and the slow spreading warmth. For a moment, he let the smoke hang, holding it captive inside his screaming lungs, before blowing it expertly out his nose as he passed the joint to his best friend and partner in crime, Az.
             “Good s**t, Az.”
             Az wasn’t his real name of course. His real name was Basil, as in hard B, hard AZ, and soft il. But, no one wanted to be named after a f*****g herb, least of all one as unintoxicating as basil. I mean, who the hell names their kid Basil? Why not call the b*****d Parsley, hand him a tutu, and tie his f*****g balls in a pretty pink bow? But as far as nicknames go, Az wasn’t half bad. He could always claim it was short for Azazel or something cool like that.
             Az sat back against the wall, letting his head tilt back as he inhaled the fine Panama Red. The wall was covered in dust and spiderwebs, but hell, that just added to the atmosphere. Cast in the dim illumination of a couple black candles spaced evenly around the circumference of what was probably the living room in this particular abandoned house, they were hardly noticeable anyway.
             Raze wasn’t his real name either. His real name was Walter. But kind of like Basil, no one takes a Wally seriously. Especially when said Wally belongs to that oft misunderstood subculture known as “Goth”. Wearing all black and writing poetry about death only carries you so far, and with a name like Wally dragging behind like an anchor, it isn’t very far.
             The two had been friends since eighth grade. They sat next to each other in the Ninth Circle of Hell, commonly referred to as Ms. Haden’s Algebra class. Since those early days heckling their obese tormentor to the current days of angry Industrial music, weed, and Ouija boards, they’d stayed as tight as the skirts on all the chicks they never got.
             “Should we get rollin’, Raze?” Az asked through a mouthful of smoke, causing little tendrils to drift forward with every word.
             Raze nodded his head, starting to feel the mellow set in. He stood slowly, shuffling over to the approximate center of the room, where the illumination from the black candles shone the brightest. It was here that they’d set up, not only because the light was best for their purpose, but also because he felt that if there was a single draw-point to this house, it would be here.
             He’d stowed his backpack here, alongside the sixpack of Guinness and bag of Doritos they’d brought with them just in case the munchies reared its ugly head. Crouching down on the dusty beige carpet, his hands found the zipper as Az started to shamble over to join him. In the faint, flickering light, the now open backpack revealed its contents: a dog-eared black notebook and a battered cardboard box with the word “Ouija” printed along the sides in white block letters.
             This was why they had come to this particular abandoned house.
             Not every neighborhood could claim an actual honest-to-god murder house. Sure, most had at least one that was supposed to be haunted by some old lady and the ghost of her three-hundred cats, but this one was an actual murder house.
             The story went that it belonged to some up-and-coming artist. The guy had had a few pieces accepted into some local galleries, but had never really achieved any true stardom. But still, the guy worked at it, producing piece after piece and doing his damnedest to make it in the art world.
             So one day one of his pieces, Remnant, got picked up by an independent art gallery which was frequented by a noted art critic in New York, though the story differs considerably as to what the guy’s name was…not that it really matters much. In any case, said art-snob saw Remnant, loved it, and bought it for an outrageous amount of money. Said artist was made fabulously wealthy and was very quickly elevated to stardom.
             Now maybe Fate was just having a laugh, but it seems that artists often don’t reach their peak of fame until after they are dead…something very artsy about being deceased, one has to imagine. In any case, Fate caught up with the artist, because two days before he moved to New York, his house was broken into and he was shot in a botched burglary.
             Raze and Az were fourteen when it happened. They’d seen the ambulance, heard the sirens, and read about the trial. Burglar was released due to a mishandling of evidence on the part of the police and basically got off scot-free. Got away with murder, you might say.
             In any case, Raze and Az lived three streets over, so they knew for a fact that this thing had actually gone down. In fact, Raze even had a vague memory of the guy, seen him in the grocery store maybe. He remembered him being tall, though he supposed everyone was tall when you were young, and thin. He’d had long black hair which he’d always worn in a ponytail. But most of all, he remembered the way he walked; long, unhurried strides which ate ground quickly while managing to remain as fluid as a river. The guy had floated.
             It had been a couple years since the guy had died and things had quieted down. The artist’s girlfriend had left town, leaving the house in the hands of a real-estate agency. Of course the place never sold (murder houses rarely do) and so it eventually became that creepy abandoned house that all the kids shy away from or dare each other to spend the night in.
             That was all well and good. As for Az and Raze, they weren’t content to leave the story at that. No way. They were going to plumb the depths of this murder house, Ouija board in hand.
             Raze carefully pulled out first the notebook, which he passed to Az, and then the box. Az flipped the book open to a fresh page, a pen appearing in his hand as if by magic. Raze had always secretly wondered how the kid managed to do that. However, his mind was busy with the task at hand. With practiced movements, he removed the white and black board, covered in an arc of block-printed letters and framed by the words “yes”, “no”, and “goodbye”, and the little white planchette which moved with the will of the spirits to spell out the messages.
             Raze stuffed the box back in the bag and hurled it across the room to lay against a wall. His space thus cleared, he set the planchette on the board and drew a Guinness out of the sixpack. He offered it to Az who expertly tugged off the cap and took a swig of the God of Beers. Raze opened another for himself and set it untouched beside the board.
             “You ready, Az?” Raze’s excitement was a little undercut by the creeping mellow of the weed, but still managed to set his blue eyes aflame.
             Az nodded in the affirmative, pressing pen to paper, ready to take down the letters as Raze called them out. Raze was the medium, he was always better at channeling the spirits when they used the board. Az’s job was to take down the letters and form them into comprehensible answers.
             Raze lightly placed his fingers on the planchette and closed his eyes. Slowly, he drew a breath, focusing on every distraction around him. Even more slowly, he let the breath hiss out between his clenched teeth as he felt those distractions ebb away until all he was aware of was the beating of his heart. The pulse was steady, regular, slow…
             The planchette jumped.
             Raze’s eyes snapped open. A slow creeping smile spread over his face as the planchette began to twitch under his fingers. It moved all the way across the board toward “A” and then quickly slid in a smooth arc all the way to “Z” and just as quickly back.
             “S**t, man. Spooks are strong here tonight.” Raze’s voice held the tremble of his mounting excitement behind the lace curtain of his mellow.
             Az nodded, taking another pull from his Guinness.
             Raze closed his eyes again, feeling the pull of the planchette beneath his fingers. Where to begin? The thing cycled quickly, running from one side to the other without pause, indicating that it was ready.
             “With whom are we speaking.” Raze kept his voice steady now, all business.
             The planchette stopped cycling for a moment, but rather began to smoothly run toward the bold imprint of a “R” on the second line of the board.
             “R…” Raze intoned.
             The planchette, even stronger this time, hurled itself to A.
             “A…G…E”
             Az looked quizzically at the letters. Rage? What the hell kind of name was Rage?
             The triangular planchette began its steady cycle…perhaps a bit too close to the tempo of Raze’s heartbeat for his liking.
             “Rage…Did you inhabit this house while living?”
             The board shot to “Yes.” The indicator was moving incredibly fast, almost pulling faster than his fingers could follow.
             “Yes.”
             Az raised his voice. “Dude, ask him how he died.”
             Raze nodded, starting to get a cold gnawing in his gut. The board had never worked this well. Even the graveyard hadn’t had an effect like this.
             “Rage…How did you die?”
             The planchette was still for a moment, not even cycling. Seconds ticked by and Raze began to wonder if the question had offended the spirit. Did spirits get offended? He didn’t have time to answer before the planchette slowly, but surely found its way to a letter.
             “M…” Raze watched the planchette move, felt the subtle power behind its movement.
             “U…” He couldn’t help but be reminded of the Artist’s walk, that fluid stride which seemed to belie the quiet strength about the man.
             “R…” He watched it move in horrified fascination.
             “D…” Something was wrong, he felt his heart speed up. As it did so, the planchette moved more quickly.
             “E…” Raze’s voice cracked as he called out the letter. His voice hadn’t cracked since he was fourteen. Holy hell, that was when…
             “R…” Raze read the letter without looking down. He didn’t need to see it to know that it was an “R”. He’d known as soon as he’d touched the planchette.
             Az looked up from the notebook, his eyes wide and a smile on his lips. He didn’t make a sound, but rather simply mouthed, “S**t, dude.”
             Raze nodded silently, trying to think of something else to ask. Here he had the spirit of a man who was murdered perhaps in the very room in which he was sitting. His tongue snaked out of his mouth, trailing over his lips, wetting them. With a hushed voice he asked another question.
             “Rage…is there a message you would like us to convey to the outside world? Is there anything you want to say?”
             The planchette was almost ripped from his hands at this. With quick jerky movements, it danced over the board, spelling out a message which made Raze’s throat go dry.
             “N…O…T…D…O…N…E…Y…E…T…5…T…O…G…O,” Raze spoke the letters in a strained whisper. He took his fingers off the planchette, unthinking, and reached for his Guinness.
             Az’s eyes went wide. “Dude, you didn’t break contact.” Everyone knew that you couldn’t just stop using a Ouija board. The spirit had to be properly dismissed or you ran the risk of having a seriously pissed off apparition inhabiting your board…or worse. At least that was what the urban legends warned.
             “S**t.” He muttered through a mouthful of Guinness. His hands sought the planchette where he had left it, sitting cheerily atop the yawning black maw of the blocky “O”. However, when he looked down he could hardly believe his eyes.
             The little white indicator sat atop the space marked “Goodbye.”
             Raze whistled through his teeth as he released a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. “Freaky, man. Totally freaky.”
             Az nodded emphatically, eyes wide as he looked down at the transcript. He rubbed absently at his arm, trying to get the goosebumps to go away. He was failing. A steady chill had taken up residence on the nape of his neck and it was all he could do to stop imagining a malevolent spirit in the room.
             Raze broke the silence first. “Think this place still has a working pisser?” They both laughed a bit, nervously, trying to break the tension.
             Az shrugged his shoulders and went back to looking at the transcript. “So wicked…” he whispered to himself as Raze stood up to find the bathroom.
             Raze found the bathroom without a problem. All houses in this area were pretty much the same. Raze and Az had taken to calling their little patch of Suburban Hell “Communist Housing.” Oddly enough, as he turned the knob and opened the door, he was not greeted with the sight of a moldering corpse or white tile washed in old bloodstains. Instead, it was a bathroom much like his only coated in a fine layer of grayish dust and bereft of his mother’s favorite maroon towels.
             Sighing, he went over to the toilet, lifted the lid and unzipped his jeans. “Get a grip, Raze.” He breathed.
             As he zipped up his pants, something caused his ears to prick up, something at the low end of his hearing. His eyes narrowed as he opened the door.
             “That you, Az?” he called out to the hungry darkness which waited in the hall.
             No answer.
             He took a tentative step into the hallway, feeling the inky black wrap around him like a tangible thing.
             “Az?” His voice was less sure this time.
             And then he was against a wall, whirled off of his feet and pressed flat against the peeling paint of the dusty drywall by…
             The figure was tall. Had Raze not been six inches above the ground, the form in the darkness would have stood head and shoulders over him. As it was, Raze had the height advantage as the figure held him securely by the throat, reducing his screams to mere gurgled whines.
             “Shhhh.”
             Raze stopped whining, though the grip did not slacken. His eyes adjusted to the dark, and the form came into focused. Lean and well muscled, his long black hair hung to his shoulders, matted and unkempt. He was cast in perfect profile as he looked down the empty hallway; A prominent nose, tapered chin, and hollow cheeks were all perfectly visible. But it was the eyes that knocked out what little wind was left in Raze. They were as black as coal, yawning abysses into some realm that practically writhed with hunger.
             He leaned in, boring those dark eyes into Raze’s. The scent of damp earth and rain cloyed about him, wafting out in an almost tangible vapor. When he spoke, his voice was just above a whisper.
             “Get out.”
             Raze dropped to the floor, coughing as his lungs sucked in air greedily. A hand went to his throat as he wheezed in a heap on the floor. When he looked up, the figure was gone
             “Raze?” Az’s voice from the living room. “You alright, man?”
             Raze stood slowly and walked into the living room where Az sat munching idly on Doritos and nursing a second Guinness. His eyes were haunted and he had gone noticeably paler beneath his white foundation. Az looked up and did a double take.
             “S**t, dude. You look like you’ve seen a…”
             Raze held up his hand, cutting off the last word. He shook his head slowly, sucking in deep lungfuls of air. “Just pack up, man. We’re bookin’.”
             Az had never seen that face before in his three years as Raze’s best friend, but his tone of voice spoke of bad s**t gone down. In minutes they had packed their stuff, climbed through the broken window which served as their entrance, hopped the wrought-iron fence, and were making tracks toward home.

             The dead man takes the stairs slowly, knowing full well what he will find at the top. The burnished gold knob turns and the door swings open invitingly. And there he sees his life, laid out like some endless banquet.
             Most of their things had been taken by the movers, on their way to New York. The four-poster bed stays behind, a mute witness; still rumpled from the night he’d been killed. He closes his eyes and sees the brilliant flash and the slow fade to red and finally black. A rueful chuckle escapes his throat, tearing free to be given flight on wings of shadow.
             He crosses to the closet and opens it. Some of his clothes, things he would have packed, still hang…moth-eaten and dusty. He selects his heavy black canvas trenchcoat. With a fluid movement, he wraps it around himself.
             The mirror in the master bathroom catches a ray of the waning moonlight, shimmering like a crushed diamond. With halting steps, he makes his way over to it, unwilling to look, but too curious to resist. He’d been in his grave not three hours ago. What did he look like? Was he some desiccated corpse, a mummy? Was he a ghost, all bilious ectoplasm without form? He had to know.
             As he draws closer, he begins to see that he is Dorian Raker. Tall, lean, well-muscled, pale…whole. He furrows his brow and hears the tinkle of broken glass as it falls from the windowsill to the floor. A breath of wind from the yawning window must’ve sent it crashing against the floorboards.
             He turns back and regards his reflection once more…and it smiles at him. It nods its head slowly, eyes glittering. Its lips move, but the voice does not meet open air, but rather echoes in his head. His voice, but not his.
             “Revenge.”
 

Reviews

[LittleScribbler]

Hi Shawn Drake
I love your descriptions.
LittleScribbler

[Kaitlyn M.]

Another fantastic chapter, and honestly, I think this one is some of your best work. And I even have several reasons why. Haha.

First: Your treatment of Basil (Az) and Walter (Raze) is nothing short of astoundingly talented. It's hard to switch perspective in third person, and it's even harder to keep description and though straight between multiple characters. Yet, you make this look like child's play. I see everything through the eyes of these two seventeen year olds (if I've done my math right), and its a lovely witty, sardonic, sarcastic view. Their window is skewed, and yet you're so into their characters that I see nothing but their personal tunnel vision (so to speak). My only thing would be to extablish their age a bit earlier, as I kept questioning the specifics of their age until the end when you give me a number which lets me add things up a bit. One, I'd like to know that they're in late high school early on. Their character gives this away a little bit, but honestly, while thinking they were that young, I kept wondering how in the hell they got away with a sixer of Guinness. A petty detail to be sure, but it did throw me off just a little.

Secondly, your description of the Ouija board is so realistic I could see myself doing it. And Raze must have some serious skill (which you do explain, so bully for you) to pull off doing it alone. Also, your opening and ending sequences with Raker are just etherially spooky and chilling. You're pulling off foreshadowing in the backstory pretty well too, as I found myself wondering how in the hell the GF survived and simply moved out without another explanation or word. I'm always reading too far into things, but it's nice to tip off the reader without being overbearing and "Hey! Look at me!" about it.

However, my only issue is that at certain times your description goes from being rather vivid (like the Ouija Board) to glazed over. The main example here would be the two boys smoking before the incident. I understand that they've gotten their hands on some nice tobacco(?), what exactly does it taste like? I see a brand name, but nothing else. I'd like to enjoy this stuff along with them, just as I feel their fears and anxieties with them.

Otherwise, another fine installment. I'd say that I'd want to see the boys more later, as you've taken such time to establish their characters that I'd hate to see them go, but since this is a second read-through, I know better than to say so. But you have done a fine job of establishing some time and place to Raker's environment, and some nice complications to what looks like a plain and simple plan of revenge.We can't go letting Raker get everything the easy way. That'd be no fun.

Fantastic job, Sir.