Previously on… Father Death (20)
16
Stu’s breathing pressed back into his face from the inside of the plastic bag. His blood thumped steadier in his veins as his consciousness swam up to his sizzling nerves. He heard the plastic shuffling around his head but did not feel it against his face or shoulders. Willing his muscles to flex and move, he found them impossibly stiff and resistant. His breath just struggled in his face.
A chill tickled him deep below his flesh, coursing over him and making him writhe on his own skeleton. A skeleton that seemed singed and radiating. Before his thoughts coagulated into words, he imagined himself glowing in this strange, constrictive plastic space.
In your dreams. Sidney’s words echoed in his skull as her face flickered before him.
He jerked at her image. An involuntary and rageful spasm against the idea of her.
You sick fucks have seen too many movies. Sidney’s voice, again, tugged him more into his flesh, throbbing in hot pain. He saw her against the kitchen counter behind Billy.
Billy.
Where is Billy? Stu’s voice surfaced in his mind. Where is Billy? Where am I?
He had been in his blood-soaked house, surrounded by the bodies of their victims. Billy had been overzealously carving him up in the kitchen and throwing the phone at the back of his head. He had tackled Sidney to the ground after she had attacked Billy. And now…
Stu scrunched his face but felt nothing. He heard the skin crack and split at the movement. Back in the recesses of his sinuses, he smelled a faint char. A liquid slid from his cheek to drip on the plastic under his head.
The pain settled over him, formed articulate shapes on his body. He recognized the buzzing feeling of his arms and legs as they pulsated in angry rhythms. When he lifted his hands along his body, the plastic sheath around him contained them. His blunt, half-numb fingertips traversed the crisp edges of his sweater and the warbled, blistered flesh of his face. It felt wet and disfigured. Stu snatched the digits away, horrified to translate the touch into an image, and pressed forward into the plastic.
Above his face, he felt the zipper sealing him into the bag. He traced it up until he found the flat metal at the top above his head. Worming a finger out around the shape, he noted the cooler temperature outside the bag, and tugged the zipper down in an awkward struggle.
As Stu parted the seam of the body bag, weak light permeated the crack. The dim beams felt like an assault, and Stu squinted against them. His vision blurred, and he blinked hard to bring the world into focus around him. Turning his head on the crinkling plastic, he glimpsed another long, lumpy shape stretched out beside him.
Billy.
Wrenching himself up on his elbow, Stu’s muscles shaking and stuttering. Once he lifted his head, the world swam, and he gauged the gentle swaying below him. Tires rumbled under him as the van rolled down the road.
They think I’m dead, he thought. I’m the supposably dead killer. They’re taking me to the morgue under the hospital.
His thoughts crackled disjointed. He squinted his eyes again, the skin crunching and cracking. He gave his head a little shake, but then the entire van seemed to spiral around him. Snapping his eyes open, he sucked in breath through his nose. It whistled distorted, and he brought his fingers to the mangled flesh again.
Sidney. Fucking bitch.
Sidney was supposed to be dead. Gale and Dewey and Randy were supposed to be dead. He and Billy were supposed to be the survivors.
He turned to Billy’s body bag beside him. His plastic only jostled softly with the movement of the van. Something in Stu’s chest sank heavily, deeper than the tingling, the numbness, and the shocks of pain. The van felt surreal, like a nightmare. As if Freddy Krueger would turn around from the driver’s seat.
But it was probably him who looked like Freddy Krueger now.
Stu craned his neck toward the driver’s seat. More cruel light poured in from the windshield, carving the seat into a haunting, warbled dark shape in Stu’s damaged vision. He could see the ball cap and jacket of the driver, not the brown fedora and striped sweater of Freddy.
Stu shimmied the body bag from his shoulders. It tangled in the frayed edges of his sweater before piling on the floor of the van. Stu remained crouched low, both to stay out of the eye-line of the rearview mirror and because his trembling arms resisted supporting him. He felt like Michael Myers coming back to life, reanimated with a second chance to finish things. Sliding from the bag, he hunched in the shadows beside the passenger’s seat.
The van bounced into the parking garage; the light from the windows brightened. The brakes squeaked softly as the vehicle stopped. Stu pressed harder into the back of the passenger’s seat as the driver opened his door and slid from the van.
Stu’s heart rate battled to the surface and pounded through his entire body, shaking the fried edges. Glaring through the windows the best he could, he pulled himself into the passenger’s seat. Before the driver reached the back seat, Stu opened the door and lowered his feet to the concrete. Reseating the door silently, he slithered under the van.
Above his head, he heard the back doors of the van swing open. The driver’s feet shuffled on the concrete. Stu watched the blurry boots turn one way then the other in nervous patterns.
“Shit,” the driver said. The low voice echoed in the empty parking garage. “Shit, shit, shit.”
Stu pictured his empty body bag beside Billy’s. It had to look terrifying, a frame out of a scary movie. A smile hesitated on his deformed cheeks.
The radio chirped above Stu’s head. “Get the Sheriff down here.” The driver’s voice cracked. “We have a problem.”
Stu felt his pulse pressing against the concrete below him. The boots shifted across the concrete. As they rounded the bumper, Stu slid from beneath the van. He crept along the ground and darted to the large green blurs against the wall. Gripping the edge of the dumpster, he heaved a long leg over the edge. He whipped over the side and lowered into the trash. The smell permeated his charred nasal cavity.
The door slammed open into the wall. Boots bounced on the floor, and voices filled the parking garage. The silent space crowded with chattering bodies. Their energy spilled over into the dumpster with Stu, yet he remained lowered out of sight, listening to them.
“Macher is gone,” the driver said.
“Gone? What do you mean gone?” Sheriff Burke said. “He’s dead. How can he be gone?”
“He’s obviously not dead then,” another voice countered.
All the voices hushed, and Stu pictured them huddled around the end of the van staring at his wilted body bag.
“Fuck!” Sheriff Burke exploded. “Well, where the fuck is he?”
Mumblings and murmurs failed to answer him. Stu cowered against the rim of the dumpster and hazarded a glance. Sheriff Burke stood at the end of the gaping trunk, his hands fisted against his bald head. He turned to the van then away into the parking lot then back again. Then he squared up to face all his officers fiercely.
“The media cannot catch wind of this. This is enough of a shit show.” He leveled his eyes and jabbed a finger at them. “This has been enough of a fucking catastrophe already. They are salivating over the massacre at the Macher house. Billy Loomis and Stu Macher are our killers, and Billy Loomis and Stu Macher are dead.” Sheriff Burke swiped a hand over his face, and Stu dropped back into the trash. “Now, find him!”
Boots shuffled on the concrete in manic patterns. Gurney wheels squealed as it approached the van. Billy’s corpse dumped heavy onto it. They wheeled it away and closed the van doors hard. Stu remained pressed in the garbage, sucking in slow and rank breaths. The garage fell silent around him until it was only his weak exhalations.
Dead, he mused. I’m dead. Just like Billy.
The weight returned to his chest to squelch his hammering heart rate. Dead like Billy.
This night had changed everything. This night had ended their lives as they knew them. Just as they had thought but not at all like they had planned. Stu strove to set aside the blooming feeling of failure, the familiar itching sensation. He did not have time to sink in that native quicksand. Even these local morons would search a dumpster eventually.
Stu peered over the edge of the dumpster, expecting to see at least one lingering officer. Surely, they would have left someone at this portion of the scene instead of scampering off frantic and disjointed to find their escaped killer. Yet his eyes found a vacant parking garage. The van stood alone in its parking spot.
If Stu was watching this scene in a movie, he would have laughed. Instead, he slunk from the dumpster and hustled to the exterior exit.
Stu pulled the hoodie low over his head, tugging on the strings to envelop himself. His raw flesh prickled at the stiff fabric. He flexed against the chill running down his back and rounded over the diner counter. Dragging the steaming mug of coffee under his face, he hunched over, squinting at the hanging television screen.
Gale Weathers filled the screen. Stu wrinkled his nose at her ghastly pink suit and the way it brought out the depths of the bruises on her face. No amount of makeup could hide all the trauma.
She probably doesn’t want to, Stu mused. Better ratings. Survivor ratings.
As Stu stared into her face, he saw her back in the news van, fresh blood trickling from her face, her head hanging limp on her neck. Appearing dead. She was supposed to be dead.
They were all supposed to be dead, but Stu had failed Billy. Now, Billy was dead.
Gale offered the camera her pursed-lip smile.
What a bitch. She really is eating this up. Loving every minute of it.
He saw her back in his kitchen, holding the gun in their faces, that same smug grin on her lips as the weapon trembled in her hand. But she had not foiled them. She had been a speedbump. Sidney had been their undoing.
“Good evening, welcome to Top Story,” Gale said from the screen. “I’m Gale Weathers, here with more eyewitness accounts of the murders in Woodsboro, California.”
Stu mashed his fists into the side of the hood. You’re supposed to be dead. There aren’t supposed to be any witnesses. Some random reporter is supposed to be saying Neil Prescott slaughtered everyone and only Billy and me survived.
“First, we need to honor our own fallen cameraman. Kenny Jones was killed on the job at the Macher house the night of the massacre. Kenny was a dear friend and colleague, and our hearts go out to his family.”
Huh, Kenny. Kenny was his name. Stu conjured the memory of Kenny’s eyes going wide when Stu’s blade parted his neck. Kenny pawed for Sidney in the van before collapsing to the dirt. He died so quickly, with barely any effort at all.
“Last week, five people were murdered by Billy Loomis and Stu Macher,” Gale continued.
Stu stiffened at the mention of his own name. He raised up on his stool and peered around the edge of his hoodie. The waitress continued to pour coffee into a wilted trucker’s cup, unfazed. The family at the far booth bickered unaffected. The two other patrons at the counter stared into the television and blinked slow. Stu lowered back down over his coffee.
“This brings the murder total for Loomis and Macher to six as it was revealed they were responsible for killing Maureen Prescott in Woodsboro one year ago. This new evidence will work to exonerate Cotton Weary, who was convicted for Prescott’s murder. Top Story has been proclaiming Weary’s innocence for the duration of the investigation and trial.”
Stu rolled his eyes and pressed his fist to his cheek, immediately recoiling away from the scabbed flesh.
“In addition to Maureen Prescott and our own Kenny Jones, Loomis and Macher savagely murdered Steven Orth, Casey Becker, their principal Arthur Himbry, and Macher’s own girlfriend, Tatum Riley.”
Stu sucked in a breath at Tatum’s name. He had not killed her, but he always knew Billy was going to. If he was honest with himself, he was surprised Billy had not made him to it. It seemed like a task Billy would want him to fulfill. Stu pictured Tatum’s face, remembered her in those tight red pants and the jersey baring her pale stomach. He listened to her reckless laugh.
“Six people lost their lives at the hands of Billy Loomis and Stu Macher,” Gale continued.
Should have been more. It was supposed to be more. All told, that did not seem like that high of a body count for a scary movie.
“But both Billy Loomis and Stu Macher are dead.”
All echoes and memories fell from Stu’s mind. His head became hollow to consume those words. The concept of his living death was perhaps as unsettling as the idea of Billy’s true death. He knew it was better to be left for dead, to be assumed dead, than to be lying beside Billy, yet Billy was not feeling the crushing weight that strangled him.
“Both men were killed by Sidney Prescott, Maureen Prescott’s daughter. Sidney Prescott has not responded to requests for interviews or comments.”
Sidney. Fucking Sidney. Billy had to put her at the center of it. Here she was, at the center of it.
Looking up at Gale’s face on the television, Stu saw Sidney rush around the screen and plant her hands on the back of the television to shove it down onto his face. The electricity shuttered through his bones at the thought. His muscles spasmed at the memory, and he wrapped his arms around himself. He glared up at the picture of Sidney imposed on the screen beside Gale.
Digging into his pocket, he pulled out the stranger’s wallet. He pulled out a few bills and slipped them under his cooling coffee mug. Then he palmed the foreign car keys and trudged out to the parking lot.
Continued on… Father Death (22) – THE END
Christina Bergling
https://linktr.ee/chrstnabergling
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- Followers – You never know who is on the other side of the screen. Followers is a mystery and thriller that blends women’s fiction with horror.
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- The Waning – Locked in a cage, Beatrix must survive to escape or be broken completely.
- Screechers – Mutant monsters and humans collide in the apocalyptic fallout of a burned world. Co-authored with Kevin J. Kennedy.
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