right. Get a clothes hanger. Help me abort the child.”
Kate watched her sister endure two quick spasms before a mist of blood sprayed from her mouth. It ran a line down her chin and dripped onto an exposed breast. There was blood between her legs, a dark red puddle. It was growing larger. Kate didn’t understand what was happening and she didn’t understand why, but she knew one thing for sure: her sister was dying, being ripped apart from the inside.
Yes. They had to abort the child.
She looked across the room and her eyes locked on the closet door. In no time at all the door was open and she was standing in the doorway, pushing bags out of the way with her left hand while pulling shirts off hangers with her right. But there was a problem: all the hangers were made with plastic. She couldn’t see any of the old-fashion metal kind. She grabbed a jacket and a vest and threw them to the ground in a pile.
Jennifer screamed.
Richard growled.
And Kate, cursing under her breath, saw what she was looking for: a rusty old hanger, nastier than a snake. She snagged it from the rack and stepped towards her sister, trying desperately to keep her eyes away from the huge thing that was laying on the bed, covered in fur, snapping its jaws, eying her like a fresh meal after a long day.
She said, “We need to get out of here!”
“No,” Jennifer whispered. “Just hurry, Kate. Hurry!”
There was no time to argue so Kate bent the hanger this way and that, playing it like an accordion, trying to snap it. She didn’t think she’d be able to unravel it fast enough, and time was so important now. Oh yes it was. She thought about running for the second time that evening, but Jennifer was in no position to follow her lead, and she couldn’t leave her sister behind.
Richard growled, sounding like a grizzly bear.
Jennifer screamed again. And Kate screamed too, frustrated with the time she was spending. Her hands were working as fast as they could but it wasn’t fast enough. She didn’t think the hanger would ever break but suddenly it did. It broke right where she wanted. It almost seemed like a miracle.
Straightening the wire, she turned it into a long, narrow spear. Then she dropped to the floor, positioning herself between her sister’s legs.
Jennifer’s eyes widened. She looked desperate now––desperate and in serious pain. She lifted her knees, stretched her legs apart, and grabbed a hold of her blood-soaked underwear. She pulled the dripping cloth to one side, exposing her vagina. Gasping and begging, she said, “Do it, Kate. Kill it. Kill it!”
Kate caught a frightful glimpse of her sister’s belly before pushing her labia apart with her fingers and plunging the wire in. But one glimpse of Jennifer’s stomach getting ripped open was enough: skin splitting, muscles tearing, blood pouring to the floor in generous amounts. There was a coil of flesh that appeared to be growing and when Kate saw it her stomach clenched and she thought she might pass out. It was too late to perform a back-alley abortion. It had to be too late.
Looking Jennifer in the eye, Kate forced the wire deep inside.
And Jennifer, gasping her final breaths, writhing in agony, looked up. Not at Kate. Oh no. There was a monster in the room now, standing high above, gazing down at the girls with its terrible green eyes, teeth like daggers, bloodlust boiling inside its brain.
Richard was gone.
And although Jennifer knew that her husband had become something entirely different––something bred without love or affection––memory of the man she married seeped into her heart and she managed to say, “I love you with all my heart, Richard Beach. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. I’m unconditionally yours.”
* * *
A GHOST IN MY ROOM
Last night I saw a ghost in my room, the ghost of my wife Luisa. I was lying in bed when it happened. The light was on––not the bright one, just the little one that sits on the table beside the bed. One moment I was rehashing my day and reading a magazine and the next moment she was there. I didn’t notice her at first; I didn’t see her appear. But I felt that something was different, something had changed. So I looked up, not expecting to see anything out of the ordinary, and there she was, looking in my direction.