Helltown - Jeremy Bates Page 0,67

right then.

Cherry stumbled into a patch of thigh-high bush. Instead of backing out and feeling her way around, she waded through it. The scratchy shrubbery snagged her skirt and blouse and held her captive. She tugged her clothing, heard the fabric tear, and freed herself.

She only made it another ten feet, however, before she rammed her forehead against a tree trunk and buckled to the ground. She listened for Earl but couldn’t hear anything over her ragged breathing and the drone in her ears.

She didn’t know how long she lay there for, waiting to be discovered, drowsy with pain and despair. Maybe one minute, maybe ten. The cool October air had slipped its icy hands beneath her skin, caressing her bones, whispering for her to relax, to give up the struggle, to slip away—

No!

Consciousness returned with bright urgency. Everything that had occurred over the past ten minutes exploded inside her head in a collage of images—and even as she fought for clarity—Where was she now? Why was she on the ground? What happened?—she found Earl towering above her, his face slabs of fat and severe shadows, his eyes dusty white and gleeful.

“Gotcha,” he said, and reached for her.

CHAPTER 21

“They strike, wrap around you. Hold you tighter than your true love. And you get the privilege of hearing bones break before the power of the embrace causes your veins to explode.”

Anaconda (1997)

After Jeff’s failed attempt to rescue Austin he dragged himself to the door, gripped the knob, and found it locked. Of course it was locked. What had he expected? Someone to open it and tell him, “Golly, what a mix-up! How did you end up in here?” Nevertheless, this understanding didn’t prevent him from shouting as loud as he could, begging for someone to get him out of there, off the fucking slaughter floor. When his throat became raw from this effort, he slumped against the door—and thought his eyes were playing tricks with him. The room was black but not pitch black thanks to the light seeping beneath the door sweep, and in that light he swore he could make out the snake directly ahead of him, perhaps ten feet away. The longer he stared the more convinced he became he was right. But it couldn’t be the snake that had eaten Austin; that nightmare creature wouldn’t be moving for the next few months while it digested it’s man-sized meal.

So a second snake?

Jeff’s heart pounded. The snake—yes, there was no mistaking it for shadows now—lay curled upon itself like a giant garden hose, watching him watch it.

Then it began to move.

Its improbable bulk slinked back and forth, propelling it across the floor toward him. Jeff wanted to scream, but he had no voice. He wanted to run, but he had no use of his legs. All he could do was sit there and watch it come for him.

It went for his legs first. Its serpent head nosed beneath his ankles, lifting them with ease. It looped itself over his shins, then beneath his calves, then back over his shins again. It was one big muscle, he could feel its power, and it manipulated him as if he were nothing but a stuffed doll.

As the snake wrapped itself around his waist, it corkscrewed him onto his chest. Screaming now, Jeff thrashed his upper body and pounded the snake with his fists, but none of this did any good.

The eyes! he thought desperately. Where are the eyes? Claw the bloody eyes!

But by then it was already too late.

Jeff was floating in a perfect void—perfect because in the void there was a rule, and that rule was no thinking or reflecting or regretting or worrying. All you could do was float and be. Then, he didn’t know when exactly, only at some point during his floating and being, he realized he was thinking after all. But he wasn’t thinking about Austin’s purple and puffy face. Nor was he thinking about the second snake that had slipped itself around his own body and was now in the process of working its monstrous mouth down over his skull. All he was thinking about was his childhood, and that, he decided, was okay, that he would allow.

Specifically, he was thinking of all the Saturday mornings when, after the cartoons had finished, he would go to his garage, stuff a basketball into his backpack, hop onto his BMX dirt bike with the yellow padding around the middle bar so you didn’t smack your balls on it,