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NOTE: These stories are
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The House of Bad Blood
A Guest Quarters story
by
Robert Mitchell Evans

The house came to me by way of bad blood. It had been my father's house. My low-life Dad skipped out before I was two and good riddance to him. Perhaps you're thinking I'm too harsh on the old man, but you never saw the scars on my mother's neck. Being knifed in prison was too good of a fate for him.

Anyway, my no-good father died in prison -- shanked in the showers-- and as the only relation the state of Oregon could find, his house passed to me. Monica had left again, this time I suspect for good. Desperately, I needed to get away from everything in my life. Wintering in cold rainy Oregon fitted my mood perfectly and when spring came I'd sell the house and move back to San Diego a new man.

Half an hour before midnight with Hobb's Landing, a burg of a town, was just a few miles behind me, I laid eyes on her. She couldn't have been too bright, hitchhiking on a deserted highway. She compounded the mistake by hitchhiking late at night in a terribly cold rain. Considering it my good deed for the week, I pulled my Prius to the shoulder and waited for her to catch up.

I popped open the door and a blast of freezing air filled the car as she climbed in. She couldn't have been more than nineteen with copper-red hair, a small upturned nose balanced on either side by striking cheekbones. I'll admit she had a figure that led men to sinful speculation, but teenage girls are a bit too close to pedophilia for my tastes.

"Thanks," She said shivering with cold. "It's fucking cold out there."

"A bad night for hitchhiking," I agreed. I turned up the heater and pulled back out onto the road. "Where are you headed?"

"Seattle." She rubbed her hands together furiously. "I'm Megan."

"Kevin Strike." She didn't react so I assumed she wasn't a fan. Likely not much of a reader of novels at all. My hands shivered from the cold. "I'm only going a few more miles up the road, but you're welcome to ride along."

"You're the first car I've seen in I don't know how long."

"Well, this is a forgotten bit of the coast," I said. "Or at least that's what I've heard. I'm new here myself."

Several moments passed in silence. The Prius motored along with hardly any noise at all. Only the sound of the heater and the pounding of the rain filled our ears.

"Shit," Megan said. "This car is quiet."

"It's a hybrid."

"A what?"

"It runs on both gas and batteries. You know, for the environment?"

"Sweet." She nodded her approval.

"What takes you to Seattle?"

"I'm going to be a singer."  Once she started talking about singing and music she didn't stop. I didn't have the heart to tell her that grunge no longer commanded the music scene.  Hell, she didn't even seem to know that Kurt Cobain had died, but nothing and no one was about get between her and her dreams.

I reached for my iPod which was plugged into the Prius's sound system. Mischievously planning to start up Olivia Newton-John's cover of Me and Bobby McGee.

"What's that?" Megan asked pointing to the iPod.

"My iPod?"

She gave me a quizzical look.

"Music player?" I offered.

"I thought mini-CD's died a bloody death," She offered.

"It's more like MP3's." I explained, but it became clear she had no clue about MP3's either. I wondered what sort of sheltered life Megan had been living.

"Well," I said. "This is where I stop." Rain pounded hard on the roof of the car and my breath hung in the cold air. I banged on the heater's vents in frustration. Less than a year old and already falling part, this car was junk.

Megan looked out at the rain falling hard, her long wet hair plastered to the side of face and shoulders.

"You can come in and dry off," I offered. I know what you're thinking and it wasn't like that at all. I've left 40 behind me and I felt no desire to seduce a runaway less than half my age.

Megan nodded, strangely silent. I shrugged and turned the Prius onto the unpaved drive to my new home. The night and the rain cut my visibility down to under five yards, so I crept the car along.

I inherited a large lot of large two and half wooded acres. We rounded a stand of pines and the house came into view. I whistled in appreciation.

White with dark trim the house was a two story wood frame building with an attached garage. A large porch extended the length of the front of the house but the rest of the details were lost in the rain and darkness.

Megan's face froze at the sight of the house. Looking back at the house I felt uneasy. The large windows seemed like soulless eyes that judged and found everyone and everything wanting.

I stopped the car in front of the garage and fumbled to remove the keys to the padlock binding the doors shut.

"Be right back,"

Megan didn't answer or even nod. I hurried over to the door, the cold rain pouring on my head. I tried key after key in the lock. After six tries I found the right one. With my hands shaking from the cold I swung open the doors and hurried back to the car.

***

Megan was gone. I scanned the front grounds, but I couldn't see further than the edge of the porch. I jumped back into the sweltering passenger compartment and pulled into the garage.

Even without heat it was much warmer in the garage. I opened the hatchback and pulled out one of my suitcases. Megan must have dashed to the porch. Instead of following her through the rain, I unlocked the door into the house proper planning to let her in from the front door.

Mr. Glesser, the attorney who handled the transfer of the house, had switched on the utilities. I flipped the switch and the kitchen lit up brilliantly. I dropped my suitcase and went, carefully through unfamiliar rooms, to the front door.

I opened the door to an empty porch. Wind-whipped rain flew in face as I called out Megan's name. Nothing. Remembering the fear I sensed from her I thought she must have run back to the road. I briefly considered getting in the car and trying to find her. It was raining, it was bitterly cold, and who knows what sort of dangerous men were out tonight, but I closed the door and did nothing. I couldn't force her into the car and make her come here. I pulled out my cell phone to call the police or sherrif, but my worthless carrier provided zero coverage here. I promised myself I'd drive into town and report my little runaway in the morning.

I grabbed my suitcase from the kitchen and explored upstairs looking for a bedroom. Mr. Glesser was good to his word. The place had been cleaned and readied for my arrival. The master bedroom was in the back of the house and from my window I could just barely see the storm tossed waves of the Pacific Ocean. I felt isolated as I stood there. Thick curtains of rain closed in on all sides and in the dark the world seemed wild and threatening.

I quickly put away my clothes and toiletries, just enough to get me through the next few day of unpacking, and then headed back to down to kitchen. I passed through the living room as the grandfather clock struck midnight.

A quick search proved that 'made ready' did not include food or dishes. Finding one lone glass tumbler, I put it under the tap for a quick gulp of water before bed.

"You wanna fuck me." Startled, I jumped, dropping the glass.

Megan stood there, still soaked to the skin, her wet shirt leaving very little to the imagination. Stunned I said nothing.

Megan took a step forward, pinning me into the corner of the counter. I shivered with cold as a musty smell of earth filled my nostrils.

"You wanna fuck me." It wasn't a question or a demand but a cold emotionless statement. I had never been less aroused.

She took my hands in hers. Her skin was cold, far colder than I thought possible. Megan put my hands on her breasts.

"Are they big enough for you?" Her expression was blank. Fear crawled into my belly. I tried to pull my hands back but she had a strength that belonged more to a trucker than a slip of a girl.

"You wanna fuck me rough." She ground my hands into her breasts as she spoke. "Make me cry." She stared with dead, lifeless eyes.

"But that wouldn't be enough would it?"

She moved my hands to her throat.

"No..." I whispered. My voice seemed far away.

"I know what you want." An emotion crept into her eyes, hate. "Pounding away while I gasp and fight. My muscles clenching tight as I tried to breath. You'd love that."

"No."

Letting go of my hands, Megan leaned in close. The scent of wet earth filled my nose, and under that the sickeningly sweet smell of decay. I started to scream but her cold hands snapped around my throat.

"I gonna choke you, fucker."

She pushed her face inches from mine. I gagged on the smell of rotting, moldering flesh. I gasped for air, trying to pull her hands away, but I couldn't break her grip. My vision began to go gray and I knew I was going to die. Megan leaned in closer, her lips next to my ears and whispered, "That's one."

I awoke to a blinding headache and promptly vomited. Eventually I focused on my surroundings. I lay in wet earth, my nose clogged with the stuff.

A bit of light filtered from a tiny dirty window lighting the basement for me. I pushed myself up to my knees and after a bout of dizziness to my feet.

I remembered everything, but believed none of it. With my head pounding I climbed the stairs out of the basement.

The door opened into my kitchen. Shards of glass from the tumbler littered the floor. Warily watching for Megan, I moved up towards my bedroom. I felt certain she remained close waiting to pop out at me like a killer from a bad movie.

In the bathroom mirror I looked pale and shaken. Bruises from her fingers marred my neck.

The memory of her aroma of dirt and decay flowered in my nose and I fell to my knees to the hard tile floor.

I knelt there, my hands quivering with fear. The cold tiles reminding me of Megan's cold touch. The sterile empty bathroom seemed tomblike. Sometime later, I have no idea how much later, I climbed into the shower and tried to scrub myself clean.

After the shower I felt marginally better about myself and the world. Vowing never to pickup stray hitchhikers again, no matter how much they needed help, I climbed into my car and headed for Hobb's Landing.

The sun blazed in the sky with millions of reflections bounding off the choppy waters to the west. The air was sweet and clean and the beauty of the evergreens surrounding my house promised that nightmares were a thing of the past.

The road to Hobb's Landing twisted through forested hills until it dropped gently to the bay-side town. By the time I had reached the edge of the small town I had succeeded in putting the night's events out of my mind.

I had pictured shopping in Hobb's Landing, population twenty thousand, to be like something out of an old movie. Images of friendly butchers and nosy old ladies in one-room general stories had flown through my mind. America isn't like that anymore. I found a Target and a Wal-Mart to buy my household wares and a Red Apple supermarket for my food. Small towns are just smaller versions of the big cities now.

I nearly stepped into a Borders to pick up my fix of books, when I saw the little bookstore across the street. 'The Magisterium' an independent book store specializing in fantasy, horror, and mystery. How the devil that man stayed in business with his location I had no idea, but he certainly deserved my business. My numbers may have been good enough that the chains weren't a threat to me, but my loyalty always went to the independent bookstore instead of the soulless chains and that abomination, Amazon.

"You're Kevin Strike!"  A man with long shaggy blonde hair exclaimed looking up from his word processor.

"That's me." He had good footage in his store and the books were stocked with care.

"Damn! Would you mind signing a few copies? It'd mean the world to me."

I nodded and laughed.

"I'm Ed," he said as he came around the corner offering his hand. He was a portly, spirited man, the type often chosen to play Santa Claus at Christmas. Unexpectedly for his size, he moved quickly and with a touch of grace. "What brings you to my little store? Passing through to Portland or Seattle?"

"Wintering over in Hobb's Landing." He had a firm and strong handshake. He released quickly, but not too quickly. I could tell he was someone good with people and business.

"Working on a new project?" Ed vanished into a back room, continuing to shout back into the main room as he dug around. "I loved your last novel."

"I'm pretty proud of that one." Any author would have been, I thought to myself, especially after it landed on Oprah's book club.

Ed reappeared with a stack of thirty or forty hardbacks filling his arms. He set them carefully down on a small table near the back of the store and waved me over.

"I don't get very many best-selling authors in here." Ed pulled a cushioned chair over to the table and took a plastic folding chair for himself. "But I have managed to get in a few for book signing as they drove up or down the coast."

"Hobb's Landing is a little out of the way." I sat and started signing copies.

"Is that why you chose it?"

"No," I answered. "Inherited a house just in time for a sabbatical."

We chatted as I signed books. He was a talented conversationalist and I happily signed copies as Ed continued to pile them before me. I learned that Ed had authored two books. In bookstores aspiring authors are as common as hookers at a political convention. Ed's first was a novel but the second book caught my attention.

On the cover my house stood photographed starkly as the sunset behind it, gray clouds filled the sky threatening rain. In a simple font the title read "The Devil in Hobb's Landing."

"That's my house." I said pointing to the cover.

"No shit?"

"Only in the bathroom." The more seriously I added. "What's the story?"

"Our local bad news." Ed got up and poured himself a cup of Joe. I waved off an offered cup. I knew that sleep would be difficult at best tonight without any caffeinated help. Joe sat back at the table and started in with a writer's enthusiasm.

"Philip Sean Dylan, we know he killed at least a dozen women in that house, but it could be more."

I play a decent hand of poker, but I have my limits. Ed reacted to something in my eyes.

"My father," I said to his unasked question. "he changed his name."

"Yeah, when he was twenty-three." Ed leaned forward, engaged in the subject matter. "He had a real obsession with Bob Dylan. He used to tape it as he strangled the girls and cut it into his own 'music'." Ed complimented his sarcasm with finger quotes in the air.

"Clearly he got caught."

"Yeah, one of the girls, Janice Newland, escaped from his fun room in the basement and made it to town."

The smell of the wet dirt on basement flooded back into my nostrils.

Ed went on with father's story. Like most serial killers Dad like to talk, in detail, about his murders. Lottery money from a lucky streak in the 80's gave Dad the money for a good lawyer which allowed him to both escape a death penalty and to protect his assets. This was big news in Hobb's Landing. For the rest of the country it was barely a three-minute segment on headline news.

It got late fast, with the sun plunging towards the horizon. Carrying a copy of Ed's book -- he mumbled apologies about printing errors and we both cursed major print house and their falling standards of quality -- I headed back home.

***

As I drove up into the forested lands I thought about Megan. Hitchhikers lived a dangerous life. I didn't doubt that Dad had killed her as she hitched her way to Seattle and now she haunted the highway trying to get to the fame she would never find. It was just my bad luck to drive the ghost to the site of her murder. She was doomed to haunt that highway, never reaching her destination.

Fog shrouded the pines as I drove up to the house. I passed through a silent army of ghostly pines guarding either side of the drive.

Night fell quickly and soon the only lights were the ones blazing from my winter home. I ate a simple pre-made dinner reheated in the stove. After dinner I soothed my edgy nerves with a tall glass of wine.

I walked out on the porch, wine in hand, delighting in the wet chill of the thick fog. Even with a nearly full moon the fog prevented me from seeing any of the trees around the house. I felt alone in a gray, featureless world.

"Half of all the people who ever lived are alive today."

I didn't drop the glass, but I spilled quite a bit of the wine. Megan stood there, soaked to the skin, looking exactly as I had seen her the night before.

The night grew colder as Megan paced around porch.

"And they're all going to be forgotten." She tossed her wet hair out of her face and stared at me. "You get born, you live, and then you die and no one ever knew."

"Megan?" My voice shook.

"Yeah?" There was no threat or menace in her voice. She was again the lost little girl hitchhiking her way to fame.

"You've got to move on." I had no idea what I was saying or if it would make any difference at all. The only thing I knew about ghosts was what I learned from Poltergeist, way back in the eighties.

"No shit," She laughed "I have to get to Seattle. She sounded light and happy. Someone who didn't know real pain. Tears rolled down my face as I thought about the pain she had suffered at my father's hands.

"I mean it." I stepped closer to her. "It's time to let go of this world. There's something better for you."

"What the hell are you talking about?" She backed away from me. "You're not a Jesus freak are you?"

"It's over. The man who killed you is dead. There's nothing left here for you."

She backed slowly steps down to the lawn, fear crept into her face.

"It's true Megan." I followed her, hoping that I could find The right words to put her to rest. Isn't that the problem with ghost? They don't know they're dead and it's time to go into a light or something?

"I'm not dead." She stepped backwards down the steps, never taking her eyes from mine.

"Yes, you are. There's never going to be a band or any records or any screaming fans, Megan. Philip Dylan took all that away, but he's dead. Let go."

Collapsing slowing, like a deflating balloon, she dropped to the ground.

"I'm not going to be forgotten!" She sobbed, her shoulders shaking violently.

I moved closer to her, but didn't touch her. The air grew cold as the fog thickened.

"There's a better place waiting for you." I didn't know if it was true but I needed her to believe it. "There's nothing for you here but a memory of pain and suffering."

She cried, nearly silent sobs as the fog swirled around her. Tears blurred my vision. I wiped them away and Megan was gone.

I stood and climbed back onto the porch. I have never believed in God. Even as a child in Sunday school he seemed too improbable, too much like a Santa Claus for grown-ups, but now I wanted to believe. I wanted to believe that somewhere Megan might find something or someone waiting for her.

Exhausted from too little sleep and too much excitement I climbed the stairs to my bedroom and climbed into bed. Satisfied with my success as a Ghostbuster I fell asleep.

A sharp chill jolted me awake. My breath came in ragged puffs of white that seemed to glow in the pale moonlight. My bedroom was empty with only shadows thrown by the full moonlight. The fog deadened any sounds from outside and inside I could only hear the pounding of my heart in my ears. Horripilation crawled over my entire body. I couldn't see her, but I knew Megan lurked near.

Carefully, I climbed out of the bed. Distantly, the grandfather clock struck midnight. I'm a light sleeper, both in terms of how easily I wake up and what I wore to bed. I couldn't run for my car wearing only skivvies. I started for the closet.

"Don't you want to play?" Megan stood by the window, the moonlight coming through her hair illuminating it from within with a ghostly pale light.

"If you play nice I might let you live." She moved, gliding across the floor. Her gait triggered a deep seated fear in my brain.

In terror I dashed for the door, clothes forgotten. I flung the door open and charged out to the stairwell landing. Megan slammed into my back tackling me with the ease of pro.

I fell face first to the hardwood floor. Megan landed on my back and wherever she touched me intense cold robbed me of strength. She grabbed me by the hair and slammed my face into the floor.

"That's a bad little whore!"

Painfully she yanked by head back. "I could have been nice," She whispered in my ear. "But you want it hard?" She slammed my face down into the hardwood floor. "I'll give it to you hard."

She grabbed my neck, her fingers wrapping around my throat.

"I'm going to play and this time I'm going to win." Megan's voice descended into a snarl. I clawed at my throat, but my fingers passed though hers as though they were just fog. I fought for air, but nothing reached my lungs. As her weight settled on me I burned with cold. Her breath, thick with the musk of dirt and death washed around to my face. The world grew dark and she whispered, "That's two."

Dirt clogged my nostrils and I gagged on the stench of rotting flesh. I climbed unsteadily to my feet, my head pounding like a couple of mafia goons were using it for batting practice. Weak morning sunshine streaked into the little basement, providing scant illumination and no warmth.

Shivering with cold, I stumbled from the basement. Half naked I collapsed into a chair in the kitchen and vomited. This house need to be burnt to the foundations and the ground salted. I trembled, barely able to think through the pain and fear. This was not my world. My world dealt with contracts and proposals and appearing on Oprah. This was for priests and other shamans.

Presently, I felt strong enough to climb the stairs. Outside my bedroom, I passed a stain of my own blood. I paused, staring without any comprehension. This wasn't my world, I told myself, it wasn't not my responsibility. Hurriedly I dressed and headed out.

Passing through the living-room I spotted Ed's book on the coffee table. Without a thought I scooped it up and shoved it into my pocket as I hurried to the garage. Soon I was on the road to Hobb's Landing. A hotel, some sleep, and then I'd move on. I'd call the realtor from Portland after that, forget any of this ever happened.

Forty minutes later I found a chain motel on the far side of town. I showered trying to scrub the stink of graves off my skin. As I wiped the steam from the cheap mirror I spotted bruises across my neck. My fingers sought them out. The fear returned with the suddenness of a politician telling a lie. I grabbed the sink, my knees no stronger than linguini.

Death drove my novels, but this was as close as I had ever come to the big dirt nap. I cursed my grandfather, my father, my whole paternal line as I made my way to the bed. Serial killers aren't born they're made, the same is true of ghosts.

Deep, restful sleep eluded me. Megan haunted my dreams as much as she haunted my house. In my dreams it wasn't the murderous victim that visited me, but the young woman with the big dreams.

Somewhere around noon I gave up on sleep and climbed out of bed. The day was dark from heavy gray clouds that stretched from horizon to horizon. A chill permeated the air along with a scent of rain. I grabbed Ed's book and left for something to eat.

Over a tuna melt and coffee I scanned Ed's account of Father's murders. A twisted bastard dad played games with the girls. Choking them unconscious once, twice, and finally killing them on his third rape.

I remembered Megan voice's in my ear, 'That's two.'

I flipped through the section on his victims, looking for Megan. Ed had a chapter on just the victims, a small photograph of each and a few pages about their lives. I think he was trying to make up for the injustice that the killers' names are always remembered while the victims remain faceless and forgotten. I reached the end of the chapter without finding anything about Megan. No one ever found her body. She had become truly forgotten ones. A girl who vanished on a highway in the middle of a cold rainy night.

I shoved the book back into my pocket. I understood her haunting all too well. Bumbling forensics teams missed her grave in the basement, leaving her forever lost. I expected that Megan would be trapped there until someone found her and put her properly to rest.

Tossing the money on the table for my brunch, I got up and headed for my car. It wasn't my problem. Let the new owners find corpses in the basement. Even as I started the car my resolve wavered.

At thirteen I knew that life was just a chemical reaction; souls, gods, and spirits just bedtime stories for people who couldn't face the truth. The universe ran on particles and charges, not faith and magic. Megan upended all that. She didn't breath anymore, the chemicals in her brain had long ceased to carry any sort of messages, but she remained. There is something to us beyond atoms and electrons skittering to and fro. Despite the big bang, evolution, and relativity, mankind existed apart from the laws of physics. We are eternal and eternally special. A destination waited for us after death. A destination forever denied to Megan.

Unless I did something.

The fiction of leaving this to someone else evaporated away. New owners just might tear down the house and never find Megan's body. If that happened she'd be trapped there lonely and angry forever. The weight of an infinite future trapped angry and alone descended on me.

Instead of leaving town I drove to the Wal-Mart. Shovels don't cost much and I knew where the body had to be. With plenty of daylight left I knew I could find the body before nightfall. My father was a monster to women, I was not going to be. Not even to a dead one.

The day was bright and full of promise as I pulled the shovel from the hatchback. With luck I'd find Megan's body in less than an hour.

I stood at the head of the stairs waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dim lighting of the basement. The single light fixture didn't work, so I'd have to dig by the light that filtered in through the small, dirty windows. Steeling my courage, resolved to do the right thing, I crossed the basement.  The dirt squelched under my shoes and with the first shovelful of earth the musty smell filled my nostrils.

Have you ever dug a grave? It's hard work. I'm a writer and hardly used to hard physical labor. Soon my back ached and my hands blistered. I dug through the first foot of wet earth easily, but after that the ground turned hard and nearly frozen. Hopefully, Father would be as lazy as he had been evil.

As I dug I felt Megan watching me. I expected at any moment to hear her voice, to feel her cold touch on my shoulder. Despite exhaustion, my heart pounded and my breathing raced.

After an hour I had a hole about a long as myself and about two and half feet deep. I considered taking a break, but kept digging. I had no intention of staying after nightfall and I lacked courage to do this twice.

The ground became harder and my progress slowed. I should have brought a pickax, something I noted as research for future writing. Each progressive shovelful of dirt strained my exhausted and quivering muscles. Pulling the blade of the shove high enough to dump the earth beside the grave became a task that forced me to the edges of my endurance.

After another hour later my hands bled. I had deepened the hole, but by less than a foot. I should have found something to let me know I was on the right track; jewelry, clothes, or even bits of bone, but I found only dirt.

The sun hung low in the window, throwing most of the basement into shadow. My hands trembled with fear as I looked into the deep dark shadows. Despite the stillness of the scene I was convinced I saw movement among those shadows. My heart pounding I dropped the shovel and crawled painfully out of the grave. Shambling like an undead myself, I climbed the stairs to the kitchen.

I emerged into the bright light and stopped to let my eyes adjust. After the darkness of the basement the incandescent bulb seemed as bright as a klieg light. The light reduced my terrors as effectively as appearing on Oprah increased sales.

I hurried through the living room, digging for my keys in my jacket pocket as I did. As I pulled the keys out Ed's book tumbled to the floor. I almost ignored it, but a flash of a Megan's smiling face caught my attention.

I stopped, stooped over, and recovered the paperback. I flipped towards the back of the book and came face-to-face with Megan. My head pounded as I slumped into the couch, remembering Ed gripping about a misprint of some sort. A third of the chapter on the victims had been misprinted at the back of the book. They knew all about Megan; they found her buried in the basement. I cried for Megan, the young girl I couldn't save after all.

Weeping, frustrated and exhausted, I fell asleep there on the couch.

I jerked awake in the darkened house as the clock struck midnight. The only light came from the kitchen. Terror, cold and painful, filled my chest. I leapt upright so quickly I felt faint and hurried out the door. Running for my car, my feet slipped on the wet grass. I slammed into the side of the Prius and fumbling for my keys. I slid the key into the lock when Megan's tiny hand griped mine. Stilettos of cold paralyzed my muscles. Megan smiled, a cold predatory smile, and twisted my hand violently. The key snapped in two, jamming the lock

I jerked my hand free and bolted for the trees. The air grew cold and fog condensed around us.

***

"I'm going to play." Megan's voice high and menacing floated to me. "And this time I'm going to win!"

I pumped my legs faster, only to see Megan ahead. I turned, lost my footing on the wet grass and tumbled to the ground. The ground knocked the wind from me and I slid across the wet grass until I slammed back-first into a tree.

Despite the tears of pain filling my eyes I watched Megan walk slowly towards me.

I shoved myself to my feet, stumbling, and I tried again to escape. Muscles in my side cramped and I nearly collapsed with pain. I felt her breath, as cold as deep space, on the back of my neck. Her rotting stench filled my nose. Gagging, I fell forward.
 
I fell head over feet into a small hollow. Crashing to the bottom I laid motionless with pain and exhaustion in a puddle of muddy water. Megan walked serenely down the steep, slippery embankment. She moved tracklessly across the wet mud. Her wet hair clung tight to her neck and breasts.

"I'm going to win," she said again.

I tried to get up, but slipped in the slick mud and fell back to the embankment. Scrambling backwards, never taking my eye from her face, I tried to crawl away.

"I didn't do it!" My voice cracked with terror.

"Your blood is his blood, fucker." Megan closed relentlessly. "My terror, and my pain, and my death will be yours, too."

I jumped to my feet and charged past her. Ignoring my pain in my adrenaline-powered flight. Megan tripped me with ease and I fell to the bottom of the hollow. Face-first I landed in the cold water. I tried to get up, but my hands slipped in the mud. Barely, I got my head out of the water as Megan landed on my back, paralyzing me with cold.

"Please..." I blubbered.

"I said that too." She leaned close, her cold breath freezing the back of my neck, the stench of decay almost too much to bear. "Go ahead, beg." She yanked my head back. "Beg for your life. I did."

It would do me as much good as it did her. My heart pounded, my breath came in short jagged gasps and I fought back tears. She wrapped her cold cold fingers around my neck.

I yelped in pain as she bit hard on my ear. Blood flowed freely down the side of my face mixing with the muddy water. Megan laughed. "Come on, this is your last fuck, try and enjoy it!" Her fingers passed into my flesh. I screamed with pain.

"Kill me and no one will ever know." I stuttered through chattering teeth. I had no idea what to say, I just knew I had to say something. She had to respond to something.

"No one knows now, asshole," she hissed, anger and malice making her voice nearly unintelligible. "No one will ever know me now."

"I can change that!" Her fingers receded from my neck. She didn't say or ask anything, but just sat there straddling me; ready to kill.

"I can write your story," I spoke as quickly as I could. I fought to keep my voice level and steady despite the terror and the cold. "People will know who you are, you won't be forgotten."

I pitched her a book. I pitched a book for my life. I promised her fame and anything else I could think of. Her grip continued to slacken. I felt her begin to shake, tiny sobs shaking her body. Vengeance and vanity vied for her soul with my life in the balance.

"It better be everything you say," She finally said. She released my throat and stood. "Every last thing you promised."

***

I'm back in my condo in San Diego. The view from the old El Cortez Hotel is wonderful. The bay is lit up with tour boats at night and I am writing Megan's novel. Megan waits and watches. She exactly the same as the first time I saw her; soaked to the bone, lovely, and terrifying. My editor and publisher aren't sure about the project but they're letting me give it a try. It's the readers that concern me. They are the ones who will determine if I have succeeded.

My life is in their fickle hands.

END

Robert Mitchell Evans hails from the Southeast where he grew up reading far too many books and watching far too many films. After serving in the U.S. Navy, he settled in Southern California where he studied political science, film, and biology. A writer and avid gamer for more than twenty years he currently works in the pharmaceutical industry while pursuing his writing. He lives with his wife, two lovebirds, and a growing collection of books, films, and games. He can be found on the web at http://www.robertmitchellevans.com

Story by Robert Mitchell Evans, Copyright 2009
Image by by Rory Clark, Stopped Motion Photography, Copyright 2009