Well, it's all got to begin somehow...somewhere. They say that the opening paragraph of a book sets the tone for the entire novel. We'll see...
If you haven't read 'A Taste of Home'...this gives nothing away. If you're looking for Chapter 1 of 'A Taste of Home' thats advertised in Trailer 4...keep scrolling
1.
The falling December snow blanketed the tiny North Texas town of Twin Oaks in a manner which only a few of its residents had experienced before. Occasional streaks of the evening sunlight nestled securely behind the slow moving clouds briefly illuminated the accumulating mounds of precipitation to reveal a feeling of purity that was rare to these parts. It wasn’t an everyday winter occurrence that the children of this community got to don their cold weather clothing and venture into what resembled a Norman Rockwell painting come to life or the adults a day off from their jobs at the local air base without it feeling like they were participating in some massive act of absence. This wasn’t the first situation outside the bounds of normalcy for this small community in recent times, though. To be more precise, nothing had been the same for any of them over the past five years.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Monday, December 6, 2010
A Taste of Home...Chapter 1
Why am I doing this? As Bait! Well, at least I'm honest...
This is Chapter 1 of the third and final draft to A Taste of Home. I think I submitted a few mistakes when it went to proofing so there may be some in this version. Don't worry, they don't appear in the printed version...so bear with me.
If you like this and you want to see where it all goes...it can be purchased at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com, or Books A Million.com It should be appearing in other markets shortly.
For more details...go to www.hometownoutcasts.com
Enjoy...
1
The North East Texas drought that had lasted almost a decade had ended and now the rain poured strongly down upon the rusted tin overhang of the building’s roof. The beating rhythm of the liquefied projectiles played out a song that resembled a never ending drum roll to any audience that was close enough to experience the performance. Tonight, it only played for an audience of one. Staying hidden deep within the shadows of the darkened structure, a small boy cowered by the name of Ryan Weldon.
Now Ryan, being a boy of only thirteen, was no stranger to fear and hiding. As a matter of fact, he’d gotten quite used to it. His mother had passed away six months ago in a tragic automobile accident and his own life hadn’t felt the same since. Before her death, he’d been quite the school bully, punching out the smaller children for their lunch money or any other sacred object that they might’ve possessed that would cause them to break down into tears at the mere mention of its loss. Yeah, it was mean, but it was fun. Growing up in a town such as this, sometimes you had to invent your own ways of passing the time. Now…the woman that had given him the breath of life was no longer breathing herself, and he was hiding in the shadows from bolts of lightning that were dozens of miles away. The epitome of bravery…
Soccer practice had ended an hour and a half ago and his father was nowhere to be found. Well, he was nowhere in the vicinity to be more precise. Ryan knew exactly where he was. His father’s newest and most frequent hangout had been the local American Legion which, in all reality, was a mere three blocks away. It’s a great place for veterans to sit and reminisce about their military careers and have a few cold ones. If you were Ryan’s father, however, it was a great place to sit alone and attempt to drink the place dry in the hopes that your dead wife mysteriously rises from the grave and joins you. Sure, Ryan missed his mother too but honoring her memory in deep thought was much better than drowning it. After all, this soccer thing had been his father’s idea in the first place. Through the opaque blackness of the night time thunderstorm, those few blocks felt like miles.
The man had tried to convince him that this would be the best way to introduce himself back into the social graces of the kids his own age that he’d been neglecting since the family tragedy. Ryan knew the true definition of this logic also. This was nothing more than a carefully constructed plan to push him quietly out of the way so his father could spend more time at the bar. So far, it was working. It was now ten o’clock and the only company he had was a rising pool of collected and frigid rain water that was nearing him with every passing second.
Reaching into the already saturated pocket of his athletic shorts, Ryan searched for his cell phone. Speeding through the list of frequently called numbers, he reached the one labeled ‘asshole’. Now, of course, this wasn’t his father’s given birth name…but the only one that would stick out to Ryan when he first received his emergency phone. He pressed the talk button and awaited the inevitable.
“You’ve reached Archie Weldon” the familiar and joyful sounding voice played “and I’m sorry I missed your call. Don’t worry your pretty little head, though, because I’ll be back to you in no time…”
The call went straight to voice mail. He didn’t even bother calling again. By now, his dad was way too drunk to even notice the vibrating phone in his pocket…or if he’d even bothered to bring it in the bar with him. Either way, Ryan was running out of reasons not to begin walking home on his own. The water that was beginning to collect underneath the makeshift shelter was nearing the base of his ankles and he could already feel the cold pouring into his shoes, soaking his socks. Not that he was afraid of getting wet, but being sick this early in the school year was no picnic. The illness wouldn’t kill him but the work he’d have to make up from missing the time would. Sometimes, he thought that his teachers just invented ways to keep him busy, personally, because no other kid that he attended class with ever had any kind of trouble keeping up. Then again, no other kid his age had just lost their mother either. He turned again with his hands on either side of his face in an attempt to block out the glare of the street light above. He saw no movement inside of the building and there was no hope for scamming a ride out of someone that still might have been lingering inside. He was on his own but…Ryan was getting used to it. Taking a deep breath and preparing himself mentally for the icy shower he was about to receive, he stepped forward into the night and left the confines of his flooded hiding spot behind. The first drops of rain slapped him in his face like falling needles, causing a sting that he wasn’t sure if the rest of his body was ready for. That was when he first heard it.
A chilling howl pierced his ears, echoing from all corners of the building, causing his spine to electrify. This made the coldness of the rain feel warm and inviting in comparison. Frightened within an inch of his life, he jumped back underneath the safety of the overhang with his feet splashing loudly in the three inch pool of water that had collected there. Keeping his feet dry was now a lost cause. As another screech of terror filled the night air, his feet became the least of his worries. Cowering back in the darkest corner of the building, just beyond the luminescent glow of the street light, Ryan hid his rain soaked face in his hands.
“What the hell was that?” he thought to himself as his mind raced, searching through an endless sea of possible answers.
No dog or domestic animal that he’d ever heard was capable of such a horrific sound. As a matter of fact, knocking out all of the possibilities of a local, native animal…he’d heard nothing of its kind on the internet or television nature shows he’d seen either. Of course, he never really paid much attention to them, just bits and pieces here and there from school or when he’d wandered into the living room on occasion to turn the volume down on the television after his father had passed out from one of his numerous nights of tying one on. A few minutes had passed since he’d re-entered his saturated sanctuary and, so far, no signs of any animals that would be able to cause him any type of harm. The second sound had seemed further away than the first and whatever it was, logically, was moving in the opposite direction. Still frightened and shaking from the cold, he pulled his face away from his hands. Ryan had been so consumed by attempting to figure out the source of the howling, he hadn’t noticed that his situation had improved slightly. The once fierce downpour had withered away into a light sprinkle and it was the only time that it had done so since the rain had begun nearly two hours ago. Inching forward once again from under the tin overhang and back into the clouded night, he forced himself out into the wet, mud covered lawn with no regards to anything that could be lurking in the darkness. He just wanted to go home.
A bolt of lightning flashed, illuminating his surroundings. The letter ‘C’ had fallen off of the side of the building again from the ‘YMCA’ logo, leaving behind nothing but a rust colored stain that stretched all the way to the ground. He’d always wondered about the birth of the Young Men’s Christian Association, as well as tons of other nonsensical things that a young boy could daydream up when he was supposed to be paying attention in a classroom, and never could quite figure out why it attracted so many people in today’s changing times. To him, it had always reminded him of a recruiting center for unsuspecting altar boys with a line of priests licking their lips and rubbing their hands together in waiting just beyond the sinister shower rooms. Sure, it was a sick and twisted way of thinking, but anything that mentally took the place of what may have been watching him from the line of trees ahead was considered a welcoming thought at this point. Unfortunately, also, his father fell asleep, or passed out, fairly often watching a jewel from his prized horror movie collection. Needless to say, he had been left out of the running for ‘father of the year’.
In order to reach his home, the young teen had to cross two soccer fields with a row of trees between them that were so thick…the opposite field couldn’t at all be recognized in broad daylight let alone pitch darkness. He’d walked this path time and time again in the past few weeks, but those had always been afternoon practices and not nearing the hour of ten o’clock. Now that he thought about it, his father had failed to pick him up from the majority of those also. Why would tonight have been any different? After this night, he told himself, he was going to begin taking things into his own hands and quit relying on his alcoholic dad to be responsible for him. He paused at mid field of the first soccer pitch and glared at the dark line of trees that grew closer and closer with every step. Beyond that, he could see nothing at all. The trees, another field, two streets over and he was home free…or at least that’s all he hoped that lay in waiting between his saturated shoes and the safety of home. If his father truly wasn’t home, he’d have no way into the house but he’d preferred to be stuck out in the elements hiding underneath his own porch rather than one in the vicinity of some wild and crazed animal that he still hadn’t the slightest idea of its whereabouts. It had been at least ten minutes now without hearing anything out of the ordinary. Maybe it had left the area. Maybe, though, it was being purposely quiet…waiting just beyond the shadows…cautiously trying to remain hidden from the young boy that approached and now stood in the center of an open field. Damn his father and his horror movie collection! Ryan recalled the standard line that anyone over the age of sixty had fed him his entire life when it came to the behavior of animals and whether or not there was any danger involved with approaching them.
“They’re just as scared of you as you are of them” they always said “Don’t pay any attention to them and they’ll leave you alone!”
A comforting thought in a desperate time of uncertain fear or for anyone that wasn’t faced with the choice of coming face to face with one in the darkness. The lightning flashed again and, through the skeletal trunks of the trees, he could see the edge of the next field. The flags that marked the out of bounds perimeters were flying violently in the storm driven winds and he knew that it was only a matter of time until the rain would pour down on him again. He noticed nothing at all out of the ordinary and it gave him a glimpse of hope in this otherwise hopeless situation that any kind of fear invading his young brain was the result of a science fiction overload. His heart began to pound a little faster with anticipation, causing warmth to be felt in the tips of his fingers and toes against the cold night air. Leaving his perch at center field, he headed towards the white outline of the soccer goal that was barely visible against the blackness of the oncoming trees.
One foot in front of the other and focusing on the impending possible danger that lay ahead, Ryan stepped into a puddle of collected rain water that masked a divot on the otherwise lovely playing field. His arms flailed wildly and his hands reached in either direction for something tangible to grasp onto to save him, or even soften the impact of the fall, but there was nothing to grab within reach. Gravity had now taken over his fate and he fell forward in an almost ironic sense of slow motion. Suddenly, he both felt and heard the loud crack of his right ankle as it reached the breaking point from being held stationary in the rain caused booby trap. Ryan screamed in pain, only momentarily, as his face smacked the icy cold and wet ground, replacing his crying with a gurgling squeal from receiving a mouth full of mud and water.
Pulling himself up to a semi sitting position, he cried in such a way that couldn’t be compared with recent memory. Only in mental flashes of his young childhood could he relate this feeling of pain and helplessness. There wasn’t a single spot on his body, clothed or bare, that was even remotely dry now. The cold mud crept inside of the legs of his shorts and now every single spot on his body was in some type of major discomfort…including a couple that should never be made uncomfortable. Reaching desperately inside of his pocket, he reached for his cell phone yet again and prayed silently that it wasn’t in an inoperable state of failure.
Fumbling to dial the numbers with numb fingers and a brain full of pain impulses, he called the one number that had been drilled into his head since birth but, luckily, he’d never had to use. 9-1-2. Dammit! The mud from his fingers had slipped on the key pad. 9-1-1. The phone came to life and began ringing as thunder rumbled in the darkness from the imminent return of the rain.
“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?” calmly spoke the dispatcher.
“My name is Ryan Weldon” cried Ryan frantically “and I’m all kinds of screwed up right now. I need some freaking help man!”
“What’s going on Ryan?” inquired the voice on the other end.
“Dude, I was walking across the soccer field and I stepped in a hole or something. I think I broke my leg.”
The dispatcher spoke again.
“Okay, Ryan, try and stay calm” he said in an attempt to comfort him “Where are you right now?”
“Dude” Ryan shot back angrily “I just said I was at the frickin soccer field…are you deaf? Don’t you guys have computers or something that show where I’m at?”
“Ryan” the dispatcher interrupted “you’re going to have to try and stay calm. You’re calling from a cell phone. It doesn’t work like that…at least not in this county. You’re going to have to try and tell me where you are exactly.”
“Man, I’m in the middle of the YMCA soccer field” said Ryan cynically “I’ll be the only one with a wet ass covered in mud and a broken leg. You can’t miss me!”
“Okay, man, just stay calm” repeated the dispatcher.
“Dude, I am staying calm!” Ryan’s voice crackled as he swallowed what was left of the mud.
“Okay, I’m going to get you some help out there but I need to know if you’re on the north filed or the south field.”
“Oh my god, man you’ve got to be kidding me! I don’t know the whole north and south thing. I must’ve dropped my damn compass when I fell over!”
He was beginning to get impatient.
“Just send an ambulance or a cop or something…anything with a flashing light!”
The dispatcher was losing patience also.
“Look, kid, I’m trying to help you but the entrance to one field is three blocks away from the other. If I get an ambulance stuck in the mud on the opposite field from where you are, that won’t be offering you a whole lot of help now, will it?”
Gasping for breath in an attempt to ignore the pain in his leg and gather his composure, Ryan continued.
“It’s the field closest to the building…right before you get to the trees.”
“Okay, little man,” the dispatcher continued “help is on the way. Just try to chill out and stay cool. Can you move at all?”
“I don’t know…I haven’t really tried” Ryan replied curiously “I can barely even see anything from all the mud in my face. Why?”
The dispatcher hesitated.
“No reason, man, just stay cool.”
The creaking wheels in Ryan’s brain began to turn in a logical fashion.
“Don’t pull that crap with me, man” Ryan shot back “What do you know that I don’t?”
“Well…I’m sure it’s nothing, but there have been a lot of calls about wild dogs near where you are tonight.” the dispatcher informed him.
“Yeah, I heard them” Ryan said “All the more reason for you guys to hurry the hell up!”
“They’re coming, just stay on the li……..”
Ryan was tiring of his first official 9-1-1 experience. He hung up. They were on their way and that’s all he cared about. Uncertain of whether or not he should attempt to try and move, he remained completely motionless, causing the cold to reach an almost unbearable state. Off in the distance, he heard the first comforting sound of the evening. The barely audible siren was the signal that help was definitely on its way and what could compare with the worst night of his young life was about to come to an end. He laid backwards into the freezing and muddy field without a care for the condition of his soccer uniform. He was going to make damn sure that his father never heard the end of this one. Chances were though, that he would never really care much to listen to the beginning of the story to even hear the end of anything.
Shooting upwards, he sat again with the reaction speed of a bullet from a gun. Another ear splitting howl came from the direction of the tree line directly ahead of him and it was uncomfortably close to him this time. Lightning flashed overhead revealing the silhouette of the trees again but this time though, through mud stained eyes, he thought he’d seen something new amongst them that hadn’t been there through previous strikes. Frantically, he found a clean spot on his uniform sleeve and wiped his eyes the best he could. Blinking, his vision blurred as another flash of lightening lit up the night sky. In between two of the trees…wait…what the hell is that…a dog?
Reaching underneath his leg with both arms and gritting his painfully cold teeth, he pulled upwards with all of his might. The pain was causing him to become dizzy and nauseated and he choked back a little of the mud that he had previously swallowed. Nearly to the point of blacking out, the vacuum caused by the hole finally gave way as his broken, slime covered ankle flopped forward onto the ground in front of him. Putting all of his weight onto his arms and his good leg, he stumbled forward, falling again onto his hands and knees. Gathering his strength and focusing on the tree line, the lightning flashed again. This time, there was nothing to be seen but the trees. Hopefully, it had all been just an illusion brought on by the now overwhelming pain impulses that filled his body.
He searched his mind frantically for any signs of logic. Was he hallucinating from the pain? He had to be! It was the only explanation or, at least, the only explanation that Ryan was willing to accept that didn’t scare him out of his mind. There was no such thing as a dog that could get as big as what he’d seen in the shadows! It was more like the size of a lion or something of that nature that almost seemed out of place anywhere else but on some type of safari or in a zoo. If that was the case, he’d been lied to, as well as every other kid in this world, by all of the childhood toys that gave a learning of animals and the sounds that they made.
Using his upper body, which was now beginning to give way to exhaustion, Ryan crawled to the goal post of the soccer net. Groaning in pain, he pulled himself up to his feet as the searing impulses clouded his thoughts again. Using the post to lean upon, it felt like someone had taken a railroad spike and hammered it into his lower leg. The siren of the ambulance was nearly on top of him now and he could see the red and blue flashes of light reflecting off of the buildings in the distance. He followed them with his eyes, counting the seconds and attempting to estimate how long it was going to take for the rescue party to arrive. The siren faded and the lights could be seen again…but they were on the other side of the trees! The other side of the damn trees! They’d gone to the wrong field!
Ryan screamed aloud in disbelief.
“Hey, you bastards, I’m over here!”
He could hear some indistinct talking from the men on the other side of the tree line followed by the shutting of a door.
“Hey!” he yelled again.
The engine of the ambulance roared to life again. The tires began spinning but the lights failed to move.
“Great” Ryan said aloud “they’re stuck in the freaking mud!”
He’d had enough. Stepping forward with his strong side and dragging his still pain filled leg; he lunged forward into the tree line that separated him and the unfortunate medical personnel that had bogged down on the old road. Leaning against the closest tree, he could now understand what they were saying. There were two of them…and, right about now, they weren’t having the trophy night of their career.
“Just rock it back and forth, man” one of them yelled to the other.
“No, No, No!” the yelling continued “Man, you’re just burying the damn thing!”
“It’s too heavy!” called the other man, obviously the one behind the wheel.
“Look, keep trying!” the first man said “I’m going to walk through the trees and see if I can find this kid. In the meantime…get on the radio and get a tow truck out here!”
“Alright!” the driver yelled in perturbed agreement.
Against the red and blue flashes of light from the ambulance, Ryan could see the figure of the man walking directly towards him. This nightmare was finally reaching its end and it didn’t matter what happened to the vehicle in the process. He took a few deep breaths and prepared to signal the guy to his location by yelling crazily. The other man beat him to his attention.
“Look out!” the man yelled as the shadowy figure of an animal darted across the field and headed straight for him.
The paramedic turned to run but it was too late. The animal was much faster. He had only gotten about five strides from where he stood before he was tackled fiercely by the large creature, overpowering him almost instantly and taking him down hard to the ground. The man screamed and fought back with all of his might but it didn’t do much good. He had already succumbed to the violent attack and now lay still on the ground, thirty feet away from where Ryan stood terrified for his existence. Suddenly, the animal stood up on his hind legs and began walking towards the immobilized ambulance in a way that no other animal in Ryan’s mind had ever been witnessed before.
Ryan was frightened beyond all rational thought and motor functions and the ill feelings that had plagued him on the soccer fields now returned to his stomach with different intentions. He hid his face once again in his mud soaked shirt and clinched onto one of the ancient trees, praying desperately for some type of comfort. It wasn’t a dog. It wasn’t even an animal. It was walking! Peering out from behind the tree again, the man inside of the ambulance was giving it all he had, slinging mud in all directions in an attempt to get the vehicle moving again.
“No, No, No!!!” the ambulance driver screamed as the creature approached the open window. Ryan hid his eyes again in an attempt to block out the sound that he knew was coming next. There was another gurgling scream and the wheels of the ambulance went quiet again, no longer turning in an attempt to break free from the muck they were stuck in. The creature howled again with its ear piercing cry but this time…it was done so in a sense of triumph. Ryan clutched the tree tighter.
The rain began to fall, drop by drop, until it was pouring from the sky again with tremendous force. The rotting smell from the fallen leaves of the trees began to waft upwards as the ground was bombarded with the water coming from above. Ryan’s stomach lurched upward again and, this time, there was no chance of stopping it. He could hear the downpour pelting against the vinyl, yellow jacket of the medical technician. He still wasn’t moving and there was no sign whatsoever of the one that had been driving the vehicle. The creature had finished whatever he’d been doing with him and was now walking slowly and surely towards the distance in the opposite direction. Just then, the smell of death was stirred up by the new rainfall, reaching Ryan’s nasal cavities, and it was too much for him to handle. He leaned forward and vomited uncontrollably onto the fallen leaves below him.
The creature paused with the echoing sound that it had made. Ryan froze and swallowed whatever remained of the foul tasting substance within his mouth. With his nose high in the air, the creature sniffed it all directions for the source of the disturbance. Slowly, it turned towards the tree line with a piercing gaze as though it was staring directly at him.
“Oh Shit!” Ryan muttered as the creature returned to all fours and sprinted towards his location. Out of instinct, he turned to run but he’d forgotten about the pain in his ankle long ago. Instantly, he fell to the ground once more. The fear was a stronger driving force, though. Again, he jumped to his feet with all of his might but the young boy’s fate was already sealed. Slammed from behind and knocked to the ground by an unspeakable force, the weight of the creature held him motionless on the forest floor.
“Get off me, man! Get the hell off of me!” Ryan desperately screamed but his cries were both unheard and ignored. Something warm dripped onto his neck and the heat of the creatures breath could be felt as it leaned ever closer to the back of his head. His senses were being overpowered by the scent of fresh death that was being emitted by the creatures exhaling and he began a useless plea for what remained of his young life.
“Please don’t kill me man, please don’t…”
Ryan’s final words were interrupted by what felt like hundreds of burning knives being forced deep into the flesh on the back of his neck. As the creature tugged upwards with a force unlike anything he’d experienced before, Ryan’s world began to fade away into nothingness. The darkness began to overpower him and, for once, he thought little of the pain, soccer, or his father… who had been the cause of this situation from the beginning. From now on, his mother would be the one raising him again…but in a place that was beyond comprehension of mortal men. With a final flash of his worldly vision, he had thought he’d seen the distinct image of her standing before him and holding out her hand as if to attempt and pull him free, saving him from this macabre fate that had been bestowed upon him so early in his life. With another stab and pull from the creature’s mouth, that image faded into nothingness also. The darkness was all that remained of any signs of the life he’d known so well as though he were stuck in some type of repetitive dream and in the stages just before waking. When the new light found him, all signs of fear and pain were nonexistent.
This is Chapter 1 of the third and final draft to A Taste of Home. I think I submitted a few mistakes when it went to proofing so there may be some in this version. Don't worry, they don't appear in the printed version...so bear with me.
If you like this and you want to see where it all goes...it can be purchased at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com, or Books A Million.com It should be appearing in other markets shortly.
For more details...go to www.hometownoutcasts.com
Enjoy...
1
The North East Texas drought that had lasted almost a decade had ended and now the rain poured strongly down upon the rusted tin overhang of the building’s roof. The beating rhythm of the liquefied projectiles played out a song that resembled a never ending drum roll to any audience that was close enough to experience the performance. Tonight, it only played for an audience of one. Staying hidden deep within the shadows of the darkened structure, a small boy cowered by the name of Ryan Weldon.
Now Ryan, being a boy of only thirteen, was no stranger to fear and hiding. As a matter of fact, he’d gotten quite used to it. His mother had passed away six months ago in a tragic automobile accident and his own life hadn’t felt the same since. Before her death, he’d been quite the school bully, punching out the smaller children for their lunch money or any other sacred object that they might’ve possessed that would cause them to break down into tears at the mere mention of its loss. Yeah, it was mean, but it was fun. Growing up in a town such as this, sometimes you had to invent your own ways of passing the time. Now…the woman that had given him the breath of life was no longer breathing herself, and he was hiding in the shadows from bolts of lightning that were dozens of miles away. The epitome of bravery…
Soccer practice had ended an hour and a half ago and his father was nowhere to be found. Well, he was nowhere in the vicinity to be more precise. Ryan knew exactly where he was. His father’s newest and most frequent hangout had been the local American Legion which, in all reality, was a mere three blocks away. It’s a great place for veterans to sit and reminisce about their military careers and have a few cold ones. If you were Ryan’s father, however, it was a great place to sit alone and attempt to drink the place dry in the hopes that your dead wife mysteriously rises from the grave and joins you. Sure, Ryan missed his mother too but honoring her memory in deep thought was much better than drowning it. After all, this soccer thing had been his father’s idea in the first place. Through the opaque blackness of the night time thunderstorm, those few blocks felt like miles.
The man had tried to convince him that this would be the best way to introduce himself back into the social graces of the kids his own age that he’d been neglecting since the family tragedy. Ryan knew the true definition of this logic also. This was nothing more than a carefully constructed plan to push him quietly out of the way so his father could spend more time at the bar. So far, it was working. It was now ten o’clock and the only company he had was a rising pool of collected and frigid rain water that was nearing him with every passing second.
Reaching into the already saturated pocket of his athletic shorts, Ryan searched for his cell phone. Speeding through the list of frequently called numbers, he reached the one labeled ‘asshole’. Now, of course, this wasn’t his father’s given birth name…but the only one that would stick out to Ryan when he first received his emergency phone. He pressed the talk button and awaited the inevitable.
“You’ve reached Archie Weldon” the familiar and joyful sounding voice played “and I’m sorry I missed your call. Don’t worry your pretty little head, though, because I’ll be back to you in no time…”
The call went straight to voice mail. He didn’t even bother calling again. By now, his dad was way too drunk to even notice the vibrating phone in his pocket…or if he’d even bothered to bring it in the bar with him. Either way, Ryan was running out of reasons not to begin walking home on his own. The water that was beginning to collect underneath the makeshift shelter was nearing the base of his ankles and he could already feel the cold pouring into his shoes, soaking his socks. Not that he was afraid of getting wet, but being sick this early in the school year was no picnic. The illness wouldn’t kill him but the work he’d have to make up from missing the time would. Sometimes, he thought that his teachers just invented ways to keep him busy, personally, because no other kid that he attended class with ever had any kind of trouble keeping up. Then again, no other kid his age had just lost their mother either. He turned again with his hands on either side of his face in an attempt to block out the glare of the street light above. He saw no movement inside of the building and there was no hope for scamming a ride out of someone that still might have been lingering inside. He was on his own but…Ryan was getting used to it. Taking a deep breath and preparing himself mentally for the icy shower he was about to receive, he stepped forward into the night and left the confines of his flooded hiding spot behind. The first drops of rain slapped him in his face like falling needles, causing a sting that he wasn’t sure if the rest of his body was ready for. That was when he first heard it.
A chilling howl pierced his ears, echoing from all corners of the building, causing his spine to electrify. This made the coldness of the rain feel warm and inviting in comparison. Frightened within an inch of his life, he jumped back underneath the safety of the overhang with his feet splashing loudly in the three inch pool of water that had collected there. Keeping his feet dry was now a lost cause. As another screech of terror filled the night air, his feet became the least of his worries. Cowering back in the darkest corner of the building, just beyond the luminescent glow of the street light, Ryan hid his rain soaked face in his hands.
“What the hell was that?” he thought to himself as his mind raced, searching through an endless sea of possible answers.
No dog or domestic animal that he’d ever heard was capable of such a horrific sound. As a matter of fact, knocking out all of the possibilities of a local, native animal…he’d heard nothing of its kind on the internet or television nature shows he’d seen either. Of course, he never really paid much attention to them, just bits and pieces here and there from school or when he’d wandered into the living room on occasion to turn the volume down on the television after his father had passed out from one of his numerous nights of tying one on. A few minutes had passed since he’d re-entered his saturated sanctuary and, so far, no signs of any animals that would be able to cause him any type of harm. The second sound had seemed further away than the first and whatever it was, logically, was moving in the opposite direction. Still frightened and shaking from the cold, he pulled his face away from his hands. Ryan had been so consumed by attempting to figure out the source of the howling, he hadn’t noticed that his situation had improved slightly. The once fierce downpour had withered away into a light sprinkle and it was the only time that it had done so since the rain had begun nearly two hours ago. Inching forward once again from under the tin overhang and back into the clouded night, he forced himself out into the wet, mud covered lawn with no regards to anything that could be lurking in the darkness. He just wanted to go home.
A bolt of lightning flashed, illuminating his surroundings. The letter ‘C’ had fallen off of the side of the building again from the ‘YMCA’ logo, leaving behind nothing but a rust colored stain that stretched all the way to the ground. He’d always wondered about the birth of the Young Men’s Christian Association, as well as tons of other nonsensical things that a young boy could daydream up when he was supposed to be paying attention in a classroom, and never could quite figure out why it attracted so many people in today’s changing times. To him, it had always reminded him of a recruiting center for unsuspecting altar boys with a line of priests licking their lips and rubbing their hands together in waiting just beyond the sinister shower rooms. Sure, it was a sick and twisted way of thinking, but anything that mentally took the place of what may have been watching him from the line of trees ahead was considered a welcoming thought at this point. Unfortunately, also, his father fell asleep, or passed out, fairly often watching a jewel from his prized horror movie collection. Needless to say, he had been left out of the running for ‘father of the year’.
In order to reach his home, the young teen had to cross two soccer fields with a row of trees between them that were so thick…the opposite field couldn’t at all be recognized in broad daylight let alone pitch darkness. He’d walked this path time and time again in the past few weeks, but those had always been afternoon practices and not nearing the hour of ten o’clock. Now that he thought about it, his father had failed to pick him up from the majority of those also. Why would tonight have been any different? After this night, he told himself, he was going to begin taking things into his own hands and quit relying on his alcoholic dad to be responsible for him. He paused at mid field of the first soccer pitch and glared at the dark line of trees that grew closer and closer with every step. Beyond that, he could see nothing at all. The trees, another field, two streets over and he was home free…or at least that’s all he hoped that lay in waiting between his saturated shoes and the safety of home. If his father truly wasn’t home, he’d have no way into the house but he’d preferred to be stuck out in the elements hiding underneath his own porch rather than one in the vicinity of some wild and crazed animal that he still hadn’t the slightest idea of its whereabouts. It had been at least ten minutes now without hearing anything out of the ordinary. Maybe it had left the area. Maybe, though, it was being purposely quiet…waiting just beyond the shadows…cautiously trying to remain hidden from the young boy that approached and now stood in the center of an open field. Damn his father and his horror movie collection! Ryan recalled the standard line that anyone over the age of sixty had fed him his entire life when it came to the behavior of animals and whether or not there was any danger involved with approaching them.
“They’re just as scared of you as you are of them” they always said “Don’t pay any attention to them and they’ll leave you alone!”
A comforting thought in a desperate time of uncertain fear or for anyone that wasn’t faced with the choice of coming face to face with one in the darkness. The lightning flashed again and, through the skeletal trunks of the trees, he could see the edge of the next field. The flags that marked the out of bounds perimeters were flying violently in the storm driven winds and he knew that it was only a matter of time until the rain would pour down on him again. He noticed nothing at all out of the ordinary and it gave him a glimpse of hope in this otherwise hopeless situation that any kind of fear invading his young brain was the result of a science fiction overload. His heart began to pound a little faster with anticipation, causing warmth to be felt in the tips of his fingers and toes against the cold night air. Leaving his perch at center field, he headed towards the white outline of the soccer goal that was barely visible against the blackness of the oncoming trees.
One foot in front of the other and focusing on the impending possible danger that lay ahead, Ryan stepped into a puddle of collected rain water that masked a divot on the otherwise lovely playing field. His arms flailed wildly and his hands reached in either direction for something tangible to grasp onto to save him, or even soften the impact of the fall, but there was nothing to grab within reach. Gravity had now taken over his fate and he fell forward in an almost ironic sense of slow motion. Suddenly, he both felt and heard the loud crack of his right ankle as it reached the breaking point from being held stationary in the rain caused booby trap. Ryan screamed in pain, only momentarily, as his face smacked the icy cold and wet ground, replacing his crying with a gurgling squeal from receiving a mouth full of mud and water.
Pulling himself up to a semi sitting position, he cried in such a way that couldn’t be compared with recent memory. Only in mental flashes of his young childhood could he relate this feeling of pain and helplessness. There wasn’t a single spot on his body, clothed or bare, that was even remotely dry now. The cold mud crept inside of the legs of his shorts and now every single spot on his body was in some type of major discomfort…including a couple that should never be made uncomfortable. Reaching desperately inside of his pocket, he reached for his cell phone yet again and prayed silently that it wasn’t in an inoperable state of failure.
Fumbling to dial the numbers with numb fingers and a brain full of pain impulses, he called the one number that had been drilled into his head since birth but, luckily, he’d never had to use. 9-1-2. Dammit! The mud from his fingers had slipped on the key pad. 9-1-1. The phone came to life and began ringing as thunder rumbled in the darkness from the imminent return of the rain.
“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?” calmly spoke the dispatcher.
“My name is Ryan Weldon” cried Ryan frantically “and I’m all kinds of screwed up right now. I need some freaking help man!”
“What’s going on Ryan?” inquired the voice on the other end.
“Dude, I was walking across the soccer field and I stepped in a hole or something. I think I broke my leg.”
The dispatcher spoke again.
“Okay, Ryan, try and stay calm” he said in an attempt to comfort him “Where are you right now?”
“Dude” Ryan shot back angrily “I just said I was at the frickin soccer field…are you deaf? Don’t you guys have computers or something that show where I’m at?”
“Ryan” the dispatcher interrupted “you’re going to have to try and stay calm. You’re calling from a cell phone. It doesn’t work like that…at least not in this county. You’re going to have to try and tell me where you are exactly.”
“Man, I’m in the middle of the YMCA soccer field” said Ryan cynically “I’ll be the only one with a wet ass covered in mud and a broken leg. You can’t miss me!”
“Okay, man, just stay calm” repeated the dispatcher.
“Dude, I am staying calm!” Ryan’s voice crackled as he swallowed what was left of the mud.
“Okay, I’m going to get you some help out there but I need to know if you’re on the north filed or the south field.”
“Oh my god, man you’ve got to be kidding me! I don’t know the whole north and south thing. I must’ve dropped my damn compass when I fell over!”
He was beginning to get impatient.
“Just send an ambulance or a cop or something…anything with a flashing light!”
The dispatcher was losing patience also.
“Look, kid, I’m trying to help you but the entrance to one field is three blocks away from the other. If I get an ambulance stuck in the mud on the opposite field from where you are, that won’t be offering you a whole lot of help now, will it?”
Gasping for breath in an attempt to ignore the pain in his leg and gather his composure, Ryan continued.
“It’s the field closest to the building…right before you get to the trees.”
“Okay, little man,” the dispatcher continued “help is on the way. Just try to chill out and stay cool. Can you move at all?”
“I don’t know…I haven’t really tried” Ryan replied curiously “I can barely even see anything from all the mud in my face. Why?”
The dispatcher hesitated.
“No reason, man, just stay cool.”
The creaking wheels in Ryan’s brain began to turn in a logical fashion.
“Don’t pull that crap with me, man” Ryan shot back “What do you know that I don’t?”
“Well…I’m sure it’s nothing, but there have been a lot of calls about wild dogs near where you are tonight.” the dispatcher informed him.
“Yeah, I heard them” Ryan said “All the more reason for you guys to hurry the hell up!”
“They’re coming, just stay on the li……..”
Ryan was tiring of his first official 9-1-1 experience. He hung up. They were on their way and that’s all he cared about. Uncertain of whether or not he should attempt to try and move, he remained completely motionless, causing the cold to reach an almost unbearable state. Off in the distance, he heard the first comforting sound of the evening. The barely audible siren was the signal that help was definitely on its way and what could compare with the worst night of his young life was about to come to an end. He laid backwards into the freezing and muddy field without a care for the condition of his soccer uniform. He was going to make damn sure that his father never heard the end of this one. Chances were though, that he would never really care much to listen to the beginning of the story to even hear the end of anything.
Shooting upwards, he sat again with the reaction speed of a bullet from a gun. Another ear splitting howl came from the direction of the tree line directly ahead of him and it was uncomfortably close to him this time. Lightning flashed overhead revealing the silhouette of the trees again but this time though, through mud stained eyes, he thought he’d seen something new amongst them that hadn’t been there through previous strikes. Frantically, he found a clean spot on his uniform sleeve and wiped his eyes the best he could. Blinking, his vision blurred as another flash of lightening lit up the night sky. In between two of the trees…wait…what the hell is that…a dog?
Reaching underneath his leg with both arms and gritting his painfully cold teeth, he pulled upwards with all of his might. The pain was causing him to become dizzy and nauseated and he choked back a little of the mud that he had previously swallowed. Nearly to the point of blacking out, the vacuum caused by the hole finally gave way as his broken, slime covered ankle flopped forward onto the ground in front of him. Putting all of his weight onto his arms and his good leg, he stumbled forward, falling again onto his hands and knees. Gathering his strength and focusing on the tree line, the lightning flashed again. This time, there was nothing to be seen but the trees. Hopefully, it had all been just an illusion brought on by the now overwhelming pain impulses that filled his body.
He searched his mind frantically for any signs of logic. Was he hallucinating from the pain? He had to be! It was the only explanation or, at least, the only explanation that Ryan was willing to accept that didn’t scare him out of his mind. There was no such thing as a dog that could get as big as what he’d seen in the shadows! It was more like the size of a lion or something of that nature that almost seemed out of place anywhere else but on some type of safari or in a zoo. If that was the case, he’d been lied to, as well as every other kid in this world, by all of the childhood toys that gave a learning of animals and the sounds that they made.
Using his upper body, which was now beginning to give way to exhaustion, Ryan crawled to the goal post of the soccer net. Groaning in pain, he pulled himself up to his feet as the searing impulses clouded his thoughts again. Using the post to lean upon, it felt like someone had taken a railroad spike and hammered it into his lower leg. The siren of the ambulance was nearly on top of him now and he could see the red and blue flashes of light reflecting off of the buildings in the distance. He followed them with his eyes, counting the seconds and attempting to estimate how long it was going to take for the rescue party to arrive. The siren faded and the lights could be seen again…but they were on the other side of the trees! The other side of the damn trees! They’d gone to the wrong field!
Ryan screamed aloud in disbelief.
“Hey, you bastards, I’m over here!”
He could hear some indistinct talking from the men on the other side of the tree line followed by the shutting of a door.
“Hey!” he yelled again.
The engine of the ambulance roared to life again. The tires began spinning but the lights failed to move.
“Great” Ryan said aloud “they’re stuck in the freaking mud!”
He’d had enough. Stepping forward with his strong side and dragging his still pain filled leg; he lunged forward into the tree line that separated him and the unfortunate medical personnel that had bogged down on the old road. Leaning against the closest tree, he could now understand what they were saying. There were two of them…and, right about now, they weren’t having the trophy night of their career.
“Just rock it back and forth, man” one of them yelled to the other.
“No, No, No!” the yelling continued “Man, you’re just burying the damn thing!”
“It’s too heavy!” called the other man, obviously the one behind the wheel.
“Look, keep trying!” the first man said “I’m going to walk through the trees and see if I can find this kid. In the meantime…get on the radio and get a tow truck out here!”
“Alright!” the driver yelled in perturbed agreement.
Against the red and blue flashes of light from the ambulance, Ryan could see the figure of the man walking directly towards him. This nightmare was finally reaching its end and it didn’t matter what happened to the vehicle in the process. He took a few deep breaths and prepared to signal the guy to his location by yelling crazily. The other man beat him to his attention.
“Look out!” the man yelled as the shadowy figure of an animal darted across the field and headed straight for him.
The paramedic turned to run but it was too late. The animal was much faster. He had only gotten about five strides from where he stood before he was tackled fiercely by the large creature, overpowering him almost instantly and taking him down hard to the ground. The man screamed and fought back with all of his might but it didn’t do much good. He had already succumbed to the violent attack and now lay still on the ground, thirty feet away from where Ryan stood terrified for his existence. Suddenly, the animal stood up on his hind legs and began walking towards the immobilized ambulance in a way that no other animal in Ryan’s mind had ever been witnessed before.
Ryan was frightened beyond all rational thought and motor functions and the ill feelings that had plagued him on the soccer fields now returned to his stomach with different intentions. He hid his face once again in his mud soaked shirt and clinched onto one of the ancient trees, praying desperately for some type of comfort. It wasn’t a dog. It wasn’t even an animal. It was walking! Peering out from behind the tree again, the man inside of the ambulance was giving it all he had, slinging mud in all directions in an attempt to get the vehicle moving again.
“No, No, No!!!” the ambulance driver screamed as the creature approached the open window. Ryan hid his eyes again in an attempt to block out the sound that he knew was coming next. There was another gurgling scream and the wheels of the ambulance went quiet again, no longer turning in an attempt to break free from the muck they were stuck in. The creature howled again with its ear piercing cry but this time…it was done so in a sense of triumph. Ryan clutched the tree tighter.
The rain began to fall, drop by drop, until it was pouring from the sky again with tremendous force. The rotting smell from the fallen leaves of the trees began to waft upwards as the ground was bombarded with the water coming from above. Ryan’s stomach lurched upward again and, this time, there was no chance of stopping it. He could hear the downpour pelting against the vinyl, yellow jacket of the medical technician. He still wasn’t moving and there was no sign whatsoever of the one that had been driving the vehicle. The creature had finished whatever he’d been doing with him and was now walking slowly and surely towards the distance in the opposite direction. Just then, the smell of death was stirred up by the new rainfall, reaching Ryan’s nasal cavities, and it was too much for him to handle. He leaned forward and vomited uncontrollably onto the fallen leaves below him.
The creature paused with the echoing sound that it had made. Ryan froze and swallowed whatever remained of the foul tasting substance within his mouth. With his nose high in the air, the creature sniffed it all directions for the source of the disturbance. Slowly, it turned towards the tree line with a piercing gaze as though it was staring directly at him.
“Oh Shit!” Ryan muttered as the creature returned to all fours and sprinted towards his location. Out of instinct, he turned to run but he’d forgotten about the pain in his ankle long ago. Instantly, he fell to the ground once more. The fear was a stronger driving force, though. Again, he jumped to his feet with all of his might but the young boy’s fate was already sealed. Slammed from behind and knocked to the ground by an unspeakable force, the weight of the creature held him motionless on the forest floor.
“Get off me, man! Get the hell off of me!” Ryan desperately screamed but his cries were both unheard and ignored. Something warm dripped onto his neck and the heat of the creatures breath could be felt as it leaned ever closer to the back of his head. His senses were being overpowered by the scent of fresh death that was being emitted by the creatures exhaling and he began a useless plea for what remained of his young life.
“Please don’t kill me man, please don’t…”
Ryan’s final words were interrupted by what felt like hundreds of burning knives being forced deep into the flesh on the back of his neck. As the creature tugged upwards with a force unlike anything he’d experienced before, Ryan’s world began to fade away into nothingness. The darkness began to overpower him and, for once, he thought little of the pain, soccer, or his father… who had been the cause of this situation from the beginning. From now on, his mother would be the one raising him again…but in a place that was beyond comprehension of mortal men. With a final flash of his worldly vision, he had thought he’d seen the distinct image of her standing before him and holding out her hand as if to attempt and pull him free, saving him from this macabre fate that had been bestowed upon him so early in his life. With another stab and pull from the creature’s mouth, that image faded into nothingness also. The darkness was all that remained of any signs of the life he’d known so well as though he were stuck in some type of repetitive dream and in the stages just before waking. When the new light found him, all signs of fear and pain were nonexistent.
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