Marredbury Episode 11

Lurking Shadows

Marredbury is a serial anthology. Episodes include the found digital artifacts of Carla Bird in New Town Marredbury. followed by the files encrypted by her grandmother in Old Town Marredbury. See a full description and start from the beginning here if you are new to the series.

Hi Readers,

We’re on episode 11! Only two more left.
I really love the pairing of this segment of Carla’s plot with the short story. I’ve tried to rearrange the stories a few times, but can’t separate these two.

The short story is a bit rougher. I wrote this one based on a first line prompt years ago and have enjoyed so many elements in what came out of the prompt. The first line being one, still unchanged from the original prompt given. I also love the character relationships in this one as well as the horror references. It was running short for a while, but I couldn’t figure out what was missing. My writing group helped me out with this one, though I know it’s still not there yet. As always, all feedback is welcomed! I’m still learning.

Because this one is a rougher draft, it is not ready to be put into audio. I appreciate my paid subscribers for their patience with the audio versions. You haven’t been able to enjoy audio for a couple episodes! Next month, the audio is ready to go 😉

I’ll end my intro here. If you missed an episode, you can find it in the table of contents here. Get caught up before episode 13!

Episode 11

Run

Photo by Iucas Favre

Thomas hadn’t expected to be alive when the town’s time capsule was opened. He expected to be six under, or perhaps four feet because the digger had grown tired, with worms having long ago abandoned his rotted away flesh so only his bones remained to mingle with the rocks and decomposing leaves.

It had been twenty-five years since the town’s bicentennial celebration. Twenty-five years since government officials, teachers, factory workers, and children alike had placed their belongings in the four and a half foot tall metal tube. Thomas never had a chance to add his trinket to the capsule. He never saw it buried. He’d left Marredbury twenty-five years ago— ran. He and his mother disappeared into the mountains of Northern California. Away from Thomas’s only friend. Away from him.

For two and a half decades, that man haunted his dreams. Thomas could still picture his face, the whole scene seared in his memory, seen through a slat in a fence across the street from Devika’s house.

Thomas approached the crowd. A new mayor stood on the makeshift stage in town square. She waved and smiled to the people waiting for the capsule to be opened and then turned to talk to the man standing beside her. That man looked nothing like the man of Thomas’s nightmares. The man beside the mayor stood taller and had a stronger jaw line.

Peels of laughter sounded behind Thomas. He jolted and snapped his gaze over his shoulder. Had he expected a shriek of an attack? His nerves made him too jumpy. An older woman eyed him. Thomas couldn’t decide if it would be better or worse to draw attention to himself.

He didn’t have time to figure it out. He had to find Devika.

Thomas only visited Devika’s house the one time, despite having grown close through middle school. They never invited each other over to their homes. That was the biggest part of their friendship that worked. Thomas’s mother refused guests ever since she struggled to get out of bed. At the same time, she feared letting Thomas visit his friends. His father had come home too many times with stories of molestations during sleepovers, kidnappings during solitary walks home. One curse of having a cop as a father, another being him killed in the line of duty. That’s when his mother had crawled into bed.

Thomas never asked Devika why she didn’t invite him over and she never asked him. They spent their classes and breaks discussing about horror.

“What’s your favorite movie?” Devika perched on top of one of the dozen picnic benches arranged under a large oak tree for students to sit outside and eat lunch. Thomas and Devika had a table to themselves, a symphony of preteen cackles surrounding them.

Thomas thought back to the last horror movie he had seen. Must have been something with his dad, but he couldn’t remember. “My mom is scared of those movies, so I don’t watch them much. I mostly read. I just finished Rosemary’s Baby. I liked it.”

“The movie is good too.” Devika took a bite of a small carrot, a resounding snap like the crack of a bone. “Maybe they’ll play it at the theaters on one of those classic movie nights. We could watch it together.”

Thomas shrugged.

“I saw The Ring last weekend. The ending was terrifying.” Devika gave him a mischevious grin.

“I think I’ve seen those commercials on TV.” Thomas smirked.

“So what’s your favorite horror book then?” Devika dug for another carrot from the bag in her hand.

She wouldn’t know the book. No one did. Thomas found it in a box of his dad’s stuff, a worn paperback with a goofy grinning demon on the cover. His reads further weakend the spin of the book until he could bend the pages all the way around. “The Drive In.”

Devika’s gaze flicked up from her carrots. “By Joe R Lansdale?”

Thomas frowned. “You know it?”

“It’s supposed to be the better of the splatterpunk era. More serial killer fiction than gore, I hear. Most of those books written in the 80s are overly gross and sexist. You really just need to read one to know them all, but I’ve never been able to find Lansdale at the library.”

They ate their lunch without speaking for a moment. Thomas enjoyed her quiet company just as much as their talking. He spotted an old friend from elementary school playing basketball. They hadn’t hung out much since they started middle school, but today Thomas didn’t care.

“All that gore might become popular again if those murders keep happening,” Devika said.

“Popular?” Thomas raised an eyebrow.

“That’s how it usually works, you know. Whatever is happening in the world drives the trends in pop culture. The Satanic Panic in the 80s and 90s. The broadcast of War of the Worlds in the 30s. Twilight.”

Thomas smirked. “What murders, though?” Crime news wasn’t often on at home. It upset her mother.

“You haven’t heard?” Devika’s eyes widened. She leaned closer and softened her tone. “College girls are being killed. They’ve found three so far. The police officially released that they are looking for one suspect. A real serial killer.”

“That’s terrifying.”

Devika nodded and chewed her last carrot. She closed the bag and set it down beside her. “Totally scary. Makes people want to get lost in the fiction of it all, forget about the real fear.”

“You really like this horror stuff?”

Devika shrugged. “It’s a distraction.”

Thomas opened the candy package, the last of his lunch. He emptied half into his palm and offered the rest to Devika. Her fingers brushed his palm as she scooped the snack up with a quick thanks. Together, they dropped one into their mouth. Thomas enjoyed the sweet liquid center washing over his tongue. Devika giggled and ate a second.

Thomas noticed The Drive in on his bookshelf a couple months later. He and Devika had been spending lunches together everyday. He enjoyed the animated way she talked about horror, the flash behind her eyes when she had an opportunity to teach him something about the genre. Books, movies, music. She was a trove of information. Her passion warmed him even as the days grew colder. So, he grabbed the book and tossed it in his backpack.

The next day, sitting at their regular lunch table, Thomas offered her the book.

“I’ve never seen this cover before.” Devika ran her fingers over the block letters of the author’s name and then turned the book on its side to examine the creased spine. Her shoulder pressed against hi and he could feel her warmth. She looked to Thomas with a wide smile. “Thank you.”

“I expect a full report once you’ve finished.” Thomas’s cheeks warmed. He’d been nervous to give her the book, worried what she would think.

“You won’t get me to shut up.” She slid the book into her backpack.

Thomas paced the outer edge of the crowd. Town hall shaded the mayor and capsule as the sun began an early decent past afternoon. His heart thudded, like he was thirteen again and fearing for his life. Every scuff of a shoe took him back to his mad dash to his bicycle, Devika at his heels and the man not far behind. The clearing of a throat made him flinch. It sounded just like the officer. The one with the soiled handkerchief that he continually ran over his sweating forehead as he listened to his and Devika’s story. The cops hadn’t believed them at first, thought it was all a prank, just two bored kids.

His mother saw the terror behind his eyes. She understood.

Thomas wiped his sweaty palms down the side of his legs and studied the sea of unfamiliar faces. He didn’t recognize anyone yet. Initially, the crowd seemed like a good idea, lost of people, lots of witnesses. But now Thomas caught a glimpse of his face in the corner of his eye, slipping from view before he could get a good enough look. Fear twisted his vision as his breaths grew shallow.

He should have found Devika by now. Had he been foolish to believe her letter? Was he too late?

She wouldn’t call for him if she didn’t need him. Thomas couldn’t say no. The last time he had been worried about Devika had been twenty-five years ago.

She hadn’t shown up for school for a couple days. Thomas missed her. They could sit quiet on days one of them needed space. Thomas had his low days, the days the world pressed on him, he missed his father, worried about his mother, had tests in half his classes with a final essay due in biology that he hadn’t started yet. Just as they never invited each other to their houses, they never questioned their quiet. Devika had her low days also, days that she arrived to school with bloodshot eyes and extra layers despite the warm weather. They each shared what they wanted to share and didn’t ask for more.

When the two days turned into a week, he grew worried. She didn’t answer her phone or emails.

After two weeks, he broke the unspoken rule of their friendship. He stopped by her house.

Thomas found her address on a magazine she lent him and he rode his bike to her. She lived in a neighborhood across town, though their town wasn’t very large. Her neighborhood was newer than Thomas’s, the houses bigger, lawns better manicured. The sun set below the surrounding hills and he peddled faster. His mother would throw a fit when he got him. A murderer was loose in town. Didn’t he understand the danger. But Thomas needed to know Devika was okay, needed to see his best friend.

Thomas knocked on her door, nerves quivering in his gut. He had crossed their boundary. She may be upset. She may not want to be his friend anymore.

Devika answered. She opened the door just enough to fit through the crack, stood on the porch beside Thomas, and closed the door behind her.

“What are you doing here?” She hugged her arms over the school mascot printed on her sweatshirt. Thomas couldn’t see clearly in the twilight, but he could almost make out the dark bruise across her jawline.

“You haven’t been coming to school,” he said.

Devika brushed her black hair over her shoulder, masking the bruise Thomas was now certain was there. She wouldn’t meet his eye, just looked over his shoulder.

“What happened?” he asked. “Did someone at school hit you?” At school Thomas rarely asked personal questioned. They talked about horror and complained about classes, but the intimacy of Devika’s porch fueled Thomas’s voice. He just wanted his friend to be safe.

She shook her head.

Thomas swallowed as her secret cleared in his mind. If not someone at school, then someone at home.

“Was it your dad?” He could take Devika home with him. His mother would forgive him. Devika could stay with them until they found her help.

She shook her head again. “He kicked her out. I’m okay now, really.”

He nodded. “You can tell me these things. I’m here for you, ya know.”

She watched him with tears in her eyes. Her lips parted, like she would speak, but no words came out. After a moment, Thomas opened his mouth to ask his own questions. They had been hiding pieces of themselves from each other, denying their closeness to avoid vulnerability. Not anymore. Devika’s injury was Thomas’s. He thought of his father, a man who gave his life to keep others safe, to keep strangers safe. The least Thomas could do was protect his best friend.

The questions perched on his tongue, but Devika stopped them from leaving. She pressed her lips to his. Thomas stuttered back in surprise and Devika grabbed his shoulders. They separated, her hands warming his skin through the fabric of his t-shirt. A small smile lifted the corners of Devika’s mouth. Thomas craved for more. He leaned in for another kiss until a cry froze them both.

Glass shattered, the break echoing from across the street, followed by a shriek. Devika released him and they both turned to the noise. Another scream. A woman. Thomas’s blood chilled.

Devika had written him. They hadn’t spoken since they fled. Thomas had tried. He tracked down family, sent letters, left a phone number, but she never reached out. Wen he received a small envelope in the mail, he recognized the quick scrawl of her handwriting. How had she even found him? He hadn’t tried to contact her in years, had moved several times since then. Thomas should have been concerned that if she found him then their nightmare man could too, but a part of him was comforted by the loops of her i's and slant of her s’s. The sight of them returned him to a time he had felt safer. He hadn’t ached for home until he found that envelope in his P.O. box.

There was no return address on the envelope. Thomas understood the precaution, but if he had an address he would have answered her, would have suggested they meet somewhere other than Marredbury. Why their hometown? They could have met at Disneyland or the Golden Gate Bridge. He’d been meaning to plan a family trip anyway. Did Devika have kids now? Was she happy?

I need you. Come home. Please.

Thomas held the note with trembling hands. The paper had soften from multiple folding and unfolding. The mayor stepped up to the podium and welcomed everyone to the event. The people around Thomas quieted their conversations. Hushed voices hummed through the crowd. Every nerve in his body alarmed. He couldn’t not show up, couldn’t just leave her in that town by herself.

The mayor continued. “I feel so honored to be a part of this moment of history, this chance to travel through time.”

That night on Devika’s porch had changed their lives. Across the street, a woman screamed, nothing Thomas had ever read about in his books, never heard replicated by actresses in the movies, true terror.

Devika darted across the street to investigate. Thomas’s eyes widened as he watched her retreating form. The scream quieted. The entire block seemed to hold its breath, not a dog barking or phone ringing. The silence pricked at Thomas’s nerves as Devika ran toward the danger. He should have called out to her, but he feared what would happen if the silence was broken, feared someone would overhear, would discover two kids standing outside witnessing the scream.

He followed her. Never split up. Horror taught him that. He joined her at the fence line, giving her a look that shared his fear and outrage with her. She bit her bottom lip, shrugged an apology, and then turned to the fence. The slats were wide enough to peer through and they each pressed their faces to the crack. Thomas struggled to make out the shadowed backyard through the slender gap. The night chilled the air as the sun finished setting, but he knew his goosebumps weren’t caused by the cold. The news report Devika had shared with him flashed through his mind. College girls slaughtered. The police suspect one culprit. At school, surrounded by the noise of their classmates and the sun beaming down on them, their discussion of a town serial killer had been a morbid curiosity. Just two calloused kids who had read too many books and watched too many movies. Just stories where the hero was safe from harm.

The dark backyard before him, the plot of this murder mystery slipped away. Thomas had to race back to his bike and pedal home until his legs burned from the effort. He would crawl into bed with his mother, safe under the covers. In the dark, this threat was real, the killer wasn’t a villain in a story, but a living, breathing monster, and they had snuck into his grasp.

Thomas opened his mouth to whisper his concerns, but it had dried, his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth. He swallowed painfully and then caught the sight of movement in the neighbor’s backyard.

“Twenty-five years ago, our children captured the beauty that was our town. They brought our community together and built this time capsule with plans to show their children the world they grew up in.” The mayor smiled at the crowd. Thomas recognized the crinkle of her eyes when her cheeks lifted, a flicker of the life he had left behind. She continued. “Twenty-five years ago, our children already knew how much our world would be changing, that there would be pieces that would slip away from us, things we will miss.”

She approached the capsule. The people watching pressed forward. Cameras pointed toward the tall cylinder as the mayor put on plastic gloves, twisted the lid and opened the capsule. The late afternoon sun glimmered, revealing the auburn in her hair. A couple several feet from Thomas laughed at some unheard joke. This mayor, this world, hadn’t been the one that Thomas left, the one where a different mayor had to reassure the town that the police would catch a serial killer.

The people around Thomas had long forgotten the fear twenty-five years ago. They anticipated a walk down memory lane with gaiety and happy tears, no concern at all for the killer that had never been caught. The murders had stopped after that night at Devika’s house, but no one stood trial.

Thomas found himself alone in the middle of the crowd, trembling and wishing for his mother just as he had so many years ago. A wide smile spread across the mayor’s face, not mischievous like Devika’s, but warm and inviting.

“Our world has changed so much since the end of the last century. The people of 1999 wouldn’t recognize us.”

A rumble of laughter waved through the crowd.

“And so we honor our past community. We will open this capsule and learn from those things they valued all those years ago.”

She reached into the capsule and retrieved the first item. Thomas scanned the crown again, a final hope of finding his best friend. Unease tugged at his guy when he still couldn’t locate Devika.

Before the fence, Devika gasped. Thomas’s heart pounded in his chest. Devika scrambled back, her foot catching on the wheel of the garbage bin beside her. She fell, knocking it over. Through the slat, Thomas watched the man turn in their direction, eyes black, lips pressed together in a straight line, and a knife gripped in his hand. He stood over the body of a woman, her head turned toward them, eyes staring, unblinking. Thomas’s gut wrenched at the sight. Blood dripped from the tip and he feared he would vomit.

The man approached the fence in a few large steps. Thomas fell backward, a cry caught in his throat. As the man lifted himself over the fence, Thomas snatched Devika’s hand and yanked her to her feet.

“Hey!” The killer shouted after them. His black eyes bored into them.

Thomas and Devika sprinted back aross the street. Devika fell against her front door, twisted the knob, and yanked Thomas inside. She yelled for her father. She quaked in Thomas’s arms, his own tremors in sync with her. Devika’s father raced downstairs. He understood the panic, must have smelled the fear. Before Thomas or Devika said a word, he retrieved his grabbed the phone, twisted the dead bolt in place, and dialed.

They had stayed at the police station that night, Devika, her dad, Thomas, and his mom. Thomas had a better look at the killer than Devika. Between the two of them, they described enough for a sketch artist. They were key witnesses to the poor woman’s murder. Same wounds as the other victims, same lock of missing hair. And Devika and Thomas were the only ones who could identify him.

The killings stopped. Police surveyed the town around them, even checked neighboring states, but no victims matched their killer’s patterns.

Fall slipped into winter and Thomas began to breathe easy. The killer had been scared away. The town was safe again. A part of his self-involved preteen brain tried to convince him that he and Devika were the town’s heroes.

Thomas received the first note three days before Christmas.

I’m watching.

For the first time since his father died, he and his mother traveled to her family’s for the holidays. Even two states away, she and Thomas continued to peer out the frosty windows and scour the shadowed yards for danger.

Devika received notes too. The horror twisted and tightened.

Fear the Reaper.

Two weeks after the New Year, Thomas answered a late night call while watching TV in his living room.

“I need you,” Devika’s plea washed like ice over him. “My dad’s not home. Please, Thomas.”

“What’s wrong?”

His mother’s head poked out the bedroom. She had been getting out of bed more often since their night at the police station.

Devika’s voice dropped to a harsh whisper. “I think he’s coming to get me.”

“I’ll call for help.”

His mother joined him in the living room. She sat on the couch and began tying up her shoes.

“Hurry!”

They made plans to leave that night. Each family would leave on their own. No plans shared. The less they knew of their new whereabouts the safer. Devika said good bye to him for the last time that night. They stood on her front porch, just like they had the first time Thomas had visited.

“We’ll see each other again, won’t we?” She asked.

“Of course.” Thomas had his doubts, but he couldn’t tell her no. “You still need to tell me what you think of The Drive in.”

“Oh!” Devika’s hands flew to her mouth. “I still have your copy. I’ll go get it.”

He waved her off. “Please, keep it. Read it.”

“But it’s your dad’s,” she said.

“I have plenty of his stuff.”

Devika smiled. Her gaze flicked over Thomas’s shoulder to his mother waiting in the car in the driveway.

“I should go.” Thomas wished his feet were cemented to the ground so he couldn’t walk away.

Devika took a half a step forward, closing the gap between them, and kissed his cheek. Her breath was warm and sweet, her lips soft against his skin. He wrapped his hand around her arm and inhaled sharply. When she started to pull away, he tightened his grip slightly, unwilling to let her go.

“Good bye, Thomas,” she whispered.

“Bye, Devika.”

Excitement vibrated through the crowd as they awaited the first item. Thomas squinted to get a better look, a book. The mayor held it at arm’s length. Her smile dropped and her brows furrowed. The small paperback sat heavy in her hand as she studied it. From his spot, Thomas could make out a bulge, something shoved between the pages. The novel bent and warped around it. A stain darkened the cover and spread through the pages, a deep brown. He squinted and made out the title: The Drive in. His heart leapt to his throat and he couldn’t get a full breath into his lungs. Panic clouded his mind.

His book. The one he had given to Devika. His gaze swept the town center. She was there somewhere. Where else would she be?

The people standing closest to the capsule gasped and shirked away. A few screamed and the audience silenced. The mayor dropped the book. It landed on the stage with a heavy thud and bounced open. The sun reflected off the hilt of knife. The blade was stained red with blood.

The crowd shrieked and pushed away. The mayor held her gloved hand before her face, pale and slack-mouthed. Security raced to her side. A few clear headed spectators pressed phones to their ears. Many more held up theirs, recording the scene.

The knife lay across the pages of his book. Blood. Thomas staggered back. Devika should have that book. He scanned the chaos, searching past the fear. The book and blade were covered in blood. Thomas hadn’t heard from Devika since their final night in Marredbury. What if she never made it out?

Thomas’s skin itched. The nightmare man had to be watching, stalking, and waiting for the perfect moment. Thomas hadn’t expected to be alive when the time capsule was opened, but he stood in that crowd, heart pumping in his chest, breathing short quick breaths. He wasn’t about to give up now. Thomas turned on the ball of his feet and he did the only thing he knew what to do. The only way he knew how to survive.

He ran.

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Go back to Episode 10. Episode 12 is coming at the end of November 2024.