The Tooth Collector (and Other Tales of Terror) (6 page)

There was the sound of wheezing and choking
again. This time someone whispered, weakly, “Emily...” She turned
to look at Eric, sprawled on the edge of the road. He raised his
hand, palm slick with blood, and coughed. Bright red droplets
spattered the snow.

“Eric!” she yelped. She jumped to her feet.
She almost fell as her boot slid on a patch of ice. She ran to him,
fell to her knees, grabbed his hand and gently squeezed.
“Eric...”

“Em...”

“Shhh. Shhh. Save your strength. Don't talk.”
She stroked his face, running shaky fingers through his hair. “I
need to get my cell phone. I'm going to call for help. You stay
with me, Eric. You keep those eyes open. Don't close them,
okay?”

He gripped her hand. His body shivered in the
freezing wind. The scratch wounds on his face were deep. His arm
was broken at the elbow, ribs crushed inward. He held onto Emily as
his teeth chattered uncontrollably, eyes rolling in their
sockets.

A wave of sadness washed over Emily. What if
he didn't make it?

“And Eric...” She tightened her grip on his
hand. She wanted to throw her arms around him and squeeze, but his
injuries were too severe. “I have something important to tell you.”
Eric struggled to focus, strained to keep his eyelids from
shutting. “The baby...” Her tears dripped onto his arm. “I want you
to know the baby was yours.”

She saw a change in his face. His features
softened, and he looked almost peaceful. It was an overdue
expression, one she had longed to see on Tim's face when she told
him she was pregnant. A certain kind of pride. Happiness—quickly
followed by a look of sadness as Eric remembered the miscarriage.
But Emily had seen it, a twinkling in his eyes... even through all
the pain.

“That night we spent together...” She tried
to finish her sentence, but couldn't find the right words. She
kissed his lips, looked into his eyes. Tears rolled down her face
and left a trail where they warmed her frostbitten skin. “I'll be
back. I'll get help. Don't close your eyes!”

She rose to her feet and raced for the Jeep
as memories took over her mind. Memories of Tim and his lying,
cheating ways. Of his girlfriends, calling the house and hanging
up, leaving notes in the pockets of his clothes. The clues were too
many, too frequent, for her to turn the other cheek any longer.

One night, she went to Eric for comfort. She
cried on his shoulder for hours. Things got out of hand, and they
ended up in bed together. But Emily didn't regret it. Alone on this
cold mountain, face to face with the possibility of losing Eric
forever, it was the only memory that truly brought her joy.

She reached the Jeep and crawled into the
driver's seat. She dug through her purse and found her cell phone.
She hastily punched the “9” button, then “1”, but she froze when an
ear-splitting howl ripped through the night. It shook the earth and
caused the Jeep's frame to rattle.

She scanned the treeline and saw the white
creature standing in the snow, still gripping the corpse of its
child. Beside it stood another beast—taller, stronger than the
other two. Its curvy, well-defined muscles bulged beneath layers of
fur, thighs the size of tree trunks. It stood fully erect, twice
the height of the Jeep. It beat fists against its chest and howled
for a second time, the vestiges of its preceding roar still echoing
through the night. A bushy tail beat steadily back and forth at its
rear, as if counting down the seconds of a ticking time bomb.

The beast's demon-red eyes locked on hers. It
lunged forward, mounds of snow erupting in its wake. The Jeep
rattled and shook as it thudded the earth. The monster ran on all
fours with its long arms and powerful legs, breezing past Eric
without so much as a cursory glance.

Then the beast slowed. It skidded to a stop.
It turned around, cocking its head at Eric who lay helpless beneath
a blanket of snow. “No!” Emily screamed as the creature approached
Eric and held a hairy foot over his frightened, pleading face. With
one stomp, Eric's head popped like a melon and splattered the icy
mountain road. Emily closed her eyes, but it did little to erase
the image of Eric's brain tissue bursting from his skull like a
pinata.

Panic gripped her. She dialed the remaining
“1”, but knew it was fruitless. Help would never arrive in
time.

The beast threw its head back and howled even
louder than before, furiously beating its chest. It turned around
and barreled toward her, a white blur with piercing red eyes. Emily
screamed as it rammed the car, scrambled away as it ripped the door
from its hinges. Enormous hands pulled her from the car, pinned her
down in the snow.

Emily turned her head as the giant beast
raised a clawed fist into the air. She saw the smaller one, the
beast that had let her go, still standing at the edge of the woods.
It clutched the corpse of its child in its arms. Its crimson eyes
glowed from the shadows.

The eyes of mother beast, watching, waiting
in the forest... as father beast took his revenge.

Invitation
Only

Daniel turned the pages of his mother's photo
album, fighting back tears. Pictures of his own face—in various
stages of development—stared back at him, a reminder of innocence
lost. Snapshots filled each glossy slot in careful chronological
order. His mother's handwriting marked the months and years on bits
of paper underneath. A familiar lump returned to his throat as he
resisted the urge to cry.

Daniel closed the book and rubbed his eyes.
He couldn't shake the feeling that he had failed her. He was a
loser. After forty-eight years of life, it was obvious. He hadn't
accomplished much of anything, so busy following his dreams that he
never thought to set aside money for his mother's needs.

In the end, when mom had passed, he was
forced to sell the few valuables he owned just to pay for her
funeral. Even then, he couldn't afford a casket. Mom now rested in
a porcelain urn.

He stood up from the foot of his mother's bed
and smoothed the wrinkles from the cover. It occurred to him that
this was a pointless action, that sooner or later the bedding would
join her other possessions in a truck heading for the nearest
Goodwill. But he adjusted it anyway, noticing its age for the first
time. It was the same ragged quilt she'd been using for
decades.

He looked around the room at the outdated
decor, the open closet full of thrift store dresses, the ancient TV
atop her dresser. She hadn't lived a glamorous life. Her only
child, Daniel, had failed to provide.

Placing the photo album in a box marked
"keep", Daniel turned to face the rest of the closet's contents.
The clothes would all go; that was easy. The boxes full of
knickknacks and keepsakes, those would take some time to sort
through. He owed her that much, to handle her items with care. They
were memories, after all, souvenirs from a lifetime spent
encouraging her loser son. First, with his failed movie career.
Then, with his non-selling novels. Mother always kept the faith
that he'd succeed.

Daniel grabbed a shoe box from the shelf and
placed it on the bed. It was old, the logos obviously passé. His
fingers left prints on the dusty surface as he removed the lid,
setting it aside. The box contained papers—some folded, some
rolled, some small enough to fit without bending. He unrolled a
paper: the deed to the house. He walked it over to the "keep"
container, setting it next to the box so it wouldn't get buried
beneath the other items as he sorted.

He started a pile of old receipts, crumbling
them as he scanned them for importance. And then, further down,
underneath the top layer of papers, he spotted something that made
his brow furrow. It looked exactly like something he'd seen in his
youth. The words were different, but there was no mistaking the
font.

He picked up the red post card with the bold,
black text. The words were scrawled in haunting, gothic letters. As
a boy, he had marveled at the shape of each character. He'd never
seen writing like it. And now—as a grown man—he knew he hadn't seen
it since.

There was no picture, no friendly greeting,
not even a stamp. The card was the color of blood, but lacking the
glossy coat that some post cards possess. Just the dull, crimson
paper with the strange black letters.

He remembered how Jimmy Hannigan had gloated,
waving it around. A chubby redheaded kid with an ego so big it made
you wonder what he saw in the mirror, he carried himself with an
attitude that suggested he was Top Dog. Jimmy was a hellion, a cool
outlaw, trapped in the body of an overweight ginger. Daniel knew
this was why he bullied the other kids, like in that moment, as he
taunted Daniel with the post card in his hand. "Didn't get one,
huh?"

"Don't want one." Daniel kicked a rock with
his dirty Ked sneaker, eyeing Jimmy with thinly veiled chagrin.

Ever since the delivery man had appeared on
Jimmy's doorstep and handed him the strange invitation, he couldn't
stop beaming from ear to ear. Jimmy had spent the school day with
that dumb smile on his face, questioning all the children in their
seventh grade class. "Did you get one?" he would ask, waving the
crimson card around. With each "no" he seemed to walk a little
taller, as if hand-picked to join a group of socialites.

The invitation itself was peculiar. The
letters looked like they belonged in the credits of Vampira or The
Addams Family, and Daniel was thoroughly intrigued. He found
himself trailing Jimmy as he posed the question to each classmate.
So far only Teddy Green, Dennis Halloway, and Johnny Cougar had
matching post cards. The oddest part: they were the worst kids in
school.

Daniel was partly telling the truth when he
said he didn't want an invitation. There was a twinge of jealousy
at having been excluded, but something about the blood red card,
inviting the recipient to the "best haunted house this Halloween"
sent a chill down the length of Daniel's spine. He had been there
when the delivery man arrived on Jimmy's doorstep. The lanky figure
in the long, black trench coat seemed to appear out of thin air
that afternoon. One moment they were discussing Heather Janeson's
tits, the next they were sitting in his shadow.

The autumn air was crisp, carrying the scent
of fallen leaves, and it whipped at the stranger's colorless hair,
which hung in a tangled mess from beneath his ebony top hat. His
face was even paler than his thin, white hair, and his dark eyes
leered at Daniel from the shadows of the hat's brim.

"Are you Mister Jimmy Hannigan?" his deep
voice inquired. Daniel thought it sounded more like a growl than a
question. He caught a glimpse of sharp teeth as the delivery man
spoke. Slick with spit, the jagged teeth glistened behind chapped
lips, brownish-yellow and tapered into points. Jimmy, who was
accustomed to speaking his mind, who had told countless teachers
and parents to "fuck off", only nodded in response, taken aback by
the proximity of the imposing figure.

The man handed Jimmy a black envelope and
curled his lips in a closed-mouth smile. The expression seemed to
strain the muscles of his face, as if causing him actual pain.
Daniel caught another glimpse of those cat-like teeth as the man
spoke again in that low, bassy tone, "We hope you can make it."
With a tip of his satin top hat, the man turned and walked away,
leaving the boys to stare at the envelope in wonder.

"Open it," said Daniel, licking his lips.

"Chill out, spaz. I just got it ten seconds
ago."

Daniel looked in the direction the man had
walked, but he was nowhere to be seen... already gone. "That guy
gave me the creeps.” He rubbed the goosebumps from his arms.

"That's because you're a pussy,” Jimmy said
with a roll of his eyes. He ripped at the envelope, shredding the
seal. His eyes widened as he read the words aloud, "You are invited
to Manic Manor, the most terrifying haunted house in the
state."

Realization dawned on the boys, and they
laughed, releasing their tension.

"So that explains the creepy getup," said
Jimmy.
But not the creepy teeth
, thought Daniel.

"Admission is paid in full, courtesy of
someone who believes you can survive the terror.” Jimmy looked up,
pride obvious in his eyes. “Halloween night. 10 o'clock. The old
mansion on Pennington Hill."

Leaves skittered down the sidewalk in the
autumn breeze. The jack-o-lantern's candle had burned down to a
nub, its flame fighting to stay lit against the wind. Daniel
breathed deep the smell of melted wax. It was a comforting aroma,
reminding him of past Halloweens, when he'd been allowed to enjoy
the festivities. Now he was twelve, going on thirteen. Too old for
silly costumes and trick-or-treating.

Jimmy smacked his lips, savoring the candy
bar with as much etiquette as a pig at the trough. "You sure you
don't want some?" he asked, holding the bag out to Daniel.

He shook his head, "No man. It aint even
ours."

Jimmy rolled his eyes. "Okay, suit yourself."
He plunged his chubby hand into the depths of the treat bag,
digging for another snack to join the pile of empty wrappers at his
feet.