Randy and Walter: Killers (7 page)

Randy stood motionless as he watched the fire burn. The smell of bur
n
ing flesh and hair didn’t bother him. The black smoke was filling the basement and this didn’t bother him either.

What did bother him was the thought that had crept into his mind. The thought of a little red-haired girl looking at him through the darkness, her vexing smile promising more to come. Promising much worse things to come.

After a while the smoke was getting to his eyes and nose. He found it hard to breathe, and although the smell was invigorating to his nostrils, it was also burning. A fine layer of sweat was cove
r
ing his skin and stinking up his clothes which clung to him like cellophane. He quickly walked around the basement, or rather stumbled, his hands searching for the small window which was hidden against one of the walls within the smoke. It took him nearly fifteen minutes, but he finally did find the window. He opened the latch and with a push popped the stained glass open as wide as it would go. The smoke immediately began to run outside as if escaping the clutches of something evil. He turned back and wiped his eyes, still blinded by smoke. Randy saw light leading upwards into the innards of the house, an escape from the burning stench of flame and smoke. It was finally bothering him. So much, in fact, that he thought that at any moment he may pass out from asphyxiation. He ran blindly through the smoke towards the light. He could feel the stairs coming closer to him, but he reached them too quick and tripped and fell. His chin smashed down hard onto the wooden step. Randy ignored the pain and climbed to his feet. He ascended the stairs two at a time. He plunged out of the red darkness and into the bright house. The smell was lingering throughout the house along with the smoke which seemed to lurch from room to room. He ran all through the house opening every window he could find.

After every window in the home was open, Randy walked out onto the front porch, still covered in blood with black ash stuck along his skin. He looked almost like a portrait painted by some depressed suicidal Goth chick, standing on his front porch drenched in blood and soot.  In the silent darkness before him, he could make out a single outline. The outline of a man standing at the edge of his yard.

And then he heard the faint sound of laughter. He grimaced, knowing who the outline was and went back inside, slamming the door closed behind him.

Randy was still covered in blood and ash when he awoke the next mor
n
ing in the middle of the basement floor. Sometime during the night, he’d finished cleaning up. Everything in the house was scrubbed clean. The only blood that was left was the layer covering his clothes and skin. The smoke had stopped rolling and the fire had died, yet the smell still lingered in the air.

Randy stood up slowly and began to walk up the stairs when he heard clapping coming from behind him. He turned to face Walter, who leaned against a far wall hidden in the shadows.

“That was very entertaining but it would be great if you could take this a little more seriously,” Walter said.

Randy did nothing but stare at Walter, whose eyes seemed to shine back at him. “Let’s try this again shall we?”
Walter said.

Randy closed his eyes and silently nodded his head. “Good,” Walter grinned. “There’s a woman named Margaret who’s going to Caruthers Coffee house
later today
. She always does. And she goes there with her seven-year-old daughter, Amanda. Inte
r
ested?”

Randy looked at the shadows
.
“Yes, I’m interested
,
”
he said with a smirk.

Walter chuckled a bit
.
“I thought so. I suspect they’ll be getting their around
five or so
. They walk there, so this should be easy for you. Let’s see who can get to them first.”

Randy watched as Walter walked past him, his face motionless as if he didn’t have a care in the world. But then their eyes met and Randy saw what can only be described as pure hate. He just wasn’t sure if it was just hatred for Randy or if it was for everyone in the world. But it was there like some sort of fire burning bright into some soulless creature shaped like a man. This frightened Randy, and he hoped that he would someday be rid of this mo
n
ster he called a brother.

A
fter Walter left the house, Randy stripped himself of his clothes and dropped them into the drum. At the bottom of the drum were several bones now colored with a black lacquer. For now, he decided to ignore them. As he showered, it occurred to Randy that the stench and the smell and the smoke should have bothered the neighbors. Yet, he hadn’t heard a word. He couldn’t help but wonder why he hadn’t heard anything.

In fact, he hadn’t seen or heard any of the neighbors in at least a month. He found this curious but he pushed the questions out of his head as he scrubbed the bar of soap onto his skin. He’d never liked the feeling of using a washcloth. It was so rough to the touch. He preferred to use just the soap on his skin. He felt smoother and better than he imagined he ever could with a rag.

It took him quite a while to get the blood off of his skin. He even had to stop to find a washcloth just so he could scrub the dried blood off. The water circling the drain in the tub was colored red as if someone had poured a gallon of red and orange food coloring into the tub with him. The colored water ran down his legs, across his feet and followed the rest of the water to their escape into the drain.

The shower finally ended and Randy stood at the closet in his newly cleaned bedroom searching for something nice to wear.

Something respectable; he had an idea how to get the mother and daughter to come with him. He looked at the clock which read 2:33 p.m. He had to hurry up. He wanted to be there before Wa
l
ter. Using both hands
,
Randy thumbed his way through the clothes which hung neatly in his closet. It looked as if he hadn’t been in it in years, which really he hadn’t. After a few more mi
n
utes of rooting through the hanging clothes, he found what he was looking for. A nice, two-piece brown suit with a white shirt and red tie. He laid it neatly on the bed and began to put the suit on.

After he was dressed, he found his black dress shoes at the bo
t
tom of his closet. He put them on with black socks and stood tall, admiring himself in the mirror. He couldn’t help but smile and think to himself,
My God, I look like a business man
.

Something about this was funny, although he wasn’t sure just what it was. He fixed himself a bowl of sugary sweet cereal and ate it before he left the house to walk towards Caruthers Coffee. A
n
other day of hunting, another night of feasting, another night of fun.

The air outside the house and along the sidewalk was filled with a cold chill that seemed to be alive, wrapping itself around Randy’s face as he walked silently towards his destination, Caruthers Coffee.

It was a place he’d come to know very well and would co
n
tinue to know very well. Near Caruthers was an alleyway, the perfect hiding spot for Randy. There he planned to wait for the two targets to pass. Then he would come out from behind and grab them. He would pull them back into the shadows where he would do horrors to the woman and even more unspea
k
able things to the little girl.

The sun seemed distant and gray, the gray you see only during winter. It was a sad depressing shade of color that seemed to affect all who stepped into its icy-cold glow. It was almost as if the sun was taking a much needed rest away from the rest of the world. The clouds appeared to be so low you could just reach out and touch them. Soon, Randy saw the warm light of the coffee shop. The worn-sign above the storefront of Caruthers was missing three lighted letters; the A, R and the H. So the word
Caruthers
became the word
Cuters
.

How morbidly ironic that seemed to Randy. He was damn-near positive no one else had ever noticed the different name. The alley was a mere four second walk from the coffee shop. Randy silently and quickly ducked into the ally and leaned against the wall facing the coffee shop. This way he could come behind them more quickly, plus if the mother came from the other side of the shop, he would know immediately.

There he stood, shivering in the cold, his skin crawling with bumps that only arrive when the cold seeps through your clothes to touch your skin. His fingers and toes were numb. A steady stream of liquid ran out of his nose and he wiped it away with his arm. He pulled the cloth hood over his head tighter, trying to keep some of the cold away. An hour or so passed as he stood there patiently awaiting his prey. The cold was stinging and the num
b
ness was reaching up to other parts of his body. He started to feel as though he may freeze to death standing in the alley.

He glanced at his wristwatch. The time said 5:30. They should have a
r
rived by now. They were thirty minutes late.

Perhaps Walter has beaten me again
, he thought grimly to himself.

Still, he waited in the alley. The sun was almost completely down now and the darkness was inching its way across the town. The pale blue glow of the moon was showing a bit through the clouds above. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw someone on the other side of the alley. The outline was small and short. He may have missed it if he hadn’t been paying so much attention to his surroundings. The shape was walking towards him. It got closer, closer, closer and closer still. Then it was on top of him.

A little bit of light shone through the darkness and fell upon her face like a spotlight cast down unto a show. Before him stood a little girl with brown hair. She was chubby. Her face pudgy like something you might see on a Hallmark greeting card. She was probably fed wonderfully by whoever were her parents.

Randy saw that her cheeks were red-stained with tears. She’d been cr
y
ing. The little girl walked over to him and began to plead, “Please, mister, help me find my mommy.” Her voice was soft and shaking.

Randy knelt down next to her and placed a friendly hand on her shou
l
der.

“Where’s your mommy, honey? Are you lost?” he asked her.

“I don’t know. She told me to stay in the store while she went to get some money,” she replied, looking into his eyes

Her voice was cracking sounding almost like that of an old r
e
cord
.
“Will you please help me, mister?”

“How old are you, honey?” Randy asked, not entirely sure why.

“I’m seven, mister. Please help me find my mommy.”

She was crying now, the tears streaming down her cheeks and falling onto her shoes. This was the little girl Walter had told him about; Randy knew it. Walter must have done something to her mom, expecting the little girl to do as she’d been told. Children, however are an interesting type. They never listen to authority. Just like his own daughter, this girl had disobeyed her mother.

Randy flashed her with a wicked smile. She smiled back, not knowing that his smile was only for himself and not for her. He had no intention of helping her. He only wanted what he wanted and at that precise moment, he wanted the little, chubby, Hal
l
mark card girl who stood smiling at him with tears leaking from her brown eyes.

“Okay, I’ll help you. Come with me,” he said and stood up, e
x
tending his hand. She took it, believing him to be a friend and not a monster that eats little girls. Not the thing your parents warn you about. A bogeyman with a taste for little kids and a sweet smile hiding in closets and under beds, all the while waiting for a chance to strike.

Holding hands, they walked out of the alley and up the sid
e
walk and back towards his house. The house that had quickly become a place of such terrible nightmares.

On the walk over, the little girl never asked any questions, she just kept looking at her new-found friend who in return would look down at her and smile. She smiled back every time, still thinking she was safe.

Perhaps Walter did win
, Randy thought,
but I got what I wanted, too.

They reached his house and hand in hand they began to walk up the stairs to the front porch. She stopped walking before they reached the front door. He looked down at the girl to see her smile was gone, replaced with a grimace of terror.

She knew that something wasn’t right about this house, about any of it. Why would anyone bring her to their house? Why didn’t Randy just help her find her mother? To her, the house was horr
i
ble looking, almost as if it was haunted. It was dark and dreary; the kind of place a person would walk away from with their head hung low, scared of something that they weren’t sure of. Neither was she, she didn’t know exactly what it was that frightened her so much. She only knew that something just didn’t seem right. Randy saw this through her eyes and knew what was about to happen.

She began to try to pull away from him, but he wouldn’t let go.