Preface
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This is the second part in an ongoing work-in-progress. It is a story based on early memories of childhood, mixed with a fictitious element of my own device. In this installment I have tried to incorporate some of the advice I received on the last column, namely the overall length. This is a slightly shorter segment of story. Unfortunately, I can't really address the complaint regarding the lack of pictures here since I have no way to acquire any meaningful ones short of drawing them myself. Believe me, you don't want that! Also this time there is much more fiction involved. The first section was mostly based from memory with only a few creative additions. Here, the majority of events are fabricated, with elements of memory involved that may be difficult to seperate. Typically a rule of thumb is: if it is a person, place, or thing it is likely based on memory. If it is an event, it is most likely fiction.

If you want to read the first part of this story, go to

http://www.retrojunk.com/details_articles/6901/

If not, here is the rundown.

Rue and his brother Brad are two boys, 10 and 12 years old respectively, living in the town of Great Bay. Their lives were just like yours and mine at that age - lives of discovery, adventure, and innocence. They spent their summer days tromping through the woods, cutting trails, playing games; doing the things that kids do out in the country.

After a typical but patchy recollection of a hazy last day of school, Rue tells us about a frightening dream he had, and how he had awoken from it to find his home empty of all it's usual residents. After searching fruitlessly inside, he looks out the window and sees that his mother's truck is gone. Rue decides to go outside to look for his brother. We find him here, walking toward the woods to begin his search.



Chapter 1 (cont'd)
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I climbed the ladder of scrapped two-by-fours to the back door and looked inside. No one sat upon the ancient azure pickup truck seat that served as our couch. I climbed back down again and rejoined the path to the creek.

That sandy path was never quite clear of sharp objects such as holly brambles or those spiky little spheres southerners inaptly refer to as gumballs, and my recollection of that fact was coupled with sharp pain in my feet and the realization that I wasn't wearing any shoes. I began looking down as I walked, scanning for these anomalies and dodging them to spare myself as much pain as possible. I was approaching the entrance to the domain of Brad and myself- the woods.

My brother and I spent many years together in those woods. Over the course of several summers he and I, with the help of our friends, transformed those twenty acres from a rugged, untamed wilderness into an organized but labyrinthine network of trails and paths. There were many points of interest in those woods. The marsh; a beautiful and frightening place where there were no trails and that we were certain alligators inhabited. The pools; a treacherous area where densely scattered pits filled with black water were surrounded and encroached upon by great leaning stalks of grass of the deepest emerald green imaginable; where stepping in the wrong place would result in the formation of a new pit which you would then have to pull your mud-caked legs out of. There was the old fence line; a short run of decrepit wood that ran through an obsolete property line upon which Dan, my step father, had built a hunting stand and instructed us never to go near. Heading well east past the pools the trail would lead one to the Jasper plot, where leafy brown hills rolled along the north bank of the creek and open plains of dry, brittle wheat lined the south bank, swaying to and fro in the constant breeze.

And of course there was the bridge; a massive squared length of treated lumber that crossed the creek and served as the entrance to it all, upon which I presently stood, staring down into the clear water and watching the minnows dart back and forth.

As I watched the flowing water I thought about where my brother could possibly be. He had been spending a lot of time lately at the hunting stand, as he loved to challenge Dan"s iron hand at any opportunity. Since that was as good a place to look as any, I began the journey there.

The humid summer climate began taking it's toll on me, and beads of sweat and condensation began rolling off my forehead. The heat was typically unbearable, tempered only by the incremental breeze that

blew through the trees from random directions. My eyes wandered as I walked down that well-worn dirt trail, wiping my face with the back of my hand occasionally. I watched the trees pass, their leaves still moist from the morning dew that had not yet evaporated in the sun. I thought about the last day of school and felt slightly troubled that I could not remember all of it.

What had happened that day? There was a conversation with Chris and Tanya at breakfast, I was sure, but that could have been any morning. After that? Whenever I thought about it, there was nothing. I remembered going out to the track during physical ed, halfway through the day, and the confrontation with Matthew. But what about before then? What about after?

This train of thought carried me past the riddled thickets and great oaks, beyond every fork in the trail, to where the footworn path opened up to a wooded avenue which was the width of a landscaping tractor. As I continued on I listened for Brad, hearing no signs of his presence. Just beyond the treeline ahead was Dan"s hunting stand, it's camouflage aluminum roof easily spotted above the trees. As I rounded the bend and the hunting stand came into view I finally spotted my brother beneath the structure.

He was sitting with his back against one of the stilts and looking rather dazed. His head lolled about absently and his eyes were vacant, as though he had been struck unconscious and was just coming to. He didn't seem to notice my noisy approach, though I was crunching and tromping through the woods with abandon.

As I drew closer I noticed he was wearing unfamiliar clothes. I didn't recognize a single thing he was wearing, with the exception of his sneakers; those same old blood-red Converse knock-offs he always wore. That feeling of unease returned as I looked upon him.

His dizzied motions became more focused, and he seemed to suddenly gain an awareness of himself. His eyes began to dart around in all directions before they finally settled on me as I stood before him.

He looked as pale as a ghost.

"Brad?" I whispered timidly.

"What am..." His voice cracked, and he cleared his throat. "What am..."

"What?" I asked, confused. He seemed so befuddled, so out of it. It was atypical and quite alarming, considering that Brad was always in control.

His eyes finally relaxed. "Rue! Dan told you never to come here."

"He told us both," I said, defensively. "I woke up and no one was home. The TV was on and mom"s truck was gone. I didn't know where anyone was!"

"So you came out here?" Any trace of confusion on his features had dissolved and his irritation shone through.

I explained why I thought he would be there, and he seemed to accept it. I expected him to chastise me or give me some kind of punishment for emulating his audacity to defy Dan. None came.

"Have you ever gone past here?" he abruptly asked, pointing at the rotting segment of wooden fence that stood alone nearby.

"No," I lied. Our stepfather had made the punishment clear if we were to go beyond the wooden fence. He wanted the area to be completely devoid of the scent of human beings, for fear that his game would be directed away from his aim by it. Of course, I had gone past the fence once, but only in defiance, and I turned back from fear relatively soon after I passed the boundary.

"Well I have," he stated flatly. "Just this morning."

I gaped at him, surprised. Some of my reaction was feigned to forestall his suspicion of my having shared his disobedience. "Are you crazy..."

"Listen to me," he interrupted, grunting the words as he rose to his feet to regard me squarely. "You need to get back home. Mom"ll be back soon and you don't want her to find out you were out here alone."

"But you"re out here..." I began, but he interrupted me again.

"Just listen!" he whispered fiercely, glancing behind himself and beyond the old fence. "There"s something out there I want you to see, but not right now."

"What is it?" I asked.

"There isn't time to explain." He took a few steps toward the fence, watching me all the while. "Just trust me. I want to take you there but I can't right now."

"Why not?" I whined. "What"s the big deal, Brad?"

For a moment the confusion returned to his face, but quickly faded again. A little smile swept across his face and that too quickly retreated.

"All I can do is make it the way it was," he said.

"The way it was?" I asked, perplexed. "What are you talking about?"

Brad paused, eyes closed, seemingly to steady himself to respond cohesively. "Rue, I"m not coming home for a little while yet. And you're not staying out here with me," he finally said, his eyes open and clear again.

I thought about how I had found him there; dazed and semi-conscious. I couldn't help but wonder what he had seen that shook him up so badly. My unease worsened again, this time bordering on panic.

"What"s out there?" I pleaded.

"I"ll show you another time," he said, turning away. He took a few more steps and then turned to face me. He stared at me for a moment; a distant look on his face. Then he turned away again and began walking, past the forbidden fence.

"Where are you going?" I asked, raising my voice to cover our increasing distance. "Wait up!"

"Don't follow me," he said over his shoulder, not slowing down.

He walked up the hill beyond the old wooden fence and continued on through the clearing,
stopping at the treeline. He turned and looked one last time, and then disappeared into the trees.

I didn't follow him. As I watched him leave I felt a tinge of sadness. It wasn't unusual for Brad to exclude me from his activities, but I felt that whatever he had seen had to be important enough to tell me if it was enough to cause such a change in his character. Mulling it over I suddenly felt very tired. I stood staring at the treeline for a bit longer, then turned back for home.

What was out there? I couldn't fathom it. All the way back through the woods I wondered. I ran the conversation through my mind again, trying to make sense of it. Brad had gone beyond the forbidden fence, where at some point he made a discovery that apparently shook him to the core. In his eyes I had seen many emotions that he had never shown me- confusion, pain, fear. The fear was the one I was most concerned about. But if it was so scary, why did he just go right back out there alone? It just didn't make sense.

Crossing the bridge seemed to absorb most of my feelings, and by the time I had stepped back onto the sandy trail only exhaustion remained. My legs grew heavier and heavier as I went, past the treehouse and up the winding trail into the back yard. With home in sight my weariness was almost unbearable, but I persevered, trudging through the yard and up the back porch steps.

I stumbled through my bedroom door and clawed my way up the bunkbed ladder to collapse on the bed, catching a glimpse at the clock. It was just after eleven. I had only been awake for a little over an hour. Why was I so tired? These and all concerns were lost then, and I drifted off to sleep, all things forgotten. All things, except for one sentence which replayed itself again, echoing through my last moment of consciousness.

"All I can do is make it the way it was."



I awoke some time later in semi-darkness. The world outside my window was black, save for the cone of light that shone down from the power pole that illuminated the ground. I looked at the clock, which indicated that it was nearly midnight. Had I slept that long? Thinking of how I had awoken that morning to an empty house, I suddenly felt frightfully certain that I would still be alone, at midnight, in the dark. I quickly leaned down to check Brad"s bunk and was relieved to see him there, sleeping peacefully and wearing his own clothes. I rolled over and looked at the ceiling, and thought about trying to get back to sleep. I could see light streaming in through the half open bedroom door, casting a shadow through the little floral buttons that dotted the ceiling. This intruding light created a series of shadows that Brad and I always called "The Man" due to it's creepy, sillhouette-like appearance. I became aware of the rhythmic flopping sound of the clothes dryer and decided Mom was still up. I carefully climbed down off my bunk and silently traversed the floor to the bedroom door.

I walked into the living room, where Mom sat reading an unthinkably thick novel. The soothing smell of marijuana smoke filled the room. I sat down on the gray recliner that did not match the couch and looked at her.

My mother, Angela, was a beautiful woman. She often modeled for independent photographers in her spare time, and her portraits were scattered throughout the house. She was an intelligent woman, witty and talented. Her greatest desire for my siblings and I was that we would think for ourselves, and grow up to be unique and intelligent individuals. She always encouraged our individuality, and never criticized the things we wanted for ourselves. She wasn't as strict about things as Dan was, but she respected the rules he laid down for us and enforced them upon us. I decided not to tell her about my little trip to the hunting stand.

I was silent for a moment, waiting for her to open a dialogue. When she didn't, I asked her where she had gone that day.

"To your grandpa"s," she said. "Why did you sleep all day?"

"I don't know," I said truthfully. I thought for a moment and added, "I guess it's because I was up all night."

We had a strict bedtime, but I would rather have been found guilty of violating it than of violating one of Dan"s rules. At any rate, it was summer vacation and I figured a little leniency toward the matter was in order. Mom seemed to agree, for she didn't press the issue.

"Your brother isn't feeling well," she said, looking a little worried. "He came in from the woods complaining of a headache and covered in mud. He would have gone to sleep in his muddy clothes if I hadn't made him change."

"A headache?" I asked.

"Yeah, him and the boys were out in y"all"s woods horseplaying again."

I didn't volunteer any information. She must have thought he had hit his head or something, which I thought was pretty convenient since she wouldn't be inclined to investigate the situation only to discover that we had violated one of Dan"s precious rules.

We sat in silence for another moment as Mom lit up and took a few long pulls from her pipe. As she exhaled slowly I watched the smoke rise into the incidental rays of her reading lamp, dancing and swirling, conforming to the shape of the light. Finally she spoke again.

"Is everything ok?" she asked me.

"Yeah, mom," I said. "it's just... well I"ve been having some strange dreams."

"What kind of dreams?" she asked, immediately interested. Mom had a passion for dreams. She often wrote them down in a composition book she called her dream journal and read them to me. A majority of them consisted of her flying in the nude over different lands. Others were about God or some other existential thing. In her dreams, she must have taken the form of an angel.

"The scary kind," I said in a low voice. "Last night I dreamed I was at school at night and something was after me."

"Tell me about it," she demanded, smiling. My guess was that if she knew all the details of that particular dream she wouldn't have been smiling.

"Well," I said, not really wanting to remember, "I was walking down a dark hallway at school. Everything was all rusty and ugly. I went through a door and down some stairs and a monster came after me."

"What did the monster look like?"

I remembered clearly what it looked like. A half-skeletal thing with rotten skin and tattered, musty rags of clothing. It looked like it was once a person, but it moved along the walls instead of the floor, and it screamed horribly as though in constant agony and vomited my name.

"I can't really remember. Just a monster," I said shamefully, looking down at my feet. They were black with dirt. Before she could take notice I abruptly got up and went to the bathroom to wash them.

When I came back into the living room Mom was puffing on her pipe again, this time she had to curtail a violent cough, resulting in a muted sneezing sound.

"You ok?" I asked, knowing the answer. It was my way of picking on her for her habit.

She nodded vigorously and exhaled, and the smoke reprised it's luminous balet. I liked the fact that she never tried to hide her habit from me. She had placed a certain amount of trust in me, and I appreciated it.

"Well, what else happened in the dream?"

"Nothing, really," I responded. "Right before it got to me I woke up."

After considering this, she said, "You said dreams, as in plural. What other dreams have you had?"

I had recently had many dreams that I could remember. Some were just abstract, surreal nonsense while others were a bit closer to home. All were bad dreams.

"I dreamed that Dan was a demon."

Her response to this began as a chuckle and became a belly laugh, her beautiful smile not quite offsetting the cruelty I inaccurately observed in the moment.

"Hey, don't laugh!" I said. The notion that your stepfather is an evil demon is serious business for a ten year old boy.

Mom stifled her laughter. "I"m sorry, Rue. I couldn't help it." She took one more pull from the pipe and put it on her little green tray, then drew a Marlboro 100 from the cigarette pack in her purse as she exhaled the smoke. She lit the cigarette and tossed her lighter on the tray. It kicked some of the tray's contents around as it landed.

"Mom," I asked. "What"s the worst nightmare you ever had?"

Her face took on a serious look. She looked at me for awhile, considering. I could see she was debating whether or not to tell me, and I knew then that it must have been a terrible one.

"Well?" I asked, applying pressure.

"A mom"s nightmares can be scarier than any other nightmare," she said grimly. "Are you sure you want to hear it?"

"Yes!" I said instantly.

"Ok," she said, and puffed on her cigarette. "It was at our old house on Bellard Road when your deddy was alive. You were just a baby then, and Brad and Chrystal were just little kids. I dreamed your deddy was gone somewhere and we were home alone. I was sitting on the couch and I heard a crash through the back window. I couldn't move, all I could do was watch. It was a burglar, or a murderer or something. He came into the living room and pointed his gun at me. Brad and Chrystal came into the room to see what was wrong. I screamed for them to get away but they wouldn't move. Then the man shot them both through the chest. I saw the holes in their chests and screamed. Then I woke up.

Your deddy had to calm me down. He just held me and said, 'it's just a dream, Angie.' over and over again while I bawled my eyes out. It was the scaredest I"ve ever been in my whole life."

When she was finished, I was greatly disappointed. "Aww, Mom!

That wasn't scary at all!"

She wasn't surprised that I didn't understand, but she tried to explain.

"Son, one day when you"re older, you"ll understand just how scary it can be to think about losing your children. When I die, I want all three of my children to bury me."

"Don't worry, Mom," I said, trying to reassure her, and myself.

I moved over to sit next to her on the couch. I stood up on my knees and held her face, kissing her forehead. "We"ll always be together."









To Be Continued.
Thank you for reading.