Alfred Jenkins was on his way home from his wife’s funeral.  He looked at the passenger seat and began to chuckle.  “I wonder if your ghost is sitting there, Irene.  Are you watching my driving, angry because you have no voice to nag me now?”  He laughed aloud, so hard that he banged his hands against the steering wheel.

        “Ya know, I had to grit my teeth to keep from laughing and dancing at your funeral.  I did giggle through my handkerchief, but they thought I was crying.”

        He stopped for a red light, still laughing loudly.  He looked around and saw the woman in the adjacent car staring at him.  “Something funny I heard on the radio,” he said to her.  She nodded and smiled.

        The light changed and he continued.  “Oh, it’s so funny, Irene.  They think you fell from the ladder and bashed your head while changing a light bulb.  Only you and I know the truth.  And, I know you disapprove of my putting you out of your misery.  But there ain’t a damn thing you can do about it, ‘cause you’re just a spirit now.  No body, no voice, no nothin’.

        “Hey, that reminds me.  I got a secret that nobody knows but me, and now I’m gonna share it with you.”

 

      He pulled into the driveway of the small wood-framed bungalow.  “You always complained about this little house.  One bedroom wasn’t good enough for you.  Well, we never had any kids, so what did we need another room for?  Well, it don’t matter to you now, does it?”

        He entered the house and locked the door behind him.  Moments later, he was jumping up and down on the couch like a child, all the while whooping with laughter.  When he tired of that, he jumped off and started dancing, then fell rolling on the floor.

 

      The doorbell rang.  He leaped to his feet, straightened his clothes and went to the door.  It was Michelle Fletcher from next door. She was carrying a covered tray.  “Hi, Mr. Jenkins,” she said.  “Mom and I are sorry we couldn’t make it to the funeral, Mom being in a wheelchair and all.  Anyway, we brought you a little something.  There’s roast chicken and the trimmings.”

        “I understand,” he said.  “And thanks for the food.  I really appreciate it.”

        “I’d like to say once more, that if there is anything we can do, just let us know.”  She gave him a hug and left.

 

      “You see that, Irene?  That gal’s got the hots for me.  Wow, them skimpy white shorts she was wearing?  Wheee!  Wanted to give me a show.  So, she ain’t even half my age, but who cares?

        He turned on the TV, placed the tray with the chicken on the coffee table, and sat down to watch a rerun of The Andy Griffith Show.

        “Yummy, this chicken’s good.  Wanna piece?  Oops, forgot, you can’t eat it. Well, I’ll eat if for you.  Hey, I almost forgot about the secret.  I’m gonna take you out to the hills tonight and show you something real nice.  You’ll love it.”

 

      After nightfall, Alfred left the house.  About a mile out of town, he turned off the blacktop and onto an unpaved, winding road that led into hilly terrain.  “You never been out here before, Irene.  This is part of my rural mail route.  Know it like the back of my hand.”

        After a short while he stopped and got out of the car.  The full moon lit up the night almost as bright as day.  “See that hill?  Just follow me and I’ll show you something.”  He trudged about halfway up and stopped near a large boulder.  “Just a few paces from the left of this boulder there’s two graves, and in those graves lie two lovely girls.”  He giggled and danced a little jig.  “Couple of real lookers, too.  Whee!

        “Didn’t I tell you you’d love it?  See, now you got company.  Ain’t that nice?  Irene, this here is Candice and Barbara.”  He made a slight bow and gestured toward the graves.  That’s when he saw two shadowy figures appear over the graves.

        Alfred retreated a few steps.  “Go away!  You ain’t scaring me.  Go away.”  He pulled a switchblade knife from his pocket.  “I swear, I’ll kill you again.  Go away.”  The figures dissipated as suddenly as they appeared.  “They try to scare me sometimes, Irene.”  He pocketed the switchblade.

        “Course, you do remember the girls being in the news?  One, about three years back and the other, just last summer.  Seems they disappeared and was never found.”  He giggled.

        “Lovers come up here and park sometimes, but they’d never guess what’s here.”  He chuckled.  “I keep a map of this place and a written account of what happened to the girls, because I’m going to be famous after I’m gone.  I keep it in that little gray strong box that you always thought contained letters from an old girlfriend.  Well, now ya know.”

 

      He took a deep breath as his mood suddenly changed from gleeful to pensive.  “The girls was hitchhikers just passing through, and I picked ‘em up in the mail truck.  I put them out of their misery, just like I did for you.  Only I used a different method.  Sliced ‘em up with my switchblade.”

        He got back in the car and headed home.  After a few miles he glanced at the back seat.  “Nobody there.  Looks like your new friends don’t want to go back with us.  They never leave the hill.  Like it there, I guess.  But don’t feel bad, ‘cause we’ll come back to see them.  Sometimes I stop by to visit while I’m out on my route.  If anybody sees me, they figure I’m just taking a pee.”

 

      The following morning was Sunday and Alfred slept late.  He crawled out of bed around nine, went to the bathroom, then padded to the kitchen.  He made coffee and filled a bowl with sugar-coated flakes.  He looked across the table as he ate.  “Ha, thought I couldn’t make my own breakfast, didn’t ya?  Well, I can, Dearie, and I can do lots of other things, too.  You’ll see.”

        It was nearly ten when he finished breakfast.  He got up from the table and immediately went to the window in the living room.  He lifted a slat in the blinds and peered through the crack, just in time to see Michelle spreading a blanket in her backyard.  He noted that she was still wearing the skimpy white shorts.

 

      She went back into the house, and moments later he saw her rolling her mother down the ramp.  After she parked the wheelchair in the shade of a tree, Michelle stretched out on the blanket and turned on her portable radio.

        “Whee!  Just look at that, Irene.  That girl’s putting on another show for me.  She’s just begging for it.  Wants to join you, Barbara and Candice.  And you know what, Dearie?  It gets better each time I do it. Bashing your head was fun, but the switchblade is even better.”  He closed the crack in the blinds and reached into his pocket, drawing out the knife.

        He pressed the stud and the blade made a click as it sprang open.  He felt the sharp edge, thinking again of the red gash one stroke of its thin bright edge would make on Michelle’s slender throat.  “Oh, the pleasure,” he said.  “The ecstasy.”   As his finger lingered over the razor-sharp edge, he felt a stirring in his groin.

        “I’m gonna let you in on another secret, Dearie.  Remember when Michelle and her mother were gone for two weeks and left their house keys with us?  Well, guess what?  I had copies of the keys made for the security storm door and the entry door.”  He peeked through the blinds again.  “I know where your bedroom is, my Michelle.”  He sang out in a hoarse, tuneless voice, “Michelle, ma belle,” then stopped, erupting into a fit of giggling until he lay on the floor, gasping.  ‘Yep, tonight’s gonna be the night.”

 

      Alfred finished his supper, a frozen enchilada dinner, and went into the living room.  He turned on the TV.  “We’ll stay here and watch TV until two o’clock,” he said.  “Michelle don’t go to bed until after midnight, so that’ll give her plenty of time to fall asleep.  It’ll be so easy.  No dog, no alarm system.  They think those barred windows and security doors are enough.”  He tapped his temple with his forefinger.  But not enough for a smart and cunning man like me.”

 

      Alfred left the house shortly after 2:00 a.m.  Making sure that there were no cars coming from either direction, he kept in the shadows and used the shrubbery for cover as he stealthily made his way to the Fletcher’s house.  He stepped onto the stoop and quietly inserted the key into the barred storm door.  There was a slight squeak as he pulled the door open.

        The second door opened noiselessly.  He slipped out of his loafers before entering.  Using a small flashlight, he made his way through the living room and into the hallway.  He passed Mrs. Fletcher’s bedroom and soon was standing in front of Michelle’s bedroom door.  He pushed it open, crept to her bedside and then stood there, looking down on her.  He would awaken her an instant before drawing the blade across her neck, so that she would know her fate.  That was important to him.

 

      He pulled the knife from his pocket.  It opened with a soft click.  Michelle moaned softly and turned, facing toward the wall.  That presented no problem for him, for her throat was still exposed.  As he held the knife near her throat, an almost overpowering feeling of euphoria came over him, that he had to control his shaking.  He now had the ultimate power over another human being: the power of life and death.

        As he gazed down at her, exulting in his power, he caught a slight movement in the corner of the room.  He turned to see a dark, shadowy figure standing there.  While he stared at the figure, two glowing eyes formed.  They focused directly at him.  He gasped, and Michelle stirred again.

        The figure advanced, never taking its glowing eyes off of him.  “Irene!” he called.  “You can’t do this!  No, no!  You think you’re gonna scare me, but you can’t.”

 

      Michelle screamed and jumped from her bed.  She ran for the door, but her foot tangled in the sheets and she tripped and fell.  There was a thump as her head hit the floor.  She lay still, face down.

        Alfred moved toward the girl, but halted as the hypnotic eyes held him within a few feet of his prey.  “No!  Go away.  You’re a spirit and can’t hurt me.  You’re not scaring me, Irene!”

 

      When the figure came within striking distance, he swiped at it with his knife.  “I’ll kill you again, dammit.”  But the blade went harmlessly through thin air.  Michelle stirred and groaned.  The shadowy figure vanished.

        Alfred saw through the fog of his clouded mind long enough to realize that the shadowy figure had been a hallucination.  But that flash of clarity was transitory, and he took the disappearance of the figure as a victory over his wife’s spirit.  “I’ve killed you again, Irene.”

        Brandishing the knife, he turned his attention back to Michelle, who was now trying to raise herself from the floor.  He stooped over and grabbed a handful of her hair.  With practiced calm, he jerked her head back, exposing her throat. He readied the blade.

 

      Suddenly the lights came on.  Alfred spun around to see Mrs. Fletcher in her wheelchair.  Switchblade in hand, he ran straight at her.  But she had something in her hand, too.

        Michelle screamed.  There was a loud roar, and Alfred lost his breath.  It was as if someone had punched him in the chest.  He looked down.  A crimson stain was spreading across his shirt.  He felt the knife slipping from his hand.  Another roar knocked him off his feet.

        “Damn you, Irene, damn you to Hell,” were the last words Alfred Jenkins said.

 

 

About The Author

       

     Donald Sullivan is retired from the US Army and lives in Fayetteville, NC.  His first story, “The Deer Hunters,” was published in Dogwood Tales.  Since then, he has had about forty-five stories published, mostly in the small press and in webzines.

        A long-time SIG member, he has contributed a number of stories to Calliope and has earned two Second Place finishes, two Third place finishes and an honorable mention in Calliope’s Fiction contests.  He also placed First in Calliope’s 2002 Nonfiction contest for his essay, “Hooray for Clichės.”

        Visit him at his official website: http://www.webspawner.com/users/dsullivan, or contact him at dsullivan30@juno.com.