Different Seasons - Stephen King [205]
When his legs broke water in a shaky but triumphant V, I saw that they were covered with blackish-grey lumps, just like the one I had seen on Chris's shoulder. They were slugs-big ones.
Chris's mouth dropped open, and I felt all the blood in my body go as cold as
dry ice.
Teddy screamed, his face going Dale. Then all three of us were thrashing for the bank, going just as fast as we could. I know more about freshwater slugs now than I did then, but the fact that they are mostly harmless has done nothing to allay the almost insane horror of them I've had ever since that day in the beaver-pool. They carry a local anaesthetic and an anticoagulant in their alien saliva, which means that the host never feels a thing when they attach themselves. If you don't happen to see them they'll go on feeding until their swelled, loathsome bodies fall off you, sated, or until they actually burst.
We pulled ourselves up on the bank and Teddy went into a hysterical paroxysm as he looked down at himself. He was screaming as he picked the leeches off his naked body.
Vern broke the water and looked at us, puzzled. 'What the hell's wrong with hi
'Leeches!' Teddy screamed, pulling two of them off his rrembling thighs and throwing them just as far as he could. Dirty motherfuckin' bloodsuckers!' His voice broke shrilly on the last word.
'OhGodOhGodOhGod!' Vern cried. He paddled across the pool and stumbled
out.
I was still cold; the heat of the day had been suspended. I kept telling myself to catch hold. Not to get screaming. Not to be a pussy. I picked half a dozen off my arms and several more off my chest.
Chris turned his back to me. 'Gordie? Are there any more? Take 'em off if there are, please, Gordie!' There were more, five or six, running down his back like grotesque black buttons. I pulled their soft, boneless bodies off him.
I brushed even more off my legs, then got Chris to do my back.
I was starting to relax a little and that was when I looked down at myself and saw the granddaddy of them all clinging to my testicles, its body swelled to four times its normal size. Its blackish-grey skin had gone a bruised purplish-red. That was when I began to lose control. Not outside, at least not in any big way, but inside, where it counts. I brushed its slick, glutinous body with the back of my hand. It held on. I tried to do it again and couldn't bring myself to actually touch it I turned to Chris, tried to speak, couldn't I pointed instead. His cheeks, already ashy, went whiter still. 'I can't get it off,' I said through numb lips. 'You can you '
But he backed away, shaking his head, his mouth twisted 'I can't, Gordie,' he said, unable to take his eyes away. 'I'm sorry but I can't No. Oh. No.' He turned away, bowed with one hand pressed to his midsection like the butler in a musical comedy, and was sick in a stand of juniper bushes.
You got to hold onto yourself, I thought, looking at the leech that hung off me like a crazy beard. Its body was still visibly swelling. You got to hold onto yourself and get him. Be tough. It's the last one. The. Last. One.
I reached down again and picked it off and it burst between my fingers. My own blood ran across my palm and inner wrist in a warm flood. I began to cry. Still crying, I walked back to my clothes and put them or. I wanted to stop crying, but I just didn't seem able to turn off the waterworks. Then the shakes set in, making it worse. Vern ran up to me, still naked. 'They off, Gordie? They off me? They off me?' He twirled in front of me like an insane dancer on carnival stage. They off? Huh? Huh? They off me, Gordie?'
His eyes kept going past me, as wide and white as the eyes of a plaster horse on a merry-go-round.
I nodded that they were and just kept on crying. It seemed that crying was going to be my new career. I tucked my shirt in and then buttoned it all the way to the neck. I put on my socks and my sneakers. Little by little the tears began to slow down. Finally there was nothing left but a few hitches and moans, and