Lunar Park - Bret Easton Ellis [53]
The night was drenched with darkness and the darkness really was dazzling. And the sound of the wind seemed amplified, and I noticed that Victor was standing up again and staring out into the woods, the hot wind ruffling his golden coat. I just kept staring into the blackness of the woods, drawn toward the darkness as I always had been. And the wind rushed up against me and the wind felt . . .
. . . feral . . .
There was no other word for it. The wind felt feral.
“Hello darkness my old friend . . .” The lyric drifted into my thoughts and I felt as if a boundary were being erased. I closed my eyes. I suddenly realized how alone I was. (But this is how you travel, the wind whispered back, this is how you’ve always lived.) I opened my eyes when a moth landed on my arm. It looked as if the entire world were dying and turning black. The darkness was eclipsing everything.
And then Victor started barking—much more insistently this time, shaking as he stared out at the woods, and his barking was soon interspersed with growls. And, just as suddenly, he stopped.
He stood still. He had heard something.
He kept looking into the woods.
And then he leapt off the deck and ran toward them, barking again.
“Victor,” I called out.
I could see his shadow loping along the field as if he was chasing something and he was still barking, but when he entered the woods the barking stopped.
I sipped my drink and decided to wait for him to come back.
I looked at the bathing suit. I thought about the Mercedes cruising down Elsinore Lane. How long had it been following us? Who had been in the Jacuzzi?
And then I thought I saw Victor. A shape, low and hunched over, had emerged from the woods but I couldn’t make out what it was. It was the size of Victor, perhaps larger, but its movements were spiderlike as it lurched grotesquely sideways, clumsily darting in and out of the trees at the edge of the woods.
“Victor!” I called again.
The thing stopped moving for a moment. And then its dark shape scuttled sideways and picked up speed and it began shambling back into the woods. I realized, sickeningly, that it looked as if it was hunting something.
“Victor!”
I heard what sounded like squeals of despair coming from the dog but they stopped abruptly and there was only silence.
I waited.
Squinting, I could make out Victor’s bulk as he slowly walked back across the field and I couldn’t help feeling weak with relief when the dog—now eerily calm—moved past me and into the kitchen. But then something forced me to understand that I was not alone out here.
Can you feel me? it asked.
“Go away,” I whispered. I was too fucked up to deal with this. “Go away . . .”
It was time you learned something, I could hear it moaning.
I was not alone.
And whatever was out there knew who I was.
Something was moving in the woods again.
The swings on the swing set began rattling in a sulfurous rush of hot winds and then, almost immediately, they stopped swinging.
I could hear the soft, snapping sounds of something approaching. And it was moving eagerly. It wanted to be noticed. It wanted to be seen and felt. It wanted to whisper my name. It wanted to deceive me. But it wasn’t making itself visible yet. And as I kept peering into the darkness, I saw another figure hurrying across the field, grasping what looked like a pitchfork. I stood immobilized on the deck. My teeth had started chattering. The wind gusted again. And then there was the sound of locusts swarming. I started shaking. I’m scared, I suddenly thought. When it sensed how frightened I was, there was a strange odor in the air.
Get inside, I told myself. Get inside the house now.
But when I looked back at the house I knew it couldn’t protect me from what was out there. Whatever it was could get in.
And then I saw the headstone.