Fear by Ronald Kelly

Author:Ronald Kelly [Kelly, Ronald]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Horror
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Five

Something Underneath

They awoke the next morning to find sunlight streaming through the dirty windows of the school bus. Water dripped sluggishly from the broken seams of the roof, but it was the last remnants of the thunderstorm. Jeb sat up and listened for the singing of robins and sparrows, but he heard no such comforting sounds. It took him a moment to realize exactly where he was and, again, that antsy feeling of dread fluttered in the pit of his belly.

“You don’t look so good, Jeb,” said Roscoe from the seat opposite him. “Did you have a bad night?”

Jeb nodded. He almost told him about what had happened last night, and then decided not to. “I had me a passel of nightmares all night long,” he said. “Hardly got a wink of sleep.”

“I slept like a winter bear, but I had me one hellacious dream, too,” replied the bluesman. “Dreamt that I met the Granny Woman and she was my own mother, God rest her soul.” The very thought of the dream seemed to unsettle Roscoe a little and he shuddered openly.

“I had a dream, too,” added Sam. “But it weren’t no nightmare. I was fighting in the war, just like John Wayne or Gary Cooper, and I was shooting at the Nazis from a foxhole. Then somebody threw a tatermasher grenade into the trench and everything went black. Funny dream, wasn’t it?”

Jeb and Roscoe traded knowing glances, but said nothing in reply.

“Roscoe?” asked Jeb, tossing off his blanket. “Can we get out of this place now? It gives me the creeps just being here.”

“I was just thinking the same thing,” agreed the black man. “We’ll eat our breakfast somewheres else.”

They gathered up their gear and soon were climbing down out of the wrecked bus. As they crossed the junkyard and made their way toward the front gate, they walked around broad puddles left behind by the storm. In one such mudhole, Jeb spied the dark body of a cottonmouth snake. But it was unlike any the boy had ever seen before. When it lifted its neck from the murky water, Jeb was shocked to see that it had two heads. It hissed contemptuously as he passed, both of its fanged mouths yawning wide and exposing the pale white flesh that lined the inner jaws.

Jeb, Roscoe, Sam, and Buckshot made a hasty exit through the open gate, leaving the auto junkyard behind. They walked a mile farther down the road before they sat down beneath a huge oak tree and began to fix breakfast. Roscoe built a small fire out of twigs and dry weeds, then, taking a small cast iron skillet from his knapsack, mixed up a pan of home-made biscuits using flour, butter, and water from the canteen. They ate the biscuits with pear preserves Miss Claudine had sent with them, then put out the fire and continued down the lonely stretch of rural road, their spirits a little lighter than they had been an hour ago.

They

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