The Gate 2 Part 11

"No, you don't. You've grown a lot in the last few years."

"What if she doesn't recognize me?"

"I think she would."

I cough and the black-eyed girl pulls away. "Come on. We need to get you inside. You're getting sick and you remember what that's like. Maybe when he comes back, he'll bring more wood."

He doesn't. He doesn't bring much food, either, just a cheeseburger from a fast food place and a shopping bag full of apples.

"Is...is there anything else?" I ask, and I pay for it. The girl with the black hair helps me up and stands behind me while I wash the blood from my dress. I meet her eyes in the mirror.

"Something's wrong, did you notice?" Her arms are folded across her chest. "See how he's pacing like that? Be careful."

He barks for me and I come. The girl was right. Something is wrong.

"Have you been out of this house, Mary?" he demanded.

My name isn't Mary. I told him that once, but he didn't care. We're all Mary here.

"Yes, sir. Just to the field and the wood pile."

"No farther?"

"No, sir." There isn't anywhere else to go. Nothing but fields and rocks and animals that run through the gra.s.s.

He leans close, his face red and his eyes wild. I flinch and this seems to make him angrier.

"You afraid of me, girl?"

I don't know what to say. His fist rises. The girl with the black hair stands behind him, her eyes huge. They're leaking oil. I'm still staring at her when he hits me the first time. A few more blows and I squeal, "How come you only hurt me and not Black Mary?" The second I say it I wish I could take it back. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," I tell her, but she crouches in the corner, her hands over her ears, facing away from me.

The man demands to know if I love him. I try to say no. I try to say yes. My mouth is too swollen to work properly. The man stares at me in a new way and leaves. He's never left before morning before. Even though I'm grateful, my stomach twists and I'm afraid.

A new girl arrives with the sunrise. She's younger than I am. She has curly red hair and freckles. Like me, she's in a torn dress. Like me, her feet are bare.

"Who are you?" I ask. It hurts to move my jaw.

"This is Red Mary."

The girl with the black hair has bruises around her eyes. Her long hair has been cut, s.h.a.ggy and boyish, like mine. She has displeased him.

"What happened to you?" I want to ask, but I'm afraid that she'll tell me. He found her. He went to her. I pointed her out and she isn't safe anymore.

Red Mary speaks. Her voice is tremulous, soft like tiny bells. "He asked me if I liked toys. He said that we could play games."

I turn and look at her. Seize her arm, yank up her sleeve. Her skin is white, without marks in the shape of his fingers. Her eyes are scared but not horrified. Not yet.

"He said that to me," I told her. I grab her hand. She grabs back.

"He said that to me, too." Black Mary's voice has changed. It sounds tired, more like mine. Like she's given up.

I'm not giving up. Not if we can save Red Mary.

"We need to go," I say. The girls look at me. I swallow hard. "We need to go."

"Go?" Red Mary asks. She's so trusting. She's holding onto a grey stuffed bunny that I hadn't noticed before. I had one just like it when I was little.

"He'll hurt you," I tell her. "He'll keep you here and do...horrible things."

She starts to tremble. "What kind of things?"

My breath hitches and I can't talk for a minute. I catch Black Mary's eye. One is starting to swell shut, but she still tries to smile at me.

"If he catches you, he'll kill you," she says. "You know that he will."

I know.

I don't have anything to take with me except the apples. I shove my feet into the too-big shoes and stuff them with newspaper. It had snowed during the night. I wish that I had a coat.

"Now we run," I say, and take Red Mary by the hand. My muscles ache and new cuts from last night open up. But we keep moving.

"I'm tired," Red Mary says after a few hours. "I want to go back."

I shake my head. "You don't."

Black Mary climbs beside me. She isn't even breathing heavy.

"Do you remember," she says, "when we tried to run away before? You were little, just like Red Mary. We got about this far and then you turned back."

I'm shocked. "Did I? Why would I do that?"

She shrugs. "You didn't know any better. You didn't know what he was like then."

My sides hurt. My feet are blistered, but I know that if I stop he'll catch me. There was something wrong last night, something in his eyes that makes my mouth go dry.

"He's in trouble. Maybe somebody knows. Or maybe," Black Mary says, blood running from the corner of her mouth, "you're too old."

"What do you mean, too old?"

"You know what I mean."

The snow starts to fall again. The cough from earlier deepens in my lungs.

"Are you going to die?" Red Mary asks. She's skipping through the snow, not seeming to feel the cold.

"That's not a nice thing to ask," Black Mary scolds. Her hair is back to its long, shiny length, her black eyes healed.

"But is she? Are you?" Red Mary turns to me. I don't know what to say.

Black Mary lies down in the snow. "Maybe I'll just wait here until he finds me. Oh, he's going to be so mad." Her eyes glitter. "Don't you think he'll be mad?"

"You need to stand up," I tell her, and pull at her arm. Suddenly I realize that she is the one who is standing. I'm lying in a snowdrift, my hair blowing over my face. I had almost fallen asleep.

"Run," she says, and Red Mary echoes her. "Run."

It's getting dark now. I scramble to my knees and crawl through the snow, not strong enough to run. At least the burning pain of freezing to death makes me think of something other than my bruises.

There's a light. It's small and beautiful. I ask the girls if they see it.

"What light?" Black Mary asks, and she falls.

"I'm cold," Red Mary whispers, and she also falls.

I try to drag Red Mary but I only get a few feet. She's too heavy. I'm too cold.

"I'll get help," I say, but they don't answer.

The light is coming from a window in a small house on the edge of a field. It looks like it might be painted yellow. I think my mom's house was yellow.

"It was, when you were younger," Black Mary says. She's crawling through the snow with me.

"Feeling better?" I ask her.

Her eyes are like ice. "No."

We make it to the porch. I'm on my knees, hesitating. Black Mary puts her hand on my shoulder.

"We can always go back if you want."

I knock on the door. The bones in my hands feel like they'll shatter from the cold.

A shadow moves in the window. I want to scream, and I do. Shadows. .h.i.t and twist and bite. Shadows hurt you from the inside out.

The shadow opens the door. It is a woman. She looks at me and her hand goes to her mouth.

"Oh my goodness. Oh no," she says. She calls over her shoulder for a blanket and some hot chocolate and the police. She looks back at me, reaching out with both hands. She touches my skin and we both draw back.

"Are you alone, sweetheart?"

Black Mary sweeps past her into the house. Red Mary sits on the porch, sucking her thumb.

"You're too old to do that," I tell her. I look back at the woman.

"My mom had a yellow house, I think. Do you know my mom?"

The blanket arrives. She spreads it out and I gingerly step into it, my eyes on Black Mary. She nods, and I let the woman wrap it around me and lead me inside.

"What's your name, sweetie?" The woman is all eyes, taking in my tattered dress and ratted hair, the bruises and dried blood. I want to say that she should check on Red Mary, but the little girl seems happy. She seems okay.

My name. It's been too long. I scribbled it on the page of a book once, but he threw all of the books away one day when he was angry.

"I can't remember. I'm just one of the Marys."

The woman's voice is patient, carefully so. "One of the Marys? Which one?"

A man enters the room, saying something about the police being on their way. I see him and shrink back. He is big and tall and his hands could wrap around my throat so easily. The man looks like he wants to say something, but he only uses his big hands to pa.s.s a mug to the woman and then steps away.

"Which Mary?" the woman asks again. Her eyes are soft. She shows me that the mug is full of hot cocoa.

"I don't know. Maybe White Mary. Do you think my mom will remember me?"

Red Mary taps the woman on her thigh. "We're all Mary here," she tells her, but the woman doesn't look at her. Not once. She doesn't even seem to notice.

- Mercedes M. Yardley wears red lipstick and poisonous flowers in her hair. She has been published in John Skipp's Werewolves and Demons anthologies, The Pedestal Magazine, The Vestal Review, and A Cup of Comfort for Parents of Children with Special Needs. Mercedes is the Nonfiction Editor for Shock Totem Magazine.Visit her at http://www.mercedesmyardley.com.

EXHIBIT C.

By David McAfee Ah, good. Right on time, sweetheart. I'm gettin' pretty good at measurin' doses; I had your timin' down perfect. Of course, it helped that I knew your weight, even if you tried to keep that s.h.i.t secret. But I knew it. I always knew it, even when you'd lie and say a different number. I knew you were lyin', I just didn't care. I...

Oh, s.h.i.t. Hold on. Let me get the tape recorder goin'...

There. Now we can start. So, didja miss me?

d.a.m.n! If you arch your back any harder you're gonna break your spine, hon. Sorry, I shoulda told you about my little friend, there. His name is Merle, after Merle Haggard. He's just a plain ol' rat. Like him?

Right, right. Of course you don't. You were always scared of rats. Pretty silly, if you ask me. The things are mostly harmless. That's why I stuck Merle in there with you, so you could see he's just a cute little furball. You guys are gonna get along fine.

Don't bother strugglin'. Those cuffs held that cop for half a day before I finally did him a favor and broke his shins. They'll hold you just fine. But, since I remembered how much you like kinky s.h.i.t, I had 'em padded just for you. Whaddya think? Just like old times, right? Ha! Okay, maybe not so much. Still, you're cuffed, and I'm standing next to you. That's gotta bring back a few memories, don't it? I know this ain't the same as bein' cuffed to the bed, but it'll do. The bed is still upstairs, but I needed somethin' different for the bas.e.m.e.nt. Somethin' stronger. Somethin' that wouldn't absorb the blood like a mattress.

That's why you're layin' in a big marble box. Took me a while to make it, especially since I had to scrounge the marble from foreclosed houses and the like. I couldn't just walk into Home Depot and ask for pieces to make a marble box three feet deep and six feet long. That woulda looked kinda funny, don't you think? Woulda given the cops too much info, too. Took f.u.c.kin' forever to cut the slabs and secure *em together, too. You wouldn't believe how heavy that s.h.i.t is. But it had to be marble. I know how much you like marble, plus blood just washes right off that s.h.i.t. A little water, a little bleach, and presto! Clean as a freshly-wiped baby's a.s.s.

Oh, looks like Merle found your toe. Come on, now. It's just a little nibble. No need for such a fuss.

You know, hon, you really should see your face right now. I'm tempted to take a picture so you can check out your expression, but that's probably not a good idea. I dunno much about that s.h.i.t, and I'd probably send the f.u.c.kin' pic somewhere by accident, and that'd be the end of me. We don't want that, do we? Of course not.

Anyhoo, I bet you're surprised to see me again, ain'tcha? After all, it's been six years since you met Brian and took off. What have you been up to? Oh, right. The gag. Sorry. I'm working on a new place that will let me stop using those things, but for now I can't have you screamin'. The neighbors might hear. So far this setup has worked pretty good, at least it suited for the last few people. It should work just fine for you, too.

Don't matter anyway. I know what you've been up to. It took me a long time to find you again, but once I tracked you down it was easy enough to see what you've been doin' the last six years. For example, you taught my son that Brian is his father, and then you went and gave him a little brother. Still sittin' on your a.s.s at home, too. No job for you. Poor Brian. How many hours a week is that sap workin' to keep you happy? 60? 70? What a dips.h.i.t. I might have to pay him a visit next. Nah, that's probably a bad idea. It's bad enough I grabbed you, but if he disappeared too, it'd point the cops right at me. They're already lookin' harder since I put that detective up on that cross. Did you see the news reports? I especially loved the shot from that one photographer; the one that showed the big metal cross stickin' up outta the dirt with the detective's body hangin' from it. That s.h.i.t was cool. It was a b.i.t.c.h gettin' that d.a.m.n cross out of the bas.e.m.e.nt and planting it in the park like that, but it was worth it. They showed that picture on every TV news show from California to New York. I'm famous now.

And you always said I was a b.u.m who'd never make anything of myself. Guess I showed you.

Merle sure seems to like your toe. No matter how many times you kick him away, he just keeps comin' back. My fault. I forgot to feed him the last couple of days. Sorry, Merle.

It's their own fault, really. That detective was a joke. Them givin' my case to him was a slap in the face. Told me they didn't take me serious. Made me realize I had to do somethin' big to get their attention. It worked. But now that I got it, I gotta be extra careful. That's why I have the saw, but we'll get to that in a minute. First we're gonna have a little fun.

Ha! You should see your eyes! I swear they are the size of apples! Relax, hon. Not that kind of fun. If I wanted to f.u.c.k you I'd have already done it. You ain't exactly in a position to resist, y'know. I won't lie, I thought about it. After all, you f.u.c.ked me pretty hard when you left. Divorce papers served in absentia. The f.u.c.k was that about? Still, I'm over it.

No, really. I am. That s.h.i.t's got nothin' to do with why you*re here, although I can't say I'm not glad it's you strapped to that piece of rock. Kinda like a bonus. No, see, the thing is, the cops are looking extra hard for me. I thought if I took someone from another state it might confuse *em. And it just so happened that the P.I. I hired to find you got back to me just as I started lookin'. It felt right, y'know. It just clicked. This was perfect. No online trail to track because I didn't have to use the *net to find my next person-amazin' how those forensic computer guys can find just about anythin', ain't it?-and now that the P.I. is toast, no human trail, either. No trace of who or what I been doin'. Even Merle, there, is a wild-caught rat. No pet stores are gonna know my face when the cops come lookin'.