The Gate 2 Part 4

Henry ignored this and flipped to the next page.

Henry took out one of Jerry's knights with his last p.a.w.n, simultaneously shielding his bishop from Jerry's queen.

"Suck on that," Henry said.

Jerry groaned.

While he waited for Jerry to make his move, Henry stared into the back yard. A couple of birds landed on the rusted T-pole that was the last of the pair that had once held the old clothesline. Henry tried to imagine a world in which people had the time or inclination to haul whole loads of wash into the back yard for air-drying and couldn't quite do it.

"If it comes down to it," Jerry said, "I don't want to suffer."

"Huh?"

Jerry repeated himself.

"Uh...duh," Henry said. "You think there are people out there who do want to suffer?" He didn't look away from the birds, didn't quite understand what Jerry had said until his brain had a second to run through it again.

"Probably," Jerry said. "But I'm not one of them."

Now Henry looked at his brother. "Are you seriously talking about this again? I thought I-"

"I have to talk about it. No matter how much you want to pretend it isn't happening, I need to face reality. We need to."

Henry said nothing.

"If it comes down to it," Jerry repeated, "I don't want to suffer. But I don't think I have the guts to...well, you know."

"Yeah," Henry said. "I know. Try not to worry about it, okay? Now shut up and make your d.a.m.n move."

Henry flipped to a picture from some birthday party or other. In it, both he and Jerry had cake smeared across their faces. Mandy wasn't in this one, although she had undoubtedly been nearby. It might even have been her party. Henry couldn't remember for sure.

It was her party, Jerry said. We gave her a doll, remember? That stupid doll she carried around from then on? She probably still has that thing on a shelf in her bedroom.

And suddenly-thanks to Jerry, or the Jerry in his imagination-Henry did remember.

Henry plopped his foot onto the coffee table and kicked over a pile of papers. One of those sheets held Jerry's test results. They had looked over the results together when they got home from the doctor's office, pretending to understand what they meant.

But they hadn't really needed to understand the science; the doctor had laid it out in plain old English: Jerry is going to die, he'd said, leaning forward in his leather chair and staring at them through his thick, Santa Claus gla.s.ses. Not today, and not tomorrow, and probably not in the next few months, but within the year for sure. And we need to start planning what we're going to do.

There'd been no need to plan, of course. Not really. Jerry had already made his feelings perfectly clear.

I don't want to suffer, he'd said. But I don't think I have the guts to kill myself if that's what it comes to.

Jerry hadn't said that last part, but he hadn't needed to say it outright. Brothers-really close brothers-have more than one kind of communication.

The doctor hadn't said what he thought might happen to Henry, hadn't even been willing to give them his best guess.

Henry knew now, however. He could feel himself weakening, could sense the world closing in around him like a big, warm blanket.

He turned to the last page of the photo alb.u.m.

The picture showed him and Jerry on stage at one of the many carnivals they'd toured over the years. The banner above them said, in big white letters, MEET JERRY AND HENRY, THE AMAZING SIAMESE TWINS!

Political incorrectness aside, Henry thought it was a nice picture. It showed the two of them in mid-bow, smiling out at the audience with their twin grins.

He closed the alb.u.m and laid his head on their conjoined shoulder. He hoped Mandy would be okay with this, that she'd get over it in time.

She will, Jerry said. She's tough.

Henry smiled. In the end, he hadn't gotten the peace and quiet he'd often longed for-not so much as a single minute of alone time in his entire life-but that was okay. He thought maybe isolation was overrated.

In the trees beyond the porch, a single bird woke and sang. It was still too early for so much as a hint of sunlight on the eastern horizon, but it would come soon enough.

Henry leaned his head into Jerry's neck and ignored the stench of blood.

Night night, Bubby.

Henry kissed his brother's cheek. "Night night," he said and closed his eyes for the last time.

- Daniel Pyle is the author of Dismember, Down the Drain, Freeze, the upcoming Man vs. Himself, and many short stories. He is also the editor of Unnatural Disasters and is an Active member of the Horror Writers a.s.sociation. After studying creative writing at Amherst College, he moved back to his hometown of Springfield, Missouri, where he now lives with his wife and two daughters. You can visit him online at www.danielpyle.com.

DEAD THINGS.

by Michael Crane.

When he heard the doorbell, Dwight rubbed his face with his hands. A loud, disheartened sigh left his lips. He knew one of his least favorite people in the world would be at the door. He didn't hate her, of course. He knew the woman had issues that were beyond her control, but after a few months of this it was becoming a tired trend.

After taking a breath, he finally went to the door and answered it. "Everything okay, Mrs. Hendrickson?"

The old woman wore a horrid pink robe decorated with blackbirds. She shook her wrinkly head while her mouth quivered. "Zombies, Mr. Jacobs! Zombies."

He did his best to hold in a groan. For weeks Mrs. Hendrickson had been coming over, claiming zombies had invaded their cozy little town and was convinced it would only be a matter of time before they tracked her down. She even went into graphic detail about what zombies did to people, even though Dwight was quite aware of how they behaved due to many of the horror flicks he'd watched over the years. Of course, he didn't believe her. She was probably off her meds again.

"Zombies?" Dwight asked. "Have you been watching scary movies again?"

Mrs. Hendrickson's mouth hung agape and an offended gasp escaped her throat. She wagged her finger at him. "Don't you go making fun of me, sonny boy. I'm trying to tell you something important here. Zombies are invading our neighborhood!"

He took a quick peek outside and threw his hands up. "I don't see anything, Mrs. Hendrickson. Maybe you were dreaming?"

"Fine," she said, putting her hands on her hips. "Don't believe me. Think I'm a wacko. I'm sure that's what everyone thinks of me anyway."

"n.o.body thinks you're a wacko," Dwight said, although he d.a.m.n well knew that was a lie. The whole neighborhood knew of Mrs. Hendrickson's antics, though they never complained or confronted her about it. Everybody felt sorry for her after she lost her husband in a car accident two years ago. That was when she really started to go off the deep end. She would keep herself locked up in her house and do nothing but watch TV all day long. No wonder she came up with such outrageous stories.

Dwight began to rub his arms even though he wasn't cold. "It's getting late. If you see any zombies lurking about, you can come back and let me know."

She waved him off, angrily shaking her head. "Whatever. I know you're mocking me, but I'm gonna show you once and for all that there are zombies and I'm not off my rocker!" He watched her storm away while she continued to shake her head and mumble to herself. Dwight just stared in silence. He hoped she wouldn't come back again, but he wasn't that lucky of a guy. She always came back. After taking one last look outside, he closed the door.

"Was that Mrs. Hendrickson again?"

Dwight turned and saw his seven-year-old son, Jimmy, standing on the stairs. He wore his blue pajamas, his brown hair a feathery mess on the left side of his head.

"You should be in bed."

"Is it true? Did she really see zombies?" Jimmy asked.

"No, she didn't see any zombies." Dwight ran his hand through his son's hair and the two of them began to walk up the stairs. "You know she has problems."

"What kind of problems?"

"She's not really right in the head, you know? I mean, she lost her husband and she's a bit on the old side." He cringed at his own words, knowing that he wasn't the best when it came to explaining things to his son or giving fatherly speeches.

"Old people have problems?" Jimmy asked while Dwight tucked him in.

"Some of them do. When something really bad happened, or when they get old, they start to act like a child. I think it's a little bit of both when it comes to Mrs. Hendrickson."

One of Jimmy's eyes became big. "She's turning into a kid?"

Dwight chuckled and shook his head. "Not like that. In her head, she's thinking more and more like a kid."

"And that's bad?"

"When you're a grownup like her it is. There's nothing to be afraid of. She won't hurt you or anything. It's just that she's a little out of it and she makes up stories. It's her mind playing tricks on her. When she tells these stories, she thinks they're true, but they really aren't."

"So there's no zombies?"

"Only in movies." When he noticed that Jimmy's eyes shrunk and a worried frown began to spread across his face, he asked, "What's the matter? I'm sorry if she scared you, but it's really nothing-"

"It's not that."

"What is it, then?"

Jimmy's tiny nose crinkled a bit. "Mommy looked like a zombie sometimes."

A chill ran through Dwight. His shoulders twitched at the thought of Sammie. The frail and sickly image of her burned into his mind, and no matter how much he wanted to he couldn't shake it away. He could never get her out of his head, but the days that pa.s.sed without a mention of her were considered good days. There was no denying that his son was right about such a comparison. By the end of their marriage she had transformed into a gaunt sh.e.l.l of what she used to be, her skin pale as bones, those horrible, rotting teeth. She wasn't the same woman he had fallen in love with, that was for sure.

"Enough zombie talk," Dwight said. He gave Jimmy a soft kiss on his forehead and pinched his right cheek while saying goodnight. He left the bedroom, leaving the door open a crack. He stood outside of Jimmy's room for several minutes, motionless.

Sammie had become a meth addict. While Dwight never figured out what triggered it, he had always suspected that it was because she wasn't ready to be a mother. It was like a part of her life was over and she did everything she could to hold onto that part, never growing up or accepting any responsibility. Sure, she enjoyed being a mother at first, but her depression started when Jimmy was a year old. She would slump in a chair with her hands over her face, crying, ignoring her son's pleas. Dwight had suggested they take a vacation, saying how his father always looked forward to watching over Jimmy while they were away. The offer never seemed to appeal to her. That's when he thought maybe he was the problem.

She started going out regularly with friends not too long after that. As soon as Dwight would step into the house, before even saying, "I'm home," she would rush out the door, all dressed up with gallons of makeup on her face. She wouldn't come home until late in the morning the next day. Dwight was pretty sure she'd cheated on him, but he never confronted her. In the end he just wanted to be there for Jimmy, but it tore him apart having the youngster ask him every night where his mommy was.

"She went out," he'd tell him.

That's when Jimmy would frown and say, "Mommy goes out a lot."

He didn't know what else to say. At first he figured Sammie was burnt out on motherhood and needed to escape for a while. He told himself that it was a phase and she'd snap out of it. If he pressed her on the issue or got mad, it'd only make things worse. He figured that if he just let her do as she pleased, she'd get bored and drop the act.

Dwight could've never imagined that it would get as bad as it did. When she started rapidly losing weight, that's when he knew that something was up. She wasn't the same person anymore, constantly indifferent to everything. Whenever Dwight asked her a question, she'd mumble an unintelligible reply. She stayed away from the house more and more, even when he was at work. It got to a point where Dwight would have to call his father and ask him to watch Jimmy during the day.

"Son, you know your wife's got a serious problem," his father said at one point.

Dwight had told him everything was under control. His father agreed to look after Jimmy while he was at work. Dwight wasn't exactly pleased that it had to happen that way, but he didn't know what else could be done.

When Dwight came home from work one night, his father sat him down at the table so they could have a talk. Dwight knew this wouldn't be a pleasant conversation, but he had nowhere else he could go, and he knew that his father wouldn't leave until he said what he needed to say.

"You've got to face that fact that your wife has a problem, Dwight. You can't keep on denying it."

"Who's denying it? I know things aren't good."

"But you're not doing anything about it."

Dwight threw his hands in the air. "Dad, what the h.e.l.l am I supposed to do? Huh? Sammie is an adult, and I can't ground her for acting out."

"This goes beyond acting out, Son."

"She'll snap out of it."

"She's a mother, for chrissakes!"

"I know what she is."

"Clearly you don't. Last time I saw her, she looked like a walking corpse. And her teeth!"

"Dad..."

"You know she has a drug problem. There's not much else that can cause a body to change like that."

Dwight rubbed his face into his hands. His eyes began to water, but he did his d.a.m.ndest to fight back the tears. Yes, he knew what was going on with Sammie. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out. Maybe he didn't want to face it because he felt responsible. He should've stopped it long before it got so out of hand, but he really believed that Sammie would get better on her own. Anything was better than Sammie leaving them.

"Dad," he started, "when you and Mom had problems, you tried to talk it out with her. And you two split."

"We had problems, but nothing like what you're dealing with. And even though we split, we never stopped being your parents, now did we? You can't sit there and be pa.s.sive just because you're afraid Sammie is going to walk out on you."

"I don't want to lose her."

"She's not Sammie, Dwight. She's...something else. The woman you loved is gone, but there's a way to get her back. She's gotta get clean. Seek treatment. Threaten to cut her off from you and Jimmy."