Whiteout (Book 3): The Numbing Page 9

  “I know it’s bad out there,” Bob said, “but I think there’s a damn good argument for it being worse in here.” He gave an exaggerated shudder. “Don’t even wanna think about the types that used to frequent these rooms.”

  “Hey, I’ll take a hooker-and-junkie motel over the snow and the monsters any day, my friend,” Stone said.

  Eleanor mumbled her disgust at this vivid yet fitting description.

  Bob raised a finger. “Then you’re a braver man than me…but why suffer here, when we can get on up to my place? Sun’s shining, it’s a beautiful day!”

  I was leaning on the wall, waiting for the others. We were finishing getting our stuff packed into the snowmobiles. The wall’s wood paneling buckled beneath my weight and a piece of it curled backwards. Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t real. I pushed the piece back in its place, but it didn’t stay. Go figure.

  Bob, no longer able to stand or help out much, sat in a cheap fold-out chair. I caught his attention. “You know, I never asked what you were doing out in all of this.”

  “Yeah,” Stone added, dragging a few plastic bags full of junk in one hand, using his two-by-four as a cane in the other. “It was still pretty dark out.”

  Bob smiled. “Those things, the monsters, hate any kind of light. As soon as the sun pokes through the clouds, you’re in the clear. I heard your snowmobiles before we had that long dark spell. If you haven’t noticed, it’s quieter than a morgue out here. I think someone could hear those engines from Canada. If the wind wasn’t always blowing so hard, I mean. I heard the engines however many days ago and hadn’t heard them since, so I figured you saw the sign and you had to be staying somewhere in town. That made me feel a bit guilty. Many men can live with guilt on their minds, but not me. No way. I had to come down and right my wrong. That’s all. But a certain icicle kinda put a damper on that idea.” He patted just above the bloody scarf.

  I nodded.

  “Did I pass your interrogation?”

  “Yeah, Grady,” Mikey called from the adjoining room, where he was helping Mia pack. “Leave Bob alone!”

  “Just being cautious.”

  Bob winked. “Yeah, yeah, I get it. No hard feelings.”

  “How long of a trip is it?” I asked.

  Bob weighed the question a moment, tapping his teeth with an index finger. Some blood had crusted under the nail, dark red. “Hard to say with the fresh snow. Not more than an hour. Thirty minutes, if your sleds are as powerful as they sound.”

  “It’ll be a tight fit.”

  “Not a long trip. The huddling together will keep us nice and toasty,” Bob said.

  Stone flashed a glare. His don’t-fuck-this-up stare. “Relax, man. If I stay in this icebox motel any longer, I’m gonna lose my nuts to frostbite. Is that what you want?”

  “Uh…”

  Ell leaned on me from behind. She planted a warm kiss on my cheek. “We can make it work, Grady, can’t we?”

  “Yeah, we’ll have to,” I said.

  “Good.” Eleanor frowned at Stone. “And dude, please stop talking about your balls.”

  “If I don’t, who will? I mean, someone has to!”

  “No…they really don’t,” Ell said.

  The whole exchange got Bob braying laughter again. I didn’t join in this time. I didn’t even smile.

  Listen, it’s easy for me to say I had a bad feeling about Bob Ballard now, after everything that had happened. You may not believe me, but I’m telling you the truth. There was something…off about the guy. Majorly off. I just couldn’t put my finger on it.

  You may think to yourself: Well, Grady, if you had a bad feeling about him, why the hell didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you pack up and get as far away from that god-awful town as possible while you still could?

  And those would be simple questions, so I’ll give you a simple answer.

  But, to understand it, you’ll have to put yourself in our shoes.

  We were cold, scared, hungry, confused, and always looking over our shoulders—especially after what had happened on Prism Lake. Then, out of nowhere, we met a man who had survived here since the onset of the storms, who was offering us warmth, comfort, food, and shelter. If I had gone against popular opinion, the others would’ve lost their minds. You know why? Because we thought we had found the solution to all of our problems.

  Now, I’m not a fan of spoilers, but I’ll give you one here: Bob Ballard wasn’t the solution.

  He was far from it.

  His place was nice, I’ll give him that. It sat at the top of a hill in an even nicer neighborhood. His house was the smallest on the block, but that was like saying an A-class was the smallest Mercedes. No matter the size, you were still driving around in a Benz.

  Mia and I parked the snowmobiles in his garage next to his truck then we all got out and waited for Bob to direct us. Despite the terrible cold—worse and worse every time the wind blew—waiting seemed the polite thing to do.

  Bob had part of the driveway and a long walkway leading up to the front door semi-clear, but the snow was still falling. If it kept up, all he cleared would be covered soon; and I doubted he could shovel in his condition despite his near-miraculous recovery from a very gruesome injury.

  Inside, a smell hung in the air. It’s no secret the houses of strangers have their own scent. The occupants don’t notice unless they’ve been away for a while, and when they come back, they don’t understand why the whole place reeks of cat urine or old food lodged in the kitchen drain. That’s not to say the scent is always bad. It can be a million different things. In my own experience, I’ve come across houses smelling like vanilla candles, cigarette smoke, mold, fresh baked goodies, wet dog, or even something similar to the Midnight Lilac air freshener Stone had prepared to use as a weapon at the BP.

  The scent in Bob’s house though…I had never come across anything like it before.

  It was a wet kind of smell, yet it reminded me slightly of burning leaves in the fall. It was sweet, almost sickeningly so. Think cheap perfume sprayed around an overflowing trash can to hide the stench. Not wholly unpleasant, no, but not something I would want lingering around, that’s for sure.

  Soon, however, the cold air overtook that weird scent, and I momentarily forgot about it. Had it stuck around, what I saw when I walked through the door would’ve taken my mind off it.

  There were clocks on the living room and kitchen walls. Tons of them, crammed together from the floor to the ceiling—weird clocks, normal clocks, cuckoo clocks, cat clocks. They all told a different time, and I’m not talking about what you would’ve seen at a Fortune 500 company—London, New York, Tokyo, and so on. These wrong times held no rhyme, reason, or purpose.

  I found it pretty—

  “Fuckin’ eerie,” Stone mumbled as we followed Bob through the kitchen and into the living room.

  Bob said, “You like them?”

  Mia gave an answer, and I hoped Bob hadn’t caught the sarcasm in her voice. “Yeah, they’re great…”

  “Blame my dad for them. He got me hooked on it when I was just a little tyke.”

  “How does one get hooked on clocks?” Mikey asked.

  I thought it was a fair question.

  “Well, he was a watchmaker. Worked out of the garage. Not this garage, but not far from here either. I’d come down in the mornings before school and see him tinkering with the little gears, the magnifying glasses on his face making his eyes look like twin moons, and then around three in the afternoon when I came home, he’d be in the same spot doing the same thing.”

  A couch was set on each side of the living room. Between them flowed a sea of sandy yellow colored shag carpet. I doubted that was the color it had originally been. A fireplace was set in the far left wall if you were coming from the kitchen. A medium-sized flat screen TV hung above the mantle, where more clocks (some nearly as big as the television) battled your eye for attention.

  Bob limped across the carpet, making no sound, and grabbed one from
off the wall. It was in the shape of a sailboat. He turned it over and popped the back open. Then, like a man brandishing something so valuable your audience has no choice but to be excited about, he waved the clock around at waist-level to give us a good look.

  The image of Mia’s deceased ex-boyfriend, Billy, filled my head. The way he was lying there in the snow with all his guts hanging out. Exposed. The inner workings of the human body weren’t meant to be seen. Maybe clocks were the same way.

  “See how intricate they are? It’s a beautiful thing, the inside of a clock. They don’t use electricity either, which means they’ll keep running as long as you keep winding them up. How perfect is that for the world we live in now?” He brought his fingers to his lips and kissed them, a gesture I’d seen in many an Italian gangster movie. “I know, I know. You think I’m crazy. But when my father passed, I couldn’t bring myself to throw them out. I hung them up as a tribute to my old man.” He wiped his eye with the back of one hand. “Besides, you got to admit they’re pretty cool, eh?”

  “Nifty,” Ell said. “Do you mind if I sit?” She shrugged out of her top winter coat, shivered, thought better of it, and put it back over her shoulders.

  The warmth in the house was a far cry from the temperature outside, but it was still chilly.

  “Oh my, where are my manners? Yes, please sit! Mi castle is your castle, or whatever that saying is.” Bob clapped his hands together. “I’m rambling, aren’t I? I’m sorry, I’ve just been starving for human-to-human conversation. I haven’t seen a living soul for a long time.”

  “How long?” Stone asked as he settled onto the couch.

  Bob raised a finger. “Hang on a minute. Let me get the fire going.”

  Once the flames were dancing and he was sitting on the couch, Bob told us about the soldier with one arm.

  “Well, let’s see”—Bob stroked his beard—“this had to be about three weeks ago. I’d been keeping a tally on the calendar. Gave up right around then. Anyway, I forget the exact date, but I’d never forget the fella on account of him being an amputee.” He tapped his left arm with his right hand.

  “He had no arm?” Mikey said.

  “Yep,” Bob said, “somewhere in the Middle East, fighting right after 9/11. He was only passing through Woodhaven on his way south. Talked about some refugee camps he heard about on the radio.”

  “Cities of light!” Mia shouted, nearly jumping from her spot on the couch opposite Bob, Ell, and I. She probably would’ve jumped had she been a few months less pregnant.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Bob said, “that’s what he called it, I think. Sounded like a bunch of horse crap to me, so I asked him what stations he was getting ‘cause I wasn’t getting anything but static and silence over here. And the fella told me he heard it on one of those religious channels—I don’t know, Jesus Christ Superstar or some crap like that.” Bob waved a hand. “I always tuned right by those guys, believe you me. They’re meant to inspire hope, but with the pastor or reverend or whoever it is babbling all that end of the world nonsense…it just made me feel hopeless.”

  I agreed, remembering back to when Stone and I struck out for his van the first snowy night on the lake.

  “What happened?” Eleanor asked.

  “With the one-armed vet?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, I invited him back here. He stayed over a couple nights. Good company, and a hell of a chess player, but then he said he had to get going. I tried to talk him out of his fool’s crusade and ultimately failed. So if I had to guess, he’s buried under the snow with the rest of ‘em.”

  That brought on a grim image. But hey, no big deal, my head was full of them.

  “Poor dude,” Stone said, shaking his head.

  “A vet too. A true hero,” Bob said.

  That made me think of Jonas. A vet himself, now gone. I missed the third Musketeer more than I missed the sun.

  Bob raised his head and smiled. “But hey, I tried.”

  Ell leaned over and patted his shoulder. “Short of tying him up and holding him hostage, you couldn’t do much.”

  “Know what? You’re right. I kept him fed, watered, and warm. Even revealed a few of my chess secrets to him. I hope he’s using them at the Bright City or whatever.” The grin reappeared on his face. “Besides, I’ve got you all now. I think that calls for a celebration.” He tried standing, but Ell stopped him before he made it.

  “Rest easy, Bob,” she said.

  “I was just gonna see if I had some wine or champagne we could drink. When Bobby Ballard celebrates, he celebrates.”

  “I’ll get it,” I offered.

  “You’re a saint, Grady. Should be in the fridge. If not, then one of the cupboards nearby.”

  I left just as Stone said in a low, conspiratorial voice, “Hey Bob, you ever watch Tom & Jerry…?”

  Glad to be away from that conversation, I searched the fridge and the cabinets, making sure to take extra long so I wouldn’t have to hear about Stone’s hatred of an animated mouse.

  I found no wine or champagne, but Bob was well stocked on food and water. I noticed it was no longer cold inside with the fire going and radiating out through the house, and suddenly the bad feelings I had gotten earlier were fading. Maybe we could make this work.

  When I came back to the living room empty-handed, Stone was flailing his arms around as he described how he, if he were Tom the cat, would’ve handled the “little rat bastard”—his words, not mine. I quite liked Jerry, and Tom, for that matter.

  “Nada,” I said.

  “Nothing?” Bob said with disappointment in his voice. I shook my head.

  “There’s wine in the snowmobiles!” Ell said.

  “There is?” I questioned.

  She flashed a guilty smile. “I snuck some from the BP. What can I say, the end of the world has turned me into a drunk.”

  Stone bowed to her. “You’re a saint, Eleanor.”

  “I’ll go grab it,” I said.

  “Garage door’s down the hall, around the corner there, and to the right,” Bob said. “Be careful—the knob sticks a bit.”

  As I left, Mia’s fading voice—dripping with sarcasm, I should add—followed. “Yay… More shit I can’t drink!”

  The house was more twisty than I anticipated; winding corridors gave way to more winding corridors. I went down one, found no corner, got turned around, and before I knew it I was lost.

  Instead of owning up to my failed ability to follow directions (thanks, testosterone!), I tried retracing my steps. As I did this, I passed a few rooms I hadn’t noticed before. I stopped here, and, I know I shouldn’t have done it, I eased the door to one open.

  I don’t know what I expected to see. A few bodies hanging from meathooks or a room full of collectible ventriloquist dummies, maybe.

  Surely not this.

  It was like looking at a display in a department store. The sheets were smooth and untouched. Wasn’t even a slight dent in either of the two pillows. Nothing littered the floor, like clothes or a misplaced slipper, and a thick layer of dust covered the top of the nightstand.

  I stepped inside, also knowing I shouldn’t, and I opened the top drawer of the dresser since it stood closest to the door. It was empty; so were the other two, as well as the drawers of the nightstand. Not a stray battery or a cough drop in sight.

  Laughter drifted from the living room and echoed down the hall. I would’ve snooped around a little longer, but if Bob had anything to hide, he’d no doubt wonder about the length of my absence. All I was supposed to do was go to the garage, not take a tour. Then again…if he had something to hide, I doubted he’d let me go wandering around his house in the first place.

  Back in the hallway, I headed for the other room because why the hell not? I almost turned around, but the voice in the back of my mind told me not to. Finding out something I wasn’t supposed to find out could’ve been the difference between life and death.

  But a different voice told me I was being an
idiot. The way this voice saw it, Bob was a single dude whose home was bigger than his lifestyle. Of course he’d have a spare bedroom. Most houses did.

  I told the latter voice to shut up, and I crept down the hall to do some more exploring.

  Before I could, however, the floor creaked, making me spin around and collide with something hard.

  It was Bob.

  He spoke in a tone as cold as the wind outside.

  “You lost, Grady?”

  5

  Small Talk

  I chuckled a bit nervously and smiled. It all felt very false.

  “Uh, yeah, a little lost. I must’ve turned down the wrong hallway.”

  Bob frowned as he crossed his arms over his chest.

  I could still hear the laughter of the others from the front room. Good. They were okay. For some reason I had this terrible image in my mind of Bob cutting us up and using our severed limbs to make the numbers of a clock face. Would he have enough to reach one through twelve? Maybe…probably, if he got creative, but where he’d hang us I had no idea.

  “Need me to walk you there?”

  “Just a point in the right direction would be fine,” I said.

  “That didn’t work the first time, now did it, Grade?”

  I cringed at the nickname. No one had called me Grade since my high school gym teacher, a megalomaniac whose lot in life was to torture me. Such ways of torture consisted of making me do pushups until I about puked, run laps until I about puked, and climb rope until…you guessed it, I about puked.

  Despite my old gym teacher being a colossal prick, I never got the kind of vibes from him like the ones I was getting from Bob Ballard. What those vibes were exactly was still a question I had no answer to at that point. I wanted to grab the others and run away, but what if I was wrong? Then we’d be out in the snow and the darkness, hunted by monsters and wolves, all while trying to find a place for Mia to safely give birth. It was a chance I wasn’t willing to take.