Hold the Light (9 page)

"And you'll do," he uttered in thirsty anticipation.

It took only moments to reacquaint himself with murdering with his own two hands again. Mural had put his knife aside for too long, but it sang with its old voice, beating in unison with his accelerated pulse. He hacked at the young adults, cutting into their dresses and suits. Their screams echoed about the town square and added to the harmony he heard. His wrist bent and swiveled nimbly. As the necks of the bystanders split open, the blue light inside him chimed in with sounds beautiful to his ears. Blood leapt freely into the open air and it was thick and blue to his eyes. In the blurred and methodical fury, Mural sliced their bodies apart. The knife conducted a murderous orchestra that filled his ears with joyous melodies. The blade sung along, pushing their talents, demanding perfection, until all but one of the bodies lay flat on the concrete. He left a young woman barely alive and kneeling before him. His shoulders settled and the frenzy was over - oh how time flies when you're having fun. Time and his glee settled though, as he peered into the girls eyes. They half pleaded and half accepted; she knew her death was upon her. Mural nodded to her and took one last spin, the black cloth of his coat flowing as his blade performed an encore, with one last ostentatious jab.

This was truly the finale to his symphony. His blade ripped into the girl's jugular and sprayed blood across his face and over the pristine white siding of the theatre walls. Mural smiled at his marking, thinking it to be his signature, before he was completely lost in his fantasy. Lost in the gift. Standing before a full ensemble of imaginary violins and horns, he lowered his bloody baton, maroon flesh slipping down the knife's edge, and bowed before the crowd. He felt spotlights of heat the back of his neck burning from dozens of eyes. All stood around him with mouths agape, some silent, some screaming.

"They're stunned! This must be how Beethoven felt!"

Mural's music played on in his mind as he relived the symphony through the gift, taking their souls and releasing them into the darkness.

"So nice I did it twice," he chuckled.

The police found Mural with his last victim's bloody head in his lap, her long blonde hair draped in matted clumps across his legs. Timidly, the authorities approached Mural as he ate from a discarded yet perfectly good bag of popcorn. His fingers were stained red and the popcorn between his fingers was pink. Covering the lapels and seeping in through a tear in the shoulder of his long black coat, blood stained draped him as much as the applause he heard in his head.

Wavering guns were drawn in shaky hands. Even light had to muster courage to come near Mural as he sat in shadows at the theater's entrance, lost in his creation, barely noticing the police close in.

"I can swallow better already," he exclaimed, munching on popcorn with a puerile glee to an officer ready to pistol whip him, "I will reunite with her in Hell!"

The surrounding mob of officers and civilians disarmed Mural and beat him into the blackness he yearned for.

PART TWO

Randy

Chapter 13

Sharp sunlight pounded down on Randy's window and seeped between his eyelids. He partially awoke, but fell back down to his pillow, feeling the remnants of his illness that left him unsure of where he was. The room, or wherever he was, spun, even with his eyes closed. Randy moaned and forced his eyes open, half fearing he was dead. He felt terrible enough to be.

His head pounded and the wan light was as bright as the sun to him. The light, seemingly noticing his condition, attempted another approach and moved through Randy's small room and onto his brothers' beds, illuminating only empty mattresses. They had to be out back, picking up the slack Randy left by getting ill. Yes, that was what happened. His bearings came back to him with a twang of guilt for not helping with the farm work. He had to help. Randy braced his weight on his teenaged knees and slowly climbed from bed and began to exit his room. With his head spinning and stomach churning, each step he forced forward became immeasurably harder to keep planted. The disorientation proved to be too much for his buckling knees and forced him to rest at the doorway between his room and the small living room. Randy waited for the pounding in his skull to subside, bracing under the whirlwind of nausea - and it felt just like a wind, like a gale, and it burrowed deep into him as a terrible omen.

He peaked through the back window to see if there was any activity. The walls seemed to close in around him and the entire wooden shack his family called home, creaked and moaned.

A broadcast crackled from a distant speaker. All Randy heard was "I am the lantern and you are the light." Confused even further, he took one step to investigate and stopped, deterred by his illness and the garbled halt of the broadcast. The whole family used to gather around that radio for an hour every night before mother had to get a job. Ever since then it had been silent. Something wasn't right.

Wind rattled against the windows and Randy realized that it wasn't morning. The rays of sun were not the blinding bit of dawn, but the remnants of the day dying, which meant that his family let him miss the entire day of work. Leaves shook free and branches flapped against the windowpane at increasing speeds, and beyond, a wall of black clouds frowned down.

Hobbling as fast as the nausea would let him, Randy passed by the dinner table to the backdoor, where he could look over the whole farm. Peaking through the plaid curtains that used to be the old tablecloth, he watched the small hills of grass bend horizontally under the wind. The vast land appeared twice as large and twice as green against the dark sky. Not a single sign of life though. Randy couldn't remember a time when this backyard didn't have some life in it - a random horse or cow, mallards creating some fuss on the pond, some stupid squirrel trying to muscle his way into the bird feeder. The only motion was created by the foreboding storm, continuing its haunting of the property.

He hobbled onto the porch, the harsh wood on his soles and creaking under his weight, and stumbled down the stairs to the lawn. The grass was soft and kind on his bare feet and the breeze, though stiff, was a cool relief on his heated forehead.

All the flat land was empty. Even the neighbor's lot a half-mile away was still. Randy spun around and looked at his house, lumped like driftwood in the middle of a waving green sea. This small sliver hadn't even the capacity to house his family, the little dump, but it's all about location with real estate. It, and his family, was set in the middle of the best soil in the area. The Earth was a wonderful constant, but Randy couldn't live the life of a farmer for much longer; he had to leave soon. He knew he would leave soon. He wondered how they would all manage to put a meal big enough for every child on the rickety dinner table every night with him gone. And that thought alone kept him home until he was forced out of there was no home to come to.

Turning his gaze over the backyard, he watched the crops swaying behind the barn, the refreshing smooth and cool breeze made him smile; the calm before the storm always soothed.

"The animals must be in the barn," Randy guessed aloud.

Bruno suddenly bolted from behind the splintered barn, barking and racing across the yard towards the pond. He was a stupid dog, but all the kids loved his playfulness. Bruno finished his streak with clumsy plunge into the water. His idiotic head floated above the water and he slowly paddling after a small patch of ducks floating in the middle of the pond. Of course, the thunderous clap of the dog's landing scared every duck off on the pond, but that never occurred to Bruno.

Another thunderous clap belted out from overhead and shook the windows behind him. Randy's baby sister Betsy yelped from inside. Her cry surprised him. He looked up at the black sky as a vein of lightning cursed through the brooding clouds. One more cry came from her room for 'Mommy!' He turned to go comfort her.

"Get in here Bruno, you dumb dog," Randy yelled, entering the house.

Bruno ignored him and continued to flop around in the water.

Betsy was sitting bolt upright in her bed, frightened but not crying. She never cried much. Safely smothered in her sheets, Randy watched her shake beneath the blanket, as he leaned lightly against the doorway like a phantom. The house was dark and what little light remained was in Betsy's eyes.

"I'm scared, Randy," Betsy said, her sweet blonde hair matted down all over her face. She untangled herself from the covers and ran to his side.

"It's all right sweetie," Randy said, petting her head. "It'll be a great storm to watch."

Together they walked hand in hand to the front of the dark house. The storm seemed to have stolen the sun. The rooms were splashed with intermittent darkness; the only lighting came from unpredictable lightning. Betsy squeezed Randy's hand with every flash as she half expected to see monsters in the crannies. They got to the front door and Randy struggled to open it. Together they both meekly poked out into the front lawn and their entire town was dark as sin. Thunder and lightning worked in unison. Lightning lit the horizon into a beautiful array of chaos and color, and the thunder clapped fear into their hearts.

With one sinister flash of light, clarification came and showed them the broken trees that lined the dirt road. Their neighbors scurried off down the path with their animals. Seconds later they were dark silhouettes with howling winds in their faces. Everything was out of place. Worry hardened and settled in both Betsy's and Randy's guts. It never left them.

"Where is everybody?" Betsy's sweet voice asked. "They should be back by now."

"I don't know, Betsy, but they'll be home soon. I'm sure of it."

The radio hissed and screamed out one more blurt and then trailed off as it died.

Chapter 14

Every bone in Randy's body shivered with the gale's omen. He sensed grief in his heart and let Betsy in on none of it.

"They must have been held up, sweetie. It's a long trip to the market, no matter what the weather."

Betsy pulled on Randy's pant leg with a wan smile her response and sat on the doorstep. Randy turned down to her with a smile. Watching storms together had been something they both enjoyed, though Randy had another intuition completely with this one. But Betsy had worked up her courage this time and her love for the colors and the sounds keep her watching, but only if he was around. Randy loved being so close to his little sister; it made him feel important in times where many people got lost in the mix.

The storm pounded harder towards them and thunder ran up the road. Wait, up the road?

A deafening roar rumbled the gravel as the sky raged out of control, dropping a black spout just over the horizon. Every cloud merged and savagely attacked the ground. The force pounded gaping craters and heaved anything and everything into the funnel cloud.

Randy instinctively pounced and scooped up Betsy in his arms, ready to run. The debris sped off in every direction through the air, swirling madly about like angry missiles. Barns half a mile away burst into red splinters and the scythes and plows within scurried around the sky. Everything that was supposed to be grounded was airborne.

Betsy clutched Randy's neck with each new thunderous boom that approached. He began to shake.

"Where are they? This isn't right," Randy questioned.

The longer the family was gone, the worse their chances of survival were. The entire world seemed to be toppling its contents on their town and it all headed straight for their house. Helpless and fearful, Randy's options quickly ran out until his father, mother, and two brothers raced into sight at full gallop. A crowd of stampeding horses followed right behind them in a rout of wild brown fear. Randy cradled Betsy tighter, reciting every prayer he could remember, as he watched his family try to out race the stampede.

The rush of horses kicked up dirt from one direction and the tornado did the same from the opposite. Randy could barely see both but knew, deep in his fearful heart that the two promised to collide.

Father yelled muted orders from the distance, but Randy couldn't move a bone in his body even if he heard. He frantically prayed, above Betsy's sweet smelling head, hastily speaking anything he could for his family to outrun the stampede before the oncoming twister beat them home.

More portions of the town lifted into the air, piece by piece, until everything that Randy had ever seen in his whole young life was ripped apart. The Williams' black Ford pickup blew into view, hovering in the air like a big black witch, growing closer and closer until it crash landed fifty yards away, spouting into flames. The explosion warmed his face. The model T split into pieces and rained shrapnel for miles, leaving a scorched block in the road. The blaze forced Randy's arm into action and they stuffed his petrified sister into the house. She immediately sneaked behind the big picture window and watched over Randy's shoulder. Their family was riding low, racing even harder to get to the house, all of them barely galloping ahead of the storm and the stampede.

"Stay put right there, Betsy, and keep your head down!"

She made no acknowledgement; she just stared. Randy stood by the door, waiting to let them all in the house. They had to do this precisely and together to make it. But the thought was a curse.

The twister barreled down and spit a terrible gust that knocked his brother John's horse off balance. The wind was insurmountable and he crashed into his mother's horse, sending them both into a trampled cloud of dust and twisted limbs. Randy reach out, it all happened so fast. Randy could barely see them topple and couldn't hear much over the clamor of the storm. But he did hear something close to screams as the horses following them stampeded over where they fell.

Randy closed his eyes and looked away, holding his head in his hands. Tears welled in his eyes and his blood burned with anger and despair. He tried not to look up but snuck a peak out of the corner of his eye and saw Betsy watching out of the window. Randy blinked away tears and turned to shout to his family.