Psychopathia: A Horror Suspense Novel (4 page)

Matt snorted, and from the driver’s seat,
Lara thumped him. Tully just shook her head.

‘Don’t worry about it. I know how it sounds.’ She hunched deeper into herself.

‘I believe you,’ Lara said. ‘What else happened?’

‘I don’t want to talk about it. Just get us home,
Lara? I need a drink or something.’

The sun pushed in between the curtains and Tully rolled over in the bed to squint at the slice of sky she could see. It was a rich blue and she flopped back against the pillow and dragged in a deep breath, then twisted to grope around under her pillow for her phone. She scrolled through the gallery, and found the series of photos from the night before, lying back and staring at them one after the other.

They were all blurred and there was no detail, just a misty blob surrounded by a whole bunch of black, and Matt was right, it could have been a picture of the moon. But she knew better. That wasn’t the moon. Sitting up, she swung her legs out of bed and padded over to her desk under the window. The smell of summer
came slinking in through the open window and made her smile. She loved summer, and especially this one. None of them had wanted to go home these holidays, so they’d rented a cheap cabin half an hour out of the city, and though it would mean a bit of commuting once they started their holiday jobs, they’d all carpool and it would be worth it.

The memory of the night before gave her a frisson of fright
. She plugged her phone into the computer and hit the button to transfer the files. She wanted to see the photos on a bigger screen.

The sun inched across her desk as she waited, and she pulled the curtains, spreading them open to greet the day.
Her computer beeped, and she sat down, clicking on the file and leaning closer to see.

They still looked like pictures of the moon. She clicked rapidly through all four of them, disappointment settling in her stomach like a bowl of bile. Pausing on the last one, she squinted at it. This one was a bit better. The thing must have been rushing them when she’d snapped this one. It was bigger, blurred at the edges, not really moon-shaped. More of a…blob. A greyish, whitish…blob.

But still. Tully knew what it was. Or rather she knew it wasn’t the moon – or anything natural. It had been something otherworldly that had scared them the night before. She remembered the fear, the moment when she’d frozen, Toby’s arms pinning her when he’d jumped down from the tree, the bush shaking. Otherworldly, and unnatural. She shivered, but in the morning sun, it was almost more from excitement than fear. She flicked the printer on, checked it had paper in it, then ordered it to print out the photos. She pinned them on her wall.

Lara
was in the kitchen, bent over, head stuck in the fridge. She turned and glanced at Tully with bleary eyes.

‘You’re up early,
Lara,’ Tully said. She was generally the only early riser in the household. It was the one area she differed from her twin. He’d lie in bed all day if he could get away with it. Tully liked the mornings. They made her feel refreshed and vigorous.

‘I had the worst night’s sleep ever,’
Lara said, and slapped a packet of bacon down on the counter. ‘All night, bad dreams.’ She wiped a hand over her eyes. ‘I think it was you telling me those stories that did it,’ she said.

‘It wasn’t a story. I didn’t make it up.’

‘I know, and that was the problem.’ Lara leaned against the counter and fiddled with the ends of her long hair. ‘Matt and I were in the clearing – well, you can guess what we were doing…’

‘I don’t have to guess,’ Tully said, looking in the cupboard for the jam. ‘I saw before we left. Not to mention, that you two are always chucking off your clothes
and getting down to business.’

‘Yeah, but what if something was watching us? What if the thing you saw had been watching us?’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t stop freaking out over the thought of it.’

‘What makes you think it was though? It was pretty busy scaring the crap out of us.’

Lara
put a strand of hair in her mouth and chewed on it. ‘Well, nothing. I mean I didn’t see anything, and Matt didn’t either.’ She spat the hair out. ‘But what if that was because we were too busy to look, not because there wasn’t anything watching?’

Tully laughed. ‘You’ve never worried about an audience before
Lara.’

‘Piss off. I’ve never done it in front of any
ghostly perverts who wanted to watch before, either.’

Plugging the bread into the toaster, Tully turned her attention to coffee. ‘I don’t think you have to worry about it,
Lara,’ she said. ‘It was in the woods. Whatever it was, it was miles away from you and Matt.’

There was silence for a moment. ‘What do you think it was?’
Lara was practically whispering.

‘I don’t know. The photos show a light, that’s all. Matt was right, they pretty much just look like the moon.’ She shook her head. ‘But it sure as hell wasn’t the moon we saw. It chased us,
Lara. Came after us, attacked us.’ She stared out the window, remembering, then shuddered. ‘It disappeared as soon as it touched us. Just vanished.’

‘Well that’s good though, right?
What did it feel like? When it touched you?’

Tully frowned. ‘It all happened really fast. I don’t know, my heart was beating
fit to bust, nothing felt real. It rushed us from the trees, and I remember screaming. I think. Then it was on us, and I don’t know, it was just like a cloud, I suppose. Like mist, a little bit cold and damp. Then it just vanished.’ The toaster popped and she jumped.

‘Well, I don’t like it and I didn’t even see it.’
Lara gave a self-conscious laugh and poked at the packet of bacon. ‘But I dreamed all night of it. That it was here, and whenever I went into the hallway, there was this cloudy thing there, just kind of hovering around.’

Tully pulled a face. ‘That’s awful.’ She went over and hugged her friend. ‘But it’s okay
Lara. It was just a dream. Whatever it was Toby and I saw, it hangs around in the woods up there, not in the hallway of our place.’ She smiled and squeezed Lara until she smiled too.

‘Yeah, you’re right. Just next time you want to go ghost hunting,
let’s just go to the pub instead, okay?’

‘Deal,’ Tully said. She didn’t even think she was lying. What she and Toby had seen the night before had totally freaked her out. It was exciting, yeah, but she didn’t know that she wanted to see anything like it ever again. ‘Besides, we have to start work next week.’

Lara groaned. ‘Don’t remind me. What a bore.’ She picked up the bacon and replaced it in the fridge. ‘I think I’ll go back to bed.’

Buttering her toast, Tully just waved. ‘No worries,’ she said.
‘Just, Lara?’

‘What?’

‘Try not to scream so loud, okay? I don’t need to count your bloody orgasms over my morning coffee.’

Lara
grinned and waggled her fingers in a wave, before flouncing off to the bedroom she shared with Matt. Tully gave a little laugh and carried her toast and coffee back to her room so she could look at the photos again.

‘Hey, which of you morons moved the car keys? I’m going to be late.’

Tully stuck her head around the bathroom door and looked at her friend. ‘They’re in the bowl where we always put them. You must have moved them.’

‘It wasn’t me. Why do you always blame me?’ Lara was standing in the kitchen, her hands clenched into fists. ‘I’m sick of your tricks, Tully, just tell me where the fucking keys are.’

Tully caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror. There were hectic spots of colour in her cheeks and her own fingers curled around to dig their nails in the flesh of her palms.
She opened her mouth to yell at her friend, then took a deep breath instead, and stepped out of the bathroom, towel still wound around her hair.

‘I haven’t touched them,
Lara. You were the last one to use the car.’

‘And I always fucking put them in the bowl. I’m not stupid, you know. I come in, dump the keys,
go to my room to get changed. Same thing every day.’ Lara pressed her lips together in a thin line. ‘You know that though. Every day you follow me through the door and see me do it. Jeez.’ She put her hands on the counter and sucked in a deep breath. ‘Damnit! Things aren’t supposed to be this hard. I just want to go to work!’

Tully fought the urge to roll her eyes at her
friend’s tantrum, and shoved aside her own frustration. ‘They must be around here somewhere – I’ll help you look.’

Matt, sauntering in, held up the car keys, and set them jangling. ‘Anyone looking for these?’

Snatching them from his hand, Lara snarled at him. ‘You know I was. Where the hell had you hidden them?’

‘Whoa there,
Lara. I didn’t hide the fucking keys. Why would I hide them? I’m not ten anymore. Shit.’

‘Where were they?’ Tully pulled her robe tighter around her waist. It was cold in the house.

‘In the bathroom.’

Lara
’s eyes swung around to glare at Tully. ‘You had them!’

‘No way. They weren’t in there a minute ago. I swear.’

Matt set the offending keys down on the counter and all three of them stared at them like they were suddenly going to jump up and scurry off.

‘They were on the shelf above the basin. Couldn’t miss them,’ Matt said.

Shaking her head, Tully crossed her arms protectively in front of her. ‘No. Uh uh. They weren’t there a minute ago. I would have seen them.’

A choked silence crowded the room, then
Lara darted out a hand and snatched them up. ‘I have to go to work,’ she said. ‘Enjoy your day off, arseholes.’ She flounced out the door and slammed it shut behind her.

Tully snuck a look at
Lara’s boyfriend. ‘They weren’t in the bathroom when I was in there. I swear.’

Matt just shrugged. ‘She’s just hormonal.’

It was too hard not to roll her eyes at that one. Sometimes – often – Tully just didn’t know what Lara saw in Matt. Must have something to do with the sex. Though just the last week or so, the screams from their bedroom hadn’t been of the orgasmic kind. Tully shrugged down further in her robe and wished she knew more about Matt. She and Toby had known Lara since preschool, but Matt was new. Hopefully he wasn’t going to turn into the violent type. She shook that thought away, shocked at how unfair she was being. Matt was okay.

‘What are you staring at?’ he asked, and she blinked, guilty, and looked away. ‘I’m having a beer. You want one?’

‘It’s only eleven o’clock in the morning!’

He shrugged. ‘You know what they say – it’s five o’clock somewhere.’ Snagging a bottle from the fridge, he shucked the
bottle top and wandered out the back door, digging in his pocket for his tobacco. Tully stared after him and rocked back and forward on her bare feet.

‘What day is it?’ Toby rubbed his eyes and draped himself over the counter
, perching on a stool.

‘Wednesday, why?’

‘Am I working today?’ Toby’s eyes were bleary. ‘What was that stupid cow making all that racket about?’

‘
Lara isn’t a stupid cow!’

Toby shrugged. ‘Whatever. Am I working today?’

‘Are you sick or something?’ He didn’t look so good.

‘Nah, I’m okay. Just can’t get warm.’

Tully noticed for the first time that her brother was wearing a thick hoodie, the sleeves drawn down over his hands. He reached up and pulled the hood up over his head, until only his bloodshot eyes peered out at her.

‘So am I working today or what?’ He chewed at his lip.

She shook her head. ‘It’s our day off. And tomorrow.’ They both worked as wait staff at the same place. Their boss seemed to get a kick out of having the both of them work, and dressed in the uniform black pants and white shirt, hair slicked back, it was hard to tell which of them was which.

The difference was plenty obvious right now though. Tully walked around the counter and pressed her hand to her brother’s forehead. He shied away from her.

‘Don’t touch me.’

‘Why? You look sick.’

‘I’m fine. What was Lara yelling about this morning?’

Tully sighed, moved to make coffee. ‘She couldn’t find the car keys.’

‘Again?’

‘Yeah. Again.’ Tully paused and looked over at her brother. ‘Matt found them in the bathroom, but I’d just been in there, and they weren’t there before.’

Her brother shrugged, and hunched down further into his clothes.

‘You want coffee?’ Tully asked.

‘Whatever.’

Frowning, Tully
poured boiling water over coffee grounds and went to the fridge for the milk. She grabbed the mugs and poured a dollop of milk in the bottom of the first.

‘Oh my god!’ She threw the milk carton into the sink. ‘Oh that stinks. The milk’s off.’

‘Can’t be. I only bought it yesterday.’