Point Pleasant (5 page)

“Where’d it go??” Nicholas asked, darting his eyes around the tree line that surrounded the road.

“Not far,” Tucker replied, his voice like a gruff rumble of thunder. “I hit it with the first shot. Got it in the wing, I’m sure of it.”

Nicholas sank onto the asphalt at Ben’s side.

“What in damnation are you two knuckleheads doing out here at this time of morning?” Tucker asked as he leapt off the hood of his truck and reloaded the barrels of the shotgun. “Never mind. I don’t even want to know. Get in the truck.”

Nicholas stood first and offered Ben his right hand. He seemed shaken, though not as badly as Ben, who needed a few extra seconds before he rose with Nicholas’ assistance.

Every nerve in Ben’s body danced and quivered as if electrified. Nicholas opened the driver’s side door of the truck and pushed Ben inside before he clambered in as well. Ben moved to the furthest side of the front seat—a bench with dirty, tattered leather lining—and rolled up the passenger window.

The heavy thump of metal on metal broke the eerie silence of the road when Tucker heaved the bicycles into the bed of his truck. He hauled himself in behind the steering wheel and pulled the door shut. The noxious squeal of the door’s hinges sent a shudder down Ben’s spine.

Tucker pulled off his soiled, red baseball cap to wipe a film of sweat from his dark brow. He started the truck, and its engine roared to life as he slid the cap back on his head.

Ben stared out the dirty front window and continued to perch on the edge of the front seat with a rigidity to his posture that was alien to him. Andrew was fond of poking at Ben’s back while saying, “Sit up straight before you get stuck like that, Benji.” As Ben eyed the tree line, he yearned for his father’s presence.

“Where are you going?” Nicholas asked.

Only then did Ben realize that Tucker had turned the truck toward the direction they had just come from rather than toward town.

“Gonna see if I can see it,” Tucker replied. “And if I need to put it out of its misery.”

Nicholas nodded, but Ben gave Tucker a wild look.
No, no, no.
You don’t go check on it. You never go check on it. That’s the unspoken rule of all good, bad, and horrendously cheesy horror movies.

Ben knew that if Andrew could see his son’s total panic, he would give a lecture on how Ben should not be
such a baby
. But a giant bat with glowing red eyes had not almost airlifted Andrew off
his
bike, had it?

As Tucker’s truck crawled toward where they had lost sight of the creature, Ben shifted closer to Nicholas. The three passengers peered out the driver’s side window, which Ben had been remiss to roll up.

The Ford came to a standstill. Tucker put it into gear and killed the engine. Morning birdsong cascaded through the thicket of trees, but there was no sign of movement from the forest.

Tucker shifted to open his door, but Nicholas put a hand on the farmer’s right forearm. “Please don’t, sir.”

The man leveled them with a stolid stare. “I’ve got my gun.”

Nicholas shook his head, but Tucker kicked open his door and hopped out of the truck.

The farmer walked to the shoulder of the road and reloaded his Remington. He pulled the forend with a sharp click as he edged closer to the forest. Nicholas skidded across the leather seat, pulled the driver’s side door shut, and rolled up its window with a few quick jerks of the manual handle.

The dense woods obscured Tucker’s reassuring presence, and Ben did not realize that he had been holding his breath until Nicholas said, “
Breathe
, Ben. Jeez.”

Ben’s eyes danced from the tree line to Nicholas, and he was ready to shoot his best friend a glare, but Nicholas looked as frightened as Ben felt. Ben took a deep breath when Tucker completely disappeared from viewpoint.

“Crazy fool,” Nicholas said.

“Crazy fool saved our lives,” Ben replied.

They sat side-by-side for what seemed like a small eternity. It was too early for most cars to be on the road this far out of town, and the forest itself was still and silent. Ben managed to gain some control over himself, and he was pleased that Nicholas had stopped giving him cautious, worried little glances while they waited for Tucker to return.

“What if he doesn’t come back?” Nicholas asked in a hushed, hurried whisper to give voice to the fear that Ben knew they had both entertained since Tucker first disappeared into the forest.

“He will,” Ben said. “He’ll come back.”

Ben did not know why he felt so sure of this; he barely knew Tucker to speak of him, but something about the sight of the man poised on the hood of his pickup truck with a shotgun at the ready inspired a certain amount of confidence.

Still, Ben reached up and took hold of the arrowhead he wore on a leather cord around his neck. Nicholas had given it to him as a birthday gift the previous October. Ben had first spotted the artifact in Marietta Abernathy’s Antiques Shop on Main Street a few weeks before Nicholas presented it to him with a wide smile. The arrowhead was flat and smooth save for a small carving of the famous Shawnee Chief Tecumseh’s head on the front side.

Abernathy was known throughout Point Pleasant for her eerie but accurate palm readings, which she provided in the back room of her shop. The woman had insisted the arrowhead was
special.
“It will keep you safe.”

Ben hoped she was right.

Nicholas noticed that Ben was clutching the arrowhead in his palm. He regarded Ben for a moment and then whispered, “Wiseass.”

He had knighted Ben with the term earlier that summer and had taken to using it whenever Ben was especially ridiculous. As Nicholas spoke the word to fill the stifling silence of Tucker’s truck, his tone lacked the usual reprimanding edge. Ben felt almost comforted.

“Boy Scout,” Ben returned, his voice just as gentle.

Tucker reappeared ten minutes later with only his shotgun and a mystified expression. “I
shot
it,” he said as he pulled the driver’s side door shut after he climbed in behind the steering wheel. “I shot it in the damn wing, I don’t see that it would have gotten far.”

“It was fast,” Nicholas told Tucker.

“Really fast,” Ben agreed.

Tucker started the engine. “Big too,” he said as he assessed the forest a final time before he pulled the truck around in a U-turn.

True to his earlier comment, he did not seem to want to know why the two boys had been alone in the woods. Ben reckoned Tucker understood their curiosity over the recent reports. The three of them spent the ride back to town entrenched in tense silence.

As they neared Main Street, Nicholas spoke up. “Are you taking us to the Sheriff’s Department?” he asked Tucker, who fixed them with a wary gaze.

“Was gonna,” Tucker replied. “Your daddy ought to be there, I expect.”

Nicholas’ eyes widened at the mention of his father, but he nodded. “Yes, sir.”

Dread settled in Ben’s chest. They would both be in a world of trouble for sneaking out of the Nolan house, especially considering how their misadventure had ended.

Tucker pulled into a parking space in front of the Sheriff’s Department and let out a heavy sigh. “Well, here goes me cementing my reputation as the town nut,” he said as he got out of the truck. “C’mon, boys.”

Their disappearance had apparently not gone unnoticed by Mrs. Nolan. Leslie woke early, unable to sleep, and had been delirious to discover that Nicholas’ room was empty when she checked on them.

Nicholas was stiff as he sat in a chair in the waiting area. An officer made the necessary calls over the system to let Deputy Nolan know that his son was at the station.

Deputy Nolan and his wife burst into the Sheriff’s Department ten minutes later; their house was only a brief drive away. Leslie’s short, honey-colored hair was unkempt, and her blue eyes were fraught with a mixture of fear and relief.

“Where
were
you?” Nate thundered as he loomed over them. The deputy was a man of intimidating stature, and though his dark hair was neatly combed, the coarse, week-old beard on his usually bare face was evidence of the strain his job had placed him under as of late.

Ben hung his head in shame. The polished marble of the Sheriff’s Department’s floor served as a poignant contrast to his filthy Converses.

Nicholas stood to face his father, but he immediately shrank under Nate’s imposing shadow. “I’m sorry. I was—”

“It was my fault,” Ben said. “I wanted to investigate the old factory. See if we could find the creature everyone’s been talking about. Nic only came along to make sure I didn’t get hurt.”

“No, it was
my
fault,” Nicholas countered.

“Both of you are grounded forever!” Leslie exclaimed in a rush before she leaned in and embraced her son. “Even you, Benjamin Wisehart!” she said and pulled away from her son to hug Ben as well. “You stupid, foolish boys.”

Ben felt his cheeks burn hot when he realized Tucker was watching them from a few feet away.

“Nicholas James Nolan, what were you
thinking?
” Nate reprimanded, his tone thick with a disappointment that Ben wished had been aimed solely at him when he saw Nicholas’ shoulders slump in defeat. “We will discuss this when I get home. You go with your mother now. You too, Ben. You’re not allowed to set a toe outside the house, do you both understand me? Not a single toe.”

Ben and Nicholas nodded in unison. Nate shifted to speak with Tucker. The deputy’s posture was defensive, and Ben was certain the man’s fury was about to extend to his rescuer, even though Tucker had nothing to do with Ben and Nicholas’ foray into the forest. Ben had to speak up.

“He saved our lives!” Ben said to Nate, who twisted back in surprise.

“What’s that?”

“Mr. Tucker, sir. He saved our lives. He’s a hero. He shot it! He shot the Mothman! It was chasing us when we were on our bikes, but he shot it, and it flew off into the woods.”

Nate looked from Ben to Nicholas and then to Tucker with incredulity. “We’ll discuss this when I get home,” he repeated as he fixed a glare over both boys. “Now go and get cleaned up.”

Tucker’s considering gaze settled on Ben, who shrugged with unease before he finally shuffled out of the Sheriff’s Department with Nicholas and Leslie. He had no idea what Tucker and Nate discussed, but he knew that by the time Nate finally got home, it was late that night, and Ben had already returned to his house on Cardinal Lane with Caroline. Nicholas told Ben that after they left, a call came in from Jefferson County; the police there had found Grant Harper.

POINT PLEASANT, WEST VIRGINIA

October 2012

Ben steered the Camaro onto Cardinal Lane for the first time in over a decade and was unsurprised to see that the road he had grown up on had not changed much at all in that time. Just as he had observed during his drive through Main Street, Point Pleasant was still
familiar
. There were differences, of course.

Duvall’s Diner boasted a relatively new sign, and the Harpers’ Save n’ Shop had been replaced by another grocery store called Chapman’s. Abernathy’s Antiques looked the same, but there was an unfamiliar restaurant called The Grill next door. The post office had what seemed to be a relatively fresh coat of blue paint, which complimented the red brickwork of Carmichael’s Pharmacy to its left. The library and Sheriff’s Department had been completely rebuilt, though; the buildings stood in modern contrast to the quaint, old-fashioned feel that the rest of the town emanated.

Town Hall loomed tall and pale with its columnated portico and high clock tower. The stone fountain in the middle of the picturesque square at the center of Main Street bubbled like a lazy brook. The square itself was lined with white birch trees bearing golden leaves and appeared as well-manicured as ever.

The ‘
Welcome to Point Pleasant
’ sign listed the population at 4,637. Point Pleasant was small in contrast to a city like Boston, but the town suddenly seemed larger than Ben remembered from his youth. He smiled to himself at the rest of the sign as he sped past: ‘
We’re Mighty Pleased to Have You!
’

We’ll see about that. 

Ben’s seatbelt felt uncomfortably tight. The journey had taken a little over thirteen hours. He left Boston at six o’clock in the morning after a fitful night of sleep. He had packed his freshly laundered clothes and hit the road before his resolve could shift and he reconsidered the notion of returning to his hometown.

When he pulled the Camaro up to his childhood home just after seven o’clock in the evening, Ben put the car into gear and sat with his hands on the steering wheel for a full minute before he finally killed the engine, climbed out, and breathed in the scent of burning leaves on the otherwise fresh air. The black Ford Expedition in the driveway signaled that Andrew was home.

The lawn was mown, but the flowerbeds were vacant. The cherry tree that grew in the westernmost corner of the yard showed signs of a recent pruning; it always bloomed in the spring. As it was late October, Ben wondered if the apple tree in the backyard was still there and if its branches were weighted down by its seasonal yield of the tart green apples that his mother used to bake into pies.

The house itself was as pristine as the front lawn. Andrew Wisehart was a military man; he had served in Vietnam as a field surgeon where he took a shot to the hip while tending to a wounded soldier. His career in army greens had been cut short due to his subsequent limp, but the rigid training lingered in his general philosophy. There was a place for everything so that everything could be in its place.

Andrew had always—quite literally—presented his best foot forward to the world, and this included the appearance of his home. The week after Caroline died, Andrew saw to it that the hedges were trimmed and that the interior and exterior of the house received a new coat of paint after the smoke damage had been cleared.

Ben and Kate had helped, of course. Kate had flown down from Boston upon the news of her mother’s death. Andrew cried once that week, only once. He blamed himself with the misguided notion that with all his medical expertise, he should have recognized the signs of the ticking time bomb in his wife’s brain. Ben knew that his father’s desire to have the house restored to its initial beauty was not a result of his anal-retentive need for order. Rather, it was his tribute to his dead wife and the home she had helped create for their family.