Sourmouth (32 page)

             
“Get in the car,” Violet said as she ran forward, her feet trudging along in
the thick layer of bloody mud from the heavy rain that still fell. She sprang
the car door open and hurled herself into the driver’s seat, then leaped into
the passenger’s side without so much as bumping her head.

             
Riley was a bit slower to move, never breaking eye contact with the wolf as he
sprinted along, collapsing into the driver’s seat and closing the door behind
him. 

The
Tylers
sat in
dread-filled silence, their bloodshot eyes ascending from the bottom up to the
top of the imposing figure before them.
Sourmouth
stood upright like an arrow with its nose towards the moon, its muscles taut
and readying to pounce. Violet fumbled with the dial as Wait’s Yesterday Is
Here blared from the cassette player, trying in vain to turn it off as if it
was the music that was drawing the beast in. She barely even noticed when she
failed the task and switched her attention back to the creature in front of
them.

Even from a distance they could see its teeth, which
seemed to glow in the soft moonlight, tightly packed in their rows like razors.
Sourmouth
had its large head cocked to the side like
an inquisitive puppy, eager to play with the tiny prey as they scurried about.
Over the music they couldn’t quite hear, but the beast seemed to be clicking
its claws together in a rhythm as it watched them. It was a silly thought, but
the
Tylers
couldn’t help but be in awe of the
realness of
Sourmouth
. Its reflection had been so
close and still for so long, that its very existence was earth-shattering.

“Drive,” Violet uttered with a voice hoarse with
fright.

Riley pressed his foot on the accelerator with
resolve, noticeably spinning the wheels helplessly in the mud, slowly sinking
the car even further into its rut. He turned to his wife wordlessly, his eyes
saying the last thing either of them wanted to admit. They weren’t going
anywhere.

Lightning soared through the air above, illuminating
the edges of the brute’s fur in the pitch black night. Suddenly, the sky
cracked with thunder. The deafening sound surprised
Sourmouth
,
who turned and roared into the clouds in a frenzy. The very air around the wolf
seemed to vibrate as its throat violently shook. What was left of the skin
around its mouth that connected the bottom of the jaw to its skull tore wide
open, the tear continuing upwards along its mandible until the pale
colour
of bone and teeth could be seen underneath the
ripping flesh. When it turned back to the
Tylers
, its
face dripped nauseatingly with gore and chunks of facial tissue.
Sourmouth’s
expression had lost all curiosity, to be
replaced only with its unrelenting fury.     

“We need to go. We need to go now,” Riley said
sharply, placing his quivering hand on the latch of his door.

“Where are we going to go?” Violet cried out, shifting
her weight in her seat to follow suit, not fully sure if her feet could carry
her if she tried.

Riley turned and eyed the front door of the house,
nodding in its direction.

They had only turned away for a few seconds but it was
long enough to close the distance. As quick as a whip
Sourmouth
sprinted forward, leaping feet-first onto the hood of the car with a crash. The
claws on its hind legs came down with an ear splitting scrape, nearly matched
in pitch by the scream from Violet’s mouth. Without hesitation,
Sourmouth
lashed out, its mammoth fist crashing into the
windshield of the car, bursting a
hole
inwards in a
cascade of glass.

Riley opened his door with a snap just as another
gigantic clawed hand came crashing down, lodging itself wrist deep in what was
left of the window.

As her husband leaped out of the vehicle Violet tried
to hurdle over the seats to escape behind him out of his door. It was then that
she felt a tug.
Sourmouth
had grabbed a handful of
her hair.

Riley stood in the cold drenching rain, watching in
horror as the creature held his wife. He could see that the only thing stopping
it from yanking her out of the car was that the glass was cutting into its arm,
slicing into its skin with every movement. He contemplated waiting, hoping that
it might slit its own wrist open. But the fact was that it might still try and
drag her out of the hole it had punched, which most likely would decapitate his
wife far sooner than the creature would bleed to death. He had to do something
fast.

Riley dashed towards the house, leaping over the
remains of the woodland creatures. His feet slipped underneath him as he landed
knees first in the slimy mud. Crawling on hands and knees he got to the pile of
firewood by the deck, grabbing hold of the axe.

In the car, Violet grabbed the creature’s humungous
hand, pushing it away as hard as she could, trying to yank out her own hair in
order to get free.

The beast snapped, its heavy jaws colliding against
themselves, spraying its rose-tinted saliva through the air in heavy streams.
With its hand still stuck in the windshield, blood dripped down and fell onto
Violet’s arm, almost burning her with its heat. She could feel an increase in
the amount of blood leaking as she was lifted higher in the air out of her
seat, her face getting closer to the jagged glass as the wolf pulled her nearer.

Riley moved forward in the slippery muck, using his
momentum to carry him closer. With one downward swing the head of the axe found
its way into the muscle of
Sourmouth’s
arm, ripping
through the flesh with a revolting squish that sprayed crimson blood into the
air.

The creature roared in pain, releasing Violet from its
grasp as it pulled its arm from the windshield, slicing itself even further.
With its injured arm it swung outward,
its
backhand
colliding with Riley’s face.

Riley was sent reeling onto his back, landing directly
on top of a half-eaten deer with a crunch that broke the animal’s ribcage. The
axe fell limply beside him, close enough to dive for, but not close enough to
just reach
..

“Riley!” his wife called out as she fell out of the
car, landing on her stomach in the mud a few feet away from her husband.

Riley could feel the side of his face swelling up, the
hot sensation of blood as it spilled from his lacerations and ran down his
cheeks.

Sourmouth
stood on top of
the car, licking its wounds to try to slow the profuse bleeding.

Violet tried to run to her husband, slipping wildly in
the mud as she did. With one hand she grabbed hold of the axe on the ground and
tried to help lift up her husband with the other. A fruitless
endeavour
as they both nearly toppled over.

“Get to the house!” Riley said as he tried to get on
his knees to regain proper footing.

“Not without you,” she screamed, her eyes watching as
the wolf turned its attentions back towards them. Its gaze alone straightened
up her spine.

“Go!” he yelled, pushing her on the lower back to
propel her in the right direction.

Sourmouth
leaped off the
hood of the car and landed on the ground with a tidal wave of mud and animal
bits. The rushing liquid crashing into the back of Riley’s legs made it even
more difficult to run. The beast crawled forward towards Riley who frantically
scrambled on hands and knees to get away.
Sourmouth
swung its healthy paw downwards and dug three of its three-inch-long nails into
the back of Riley’s calf.

Riley screamed in agony as he was slowly dragged
backwards on his belly; the
claws
in his leg acting
like anchors as the creature pulled him closer. No matter how hard he tried to
kick at
Sourmouth’s
forearm, Riley couldn’t seem to
break the hold. Every inch that he got closer, he could feel the thick fingers
digging further into the muscles in his leg.

Sourmouth
was practically on
top of Riley, snapping its jaws furiously as it leaned in to bite. When
suddenly it was cracked in the skull with the top of the axe. Violet thrust
forward with it again, hitting the wolf in the jaw, knocking it backwards with
a thud against the driver’s side door of the car.

“I told you to get in the house,” Riley groaned as his
wife helped lift him to his feet, the pair slowly trying to make their way to
safety.

“I’ve never been good at taking orders,” she said with
a huff, his weight straining her already wobbling legs.

They looked back as
Sourmouth
was shaking the cobwebs from its head, leaning on the side of the car as it
tried to stand back up.

The
Tylers
nearly fell onto
the porch when they finally managed to get there.

Instantaneously Riley began digging deep into his
pants pocket to find the key to the front door.

“Hurry up, babe...it’s coming...” she muttered as she
slapped his shoulder, urging him to find it faster.

Riley grabbed onto the small key, covering it in mud
from his dirty hands. It took precious seconds to wipe it clean before placing
it in the keyhole, turning it with a clunk.

Sourmouth
roared from behind
as they forced their way through the front door, slamming it shut behind them.
The
Tylers
both braced themselves against it like a
barricade, pressing their weight on it in effort to keep it shut.

             
Instantly, the wolf crashed into the door with its shoulder, splintering the
wood on both sides from the impact. The force rocked the couple backwards and
nearly off their feet. Without hesitation they threw themselves forward against
the door again. They could hear the beast outside, pacing back and forth across
the deck, the claws on its feet scraping with every footfall.

             
Riley looked at his wife, his eyes focused on the tears that streamed down her
face. Her hair was frazzled, small sections of her scalp bleeding and bald. Her
face was patterned with blood where the glass from the windshield had rained
down from above, cutting into the skin. She was caked in mud that was quickly
trying to dry, which would make it hard to move in the near future. It was just
then that he realized he was in pain. His own face was scratched up, as was his
forearm from when he attempted to shield his face from the glass. His cheek was
swollen and purple from the hand that had struck him. His leg felt numb from
blood loss aside from the dull ache of dying muscle that seemed to pulse
outward from the inside of his calf. 

             
“Listen,” Violet whispered with her ear pressed against what was left of the
door.

             
Riley pressed up against it, holding his breath in to quiet his haggard sounds.
And in return he heard nothing. The beast had gone.

             
Violet turned around and pointed at the couch, “We need to block the doors.
Block the windows if we can”.

             
Riley looked over towards the couch, past
Tsitusem’s
quickly decaying corpse. He nodded and pushed away from the wall, limping
towards the sofa with determination, leaving a trail of blood from his leg as
he walked. It took far more effort than he was expecting to move the furniture.
What was normally a mild annoyance during spring cleaning now seemed like a
mountain he was trying to shove. Every push of the couch required him to put
more weight on his injured leg, which seemed primed to give out any moment.

             
Violet looked at the door as if to tell it to stay in place, before abandoning
her position and running over to help her husband.

             
Together the
Tylers
pushed and pulled the couch
across the floor, placing it firmly against the damaged door as reinforcement.

             
Without words Riley pointed to the side window, which was only covered by the
dusty old curtain.

             
With an agonized groan the
Tylers
made their way
across the room which now felt barren and exposed. They walked up to the large
cuckoo clock, which must have weighed at least a hundred and fifty pounds.
Riley positioned himself on the side while Violet took the job of steering it
from the front. Together they pushed and pulled again, sliding it
inch-by-excruciating-inch across the floor. Slowly but surely they placed it in
front of the window, blocking the entryway at least temporarily.

             
Riley sighed out as he leaned back against the wall, the muscles in his leg
shrieking at him to stop and rest.

             
From outside, the
Tylers
heard an ear splitting howl,
barely muted by the worn walls of the house.
Sourmouth
was still out there, still alive and still angry. The animal’s cry was followed
by an aggravated thump, its paws slapping against the side of the house as it
attempted to figure out a way to gain entry.

             
“Apparently, it doesn’t remember being here before,” Violet choked out in a sad
laugh, a small smile slipping across her face.