The Bighead (12 page)

While Charity’s own spirits
plummeted.

She tried to maintain the
conversation—again, she liked Jerrica very much, and liked talking
to her—but now, after five beers, she felt buried by her own
reflections. Jerrica ordered another round, then nudged her. “Hey,
why so glum all of a sudden?”

“
Huh? Oh, I’m sorry,”
Charity replied, chin in hand. “I was just thinking.”

Jerrica didn’t even have to ask. Were
Charity’s regrets that plain? “Like I told you before, don’t worry
about it. Be patient. You’ll meet the right guy
eventually.”

Charity nodded, trying not
to appear the sad sack, and failing.
It’s
that ’eventually’ part that bothers me,
her
thoughts went on moping.

The keep brought two more beers, then
emptied Jerrica’s ashtray which, by now, sat clogged with butts. As
he did so though, Jerrica leaned forward, squinting. “What the hell
is—”

“
What?” Charity
asked.

Jerrica’s finger touched the bartop,
the space the ashtray had been sitting on. “What is
this?”

Now Charity
squinted.
Writing,
she realized. Etched vaguely in the varnished wood, by a knife
no doubt, were words, like a graffito. “I can’t make it out,”
Charity admitted.

Jerrica squinted harder. “It says,
’The Bighead was here.’ And that’s weird. Somebody wrote something
similar in the bathroom, on the stall door. Who the hell is The
Bighead?”

The Bighead? Charity’s eyes narrowed,
and she remembered as vaguely as the words had been scrawled. The
memory seemed a million miles away. “Its like a local legend, I
guess.”

“
What, you mean like
’Kilroy was here’?”

“
No, more like a resident
bogeyman. I remember hearing the stories from when I was
little.”

Jerrica’s eyes seemed suddenly
enthused. “Tell me the stories. I can use them in my
article.”

Charity half-shrugged, numb now from
beer and self-reflection. “I can barely remember, it was so long
ago. Just some story about a monster-child who lived in the woods.
He had a giant bald head and crooked teeth, and supposedly was a
cannibal. It’s just a story parents made up to scare their kids,
you know, ’Be good or The Bighead’ll get you.’ Over time it sort of
developed into a backwoods myth.”

“
Ain’t no myth, girl, I’se
kin tell ya.” The rube barkeep’s face hovered closed as he replaced
the emptied ashtray.

“
Oh yeah?” Jerrica said.
“Tell us about this Bighead.”

The old face hardened, an eye cocked.
“Ain’t a purdy story. Might git you city gals all upset were I ta
tell ya.”

Jerrica challenged him with a sly
smile. “Try us.”

A pause, a hand sliding against
whiskers, then the barkeep began, “This were long ago, mind ya, but
it was outa the woods he came. No one knowed who his parents was,
and no one’d wanna know, ’cos The Bighead were about the ugliest
kid you could ever ’magine. I seed him once myself, matter’a
fact.”

Jerrica, obviously, was
getting a kick out of this. “You
saw
him? You saw The
Bighead?”

“
That I did, girl, and I’se
wish I hadn’t. Wearin’ old scrap fer clothes, he was, an’ ya coulds
smell him a hunnert yards off, I swear. You coulds always tell when
he was around too, ’cos the woods’d get real quiet. Any ways, they
called this kid The Bighead on account of he hadda real big head,
like twice the size’a normal, an’ there weren’t a single hair on
it, an’ his eyes—Jimminy Christmas! The Bighead’s eyes were big an’
crooked, they was, an’ reals close together, looked like a coupla
hard-boiled eggs pushed inta his face, only one were big an’ one
were little. An’ his teeth? He hadda mouthful’a teeth on him that
looked like dog teeth, he did, an’ I’se know it’s true ’cos, like I
said, I seed him myself. I seed him eatin’ deerguts in one’a the
soybean fields by Luce Creek.”

“
Gross,” Jerrica remarked,
paling. “Deerguts?”

“
Shore,” the old man
bantered on. “The Bighead like guts, an’ brains too. Liked ’em
raw.”

“
Come on,” Jerrica
said.

“‘
S’true, I’se swear.” The
keep, then, poured himself a shot of whiskey, fired it back neat.
“An’ it were more’n just animals he et—it were people too. See, it
weren’t fer but a week ’er so that The Bighead went on his rant.
Alls of a sudden lotta folks started findin’ their livestock kilt,
gutted. We’se all figgured it was a timber wolf ’er somethin’, even
though there ain’t been a wolf in these here parts fer over a
century. Then, a’corse, it were more’n livestock we started findin’
dead. It were local folks too, all on the north side’a town, toward
the ridge. Kath Shade, Vera Abbot, Vicki Slavik an’ her husband
Martin, shee-it, several more, cain’t remember ’em all. So’s we all
banded together ands went out onna shootin’ party, ’cos at that
time we still thought it must’a been a wolf or somethin’. ’Corse,
we knowed we was wrong once we saw it.”

Jerrica lit another cigarette,
intrigued. “So other people saw The Bighead, not just
you?”

“
Shore, plenty’a fellas.
Cain’t quite think ’zactly who off hand, but we’se saw it, all
right. ’N’fact it was me who saw it first, in the soy field eating
that poor deer’s insides. I chased The Bighead, I did, an’ the
other fellas caught up ta me, an’ we’se started firin’. I thinks we
hit it, but I’ll never be sure. The blasted thing run off through
the woods, an’ nobody ever saw it again. Next day we searched the
woods fer the body but couldn’t find nothin’.”

Jerrica was trying hard to contain her
amusement. “And you’re saying that The Bighead murdered people,
townspeople?”

“
Shore am,” the keep
affirmed. “Murdered ’em, et parts of ’em too. Mostly gals. See, The
Bighead liked gals even though he were only a kid.” The keep’s lips
turned up. “He kilt a few fellas too, but like I say, it were
mostly gals…
blond-hairt
gals at that.”

“
I guess I better dye my
hair,” Jerrica laughed.

“
Ain’t nothin’ ta make
sport of, missy,” the keep replied with no mirth at all. “‘Cos like
I just got done tellin’ ya. We ain’t pos-er-tive we kilt it.”
Another quick whiskey shot was poured, and swallowed neat. “So’s
who kin tell? The Bighead could still be out there somewhere. All
growed up now. An’ who’s ta say he won’t come back?”

««—»»

“
Out
rag
eous!” Jerrica said, cutting the
Miata’s motor. “That old guy was a trip!”

Charity got out, closed her door, then
they headed wearily for the front porch. “Most people around here
are like that. They love to tell tall tales.”

“
The way he sounded, The
Bighead was real.”

“
I hope you don’t believe
that.”

Jerrica chuckled. “Of
course not! But what great material for my article—a local myth,
a
monster-child!
I
can’t wait to find out more about it, and everything else about
this town.”

Just then they sky briefly alighted;
Jerrica glanced up. Vague lightning flashed on the horizon, bereft
of accommodating thunder. “That’s weird. A storm’s coming but the
sky is almost totally clear.”

“
It’s just an electrical
storm,” Charity cited. “It happens all the time out here in the
summer. No rain or thunder, very few clouds. Just silent lightning.
It’s kind of spooky.”

Spooky, hmmm.
Well, after that story in the bar, Jerrica figured
anything would seem spooky. But she held her gaze a moment more to
the sky and watched a few more of the mute, distant flashes.
I’ll have to remember to photograph that. It’d
make a great time-exposure.

Only the parlor and
stairwell lights were on when they entered the boarding
house.
Annie must be asleep,
Jerrica surmised. The grandfather clock in the den
tolled twelve times as she closed the front door behind her, and
after that: silence.Jerrica nimbly mounted the steps while Charity
more or less trudged behind.

“
You look exhausted,”
Jerrica said on the landing.

“
I am. All those beers
finally caught up to me.”

“
Well, get some sleep—”
Then Jerrica casually kissed Charity on the cheek. “I’ll see you in
the morning.”

Charity smiled bleakly in her doorway.
“Good night.” Then her door clicked closed.

Before Jerrica could move
on to her own bedroom, she noticed a light on under the door across
from hers.
Who’s room is that?
she wondered.
Annie’s?
No, I think she said she sleeps downstairs. Goop’s, maybe. At least
I’m not the only night owl.
When she went
into her own room, she propped upon the windows, smiled with her
eyes closed at the mild breeze. More lightning flashed mutely from
far off. She didn’t understand how she could feel so enlivened,
though. It had been a long day for her too, the seemingly endless
drive, then six beers at the local tavern. But she didn’t feel the
least bit tired. It was her assignment, she knew, that prompted
this new elan, this vitalization. It was a rare thing when a writer
could feel so charged over a project.

She reached into her travel
bag, pulled out her Mouse Systems trackball; in doing so, though,
he again noticed the small bag of years-old cocaine. This made her
smile again, happy with herself.
I don’t
need it. I don’t even want it!
Proof of her
victory.

She input some quick notes
into her laptop, the white screen aglow in her face; tomorrow,
she’d tap out a working outline. It was a multi-part series, so she
wouldn’t have to fret as much over word-count.
I’ll divide it into sections,
she
decided.
Locale, history, economy, then
the sociological element as a summation.

Still, though, and late as
it was, she felt too energized to go to bed; it would be useless to
try. Instead, she took a cool shower, donned a sheer nightgown, and
went downstairs. The hardwood floors felt warm under her bare feet
as she traipsed through the quiet house. She moved through the
parlor, through the dark country kitchen, eying the myriad relics
and gimcracks. Old quaint portraits hung on the papered walls,
faces peering through dark oil paint. The top of an antique
high-boy boasted a display of genuine Depression glass, lovely
translucent blues and greens. A sparkling corner caddie in the
den—of perfectly rounded glass and gold-painted woods—shelved what
must’ve been hundreds of crystal knickknacks.
For a dirt-poor hill woman, Annie’s got herself a nice
place,
she thought. And the house itself,
though old, had been refurbished impeccably. New appliances in the
kitchen, a great butcher-block counter that must’ve cost a bundle.
Yes, the boarding house was beautiful.

But the real beauty assailed her when
she stepped outside, onto the back porch. Jerrica felt stunned; she
peered out into the flowered demesne that was the backyard—she had
to actually catch her breath at the vision.

Moonlight shimmered over
the trees, tinseling the exploding beds of flowers. A nightbird
frolicked at one of many concrete bird baths, and an owl hooted at
her from the high trees. Sounds throbbed in an uneven anapest,
crickets and peepers sending out their calls of love. That, and of
course, the strange lightning and its silent pulses fracturing the
twilit horizon. It was a wonderland of sound and moonlit spectacle,
a silent tempest.
I’ve never,
Jerrica realized,
seen
anything so beautiful in my life…

But then—

crunch

Jerrica’s eyes darted toward the tiny
sound. And then—

creak!

When she turned, her heart nearly
ceased. A tall figure like a carven shadow stepped up on the porch
and stopped, facing her. Big shadowed claws for hands hung at the
figure’s sides. Jerrica’s sudden fear seemed to close around her
head, like jaws, and just before she would scream, the figure
said:

“
Miss…
Jerrica?
That you?”

Jerrica’s sigh of relief
heaved out of her. “Jesus
Christ,
Goop! Don’t sneak up on people like that!” Her
hand opened on her chest, as if in doubt that her heart were still
beating. “You scared the living shit out of me!”

Goop Gooder seemed to shudder at the
respite, his voice pitched like an upset child’s. “Aw, daggit, Miss
Jerrica! I’se terrible sorry! I’se-I’se, aw! I’se didn’t mean
ta—”

Jesus,
she thought when she calmed down.
Sounds like he’s gonna start crying, for God’s sake.
“Don’t worry about it, Goop. It was an
accident.”

“
I’se mean,” his voice
quivered on, gibbering, “I’se had
no
idea
yous was out here, no I didn’t.
I’se
awful
sorry
fer scarin’ ya.”

Jerrica rolled her eyes. “Forget it,
Goop. Calm down.” It was then, though, as the young handyman made
another step, that Jerrica took closer note of him, his body in
particular. He was dressed in nothing but jeans, his long dark hair
disheveled as though he’d just gotten out of bed. Now his physique
caught the moonlight at a delineating angle, and Jerrica could well
see its masculine lines, the bundled pectorals and broad, tapered
back—a hot lust-sculpture, a chiaroscuro of flesh…