The Last Customer (4 page)

           
The girl.

Rod stood fast, then ran through the kitchen, pulled the basement door open and hurried down the stairs. Stopping at the bottom step, he turned back to look at the top. He saw Patty gnawing on her fingernails, with a frightened look in her eyes.

           
“I heard it too. Is she still alive?” Patty called down.

           
Rod didn’t answer, he was too afraid to talk. He could feel that his mouth was dry as he crept toward Judy’s body. Her love-handles hung over the blood soaked rope-binding. The thick hemp length dug into her bloated and blackening stomach, forcing her back to arch. .Her bony spine stretched a line along the middle of her back. Her chest folded forward and at first glance, she looked is if she had collapsed

           
Still scared, Rod forced a nervous smile. With his knees feeling weak, he wobbled to the back of the basement. It was dark. Any visibility was nonexistent. His footing was staggered and he nearly tripped over Judy’s left leg.

Judy was motionless...much to Rod’s relief.

Maybe he imagined the screams?

Maybe they were delayed death throes?

Neither would have surprised him. The methamphetamine tricked his sense of sound.

           
The upstairs light-switch clicked on, prompting Rod to spin around quickly.

           
“You want the light on?” Patty called down in a shaky voice.

           
Rod was annoyed. He stared silently at Patty, watching her descend down the stairs. The creaking wood was unnerving. Each time she took a step, Rod’s heart pounded.

 
Patty hit the last step. She stood, gawking at Rod from the bottom of the staircase. Her hand was wrapped tightly around the railing. As she moved closer, Rod could see the whites of her knuckles, and that her eyes were wide with terror.

Confused, Rod spun back toward Judy, and was horrified when she rose from the floor. She was levitating, her dead legs lifted parallel to the cement before the rope began to stir, unwrap, and then fall to the ground.

           
Rod’s mouth dried up. He could feel saliva clinging to the roof of his mouth, creating a paste. He pried his tongue from his cheek and swallowed.

Judy’s head jerked forward. The color of her eyes rolled over white, fiery. Her lips inched back into a smile. The corners of her mouth tore upward, pushing her teeth forward. A harmonic cackle escaped her lips, sending Rod running for the stairs.

Something heavy grabbed his neck, picked him up, and threw him with great velocity. It wasn’t Judy—she was across the room. Whatever it was, it felt like he’d been hit by a truck. His body slammed against the cold cement wall at the far end of the basement. His jaw was broken and his organs burned. His joints felt like they were on fire. The pain was unbearable. The blood he coughed up splashed against the cement. He didn’t know if he could endure the pain. Looking to his right—with his peripheral vision—he saw Patty being erected from where she stood. She was smashed flat against the wall. It was as if gravity had sucked her against the cement bulkhead. Given the stretched look upon Patty’s face, Rod knew that she was experiencing the same excruciating burn that he felt.

           
Judy glided toward them as though she were being operated by a pulley system. She slid in front of Rod, emitting the laughter of a demonic child. Her voice sounded synthesized.

Rod’s heart thumped out of control. He tried to scream but his lips wouldn’t part.

Judy stood between Rod and Patty with her shoulders spread apart. Glistening snake-like vines slithered from the stumps where her arms used to be, around the elbow. Pieces of meat fell from the severed arms and onto the floor, covered in dark ooze. The slimy end swaying from her right arm wiggled between Rod’s lips, forcing his mouth to open. Tiny razor sharp hooks poked out from the center of the scaly snake. He felt the slimy vine forcing itself down his throat. It felt like the serpent was slithering into his stomach, tearing the moist flesh of his esophagus. It continued lower until it ripped the lining of his stomach. Blood gushed from the fissures. His heart hammered fast.

Relief suddenly swept his mind. This thing was going to kill him, and being dead was better than living with this degree of pain and agony. He thought he was going into cardiac arrest, when the slithering thing wrapped around his heart and squeezed. The burning intensified as the hooks ripped through his ventricles, then his aorta. Rod’s sanity fled. He watched a blazing hole open in the wall. Another world was opened up to him.

He was afraid. He fell forward into the lack of color.

He was in Hell.

5

Patty watched-on while Rod’s corpse slumped forward onto the floor. The swaying, pulsating vine—that looked very similar to a raw muscle—retracted and then shot back like an elastic band into the remaining length of Judy’s arm.

Patty wanted to die. Closing her eyes as hell seized her. She fell to the ground like crumpled trash next to Rod—what was left of him.

Chapter 3

1

Rod felt his limbs tingle and tighten. Every muscle in his body cramped. Each fiber of hair stood tall. His skin pulled taut, like it was about to shed. Every fiber of his body stung, and his his heart hammered heavily in his chest. Even his ribs felt like they would break, and burst through his skin. He wanted to scream, but couldn’t. His eyes opened wide. He realized he couldn’t shut his eyelids; panic began to set in.

Rod stared across the length of the basement. Unable to control his body, he fell forward onto his face. The cold cement hurt when his forehead pounded into it. Blood trickled from his mouth, staining his lips. He tried to move of his own will.
 
He wasn’t in control... Mentally he was aware, but physically he was invalid.
 
He was flat against the ground, lying on his stomach. He tried to wiggle his fingers. Nothing. Then his toes began to move, but something else was moving them. The communication between his brain and limbs no longer functioned. He was paralyzed, yet moving. Something else was driving the vessel, his body.

Whatever movement took place, now, had to be some kind of nervous twitch.
He thought. He felt the sensation of movement, but control didn’t exist. The stinging sensation spread through his veins. Fire pumped into his heart. Then he was being lifted. His body cranked ninety degrees and his feet planted on the cement. He walked toward Patty, but he was still only a passenger, in
his
body.

He picked up Patty’s head. His face lowered toward hers, peering into her eyes. He felt his own eyes move, but wasn’t controlling the movement. His optic nerves seemed to invert. Then he felt
something
within him, an indescribable presence.
 
A voice dwelled within the prison of his mind. Whatever it was, it laughed at him, and the laughter humiliated him. Rod’s mouth opened, and he began to speak. He felt the sensation of his tongue lolling and his vocal cords stretched, but still, he wasn’t in command of his functions. He wanted to scream. Then his mouth vocalized. His voice was deep, rich in tone but held the familiar synthesized sound.

           
“Rise, Jezebeth,” the voice commanded.

           
Patty stood and peered into Rod’s eyes. Patty held a glowing ring of white fire around her pupils. The circle outlined the blue coloring.

           
“We’ve been given time,” Patty said.

But it wasn’t Patty.

2

Sammael stood in the dark pit of eternity. He brooded over the lake of torment and flames, enjoying the endless screams of the vile spirits surrounding him. They splashed in and out of the fire, begging for his hand. He only laughed.

Without warning, he began to levitate from the rock he stood upon. He was being beckoned by the
Unholy
. Pleasure sizzled within him. He was being sent up, and enjoyed being sent to the plain of human existence. People were tantalizing when they were tormented.

They were fun.

Sammael had walked with humans of the earth many times. He took pleasure in possessing them and killing them. It had been three years since he’d been granted existence on earth. The last time had been spent pleasurably. He and the demon, Lilith, were sent to an isolated farmhouse where they tormented a young married couple that had killed their infant child. They’d killed their young son simply for the insurance money. It was fun to toy with the couple. The newlyweds had done awful things and in return for their sins, Sammael and Lilith had drowned them, cut them and brutalized them. Afterward, they sent them into the searing pit of darkness.

Sammael felt a familiar sensation while he sunk into the flesh of his newest human. The feeling was pleasant. His focus was lost as he saw the Priest:
Father Leslie Gardner
. Sammael was being sent to earth to take revenge on the priest, Gardner. Excitement coursed through him. This would be a great redemption. It had been decades since the priest expelled him from the body he’d stolen and being sent
back
had hurt. Sammael’s rage burned for a long time. It stewed inside of him. The last mission, torturing the married couple, had been a good release, but it hadn’t eased his anger toward Gardner or the junkie whore whose body he’d borrowed.

           
Looking down at the powerful arms of the body he now possessed, he admired its flesh. The body was strong, youthful, and attractive. This boy was muscular and physically able. Sammael looked over his new vessel. He flexed his new muscles and saw the world through human eyes. Then he took in his surroundings.

He was in a basement. There was a dead woman lying on the ground at his feet.

How nice.

She was missing her arms. Blood seeped from her orifices; her skin was blackened, producing a foul smell. There was also another woman and she began to rise.

Sammael knew this demon well. It was Jezebeth. She had taken the body of the other woman, the younger one with blue eyes and blonde hair. This woman wasn’t missing her arms and was physically fit. She radiated beauty, and was quite attractive. Both Sammael and Jezebeth wore attractive new bodies. Their vanity was very pleasing. But as Sammael looked inside the eye of the woman’s mind, he saw how retched her soul was. The boy and girl that Sammael and Jezebeth
took
had been torturing the woman with no arms. The two of them had taken pleasure in tormenting her. They’d inflicted hell upon her.

Sammael would enjoy this young man.
Hhe
was a worthy vessel.
Reading through
the boy’s thoughts, he found a name. This boy was Rod and the girl was Patty. But Rod and Patty were gone. It was only Sammael and Jezebeth, now.

Jezebeth had wiped out whatever life was left of Patty. They could remain in these bodies until they were destroyed. Destroying human bodies was fun. Possession was a regal experience. The only trouble with possession was that the body rotted. It could only be inhabited for a short time. Once it was deteriorated, it couldn’t hold the evil spirit any longer. The body would quit and the demon would move on. They needed to get busy.

           
“We must go. We don’t have much time,” Sammael said to Jezebeth.

           
They walked up the stairs and exited out the back door, stepping into the new day. They walked through the wet grass, and strolled down the driveway finding their new bodies were exceptional.

When they reached the mouth of the driveway, they stopped walking.

Sammael flicked his fingers. The beautiful Victorian house ignited into explosive orange flames. The flames painted the morning sky with magnificent ribbons of orange.

           
They continued past the base of the driveway, where a white Ford Explorer was parked at the foot of it. Within minutes, Sammael and Jezebeth were speeding down a deserted country road.

They headed toward Gardner

Chapter 4

1

Every few minutes, the roar of a passing car whisked down highway 26 near the edge of Dodge Junction. Buggy’s Liquor store sat off to the right side of the highway. The white brick building rested at the base of a rolling hillside. The hilly terrain held acres of cornfield. A narrow gravel road led to a farmhouse on top of the hill.

Winny and Garth Gasper stood quietly behind the counter of their liquor store munching on Corn Nuts. Garth read an automotive magazine with a 1969 Ford Mustang on the cover, while Winny watched the sun fade below the small town of Dodge Junction. The day had been a nail-biter, a real bore of a Saturday afternoon leaving both Winny and Garth tired. They’d done nothing all day and boredom was tiresome.

Winny walked around to the front of the counter. He stopped near the entrance doors and looked out at the vast acreage of farmland, which rested beyond the parking lot. His sullen green eyes quickly adjusted to the setting sun. The fields and forest held many luscious colors. The greens and rustic tones captivated his sights. The evening glow of sunset highlighted the treetops and fields with a golden tint. The pink hue and shadowing of the evening was magnificent. Looking through the aluminum framed window, reality became a painting. The sun’s fading orange glow splashed across Winny’s long, bony face. His figure was bony too. He’d bulked up over the past few years, placed a few layers of meat beneath his skin, the result of acquiring athletic routines like running and mild weight lifting. He had a modest bench press and dumbbells in his garage, but he was still wiry.

Winny loved the small town they lived in. He was proud of its German and Irish heritage. He appreciated that his immediate family and most of his friends lived within five minutes of anywhere and everything in the community. Meeting up for a beer with an old high school
buddy
was never a problem and always satisfying. Winny didn’t want for anything. His family and friends were all he needed and they were close.