Whispers From The Dark (15 page)

THE SWIM

It hadn't rained in almost three months and as far as Tim could remember, there hadn't been a cool breeze for at least that long. The last day of rain had been April fourth. He remembered the exact date because it had been his thirteenth birthday. The heat was like thick syrup that clung to everything. Even now, hidden from the sun as he and his brother rode their bikes through the shade of the tall pines on Cedar Plank Road, sweat poured in streams from his forehead.

"Where are we goin‘?" Jeff asked.

Tim shrugged. "I dunno."

Their parents were fighting again. It was a weekly ritual; the adults would get into an argument that would escalate into a screaming match, then Tim would be chartered to take his younger brother and go entertain themselves for a few hours.

They rode in silence for a few minutes, each swimming in their own thoughts.

Finally Jeff offered a suggestion. "We could go to the creek."

"Creek's almost dried up ‘cause of the drought, Jeff. It was barely deep enough to swim in anyways. Now it ain't more'n knee deep."

Jeff pursed his lips together in disappointment. "It'd be fun just to sit in it, I reckon."

Tim pressed the brakes on his bike quickly, the bike tire sliding through the gravel and sending up a little trail of dust that hung in the muggy air like a grimy curtain. He sat perched upon the bike, looking off the side of the road.

In the distance, a hundred yards away, was a small white farmhouse. A long driveway led from it, connecting with the road a few hundred feet from Tim and Jeff. A large field surrounded by forest stretched between them and the farmhouse, in the middle of it was a large pond fed by a small stream trickling out of the woods. The water glistened in the sun, reflecting the few cotton candy clouds clinging to the sky above.

The boys stared at the pond, hypnotized by its allure.

"Look," whispered Jeff. "It's Mr. Young."

A small, lithe man with a thick beard was making his way around from behind the house carrying a plastic gasoline jug in each hand. The boys watched as he made his way to a pickup truck in the driveway and tossed the jugs into the back of it, climbing into the cab and cranking up the vehicle.

Tim seldom saw Thomas Young. His dad went fishing with the man from time to time and Tim would see him around town on occasion, but considering that they lived only a mile from one another Thomas Young may as well have been a hermit.

The pond was a bigger mystery than its owner. On the one or two occasions that he had been in Mr. Young's company Tim remembered him telling his dad about the fish in he had stocked the pond with.

"They're damned huge, Jimmy. Must be the feed I'm givin' ‘em. Grass carp and bass. Long as your arm, I shit you not."

Mr. Young's voice was like a throat cancer survivor's, so deep and scratchy that even the mere recollection of it sent a shiver up Tim's spine.

"He's leaving." As Tim spoke the words a smile tickled the corners of his mouth.

"So?"

"So he's heading to the station for gas. That's a fifteen minute ride from here."

Jeff frowned, brow creasing with the dawning realization of what his older brother was thinking. "No way."

Tim shot an annoyed glance his brother. "That gives us thirty minutes, Jeff. Screw wading around in ankle deep creek water. We can swim . . . get outta the heat for a minute and really swim."

Jeff watched as Mr. Young's truck crept down the long driveway, shaking his head. "You know what they say about the pond, Tim. You know what Daddy says and what the kids at school say."

There were a lot of tales about Mr. Young, Tim had to give his brother at least that much. He lived alone in one of only five houses on the road, was hardly ever seen by any of the youngsters in town, and had a downright creepy voice. Those three things added together were beyond enough to give birth to rumors of devil worship, cannibalism, and more. And his pond, being only one of four in the entire county, had birthed forth its own legends.

It was fifty feet deep, swarming with snakes.

The fish in it were abnormally large and would happily eat your limbs from your body.

Mr. Young would immediately shoot and kill anyone fishing or swimming in it.

Tim ran all these rumors through his mind as he watched the old man's truck disappear into a thick curtain of dust as it moved down the road. He'd never heard of anyone actually getting eaten by monster fish or bitten by a snake while swimming in the pond-but then again he'd never heard of anyone brave enough to try their luck at sneaking into the pond.

"They're full of crap," Tim said flatly, nodding his head to remind himself that he was now too old for silly monster fish stories.

"But what about Daddy? He said stay away from it."

Dad
had
told them that.

"I reckon Dad said that ‘cause he thinks we'll drown. I know how to swim. Besides, it can't be that deep," Tim said as he slung his leg over his bike and pushed it towards the side of the road. He let it fall onto the side of the road and slipped his t-shirt over his head, tossing it onto the bicycle as he kicked off his shoes.

Jeff shifted his weight to his other leg nervously, glancing down the road. The pickup truck was out of sight now, but the sound of the engine was still audible over the birds and cicadas.

"You coming?" Tim asked as he unbuttoned his jeans.

Jeff shook his head.

Tim sighed. "Well will you at least keep a watch for me?"

Silence as Jeff's eyes darted from the pond to his brother and back again. "After you do it can we go the creek?"

"Yeah. We can. Will you watch out for me?"

"I guess so," Jeff said.

"It's not a big deal," Tim said reassuringly, sensing his brother's unease. "Just keep an eye out for Mr. Young and anybody else. If you hear or see anybody just whistle at me or something." He had stripped down to his underwear, and was starting down the hill towards the pond. "I'm only gonna jump in for a second, swim across and back."

Jeff frowned. "Just hurry, okay?"

Tim half-jogged, half-leaped down the steep hill, landing in the field below with the surefootedness that only cats and young boys are blessed with. He turned and grinned up at Jeff and gave him a thumbs up. "I will. Don't worry."

The tall grass whipped at his legs as he dashed across the field towards the pond, and he reached the water's edge quickly. He had planned on diving straight into the water, but thought better of it as he neared the pond and instead slowed himself and walked the last few steps before stopping at the edge. His eyes danced around the surface of the pond, trying to no avail to spot any of the snakes or fish of local legend.

Beneath the sky's reflection you could see the muddy bottom of the pond out for fifteen or twenty feet, before the water grew too deep to see through to the bottom. There were a few frogs and small minnows, some of the bugs that his Dad called water skippers, but otherwise Tim could see no life. Just to his left was the feed stream, although thanks to the drought it was now reduced to a small trickle of water; the pond itself was a foot lower than usual, judging from the exposed edges that had once been hidden by the water, now dry and baking in the sun.

After a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure he could still see Jeff on the roadside Tim waded out into the water. Thanks to the June sun it wasn't as cool as he had hoped, but was still a welcome reprieve from the hellish heat he'd been enduring for months. The mud and algae crept between his toes and licked his ankles, feeling both foreign and wonderful. A moment later he was deep enough to lean forward and swim out into the water.

The water washed over his shoulders as he slowly swam across the water using a breaststroke so as not to splash or make much noise, enjoying the calm serenity that a solitary swim can bring. For a few moments he was alone in the world, wrapped in the cooling waters like a fetus still in the womb. Here and there he would glimpse a frog or large dragonfly in the corner of his eye, darting away from him as he invaded their world.

Near the center of the pond he felt something touch his foot. It was colder than the water, slimy and smooth. Tim's breath caught in his throat for a moment, but he didn't slow or speed up his pace.

Tim jerked his head from side to side, scanning the water around him. He could see nothing, no fish or even a shadow of one moving under the surface. Tim swallowed hard against the oncoming adrenaline and sped up his breaststroke slightly.

It hadn't felt like a fish. There wasn't a sensation of something haphazardly swimming into him and retreating. His foot had hit it, some stationary and alien thing beneath the water, and his foot had retreated.

By the time he reached the other side of the pond his heart was racing. He stopped swimming as soon as he felt the fine silt beneath his body and turned back to face the way he had come, letting himself sink until he was sitting in the mud below with only his head above the surface.

His eyes darted around the water as he caught his breath. He made a quick glance up towards his brother still sitting on the edge of the road, a tiny shape almost blotted out by the sun. He raised a hand and waved, but Jeff must not have noticed for the gesture wasn't reciprocated.

He had survived. Whatever that cold and slimy thing had been, it hadn't pulled him underneath and devoured him like a trout swallowing a worm. He had bumped into it, and it hadn't killed him for his trespass.

Fear was replaced by curiosity. What the hell had it been if not a murdering, child-eating monster fish? He was probably the only kid in the county to have dove into this mysterious, legendary body of water. What if in addition to that story and the bragging rights that came with it, he had an even more amazing tale to add? Maybe there were giant fish . . . not gigantic enough to eat a person, but giant nonetheless.

Must be the feed I'm givin' 'em.

If Mr. Young felt compelled to boast about these fish, then surely they were worth seeing. And he would be the only person other than Mr. Young that could honestly say they had seen fish so large it was near unbelievable.

Tim let his eyes drift around the surface of the water again; assuring himself there was nothing that could harm him in the pond. After a moment, his breathing normal again, he let himself float upwards a bit, extended his legs out behind him, and started the swim back across.

His eyes were fixed on the center of the pond as he swam. He couldn't be sure of the precise location he had felt the . . . thing but he knew the general area, and that area was where his gaze was trained.

A few more thrusts of his arms and he was near it. He took a deep, lung-bursting breath and dove under the water.

At first his eyes stung, adjusting themselves to the water. Tim could see for several feet around him as he swam forward and down, deeper into the pond. Finally he stopped his swimming and sat there floating like some pre-pubescent unsuited astronaut afloat in the void, small particles of plant matter and dirt shimmering around him.

In the distance, just beyond his field of vision, a shadow swayed in the water. It was large, bigger than any fish he'd ever seen. Tim kicked his feet and swam towards it, heart beating quicker, excited at the prospect of seeing this great beast.

But it isn't swimming.

The thought came to him just as he spotted another of the shapes a few feet from the first. Neither of them were swimming, both simply floating in place and swaying gingerly back and forth.

As the shadows gave way to light and revealed their contents Tim immediately stopped his advance. He felt a warm sensation spread about his groin as he urinated himself.

A girl.

It was a dead girl so white that she seemed to shine in that dim underwater realm. She was young, close to his age. Her hair was gone, eyes wide and empty. Around her waist and chest were chains leading down into the dark below, to some unseen anchor, holding her form horizontally in the water like a magician's assistant in a macabre levitation illusion. Her arms floated upward, hands floating a foot or two from the surface, reaching upwards through the murky water towards the dark blue oblivion the sky held. Here and there Tim could see that small pieces of her bleach-white body were missing, as if nibbled at.

Must be the feed I'm givin' ‘em . . . 

Tim felt a scream try to exit his mouth, but it caught in his throat and hung there like a trapped animal.

He floated there, a paralyzed effigy of his former self, heartbeat pulsing in his guts until his lungs burned for oxygen and broke the spell the ghostly girl held over him.

Legs kicking furiously, Tim burst up from beneath the pond and into the surface as his once silent scream found purchase in the warm air. Rather than swim the distance across the length of the pond Tim turned toward the much closer side of the pond and swam as quickly as he could, arms and legs loudly splashing water six feet above the surface of the water.

As soon as he felt the muddy bottom of the pond below him he threw down his feet and tried to dash out of the water, looking much like a drunken man trying to wade through a deep snow as his feet sank into the silt and his legs fought the pressure of the water.

Once out of the water and running through the tall grass, Tim kept his eyes fixed on the end of the driveway. A cold fear pulsated in his stomach, telling him that at any moment Mr. Young was going to turn into his driveway and see young Tim Conner running across his field, soaking wet from pond water and fear. Thomas Young would see him and then he would be next in the pond, floating alongside God knows how many other children. Once Mr. Young came home and caught sight of him, Tim Conner knew he would be fish food . . . literally.

But Thomas Young didn't come home while Tim crossed the field. Tim reached the small hill he had nimbly danced down minutes earlier and scrambled up it like a clumsy fool, panting like a hound after a long rabbit chase.

"You look like a city boy tryin' to climb that bank," Jeff laughed as Tim topped the hill and started snatching up his clothes without a word.