“Why’d you come back, Vey?”

Tunnel vision began to clear as my mind did the same.  I opened my eyes and was immediately blinded by overhead lights.  Lifting my hand to block them, I blinked and squinted trying to see clearly.

I thought I was hearing Beth’s voice.  She sounded different than I’d ever heard her before.  I couldn’t explain what made it different; I just knew it was.  And behind that voice, or below it, or around it, were the voices of children.  Many of them.

Beth’s voice continued, “I don’t understand why you didn’t listen to me.  Why did you come back?  Didn’t you believe me when I said you should go?”

My eyes adjusted to the brightness.  As my vision returned, I realized I was in the sunroom.  The lights in the ceiling shone brightly in my face.  I blinked repeatedly to get accustomed to the room.

If I was really hearing Beth’s voice, she sounded irritated—and something else.  And why could I hear children singing?  Or were they reciting a pat-a-cake rhyme?  That thought horrified me.

“Didn’t you believe me when I said you needed to go?  I thought you’d listened to me when you left, but now you’re back.  I don’t understand why.  Why did you come back after I told you to leave?”

I became certain it was Beth’s voice.  It surrounded me.  Although she was clearer and louder than the sounds coming from the children, I finally understood why she sounded different.  There was a weakness in her tone, a strain of some kind.  Her voice even seemed hollow in a way I couldn’t put my finger on.

Am I dreaming again? I wondered.

I sat up and looked around.  I was indeed in the sunroom.  I knew I had to be in a dream.  In the real world that room surely was filled with the darkness that had come to call on us.  That glass-riddled room at the east end of Carr Beholden must already belong to the devil that poured in through the fireplace and porch door.

I glanced around me.  Just as they were before, the windows showed nothing but blackness filled with unblinking eyes.  They floated around me and stared with growing hunger that I could feel on my body and in my soul.

I was weak and afraid.  I felt vulnerable.  My previous experience in this place felt safer by comparison.  Those ravenous eyes stayed away from me then, or at least away from the windows.  They had floated out in the distance somewhere.

But not this time.  This time they were right outside.  This time they hovered around the glass as though the bodies that owned them leaned against the house.

Shouldn’t they be further away from me?  Please make them get away from me…

Hope is just a fleeting promise
Darkness comes and is upon us

The children’s voices made a constant undertone.  They provided the ambient sound around me and faded in and out of hearing.  Similar to how Beth’s voice seemed different, the children’s voices also seemed different when compared to the previous dream.  The dark song they sang was much closer, more powerful even, more real in the most dangerous of ways.  The last time I was in this place, the children stayed away until the very end.  Why is this different?

“Vey!”  My dead wife’s demanding pitch grabbed my attention.  “Listen to me.  You can’t be here.  You’re in danger and we can’t protect you anymore.”

I was still trying to come out of whatever fog I’d been in.  “Beth?  Is that you?”

“Yes.”

“Babe, you have to help me.  What’s going on?”

“Darkness comes.”

“I know about the darkness.  I’ve seen it.  I’ve seen what it can do.”

“You’ve seen nothing.”

It was so matter-of-fact that I was shocked by it as I would be a slap across the face.  It denied everything I’d been through.  That offended me.  I felt like a child being scolded by a parent who needed to point out the terribly obvious when I already knew the terribly obvious.

“I’ve seen it,” I argued, “and it’s killed two of my friends already and who knows how many others.  Don’t tell me I haven’t seen it.”

We make all your worlds
Burn to dust

The children seemed much closer still.  The chorus formed from their joined voices made me think of hate and destruction.  It wasn’t a happy song they sang even if they sounded happy about singing it.

“The darkness is yet to come.  You haven’t seen it, Dave.  We’ve been holding it back.  Only now we can’t hold it back any longer.  We couldn’t protect all, but we’ve protected many.  Now we can protect no one.”

That thought disturbed me on so many levels.  It pissed me off and confused me.  “What the hell are you talking about?  Haven’t you seen what’s going on?  Nobody’s been protected.”

The eyes outside continued to shift around me.  They were like tiny flames of hate dancing in the darkest of night.  I felt more threatened by them than I had the first time I’d dreamed this place.  Their closeness unnerved me.  I felt their lust trying to consume me as it scraped all over my body with gross roughness.

My wife’s voice was firm yet not firm.  “The darkness is upon us, but it’s not here yet.  Some have fallen.  Many more soon will.  All will in the end.”

I loved my wife dearly.  She meant the world to me before her death.  Even in a dream state of consciousness, I would gladly die for her.  But I was growing frustrated with the ambiguities.

I knew what I’d seen.  I’d witnessed deaths.  I’d endured horrors both gross and subtle.

“You’re not listening.  The darkness is already here.  It’s killed two of my friends and two practically sacred family pets.”

I assumed Brogan was dead although I barely wanted to acknowledge the violation I’d seen him subjected to by the darkness, being coddled and petted, being neatly folded together and carefully moved out of the house.  For his sake, I hoped he was dead.

“Who knows how many others it’s killed around the world.  Don’t presume to tell me—”

“You’re so blind,” she interrupted.  “We’ve all been so blind.  That’s why this is happening.”

I pondered that for a moment.  Answers seemed in short supply, our world thrown for a loop with nary an explanation.

“Then tell me what’s happening,” I offered in hopes of gaining something from the conversation.

Her voice faded in and out in a way I didn’t understand.  Mine seemed nervous and uncertain even to me.  But hers…  Yes, her tone sounded like the last flicker of a dying candle.

We are bringers of night
And dark despair

I glanced around the sunroom again.  The children seemed right outside the windows.  Eyes continued floating out there, glowing embers of emptiness staring back at me from mere inches away, hovering in the nothingness and moving about in disturbing ways.  The darkness that encompassed them was complete and devoid of form.  I recognized it all too well.

“You must go, Dave.  I’m too weak.  We can’t protect you anymore.  You shouldn’t have come back.”

I was growing angry.  Hell had come to planet Earth and some dream-form of my dead wife was trying to tell me I was in more danger while passed out than I was in the real world that had already proved quite deadly on its own.  I couldn’t stand much more of it, so I demanded, “You tell me, Beth!  You tell me what the hell is going on!  People are dying.  The world is bathed in black evil that seems capable of anything.  The world’s dying and you want to play word games?  Give me a fucking break!”

“So naïve.  We’ve all been so naïve.”

“Ah, Jesus Christ, Beth.  Come on already!  What the hell is going on?  I need you.  Please help me.  Please…”

We bring death to hope
And end of days

Angry red eyes viewed me through the glass.  I could feel their rage and contempt.  I could feel their hunger.  I was on display, held up for inspection like a piece of meat.  The predators were out there; I felt like feeble prey waiting for the deadly pounce.

“The darkness has come, Dave, and they can’t be stopped.  It’ll be here soon.  I don’t want you to be hurt and we can’t stop it anymore.”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’re dying.  We’re already being hurt.  It’s all around us and killing us off like stew fodder.  If you have answers, I’d appreciate hearing them.”

I tried to focus on the underlying voices of children that grew louder in such tiny increments that it was almost negligible.  And yet it wasn’t.  Despite coming from what would otherwise be considered the innocent, those voices speared me time and again with overwhelming fear.  I couldn’t hear everything they were saying, but almost…

Beth’s voice faded in like music from a tape player running on low batteries.  “There are no answers.  There are only truths.”

“Then give me the truth, goddamnit!” I shouted.  I’d had enough.  “Either tell me what the hell is going on or leave me alone.”

We are pleasure’s anguish
And pain’s desire

Her voice came feebler still when she said, “I’ll tell you what I know, but you must promise to leave as soon as I do.  Promise me, Vey!”

I would have described her tone as petulant if it hadn’t been so weak, so pitifully small.  I was frightened for that voice.  I knew my wife was dead and whoever or whatever this was was just playing Beth, but I still felt sorrow for the growing anguish I could hear in her words.

“Then tell me, Beth.  Tell me what you know and I promise to leave and never come back.”

I wasn’t sure precisely how I could keep that promise.  Since I was dreaming, I assumed I had passed out from shock but was tucked safely into the office.  It was a safe room because of the computer and security equipment housed inside.

I remembered telling my father to hit the panic button.  If he did, the room would have sealed.  The point had been twofold: provide a place to house my files and electronics and the systems that ran the house’s alarm and backup services, and also to be a place to keep me safe in case of a significant emergency (although I’d assumed that would mean a severe weather event, a thought that was not entirely lost on me under the circumstances).

If we were in that room, it had its own very limited power and water supplies, a small bathroom, and some semblance of isolation from the outside world.  Having seen what the darkness could do, I didn’t feel confident that would be enough.

Hourglass sands are had in vain

“Oh, for fuck’s sake already.”

I was so mad and frustrated trying to listen to the children and Beth at the same time.  Unfortunately, the children were beginning to override her voice.

I still couldn’t make out everything they were saying.  Bits and pieces still filtered in however, and I tried to collect those items as they floated to the surface of my mind.  I needed to know what message they were conveying.  More importantly, I needed Beth to tell me something.  I needed those truths.  I needed them desperately.

My attention was abruptly diverted by scratching on the window next to me.  I jumped from my seat and turned.

A pair of eyes nestled right against the window on level with my own.  It stared into me.  If eyes are windows to the soul, this demon peered into the depths of my being.  It was the darkness’ own Peeping Tom.

I didn’t want to look into those eyes yet couldn’t look away for fear it would be a sign of weakness or an opportunity for it to act while I wasn’t looking.  Despite its nearness, I could see no body that owned those horrible and death-filled flames that glared back at me from the empty nothingness beyond the glass.

Cataclysm is what we give
Darkness now is all there is

The children’s voices continued growing louder.  Even as I struggled to listen to them, Beth’s voice continued to weaken.

[Introduction | Part 13 | Part 15]

As we approached the end of the hall, Mom and Helene backed out of the large open space and glanced in our direction.  The looks on their faces were of sheer terror.  Even as protective rage welled up within me, tears blurred my vision in response to the look on my mother’s face.  It was almost unbearable.  No, it was unbearable in ways that defy description.  One should never witness such horror reflected back in the expression of a parent.  It’s as unforgivable as it is unimaginable.  It distorted her in some way that could not be accepted.  It struck me repeatedly as I ran toward them.

“Richard!” she screamed again.  Her voice had gone up an octave despite my thinking such a thing impossible.  The sound of it was like a blade cutting through flesh.  It was my flesh, and it cut me again and again and again.

Helene was beyond words and simply cried out in sharp tones of emotional agony.  She rested her back and head against my mother as though she were drained of energy, and then she fell silent.  I could see her body wracked by seizures of grief before she fell limp.  Whatever they faced, it was so dreadful that it pushed her mind over the edge and made her unable to cope.  I suspected she’d passed out.  My mother held her close and continued backing into the hallway.  Her gaze bounced repeatedly between us and whatever hell was taking place in the living room.  She was dragging the teenager.

We reached their position in the hallway and gave our best effort not to run them down in our reckless abandon.  My father slid on the floor and stopped near the two, promptly wrapped his arms around them and spun them toward the kitchen.  That put his body between them and the living room.  With one quick glance over his shoulder, he immediately started sidestepping down the hall in the direction we’d come from, his charges in tow.

I turned the corner through the doorway and froze.  While the others passed behind me, I stood motionless.  My eyes couldn’t have been ripped away from what I saw.  I looked first toward the fireplace and then toward the corner of the room where Brogan had been lying.

“Jesus Christ…”  The words slipped from my mouth without a thought.

“Dave!” my dad yelled as he and my mother dragged Helene down the hall.  “Where do we go?  Where do we go?”

I shot a quick glance over my shoulder at them and said as loudly as I could, “The office.  Last door before the sunroom.”

I turned back toward the living room and watched in awe.  What I looked at assaulted my mind.  How could such a thing be?

Living darkness poured down through the fireplace like a waterfall and splashed in all directions when it reached the floor.  Margaret hung suspended, her feet dangling little more than a foot above the couch.  Innumerable arms of smoke entangled her.

They’re restraining her, I thought, just like they did with George.

One of her arms was held back in an unnatural position and I assumed—I knew it had been broken.  Her head flopped to one side, tendrils of darkness wrapped around it so that it was almost completely shrouded, and one wispy tentacle seemed to be stuck in her mouth.  I suspected much later that that was the reason she’d been so suddenly muffled and silenced.  Despite that, her eyes were wide open.  They suddenly looked directly at me.

“Fuck…” I mumbled.  Her gaze was full of pleading, full of despair and begging for help, but I could offer no such thing.

More of the ethereal mass filled the room as it rushed out from the gaping mouth of the fireplace.  More appendages formed and bound her hands and feet, her arms and legs, her neck, and more and more of her torso.  Her body was distorted into positions I knew no human could endure, and yet her eyes remained fixed on me.  It was such a horrific sight.

I turned away.  I couldn’t watch—couldn’t be looked at like that.

My attention fell on Brogan.  He was covered with so much darkness that it looked like a blanket laid carefully over him.  He had not moved from where he lay the last time I saw him.  I found that terribly confusing.

Upon closer inspection, I could see small tendrils of blackness protruding from the whole that lay atop him.  They caressed him in some way, petting him even, caringly touching his coat as though taking care of a sick child.  The scene so wholly offended my sensibilities that I threw up where I stood.

I looked away and toward the fireplace, but not at Margaret.  I looked at the horror dropping down through the chimney and into my living room, and I screamed.  I screamed like a child would scream after a nightmare.  I screamed like a person ripped asunder by unholy angels.  I screamed, “Get out!”  I repeated it over and over again.

A sickening sound filled the room.  It was almost recognizable yet offensive to my ears.  Despite my mind trying to shut down, I became aware of the darkness pulling Margaret into the fireplace.  Her body distorted and folded over on itself as she was pulled into a space not meant for that purpose.

And then she was gone.  She was pulled up and out of sight as quickly as George had been yanked from the porch.  The sound followed her and I was again sick with the sudden knowledge of what that cracking noise represented: bones breaking.

Yet again I was reminded of a line from Storm of the Century that seemed so applicable.  In my confusion and growing blankness, it took center stage in my thoughts.  It was Andre Linoge’s dictum: “If you give me what I want, I’ll go away.”  I thought about that when all else seemed unthinkable.

“What do you want, damn it!?  What the fuck do you want!?”  I wanted to scream it and willed my mouth to do so.  My ears reported nothing but slurring nonsense in response.  I couldn’t be certain which of them was responding clearly if either.  Whether I had said it or not, no answer was forthcoming.

I was rapidly losing awareness of my surroundings.  A quick glance at Brogan showed he was being tenderly cared for by some horror that had no right to do such a thing.  It seemed to protect him and stroke him lovingly, if such a thing were capable of love, and it hadn’t moved him from where he’d spent the afternoon.

Although in the most despicable of ways, I had my confirmation.  The darkness out there was not all there was to this.  He was proof, and it was proof in the way it treated him, the way they treated him.  The darkness was coming, yes indeed, and perhaps some of it had already arrived, but I suspected at that point we’d not seen it all yet.

We’ve seen darkness, but there’s more to come, isn’t there?  My thought also went unanswered.

The world began to go black.  Tunnel vision formed and I lost view of everything around me.  Dry heaves wracked my body.  Darkness began to fill my vision just as it continued filling the living room.  Darkness touched the heart of me with violence antithetical to the abhorrently offensive way it loving touched a family pet.  Darkness invaded my mind just as it invaded my home.  Darkness violated me like it violated every law of nature I thought I knew.

I was about to pass out.  I was only vaguely aware of that fact.  My mind seemed incapable of dealing with the new reality of our world.

The large room was half-full of writhing blackness when my legs began to crumble beneath me.  My own brain and flesh betrayed me.  Neither seemed capable enough to protect me.

Smoky apparitions akin to animal limbs continued filling the room.  They touched here and there testing everything they could find, inspecting windows, overturning furniture, subjecting walls to invasive examinations.

Is it learning?  Is it trying to figure out its new world?  What the hell is it doing?  And what is it doing to Brogan?  With Brogan?  What monstrosity would kill so unthinkingly yet respond so affectionately to a sick animal?  Is he now one of its own?  Is there something different about him that demands respect?  What the hell is going on?  My thoughts were chaotic.

The body I’d always commanded crumbled beneath the weight of an overloaded mind.  What had happened already and what continued to happen overwhelmed me.  The legs that held me up for nearly 45 years suddenly seemed incapable of supporting my own weight.  My eyes that had provided better-than-perfect vision for more than four decades were giving out and shutting down as though they’d suffered some tragic accident.  My mind that had produced award-winning novels and sustained me as a career for so long was no longer able to wrap itself around the unfolding events that continued to assault my senses.

And yet the darkness kept coming.  It flailed around the room in a sickly dance meant for the dead.  It played life while remaining unreal to everything I knew.  It was untouchable yet touched everything.

As I stared in disbelief, Brogan’s body floated through my declining field of vision.  I was startled by it.  He was still shrouded by darkness and still being petted as though by a loving owner.  It sickened me to see it, yet the offense continued.

He still breathed and his tongue still lolled out of his mouth, yet he remained asleep, comatose, subdued.  As his form approached the fireplace, more black smoke encircled him as it formed the unreal arms of something never seen.  The appendages gently folded his legs.  They pushed his tongue into his mouth and closed it with the utmost care.  Tentacles of nonexistent flesh held his head up and tucked his tail around his hindquarters.  I could only see a small portion of what was directly in front of me and he was all that field of vision showed.

As my body began to slump in the doorway, the only thought that crossed my mind was that he was being packaged for shipment, folded neatly into a pile that could be moved without much fuss.

I thought of Margaret being pulled into the fireplace and up through the flue.  I thought of her bones cracking the whole way as one of those damnable wisps of smoke filled her mouth.  I thought of the tortured sounds of her voice being gagged before I even reached the room and how awful it had sounded.  I thought of George and Mosko being ripped from the porch as though they were yo-yos bouncing back and forth uncontrollably and finally yanked back by the puppeteer that controlled them.

I watched Brogan’s body float to the fireplace as it was neatly gathered together for transport.  And then he was carefully pulled into the fireplace, turned on his side, and whisked rapidly up through the chimney.

I was falling.  Darkness was all I could see.  It whipped around the room and filled it rapidly.

But why does it care so much about Brogan?  Why did it so carefully prepare him for movement?  Why didn’t it rip him up through the fireplace as it had Margaret only a few seconds before?  What’s so special about him?

I leaned against the doorframe and knew I would die.

My father’s hands grasping my arms as I started to fall seemed alien to me.  They were disconnected from reality in some way.  Either that or I was.

I could no longer be certain of what was real and what wasn’t.  Still, I heard his voice.  “I’ve got you,” it said.

His arms wrapped around me and pulled me the hall.  I could no longer see the living room but instead stared up at the ceiling.

I willed my feet and legs to respect my wishes and pick up my body, but they didn’t listen.

Are my feet shuffling?  Are they even responding to me anymore?  I couldn’t tell.  They seemed to drag along the hardwood floor of the hall toward the sunroom.  Or is it the office?  I could not be certain.

“It’s okay, Dave.  I’ve got you.”  That voice…  It sounded like my father.

As the lights overhead dashed by uncontrollably, I tried to look toward the other end of the house.  Something was wrong with the picture I saw.  A large mass of something dark and ominous flooded out of the living room.  It spilled into the kitchen across the hall.  More of it splashed in our direction.

Or is it just my direction?  Is someone with me?  How am I moving?

I looked on in my new dream world and thought I saw the door to the screened-in porch blow inward right off the frame.  It wasn’t possible, I knew, because it exploded toward us and was immediately suspended in midair.  It hung for a moment inside the entryway as more darkness flooded in around it.

The door…  How does it float like that?

My eyes rolled back into my head and I again saw the ceiling and overhead lights passing by.  And then it all turned.  The view was different.  It looked like the ceiling in my office.

How did I get here?  If I’m in fact here?

“Dave, listen to me.  We’re in the office.  What do we do now?”

I thought that was my father’s voice.  My head sagged backward and his face seemed to fill the tiny spot of vision I had left.  Shadow distorted everything.

“Dave, you have to tell me what to do.  We’re in your office.  The door is closed.  What do we do?”

That was definitely his voice.

I must surely be dreaming.  Must one respond in a dream?  It only seems polite.

“Panic button,” I hoped I said in response.

Then the world disappeared.  It disappeared into the darkness.

[Introduction | Part 12 | Part 14]

The entryway felt too small as we waited.  The door was closed and locked yet I feared that was insufficient to restrain whatever hell had been unleashed on Earth.  I thought of what happened to the screen door as I looked at the large solid-wood structure that stood between us and what was outside.  I wondered if that barrier would be torn from its hinges as easily as the other had been.

My hand rested tentatively on the handle.  I feared it might start turning as some unspeakable thing tried to open it.  Considering the outside door had been ripped from its frame with no effort whatsoever, I felt more than a bit silly for thinking the main door would be treated any differently.  As if the horror a few inches away had suddenly gained some semblance of manners and civility.

Yet my hand resting on the metal knob communicated something else to me: it quickly became ice cold.  It was as if the other side had been submerged in liquid oxygen.  I pulled my hand away quickly as the chill became uncomfortable.  I didn’t doubt what rested right outside, against the outside of the door, separated from us by a flimsy wooden construct and a few measly metal bolts.

“It’s getting colder,” I mumbled as I stepped away from the door.  “The door knob… it’s getting colder.”

I wasn’t sure why I repeated myself but was once again subjected to an internal smirk as a quote from Stephen King’s Storm of the Century came to mind: “Born in vice, say it twice… eh, Davey?  At least twice.”  I certainly had my vices.

While I restrained the sick laugh that welled up within me, the image leaped into my mind of Andre Linoge staring down young Davey Hopewell and his parents in the middle of the town hall during that particular expedition into Mr. King’s imagination.  The repercussions of that scene in stark contrast with the horror we had been thrust into made short work of whatever enjoyment I found in the memory of that fictional tale.

Would I fare as well as my namesake from the film?  I was shaken to my core by the possible answers to that question.

Gradually, I took another step back but didn’t turn away from the door.  Fear kept me from turning my back on the abomination that waited on the other side.  If it forced its way through as it had when George touched it, I wanted to see it coming.

Another step back brought me next to my father.  I glanced at him.  He was crying the silent weep of a man who’d lost his best friend yet had no time for his own grief.  He needed to cry for both George and Mosko, and I suspected he needed to cry for Brogan as well.  I hoped that was as far as he would need to travel down the road of loss.

I turned the other way and saw my mother trying to comfort both Margaret and Helene.  All three huddled together in the doorway to the living room.  The McCreary mother and daughter wept uncontrollably yet almost silently—out of fear, I guessed.

Mom’s tears were also unvoiced.  Like Dad she wept for two lost friends, but I also realized each of them wept for us.  Prematurely?  Perhaps, but if so, just barely I feared.

I reached up and wiped tears from my own face.  No one should have to see such a thing, I thought, and no one should have to live through this.  No one should have to face this darkness.

Two warning lights on the alarm panel next to the door drew me from my self-pity.  They blinked methodically, the silent scream of danger from a device not capable of understanding the importance of its role.

I needed to look at it.  My legs strongly disagreed and made certain my feet stayed firmly in place.  I was frozen to the floor where I stood and saw the distance between me and the door as a gulf too wide to cross, or too dangerous.  Or both.

I took a deep breath and willed myself to move.  A few steps left me in front of the panel.  I immediately turned to my father and said quietly in hopes the others wouldn’t here, “The generator is in alarm.  It also shows the batteries are almost dead.”

“What?” he whispered.

I shook my head and said with unnecessary frustration, “I don’t know how.  I just know we’re going to lose power very soon.”  I looked up and around and couldn’t understand how that much electricity could disappear in such a short time.  I turned back to him and continued with less irritation, “Maybe the batteries were already low and a generator failure meant they couldn’t be recharged.”

For the first time in my life, I had lied to my father.  The batteries constantly charged and discharged when the main power was on.  I didn’t remember how many batteries there were, but I did remember the installer saying they cycled individually.  That is, one would discharge and recharge before another in sequence would do the same.  The intention was to make certain as much battery power as possible was available at any one time while continuing to exercise all of them.

When I’d looked at the panel earlier, it showed a full charge.  How they’d lost so much power so quickly was beyond me.  It was then I desperately wished I had paid more attention in high school physics.  Not doing so came back to haunt me at the worst possible time.  Despite having no answer for the battery status, I suspected I knew what had happened to the generator.

Turning from the panel and walking back to my father, I said, “We need to go downstairs.  It’s already getting colder in here and we can’t build a fire without opening a fireplace to the outside.  We need to see if we can fix the generator.”

He nodded and said, “I agree.”  Then to Mom he added, “Honey, why don’t you take Margaret and Helene into the living room and see if you can’t make them comfortable?  We have to go check something.”

“Okay,” she replied with a weary yet trusting look.  “Be careful.”  She turned her head to the new orphan and new widow and whispered quietly to them.  Although still crying, Margaret nodded in response before the whole group turned and walked into the living room.

“Where’s the basement?” Dad asked.

“The door’s under the stairs,” I replied as I pointed down the hall.  I reached into the kitchen and pulled the emergency flashlight from its base, and then I said, “We might need this.  You know, just in case it’s dark.”

He offered an uncomfortable snicker that I immediately recognized as obligatory.  Nothing seemed funny anymore, and if it did, it seemed inappropriate to openly recognize it.

His seriousness was evident when he asked, “How much longer do you think the batteries will last?”

“I don’t know.”  I shook my head as much in response as in disgust toward my ignorance of how my house worked.  “But that’s not the biggest concern anyway.”  His eyes widened but I didn’t wait for him to express his dismay before I continued, “If the batteries fail and the generator won’t recharge them or provide power, we’ll lose water as well as electricity.  The systems are redundant but weren’t built for these kinds of failures.  I also never thought it would be impossible to run to Joe’s or your place in case of an emergency.”

“It’s gonna get cold too, isn’t it?”

“Uh-huh,” I nodded.  The concern on his face was evident.

Unfortunately, I’d not yet dropped my major concern in his lap.  As we made our way down the hall and stopped in front of the basement door, I thought it as appropriate a time as any.  “Dad, wait.  Listen.  The basement is sealed because of the generator.  This door is like the outside windows: no air moves between the inside of the house and what’s on the other side.  That was just in case the generator ever had a problem and vented fumes or something into the basement.  At least it wouldn’t affect anyone inside.  I know the generator is new—it was installed less than a year ago—but I don’t know if that means the damn thing is perfectly sealed or not.  My guess is it’s failing because whatever’s outside has gotten into it through the vent.  Now, you know more about engines than I do, so tell me: if something got into the generator through its exhaust, could it get out of there and into the basement?”

He took a deep breath as he thought about the question.  “Well shit, son, I don’t rightly know for sure.  I’m no mechanic.  I can find my way around an engine but don’t know all there is to know.”  He paused for a moment and took another deep breath.  I could see the consideration on his face.  And then he continued, “I honestly don’t know, Dave.  It’s possible.  I suppose if the motor isn’t running, the whole system could be sealed and would keep it bottled up.  But I’m guessin’ here.”

I looked at him closely.  His concern was real and bordered on panic.  I could almost feel it coming off him like heat.  I’m sure it was mixing with my own since I didn’t have the answers and was scared to death to open that door.

Nevertheless, I said it: “Is it worth it, Dad?  Is the risk worth the reward of opening this door?”  I reached out and put my hand on it as if there was some kind of confusion about what door.

“Son, we can’t live long without water.  I know that much.  The cold won’t be so hard to deal with assumin’ you’ve got blankets and such, but water’s a problem.  And what about food?  What if the refrigerator and freezer fail?”

“Food’s not so much an issue since there’s plenty of nonperishable stuff we can eat.  It ought to last four people several days, I guess.  Maybe a week?  Give or take?  I agree the cold’s not so much a concern either, although it could get very uncomfortable if we’re in here long enough.  Water’s my main concern.  If the power goes out, what’s already in the tanks is all we’ll have.  That’s about a thousand gallons if I’m remembering correctly.  I don’t know how long that’ll last since I don’t how much we’ll use or even need.  And we certainly can’t go outside and pump by hand…”  I trailed off not wanting to consider that possibility.  It’s not a possibility! my brain shouted.

“Let me ask you honestly…” my father said, and the earnestness of his tone grabbed me like the darkness had grabbed Old George and Mosko.  He looked at me for a moment before adding, “Do you think we’ll make it out of this, whatever this is?”

My mind reeled with the implications.  I’d been considering that very thing.  I had no answers and could only offer conjecture, yet I knew my father respected my opinion.  He considered me the most learned member of the family.  I was the only one of us who’d finished high school and had been to college, even going so far as to get a degree in creative writing that I later considered a complete waste of my time.  Nevertheless, Dad respected me for, as he put it, “all my schoolin'” and asked for my best possible opinion.

I decided to offer it to him unvarnished as he had every right to expect.  “I honestly don’t know, but I suspect we won’t.  When I had the dream, Beth told me there was no safe place and yet I still needed to leave.  I didn’t listen and look where we are.  Even if there was no place to go where we could have survived, I trusted that voice.  Maybe I was wrong for doing so, but I did.  She said it was coming and there was no place to hide.  I believed her then and I believe her now.  I think the rhyme after that just cemented the belief in my head.  It said something like ‘Cataclysm is what we give, Darkness now is all there is’ or something to that effect.  I think we’ve seen that come true.”

I paused for a moment and watched that sink into his brain.  He was chewing on it still when I decided to continue.  “My opinion is that this is the end of the world as we know it.  Maybe things’ll go on anyway.  I’ve always believed life tends to find a way out of any fix it’s in.  That said… I’m not so sure there’s much hope for our version of life.  I suspect what’s out there—”  I gestured toward the door at the far end of the hall that led to the screened-in porch.  “—will get in here eventually.  I don’t know if that’s soon or not, but I feel it’s highly likely in either case.”

He mulled over that for the briefest of moments.  My father and I had a great relationship in that we could easily take the worst of news from each other.  We expected complete honesty and always gave complete honesty.  That’s why I felt bad earlier when I lied about the batteries possibly being low when the power went out.  I was crossing lines I’d never considered crossing before, but I felt strongly that it was necessary to consider the impact of the truth when the truth would have made no difference other than to make people feel worse.  I’d betrayed that trust for the first time in my life and felt so guilty about it that I couldn’t do it again.  The thought was so abhorrent that it was considered and rejected in the fraction of a second it took me to start talking.  I could think of no better time to rely on our bond and felt its enforcement was of the utmost importance.  Despite my dire predictions, I knew he appreciated it.

“And Dad,” I continued, “I think Brogan is part of this.  I don’t know how.  I don’t know why.  I just do.”

He immediately nodded and replied, “I do too, son.”

Screams from the living room echoed down the hall and struck us like daggers.  It was Margaret.  I immediately felt the end was upon us.  Her cries reminded me of George’s just before he was pulled into the darkness.  Then they ended as quickly as they began, but they ended in muffled noises that sounded as though she’d been gagged.  That was quite different from what happened to George.

Mom’s urgent calls followed.  “Richard!  Vey!”  I’d never before heard my mother sound like that.  It was the kind of shrieking that overrode all considerations.  No one messed with my mother.  She should never sound like that.  Nothing and no one had the right to bring out from her that horrific sound.

Dad and I turned from the basement door and ran toward the living room.  It was only forty feet away from us and yet felt like miles.  My legs were on automatic pilot as they carried me across that infinite expanse of space.  I could not imagine harm coming to my mother outside of what age would eventually visit upon her.  What I heard in her voice betrayed that assumption and told me clearly that I had no control over her fate.

[Introduction | Part 11 | Part 13]

We stood in silence at the door leading to the screened-in porch.  None of us knew what to expect.  Part of me felt it would be nothing; part of me felt it would be Armageddon.  Neither of those parts seemed to be talking to each other.

Regardless of the disparity in my own person, I watched my father make certain his pistol was ready for use, watched Old George step up next to me so he would be ready to put his entire mass into closing the door if needed, and watched Margaret and my mother stand side by side in the doorway that led from the hall to the living room.  The thought of them as a cheering squad almost made me burst into uncontrolled laughter, the sick kind the brain spits out when declaring it’s in way over its head, but I was able to subdue it before it bubbled to the surface.  I didn’t like what we were doing.  That didn’t change my resolve in thinking we needed to do it.

My father nodded to me and I assumed he was indicating his readiness.  I turned and looked at George and he too nodded.  I wondered then in the back of my mind when we had decided to go with silent signals, but again I ignored the thought and turned back to the door.

I lightly touched the handle.  I wasn’t sure if I expected it to be hot, cold, or something altogether different.  It was none of those things.  I then reached up and unlocked the keyless security bolt.  Nothing happened, so I unlocked the dead bolt.  Again the world didn’t crash down on us, so I finally unlocked the handle.  I knew then nothing was holding the door shut except a quick turn of the knob.

I waited for a moment expecting something.  In that second of time, I questioned the logic of what we were doing.  As a writer, I prided myself in conquering the many aspects of a scenario in order to provide my audience with a realistic narrative.  Only with the door unsecured did I realize that that gift had failed me when agreeing to this plan.  There were concerns we had not discussed.

What if there was no oxygen outside?  What if there were toxic gasses?  What if it was a pure vacuum?  What if…

Stop it! I thought to myself.  This is ridiculous.  There are a great many reasons not to do what we’re about to do, but there equally are as many reasons to do it.  We can’t survive in here forever.  We have to know something more than what we know now.  The only thing that awaits us inside is eventual starvation, each other’s company, and the possibility of more terror-filled dreams… and possibly the same fate as Brogan.  We have to know what’s going on out there.  We have to know if it’s safe.  We have to know.

I wrapped my hand around the handle, gave one final glance to both George and my father, and opened the door.  I pulled it toward me by a tiny crack that allowed me to peer outside in the most limited of ways.  My foot was pinned against the bottom of the door so I could offer to George whatever help possible should some unspeakable thing try to force its way in.  My nervousness caused a twitch that ran right down to that foot and I promptly slammed the door shut in my own face.

That’s when I finally laughed out loud.  It was a nervous laugh though, one that didn’t help the situation.

“Sorry,” I cheaply offered, and then I pulled the door open again.

With only a hair’s width between the door and jamb, I couldn’t see much.  The porch was definitely clear in that tiny sliver of space.  I also felt a cold breeze blowing against my eye.

“It’s cold,” I mumbled, and then more clearly, “It’s really cold.”

I pulled the door open a bit more and the rush of cool air came in on all sides.  It was hitting my face hard and I felt as though it must be winter outside.  It had been in the mid-nineties before the storm moved in, yet what I felt was far colder than that.  And it was still a summer afternoon in Texas.  How odd…

With the door open about an inch, I had a relatively clear view of a swath of the porch.  It looked like it would on any dark night.  Only the absolute darkness pressed against the screens betrayed that vision.  It was a seething mass of blackness so rich and complete it consumed every detail.  Maybe peripherally and maybe only in my mind, I could see it moving.

I pressed my lips to the small open space and took a breath.  It tasted sterile and cold.  I’d have called it frigid if I were writing about it.  Like all icy air, it was sharp and clean.  I took another breath to be certain before pulling the door open.  There was about a foot of space between it and the frame.

I held my place and looked out.  The lights on the porch felt normal to me.  The rush of cold air did not, at least not for a summer afternoon.  Nevertheless, the screened-in space appeared to be all right so long as I ignored what was outside its meager boundaries.

Pulling the door open a bit more, I stepped into the doorway.  My father came up behind me and George stepped over to the door’s edge where he could see out.  Both looked over my shoulders.

I glanced around the porch and even leaned my head out beyond the wall to look in either direction.  Other than fuzziness along all outside edges, it was a perfectly normal screened-in porch on a very dark night.  So I stepped out the door.

It was indeed cold.  I was still wearing shorts and found myself tragically underdressed.  What I needed was winter clothing.  I ignored the discomfort from that and took one more step while I continued glancing around me.  There was really nothing to see.  It was unremarkable.  Again, that was true as long as one ignored what rested just outside the screens that surrounded the area.

“I think it’s okay,” I tentatively said, “but it’s really cold.”

My father stepped through the door behind me.  If my judge of distance was correct, he was standing in the doorway.

I tried to focus on the blackness beyond the edges of the porch and, just as had been the case in the sunroom, I found it difficult to see anything.  The darkness that swirled beyond consumed everything, including vision.

“Let me see,” George demanded.  As always, he pushed his way through no matter what.  I heard the door swing open a bit farther as he made room for himself.  My father likewise stepped aside as his dear friend walked out and joined me.

“Seems relatively normal aside from the temperature.”  I wasn’t speaking to him directly but knew he’d have an opinion.

“Ain’t that the truth, Davey.  It’s like a dark night in winter is all, assumin’ you don’t look out there.”  He nodded toward the seething nothingness beyond the screen barrier.  “But take a gander at it, why don’t ya?”  He took a few steps past me and stood closer to the porch door.  He leaned his head forward as if inspecting the screens and what lay beyond.

I could see what captivated him.  It was the same reason I thought the screens looked fuzzy.  Tendrils of darkness came through the wall.  They were made of whatever had surrounded us, whatever had enveloped Carr Beholden—No, not enveloped so much as consumed.  They looked like tentacles if such things could be made of smoke.

I took a few steps forward to satisfy my own curiosity.  Although the darkness seemed held back by the screens, my first impression was that it was probing the barrier looking for weaknesses or a way in.  Tiny wisps of it felt their way through the small mesh spaces and wagged around on the inside of the porch.

Tentacles of black smoke…  They would enter, feel around in the air, sometimes touch the screen through which they’d passed, and then disappear back to the outside.  Their reach into the porch never surpassed six inches.  Each one was so small and fragile that it seemed it would we washed away by the slightest breeze.  I was even tempted to step up to the barrier and blow on them to test that hypothesis, but I quickly denied that idea and stored it in the not-a-good-idea-and-never-gonna-happen file.  Watching them was amazing, however, and they were everywhere.

“What’n the hell is that?”  George’s voice shattered my inspection but helped me realize I was not hallucinating.  “It’s like little smoky arms or somethin’, like a octopus made’a fog.”

I laughed aloud.  It was a great description and seemed to fit.  As soon as the laugh escaped my lips, all of the strands of darkness disappeared back through the screens.

“Holy shit!”  The words leaped from my mouth.

“Amen t’that!”  George had seen it as well.  Whatever it was, the lightless tempest heard me and responded.  It didn’t respond to our voices but did respond to the suddenness of my laugh.

I glanced around the porch and realized all the screens had cleared.  “That’s impossible…”

“It ain’t if we’re standin’ here a’looking at it, is it, Davey?”

“No, I suppose not, George.”

As we watched, vines of nothingness began to feel their way back through the screens.  I took one more step to get a closer look.

They were small.  They were made of smoke or fog or whatever was out there.  They were definitely alive, or at least under control of something that was alive.  They danced in and out of the porch via whatever means they could find.  Whether through the screen, the miniscule spaces around the door, or even cracks in the old wood flooring, they probed and searched and investigated every means of ingress.

Or was it searching?  I suddenly remembered the dream and how Beth had used itand they interchangeably.  Is it controlled by them, or them by it, or are they and it one in the same? I wondered.  And who are they and what is it?

My considerations aside, what I saw was like watching smoke rising from a fire, flailing about in the air above the flames, and eventually returning to the embers from which it was born, and all in a way that was alive.  It then occurred to me I was seeing more clearly the same kind of movement I thought I’d seen through the sunroom windows.  The darkness was in constant motion.  The proof was right in front of my eyes.

As I pondered this unimaginable puzzle, several of the intruding wisps joined together through the door and formed a single larger tentacle.  It whipped around from side to side before bending into a horseshoe shape and touching the door frame, door handle, and screen.  George and I were mesmerized.  The thick tendril remained translucent yet moved like a living appendage.

It was ethereal smoke and nothing more.  Those realizations didn’t negate the fact that it was moving and touching.  It was feeling around the inside of the porch and inspecting everything around it.

“What the hell is that?” George exclaimed.  Then he reached out to touch it.

“Don’t!”

I was too late.  His hand brushed against the larger projection and it responded.  It all responded.  They responded.

The screen door pushed inward with explosive force.  It struck George head-on and I felt certain he’d be thrown backward into Carr Beholden.  It was so quick I couldn’t understand how any other reaction was possible.  Yet he stood in place.  My eyes widened as I realized the darkness had reached in and wrapped around both him and the door.

“Son of a bitch!” I yelled.

I grabbed his arm as more writhing nothingness encircled him.  He was pinned to the door by expanding tentacles of black smoke.

At first it was just his torso, but then more and more tendrils reached in through the open space and grasped at him.  They grabbed his arms, his legs, his head, and even his neck, all while more of the darkness looped around his midsection.

As I pulled on his left arm and my father began pulling on his right arm, George’s entire mass lifted into the air.  He hovered about two feet off the ground with the door still pinned to the front of his body.

“Help!” I shouted.

My mother and Margaret were already making their way out the door as they’d seen what was happening.  Margaret’s screams pierced my ears once she was outside and could fully appreciate the situation.

Whatever was holding George reacted, but it was not the same unexpected way they’d pulled out of the porch when I laughed.  This time a few of the cloudy arms disappeared back through the door to the outside.  Most of them, however, did not release their grip.  And slowly yet deliberately, more came back.

“No!” Margaret screamed.  “Let him go!”

Darkness continued reaching into the porch and grabbing George, more and more, all too much.  They wrapped around every part of his body.  All the while, their grip tightened on him and pinned him to the floating door that once held them back.

My father let go of his friend’s arm long enough to aim and fire the gun into the darkness.  To the bullets and the loud noise, this time there was no retraction.  More of it continued to pour through the open doorway and enwrap Old George as he hung in midair and struggled.

“Get inside!” I shouted.  “Get inside now!”  It’s a game of numbers, I thought, and there are more to protect than there is to save.

Mosko’s fierce barking and growling interrupted my train of thought.  Helene’s screams followed.  “No!  Come back!  Mosko!”

“Get inside!” I yelled again as Mosko’s ferocity flew through the door and reached our position.

Whimpers and whines separated his growls and barks.  He fought two opposite ends of the fear spectrum.  He would act to protect the members of his pack.  He was also scared to death.

The dog leaped up and tried to grab one of the dark tentacles.  He passed right through it only to be snatched out of the air by another.  I couldn’t help but notice how his motion was halted like watching an egg hit the floor.  He just stopped.

That’s what happened to Mosko, except he stopped in the air.  His yelps stabbed my being as they joined the horrific cries from George.

More of the uncoiling terror came into the porch and restrained the dog.  It grabbed his legs, then his paws, then his entire body, and finally his throat.  A small wisp of it then clamped his mouth shut.

The canine disappeared into the darkness while being held at least four feet off the ground.  He was gone in an instant.  It enveloped him as soon as he passed beyond the screen wall.

Much later, I would appreciate to no small degree the fact that his painful yelps started and stopped almost immediately with one final cry of agony.  A brief bout of angry growling and snapping lasted only a second after he’d been pulled from the porch.  I hoped desperately he hadn’t suffered beyond that final cry.

George was almost completely shrouded by the darkness and held so tightly against the screen door that it cut into his face.  Both floated above the ground as one.

The situation had grown beyond our control.  George was to be no more.  I let go of his hand and grabbed Margaret.

“Dad, get Mom and get inside!”  My yell was sharp and commanding.

My father released his grip on his friend, turned, wrapped his arms around my mother and began pushing her back to whatever refuge we could find in Carr Beholden.

Helene’s screams from just inside the door continued to pierce the air.  I pulled Margaret’s hand free from George’s arm even as his cries bellowed around us.  She struggled against me and I picked her up and carried her to the doorway where her screams mixed with those of her daughter.  I pushed her into the house and let Dad restrain her.  My mom had already stepped back to hold Helene.

I turned one last time to look at George.  He was suspended in the air by wispy tendrils of smoke that cloaked his body.

It was the impossible happening right in front of us.  The darkness had come and was now baring its teeth.  I could barely get my mind around it.  In the split-second I stood in the open doorway looking at a father and husband and friend be consumed by nothingness, I assumed I finally understood what the dream had warned us about.

And then George was gone.  He was pulled into the darkness just as Mosko had been.  He vanished in a heartbeat.  His screams ended just as quickly as the dog’s before him, and I stared at the suddenly empty porch.  My eyes were drawn to where the screen door had been.  The darkness formed a perfect barrier in its place.  Swirling and writhing in and on itself, it was an unnaturally flat surface running parallel to the screen wall.

The porch existed for an instant just as it had been when we first stepped outside: completely encapsulated by whatever was out there.  My amazement was short-lived.  Similar to watching the fog from dry ice pour from a container, the darkness began pouring into the porch and toward the open door where I stood.  It came from all directions.

Dad grabbed me and pulled me inside while my mother slammed the door shut and locked it.

[Introduction | Part 10 | Part 12]

Before I could engross myself once again with the view outside the window, George’s ever-so-loud voice boomed through the kitchen.  “What’re y’all lookin’ at?”

I replied, “The porch.”  I didn’t turn around.  I could tell he was standing just inside the kitchen door.  “There’s something different about the porch.”

“Whatcha mean?” he asked as he came to join us.

“I mean there’s something different.  Look at it.  Whatever that is out there, it’s not coming through the screens onto the porch.  It’s weird.”

He stopped beside me and peered through the window.  He was such a large man that I felt intimidated by his presence.  I knew he was a gentle giant, but he dwarfed me and everyone else.  I was quite aware of his mass standing beside me when he spoke.

“Huh.  Would y’all look at that.  Now ain’t that the strangest thing you ever did see.  I ain’t never seen nothin’ like it.  That don’t seem possible.”

His countrified rhetoric aside, George voiced my own thoughts with unnerving precision, and I was quite certain it was also what my mother was thinking.  The lights on the porch shone as brightly as ever and bathed the west side of the house in vivid light.  Had there not been an obvious discrepancy floating around right outside the screens, the view looked at would have seemed completely normal for a dark moonless night.

Except it wasn’t night.  I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and checked the time.  It was a few minutes before two in the afternoon.  The view out the kitchen window didn’t support that truth.  I slipped the cell phone back into my pocket.

“Why don’t we mosey on out and take a gander?”

My head spun toward George as though his head had exploded.  “What?”

“There ain’t nothin’ out there except the porch and furniture.  The lights’re workin’ fine, seems to me.  Don’t seem like nothin’s wrong out there.”

I turned back to the window.  Mom hadn’t moved in response to George’s suggestion.  To her I asked, “Does that sound crazy?”

“I don’t know.  Maybe.  Maybe not.  I’m not overjoyed with the idea.”

I couldn’t blame her.  I didn’t like it either.  Nonetheless, Old George was on the right track.  We needed to know something.  We needed some idea of why we were hiding inside Carr Beholden.  The porch looked clear and there was plenty of light.  Besides, if we went out on the porch, it was obvious we wouldn’t be inside the darkness.  It appeared unable to get through the screens, although that premise seemed insane to me.

“Maybe we should try.”

“I’m thinkin’ we oughtta.”  There was no doubt which way George’s vote would go on the subject.

“Let’s go check on everyone else, and then maybe we’ll run it by them and see how they feel about it.”  Playing democracy under the circumstances felt right to me, yet even as we turned to leave the kitchen, I was rapidly coming to the conclusion that we had to know something more than what we already did.  If going out on the screened-in porch was a possibility, it was a place to start.  It also seemed to be the only option we had available although I knew I was not the best authority on strategic planning or thinking.

The three of us stepped into the living room simultaneously.  My father was still tending to the dogs.  Mosko had at least crawled far enough out from under the love seat to place his head on Dad’s lap.  In return, Dad continued petting and soothing him.  Brogan had not moved.  He was still in front of my father stretched out on the floor.  Anyone walking into the room who hadn’t been in it before would assume the dog was sleeping.  We knew better.

Margaret and Helene were sitting on the couch.  One of them had removed the red bandana that covered most of Helene’s head all day.  It rested on Margaret’s leg as she braided her daughter’s luxurious black hair.  Helene, for her part, talked quietly with her mother as she looked toward the wall.  She refused to look at any of the windows.  I felt guilty about that knowing the limited view available out there, so I stepped away from George and my mother and walked the perimeter of the room closing the curtains.

Moving from one window to another I said, “Listen, there’s something interesting on the porch.  It doesn’t look like everything else outside.  You can see it through the kitchen window or that one over there.”  I pointed to the large living room window facing the porch.  “The cloud or whatever it is doesn’t seem capable of getting through the screens.  The porch looks normal.  We turned the lights on and can see just fine.”  I peered through each window as I moved around the room and found that only the one facing the screened-in porch offered a different view from the blackness that pressed against the others.  “George mentioned we might want to go out there and take a look.  I think that might not be a bad idea.”

As Margaret used the bandana to tie the French braid in Helene’s hair, the young girl looked at me briefly before turning her gaze on her father.  “Daddy—”  I’d not heard her use that affectionate term in several years.  “—I don’t want you goin’ out there.  It’s not safe.”

“Honey,” he said as he stepped over to her and placed his hand on her head, “it’s alright.  If’n we goes, we’d just step out there long enough to take us a quick peek.  We wouldn’t get the door open if’n there was somethin’ to worry ’bout.”  She leaned her head against him as he spoke.  I doubted his words comforted her at all.  “I took me a look-see and it’s alright.  Here, you can look out that window over yonder and see fer yourself.”  He pointed to the one window I’d not covered yet, the one that faced the porch.

I stood in front of it and hesitated with the curtains.  Then I turned around and offered, “Here’s how I see it.  We need to know something.  What if we’re standing in here being paranoid for nothing?  What if it’s just a dark fog caused by some freakish storm?  The porch gives us a way to investigate without being out in it directly.  If there’s any danger, we won’t even go out.  If we can go out there, at least we can get a sense of what might be happening.  I think it’s worth consideration.”

“I agree,” Old George added with a nod.

“I looked out there.  I don’t think there’s any way to know if it’s safe or not.  The porch is clear though, just as Dave said.  It looks like the black fog is being held back by the screens.  It’s strange to see, I’ll admit.”  Mom’s voice cracked for a moment before she continued, “But I think we need to know more than we do now.”

My father rose from his position in the far corner and took a few steps toward the rest of the group.  In response, Mosko pushed himself back under the love seat and curled into as tight a ball as he could.

Dad said, “I agree we need to know something.  What if we’re all standing in here gettin’ ourselves worked up over nothing?  We’ve all seen dark storms blow through here before.  Can any of us claim we’ve seen everything Mother Nature has to throw at us?  What if this is just a new kind of storm?  It’s new to us, but maybe it’s nothing to worry about.”

He then closed the distance between him and my mother, took her hand in his, and kissed her.  I questioned the sincerity of believing all of this was nothing to worry about, but I appreciated the denial sentiment nonetheless.

Margaret looked around the room at us before her gaze returned to her husband.  “Baby, do you think it wise to try this?”

“Yep, I do.”

“What if it’s not?” she questioned.

“I don’t right know, Margaret, but ain’t we gotta know one way or another?  I think it’s best if’n we gives it a try.”

She reached out and took his hand that was draped over his daughter’s shoulders.  “I’m frightened…”

“I am too.”  His words were loving yet reassuring.  George was a big man.  When he spoke with authority, it was rather easy to believe in him even when it was clear he was unsure.

“It’s a bad idea, Dad,” Helene interjected.  “It scares the fuck out of me!”  Her voice had suddenly become petulant and demanding, that of a spoiled brat.  It was indicative of the fear of a child.  All she saw in this idea was more danger and more uncertainty.  “It’s a dumb idea!”

Margaret grabbed her daughter’s arm.  “Helene McCreary!  Where’d you learn that kinda language?”

“Never you mind, Mom!  We shouldn’t do this, that’s what I know and that’s what I’ll say.”  She suddenly burst into tears.  Margaret wrapped her arms around her and held her closely.

My mind was already made up.  “I know there’s more we don’t know than we do know, but one of the things I know is we need answers.”  I gestured to the last open window in the room.  “I know some of those answers are out there.  If that porch is safe, we need to know it.  If we can go out there and get a closer look at whatever this darkness is, I say we need to take the chance and go out there.  If all of you want to stay inside, I certainly understand, but I’ve made up my mind.  I’m going outside.”

“I’m goin’ too,” George announced.  He squeezed his wife’s hand as he hugged Helene tightly.  “We gotta know.”

“Then let’s figure out how we’re doing it,” Mom said.

Dad reached behind his back, pulled up his shirt, and pulled out a pistol.  He was licensed to carry a concealed weapon in Texas.  Rare was the time when he didn’t have something tucked away somewhere on his person.

I know little about guns, but I could plainly see it was big.  Very big.  While I generally disliked guns, I felt a rush of comfort in seeing he had it with him.  That feeling was immediately tempered by the sudden impression that it might be of no help.  Either way, I assumed it was better to have it than not to have it.

“I’ll go too,” he added.

Margaret turned to look at us.  I immediately recognized her stern dismay.  “You can’t all go rushin’ out there like a posse.  This isn’t the Wild West, you know.  Has anyone thought of a reasonable plan?”

“I can tell you the first part of it,” my father immediately responded, “and that’s that George is staying behind the door until we know it’s safe.  My friend—”  He looked at Old George.  “—you’re a big man.  If there’s anything on the other side of that door that we need to be worried about, the safest place for you is to be on the inside of the door to make sure it gets closed.”

“I agree,” I said.  I looked at George and continued, “Why don’t you let me crack the door open and take a quick look.  If I yell, you push the door with all your might.  If there’s nothing to worry about, we’ll open it a bit further.  If we’re still in the clear, we can open it and step outside.  Dad can stand behind us and be ready to shoot if it’s needed.  And I don’t mean to be chauvinistic, but perhaps you ladies should stand behind him and wait for the all clear.  If that’s alright with you, that is.”  I offered a devious grin for their enjoyment, but also to defuse the tension a bit.

“You’ll get no argument from me,” Margaret responded.

“Me neither,” my own mother said.

Helene’s fading sobs grabbed my attention and I turned to her.  “Helene, you can stay here with the dogs if you’d prefer.  Your parents certainly get their say, but you’d also be welcome to stand inside the door with our respective mothers.  That’s if you want to be that close to the open door.”

The young girl looked over her shoulder at me and offered that smile from her I’d come to expect.  It was the wicked side of her personality that often made me keep her at arm’s length.  In this case, I realized it was an acknowledgement that I’d dealt with her directly and in an adult manner.  For some reason I didn’t understand, that made her quite happy.

“If you don’t mind,” she began while turning her attention to her mother and then her father, “I’ll stay inside with the dogs.  I’m worried about ours, but at least I can help with these.”

Margaret leaned forward and kissed her daughter on the cheek.  “Of course it’s alright, honey.  And I know you’re worried about the dogs.  If going outside means we figure out it’s okay to go home, I think that’s worth it, don’t you?”

Helene nodded and leaned back against her mother for a brief moment.  She stood after that, gave her father a quick kiss on the cheek, then went across the room and sat on the floor next to Brogan and Mosko.  She carefully put her hand out and allowed Mosko to sniff it before she began petting him.  His whining continued.  Her other hand had already begun stroking Brogan’s fur.  She looked back at the rest of us and offered an uneasy smile.

George turned around and said, “Well, come on, folks.  We ain’t got all day.”  Margaret stood and stepped around the couch to join him.

“Helene, do you want me to close these curtains?”  I was still standing next to the large window in the living room that faced the screened-in porch.  The lights were on and, especially from her distance, the scene looked relatively normal—had it been midnight.

“Yes, Mr. Lloyd, if you don’t mind.”

“I don’t mind at all, hon.  You can’t see the main door from here, but at least you can see the porch.  The lights are on and everything looks fine.  If you’re not comfortable and want to close them, you go right ahead.”

I felt terribly patronizing but didn’t much care about it.  I turned and walked out of the room with the rest of the adults following.

[Introduction | Part 9 | Part 11]