Eight or nine tendrils pulled themselves away from the jelly-like mass and came after Meredith. She gave Sandy a kick and slammed the door, preventing Sandy from getting out. She jumped back to the first corner of the bed and gave the crawling tentacles quick flashes from the extinguisher, directing them at the door and Sandy.
Sandy got mad and rolled to her knees, raised the Taser. Fired. The barbs grabbed hold of Meredith’s right hip and breast and dropped her like a dead tree in a tornado.
A tip of tendril bumped into the bedroom door, rebounded, and then curled up toward her. The tip was a misshapen child’s fist. Too many little fingers unfurled from the center and grabbed at her.
Sandy exhaled, and knew the trick was to keep moving. But two other tendrils joined the first, the floor between the bed and wall bristling with irregular lines of children’s limbs.
She went with her first motion and lunged for the closet. She ripped it open with her left hand and yanked out the pepper spray with her right. The tentacles didn’t like when she blasted them; the fingers curled back together, and the tendrils shrunk into themselves, each pulling back into itself like a firefighter’s collapsible ladder. The space between each of the children’s arms and legs grew shorter and shorter until the limbs slapped against other, back against the main bubble on the bed.
They were still for a moment, as if the center was tasting the pepper spray. Different tentacles crawled off the bed and came for her.
Sandy jumped inside the closet and pulled the door shut. She backed into long dresses and sweaters. The thin strip of light at the bottom broke apart as the things came closer. She held onto the door handle just in case those chubby digits could open doors and heard Meredith whimper.
Sandy knew it wouldn’t be long before Meredith simply walked over and opened the closet to let her family inside.
But Meredith said, “Oh babies. Oh no. No. Please. Not this. Over there.” Her voice took on a pleading, strident tone. “Please. Not me. Babies. Please.”
Sandy let go of the door with her right hand and patted her belt. She replaced the pepper spray and found the flashlight. She splashed it around the closet for a second, and was slightly disappointed to see a double-barreled .12 gauge leaning against the back wall. She’d been hoping for an assault rifle or something equally indicative of a family with a healthy fear of God’s wrath. Still, she wasn’t going to complain as she shut off the light and checked if it was loaded by feel. It was.
Sandy, as the police chief of Parker’s Mill, felt a momentary reflexive pang of anger at Meredith and Albert for keeping a loaded gun in an unlocked closet in a houseful of children. She checked for more ammo and found none.
Meredith started to scream.
Sandy knew it might be her only chance to get out of the closet. She made sure the safety was off and opened the door. A few of the tendrils were still agitated and exploring her side of the bed, but most seemed to be concentrating mostly on Meredith’s head, leaving her body to flop around. Sandy couldn’t quite see what exactly the tendrils were doing to Meredith because her upper half was hidden behind the bed, but she realized she was fine with that. She didn’t want to know.
She shouldered the shotgun, found the closest tentacle and squeezed the trigger. The cloud of lead balls blasted the tiny fingers into a gray mist and left greasy strings flopping from the ragged end. There was no blood. Sandy wanted to put the second round into the center mass, but she was worried it might release spores or God knew what, and didn’t think she should be breathing in the same room. So she fired at another tentacle creeping closer and went through the door. She slammed it shut behind her.
At the top of the stairs, she glanced back at the bedroom door to make sure the tentacles weren’t flowing down the hall at her. It was still closed. Meredith wasn’t screaming as loud anymore.
Sandy ran downstairs and in the kitchen found a phone from her youth with buttons in the handset and a fifteen-foot spiral cord to the base. She grabbed it and went through the sliding glass door. Slammed it behind her in case any tendrils came downstairs. She dialed 911.
“Nine-one-one. What is the nature of your emergency?”
“This is Chief Chisel. I need—”
“Oh, hello Chief Chisel. Sheriff Hoyt told us all about what you need. If you insist on wasting our time at the dispatch center, we were instructed to inform you that charges will be filed. Thank you.” A click and the line went dead.
Sandy looked at the phone in disbelief. “Motherfucking BITCH!” She tried dialing the FBI. Job protocol made her memorize the number, along with a dozen others. This time, she couldn’t even get a dial tone. She tried the CDC. The phone was out.
Sandy found the keys to the Suburban and was about to leave when she looked up at the ceiling. The thought of what was happening upstairs, how the entire family had been consumed, transformed, swallowed, made her nauseous. She’d be damned if she let it continue. Even if she had no power as chief anymore, she couldn’t let it go.
She lifted the range on the stovetop and blew out the pilot light, then cranked all the burners on. The slight hiss and telltale odor of natural gas filled the kitchen. Under the sink she found an aerosol can of Raid. It was full. She shook it up and put it in the microwave, punched in thirty minutes, and turned it on. The metal started sparking immediately.
Sandy shut the door behind her, got in the Suburban, and took off for town.
CHAPTER 22
When the combine hit the old pickup, Puffing Bill went berserk. He’d been whining and pulling back on his leash as the massive harvester grew closer and closer up the street, and when it finally crashed to a stop, he dug his three feet into the grass and whipped his head back and forth to pull away from the leash.
All it took was for Kevin to move toward him. Instead of backing away, trying to wriggle out of his collar, he turned and began to pull the boy forward, as if he was trying to drag Kevin across the park.
“Maybe he has to go to the bathroom,” Patty said. It was clear that she wanted nothing to do with that particular act and preferred that it happened far, far away from her. “Go. Go.”
Kevin knew this wasn’t Puffing Bill trying to tell him that he needed to go take a shit. The dog wasn’t shy, and would do his business wherever he felt like it, as long as he was outside. This was something close to panic, and it scared Kevin. He held on to the leash and allowed Puffing Bill to lead him wherever the dog wanted to go. They raced through the park and across the street and down through the residential streets.
Kevin thought he could hear something happening back at the parade, but they were blocks away before Puffing Bill slowed down. Despite this, the dog was still uneasy, whining and constantly keeping his head moving. His ears flicked at the rustle of every leaf, the creak of branches rubbing in the breeze.
Tuned to the quiet of the street, Kevin eventually realized he couldn’t hear any birds. No squirrels chasing each other around. In fact, no dogs barked. It was like the town had been emptied of anything that moved on its own when no one was looking.
He stopped on a corner and realized that he was across the street from the high school. The place filled him with a vague unease, as if the halls were filled with students like Jerm, all looking for someone weak. Although, Kevin reflected, Jerm himself would never be swaggering through these halls. He didn’t know how that made him feel, and he briefly touched the bandage on the back of his head. Part of him knew that Jerm had been sick, that something was wrong, and therefore didn’t blame him, but the other part, the part he didn’t want to acknowledge, was glad Jerm was gone.