She awoke with a scream of agony, and the realization that some time had passed. Blinded by darkness, she pushed her hands against the walls of her coffin, felt the smoothness of the cardboard beneath her fingers. She choked back a cry, tried to move her legs. Lightning pain shot through her right leg, and she knew that it was broken, useless. Her left leg hurt like a motherfucker, but it moved with relative ease compared to her right one. Shoving with that foot, she felt the barrier of the box and the solidness of the dirt behind it. There was a sticky wet pool beneath her entire body, and she knew that she was lying in her own blood.
How long had she been there? How much blood had she lost? How much air remained for her to attempt her escape?
Moving around, she discovered that the box was a very tight fit. He’d had to bend her legs to fit her inside of it, and she kicked a bit with her good leg to see just how solid the walls were with the dirt piled around her. It seemed like she was kicking rock, not loose soil.
The darkness was almost overwhelming. It made her want to scream out, to curse at the total lack of any kind of light.
She thought she felt something move on her arm, insects or worms, and she imagined her entire body covered with crawling bugs. She brushed at her arms, feeling a piece of skin tear away from the palm of her right hand. The hand was so numb that she wasn’t sure if she felt something on her or not. It would be just like The Digger to toss in a bagful of maggots when he buried her.
She hoped he had blisters the size of quarters on his hands from the shoveling he would have had to do to bury her.
She hoped that his truck would be spotted by the police, and that they would haul him in, and that he would be sentenced to life in prison with a serial rapist for a cellmate.
She hoped that he would howl in agony as he was repeatedly penetrated by the imaginary cellmate, the tissue of his anus torn and bloody.
And she suddenly remembered that she had to escape, to claw her way out of this cardboard prison so that she could stand and accuse the bastard in court. She had to be the one to put him away before he did this to another woman.
All those years working out in the gym...the personal trainer...
Choking on sobs, she pushed her fingernails at the cardboard until they punched through the top of the box. She changed the angle of the fingernails and mentally thanked her manicurist, who had suggested coating them with a strengthening liquid. Pulling towards herself, she stripped away a few small teardrops of the box. Loose dirt fell into her mouth and eyes, and she spat, sobbed some more.
She thought that she heard something, a noise from above her. Was it The Digger? Was he still lurking around, waiting for her last breath to die on her lips?
She’d have to take the chance that it was someone else, someone who’d spotted them or had seen the freshly-dug grave site. She screamed, “Hey! I’m in here! I’m still alive!”
She felt a fingernail break as she tore more of the cardboard away. Dirt was sifting into the box at a fairly steady rate now. She stopped for a moment, heard the noise again...a very distinct digging sound.
Someone was digging their way down.
She knew that her oxygen was going fast, so she gulped a very deep breath and pulled against the top of the box as hard as she could. Then, she raised her arms above her head as the dirt poured down around her body. It was heavy, much heavier than she had thought, but with her arms in position, she crooked her fingers and began to pull her way to the surface.
All the while, the digging sounds continued.
Praying to a God she’d nearly forgotten, she pulled herself up inch by inch, aiming for the same place where she heard the other scuffling sounds. She kept her mouth tightly closed, knowing that if she opened it, the dirt would pour into her throat and fill her lungs. She just had to reach the person who was digging on the other side.
Her fingers broke the surface, curled down, and shoved the dirt away from her. The digging sounds had ceased, but she heard a “Humph” sound, the sound of satisfaction. No hands reached for her to help in any way, and she was almost angry at this savior who had dug down at least two feet towards her, saving her half of the distance that she needed to crawl.
Wriggling, she moved the dirt from her face, seeing her blood-encrusted hands in the sunlight. Opening her mouth, she filled her lungs with good, clean air, and it had never tasted so good. Her sobs were coming, despite the sunlight that warmed her shoulders.
She was alive. She was alive, goddamit, and The Digger was going to pay.
She turned to thank her savior.
All she saw was the gaping maw of the grizzly bear, the strings of saliva dripping from its jaws, before its teeth crushed her skull and sank into her brain. As it pulled her from the earth like a weed from a garden, her last ironic thought was that today, at least, despite all the signs, she would be feeding the bears.
Holly Newstein
DIDN’T DISCOVER THE guilty pleasures of Richard Laymon’s books until a few years ago. Most of my genre reading was confined to the marquee names, as I struggled to learn the craft of writing horror. Then I had the privilege of meeting Dick at KeeneCon 2000—a charming, funny man with an equally charming family. I saw fans with boxloads of books lining up reverently to have Dick sign their collections. I was much intrigued, and decided I had better read something of his. I began with The Stake, and I haven’t stopped since.
Dick’s books are terrifying, bloody and gruesome, but they are also darkly, laugh-out-loud funny. No one will ever mistake his work for “lit’ra-chure,” but they leave the reader thoroughly entertained. Which is, after all, what a writer is supposed to do.
Dick understood the bargain between reader and writer—if the reader is willing to invest hard-earned money and precious time on the writer’s work, he or she is entitled to a rockin’ good time. And he consistently delivers just that. When I sit down to read The Traveling Vampire Show, or In The Dark, or anything else by Dick, I know I am going to get everything I want and nothing I don’t.
Ralph Bieber and I have tried to remember his legacy as we pursue our own writing careers.
Holly Newstein & Ralph Bieber II
OUR PRAYERS CAN be answered, my friends. Your fondest dreams, your heart’s true desires can be yours,” said the white-haired, well-dressed man on the TV screen. His sonorous, seductive baritone voice dropped, becoming lower and more intense. “He is all-powerful. He can make it happen for you, and I can help Him help you. I, the Reverend Paul Swann, will personally deliver your plea to Him. Just send a letter and your contribution to...”
“Yeah, right,” Ernie said from his battered recliner. He scratched the stubble on his chin and yawned. “Jesus, there’s nothing on at this hour but crazies and salesmen.” As he reached for the remote, Reverend Swann leaned forward into the camera. His eyes, dark and compelling, stared intently. Ernie’s hand froze in midair, his fingers hovering over the remote.
“What have you got to lose, friend? Your loneliness? Your illnesses? Your powerlessness? Your poverty? All it takes is a few minutes of your time and a modest contribution, and you’ll be well on the way to the life you deserve. What is the price of success, love, and peace of mind? You can have it all, right now. Right now, Ernie. Send your contribution to the address on the screen...”