The phone rang and rang until Hal finally hung up.
Weird. Someone always picks up.
This place wasn’t exactly the crime capital of the world. There should never be a reason for the phone to go unanswered.
Hal’s stomach rumbled and he looked once more at the drive-thru he’d left only a couple minutes before. The line still hadn’t moved, so he drove back to the line. This time he didn’t pull to the back but instead drove alongside it.
He came upon the red sports car that had been idling in front of him first. Because of its tinted back window, Hal hadn’t been able to see the occupants of the car. As he pulled up alongside it, he realized it wouldn’t have mattered either way because there weren’t any occupants. The car was empty. It idled there, parked, with nobody behind the wheel.
“What the fuck?”
The next car was the same. So was the truck in front of it.
“What in the actual fuck is going on?”
The drive-thru window was empty too. He glanced beyond the truck idling at the window and stared into the brightly lit interior of the Burger Bin. Usually, there would be a teenager with a visor on manning the window. This evening, the inside of the burger joint was empty.
The barking of dogs pulled his attention to the right where he watched the man walking his dogs try to hold them back from an approaching beagle.
“Come on, now,” the young man said, pulling back on the leashes clutched tightly in his fists. “Back.”
The beagle continued toward him and the other dogs, seemingly unafraid of their threats. Something about the dog seemed wrong. It reminded him for a second of the dog he’d seen headed toward the young people camping at the lake. It looked rough like it hadn’t been washed in a long time. Its fur, for being as short as it was, looked like it was blowing in the wind.
Hal rolled down his window. There wasn’t any wind.
His mind went back to the trailer park and the ravenous mutt that attacked him with so much fury Hal still couldn’t open his driver’s side door without giving it a serious boot each time he pulled the handle. That dog really fucked up his truck.
“Stay back now,” the man with the dogs said to the approaching beagle. “I don’t want you to get hurt, little guy.”
The man’s expression changed. He was seeing something extraordinary. He squatted down and stared at the dog in awe. Then he flinched. It was a slight jerk of his head like he’d been splashed with water from a kid’s toy gun, but it was enough to set Hal’s internal alarm to high.
Hal slapped his palm against his horn, hoping to make the beagle flee, but it didn’t.
The young man with the dogs fell back onto his ass and clutched his head. Then the other dogs really lost it. They began to bark and thrash wildly on their leashes. The beagle was unfazed by their wild manner.
Hal honked his horn again and the beagle turned its head toward him. It stared at him and Hal knew he’d seen that look before. It was the same cold stare the dog at the trailer park had given him.
The man with the leashes fell onto his back and let go of them all. Five dogs took off running in different directions. Not like they were afraid, but more like they were on a mission. Only the beagle remained, and it was glaring back at Hal. He honked his horn once more and it, too, fled the scene.
Hal sat there, shocked, watching as the man who’d been walking the dogs sat up and stared at the ground for a moment. He seemed confused, and Hal wondered if he needed help.
Then he picked himself up off the ground. He stood slowly to the upright position, but with his shoulders slumped slightly. The man’s head turned to the left where he seemed to be scanning the parking lot, searching for something. His gaze steadily moved to the right. When he reached the Burger Bin, he stopped with his eyes set on Hal. This man would have no reason to approach Hal. They didn’t know each other. But the man seemed interested in him, and the way he stared back at the truck gave Hal the chills.
What the fuck is wrong with this guy?
Hal pulled his gun out of his glove box and set it on the seat next to him. He couldn’t imagine having to use the gun, but he would if he needed to.
He shifted his truck into drive and was about to speed away when he heard and felt a heavy thud against his truck’s tailgate. Hal looked through the rearview mirror and saw a woman behind him, her entire body bathed in the red glow of his break lights. She snarled at him and moved around to the side of the truck.
Hal reached for his gun and for only a second wondered if he had grounds to pull the trigger. Nobody had physically assaulted him in any way. Not yet. But he wasn’t about to let it get that far.
The man who’d been walking the dogs reached his passenger side window and slammed a fist through the glass. Hal’s instinct was to step on the gas, and as he did, the man’s forearm hit a large shard of glass at the bottom frame of the window and was skewered there. It dug deep into the man’s arm as the truck dragged him through the parking lot.
Any normal person would have screamed and cried. They would have begged for their life. This guy only grinned with gritted teeth, growled back at Hal, and thrashed around wildly. Blood trickled from the wound on the man’s arm instead of gushing the way it should have. The man seemed unfazed by the pain and kept trying to climb his way into the truck.
Hal jerked the steering wheel and swerved. As he did, he heard another thud on the left. The woman was now holding on to that side of the truck. Both of these maniacs were being dragged through the parking lot. They banged on the truck, howled, and shrieked.
“Get the fuck off my truck!” Hal yelled.
The man to his right, the one at his window, pulled his one arm free, tearing the broken piece of glass away from the frame. It was deep in his arm and blood splattered the seat next to Hal.
On the left side of the truck, the woman kicked wildly, thrashing around. She was too far back to really attack him, but a glance through the side mirror showed she was hellbent on reaching him. She was shimmying hand by hand, getting closer and closer to him.
Hal reached for his gun just as he noticed the man trying to climb in his window had something wrong with his head. His hair moved oddly and there was a strange sound emanating from it.
“Ahh!” the woman to his left yelled.
She’d reached the back door and was about to open it when Hal swung his truck wide to the left and stepped on the gas, bringing the truck toward a large green metal trash dumpster.
“I said get the fuck off my truck!” he yelled as he drove so close he thought he might ram right into the dumpster. He didn’t, but she did. The woman on the side of the truck hit the large, metal container so hard she nearly lost her arms.
Hal lost his side mirror in the process, but a quick glance over his shoulder and he saw her tumbling across the ground.
A loud roar came from Hal’s right and he saw the man was nearly in the window. The guy roared again. Adrenaline flowed through Hal. He’d had enough of this bullshit. He reached for his gun, pulled back the hammer, and shot the man right between his eyes.
The man flew out of the truck, but something fell from his head in the process.
Hal looked down at his seat and saw at least five tiny bugs. They were white, almost like maggots, but black in the back. He heard the noise again and realized it was coming from the bugs.
He turned back to the windshield a second too late.
Hal drove right through the front window of the shoe store. Glass exploded all around him. The world went black.
18
They’d found an old music classroom with only one window high up in the ceiling and a metal door that bolted from the inside. It was the perfect hiding place or the best they could find when running for their lives. Seven of them were now seated on the floor. The room had chairs in it, but Nitsy thought it felt less like hiding when leaned back in a desk. Curled up on the carpet felt safer, like when she was a kid and would throw her blanket over her head to hide herself from monsters. Back then, her parents told her they didn’t exist, but that was a lie. Monsters did exist. They were at Stonewall Forge, and she was one of the lucky students from across the United States who got to see them up close.