Free The Faceless by Simon Bestwick Page A

, says Johnny .
    The atonement , says Mark.
    And then, together: We call you home.
    The blackness spreads, drowning the filtered streetlight seeping through the hotel room curtains. The three boys sink away into it, as if into black, deep water. But out of the dark swim other shapes, closing on the bed. The blackness now covers the whole far wall, and it spreads across the carpet like a tide. Vera sleeps on, silent, as it flows up over the foot of her bed and then the covers, her feet and her legs; the other walls, the ceiling. Flanking him and hanging overhead, surrounding him.
    The dark flows over Allen’s feet. It’s almost total; nothing can be seen in it unless it wants to. And something does. Many somethings. Some are at the foot of the bed; others approach on either side of him. He can’t see them properly yet; just enough to know he doesn’t want to. But in a moment, he will.
    Allen tries to scream. He really tries. But there is only silence.
     
     
    R ATS SQUEALING; V ERA woke flailing at them. Horrible things. Teeth, claws, disease-ridden – she was awake. Rats. Oh Christ she was back in Shackleton Street. No no no. Not that. Please. Everything else had been a dream. No no no. The squealing. The rats. But this wasn’t Shackleton Street, this was their room at the Midland.
    Not rats. Allen. She hit the light. He twisted to and fro in his bed. His arms and legs were stiff, unmoving. A spasm. His head whipped side to side, the neck tendons thin steel rods. He was trying to scream, but his jaw was clenched, so instead he made the rat-sound.
    Vera threw the covers back. Her heart wasn’t hammering so much now. She knew what this was. She’d done this a hundred, a thousand times. Once it’d seemed a price worth paying. Now, though – would she still be doing it at sixty, or older? She knelt by the bed.
    She switched his bedside light on. Sometimes that’d wake him, but not tonight. Still screaming, or trying to. She grabbed his shoulders, flinching – he lashed out sometimes if you did that. She’d had to hide bruises on a couple of occasions. Last thing he needed, stories like that. Appearances were all.
    Allen stopped thrashing; now he shuddered instead. Shaking. His skin was hot and slick with sweat.
    “Allen. Allen. Allen! ”
    His eyes rolled under the lids. The clenched scream became a whimper.
    “Allen. Sweetheart.” She stroked his cheek, his forehead. Kissed his forehead, his cheek. A faint moan. “Allen. It’s me. I’m here. It’s OK.”
    His eyelids flickered open. Another moan, then a ragged breath. She let her own breath out, forced a smile, stroked his forehead again. “It’s OK. It’s OK.”
    A night might come when she couldn’t bring him back, or when the terror stopped his heart. If it did, she wasn’t sure if she’d grieve or rejoice. But tonight wasn’t that night.
    “Sis.”
    “It’s OK.”
    He reached up for her, like a child. She held him; he shook, whimpered, cried. She stroked his hair, kissed his cheek, prayed he’d need no more than this. She sang, softly, the old song Mum had sung to them: “ Heelya ho, boys, let her go, boys, swing her head round and hold together... ”
    Slowly, he calmed and relaxed. “Toilet,” he said. “Need–”
    “OK.”
    “Scared. The dark.”
    She turned on all the lights, opened the bathroom door for him. Allen slid out of bed. His body shone with sweat. The bathroom door shut behind him. She didn’t believe, but she prayed: that she’d done enough; that he wouldn’t need more.
    The toilet flushed; water ran in the sink. Allen came back, naked, still shaking.
    “Sis?” He whispered. “Sis, I... I...”
    Her prayers had gone unheard. Still, that was nothing new. “Alright.”
    Ever since Shackleton Street: his raw need, her comfort. Back then, it’d been the only kind she could give. Now, it was the only kind that worked. Allen crawled back into bed; Vera peeled her nightdress off, turned back the clammy sheets, climbed in