Free After Midnight by Joseph Rubas

out and flopped it carelessly aside. He reached into the trunk, came back with a long-handled flashlight, and clicked it on, dust motes swirling in the bright beam.
    "On the way up," he said, sweeping the trunk with the light, "if something talks to you, just ignore it."
    For a moment I didn’t understand. "Huh?"
    "On the path," he removed a red gas can and slammed the lid, "if you hear something talking to you, don’t pay it any mind."
    "What the fuck would talk to me?"
    Jimmy took the shovel and zipped that and the gas can up in the body bag " Nothin'. That’s just it. Ignore it. Loons. Sound carries and plays tricks on your mind. Now help me with this asshole."
    Jimmy grabbed one end and I the other. Once we were situated, we began walking through the snarled weeds to the path.
    "So, where the hell are going, anyway?"
    "Cursed Indian burial ground or something," he said.
    "What?" I asked. "Cursed burial ground?"
    "Yeah. It’s the soil," Jimmy replied. "Makes the dead rise."
    "What?"
    "Yeah. Some evil spirit in the ground or somethin. Gets in bodies and…infests them, you know?"
    "Jimmy...don't bullshit me."
    We reached the forest. Shifting the bag, Jimmy pulled out the flashlight and clicked it back on. Ahead, a worn dirt trail curved up and out of sight between the towering pines.
    "Honest," he finally said as we started up, " I seen it with my own eyes. You put someone in, they come back."
    "Bullshit."
    "Really. You bury ‘em in the ground, and they come back. They’re all stupid and droolin, but, you know, alive ."
    "Shut up."
    "I swear to God," Jimmy solemnly returned.
    "Yeah, whatever."
    The trek through the forest from there was a misery. Occasionally, we’d come across a fallen tree and have to scramble over, Jimmy carrying Joey over his shoulder like a fireman would carry an unconscious woman from a burning row-house. In one spot a large section of the path had been washed away, and the fall was at least fifty feet down onto the carpeted forest floor. Jimmy tossed Joey across and inched along an outcropping of ledge left behind. I’m usually not afraid of heights, but I sure as hell was then. My heart crashing and my stomach rolling, I squeezed my eyes shut and shuffled over, my arms held out for balance like a high-wire artist.
    But worse were the voices, babbling from the undergrowth like the River Styx over bleached skulls. I don’t know when they started, but all at once I realized that half-formed words were being whispered to me from the darkness.
    "Jimmy?" my heart was throbbing, my breath hot and shallow.
    "Just loons," he said reassuringly.
    "No," I replied, "those aren’t…"
    "Sure they are."
    I opened my mouth, but before I could reply a chilling wail rose sharply behind us, hitching and shivering like demonic laughter.
    My heart halted as both I and Jimmy froze.
    "What the fuck was that ?"
    Jimmy, still holding a corner of the bag with one hand, slowly swiveled his head, his face bloodless and his eyes wide. "It’s a loon. Just a loon."
    It came again, this time further, fainter.
    "That’s not a fucking loon." I looked tremblingly over my shoulder; the path stood empty in the moonlight filtering through the treetops. I fumbled for my gun.
    "Loon. It’s just a loon. Everything’s fine." Jimmy sounded more sober. "Now come on."
    Heart sputtering, I fell in line, glancing often over my shoulder. When we emerged from the forest ten minutes later, a small chunk of dark weight melted from my chest.
    "I hate you, Jimmy," I panted. "I hate you."
    Jimmy laughed.
    "I hate you. I hope you get whacked tomorrow."
    "If I do, you just bring me up here, okay?"
    We crossed a large rocky butte, canted like the deck of a sinking ocean liner, a few dead trees twisting from the thin soil like ghoulish hands. Through another strand of gray wood we found another path, this one gravel, and followed it up the steep hillside.
    The summit was barren, save for piles of stones glowing in the light of the waning moon.