Free Dark Corners - Twelve Tales of Terror by Michael Bray Page B

to see
for myself, and even went so far as to make it to the porch when I
was seventeen. But the rats stopped me. Not physically, you
understand. But as I stood there, I was sure I could hear them,
moving around stealthily in the walls, the same sound I can hear now.
    That was almost seventy years ago, and in that time, I
don’t think I’ve slept a full night without the
nightmares or the sickening guilt welling up inside. But it makes no
difference. He’s back. He’s back and he’s brought
the rats. Like a ghastly pied piper he has led them to me, to the
walls of this cheap hotel room. The Fisherman house was demolished
twenty years ago, and a multi-story car park stands where it once
stood. I wonder where they went from there, Steve and the rats. Where
did they hide until the time was right to come for us?
    He
got Snoddy a couple years ago. Snoddy had led an indistinct life,
working minimum wage jobs, and developed a pretty serious drinking
problem along the way. He never spoke of that day directly, as far as
I know. But I’ve heard tell that when he was particularly out
of it, he would mutter to himself about the sounds of the rats, and
how he would never have enough traps for them all. He was found dead,
with his eyes wide open and a look of sheer terror on his face. They
said it was a heart attack, but I know better. I think Steve came for
him, and when Snoddy saw what old Stevey-boy had become, how he
looked after so many years festering in the dark— well, I think
it was enough to stop his clock right then and there.
    At
first I tried to rationalize his death, told myself I was just being
paranoid. And that worked for a while—at least until Denton
called me out of the blue last week. His voice was familiar, but
strange at the same time. It wavered as he spoke, and came in a high,
shrill register as he whispered through the line to me. Of us all, he
had fared the worst. His aggressive nature had led him to crime, and
as the story often goes, things went from bad to worse for him. He
shot an old man in a clumsy carjacking and was jailed for twenty-five
years. He ended up serving sixteen, coming out reformed and fit to
rejoin society. I hadn’t spoken to him since school, but I
remember seeing his picture in the paper when he was arrested, and
even though he was much older than the boy I once knew, he still wore
the haunted, glassy expression I remember from that day in the house.
When he called me, I could barely understand his manic whispers, and
I couldn’t really make out much before they turned to full on
screams. After that all I could hear was the high pitched drone of
hundreds, or maybe even thousands of rats. I definitely heard
something speak, although it wasn’t Denton. The voice was thick
and wet, and said it had something exciting to show me—that I
would have to see it to believe it. And I do believe it. The
scratching in the walls is louder now, and I fear I’m out of
time. He’s come back, and God help me, I deserve whatever he
brings.

    It’s
time.
    They
are here.

YURPLE’S LAST DAY

    Freddy
wondered what he had done to deserve such a run of bad luck. He’d
just turned fifty-one, and for his entire life he’d done his
best to entertain people—to make them happy. It wasn’t
always easy, not anymore. He had arthritis in his left knee, which
meant that the bumps and prat falls that always raised such a laugh
legitimately hurt him now. He sat in his dressing room and took a
long swig of Jack Daniels. No glass for Freddy. He preferred it
straight from the bottle these days.
    Glancing
at his reflection in the large mirror, Freddy wondered what the hell
had happened to his life. He didn’t know where the time had
gone, how the years had slipped by without him noticing. One day he
was twenty, with a head full of ambition and aspirations of success.
In the blink of an eye, he was here. A bitter old man, with nothing
to look forward to except biting the big one.
    Flicking
his eyes to the