The Pumpkin House Read online

  Ronnie turned the jack-o’-lantern upside down and read the name on the bottom.

  RICK WILLIAMS.

  He grinned and hurried over to his bicycle.

  Ronnie knew it was nuts, but he could somehow feel wickedness pouring off Rick’s jack-o’-lantern, oozing over his body and seeping down into the pores of his skin.

  He hopped on his bike, clutching the jack-o’-lantern tightly to his chest with his left hand, and started pedaling his bike down the road.

  * * *

  Ronnie glanced up when he heard the train whistle in the distance. He was sitting on the ground, about ten feet away from the railroad tracks, and been thinking about a story his father had told him when he was little – one of the few clear memories he had of his father.

  His father and grandfather had gone to the railroad tracks when Ronnie’s father was about nine or ten. They’d placed pennies on the rails and waited for a train to come. After one had passed by, they collected the flattened pennies left in the train’s wake.

  It wasn’t anything exciting, but it was one of those father-son experiences he would never have. His father had promised he would take him one day to flatten pennies on the railroad tracks once he got older.

  But it had never happened.

  His father was gone now.

  Ronnie stared down at his hand. He was holding one of those flattened pennies from that special day shared between his father and grandfather.

  As he rubbed his thumb across the smooth, flattened surface of the penny, he heard the train whistle again. He glanced up and saw the train was about one hundred yards away now. He stood up and backed a safer distance away from the tracks.

  When he was about thirty feet away, he stopped and glared at the jack-o’-lantern he’d placed on the tracks at the railroad crossing, the one with Rick’s name on it.

  As the train got closer, Ronnie focused all of his attention on the face carved into the jack-o’-lantern. Once again, the face began to change. But this time, it transformed into the face of Rick, flashing a mocking sneer that told Ronnie there wasn’t anything he could do to stop him from hurting his mother.

  Tears began to fall from Ronnie’s eyes, but he didn’t know if they were the result of despair or anger.

  “Bastard!” His scream echoed across Hager’s Branch Road, deserted at that time of night.

  Ronnie then spit a big, slimy loogie, hitting Rick’s jack-o’-lantern face seconds before the train plowed into it.

  The train rolled by at a steady twenty-five miles per hour, the rhythmic clang of the wheels on the tracks almost hypnotic. Ronnie stared at the CSX railroad cars as they passed by, spotting graffiti spray-painted on the side of them every once in a while. He could make out what some of the graffiti said, but the majority of it was as unintelligible to him as hieroglyphics, either written in strange-looking letters or containing bizarre phrases.

  After about three minutes, the train was gone. All that remained of the jack-o’-lantern was a heap of smashed pulp scattered all over the tracks.

  Ronnie smiled as he imagined the demolished pumpkin was Rick’s mangled body lying on the tracks, his limbs and entrails flung helter skelter.

  In the depths of his heart, Ronnie yearned for Old Notch-foot to be real and dispense an excruciating retribution on Rick for what he’d done.

  Ronnie walked over and picked his bike up off the ground, taking one last look at the decimated jack-o’-lantern on the railroad crossing.

  “God, I hope you get what’s coming to you.”

  Part Seven:

  October 31st, Halloween Night

  Ronnie hid in the shadows. For more than two hours he’d been sitting across the street from The Drinking Well, watching and waiting. The trick-or-treaters had long since withdrawn for the night, their frenzied quest for candy having officially ended at eight o’clock. It was getting cold, and, as much as he longed for the warmth of indoors, he was determined to see this through.

  Ronnie knew Rick would go out drinking tonight. He wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to get drunk. Celebrating Halloween was as good of an excuse as any for a boozer like Rick, even if he didn’t dress up in a costume like most revelers out at the bars tonight. Ronnie also assumed Rick wouldn’t take the chance of driving anywhere. The cops would be keeping an eye on him, looking for any excuse to bust him since Ronnie’s mother was afraid to press charges. Ronnie knew this, and evidently Rick wasn’t so dense as to be blind to this fact either.

  Ronnie had followed Rick when he left his house about nine o’clock, making sure he kept a safe distance behind so he wouldn’t be spotted. Rick had walked the three blocks to The Drinking Well and been inside ever since. Ronnie could picture him drinking beer and laughing with his buddies and flirting with the waitress as if he hadn’t done anything wrong whatsoever, while his mother was in a bed still recuperating from her injuries.

  But maybe, just maybe, Rick would pay for what he’d done.

  But that possibly was a longshot, gambling on whether or not little kiddie stories about monsters were true.

  Ronnie glanced at his watch. It was almost eleven o’clock.

  He doubted anything would happen to Rick, but, if it was, Old Notch-foot had about an hour. But even if Old Notch-foot failed to show up, Ronnie was determined to make Rick pay.

  He felt inside his jacket pocket. He ran his fingertips across the knife, reassuring himself it was still there. When his mother gave it to him, she said it was his father’s knife, given to him by his own father, Ronnie’s grandfather. Ronnie didn’t know whether the knife had actually belonged to his father or if his mother had bought the “father-son heirloom” at Wal-Mart and then given it to him.

  But it would suffice if Old Notch-foot turned out to be just the fanciful yarn of an old man.

  Half an hour later, Ronnie stepped back farther into the shadows as the front door to The Drinking Well opened. Rick staggered out, yelling good-bye to his friends inside. He stood out front a moment, looking up and down the street, either making sure the cops weren’t watching him or trying to figure out where to go next.

  Given Rick’s obvious inebriated state, it was probably the latter.

  Rick turned right and walked up Chestnut Street, struggling to conceal his drunken stagger.

  Ronnie waited until Rick was about halfway up the block before following after him, creeping along with his bike and making sure Rick didn’t spot him out of the corner of his blurry vision.

  After three blocks, Rick stopped at the corner of Chestnut Street and Boyd Avenue. Rick’s house was around the corner to the right and a block down on Boyd. Ronnie supposed Rick was going to call it a night and head home, but instead his eyes lingered towards the railroad tracks on his left.

  Ronnie followed Rick’s gaze. He strained his ears and picked up the faint sound of music drifting across the tracks from The Rail.

  The Rail was, without a doubt, the sleaziest, dingiest, deadest hole-in-the-wall bar in town. But tonight, it sounded like there was a big party going on, exciting enough to peak Rick’s interest and change his mind about calling it a night.

  As Rick stumbled towards the tracks, Ronnie glanced at his watch. It was ten minutes ‘til midnight. Old Notch-foot obviously wasn’t going to do anything, and now Ronnie would have to wait another two hours or more until Rick was done drinking at The Rail. He let out an exasperated sigh and shivered a little from the cold before following after Rick.

  Rick stopped in the middle of the street leading up to the railroad tracks. He glanced in both directions to make sure a train wasn’t coming. The tracks were empty. He staggered forward to cross over to the festivities awaiting him at The Rail.

  For a brief second, Ronnie’s mind flashed back to when he’d set Rick’s jack-o’-lantern on the railroad tracks and watched it get smashed to a pulp. He pictured a train coming by and plowing into Rick, the retribution for what he’d done to his mother carried out by the hands of Old Notch-foot.

  But when R
onnie didn’t see any train coming, he realized how foolish he was acting.

  There is no damn Old Notch-foot, he thought dejectedly, hanging his head down.

  He found it hard to imagine how Sarah could so sincerely believe Mr. Keenan’s fabricated stories. But he was even more surprised by how he’d almost fallen for them as well. He felt like he’d just been told there was no Santa Claus or Easter Bunny.

  Ronnie lifted his head up and started to follow after Rick, but stopped when he noticed Rick wasn’t alone. Someone stood on the tracks in front of him. Ronnie dropped his bike to the ground and jetted down Boyd Avenue, ducking behind a tree when he was about fifteen yards away. He stood with his back to the tree for a moment catching his breath before he peeked around to see what was going on.

  “Where’d ya’ ge’that cool cos’ume, man?” Rick asked in a slurred voice.

  Ronnie squinted to get a better look. He could barely make out the guy’s costume. He stepped farther out from behind the tree, the street lights illuminating every detail. He had to admit it was probably the coolest costume he’d ever seen.

  The costume was dark-colored and skin-tight fitting with a beef jerky texture to it. It reminded Ronnie of the pictures he’d seen in school of Egyptian mummified corpses once the bandages had been removed. The guy wore gloves and a claw at least six inches long protruded from each fingertip. The corded muscles on the costume in combination with the guy’s scrawny build and well over six foot frame made him look both freakish and frightening.

  The mask looked like it came straight out of some monster flick, reminding Ronnie of a mix between Pumpkinhead and Alien.

  It was shaped like an over-sized football, and the bottom half of the face consisted almost entirely of a gaping maw with long, sharp teeth which ran around towards the back. The demonic eyes were black, but they had a faint reddish reflection to them Ronnie could see when the light hit them just right.

  The guy had obviously spent a lot of money on such a professional-looking Halloween costume as this, one you wouldn’t find in just any store.

  But he was ignoring Rick’s question. Ronnie figured the guy was either drunk himself or messing with Rick by trying to scare him.

  Rick clearly wasn’t amused. He balled his hands up into tight fists, taking menacing strides forward. Ronnie was afraid he’d have to watch Rick beat the crap out of this poor fellow – a guy who was probably just some teenager trying to have some harmless Halloween fun.

  “I asked you a question, man.” Rick’s slur was gone along with his inquisitive tone, replaced by waning patience and waxing anger. “Where in the hell did you get that cool costume?”

  The guy remained silent, still ignoring Rick.

  Even from his hidden vantage point behind the tree, Ronnie could sense the rage boiling up in Rick. Surely the guy in the costume wasn’t blind to it standing only a few feet away.

  Ronnie reached into his pocket and wrapped his fingers around the knife. For a brief moment, he thought about helping the guy. He could sneak up behind Rick and bury the knife in his back. But he realized it wouldn’t do any good. As soon as he tried to sneak up to the tracks, Rick would hear his tennis shoes crunching on the gravel even in his inebriated state.

  “Okay, asshole, I’m going to ask you one more time. Where did you–”

  In a blur of motion, the guy snatched Rick by the throat. Rick flew into a coughing fit as the guy tightened his grip. Blood trickled down Rick’s neck from the claws digging into his skin.

  “It can’t be,” Ronnie whispered, watching the combination of a horrible nightmare and a dream come true unfold before his eyes.

  Old Notch-foot lifted Rick into the air. Ronnie was astonished by the strength of the creature, grasping Rick by the throat and dangling him about six inches off the ground as effortlessly as if he were a small child rather than a grown man. The creature pulled Rick closer to its face and the rows of sharp teeth comprising half of its head. Every muscle in Ronnie’s body tensed, eager to watch Old Notch-foot chomp Rick’s head off just like Ozzy Osbourne had once bitten off the head of a bat.

  But instead, Old Notch-foot sniffed Rick a few times and then tilted its head slowly from side to side as if examining his face.

  That’s the son-of-a-bitch you’ve come for tonight.

  Ronnie had to constrain himself from shouting the thought out loud.

  Satisfied it had the right person, Old Notch-foot turned and strode to the other side of the railroad tracks, now carrying Rick by the neck at an arm’s length away. Even though Rick’s face was red and he was gasping for air, he didn’t lose consciousness.

  Once across the tracks, Old Notch-foot laid Rick down on the ground, placing his head on top of the first rail. Rick punched and kicked the creature but Old Notch-foot continued to pin his head against the rail with its vise-like grip, ignoring Rick’s ineffective attempts at escape.

  Ronnie heard a train whistle in the distance – two long blasts, followed by a short toot, and finally a long blast again. Rick ceased his rapid-fire volley of punches and glanced up the tracks, spotting the headlight of the rapidly approaching locomotive.

  Ronnie beamed with satisfaction as he imagined the expression on Rick’s face, the look of horror in his eyes as he realized what was about to happen.

  Panic engulfed Rick as he started pounding and pummeling Old Notch-foot even harder than before, frantically looking back and forth between the behemoth thundering towards him and the monstrosity pinning him down in its path.

  When the train was about forty yards away, Rick gave up his useless struggle and let out an ear-piercing, banshee-like scream, his wails announcing the approach of his own imminent death. Ronnie had never heard a cry so full of terror and pleading, but it gave him pleasure nonetheless.

  Old Notch-foot must have relished in Rick’s scream as much as Ronnie because it merely laughed at him, a jovial and bloodcurdling sound which made Ronnie smile despite the hairs on his neck standing on end.

  Ronnie heard a voice in his head, and immediately realized the words were intended for Rick, who was unquestionably hearing the same voice in his own head. The sound of Old Notch-foot’s voice was a combination of the scraping sounds of fingernails down a chalkboard and a shovel against concrete, causing Ronnie to almost pee his pants as the flesh on his arms prickled with goose bumps.

  Know why you die.

  Images of Rick beating on his mother flashed in Ronnie’s mind. He instinctively closed his eyes to avoid seeing them. But even in the sanctuary behind his shut eyelids, the ghastly scenes continued. Despite how much they horrified Ronnie, he steeled his resolve knowing the effect they were having on Rick.

  The train whistled again, a long-sounding blast laced with danger. Ronnie’s eyes snapped open. The locomotive was only yards away. Old Notch-foot glanced up at Ronnie. Their eyes met for the briefest of moments before the creature released its hold and the train squashed Rick’s head to a bloody pulp as if it was a pumpkin.

  The train continued to roll by, the spaces in between the railroad cars flashing by intermittently, giving Ronnie an animated motion view, similar to a child’s flip book, of Old Notch-foot standing up, slowly walking away in the opposite direction, and then vanishing into the night.

  Ronnie glanced at his watch to confirm what he already knew. It was midnight. He turned and made his way back down Boyd Avenue to get his bike. He had no desire to wait around until the train was gone and see what was left of Rick.

  All that mattered was Rick had paid for what he’d done to his mother.

  * * *

  That night, Ronnie barely slept. Every time he would doze off, the images of Old Notch-foot pinning Rick to the railroad tracks would invade his dreams, causing him to bolt upright in his bed, drenched in a cold sweat. As the hands on the clock sluggishly ticked into the late hours of the night, feelings of guilt rose up inside him.

  He didn’t feel any remorse over Rick’s death. That son-of-a-bitch had paid for what he’d done
and got exactly what he deserved.

  No, Ronnie’s guilt lay with Mr. Keenan.

  The front page of tomorrow’s newspaper would be splattered with the headline of Rick’s death; nothing else ever happened in Smith’s Grove. It would be the top news story, and, although Ronnie supposed the authorities would label it as an accident or maybe even a suicide, Mr. Keenan would know the truth.

  Ronnie knew Mr. Keenan would confront him about it, demanding to know why he’d done something as dangerous as unleashing Old Notch-foot upon Smith’s Grove. Ronnie assumed Mr. Keenan would sympathize with the reason why he’d done it, but he doubted it would be sufficient to justify his actions in Mr. Keenan’s eyes.

  As guilty as Ronnie felt, he knew he had to do the right thing and tell Mr. Keenan what he’d done. He’d grown to regard Mr. Keenan as a close friend, as dear to him as the old man was to Sarah.

  He resolved to go over to Mr. Keenan’s farmhouse first thing in the morning and tell him what had happened. Whatever transpired afterwards, Ronnie was willing to take on the consequences.

  * * *

  Mr. Keenan was sitting in his rocking chair on the front porch as Ronnie pedaled up to the Pumpkin House the following morning. His old dog Rusty lay faithfully at his feet, lazily wagging his tail in unison to the rhythmic rocking back and forth motion of his master.

  Ronnie rode his bike up the driveway and saw Sarah sitting on the porch as well.

  He’d been willing to face Mr. Keenan and any resulting repercussions, but he wasn’t prepared to face both Mr. Keenan and Sarah and tell them what he’d done.

  Ronnie laid his bike down on the ground and strolled up towards the porch. The jack-o’-lanterns still littered the front yard like candy wrappers left at the bottom of a trick-or-treat bag. Mr. Keenan had told them dump trucks would come by on the day after Halloween to haul them away.

  Before Ronnie reached the front porch, Sarah was already walking down to meet him and pulling him over to the side. Ronnie glanced back over his shoulder at Mr. Keenan as Sarah led him around to the side of the house.