Chapter 11
11
LUKE
T ake off my clothes?
The hell?
“Just do it,” Cody says. “I’m not perving on you, dude.”
An odd request, for sure, but now Cody and I are seated in the center of the pentagram, cross-legged and facing one another, in just our underwear. Part of me is convinced that any minute now one of their other buddies will jump out from somewhere, displaying a phone as they record the ridiculous bullshit I fell for. Brad will hunch over laughing that his little Straight Boy was such a fucking sucker, and I’ll go viral for what would go down in history as one of the most epic cases of bullying ever.
But maybe that’s wishful thinking—that I would prefer an ordinary explanation over an extraordinary one, even if it meant my complete and utter humiliation.
With his eyes closed, hands resting on his knees, Cody takes deep, steady breaths.
“Seth, if you could come here,” he says. “I might need to borrow some energy.”
Seth doesn’t question his friend, just moves closer before Cody goes on, “And, Brad—”
Brad starts toward us, but Cody raises his hand. “Back the fuck up because your energy is interfering.”
“Maybe he should leave,” Seth says.
“That’s not fucking happening,” Brad replies through his teeth, and he and Seth exchange tense looks.
For guys who seemed pretty damn chummy when I first arrived at St. Lawrence, now they seem a few choice words away from a fight. I’m sure I have plenty to do with that, but I’m glad Brad’s sticking around for whatever the hell Cody’s about to do. I’ve only just barely started to trust Brad since he opened up the other night. But I definitely trust him more than his two buddies, who I don’t know shit about.
Cody takes a few more breaths before opening his eyes. “Okay. Now we’re gonna rise on our knees and move closer, until our bodies are touching, and you’ll lock hands with me.”
“Why does this keep getting more pervy?”
“All this stuff is kinda pervy,” Brad mumbles.
“Trust me, Luke,” Cody says. “It will make it easier for me to pass the vision on to you. I’ve tried touching with my fingertips and—”
“It’s like fire,” Seth interjects. “Doing it like this, you’ll feel the heat, but it won’t be as intense since it’s spread out.”
The guys really aren’t selling this to me, but I accept it’s what I have to do if we’re gonna follow through with this, so I rise on my knees, and Cody does the same. Unlike with Brad, I don’t feel this intense, inescapable lust as I move closer to him. We push against each other, and it all feels clinical.
I raise my hands.
There’s a sound, like a growl. I recognize it from sexier moments and turn to see Brad, nostrils flaring.
Cody must have picked up on it too, since he shoots Brad a look. “I’m not going under until you calm your ass down.”
“I can’t fucking help it,” Brad says.
“Don’t worry,” Seth chimes in. “He comes over here, and he won’t have a dick to fuck anyone with. Got it?”
Cody rolls his eyes. “Boys, boys.” He smirks, clearly not entirely hating their sparring.
And I must admit, there’s something comforting about knowing Brad’s getting jealous over whatever the hell we’re doing. If for no other reason than knowing he’ll keep me safe just to ensure he can fuck around with me again.
Cody rests his palms against mine. “Okay, so I know I said it’s not like a sex thing…” he says in an uneasy tone.
“This seems a little late for a warning.”
“When we’re done, there’s gonna be a bit of a mess.”
“A mess?”
Cody tilts his head, quirking his brow in a way that’s plenty suggestive.
I pull my hands away. “What the hell? Maybe someone should have told me about this.”
Brad shrugs. “If I’d said that, would that have changed what you had to do?”
“I don’t have a fucking clue, but God forbid I get a heads-up about any of this.”
“The guy’s wasting our fucking time,” Seth says.
I grunt. “It’s fine. Let’s get it over with.”
“Relax,” Cody says. “I have tissues and moist towelettes in my bag.”
The way he says moist makes me think he’s trying to guarantee this will be the least erotic experience of my life.
“Can you please just start?” Brad asks, and when I look at him, I notice his fist clenched at his side like he’s having to restrain himself, and Seth has his eyes on him like if Brad makes a move, blows will be exchanged.
“Okay, okay,” Cody says. “I’m gonna count backward from ten, and just listen to me and pay attention to how you’re feeling in your body.”
I nod as he presses firmly up against me. He interlocks his fingers with mine, and I wrap my fingers over his hand. I can’t help thinking that for a guy who considered himself totally straight, I’ve sure been doing a lot of gay shit the past few weeks.
I close my eyes and try to focus on my breathing, but I’m fixated on this heat Cody warned me about and wondering how and why this is gonna end up messy.
I don’t have to wonder for long before I feel a sensation, but it’s not heat; it’s like someone took a baseball bat to my chest.
“Fuck,” I say, the wind knocked out of me.
When I open my eyes, I’m not in the church cellar anymore. I’m running through the woods, racing behind someone who screams, “Help! Somebody help me!” I move like an animal, lurching forward on all fours. An overwhelming sensation grips me. Hunger—no, starvation.
Before I know it, I’ve caught up with my prey. Then suddenly I’m right on top of…a man, who stares up at me and screams in terror. As that horror-struck face burns into my brain, a rush pulses through me, sating my intense hunger before everything changes.
What feels like memories come in flashes.
Yellow vision…crawling from some kind of thick film, covered in goo.
I can see my hands, but they aren’t human. They look almost like branches that have formed the shape of a hand, with long fingernails at the ends.
There’s a deep hunger within me that must be sated.
I claw through some kind of sac, the yellow fluid spilling out around me.
In a moment, I’m transported elsewhere. I’m not on top of the man or fixated on the strange memories. I’m in a crowd of people, and there’s a deep pain I can’t identify for a moment, but then I realize what it is—I’m starving again.
I move so fast, I can barely process my surroundings as shrill cries fill the air around me. There’s some kind of statue—an animal, maybe a rat, no, a squirrel in a cap—before those clawed hands move in front of me, and then all I see is blood spraying through the air.
So much fucking blood!
“Cody!” I cry out in a panic, closing my eyes, trying to will myself out of this nightmarish place. My eyes pop open, and I try to scream, but it catches in my throat.
Cody lies on top of me, trembling, as I feel a sensation burst…release.
Sweet fucking release.
Cody moans as his hips thrust against me for a few moments until Seth grabs him and pulls him off me. As he removes Cody, I feel arms hook around me. Brad’s got me, holding me as I search around, struggling to reorient myself to being back in the church, away from those haunting images.
Brad pulls down my boxers and wipes me with a towelette. He’s asking questions, and once I can make out what he’s saying, he’s asking Seth, “How’s Codes?”
“How the fuck do you think?” Seth snaps. “I told you this was a crap idea.”
“It’s okay,” Cody says. “Seth, I’m fine. It’s not like the other times.”
As I struggle to get oxygen back in my lungs, I’m reminded of the day Cody attacked me, albeit unintentionally, with those thoughts about my dad’s death while I was in the shower.
I finally manage to force some air into my lungs. “That’s…the…vision?” I ask, heaving as soon as I get the words out.
“What did you see?” Cody asks.
“What do you mean, what did he see?” Seth asks.
“It wasn’t like when I did it with you guys. It was like I got kicked out of it.”
It takes me a few moments to regulate my breathing. Brad hands me a pair of briefs he must’ve brought for me, and I slide them on, noticing the bulge in the crotch where he’s stretched the fabric. He grabs my clothes, and as Cody and I get dressed, I collect my thoughts enough to walk them through the different images, sharing what I witnessed. By the time I’m done, they’re all looking at me like I’m out of my fucking mind.
Cody shakes his head. “That’s not the vision I had. Not the way you described it, at least. I saw several bodies. One impaled. One charred from fire. Others covered in blood.”
“How the fuck did you conclude that you had to get rid of me so that this wouldn’t happen?”
“Before the deaths, I saw a silhouette of a guy. His face was blurry, and it was like flashes between him and this creature that looked like a fetus before it was birthed. Its genesis. I could sense a connection between the figure and the monster, so I asked the Guides—”
“The what?” I ask.
“The Guides are entities from another world—or dimension,” Cody explains. “There’s a sort of tear between our world and theirs. We call it the Rift. When I reach a certain mental state, I can connect with these Guides. It’s very difficult to manage, but I can channel information from them. In one session, I received the message: He must go. It’s time for him to go. Go now. So I had another session, and they gave me your name.”
Guides? Other dimensions? Channeled messages?
If I hadn’t seen their powers for myself, I’d be wondering what kind of drugs they’re on.
“Well,” I say, “for guys who were trying to keep me alive, it sure didn’t seem like it.”
Brad interjects, “It was only when we realized you had powers that we started thinking the Guides might have meant something else. Before that, we believed we just needed to get you away from St. Lawrence, hoping we could deal with it before it had a chance to get to you.”
“But since discovering you had powers,” Cody adds, “we thought the Guides might have been trying to tell us something else. That maybe you were somehow responsible for why this thing gets birthed into our world.”
“And I’m just supposed to believe these imaginary friends in your head from another world?”
“The Guides worked with the original Sinners. Helped them fight creatures like this, so we know their information is reliable.”
Before coming to St. Lawrence, I would have called BS on all this. But here I am, seriously considering the shit Cody’s saying, which is wild as fuck. “So…” I drag out, “this thing you saw that’s about to be ‘birthed’ and go on a killing spree…what is it even?”
Cody retrieves his phone from the pants he discarded on the floor. He scrolls through it before passing it to me, revealing a drawing—a hunched creature with long, sharp, clawlike hands and wide eyes. “I sketched it after the first vision. This is what it looked like after it was born from the sac, but you didn’t see my version because you experienced everything through its eyes.”
I shudder. “Well, none of this tells us very much, does it?”
“It tells us, at least according to your vision, that this thing is still gonna get loose.”
But I have a bad feeling about that already. And something fresh is on my mind. “This monster…it’ll start here, right, if it’s breaking free from—what did you call it? The Rift?”
“The Guides call the places they escape from gates —like open doorways from the Rift into our world.”
“And it’ll be hungry,” I add, “so it’ll need a victim right away.” I pull my phone out of my pants and key away.
“What are you doing?” Seth asks.
“Will you shut the fuck up for five seconds so I can think?” I search “missing” + “Lawrenceville, GA” + “news.” Sure enough, an article from yesterday pops up, with a face I recognize. “George Farrow hasn’t been seen since Monday, October twenty-first. Fuck,” I mutter, handing my phone to Brad. “That’s who I saw. That’s who I was chasing. This thing is already out, so clearly, my leaving isn’t gonna do shit.”
“Then something’s changed since my last vision,” Cody says. “Something’s happened that’s affected the outcome.”
“Or you read it wrong,” I insist.
“It’s possible,” Cody says. “We’ve just never had this happen before.”
“You’ve really fucked with everything since you got here,” Seth adds.
“So whatever the hell this thing is,” I say, ignoring Seth, “we know it’s out there and hunting people. I know with everything in me that it killed that guy. You have no idea how much it needs to kill. I could feel its hunger, and it was so intense both times I saw it attack. It’s like it’s not even just feeding off their bodies, but—and this sounds so fucked—feeding on their fear of it.”
“Their fear?” Cody asks.
“Yes, it’s like I was feeling satisfied even before eating them. Fuck, I don’t even know how I know that.”
Brad says, “You remember when I made that comment about it being like a dream where you just know certain things? You felt it about the guy it killed and about the place it came from, but you don’t have the other part that’s connected to you. We know you’re the reason this is all happening.”
“And I’m just supposed to trust that?”
Brad holds his hands up like he wants me to calm the hell down for a minute, but he didn’t have to see what I just saw.
I feel like a fucking monster myself.
“I’m not saying you guys are making this up, but you can understand why you bringing me here, telling me I’m gonna see one thing, then seeing something totally different, would make me suspect you have no idea what the hell you’re seeing.”
“That’s fine,” Brad says. “We all need to be skeptical, but it doesn’t have to turn into a fight about everything.”
I take a breath. He’s right. “Sorry, this stuff is fucking with my head.”
“It’s okay,” Cody says. “It’s a lot. But it clearly doesn’t knock you down the way it does me, which is a good sign.”
“Good sign? Did you hear what I said? There’s a monster on the loose and already killing people…and apparently will kill more people. We have to do something.”
“No, no,” Seth says. “Me, Cody, and Brad have to do something. You aren’t a part of this.”
“Seth…” Brad says. “You’re not being honest there.”
Seth’s jaw clenches. “Don’t do this. Don’t you dare fucking do this now.”
Brad gives Seth a stern look; a warning. “It’s time to tell him. He needs to know.”
“I need to know what?”
“We all agreed to this!” Seth insists.
“Brad’s right,” Cody says. “It’s too late to stop whatever’s coming. And maybe Luke could help us. I mean, you can feel the power radiating off him.”
“Powerful, but a loose cannon,” Seth reminds them. “All this shit he’s been doing to our powers and with the powers he has that he doesn’t understand might even be the reason why this thing is out already.”
“That might be true,” Cody says, “but it’s irrelevant at the moment. We need to move forward with these new insights.”
I agree with Cody and am fast becoming beyond exasperated with Seth. “I get it, Seth. You don’t like me. I don’t like you. Now whatever the fuck secrets you guys are keeping, you need to be out with them because I’m getting tired of this crap.”
Cody nods. “Seth, would you grab the book?”
Seth doesn’t look happy about it, but he heads back to the stairs and grabs Cody’s backpack, retrieving an old leather-bound book. He eyes me as he returns to his friend and passes it to him.
“When I first came to St. Lawrence,” Cody says, “I stumbled upon this place. I was having a lot of depressive episodes and anxiety. I found when I came here that they eased up. One day, I felt this impulse to head toward the floorboards over in the corner there. It intensified the closer I got, this powerful urge to shift the boards around until I discovered this. Like it was calling me to it.” He flips to the first page and passes it to me.
At the top, in cursive writing, it says: The Sinners . And beneath it, two names:
Josh Dobbers
Mark Waters
Seeing my father’s name, in his handwriting, soothes some of my tension from that fucked-up vision.
“Dad,” I mutter, running my hand across the ink. But just as quickly as I feel ease, the tension returns, but this time, it’s rage. I turn to Brad. “You were keeping this from me?”
He doesn’t make eye contact. “I thought we were doing the right thing.”
“Well, that was a fucking mistake.” I stare him down. If I have some fucking powers, I wish I could blast him with all my anger right now. But whatever’s going on with me, that’s clearly not a thing, since nothing happens.
I head to the desk and snatch my bag, shoving the book inside.
“Hey, you can’t take that,” Seth says.
I don’t respond, just hurry toward the stairs.
Seth starts for me, but Cody stands in his way. “Let him. This is a lot.”
“Luke…” Brad calls after me, but I’m rushing up the stairwell. I’m so pissed.
I want to get away from these guys and get my fucking thoughts around the vision and our subsequent conversation.