The Awful Truth of December Tenth

They’ve told me to recount what happened that night.  They say it will help me get over my troubles.  But I know the truth, and nothing but proving it will ever help me.  Some day, they’ll have to let me out of this place, this prison.  Some day, when they know the truth about that night.

         It was a bitter-cold, December night like so many others outside of Chicago.  No snow fell, and hardly a wind blew.  They had each done theirs that morning, and since ceased.  The street before me was clear, but yards on either side were piled a half foot deep with fresh powder.  The car I was in, too, had a layer of snow on it.  That was intentional; too clean, and my quarry might notice it out of place.

         The target of my investigation was Jim Simley.  Simley with a short “I.”  Poor, rhyming bastard.  He was a banker and a scumbag; his wife suspected him of being unfaithful while she worked late.  A typical job for me, but one I was happy to take.  I hoped to catch Jim Simley in anything he was up to, and make him a very lonely, poor man.

         He lived three houses up, and on the opposite side of the street from my parking space.  His neighbors’ cars boxed me in front and back, creating a perfect hiding spot.  I watched his front door, the sidewalk in front, and every pedestrian who passed with a keen eye towards anything out of place.  Foot traffic was light near the Simley home.  I admired the Christmas lights thrown up in trees and over doorways, up and down the street as I sipped a cup of boiling-hot coffee.  They were all white on this block, the Christmas lights… Must have been a neighborhood association decision.  Those in the trees seemed to blink and swim in and out of focus as the wind gently rocked the leafless boughs.  In the home in front of which I was parked, I could see a Christmas tree, lightly pattered with more lights, white as well.  It was a very homogenous neighborhood that way.  All white.

         I rolled the window of my boxy sedan down a crack, to get a taste of the fresh, freezing air.  Steam roiled off my coffee as the night blew in that crack.  The wind whistled a little, then left the night silent.  It was just that kind of night; silent in a vast and powerful way.  I felt like I could hear the nothingness stretching out for miles.

         The scuffle of boots through the shallow powder of the sidewalk roused me from my musing.  I looked back over my right shoulder, saw a middle-aged couple in overcoats working their way towards and passed my car.  They had a way about them… a closeness.  That’s not to say that they were close -- they were, but that’s not what I mean.  Rather, there was something about them that seemed to shut out everyone else… A secret that only they knew.  They didn’t notice me in the car as they passed.

         I kept one eye on the couple as I turned my attention back to the Simley house.  An upstairs light was on now.  It hadn’t been a minute ago, and I watched to see if I could catch any hint of motion.  It switched off again; probably Mr. Simley getting something from the bedroom.  I glanced back across the street to my couple.  They had turned off and headed up a driveway directly across the street from the Simleys‘.  Now they stood at the front door of this house, and were welcomed quietly inside.  I felt a chill, and decided to roll the window up again.

         A half hour passed quietly.  My coffee cooled.  My fingers and toes chilled.  The windows grew fog around their edges.  The Simley house was still.  Then, the garage door rolled open.  I could see a shadow cast by the garage’s lone light bulb playing across the walls and the snow-swept driveway.  Just Mr. Simley poking around.  He came to the edge of the garage, casting a long, fat shadow down the driveway and onto the sidewalk.  He was a rotund man, dressed in black jeans and a navy-blue sweater.  He stood there, sipping a hot drink of his own -- I could see steam pouring off of it from the car -- staring out at the night… at the lights, perhaps.  Something drew his attention down the road, behind me.  I checked the side view mirror and saw headlights easing up the street.

         Jim Simley and I both watched the car as it passed his house, then pulled off to park on the same side of the street as I.  Simley watched them park, but sipped his coffee and retreated into the garage before anyone could disembark from the car.  Something about this struck me.  The way he did it, with uneasy speed… It seemed to me that he would want the neighbors to see him.  Want an alibi close in time to his crime against marriage.  But, instead, there was this hurried retreat, as if he were afraid of the car… or, more accurately, the driver and its three passengers, as I now saw tracking through the light snow in the driveway to the front door of that same house, across from the Simleys‘.  Again, they were dressed in long coats.  Around their hems, though, I could see… gowns?  All of them, two men and two women, seemed to be wearing silken gowns underneath their coats.  The men’s were dark -- blue or black, perhaps -- and the women’s, white.

         It was strange, to be sure, but not what I was there for.  I made a note of it and turned my attention back to the Simley house.  Jim had gone inside.  Dammit.  The bright rectangle emanating from inside the garage was just dwindling down to a slit.  I’d been distracted too long.  Simley’s car was still in the driveway, though, and I assured myself that I hadn’t missed anything.

         That was when I made the fatal mistake of that mid-December night.  I rolled the window down again -- just a crack, but that was enough.  There was a breeze that might not even be recognizable as such, and on the still, dead air came a sound that chills my blood to recall.  On that slightest of air currents rode the hollow sound of low, rhythmic chanting.  It swelled in my ears only a moment, and then faded as though it had never come.  So ill did it sound, though, that the impression it left in my mind lingered for cold, drawn-out minutes as I waited, straining my ears, for it to resurge.

         I struggled to put the memory of it away, to discard it forever.  I would be a happier man today had I forgotten what I’d heard, and returned my total focus to Simley.  But I couldn’t.  I sat there, idly tapping one foot, rubbing my day's growth of stubble, nervously trying to regain composure.  I sat there, forcing restraint on myself.  I sat for what felt like hours, though I know it to have been only minutes.

         Finally, I could take it no longer.  The haunting memory was still audible to my mind’s ear, and  it stuck there, like a thick, hard splinter.  All at once, I threw open the car door and launched myself into a standing position outside the car.  My ears ached, straining to hear the notes I had just moments ago tried so hard to forget.  No sound came to me.  I delicately, silently, closed the car door, and crossed in front of the vehicle, up onto the sidewalk.  I stood in the thin layer of light powder for some moments, still just… listening.

         The night air shifted again, and the horrid sound again played through my ears.  I was drawn to it, inexplicably so.  I started up the sidewalk toward where from it seemed to emanate.  I walked as though in a daze, only vaguely aware of my surroundings.  The God-awful sound had faded again, just as quickly as it had come, but the memory lingered, guiding me.  I followed it past one house, then another… and the trail grew cold.  Across the street, a door opened.  It was the Simley house, and Jim Simley was standing on the steps, staring at me, his keys in his hand.  We looked at each other for some moments; he, unsure of my intent standing stone dead still in the middle of the sidewalk; and I, torn between my duty and the unearthly lure of this evil music.

         The volume swelled again, and I made my decision.  “Do you hear that?” I asked absently.

         Jim Simley stared a moment longer, then decided not to indulge me.  He got in his car, backed down the driveway, and then, staring at me as he passed, drove away.  I shook it off, intoxicated by the pull of that sound.  I wheeled around, searching  for its source, and came face to face with That House.  The house into which the cloaked and overcoated men and women had been filing since I arrived at my hiding place.

         It seemed to loom up in front of me in the chilling reverberation of those empty notes.  Still, the sound was faint, and I couldn’t be sure… The windows were all dark, so far as I could see.  I looked up and down the street, and, finding it clear, proceeded to creep up the driveway to The House.  It’s since taken on quite the importance in my mind, and you’ll therefore have to excuse the grammatical power I lend to it.

         At the head of the driveway, I leaned in close to the front of the house, and crept to the left, and around the corner.  There was a walkway with the same thin layer of snow as the rest of the sidewalks in the neighborhood, leading to a door in the side of the garage.  I regretted the footprints I left behind me, but couldn’t let the risk of being found out dissuade me.  Just before the door were the house’s garbage cans, and, behind them, a window well.  Very gently, I slid away one of the cans, attempting to peer down into the basement.  The window was boarded on the inside.  But, while I could see nothing inside, I could hear.  Hear that eerie, godless hymn coming in waves.  It was still faint to my ears, but clearer than ever.  Without further consideration, I resolved that I must know its source and purpose.

         I tried the door, only to find it locked.  Of course.  I took another look around for anyone snooping -- besides myself, that is -- and found the coast clear.  I reached into my  right-hand coat pocket, and removed a nickel-plated, snub-nose revolver.  Illegal for private investigators in this state, to be sure, but sometimes a necessity nonetheless.  I used it to gently but firmly rap on the window glass, breaking out a triangle at the corner, perhaps eight inches on the longest side.  I very carefully reached inside, into the darkened garage, feeling blindly for the lock.  I felt the opposite knob, and found nothing.  I reached up higher, and felt a sudden sharp pain and blood dripping down my hand.  I had cut it, wedging it in between the sharp edge of the broken glass and the window frame.  I had a finger on the lock now, though, and didn’t let my injury slow me.  I twisted the small mechanism, and let myself into the dark space.

         Inside the garage, the sound seemed to emanate from every wall.  I had no doubts, now, that I was in the right place.  It turned out later, of course, to be next to the worst place I’d ever been.  Revolver in hand, I carefully felt my blind way through the front of the garage.  Along the front wall I kept one hand, every ready for the door into the house.  After ages of listening to that dark dirge within, I came within range of the door.  I felt for the knob, and turned.  This door opened without persuasion.

         The atmosphere in the house was oppressive to every sense.  The heat of a home was a powerful, eye-watering thing after the freezing temperatures outside.  The handful of lamps that were on were enough to turn my head away for a moment while my eyes adjusted.  There was a thick smell on the air -- so thick I could taste it -- of some wholly disagreeable incense.  It was like the smell of a church, mixed with the musk of some wild animal.  And, of course, the sound persisted.  It was louder than ever, now, and drew me nearer with greater power.  My curiosity knew no bounds, but even if it had, I doubt I could have resisted.  Something about it was alluring in the most hideous way.

         I carefully crept around the door frame, throwing a glance first in either direction.  To my left was a small laundry space, and to my right, the home’s kitchen and living space.  It was in the latter direction that I headed, ever mindful of my footfalls.  The awful sound seemed to come from everywhere at once, rather than from one specific corner of the house.  It was a surging, rhythmic hymn, which lent itself well to chilling the blood and clouding the mind.

         The first door through which my exploration led me was a bathroom -- nothing sinister to be found inside.  With my revolver ever at the ready, I leaned over the stairs to look up to the next floor.  It was dark, as was the room across from me.  In both, countless dark, shapeless forms caught my eye and seemed to disappear when I turned my eyes on them directly.  I took one last glance up the stairs, and decided not to explore in that direction.

         Just behind the stairs was a door.  I put a hand on the knob.  I thought better, and retracted it.  I first pressed one ear to the wood and listened.  The awful noise was, indeed, louder through here.  I stepped back, took a deep breath to steady my shaky nerves, and replaced my hand on the knob.  I turned it as near to silently as I could; every sound of the spring and the bolt was deafening to me.  At this point, I had to check my other hand visually to confirm that I still held the revolver.  I closed my eyes a moment to prepare, then pulled the door open abruptly, causing my heart to jump into my throat briefly as I first saw inside.

         A small, dark, empty room.  I breathed a very quiet and premature sigh of relief.  I leaned into the room, gun hand first, to find a staircase leading down to the basement.  The aural assault was almost more than I could bear.  The chanting sickened me, made my skin crawl.  But, as ever, it drew me near.  I started my descent.

         Step by step, I made my way into the basement.  The light here was dim and flickering, as though from many candles.  The basement was of unfinished cement, with cracks leeching water running up and down the walls at intervals.  With every step, the sound grew louder and clearer.  It was as I had heard, though far more nightmarish -- like a hymn in some long-dead tongue, uttered by the damned and the soulless.  Still, it drew me near.

         Finally at the landing, I peered around the divider wall, into the main space of the floor, and here I am baffled as to what kept my heart beating.  For in the room, surrounded by candles and strange, painted symbols, stood a group of some dozen men and women, all clad in black or white cloaks, and all singing their damnable hymn with all the fervor of the condemned.  And, in the center of their circle, I could make out, between their gown clad bodies, the shape of some awful, crouching thing.  It was the size of a man, with skin black and shiny.  That is, if it did, indeed, have skin.  For its surface was more like exposed musculature, ropey and lumped.  On either side of its head were two tall, pointed, fur-tufted ears.  And its hands were like those of a corpse -- fingers long and nails overgrown and ragged.  I could not see its face, for that was obscured; it was feeding on a limp, pale young man.  His face was a mask of horror and agony.  Blood ran freely down his chest and onto the floor where it pooled and was tracked by the Thing’s awful, cloven hooves.  At seeing this, I must have let out some small sound, for the group broke its chant and turned towards me.

         I raised my revolver at the Thing, sending parishioners scattering for cover.  But I had no interest in them.  I fired.  I fired again and again into the Thing.  Black blood spattered on the white robes of the women behind It.  They screamed, and the Thing stood up.  It advanced on me and still I fired.  My fifth and final shot tore through one of Its great, yellow eyes, and, as though It had decided to, It fell limply to the ground.

         I stood, panting and light-headed, amongst the chaos.  Robes fluttered and swirled about me as the group disbanded and ran up the stairs.  Two of the men grabbed me, and wrestled me to the ground, wrenching the gun from my grip only with the greatest of force.  They dragged me up the stairs, where the other parishioners sat dazed and frightened, and bound my hands and feet with heavy tape while they called someone.

         I later found out that it was the police they had on the phone.  While the first man called, a second led a young man into the basement.  He said they would survey the damage.  This is where my story begins to disagree with that of the police and the parishioners.

         For they say that I heard no gunshots after the second man led the young man down the stairs.  They say no one heard any shots but those a dozen people saw me firing.  They say my story is self-serving fabrication.

         When the police arrived, I expected to be venerated.  I expected to be famous, hailed as a hero for exposing and putting a stop to the horrors of this sickening cult.  But, when they came back up the basement stairs, they spoke in hushed tones with the parishioners.  They spoke of the two dead men, and said it looked exactly as they had described.  The group told some story of their choir and two young men shot dead.

         “No!” I screamed. “No!  Not a man!  A monster!  A monster, eating a man!”

         Everyone looked at me as though I were out of my mind.  It was a brilliant strategy they’d devised, but I knew the truth.  I kept screaming it.  “It was a MONSTER!  The young man was already dead, his neck gnawed and bloody!”  No one listened.  I was handcuffed, loaded quietly into a police car, questioned, and brought here.  Here, to this madhouse.  This most absurd residence for a hero.

         And this is where they tell me I’ll stay, until I admit the truth.  They tell me I’m mad.  But I know the truth.  I know they killed a second young man and put him in place of that monster.  I know they hid the truth of what I’d done to hide the truth of what they’d done.  And one day, I’ll prove it!  One day, I’ll find that monstrous corpse!  And when I do, that sickly black church will pay for my incarceration and its own sins in blood.

         One day, you’ll see that I’m not mad!  I just hope that day comes before more of those Things do.  Because, sometimes, at night, when the air is still and dead, I still hear the chanting.