Come Get Me Page 15

  Pete stared at him, pain etched on his face, “I heard him screaming,” he moaned, “but I couldn’t go to him. He was in the dark. It would’ve gotten me too. I couldn’t leave my fires; if I had it would’ve gotten me. My fires are all that keep me safe. If I’d went then I’d be dead too. I couldn’t go help him.” Pete was going back to his make believe world where the monsters were out to get him. Jim wished for all he was worth that he could be mad at Pete but he couldn’t. He believed the Goatman was back to get them now too. He wasn’t even sure if he would’ve run out even to save a friend, in the dark knowing the creature was out there somewhere waiting for him. Jim wanted to hate him for letting their friend die but he couldn’t. Pete was all he had left. Everyone else was dead.., he wanted to walk over to him and start beating him until he was sane again but he couldn’t.

  “It’s ok Pete. I understand…” Jim said before being cut off.

  “Alright I’ve heard enough of this bullshit!” the Sheriff yelled as he came storming around the corner of the house. “I’m sick of hearing you spouting this shit you crazy little freak. You’ve been going on and on about this frickin’ Goatman thing and I’ve had just about enough,” he said as he grabbed Pete. “You’re coming to the station with me and you’re going to answer some questions. I’ve got an officer dead and from what I’ve heard it sounds like you know more than you’re telling your friend here. You can be damn sure I’ll find out what it is.”

  “What happened with Rob?” Jim asked interrupting the Sheriff’s tirade.

  He slowly turned to Jim and looked as if he was about to start yelling at him before he caught himself. “The state boys are going to be taking over. I sent Johnny home about a half an hour ago. He wasn’t doing much damn good up where he was anyways.” Jim hoped Johnny hadn’t gotten in trouble for letting him in but he had a feeling he had. “If I were you, Jim Collins,” the Sheriff continued, “I’d get my butt home to my mama pretty quick before I take your sorry ass in as well.”

  “But Pete didn’t do anything,” Jim said ignoring the suggestion. “Sure he’s a bit crazy but he didn’t do it.”

  “How the hell do you know that you idgit? Were you here with him the whole time? Were you two out here roasting marsh mellows and cooking weenies over the fire?” The Sheriff asked sarcastically. “Besides I’m not taking him in because I think he did it I’m taking him in as a witness. A hostile one at that. And another thing, look at this place, it looks like the Devil’s playground. Pete could pass as one of his children the way he looks. This whole area is an accident waiting to happen. I’ll have to call the damn fire department to come put these fires out when I leave. I could arrest him for that if I wanted to. But like I said I’m not arresting him. Yet.”

  Pete looked uncomfortable at the mention of the fires being put out but he wisely didn’t say anything. He’d lapsed back to his mumbling routine again. Jim looked in his eyes and saw that there was nobody home. Pete was in his own little world. The Sheriff could ask him all the questions he wanted but probably wouldn’t get any answers.

  “Yeah I guess you’re right,” Jim admitted reluctantly. “But he’s not hostile. The only thing hostile around here is whatever’s in the woods.”

  “What the hell are you talking about now?” the Sheriff asked.

  “Well, we were standing here talking and one of those heads sailed out of the woods like it had wings and hit the house. If you want to arrest someone maybe you should go see who’s out there. Then you can arrest them.” Jim thought he might’ve gone too far with his last statement judging from the look on the Sheriff’s face. Then he smiled. That was even scarier than what he looked like before.

  “Look you little shit,” he yelled, “I’ve let you get away with quite a bit more tonight than I should’ve and now you’re going to start telling me how to do my job? Boy, I was doing this job while you were still just a stain on your daddy’s sheets. I don’t want no snot nosed, wet behind the ear punk telling me how to do my job but just so you’ll shut up I’ll go take a look out in the woods and see if there’s anything out there that you need to worry about. Don’t piss yourself while I’m gone cupcake.” He drew his gun from one side of his belt and grabbed his flashlight from the other. “Oh yeah, you two stay here while I go make sure the boogeyman isn’t coming. Don’t make me have to come find you when I get back. You won’t like it if I have to.” With that said he stormed off in the direction of the woods before Jim could even think of a smart comeback. Jim looked at Pete and saw that he was giggling to himself.

  “What’s so funny?” He asked.

  “You,” was all he said.

  “Screw you,” Jim snapped.

  After their brief exchange Pete quickly retreated back into his own little world. His hands were in front of him constantly moving, never still, in a way that reminded Jim of the evil villains from the cartoons of his childhood. Just watching gave Jim chills. His nerves were damn near shot. Beneath the noises the sheriff was making he could hear Pete mumbling about the purple dinosaur again. Jim had had enough of the purple dinosaur for one night.

  “Would you please shut up about the fucking purple dinosaur! That’s enough!” he yelled and immediately felt bad about it. Pete stayed in his world and ignored him. Not having anything else to do Jim turned towards the woods watching for the Sheriff’s return.

  After what seemed like an eternity but was probably only about ten minutes he came stumbling out of the bushes near the other end of the house. There were a few braches stuck in his hat and one coming out of his shoe making him look somewhat comical. Jim was too worn out to laugh so he just watched instead as he walked up cursing a blue streak.

  “There’s not a damn thing back there!” he yelled as he yanked the branch out of his shoe.

  “Nothing?” Jim asked. “There had to be something. Maybe you scared it off with all the noise you were making. There was definitely something in there before you go there. I mean, come on, something threw that damned head at us.” Jim didn’t believe that he’d found nothing. There had to be something. Blood from the raccoon, the body, something. It couldn’t’ve just disappeared.

  “All I saw were some animal tracks and not much else. Waste of my damn time. They looked like deer or something close to it. Had hooves, whatever it was,” he said straightening his clothes. “But now this shit is over. I looked in the woods like you wanted and didn’t find anything. That’s it. I’m taking Pete for a ride down to the station and I don’t want to hear no more about no damn Goatman.”

  He grabbed Pete by the collar and started walking to the front of the house where his car waited. Jim almost wished one of those heads would come flying right now and smack the Sheriff in the back of the head. Maybe then he would believe them. Then again he would probably just blame Jim and take him in too. It didn’t seem like anything was going to happen so he quickly followed the two of them to the front. He watched Pete get shoved into the back of the car and the Sheriff make his way to his door. A chill ran down his spine again causing him to look around. The feeling of being watched was back. Studying the night he saw nothing that might cause his feeling so he wrote it off to nerves being tired.

  The sheriff climbed in the car and drove off leaving Jim in a cloud of dust. He didn’t even ask if he needed a ride. Looking at the retreating tail lights, Jim was half tempted to stay the night in Pete’s place but since the outside looked so bad he figured the inside would be worse. Plus the thought of all the dead animal head made his stomach do flip flops so he decided against it. He saw the police car reach the end of the road and decided it was time for him to leave. The dark wasn’t getting any lighter with him wasting time standing around. It was a long way back to the main road and the safety of light but he figured it was safer running then walking. The Sheriff’s idea of going home sounded like a real good idea.

  9

  Jim’s muscles were screaming at him when he woke the next morning as they remembered the previous nights’ adventures. All
the running around was taking its toll on him now. Muscle that had been unused now played holy hell with him as he rolled out of bed. Thinking about it now in the light of day everything seemed like some kind of bad nightmare but he knew that wasn’t the case. He dressed gingerly and walked down to the kitchen already able to smell the bacon his mother had made for breakfast.

  Taking a seat at the table his mother asked about his evening and he told her what had happened. He left out the parts about the heads but told her of the fires and how bad Pete had seemed to him. She was horrified to find out about Rob. Jim guessed she hadn’t read the morning paper. He figured something like that was sure to be front page news. After taking a few minutes to collect herself she asked how he was taking it. He gave the only answer he could. Two of his childhood friends were gone. He would never see them again and there was nothing that he could do about it. So all in all he was handling it but that was about it.

  The last thing he told her, almost as an afterthought, was about Pete being in jail. When she asked why he told her it was just for questioning. He hadn’t done anything wrong but the Sheriff finally decided to bring him in for the fires if nothing else. The good part was that he wasn’t a suspect in Rob’s murder. Even the Sheriff was able to see Pete was a barely functioning person. He sure wouldn’t be able to kill anyone like Rob. They just wanted too ask him a few questions since he’d been nearby when it had all happened. Jim told her he didn’t think they’d get too much out of him though since all he seemed to do when confronted with any kind of stress was mumble. Maybe if they figured out what it was about a purple dinosaur that ticked him off so much he would tell them what they wanted to know but he doubted it.

  All in all Jim’s said his visit home was not going well. Hopefully laying Tommy to rest today would be the end of the unpleasantness and things would go back to normal. He didn’t mention anything about the Goatman. If he’d done that his mom might think he was going to end up just like Pete. The last thing he wanted to do was have her worrying about him.

  Jim finished his breakfast and sat sipping coffee while trying not to think too much about what he was going to be doing later in the day. After a long bit of quiet his mother tried getting him to talk about other things but quickly figured out he was pretty much having none of it. Giving up on that she instead sat across from him with a concerned look on her face. He probably could have told her about his night with Jill but he didn’t even fell like talking about that. It just didn’t feel right having something to be happy about when his friends were dieing around him. After his coffee he told his mother that he was going to go back to his room and relax until it was time for him to leave. She tried to get him to stay and talk with her but he begged off telling her he just needed some time alone and went to his room. He felt bad and knew her heart was in the right place but he just didn’t feel like being around anyone right now.

  Lying on his bed he thought back to his childhood with Tommy and Rob. Pete was there also tagging along as he always had but he was mostly thinking of the other two. They were gone and Pete wasn’t.

  When they’d been little they always talked about what they wanted to be when they grew up. It had always seemed to change from one week to the next if not from one day to the next. For a while they’d all wanted to be firemen. Next it was a policeman. Eventually it became an astronaut. He thought it was sad how none of them had ever achieved their dreams. Well, almost none of them, he thought correcting himself. Rob had achieved his. He’d made it. He became a policeman like he’d wanted and from what little Jim had seen of him it suited him. At least he’d been able to live his dream for a little while before he’d died. Jim didn’t want to venture to much farther down that road. Rob was gone. He didn’t want to think of how it’d happened.

  Instead he thought about Tommy. He didn’t even come close to living any of their dreams much less his own. He’d ended up being a cook at one of the local restaurants. Jim smiled as he tried to imagine Tommy behind a stove wearing an apron. It just wasn’t a picture that came to mind easily. Tommy was always a man's man. He frowned on things like cooking and baking. He probably hated what he did. But then again maybe he’d changed after Jim’d left. Maybe he’d tried cooking and found he liked it. Unfortunately Jim would never know. He’d left the town and his friends behind to pursue what he’d thought were his dreams.

  Thoughts of Tommy and Rob quickly turned into thought about when they were little. The countryside around town was their playground. Riding upon the pedals of their bikes they’d explore every back road, old house or swampy lake they could find. That was one of the things that made it even harder to believe that the Goatman was the one killing them. They’d been everywhere and never seen hide nor hair of him or any other abnormal creature for that matter. The woods were a vast place where little boys could roam and pretend to be everything from Robin Hood to Flash Gordon. Granted it was Flash Gordon stuck in a wild paradise but they made due with what they had. The woods had never been a place to fear like they were now. Jim had enjoyed those times. He even enjoyed them now even though they made him sad but he guessed that what some memories did. Unfortunately that was all he had left of his friends.

  His mother came in some time later to remind him that Tommy’s funeral was going to be soon. As if he could’ve forgotten or something. He forced himself from the past and into the present where he started preparing for the funeral.

  Once out the door and on his way he again started thinking about the strange circumstances of his friends deaths. None of it made any sense. All the clues seemed to point at the Goatman but the cop’s content to just write Tommy’s death off to being an accident. Jim knew it hadn’t been though. He hopped that they were at least not dense enough to try and say the same thing about Robs. He could hear it now. They would try to say he had an axe with him and somehow fell on it repeatedly until he was dead or something else just as ridiculous. No, he had to give them some credit. They couldn’t be that stupid. Jim hopped that the state police, with their superior experience, would be able to formulate a better idea than what he and Pete had come up with. There had to be something better than the Goatman. So what if everything about both cases pointed to the perpetrator having been some mystical creature out of an urban legend. What difference did that make? Any rational thinking person would figure that thinking like that was just crazy. Unfortunately at this point in time Jim wasn’t included in the rational thinking people’s group. He was on the fringe of it though, still hoping someone would figure out a more plausible explanation than his.

  Goat hairs being found in the area of Tommy’s death, coupled with the fact that the tree had been hacked off with an axe, then only days later Rob being attacked and killed with what the police were saying was an axe or a hatchet, pointed in Jim’s irrational mind, towards the Goatman. Pete had watered the seed planted in Jim’s mind by telling him that he, himself, had been under attack by the Goatman for the past three weeks.

  As impossible as all this sounded and given the fact that Pete had gone off the deep end, Jim had seen the splattered proof against the wall. It could be argued that since Pete was insane at least to some degree that he’d staged everything himself but who wanted to think that? He could have easily gone out and killed Tommy but why? And then a few days later he could’ve gone and lured Rob to his death but again, why? If you wanted to believe he’d killed two of his best friend, set everything up in his yard so that he could have proof that he was under attack by some unseen force and then have himself arrested as a witness and not a suspect you still had to ask why. Oh yeah and if you could believe all that then you could believe in the Goatman too. But that was maybe giving Pete a little too much credit. He was smart and all but not that smart. Even if he was faking everything. Jim quickly put that out of his head. Pete was definitely a goner in the brains department but not so far that he would do the things terrible things that had happened.

  If you disqualified Pete as a suspect then the question was now
; who was doing it? Things flying from the night, bloody writing on the walls, and dead friends being found here and there. All this stuff wasn’t happening by itself. Oh wait, here’s another piece of evidence he thought ruefully. Once the sheriff had arrived and charged off into the wilderness to see what, if anything, could be found he’d come back with more support for the village idiots theory. Goat or deer tracks in the woods around Pete’s house.

  Jim knew there had to have been someone in the woods when that head took flight and came roaring at them but he’d been too afraid to do anything when it’d happened. He could’ve gone after the sheriff left but hadn’t. He was scared not stupid. Instead he’d left with his tail between his legs and almost no doubt that the prints in the woods were made by a hoof that belonged to the Goatman. Nothing else other than a human being or him could have heaved that head and unfortunately there were no other humans running about that night that anyone knew of. He didn’t want to believe any of it, and knew he would go crazy if he did, but there was only one thing it could be.

  Jim’s mind was still whirling as he pulled to the side of the road in front of the graveyard. Leaving his car and walking up a slight hill he saw that most of the town had already arrived. In a town this small everyone had known Tommy and had come to say goodbye to him one last time. It was slightly surprising to Jim. Tommy had always had friends but he didn’t think this many people would’ve shown up. Small town or not.

  Tommy’s parents stood next to the grave with a group of people Jim vaguely recognized as being distant relatives. The only way he recognized them was that he’d met one or two of them when he was little at one of Tommy’s birthdays. It was funny how little some people changed over the years. They were all dressed in shades of black and gray as befitted a funeral.