The Gate, page 4
Eric’s friend, Brad, was speaking. He held everyone’s attention as he was telling a story. A slightly pudgy kid, Brad was very intelligent, though he masked it for his friends as none of the friend group valued anyone’s mind. Al was the same as him, having to hide who she was, in order to hang out with the cool kids.
“. . . And so,” Brad continued as he took turns looking at each person in the semi-circle, taking his time telling his spooky story, “he bent down with his long, razor-sharp knife, and he began. Slice, slice, slice, into the goat’s neck. Cutting through its jugular as its eyes stared back at him, scared. Slice, slice, slice.” He spoke the sound effects slowly. Dwelling on the horror as best as he could. “Slice, slice, slice. He cut the goat’s head off as the blood gushed everywhere. Pouring out like a hose. When he had done it and held the poor animal’s severed head, it still made a noise. Bleating out of fear and pain . . . The man then threw it straight into the pit. And as he did, everything got really quiet . . . Too quiet. And—”
“And he invited everyone over for a barbeque,” Eric laughed.
“Aw, shut up, Eric!” Stacy said as she and Patty sat down.
Eric immediately did as he was told.
“. . . And then, at first, this little breeze started. Slowly . . . And then it began to grow and grow, get stronger and stronger, faster and faster until it became this huge tornado. The wind spinning around . . . and Tengler? He could hear something under all that noise. Through the wind howling and the cries of the goat still haunting the air came these new voices.”
“Voices?” another kid in the group, Andy, asked.
Tiny and looking much younger than his fifteen years, he had been scared by this story. Visibly scared.
Brad grinned. “Yeah, horrible voices, and they were becoming louder and louder. But it wasn’t words. They were screaming . . . and it was then Tengler knew it had all worked. The old books he had found in the tomb were right. He had summoned the demons from the darkest pit, from hell, to do his bidding . . .”
Just outside of the living room, on the darkened staircase, enraptured by the story being told, Glen and Terry hid.
“Darkest pit?” Eric scoffed. “More like your mom’s butt?”
“Shut. The. Hell. Up. Eric,” Patty said as Stacy nodded along.
Brad didn’t let any of this slow down his storytelling. “Anyway . . . so, all of a sudden, Tengler realized something. He realized that something was really, really wrong. The screaming from the pit. The voices that were getting louder . . . He realized that they were not coming from the pit at all! But they were coming from the house, his house. And the voices . . . He only then realized he knew who was making them.”
Eric went to speak, to make a stupid unneeded joke. But as he did, he looked over at Patty and Stacy, who both glared back at him. They both mouthed the word no to him at the same time. Eric just sank back down in silence.
“So, he ran back into his house, ran as fast as he could,” Brad said. “BAM! In through the back door. Up the stairs . . . The screaming was so loud. Not screams of anger but screams of pain. Sounding like a slaughterhouse.” All of a sudden, he let out his own high-pitched scream, to jolt his listeners, which it did.
Andy gasped loudly at the jump scare as Patty and Stacy both screamed aloud.
Eric, sitting next to Brad, clutched his ears. “Jesus, dude! Thanks a lot! I’m deaf.”
Patty and Stacy then both started giggling. Enjoying this sudden fright. Everyone else just stared at Brad in silence.
“So, Tengler ran up the stairs, across the hall, grabbed the bedroom door handle, flung it open and . . . .” He paused as he looked around for his enraptured audience.
“And?” Andy asked, dreading the answer.
“And then he, Nicholas Tengler, started to scream himself . . . You see, the book was right. It said clearly what he had to do, and he doubted it. One sacrifice wasn’t enough. And the screams he heard were his own kids. The hell demons, the ones from the pit, were on his kid’s beds, eating their flesh, as they died screaming. They reached out to him, their dad, for help. But he couldn’t do a thing except stand and watch. Each of them were too far gone. Their bellies were cut open and all their intestines chewed on. Legs and arms, all the flesh been gnawed off like dogs at a bone. They should have been dead, but the dark magic kept them alive until the demons wanted them to die, and the demons loved a meal that screamed.”
There are shrill noises of disgust mixed with groans of disbelief among the semi-circle. Andy felt sick, and the Lee sisters were appalled. It was only Eric who found the story hilarious and started laughing.
“That was disgusting,” Stacy said.
“It was awesome!” Eric added.
Patty just shook her head. “You made it up. That’s no way real!”
“You don’t have to believe me.” Brad shrugged. “But I swear to God it’s true. There really was a Nicholas Tengler, and he practiced dark magic.”
“Dude,” Eric patted him on the back. “Great story, but I’m with Patty. That was BS.”
“I’m Stacy!” Patty complained to Eric, mocking being hurt.
He looked aghast, unsure of what to reply.
Brad snickered. “You’re identical twin sisters who dress exactly the same. You can’t blame the guy, and to make it all the worse, he’s stoned.”
Eric still looked shocked that he got it wrong.
“Gotcha!” Patty and Stacy laughed in unison.
“Anyway, if ya don’t believe me, go to the library and ask for The Tengler Collection. Nothing but demonology and witchcraft in there. He was convinced that this town was a big entrance to hell. He had also thought that demons could be raised and controlled. Turning hell to his side. But he had no idea what was really waiting down there.”
“The library wouldn’t have stuff like that,” Andy said. “Would it?”
“Why not?” Brad replied. “Tengler was a famous author who lived here his whole life. They have all his books. He must have left them to the library after he died. And they’re all really scary stuff.”
“He wrote fiction, though, right?” Al asked, finally brave enough to be part of the conversation.
Brad nodded. “Yeah, that’s why he was famous. But they also have his collection of these old books as well as all of his notebooks. And he really did try all that stuff. Conjuring demons, sacrificing goats.”
Stacy tutted. “Why would anybody want to conjure a demon, anyway? What would he think would happen?”
“’Cause he could?” Brad replied. “He thought they may be like genies in a bottle. That if you freed them, they would be in your debt and would do shit for you. I guess that’s what it was. Who knows?”
“Okay, dude,” Eric said, turning to him. “Why are you such a dweeb and know all this doohickey about a dead writer?”
“You are drunk!” Brad laughed. “We did that book report on a person from this town for social studies. You did yours on the drunk bum who stands in the town square getting his dick out to passing cars?”
A flash of recognition passed across Eric’s face. “Oh yeah! That was an awesome report!” He turned to everyone. “Guy called himself Elvis Presley. Said he was the real king, but aliens stole his singing, so he faked his death and moved to Canada.”
Al laughed loudly. She had tried to keep quiet, to let the party just play out, and for everyone to have a good time, she was new to this group after all, but for this, she could not hold in her guffaw.
So much so that the Lee sisters turned to her in surprise at her voluminous laughing.
Eric smiled. “See, someone gets the genius of the story.” He turned back to Brad. “My report was true. Yours was definitely bullshit.”
Brad smiled. “It’s what’s in the book. It probably is bullshit. But it’s what I read!”
One of the other girls, a softly spoken, demure girl called Lisa, rarely spoke out among the crowd. She was happy just to be included. As one of the Lee sisters’ entourage, she knew her place in the pecking order.
“You guys ever do levitation? Talking of the occult, I mean?” she asked.
“That the floating shit they do on TV?” Eric replied. “The magicians all do it. All that illusion stuff.”
Brad nodded.
Lisa, though, shook her head. “No, it’s a matter of group concentration. It really works. It’s called ‘light as a feather.’ It’s simple, but it’s really, really weird.”
“You bringing school to this party, Lisa?” Eric asked.
“Here, I’ll show you.”
“I’d like to see that,” Al said to Lisa with a smile.
In the kitchen, Glen and Terry have moved from their place on the stairs, and stood by the breakfast table, skimming food from the open bags of chips and pizza slices.
“D’you believe all that stuff about demons?” Glen asked, having been a bit freaked out by that story.
Terry turned with a chuckle. “Believe? In that crap? You serious?”
Terry’s dad was a scientist and an archaeologist. His mother had been a biologist. Neither of them went to church, and they didn’t believe in any of the religions or any demons, angels, or ghosts. Terry was the same. Just like them. Devout in his disbelief, even though all the heavy metal he listened to were songs about devils and raising literal hell. Though since his mother passed away, he had wanted so badly to believe in anything that meant that she was still somehow around.
“Yeah, me too. Total crap.” Glen laughed nervously as inside he totally and utterly believed that it could be real.
Back in the middle of the living room, Brad sat on a wooden chair as six of the others stood around him, Eric, Al, Andy, Lisa, and the Lee sisters. Each bent down with one finger touching the underside of his seat. The rest of the party all stared on in anticipation.
“One, two, three, lift!” Lisa commanded as the group all began to strain, trying to lift the chair up with their single digits.
But the weight was simply too much. They groaned loudly until, finally, they stopped trying, Eric moving his finger away with a grunt.
“Ow, dammit that hurts,” he said, shaking the soreness off his finger.
“Maybe he’s just too heavy?” Al said.
“Hey!” Brad protested.
Eric laughed. “They got a point.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Lisa said. “We should be able to do this. It’s all about concentration and timing. Maybe not everyone’s concentrating?”
Brad got up from the chair. “Think ya better find someone else,” he said, walking over to his bottle of beer on the sideboard. “I need more drinks.”
Al then saw Glen and Terry sneakily walking across from the kitchen. Trying not to be seen as they carried armfuls of stolen snacks.
“Hey, butthead!” Al called out, causing them to stop in their tracks. “You’re supposed to be grounded in your room, not down here stealing our food.”
They both stared back, unsure of what to do.
“Just go upstairs,” she sighed.
“No, wait,” Brad said. “Glen, is it? Come here.”
At the doorway, Terry, out of the corner of his mouth, whispered, “You better do what he says.”
Glen nervously put his three bags of chips on the floor and walked into the room.
“Can I get a beer?” Terry piped up from the hallway.
Al sighed.
“Can’t blame the kid for tryin’,” Eric said before raising his bottle to Terry. “I like your style, little dude.”
Brad motioned Glen to the chair. “Sit here,” he said, turning to Lisa. “Be much easier with him, right?”
Glen’s nervousness grew. “I don’t—”
“Hell yeah, that’s a cinch! Dude looks like he weighs two kilos,” Eric said.
“Okay,” Lisa said as she thought, looking at everyone in the room before coming to a decision. “But it will only be impressive if two do it . . . Maybe just Brad and me? If it’s six of us, it won’t look as good.”
The Lee sisters shrugged and sat, happy to not be doing any more lifting.
Eric smiled, watching as he leaned on the fireplace mantle.
Terry was still standing in the doorway with an armful of snacks.
Brad and Lisa positioned themselves on either side of Glen. Each placing an index finger under the seat of the chair that he nervously sat in.
“Glen, sit as still as you can, okay?” Lisa said kindly before addressing the room. “Now, everyone, concentrate. Stare at the chair and really will it to lift up!”
The Lee sisters both shook their heads as they looked at everyone else in the room. They thought this was dumb and didn’t hide that opinion.
“Maybe we just forget all this and have some more drinks?” Patty suggested to the room as Stacy nodded.
“After this,” Brad replied.
“Now, everyone just clear your minds and think about Glen, Okay?” Lisa said. “Think about him as light as a feather . . . Just concentrate . . . He doesn’t weigh a thing . . . like dust drifting through the air, catching the ray of sunlight through a window . . . like dandelions in the breeze . . . Weightless.”
Despite the twins’ annoyance, everyone else concentrated hard. Even Terry in the doorway, still carrying the snacks. Even though he did not believe in the supernatural, he found himself falling under the spell of possibility.
Everyone was enthralled and willing this to work.
Glen, though, was not as caught up in this. He just felt uncomfortable as everyone looked at him.
“. . . And on three,” Lisa said. “One. Two. Three.”
Exerting the slightest pressure on their fingers. Much to everyone’s surprise, even Lisa’s, the chair with Glen on, began to rise.
She stared at Brad, who was in awe at what they were doing.
The chair glided up as they lifted. An inch . . . Two . . . Three . . . A foot . . .
Feeling hardly any weight on his finger, Brad smiled in amazement.
“Slowly,” she said to him. “Keep lifting.”
The party started to gasp and mumble. Even Stacy and Patty were not immune to the impressiveness.
Higher and higher the chair went.
Two feet.
Three feet.
Four feet.
Soon, he was passing the limit of their reach. The high ceilings of the living room getting closer and closer to his head.
“Please, let me down,” Glen whimpered, more terrified.
But as he looked down, he saw both Brad and Lisa’s fingers had lost contact with the chair.
“What?” Lisa said.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. It was a party trick. One her father had taught her. It was all just physics masked as magic. Glen must have weighed about forty-eight pounds. On top of that the weight of the chair, she and Brad only had to exert pressure to lift about thirty-three pounds each . . . Yet it was only now she realized that she had felt no pressure. No pressure at all. Not even from the chair.
“Help!” Glen yelled, drifting closer to the light fixture.
Al raced over. “Glen,” she said in alarm, reaching up. But she was too short to reach him. “Brad, help me!” she implored. But Brad was caught staring as was the rest of the room, staring up at the impossibility.
As he hit the ceiling, Glen’s body moved out of the chair and pressed against the glass light fixture. “Ow,” he cried out as his hip was pressed on it.
Nobody in the room seemed to be able to move.
The pressure of Glen’s body increased against the glass fixture. More and more, and the bulb within quickly glowed incredibly bright. Then . . .
POP!
The room screamed in fright.
The light bulb exploded as the light fixture smashed, breaking into shards, showering the room. And along with it, a cache of trapped, burned insects that had been held in its grasp.
As the fixture smashed, whatever had hold of Glen and the chair suddenly let go, and he fell with the shards.
Landing with a thud, the chair broke on impact as Glen fell through it and hard onto the carpet below.
With a scream, Glen scrambled to his feet in a terrified panic. He stood for a moment, not knowing what had happened as he began to feel the stares of everyone here, looking at him with the same confusion. Unable to take any more, he burst into tears and ran out of the room as Al ran quickly after him.
Everyone in the party was silent, in shock and scared, even Eric, though he would never admit it.
The downstairs bathroom door was locked.
Al stood outside, worried. Next to her, Terry was just as confused and shocked as everyone else. So much so he still carried the stolen snacks in his arms. Not knowing what to do.
Al had sent the party home, who were all willing to do so after this strange event. Especially Lisa, who could not stop crying as Brad walked out with her.
Al knocked on the door lightly. “Glen? Are you okay?”
No reply.
Al felt so guilty about what had happened. What she had let happen. She should have just insisted he go upstairs.
“Glen?” she asked again.
After a slight pause, Glen’s quiet reply could be heard. “Yeah,” he said through audible tears. “I’m okay.”
“You’re not cut or anything, are you?”
“No.”
His voice sounded so sad.
Not knowing what else to say, she turned to Terry.
Terry leaned over. “I think it’s because he cried in front of everybody,” he whispered. “He’s embarrassed.”
Al nodded, understanding. “Glen?” she said. “You know, everybody went home. Uh . . . they all said they wouldn’t tell anybody what happened. It scared them, you know. We were all freaked out. Did you hear Lisa leaving? She couldn’t stop crying. I think even Eric cried!”
Terry looked at Al in confusion at this last statement.
Al winked at him. She was lying to make Glen feel better, and it worked. The bathroom door then unlocked and slowly opened.
“I want you to call Mom and Dad,” he said quietly.
Al smiled as she put one hand on his shoulder. “And say what? Glen flew and broke a light bulb? You think they’ll believe that? No, we can wait till they come back, and I’ll tell them I broke it by accident. Okay? No one needs to know you broke it.”
