SHUDDERVILLE TWO Read Online Free PDF

breathing steadily, gently. There wasn’t the faintest suggestion of a response. Not a flicker of recognition.
    “Don’t you think you should be allowed to go outside and feel the grass under your feet? Don’t you want to jump in the autumn leaves and build a snowman, like normal kids do?” I drew the knife forward and sliced through the velvet straps binding her wrists to the bedposts. I held her small hands for a moment before I released her.
    I stepped back and watched as she slowly rose up from the bed like a helium balloon. I heard a sound like old wooden joints creaking, a restless tension released from the aching woodwork and tired crossbeams. She rose up, lighter than air. She opened her turtle eyes and looked at me, and I froze, unable to think or move. Those blackest of eyes pierced my soul, and I fought off the impulse to bolt.
    And then, silently and horribly, she started to paw at the air with frantic little movements, like a mouse trapped inside a toilet bowl. She floated silently toward me, pawing at the air, still tethered to the bedposts by the ankles—only the leg restraints kept her from dog paddling into my arms. It was a pathetic sight. She wasn’t crying or screaming or growling. Her head didn’t roll around. Her eyes didn’t shoot out jets of blood. She was just this desperate little thing trying to grab hold of me like a drowning child.
    I was repulsed by her strange silence. I could hear her breathing rigidly through her nose, but it was her neediness that terrified me the most—every one of her gestures was so vulnerable and tender and raw, and above all, silent. No words, no screams, no swearing, no cursing, no shouting. Just this awkward, unbelievable silence, her mouth forming a perfect little ‘oh.’ Like an anxious dog choking on its collar, straining greatly on its leash and wheezing because its collar was too tight. It was awful. Hideous.
    I realized I had to tie her back down. I attempted to grab her hands, while she pawed at my shirt and batted me harmlessly on the side of the head. I could hear her desperate little pleading breaths—in out, in out—like an animal fighting for its life. Her scalp smelled of overripe fruit and her cotton nightgown wilted on her small frame. I finally got one of her hands tied to the bedpost with a velvet restraint, but her other hand kept eluding me. Catching it was like catching a butterfly. She finally swiped me across the face, her nails grazing my cheek. “Ouch!”
    But I finally got things squared away and got the hell out of there.
    *
    I sat in my room and drank from my flask and smoked a cigarette. Fingers trembling. Hands shaking. Really freaked out. All was dead silent up in that attic. Quiet as falling snow—an eerie absence of sound.
    Okay, what had just happened? What had I seen? Was I losing my mind?
    It’s not like I’m a normal sane person to begin with. I am ruled by my compulsions. Sometimes I count inside my head. If I’m tapping my finger on a table, I’ll start counting—one, two, three, four. If I’m rinsing the dishes, I’ll start counting—one, two, three, four. If I’m stabbing a victim, I’ll start counting—one, two, three, four.
    Do they realize I count their last breaths? One, two, three, four.
    What was wrong with that little girl? Could she really float? Or was it a trick?
    I sat smoking my cigarette and gazing out my bedroom window. A pair of hawks circled the sky. They made a sad screeching sound, trying to flush the field mice out into the open.
    Suddenly Olive started screaming bloody murder down by the swamp. “ No, Andy! What are you doing? ”
    I strained to locate them, craning my neck. They were playing down the hill a ways, yelling at each other. “ Stop it! ” Olive shrieked.
    I hurried out of the house and ran down a short hill toward the murky pond, where the water rippled like very old glass. Andy hitched up his shorts and jabbed a stick into a dead raccoon that lay belly-up on the muddy