Out With the Boyos

“My lover slept with my mother” was playing on an old episode of Jerry Springer and it was 91 degrees in the shade. The kids next door were outside running through a sprinkler, screaming as they chased each other into the spray. 

But at least I wasn’t at work, and I had cold beer. I was basically a happy guy.

Later, I would think about how the weather doesn’t pay attention to people. It’s only in movies that someone gets mad and a thunderstorm starts. That day sure as hell didn’t pay attention to us. If it had, it would have been cold, freezing; with fog and driving rain. Instead, it was just hot.

I was zoned out on the couch, playing on my phone and listening to the kids more than the TV, when Boyo’s pickup rumbled up the driveway and came to a halt at the edge of the porch. I could hear the diesel engine from the den, even through the jeers of Jerry’s studio audience. Boyo’s footsteps thudded to the door and he came in without knocking. I didn’t look up as he lumbered over and stood slightly in front of me, gawking at the TV.

“Ever think about knocking?” I asked.

Boyo turned his head towards me but didn’t move his eyes from the screen.

”Nope.”

“Fuck you, man,” I said without malice. I picked the remote up off my thigh and started flying through the channel guide. 

“Dude, wait!” Boyo said excitedly. “Go back. ESPN2.” I clicked it back to find an aerial shot of a large body of water, the sun shining brightly and glittering off its surface.

“The hell is this?” I asked. Boyo dropped himself onto the end of the sofa, his eyes sparkling.

“Bass fishing! Dude, this stuff is the shit.”

He hunched forward and rested his elbows on his knees, like a quarterback learning an overtime play. The TV now showed two guys in trucker hats and khaki vests in sleek aluminum boats. One of them was reeling in a fishing line, his pole held tightly against his chest. After some splashes in the water and a maneuver with a long-handled net, the man pulled out a writhing fish.

A voice described the action: “Oh yeah, he’s got a nice one there! And this will be his, uh, this will be number twelve for Randy Price! He got that beauty with a Texas-rigged Zoom Baby Brush Hog in watermelon red flake.”

I lost it.

“We are not... fucking... watching this,” I choked out through my laughter. 

“What did he say that was?” Boyo’s face was pure concentration. “I gotta get me one of those... Texas-rigged… pig… what the shit...” He couldn’t handle it. A girly giggle escaped his throat. We were hysterical through the commercial break. 

Finally we collected ourselves. “Dude. Dylan. Let’s go,” Boyo said. I pushed myself up, hitched my pants, and headed out the door. But what I saw in the driveway wasn’t Boyo’s Ford. 

“What are you driving?” I asked.

“Darcy’s got the Ford, so I’m stuck with the Chevy,” he said disgustedly. Boyo worked at an auto body shop, so his vehicle standards were higher than most, but even I knew the Chevy was a shitty piece of…shit. Its only redeeming quality was that it had less than 180,000 miles, and that the side was painted with a swirly, abstract design. It looked great. Say what you want to about Boyo, the guy was a master with an airbrush. 

***

Cruising with Boyo was always fun, no matter if we were headed down Highway 97 or on some squirrely dirt road. Our main activity was driving.

That’s actually how Boyo got his name. His real name was Jason, but no one ever called him that. Back in high school, anytime I went out, my dad would say, “Going out with the boy-ohs, huh?”. The “boy-ohs” could be any of my male friends, but that always included Jason—and sometimes only Jason. 

So eventually I just started saying, “Yep, I’m out with the boy-oh.” Which, of course, became simply Boyo. Even his mom called him Boyo. It just fit him.

The shit truck didn’t have any way of connecting to our phones, and there wasn’t any service out Road 12 anyway, so I tuned the radio to the only hard rock station that came in as we flew down a cinder road to pick up Pole.

Pole wasn’t his real name either, it was Tyler. His nickname started out as “Punk Asshole,” because he once got into a fight with this old dude who called him that: “You little punk asshole!” We started calling him that, and then P-hole (hilarious in its own right), and finally just Pole.  

“Pole, what’s up?” I asked as he climbed in the back. As usual, he was in black-on-black: long shorts, ratty Converse sneakers, and an Eyeliners shirt. His green-streaked hair provided the only variation on the theme.

“Not much. Where we going?”

Boyo smiled into the rearview mirror and said, “I got someplace to go.” 

“Yeah? Where?” I’d known Boyo long enough to be wary of his surprise destinations. 

“This guy told me about this place off Road 12. It’s like this old abandoned house.”

“No shit? An abandoned house?” I laid on the sarcasm. “I’ve never seen one of those. Hey, maybe we’ll get to see some ghosts!” 

“Yeah, dude, aren’t we like a little old to go play in an empty house?” said Pole. “I mean, we’re legal now. We don’t have to go hide somewhere to drink.” 

Boyo rolled his eyes. 

“This is different. It’s not a ruin or anything, it’s a whole fucking house. Like two stories, windows, everything. And all the shit’s still there. Like the furniture and shit.”

“No one’s trashed it?” I asked.

“Guess not. No one really knows about it, and it’s not on a road or anything.” Boyo shrugged. “And of course, it’s haunted.”

”Really.”

“Well, the guy said it might be.”

“So you’re saying we have to bushwack to hopefully find this place that has no one living in it, no beer, and probably no air conditioning, ‘cause some shit told you it’s maybe haunted?” Boyo didn’t respond.

“Christ. I’d rather watch bass fishing.”

“Fuck, it’s hot,” said Pole.

***

The Chevy kicked up a cloud of dust when we started down Road 12, bouncing over rocks and holes. Suddenly Boyo braked hard, knocking me forward into the unyielding confines of my seatbelt. 

“It’s down there,” he said, gesturing.

My shirt was already sticking to my back as we walked single file down an all-but-invisible deer trail. We were in the hills, and juniper trees shaded our path a little. 

“I hate juniper. Smells like cat piss,” said Pole. A thin layer of dust already coated his shoes and was climbing the bottom of his shorts. I felt myself sink deep into the powdery grit, sagebrush scratching my ankles. The heat was ruthless. I began to feel exceptional jealousy for the kids in the sprinkler. Sweat dripped into my eyes as we trudged on. 

Boyo turned up a shallow wash, rocky and exposed. 

“I think it’s supposed to be at the top of this,” he said.

Pole stopped suddenly in front of me. “Go ahead,” he motioned. I was too hot to ask, so I went on. He probably had to take a piss. But then I heard his flat footsteps on the rocks behind me. 

“Pole, what the hell?” 

“The second person in line is the most likely to get bit by a snake.”

“Fuck you.”

“Nah, it’s cool! See, you have more leg muscles than me, so the poison will be repelled by the tissue mass, and it’ll take longer to get to your brain. I mean, out here, we’d need every second to get you out, so it’s much better to have you get bit than me, ‘cuz I would die instantly.” Pole stumbled over a rock as he finished presenting his logic. “Shit,” he said as he tried to regain his balance.

“Pole, you are a dumb shit.” I laughed anyway. 

We reached the top of the gully, and found ourselves on an empty plateau. No house in sight.

“Uh, house?” I asked the deserted scene. Boyo veered left, close to the tree line. Pole and I wandered behind him slowly. 

“Hey! Guys, come here.” Boyo disappeared into the trees. We followed him, and immediately found ourselves clawing through dense brush and branches. I was ready to say fuck it, but then I saw something. It was lighter than the sky, and lower, too. Not a tree, not a rock. Ducking juniper limbs, I went closer. 

It was just like Boyo said: A two-story, white, wooden sided house with a front porch. I’m no architect, but I’d guess circa 1920s. Not modern. The door was closed tightly. There was still unbroken glass in the windows. Boyo was motionless, looking at it. I joined him. Behind me, I heard Pole crash through the last of the bushes, cursing to himself. Then he was silent also.

“Dude. Are you sure no one lives here?” I asked. 

Boyo just stared at the house. It was so weird, the way that it was just sitting out here, neatly, as if it didn’t know that abandoned houses are supposed to be falling apart and crumbling. The paint was a little peeled, but everything else seemed untouched by time or vandals. Boyo started walking slowly around the side. I half expected to find a freshly mowed lawn in the back. Instead, it was as barren as the front, just rocks and scrub brush and sandy dirt. 

“Let’s go in,” said Pole. 

I realized that my heart was beating faster, despite the fact that we were virtually creeping towards the back door. 

“What is this place, anyway?” I asked.

“I don’t know. The guy who told me about it thought it was a drug dealer’s hideout.” 

That was possible. The wilderness out here was notorious for hiding drug cabins, airstrips, and rendezvous points. If I ever ran a drug cartel, I’d put my headquarters out in the sticks. 

“It looks too nice to belong to a dealer.” Pole was at the door, his hand on the knob. “It looks like a family home, you know?” 

Then he pulled open the unlocked door and went in.

The interior was incredible. There was carpet on the floor, coated in dust. Bookshelves lined one wall, scattered with about a dozen volumes. I don’t think we looked for a light switch, but we didn’t need to because the sunlight came through the windows, illuminating the space. Yet the air was refreshingly cool. We walked slowly into the kitchen, which still had a cloth-covered table. There were small bottles in the shelves above the sink. 

“Shit, what’s in those?” asked Pole nervously. I held one up and looked at it. 

“I think it’s crack,” I said soberly.

“Oh shit. Oh shit. Dude, we gotta get outta here,” Pole looked around wildly, backing out of the kitchen. “They’ll kill us. Oh shit.” 

“Pole, dumbass, it’s salt.” I put the container back in the cupboard with the others. They were spices. It was a kitchen, after all. Though for some reason, finding spices felt almost creepier than finding drugs. At least if it had been drugs, we would have known without a doubt why the house was hidden out here.

A loud noise came from the front of the house.

“Fuck!” Pole and I said in unison.

“I’m going upstairs!” yelled Boyo from the direction of the noise. Right. I exhaled loudly. 

The staircase was in mint condition. It hardly even creaked, except of course on the first step, which was what had scared the piss out of me and Pole. Upstairs, there was a hallway with four closed doors on the left side. The right side was an exterior wall with windows. That was weird. Most houses have rooms on both sides of the hall, right? This felt like a hotel or a hospital or something. 

Boyo gently pushed one door open and peeked inside. We crowded in behind him. It was a basic bedroom: Large, square, and with a single bed on the left side. A braided rug on the floor. The next door down was the same, except that this one had a bookshelf by the bed. I went over to it.

“Dude, this is some weird shit,” said Pole.

He and Boyo moved to the third room. I crouched by the bed and picked up a book, a very dusty version of Gone With the Wind. Definitely a girl’s room. I picked up another tome. A guide to butchering your own meat. OK, maybe not a girl’s room. The third book was a Bible. I flipped through it nonchalantly, noticing that the leather cover felt unusual, almost familiar. 

Something fell out of it. It was a slim pamphlet, hand-bound and old looking. The cover was dark blue, no title. I opened it. As I squatted in that empty room, reading the typewritten words, my blood began to freeze.

***

“Dylan?” called Boyo. “Dylan, come here.”

His voice startled me, and I realized that I hadn’t heard him or Pole talking for several minutes. I stood up slowly, clutching the pamphlet. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from it. 

“Guys, you should see this,” I called back, my voice sounding high and pinched. 

“No, Dylan. You come here.”

I managed to look up from the pamphlet and walk down the hall. Boyo and Pole stood at the last doorway, faces unnaturally frozen. Pole had his hand outstretched. As I got closer, I saw that he was holding out his keychain, pointing its tiny flashlight into the room. 

“What is it?” I asked.

“Just look,” said Pole emotionlessly.

I stepped to the threshold. This room, unlike the others, wasn’t a bedroom. It was small, only about six feet wide and eight feet long. 

And it had no windows. Pole’s flashlight provided the only illumination. The walls were apparently painted black. Against one wall was a stool. In the center of the floor was a small bowl and– I swear to God– it was full of water.

We stared. No one moved.

“There’s got to be a hidden room,” said Boyo suddenly. “It’s too small. There must be a way... at the end of that wall...” he inched into the room, toward the back wall. 

“No!” I grabbed him. “Wait, dude, I found this in the room.” I waved the pamphlet in his face. “It’s freaky shit.” 

He blinked at me. Desperately, I opened it and began to read out loud: 

“...and when we arrive, we will set about what we must do. This place is to be our sanctuary, a place of redemption. In isolation, we will fulfill our duties as foretold. There will be forces, both found there and forces that we create, which will...”

Something happened. 

There was the noise, as if a heavy object had fallen from a low height. From behind the goddamn wall. We all jumped; Pole shone the beam of his flashlight on the wall and grabbed my shoulder. 

Silence. Then we heard a soft but distinct hiss. 

That did it. Pole started screaming and we went down the stairs like our asses were on fire. I dropped the pamphlet at the threshold and burst out into the summer daylight. I didn’t notice the bushes scratching my legs, the juniper sap sticking in my hair, or the draining heat. Pole was still screaming and then I realized that we were all screaming, on different pitches but at equal decibels. It was kind of a relief, as I stumbled down the gully, to hear the terrified voice of Boyo as well. As long as I could hear them, I didn’t have to stop and make sure they were okay. I didn’t want to fucking stop for anything.

I was never so glad to see that piece of shit Chevy in my entire life. We scrambled in and cranked all of the windows up, even though it must have been triple-digit temperature inside. “For fuck’s sake, go!” yelled Pole. Boyo stalled it the first time but then we were off, fucking flying down the dirt road. We didn’t roll the windows down until we reached pavement.

***

The first thing we did when we got back to town was to buy a case of beer. The second thing we did was to drink it. It took a lot of beers before any of us were willing to call it a night.

When we talked about it later, we laughed. I mean, three guys scared of a noise in an empty house? It was probably a damn cat behind the wall or something. Or a snake. 

But our laughter was always a little uneasy. 

And we never told anyone else about the house. Later, when I asked Boyo who the fuck had told him about this place, he said it was some guy who was having his car worked on at the garage. Boyo admitted that the guy hadn’t actually been inside; he’d just peered in through the windows. Later, Boyo asked a couple of his coworkers if they knew anything about the area we’d been in, and he got back some freaky tales. Noises, lights, that kind of shit. 

But nothing about a house.

***

About a week later, Pole and I were watching TV when Boyo barged in without knocking. 

“Dylan, Pole, what’s up?” he asked, smiling his big Boyo grin. “It’s hot as hell out there.” He stood in front of us, tossing his keys in the air and catching them. Pole and I stared past him indifferently and chewed on our beef burritos.

“Guys, got plans? Let’s go somewhere,” he said plaintively.

“Shut up, dickhead,” said Pole. “Can’t you see we’re watching bass fishing?”