Elusive Dinner

The smell of the frizzling onions and carrots fused with the aroma of Michael's Pinot Noir. The blues songs blended with the cutting and knifing sounds from the kitchen. Michael sat comfortably in his chair, Plato’s Republic on his lap, and listened to his mother singing along from the kitchen. “I could have been a singer, Mickey,” his mother used to say. “But your father stole my hearts and dreams,” she always added, and they all shared a laugh.

The dogs barked outside. Not their hungry bark, but their excited one. His father was home.

“Easy, you silly animals,” his father laughed, waltzing through the front door with his briefcase dancing in his hand.

“Is dinner ready, Mickey?” his father asked, loosening his tie, and unbuttoning his suit.

“Mom is making a salad first,” Michael shrugged.

“On a day like this?” his father said with a slight frown.

Throwing his fedora by the armchair, his father strolled to the kitchen.

“Do we have to eat salad, love?” his father asked, kissing her gently.

“You need your greens, honey,” his mother responded.

“I guess you are right,” his father said, admitting defeat.

“How was your day, dad?” Mickey asked.

“Ah, you know,” his father said, pouring a glass of wine for himself. “The usual. Mr. Goodswill refuses to take down the scarecrows, scaring all the tourists away!”

“We need to speak to the mayor about that,” his mother said.

“Tell me about it!” his father said. “I start to suspect that the mayor gets something out of it!”

“It’s scarecrows, not scaretourists!” Mickey remarked.

They all shared a laugh, and the atmosphere was colorful and musical. After all, scarecrows or not, they were all excited about having a proper dinner as a family again.

“Mickey!” his mother’s head popped from the kitchen door. “Will you fetch our dinner, sweetie?”

“Pleasure, ma’am,” Michael emptied the Pinot and headed towards the basement door.

He unlocked the door—three times locked, two latches, and one chain—and pushed it open. When the pale entrance light washed down the staircase, Michael froze.

“Mom!” Michael called out in distress. “We have a problem!”

“What is the problem, sweetie?” his mother’s puzzled eyes spied from the kitchen.

“Dinner’s gone!” Michael said, knees trembling.

His father was first out the kitchen door, standing beside him, soon followed by his mother’s anxious, yet elegant steps. Michael pointed at the bottom of the stairs, where the empty chain lay on the floor, and the open window, banging against the wall.

“Ah, darn it,” his father said, more bummed out than annoyed; dinner was ruined.

As his parents kept inspecting the basement, Michael rushed to the nearest window with a full view of the grass-dressed hill. The girl, their dinner, scurried down the hill, glancing back with fear in her eyes. If they didn’t stop her soon enough, she would reach the river, the forest, and then the street. They didn’t want that.

“She’s right there!” Michael exclaimed, pointing at her figure sliding down the hill.

“Mickey,” his father smiled pleasantly. “Fetch me my gun…”

The boy’s shadow blocked the clean line of light she had to follow down the hill. Two more shadows joined him, stretching around her. Sue glanced back, but she didn’t stare for too long. They had found her. They were watching her closely, with their eerie smiles. She locked her eyes forward and didn’t dare to look back.

The grass was slippery, and thorns plunged into her feet. With their shadows masking the sharp rocks and thorned bushes in her path, a pointy rock brushed her foot, scratching it across the arch. She cursed in pain and bit her lips to contain a scream. They had the keys to her car, her phone, everything. Getting to the river was her only chance. There was a river, right? She shook the thought away. It was no time for doubt.

Two shadows left the window. She glanced back, watching the father staring at her patiently, barely moving. Through the horror of his patient gaze and the lack of light, Sue lost her step, falling face-first into the wet grass, tumbling, and spinning down the hill until she slammed upon a boulder, cutting off her fall. Groaning, staring at the lightless sky, Sue staggered on her feet. She was almost out of their yard. Just a little longer.

She passed around the boulder and sprinted the last few feet to the bottom of the hill and through the iron door, into the dirt road that brought her here. From the outside, the house looked like a dark fortress now with luminous windows scattered across its black surface. The father’s figure was still there, watching her every step.

The rhythmic sound of running water played like music to her ears, calling her. There was no light to guide her there, but she could follow the sound, reach the river, and let the stream take her away. Then a gunshot roared like thunder around the hill. A patch of mud exploded behind her. The father’s rifle shined in the light. The father loaded and pointed her way again.

Her body, as if it were no longer her own to command, propelled forward with dread thrumming in her racing heart. Another gunshot roared, more mud spraying her back. She followed the dirt road, slipped down to her knees, cursed, and stood straight again. Tears ran down her muddied cheeks. Another gunshot, another skipped heartbeat.

The gunshots stopped and the sound of running water returned. She followed it deeper in the darkness. The cloud-muffled moon offered little light and more traps in the shadows than guidance. In the silence, she had a few seconds to gather her thoughts.

How did she end up in this mess? Never take a job at a house that is more than five miles away from the nearest city and with employers having a particularly different type of crazy in their eyes and their son staring at you as if you are a cone of ice cream in the summer. If she survived, she would never leave the city again. Ever.

The dirt road took her to the elevated banks of the river, both sides muddied and slippery, with the river coursing two stories deep below the edge. The river was black, effervescent, foaming angrily among the slimy rocks. It would be too dangerous to climb down during the night. There had to be another way.

She looked around and then she remembered the bridge. There was a bridge there, barely visible in the dark like a charcoal drawing. With a new breath of hope, she took the first towards her passage to the other side, but her hopes quickly shattered.

A sound more terrifying than a gun reverberated in the night: barks, hungry, menacing barks, followed by howls and livid paws storming down the hill. Sue glanced back at the hill. Mother and son guided a pack of dogs, closing in. Her knees trembled and a desperate, pleading breath escaped her lips. She clenched her fists and gritted her teeth. She wouldn’t die, not here, not now.

She followed the road along the riverbank, away from the bridge, legs sprinting, and eyes locked forward. Her face muscles spasmed and deformed with each rock scratching her legs, but she didn’t stop. The dogs were almost breathing down her neck. She wouldn’t be anyone’s food, not tonight.

The pounces came faster, and the hungry growling roared around her. She looked back, watching the flood of canines suffuse the dirt road, coming for her. She decided to make a run, try to run faster than the dogs, but her thighs started burning and she was finally out of breath. The canines were only getting started with many more breaths to spare and an appetite driving them forward.

Muscles stiff, and head dizzy, Sue stood at the edge of the river. The dogs finally caught up and spread around her with blade-sharp teeth, drooling madness. They barked, and each bark brought them a step closer.

“Get her!” the boy shouted in the distance, and one of the dogs lurched forward.

She raised her arms and threw herself back, screaming. The ground below her feet receded. She didn’t feel the dog’s teeth plunging into her flesh. The dog arched right above her head. She smelled its foul breath and saw its stained, sallow teeth clack together, biting the air.

Her stomach clenched and her eyes widened in surprise. She was falling, down the shallow gorge and into the river. She lowered her arms, trying to protect her sides. A slimy rock stabbed her back. Her neck flung back, burning, her smarting muscles protesting, numbing with each blunt strike from the rocks. Spinning midair, with the river, the rocks, and the night becoming one single colorless image, she slammed against a surface like cement and the cold water coated her body.

She gasped for air, bubbles flying out of her mouth. Despite the pain, she floated to the surface, taking a long, deep breath. The unforgiving river took the dog away, but she swam to the other side. All those years of water polo didn’t go to waste after all.

With nothing to lose, she climbed to the other side of the gorge. Mother and son, they stood staring at her.

“Mickey,” the mother told with sadistic cheerfulness in her voice. “This is why we always check the windows.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the boy said apologetically.

“Screw you!” Sue screamed into the night, startling a flock of birds. “I won’t die here!”

She wouldn’t let them talk about her as if she was some kind of chicken running free outside the barn.

“We will get you soon enough,” the mother said, with a wide grin, waving towards her.

The father’s figure was quick to join, descending the hill.

“Ah, is she already across?” he said, crouching, loading the gun.

“Let’s go around the bridge,” the boy said.

She stood there, staring at them, planning on how to get her. She turned and started running into the density of the forest.

The branches slammed her face with strong whips of leaves. Insects found their way into her hair. Rocks, roots, and twigs slowed her down. She had the headstart, but at this pace, they would soon catch up with her.

Soon enough, quick footsteps closed in, lights flashing behind her.

“I think I saw something!” the father called out cheerfully, followed by a gunshot that ravaged a tree’s bark only a few feet away.

She was desperate for a breath, but if she stopped now, it would be her last. The barking resumed as the other dogs trailed her scent. She had to keep moving. She thought about her comfortable sofa, the cup of coffee, music in the background, Leo, her friends. She had to fight out of this situation.

She followed the moon and the pale rays of light piercing through the dense canopy of leaves and branches. It would have been a beautiful place if not for the cannibal family that owned the land.

When her lungs had emptied, her neck was sore, and her vision blurry, when she finally thought that this would be the end, Sue saw what hope truly looked like: a blue, spinning light, cruising down the street at the edge of the forest.

She almost skipped the last few feet, sliding down among roots and rocks, to the rural thoroughfare with a good view of a vast cornfield, shining blue under the siren’s light. A police car sped in the distance.

Sue jumped before the spotlights and waved.

“HELP!” she screamed with all the energy she had left.

The siren wailed and the police car stopped before her. An officer rolled down the window.

“What happened, miss?”

“They are after me!” she shouted in panic, talking fast. “Please, take me out of here. They are after me!”

“Who is?” the officer asked, taking off his hat.

He had a harsh face, one she wouldn’t trust if she wasn’t in this situation or if he wasn’t wearing the uniform.

“The family living up the hill!” she shouted.

“The Smiths?” the officer asked, narrowing his eyes.

She nodded.

“Those fuckers,” the officer got out of the car and pointed behind an old wooden bus stop by the cornfield. “Stand right there, all right?”

The officer pulled his gun and took cover behind his car as she hid behind the bus stop. The smell was insufferable here as if the entire town chose this bus stop to be their public toilet. Thousands of flies flew around her, but she ignored all that, keeping her eyes pinned on the forest.

The Smiths appeared at the edge of the woods, yanking the dogs’ leashes, with the father still searching for her with his rifle.

“Ah, Mr. Goodswill beat us to it,” the father nagged, stomping his foot on the ground.

“Game’s over, Mr. Smith,” the officer shouted.

“Dinner’s ruined,” Mr. Smith said somberly. “Let’s eat outside today. What do you think family?”

Their cheering voices faded in the forest. The officer turned her way and walked slowly towards her.

“Why didn’t you arrest them?” Sue asked.

“Oh, we are all friends in this town,” the officer said. “My job is not to arrest in these parts. Not locals at least.”

His face turned dark with a demonic grin shaping amongst his unshaven face.

Sue took a step back, into the cornfield, her back sticking on something slimy, and smelly. She turned and saw a pole, and upon the pole, she saw a corpse, hands spread, eye-sockets empty, and a cloud of flies around it.

“I’m no cannibal,” the officer said. “But young girls like you make a hell of a scarecrow!”

The smell of fries and crisp, cooking meat filled the nearly empty off-road burger house. His father idly stirred the straw in his milkshake and his mother kept staring towards the cornfields from the misty window.

“Not a good day, family,” his father said with a frown.

“I’m sorry,” Michael said, lowering his gaze.

“It’s okay, Mickey,” his mother rubbed his shoulders. “We all make mistakes.”

“Don’t sweat it, Mickey,” his father said. “No one’s accusing you, son! We’ll grab a proper dinner next time. As my pa used to say, good things happen when you least expect them!”

The waitress came over to their table with a wide smile and put down a tray of fries and a well-cooked patty.

“We are closing soon,” the waitress said. “But please, enjoy your meal. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.”

The bell rang as the last customer stepped outside the burger house. Michael exchanged a wide grin with his parents, and they all turned towards the waitress.

“Damn dad, I guess you’re right…”