Prayers On Fire

Walking up and down each long car ridden aisle, he finally found it. He recognized his black bumper and his white trunk. Finally he could get out of here, and cheerfully he jogged to it. He walked along the right side of the car and went to open the door when he looked through the wondow and froze.

A naked dead girl was sitting inside.

Nathan couldn't even react at first; he looked almost haplessly through the glass at the nude body. Her lips were turning blue and the majority of her body was extremely pale. He gulped hard and shut his eyes. "I haven't slept, I'm just seeing things," he said. Nathan unlocked the door and the corpse's unrestrained head fell to the side, its bleached eyes looking squarely at him. That was when the panic hit him, it felt doused over his head and it stung his dry eyes. Fear overtook his mind and he ran. He ran to the street, he ran along the sidewalk. Nathan ran blindly, with no idea where, just away from what he had just seen.

When he saw a bus in the right lane, he searched up the sidewalk ahead and saw a bus stop. Nathan waved his arms and made a mad dash for it. He didn't make it there before the bus, but the driver was dropping off passengers anyway, and this gave Nathan time to catch up. Once he got to it he practically bolted up the stairs, as if in an attempt to make it inside before the doors closed. The driver looked at him with a somewhat concerned expression, and Nathan tried to explain between pants.

"I... missed you... last time and... I need to.."

He shook his head and fished a dollar from his pocket, handing it to the driver. He then walked down the small corridor, looking at the plastic seats on either side. High school students, elderly folk, people on their way to work. Nathan found a seat near the back, not sitting so much as collapsing on his rear.

What could he do? He first contemplated calling the police. Initially he shied from the option, but once the body would be found in his car the police would be contacting him anyway. If he approached them first, perhaps his story would be more believable. He could say his car had been stolen. There would have to be evidence of another person being in the car; the body got there somehow.

Oh god, Nathan thought. A murderer dumped a fucking dead body in my car.

He was wringing his wrists anxiously. He couldn't believe these thoughts were his. Nathan had never delt with the police before, he'd never had a reason. Now they were going to find a corpse in his car. He tried to calm himself to minimal avail; he was maybe about ten minutes from his house. He just wanted to get home; a quart of whiskey was waiting there for him, and if anything could get him to relax, it would be that.

The bus stop closest to the house was a block away, and Nathan dragged himself down the street toward home. It was all he could do to keep walking, with his shot nerves and his mind ravaged by tumors of thought wandering aimlessly in his head.

I just need to get home, have a few drinks, and chill out.

Once Nathan got home he did just that; he practically attacked his whiskey, drinking it straight from the bottle.

It was the same room Nathan had woken up in before; the cream colored walls and the white bed. He got up to see the same flowing curtains hiding the window, and he walked to them. Once he spread them, he saw the same blue sky and the same girl; only this time instead of pleading her eyes were gleaming. Great tears leaped from her blue eyes as she looked at Nathan. He looked behind her to see the same man, the man with the unsightly hair and mustache, standing behind her with that disturbingly familiar and sinister smile. Suddenly he furnished a knife, and Nathan nearly fell back.

His mouth opened, exhibiting a toothy grin as he walked up right behind her. The man's eyes stared viciously into Nathan's and he wrapped his left arm around the girl's neck. Her face begged Nathan for help, but he was paralyzed. He watched the two feebly as the man's blade sank into the side of the terrified girl's skull.

Nathan sprang from his bed to the sound of his phone ringing. Immediately he grabbed his head and moaned. He looked over at the nightstand and the bottle and he had drunk half of it. Ignoring his phone, he stumbled to the kitchen for water. Dull streetlight crept into the room, and he looked at the clock in the living room; it was already eight in the evening.

As Nathan drank his water, he began pulling his thoughts together, which were as scattered as a kaleidoscope's fragmented colors. Then something hit him. The phone. It was the police. Why they hadn't been here yet he didn't know, but he had to get the phone. It had finished ringing, but he was sure a message had been left.

Nathan walked back to his bedroom, his head starting to feel better despite his queasiness. He picked up his phone from the nightstand and dialed his inbox.

"You have one new message."

"Hey Nathan, it's Karie again... call me back! Bye."

"Who the hell is Karie?"

Almost annoyed, he went through his log of missed calls and found the number. He dialed it.

"Hello?"

"Hey Karie, what's up?"

"...hi... who is this?"

Nathan almost groaned audibly. "It's Nathan, remember me?"

Suddenly the line went very quiet. "Wh-what do you want?"

What?

"What doyou want? You've called me twice today."

"Look Nathan, just... just leave me alone, okay?"

Something was wrong - her voice was starting to sound slightly warbled, like he was talking to an old scratchy record.

"Is everything okay?"

Karie's voice started to slow, gradually at first and then rapidly. "No, ....I mee-a-a-n-n y-y-e-e-s-s-s-s...... e-v-v-e-r-r-y-t-h-h-i-i-n-g .....i-i-i-s-s-s....... fffffffiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnne...."

The last word was said with the slowest, deepest voice Nathan had ever heard. Shaken, he ended the call.

"What the fuck is going on?"

The police had made no attempt to contact him, which was a slight relief, but Nathan still needed a ride to work. He was still somewhat aghast; he had to tell somebody about what was going on. He decided that he would go to the police first thing in the morning, that he would tell them everything after his shift. He then found his phone book and called a taxi.

At nine thirty Nathan heard the cab honking out in front. Pulling on his jacket, he left the house, locking the door behind him. He still felt slightly hung over, and when he opened the cab's back door he eased in slowly.

"Gas station, right?"

Nathan nodded, and he looked up in the front seat. He was more than a little spooked when he saw that the driver was the man from the night before, from the mall. Nathan nodded silently, trying to sit back casually. It wasn't going to be a long ride, he told himself. He was just driving, and frankly if he was going to do something, he would have already. Still, he was too abashed to directly ask him about his behavior at the mall.

Cautiously Nathan looked up at the man's photo I.D., and his photo was as unnerving as his actual appearance. He was wearing the same plaid shirt, and probably the same pants as well. The taxi cab had a very strange smell, not necessarily bad, just strange. Maybe a blend of semen and smoked methamphetamine. The name on the I.D. said-

"The name's Enoch, Enoch Draven Hyde."

Nathan's eyes darted back to Enoch, trying not to look too alarmed.

"Nathan."

"Yeah," he began, rubbing his stubble covered chin. "You worked last night? You gave me directions."

Nathan shifted. "That's right. A fare, I'm guessing?"

Enoch's eyes made contact with his in the rear view mirror. "Nope."

They had entered the city and the lights were dulled by fog. "I've got someone else to pick up," Enoch told Nathan. "It's on the way. Is that alright by you?" His eyebrows arched, and Nathan nodded without delay.

The cab pulled over to a curb, and the door opposite Nathan opened. In stepped a petite brunette wearing a short sleeved white blouse and a pleated maroon skirt. She sat and closed the door, her deep brown eyes looking over at Nathan briefly. Nathan smiled, pleasantly suprised by the lovely girl.

Nathan looked at the rear view mirror and saw Enoch's eyes, again those slithering, oily eyes. The pupils grew frighteningly as they turned onto the girl, gazing harrowingly into hers. Enoch's petrifying smile, the one he had seen in his dream, loomed on his ghastly face and Nathan turned back to the girl. Her eyes were half open as she slid her skirt up and grabbed her panties, pulling them down to her thighs. The pink cotton clung to her bronzed thighs as she ran a hand up the inside of her leg. She cooed a shaky moan, a humiliated look on her pretty face.

Sitting right next to this girl was making Nathan incredibly uncomfortable, and when he felt himself growing hard he was actually embarassed. Still, he couldn't take his eyes off of her.

Her hand moved inside her thighs, and her mouth opened. Her eyes fluttered and closed, and her hips started sliding up and down slightly on the seat. Her breathing grew heavy and she spread her legs a little farther. Nathan could now see her fingers inside herself, between her tanned thighs, with the rolled up pink panties clasping to them, and she began to cry softly.

Nathan looked back to the mirror at Enoch, who was smirking at him, his eyes still sodden with malice, that horrible smile connecting his ears across his visage.

Then, without warning, the cab stopped. "Thirty," Enoch said. Nathan pulled out his wallet and handed him the money, eager to get out of the taxi. Once he exited, he looked back and saw the girl spread out on her back, still masturbating as Enoch sped off.

Nathan wiped his face, watching them pull away. He smelled the steam rising from the grill next to him and he turned around, starting to walk toward the station. That was when he saw Tom in the booth. "He's... still here?"

He walked closer and saw a red stain on the plexiglass; Tom was pounding his forehead into it repeatedly. Stupefied, Nathan rushed to the window. Tom's eyes were vacant as he continued hitting his forehead against the stain, a gruesome open lesion just above his nose.

"Tom!" Nathan shrieked. "What the hell are you doing?"

Tom gave Nathan a sudden, manic grin. "If it stops bleeding, they'll make me come out."

Looking around frantically, Nathan felt himself losing his grip. He couldn't handle anymore of whatever was happening to him, and again he ran.

Nathan was consumed with desperation. Powerful thoughts were forcing their way into his head, and they appeared with large letters, scrawled in that barely legible writing from the journal

give up hope

give up

fool

Running and running, ignoring the screaming of his excrutiating lungs, he reached an alley off of the main street. Nathan collapsed onto his knees and looked up through the dark walkway. He saw wooden fences, rickety vertical boards lined up and meeting old, almost crumbling brick pillars. On his hands and knees he crawled, huffing wildly as images engraved themselves into Nathan's mind one at a time, even more intensely than the words.

Broken glass on a dirty hardwood floor, bloody fingers on a gleaming knife, a crying girl clutching her knees.

Pushing through a gate, Nathan got up onto his feet and saw a small house before him, the front door wide open. His brain was too amok with thought to properly register much at this point, and he walked through. To his right was a short stairwell, and across the wall was scribbled in red

hescomingupthestairshescomingtomyroomhespoundingonthedoorhesgoingto

Once he got to the top, he looked over and saw the same girl from the taxi; she was naked and she was curled in a ball on a bed. Standing next to her was Enoch; though now he was without his trademark smile. He stood draped in shadows, looking at Nathan with absolute hatred. Nathan noticed a sharp itch in his shoulder, and he reached over to scratch it. Once he did though, a lump of flesh fell to the ground, leaving a large red hole exposing the bone. His mind went awry and he bit his tongue, feeling the gums around his teeth soften. In sheer terror, he felt each tooth one by one loosen and fall into his mouth. Nathan fell to his knees, spitting out teeth and he looked up pleadingly at Enoch.

"Please... help me..."

"Die, motherfucker.." Enoch growled these words, repeating them over and over again, gaining intensity with each utterance. Soon he was screaming it at the top of his lungs, creating a sound comparable only to a train screeching to a sudden stop. Nathan pressed his hands on his ears and felt his entire body crumbling, starting to vomit at Enoch's feet.

*************************

"Jesus... how long has it been now?"

"He's been on suicide watch for two days now."

Tonight was Jerry's first night watching him, and already he had chills. The prisoner had tiny pupils brushed onto his bulging eyes, his body soaked in sweat, sitting up and facing the corner of the cell.

"I can't help but feel bad for the guy..."

Edward scoffed. "Did you see the pictures of what he did to that girl?"

Jerry shook his head. Edward walked to the bars and snorted with disgust, looking at the prisoner's pale face. "You deserve whatever you get," he muttered. He then backed away and headed out the hall. "You'll be fine, Jerry. I'll see you tomorrow."

Jerry sighed uneasily, looking over at him. This was going to be a long night.