Those Damn Kids

Jack stared at the piece of paper. He had been staring at it since the lady behind the counter took his picture and handed him the yellow carbon-copy. Seven minutes had now passed, and the other people at the DMV were getting annoyed with him. This was the most important thing to happen in Jack’s life and he wanted to savor it. Although this piece of paper didn’t explicitly grant his freedom, it may as well have. He could do whatever he wanted, wherever he wanted, so long as he called his mother and she said it was okay––or she didn’t know about it.

Jack pulled out his cellphone and called his girlfriend. “Want to head out to the old Lake Julia TB Sanitarium tonight? I just got my driver’s license.” Jack was hoping he could finish the conversation before he got to the minivan where his mother had been waiting. He didn’t want her to know what he was up to.

“Congrats on passing the test. What time will you be at my house?” Gina replied.

“My parents go to bed at eleven, so I’ll be in the alley at 11:30,” Jack said, hanging the cell up as he approached the minivan. “I had to tell Gina the good news,” he told his mother as he got into the passenger’s seat – not what he wanted, but his mother wasn’t quite ready to let go.

He waited until his parents were asleep, climbed out of his window, put the car into neutral and started pushing it down the block. He waited until he was four houses away to start the car. He pulled up to the alley behind Gina’s house at 11:30 and flashed his lights. Gina flicked her bedroom lights on and off. He went over to the garage and carefully moved the ladder out from behind it and stood it up against her window. He took off of his mittens and climbed up the ladder. He took his Swiss Army knife out of his pocket and picked the lock that her parents had placed on the outside of her window. Once it was open, they climbed down the ladder and got into the car.

The drive north passed in silence. They had been planning this trip since their first date when they snuck in to watch Friday the 13th at the Amigo last month. It had been a cold March and they were both glad. During the warmer months, the owner of the property had guard dogs that would chase anyone that hopped the fence. In the winter, it was too cold for them and he kept them inside, leaving the place unprotected for anyone that wanted to go exploring.

They pulled up to where Gina’s older brother had directed them, killed the engine and hopped the fence. Their feet crunched on the snow as they waded up to the abandoned building, a little louder than what Jack expected, but he figured that the recent cold snap could have caused it. “After you, dear lady,” Jack said as he opened the door for Gina, hoping his humor would be able to hide how scared he truly was.

Gina’s older brother had been telling her stories about this place for years. She loved horror movies and scary things. Jack, on the other hand, couldn’t stand anything of that nature and made sure he spent as much time as possible in the bathroom whenever they went to the movies.

“Mike told me that they used to take the people up to the top floor to get a view of the lake before they died. He said that over 200 people died in that room. We need to get up there.” Jack shined his flashlight around and pointed at the stairs in the far corner of the room, regretting it as he did so; but he didn’t want to seem like a sissy in front of his girlfriend.

The building was creepy, but not scary. They made their way up the floors until they reached the base of the last staircase. The hairs on Jack’s neck pressed hard against his coat. “Wait,” Jack said, “I don’t think I can go up these stairs.”

“You aren’t scared, are you?” said Gina, elbowing him in the ribs.

“I’m serious,” Jack said, his voice shaking and his color going.

“It’s okay if you are afraid; we don’t have to go to the top floor,” said Gina as she took his hand in hers. “We only have to do what you are comfortable with. I was just giving you a hard time before.”

With her hand in his, Jack felt that he could walk to the bottom of Hell. He told himself that it was just an old building that people had died in. Just like the hospital, only without all of the bright lights. Jack swallowed hard as he started up the stairs. Gina followed him up the stairs not knowing what to think.

They walked to the edge of the building up to where they used to take the dying people for their last sight of beauty before death. The window had been sold off by the owner years ago, and they could feel the cold wind against their faces. It was beautiful. They could see the entire lake by the light of the almost full moon. They stood there for nearly ten minutes, just looking at the scenery. Suddenly, Gina bent over and began to shake violently, bumping Jack in the progress. He stumbled backward as he caught himself and fell backwards against the rotting boards, hitting his head. Gina stopped her convulsions after a moment, and began to stand back up, twitching slightly as she did it. “Are you alright?” Gina asked, as she rushed over and bent down beside him.

“I think so, but we should probably go home now,” Jack said, rubbing the back of his head.

“Not quite yet,” Gina said, standing up. “There is something else I need to show you.” She put her put her fingers inside of her mouth as if to whistle, and tore her jaw away from the rest of her body. Jack screamed as he was showered in the spray of her warm blood. He jumped to his feet and started making his way to the stairs. He needed to get somewhere where he got reception so he could call an ambulance.

“What is wrong with you?” he yelled at her from across the room. Without her jaw impeding it, her tongue seemed to grow to enormous proportions and flailed in all directions. Gina lunged at him. Perhaps the police should be the ones he should be calling, Jack thought. He dodged and got out his pocketknife. Not the best weapon he could hope for, but it was better than nothing. She went for him again, her blood spraying everywhere. He chanced a quick motion with his blade and left her right nostril hanging from a flap. She let out a hideous moan and retreated, planning her next attack, flailing her arms and tongue, spitting blood everywhere.

Jack thought he saw a light come on in the woods some distance away. Hopefully the owner was coming and could help him with whatever had happened to Gina. He didn’t want to kill her but thought that he might be left with no choice. He was going to try to knock her out and drive her to the hospital, calling an ambulance if he needed to. “I am not going to be able to carry her down these stairs, so I guess I will have to lure her nearer to the car.” Jack said to himself.

As though she could hear his thoughts, Gina dove across the room and stood in front of the staircase, deliberately blocking the only exit. She bent down and took out an old rusty knife from her right boot. She raised the knife to her nose and cut the left nostril to match the right. She then drove the knife into her chest, tracing the lines between her ribs. Jack bent over and began to vomit blood onto the staircase. While Jack was bent over, Gina charged at him and jammed her knife into his shoulder. Jack collapsed to the ground in pain and she delivered a hard kick to the back of his head.

While Jack was unconscious, Gina took a matchbook out of her pocket and lit it, and tossed it across the room. She bent down and licked Jack’s face with her gruesome tongue. The far wall was now ablaze. She used the knife as a prybar to break Jack’s ribcage open. She cut the connections with the trachea and removed his lungs. Now that she had collected her prize, she began walking down the stairs, the flames spreading across the floor.

* * *

Enos looked at the clock. It was 3:30 AM, again. This was the ninth morning in a row he had not slept the night through. On his trek to the bathroom, he thought about calling Dr. Peterson in the morning and scheduling an appointment to have him check his prostate. These early morning rises were starting to get to him.

Amanda came over and nosed him in the leg. She let out a whine and looked expectantly at the window. “What girl? You can’t go on a walk now,” said Enos, following her to the window and seeing the old sanitarium. “No one is ever in there anymore. I’m just going to the bathroom. After that, we both can go back to bed and enjoy the rest of the night, unless I need to get up again.” Amanda whined again and pawed at the window before jumping out of it. Enos had no time for the bathroom anymore. Instead he moved to the door, put on his coat and boots, and headed out of the door towards the lake, relieving himself as he went.

By the time Enos got out of the front door and around to the back of the house, he could see flames licking the roof of the sanitarium. There was a small shape pacing in front of the flames. “Those damn kids,” Enos said to himself as he walked to his pickup.

He parked next to Jack’s mom’s minivan and walked towards the building. The old structure collapsed when he was about 15 feet away, causing him to stumble backwards into a snowbank. Amanda was unfazed by the collapse and remained at the base of the structure, growling, her teeth bared. “Easy girl,” Enos said, pulling out his cellphone. “Cursed technology,” Enos mumbled as he fumbled with the locking feature and began dialing 911. He was so busy with the phone that he didn’t see a burning body rise up out of the building’s remains. It grabbed Amanda by the neck and snapped it, leaving the dog limp and motionless on the ground.

Then, the figure turned, looked at Enos, and paused before using her skeletal hands to pull the remaining skin off of her bones. The creature bent down and picked up two lumps of meat from the ground and carried them into the woods. The phone call finally went through, but all the person on the other end heard was the sound of Enos collapsing in the snow.