Traditions

A rejected horror story I wrote for a holiday horror anthology. A bit more graphic than my usual. Enjoy.

photo by Photo by Tom Fisk

My buddy Rick’s boy disappeared three days before Christmas. Tyler, twenty-two years old. Good kid, works at the Dairy Queen durin’ the summers.

“He probably runned off,” the sheriff says. “Kids do that.”

Rick comes by my place that evenin’ lookin’ like he done aged five years. The Christmas lights I strung up last week blink red and green across his haggard face.

“You seen anythin’ strange?” he asks.

“Like what?”

“I dunno. Tyler said he thought someone’d been followin’ him. Said maybe a truck with a busted headlight. I didn’t believe him but…”

“I ain’t seen nothin’ like that.”

Rick’s hands are shakin’ when he lights his cigarette.

“I’m sure he’ll turn up,” I say.

But I do wonder. I know I seen a truck like that at the hardware store. Got a ratty artificial wreath on the grille.

Next mornin’ I drive past the old boarded up Waller’s place. There’s tire tracks from the road. Fresh ones makin’ deep ruts in the mud from last night’s sleet. I sit in the truck with the engine off, thinkin’. Could be nothin’. Could be someone usin’ the place to cook meth or store stolen goods, never know in these parts.

I wait until nightfall then park at the closed loggin’ road, half a mile through the woods from Waller’s. I walk in through the trees with my flashlight and a pair of bolt cutters, just in case.

I can’t see nothin’ in the house so I make my way down the cellar stairs. There’s a generator goin’ and an old freezer down there, one of them big chest freezers from the seventies. Harvest gold color and hummin’.

I lift the latch and open the lid.

Tyler’s inside, folded up like laundry with his knees pressed to his chest. He’s still breathin’, but his lips is blue and his eyes is crusted. He’s got dried blood all matted up in his pretty blond hair.

His eyes open when the light hits ‘em.

“Help,” he croaks.

Seconds tick by while I stare at him.

Rick’s boy.

The same kid done threw rocks at my dog last summer and killed her. Fourth of July, everyone shootin’ fireworks, nobody heard her cry. He said it was an accident but I seen him from my kitchen window. I seen him aim careful and I seen him laugh when she dropped.

Sadie was thirteen years old and blind in one eye. She loved to lay under the Christmas tree every year, guardin’ the presents. She wouldn’t hurt nothin’.

“Who put you here?” I ask.

“Vernon.”

Vernon runs the church bazaar every December and gives out peppermint sticks at the hardware store and has a ratty old wreath bungeed to the front grille of his truck.

Ain’t but a moment later I hear a truck engine outside.

“Please,” Tyler says. “Help me.”

I close the lid, put the latch back, step behind the stairs.

Footsteps above. The door opens. Light from a flashlight comes down first, then old worn boots. It’s Vernon, whistlin’ some old Christmas song.

He goes straight to the freezer and don’t even look around none. He opens it like he’s checkin’ on the turkey.

“Still kickin’,” he says. “Good. It ain’t fun if you’re dead.”

That’s when I hit him with the bolt cutters. Right at the base of the skull, not too hard, just enough. He drops to his knees, smashes his face into the edge of the freezer. His flashlight rolls across the floor, comes to stop against the wall.

Vernon groans and rolls over with blood comin’ from his nose, stainin’ his ugly Christmas sweater, the one with the reindeer.

“You,” he gasps.

“You promised,” I say. “You promised we wasn’t never gonna kill no one without each other.”

“I was gonna call you,” Vernon wheezes. “Tonight. I was gonna call you tonight.”

“This one was gonna be special, Vern. Our Christmas present to ourselves and you know it. We was ‘sposed to do it together. Now you gone done an’ ruined it.”

“What’d you hit me for?”

“‘Cause this is my dog killer and you know it,” I say to Vernon. “But you went on ahead alone.”

Vernon spits blood. “Come on, I saw him comin’ outta the tree lot, I couldn’t see no reason not to grab–”

“Bullshit!”

Tyler tries to climb out. I push him back down.

“Please,” Tyler begs. “Please, I won’t tell no one. My mama needs m-.”

I hit Tyler right on the top of his head with the bolt cutters hard as I can. He slumps back into the freezer, and if he ain’t dead yet he’s gonna be real soon. Blood comes out thick, lookin’ like cranberry sauce.

Vernon sits up, hand pressed against his bleedin’ nose. “What’d you do that for! We coulda had us some fun with him!”

I whack Vernon across the face. Two bloody teeth hit the ground like dropped ornaments. I lift Vernon under his arms, shove him into the freezer right on top of the kid.

Vern struggles and I hit him again and again until he stops.

He’s gaspin’ and one of his eyes is so swolled it’s about to pop outta his head. “We’re friends...”

“We ain’t friends no more. Friends don’t break tradition.”

I shove his arms and legs in with him.

Vernon Cope, who plays Santa at the mall every year, who’s done such terrible things in this very room with a smile on his face, now a sobbin’ mess.

I close the lid and I gotta sit on top of it to latch it.

After, I walk back through the woods to my truck. Stop at the Gas-N-Go on the way. Buy a Sprite and a pack of gum. The clerk’s wearin’ a Santa hat and there’s a donation jar for the fire department’s toy drive. I put in a five.

“Merry Christmas,” she says.

“You too.”

I get home, have dinner with my wife. She’s made gingerbread, my favorite. We watch It’s a Wonderful Life.

The day after Christmas some kids out with a new BB gun find ‘em. Vernon and Tyler in the freezer, both frozen solid. The sheriff finds the other bodies out back. Three in total. The ones Vern did hisself and didn’t tell me about. The bastard.

They never find the other twelve. The ones we did together every Christmas.

My buddy Rick moves away after New Year’s.

I help take down the nativity scene at church, pack away the shepherds for next year.

Sometimes I drive past the old Waller place. It’s for sale now but ain’t nobody wants it.

I got a new dog and named her Justice. She’s a good dog, stays in the yard. Sleeps under the Christmas tree just like Sadie used to.

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Thanks for reading!

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