The Mannerisms of Runners

by Barry Napier

It started off as an exercise thing, but now he has no idea why he runs. His leg muscles are toned and immune to shin splints; his ankles work like the hinges of a medieval drawbridge.

There is a rhythm to the wind against his face, to the pounding of his feet on asphalt like the heartbeat of a ghost. He runs and he runs and he has no idea where he is going. Three days ago he tasted salt in the air, the perspiration of the Pacific at his back. Today he smells manure and diesel. A large tractor trailer with a milk company logo barrels by like a big silver bullet looking for a werewolf that isn't there.

He has no idea why he is still running.

There are blisters on his feet and he is certain that both socks are filled with blood. He can feel the broken flaps of skin that were once the balls of his feet rubbing against the blood soaked fabric. His eyes, lips and the insides of his nostrils are dry. His lungs are burning and there is the sensation of a weight that has sat upon his chest for so long that it has started to absorb into his skin, through his breastbone and into his heart.

Sometimes when the milk trucks go racing past, he thinks about jumping in front of one. Then maybe the running would stop and his muscles would get a rest in the ensuing explosion of calcium and Penzoil and New Balance.

He has been running for thirty weeks. He does not sleep. He only watches the world as it slumbers around him, clouds rising and falling and sprinkling stars like salt along the way. The night sky should represent rest, but it only urges him on. Run faster, it says. There is a maniac behind you.

Maybe that is why he runs; the maniac is surely still on his heels--the maniac he encountered on the corner three blocks from his home. The maniac had worn a sheet of black that covered his entire body, standing outside a bakery at 5 a.m. among the smells of baking bread and dawn. He had looked like a shadow. The man had reached out and touched him.

Tripped him.

Joined him.

Is that why he runs?

Four days ago, he coughed out his tongue.

His calves are burning. The sun exchanges skies with the moon and another day begins. He keeps running. He tastes blood in the back of his mouth. His breath sounds like sandpaper dragging across shattered glass. A car passes and beeps its horn.

He raises his hand to wave and sees the decay on the underside of his forearm. There is no blood, only mottled gray splotches. It looks like mold on bread. This brings to mind the bakery and he peeks behind him to see if he is being followed.

The maniac is back there, gliding like a rogue shadow running from the sun. It runs without feet and points him onward. It then sinks into the road and leaves only the deserted Missouri highway (or was it Kansas or Connecticut or Calvary?) to show him where to go.

The laces of his shoes bounce up and down like the ears of a mauled rabbit. This scene looks familiar. He has been here before.

God, his feet hurt.

He coughs out his tongue; two days pass. A milk truck passes him, like a silver bullet looking for…

A car passes, beeps its horn.

He has run through this place before--always running, breathing electric pain, listening to the squishing sounds from his blistered feet in his soggy red socks.

He tastes the salt of the Pacific for several days. This is soon replaced by the wafting scent of manure and pastures.

He looks back and sees his companion, always pointing forward, always robed in black--a shadow cast not by light but by the absence of it.

He hears the approaching grumble of a milk truck as he brings his left foot up, right foot down, left foot up, right foot down…

He runs on and on.

Soon he will cough and his tongue will fall out. Then a car will pass, beeping its weak little horn.

He has been here before.

And no matter how hard he runs, he will never be faster than the shadow behind him or the truth it carries.

___________

Barry has had more than 25 stories and poems included in online and print publications. His collection Debris is currently available through Library of Horror Press. He enjoys coffee, minimalist music and irony.

An Eight Becomes Two Zeroes

by Barry Napier

Six years ago, they stared into the mesh wiring of a dog pen. Four hunting dogs ran back and forth along the other side of the wire; some of them seemed elated at their company while others growled.

“You have to do this,” Mike said to his friend. He was eleven years old but his eyes looked much older. There was anger there, and malice.

Todd didn’t understand the emptiness in his friend’s eyes. Nor could he comprehend the intentions that lurked there.

“Why do I have to?” Todd asked.

“These dogs belong to Mr. MacCaffery, right?”

“Yes.”

“And hasn’t his son Kevin been beating you up at school?”

Todd nodded. He hefted the baseball bat that rested in his hands. It felt huge; it made him feel like Thor gripping his hammer, ready to birth thunder.

“People are mean,” Mike said. The intensity was still in his eyes but, again, Todd didn’t see it. “People will walk all over you if you let them. Especially people like Kevin MacCaffery. And if you can’t beat him up, you need to look for other things to do in order to get even.”

Todd stared into the pen, his face flushing.

“Just do it,” Mike said, thumbing the latch to the pen. “It won’t be so bad.”

“Really?”

Mike grinned. “Trust me.”

Mike opened the door and Todd stepped inside. He gripped the bat and started swinging. The snapping of bones and the stifled yelps of dogs was like some sweet undiscovered music.

__________


Todd found himself thinking about that day as he stood by his friend again. He could still hear those sounds from time to time, like teeth being smashed against the floor. The two of them stood in a small darkened apartment. The room smelled of dust, sweat and fear.

An old cot sat in the middle of the room, illuminated by a single overhanging bulb. In the sickly white light, the frail man that was strapped to the cot looked as if he were made of wax.

Everything in the room seemed cold: the floor, the air, Todd’s fingers, the hatchet he held in his hands. He had seen his mother use this hatchet from time to time, cutting up chicken and steaks. Holding it in this place and knowing what it would be used for seemed rather surreal.

“You have to do this,” Mike said. It was a comment he had made to his friend countless times, particularly since Todd’s dad had died. His voice was soft and seemed to cause the overhanging light to flicker.

“I know,” Todd said.

“Just think of it,” Mike went on. “The girl you love…she was in bed with this guy. She was touching him. Her mouth was on him. Their bodies were—”

His voice was interrupted by the wet pounding sounds of the hatchet sinking into flesh. The second attack clinked against bone. The man on the cot tried to scream but the barbed wire fastened to his face was so tight that it would not allow him to open his mouth. The scream made it no further than the back of his throat where it collected in what sounded like the revving of a weak engine.

When it was done, they left the rented room and walked down the hall. The sounds of people living their lives behind closed doors followed them outside. Children were laughing, dishes clinked together and televisions spewed their nonsense.

Outside, the night air was crisp and frigid. The moon was half full and seemed to be hiding part of its face so that it would not bear witness to what had just been done.

“You did good,” Mike said.

Todd only nodded, looking to the sticky crimson stains on his hands.

“You know,” he said, “my dad’s name was Mike, too.” He said this as if the thought had never crossed his mind before. “He died when I was little.”

“You don’t say,” Mike replied. He gave very little thought to this and started walking down the street.

Todd followed him. They headed into the night together, side by side.

The streetlights that escorted them revealed only one shadow.

It stretched into the darkness behind them, as if trying to run away.

__________

Barry Napier has a BS in Professional Writing and works as a freelance writer. His fiction has been included in anthologies such as Bound For Evil, Northern Haunts and It Came From Planet Mars. He also has various short fiction and poems appearing in a number of future publications. He lives in Lynchburg, VA with his wife and daughter. He is still mildly afraid of the dark. Learn more about him at http://www.barrynapierwriting.wordpress.com/.