When she was twelve, Mary’s father had died.

While she had noticed some changes over the days, months, and years that had preceded the morning of his transformation, there was nothing that could have prepared her for the brisk, spring dawn when she had found him in their living room. He was sprawled out on the floor, his face contorted into a terrifying visage. His skin was a pale, blue hue and one side of his face was sagging as though an invisible hand was pulling it toward the ground. Blood had pooled around his head, and a gaping wound was visible in the back of his skull.

Mary had rushed to his side, but there was nothing she could have done. His skin was colder than ice, and his eyes were frozen open in a state of shock. Her mother had come out from the bedroom, and they both had cried over the patriarch’s dead body, their sobs permeating the morning air.

From then on, Mary had learned to fend for herself. To fight for herself. To make herself as strong as she could be. They had a small farm on their grounds, as most families did, but Mary and her mother had never been formally taught how to tend it. So they learned on their own. Her mother was a proud woman, who made her name – Bernadette – widely known throughout their small town out east. She would personally bring baskets of rye, barley, peas, apples, and oats into town. The money she came home with was enough to keep them afloat until the next big harvest. And so it went, from month to month, year to year.

By the time she was fifteen, Mary’s arms were rippled with muscle and her skin was deeply tanned thanks to her time out in the sun. When she had met Jackson, she was surprised he had wanted to talk to her. Most men were intimidated by her physique, and even more could not get past the determined, intuitive glint in her eye. There was also their added concern that she did not act the way a woman was supposed to act, that she did not speak the way a woman was supposed to speak. Her mother had been told the same things, though often such claims came on the heels of a denouncement she would offer, proclaiming she was doing just fine on her own and she didn’t see the need to remarry. Folks around town never really liked that thought process – it was a bit too forward-thinking for them – and they didn’t like it even more when they realized it was coming out of the mouths of the youthful.

Jackson took it in stride, though. On their first night together, after too much whiskey on his part, he had divulged his own personal strife: his racist, abusive father and his brother, who viewed their parent with idolatry. An odd conversation to have in the middle of the night underneath the stars, yet an enlightening one.

Jackson had pursued her, but respectfully so. Sometimes he would show up at her home with a handful of picked flowers, and other times he would see her in town and offer to buy her a drink. Sometimes she declined, and others she accepted. Their courtship was an oddity to most. Whispers would make their way through the streets: there go Jack and Mary again. When’s they gonna tie the knot?

For the longest time, they didn’t. They allowed their odd courtship to maintain the framework of a friendship, encouraging the seeds of romance to blossom in a natural way rather than jamming a ring on a finger and hoping it would appear. When they did eventually marry, it was a small affair. Her mother came, along with a required witness, but Jackson’s father and his brother did not receive an invitation.

Jackson had not wanted kids at first, yet when she sat down with him and he discussed why, she understood. His eyes would grow dark and he would chew on his bottom lip, his voice a husky shell of the loud and boisterous tone it usually was. I don’t want you to meet him, he would say. I don’t want them to meet him, either.

Yet, despite his misgivings about his family Jackson refused to leave their side in times of need. When his father fell ill and his brother lost the family farm, Jackson had not hesitated before giving them a roof to live under. He had also not asked her whether she thought it wise, and with a tiny house and two children, she would have advised against it. His concerns remained; he stored his father in the back bedroom and tried to ensure his brother rarely talked or came in contact with his children beyond what was necessary.

Mary looked down at the floor, where Jackson lay on his back, his eyes constricted with mortal fear, blood pooling out on the wooden floor around his head. His mouth was twisted open in a clear expression of shock.

Time quickened all at once: before she understood what she was doing, she leapt across the table and wrenched the revolver upward toward the ceiling. Another explosion tore through the home as Matthew pulled the trigger again. To Mary’s surprise, her grip on Matthew’s wrist was pulled away as John tackled his uncle. Springing into action, she rushed around the table toward her son, who forcefully smashed Matthew’s hand against the floor while uttering an animalistic yell. With a final, forceful crash, John brought Matthew’s hand down on the wood, the gun skittering away. John sent a stinging punch across Matthew’s face, blood jetting out of his previously broken nose.

Mary pulled her son off the man and held him back with her left arm. He was breathing heavily and she could see tears stinging his eyes. Without waiting for Matthew to open his mouth, she pulled him up by his shirt. Shock burst in his eyes as she did so. She pushed him toward the front door.

“Get out,” she hissed. “Get out before I put a bullet in you.”

Matthew’s eyes were still dancing with shock and terror. He opened his mouth to respond, but Mary didn’t give him the opportunity. She pinned him against the wall, wrapping her right hand around his throat, and opened the door with her left. The wind whipped into the home, and cold sprays of rainwater followed. With one swift movement, she threw Matthew out of the house, into the muddy grass in front of the threshold.

“Go,” she spat. “And never come back.”

She slammed the door closed as he turned his muddy face to look up at her.

When she turned around, a wave of emotions racked her body all at once. She felt tired, angry, terrified, sad, and tense all at once. Her family, Luis, and his daughter were looking at her with the same expression: what do we do now? The stranger was standing in the back of the house, watching with an oddly reserved countenance.

“I’m sorry you all had to see that,” she said, refusing to allow her voice to waver. “Luis, could you take m’ children into their room and close the door? Don’t allow them to go until I come get ‘em.”

Luis nodded silently and gestured for John and Emma to follow. Emma did so instantly, but John held his ground.

“John, please do as I say,” Mary said, lowering her voice.

He stared at her for a few seconds more, but nodded and followed his sister. When they were gone and the door was closed, she narrowed her eyes and marched over toward the stranger.

“Let’s get somethin’ straight,” she hissed. “I’m never goin’ to forget the way you went against m’ husband at the table. Never. So you best pack your bags, ‘cause you’re not stayin’ here very long.”

The stranger seemed strangely calm. He had folded his arms during her statement, with no signs of fear or anxiety.

“No one who threatens me lives to see morning,” the stranger said. “I’ll let this slide on account of what happened tonight, but understand this – I won’t be so kind a second time.”

Mary let out a single, barking laugh before raising her open hand and striking the stranger across the face. She closed the distance between them until she was close enough to touch the edge of his nose with her own. She stared deep into his eyes, which she noticed appeared to be black.

“Don’t ever threaten me in m’ own home again,” she said. “Or I’ll do worse than toss you out. I’ll rip your balls off and shove ‘em down your fuckin’ throat.”

She turned her heel and walked toward her husband. Toward the corpse of the man she loved. A wretched smell hung in the air around his body, but she ignored it as she knelt down next to him. For a brief moment, she felt a sob pushing its way up her throat, threatening to be expelled past her lips in a sound of torn sorrow. She pulled it back just in time, and instead placed her hand on Jackson’s chest. She couldn’t think of anything to say, so she allowed silence and the pressure of her hand to impart the feelings swirling in her gut.

She walked under the arch and into the living room where Matthew slept. With frustration still fluttering in her heart, she took one of his bedsheets, refusing to look at the stranger who was still standing in the corner. She could feel his eyes on her as she draped the sheet over her husband’s corpse and his shocked face. The blood pooling around his head began to saturate and darken the cream-colored fabric as it settled.

What am I going to do now?

First thing was first: she had to make sure the kids were okay. She had seen the look of horror and anger in John’s face when she had pulled him off Matthew. She couldn’t imagine how Emma felt, either.

A high-pitched wail road the wind’s coattail and soared over their house in grating waves.

Something was out there. She didn’t know what it was, but she knew it was there.

She also knew something else: they couldn’t stay in the house for much longer. The river was going to flood. Even if it didn’t, the stranger wasn’t their friend. As much as she had scoffed at his threat, she knew it had been real. There was a reason he had befriended Matthew of all people.

The town of Moorehead was close, only about fifteen miles away. Walking in the storm was a dangerous proposition, but if they were swift and didn’t stop, they could make it there in less than five hours.

Panic began to bloom in her heart as she heard the back of her mind, the center of her personal criticisms, begin to poke holes in her plan: what about those screams? How will you get there safely, with no food, no water, no ammunition? What if you need to hole up somewhere without any supplies? How will you convince the stranger to stay behind? Will you even be safe in that town?

Mary shut out the thoughts and refocused herself: this was the plan. This was what they were going to do.

As if to respond to her internal turmoil, a creaking sound crackled through the air, filling the house. It was quiet at first. For a moment, Mary thought someone was scratching their nails on the glass windows. Then, it grew louder. As the seconds passed, the creaking turned to cracking. It was then that Mary turned to look at the back windows of their home.

A long, spider-webbing crack was pushing its way up the glass, extending toward the wooden pane.

Without warning, the window shattered, and a powerful gust of wind blew in, along with freezing cold rain. The stranger leapt out of the way as bits of glass flew through the air, some shards embedding themselves in the wooden walls, others skittering across the floor, glittering in the lamplight.

Mary ran toward the bedroom without waiting. She opened and closed the door with a single swift motion and pushed her back to it. Everyone in the bedroom, from her haggard son to Luis and his daughter, gave her the same look: shock and fear.

“We have a problem,” Mary said. “Window’s broke out in the livin’ room. River’s floodin’. The stranger’s gonna cause problems.” She paused, though she suspected they all knew what she was going to say next. “We have to leave before things get worse.”

Everyone in the bedroom was quiet, though she could see the uncertainty in their eyes.

“How much time do we have here, do you think?” Luis asked.

“I don’ know,” Mary said. “Maybe days. Maybe hours. Maybe minutes. But if one window’s broke from the strain of the storm, it’s only a matter of time ‘fore they all do. And who knows ‘bout the river. Jackson was worried about it a couple of days ago when we still thought this storm was gonna pass.”

Silence returned to the bedroom, only to be broken moments later by her own daughter.

“What are we waitin’ for, then?” Emma asked.

Mary smiled at her. She could see so much of Jackson in her. So much of his steady calm, of his confidence. Pain struck her again as she remembered the sheet that she had placed over him.

“We’re not gonna be able to bury Dad,” John said, as if he had read her thoughts and was responding directly to them.

“I know,” she said. Her voice lost its warmth as she thought about that fact. “He would want us to get out before it was too late, though. He would want that more than a burial. And maybe when this is over we can come back and give him one.”

Her son was smart. She knew he would understand they didn’t have many options. As much as it pained her to leave Jackson behind without being able to send him off the proper way, this would have been the plan he formulated if it had been her that Matthew had shot.

Her blood boiled as she thought about the insolent maggot that was her brother-in-law. If her children hadn’t been watching, she would have choked the life out of him right in their kitchen. Throwing him out to the wilderness didn’t seem like a good enough death. Yet, if the screeches they kept hearing were any indication, there was no telling what kind of fate he was going to meet.

“Alright,” Mary said. “Let’s pack some things. Nothing heavy. We’re gonna be walkin’ in awful weather for almost twenty miles. Just pack some essentials.”

She turned and opened the bedroom door. Her heart stopped as she saw a flash of black eyes and a shadowy frame. Cold metal dug into her skin as the stranger pushed the barrel of a revolver into her forehead.

“Going somewhere, are we?” he asked.

In the living room, Mary noticed a new noise: rushing water and creaking wood.

Next Chapter: Matthew