The weight of the journal has cast a weight on my soul. What the hell was this woman writing about? A missing son. Taken by a demon? It’s so personal.  But it can’t be true. Not all those years ago. Not the same situation. I flick back to the first page. October 19, 1932. There it is, in black and white. Right there at the top. Can’t be true. Not possible.

I lay the tome down and the heavy leather cover snaps closed. Crawley. Embossed in gold. My family. This kid must be kin. But how are we related? Obsession begins to flow. Is Rebecca my mom’s ... I shake my head. I’ll work that shit out later. I feel myself getting sucked in.

But the forest from the story? That’s place is less than ten minutes from my Mom’s house. The urban planners wanted to cut that shit down and stick a subdivision out there. Nice lines of gridded streets and quarter acre blocks. Nice houses with nice families living a nice existence. Future voters and taxpayers. It never took. The forest stayed. The rumors saw to that.

I run a finger along the rough leather of the cover and drift back. Hell, I’d chased the same crayfish in the same streams the kid had. Plenty of times. With my Mom, tagging along behind. Closer than the other moms. She was always mumbling about the Melonheads. Singing some stupid little ditty I could never make out. It sounded like an … an enchantment, I don’t know. Maybe I’m making shit up. I’m never sure any more.

Then I notice my right hand. The shaky one. It’s tapping out a staccato tune on the leather cover. Suddenly my fingers are nimble and coordinated. The tune I recognize. It’s the same one my Mom used to mumble. But I still can’t remember the words.

From my seated position I look up at the dresser’s dummy.  The grin doesn’t seem so malevolent, like the evil is being kept away by the strange rhythm I’m tapping. Sawdust continues to trickle out of the wound. Why hide a satchel and book in an object like this? I mean, how was anyone supposed to find it? Chance? Just wait for it to naturally disintegrate. Shit, by then most normal families would’ve tossed the damned thing into a dumpster.

I fold open the cover again. This is high quality material, both the leather and paper were made to last. And if the 1932 date is not some elaborate joke, then it must’ve been expensive, and our family has never done expensive. We do OK, but from what I’ve heard,  something like this would’ve been excessive for a Crawley. I run my fingers along the bottom of the page. The surface of the page is almost warm, then I feel them.

Damn, maybe it’s not so expensive, maybe the paper was a low quality reject because I’m feeling little bumps, like air got into the page and tiny bubbles form. For some reason I feel disappointed, like the bumps devaue the quality of the book and the likelihood of the tale. Which I’m now almost certain it is. There’s no way the story of poor little James and Rebecca would’ve disappeared into the shuttered vaults of Crawley family history. A story like this is too juicy to have been kept hidden. And besides, a story like that would’ve been doled out as a lesson to a youngsters about the dangers of strangers in the forest.

Then I glance at the open page. At the top, the stranger with a big head. My hand starts to shake again. I try to recapture the tapping rhythm, but a sliver of fear has inserted itself between my logical brain and the more visceral part of me. the one that over analyses and overthinks. The one that gets nervous. With my left hand I trace the tiny bubbles at the bottom of the page. There’s a cadence there, again soothing. The fear recedes, but my astonishment grows, what the fuck is all this about?

My curiosity piques again. There was a time when my emotions weren’t so tidal. When they were more like the soothing surface of a calm spring lake. But since the shooting, I’ve been, well, so damn inconsistent. My fingers run back and forth along the little dots.  Realization then hits.

Shit.

This isn’t a rhythm, it’s a pattern.

I flip over a page and try again, running my fingers along the bottom of the page. Nothing. I try the next page, nothing again. I flip through more pages, and more, checking the bottom of each page. Dammit. I reach the end of the journal, and nothing.  Maybe it was nothing after all. My shoulders slump as I look around the dust ridden room. So much work. And it’s all up to me.

I snap the book shut, drop it on the upturned chest of drawers and stand. The light from the setting sun slices through the dust at a lower angle. Sawdust continues to trickle from the gash in the mannequin’s side. More stuff to clean. I sigh. The temperature is dropping, and all I’ve done is made myself alternately excited, annoyed and afraid. Maybe I need my meds checked. I sigh again and turn to leave. Then I hear it.

The tiniest of tinkles, like a silver teaspoon hitting a tiled floor a couple of rooms away. But it’s not possible, because the noise came from behind me. From where the dummy is. I slowly turn towards it, half expecting a grip on the shoulder from one of it’s non-existent arms. My heart beats faster, my breathing shallows and a band of fear tightens around my chest.  I come face-to-face with the grin-faced torso. It’s just standing there. Bleeding sawdust. Then I see it. Almost buried in the debris at the base of the mannequin. It must’ve dropped down point first to make any kind of sound at all. It’s the wooden handle of a small tool. I reach down and pull it out. I bring it closer in the dimming light. It’s an awl, or a stylus, like something they use to punch holes in leather.

Or in thick expensive paper.

Next Chapter: Four