The Laughterhouse A Thriller

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Psychic number five is the same as the other psychics, as if the first four had their personalities blended up and poured into this fifty-something-year-old Asian woman with a receding hairline and a chin home to four good-sized moles, each of which is home to at least one good-sized hair, the longest of which—the length of a baby’s arm—she must be keeping for luck. She senses dead people and can tell your destiny, and her husband gives tarot card readings too for an extra forty dollars. She doesn’t put on a show like some of the others. Instead they sit at her kitchen table while she sips Asian tea with Asian prints on the walls full of Asian symbols that mean nothing to him. The incense burning on the windowsills is making his nose itch. She looks at his palms and tells him that she isn’t a palm reader, takes her hands in his, and, like dial-up modems before he went away, she makes strange noises as she makes a long-distance connection.

“You’ve lost somebody,” she tells him, when she’s logged into the afterlife and, unlike dial-up modems, she makes the connection on the first try. “Somebody you care about.”

When it’s over he feels betrayed again, another hack taking his money from him, and most of all he feels annoyed at himself for putting himself through it. For some reason he thought her being Asian would have made it more real, more spiritual, and it makes the disappointment harder. He’s running out of chances to talk to his family.

He doesn’t thank her for her time. He pushes himself away from the table when she tells him his wife forgives him. He throws the money down and declines her offer of the tarot card reading.

Caleb is passing the living room when he sees his car on the TV. He sees it, and has taken two more steps before it registers with him. He comes to a stop and moves back to the doorway. The husband is on the couch with two golf ball—sized crystal balls in his hand, using his fingers to circle them around each other. He looks up and nods at Caleb but doesn’t say anything, and Caleb watches as the reporter tells them Dr. Stanton and his children have been reported missing. She tells them there have been signs of a struggle and blood found at the scene. A car found on the same street has drawn the interest of the police, and they show the car again, and then they show it being loaded onto the back of a truck.

He figured they would discover Stanton was missing today. He figured there was a chance they would find his car—he just didn’t think it was likely. Not so soon anyway.

It changes everything.

The woman follows him to the door, trying to sell him the idea of another appointment, saying she can give him a discount if he comes back. He keeps his back to her and walks quickly to the doctor’s car, and she stops following him at the end of the footpath. He’s suddenly aware that soon, if not already, a description of the doctor’s car will be all over the news, along with the license plate. Can the psychic see it? He turns back toward her, but she’s already making her way back inside.

His own car, he wiped it down last night. If there’s any trace of him the police will find it. Same goes for the house—he wiped down any of the surfaces he touched. DNA can take weeks, he isn’t worried about that, but fingerprints are quick. If they find his prints they will have his name within hours.

They won’t find them. He was careful.

Damn it, why couldn’t he have focused more last night? If he had, he could have gotten it all done. The cops could have found all the fingerprints they wanted because it all would have been over by now.

If they do get a print, and he doubts they’ll find one, and get his name, the first thing they’ll do is talk to his probation officer and get his address. They’ll see he has gone, they’ll call in at his work, then they’ll come to the slaughterhouse. With the doctor and kids missing, they’ll probably try the slaughterhouse first. All because of a stupid car battery. Why the f*ck couldn’t the psychics have seen that one coming?

The car battery. Ah, damn it! Last night, he’d have put his hands all over the front of the car when he was jump-starting it. Would the police fingerprint that area? No, he doesn’t see why they would. Surely they’d check only the steering wheel and doors, parts of the interior. Maybe the gas cap too.

He has to think worst-case scenario. He has to imagine the police will know soon who he is.

New plan.

It takes him twenty minutes to get back to the slaughterhouse. The first half of the journey he has to stick to the speed limit, but once he hits the open roads he puts his foot down. The doctor and two of the kids look scared. As well they should. Octavia has fallen asleep. First thing he does is put a piece of duct tape over Stanton’s mouth to shut him up. There is no time to mess around. No time to be polite.

“Drink this while I tell you all a story,” Caleb says, handing Melanie a glass of cola.

“I’m not thirsty.”

“You might not get another chance for a while,” he tells her.

“I don’t want it.”

“Do you want me to hurt one of your sisters instead?” he asks, and points at Katy. Katy, upon being pointed at, starts to sing her version of the alphabet again.

Melanie sips at the drink. “It tastes funny.”

“Melanie, I’m not f*cking around here,” he says, desperate to get this done. “If you don’t carry on drinking it, I swear I’m going to start hurting people.”

Melanie holds in her tears and starts drinking.

“That’s good,” he tells her. “You’re doing good. Now, this story,” he carries on, “it’s about a little girl named Tabitha. One day this bad man saw her and he thought she was so cute that he wanted to hurt her.”

Katy stops singing. She’s focusing on what he’s saying, and slowly she shakes her head. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Caleb agrees, looking over at Dr. Stanton, “but sometimes in life that’s just the way it is. The bad man’s name was James and he began to follow her. Every day after school Tabitha would walk home, and this bad man, this James, he would be there. He knew where she lived. He knew which direction she took.”

The girls are staring at him with big eyes, holding back tears and faces full of concentration. And fear—there’s a good amount of fear in their faces too. And confusion.

“He knew everything about her. He had even broken in to her mom and dad’s house and spent time in her bedroom, going through all of her things, looking at the pictures on the wall she had drawn, looking at her clothes. He was so obsessed by her that he would steal her underwear and store it under his mattress.”

“That’s gross,” Melanie says.

“Why would he do that?” Katy asks, and both girls are scared but engaged.

“Because James wasn’t like other people,” he says. “He stopped Tabitha on the way home from school one day. He was on the sidewalk by a park calling for his puppy, only there was no puppy, but Tabitha didn’t know that. He called and called and then he saw her, and he asked her, “Have you seen my puppy?” She hadn’t, but she wanted to help. So she went into the park with him, and he took her across the other side, through the trees, and out the other side where his van was waiting. He took her home, and for two days he hurt her over and over while the police and her family looked for her.”

“What did he do to her?” Melanie asks.

“He hurt her,” Caleb says.

“But how?” Katy asks.

“That part of the story you don’t need to know,” he says, “but when he was done, he didn’t know what to do, and he didn’t want her telling people about all the things he had done to her, so he took a knife,” he says, then holds up his, “that looked just like this.”

The doctor starts murmuring against the tape, and Caleb can see him squirming against his bindings. All eyes in the room are on the knife, except Octavia, who is snoring softly.

“He was getting ready to kill her,” he says, carrying on, “when the police knocked on his door. Somebody had seen a van in the area. The police were doing a routine check on people with that model van. They came to talk to him expecting nothing, but had known straight away there was something wrong. They forced their way inside and found Tabitha. If they had come to his house a minute later she would have died.”

Melanie has almost finished her drink. Both girls are crying.

“Here,” he says, and he takes the glass from her. He fills it up and hands it to Katy. She slowly sips at it, finding it difficult because she can’t stop crying. The doctor is still squirming on the floor, perhaps this story giving him an idea of where things are heading. He isn’t covering any ground and his face is almost purple. Melanie is slowly becoming tired.

“Your daddy knew what the bad man had done,” Caleb says, still staring at Stanton, “and yet not long after that they became friends. Your daddy said all these good things about James, how it wasn’t James’s fault, how he was sick, how he wasn’t able to control himself. Your daddy spent one hour with him, he got to know him so well that he told the world that what James needed was help, not punishment, because what James had was a sickness, a sickness brought about by his own upbringing. Your daddy took all that blame from James and he put it all elsewhere. He told the lawyers and the judge and the jury that it was James’s mother’s fault, that it was the school system’s fault, how it was everybody else’s fault except James’s. They all listened and agreed because your daddy was very convincing. What James had could be cured, your dad said, if he was given enough care and understanding. So, instead of putting him in jail, he went into a hospital called Grover Hills, where people who didn’t think properly were looked after. He was in Grover Hills for two years, and then your daddy said that James was all better, that James could be a productive member of society.”

Melanie’s eyes are heavy. She’s yawning and struggling to stay awake. Katy isn’t far behind. How long does he have?

“So your dad let James go, and they got him a flat in town where he would live alone, under the condition that once a week he had to go and see your daddy.

“The thing is, girls, your daddy shouldn’t have made friends with such a bad man, nobody ever should, because that man wasn’t cured at all. Within a week of being released he did the same thing to my daughter that he did to Tabitha, only the police didn’t know where to look because James brought her here,” he tells them, and he spreads his arms in a gesture that shows here is this room, that here is this entire building. “He kept Jessica here—that’s her name, by the way, he kept her here and hurt her and the police knew who they were looking for but they didn’t know where to look, and when they did know it was too late. When he was finished with Jessica he took a knife like this one,” he says, moving the knife so each of them can get a good look at it, “and he stabbed her nineteen times,” he tells them, “and her life and all her blood and everything she ever would have become seeped out onto the very floor you’re resting on.”

Melanie is asleep. Katy’s chin is dipping down to her chest. It’s hard telling the story—it’s making Caleb feel sick. For fifteen years he’s visualized the moment his daughter died. He’s visualized the six hours of hell before it, the abduction, the fear. Every topic leads his mind to his daughter somehow. Everything he sees or hears can be linked back to Jessica in only a few steps. It’s like seven degrees of separation. At dinner he’ll see a knife and think about his daughter. He’ll see a child on TV or in the street. He’ll see an ad in the newspaper for children’s clothes. Eating steak makes him think about the slaughterhouse. The cold weather, policemen, TV shows, speeding cars, abusive old women—they’re all just a step away from visualizing this nightmare. There is no off switch. His daughter lying naked and dead on the floor, even though he never saw it, is an image he can’t shake. The last thing she ever saw—he can’t shake that either.

“And your daddy,” his voice lower now, “he could have stopped that from happening. He was the one who told everybody James could be cured. He’s the reason my little girl was killed. It wasn’t just my daughter who died. My wife was so sad at what happened that she died too, and so did our baby boy who was so tiny he was still inside her. Your daddy took my family away, and that’s the reason,” he says, looking over at the doctor, “I have to do the same thing to him that happened to me.”

The glass falls out of Katy’s hand and smashes on the ground. Stanton reacts to it, and Octavia wakes up. Melanie and Katy stay asleep. Octavia looks at her father, then at her sisters, smiles, then frowns, then cries.

“There’s been a development,” he says, looking over at the doctor. “The police know you’re missing, and soon they’re going to figure out it’s me who has you. I wanted to finish things out here tonight, but there’s no time for that now. So the plan has to change. Instead four of us are going to go for a ride.”

The doctor is struggling against the plastic ties, his face still purple. Octavia’s cries are getting louder. And more annoying. He looks at her and her face is scrunched into an evil little grimace, her eyes closed tightly and her mouth puckered open. She inhales deeply, then lets out an even louder cry.

“It’s okay, your daughters are okay,” Caleb tells Stanton, having to talk loudly over the baby. “Now I know I told you earlier I was going to kill your family, and that hasn’t changed. I’m going to assume your addition is better than your diagnosis, so when I said the four of us are going for a ride you know that means somebody has to stay. We’re going to cull the group a little. I’m the driver and the man looking for revenge, so I’m essential. You’re essential too. The girls, well . . . Goddamn it,” he says, Octavia, breaking his train of thought. “Shut up, will you just shut up?”

She gets louder. He unstraps her from her seat and checks her diaper. It’s wet. She’s probably hungry too. He bounces her up and down and her crying only gets louder.

“Sssush,” he tells her, rocking her gently. “If you don’t stop crying, I’m going to have to wrap duct tape all around your face,” he says, knowing she doesn’t understand him, and knowing he wouldn’t need to use that much tape. “Come on, Octavia, shush now.”

She hiccups then throws up on his shoulder, then starts wailing again. He puts her back into her seat and straps her in, then carries the seat outside. He rests her in the sun and walks back into the office. He uses a wipe to clean his shirt and carries on talking to Stanton.

“Only two of your daughters are essential, and to me each of your daughters holds the same value. The question is, what value are they to you? One can stay here, and two can come with us. It’s your decision. Oh, and I should add, the one who stays behind—she has to die.”

One of the girls gasps from behind him. He turns to look at them. They’re both still sleeping. At least he thinks they are. Maybe one is having a bad dream. He crouches down and rocks them. Maybe one of them is faking.

“Are you awake?” he asks Katy, then he asks the same of Melanie. “If you’re faking, now is the time to tell me. If I find out you’re awake I’m going to hurt you.”

Nothing. Well, if one of them is faking he’ll know in a few minutes’ time, that’s for sure.

He turns back to Stanton.

“I promise you, the one who stays won’t feel a thing. And the others won’t even know who you picked. None of them have to know you were picking favorites.

“So, Doctor, who’s staying and who’s coming? I’m not an unfair man,” he says, and he can still hear the baby screaming outside. “I’ll give you two minutes to decide. You don’t have an answer for me in two minutes, I start cutting off Katy’s fingers until you do,” he says, and Stanton’s grunts get louder, the veins are standing out on his forehead as he struggles to break free. He sounds like he’s choking on his tongue. “Somehow I don’t think you’ll let me get through all those fingers, because if I do then I start on Melanie. Then I go to work on their feet, and by the time you finally make a decision there won’t be anything that I haven’t cut off. It’s going to happen, Stanton, it’s going to happen no matter what,” he says, his voice calm and steady, and for a moment the doctor stops struggling as all the color drains out of him, no doubt his mind filling with images of what’s to come over the next few minutes. He looks up at Caleb, his eyes pleading for him to stop all of this. Caleb reaches down and grabs the duct tape, ready to pull it away. “I’m a runaway train you can’t stop, Stanton—all you can do is push some of your family out of the way. Save your daughters some pain, save yourself from having to see what a pile of fingers and limbs looks like bleeding all over the floor because it’s not going to be pretty. Don’t waste time on thinking you can save them all because you can’t. You really, really can’t. You’ve got a big decision to make. Two minutes to decide which one of your daughters doesn’t get to walk out of here alive, that’s all you have, Doctor, because the train has already left the station.”