Darkness Stirring: A Troubled Spirits Novel Read online

  Darkness Stirring

  A Troubled Spirits Novel

  J.R. Erickson

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Epilogue

  The True Story that Inspired Darkness Stirring

  Also by J.R. Erickson

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2021 J.R. Erickson

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  For Hannah, Nicholas and Maddison.

  Author’s Note

  Darkness Stirring is inspired by a true story. To avoid spoilers, that story is briefly retold at the end of this book.

  1

  June 1998

  "Beverly, wait up," Lorraine called as her friend zigzagged through the trees, long red hair flowing behind her. The bell she wore around her neck rang as she ran ahead.

  A stitch had worked its way into Lorraine’s side, and she stopped, leaning against a tree and rubbing the sore spot. She wasn't a runner. She hated mile day in gym class when the teacher led them out to the track with his stopwatch and whistle. Everyone would take off, sneakers pounding on the rubber-coated asphalt, and Lorraine would be at the end of the pack, huffing and puffing, desperately counting the steps in her head, though every footfall seemed impossibly far from the one that came before.

  Bev was a runner. She ran long-distance on the track team and even did those races where she leaped over hurdles. Lorraine had gone to a couple of her meets, watching enviously from the stands as Bev's sneakers slapped the pavement in dizzying blurs. Lorraine had munched on the energy bars her mother had shoved into her bag, eating away the feeling she'd never be able to run like Bev or be as pretty as Bev or as popular as Bev. The energy bars were supposed to help Lori snack on healthier foods, but she often scarfed down two or three of them in one sitting, chasing that full feeling that never seemed to arrive with ingredients like whey protein and cashew butter.

  "Lor, come on!" Beverly shouted. "We're going to miss the sunset."

  She walked back, slightly exasperated. Lorraine had paused, breath hitching in her lungs. Bev lifted the silver charm that rested against her white t-shirt and shook it. The silver ball emitted a pretty tinkling sound that reminded Lorraine of the little metal triangles some students used in the band. Lorraine played the tuba, which was delicate neither in appearance nor sound.

  "What is that?" Lori asked her, stepping closer to peer at the spherical pendant.

  "It's a harmony ball," Bev said, shaking it. It released its dainty tinkle. "Or a Mexican bola according to my mom. My yaya called it ‘llamadores de ángeles,’ which I guess means angel caller or something like that."

  "Okay," Lorraine said slowly, wrinkling her nose.

  "It's a charm Yaya wore when she was pregnant with my dad. She said they're used to summon a baby's guardian angel. She passed it to my mom when she was pregnant with me, but my mom never wore it. When my yaya visited last month, she told my mom she needed to find it and give it to me. My mom came across it last week when she was cleaning out our attic." Bev shrugged. "I like the way it sounds."

  "It's kind of ugly though," Lori said, and maybe it was with its strange designs etched into the silver orb, but really, she didn't find it ugly at all. She thought it was beautiful and unique, much like Bev with her yaya and her big family from Mexico that she went to visit twice a year, at Christmas and on the Day of the Dead, which was kind of like American Halloween, but sounded far more exotic than dime-store costumes and a pillowcase full of candy.

  "No, it's not," Bev argued, lifting it up. "Well, maybe a little. It sounds pretty, though. Come on."

  She grabbed Lorraine's hand and dragged her along. The cramp in Lorraine's side had abated, but she still lagged behind Bev. Lorraine’s shoulder-length brown hair stuck to the sweat on the back of her neck.

  "Did you ask your parents about Milton's party this weekend? His dad is hosting it and he has an indoor pool. You have to go, Lorraine."

  Lorraine hadn't asked her parents about the party, and she did know that Milton's dad was hosting and that he had an indoor pool. Which was exactly why she hadn't asked to go. The thought of donning a bathing suit in front of the entire eighth grade made her stomach feel like it was dropping out of her body into an alternate dimension. A vision of her pale flabby thighs pressed together, dimples deep in the soft flesh beneath her ugly purple bathing suit, made her want to die from shame. The soft marshmallows that were her upper arms flapping as she jumped into the pool? No, thank you very much.

  "I don't think I can. My mom said something about visiting my grandma."

  This was a lie, though it held a kernel of truth. They visited Lorraine's grandma almost every other weekend. This weekend would likely not be any different, especially if Lorraine's dad worked late Friday night and her mom got so wound up she packed Lorraine and Henry in the car and took off for the hour-long drive to Grandma's house. Lorraine loved visiting her grandma. She always had a plate of fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies in the center of her kitchen table. She and Lorraine's mom would sit around and clip coupons while Henry tried to catch her fluffy Persian cat named Trixie, and Lorraine read or watched hours of television and munched cookies.

  Grandma Mavis was her mom's mom. Lorraine’s dad referred to her as Miserly Mavis, which often resulted in scowls from her mother. Lorraine had looked up ‘miserly’ once in the dictionary at school and found out it meant ‘having the character of a miser’ or ‘small and inadequate,’ which left her no closer to understanding what her dad meant.

  Either way, Grandma Mavis was her favorite, and not just because her dad's mom was a grouchy old lady who chain-smoked and ignored Lorraine and Henry whenever they visited her. She had two Chihuahuas she called her babies, and when one of them bit Henry, she’d snarled, 'Serves you right, you little brat.' Lorraine's mom referred to her as the ‘wicked witch,’ but never in front of her dad.

  "That sucks," Bev announced, dragging Lorraine through the forest. "You go to your grandma's all the time. Can't they leave you behind this once? You could spend the weekend at my house. My mom loves when you come over. She says you're the only person who compliments her cooking
."

  "I don't know why,” Lorraine said. “That fire chicken she makes is so good, and the corn soufflé, that's like my favorite."

  "Ooh, look. Let's climb that one." Bev stopped, pointing at an oak tree that rose toward the sky. The trees in this part of the forest were big and bushy.

  Lorraine couldn't see the top from where she stood at the bottom, which meant the climb would be hard, not to mention scary. “It’s pretty tall,” Lorraine said.

  “Isn’t Machu Picchu in the mountains?” Bev asked. “How are you ever going to go there if you’re afraid of heights?”

  Lorraine scowled. “There’s a difference between being high up with feet on solid ground compared to standing on a twig that might snap at any moment.”

  Bev wasn't afraid of heights. In gym class, she always scrambled the rope to the ceiling without even looking down. She'd skip along the highest bleachers, arms stuck out, barely aware of the drop on either side.

  Bev ran toward the tree and jumped, grabbing the lowest branch that hung a foot above their heads. She kicked her legs and hoisted herself up, wriggling up onto the limb.

  By the time Lorraine was beneath the branch, Bev had already crawled up two more. Soon she'd be in the leaves.

  Lorraine jumped up and grabbed the tree-limb. The bark bit into her palms. She strained upward, trying to lift herself up. The muscles in her arms shrieked and her hands burned. Lorraine let go, dropped back to the ground, and wiped her raw palms on her jean shorts. They were cut-off shorts, but they went nearly to her knees, unlike the cute cut-offs most of the girls wore, Bev included. She had cut-offs on too, but hers were white and stopped high on her lean thighs.

  Lorraine looked up to see Bev disappearing into the dense leaves, easily stepping from branch to branch as if she weren't twenty feet off the ground. Her harmony bell tinkled as she climbed. Lorraine thought if she couldn't see Bev and merely heard the bell, she'd imagine a little magical fairy crouched in the dense leaves above.

  Lorraine took a few steps back and got a running start, jumped and planted her hands on the limb. She gritted her teeth and swung her leg up, hooking one foot on the branch.

  "Come on, Lorraine," she muttered, eyes crossed as she struggled to heave her weight up. She was almost there, so close, but then her right hand started to go numb. She let her leg fall and then her hands jerked free. She landed on her feet, but her right leg buckled and she went down on one knee.

  Lorraine sat heavily on her butt, kicking her legs out into the leaves.

  "Whatever, who cares," she snapped, though her throat had grown sticky as tears pooled behind her eyes. She grabbed a handful of leaves and ripped them into shreds on her bare knees, gathering more until she'd concealed all of her pasty skin beneath the prickly vegetation. The tears dried, and she stood, brushing the leaves off and staring up into the tree.

  "I'm not coming up," Lorraine yelled. She almost added it was too hard or something less lame like she'd seen a deer and wanted to follow it, but she said nothing, searching for Bev in the branches. She couldn't see her.

  The shadows on the forest floor had grown longer, casting the world beneath the canopy into expanding darkness. The sun was setting, and Lorraine imagined Bev perched high in the oak, watching the dazzle of pink and orange flare at the edge of the world. A knot twisted in her gut, but she ignored it.

  "Who cares about a stupid sunset," she snapped, reaching down for a stem of milkweed. She jerked it out, root and all, and tossed it aside. She could watch a sunset from her bedroom any night of the week if she wanted, and she wouldn't have to worry about falling and breaking her leg.

  She walked a few paces away from the tree and examined a log, where a scattering of plump oyster mushrooms poked from the crumbly bark. She broke one off and sniffed it, wrinkling her nose. It smelled like mud and black licorice. She dropped it and squished it beneath her shoe, smearing the white flesh across the leaves. She pulled off another mushroom and crushed it between her palms before picking up another one. The texture was spongy and damp and she thought of the mushrooms from Alice in Wonderland. The hookah-smoking caterpillar had told Alice if she ate from one side of the mushroom, she’d grow larger and if she ate from the opposite side, she’d grow smaller.

  “Smaller, please,” Lorraine murmured. She looked at the mushroom in her hand and considered touching it against her tongue.

  "Good way to end up in the emergency room," Grandma Mavis liked to say anytime Lorraine did something she considered dangerous, which more than once had been suggesting sampling wild mushrooms or berries during their walks in the woods.

  She chucked the mushroom at a tree and watched it splatter on the gray bark.

  Further into the forest, Lorraine heard Bev's harmony bell tinkling.

  She turned and gazed at the tree Bev had climbed into ten minutes before. How had she climbed down without Lorraine hearing her?

  "Bev?" she called, stepping toward the sound of the bell.

  Bev didn't answer, but Lorraine heard the crunching of leaves and walked toward the sound.

  In the distance, something darted behind a tree.

  "Bev?" she called again, hesitantly. It hadn't looked like Bev. But then she heard the ting-a-ling once more. Lorraine ran forward, leaping the last few feet to the tree the figure had disappeared behind.

  No one stood there.

  Lorraine paused, listening, but didn't hear the bell or her footsteps now.

  "Come on, Bev. I don't want to play this game." Lorraine didn't know exactly what game they were playing, but she figured it ended with Bev bounding out from behind a tree and scaring her half to death.

  Bev didn't answer.

  "Bev! I'm serious. It's going to be dark soon. Let's walk back."

  Nothing.

  Lorraine shoved her hands into her shorts's pockets, irritated but also primed for the scare she suspected was coming. She walked back toward the tree Bev had climbed, kicking at the leaves, spinning a full circle every few seconds in case Bev crept up behind her.

  She didn't.

  "Bev!" Lorraine hollered, directing her voice toward the top of the tree, though she surely wasn't up there.

  Lorraine had heard the bell in the woods. Bev must have climbed down when Lorraine wasn't looking. She could practically feel Bev watching her, crouched behind a bush, waiting for the perfect moment to jump out.

  Goosebumps rose along her forearms as she studied the darkening woods. Lorraine truly did feel as if someone were watching her—only it didn't quite feel like Bev.

  She scowled and kicked the tree. "Come on, Bev. I'm not kidding around. I seriously will walk back by myself if you don't come out in five seconds. One, two, three."

  A twig snapped behind her and Lorraine spun around, eyes searching the gloom.

  No Bev.

  Lorraine almost said, 'Four,' but her throat had gone dry. She needed a drink of water. She drew in a breath and squinted into the murky woods. The trees had taken on menacing shapes, big and black—perfect for concealing anyone or anything.

  The Dogman flashed into her thoughts, an urban legend that had been the subject of Brady Malcom's English paper. He'd stood in front of the class two weeks before reading aloud from said paper, accentuating the stories of the Dogman as if he stood beside a crackling campfire in the night woods regaling his riveted audience with details of the half-man, half-dog beast who stalked the northern Michigan woods.

  A strange sound ripped through the trees, a shriek of pain and terror snuffed out before it could reach its peak. Lorraine gasped and stumbled back against the oak.

  ‘Some witnesses have described the Dogman's cry as a humanoid shriek,’ Brady had told the class, a leering grin revealing his brace-encased teeth.

  Lorraine pressed her back against the tree as she remembered the details of that hideous monster, and she wanted suddenly, desperately to be home sitting in front of the television, eating microwave popcorn, talking with Bev about which Buffy the Vampire Slayer character they
'd most like to go on a date with.

  "For real, Bev. I swear I'm going to leave without you." Lorraine's voice had lost some of its boom. It barely echoed through the trees before it faded and disappeared.

  Gathering her courage, she stepped away from the tree, back in the direction she'd heard the bell earlier. She walked forward. "Bev!"

  Lorraine continued walking and calling Bev's name, going ten yards in one direction, circling back to the tree, ten yards in another direction, back to the tree.

  No Bev. Every minute that passed, her spine stiffened and the thump of her heart grew louder in her ears.

  "Bev?" she called again, and now Lorraine's voice cracked and hot tears spilled down her cheeks. She didn't even care now if Bev saw her crying, if she jumped out and Lorraine was blubbering like a baby. She just wanted Bev to jump out.

  "Bev?" Lorraine whimpered her name one last time, and then she ran.

  Her feet cracked over sticks and leaves as she fled through the trees. She'd come back for Bev later.

  Something, someone was behind her. She could feel it. She could imagine it growing larger, looming, the darkness swallowing her up, a hand reaching out to grab hold of her shapeless t-shirt.