Doll Face

33

There in the darkness of the sedan that drove slowly toward an unknown destination, Creep retreated further and further into the void of his own mind. How long he crouched there on the backseat, shaking and delirious, he did not know. Only that suddenly, as if a light had gone on in his brain, awareness returned and he heard a voice in his mind say, Just what the fuck do you think you’re doing? You waiting for Mommy to come and chase away the boogeyman?

He sat up straight.

He was not the bravest or calmest of people in the best of times and right then his nerves were jangling like wind chimes. He was afraid to act. He was afraid not to act. Regardless, the unpleasant reality of his situation remained: he was in a big black car that was driving itself down dark streets, moving leisurely like it was part of a funeral procession.

He figured that probably wasn’t too far off the mark.

Everything was still in black-and-white inside the car. It was madness, but there was no getting around it. He could see color outside the car—a red STOP sign, a yellow curb, a purple flowering lilac bush fronting the street—but inside it was all grays and whites and blacks.

You going to sit here and do nothing, you pussy?

God only knew how far away from the others he was now. He had to bring this to a halt one way or another. He had to get out of this fucking car right now. Which was a great idea, but how was he supposed to do that? He was terrified and almost afraid to move, afraid to try anything in case whoever was controlling this decided to make it worse for him.

But you have to do something.

God yes, he knew that… but what?

He was staring at the steering wheel, watching how it rotated itself smoothly to the left or the right when the car needed to take a corner. The turn signal lever was even pulled down and then pushed back up. It was insane. He was insane. None of this could be happening, yet it was. He was seeing it.

He waited there helplessly for a few more moments and then became aware of a hot, spoiled smell in the car.

He was almost certain some dead thing would materialize on the seat next to him as the smell was so strong. He waited for it to dissipate as if maybe the car had just driven past some rotting animal on the road, but it did not dissipate—it grew stronger, hot and sickening.

A drop of liquid fell on his face.

With a start, he brushed it away… his fingers were wet with something black. Blood? Dear God, was it blood? But he knew it was. In old black-and-white movies, blood always looked black and he remembered finding that very disturbing as a child. Black stuff leaking from people. Not red, but… black. As this crossed his cluttered, seesawing mind, another drop landed on the tip of his nose and another struck his scalp. It felt hot, very hot.

More black blood fell. It was seeping from the ceiling as if the car were horribly injured. It dropped onto his head and ran down his face like hot oil. He crawled away, pushing himself up against the opposite door. The seats were oozing blood now. As he pressed a hand against them, dark blood pooled. Then a strip of upholstery hung down from the ceiling a few inches from his face… only it was not upholstery, it was not cloth or leather or some nappy knit fabric that had torn loose.

It was flesh.

It was living tissue.

No, not living tissue but dead tissue. He could smell the odor of putrescence wafting from it. He had all he could do to keep his stomach down. The car was not metal and wood and rubber and plastic… no, it was a living thing, an organism that was dead or dying. It was decaying around him and he was trapped in it like a mouse in a rotting pumpkin.

Creep sat there, stunned and nearly breathless by the idea. It could not be. He was hallucinating, he was tripping. He wasn’t here at all. He was in a padded room somewhere, heavily sedated and screaming his mind out.

Panic broke inside him, sharp and cutting as a voice in the back of his head said, first it’ll rot with organic decay, then the worms will come crawling out of the seats and the flies will cluster and the vermin will swarm as it goes to mush. And you’ll be here. You’ll be here to witness it all—

He couldn’t take any more of it.

He just couldn’t.

Shrieking and wild, he bashed at the windows as the ceiling dripped and great fleshy strips were torn from the moist, putrid seats as he thrashed. The stench of gassy decomposition was getting thick in the air. It was like a seeping green mist, hot and gagging and utterly repulsive. He could taste it on his tongue, feel its foul juices like dew against his face. He tried to pull himself over the seat into the front and his fingers sank into the spongy tissue they were made of, black juice gushing over the backs of his hands.

Everything was rot and ruin and there was no escape.

Manically, he began to tear at the upholstery, ripping it with his fingers, gouging his nails into its pulpous tissues and somewhere during the process he began to scream as his mind emptied itself.