Everyone hoped that the rains would stop, but according to the news, this was a mini- nor’easter. And, another missing teenage boy. No one was going outside.
Two days later and it was still pouring. On the second night, the whole family was gathered at the dining table for supper. They ate spaghetti and meatballs, using this homemade marinara sauce that grandma had brought over for the occasion. While everyone else made small talk, Bobby sat silent, twirling angel hair around his fork.
Grandma took notice and smiled at her grandson. “Why, I haven’t heard a peep out of you all day, Bobby. Cat got your tongue?”
“We don’t have any cats,” Bobby said.
Grandma laughed. “My, you’re quite the stoic.”
“Mom, don’t bother the poor boy,” Dad pleaded.
“I’m just trying to include him, is that so mean?”
“What’s stoic mean?” Bobby asked.
“It means you’re a man of few words,” Grandma replied with a wink. Dad gave Grandma a look and Grandma sighed and said, “Oh, alright. You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.”
The boy smiled slightly, although he gladly accepted Grandma’s invitation to silence. She was always nice. Bobby remained mute throughout the rest of dinner, opening his mouth only briefly to thank his grandma for the meal.
“You’re welcome, dear!”
With that, Bobby nodded, smiling awkwardly and left the room. He was on his way back to his bedroom (it was still his before bedtime, at least), until halfway there Bobby realized he forgot his half-full soda glass at the table. Bobby turned and started back, but stopped when he heard his grandpa mention his name.
“Never seen a boy that quiet,” Grandpa said. “It’s eerie. Is everything alright, y’know…” Grandpa paused. Bobby pictured him tracing his wrinkly pointer finger around in a circle beside his bald head. “…Up there?”
“He’s fine,” Mom said. “He’s just different is all. He talks when he wants to.”
“I’m just saying. It’s not right, a boy his age being so quiet. And don’t get me started on the masturbating!”
Everyone dropped their silverware in a weirdly synchronized clink! Of course, no one else spoke, but the internal sighing was quite palpable.
Bobby peeked around the corner just as Grandpa put up his hands in humble surrender. “I’m sorry. Sorry, really. All I’m asking is, did you get him tested?”
“Pop, please,” Dad pleaded, getting frustrated. “We talked about it. We tested him a while ago and he’s perfectly normal...according to the psychiatrist.”
“Right. I’m only asking, and no offense to you, Marie,” Grandpa said to Bobby’s mom.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Mom replied.
“Back in my day, we used to blame the mothers for boys like that. Nobody could help them, but now I hear you can treat that sort of thing.”
“Pop, that’s enough. There’s nothing wrong with Bobby.”
“And the jerking off every two seconds?!”
This time Bobby’s dad sighed quite loudly, aggravated.
“God damn it, Pop. Stop talking, please.”
Susie piped up: “What’s ‘jerking off’?”
Bobby couldn’t listen anymore.
He shuffled silently away to his room, shut the door, and went into the bathroom. He turned on the shower and stripped, but he didn’t step into the tub. Using the running water to cover the sound, he started to beat off. He had ten, maybe fifteen minutes before grandpa yelled at him to stop wasting the hot water.
Bobby jerked and beat and whacked and wanked, thinking about the girls at school, about the redhead from by the cove, but God damn it he couldn’t get hard. So he stroked faster and faster even though it hurt, even though it opened the half-healed scabs and drew blood, and even though he wanted to cry and stop, he just kept going until finally there came a hard rap on the door from Grandpa:
“Hey, finish up in there. You’re wasting all the hot water!”
The rain let up towards the weekend, and finally Bobby had a chance to get away from his folks. With the clouds parted and the sun out, hundreds of tourists and locals took to the beach.
Bobby was in line for fried dough on the boardwalk, when he spotted a flash of red to his right. He turned his head, half expecting his mystery love to disappear, but there she was, strolling on the beach all by her lonesome. Bobby followed her.
She padded gently across the sand a little ways away from him, maybe twenty feet or so if he had to guesstimate. Bobby tried to catch up to her without making himself seem too eager, in case she turned around and saw him.
Gawking from afar, Bobby felt his heart aching and breaking for this girl. He didn’t know her, but he loved her. He knew it was stupid to love someone you didn’t know. But you can fall for a face. You can be captured by it, and, what’s more, moved and molded and commanded and condemned too. In a face that you love, you see your salvation translated in the lines and dimples etched across the skin, and when the face turns away all you see is your true and lonely future dancing mockingly on the back of her head.
They walked across the beach, with Bobby always just a little too far away from his dream girl. As they neared the underside of the pier, Bobby stepped barefoot on a small piece of broken glass. He yelped and stopped in his tracks, stumbling backwards and falling in the sand. He clutched his foot, and, gritting his teeth, Bobby took a handkerchief out of his pocket, wrapped it around his foot, and stood again to follow his girl. She was nowhere to be seen.
Where did she go?
Bobby half-jogged across the sand to the pier, wincing at the sharp sting that tortured his foot at every step. He reached the underbelly of the pier and passed between the wooden pillars that propped it up, scanning the way ahead as he did so. Still, he didn’t see her, but he didn’t want to give up that easily just yet. Bobby moved on, casting his eyes left and right, hoping that the redhead might have slipped behind one of the pillars.
He moved out from under the pier and carried on down the shoreline. A small part of him wondered what the hell he was doing. It was a busy day on the beach, even a one-armed man with horns growing from his head could get lost in the masses here. Still, it did not deter Bobby from his tireless search.
The boy stopped two people along the way and he asked, “Hey, you didn’t see a beautiful redhead with green eyes, did you?” The first person, a fat guy with a tremendously curly happy trail running down his engorged stomach, just rolled his eyes and ignored Bobby. The second person was an elderly woman. She shook her head, then looked over Bobby’s shoulder and then down at his foot. “Young man,” she said, “Is your foot bleeding?”
Bobby turned his head and saw a series of scattered red prints in the sand leading straight to himself. He lifted his bandaged foot and realized his wound had bled through the handkerchief.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. Thank you.”
“Do you need help?”
“No, no, I’m fine. Thank you.” Bobby carried on and the old lady shrugged and went her separate way.
Eventually, his foot stopped leaving a trail, but not before attracting a few stares from the passerby. Bobby felt too many eyes on him and he walked a little faster.
What are you doing? Asked the lone voice of reason in his head. Where are you even going?
The cove, he answered to himself. Bobby had not realized that he had been moving in that particular direction already, but as the sound of civilization drifted away, soon enough he recognized the usual landmarks. The tall grass, the big rocks in the distance, and the crabs in their tiny lagoons. He even saw two turtles mating again but drawing closer he noticed the male’s head hung limp upon the female’s shell. The male was mute, its eyes half open and glassy while blood ran from the corners of its mouth. The female was alive. Bobby stopped and gawked, his jaw dropping at the sight. The female turtle met the boy’s gaze and she blinked, seemingly uninterested. Bobby took a tentative step forward and the turtle suddenly hissed at him like a raptor, instantly sending the boy back on his path.
Alarms rang in his head and his gut twisted with every instinct urging him to turn back, but Bobby persisted. He couldn’t quit now, the cove was in sight. It grew with each passing step until the cove loomed just ahead, then Bobby stopped and stayed put for a long beat. There she is, some mad part of him thought. He didn’t see her, but somehow he just knew. What are you waiting for?
He didn’t know. Maybe it was the hairs rising on the back of his neck, or perhaps the heat of the sun bearing down, or the pain in his foot, or just the overall ludicrousness of the situation finally dawning upon him -- but the wind seemed to die from Bobby’s sail.
Why am I here? The voice of reason questioned.
The cove was close enough for him to see that the tides were high and especially wild today. He could swim if he had to, but the thought of accidentally getting dragged out to the wider ocean did not seem so appealing. Yet that mad part of him, the louder voice, screamed for him to take his chances. Go on. Take a dive. Search the cove. Fuck it, comb the whole beach if you have to.
Bobby lifted his cut foot to step forward, but he stopped, looking down at the hasty tourniquet that he had tied so poorly. Reason spoke up again, louder this time. Why? What’s so important about her? Who is she to you? You’re stalking a complete stranger. Just go home, Bobby.
He didn’t want to listen, but a raindrop landed on his head just then, which was quickly followed by another, and another, until the scattered drops became a drizzle. Bobby gazed at the sky, equal parts annoyed, relieved, and surprised at the unexpected change in the weather. The clouds were thick and grew ever darker while thunder rumbled overhead. It would pour soon, Bobby had to make a choice.
Go home, pleaded the voice, and with much reluctance he finally did.
But Bobby couldn’t forget her. Her face stole into his mind -- the image of that perfect and terrifying woman torturing him with her cryptic smile and haunting gaze.
In his dreams he saw blackness like an empty canvas until, little by little, she took shape. A thin, red tracer drew across an invisible horizon, and then another, and so on, until the tracers grew thick and weaved together into a full head of hair. Two milky white hands finally reached up to part the thick strands.
Her face appeared in the dark, and she smiled with two narrow lines of blood running from the corners of her mouth. Her green eyes sparkled and glimmered, casting a peculiar light. Full lips pursing together softly. Hanging there, unblinking, Beautiful and painful as a torch held too close to his face.
He awoke later to the sounds of storm clouds cracking in the night. It was dark in the living room, save for the blinking red light on the wall-mounted TV. Between bouts of thunderclaps was the steady patter of rain falling outside, which had initially lulled the boy to sleep, but at present the storm raged so hard that Bobby could hear water overflowing from the gutters in heavy torrents. He laid awake on the pull-out sofa bed, rubbing his eyes and glancing left. In the adjoining kitchen, he could just make out the glowing green numbers on the microwave clock: 2:33 AM.
Bobby slipped from the covers, yawning, and he got to his feet. He was thirsty and started for the kitchen to grab a glass of water, but then he heard something bounce off the back door. He almost missed it with the rainfall muffling any and all sound, he could barely even hear the air conditioner humming in the background, but something hit the glass hard enough to make it rattle in place.
The curtain was drawn, so Bobby approached the door and pulled it aside. Pitch-black void and thick drops of rain greeted him. Bobby turned on the back porch light -- it did little to illuminate the darkness, but looking down he could see a beach ball laying on the ground right in front of the door.
Of all the things, Bobby thought. Someone must have left it on the beach and the wind blew it towards us, or something.
He flicked off the porch light and grabbed the curtain, but as he was about to pull it back across the glass, lightning flashed and lit up the whole beach in front of him like a flare. Thunder crashed in the sky and in the briefest instant, Bobby saw the figure of a naked redhead walking towards the house. He couldn’t see her eyes or face, but who else would it be? Lightning struck again a moment later and there she was again, somehow closing the distance by several yards in the seconds between flashes.
Bobby had seen enough horror movies to know this is how the worst ones started, with some mysterious siren appearing in the night to tempt the poor victim. He knew this consciously and the little voice of reason begged him to leave things be, but something came over him. Not the other, reckless voice that screamed inside his head from earlier, but rather it was a feeling. A force, like the invisible strings of a puppeteer pulling him along. He watched his hand leave the curtain and grip the door handle instead. Bobby tried to open the door, but it stuck at first. He forgot it was locked, so he quickly unlocked it and slid open the door.
The sound of torrential downpour practically exploded in his ears without any glass in the way to mitigate the sound. Bobby grabbed an umbrella off the nearby coat rack and pushed it open, but as soon as he stepped outside the wind picked up in a violent gust and blew the thing inside-out before it ripped itself out of his hand. The ball flew away with it, bouncing across the beach in huge leaps, while the umbrella landed ten feet away, its thin metal ribs sticking the thing upside-down in the sand.
Bobby was outside for all a few seconds and he was already soaked, but he didn’t care. His eyes were locked on the dark, hourglass silhouette ahead of him. She stopped in place, standing still for a beat while Bobby slowly approached her. That voice of reason (Go back go back don’t do it go Bobby go) was almost non-existent. He was entranced, every step not his own, every iota of good sense suppressed, yet he carried on.
Thunder clapped and lightning flared – the redhead flashed for a moment and then darkness fell as fast. The dark silhouette was gone and Bobby thought for a second that his eyes simply needed to readjust. No one disappears like that. Once more, lightning struck and bolts of electricity forked across the ocean’s horizon, like manyfold branches on a tree. The beach lit up and sure enough, the redhead was gone.
Bobby stood there, rain pummeling him with drops as thick and heavy as hailstones, waiting for a silhouette or another flash to reveal his mystery love. Minutes passed, lightning lit the sky and turned night to day for individual seconds at a time, and yet Bobby saw no one.
The trance lifted itself. Bobby blinked and shivered, suddenly aware of his miserably wet and cold he was. He hurried back inside, slid the door closed, locked it, and drew the curtain. He was scared. Am I going crazy? He repeated the question to himself over and over as he retreated to the other bathroom in the hallway to grab a fresh towel off the rack. Bobby stripped his soaked clothes, ringing them out before hanging them over the shower curtain pole.
By the time he dried himself off, Bobby had semi-successfully talked himself down. Thoughts of, Am I crazy? became thoughts of, Not crazy, just the mind playing tricks. Mind plays tricks all the time in the dark. Just woke up, you were dreaming about her, of course you’re gonna see – no, think you’re seeing – some girl on a stormy night. Just the mind playing tricks. Mind playing tricks.
Even so, when he went back to bed, it took him a while to fall asleep.
Bobby awoke not long after. It was little after six in the morning and as he rubbed his eyes, he remembered what he saw and wondered if it was a dream. Quietly as he could, Bobby put on his sandals, slipped out the back door, and sure enough he found the wrecked umbrella still sticking out of the sand. At least the weather had improved, with the so-called “monsoon” having ceased and the storm clouds parted. As the sun rose in the east over the ocean line, the sky-tinged purple around the orange circle that burned on the horizon.
A gentle breeze caressed Bobby’s cheek and he shivered. He didn’t want to go back to sleep, but he didn’t want to sit around inside either. Besides, his grandparents were leaving at some point in the morning, so in the hopes that he would miss them, Bobby took it on himself to go for a walk.
Going south took to the pier and eventually to the cove. He was still unsure of what came over him last night, and he didn’t believe in magic, but Bobby was sure the redhead had an unnatural power. It was silly to consider, but despite the way he lusted for her still, he had a feeling that if he turned south, he might not come back. So, Bobby walked north.
The beaches were privately owned by summer residents and various hotels, so while it was too early for anyone else to be out and about, Bobby left the sand and hit the sidewalk. He walked for an hour, strolling past businesses that had yet to open today and cutting through various neighborhoods without straying too far from the shore. The naked redhead was on his mind the whole time, no matter how hard he tried to push her image away. His thoughts bounced between those of a lewder nature (Wow, real or imagined, that chick had a rack on her...), to questions that terrified him on an existential level (never mind who she, what the fuck is she?).
Eventually, his stomach growled, and he didn’t bring his wallet, so Bobby made the long trip back to the house. By the time he got back, it was almost eight, if he had to guess. He came in through the back and immediately went to the kitchen, but he stopped just before opening the fridge. Bobby saw Grandma and Grandpa’s bags fully packed and sitting in the hallway while the rest of his folks were hanging by the front door to say their goodbyes.
Mom and Dad were hugging Grandma, and Grandpa came out of the second bathroom, lighting a match and shaking away the flame before he threw it out.
Grandpa hugged Bobby’s parents, and Susie came in, hugging both her grandparents. “Goodbye Grandpa, goodbye Grandma!” Susie kissed them both on the cheek.
“Oh, you’re the cutest,” Grandpa said and kissed his granddaughter on her forehead. He turned to Bobby, who had left the kitchen to say his own goodbye. To Bobby’s surprise, Grandpa actually smiled for real this time. “There you are. Thought you’d run away.”
“No, just walked away.”
Grandpa laughed and said, “Funny kid. C’mere and give your grandfather a hug.” Bobby didn’t want to, but he did as he was told since it meant getting the old bastard out the door quicker. Grandpa squeezed Bobby in a tight embrace, and, as Bobby pulled away, Grandpa looked down and frowned, disgusted at the off-white/yellowed spots standing out on the front of his grandson’s shorts. “Yikes, I hope the watermarks are at least dry.”
“Huh?”
Bobby looked down and realized that after he hopped out the shower, he might’ve grabbed some clothes out of the dirty hamper by accident. And they happened to be the one pair of his shorts that had cum stains on it. Bobby’s dad face palmed. Susie blinked, the remark going over her head completely.
Bobby muttered, “It was nice seeing you,” as he turned around to leave.
Grandma picked up her bag and took her husband by the arm, gave him a stern look, and said to the room, “I apologize for my husband.” They left, and Mom and Dad, torn between consoling their son and, at the same time not wanting to confront their son’s disgustingly obvious problem, went outside to see the elders on their way.
Bobby, still downcast, left to find his hand. He shut his door, drew the shades on his window, and opened his desk drawer to find the lube. Right when he was about to squirt a line of lotion in his palm, there came a soft knock on the door followed by his sister’s voice.
“Hey, Bobby, can I come in?”
Bobby was about to ignore her, when he realized that he forgot to lock the door, so he quickly hid the lube. Just in time – like her mother, Susie never waited for an answer and simply stormed right in if the door wasn’t locked.
Susie stood in the doorway, not saying anything at first.
“What do you want, Susie?”
“I was wondering, uhm…do you wanna go outside and play?”
“Uhh…” How do I say this without sounding mean? “I don’t know. I’m not really in the mood.”
“Okay.” His sister frowned a little and started to turn around, but then stopped and looked back at her brother. “Wait, there’s one more thing.” Susie walked over and stood a few inches away from Bobby. She was quiet for a spell and stared up at her brother with a dead serious look on her face.
“What?”
Susie shoved her brother, just hard enough for him to stagger back a step. “TAG!” She cried and spirited away. Not thinking, Bobby chased after Susie, and they ran out the house, past the dunes and down a short trail, until they were running across the sand in their bare feet.
Bobby yelled after her to stop, but Susie kept on running, laughing. So Bobby dug deep for an extra spark in his step and, before long, he caught up to his sister, tagging her on the back of her head.
“Tag!” He said, doubling over exhausted. Susie stopped to rest, and, when they both caught their breath, a big smile spread across her lips.
“What?” Bobby asked, confused. Susie tapped Bobby on the shoulder and giggled. “You’re it,” she said and ran away.
“Son of a bitch.” Bobby sprinted after Susie again and tagged her back. Then she ran after him and tagged him back, and so on and so forth, until Bobby started to laugh out loud despite himself. Here he was, just a kid again, happy and free. Without an urge, without a tear, only sand underfoot and joy in his heart.
And then Bobby tripped over a raised mound of sand and fell near the lapping shore. Spitting out grains of sand, he pushed himself up, and, out of the corner of his eye, Bobby spotted a flash of red.
Her face floated on the tide, just breaking above the water. He couldn’t believe it. Bobby slowly regained his footing and stared at the water, at her, watching her float and bob in the ocean with that wry and cryptic smile of hers. Susie called out to Bobby, but Bobby didn’t hear.
Suddenly, the redhead disappeared beneath the waves. She reappeared further down shore, then disappeared and reappeared again further down. Bobby broke into a run to keep up with her. Susie chased after Bobby, but her brother was in a mad sprint. On and on, he galloped like a frightened horse, he himself knowing that he should stop but compelled to keep running, until, eventually, Susie had to stop. Doubling over, she called after her brother again, but either he was too far away to hear, or he simply didn’t care.
The redhead flew along the surf, so he flew with her and, before he knew it, he was at the cove. Bobby stopped running. His lungs burned, and his legs ached. When he could breathe normally, Bobby climbed a jet-black and salt-washed boulder, so he could get a clear view of everything, so he could find the redhead under the sea.
Bobby looked at the world before him, searching for the face he loved so irrationally, and, for once, he found it. She was treading water, her slender legs kicking lightly, delicately to stay afloat. She smiled at him from far below, the same way she always smiled at him in his head. Bobby descended from the rocks as fast as he could, without breaking his neck, and, when he was close enough to the water, he jumped in.
He looked around and saw his love kicking backwards beneath the shade of a small, narrow cavern. Bobby paddled through the water. He could hear her giggling. When his toes reached the bottom, and the cave blocked out the sun, she swam up to him, so that they were only a few short inches away from each other. She pressed against Bobby, and her touch put an icy heat into his being -- his bones felt cold and stiff and shaky all at once, while in his skin and in his muscles, he could feel the excited energy of his own blood pumping through his veins.
She kissed him, and Bobby felt himself melt into the pool with her.
When the siren took him, Bobby felt no pain. The spit of her kind has opiates that deaden the nerves, ease the mind and paralyze the body. When Bobby still felt his hands, he pulled down his pants and pushed into her. His whole body went numb with a good feeling, and Bobby felt neither fear nor agony, despite the fact that the redhead had teeth in her vagina. They sank into Bobby’s dick, and the redhead tightened her uterine walls and legs to hold him in as she drank his blood. Her spit also carried certain enzymes to help keep her victims erect so it could drain them to their last drop. When Bobby was fully drained, she relaxed her grip, retracted her teeth, and dragged him below. She hooked his feet under a section of coral reef, tying him in place with lines of seaweed and weighing his pockets with rocks. At the bottom of the cove, Bobby stood up in the water, lifeless beside the others. Young men each, in varying stages of decay, their eyes and lips eaten by fish or plucked by the siren herself.
Bobby remained like that for a day. By chance, his shorts had holes in the pockets. The rocks soon fell out while the flesh eventually peeled from his feet. The top layer of his flesh clung to the seaweed binds, but Bobby’s bloodied appendages floated free.
He floated up and away from the cove, bobbing in the ocean blue, until the current took hold and washed him ashore.
Susie later found him, pale, eyes closed, with a smile frozen to his face. She ran back home and told her parents about Bobby, and they called the police. They retrieved the body and when they later examined him, they found puncture wounds in his dick and all the blood was drained from his body. They didn’t have the faintest clue what happened, though they did take note of the various bruises, scabs, and scarring along the foreskin.