Adelmo managed to get through the day without too much conversation with Lana, who seemed increasingly concerned about his strange behavior. But there were no more odd feelings, sounds or smells, and by the time he left the book store he was actually feeling better.
Adelmo had almost convinced himself of that, thinking the reason he’d been so edgy and excitable all day was because of the odd dreams he’d been having lately about his grandfather and his crazy stories.
He left the store for an uneventful drive home. His mind wandered back to his inability to contact his grandfather.
“Grandpa!” Adelmo exclaimed as he pulled into his driveway. He’d never called back to find out what was going on. After all the excitement that morning, he’d completely forgotten the scrap of paper with the number of the local police precinct in his village.
He rushed into the house to make the call. He wasn’t exactly sure, but he thought there was at least an eight-hour time difference. Still, the police were always open, right?
“Yes, yes. This is the precinct.”
Adelmo rolled his eyes. At least the man spoke English.
“I want to talk to the police captain.”
“No, no.”
“Why not?”
“No police.”
“What do you mean? You just said this was the police station.”
“Ya.”
“Then let me speak to...the sergeant, the...” Adelmo had no idea about the hierarchy of the village police.
“No understand.”
You’re telling me, Adelmo thought. “Let me speak to anyone, any police officer.”
“No understand.”
“What don’t you understand?”
“You no understand. No police here.”
Adelmo was now even more confused. No police in the police station?
“Where are they?”
But the line had gone dead.
Adelmo just stared at the phone. How could there be no police at the police station? What on earth was going on in the village of Varcolac?
The phone rang, and he nearly jumped out of his chair.
He laughed nervously and picked up the receiver.
“Hello?”
No answer.
“Hello?”
Now he could hear raspy breathing.
“Who is this?” For Pete’s sake, Adelmo thought, crank calls, too?
“Look, I’m hanging up if you don’t say anyth...“
“Il caut pe lup.”
Adelmo froze.
“What did you say?”
More raspy breathing filtered into his ear from the phone.
“What did you say? Who is this?” Adelmo was now screaming into the phone. The events of the last twenty-four hours had really started to rattle him.
“What do you want from me?”
The line went dead.
Adelmo sat there, looking at the phone. He couldn’t remember the last time he had felt so unsettled. The undercurrent of an almost primal fear was really starting to get to him.
He replayed the strange events in his mind.
The strange man in the shop, the book appearing out of thin air, the murders, his strange experience in the attic, the dream about his grandfather and the list went on.
His grandfather, who was apparently missing, and now even the village police were missing.
At that moment Adelmo remembered only one other time that he felt as frustrated and confused. It was after one of his grandfather’s stories. A story that had scared Adelmo so much, his grandfather had promised never to tell it again. It was a story somehow different from the others. The others, though strange and violent, had almost been like a balm to Adelmo in the wake of his parents‟ loss.
They had enabled Adelmo to take brief trips into fantasy that, while frightening, scared him nowhere near as much as real life.
Perhaps fantasy and reality were now coming together.
Adelmo tried to remember the story, but it was only the strange feeling of disquiet that he recalled, not the details. It was as if he’d completely blocked everything from his memory except the effect of it, like a meal remembered only for its aftertaste.
Adelmo suddenly had the feeling he needed to hear that story once again, and he needed to hear it from his grandfather.
He looked at his watch and was startled to see that he had been sitting at the kitchen table for hours, lost in thought. It was almost midnight, and the kitchen was bathed in silvery light from the full moon which shone brightly through the window above the sink.
Adelmo decided he would look into making a reservation to Bucharest in the morning. He went into his bedroom and grabbed his camera. There was something still bothering him about what had happened at the store that morning, and he thought maybe he would take a few pictures after all.
Adelmo pulled into the parking lot of the market at just before one o’clock in the morning. The yellow police tape was still in place, and the store was dark and almost forbidding.
At first, Adelmo didn’t realize why the place seemed so spooky, but then he realized that even the lights of the parking lot were turned off, as well as the marquee, which were usually kept on all night to discourage intruders.
Like me, he thought?
He got out of the car with his camera and walked around to the side of the building. Without all the lighting that he was used to, it seemed desolate. Like a dead place.
The paw print was still there, shining eerily under the light of the silver moon. It almost seemed to glow, even though it had long since dried and its rich red hue had turned to a dull, coppery brown.
Adelmo stepped away from the wall, adjusting his lens. He lifted the camera to his face and the bloody paw print filled the viewfinder.
He adjusted the focus, and took a picture.
Before he could take another, he heard a noise and a dark figure stepped out of the shadows behind him and Adelmo’s lights went out as surely as the store’s.
**********
Adelmo is running from something in the woods.
The full moon flickers through the trees as he crashes through the brush, panting and gasping for breath as if his lungs are about to burst.
Adelmo feels his heart beat faster and faster until it seems as if it, too, will burst, leaving him on the floor of the forest as easy prey for whatever is chasing him.
As he runs through the brush, branches slap at his face, Adelmo doesn’t even attempt to look back. Somehow, he knows that looking back means death, and feels sure that whatever is behind him knows it, too.
Tiring, he feels himself reaching his physical limits. His legs are on fire; his arms are raw and
bleeding. Try as he might to push himself harder, Adelmo knows he will soon collapse from exhaustion, lying helpless in the dirt until whatever is behind him pounces.
His foot hits a tree root and Adelmo pinwheels wildly off what little path there is, crashing through the underbrush and desperately trying to keep his balance.
The last thing he feels is hot breath on his neck, accompanied by a feral growl and the smell of death-
“Adelmo.”
He opened his eyes to the face of Nikusubila Minkah.
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