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nowitsdarkfic · 4 years

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chapter thirty-seven (back at lars’ place)

November 6, 1988. Oswego, New York.

It's well after midnight by the time Lars brings us home, and at this point, some of the rain has morphed into snow. He bounds up to the driveway of my apartment complex and the headlights are showing big fat snowflakes amongst the drops of rain.

“Shit, man, I dunno if I can make it back to Rochester,” Lars confesses as he pulls up the front of the complex.

“Yeah, that road gets pretty scary when it snows,” Spence points out, “especially when we start getting the lake effect going.”

“Why don't you stay with Joe for the night, man?” Barney suggests.

“I am not doing that again,” he scoffs. “Between the ghosts and Joey kicking me in the back of the head, no way.”

As I take off the seat belt, I gesture into the backseat.

“Stay with Barney and Billy,” I tell him.

“With Barney and Billy?”

“Yeah. It's gonna get bad, dude.”

“We'll get a fire going,” Billy assures him.

“Yeah, and that bed's got clean sheets on it,” Barney adds.

“Trust us, man, it's gonna get bad,” I continue, not realizing that I raised my eyebrows at Lars. I lower them and brush my bangs out of my face.

“Alright. I'll drop you off, Spence, and then I will—go to you guys' place, and I'll call Marcia and Sonia and tell them what's up. And then Joey and I will—go on a mission in the morning.”

He flashes me a wink and that's when I climb out into the frigid bitter cold. I close the door and, using the light from the porchlights and careful not to slip and fall on my ass, I make my way to my apartment. I feel the snow sticking to my already wet hair and I have a chill running down the sides of my head, down my neck, and all the way down my spine.

I reach into my jacket pocket for my key and unlock the front door. I gasp once I step into my place.

It's chilly in here, but dry.

I shut the door behind me and round the couch to turn on the lamp. Golden light washes over me and without turning my head, I notice the big snowflakes clinging to my hair. I reach up to touch the sides of my head. Snow. Covered in snow. Already fully covered in snow.

“Mrs. Snow?” a girl's voice says from behind me. Careful not to make the snow touch my already cold face and neck, I slowly turn around to find Vera floating in from the hall. Her dark hollow eyes follow me even though I'm not moving.

“No, just—just me. Joey.” The cold is setting in and her being there is adding to it.

“Where's Mrs. Snow?” she asks me in a light, floaty voice.

“I—I—I dunno.”

She hangs there, and unbeknownst to her I am practically freezing my balls off here. She breathes out a heavy sigh before drifting away into fine wisps, and then into nothing. I'm still shivering but the cold isn't as intense anymore. Shuddering, I turn off the lamp and make my way down the hall to the thermostat.

I turn up the heat and duck into the bathroom for a shake of my head in the shower. The snow falls off of my hair into the floor of the shower: some of it hits me in the face but I'm getting it off of me with each shake. My jacket meanwhile is soaking wet and so once I straighten myself upright, I peel it right off and sling it over the curtain bar. I set my bath towel over my hair to dry off my hair as best as I can before taking off my shirt and hanging the towel back up. I then double back into my bedroom and I hang my shirt, which is still dry, up in the closet, and then I trade my pants for my pajama bottoms. My hair is still pretty wet, but at least it's not dripping anymore.

I take off the arrowhead pendant and lay it on the nightstand next to my copy of Tropic of Capricorn. I crawl into bed, under the covers and with my head firmly pressed against the pillow. I reach up to turn off the lamp and I'm laying there in darkness, trying to get warm.

My feet are cold, like freezing. I lift my head in time to see Nerissa floating over the foot of the bed towards me. If she was a real live girl, I would let her under the covers with me. But her presence is only worsening the cold feeling around me.

“Nerissa,” I sputter out the words, “—Nerissa, I'm not really in the mood, baby doll.”

“Nonsense, lush boy,” she whispers to me, stroking the top of my thigh with two fingers.

“Nerissa, I'm—I'm freezing!”

She floats over my chest and into my face. Her cold lips graze mine, as light as two feathers. She then floats over me so I'm met with her neck and shoulders, and then her chest. I'm absolutely freezing, even under the covers. I'm usually warm by now, but between my wet hair and Nerissa hanging over me with her chest right in my face, I am shuddering even in my bed. And yet, even with the wash of cold over me, I still manage to fall asleep.

I still manage to drift off into the wake of a dream where I'm surrounded by big black circles. Gaping black holes, some of them as large as my head. There must be thousands of them, all of them hanging around my head and my shoulders as if they're suspended from wires.

Wait a minute, they are suspended from wires. They're taking the gloss and the smooth texture of glass. I'm surrounded by black glass, pitch black glass hanging down from the ceiling. Some of it's rough and with the texture of stone. Some of it is smooth, perfectly smooth. Some of it gives me the creeps. Some of it floats around my head like a series of stars.

One of the shiny pieces of glass floats into my face and I can see myself. But my reflection is not showing my own face. Rather, it's taking the shape of Lars' full face, followed by his button nose and his little lips. My brown irises are changing color to that fresh green.

I'm turning into Lars. I'm turning into Lars and there's nothing I can do about it.

I'm jarred awake by the sight of it. I gaze in front of me to the dark ceiling. I hear the winds outside raging and the snow pummeling the roof.

At least I'm warm now. It's dark and I have no idea what's the time. I swear I see something moving around on the ceiling overhead.

Could just be my tired eyes getting to me. Or maybe not.

I make out the shape of tattered cloth up there on the ceiling. I'm probably hallucinating, but I also can't be too sure of it. All I can do is close my eyes again and pull the blanket up over my head.

And then I hear something tapping on the window. But I don't want to look.

I nestle the side of my head into the pillow with the blankets over me. Even over the snow, I can hear the tapping. But I don't want to look, even as it moves away from the window and onto the wall over my head.

But I still lay there, relaxing every inch of myself and having faith in the dream catcher over my head. Then the edge of the dream catcher scrapes against the wall.

And that's when I pull the blankets over my head. I'm safe in here. I'll keep this over my head all night if I have to.

I live with ghosts and they have scared me a few times in the past, but I don't ever recall either of them freaking me out like this.

By some miracle, I fall asleep again, this time into a dreamless sleep.

And I awake to pure white morning light from the snow outside.

Time to walk up to the House of Grey, grab Lars, and go to New Orleans.

As I'm getting out of bed, I find my hair is still quite damp from the snow last night and it sends chills over my skin. I get dressed with haste, slipping on a sweatshirt, my pinky ring, my blue and white scarf, my big black overcoat, and my big black leather boots with the chains on them in the process. Then I remember my gloves are still in the pockets of my leather jacket and, once I run my fingers through my hair to sort of brush it, I make my way across the hall for them. The last thing I do before leaving is swipe the pendant from my nightstand, which is on top of the nightstand itself and not my book. There was something in my room last night, but I'm too focused on fetching Lars to crawl our way back down to the French Quarter.

About a half a foot of snow fell last night and there are still little flurries falling over me. The street, which has already been plowed, is empty and silent. And it's here I'm glad Lars spent the night with the Greys instead of braving it back to Rochester.

These are cheap ass boots I found at Goodwill for about five bucks, but they do the trick as I'm making my way up the walkway to the front door of the House of Grey. The door itself swings open and Lars bustles out of the house, still tugging on his coat.

“You got the pendant?” he asks me in a broken voice.

I reach into my coat pocket for the arrowhead. He shuts the door behind him.

“Have at it.”

I make the cross shape in mid air and the wormhole opens. I focus on the French Quarter as I'm crawling inside the darkness with the snow flurries on my tail.

I land on something hard and smelling of stone and metal. Not Lars' apartment.

I lift my head to find us on the roof of some building somewhere. Lars himself meanwhile sits upright over on the corner next to me.

“Where the fuck are we?” he demands, rubbing his eye.

I pick myself off the stone and the cold metal to find a low brick wall above my head. I peer over the wall and I see we're atop an apartment building down the street from his. I point to the right.

“What're you pointing at?” he asks, climbing up onto his feet.

“Your apartment building.”

“Well, what are we doing here then?”

“I just focused on the French Quarter.”

“Well, there's your problem! You only brought us to the French Quarter and not my actual apartment building! Now the big question—”

“How do we get down from here?” I fill in for him.

“Exactly.”

“Well—surely there's a fire escape.”

We peek over the edge to the street below and there is indeed a fire escape, but not one I would have expected to see in New York City for example. The steps of the first ladder themselves are about a foot down from the edge of the brick wall; beneath them is a landing, followed by a set of stairs that appear to be retracted up by a lever. Meanwhile, the top of the first ladder is met with a gray metal tube, like whoever is climbing off the roof is supposed to slide down there and somehow hope that they'll reach the top of the ladder without falling onto the next landing.

Lars leads me over to the tube, to the step ladder on the wall leading inside of the tube, and we find there's a fire pole in there instead.

So that clears up that. He peeks over the edge of the wall down the tube.

“It's definitely a safe way down—like we can climb over and slide down this pole here,” he informs me, “and then put out feet on the top of the ladder, but there appears to be something blocking it.” He stops, and then slowly turns his head to me.

“What're you looking at me like that?” I demand from him.

“Because you've got those boots.”

“You've got boots, too.”

“Yeah, but these are more for keeping my feet warm, not for pushing something out of the way. On top of this, you're also skinnier than me.”

I fetch up a sigh and climb up the little step ladder onto the fire pole, which is out from the side of the ladder. I reach over onto the pole, turn myself around and slide down the pole like a fireman. I'm down inside of the tube and I soon reach the bottom, which is the top of the next ladder. I glance up the tube to Lars' head poking out from over the wall.

“There's nothing here,” I confess.

“Really?”

“Nope. Just a pole and the next ladder. Here, let me get down first and then you can follow me.”

But as I'm glancing down the ladder, I'm finding a series of gears connected by belts attached to the bottom of the tube. No, there's something here, just not inside of the tube. But I climb down to let him make his way down towards me.

I reach the first landing and the break in the floor to let down the next row of ladder steps. I'm about to figure out the gears there when Lars must have taken a misstep on the ladder because he falls on the landing and the gears in front of me crack. I lunge back to the rail in order to keep myself from falling

The ladder falls out towards the next one down, and the one down there cracks open, followed by the next one, and the next one, and the last one, which clanks onto the pavement down below.

I let out a low whistle while Lars peers up at me with his eyebrows raised and his mouth agape.

“That was close,” he remarks.

“You're telling me.”

We make our down the ladders, all the way down to the bottom to the sidewalk and the street. I have no idea how to fix the ladders so we leave them as soon as Lars hops off the last ladder before me. We turn around in unison when we're met with the sight of Molly herself on the pavement before us with her arms folded over her chest and a thoughtful look upon her face.

“Darling Molly,” Lars greets her. She clears her throat as she scans the both of us.

“I hear the two of you have been wanting to know more about Maya.”

I frown at her.

“Where'd you hear that?”

She doesn't reply; instead, she gestures for us to follow her back down the street to the apartment building. Once her back is turned, I face Lars and the befuddled look on his face.

“Where did she hear that?” I ask him in a hushed voice.

“I don't have any idea.”

#after the watershed #now it's dark #chapter 37 #new chapter #fanfic #fanfiction #anthrax fanfics #metallica fanfics #joey belladonna #lars ulrich #anthrax #metallica #noir au #steampunk #gothic horror #amwriting #text

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