Chapter 1- He Doesn't Look A Thing Like Jesus...(Re- Revised)

Warning: This story contains: Bad Language, & Violence.

Author's Note: This story is dedicated to all of those chumps like me who are a mite obsessed with the ghosts from the movie "Thir13en Ghosts"- I created this out of an annoyance with the lack of stories revolving around one of my favorite ghosts (The Juggernaut, A.K.A, "The Breaker", A.K.A, Horace Mahoney)

--M. R. Q

Let's just say that as a kid in elementary school, I spent alot of time coloring. And not a whole lot socializing. I was always the lonely kid- but if you knew the whole story you might not blame me.

For about as long as I can remember, my parents have always seemed to hate each other I was constantly stuck on the sidelines during almost every fight.

It always felt like some twisted professional sport I was witnessing- and whether I liked it or not, I was the appointed referee. They had one thing right, I suppose; I was, for the most part, unbiased, since I loved both of them.

I often spent nights when they would fight curled up under my bed or I would just break out of the house and I would just start running and running and running anywhere and everywhere around town. It was no wonder that I was such a skinny kid, looking back, for all of the running I did during those years.

That night things escalated, as they so often did. I don't remember really what started the fight, but a prominent memory I had of the night was of my mother yelling, "You like your things, you sonofabitch?! Well, you can have them!" as she proceeded to start throwing everything that was my father's all over the house.

Everything about the fight is blurry to me, as well as how long I ran for once I made a break outside. I just remember finally reaching a big, rusting fence. It took me a moment to register what lI could remember as what laid beyond the fence. It was the local junked car lot.

I was immediately turned off of the place out of fear.

Everybody in town knew about the two-person Mahoney clan that resided within. The adults in town spoke more of the slimy working policies the owner himself indulged in- but it was the children who turned the lot into a place of nightmares and mystery with rumors about the teen boy who lived within.

I had never seen this person everybody talked about, but i had heard plenty, and to me that was more than enough. He was hunch-backed. I had heard that he looked like one of the unrealistically robust villains on Saturday morning cartoons than an actual, real-life person. I had heard that he and his group of red-eyed dog/beasts hunted stranded motorists at night.

Even standing on the same side of the street of the lot was supposed to bring on the wrath of the monster boy who lived there.

I was not an adventurous child. The closest I would get to actually doing anything what I would consider crazy were those runs I had during fights. It was ironic that out of everything that was so normal about me, the only thing I ever did that really wasn't "normal" was what would lead me to the lot.

I had not thought of the fact that it was incredibly dark outside back when I had only thought of running out of the house, away from the noise. It was then, standing as frightened as I was near one of the gateways into the lot, that I had the realization that it was probably midnight.

As if to add to my growing list of reasons to be frightened, I remembered the one thing that my school's administrators had been warning us about.

About a week ago, a small boy had been found dumped in a field about a mile away from town. He had disappeared from the local playground- which, incidentally, was not that many blocks away from the dump lot. I, who had been going to the playground every once in awhile for a long time, alone with the possible exception of one of my aunts who would later cut my family off later on sometimes. At times, when I had run really late at night, I would even camp there when I was too frightened to make a dash back to the house.

But the situation back then provided itself with a big problem for me. Not only was I all the way across town and stranded- which was a normal enough situation for me- but I was too frightened to go hide in my only other place that I could sleep at that night.

What was I to do?

I reached a decision that came close to amounting to suicide in my eyes.

I was a skinny enough as a child (one of the many differences between me then and me now), so all I had to do to gain entrance to through the chained gate was to slide between the small empty space under the chain that kept the gate closed.

I had thought about it and had thought about it, and I had thought quickly of the many cars that laid beyond the chain link fence. And the soft interior of one that had to exist somewhere close by that I could bed down in for the night. And, before any of the mysterious people and animals in the place could even know I was there, I could sneak back home during the first light of morning.

The plan had to be fool proof in order for it to work. It was too bad that I was too young to be anything other than a fool.

As soon as my feet hit the dirt on the other side of the gate, I heard a noise that threatened to stop my heart stop beating.

Barking.

As I spun around, I saw them- three huge, black, ugly dogs.

I cried out and ducked with my arms over my head as they ran at me. I expected that I be killed right then and there. After a heartbeat in which they should have lunged at me, I dared to look up.

I heard the dogs' whimpering first, then they all backed away as a deep, growling voice boomed at them.

"Back off, boys! I SAID BACK OFF NOW!"

I was too shocked to scream out. All I could do was clutch at my legs, gripping them as hard as I could in fear.

When I could finally look up, the first thing I saw of him were two awesomely huge columns covered in denim that were his legs. I kept looking up and up, expecting them to end until they finally came up to his back.

I can remember that first time looking up at him; it was almost the equivalent of climbing Mt. Everest for my eyes.

He was a giant.

My first instinct was to RUN. My imagination and the fairy tales I had been fed as a child told me that giants don't save you from certain death out of the kindness of their hearts.

I looked passed the huge boy. Standing beyond him were the dogs. The change from how they had nearly jumped me and how calm and complacent they appeared then was a strange sight to see. It was almost as much as the boy himself was.

The boy turned around slowly. I'll never forget when I saw his face for the first time.

Especially being as angry as he was.

"What are you doing here?!" He roared.

I began backing away towards the gate, trying to get some distance between him and me. the more I moved backwards, the better I could get a better look at him. He was BIG, it wasn't just my imagination. And it could not have been just because I was a child.

From what I could see of his big, long arms that came out of his gray blue mechanic's shirt sleeves, he had muscles that looked to be unbelievably huge in size. His hair was very short-cropped, and was also a shade of yellow paler than my own. I had only gotten a general look at him before I became interested in staring at his pale blue eyes. Fire seemed to blaze in them right back at me, and I had no doubts then that he was fully capable of killing me and boiling me for soup if he wanted to.

"Well?" He was no longer bellowing- and that was a relief.

"I-I'm sorry sir, but I have nowhere else to go!" I yelled it up at him as fast as I could manage, trying hard all the while to not avert my gaze from his own. "Please, please don't throw me out- and don't feed me to the dogs- or eat me!"

His eyebrows rose in surprise. That was definitely not the answer he expected.

"Are you homeless?" His voice had grown almost miraculously gentle sounding, but the soft growl, which I hadn't really noticed until that moment in his voice, never seemed to go away. Was it a permanent thing for him?

I pushed my hair out of my face, using the excuse to look down at the ground. "No, mister, my mom and dad are fighting, and- and- and.." My eyes clouded with tears despite how hard I tried to hold them off. I pressed my face down to the ground in embarrassment as the tears dripped down my cheeks. It wasn't enough that I was miserable and truthfully alone, but I was making myself look like a damn baby in front of a person I hadn't even met.

I had my face turned down, not looking up, so I nearly leapt backwards when I felt the pressure of a hand came down to rest on my shoulder, gently clinging there.

"Come on, that can't be true… don't you have some other family members who'll take care of you?"

I looked up at him, and I saw him crouched down next to me, looking all the more like a giant by the way he was practically sitting next to me in an attempt to lower to my all the more diminished height from where I sat, knees sticking up, butt resting on dirt. I shook my head slowly. "It was either here or the park, and I don't want to die…" for no reason that I myself could understand, I started to whisper, making the boy lean in closer to me to hear me. "...I'm scared of sleeping there."

He was silent for so long that I lifted my head up to look at his face. The long sides of his hair were covering his eyes, and he was scratching his head slightly, and his (I then noticed) slightly abnormal, swollen, fishy lips were twisted in what appeared to be deep thought. "You know this place is terrible, right? This isn't exactly a, uh, hotel for runaways."

I felt a blush spreading like a rash over me. "Well… yeah, but-"

"Just how bad are things at home? Why can't you stay there?" He interrupted. I don't think he really wanted me to speak- he was thinking aloud.

I swallow back a sob and fought against the desire to quiver my lips. I must have thought of my mother and father then, because I can remember tears coming to my eyes. "I can't go back tonight. I can't… I just can't."

And then, the pressure on my arm was gone, and on my head I could feel a soft, rhythmic feel of his fingers starting from my crown and back to the top of my neck. He was petting me!

"Jesus, kid. Where else could you stay, I mean, seriously, this is a bad place to live, much less a place to spend the night. And my dad-." he trailed off, no longer petting me like a, well, dog. After a long moment of silence, he sighed. "Well, even this place is better than the street. Just be quiet if my dad comes to check my room later, okay?"

He lifted my chin up so he could see me. As he stared at me, I can believe that was when I fell in love with him.

"Okay?" He repeated, attempting a smile with almost endearing awkwardness.

"Okay." I answered. This time he did smile, and I smiled back, now dazzled by his pale blue eyes. He helped me up, and I walked with him. As we walked, the dogs walked near Horace. They seemed to despise me- which was more a good reason, other than utter infatuation, why I shrank against Horace as we walked.

We eventually reached a small building. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a huge key ring with almost more keys than there was space on the ring. He looked down at it for a moment before pulling out one key in particular and turning it in the door's keyhole. He opened it and looked down at me.

"What's your name, by the way?"

I looked up at him with with what I now cringe to realize as nothing less than unequivocal adoration. "Molly Christoe. What's yours?"

"Me? My name's Horace Mahoney."

My eyes widened at the sound of his name as memory seemed to pour into me like liquid metal into a mould.

AT the sound of his name, uttered from his own lips, I had a flash back of everything I had heard about him. The kids at school (who I was, oh so often, an outcast from) whispered about Horace Mahoney in the utmost tones of pure fear. He was a giant. He was hunchbacked. He spent his nights looking for people to murder- usually unwary motorists.

Staring up at him, I felt as though reality had just sledgehammered two of those stories I had heard in school into a nice, fine powder. Love had a nice way of blinding you in a world of rose colors.

I had tried to keep my shock that had come from learning his name off of my face- but he must have seen the look of shock on my face, because he gave me a questioning look before shaking his head and walking into the small room that comprised of the living space in the shack. I couldn't see into the room, but I heard Horace's clumping footfalls on what sounded like hardwood floor. Finally, after three footfalls, I heard a soft click, and the room was illuminated with a soft glow resonating from a floor lamp next to a very long, very sparsely decorated cot on the right side of the room. The room smelled a bit like rot and dirt, with a mix of oil in it. It smelled, pretty much, like everything in the junkyard. As I had guessed, the floor was hardwood, and the room seemed barely able to hold the tall older boy's prescence who stood on the other side of the room.

As I noticed, he had to duck down a bit to not knock his head on the low ceiling as he began to busily throw a few articles of dirty-looking clothing into a corner of the room. He had picked up a flannel jacket that was lying on the long cot when he turned his head toward me. As was beginning to become usual, my heart did little hops around in my chest.

"Come in and close the door." He said, sounding impatient.

I hurried into the room and attempted to close the door. I tugged on the door, expecting it to shut. Unfortunately, It was so heavy that the only way I finally managed to push it shut was to press all of my weight into pulling the door, and after a lot of loud grunting. When I was done, I turned around and saw that Horace was staring at me, obviously trying not to laugh. He was smiling.

I blushed an even redder shade of pink.

"It's NOT funny."

He didn't say anything, but I could tell that he was close to laughing.

The last nail in the coffin for any sense of seriousness I wanted to convey to this man who I wanted to see me as a desirable, practically adult woman died hard moments later. It was because of the fact that whenever I got angry as a kid, my face would bunch together and turn deep red. He saw me do this when he turned around to look at me, and started to really laugh. Any love I may have had for Horace felt like a much strained thing then as I crossed my arms over my chest and I glared at him, waiting for him to stop. When he (finally) did, he wiped at tear out of his eye before going back to clearing his part of the room of the last three articles of clothing.

"Sorry, but I don't think I've ever seen such a funny face on a girl." he said, still bent over, picking up a pair of jeans. "I'm gonna put a blanket on my bed here over my sheet so you can sleep here for the night."

I felt my breath get sucked in as he finished throwing clothes in the corner of the room, and began pulling blankets off of the cot, covering the white sheet on the cot with a blue blanket that could only reach to the lower middle of the cot.

Was I going to sleep next to him? Did he think I was pretty as much as I thought he was? Could he...?

He finished, rubbing his hands together. "Well, you sleep here. I'll take the car I sleep in sometimes. If something happens, or if you need to see me, I'll be in the red convertible a little ways from here…" he scratched his head thoughtfully. "You probably won't be able to find it, actually. I'll come back here tomorrow. And, hey, if you hear someone opening up the door, just hide under the blankets, and stay as still as you possibly can unless you, uh, hear me."

I felt my heart sink as he began to walk past me. I had to stop him, I had to tell him how I suddenly felt about him before he left me here. My only excuse is that I was eight, and I had just found the first (and last) person that I had ever felt such emotion for.

"I love you." I blurted out.

He stopped, his hand on the door's handle. "What did you say?"

He slowly turned his head around.

"I said "I love you"."

I could feel my heart beating into my ribcage as I watched him regard me, confused. There was this long, horrible moment of utter, embarrassed silence before he spoke, a smile breaking open his otherwise stony features.

"Well," he said, beginning to laugh. "I guess I love you too, kid."

He reached over to touch the top of my head with one of his huge hands. He patted and rubbed the top of my head as if I was a dog or a small child, and not a girl who had just bared her soul to him and told him that she loved him. Of course, by that point, the fact that I had just started to learn cursive and that I hadn't even started to lose all of my baby teeth was a most unimportant thing to me.

I was confused- but it wouldn't take me too long before I would realize that I was too young to possibly be taken seriously with any declarations of love I could give to adult- or older kids. He gave me one last pat on the head before walking out. "I'm locking the door." he said, following it with the audible click of the door lock as he shut the door.

I spent the night curled up in the musty-smelling cot, thinking of Horace. I realized that I had never felt anything close to what I was feeling then for anyone before. I had fallen in love with the giant that lived in old man Mahoney's junkyard. And, to make things worse, he didn't seem to feel the same way I did for him that he did for me.

As I was falling asleep, scared and worried about a lot of things, I felt as though I was allowed to feel good about just one thing at least. At least, I thought, the boy I was now in hopeless love with was not the monster everybody in school said that he was. He was no murderer.

I once heard that it would take a book the size of a dictionary to fill up with ironic things that people don't really know- in short, little did he/she know(s). Like, for example, Jerry kissed his wife goodnight every night, but little did his wife know that he had been doing the same with another woman only ten minutes before he would kiss her for the past week and a half. The irony would be that Jerry's wife believed that her husband was loving- when the reality was that he was a cheating, back-stabbing bastard.

As I laid down, believing that out of all of the things I had to worry about, that the boy I was in love with was not, in fact, the murderer I had heard of was not one. Little did I know, however, that what the other children in school were right about Horace's affinity for murdering motorists- but they were only off by two more years.