50.
~ "Romero." Dylan said nervously. "We should call that detective Chambers."
"We're just going to check on your mother's property." Alex said handing Dylan his back up side arm.
"Check on the property with loaded guns?" Dylan asked sarcastically.
"Yeah." Alex nodded.
The men had arrived at the old house by the motel. It looked just as lonely and unloved as ever. Norma had made this house a nice home when she lived there, but now it was devoid of all the life she'd brought to it.
"How long has it been boarded up?" Dylan asked. He nodded to the uninviting windows and chain linked fence surrounding the property.
Alex check his side arm before answering.
"Since Lucy was born." he admitted. "We couldn't unload the house. We'd sold the motel and investors kept abandoning any projects they started. No one wanted the house with a motel so close by that they didn't own."
"You just keep it locked up?" Dylan asked.
"I drive by and check on things every month." Alex admitted. "To be honest it would be nice just to have vandals burn it down. It's insured for more than we could sell it for now."
"Norman would defiantly come back here." Dylan sighed.
"I kept water and power in the place so the pipes wouldn't freeze." Alex admitted. "Just in case someone wanted to buy it. He could be living here for a while and I wouldn't have known. The place is huge."
Alex unlocked the gate towards the house and felt that unease that always came to him when he was back here. He couldn't help but remember finding Norma half dead that night. The smell of the gas, breaking a window and carrying her into the hallway. Pulling Norman out to because he wasn't sure what had happened. The relief that flooded him when Norma started breathing on her own. Norman sobbing that he shouldn't have come back.
Alex felt the oppressiveness of that night every time he checked on the property. He couldn't force himself to remember the good times he'd experienced in the house. That night had blocked them all out now.
He unlocked the front door and Dylan was quick to follow him inside.
"Okay, what do we do if Norman has her?" Dylan asked. "You can't shoot him. Mom would never forgive you."
"If Norman has taken my daughter, if he's holding her here, I'll put three bullets in him without a second thought." Alex said honestly. "Your mother will either forgive me or she won't. I have to protect my child, Dylan."
The men had stopped in the foyer and Alex unlocked the door into the house itself.
"Just… maybe we can talk to Norman first. Maybe he just wanted to meet Lucy." Dylan offered. "Just don't do anything you can't take back, Romero."
Alex was about to tell Dylan that Norman had all the chances in the world for talking. The two of them looking up the impressive staircase to the second floor. He was about to say they should split up. About to turn on the lights so they could see where they were going, when something detached from the shadows and moved.
Alex didn't have time to turn around before a heavy clank sounded and Dylan dropped beside him; his face covered in blood.
Alex jumped in surprise and reached for his side arm.
A woman, horrible and pale came into the light. She was grinning at him and holding a large kitchen knife.
Maybe it was the shock of what had happened, but Alex was slower than normal when it came to drawing his side arm. The terrifying woman with sinister black eyes swiped the knife and cut his dominant hand.
Alex felt the sting of it, but didn't register how deep the cut was until blood started flowing out of his wounded hand.
He looked up at the woman in a powder blue dress. It was Norma's house dress. He recognized it anywhere. The woman with dark hair, a pale powdered face and red lipstick was advancing on him. Alex instinctively backing away. His feet hitting something and he tripped. Falling backwards into the living room. He was dazed for a moment that a frail old woman had gotten the best out of both himself and Dylan. Alex looking up at the slender figure still holding the butcher knife. Still grinning a clown like sneer.
"Good girl, Juno." the woman cackled to the taxidermy dog that Alex had tripped over. There was an attempt to sound feminine, but Alex would recognize that voice anywhere.
"Norman?" he said in horror. His step son, Norma's beloved lost child, was like a wicked step mother from a fairy tale.
He was dressed like a woman, but no attempt to be attractive was made. Instead, the effect was grotesque and terrifying.
"Norman." he said again trying to reach his side arm with his other hand. Norman advanced on him in a second and Alex realized that his step son wasn't a scrawny teenager anymore. Norman had put on muscle and weight and it hurt when he plunged the knife into Alex's shoulder.
Maliciously, Norman twisted the blade and Alex let out a cry of pain before his fight instincts finally kicked in. He pushed Norman off him and clumsily freed his side arm. His right hand still pulsing blood and the large kitchen knife still deeply embedded in his shoulder.
Alex pulled back the hammer and fired into the hallway at Norman. The blue robe vanishing down the hall quick as lightning.
Alex knew there was only one place that Norman would retreat to. Norma had told him all about his taxidermy hobby and how he did all his work in the basement. Naturally he would run there. Alex managed to stand up and decided to leave the knife in his shoulder. It could do more damage if he tried to take it out at this point. He looked over Dylan by the stairs. His other step son's face was covered in blood, but he felt a strong pule. Norman must have knocked him out with something. He didn't bother to call 911 or Chambers. Lucy was most certainly in the basement with Norman now. She was in trouble.
Alex kept his gun up as he carefully went to the basement. The acid etched glass on the door looking exactly as it always had. Nothing in the house having changed on the inside.
The door was unlocked and Alex looked down the dark stairs. Music was playing down there somewhere. An old fashioned kind of song that required a band. The type of thing people danced to in the forties and Norma was a sucker for.
The eeriness of the basement, the stillness didn't fool Alex for a second. He looked below the steps for Norman's sister white face hiding in the shadows. The overly powdered makeup would practically glow in the darkness. He didn't see anything and carefully went down to find Lucy.
The music, happy and joyful, was coming from the back of the fruit cellar. The portion of the house that was the original foundation and seldom used by Norma or Norman when they lived here. Alex knew this basement well enough from looking for a good hiding place after he came to live here. Knew that all the junk had been cleared out and the basement looked smaller.
It was then he saw it. Saw the pink neon light burning at the far side of the basement. Saw that there was a door open where before, it had just been a large open space. He could smell new lumber and realized someone had built a room inside the basement. Complete with a metal storm door and many locks.
Alex peered into the room with the bright pink lights and almost stopped breathing in horror.
Lucy was sitting slumped in a white rocking chair. Her face blank and expressionless. Her left arm at a funny angle and she was perfectly dressed in a frilly pink party dress.
His daughter didn't move or even blink when entered the room. Her blue eyes staring lifelessly out at him. Not seeing her father at all.
Alex took a second, just one, to look over the bedroom. It was a nightmarish version of a little girl's room. Everything was pink and white and there were more of Norman's stuffed creations on a bookcase. The poor animals dressed like people in an attempt to be child friendly. The result of was strange and fiendish looking. Nothing in this room was meant for a child, yet Alex knew this was where Lucy was meant to be kept. The big band music stopped and Alex heard the swish of a turntable revolving around and around. Norman had been thoughtful enough to provide a record player for Lucy's imprisonment.
"Lucy?" Alex said. He moved closer to his daughter. Her body slumped lifelessly in the white rocker. He'd been so fixed on finding her, seeing her like this, his didn't notice the figure in the blue robe behind him.
Lucy's blue eyes moved suddenly. Her focus not on her father but on something more dangerous than he could ever be.
Alex saw her eyes move away from him and he turned just in time for Norman's attack.
As if it was a reflex, Alex fired his gun at the monster and missed. Norman pulled out the knife in his shoulder and tried to stab him again. Alex still wasn't prepared for how strong Norman had become over the years. Wasn't ready to have this monster rip his gun away and physical over power him with little effort.
"You should have just come after me!" Alex shouted in furry at the monster who was trying to kill him.
Norman didn't like him fighting back and plunged the knife into Alex's hip before pistol whipping him across the face with his own gun.
Alex was done after that. His vision was fading and he was bleeding all over a horrible pink rug. He collapsed and rolled over on his good side. Feebly trying to stop the bleeding to his shoulder. The knife he'd been stabbed with a second time sticking out sickeningly from his hip.
"You shouldn't have come here, Sheriff." Norman said in his old woman's voice.
Alex winced from the pain in his face, his cut open hand, his shoulder and hip before looking at the monster.
"Get away from her!" he growled savagely when Norman casually went over to the rocking chair. He picked Lucy up as though she were a delicate antique doll. Lucy's eyes growing big, but she didn't move or make a sound. Alex saw clearly her arm had been dislocated.
Norman sat in the rocker now, holding Lucy on his lap. He was smiling at Alex in victory. The offending handgun, useless to him now, sat on a white dresser well out of the Sheriff's reach. Norman picked up an antique hairbrush and started to brush Lucy's long, dark hair.
"Lucy?" he cackled and Alex felt himself seethe with hate. "See what he made mother do? He would have taken you away from me. Taken you away just like he took her away."
Alex was worried about the amount of blood that was pooling out on the pink rug. He was bleeding to death and Lucy would have to watch.
"That's right." Alex shouted. He couldn't bare the sight of this monster touching his daughter. Couldn't stand that Norman had hurt her and would probably do worse to her very soon.
Norman looked at him with cold, black eyes. His red lips growing into a sneer of disgust.
"That's right!" Alex shouted. He gasped slightly in pain from the stab wounds. "I took her away, Norman. I took your mother away. She chose me over you! That's what happened!"
"Be quite!" Norman hissed and pulled roughly on Lucy's hair.
"Look at me!" Alex shouted. Norman's black eyes once more on him and away from Lucy. "I made your mother put you in those places, Norman. I made her leave you there. I told her she had to leave you there. I made her marry me. I told her that she had to lock you away, Norman."
"Shut up!" Norman shouted. His feminine voice gone and Lucy forgotten.
"I made her, Norman!" Alex shouted again. "I made her marry me. I made her go to bed with me. Even when she didn't want to! I made her do things to me, Norman. Things she didn't want to do!"
It was working. Norman was becoming angry. He pushed Lucy away from him. Alex watching in horror as his daughter fell off Norman's lap. Her body falling to floor like she really was just a doll.
"I got her pregnant, Norman." Alex said eagerly. "I got her pregnant so she wouldn't ever be able able to leave me. So she would have to stay with me. I made her have a baby, Norman."
This seemed to be the final straw. Alex gripped ahold of the knife still in his hip. His blood slicked fingers slippery on the handle.
Norman stood up slowly. His teeth revealing a sister glower behind the red lipstick. When Norman attacked him, all Alex had to do was pull out the knife and cut his throat out. For that moment though, he'd forgotten about the handgun Norman had gotten away from him. Forgotten that Norman had put it on the dresser beside the rocking chair.
Norman took the gun daintily in his hands. Alex seeing that he'd gone to the trouble of painting his nails a bright red to match the garish lipstick.
"I think we've heard enough out you, Sheriff." Norman said in his high pitched voice. His face no longer angry, but now grinning a horrible smile.
Alex felt himself hold his breath when Norman cocked back the hammer.
Three shots rang out in the basement and Lucy saw nothing. She lay crumpled on the floor beside the rocker. Truly a forgotten little doll in 'Mother's' eyes right now. Her body was forgotten and discarded, but in her mind she was securely settled between her parents. They were on either side of her in the big bed upstairs and she felt safe and protected by them. Her arms wrapped around the yellow bunny while mommy sang to her in a high clear voice.
"Mister Sandman, bring me a dream. Make him the cutest, that I've ever seen."
Gruesome. Isn't it?
