TWO
"Before you can kill the monster, you have to say its name." - Terry Pratchett, A Slip of the Keyboard: Collected Non-Fiction.
Upon hearing of the events that transpired the evening prior, Darlene and Richard Carruthers had booked the soonest flight from Cleveland to Chicago and took the cab the rest of the way to Haddonfield. Their house had become a frenzy of reporters, news trucks, and police officers alike, but they manage to dodge the worst of it on their way inside.
Rachel sits on the couch with Jamie tucked under her arm, arms wrapped around her and clad in a pair of pink pajamas. The shorts reveal her leg wrapped in a bulky cast with a bandage wrapped around her head, but otherwise she's in one piece. Darlene can't get to the two of them fast enough, waking Jamie in the process of getting her into her arms quickly. Richard sets a hand on Darlene's shoulder before embracing his family. It's hard to fit the three women into his arms but he tries anyway, Jamie's dark head sandwiched between Rachel's and Darlene's. He kisses their hairlines and sighs a breath of relief.
They're so caught up in their tearful reunion that they ignore the group of officers sitting at their dining room table adjacent to them. Sheriff Meeker watches for a long moment, exhaling wistfully at the sight. He thinks of his own daughter, the way her big head of golden hair used to fit so easily under his chin whenever he came back from long shifts, then the way her eyes stared distantly past him through the wall when he finally arrived home to find her there, dead with that gun through her chest.
He taps his knuckle against the table to announce his presence.
"Good afternoon," Meeker says cordially. Darlene sighs as the family withdraws, Jamie still against her chest.
"Sheriff," Darlene says.
Meeker offers Jamie a smile, then glances back at Darlene and Richard, expression solemn.
"I need to speak to you both alone for a moment, if that's alright?"
Darlene kisses Jamie's head once before nodding, stepping into the kitchen with Richard and Meeker. Jamie watches on for a moment, curious, before reaching for her American Girl Doll to brush her fingers through her hair. Rachel smiles sleepily down at her, head lolling back to fall asleep.
Richard looks from the living room to Meeker, eyes narrowed. Meeker braces himself for impact.
"Do you mind telling me why you used our daughter as bait?" Richard asks. Darlene shushes him, gently, and he shakes his head.
"The worst thing is that you didn't ask for our permission," Darlene continues, softer, mindful of their daughters in the next room. "We wanted him gone as much as you did, but not at this cost. Why not call the National Guard? A SWAT team? Why did you allow Jamie to enter into hat nutjob's care-"
"Mrs. Carruthers, I understand and sympathize. Believe me, Dr. Loomis is-he's something else, alright? But we did what we had to do. I understand-"
"I don't think you understand anything at all, Sheriff," Richard interrupts. "With all due respect. We understand that you lost your daughter, we get that. But you have no idea what we've been through as a family since last year. It only started with-Jamie attacking Darlene. That was only the start. This is going to take years-years of counseling-"
"I know," Meeker says, solemn, inclining his chin toward the living room where he watches Jamie brush her doll's hair. He hangs his head. "I'm sorry for that. This is never what I wanted to happen, and I'm here because I want to make this as easy as possible. Her transition, from the hospital to your home and to wherever you want her to go next. I want to make this up to you."
Meeker's earnestness earns a smile from Darlene, sad as it is.
"I'm sorry, for mentioning her like that. Jamie's just been through so, so much-I hate even thinking about it." Darlene frowns, heading to the coffee machine. "Tell you what, I'll put on a pot of coffee for all of us. Do you take yours with creamer or sugar?"
"That won't be necessary."
Darlene shakes her head. Richard pulls out a chair, lighting up a cigarette and offering Meeker one. Meeker takes one after a moment, sitting beside him.
"No, no. We insist," Darlene says, and, lower, "you really caught him."
"We wouldn't have been able to without Jamie, ma'am," Meeker's manners, wrought from years in service, accidentally peak in his midwestern drawl. He continues. "And I mean that. We appreciate everything she did tonight, as terrible as it turned out, because now we've got him. We've got the keys to every door he's locked behind and we're never opening them again. Never again."
Richard tips some of the ash from his cigarette into the ashtray on the kitchen table before pressing it between his lips once more. Sheriff Meeker takes a moment to light up his own cigarette but doesn't take a puff from it, staring out the window before returning his attention to the two parents, feeling tension build with each tap of Darlene's manicured nails against the sleek countertop and every puff of smoke that Richard exhales through flared nostrils.
Finally, Meeker breaks the silence.
"There will come a time," he says, "not now, not anytime soon - on Jamie's eighteenth birthday, she will become Michael's legal ward. Ever since the courts unsealed Laurie Strode's legal birth certificate - that fact has been very much clear. Obviously, his status as a fugitive has made that irrelevant up until now."
Darlene blinks her shock as she sets down their mugs of coffee, then sits herself. "So, what are you saying?
"What I'm saying is that she is his next of kin, until she can legally say otherwise. The Myers House, considering it was paid for outright by the Myers Family back in '47 and no one has made any move to purchase it-will go to her, if no one will. All of his records from his original incarceration belong to her," Meeker inhales, not realizing he hasn't breathed since he first started speaking. His gaze flicks to Richard's knuckles, white around the handle of his mug, then back between the two of them. "This isn't an issue you should concern yourself with, now. But I wanted to warn you before you had any surprises."
"So Jamie is tied to that bastard? No matter what we say?"
"-Only legally, Richard."
"Only legally." He huffs out a laugh, sardonic, then pinches the bridge of his nose with a shake of his head. Meeker pours some of the half and half into his mug, nodding in thanks to Darlene before taking a sip. It burns his throat as it goes down. "I'm just-scared for Jamie. Especially knowing that."
"I know, Richard," Meeker says. "I am, too. But I think we can find some way to make this all better. For one thing, there's a great alternative school over in Russellville, where I think Jamie would fit in perfect."
The adults continue speaking while Jamie sighs, climbing with a little struggle out of her spot on the couch beside Rachel without waking her up. With her little hands balancing herself on the coffee table, she ambles over to the window by the couch. Rachel and the Sheriff had both instructed her to stay away from it, lest any of the reporters or news stations outside get a glimpse of her face, so she's careful to peak between the blinds. The early morning casts a lavender hue over the sky, the sun barely peeking out, but she can make out some of the faces in the glow of the streetlights above. In the sea of reporters and police officers outside of their home, a lone figure behind them all, beside a telephone pole, clad in a black coat and black hat, stands staring back at her. Jamie squints but even then, she can't make out his features, as if his face were as black as the coat and hat he wears.
Jamie blinks, backs up, and he's gone. Simultaneously, she finds herself hitting a solid figure behind her. Rachel. She exhales the breath she'd held in without realizing it.
"What did I say about going near the windows?"
Jamie sighs, wrapping her arms around her sister. Rachel's fingers find their way into the bump where the braid she'd made still sits.
"I'm sorry, Rachel," she whispers, looking back up at her. "I just wanted to make sure he wasn't out there."
Rachel sighs, bending to her knees to be eye-level with her. "He's never getting out. Ever. So you don't need to worry about that, okay? I'll always protect you, from now on."
Jamie offers a small smile and nods. "Do you promise?"
Rachel holds up her pinky. "Pinky promise. And you know you can't just break those."
Jamie laughs, entwining their pinkies. Rachel cups her face, kisses her on the head, and stands to entwine their fingers.
"Come on, I'll make some breakfast. How about some French toast, huh?"
"That sounds great. Extra sugar?"
Rachel sighs with a smile, wider this time.
"Alright, sure. Now, help me set the table."
Recent budget cuts have left the halls of Smith's Grove short-staffed and barren. Charge Nurse Marion Chambers can already feel what little energy she had when she woke this morning leave her and she's only just gotten back from her half. It'd given her just enough time to eat her leftover lasagna from the night before along with her carrot sticks, hummus, and Diet Coke. The caffeine should cut it but it doesn't do much these days.
Especially not on a day like today. After spending nearly seven months awaiting trial, Michael Myers had finally been sentenced to life in Smith's Grove as everyone had anticipated he would. Unlike when he was a child, docile and drugged on so much Thorazine that it'd alarmed the rotation of nurses who double and triple-checked his chart, he'd be staying in the maximum security ward. Despite the budget cuts to general staffing and medical care, more than enough funding had been spared to ensuring Smith's Grove could compare to any other prison in the midwest with the War on Drugs that's raged across the country for years now. It makes Marion huff but it's evidently for the best, as without it, people like Michael Myers wouldn't get the care they needed.
"If he's even a man," Marion huffs under her breath, putting out her cigarette in the ashtray in the designated smoking area before heading back down the long hallway to Dr. Terrence Wynn's office, where she taps her knuckles against the door. The resident inside, a young medical student, quickly stands up and exits upon seeing her in the threshold.
"Marion," Terrence greets her warmly. She offers a small smile as she steps inside, kicking out the doorstop with her foot so it shuts behind her.
"Terrence," she says.
"Please, take a seat." She sits in the offered chair, feeling antsy. His gaze sets upon her, expression neutral before that same smile crinkles at the corners of his eyes, easy and personable. Everything about Terrence Wynn is. "How's Sam doing?"
She exhales, huffing a laugh. "Sam is as stubborn as ever. Hates that he's lost his independence and hates it even more that he can't get here by himself yet, to see the monster in captivity for himself. To ensure, as he told me, that he could lock him up himself and throw away the key."
The older man lets out a hearty chuckle.
"He sounds up to spirits, then. I knew he'd bounce back from the stroke."
"The stroke, it did get to him, Terrence, but-he's bound to make a full recovery within the next six months, luckily enough. He's just not ready to leave the house yet, without me or someone to watch him, you know. He wishes he was."
Terrence nods. "That sounds like him. But you're the best nurse I've ever met, and an even better friend. Sam and I both know that."
Marion feels her face heat up and laughs.
"Flattery will get you everywhere and I could listen to you compliment me all day," Marion says, "but that's not why I'm here. Sam actually asked me to come, to see him. I know I'm not on Michael's rotation of nurses today, but I'd like to see him. For Sam's sake."
Terrence blinks a few times, lips pressing into a thin line. "Marion… you know I have strict instructions not to allow visitors…"
"And you know this isn't a visit, Terrence. I have the clearance to see him," she shakes her head. "It's-not for me. It's for Sam."
Terrence exhales and stands, reaching for his telephone to inform the maximum security ward-located in the belly of Smith's Grove, all the way in the basement-of their arrival. He gestures toward Marion to follow him before closing and locking his office door behind him.
"I presume Sam was persistent about this as he is about everything else?" Terrence asks upon turning his key in the elevator to reach the basement. Marion nods, adjusting her lanyard on her scrubs.
"You presume just right. You know more than anyone how he is-especially about Michael Myers."
They both step in alongside each other for the elevator's descent.
"Well, he'll be locked away down here, in the dungeons, until the day he dies. Stowed away from the world, just as the man always intended. I imagine he regrets not killing him in the old house."
Marion's ears pop with the elevation change. She swallows to try and alleviate it, and then, "I'm sure. I hope, with this, he'll have some sort of closure and can try to live an actual life, with whatever's left of it."
Terrence glances at her from the side.
"I think Michael Myers will always be his white whale, Marion," he says, finally, as the elevator dings their arrival. "And I think you know that, too."
"I suppose you're right." She steps out into the red hue of the basement, so bright it's an eye-strain until she adjusts after a moment. Terrence leads the way to a wrought iron door, which he unlocks with one of his many keys. They both walk down a long, narrow path to another door, where two manned personnel stand in wait for them. A loud buzz sounds and the barred entrance slides open automatically, leading to a line of cells.
Noting the dingy surroundings, the leaking from the ceiling and the overall unclean atmosphere, Marion says nothing more, biting back any instinctive reaction against the inhumane conditions.
He isn't human, she can practically hear Sam's voice in her head, resounding and reassuring, and follows closely behind Terrence until the reach the last cell on the right.
"We keep him here. Away from the others," Terrence says. "He's made no effort to communicate with me or any of the other staff. He's made no effort to even move. He just stares at that wall. But he's still a danger, a predator lying dormant in his cage."
He pushes the bar covering the small window into his cell open, revealing the Shape sitting with his back facing the door, dark sleek hair shining in the fluorescent light of the cell and hands bound behind his back. Michael is no less foreboding in the white asylum pajamas, back broad and shoulders broader, speaking to all of his strength even from the limited view Marion is provided of him.
"Hello, Michael. You have a visitor-you may remember her. An old friend of yours, perhaps-Marion Chambers," Terrence says, pleasantly.
"Hello, Michael," Marion says, the usual steel resolve in her tone nearly gone at the sight of him. Michael doesn't even flinch. Marion remembers the long days she spent, working the night-shift rotation and looking forward to taking care of little Michael Myers because he was such an angelic boy, so well-behaved because he was so docile, so quiet. Little had the nurses in the juvenile ward known, he'd simply been lying in wait.
Terrence shuts the viewer, abruptly halting her reverie.
"He reacts to nothing," Terrence says. "It's-monstrous. But I hope to break through to him, somehow. Like his niece claims to have done, in that attic back in the old house. Maybe she's the key."
Marion's more than ready to be out of the cold, dingy basements-away from the screaming and hollering of the other patients in their cells that echo throughout the bad acoustics, away from the Boogeyman.
"Mm. You tell me more about that when I have some more coffee in my system."
Terrence chuckles, the baritone sound likewise carrying throughout the basement.
"Right this way, then."
It's been nearly ten years.
It's been ten years, and the Shape can feel strong gusts of wind shaking the asylum straight through its foundation and imagines the sound of rain and hail pelleting against the walls like bullets. It's an old institution, around since he was a boy and likely longer. He knows the inside and outside of it very well, too, and doesn't need to look through a window to know of the thunderstorm that wracks through the county. He hasn't seen the outside in many, many days, hasn't seen the outside even longer.
Rain also means the leak in his ceiling gets worse. It doesn't affect the Shape, though-nothing does. Not the cold of his cell, or the fact that rats roam about in his cell, squealing almost louder than the other inmates in the long line of cells adjacent to his own. The Shape is more alone than he's ever been and nothing, nothing can get to him here. It doesn't bring any comfort, or anything at all-he feels nothing.
He does nothing, even when the familiar sound of keys jingling and the big, heavy door opening. Michael doesn't turn toward the sound-he doesn't react. Steel-toed boots scrape against the asphalt floor as the black-clad figure steps inside, alongside a few others dressed in white orderlies scrubs.
"Good evening, Michael," Terrence Wynn greets, warm as ever. Michael doesn't even blink, facing away from his doctor. However, the sound of a squeaking mewling, echoing throughout the cell, catches his attention more so than, though he doesn't react likewise with every other source of stimuli that he receives in such a minimal amount.
Wynn smiles wider, showing teeth viciously.
"Yes, I've brought you a gift, Michael. Some company."
Michael hears the meowing-a kitten, he knows that, remembers the big stray cat in his neighborhood that had a litter of kittens that were more attached to him than their own mother. Remembers that the sweet things, somehow such efficient predators too, had never bothered him as much as the big dogs had in the houses adjacent. Michael knows this. Wynn continues, coy.
"It's not company like your niece," his hand twitches and-now, he thinks of her. Her dark sleek hair, like his own, her black eyes so big and animated like his own. Gets a good picture in his head of her, how she'd look now-seventeen. It's been ten years since they last glanced at each other, and she's the same age as Judith. As Laurie. Michael knows that, too. Knows that her hands would be soft and small, like they had when she held his hand close to hers, that his hands would fully engulf her own. Knows that she'd be small, too, smaller than her mother but so similar in her features, so similar to Judith, maybe. But nothing like either of them, nothing like them.
But she has his eyes, because you're just like me.
"She's not your niece, but she's very sweet. I'd love to see how you react to her."
The Shape's hand twitches once more at the thought of her and sees a glimpse that takes over his entire vision-her foster mother, screaming in agony in the bathtub, Rachel's terrified face staring up at her from the bottom of the staircase as Jamie's heart raced in terror, in fright. The emotion, stronger than any rage he's ever felt, confuses the Shape. It enrages the Shape.
Wynn smiles, setting the kitten to wander the small space of Michael's cell.
"I'll leave you to your own devices. You know better than to hesitate about any of your instincts here, Michael. Not that you ever have."
The door shuts. Michael glances from the wall to the kitten, who's taken to rubbing against his legs. He reaches one big, scarred hand down to touch its black and white fur after a moment, finding himself being gentle. He remembers his mother's touch in his own hair, remembers Jamie's touch so gentle on his features to wipe away the tear that fell freely down his cheek. Two memories he knows he'll never forget but doesn't quite feel enough to cherish.
The Shape feels rage, because he doesn't understand it. How the simple thought of Jamie Lloyd, his niece and his only living family member left, continues to bring such feelings these years gone by. It's not rage, or emptiness.
He watches as one of the many rats that infest his cell and likely the others in the block runs in the corner of his gaze, likely for a crumb of food left behind. The kitten, quiet and eager, sinks down and wiggles her rear to pounce. Michael watches in fascination as the cat pursues its target, though the rat quickly escapes to the small hole from which it came. The kitten stays watch for it, vigilant, and Michael's tempted to run his fingers along her fur coat again, but doesn't, simply watching as she hunts new prey in the roaches in his cell.
She likes cats. She likes dogs too, and he doesn't, but he knows now from a pang of something in his gut that she likes cats and all animals.
She likes him, too. Loves him - he's known that longer than anything else.
The Shape understands how she loves cats. He does not understand the latter.
When Wynn enters his cell ten minutes later, he finds the kitten curled up and asleep on the rough, hospital-issued cotton of Michael's blanket. Michael himself sits, staring at the wall, not having moved an inch from where he's left him.
"Maybe this prey isn't good enough of a hunt for you, Michael," Wynn says, scooping the cat up in one hand while she squeaks loudly. "I understand that. I wanted to provide you with some stimulation, but perhaps I will have to find something more sufficient for you. Better than some kitten. I suppose that isn't much of you anymore, is it?"
Michael remains silent and still.
Wynn sighs, with a smile, noting that the only thing that seems to stimulate the Shape is any mention, anything at all, of Jamie Lloyd. It's been this way for the entirety of his ten years of captivity, culminating to this point.
"Alright, alright," Wynn says. "I will leave you to sleep for the evening, Michael. You'll have to rest up for our session, tomorrow - I have a feeling we're going to make a breakthrough."
The heavy door closes loudly behind him, locking shut. The Shape has no desire to pander into Wynn's hands any further, but the man has more than one resource that will be useful to him for what he knows he needs to do, so he plays docile. He's always been good at playing docile, but that doesn't mean he's any less of a beast.
His gaze at the wall breaks once more when he hears the loud squeaking of the same rat as before-emerged from its hole in the wall where it ran, assured of its own safety. He hears the rumbling of his belly at the sight and feels the pang of hunger from not eating for days prior, and knows what he must do.
The Shape stands to pick the vermin up by its tail.
The Shape eats.
It's been ten years, and the dream ends differently, this time-not with Darlene Carruthers' lifeless body staring up at her from the bathtub, or with Rachel Carruthers in front of her vanity dead and bleeding on the floor from eleven stab wounds to her chest. It doesn't end with Michael killing her, strangling her to death and leaving her for dead in that coffin.
It ends with Michael, touching over a cat's fur. Michael, touching over the space of her palm, somehow.
It ends with-the taste of-
Jamie Lloyd-Jamie Carruthers as of last year, when the name change went through almost knocks over the contents of her night table in her frenzy to get to the nearest bathroom. Half-asleep and eyes not adjusted to the dark, she sends her cat, Coco, off her side and almost onto the floor. The cat meows loudly in protest but she doesn't hear it over the sound of her own vomit into the toilet.
When she's finished, the seventeen-year-old sighs, resting her head against the porcelain of the glass and resting her cheek against the coolness of it. Upon catching her breath, she listens for the sounds of the house, hearing no one awakening to check on her. She exhales in relief, standing to reach for the sink to steady herself on her feet so she can turn the light on. When she looks into her eyes in the mirror, she sees his gaze staring back at her again in her own.
Jamie sighs, reaching for her toothbrush, and feels Coco rubbing against her ankles. The clock above the toilet reads nearly five in the morning.
She turns on the water, brushes so hard she nearly gags, and spits out the toothpaste into the sink.
It's only when she finishes washing her hands that Jamie says, "Happy birthday, Michael," to her own reflection, and wonders if he heard it, in the same way she feels and hears him in her dreams.
She turns off the light to the bathroom to head to her room to get ready for school because Halloween is just like every other day. She's learned that among other things, thanks to therapy and counseling. It should feel like any other day now, but it doesn't. Darlene Carruthers wakes up at 5:30 on the dot to start the big breakfast of the day and Richard gets in the shower fifteen minutes after. Rachel gets in her bath shortly after that, playing music from her CD player that Darlene yells at her to turn down. Jamie gets dressed like she does any other day, too, in a sweater and jeans with her backpack slung over her shoulders. It's just as cold as any other fall day.
Yet, she knows.
After getting dressed, Jamie looks out her bedroom window and breathes out a sigh of relief when she finds no one there looking back up at her.
Somehow, in her gut, she knows she's only on borrowed time before someone does.
Author's Notes: If you're seeing this again-please reread it. I have changed the current setting from October 31st, 1999 to October 19th, 1999 to reflect an update in my story that will be seen in chapter 4.