The Dead Forest--chapter two

Hello All:

"This is a very, special week at The Literary World of Tom Raimbault, for this is Halloween week! And like we do every year, new stories written just for the holiday are featured throughout the week. This year we roll out a new novella titled The Dead Forest. Be sure to visit Monday through Friday of this week as well as next Monday (Halloween) for each new installment.

As a side-note: the novella has yet to be properly divided into chapters. I simply counted the amount of pages in the manuscript and then divided by six to feature throughout this week and next Monday (Halloween). Being the case, I will sometimes leave the reader with unfinished sentences to be completed the following day. Sorry for any inconvenience.”

The Dead Forest--chapter two

At this point, Stan looked up and realized that he had spectators—spectators who he made eye contact with. Immediately the morbid fantasy had ended.

"Are you alright?" called out Richard.

"Yeah, I'm okay answered Stan. I'm just getting something." While saying this, he quickly tossed the terrified doll into the metal tool box, closed the lid and set it back into the ground. Before covering it back up with soil, Stan nervously lay on the ground, and pulled his trousers back up in case the curious spectators wou
ld come over to see what he was doing.

But, apparently they were not interested. Both Richard and Laurie continued to hike back to the car. By now, Laurie realized that the boy was doing something that he shouldn't have been doing. But, again, things like this weren't discussed in olden times.

A few minutes later, Stan's father encountered Richard and Laurie on the walking path. "Excuse me!" he called out.

"Yes?" answered Richard.

"Is that your Thunderbird parked in the lot?" asked Stan’s father. He wanted to verify that it didn't belong to those imaginary girls.

"It is." answered Richard with a note of concern. "Did it get hit?"

"No your Thunderbird is fine." reassured Stan’s father. "I apologize. You see, my son is here and he claims he is out riding his bicycle in the woods. I was concerned that maybe he was meeting some girls out here."

Richard nervously glanced at his wife.

Richard’s father definitively noticed. "You didn't happen to see a teenage boy riding his bike, did you?"

Laurie spoke up, "Well we did see that boy off the main trail. He was kneeling on the ground and..."

Richard interrupted his wife, "Yes, it looked like he was bending down to pick something up."

Laurie stared at her husband for a second. Was Richard sure that's all it was?

Stan's father grew all the more curious. "Kneeling on the ground? Are you sure he wasn't with some girls?"

It was then that Richard grew outraged. You see, Richard was a young newly-wed and felt a need to demonstrate himself as having a certain merit in society; maybe equal to those who are some years older than him. He sharply asked, "Hey, what's the big idea of asking all the questions about your son?

"I'm sorry..." apologized Stan's father.

But Richard continued, "If you're so concerned about what he's doing, then he's your responsibility, not ours!" Richard looked over to his wife and ordered, "Come-on, Laurie, let's go."

And with that, the pair of newly-weds continued hiking back to their car.

Poor Father, he was worried about his son. From the looks of the newly-weds, they had seen Stan doing something that wasn't right. What could Stan have possibly been doing? Father continued onward in hopes to locate his son.

Not more than three minutes later, Stan and his Father finally approached and faced one another on the main trail of the Berry Bush Forest Preserve. Stan knew that he was to stop and dismount his bicycle, and he did so.

"Well I suppose you have some explaining to do." began Father.

"Sir?" questioned Stan. "What do you mean? I'm riding my bike in the forest like I said I was going to do?"

"Never mind that!" snapped Father. I ran into a pair of newly-weds who said that they saw you in the forest off the main trail. They said you were kneeling on the ground."

Immediately Stan blushed, and his heart rate increased. Did they report to Father of what he was doing?

"Now I'm going to ask you once. What were you doing out there?"

Stan quickly made up a lie. "Well, Sir, I'm almost embarrassed to admit. I rode off the main trail to enjoy the scenery some more, but fell off my bike."

"You fell off you bike?" asked Father in disbelief.

"Yes, Sir, that's the honest truth. See my hands?" Stan held out his soiled hands which in truth had been dirtied by quickly covering the ground over the buried metal tool box. "They got dirty when I braced my fall. And that couple probably saw me at the very moment when I had fallen."

"Well are you alright?" asked Father with a note of concern.

"Yes, Sir." answered Stan. "My hands might be a little scraped, but I'll be okay."

"No, something's not adding up." remarked Father. Why is your heart racing? It looks like you are nervous. It looks like you are covering something up from me."

"Well I was riding my bike." offered Stan. "Of course my heart is beating faster. I swear, I'm telling you the truth about everything."

Father heard enough. As far as he was concerned, Stan had been doing something that he wasn't supposed to in those woods. But for now, he would play it off that he believed him. "Okay, fine." answered Father. "Maybe the whole situation just looked weird. Are you alright to make it back home?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Then I'll see you when I get home."

With that, Stan mounted his bicycle and proceeded to ride off towards the parking lot of Berry Bush Forest Preserve. From there he peddled on the main road in town and head home. Halfway there, he realized that in his frantic state of quickly burying the toolbox, Stan had left Father's hand shovel near the grave.

"Oh no!" exclaimed Stan. "I'll have to go back later and get it." You see, Stan was worried that the pair of newly-weds would have called the police. He needed to quickly leave before the police possibly arrived.

Unfortunately for Stan, he would never have an opportunity to retrieve the hand shovel. Like mentioned above, parents were a little different back in those days. They didn’t believe their kids when something looked suspicious. And kids weren’t let off the hook so easily.

Stan’s bicycle tires left fresh tracks on the gravel trail. Father simply followed them until they stopped at the place where Stan wandered off into the forest. Although Stan had gotten off his bicycle to walk it which no longer left tire tracks, Father simply continued to walk.

“He couldn’t have gone too much further…” Father continued walking. “Anything… cigarettes… maybe a lipstick from whatever girl he was with…”

But what was this?

So unexpected; some fifty feet off the main trail and near a large, old tree; Father discovered a hand shovel. “That’s my hand shovel.” he silently exclaimed. “What in the world is that doing here?” Then he glanced over near the tree and could see that a fresh hole had been dug and then the dirt covered back over it. “He buried something?”

With the hand shovel, Father quickly began to dig around the area which—unbeknown to him—was the doll’s grave. Moments later, he reached the metal toolbox. “This is my box.” exclaimed Father. He pulled the metal toolbox from the ground and took a deep breath. “Alright, is he stealing money and hiding it…? Maybe from Mr. Green’s dime store?”

But, no! It was nothing like this. When the metal toolbox was opened, there lay the terrified doll who quickly looked relieved to finally be rescued. Her ordeal of repeated rapes and then being buried in the ground was finally over.

“Why this is Sherry’s doll!” exclaimed Father. “What is wrong with that boy?” He closed the lid, and walked back to the car with the metal toolbox and shovel in hand.

***

Fifteen minutes later, Father entered the house with both the toolbox and hand shovel. He entered the kitchen where Mother was cooking dinner. “Where’s Stan?” he asked.

“Well he came home and went right up to his bedroom.” answered Mother. “Why, is there something wrong?”

“I’m afraid there is.” affirmed Father. He walked over to the foot of the stairs and called out, “Stan, come down here.” While waiting, he set the toolbox and hand shovel on the kitchen table and then sat down.

Cautiously, Stan descended the stairs. He could tell by the tone of Father’s voice that he was in trouble. And upon entering the kitchen, he could finally see what it was.

“Sit down.” ordered Father.

Stan pulled out the chair and sat down at the table across from Father. His heart was definitely racing, now.

Mother stood near the kitchen counter and quietly prepared dinner while listening.

“Now don’t tell me that your heart is racing because you were riding your bike.” warned Father.

Stan remained silent.

“Son, I’m still at a loss of how to process all of this. You see, after you left, I followed your tire tracks until they ended. I assumed that was where you deviated off the main trail and hiked to wherever it was that you were going. And I was right. I’m sure you realize that there is no point in lying because this is clearly my hand shovel. That’s what I found. And I noticed that there was a fresh hole which had been dug and covered up. I was really curious. I thought you had been stealing money from Mr. Green’s dime store and was burying it in the forest. But then I uncovered my toolbox from the basement. And inside…” Father opened the metal toolbox. “…there lay your sister’s doll. Young man, you have a lot of explaining to do.”

Stan’s face was beat red out of embarrassment and humiliation. All he could do was shrug his shoulders. “I… I… I was just…”

“Just what?” demanded Father.

Just then Stan’s sister, Sherry, entered the kitchen and spotted her doll. “Betsy!” she exclaimed while rushing over.

“Sherry, no!” warned Father. “Your mother is going to have to clean Betsy. She’s dirty.” You see, although interrogating his son for an explanation, Father was aware of what Stan did to the doll in the forest. He resumed his interrogation, “Son, do you have any idea as to what this looks like?”

Stan shrugged his shoulders and did his best to keep from crying.

“This looks like you are some sort sexual pervert…”

“Henry!” cried out Mother.

“Let me finish!” snapped Father. “There is no point in pretending. Our son has a problem, and we need to correct this. As for you, young man…” he glared back at Stan. “It looks like you have some perverted desires of molesting the dead. That’s called necrophilia. And it’s a crime not only punishable by serving jail time, but it’s also a mortal sin. I’m afraid I’m going to have to dish out some punishment to teach you a lesson—see to it that you never do this again.

Stan’s lips quivered and the tears rolled down his cheeks. He knew the sort of punishment that Father referred to, and dreaded it.

“For starters, since you like playing in the dirt so much, you can go outside every Saturday and Sunday when you are not at the dime and do plenty of yardwork for us. And while doing that, you can think about what a bad kid you are. And Stan… I’m afraid this is going to hurt me more than you, but you can get your ass upstairs and bend over on the bed. I will be there shortly to deal with you.

Stan sobbed and ran up the stairs in terror. The last time Father dealt with him, he felt like he was close dying. He bent over and lay on the bed. While waiting, he imagined Sherry’s doll who must have cried out for mercy whenever enduring Stan’s sick play. Stan had been a monster in that doll’s eyes, and ignored any pleas from her to stop. Perhaps Stan deserved what was about to happen.

In stormed Father with the thick, leather belt. He raised his arm in the air and unleashed the wrath of God across Stan’s ass in the form of stinging leather. Father did it again and again—at least a dozen times before adding words to the beating. “You steal my metal toolbox and hand shovel to do something perverted in the forest preserve!”

Stan screamed and cried and even began to choke from the shock brought on by pain.

Father continued to beat his son. “You use your sister’s doll to play perverted games! And I just know that the pair of newlyweds saw what you were doing with that doll!”

Downstairs, Sherry observed from the hallway as Mother frantically scrubbed her doll, Betsy. “Is she really dirty, Mommy?”

“Oh yes!” affirmed Mother. “She’s very dirty!” Mother would see to it that every bit of filth and lust would be scrubbed off of that doll.

While being scrubbed, Betsy would occasionally glance at Sherry in hopes to communicate what a horrible ordeal she had endured.

Sherry could hear Father continuing to beat her brother Stan, upstairs, who choked and gasped for air while crying out. “Okay! Please! I’ve had enough! Please stop! I can’t breathe anymore!”

But the leather strap continued to snap. Little did Sherry know that Stan was now sitting on the ground and kicking his legs, partly in reaction to pain and partly as an involuntary response to prevent any further whipping. 

Stan’s beating that fateful Saturday afternoon lasted for five minutes, long enough for Father to become exhausted and believe that he had beaten the sick and perverted nature out of his son. Immediately, Stan stood up to rush to the bathroom.

“Where are you going?” demanded Father.

Stan cried, “I’m having trouble breathing. Please let me splash cold water on my neck and face so I don’t pass out.”

“No!” declared Father. “You get in bed and lay there. While you feel like you are dying, you can think about what a dirty pervert you are. Think about what life would be like in jail if you were ever caught molesting the dead. No supper tonight, either!”

Yes, it was a harsh punishment. But that’s what Stan deserved for kidnapping Betsy, burying her in the woods, and repeatedly unearthing her to rape her like a corpse that could not cry out.

Too bad the beating didn’t stick with Stan. Despite what Father may have believed, it didn’t change him. Oh, Stan never asked to ride his bicycle again. He wouldn’t dare. And he didn’t return to the forest preserve to play perverted games with his sister’s dolls. Still, the morbid fetishes remained with Stan throughout high school and after graduation.

***

It was expected—actually demanded—of Stan to join the Army after high school. Father believed that Stan needed a good drill sergeant to finally straighten out and make a man out of him. You see, Stan was mostly quiet in high school, and didn't make many friends. He didn't play sports and didn't pull the best grades. And there were still those concerns of Stan being a morbid pervert. Aside from that, Stan appeared to have no aspirations of doing much of anything after graduating except continuing to work at the dime store.  He was nearly nineteen years upon graduating high school. What's more? It was only natural to join the military with talks of drafts for the Vietnam War.

Father took Stan to an armed forces recruiter one Monday morning.

"Yes! I do believe we can make a man out of your son!" declared the recruiter with a menacing look. "What do you say, boy?" he asked Stan. "Are you ready to be a man?"

Stan shrugged his shoulders, "Sure, I guess so..."

"You guess so?" challenged the recruiter with a confounded look. "Well that's one thing we're going to fix for you, boy. We're going to take the guess work out of everything." Then he looked at Father. "We can take him right now if you want. We've got a truck load of 'em heading out to boot camp just like your son, all on their way to be turned into men and soldiers."

"It sounds like a great idea to me." agreed Father. "You can take him."

Stan was in shock. He believed that he would only visit the armed forces recruiter to talk about joining. He didn't think he'd be shipped off to boot camp on that very day.

And when he finally arrived, there stood a mean drill sergeant who yelled at Stan and scolded him for being late. "Now drop and give me twenty!" ordered the drill sergeant.

"Yes, Sir!" answered Stan who dropped to the ground and struggled with all his might after the third push up.

"What, are you some kind of girl?" asked the mean drill sergeant. "You can't even do pushups?"

Stan huffed and puffed with beads of sweat pouring down his face. You see, Stan wasn't exactly fit to do strenuous activity. And this disgusted the drill sergeant all the more.

Stan's time in the military lasted all but three weeks. He couldn't even make it through boot camp. Back in those days, cadets were severely beaten and punished for being unable to fulfil the drills and exercises. And that's what happened to poor Stan. They beat the shit out of him, beat him bloody and unconscious. They beat him so bad, in fact, that he was unconscious for three days due a concussion. It was a miracle that Stan didn't die.

But the Army didn't feel the least bit sorry for Stan. Again, this was olden times and things were handled differently. As far as the Army was concerned, Stan failed boot camp and was dishonorably discharged.

Back at home, Mr. Green no longer needed Stan at his dime store. He found a replacement, a studious sophomore boy in high school who was working quite well. Fortunately for Stan, he quickly found an alternative. He managed to land a full time job at the local Texaco gas station as a pump and lube attendant. Stan was certainly knowledgeable on filling gas tanks. As for changing oil, Stan had done it for Father on a few occasions which made him qualified enough to work at Texaco.

It wasn't such a bad job. It paid fairly decent and enabled Stan to pay for Father's mandatory rent for living at home. It also enabled Stan to purchase his own car, a black 1959 Chevy Impala. Through his new network of coworkers and their friends, Stan landed a nice deal for the used car. So he no longer needed to ask Mom and Dad to use theirs. How's that for becoming a man?

Oh, but things would get even better for Stan once summer ended, right around the time when his yearly morbid fetishes began to stir. It was on Thursday, September 24^th, 1964 when Stan sat in the family room with Mother, Father and his kid sister Sherry. They watched the very, first episode of The Munsters. And that's when Stan fell terribly in love with the wife, Lily Munster. You've seen her before, I’m sure; long, raven-black hair with a pale face and red lipstick—at least this was seen when the episodes were finally colorized. But viewers in those days swore that they could see the full colored morbid beauty of Lily Munster through the black and white TV screen. But Stan saw so much more than her morbid beauty. For Stan, Lily Munster was the woman he had been waiting for all his life. So haunted-looking, she was the sort of woman he could bury in a grave and later unearth for an evening of romance.

Poor Lily Munster...

“So is this how things got even better for Stan?”—you might ask? “He saw his first episode of The Munsters and fell in love with Lily Munster?”

No, that’s not what happened. It only served as a precursor, and Stan would soon forget about Lily Munster. You see, the very next day, around 4:30 PM, a car pulled into the Texaco gas station—a 1962 Dodge Belvidere—with Stan's high school classmate, Fredrick, driving. In the passenger seat was Fredrick's girlfriend, Donna—the same Donna who was discussed at the beginning of the story. For all practical purposes, she was already grown up—a young woman.

Stan had to take a deep breath to pull himself out of disbelief. You see, this was beautiful Donna; Spanish with long, raven black hair, dark Spanish eyes, and fair skin. She was nearly a dead-ringer for Lily Munster! He remembered seeing Donna throughout high school. Why hadn't he noticed her before? Stan was in so much of a trance that moment that he initially walked up to the passenger side.

Donna could see the love in Stan's eyes. But she had Fredrick, now a soldier who had successfully graduated boot camp and was waiting to hear word of when he would be deployed for the Vietnam War.

"Over here Stan!" ordered Fredrick from the driver seat.

"Oops, sorry!" apologized Stan. "I guess it's been a long day."

For some strange reason, Donna momentarily felt sad.

"So how have you been, Fredrick?" nervously asked Stan while trying to make small talk.

"Not too bad." answered Fredrick. "And you?" But before Stan could answer, Fredrick was sure to jab the knife in. "I hear you didn't make it in boot camp. Yeah it's rough, ain't it?"

Stan sighed, "Yeah..."

"I hear you were dishonorably discharged." continued Fredrick.

Donna sadly called out, "Fredrick, that's not nice."

But Fredrick ignored his girlfriend. He was a soldier, and no girl was going to dictate what was nice. "I heard they beat shit of you."

Stan now felt about two-feet tall. "Yeah, I was unconscious for a few days..."

"Sorry to hear that." finalized Fredrick before ordering, "Fill it up with five dollars regular."

"You've got it." acknowledged Stan who walked over to the gas pump. Normally he would ask the customer if he should check under the hood. But with as humiliated as he felt, Stan wanted Fredrick to be gone as soon as possible. But not Donna! How Stan wished that Donna would have voiced her disgust in the way Fredrick had treated Stan, and then exit his vehicle to be with Stan for the remainder of the evening. Stan did clean the windshield while the gas pumped. For a split second he managed to glance in towards the passenger seat at Donna who returned a micro-second sad look which communicated how sorry she was.

"Okay, that will be fiver dollars." announced Stan after hanging up the gas pump.

Fredrick handed a five dollar bill and a single out the window. "Keep the change." Then he drove off with beautiful Donna in the passenger seat.

***

It had been over two years since Stan paid a visit to the Berry Bush Forest Preserve. After that severe beating from Father on that fateful Saturday, Stan avoiding the place mostly out of fear that Father would be lurking. But Stan was older now. He worked, paid rent, and had his own vehicle. There was no reason why he couldn't visit the old burial spot on a Friday night after work which just so happened to be the same Friday when Fredrick visited the gas station with beautiful Donna sitting in the passenger seat.

It was late afternoon, actually nearing twilight, as Stan pulled into a parking spot at Berry Bush Forest Preserve. He put the transmission in park and turned off the engine. Located a few spots away was a vehicle with a couple that were necking.

"Is this the new lover's lane?" Stan thought to himself.

The couple briefly stopped with their passionate necking—young kids still in high school—and observed Stan. It was no one they recognized, so they resumed making out.

Stan walked the main trail for some minutes until reaching that place where he would deviate into the forest preserve. From there he continued until reaching the tree where he used to play his morbid game of unearthing Father's metal toolbox with terrified doll laying inside. With over two years passed and extreme weather conditions, evidence of a hole once being there was gone.

Stan was older now, and didn't really feel like playing with dolls. But how he needed an outlet to fulfil his morbid fetishes. He gazed off into the distance of the forest while briefly pondering for a moment. It was then that his attention was drawn to a large, old tree some distance off in the forest. There were actually two of them towering over the forest side-by side, but it was the one on the left that really caught Stan’s attention. It was clearly an old tree that had to be at least three to four hundred years old.

But why would an old tree catch Stan's attention?

It was because the tree exhibited the shape of a young woman; the curvaceous sort of woman... perhaps one that has long, raven, black hair with dark, Spanish eyes and fair skin... perhaps someone, exactly, like Donna. Has the reader ever taken notice of a very, old tree? It's beautiful to say the least. But pay attention to the outer surface and how the bark begins to build up curvy, irregular designs. It might remind you of a curvaceous woman. But would you fall in love with the tree in a way that Stan was beginning to do? Stan was spellbound and captivated. The more he looked at the tree, the more it resembled—perhaps—a wooden sculpture of the sort of woman he had been waiting for his entire life; someone like Donna.

Stan left his once-upon-a-time burial place of the doll, and linked back to the main trail. He walked and walked for over a hundred feet until at a location where he felt he could deviate off the trail and reach the tree. Oh, but it was no easy task. It required a bit of bushwhacking and then climbing down a ravine. When finally at the bottom, Stan approached the old tree which strongly resembled Donna.

Stan reached out and touched the sides of the old, curvy trunk as-if he were gently caressing Donna's hips. If Stan didn't know any better, there was something living in the tree—a spirit or some sort of ghost. And in that moment, Stan was able to use his morbid fetishes and fantasize of bringing to…

BE SURE TO RETURN TOMORROW FOR MORE OF THIS WEEK’S NEW NOVELLA, THE DEAD FOREST!