by Daniel Ray

Dyersburg was dead.

Jerry was the last holdout, the only person who still lived downtown. The solitude suited him well. His life was simple: he did the same things everyday, and he didn’t go out unless he needed to. When he did leave his apartment, he walked. Jerry was glad to be alone. People cause problems. Being alone was better. And Jerry would take a run down one room apartment over a nursing home any day.

Jerry went to bed early, usually before sunset.

The nights were quiet.

Usually.

Jerry jerked awake and lay in bed listening. Outside in the street people were laughing and yelling.

“Hey, it’s my turn.”

“Fine, but I get the next one.”

“There won’t be a next one, you moron. Do you see another car?”

“Shut up and gimme that.”

More noises, sounds of things breaking, louder than before—closer.

Jerry swung his legs out of bed and grabbed his cane and hobbled over to the window and slid it open and stuck his head outside. There were three of them. The boys were young, early twenties maybe. One was standing on the hood of a car, and was repeatedly slamming an aluminum baseball bat against the car’s windshield.

The boy brought the bat down hard and the windshield gave in.

The two other boys laughed and cheered.

The streets were dark and empty, save for the boys and the car. Jerry didn’t know who the car belonged to; he had been waiting for someone to tow it away for days. The sky was overcast but Jerry knew there was a full moon behind the clouds. He kept track of the cycles. There wasn’t much else to do. People go crazy during full moons. Mix that with being young and drunk and anything could happen. Still, Jerry was surprised at how brazen the boys were. Then again, everybody knew that downtown Dyersburg was dead.

One boy bashed the car’s tail lights out; they popped like firecrackers. Another boy finished a beer and threw the bottle against the passenger side window; both shattered and the boys howled with laughter. The empty street amplified the noise. The sounds made Jerry think of a ravenous pack of hyenas, or maybe wolves.

Before he thought about it, Jerry yelled, “Hey! Stop that!” and instantly regretted opening his mouth.

The boys looked up at him, momentarily stunned, maybe eighty feet away.

“What’s wrong, old man?” one of them said, pointing the bat at him. “This your car?”

“No, but it’s somebodys.”

The three of them looked at each other then erupted into laughter. One bent over and held his knees. The other two held each other as they cackled. Jerry stepped back and closed the window. For a moment it was quiet and Jerry hoped the boys had fled.

They hadn’t.

From the sidewalk just outside his window, one of the hooligans said, “Where’d you go? Don’t you wanna talk anymore?”

Jerry could feel his heart in his chest. He didn’t own a phone. He didn’t own a gun. He should’ve kept his mouth shut shut and stayed in bed.

“Hey, I’m talkin’ to you, old man. Can’t you hear me?”

“He probably went to change his diaper,” one boy said, and they all laughed again.

A glass bottle exploded through Jerry’s window and sailed past his head and burst somewhere on the other side of the room near his tiny kitchen.

“I know you can hear me now, so why don’t you come back over here? I wanna talk.”

Trying to sound authoritative, Jerry yelled, “I’ve called the police. They will be here any minute. I suggest you leave immediately.”

“Uh-oh guys, I guess that means we need to scram.”

There was a long moment of silence, then the hyenas were back. Jerry didn’t know how much more of their laughter he could stand to hear, but there wasn’t much he could do to make it stop.

“I guess if you won’t come talk to us, we’ll just come up there.”

Jerry’s heart skipped a beat. He hurried to the door and made sure it was locked. He could hear them working on the street level door at the bottom of the stairs—his first line of defense; it was heavier than his apartment door and locked with a deadbolt. He hoped it would hold, but it didn’t. As the boys thundered up the stairs, Jerry dropped his cane and shuffled away from the door, knowing the second door wouldn’t keep them out.

He grabbed a chef knife from the counter and hid it behind his back.

It wasn’t much but it was something.

One kick and the door was open. The boys entered. Up close they looked more like men. The one in front was shorter than the other two but twice as mean looking. His arms were covered in crude jailhouse tattoos. The other two could have been brothers; they were tall and lanky and had pale, waxy skin. One brother had long yellow hair. Not blond—yellow. The other brother had a single tattoo on his neck: a red devil with a pitchfork.

Jerry backed to his bed and sat down and the two could-be brothers began rummaging through Jerry’s things. The short one just stood there looking at Jerry. He rotated the baseball bat in his hands. The way he was smiling…he was hard to look at.

“You live alone, old man?” he asked.

Jerry nodded.

“He don’t even have a phone,” Devil Neck said.

“Figures,” Yellow Hair said.

Jerry swallowed and said, “You need to leave.”

“No, I think we’ll stay awhile,” Shorty said, and joined the other two in their search.

They ignored Jerry like he wasn’t there. Jerry’s hand was sweaty; he had to readjust his grip on the knife.

A few minutes later when the boys had failed to find anything of value, Shorty pointed the baseball bat at Jerry and said, “Where do you keep your money, old man?”

“The bank.”

The two brothers laughed and Shorty’s smile faded. A long time ago when Jerry was young, he had been shot in the knee by a man who looked very much like Shorty. Since then, Jerry had walked with a cane, drawing a disability check every month. He wasn’t lying; his checks really did go straight to the bank.

Shorty crossed the space between them. Jerry could smell the beer, the cigarettes.

“Get up.”

Jerry revealed the knife and before he had time to do anything with it his wrist was broken. Homerun. Out of the park. Shorty knew how to swing a bat. The knife clattered to the floor and Shorty kicked it away and grabbed Jerry and jerked him to his feet. The three intruders began rifling through his bed. There was nothing to find. No stash of money, not even an old gold watch. Jerry stood there trembling, trying to support his broken wrist.

“I know you have somethin, and you’re gonna tell me where it is,” Shorty said.

He swung the bat like a golf club and Jerry felt something snap and his leg buckled. Jerry landed on the floor. He grasped his bad knee, pain howling up his leg.

“I ain’t gonna ask you again,” Shorty said.

He readied the bat.

Jerry looked up at him and said, “Get outta here, or I’m gonna kill all of you.”

Hearing the boys laugh again made the decision easier. If Jerry lived, they were going to die—even if they did leave. His mind was made up.

“And how are you gonna do that, old man?” Yellow Hair asked.

Jerry narrowed his eyes at Yellow Hair and said, “I’ll remove your face, and you’ll scream like a little girl as I do it. Your type always screams.” Jerry turned his gaze to Devil Neck and said, “You’ll beg me not to, but I’ll tear your guts out with one hand.” After taking a long look at Shorty, Jerry said, “I’ll pull your head off your shoulders and drink your blood while your eyes are still moving.”

Of course they laughed.

Jerry began to crawl.

Shorty said, “Last chance, old man. Tell us where the goods are.”

It was just a few more feet to the window; Jerry figured he could get there. When the baseball bat connected with his torso, he heard it more than he felt it; his ribs cracked like chicken bones. He kept crawling.

“This dude is tougher than he looks,” Devil Neck said.

Jerry reached up and grabbed the windowsill and the broken glass cut into his hands. He pulled himself up and looked at the sky.

“Where you goin’?” Shorty asked. “I thought you were gonna kill us?”

“I think he’s gonna jump out the window,” said Yellow Hair.

More laughter, more of it than Jerry could bear.

Any other night and Jerry would’ve died a broken old man. But the clouds were breaking. One good look of the moon was all he needed. The boys were still laughing. Part of him felt sorry for them. The clouds cracked and the moon shone through silver, big and bright as Jerry had ever seen it.

Yellow Hair began screaming.

If Jerry didn’t know better, he would’ve thought the scream was coming from a woman.

Devil Neck started yelling, “Kill him!” over and over again.

Jerry could feel the baseball bat bouncing off his body, but it barely hurt. He could feel his ribs and wrist healing already. His knee would never heal—not from a silver bullet wound—but the rest of him was growing stronger by the second.

Nothing beats changing.

Jerry had forgotten how good it felt.

The pain is unimaginable, but so is the pleasure. The worst and best part is when your nose and mouth stretch into a long snout, but it’s over pretty quick.

Devil Neck and Shorty bolted. Running wouldn’t save them. No matter how fast they were, Jerry would catch them easily. Yellow Hair stood frozen—looking like a little boy, screaming like a little girl. His pants were wet. Jerry crossed the apartment on all fours, his claws clicking against the hardwood floor. He rose to his back legs, a full head taller than the boy.

Then Jerry did exactly what he said he was going to do.

                                                     The End