IFFY FICTION

Read Pt. 1 here

Read Pt. 2 here

There was a groan from the ground. Ida looked down to see a huddled figure in the shadow of the oak, sunk into the mud, soaked and shaking. 

“Oh, honey.” She set Muriel down, took off her jacket and crouched down beside him, placing it over his rounded shoulders. “You’re drenched. Let’s go back inside.”

She grabbed Arthur’s elbow and tried to pull him up. He didn’t budge.

“Are you hurt?”

Silence.

She stood up. “Thomas! Henry! Come help me!”

A quiet muttering came from the hunched figure. Ida knelt back down.

“What is it? Are you okay?”

“Now depart what dwell within, to taketh vengeance for their sin.”

Ida rubbed his back, trying to warm him. “We need to get him inside,” she said as her sons approached. “He’s soaked. He’ll catch his death.”

“Foul breeding, faith, and errant ways, enacted doth my wroth araise!” Arthur’s voice was louder.

“He’s already delirious.”

Arthur stood abruptly, turning to look his wife in the face. “Shall come to fruit the prophecy, with the felling of the tree!” His booming voice filled the dark, echoing off the gravestones that jutted up like broken bones.

Ida gasped and stepped back. “Arthur, snap out of it! It’s just a story!” Then, turning toward Thomas and Henry, “Take his left arm, Thomas. Henry, take the other.”

Thomas did as he was told, but Arthur pulled away and moved toward Ida. “Don’t you see? ‘Crook’d the wicked branches run.’ It’s us. The wicked branches. “Festering evil, foul misdeed…”

Ida took another step back. “Arthur, you’re frightening me. It’s just a story. It’s just a tree!”

“You!” He pointed a finger in her face. “You never believed. You mocked the prophecy.” Then, in a mocking voice: “It’s just a story.” 

The clouds parted, revealing the moon’s wan light, illuminating Arthur’s face. But the face wasn’t Arthur’s at all. His sparse eyebrows were now white and wiry. His aristocratic nose extended now to a bulbous end. His delicate jawline now drooped with fleshy jowls. 

He moved toward his wife, his eyes wide with fury. “You did this!” he howled as he shoved her backward. Her heel caught on a root and she hurtled onto the ground, the back of her head cracking loudly on a crooked stone. 

“Mom!” Thomas screamed, rushing to her side. He took off his coat and pressed it to her scalp, trying to staunch the bleeding. Henry started to cry. Muriel stood motionless, eyes wide, knowing beyond their years. 

Dahlia rounded the stump, Calvin’s hand in hers. “Oh my god!” she screamed, shielding Calvin’s eyes with her hand. “Mom!”

Ida looked up from where she lay, the deep mud sucking at her back, pulling her in. Her vision blurred and focused, a display of lights like a crackling fire in her eyes.

Arthur knelt down beside her, his face hovering inches above hers, his own expression wild and enraged. His hands trembled as he reached for her. A low growl emanated from his throat as his fingers closed around her neck.

“Daddy, stop!”

Muriel’s voice caught his attention, pulling him away from his deed just long enough. Recognition washed over his face. His mouth softened, his eyes looked like his once again. 

“Ida. Oh my god. What am I doing?” He pulled his hands away from his wife’s throat and touched her hair. “You’re bleeding.” He wedged an arm under her shoulders and propped her up in a sitting position. Blood streamed down her back. 

“Thomas, Henry, help me lift her. Dahlia, go inside and get the first aid kit. Calvin, take Muriel inside.”

They made their way down the path through the headstones, through the gate, across the yard, and into the darkened house. 

Once Ida was on the sofa inside, Arthur cleaned the blood from her hair and bandaged her wound. Dahlia helped her into a clean frock, while Thomas and Henry relit the fire. Calvin and Muriel sat in their father’s armchair, silent. 

Arthur had moved a stool beside his wife, where he sat, stroking her hand. “I’m so sorry, Ida. I never meant to hurt you. I can’t even remember what happened. It’s all a fuzzy…”

Ida’s eyes flicked open, checking that his face was still her husband’s. “It wasn’t you. It was…” She trailed off, shaking her head. “I don’t know.”

“And now the tree… I can’t believe it really happened. Everything Hiram said was true. Now they’re coming. Coming to deliver his wrath.”

“Now they can go?” A squeak of a voice asked from the armchair. Muriel.

“No, they’re coming to…” Arthur began.

“Yes,” Dahlia interrupted. She’d returned from the kitchen with a bowl of fresh water and a clean rag. “Now they’re free.”

Ida nodded, wincing with the pain. “Now we’re free.”

Arthur looked at his wife, then his eldest daughter. His smile was dubious. 

“I suppose you may be right. But that tree was our family tree. And the book…”

Arthur’s thought was interrupted by a small voice. “It’s a bad book.”

He turned to look at Muriel who now stood beside Henry as he stoked the fire. “It’s not bad, Muriel. It’s part of our heritage.” The next sentence caught in his throat when he saw what was in her hand.

“Muriel, give the book back to Daddy.” She stared at him with those wide eyes. She didn’t move. 

Anger flashed, and the voice that came from Arthur’s mouth wasn’t his own. “Give it to me, now!”

Muriel’s eyes grew even wider. She looked down at the book, at her father’s face, back again. 

Then, with a quick flick of her chubby wrist, she tossed the book into the hearth fire. The flaking leather of its binding, the ancient stained ages went up in a burst of flames. In moments, its ashes had disappeared into the cinders below.

Arthur stared, paralyzed, mouth agog. When he finally could speak, a weak voice squeaked out “what have you done?”

Muriel stayed where she stood and repeated herself. “It’s a bad book, Daddy.”

His eyes searched the faces of his other children, looking for support. They were all nodding. 

Something touched his arm. A hand. Ida’s. He looked at her face. She was nodding, too.

“It was a bad story, Arthur. Time to let it end.”