Bag of Bones   ::   Кинг Стивен

Yet I stood a moment longer, uneasily studying the face I could see in the bushes, not liking the way the little shake of breeze seemed to make what was nearly a mouth sneer and grin. I think perhaps I started to feel a little bad then, was too preoccupied to notice it. I set off north, wondering what, exactly, Jo might have written… for by then I was starting to believe she might have written something, after all. Why else had I found my old typewriter in her studio? I would go through the place, I decided. I would go through it carefully and…

help im drown The voice came from the woods, the water, from myself. A wave of lightheadedness passed through my thoughts, lifting and scattering them like leaves in a breeze. I stopped. All at once I had never felt so bad, so blighted, in my life. My chest was tight. My stomach folded in on itself like a cold flower. My eyes filled with chilly water that was nothing like tears, and I knew what was coming. No, I tried to say, but the word wouldn’t come out.

My mouth filled with the cold taste of lakewater instead, all those dark minerals, and suddenly the trees were shimmering before my eyes as if I were looking up at them through clear liquid, and the pressure on my chest had become dreadfully localized and taken the shapes of hands.

They were holding me down.

“Won’t it stop doing that?” someone asked—almost cried. There was no one on The Street but me, yet I heard that voice clearly. “Won’t it ever stop doing that?”

What came next was no outer voice but alien thoughts in my own head.

They beat against the walls of my skull like moths trapped inside a light-fixture. . or inside a Japanese lantern.

help I’m drown help I’m drown blue-cap man say git me blue-cap man say dassn’t let me ramble help I’m drown lost my berries they on the path he holdin me he face shimmer n look bad lemme up lemme up 0 sweet Jesus lemme up oxen free allee allee oxen free? pounds, SE OXEN FREE you go on and stop now ALLEE OXEN FREE she scream my name she scream it so LOUD I bent forward in an utter panic, opened my mouth, and from my gaping, straining mouth there poured a cold flood of…

Nothing at all.

The horror of it passed and yet it didn’t pass. I still felt terribly sick to my stomach, as if I had eaten something to which my body had taken a violent offense, some kind of ant-powder or maybe a killer mushroom, the kind Jo’s fungi guides pictured inside red borders. I staggered forward halfa dozen steps, gagging dryly from a throat which still believed it was wet.