Ray Rexer's "RAY - VINGS"

Character Assassination

-I-

Stephen King was in trouble. Bad trouble. There could be no denying that.

Snow drifted down unwatched in light, delicate spirals and pushed softly, like ghostly hands, against the locked door of the cheap Dakon Street motel room he occupied. Inside, Stephen stood before the grubby mirror and saw an old man, thin and haggard, wearing his face. He passed a hand slowly over his grizzled chin. I look haunted, he thought. And in a very real way, that was just what he was: Haunted.

He took off his thick glasses and rubbed his eyes. He was tired, bone tired. He couldn't recall the last time he had slept through an entire night. Another lifetime ago, perhaps. A truck roared by on Highway 1, shaking the thin walls of the room and rattling the door. Stephen jumped and turned quickly to look at the door. The thin wood vibrated with the truck's passing. "Shit on a shingle," he muttered, and then laughed bitterly at himself for sounding like a character out of one of his own stories. But why not? It was, after all, those very characters that got him into this mess, now wasn't it? "Shit on a goddamn shingle," he said again, as he watched the door.

-II-

It had started some seven months ago, wayback when he had been the Stephen King everybody knew, and some even loved. A good ole boy, normal in most ways. Slightly overweight, but happy and sane. A lifetime ago. When he had been a writer. Remember that? A writer, for God's sweet sakes. He had put words down on paper to the delight of himself, a nearly orgasmic delight at times. It was what he lived for. He was a gleefully possessed man when he was at his word processor (a big Wang he lovingly called "The Monster Dick"), and back then he had been a writing fool, a one man story factory. Back then he had been at his word processor nearly every waking moment. It was almost as if he fed off the light rays from his CRT, like a plant absorbing life's energy from the sun. It meant that much to him.

But he hadn't typed a single word, a single letter, in over seven months now. And for him that was the worst thing, worse than everything that had happened since. But he couldn't risk it, couldn't take that chance. He had become much too powerful of a writer for his own good. He had become dangerous. His words had almost killed him.

Stephen King was scared. And he was in trouble. Bad trouble.

-III-

He set his glasses on the scarred nightstand next to the bed, and stretched his long frame out on top of the ratty bedspread. He reached up and turned off the light. The darkness was nearly complete; the only sound his own shallow breathing. He felt very much alone. He had a headache, a real bitch-kitty, and he rubbed fiercely at his temples. "Those are stressaches," his doctor had once told him. "You gotta slow down, Steve-o, start taking it easy."

Right. Slow down. Take it easy. He snorted at the thought and the sudden intake of air drove a spike of pain through his eyes. Lying fully dressed in a cheap Dakon Street motel room bed, protected from death by thin plywood walls and discount K-Mart locks, "taking it easy" didn't seem very much in his future. Sure. Slow down. Cheap advice. He squeezed his eyes shut against the throbbing pain in his head. Yeah, I'll slow down, he thought. I promise. And that, my friends, is boolsheet of the purest ray serene. He concentrated on his breathing, tried to make it deep and regular, tried to relax, tried not to think of anything. He tried to make his mind a blank, a complete blank, a white void...and finally he drifted off.

-IV-

A knock at the door woke him with a start from the cheap beginnings of sleep. His heart flapped and thundered in his chest like aluminum in the wind. He grabbed the hunting knife from the inside pocket of his denim jacket and held it pointed at the door. His hands jitter-bugged the knife above him in the dark. He resisted the urge to scream. The knock came again. Stephen held his breath. Who this time? Which one of them? Why can't they just leave me alone?

The knock came louder, a booming WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! that echoed throughout the small room. Then a voice, almost a whisper. "Steve. Oh Ste-eve. Open the door. Open the goddamn door."

He back-crawled out of bed, eyes wide in the darkness, never leaving the shadow-shape of the door. He backed to the far side of the motel room until he felt the cool wall against his hips. The knife was still held out in front of him, more like a talisman than a weapon. Award against evil.

Then sharp and loud: "OPEN THE GODDAMN DOOR! OPEN IT!" The door buckled inward from a shoulder crash. "Open the door or I'll...I'll..." Then a pause. "Why, I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow it right the fuck down!" Laughter, deep and maniacal shot through the door, chilling Stephen's spine. "Right the fuck down. I shit you not."

"No," Stephen said out loud, shaking his head in denial. "No. You're not real. You're not real!"

"I'm real, you little pup. You created me."

"No." But it was too late for denials.

"Yup, and it's time for paybacks. It's time for...correction. Can you say that, you witless bastard? Correction. It's time for correction, you shitheap! You officious little prick!"

The final word was counterpointed by a resounding CRASH! as the business end of an axe came through the door. Jagged wooden splinters flew. Stephen screamed. A flashback of Annie Wilkes hit his brain and he touched the fresh scar on his wrist. The axe was pulled out and then came down again, harder. A hole the size of a fist appeared in the door. Trapped, he thought. I'm trapped. He pushed away from the wall in a panic and struck the nightstand hard with his thigh. Gonna bruise, he thought crazily, as the nightstand fell over and he went down with it. The knife flew out of his hand in comic slow-motion, somersaulting in the air. It landed and skittered across the floor. Stephen scampered on hands and knees over the contents from the spilled nightstand and groped wildly around for the knife. The axe came down again and now its whole head crashed through the door. Stephen screamed again and looked up. The axe was pulled free. Puffs of snow swirled in through the hole, and spears of gray light stabbed their way into the small room. He could see movement outside, shadowy and indistinct. Then an eye appeared at the opening, and part of an evil, crooked smile.

"Redrum, Stevey. It's time for Redrum!"

It was Jack. Jack Torrance. He was alive.

-V-

His characters had been coming back from the dead for seven months now. He had been running, not really sure why, but not knowing what else to do. Most of his friends thought he was crazy. And who could blame them? Made up characters just didn't come to life, forchrissakes. They were figments of imagination - paper and ink, not flesh and blood. Not real. Sure, he was good at characterization, even his harshest critics gave him that. But he wasn't that good. No one was. Characters just didn't come alive. That was fucking absurd. That was like something out of a Stephen King novel, as ironic as it seemed.

The first one had been Andrew "Poke" Freeman, a relatively minor character out of the pages of THE STAND. Stephen had been finishing the final draft of a short story for a Charles Grant anthology called "Horrorfest," when Poke appeared at the door to his study.

"Wha-," Stephen said, lookingup at Poke, shocked by his sudden appearance, and then dumbfounded when he really looked at him. "Wha-."

Poke stood in a blood-soaked shirt. He was smiling, but the left side of his face was mostly gone.

And the smile was less than friendly. "Whoop! Whoop!" he said. Steve could see his jaw working through the rough open flesh on his face. Most of Poke's teeth were gone on that side. "You blew me up, you stupid fuck. Blew me up in your stupid book. Got me shot. Now I'm gonna Pokerize you, ole buddy."

Poke brought a gun up from his side. Stephen wasn't the least bit surprised to see that it was a .357 Magnum. He had, after all, given the gun to Poke - in a literary manner of speaking.

Stephen didn't give much thought to the utter impossibility of the situation, he just dove for the floor. The shot exploded above him and took out his word processor. Glass rained down on him. He hugged his head with both arms. His mind cartwheeled in his head.

And then there had been silence. Just silence. Fifteen minutes had passed and then another fifteen before Stephen had cautiously crawled out from under the desk, brushing glass chips from his shoulder. He stood up. The room was empty.

Three weeks later, while walking out of the downtown Bangor Public Library, he had been chased by Mrs. Carmody and a small band of her followers right down Main Street in the middle of the afternoon. "Blood Sacrifice!" they had screamed at him, fists raised in anger. "Expiation! Expiation!"

Over the next seven months, fourteen more of the characters he had killed off in his books and short stories had come for him. Had come for revenge. Some seemed mostly benigned, their intentions unstated. Like Ray Brower. Ray had appeared shoeless one day in Stephen's backyard, his ashen face a blank and staring mask. A dented blueberry pan held out in front of him, like he was catching raindrops - or maybe hailstones.

But others were evil, pure and simple. There was no ambiguity to their intentions. They were out for blood.

One morning, late in October, with the air as cool, crisp and fine as a sip from a New England stream, Stephen had opened the front door and stepped out onto the porch to get his morning paper. Kurt Barlow had been waiting, fangs dripping morning dew and shining bright white in the new October sun. He had held the newspaper out to Steve and said, "'Local Autbor Suffers Fate Worse Than Death.' Read all about it."

"No," Stephen had said. "You can't...the sun...you can't..."

"I can. I can do whatever I wish now, Mr. King. You have lost control."

"Oh, Jesus!"

"Oh, no. Quite the opposite, Mr. King. Quite the opposite, indeed."

He had escaped Barlow. At first all of his characters had been easy to elude. They moved like toddlers - or maybe more like zombies. All stiff in limb and motion. But each new arrival seemed to be stronger, to have more substance. And each new arrival was more dangerous than the last. When Annie Wilkes had come back three weeks ago, she had nearly killed him. He would carry the scar from where Annie had carved him for life. Annie had convinced him, in her own mad way, that it was time for him to boogie right the hell out of Bangor, if for no reason other than to protect his family. He had taken just enough time to pack a bag and call his agent to let him know that he would be taking an indefinite writing hiatus.

-VI-

The face disappeared from the jagged hole, and a bare arm snaked its way through the opening. Stephen continued his frantic efforts to locate the knife. Jack's arm bent and his hand opened and closed like a viper's head, searching for the door lock. "Donna getcha Steve," Jack said from behind the door. His hand brushed the security chain and clamped down on it. "Gonna getcha."

Stephen's knee rolled painfully over something hard and round. Hoping it was the knife, he grabbed it without looking. But it wasn't the knife, it was an ink pen, apparently shot out of the overturned nightstand.

"GETCHA! GETCHA! GETCHA!" Jack yelled. He began working the security chain out of its track.

Stephen lurched to his feet and crossed the room in three loping strides. He held the pen out in his right hand like a dagger. "This is crazy," he said, and stabbed Jack's forearm with the pen. It went through the arm with sickeningly little resistance. Jack howled, long and hard. Blood as black and thick as dirty oil flowed from the wound. The air suddenly smelled of rotted meat.

Jack yanked his arm out, leaving Stephen holding the bloody pen. He wiped it off on his jacket without thinking. Mightier than the sword, his mind reeled. Mightier than the sword.

"You bastard!" Jack cried. "You bitch!"

The pen had hurt Jack much more than an object so innocuous had any right to. Stephen sensed that immediately. He sensed it in the tone of Jack's cry. There had been more than just pain and anger in that cry. There had been fear. But why? Stephen looked at the ink pen, held it close in the murky light. It was just an inexpensive ballpoint, a courtesy pen with the motel's name printed on it. But it felt warm and alive in his hand, like it was filled with living, pulsing blood instead of ink. And did it glow somewhat in the predawn darkness? Perhaps.

Jack howled again from the outside. Stephen didn't seem to hear. His gaze was locked on the pen. It was definitely glowing now, there could be no mistake of that. The room was visible: the bed,the overturned nightstand, a scattering of motel stationary. All visible.

Jack had retrieved his axe and brought it down on the door again. But this time there was no force in the swing, and the blow was mostly ineffective. "LET ME IN!" he wailed. "YOU GOTTA!"

Stephen looked at the door, then back at the ink pen. He walked slowly around the bed plucked a sheet of stationary off the floor, and righted the nightstand.

"Jack," he said softly.

"LET ME THE FUCK IN!"

"Jack, listen to me."

"NO!"

"It's not your fault."

"NO!"

"You're going to be going away now, Jack."

"NONONONONO!" He hammered at the door.

Stephen looked at the piece of paper in his hand almost reverently. He set it down on top of the nightstand and brushed it straight with a gentle hand. "Yeah," he said quietly. "Yeah, you are."

Then he sat down on the edge of the cheap motel room bed and, using the nightstand as a writing table, he wrote: "Jack Torrance came back from the dead, looking for revenge. What he found instead was his permanent demise. Jack Torrance was written out of existence for good, once and for all."

Stephen read back what he had written. He smiled. He thought it sounded too much like the beginning of some cheap pulp novel. But he also thought it'd do just fine.

And God, didn't it feel good to be writing again?

* * * *

NEXT ISSUE...Ray's First Installment of "Interviews From Within."

Horrorfest Press Fall 1989 #1, pp. 8-9 Ray Rexer - Contributing Editor Story later revised.