Page 36 of Earth-Bound

“Why?”

He didn’t answer. I tried to look over my shoulder at Randall but Terrund was blocking me from turning my head far enough.

At last, he said, “It might be dangerous.”

“What? What’s going to happen, is it going to curse me?”

I’d meant it as a joke. This was some serious creepy cult shit and I didn’t like it at all, but I’d wanted to lighten the mooda bit. Terrund’s arms tightened around me, squeezing me to the point of discomfort.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know what any of it does.”

I tried to reassure him. “It doesn’tdoanything. Some sick bastard has strung a load of animals up and we need to take them down and bury them.”

“No.”

He sounded so firm about that, and he spoke straight into my ear, so close that I actually felt his lips brush against my lobe. It was a bit hot, actually. I could get behind a bossy Terrund. Pun intended.

Randall sounded a bit faint when he said, “I want to get out of here. Can we go?”

“Yeah, of course,” I said, and tried to move back.

Terrund wasn’t letting my arms go and we had to shuffle round.

“You might want to let me go now. I need the light to get up the stairs.”

Broadmire had actually lifted Randall up into his arms, and Randall had wrapped his legs around his boyfriend’s waist and buried his face in Broadmire’s neck. They went up the stairs like that and disappeared into the light of the kitchen.

Terrund’s voice was soft against my ear. “Don’t touch anything. Please.”

“Fine, I won’t.”

“Promise?”

It seemed this shit really bothered Terrund more than it bothered me, so I said, “I promise.”

He let me go and, ironically, I just wanted him to wrap himself around me again.

When we got upstairs and Terrund had shut the door to the basement firmly behind him – as firmly as he could, at least, since it was hanging in two pieces – we realised that Broadmire had carried Randall straight outside. By unspoken agreement, we followed.

I was glad to get out in the sunshine. The feeling of relief I usually had when I left the house was double today and I took several gulps of the fresh air.

I just heard Broadmire grind out a few words. “I’m sorry.”

Randall touched his boyfriend’s face gently and looked into his eyes. I looked away to give them some privacy.

“That wasn’t your fault, Broadmire. How were you to know what was down there?”

“You won’t want to live there now.”

I glanced across towards the apple tree and the carefully-made model of the house that we’d left under it.

Randall sounded like he was getting back to his old self after the shock. His voice was stronger. “Don’t be silly, of course I do. It’s a perfect house and we can live there together and walk down to the village together every morning and it’ll be wonderful. All we need to do is clear that stuff out.”

They nodded at each other and looked round at me. I thought Broadmire – as my boss – was hinting, so I volunteered.

“I can do it, if you want. There’s no need for you to see it.”

“No!”

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