TONDER Chapter 3

Only a few steps behind my father, I could not find a sense of safety in his shadow. He stopped within an arm’s reach of this creature and I nearly ran into him, distracted and confused. I tried to form a discerning thought, but felt as though my senses were ablaze. I sidestepped slowly in a single motion to see around my father’s shoulder and quickly found myself in full view of this beast. There was little evidence of anything related to human form except for the jerky movements from the two gnarled and boney appendages jutted outwardly and reaching. The sporadic movements lacked a rhythm and reminded me of an eight millimeter film that blinked and skipped frames. Through the surface I could see traces of a scarlet substance that suspended seemingly injected into the slime beneath giving the gathering blob a hue of pink. From the ends of the arms was a single claw, yellow and razored, that the monster was using for its awkward mobility.

There did seem an obvious direction for its movement as it traveled in a straight line toward the trees; not hindering from its path. In my mind I was hearing the distant call to turn from this and run backward to the truck, past the old shack and beyond the forsaken path and forget what I have seen. I knew that I could never forget and I realized that I could not run away. The evil that ebbed and pulsed before us seemed to pull us ever closer into its rank stench and unbearable sight. 

My father placed his hand in the center of my chest and pushed me directly behind him as I peered out from around his shoulder. Doubt simmered in my mind and threatened a rolling boil. Why hadn’t my father taken the gun offered to him by the old man? I would have felt more confident with anything between us and this atrocity then just our fear and apparent reluctance. Scratching. Searching in the hard dirt. Pounding steadily. It moved as if compelled with a purpose. My bones ached as I clenched my fist, frightened by the quickness and authority of my father’s words.

“You beast from Hell, by the power of Heaven you must stop!”

My father’s words echoed through the field’s opening and settled beyond clearing. His right arm forced instantly in front of him, and aimed unswervingly at the beast as the veins atop his tightened muscles pulsed beneath the tightly stretched skin. His right hand opened wide showing his palm to the ghastly subject as if clutching the air. The beast paused but seemed unthreatened by this command - perhaps waiting; sensing; gauging us. The adrenaline raised higher into my throat as the blood rushed from the reaches of my brain. Stronger and more commanding, my father spoke again in a tone of authoritative ruin. It was a tone of unrefined hate. His voice was now full of salt and gravel.

“Beast of Hell! I order you back from where you came, in the name of all that is good and Holy…in the Blessed name of our Lord!”

The beast still did not move and appeared unaltered. The words shot through me like a blast and compounded the seriousness of this situation. My Catholic upbringing caused me to feel threatened by these words and fearful of the repercussions. These words were not to be spoken in jest or whispered carelessly. These words were powerful and compelling; dangerous and provoking. Angered further, my father raised his open palm to the sky curling his fingers in rage as if ready to throw an unseen fastball through the engine block of a Mac truck. Again, loudly he proclaimed;

“Beast of Hell I compel you…”

His words were stopped in his throat by the abrupt changing of the beast into an altered form. In a quick jerk, a face came forward from the side of the monster closest to my father. The suggestion of a head was a disfigured protrusion of tightly wrapped skin that seemed to radiate heat evident by the curled vapor as a hot summer highway of an open road. Eyes extended beyond a jagged forehead and were cast in a black gloss such as polished marbles. There was no nose; no ears or hair, but merely the idea of something earthly or an imitation of human familiarity. As its form of a head swayed forward and back atop a growing and shrinking neck; it spoke. It spoke in a voice distressed and angered and with a resonance of a desolate sewage.  The voice was neither male nor female and there rolled an ethereal growl beneath its grisly hissing. I stepped back immediately as my father was confronted by the fiend.

“I know your words, Chaser. Leave me!”

“Damn you back to Hell! I compel you back from…”

“Damn you Chaser and your ignorance. I have championed you in the past if only for my amusement. Are you so arrogant that you think you can push back Hell?”

The beast’s voice weakened as it seemingly tried to speak and its face lost more of its shape, now resembling a sketch that had been poorly erased. The body began pulsing quickly as its arms reached forward, clawing faster at the earth while throwing clods of the polluted ground into our faces. The flickering head turned away from my father and focused toward the ground while it continued to speak without looking.

“You… not contain me, Chaser. Greater men… failed than you and you too will. Not Tonder… want you. Not… Tonder, Tonder in me…you see…soon you see!”

With these words the shape of the beast shifted back. It appeared as when we first approached it and its disjointed words showed a loss of strength in the monster as if it was made weary by speaking to my father. The claws began digging faster into the earth as if trying to produce a hole big enough to contain it. My father and I stood there helplessly watching the creature shovel its way deeper into the ground. My father appeared beaten by the creature as his brow creased heavily and his lips drew upward revealing his tobacco stained teeth. He dropped to his knees as his arms fell to his sides and a blank expression overtook his face. His entire appearance seemed pale and unwell, as I became more concerned of him than of the sacrilege before us. For the first time, I forced the swollen words from my throat.

“Dad? Are you o.k.?”

He did not answer, but remained motionless as if entranced. From behind, I placed my hands upon my father’s shoulders, but instantly and quickly removed them. My father felt as if encased by an extreme heat and a brilliant shroud of white light illuminated around him. His body, framed in radiance, jerked as if connected to electric shock.  I feared that the beast even in its weakened state was killing him. My feet were filled with lead and welded to the steely earth below as my knees served as a mere sign post for my fear. My body was locked and my hearted pounded as if searching for an exit from my chest. The words formed again and my eyes began to roll backward.

“Dad! What’s going on! Stop this! Please stop it!”

Upon saying this, an overwhelming calm came over my body as I felt filled with a sense of serenity. My mind cleared and I immediately felt a focus and clarity that I have never experienced before this moment. I was no longer in control of my body and my mind was giving me a distinct direction. My once leaden filled legs were abruptly strong and vibrant.  I wondered if I was dying, but the thought was very quiet and peaceful as if my direct thoughts were being pushed into my subconscious; into a place I had never been. My mind was freed to go anywhere that it wished without my power of thought or remembrance. I could go away from this place if I chose to go; I knew that. With confidence, I knew that. I could go back to my mother’s kitchen or the hazy heat of a summertime playground where baseball and friends waited for me to bring my bat and glove. I could even go back to the comfort of my living room television. I could simply go.

I also felt a greater purpose of the moment.  My surroundings were real. The trees were a beautiful blanket of lush green foliage and the ground as soft as cotton. The once overcast sky was now vibrant and alive, painted in a color of blue that I could not remember. I felt as a blind man that was seeing a brand new world. I felt alive and suspended in time. In this moment, there was nothing but now. In this mind, there were no kitchens, living rooms or televisions. In this instance, there was only my father and me as one with a single voice telling me to go forward and do as my destiny has placed me. The vision of the world was clear as I turned my attention to my father, now encased in light and gloriously decorated in a multitude of colors. For the first time I was seeing the world as it truly is and I knew this for certain. I was more certain of what was around me than ever. I was awake and alive.

 The look of the beast was unchanged except that from my new point of view I felt its evil in all of its simplicity. Still pulsing and clawing it continued its trek downward into the ground; now one third of the way hidden from sight and rhythmically digging as a malevolent pickaxe. My father’s lips were moving and forming the sound of chanted verses. He and I were reciting in a dronish gurgle the repetitive chorus.

“Tonder, Tonder, Tonder, Tonder..."

The chanting continued as time paused until the beasts slithering movements began to slow to an eventual stop. It laid there as if lifeless; its wicked claw curled under its body that was now pulsing only occasionally. It was not dead but contained. As if shook from a dream, the putrid aroma of stench polluted my throat and soured in my stomach. My body trembled as the world melded back to its familiar form. The trees dimmed into their tattered bareness and the ground hardened beneath my now outwardly swollen feet. My eyes burned as I tried to regain focus on the lucid creature before me. The radiance that once surrounded my father had subsided while he rested on his hands and knees in front of me as we both struggled for breath. For a moment the air was poisoned with reality and being. I felt as if I had been wrecked as my mind and body cried with pain. My father gasped and choked to find his words.

“You did it, Sutter. You came through and you did it.”

The broken words were too much for him and he did not try to speak again. Instead, he rested his forehead on the ground beneath him as sweat dripped from the ends of his tasseled hair. I did my best to respond to him but could not speak. The words lodged in my throat and I collapsed to the ground crying silently. With my hands on my knees I sat there motionless in that forsaken field, sobbing now uncontrollably as my reality settled upon my shoulders, heavy like the searing heat above me. I had no understanding of what had just happened and questioned if I wanted to. My father rose to his knees and fell down beside me on his back staring into the sky. His breathing returned to normal, but his words were still stirred with depletion.

“Son, I’ve got a lot of explaining to do and I hope that you will listen. Trust me; I will explain what I know once we finish up here. We have one more thing to do before we can rest and that's to get this thing back to the shack. Then we can sit down and talk.”

I watched my father lift himself to his feet and then extended his hand down to me. I looked up to him through teary eyes and placed my hand in his. The strength in his hands brought back a security and confidence to me that told me we are again safe. He pulled me to my feet and embraced me tightly.

“You are the man that I knew you were. I always knew.”

“I’m ready to go home now.”

“Me too, Sutter, let’s start dragging.”

We each raised an appendage of the beast and the stench intensified. The feel of this creature was as cold as ice and the consistency of its skin reminded me of a rotted potato peel, yet the coolness of it brought a certain relief to our sweat soaked bodies. The weight of the monster was not great but amount of space that it consumed made our task more demanding. My father and I were forced to walk backwards while pulling the creature. The elastic skin seemed to stretch to the point of breaking but failed to do so. Only a few feet into dragging and we stopped twice to catch our breath. The dragging of the beast was cumbersome and took quite some time through the now brutal heat of the late summer morning. I wondered how long that we were out in this field. I had no gauge of time as my watch had stopped at 9:37 a.m. I am guessing that to be the time of contact with my now altered destiny. My father spoke in an “as a matter of fact” fashion to me.

“She’s sleeping.”

“What do you mean she’s sleeping?”

“Well, for lack of a better term we’ll just say she’s sleeping.”

“Why do you keep calling this thing a she?”

“Well, I can’t remember ever lockin’ horns with anything this ornery that wasn’t female so we call it a she.”

“So you’ve done this before?”

“Once about twenty some years ago I tangled with her. She wasn’t near this mean though. She should’ve been a lot weaker than she is according to Tonder. After being held for this long, she shouldn’t have had the strength that she did. It scares me a little bit that she got out. It scares me a lot really.”

“And what is this Tonder that you and the hillbilly have been talking about?”

My father stopped dragging and I followed his lead. The sun now burning my skin brings back many memories of cutting hay for my Uncles as sweat rolled down the back of my neck while dirt adhered within the creases of skin giving it a grinding sensation of pumice. My mind could not help but feel jealous of any man that was cutting hay at the same time that we were dragging this creature across the forsaken earth.

“Good question. I don’t know how to explain that to you and I guess you will just have to experience it for yourself.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I know that you had a taste of it back there. Tonder is for sure a higher power. Sent to a handful of chosen folks on Earth to keep the evil at bay. Tonder has never really said for sure, but I figure it to be some sort of an angel; maybe bigger, I don’t know. I do know that Tonder has used me to catch this evil mess beside us here on more than one occasion. I just do what I am told and in return Tonder keeps us safe.”

“What did you call that guy at the shack?”

“Balsavoy? That’s the name that Tonder gave him. Nobody else calls him that so I figured it was a good time to use it. Ya know with a gun pointed at you and all. Far as I know only Chasers know him by that name. They’re the only ones that would understand.”

“This is way too much info for me right now. Seems like God is watching out for us through Tonder maybe? I can get my head around it. If it were God, wouldn’t you know that without a doubt?”

"Well, Sutter, I suppose it is not so obvious sometimes. Sometimes he whispers and sometimes he shakes mountains. I am just trying to listen as hard as a can and do what I am told. Let’s hold up on the questions for a while and get her back to the shack. Still got a ways to go.”

We continued pulling the beast as not another word was spoken between us. When we reached the backyard area my father found a seat upon a rotted stump. The sweat now beaded off of his skin as if he were covered in glass. My muscles ached and cried for rest and my mind pounded in agony with every pulse of my heart. While we were gone, Emmett had gathered the stones and piled them beside the rubble of what was once a rock column. He had begun mixing mortar and started laying up the walls of the foundation. Emmett brought my father and me a glass of water and we sat quietly for a few moments gathering our thoughts and ourselves. Questions raced through my mind in fiery synapse; one after the next, most times not waiting for the previous to finish. There were so many questions that I could not contain them all and they were spilled out of my mind silently upon the ground and forgotten. Something had happened that I wanted to understand but could not begin to question. Although still fresh in my memory, the images began losing their sharpness and I found myself forgetting details; hideous details that were burned into my subconscious thought now being painted with imagination. 

“Wee-haw, Chaser! Knocked the wind outta ‘er this time! Pasty old nothin’ deserved it too, I bet! Put up much of a fight? How’d tha boy do up there? Did you talk to Tonder?”

My father, with eyes closed, extended his hand halting Emmett’s words.

“Emmett, too many questions."

He stifled the old man as if protecting me from remembering the details that were already fading from my mind; slowly but still present. I wondered at what point I would forget until the incident appeared as a movie in my head and my father and I as actors. The old man lowered his head as he received my father’s response and looked as a dog that had been badly beaten. But much like the abused dog, the old man found a renewed interest as my father gave him more details.

“Sutter saved me up there, Emmett. That demon has not gotten weaker; she is stronger and I don’t think I could have taken her. Not even in my prime. Tonder used Sutter to save us. He is eklektos”

There was a blank expression on Emmett’s face as he stared at me in surprise, his jaw seemingly unhinged.

“Mercy me, boy. You lektos?”

I felt the familiar confusion overtake my mind as I was not sure how to answer his question. His voice bounced in my head ricocheting from the corners of my mind like a caged animal begging for release. Again and again the words were repeated in my conscious as I tried to embrace the terminology and understand that I could not explain it. My father, now familiar with my uncertainty, spoke in my behalf.

“Sutter, Emmett is trying to say eklektos. It is Greek for “chosen” and Tonder has chosen you. Like I told ya before, I’ve been called by Tonder in the past to retrieve these demons and most times I have been successful. There have been times when I haven’t been strong enough and I simply can’t run ‘em down; Tonder made me a Chaser. There has always been talk of the Chasers eventually being ineffective as evil in this world gets stronger and people care less and less about themselves and others. That’s where a chosen one, eklektos, will battle stronger than the others. I believe that is you, Sutter. ”

“I’m not sure what I experienced up there, Dad. I’m a little freaked out right now.”

“Jeez Louise, Sutter. You are gonna do big things I just know it. Chaser, could he really be the one?”

“Let’s not talk about this right now. We got a cage to build. Grab a trowel Emmett and let’s get busy. It’s been a long day already and I know that Sutter’s bushed.”

My father and Emmett worked their masonry for hours, placed the creature inside, and sealed it shut. By the time that they had finished, the sun was going down and I fought to stay awake. They talked mostly of ordinary things throughout the remainder of the day and never once mentioning what happened or what would happen. Perhaps a grasp at normalcy for all. Although tired, I felt a new bond between my father and I that was unmistakable. My father gathered himself and escorted me to the truck by dark and we drove home. The rosary was returned to the rear view mirror to swing between the radio knobs and remind us of an age old convenant. I slept most of the way although light and nervous. The hypnotic swaying of the crucifix rocked away some of my edginess although uneasiness was still resting heavy upon me as I listened to Johnny Cash singing over the radio waves.

“On a Sunday mornin’ sidewalk, I’m wishin’ lord that I was stoned. But there’s somethin’ in a Sunday, that makes the body feel alone…..”

TONDER Chapter 2

The truck door opened on my father’s side with a slow creaking reminiscent to the sound of a movie-style coffin lid, adding only to the heavy air of anticipation. My father stepped out and shut the door while inspecting the shack from his distant view. I remained in my seat not knowing if I should follow him or stay.                                   

“Why don’t you wait here for a bit until I tell ya. Just sit tight.”

I nodded my head in acceptance as for once he and I were in complete agreement. I watched through the dust spattered windshield as my father walked easily and cautiously toward the shack. In a tone of authoritative reluctance, my father called out into the open air.

“Emmett? Emmett, are you here?”

I scanned the walls and windows of the old shack while struggling to see through the windshield. The windows showed no sign of movement, and the floor boards of the front porch were coated with a layer of red clay dust. As I intently studied the shack, a shaky and fearful voice bellowed from behind the truck, startling me and causing me to lunge forward in my seat.

“Don’t turn around you, I’ve got a bead on ya, ya sorry mule!”

My father froze in his tracks and did not turn around. His hands slowly rose from his sides reaching outward with his palms up while he faced the dirty shack. I turned to the direction of the voice to see a withered old man through the back glass. His appearance was that of an old prospector from vintage film with tattered boots, disheveled grey beard, and tanned skin. He stood awkwardly shifting his shoulders inside of his faded, ripped, and stained coveralls; the irony not lost on the smiling mascot of the Blue Hydrant Home and Lawn logo of his left chest pocket. His most outstanding characteristic, however, seemed to be the shotgun that he cradled upon his hip while pointed at my father. He was looking directly at me as if studying my face intensely.

“Step outta that truck real slow ya piss ant and don’t turn yer head. I wanna see them eyes real good so ya don’t so much as blink!”

I heard my father in the distance giving me instructions with an eerie calm within his voice.

 “Do what he says, Son. Don’t be afraid.”

I found it difficult to open the door with my trembling hand but slowly made my way out of the truck as the old man continued to gape at my face. I said nothing. He seemed content with my cooperation, but continued with his directives.

“You seem alright, now lay down on tha ground and keep yer mouth shut…and stop lookin’ at me.”

My father broke in startling the old man while maintaining his surrendered pose.

“Balsavoy, is that you?”

The old man relaxed his grip of the shotgun and displayed a curious look of interest in my father’s words as my father repeated them.

“Balsavoy, it’s Doyle…The Chaser.”

The sound of this confused me as I had never heard my father refer to himself this way. The old man found comfort in these words and lowered his shot gun and cautiously walked up behind my father.

“Who you think you are comin’ out here and callin’ yerself Chaser. Chaser I knew didn’t travel ‘round with no sawed-off runt of a boy. Chaser I knew’d stare down the devil and smack his shiny tail all tha way back ta hell. Turn around and let me see ya, but do it slow!”

My father pivoted slowly on his foot while looking confidently at the old man who was studying my dad closely, before his lips shaped into a crooked smile and parted to question my father with a single word.

“Chaser?”

“Yes, it’s me Balsavoy, and that’s my boy layin’ down in your dirt over there. Why don’t ya let him get up?”

“Son of a biscuit-eater! Chaser! Yer still alive! I figured you’d be done and buried by now!”

“Not yet, I’m stayin’ a few steps ahead, so far.”

I laid there, eyes up and chin in the dirt, breathing in the stale bitterness that seemed much worse from this close to the ground. I did not look directly at the old man who my father referred to as Emmett and then Balsavoy. I guess there was some relief in knowing that they knew each other, but still there was something in the air and the way that the old man looked at me; looked through me. It was more than a look from him; it was as if he was searching for something. I raised my head slowly to see my father and the old man embrace and hear the thudding pats of manly acknowledgement. By now I could not hear the conversation, but I could tell that the tension had lifted between them.

“Boy, get your face out of the dirt and get over here. I want you to meet an old friend.”

I picked myself up and walked over to the two men who were both smiling at me.

“Emmett, this is my boy, Sutter.”

The old man extended his dirty hand to me and continued to smile. I could see him much more clearly without the distraction of the shotgun between us. He appeared to be a frail man in his late sixties with lines of living etched tirelessly upon his face. His skin appeared as leather and his worn clothes hung about his lanky frame as if they belonged to someone else at some other time. I reached my right hand forward to shake his, feeling his skin under the pressure of my grip, as wetted onion skin draped over a knotted rope. 

“Pleased ta meet ya, boy. Name’s Emmett Caine from Fritzville. Don’t get a lot of folks through here unless they’re lost or…”

He paused upon his words and looked to my father as if searching for the next thing to say. My father finished Emmett’s sentence.

“…lost or crazy.”

“That’s ‘bout right, Doyle! Lost er crazy. Hell, anymore I’m mostly both. I’m ‘bout the only guy I know that can hide his own Easter eggs!”

“Pleased to meet you too, sir” I said shyly.

“Light-o-fire, Doyle, he’s a good lookin’ boy. Ain’t much to him though. Kinda frail fer yer stock.”

“He makes up for it in brains, Emmett. I never seen a boy so smart in my life as Sutter is. Get’s it from his Mom I’m sure.”

“Ah, hell, look at ‘im. Mean as a snake, best I can tell. I’d bet he’d soon as whoop yer tail as ta look at ya!”

My father smiled proudly and put his hand on my shoulder.

“Who is Balsavoy, Dad? And why do you call him Balsovoy and then Emmett?”

The old man turned quizzically toward my father with a sternly confusion glare; mouth wide open and eyebrows lifted.

“You ain’t told ‘im anything, Chaser?”

The look of worry returned to my father. I did not understand the strange names being exchanged between the two friends. My father looked down at the dusty ground and spit. From his pocket he produced another cigarette and lit it with ease.

“I haven’t explained anything, yet. I wanted to come out here and look around before I jumped to any conclusions. Everything might be fine, but it seems that there is a change in the air and I am afraid that I know what it is. I’ll fill him in after I see your back yard.”

“I know what yer thinkin’, Chaser, and yer right about her. You’d best follow me.”

The old man turned awkwardly and started toward the shack in a limping gate without looking back. In my mind I was thinking that the old man was certifiably crazy and that my father would visit for a short time and we would go home and find my mother in the kitchen frying chicken. We would have a good lunch and the summer would continue on as usual: quiet, hot, and safe. Those days were now over. As we rounded the corner of the shack, several steps behind the old man, the back yard came into my full view. It was not what I would normally call a back yard as there was no back porch, no grill for Sunday barbeques, and above all no grass or trees. The ground was as the rest of the terrain; lifeless, foul, and charred with fear.

Ten feet behind the shack was amassed a large pile of rocks; what I would imagine to be the only rocks on this small plot of ground. The rocks lay in disarray, but a pattern was evident to be a broken tower of some kind; one that had been disassembled and scattered around a twenty foot radius. Some rocks still bore traces of old mortar that continued to cling relentlessly to the edges.

“This is where she was, Chaser, jus like we put ‘er twenty years ago. I did everythin’ that tha Tonder told us ta do, everythin’ down to tha letter. I didn’t miss a thing, Chaser, I swear. Not a thing!”

“Emmett, did you notice anything unusual in the past few months at all? Any kind of change?”

“Well, a couple months back I did noticed she was hissin’ a lot. Like some kind of copperhead er somethin’, but I said tha verses jus like the Tonder said and she’d calm down. Next day; a hissin’ again! Then she started ta smellin’ real bad ta where I couldn’t stand ta get close ta her. A stench you wouldn’t believe! So I jus said the verses again, just like tha Tonder said, but she kept stinkin’! Next thing I know, I come out this mornin’ and she was gone! I didn’t do nothin’ wrong and I followed tha rules just like tha Tonder said.”

“Have you seen her at all, Emmett? She can’t be moving too fast, I mean she’s gotta be tired.”

“Haven’t seen ‘er at all, but there lays ‘er trail off toward tha woods. I figure a fella might find ‘er down toward tha bottoms close to tha tree line by now. Hell, I was gonna go get ‘er, Chaser, but you know that ain’t my job. I didn’t even know you was still alive but I figured some other runner might get ‘er if she got too far. Ain’t my job ta run em down ya know! Never was!”

My mind was racing much too quickly to understand what the men were discussing. A surreal feeling overcame me as I looked at the trail in the dirt leading over the land and out of sight toward the tree line. The trail was cut through the earth about six inches deep; as if something extremely heavy was dragged unwillingly across it. It frightened me to think of what could have carved such a path.

“Well, I’d better go bring her back, Emmett. Are you comin’?”

“Light-o-fire, no! Ain’t my job to run em down. Ain’t my job! Never was!”

“Son, I know this makes no sense to you. I have lived my life hoping that I would never need to explain any of this; that it would all be over by now or just something handed down to your great grandkids without you even knowing. Maybe even something that would leave this family all together and let somebody else fight this fight.”

My father squatted down and remained in a seated position, resting atop his worn work boots. He dragged a small rock through the dirt and affixed his eyes somewhere far away; beyond this tree-lined circle of stench, and far beyond my realm of understanding. When he spoke, his voice was low and stern. His chin rose in a prideful jut and his legs straightened as he lifted his body while speaking.

“For now, just take it as it comes and forget everything that you know that is real. I’ve raised you strong and have been preparing you for this for some time. I just didn’t know that the time would be at sixteen years old. I will explain it further when we get home, but for now suck it up and be strong for me. I know that you got it in you.”

My father’s words were deafening to me. I could not guess what he might be preparing me for or what waited for us near the tree line. I only knew that I was a kid who was scared and wanted to go home to my normal life; not this strange world of hissing “she’s” and the babbling of an old man about a Tonder. I felt my reality slipping away.

“Do you understand me Sutter? I need you with me right now.”

Nervously I replied, “I’m with you.”

But the words fell out of my mouth and bounced over the tops of my trembling feet like a balloon poured full with hardened steel.

“I knew that you would be. Just let me get something out of the truck.”

I walked a few steps behind my father as he opened the truck door and removed his rosary from around the rear view mirror. He kissed the feet of the crucifix before placing it around his neck tucking it under the collar of his sweat stained t-shirt. With me still swimming in his wake, he started toward the rock pile in the back yard once again. As we approached the collection of rocks and mortar, the man my father called Balsavoy stood there waiting. He extended his shotgun to my father.

“Take it, Chaser.”

“You know that this gun ain’t no use to us.”

“I know, but take it anyway, ya never know.”

“You keep it, Emmett, I would feel better if you had it. Sutter, let’s go.”

My father and I started out over the unforgiving ground following the deep cuts through the land. The morning sun had heated the air to a point of intolerability. I thought that by now I would have grown accustomed to the smell, but with each step closer to the trees the strength of the stench intensified. We crested the slope of the land and figure came into view in the distance. My heart began to race with fear and the thought of turning back became ever-present. I could not clearly see what this figure was and my father’s footsteps slowed until we both stopped. We had been walking for ten minutes without speaking and my lungs burned with agony. My father began to speak slowly and clearly.

“Well, there she is.”

From my vantage point I could not tell of any markings on the object that would lead me to believe that this hideous thing we were to soon approach was a she. About one hundred yards from us moved a gelatinous substance that resembled a semi-transparent pile of sticky flesh. Two gnarled and boney arms protruded away from us and were slowly clawing at the ground beside the fleshy pile as if blindly searching for something that was not there. With every motion, clods of earth were expelled behind the mass only accompanied by the sound of slow scraping in what is best described as a sporadic four- count. The creature made no other sound except for the rhythmic scraping and clawing as fingernails on a dry chalk board. My muscles stiffened and I realized that I must tell my body to breathe, as painful as it seemed. I felt a sour burning in my throat and recognized the bitter taste of adrenaline. My eyes remained steadily fixed upon the abomination and the strength to look away was not found within me.

“Dad, I want to go home.”

“Son, we’ve got a job to do right now and I need you. Stay with me for just a while longer.”

“What is it…what is that, thing?”

“Right now, just know that it’s our job. We’ve got to get this back to the rock pile so Emmett can contain it again. Don’t think too hard, Son, just do what I tell you.”

I followed a few steps behind my father and we began moving forward slowly. As we approached the beast my eyes began to burn and tear from the odor and apparent heat culminating from what laid before us. I was more afraid than I have ever felt and reluctance had taken over my senses. My father removed a white handkerchief from his back pocket and handed it to me. I quickly placed it over my nose and mouth. A realization came over me and replaced my paranoia with a sense that we were approaching evil.

TONDER Chapter 1

For an unusually hot October, I realized that my childhood was becoming distant. Not distant in a sense that it appeared far away, but removed from me in a way that seemed unreachable. Maybe there was a churning in me that caused a longing for the comfort of my childhood. Likewise, the irony of growing up caused me to wave fondly at my fleeting youth, never to look back. On this morning, I laid in bed listening to the creaking springs of my mattress while I turned to my side. I wondered how long it would take or how many times I could roll before the worn springs would push through the tired mattress, poking my side and piercing my dreams.  I stayed there, full of sleep, scanning the walls of my room that were adorned with posters of bikini clad women and sports icons. I gave no life to the thoughts of what the day held for me.  I gave no prediction of the feeling of fear that I could neither ignore nor explain.

Within an hour of sunrise, the morning dew was dissipating into the hazy light rays and the promise of the day was more heat and humidity. My dad awakened me an hour earlier and I raised my bedroom window in hopes of capturing a slight breeze.I paused for only a moment to take in the echoing song of bull frogs and wearied crickets. My view was interrupted by imposing clouds in the eastern distance and soon a sky the color of gun-metal was shielding the typical morning sun, casting a hue of uneasiness and worry to the dirt and bareness between the grassy patches of yard.

Before eight o’clock my father loaded me into the cab of our pick-up and we were in motion.  I traveled with my father without speaking. We drove for almost an hour and the area was unfamiliar to me. I knew approximately where we were, but I also knew that I had not been here, although there was a sound of remembering in the wind. We exited Old Vallonia Road and turned onto an unmarked path through the woods and were an hour through desolate fields without houses or evidence of civilization. The silence hurt my ears while I waited for him to say something that might make this trip tolerable. Occasionally a small rock or debris would fix itself within the tread of our tires and jump out onto the side of our vehicle making a clink against the paint. Besides the bouncing monotony of the engine, the exchange between rocks and tires was the only conversation.

My small physique was tossed around the faded seat of the Chevy truck as I tried to compensate the bouncing with my arm comfortably rigid against the door handle. My open window let in the smell of fall and harvest. The sweet smell of the dirt road masked the odor of what I remembered to be decaying flesh. This was a familiar smell from the many long summer days spent alone on the banks of our family’s pond in countless hours fishing. My cousins and uncles frequented the pond and most times would dispense fish much too small to eat down to the lower portion of the bank to die and rot. This was a thinning-out process to give larger fish room to grow and something that I found difficult to understand. In a way I resented the action, sighting that in my youth I was also a small fish in a very small pond. In a family of great strength and pride I was not surprised when my opinion was quickly misunderstood and so rejected like the rotting carcasses of fish paste which spotted the banks.

The road traveled hard upon us. On and on we ventured forward, seemingly never slowing or hindering from the trail on which my father placed us. He wore upon his face a look of confident dismay and the corners of his weathered blue eyes dropped slightly downward. Still there was the comforting constant of my father beyond the scowl. The lines of smoke from the endless cigarette balanced upon his lips traveled upward from the corner of his mouth and circled his rugged looks before being captured by the wind of his open window and escaping into the morning air in what seemed to be a great hurry; as if the smoke sensed a greater urgency and direction that it needed to follow, and carried out its duty without thinking. I tried to carry my thoughts out that window and high into the atmosphere.

A metallic rosary hung suspended from the rear-view mirror. The beads, worn and elongated, were evidence of use and clutching. The unevenness of the road would ricochet the crucifix between the stereo knobs before Dad’s hand, scarred, weathered, and callused, would gently halt the cross in mid-air in a momentary display of reverence.

The summer heat placed its mark on my surroundings which is most apparent by the brownish tint of the grass near the tree lines. A dry summer makes men weary when thinking about the wasted days of no rain. In days such as this, the dust dances like a jet stream through brick dust and behind every ground ball that you try to field making the day seem hotter than it actually is. Most nearly intolerable summer days are spent inside until the sun sets and the dew plants itself, cooling the grass and softening the earth. With fall upon us, there is a certain relief to the misery of a teenage boy who cannot stand to spare a minute of summer enjoyment.

The truck continued to follow the course that my father had placed us on, regardless of the dust, fields, stench, or memories. I sat patiently. I rode nervously. I wondered unknowingly. Without warning, my father reached to turn the knob of the radio, changing the atmosphere only slightly. At my young age I had developed distaste for the sound of Johnny Cash singing Sunday Morning Comin’ Down early in the morning. I am sure that I had been conditioned since early morning was the usual time that I would hear the tune while eating breakfast before school every week day. A salty taste of grits and bacon filled my mouth as Johnny sang:

“…and the beer I had for breakfast wasn’t bad, so I had one more for dessert.”

A smile broke through the lines of my father face as he began humming along and slowly dragging smoke through his cigarette while never losing sight of the oncoming road. Knowing this look,

 I decided to break through the drone of travel.

“Ronnie says that later he will take me down to White River and we can fish for Channel Cat.”

“You don’t have a fishin’ license and I doubt that Ronnie does either. You boys ought to just fish in the pond where you don’t have to worry about it.”

This was a typical response coming from my father. I knew the answer even before I made the statement. I only chose to leave out the part of our plan to take beer from a cooler that Ronnie’s dad kept in his garage. We had done it before and had grown accustomed to the taste of skunked Old Milwaukee on our fishing outings. Besides, his dad never missed them. They were left over from his fishing trips on the weekend and generally after they warmed from being on ice, they were no good to drink and he would toss them out. We were not drinking for the taste, but because we were sixteen and they were available. We could have been drinking bile and would have been just as happy as long as we were forbidden to do so.

“You are right, but you can’t catch Channel Cat in our pond, Dad.”

“Ah! Boy, there’s catfish in that pond as big as your leg if you know where to catch em! Just the other day I saw a snapper in there as big around as a wash tub. You wanna watch that Ronnie anyway, he’ll get you in trouble if ya ain’t careful.”

“Ronnie’s not a bad guy.”

“I didn’t say that he was a bad guy, I said that he would get you in trouble. He’s just like his dad and his dad was always into something that he wasn’t supposed to be. Be careful hanging around with Ronnie Turner.”

Once again, silence filled the cab of the truck as we tumbled forward in time. My father had won the discussion as he had many times in the past and most likely would in the future. I knew my limitations with him and occasionally would push the boundaries as the subject would dictate. My father’s downfall was that he was an extraordinarily intelligent and well-rounded man. In the small town where we lived, he was an Einstein among Forrest Gumps. This situation made it difficult to communicate as the community loud-mouths can make him into the fool since he did not think as they thought. I remember countless conversations with some of the locals in which my father would speak in a manner more appropriate to their understanding. His vocal inflection changing to match theirs, his weight shifting from foot to foot, and hands nestled in his front pockets. Even his noxious smoking habit was a product of those around him; an effort to blend in and be unnoticed.

 Each time I witnessed this, I would ask myself why he behaved this way.  Instead he chose to laugh as they laughed while they told him of the pet tricks they watched on the previous night’s Late Show. My father was more complex than those. I watched him work out calculus problems in his head as he planned projects that he engineered to build an idea that was simply on his mind. He created for the sake of creating. Sometimes I could find him in his garage before the sun raised reading from the diaries of Freud and studying the minds of great authors. I never fully understood why he chose the path that he walked as I always saw him as something much larger. I guess that explains why he speaks to me in the fashion that he does with the mannerisms and dialect of the community. Occasionally, when we are alone, his true self emerges and I experience the knowledge and power that he keeps asleep inside of him.

A familiar voice cuts through my thoughts as Blair Wannamaker begins the agriculture report over the hum of radio waves.

“Corn yields are low and that could mean trouble for area farmers. This has been attributed to a dry spring, an early summer, and the blight which plagued most farmers recently. Agriculture specialists are expecting results back on tests conducted on crops from Vallonia and surrounding areas throughout Jackson County as early as next Tuesday. The unidentified blight swept through many areas of Jackson County destroying corn crops for as many as one hundred acres at a time. We will keep you updated as information is presented to us.”

“Dad, have you ever noticed that the stations play the same songs in the same order everyday?”

“Well, you gotta understand that we live in a small town. Our music is taped from a bigger station and piped in over our air waves. Hell, our only DJ is Blair Wannabe Wannamaker. He basically just sits in a hot room all day and interrupts the transmission when he’s got some local news to give which usually amounts to bull.”

“What’s the deal with this blight that he was talking about?”

“I wish that I could explain that one to ya, son, but I think that it will make more sense to ya in just a little while.”

We traveled through a narrow pass beyond a section of trees that formed a bottle-neck passage into an open field of dirt. Through my window crept the thickened air which carried the stench plaguing my nostrils and intensifying as we entered the passage. The scenery did not change except for the ground. The soil looked as though no life had emerged from the reddish clods of earth or ever would. In the distance of the open field I noticed that we were circled by trees that produced no foliage within their inner circle. The air seemed still and stagnant as it passed through my nostrils, infecting my lungs with its putrid scent. This was not a smell that I recognized. There was a smell of what I imagined to be death without remorse. The rosary swung to a halt expelling the truck’s inertia.

 In the center of the clearing sat a single house long since deserted and falling down. There could not be more than two rooms in the dwelling, and an outhouse, far removed, displayed a hanging door; captive upon rusted hinges. There was no sound and no movement as my father and I sat gazing at the old house. I noticed a different look upon my father's face. It was a look that I interpreted as a runner facing the eighteenth mile of his marathon when the oxygen is indebted to his lungs while his legs are pleading with him to stop. Something makes him go on when his body tells him that he can’t. He is an animal or something much more primitive: he is a waltz of time.

The silence is broken by the exhaling of air from my father’s mouth. He reaches into his shirt pocket and brings out another cigarette giving it life by the touch of fire from the Zippo in his right hand.

“Dad, where are we?”

My father turned to me with cigarette in mouth and places his chiseled hand on the back of my neck. Looking at him face to face was something that I would dread most times as his appearance reflected years of fighting and struggling. I knew that if he locked his eyes upon mine, he was serious and wanted me to hear and understand every word. At this time I tried.

“Son, we are here.”