Jonathan Hemsworth's Arc

Chapter 3 of 7

The knock came again, harder. Jeb backed against the wall. Jonathan slid off his stool and hit the floor. He laughed at nothing. Eva stared at her husband, red-faced and useless, the man who once cried over a hotel room while she fixed it. She would not wait for whatever stood outside. She grabbed the liquor bottle by the neck and yanked the side door open. Rain slammed her face. The cold woke her fully. She stepped into the lot and turned toward the front of the station. A figure stood there in the downpour. Black coat, soaked through, hood dripping. One hand hung at its side. In that hand was a curved blade, a hook knife, catching the moonlight. "Stop," Eva said. Her voice did not shake. "Who are you." The figure turned. Under the hood was a man's face, thin and withered, skin pulled tight over bone. He did not answer. He raised the hook knife and stepped toward her. His mouth moved, but no sound came, only the same low words over and over, like the pages of the book she had found. Eva did not run. Running was what Jonathan would do. She threw the bottle. It struck the man's shoulder and burst. Brown liquor and glass sprayed across his coat. He flinched. The knife dropped an inch. That inch was enough. She darted past him, back through the side door, and slammed it shut. "Help me," she said. Jonathan was on his knees now, blinking up at her. Behind them a maple stood black against the sky, its red leaves shaking in the wind. The hook scraped down the door, slow, testing the wood. Jeb pointed a shaking finger at the counter. "The bar," he whispered. "Wedge it." Eva looked at Jonathan. He would not move fast enough. She grabbed a fallen shelf plank herself and jammed it under the door handle. The scraping stopped. For a moment there was only rain. Then the man in the coat spoke, clear this time, close against the wood. "You read from it. You called me. Only the book sends me back." Eva went still. She understood. The thing outside came because of the leather book in the concrete bathroom. She had touched it. She had read the word on its cover aloud without knowing. "Jonathan." She crouched and took his face in both hands. "Listen to me. I need you sober. I need you now." He nodded, slow, scared into something like focus. The scraping began again at the window this time. Eva stood. She knew what she had to do next, and it terrified her. She had to go back to that bathroom, in the dark, and bring the book here. It was the only thing that could end this. And she could not send Jonathan. She would have to go alone.