A Waking Nightmare

A Waking Nightmare

Linda's Toyota shuddered as she shut off the engine. She sat in the driveway of her modest suburban home, the lights were off, the kids obviously not home. It was unusual. Ever since last year, her husband, Jim, had been leaving work early to pick them up from school. He was trying to spend more time with them. It was sweet but tinged with an underlying hint of the darkness that still clung to their small family.

Her hands trembled slightly on the steering wheel. It had been almost a year since that horrible night at Morrison's. A year since she let Marc LaValliere sweep her away for a night of debauchery. A year since she left her husband alone in that club, shattering her marriage and her family.

The last twelve months had been torture. Every day a mixture of guilt wearing a mask of fragile hope. A quiet battle to prove to Jim that she'd chosen him... at least since that night. She'd worn her mask like a second skin, embedding it on her flesh with every ounce of will power she had. Tending to her "new marriage" with a devotion that had been almost maniacal. In truth, she was coming apart at the seams, unable to bear the burden of "making it up" to her husband, especially when his eyes still held that distant chill. He said he had forgiven her, but he had not forgotten. Tonight, she'd try again. She'd push past the pain and summon some spark from that night she had shared with Marc and redirect it to Jim. It was wrong, but it was all she had.

Linda stepped out of the car, her heels crushing some late February snow. It was odd that the house looked so dark. Fumbling for her keys, she finally unlocked the door and stepped inside, her instincts screaming at her that something was wrong.

"Jim? Emma? Tommy?" she called out, her voice bouncing off the walls.

She dropped her purse on the entry table and flicked on a light. The silence pressed in, thick and heavy.

"Maybe they're at a neighbors? Or getting dinner on their way home?"

She checked her phone again for messages but found none. She sent a text - "Honey? Are you with the kids? When are you coming home?" That itching in the back of her skull was getting louder. She went next door, then across the street. No one had seen them. The clock ticked past six, then seven, then eight. The knot tightened in her gut.

She dialed Jim's phone, her fingers fumbling. She left a panicked message on his voice mail. She tried Emma's little prepaid cell, then Tommy's school friend's mom. Nothing. Her breath quickened as she paced the living room, the familiar hum of their home now a mocking void. She called her parents, her voice cracking.

"Mom, they're gone. Jim and the kids, they're not here. I've been calling, but they're not answering."

Her mother's tone was gentle but edged with something Linda couldn't name.

"Oh, honey. Are you sure they didn't just step out? Maybe Jim took them for ice cream or something."

"No, Mom. It's too late for that. Something's wrong, I can feel it." Linda's eyes darted to the window, half-expecting to see them walking up the path. Nothing.

"Well, call the police if you're that worried," her mother said. "But Linda, after everything, maybe he just needed some space."

Linda hung up. She knew what her mother meant. The night with Marc. The public humiliation. The destruction of Jim's trust in her. Space? After everything? She shook her head, refusing to believe that things were still that bad. Instead, she called Dee, her last tether to sanity.

"Dee, they're missing. Jim and the kids, they're gone. I don't know what to do."

Dee's pause stretched too long. "Linda, have you watched the news today?"

"What? No, why would I? My family's missing, Dee!" Linda snapped, her voice rising.

"Marc's missing too. Since yesterday."

The horror that Linda had been trying to keep at bay finally overwhelmed her. Her knees buckled and she sank onto the couch, the phone slipping from her hand. The coincidence clawed at her, a sick twist of fate. The itching in the back of her skull was a howl.

"God, please no!"

She scrambled for the remote, flipping to the local news. It was big news, Marc was a celebrity, a hometown hero. A man who stole other men's wives and they thanked him for it. He was a god among men... and now he was gone.

"Marc LaValliere, star tight end for the city's football team, was last seen two days ago. Police are investigating possible connections to his known associates."

Linda's stomach churned. She turned it off, unable to hear more, and called the police.

-=-=-

The first officer arrived within the hour, a stocky man with a handlebar mustache and a tired expression. Linda met him at the door, eyes wild and tinged red.

"My husband and kids are gone. I've called everyone. Please, you have to find them," she pleaded

The cop scribbled as she spoke. "When did you last see them, Mrs. Grayson?"

"This morning. I kissed Jim goodbye before work, dropped the kids at school. Everything was normal." Her voice broke. "Please, they're my whole world."

He nodded, but his next question shifted the air. "We need to ask about Marc LaValliere. You know him, right? He's been reported missing too."

Linda froze, her throat tightening. "Yes, I know him. We. I mean, I danced with him once, a year ago. That's it. Why are you asking about him?"

"Just covering bases," he said, but his gaze lingered, sharp and probing. "Any reason your husband might have a problem with him?"

She flinched, the implication was heavy in the air. "No. I mean, yes, there was a thing, but it's over. Jim wouldn't. He's not like that." Her words sounded hollow, even to her.

The officer jotted more notes, then left with a promise to follow up. Linda stood in the doorway, feeling the neighbors' curtains twitch, their eyes boring into her. Judging her. She slammed the door shut and sank to the floor. Jim wouldn't hurt Marc.

Would he?

But the doubt festered. Something dark and twisted, birthed almost a year ago, finally took root in her brain stem - a seed planted by that look in the officer's eyes and nurtured by her own unrelenting guilt

-=-=-

The days washed away, colder than the waves on Lake Michigan. Linda called Jim's parents next, her voice raw from shouting into voicemails.

"Mary, it's Linda. Jim and the kids are gone. Have you heard from them? Please, tell me if you know anything."

Mary's response was cool, clipped. "No, Linda, we haven't. But honestly, can you blame him if he left? After what you did with that football player, parading it around for everyone to see?"

Linda's chest tightened. "I've been trying to fix it, Mary. Every day for a year. I love him. I love the kids. Please, let me know if you hear from them!"

"We'll let the police know," Mary said, and hung up.

Linda stared at the phone, her mother-in-law's words stung. Parading it around. She hadn't paraded anything, had she? But the town knew. The gossip had spread like wildfire after that night, and now they were staring, whispering behind her back. She felt it every time she stepped outside, their eyes accusing her, branding her the adulteress who'd driven her family away.

The next week, she stopped going to work. Her boss called, his tone sympathetic but firm. "Linda, we need you here. You've missed three days. What's going on?"

"I can't," she mumbled, her voice flat. "My family's gone. I have to wait for them."

"Take some time, then," he said, "but you need to let us know when you're coming back."

She didn't answer, just hung up, and let the phone clatter to the kitchen counter. Work didn't matter. Nothing mattered but Jim and the kids walking through that door.

The chaos in the house began to reflect her own unraveling. Dishes piled in the sink, crusted with uneaten food. Trash bags slumped against the walls, spilling wrappers and coffee grounds. She stopped bathing, her blonde hair matting into greasy clumps, her skin prickling with neglect. Strange rashes broke out on her shoulders, flakes of skin always present under her scratching nails. She sat wordlessly by the window, curtains parted just enough to watch the driveway, waiting.

Always waiting.

Friends stopped calling. The neighbors stopped knocking. Even her boss had stopped trying to contact her. She didn't care. She was avoiding them anyway. Avoiding the whispers. The judging stares. She wanted to crawl into her own skin.

She wanted her family to come home.

She muttered something unintelligible to herself, scratching fine lines down her arm and continued her silent vigil by the window.

-=-=-

Her parents came again a week later, their faces etched with worry. The smell hit them first. A sour, rotting tang that made her mother gag.

"Jesus, Linda, what is that?" her father asked, stepping over a pile of laundry.

"I don't know," Linda said, her eyes wild, darting to the corners. "It's been here a while. I can't find it."

Her mother knelt beside her, brushing back her tangled hair. "Honey, you're not okay. Look at this place. Look at you. You haven't showered, you're not eating. Let us take you to a doctor."

"No," Linda snapped, pulling away. "What if Jim comes back? What if the kids need me? I can't leave."

Her father's voice hardened. "Linda, they're not coming back. Jim took them. You know why. We all do. You need help."

"You think I deserve this," she whispered, tears welling. "You're judging me too. Everyone is. I see it in your faces, the way you look at me like I'm trash."

Linda's father looked like he wanted to say something, but he held his tongue and turned away, rubbing his face. Linda knew that look. He never did know how to deal with her.

Her mother stepped in to cover.

"We're not judging," her mother said softly, "we're scared for you. Please, come with us."

Linda shook her head, curling into the couch. "Go. I'll be fine. They'll come back."

Her parents exchanged a look, then left, muttering about a judge and a protective order. She barely heard them, her ears tuned to the silence, waiting for footsteps on the porch that never came.

-=-=-

The police returned, this time with a woman detective. She was tall and dark, Italian, or Latin. Her hair was thick and black, her face graceful but stormy. Linda sat amidst the chaos, her robe stained, her nails bitten to the quick.

"Mrs. Grayson," the detective began, her nose wrinkling at the stench of Linda's rotting home, "we've confirmed your husband withdrew large sums from your accounts and his 401k. He also maxed out your homeowner line of credit and maxed out all your credit cards."

Linda's hands twisted in her lap. "You're wrong. He wouldn't do that. He loves me."

The detective's eyes softened, but her tone stayed firm.

"Linda..." she said, her voice dripping with compassion. "Jim isn't coming back."

Linda silently shook her head and picked apart the crumbling tissue in her hand. It was obvious that she still wasn't ready to hear this. The detective sighed and pressed on.

"We also need to talk about Marc LaValliere. His car was found abandoned ten miles from here. We know the two of you had a relationship. Is there anything you can tell us?"

Linda's breath hitched. "We didn't have a relationship! It was just one night!"

Detective Annabelle Gomez internally sighed. It wasn't a very well kept secret that Marc LaValliere made a habit out of seducing married women and privately she thought that if someone did do something to him... he probably deserved it, but she had a job to do and right now that job was trying to get this delusional woman to give her something, anything, that might help her crack this case.

"Sure, just one night - I hear you. But did you have any contact with him afterwards? Anything your husband wouldn't like?"

Linda rubbed her eyes.

"He sent me things. I told him to stop. I didn't want him. I chose Jim. Ask Dee, she knows."

"We've spoken to Dee," the detective said. "She mentioned an incident at Morrison's, St. Patrick's Day. Marc asked about you. Your husband wasn't thrilled about him, was he?"

"Jim hated him," Linda admitted, her voice small. "But he wouldn't hurt him. He's not violent. He's not that kind of man."

Detective Gomez leaned forward. "Linda, we're not saying he's violent. We're saying he's gone, and Marc's gone, and there's a connection. People saw you with Marc. They talk. Did Jim ever mention anything, any plans?"

"No," Linda lied, her mind racing. She felt the detective's gaze, heavy with suspicion, joining the chorus of eyes she imagined everywhere--neighbors, coworkers, strangers on the street. "You think I did something to Marc, don't you? You're all staring at me, blaming me."

"We're just asking questions," the detective said, standing. "Call us if you remember anything." She left a card on the table, but Linda didn't touch it, her eyes fixed on the window.

-=-=-

Dee came over the next day, her knock tentative. Linda let her in, the stench making Dee wrinkle her nose. "Linda, God, what's happened here? You look awful."

"They're gone, Dee," Linda said, her voice a monotone. "Jim took the kids. Marc's missing. Everyone thinks I'm to blame."

Dee sat beside her, hesitant. "I don't think that. But people are talking. That night with Marc, it's all coming up again. They're saying maybe Jim snapped."

Linda's eyes flared. "You're judging me too. I see it. You think I drove him to this."

"No," Dee said quickly, "I'm your friend. I'm worried. You're falling apart. Let me help you clean up, get you showered."

"I can't," Linda murmured. "I have to wait. They'll come back." She turned away, staring at the driveway, and Dee sighed, leaving with a promise to check in later. Linda didn't believe her. She finally understood what kind of person her "friend" Dee was. She had been more than happy to help Linda fatally wound her marriage and then just like the others, she judged her for the consequences. She could see it in her eyes, it was just like the rest of them. She was sure of it.

-=-=-

Weeks passed, and the voices started. At first, they were faint whispers in the night, waking her from fitful sleep. "Linda," they'd call, soft and insistent. She'd sit up, heart pounding, searching the dark. "Jim? Kids?" No answer. The smell grew worse, a thick rot that coated her throat, but she'd grown numb to it, her senses dulled by exhaustion and despair.

She wandered the house, noticing gaps where memories once stood. Some family photos, some of Emma's drawings - gone. She looked for her wedding album but couldn't find it. In desperation she tore through closets, under beds, but came up with nothing but dust. The voices grew louder, a chorus now, calling her name, mocking her.

She'd stand in the kitchen, staring at the trash-strewn floor, whispering back. "I'm here. I'm waiting. Come home."

One night, she woke to a scream. It wasn't hers, was it? She stumbled to the window, peering out. Shadows moved across the street, neighbors glancing her way. They knew, she thought. They were laughing at her, pointing, their eyes burning through the glass. She yanked the curtains shut, her breath ragged, and sank to the floor, rocking herself.

"I didn't mean it," she ranted. "I chose you, Jim. I chose you."

-=-=-

Her parents returned, their faces grim. The smell was unbearable now, a wall of decay that made her father retch. "Linda, this is insane," he said, his voice sharp. "You're living in filth. What is that smell?"

"I don't know," she snapped, her eyes darting. "It's not my fault. You're blaming me too, aren't you? Everyone is."

Her mother knelt, tears in her eyes. "We're not blaming you. We love you. But you're sick, honey. You need help."

"No," Linda shrieked, scrambling back. "I can't leave. They'll come back. You don't understand."

"We do," her father said, softer now. "But you can't stay like this. We're going to a judge tomorrow. We'll get you help, whether you want it or not."

They left, and Linda curled into a ball, the voices swelling around her. "Linda, Linda," they chanted, a relentless tide. She pressed her hands to her ears, sobbing, but they wouldn't stop. She hadn't bathed in weeks, her skin sticky with grime, her clothes stiff with sweat, but she didn't care. She'd wait forever if she had to.

-=-=-

The final night, the voices roared, a cacophony pulling her from sleep. "Linda!" they shouted, clear as bells. She staggered up, her legs weak, the air heavy with ruination. Something drew her to the basement, a pull she couldn't resist. She hadn't been down there in months, hadn't thought to look. Her bare feet slapped the cold steps, the smell choking her, but she pressed on, flipping the overhead light.

She wanted to scream, but nothing came. The rotted, bulging eyes of her adonis, his mouth covered with layer after layer of duct tape, was lashed to a support beam. He was naked - his form no longer perfect, no longer exuding anything other than rot and decay. Linda saw the pool of blood at his feet, traced it up his legs and saw that it was gone - his conductor's tool that had played her body so expertly just a year before.

The room began to spin as the horror and truth crashed in. Jim had done this. He had taken everything - their family, her sanity and in return he had left her this. The message was clear.

"But I chose you! I CHOSE YOU! I SWEAR I DID!" she howled.

-=-=-

Police tape fluttered around the house, a grim halo in the dawn light. The forensic crews were just wrapping up and two officers lingered outside, their voices low over coffee cups.

"Christ, did you hear how they found him?" the older one said as he lit a cigarette.

The younger cop, a rookie and not a sports fan, chuckled.

"Yep, dick cut off and shoved halfway down his throat. Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy."

The older cop shrugged and took a sip of coffee, the steam from his drink mixing with the smoke exhaling from his breath.

"I don't get it. A guy like that - famous, loaded to the gills. He could have anyone! An endless supply of models or actresses. Any fucking bimbo he wanted, and he does this? Fucks his way through half the married women in Chicago?"

"I hear ya," said the younger cop, "Did you see the wife? Middle aged, bottle blonde, face like a boiled rat. The man had to be insane, or he had some serious mommy fetish shit going on. Like - What. The. Fuck."

They shook their heads and finished their coffee. The entire situation was fucked up. Someone had almost immediately talked to the press and the tabloids were having a field day. It'd probably take some time, but eventually someone would start to wonder about the husband and the missing kids. Were they missing, or would they find more bodies in that house if they looked hard enough? Or perhaps they'd find them in an abandoned car off a rural road or in a burnt-out building or washed up on the shores of Lake Michigan. More horrific things had happened, and this seemed to be the kind of tragedy that had no happy ending.

-=-=-

Linda lay in a hospital bed, her eyes hollow, fixed on the door. They had tried to use drugs and therapy to stitch her back together, but she waited, always waited, for Jim and the kids. The discovery of Marc's body had put the spotlight on her family tragedy and soon the entire nation knew the story. The night at Morrison's, the tactless friends who covered for and encouraged her, the long list of other married women who ended up as fodder for what the internet called, "Marc LaValliere's sick fetish for old ladies".

She knew it was true. Sure, she had been beautiful - for a nearing middle-aged mother of two, but Marc was young, handsome, outrageously fit, famous and rich. He didn't pick her because she was irresistibly beautiful, he picked her because he hated her and wanted to ruin her - and she had happily let him. Linda had leapt at the chance to become a more than willing accomplice to her own destruction. All because she wanted to believe her drooping tits, flattened after breastfeeding two kids, or her cellulite riddled ass and stretch marked stomach made her desirable to a man she knew should never want her.

Jim's revenge had splashed across screens and papers around the world and Linda had become a reviled, cautionary tale of a woman. People had sympathy for Jim, they said things like, "I don't agree with what he did, but I can understand why he did it." Often with a knowing look, or a sheepish smile. Linda however was nothing more than a whore, a harlot of a wife, a narcissistic bitch, an evil slut. The public scorn was palpable and clung to her like rancid shit, in stark contrast to her friend's eager encouragement and excuses.

"It's just one night," she had told everyone, but that one night had stretched into an endless nightmare.

-=-=-

Far away, under a warm tropical sun, Jim watched his children play with their new puppy in his large walled garden. He heard the patio door open and his girlfriend Maria announcing to the kids that lunch was ready. He took a sip of his Belikin Sprite and sauntered after the children into their rather large home.

Maria was sitting at the island kitchen across from the kids and laughing. It was comforting in a quiet, familiar way.

"I'm going up to the den for a bit," he said, placing his empty drink down on the counter, "I just need finish up some paperwork and then we can all go to the beach."

Tommy, or Jake as he was now known, perked up "Can we take the boat out dad? Please?"

Jim smiled and said, "You bet sport. Now be good for Maria, I'll be right back."

There had been a lot of boat trips, trips to the zoo, presents, new toys and recently a puppy over the last few months. He knew he was doing the entire Disneyland Dad routine with the kids and eventually it'd have to come to an end, but that'd only be after he'd gotten them settled completely into their new life.

Up the stairs and behind the locked door of his library, he logged onto a secret email account through an encrypted proxy and read the latest report from the PI he was still paying. The police were obviously still looking for him, they knew that he had fled the country but weren't certain where. That was good news and he hoped that his luck would hold out. Linda was still in the hospital - it looked like her mental breakdown might be more serious than anyone initially thought. This gave him a dark sense of satisfaction that even after everything he had done, still surprised him in how ebullient it made him feel.

"God damn that bitch."

Jim had done a lot of things that he never thought he'd do. Things that had been all but incomprehensible to him before that leap year night in February. Things that still made his skin crawl in the darkest parts of the night.

"What was it that Churchill said? Even a cornered rat is dangerous?"

That's what he had been - a cornered rat. A helpless sucker, torn between his love for his children and a lifetime of emotional abuse and gaslighting. Linda, he had concluded, must be some sort of sociopath to have done what she had to him, so brazenly and so publicly. To make matters worse, she was completely without remorse, saying nonsense like how HE loved HER so much that it made it okay, or understandable for her to eviscerate and emasculate him. Then, when he read her confession, he understood the depths of her absolute disregard for him. She didn't even have the fucking decency to lie about what a fantastic lover her football star had been. It made him wonder if part of her strategy, asides from the constant gaslighting, was to just make him feel so small and insignificant and inferior that he'd stay with her out of gratitude for having even a scrap of her middle-aged pussy.

As if she was some kind of fucking prize.

Jim had learned a lot from Linda and their friends. He learned about callowness, about misdirection and lies. About how bloody efficient it was to turn trust into a weapon to destroy people. He learned it well. He nurtured his resentment and choked down his shame as he "forgave her" as part of L. W.'s emasculating stunt with that call girl Ellen.

And then he planned.

Money was easy - Linda never did the books before, or after her betrayal. He simply cashed out investments and moved funds to an overseas account. He tricked Linda into co-signing on a second mortgage for home improvements by preying on her desire to "make it up to him". He secured passports and documents for the children and had them altered. He drew down his 401K and sold everything he could get his hands on, leaving Linda broke and him with enough start up capital to begin a new life, with a new name in a new country.

He started being more romantic and flirtier with Linda, even taking her back to their bed. It was all part of his own misdirection. He convinced her to send him nudes while he was at work, and she was all too eager to comply. He had long ago copied Marc's cell phone number out of Linda's phone and with a burner and some pictures he lured Marc to his fate.

"Use this number, I don't want my husband to know you're fucking my married pussy."

The violence had been liberating in ways that Jim had never imagined. The look on LaValliere's smug face as he approached his nude and restrained body with the almost comically large garden sheers was priceless.

Was he a monster for killing Marc? For ruining Linda? For stealing their kids?

Absolutely he was.

He knew that he had done evil, worse even than Linda had done to him and their children. But what choice did he have? The weight of the expectations of friends, family and society had borne down on him - either accept it and lose himself or fight it and lose everything else. There was no acceptable way for him to win or even leave with his dignity and life intact. He was the cornered rat.

So, he bit back.

Someday, maybe even soon, he'd be held accountable for his crimes, either in a court of law or in the afterlife. Still, he would not change a thing. He couldn't. Jim Grayson, the affable and trusting schmuck who devoted his life to a faithless woman had fallen into a nightmare, not of his own making and what woke up from the dreaming was The Monster - a waking terror that hated with a passion that mirrored the love that Linda had so cruelly extinguished.

Jim shut down his computer and pushed his chair away from his desk. Even here, under the bright tropical sun, The Monster cast a long shadow. It'd cling to him for as long as he walked the earth, but he was certain that from now on he'd control it and tame it. So long as he had the kids, The Monster would stay where it belonged.

He'd continue this dream for as long as he could. Enjoy every moment of it. Savor every new experience. His nightmare no longer had any power over him and God help anyone who tried to wake him from his dream.

-=-=-

FIN

-=-=-

It's not a big secret that I actually dislike the original February Sucks and that in my opinion, one of the reasons why it's rewritten so frequently is because really, it's incredibly bad. The entire premise operates on what I call nightmare logic - the kind of warped perception of reality that mimics those dreams where you're running from an unknown man and you never seem to move from where you're standing. Like where you could be panicking and struggling and nothing you do matters. You're stuck.

That's Jim to me in the original story. The author never allows him to have any agency. He's never allowed to struggle against the conflict in the story - instead he must meekly accept it. It's all there in the story - from the very first encounter in Morrison's where he's thwarted by everyone around him, to the forced reconciliation which is actually a set-up by L. W., who, like a shitty magician, reveals the trick after the fact only to further humiliate and emasculate him - Jim is a protagonist that has no protagonist energy. He's limp. Weak. Ineffectual and completely subservient to the fact that George Anderson wanted to reconcile an irreconcilable relationship.

Anyway, the impetus for this story came from the above conclusion. If, after all, Feb Sucks is just a nightmare story with shitty logic and a fake protagonist, why not just run with that nightmare energy and go balls to the wall with what would be a fitting conclusion. I mean, if we're operating off of nightmare logic already - surely this ending is logical within that context, isn't it?

This will probably be the only Feb Sucks crap-fest that I ever write because everything else would be boring. Not to throw shade at other authors, because I have indeed liked some of the retreads that I've read, but the reason why I did a continuation instead of a rewrite is because I don't think that rewriting a story to make it less shitty is a very fun thing to do and I can't envision any sort of continuation that I would find interesting to write. But hey, never say never, huh?

P. S. - Show of hands - who figured out what the stench in the house was before the final reveal?