The Best Horror of the Year. Volume 4

“It’s colder than you think.”

“Oh, I know it’s cold. We just won’t freeze.”

She splashed me and laughed again and wondered what I meant by that, but we both knew what I meant by that, and after we’d not-quite tired ourselves out in the surf, we made back for the shore.

I wonder how things went for you, right then? I know that you always fancied Jonathan; I know what happened later. I hope you don’t think I’m being bitter or ironic when I say I hope you had a good time with him. If he misbehaved — well, I trust you did too.

Shall I tell you how we misbehaved?

Well—

In some ways, it was as you might expect; nothing you haven’t seen, nothing you haven’t felt, my dear.

In others…

Through the whole of it, Lucy muttered.

“He is,” she would say as I pressed against her breasts and nibbled on her earlobe; and “Quiet!” as I ran my tongue along the rim of her aureole… “I said no,” as I thrust into her, and I paused, and then she continued: “Why are you stopping, Tommy?”

This went on through the whole of it. As I buried my face between her legs, and she commented, “Isn’t he, though?”, I thought again of Lucy on the shore, under the water. “Too bright,” she moaned, and I remembered my visions of the sky, on her skin.

And as I thought of these things, my hands went exploring: along her thighs, across her breasts — along her belly…

She gasped and giggled as I ran my thumb across her navel… and she said, “Tommy?” as my forefinger touched her navel again… and “What are you doing?” as the palm of my hand, making its way along the ridge of her hip-bone… found her navel once more.

I lifted my head and moved my hand slowly aside. For an instant, there was a flash of dim red light — reflecting off my palm like a candle-flame. But only an instant. I moved my hand aside and ran the edge of my thumb over the flesh there. It was smooth. “Tom?” she said sharply, and started on about unfinished business. “Shh,” I said, and lowered my face — to the ridge of her hip-bone, or rather the smooth flesh inward of it. And slowly, paying minute attention, I licked her salted skin.

I would not have found it with my crude, calloused fingertips; my tongue was better attuned the task. I came upon it first as a small bump in the smooth flesh: like a pimple, a cyst. As I circled it, I sensed movement, as though a hard thing were rolling inside. Running across the tiny peak of it, I sensed a line — like a slit in the flesh, pushed tightly closed. Encouraged, I surrounded it with my lips and began to suck, as I kept probing it with my tongue. “I’m sorry,” she said, and then, “Oh!” as my tongue pushed through. It touched a cool, wet thing — rolling on my tongue like an unripened berry.

And then… I was airborne… it was though I were flying up, and falling deep. And I landed hard on my side and it all resolved, the world once more. Icy water lapped against me. And Lucy was swearing at me.

I looked at her, unbelieving. She looked back.

She, and a multitude.

For now I could see that what I’d first thought were star-points, were nothing of the sort. Her flesh was pocked with eyes. They were small, and reflective, like a cat’s.

Nocturnal eyes.

In her shoulders — the swell of her breasts — along the line of her throat… They blinked — some individually, some in pairs, and on her belly, six points of cobalt blue, formed into a nearly perfect hexagon. Tiny slits of pupils widened to take in the sight of me. The whole of her flesh seemed to writhe with their squinting.

It didn’t seem to cause her discomfort. Far from it; Lucy’s own eyes — the ones in her head — narrowed to slits, and her mouth perked in a little smile. “He is that,” she said, “yes, you’re right.” And it struck me then: those strange things she was saying weren’t intended for me or anyone else.

She was talking to the eyes.

“He can’t have known,” she continued, her hand creeping down to her groin, “and if he did, well now he knows better.”

I drew my legs to my chest and my own hands moved instinctively to my privates, as the implications of all these eyes, of her words, came together.

These weren’t her eyes; they were from another creature, or many creatures. And they were all looking upon me: naked, sea-shrivelled, crouching in the dirt.

Turning away from her, I got to my feet, ran up the beach and gathered my shirt and trousers, and clutching them to my chest, fairly bolted for the stairs. I pulled on my shirt and trousers, hunted around for my shoes, and made my way up the stairs. At the top, I looked back for the glow of Lucy. But the beach was dark.

The eyes were shut.

You and Jonathan were gone by the time I came back to the house.