Revenant

By Peter J Larrivee

Don't let his cool demeanor fool you, Jake King's life has been a long, haunted existence. His father died when he was six, his mother is incarcerated at a mental health facility, he's just lost his job as a journalist and he's crossed paths with the local mob. Of course, this is only the beginning, as Jake soon begins seeing the wandering, translucent spirits of the streets of Providence crying out for his help. Worse yet, there is a stalking shadow that has been killing people around him. If Jake doesn't discover what this revenge spirit wants and how to stop it, he could wind up in the obituaries. Even if he survives this spirit and the mob hit, he must contend with the screaming headaches, a shady mentor figure, and unknown beings from beyond the veil that threaten our world. Revenant is a Horror/Urban Fantasy novel set in H.P. Lovecraft's city of Providence.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Arrival Books
• Release date: Aug 14, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201352059

Peter J Larrivee

Peter J Larrivee is a horror and weird fiction writer from the Land of Lovecraft. He's been published in Perihelion, Night Terrors Volume 21, the Hell is for Children charity anthology and on Trembling with Fear. In addition, he is a long time contributor to Motif Magazine, an arts and entertainment publication.   When not working or crafting nightmares, he can usually be found in bookstores or out with his family. 

Book preview

Prologue

Providence

October, 1989

Rain spat against the window next to his bed, only the strange blue-black of the city’s special darkness cut through the gloom; that eerie glow cast by streetlamps and televisions in the shadowed rooms behind a thousand little flickering rectangles against the cold night. Outside, the metallic sound of the fire escape, dripping rain down its thin frame, provided a dull ringing that normally would lull him asleep. The air was cold, seeping into his very bones. He tossed; his bone-skinny arms kept getting in the way, falling like awkward spider-limbs around him. Even curled in the fetal position, he could not get warm. It wasn’t even winter, and the six-year-old boy lay alone in the cobalt cold.

He rose. The sapping, empty chill immediately took the feeling from his toes as he slid onto the weathered rug. His feet stepped around the discarded Optimus Prime figure, fresh from a victory earlier that afternoon, over the forces of evil in a simple, child’s understanding of war. Prime’s opposite lie across the room in a heap. The die-cast metal had a dull gleam in the cold light.

The boy needed warmth; both for his feet, and his soul. The ache that had made a home within his chest persisted even in his dreams.

It wasn’t just that he was gone. He was usually away at work, always off somewhere arresting bad guys, day and night, tireless. Jake was used to his father’s absence, because he knew when Dad came home, he took off his coat, kicked off his shoes, and became a Dad again. He would cook hot dogs over the open flame on the stove and laugh at old corny jokes. He would make pancakes on the weekend and let Mom sleep in. No matter how often he was gone, he would always come home and pick right back up where he left off.

But he was buried deep in the ground now, and the world felt emptier.

The door opened with a slight squeal from old hinges. Jake’s feet touched the creaky varnished floor in the hall, when suddenly there was light.

Pale white light from a fluorescent strip cast a wide glow, blurring the lines of shadows. Soft, low music came from the glowing room.

The boy crept carefully down the hall towards the light coming from the bathroom, avoiding every spot that he knew for certain would creak. He knew every creaky floorboard from all those days playing spies with his best friend. The little apartment was absent of life but for that pale glow and the hushed beat of strange music set against the irregular clatter of water from outside.

He peered into the sterile room, creamy white with pink tile trim on otherwise pristine cold ceramic, like ice. The shower curtain was pulled aside, revealing a form in the tub around the corner. The light stung, washing detail from his eyes, but soon he could see a naked arm lying on the rim.

There she was... his mother, taking a bath, head reclined in some sort of reverie. The boy crept closer, stopping at the threshold. The music came from a small tape player seated on the toilet. There was an envelope next to it, dark red, like a Valentines Day card would be. Beside it was one of the knives from the kitchen, a small knife she often used to cut vegetables. It was wet for some reason, and there were tiny droplets of light red trailing along the floor.

He stepped on one of the loose tiles, not intending to, but he couldn’t understand what was happening. What was his Mom doing, taking a bath in the middle of the night? The music? Why was the knife there?

She’d been acting so different lately. She was quiet whenever Jake was around, but at night sometimes he caught her crying in silence, her shoulders shuddering from sobs. She’d tell him to go to his room for no reason, then he’d hear her talking to someone in hushed tones. She could barely get through a dinner without suddenly getting angry, or her eyes going wild and wide for no reason, staring at nothing.

She’d been that way ever since the funeral, where everyone gathered in a surreal ceremony to watch a body remain inert. Jake’s whole family was there for support, but even those long lost cousins and family friends could not offer him a cure for that dull ache, the one that told him his father was gone, his world that much more empty. He thought maybe his mother suffered the same thing. Was she trying to make the ache go away now?

The cold even persisted in here, the tile making his feet feel dry and bloodless. He moved from the loose tile. It scraped against the others in complaint. Immediately there was a jostle, a splash, and a light moan, as she seemed to struggle to raise her head. It flopped like a baby’s, eyes glazed over. She seemed to look at him vacantly, unable to recognize.

He did not want to see his Mom naked, but something strange was happening. That arm was pale, and it spasmed slightly as he approached.

Mom? he asked quietly. It felt like thunder in the unquiet night, hearing his own voice.

Another strange noise, a whimpering sob, answered him. He crept closer yet, his feet grateful to touch the bathroom carpet and feel something besides the draining, empty numbness.

He saw the tub was filling with a cloud of crimson, his mother pale, looking at him with empty eyes.

...no... she whimpered, ... Jake... Whatever else she had to say was lost along with her blood, leeching down her arm into the water where it became a hideously beautiful nebula.

He stood frozen. His small mind couldn’t even begin to grasp what was happening. He opened his mouth to speak, but words died on his lips. He was six. Nothing in his mind could cope with what he saw. A part of him was trying to scream.

A familiar weight landed on his shoulder. A shooting pain went through his head like no pain he’d ever known, but it forced him to turn, looking at the hand that held him.

It was there, strong, calloused, firm, spinning him around to a face he knew. It was the face of the man that had been lowered into the ground weeks ago. Without speaking, eyes empty of life, the pale face mouthed one word that landed in Jake’s head as if it were his own thought.

Phone!

The boy broke away from the man, who simply erased from sight as Jake ran across the apartment. In the living room, he grasped the phone, fumbled with its weight and awkward, long antenna. It almost fell to the floor, but he caught it, then dialed 9-1-1 as he’d always been taught in school. He shook so bad that the antennae wobbled and swatted his head every few seconds.

Help my Mom! he choked into the phone at the first human voice.

A brief eternity later, the boy sat shivering in the passenger seat of a police car. Everything had been a blur, but they’d taken her away in an ambulance, thick bandages on her wrists and a blank, pall on her face.

He shivered, then cried, as he couldn’t do anything else. Rain continued to tap-dance on the roof of the police car. Jake curled up tighter in the blanket, his body finally warming as he sobbed in great heaves. A torrent of grief flooded his body, bringing life and blood to his every cell... dragging misery along for the ride.

He didn’t know how long he cried, but at length, the door of the car opened, and a stout man who smelled of vanilla cigars and a barber shop sat down. He wore a large windbreaker over his short sport coat, and an old fashioned fedora hat, so soaked from rain it dripped little tassels of water from the brim. He tossed it disdainfully to the side, then looked Jake over.

Uncle Eddie was shorter than Jake’s father had been, but he had that same set of laughing eyes and gruff, but loving voice. His eyes did not laugh now. They were frozen, distant, heavy with something Jake could almost understand. On his jacket, his badge gleamed red and blue from the flashing lights outside.

Uncle Eddie handed Jake a small Styrofoam cup full of a steaming hot brown liquid, partially congealed on top. Jake took the cup, but did not drink. The heat was sharp against his fingers, so strong it almost burned. He set the cup on the dashboard.

I’m so sorry, Jake, he said, his voice flat, The doctors will do what they can. He swore, as he sometimes did, but it was largely drowned by the rain on the roof. Outside, the apartment building was fully lit now as neighbors craned necks to see what was happening.

He thought about asking what was happening, but he couldn’t make the words come out. Uncle Eddie shed his soaked jacket, then put an arm around the boy.

They sat in silence.

He couldn’t begin to talk about it... The nightmare wasn’t going away. He wasn’t waking up. Whatever he saw, whatever bizarre thing happened to him, to his mother, to his father... all he could do was sit, numb and warm, and hope that tomorrow this would all be over.

Detective Eddie S. Vance left the boy in the car once he’d fallen asleep. At least, he hoped the kid had fallen asleep. His very skin felt cold, and though no more tears were issuing forth from his little eyes, it was clear the boy was in a lot of pain from something he didn’t understand.

He lit a cigar, now that the rain had eased to a light drizzle, and let the smooth vanilla fill his senses for a moment. It calmed his nerves, but not enough.

A uniform he didn’t recognize started walking towards him, shielding his eyes against the drizzle.

Detective Vance, said the young man, a corporal, probably still pretty green since Eddie didn’t recognize him in the least. He had either freckles or zits, he couldn’t tell exactly in this light. He gave the kid his best grunt of authority. In turn, the young officer held up a small plastic bag full of different pills. We found this in the bedroom.

Detective Vance looked the pills over. They were little, white, oblong and bisected in the middle. He didn’t recognize them. Probably anti-depressants. Solution to everything these days, just take some pills. He tried to forget how close he and Susan used to be, tried to forget that his best friend’s wife was the one currently being taken to the hospital, and then... who knew. It forced him to choke back a sob that threatened to bubble out his throat, he sucked in a breath full of nicotine and vanilla to cover it.

Okay, he said after a minute, Bag it, tell the boys downstairs I want to know exactly what those are by tomorrow morning or heads will fucking roll!

The uniform nodded and stepped away, back into the bedlam of haphazardly arranged police cars and plastic ponchos over blue uniforms that milled as they checked and re-checked the apartment. He’d ordered them to be thorough.

Sitting there, with the flashing lights and some curious neighbors peering out through their curtains, Eddie Vance felt like a bug under a magnifying glass.

What’re you lookin at? he muttered to a nearby window. He sat down heavily on the hood of his car, forgetting for a moment how soaked it was. He looked at the rookies putting up the tape over the doors he’d stepped through time and time again, play dates between their sons, weekend cookouts, poker night, memories of good food, beer, laughter, swapping great stories and toasting to lost or fallen comrades who could not share the merriment. Little Jake called him ‘Uncle Eddie,’ and little Eddie, his own boy, called Jake’s father ‘Uncle Toby.’ They were family, if not blood.

He felt a chill, and a sudden weight on his shoulder as if someone had grabbed him. Between the long hours and the ache of seeing his friends in torment, Uncle Eddie was slower to react than normal, but no less prepared. He spun with a fist ready to make someone’s day a lot shorter. Nothing but empty air and pale streetlights greeted him. He shivered.

‘First Toby... Now Susan,’ he thought, ‘I’m not letting that boy out of my sight.’ Eddie had seen a lot of terrible things. It was the worst nightmare of any cop, or father, to see a child go through that kind of trauma. He owed it to Tobias to look after his boy, no matter what. Susan had been a wreck ever since the funeral. To think she’d go this far...

Inside a plastic evidence bag in the detective’s pocket was the rambling, nonsensical note Susan had left. It ranted about stalking shadows and the woken dead. The hardened detective shivered and tried not to let the overwhelming pity show on his face.

Chapter One

Providence

Mid-October, 2014

Jake’s fingers inexpertly plucked at the classical guitar while he watched the news crawl on the computer screen. Other than a note about a missing person downtown, he saw little of interest. Even then, a missing person in itself wasn’t a story these days. It should be, he thought, but it isn’t. ‘We don’t care about finding people, we only care about problems we can feel good about ignoring,’ he thought.

He sighed, leaning forward and closing the browser. He sat back and plucked a few more strings experimentally while sliding his other hand up and down the neck, listening intently to the sounds. He was practicing, but it was a momentary diversion before he had to leave.

Actually, he should have left a few minutes ago. He was going to be late to work, but he didn’t particularly care. He was certain he wasn’t going to be there long.

Finally, he put the guitar down. It bumped the side of the chair and made a final hollow noise before it came to rest on the stand next to his computer. He liked to think it helped him ease his own tension, but more often than not, it increased his frustration as he tried to make his fingers do things they weren’t yet trained for. He retrieved his coat, hat, and other accessories. He could feel the bite in the October air even before he stepped outside. It looked to be a cold day.

It was a long meeting, attended by no less than four lawyers, and every one of them simply echoed the same ten or twenty words while they went through the motions of finalizing the settlement; words like ‘libel’ ‘unsubstantiated’ and ‘fired.’ Only one man in that room, besides Jake, wore something other than a crisp, expensive suit. He was in fairly good shape for someone in his fifties, his slight paunch only accented his broad chest. His eyes were sharp, and at the moment, hiding a cloud of anger. The man was slowly losing his hair but, had a classy streak of gray framing the sides of his head. Jake had bets with his co-workers as to whether it was dyed or not. This man sighed slowly, almost imperceptibly to those who didn’t know him. He was Jake’s editor at the Journal, Alan Lenson. Maybe he didn’t show it, but he took all the same slings and arrows that Jake did in that meeting.

At length, the meeting ended, and Jake made an angry beeline to his office. The other man followed, his face flat and businesslike, but his eyes hiding storm clouds.

The small, windowless office was decorated with a corkboard on the far wall, covered with clippings and scribbled notes. An original Maltese Falcon poster hung in a frame where Bogart’s unflappable stare and cool eyes lent an air of calm confidence. A little wooden desk overflowed with a laptop, three little notebooks, and dozens of scraps of paper, all puzzle pieces over which Jake had been slaving over for weeks. Words like ‘nepotism,’ ‘kickbacks,’ and even ‘death’ fell on notepad sheets like rain since he’d started his story two months ago.

Jake was about to start gathering his belongings. He stopped and idly wondered why he should bother. He should leave it, so that everyone would see, and remember, what happened to him. Then his thoughts turned bitter, as he realized it wouldn’t be a symbol of inspiration, but his gravestone at this paper. He heard footsteps behind him, but did not turn to face the man in the doorway.

Jake, I’m so sorry. He genuinely was. His voice was soft, passive, ashamed.

Goddamnit, Len! Jake spat, You’re supposed to go to bat for your people!

I did, you wiry dumbass! he shot back quickly. He cleared a small space on the desk and leaned against it, folding his arms together. I told you this was a possibility. You don’t just toss accusations around, proof or not, without some kind of leverage. Do you know how bad this lawsuit hurt us already? And it’s not like I can just tell Upstairs to go fuck themselves with the first amendment. That’s not how it works anymore.

Five people, all missing, four of them women! Jake stared his editor down with his hard, dark-emerald eyes. And every one of them had been around Garabedian’s kid.

I told you to get me the solid proof, your inside man...

Is suddenly not answering my calls! So, I guess that’s victim six!

Yeah, and you’re lucky not to be seven! Heck, you know these guys. They might string you up just on general principal.

Oh, the good news keeps on coming. Jake rolled his eyes.

The man threw his arms up. What do you want from me? We’re not the police. Bad people do bad things, and we can sometimes get lucky enough to catch them doing it. But if they can win the lawyer game, our hands are tied, here, he jabbed a finger at Jake, If we’re lucky.

I almost had it! Camera footage, E-mails, files on stuff that would turn your stomach! Jake spat. Len’s eyes softened, as if they were themselves heaving a helpless sigh. Jake took a moment, trying to calm down. His hands shook with rage despite his forced, even breathing. He knew Len had just fought for him, but he couldn’t help feeling betrayed anyway. He always knew the risk. He just never thought it would happen to him. You’re right.

Alan Lenson walked up to his star reporter, reaching up to pat him on his lean back.

Hey, I’m still proud of you, kid. You fought the good fight. You just lost. It happens. But I can put in a good word with the Sun, you’ll have to work your way up from copy editor, but... it’s something.

Start again? From scratch? asked Jake, looking down with an obvious wound behind his eyes.

And you’re lucky to get it, said Lenson. It’s not the end of the world. Losing sucks, but what’s the alternative?

Quitting, Jake spat. He took up his long coat and hat from the hook on the door. His scarf remained for a moment as he affixed his black trilby hat, then slid the coat on.

Don’t be dramatic, King, said Lenson, It’s officially a layoff on the books. If you don’t want the gig at the Sun, at least you’ll get your Unemployment.

Jake slid the long, forest-green scarf from the hook, then set it about his neck. He tossed one side around in a practiced motion so it rested more comfortably. He took a breath to calm his anger, then looked up at the poster where Bogart’s suave eyes reminded him of the importance of keeping yourself cool.

You’re a good man, Alan, Jake said, I’m amazed you lasted this long.

Back atcha, Kid, he said. Just think about the job. I can’t promise it’ll be there very long.

Jake held out his hand. Lenson shook it firmly. The elder man left Jake to gather his belongings.

Jake emerged into the cold October wind, the bottom of his trench coat flapping around loosely. He ducked his head against the wind to keep his hat from flying off until the gust passed. His scarf was blown backwards, almost off of him. He caught it, re-settled it, then walked somberly across Providence. Around his wrist were the handles of a plastic bag containing the few knickknacks he cared to bring home with him from his last day of work. The poster was rolled up into a neat little tube, which protruded awkwardly from the rest, and threatened to flop out when a strong wind caught.

The city, even in the chill of fall, still breathed. Buses harrumphed along the streets, hissing and ferrying bodies to and fro. Jake thought about grabbing one, but since he was now unemployed, he had but one goal in mind: Distraction. His mind ran in turbulent circles of impotent rage. If he kept thinking about it all, it would drive him insane. Sued for libel!? Every word in that article was true. No, not true... fact. He’d come within spitting distance of putting the final nail in the coffin, of bagging a set of very bad people who were covering up their nascent Senate Candidate’s scandals. Then it all fell apart. He had someone willing to go on the record, he had E-mails, files and a taped conversation, all of which vanished with his witness.

In retrospect, he should have known... he should have been more careful, but someone must have caught him snooping, or caught his anonymous source. Now both Jake and his story were kicked to the curb, and some poor woman who did the right thing was probably either on the run or dead. Jake’s stride slowed as he reflected on the day they met.

Jake had been on the trail of some missing persons orbiting gently around a family known for both criminal ties and political aspirations. He’d first gotten wind of something odd when the TV news reported a domestic disturbance at the Garabedian estate, but no charges were filed. From there, Jake had discovered a nebulous pattern of reckless behavior, and some coincidental missing persons.  The connections were vague, difficult to get a precise pattern on. There were years of small incidents that didn’t stand up to much scrutiny. Nobody who knew anything would go on the record, or even point Jake in the right direction.

That