If You See Him Once, He Follows You (Part 3)

“What the hell do you mean that thing will kill me if I see him again?” Stacey yells, her voice dripping with rage. She huffs, “Do you really expect me to believe some campfire story? Is this just a ploy to get back together?”

Needless to say, my attempts to explain what the Gooweny-Ein is and the very real danger he poses are not going over well with my ex-girlfriend. “You saw him,” I reply. “Did he look human to you?”

Stacey scoffs, but she crosses her arms and clenches her jaw in such a way that I can tell she doesn’t have a rebuttal. “It wasn’t the Goony-En or whatever you called it.” She says after a moment. “Listen to yourself. Curses! Monsters! This is crazy!”

“Trust me, I know it’s crazy.” I say, “But it’s true. You have to trust me.”

“Trust you!” She yells as if this is the most obscene thing I’ve ever said, and I know for a fact it’s not. She’s heard me say some pretty stupid things.

“If you see him again, you’ll die…or worse.” I reiterate, thinking again of the descriptions I’ve read of that woman cutting herself in half with a chainsaw, and how she’d attacked her parents before killing herself.

Stacey looks like she’s going to argue for a moment, but instead she slumps down on my couch and rubs her forehead with both hands. “I need a drink.” She says wearily.

“You sure that’s a good idea?” I ask, thinking of our last fight. I’m not going to say that alcohol caused our argument, but it was certainly a factor.

She glares at me, and, sighing, I relent. I’ve put all my hard liquor and most of my beer on top of my kitchen cabinets, right up near the ceiling. Keeping it out of reach has prevented me from drowning in it these past few days, but for Stacey, I get my step stool out and pull down a bottle of dark rum. I get us each a glass and some ice, take the cap off the liquor, and watch as the golden liquid flows over cubes as clear as Icelandic spar.

Stacey remains on my couch, wringing her hands and looking around nervously. When I bring over the rum, she snatches it from me with a trembling hand. By the time I put the bottle on the coffee table and sit down beside her, she’s already polished off her drink and has taken a few additional gulps right from the bottle.

She fills her cup again, “I’d ask how things have been going for you…” she says with a laugh as filled to the brim with sarcasm as her glass is with rum.

“I wouldn’t bother,” I reply, adding my own bitter laugh to hers.

“So, how long has that thing been after you?” She asks after a few more swigs. Her words are starting to slur.

“Four days,” I answer, avoiding her gaze. I want to say so much - about our breakup, about how sorry I am that she’s wrapped up in this curse with me - but I can’t find the words.

She nods and sucks in the sides of her cheeks a bit as if to say “that’s unfortunate” without being too sincere about it. Then, she blows air out of her mouth as if she’s anxiously trying to think of something else to say. I get the sense she resents me; she doesn’t want to, but she does; though I don’t know if it’s over our breakup, the monster stalking us, or both. “Is that how long I’m going to be stuck here?” She says after a moment, her voice quiet, “Because I had plans this weekend, you know? And I have a job. I don’t even have my laptop.” She laughs, though I know for damn sure she doesn’t find this funny, “If I had known I’d be trapped in your apartment, I would have packed a bag or something.” As her tone becomes less sincere, her gestures become more grandiose, and I can tell she’s drunk.

“I’m trying to think of some way out of this,” I say. “I’m doing everything I can.”

She nods her head as one side of her mouth dimples with a sort of melancholy. “I know you will.” She says gently. For a moment, she looks as if she might say something profound or vulnerable, but instead she gets up and announces that she’s going to bed. I watch her stumble to my room, unsure if she wants me to follow or not. I suppose I'm uncertain if it's right to follow, really. I decide to sit out on my couch, slowly finishing off my glass of rum as I try to think of how to get us both out of the Gooweny-Ein’s clutches.

After maybe twenty minutes, I go in to check on her, expecting to find her passed out in my bed. Instead, I find her standing straight up, looking in the direction of the blinds. “Stacey?” I say cautiously. Before she can respond, I see that the edge of the blinds is folded, as if someone has moved them. She’s moved them, I realize. In her drunken state, she must have lifted them to look outside when the Gooweny-Ein tapped on the window and called for her. Maybe she briefly forgot about the curse and only caught herself too late, or perhaps curiosity just got the best of her. Whatever happened, it's sealed her fate, and likely mine too.

She turns slowly. Her eyes are wide with fright. Her clothing is cut down the middle, right where the ribs meet the sternum. It's not just her clothing that’s been sliced, though; there’s blood all down her shirt, and I can see through layers of skin and muscle deep into her chest cavity. There’s something else in there, too – something moving. It stretches and contorts as if it’s trying to force itself into a tight pair of jeans – only those jeans are her body. Her arms raise, and I hear popping and crunching sounds as her muscles try to resist, but she’s not in control anymore; the Gooweny-Ein is piloting her from the inside now. I stare at her as if trapped in a trance, and I’m sure my own look of terror matches hers. Supposedly, when you’re scared, your heart pounds, but the sight is so horrific that I swear mine stops.