Cadaverton

by Bob Schmalfeldt

In the physical world, he was lying in his bed, his eyes darting right and left under closed eyelids. But in the dream, Alan Seabrook was standing along the side of Wisconsin State Highway 33, at the city limits of his home -- the rural community of Dillingham.

The harsh afternoon sun reflected off of the city limits sign. Alan walked over to it, wondering who it was that had crossed out "Dillingham" with red spray paint and wrote "Cadaverton."

The sky directly above him was the kind of enraged blue which doesn't exist in the real world. But directly ahead of him, over the tiny community and all the way west to the horizon, small black clouds dotted an orange-red sky. The change seemed to take place right over the town boundary.

Ahead of him, Dillingham was silent and still. The hot wind which ruffled his t-shirt didn't seem to reach into town. The highway ahead was littered with debris, lying perfectly still and unbothered by even a whisper of breeze.

Alan felt the change as soon as he stepped over the city limits. It was like stepping from July into October.

Just down the road was the high school he attended, built just three years earlier. But now, it looked ancient. Broken. Its windows were shattered. The grassy lawn was now overgrown and weedy.

As he stepped into town, the sun was directly overhead. But with each step, the sun moved a little more to the west. By the time he'd walked the three blocks to the post office, the sun was halfway down to the horizon. When he reached the town square, another six blocks, it was nearly sundown.

Alan looked at the highway pavement, examining the small cracks in the street. They were crawling with worms like he'd never seen before. Long, thin and white with black, pin-prick eyes.

When he raised his head, the scene had shifted. He was standing at the edge of the town square. The normally tidy business district was in ruins. Storefront signs hung in disrepair. Windows were smashed and, in some cases, entirely missing.

And the sidewalks were littered with bodies.

"Of course," he thought. "Everybody's dead. That's the way it's always been in Cadaverton."

Directly in front of him was the body of Timmy Smith, his best friend since childhood. His skin was dark and dry as leather. Smitty's chubby face was sunken and shriveled. His eyelids folded into his skull, with no eyes to round them out.

"Hi, Smitty," Alan said. "Been dead long?"

He started to step over the body, when something grabbed his ankle. Alan looked down and saw Smitty's withered hand, clutching at him. His body was attempting to get off of the pavement.

"There's something I have to do," Alan said, trying to wrench himself free. "Someplace I have to go."

He pulled his ankle away, reaching down to brush away the clumps of Smitty's dead skin, which had clung to his socks. Smitty was on his hands and knees, white worms investigating the nooks and cracks of his rotting fingers.

"No!" the cadaver yelled. "Don't go there! It's not too late! Don't go there!"

Smiling, Alan turned to look at his friend. "I have to," he said.

Smitty's eye sockets were open wide, the flapping eyelids hanging uselessly in them. He opened his mouth wide, the dry skin of his jaw flaking and peeling away as he did.

"No! Don't! NO! Noooooo!"

His scream continued, even as his jaw fell off and clattered on the sidewalk. Alan laughed and continued walking west, listening to Smitty's screams. Without a jaw, he could no longer say "no." But he could still shriek.

"Ohh! Ohh! Ohh! Ohgnt Oh Air!"

"But I have to go there," Alan answered. "I just don't know why." He turned and gave his friend one last, friendly wave. Then, as the skin of Smitty's corpse slid off onto the sidewalk and the dry, brittle bones clattered into a heap, Alan walked through the town square.

Everywhere he looked, he saw corpses in varying stages of decay. As he passed by, he heard them whisper his name. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see them stir. And as he stopped to look behind him, he could see they had risen to their feet and were following him.

"Come along if you want to," he said. "But I have to press on. It's getting late."

Westward he walked, through the square, the sun settling toward the horizon with each step. Behind him the clattering of bones as the more severely decayed members of his entourage fell apart. He could hear (and smell) the sliding, squishy, gassy skin of the others.

By the time he reached St. Boniface's Cemetery on the western edge of town, the sun was hovering just over the horizon. Alan paused and looked at the cemetery gate: the wrought-iron monstrosity with the giant arch which proclaimed that We Shall All Rise Again.

"Indeed," Alan said as he strode through the gate and walked toward the center of the cemetery. Those corpses that had made it all the way here without disintegrating, stood outside the gate and continued to whisper Alan's name.

Alan stood next to the massive obelisk in the center of the ancient cemetery, marking the private plot of Henry Dillingham and family -- the town's founder.

"This is where I'm supposed to be," Alan said. "And this is what I'm supposed to do."

He looked to the west, at the steeple of St. Boniface Church -- not at all surprised to see that the crucifix at the tip had been replaced with something looking more like a totem pole. On top was a wrought-iron hand. Below it, an eye. Below that, a spiral. And at the bottom, something that looked like a fanged, screaming mouth. The surreal totem was supported by an iron column of winding snakes, shooting heavenward from the top of the church's steeple. The last rays of red daylight glinted off of the blasphemous totem.

The sky was settling from amber to violet as Alan closed his eyes. The corpses stood by the gate waiting for -- something. Alan didn't know what. But he now knew what he was supposed to do.

He felt the muscles in his neck loosen as his head tilted backwards. His arms hung loosely at his side. Below the scrabbly grass of the cemetery, he could feel the others, the imprisoned -- begging him in a language he couldn't begin to understand.

Alan felt a pull on his arms. The dirt had become a magnet -- his arms had become steel. Slowly, pulling against the tug of the earth, he raised his hands. The buzzing and whispering of those waiting at the gate grew louder. cont

(From the unfinished novel, "We Shall All Rise Again" by Bob Schmalfeldt)