Dog Blood

of white lighting everything up like a strobe. It’s impossible to gauge the distance, but that sounded close. Too close. I can still feel the vibrations through my feet as I start chopping again. This door is more stubborn than most. It’s newer than the others, probably recently replaced. I guess I’m not the first person to have to try to break into a room here. I grunt with effort as I hammer the door again and again, desperate to get through.

viii

WITH HIS FACE PRESSED hard against the spyhole in the door, Mark stared in disbelief at the man trying to bludgeon his way into the room directly opposite.
    “What is it?” Kate asked, trying to pull him away. He didn’t answer. He couldn’t answer. How could this be? How had he found them? Was it just coincidence or the cruelest stroke of bad luck imaginable? Had he been looking for them? How could he have known they were here? He glanced back over his shoulder at Lizzie standing in the far corner, the stunned expression on his face obviously speaking volumes.
    “Mark, what is it? What the hell’s the matter?” Kate demanded again, her voice now frantic. He ignored her and instead continued to stare at Lizzie. She moved closer, her pace quickening as she approached. Sensing that she already knew what was outside, she tried to push Mark out of the way. He stood his ground, turned his back on her, and pressed his eye up against the tiny glass button in the door again.
    He hadn’t seen him for almost a year, and he was virtually unrecognizable, but it was definitely him, he was sure of it. Danny McCoyne. His cousin Danny. His mom’s sister Jean’s son. The kid he’d messed around with at countless boring family gatherings and parties when they were growing up. The miserable loser with the dead-end job who’d ended up saddled with too many kids in an apartment that was too small. The notorious slacker who other members of the family had frequently cited as a prime example of how not to do things. Lizzie’s partner. A murderer. A Hater.
    Outside on the landing, McCoyne continued to hammer against the door. Mark was overwhelmed by the anger and hatred so visible on his cousin’s twisted face, shocked and appalled by what he had become. He’d always seemed awkward and gangly, uncomfortable in his own body, but that uncertainty had been replaced now with focus, ferocity, and a vicious intent. To Mark, Danny McCoyne now personified the previously faceless Hater menace, and he felt his legs weaken with nerves at the thought he might be forced to confront him.
    Lizzie grabbed Mark’s arm and yanked him out of the way. She pressed her eye against the spyhole briefly, then staggered away from the door, recoiling in shock at the sight of the Hater in the hallway. The room around her was filled with noise-Kate’s panicked screaming, Gurmit Singh’s constant unfathomable tirade-but she didn’t hear any of it. How could this be? How the hell could he be here?
    “Will someone tell me what’s wrong?” Kate pleaded, desperate for information.
    “It’s Danny,” Lizzie mumbled, her voice barely audible.
    “What? But how could he-?”
    “Keep your voice down, Katie,” Mark warned.
    “Let him have the kid,” Kate shouted, moving forward. Mark pushed her back away from the door. “Come on, Mark, let him take her. Give her to him. Get the little bitch out of here. We’ll be safer if-”
    He kept pushing her away, the noise from the hallway getting louder and louder. He shoved her back toward her catatonic parents, then ran to the spyhole and peered outside again. He watched as McCoyne finally forced his way into the room opposite. He disappeared inside but was back out again just a few seconds later, and this time there was no question as to where he was heading next.
    “Get back!” Mark hissed as he stumbled back toward the others, sweeping them away from the door. He grabbed a baseball bat they’d kept in the room to defend themselves, then herded Kate, Lizzie, and Singh around the foot of the double bed, gesturing for them to get down and stay out of sight.
    “Is he-” Lizzie started, the sound of the first flurry of blows from the axe against the door rendering her question obsolete before it had even been fully asked. The door rattled and shook in its frame. Mark glanced back at Kate, who cowered alongside her parents, then turned and faced the door again, desperately trying to give the impression he was ready to fight when all he wanted to do was