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  I shut the door quickly and walked fast to the next. It looked like a kitchen area, the swinging doors each had a small window on them, and so I peered inside. I saw the man in there, standing above another man that was tied to a chair. The man was injecting some sort of drug into his victim and pouring the same green liquor into his mouth. The tied up man began to convulse violently and spit up a frothy liquid that bubbled from his mouth. Without hesitation, the man that drove us slit the other’s throat with a single motion.

  I freaked out and ran to the next door, bursting in just as a brunette rose from Gary’s lap, wiping her chin with her hand.

  “Gary, pull up your pants, we need to get the fuck out of here!” I yelled as my head began to spin again.

  He stood and buckled is belt, swaying back and forth. I could tell that he was just as trashed as I was. Still, I grabbed his arm and rushed toward the front door. As we passed near the man’s table, I could see him yelling at the blonde before slapping her to the ground. He was raising his voice for all to hear, but I couldn’t understand a word he said.

  Gary began to realize the man was dangerous and ran faster as we pushed through the iron gate and outside. The humid night air was unforgiving, taking our breath away as we ran full speed down the dirt road toward the paved portion. Neither of us looked back for at least a mile, we just ran against the fog in our brains down the blurry path before us.

  When we couldn’t run any more, we both dropped to our knees and puked violently.

  “What the fuck was that all about?” asked Gary in a panic.

  “Hell if I know, but that man was evil,” I responded. “I am not sure he was even a man, he was too convincing and nice. I fucking saw him slit a man’s throat.”

  “Fuck, do we even know his name? We just spent the fucking night with him and never asked his name. “Fuck!?” yelled Gary.

  “Dude, come on, we need to keep going.” I said. “If we see any headlights coming up on us, we need to run into the trees.”

  We walked for a couple miles before the city lights began to appear in the distance.

  “What time is it?” Gary asked.

  I grabbed my phone, “3:37 in the morning. How the fuck did it get so late? I swear it was just 9:30.”

  “Me too, what the fuck?” said Gary.

  I had never been more scared in my life; I honestly thought I was going to die. I was convinced that the nameless man was not an ordinary creep. I was convinced he was the devil and I needed to talk to someone about it. Someone who wouldn’t judge me, wouldn’t scold me, someone who would comfort me.

  Staring at my phone through blurred vision, I dialed the first person that came to mind.

  “Hello,” said the voice.

  “Mom, sorry to call so early, but you are the only person I could think to call.”

  STRANGE OLD BREW

  Jim Goforth

  They called themselves the High Society, the moniker less to do with upper class pretension and more of an indication of the lifestyles chosen by the group members and how they elected to spend their down time.

  Led by the charismatic Quentin Vanhorn, they were comprised mostly of those who’d done poorly at school, or in most areas of life in general, of petty criminals and disturbed souls, as well as a handful of idle, bored rich individuals, people who were truly well-off and affluent, choosing to indulge in the same sets of vices as their less well-off associates. While most folks of their age had accepted adulthood and responsibilities, carving out niches for themselves in various occupations, or settling down into family life and having children, the High Society had no such desire to do so.

  Renetta wasn’t the same as the rest of them, and she knew it. She was neither a high school burn-out, drop-out, troublemaker nor a small-time collector of misdemeanours and criminal offences. She wasn’t one of those indulgent individuals born of privilege, born with a silver spoon in her mouth either. She’d been a reasonable student at school, always maintained good grades and came from a normal family background with none of the issues of broken homes, abuse or general neglect that others suffered. She had a job too, nothing fancy or high flying, but around Hurlstone, you took what you could get, and landing a full-time bar-tending position was a good gig.

  It was also how she met Quentin and the rest of the High Society, and ultimately how she became one of them.

  Renetta was no stranger to drugs; she’d experimented with them through the latter years of high school and beyond. Her first toke on a joint was at fifteen and later on, she ended up running with a crowd whose idea of a good time was sitting around in a basement smoking bongs. From that, they graduated to dabbling in methamphetamines and ecstasy, and some went further still. A falling out with a couple of those members meant Renetta stopped associating with them and moving in different circles. Until Quentin and his cohorts wandered into the bar she worked at.

  One thing led to another; his captivating presence and sheer charisma had her spellbound, and soon enough, she was a full-fledged member of the High Society, a willing participant in all of their frequent soirees celebrating everything about drug culture and the good old fashioned pursuits of getting utterly trashed for recreation.

  ***

  “Party time at the usual tonight then, Quen?” Nestor Wakefield sparked up a cigarette from the packet borrowed from his perpetual shadow Wilson Winters and shot a gaze of query at the self-proclaimed king of High Society.

  Including Quentin and the two stooges, there were around a dozen of the collective gathered in the den of the Vanhorn residence, where Quentin usually called meetings to announce upcoming celebrations, debauched events and all round, general get fucked up assemblages. That accounted for roughly half the members of the Society. Those who were unable to attend were usually clued in via text message or phone call after Quentin wrapped things up here, and as usual, they’d all make sure they cleared whatever other menial plans they had to get together for a drug-addled orgy of epic proportions.

  Unlike most of the group, bar a small percentage, Quentin wasn’t a ne’er-do-well, or a cheap crim, or a kid who’d spun out of control and off the rails because of some kind of learning difficulty; he was one of the privileged, a spoilt rich young man who had everything gifted to him from day one. Consequently, he and the others with money bankrolled all of the drugfests, and though they mostly did so because they wanted as many other like-minded souls to get truly obliterated and indulge in the lifestyle with them, they did take certain liberties with some of the female members as a form of paying them back for their generosity.

  Sitting in a leather recliner, Quentin allowed himself a small chuckle, then leaned forward over the glass topped coffee table where he already had a series of lines of cocaine racked up and set out neatly, chopped and lined up with his one of his multiple bankcards. He didn’t answer immediately; instead, he leaned forward over his nose confectionery and proceeded to snort a line with a rolled up fifty dollar bill. He sat back, sniffing hard and rubbing his nostrils with a bunched up knuckle, then jabbed the powdered bill at another member of the congregation.

  “Nah, not this time. We’re going to take the shindig to a new location. Heath found somewhere else. Reckons it would be just ideal for such gatherings as we like to hold. Ain’t that right Heath? Tell everybody about it.”

  The short, stocky Heath eyed off the remaining lines of coke as if he hoped Quentin was about to offer him one in return for revealing the secret he was apparently keeper of, but when the other man didn’t immediately do so, he shrugged and launched into his tale.

  “Well, me and Kelsey were going for a drive earlier on. Looking for a good place to fuck, since y’all know how Kels loves getting her freak on out in public somewhere, or out in the woods and shit like that. Am I right?”

  He looked around the gathering, seeking some confirmation from his buddies with the usual response of whoops, cheers and catcalls, and was rewarded appropriately. The petite blonde woman reclining on the double loung
e with him, flushed crimson, but she didn’t dispute what he said.

  “So, anyway, we were cruising around, heading way out of town ‘cause we kept seeing all these places we’d already done it and wanted somewhere completely different. It took some driving, let me tell you,” Heath grinned lecherously. “Shit, we’ve banged all over this joint, that’s for sure. So, we ended up way the fuck out in the middle of nowhere, down in creepy land where ain’t nobody like to go. Turns out there’s an old abandoned farmhouse or some such shit down there, just sitting by itself, going to waste. Ain’t nobody around for miles ‘cept for all the farms and shit, and even they ain’t within any earshot of the place. It’s surrounded by woods and all that, and if ya ask me, it’s just been plumb forgotten by everybody.”

  Heath paused for dramatic effect, gazing around at the assortment of expressions on the visages of his companions. Some interested looks, a few definite grins of approval and some wrinkling of noses, as if they found the idea somewhat distasteful.

  “Mind you, Kels got the creeps and didn’t wanna go on in to test out the old joint, so unfortunately I can’t claim to be the first to have fucked in there, but trust me, this joint could become the new stronghold of the High Society.”

  “Well, all right. I’m in,” Wilson enthused, agreeing to the idea, sight unseen.

  “Wait a minute,” another one of the female members, a tall woman with a short dark bob interjected. “There isn’t any electricity or anything like that at this place is there? If it’s been abandoned, forgotten about, or what have you, I wouldn’t think so. How’s that going to be a good place? No music, nothing. Screw that idea.”

  “Christ, Yvette, we’ll have cars there. With stereos, which we can pump up to the max. Deck the joint out with candles, set up some ambiance and whatnot. It’ll be motherfucking sweet. I’m telling you, this is gonna be insane!” Wilson was one hundred percent behind the idea, almost as though he’d discovered the secret spot.

  “Quen?” Yvette asked. “Is this for real? What’s wrong with the usual place? Or even here for fuck's sake? We never party here anymore.”

  “Oh, it’s for real indeed,” Quentin was done with another line and sniffing accordingly, as he now offered one of the women closest the rolled up bill for a go of their own.

  Scowling to herself, from where she sat over in a corner of the den, near where Quentin kept bookshelves of literature he’d never read and never had any intention of reading, Renetta knew why big-titted, blonde Stacey was getting the privilege of indulging in the dwindling lines, and it irked her no end. Still, she knew Quentin didn’t understand a thing about monogamy, nor would he ever attempt to consider trying it. With a Quentin Vanhorn party, the partners were multiple, the drugs were constant, and anybody who had disagreements to that were out of the Society.

  “I went for a little drive myself after Heath told me about this place, and you can bet your ass it will be ideal. No electricity, yeah that’s right, but Wilson’s on the money with car stereos playing music if we want music, or portable stereos, there are all kinds of ways around having no power on. Coolers for the booze, batteries for things, shit, we’ll have everything we need sorted no problem. See, the problem with the usual spot is that it’s becoming too obvious. We go there all the time and it’s going to bring too much attention down on us. None of us want the party to end, and that’s what’s going to happen if we get raided by the cops at a joint we get complacent in. I’ve been feeling for a little while now that we need to move elsewhere, just with that feeling in the back of my mind that maybe somebody has tipped the pigs off about our little group, and they’ve got surveillance on known locations, which is why Heath’s find is a score for us. And as for partying here, well shit, that’s old hat. Mundane. We’ve partied this old den out so many times that it’s kinda leeched the fun out of it some. We have to keep things fresh, shake ‘em up, change up the locations. Get crazy out in weird funky places.”

  “Fucking A,” Wilson said.

  A chorus of assent, alongside an array of questions, filled the room, though Renetta had mostly tuned out by then, or didn’t particularly care to hear some of the inanity that would follow. Personally, though she didn’t like Yvette much better than she liked Stacey, she had to agree with her. She wasn’t fond of the idea of the High Society getting all drugged up, liquored up, fucked up and zoned out, way out in some remote abandoned house that was probably scheduled for a date with the wrecking ball.

  A place none of them were familiar with, in an area out of town few would know much about, in a place with no electricity, surrounded largely by wilderness, did not sound like the ideal location to engage in a debauched drug and alcohol-fuelled party. The whole notion was rife with potential hazards, danger and outcomes that could not be good, but Renetta knew better than to raise her concerns. They’d be shouted down in no time flat, by all those who were keen on the idea, and probably some of those who weren’t, just because she was the new girl on the block here.

  She didn’t bother standing up as a dissenter, inwardly resigning herself to the fact that peer pressure was a motherfucker and she was going to attend the party, no matter where it ended up being held.

  Quentin had clearly decided, and that was going to be the bottom line.

  ***

  With the thumping pulse of music beating on her eardrums and a potent cocktail of drugs coursing through her every fibre, Renetta very vaguely recalled that she’d thought this would be a bad idea. Now, she knew she’d been wrong, dead fucking wrong. She was finding it remarkably difficult to remember exactly why she’d even had misgivings about it in the first place.

  She danced in a crazy carefree caper, along with the likes of Yvette, Stacey and some of the other girls, even a handful of the guys, in a front room of the decrepit farmhouse Heath and Kelsey discovered, and Quentin decreed, would be the location of this evening's gathering.

  Old and abandoned were understatements to describe the state of the place. Bluntly, it was a fucking travesty it was still standing, and for that matter, it was only just barely standing.

  Surprisingly the exterior of the place, left to fend for itself out in the elements, forced to face wind, rain, hail and sun, was in relatively reasonable condition, at least as best as could be expected, but the majority of the inside was a wreck. Some rooms were largely undamaged or eroded away into disuse and disrepair, but the majority of them were quite plainly, fucked.

  Broken boards littered the floors of these rooms, so thick in areas that the entire floor was completely covered with them, along with fallen sections of ceiling, random bricks and concrete chunks. They barely had anything that could be construed as walls, bar skeletal supports, with the fibro and other material formerly used to create them, torn away and also lying in pieces all over floors.

  Most of them were also sans doors, with some propped up against the bare wall frameworks or inexplicably absent all together.

  To just about everybody in the party collective, it looked like a place that shouldn’t even exist, an abomination that had ducked and dodged every attempt to bury it and put it to rest, and remained standing by sheer stubborn will. Even those members of the High Society who’d come from ghetto and slum areas couldn’t quite recall seeing such a dilapidated wreck of an abode as this monstrosity.

  Clapping immediate eyes on it sure hadn’t quelled the trepidation, reservations and utter misgivings for those who hated the idea in the first place, but that all changed.

  By the time those who’d brought vehicles and transported others who hadn’t, had their vehicles pulled up as close to the house as the woody, tree-riddled, branch-littered, over-grassed terrain would allow and got the music cranking, the iceboxes of alcohol were carted out of them, candles and other items of ambience were situated around the more intact rooms and the substance providers wheeled out their various illicit wares for all to imbibe in, all misgivings wholly evaporated.

  A cocktail of cocaine, ecstasy, speed, marijuana, alcoh
ol and assorted other things for specialty imbibers, or those with their own particular preference, had the whole collective in various drug addled states and acting accordingly.

  Renetta could barely recall why she disliked the girls she was dancing with at the moment. With pills and powder sparking her brain in paroxysms of elation, she felt more like making love to them all in some writhing, naked orgy of flesh than she did punching them in the face, although she did vaguely remember that was what she usually wanted to do whenever she saw them. She guessed it had something to do with Quen, but the drugs in her head, the bass-heavy dance music in her ears, wouldn’t allow her to mull over that.

  Instead, she grasped Stacey around the waist and pulled her supple body in against hers, feeling the blondes perfect (and certainly paid for) breasts thrust against her own. The taller woman giggled, and reciprocated, to the extent where she clamped her mouth over Renetta’s, tongue probing inside. Through the perpetual hammer of the music, Renetta could hear a litany of encouragement rolling in from the men around, most of the other women too.

  Breathless, the women finally broke contact, at least with their mouths, but kept their bodies firmly pressed against one another. Hands groped and roamed over asses, trailing up the planes of backs and tangling in each other’s hair.

  ***

  Over in a corner of the room, where bizarrely, an old leather recliner still remained, holding fast to its position, Heath was seated, pounding back beers, his eyes wide, pupils dilated. He was enjoying the fuck out of the show, but he was also enjoying Kelsey, on her knees before him, deep-throating his erect cock. Both the combination of the dirty dancing women and his own girl sucking him off had him in a heightened state of excitement, but he was too fucked to be able to stand up. Not that there was any need to right now, but in the back of his mind, he was contemplating how enthusiastic the two dancing girls would be if he wandered over there with his stiff cock out. Could turn into a four-way fuckfest. It wasn’t as though that hadn’t happened before at these soirees, just not yet involving Heath. Tonight could be the night.