Compulsion

An irresistible urge to behave in a certain way, especially against one's conscious wishes.

Stone Creek stared at the quaint cottage on Longview Lane. The name on the mailbox was Elm. He hesitated before pushing open the small gate in the white picket fence. A small dog rushed at him, yapping away and bouncing with excitement. Stone scowled at the annoyance and walked the short distance of the red brick walkway to the front porch. He raised his hand to knock, but the door opened before his knuckles made contact with the wood. A smiling woman stood before him. “Hello,” she said. “Who might you be?”

Serotina Elm wasn’t expecting company, least of all a gentleman caller. Her corgi was absolutely delighted to see him. The dog always was a good judge of character. Stone hesitated before replying, “my name is Stone Creek.” He wasn’t exactly sure why he was there and hoped that she wouldn’t ask.

“Well, come on in, Mr. Creek. I’ll put on some tea.” The corgi barked excitedly as Stone stepped across the threshold. “Lollypup, you hush now,” Serotina scolded. After turning a few circles on a nearby rug, Lollypup settled down. “Sit yourself down anywhere. One chair is as good as another.”

Stone examined the loveseat and chairs in the small sitting room. The brocade had faded and frayed. The small coffee table sported a few scratches and water rings. The curtains in the window had yellowed from age. The area rug beneath his feet was the one bright spot in the room. He sat in one of the chairs facing the front window, but spent his time examining the colorful rug. Perhaps it was nothing more than the effect of staring at it for too long, but he could swear that the creatures depicted in the weave were moving – that somehow the rug was alive beneath his feet.

“Here we are, Mr. Creek. Some freshly brewed Earl Grey and a nice plate of snickerdoodles. I hope I haven’t kept you waiting too long. It’s been a while since I last had company.” Serotina set down the tray and poured out a cup of tea into a faded china cup. She placed two snickerdoodles on the saucer and handed it to Stone.

Stone accepted the offering with a smile and absentmindedly bit into a snickerdoodle while Serotina prattled on about seldom receiving visitors “...this far out of town. Why, you’d think I lived on the moon!” He took a sip of the tea to wash down the crumbs stuck to the inside of his mouth then bit into the second snickerdoodle. “Once upon a time, this used to be the center of town, but then they put in the expressway and the town moved closer to the highway. Would you like another snickerdoodle? I could freshen your tea for you.” He held out his saucer and she placed two more snickerdoodles on the saucer before refilling his teacup.

Stone slid back in the chair and balanced the teacup and saucer on the arm. Serotina continued to talk about the history of the town of Shady Glen. Stone hung on every word while munching on cookies and drinking tea until both the plate and teapot were empty. Normally, Stone would be carousing at the local bar, then staggering back to his apartment drunk. But there was something about Serotina’s voice that captivated him.

Serotina still hadn’t asked Stone why he was there. It was a question that he had been asking of himself since he arrived outside her front gate. Why was he there? Why had he sat through her drivel about the town’s history? Why had he just devoured a plate of under-baked cookies and a pot of weak tea? Why was the rug suddenly urging him to run?

Stone awoke in a sweat from the fever dream. He stumbled to the bathroom for a drink of water. The face in the mirror was flush and bristly. According to the clock it was mid-day. He had overslept. He struggled to remember what day it was. He braced himself against the sink as a wave of nausea passed. Fortunately, the water stayed down. “Baby steps,” he told himself.

Stone wandered into the kitchen to brew a small pot of coffee and search for something bland to eat. He found a package of stale saltines to nibble on while the coffee brewed. The saltines were unsatisfying. He had a gnawing hunger inside him and dug out a package of raw liver and voraciously devoured it. His intake of raw protein broke the fever. Feeling better, he took a shower and dressed, then drank some coffee while perusing the local yellow pages.

Shady Glen was a small town with quite a few local bars. He wrote down the address of the oldest bar in town in his pocket notebook. His first stop outside the small apartment that he had rented would be the local library. Stone’s father, Jakob Creek, had died recently. His father had left Shady Glen after Stone’s mother had died. Stone hoped to find the cemetery where they buried his mother. He needed to search the old-fashioned way as the internet had not arrived yet in the middle of the state forest area.

The town library was small. It still used the card catalog system to locate the books that it housed. He approached the librarian at the desk to ask about old newspapers. She told him that he needed to go to the newspaper’s office if he wanted to see back issues. She gave him directions to the offices of the Daily Herald.

The editor of the Daily Herald had the same last name as the librarian that Stone had spoken to earlier. He listened carefully to Stone’s request and then led him to a back room. Despite the newspaper’s name, it had always been a weekly paper. Relieved by this odd fact, Stone pulled the first bound volume off the shelf. He started to leaf through the pages looking for the obituary notices. There were no notices for an “Ivy Creek” listed in the newspaper during the first ten years of his life. He went through the pages again, this time looking for a birth announcement. There were none for Jakob and Ivy Creek.

Frustrated by his lack of success at locating any information on his mother or himself, Stone decided that he could use a stiff drink. At the Long View Bar, Stone introduced himself to a few old-timers occupying a corner table. “I’m looking for information on Ivy Creek. Have any of you ever heard of her?”

“No, son. Can’t say that I have.”

“Perhaps you knew her husband. His name was Jakob Creek.”

“Nope, never heard of any Jakob Creek. Knew a Jakob Elm once. He disappeared twenty-some years ago along with his son. Drove Serotina mad with grief. She used to live in the last home in Long View, until it burned down with her in it.”

“That woman was a real nut. She had a taste for raw meat, especially human flesh. She’d lure them in with cookies and tea.”

“But she took a real liking to Jakob. Let him live long enough to father a child. Then one night her craving for human flesh returned. She took a bite out of Jakob. He grabbed the boy and the two of them just disappeared.”

Stone smiled. “Thank you for the information.” He dropped a twenty-dollar bill on the table. “Have a round on me.” He turned his back to the gentlemen and quickly left the bar. “Well,” he muttered to himself as he walked briskly back to his apartment, “that explains the body parts in my refrigerator.”