A Forest Darkly

Low Hanging Moon

There’s a story that goes around the hobo camps, about a thing that was once a man, that comes after the unwashed and unwanted and eats them up and spits out their bones. Nobody misses them. Nobody mourns them. Nobody even notices they’re gone.

Down by the train tracks where the Redline No.14 ran parallel to Danny’s Crick on the edge of the small town of Jasper, Tennessee was a place where the men camped out between rides on 14. The train ran north toward Virginia and ended up somewhere in Maryland, so it was a swift way to get over the Mason-Dixon without too much trouble. There weren’t many railroad cops on the 14 line, as it carried coal and ran slow, and the men who called themselves jumpers found it easy enough to hop aboard. The townfolk called the little hollow by the tracks “the bins”, as in trash bins, because it was often strewn with garbage leftover when the jumpers took their next ride, leaving Jasper behind.

No self-respecting citizen of Jasper spent any amount of time down near the bins, but the kids were known to lurk, interested in the raucous music and laughter that often floated up from the camp. Lyle Perkins found himself lying near a steadily burning fire in the bins on a late March night, having hitchhiked his way up from Alabama over a long and perilous three weeks. He’d run up on a fellow by the name of Todd Dean who assured him that riding the rails was a much safer and faster way to get to his final destination of Sandhill, New York. Lyle had a cousin in Sandhill, and anywhere had to be better than Alabama, of that he was sure. Tomorrow, Todd said, the No.14 would rumble by and they’d hop on, finding themselves a little niche in the cars. They’d ride all the way to New York.

A grizzled old man who went by Beck was picking on an old guitar, humming some tune he’d made up himself and the crackling of the fire was nearly as welcoming as anything Lyle had ever felt. He was under the stars, free and clear, and he’d have been happy to stay in the bins forever if the feeling would last.

“Reckon it’s a low hanging moon tonight,” Beck said suddenly, fingers stilling on the guitar strings. He stared up at the sky, and Lyle followed his gaze. The moon was full, round and yellowish, hanging low over the trees. Beck smacked his lips. “Best stay near the fire tonight, gents.”

“What’s gonna happen, Beck?” Todd sneered. He wasn’t a nice man if there was such a thing these days, and he liked to pick and make fun of anyone who ran afoul of his temper. Tonight, it seemed, Beck was his target. “Snake gonna crawl in your blanket with ya?”

“Ain’t no snake to be a-feared of,” Beck replied quietly, returning back to picking at the guitar. “There’s low things about when the moon is yeller. The Big Mouth might come.”

“Big Mouth.” Todd snorted. “That old story again?” He glanced at Lyle. “Lyle hasn’t heard it, Beck. Why don’t you tell it?”

“Big Mouth’s not a story.” Beck’s eyes went to Lyle, boring into his head, hot as coals, it seemed. “Many a man has gone missin’ on the 14 cuz he’s hungry and he’s mean and he roams when the moon is low and yeller.”

Todd elbowed Lyle. “Crazy,” he muttered.

“Don’t leave the light of the fire,” Beck warned, ignoring Todd. “Stay in the light and you’ll be fine.”

Lyle wasn’t one to believe in ghost and such, but he had no plans to go traipsing about the bins in the dark, either. He laid his head back and closed his eyes, his dreams of Sandhill, New York and someplace that had to better than Alabama.

***

“Lyle!”

He came awake to Todd shaking his shoulder roughly. “Wha?”

“Get up!” Todd said, frantic. A whisper. “We gotta run, man!”

“Run?” Lyle sat up, looking around. The camp seemed quiet, the fire burning low. “What?”

“It’s out there.” Todd’s eyes were wide, and he stared into the dark. “It’s out there!”

“What are you blabbering about?” Lyle scratched his head, wondering just how much cheap whiskey the man had hidden in his old rucksack.

“Big. Mouth,” Todd whispered. His face was pale. “He’s here.”

“Shut up. I’m done playing your games.”

“Lyle!” Todd grabbed his arm, fingers gripping tight. “He’s already got everybody else. Can’t you see?”

Lyle squinted, noting the bedrolls were empty around the fire. Beck’s old guitar lay over his blanket. “Where they go?”

“I told you!” Todd was on his knees. “We have to go before he comes back!”

A sound made them freeze. It came from the deep night beyond the weak glow of the fire. Snap. Crack. Feet on brambles. Someone was in the woods.

“If we run into the dark we’ll be easy pickings,” Lyle said to Todd quietly. “Stay near the fire.”

“I don’t got no gun!” Todd blabbered. “No weapon at all!”

“Just shut up!” Lyle hissed, pulling him closer to the dying fire.

“The fire won’t save us,” Todd protested. “It already got everybody else!”

Lyle picked up a log, the end glowing hot. Whatever came at them, he’d at least leave a scar before he let it take him. He hadn’t come this far to get ate up by some mountain monster.

They stared into the dark, trying hard to see what seemed to be circling the camp. Lyle thought he saw movement, but there was nothing beyond that. A smell, like camphor and old dirt wafted past now and then, but he didn’t see anybody out there. Todd was breathing fast, sweat on his forehead. Lyle’s bladder was screaming he needed to empty it, but there was no way in hell he was letting his pants down now.

Todd gasped when a howl echoed out from the woods, almost whining in fear as he stood and took off, running into the dark.

“Todd, you dumbass!” Lyle yelled, watching the man bust through the underbrush like a hog being chased by hounds. “You’re gonna break a damn leg if the Big Mouth don’t get you first!”

Lyle held his breath when a grunt hit his ears, the sound of a body hitting the ground hard. Todd had likely tripped on a root or a branch, falling. There was a scuffle, another grunt and then Lyle closed his eyes at the scream that echoed from the woods a moment later. Wet. Sick. The sound of bones breaking. Skin tearing. Having spent a few years in a slaughter house, he knew the sound of death. Whatever was out there really had gotten a hold of Todd.

Well, if it was coming for Lyle he was going to make it wish it hadn’t. He didn’t kill an evil man in Alabama and run from the law across four states for three weeks to get this far only to die at the hands of something some hobos called “Big Mouth.”

“C’mon out then,” he said through gritted teeth, holding the log over the fire to keep it hot. “Eat me if you can you sumbitch.”

Eyes locked on the dark beyond the firelight, Lyle thought he could make out an outline. Maybe a man? Bigger than most, though, and wide through the shoulders in a way that almost unsightly. It came closer, lumbering a little, arms too long and neck stalk-like, the head too big and too round. Pinprick light shined out from holes that Lyle had to assume were eyes. Yeah, maybe it was a man once or a really deformed kind of one, but it was something else now. The stench of wet dirt followed, and blood drenched what parts of it he could see. It sniffed, grunted.

“There ya are,” Lyle said, and even though he was terrified he was ready to make this thing work for his death. “Hey there, Big Mouth.”

It came closer, almost into the light. Maybe Lyle had known nightmares before, like the kind that you remembered a few minutes after waking up, but this was worse than any of those. Jagged ripped flesh where a mouth should be, and a jaw that opened. Opened. Wide. Wider. A maw, he supposed you’d call it. Pure blackness inside it’s throat, the hole as it yawned in his direction slick with the blood of others. It let out a howl from the gullet, but he rushed forward, not wasting any time being scared. He jammed the hot end of the log down the throat, lunging and slipping through the bload-soaked fingers as they grasped at him.

It tried to scream, falling back, clawing at the log he’d jammed down its throat. He picked up his bag, throwing it over his shoulder as the whistle of the No.14 echoed through the hills. He saw the lights on the front of the engine heading their way and he jumped across the tracks, putting the train between him and the thing that still screamed in the bins. He threw himself aboard the first train car that he saw open, rolling over the rough floor and lying, breathing heavy as the train rumbled on, oblivious to the horror it was leaving behind.

Lyle crawled to the wall of the car, peering through the slatted wooden planks at the bins. The fire was almost out, but it lit up the space enough for him to see it was empty. The thing, Big Mouth, was gone. Perhaps he’d hurt it, or maybe not, but he didn’t see it following. He slumped against the wall, all the horror and fear finally catching up to him as he stared at his hands in wonder. What in the actual hell just happened? Did he see a monster? A thing that was a man, though bigger, meaner and more atrocious than any man he’d ever seen?

The train rumbled on through the night and Lyle did not sleep until the sun rose, and the low-hanging moon was long gone into the night. Maybe, he thought, Alabama wasn’t the worst place in the world after all.