Asylum Lake by R. A. Evans Read Free Book Online Page A

small Cape Cod to the other and smeared fingerprints were on everything from the kitchen knives to the golf club he discovered in the hall closet. Even the hedge clippers he had picked up in the garage were bloodied and broken. The blades had actually bent and snapped clear off from the wooden handles. The dull and rusty shears had worked just fine on the kids, but Mrs. Reed was a big woman with thick bones and thick bones, he learned, required a hacksaw. Lionel had to make the long walk from the bathroom to the garage three times for new blades.
    The white plastic bracelet hung loosely on his wrist throughout the entire ordeal. It, too, had been stained beyond any hope of coming clean. Most of the words, however, were still legible beneath the smears of blood.

    Ellis Arkema #00981
    SOUTH WING, LAKE VIEW ASYLUM
    DOB: UNKNOWN

RESTRICTED

    Lionel liked the feel of the cool plastic against his skin. He had found the bracelet while fishing with his father. It was the only thing he had hooked all day. He felt compelled to hide it away in his pocket before his father could notice. Ever since then he had gradually set aside most of his other interests, everything from comic books to baseball cards, and instead found himself spending his time alone in his room imagining stories about who Ellis Arkema was and how he may have lost that bracelet in the lake.
    At times it almost felt as if he were listening to someone else tell these stories, a faceless and shadowy voice inside his head that was both scary and reassuring. Sometimes the stories made him cry and other times he laughed out loud. It all seemed to make his parents more than a bit uncomfortable. He had thought, and the voice agreed, that maybe he should keep the bracelet a secret.
    He turned from the sink and decided to make one more trip through the house before leaving. He followed the trail of blood and gore from the hardwood floor in the kitchen to the orange shag carpeting that led through the living room and down the hallway. A dead body is difficult thing for anyone to move, and at only twelve, it had taken quite an effort for Lionel to drag it all the way to the bathroom.
    The door to the nursery the twins shared was wide open. He could see their small forms huddled close together on the floor as he paused in the hallway. The pools of blood that spread from under their lifeless bodies formed giant wings in the carpet. It was an oddly beautiful sight with the pale light coming in through the window falling gently across their outstretched wings. Their bodies, he reasoned, were mere cocoons from which he had helped them escape. He envied the flight of their spirits.
     
    Slicing their tiny throats had proven to be much more difficult than he had anticipated, but the hedge-clippers had taken away their hands and feet quite easily. As he continued down the hall, Lionel tried unsuccessfully to remember where he had put them.
    The bathroom looked like someone had flung red paint violently across the walls and floor. Spattered blood ran down and across the mirror hanging over the vanity and onto the toilet nearby. The broken hedge-clippers had been thrown into the corner near the trash. Dull hacksaw blades and an assortment of knives and other tools lay scattered coldly on the tile. The back of the toilet reminded him of the meat case at Dell’s Grocery, filets and various other cuts of the late Mrs. Reed were neatly stacked into three identical, gooey rows. Blood trailed from the oozing stacks down the side of the tank and onto the floor, forming clotted pools.
    Lionel drank in the coppery smell of the blood and gore, a devious smile flashing across his innocent lips.
    Stepping carefully toward the tub, he attempted to avoid the slick pools of blood. He had slipped and fallen once already, banging his elbow painfully against the toilet. It had sent a jolt throughout his entire arm that throbbed with every step he took.
    Looking up, Lionel noted sadly that the shower