A Place So Wicked by Patrick Reuman (life books to read txt) 📕

there once or twice, back when he was new to town. There was some sort of ceremony they attended at the church. A lot of strange characters showed up, religious folk and the like. Looking back, he wasn’t really sure what they were even doing there in the first place given that neither he nor his mother were particularly religious. All he knew was some lady invited his mom and, as sad as it sounded, his mom was desperate to make friends, so they went.

It didn’t matter then, back when they visited the church, but something about it came rushing back this morning as he pondered their situation. In most ways, that church was exactly the same as any other. But there was one strange thing that occurred while he was there. As he wandered around the grounds, exploring the outside, taking in the statues and graveyard, he had gone mostly unnoticed. The church grounds, from what little people told him while he observed, used to be the center of town. Old, faded graves circled the back and side of the antique structure. These had once been the primary burying grounds until the city expanded and they had to begin another cemetery elsewhere, on the outskirts.

When he ventured back inside was when things began to take a turn for the weird. The church was of moderate size. It wasn’t massive, but it was large enough that you couldn’t take in its entirety in just one single glance. He ventured around, looking at the murals and art, the remnants of a time long past. History had always fascinated him, and the church seemed to possess one entirely in its own, separate from the town that had grown up around it.

He wasn’t sure where his mom had gone. He craned his neck, trying to see around all the people scattered throughout the main chamber. But if she were there, she was lost amongst the crowd. So he continued on his exploration until he reached a door that stood off to his right side from the main stage where the pastor would give his sermons. He, of course, wasn’t sure where it led, but what he did know was that he needed to use the bathroom. And beyond this door seemed as good a place as any to house a bathroom. So he gave the handle a turn and pushed it open.

On the other side of the door stretched a hallway. This was mildly disappointing as it meant he had to search further to relieve his bladder. Pictures wrapped by golden frames lined the walls as he walked slowly, checking for a bathroom symbol on all of the doors as he passed. Within these frames were colored photos and, in some, black and white photos. He wasn’t a whiz when it came to clothing trends throughout history, but what he could tell was that some of these pictures were very old, their clothes looking like something you would see in a documentary about the Middle Ages or the Renaissance. But that was impossible, or at least he was pretty sure it was.

He reached the end of that hall, arriving where another grew off it, only this one was much shorter and ended at a singular door. Eli stood there, staring at it, at the strange designs that covered its front. Suddenly there was a noise, and he turned to his right, back in the direction he had come.

“You!” a man in full religious garb shouted. “Stop right there!”

In came two more, charging closely behind the first. Eli had frozen, unsure of what was happening, of what they looked so angry about.

“You aren’t supposed to be back here!”

“I—I was just looking for the bathroom.”

When the man reached Eli, he grabbed the boy’s arm firmly, almost painfully. The man looked up the hall, the way Eli had been looking before their arrival. He looked at the door. Then he looked back at Eli before glancing again at the door, as if making sure it was still there and Eli hadn’t done something with it.

Eli watched as the muscles relaxed in the man’s face and a wave of relief washed over him. He loosened his grip on Eli but didn’t let go.

“This is a restricted area,” he said. “You aren’t allowed back here.”

He wasn’t allowed back there, Eli repeated in his head as he walked down the sidewalk toward the middle of town. But why? Why would a church have a restricted area? And why had the man seemed so…scared when he found Eli just feet from that door? Perhaps it was nothing. Maybe he was connecting dots where there were none. But there was just something about that man’s face that rushed back to him the night before, because it wasn’t anger with Eli that he saw in it. No. It was fear.

That’s why he was on his way there now. It all made sense, at least to him, and to Toby. Otherwise the kid, whom he hardly knew, wouldn’t be on his way across town to assist him. They knew very little, but there were some facts that they could all be almost sure about. First, there was something in that basement, something beyond the door. And second, the town wanted Paisley’s family dead. Whatever was going on there, Eli was certain it had been going on for years, maybe even decades or more. If there were a key to that door, and it was hidden somewhere, Eli thought the oldest place in town, the church where there was a secret room, was a good place to start looking.

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The worst part was leaving Paisley behind. He didn’t trust the house, nor anybody else for that matter. It was just her and their sick family there. But he would be quick, and there seemed to be some merit to what Eli had told them on the phone.