The Haar

by David Sodergren

It had echoed off the walls. It was here in the room with her.

“Is that what you want? My blood?”

“If that’s what you need,” she sobbed. “If my blood is what it takes to hear him one last time…”

“Muriel.”

“Billy,”

“My God,” she said. “You’re home.”

Billy McAuley had disappeared at sea twelve long years ago.

He had risen early and left the cottage without waking her,

Thirty-six hours later, the boat was found adrift in the North Sea by a passing vessel. There was no one aboard.

She would do anything to hold him one more time. Anything.

He loved Muriel, and always had. She was the only woman he had ever truly loved. His ex-wife — the old boot with whom he had fathered a son

It was attached to something. Something inside him. He tugged harder, feeling the pressure on his guts, until — with one final, Herculean pull — his bowels tore wide open, releasing a flood of warm shit that spurted from between his clenched cheeks.

As Tommy’s internal organs started to liquify, he emitted a thin, high-pitched whine. Through the translucent skin of the creature, he could see his penis crumbling to pieces and drifting through the murky body of the thing that clung to him, destroying him, killing him.

As last words went, they may not have been profound, but they were certainly appropriate.

The living room was a slaughterhouse.

someone — or something — had just… exploded.

Billy’s old chair was turned towards the window. There was someone in it.

The figure stood. He was naked, outlined in icy blue by the moonlight that flooded in through the blood-smeared window pane. He looked at her. “Hello, Muriel,” said Billy.

Billy McAuley was dead and gone. And yet… There he was.

He touched her face.

His fingertips caressed her cheek. It was a delicate touch. A lover’s touch. She opened her wet eyes and looked into the face of her dead husband.

“I am the one you call… Avalon.”

“I made the pain go away.”

“You look exactly like him.”

“I found him in your memories,”

“So many memories. You kept him alive in there. You never forgot....

“I prefer the term sea creature.”

“Creature, not monster,”

“Monster implies… evil. I’m not evil.”

“He killed your friend, and then I consumed him. He gave me the strength I needed…” he gestured at his body, “…for this.”

“I’m very quiet.”

Avalon tried again, and this time the laughter was perfect. It was exactly as Muriel remembered. Somehow, it was exactly as she remembered.

She touched his face, ran her fingers down his stubbled cheek, and she was sure it was him, her Billy,

“I missed you s...

“I missed you too,”

Is that Billy or Avalon talking?

What difference did it make? Billy was here. He was home.

He turned to her. Every time she saw his face, she felt her heart might burst. Could she ever get used to seeing him again?

“On the left,”

“I know.”

There was more to this world than people knew. A lot more.

“Wonderful. Just wonderful.”

“I want to try out my new body. Let’s go for a walk.”

“That’s my home,”

“Out there.”

Muriel couldn’t keep her eyes off him. Her body tingled from Avalon’s soothing touch, her mind aflutter.

“You always hoped he’d come home. You never accepted his death.”

“No, you didn’t.”

He could see inside her mind. She had no secrets from him.

“Death is hard to understand,” said Avalon. “Especially for humans. You ...