White Walker Read Online Free

left.”
    “Too damn cold,” Andrea answered as she swiped her
badge and pulled the door open. “Are you coming?”
    “Not yet, I gotta finish this.” Norman held up his
unlit cigarette.
    “Well, you better light it first,” Andrea said with
a smile before she stepped into the building.
    Norman glanced at his cigarette and reached into his
pocket to retrieve his lighter. As he lowered his head to light, it
an old memory surfaced.
    Butterball. It was the nickname the kids in
the neighborhood where he grew up used to call him. With the memory
came the all too familiar feelings of self-loathing and
worthlessness he’d suffered through his entire childhood as he
waged a losing battle against obesity. Beneath that lay a
smoldering rage and he imagined what it might have been like to
grab his tormentors by the throats and squeeze until their faces
turned purple and their tongues hung uselessly from their gaping
mouths.
    “Is that what you want to do, Norman?” a voice
whispered from the curtain of falling snow beyond the edge of the
roof.
    A sudden chill washed away his rage.
    “Who’s there?” he asked, his voice barely above a
whisper. A primitive part of him did not want to draw any more
attention to himself. He swiveled his head back and forth,
searching for the owner of the voice, his gaze tracking across the
solid curtain of falling snow that shrouded the world with a
silence that inspired more fear than even the darkest night.
    The falling snow parted like stage curtains pulled
aside to reveal the waiting set to the audience. Less than twenty
yards away a man stood, watching Norman from beneath the shadowy
brim of a wide hat that shaded his eyes. He didn’t need to see the
stranger’s eyes to know he was staring at him.
    His cigarette slipped from fingers that had gone
suddenly numb. It didn’t matter if they wrote him up for not
putting his butts in the proper place. Suddenly nothing mattered
but getting back inside where he was hidden from that stranger’s
prying eyes.
    He sidled to the left as his hand fumbled with his
key card. The stranger approached through the swirling curtains of
snow and it was then that Norman realized the wind had no effect on
the stranger. The filthy red scarf wrapped around the stranger’s
neck lay perfectly still against his chest. The collar of his heavy
brown jacket stood unmoving. Even his wide-brimmed hat remained in
place, untouched by the searching fingers of the wind that seemed
to avoid him, as if to touch would be a mortal sin.
    Norman’s heart slammed against his rib cage as he
turned to the door and frantically swiped his card through the
reader. He yanked on the door to no avail, realizing when he looked
down that he had swiped the card upside down.
    Behind him, he felt the stranger’s approach and he
glanced over his shoulder to see the man climbing the stairs to the
dock.
    “Please,” he moaned as panic blossomed in the pit of
his stomach.
    He swiped his card again and the key lock beeped.
Norman yanked the door open, hyperventilating as the panic
overwhelmed him. He’d been caught in the open by the stranger, who
was even now getting much closer than Norman cared for him to
be.
    Then he noticed the smell, a mixture of spicy
sweetness with an almost undetectable undercurrent of decay. It was
a dangerous scent, awakening primitive fears that had been
subjugated by the conveniences of modern society and
technology.
    He saw the short hallway before him. Bathrooms to
the right, break room to the left. Beyond the hall lay the
industrial-grade gray carpet of the main floor, where a maze of
cubicles housed small desks, each with its own computer and
telephone. He was so close, yet so far away. Before he could step
over the threshold, into the safety beyond, the stranger spoke to
him.
    “May I come in?” he asked.
    Unable to speak, his throat tight with fear, Norman
was only able to shake his head vigorously. He stumbled into the
hallway, pulling the door closed